Strength Basics

Stance-changed Single Leg Deadlifts

2022-11-04T00:01:00.001-04:00

When I program for my clients, I don't use too many variations of the single-leg deadlift. I tend to teach a single-leg Romanian deadlift as soon as I can. That usually means two-legged deadlifting and single-leg balance before I progress to them. These, however, really intrigue me. They're a potentially useful tool to get the single-leg effect before you need to ensure the client has the balance to load them effectively.

WHICH SINGLE LEG DEADLIFT OPTION IS RIGHT FOR YOU?

I plan to implement these with myself first . . .

Hate Cardio?

2021-07-15T21:10:00.002-04:00

I love cardio. Most people do not. This article over on The PT DC has a good look at why cardio is important (you probably live longer and better) and ways to make it less hateful if you don't enjoy doing it.

Don't Hate Cardio, Fix It

Heat or Ice?

2021-03-24T04:55:00.001-04:00

Dr. Jared Cooper, the physical therapist I personally go to, is a wealth of valueable information.

In this video he covers heat vs. ice.

"Ice it!" was the answer to everything for as long as I can remember.

Then, not that long ago, the answer was, "Ice is bunk! It doesn't do anything!"

Naturally, the answer is more complicated than "only heat" versus "only ice." They both have their specific uses.

Ice vs. Heat

Sleep Improvement by Joel Jamieson

2021-03-22T19:59:00.001-04:00

Joel Jamieson put up an excellent post on sleep and how to improve it to improve fitness.

Give it a look, I think it has valuable information - especially if you've never looked at sleep quality improvement as a path to better health.

Article Review - 3 Strength Exercises Everyone Should Do

2021-01-31T00:01:00.001-05:00

You can't really go wrong with the recommendations in this article:

The Three Strength Exercises Everyone Should Do

1) Loaded Carries - simple, and there are so many ways to do them.

2) Trap Bar Deadlift - technically easier than the deadlift, and most trap bars come with higher handles to deal with deadlifting with restricted mobility. I use this as my main heavy bilateral lift with my clients. I only teach straight bar deadlifts to people who need to straight bar deadlift for other reasons. If all you need to do is get stronger, we keep with the trap bar.

3) Squats - some variation of the squat is critical. I generally teach a lunge, though, rather than a traditional squat. If you can trap bar deadlift, and you can lunge, you can pretty much execute most daily life movements while utilizing what you've built in the gym. Still, a lunge is ultimately a single-leg variation of a squat.

Good stuff from Greg Nuckols.

Don't Choke

2020-11-07T17:34:00.003-05:00

The Guardian put up an very interesting article about choking in sports:

Under Pressure: Why Athletes Choke

If you're training, the takeaways are:

- Have a routine to calm yourself under stress

- Don't rush when you're under stress

- Train under conditions that more closely match competition.

When I did my first grappling tournament, despite my prior experience fighting MMA, I was very nervous. I went out, and my coach said, "Just like class." And it was, really. I just had to realize that yeah, it was just like class. Nothing new. No surprises. I'd been doing untimed rounds against grapplers better than me and larger than my weight class for months. My opponent had nothing that I hadn't encountered before - that's what I had to tell myself. And it worked, because, hey, it really was "just like class."

I found it a good read, and valuable even if you aren't going to compete.

Online Nutrition Coaching

2020-09-26T12:59:00.002-04:00

I have just launched my online nutrition coaching practice.

Peter's Pro Coach

I'm taking on a very limited number of clients to start with, so contact me right away if you're ready to get control of your nutrition habits!

What Everyone Thinks My Job Is

2020-09-15T17:42:00.002-04:00

I'm pretty sure that this is what everything thinks when I tell them I'm a personal trainer:

Not exactly accurate, but I can't argue with Ranier Wolfcastle or Homer Simpson.

Choosing a Protein Powder

2020-09-11T00:01:00.002-04:00

Protein is a critical part of a healthy diet - one that will help you lose fat, put on muscle, and keep the body composition that you want to have.

Sometimes it takes a lot of protein to do that.

It can often mean eating more protein than you can easily get from whole foods such as tuna, chicken breast, beef, and so on.

It can be especially tough for someone transitioning to a different eating style. If you're going from a meat-heavy diet to a plant-heavy diet, say, or changing from pescatarian to vegan, or cutting down on your total food but trying to keep your protein up, it's even harder.

Luckily, the folks over at Precision Nutrition can help you out.

They put out good stuff - they're where I got my nutrition certification from - it's what the PN1 under my name means.

“What’s the best protein powder?” Your complete guide to choosing the right supplement for you

It's a fairly dense article, with a lot to unpack.

TL,DR? Too long, didn't read?

In that case, the folks over at Kelly Starrett's The Ready State broke it down into three essentials.

3 Considerations When Selecting a Protein Supplement

It's worth reading both articles if this is really your thing.

Need more help with nutrition? Reach out to me and we can talk about a path forward to better eating that suits you. A month from now, a year from now, five years from now, you'll wish you'd started today.

2020-09-10T19:27:00.000-04:00

New gear!

How much do I eat for my goals? - PN's simple calculator

2020-09-10T11:21:00.000-04:00

Almost all of my clients have some weight goals.

They're looking for:

- weight loss

- muscle gain

and the every popular

- lose fat while building muscle.

But knowing where to start is tough.

Lots of websites will give you tools to figure out where to start but it's not always clear what step two is.

Also, you can generally skew your own results - tell the website you'd like to lose 10 pounds a week, say, or put on 25 pounds of muscle in two months . . . and get some numbers that won't really get you that.

Start Here

If my clients are going to do it themselves, this is where I like them to start:

The Ultimate Calorie, Portion, and Macro Calculator

Why do I like it?

First off, it lets you choose a broad goal - and if you choose an unrealistic one, it'll pop up a warning. Want to lose 28 pounds in two weeks? I'll tell you this is not a good option.

Second, it gives a lot of diet plan options - including vegan and vegetarian, two groups that often suffer from automated meal planning.

Third, it gives you actual portion-sized amounts and macros for each part of your eating plan.

Overall

This is a good tool. It's my go-to for clients and it's where I prefer most people start. Plus it's fun to toy around with your own eating plan and your own goals. And you can download the results easily!

Lower body strength training for Sumo

2020-09-06T19:23:00.001-04:00

I recently found an interesting video showing some strength training for sumo wrestling.

This video features the top sumo wrestler in history - the champion with the most tournament victories ever - training two of of his kohei (KOH-high) - juniors in the same heya (gym) - out in the street. A lady even rides her bike right on through them. So, in retrospect, maybe it wasn't that unique that I used to drag a home-made dragging sled laden with home-made weights (and neighborhood children) up and down the street near my home in Japan.

Sumo requires an enormous amount of power - matches are very short - usually in the 5-20 second range - but they can a couple of minutes for very drawn out bouts. The ability to generate power from a low stance is critical, as you need to force your opponent out of the ring or force him to touch the clay with something other than the bottom of his feet.

Here you can see Hakuho (that champion I mentioned) training Ishiura and the current smallest man in the top division, Enho, with a 30 kg (~66 lbs) sandbag. It's brutal, and the video was shown in March . . . but probably shot a little earlier in the year.

Wrestlers are expected to train hard seven days a week for years. They live in their heya and work there, performing chores until they're skilled enough and senior enough to win bouts in the upper ranks of the sport. Then they're paid - and earn prize money for bouts - and are expected to help their juniors improve.

Training at Home

2020-03-30T18:17:00.000-04:00

I am now accepting clients for home training remotely via internet conference apps. Email me at p_dellorto@yahoo.com for more information.

Online Training & the Age of COVID-19

2020-03-19T14:35:00.001-04:00

The onslaught of COVID-19 has meant so many negative things for society, and for the lives of people affected directly and indirectly.

The need to keep people separate for their health and safety has also meant the closure of gyms and the inability of people to get to the place where they keep up their health.

I've switched my training clients to exclusively online training for the duration of this medical emergency. I'll extend it further for client for whom it makes the most sense to continue online, due to distance or circumstance.

Training remotely has its own challenges, but its own rewards, too.

The rewards are continued health and fitness in the comfort of your own home. No commute to the gym, nobody hogging the equipment you need to use, and no concerns about pet sitters, child care, and how to fit in the extra time to get to and from the session.

The challenges are the need for your own equipment in your own home. It's minimal equipment, of course, and I'm happy to say that for well under $100 you can equip yourself with everything you need to stay fit at home. You need reasonably good internet access and a phone, tablet, or phone with a good camera.

You also need a trainer for the best results. I say that as a trainer, but also as a trainee - I have my own coach, someone I've worked with for years so I can have his expert eye and objective viewpoint guide me to success. I've been leveraging my own experience teaching online classes and my 11+ years of experience as a trainer to get my clients results without their needing to get physically in the same gym as me.

If you're training at home, I urge you to at least try out an online coach and see how it works out. I offer full-service Skype-based training sessions where I program for you, coach you through the movements, and provide my expert eye to see what best suits your needs and goals. I also offer programming customized to you, for you to execute on your own time without the need for an appointment with me.

Email me at p_dellorto@yahoo.com with any questions about programs and rates! I'm ready to help you get started today.

Exercise vs. Old Age

2018-03-12T09:37:00.001-04:00

The BBC put up two articles - one very short, one moderate length, about the effects of exercise on what we used to consider normal aging.

The shorter one concerns nerve impulses and muscles as we age:

Muscle loss in old age linked to fewer nerve signals

The basic idea there is that as we age, we weaken. As our muscles weaken, we lose the ability to send nerve signals to those weakened muscles.

But continued physical activity and training blunts that effect - keep the muscles, keep the nerve signals, and stay in a virtuous circle of fitness.

Exercise is required. We often think that it isn't, because unlike drinking water, eating, sleeping, going to work, etc. we don't feel an immediate negative consequence for not doing it. But it's insidious, and over time our capabilities go down. It's never too late to start, but like saving for retirement, the earlier you get going the better and longer you reap the rewards.

The second article concerns the immune system of older endurance athletes:

How exercise in old age prevents the immune system from declining

The basic idea here is that exercise reduces the decline in the immune system that usually follows age.

"A separate paper in Aging Cell found that the cyclists did not lose muscle mass or strength, and did not see an increase in body fat - which are usually associated with ageing."

"Associated" with aging is key, here. We think you get a weaker immune system and lose muscle mass and strength, and gain body fat, as you get older because you get older. It's not necessarily the case, and studies are showing that people who continue to exercise as they get older do not show that same effect. In other words, we think aging makes you weak and frail, but it's more like aging without exercise makes you weak and frail.

So keep training, and suffer less of the "age-related" declines in fitness and immune health.

Key takeaways here?

Sparing the Spine through Hip Hinging

2018-03-04T20:26:00.002-05:00

Folks familiar with Dr. Stuart McGill won't find anything really new here, but this is a good article on hip hinging to spare the spine:

Lost Art Of Bending Over: How Other Cultures Spare Their Spines

Good stuff.

Fueling up with Chankonabe

2018-01-17T14:56:00.001-05:00

While looking at the latest sumo news for the January Grand Sumo Basho, I found this much older article about how sumo wrestlers fuel up:

FUEL: The 10,000-Calorie Sumo Wrestler Diet

It's light on the recipe, but you can see how the meal is prepared and a bit of sumo training outside of Japan.

Precision Nutrition Level 1, Version 3 certified

2018-01-04T09:52:00.000-05:00

In the past two days I completed upgrading my Precision Nutrition level 1 certification.

I've been certified in PN level 1 for several years, and took the exam every couple of years to stay certified. Recently, though, they upgraded the course and manual.

Nicely, they didn't make the prior levels obsolete. I could keep my certification. As a matter of fact, I'm current dual certified in level 1, v1 and level 1, v3. (I'm not sure what I missed in v2)

They made the upgraded course materials available at a reasonable price for currently-certified trainers like myself. I jumped on the upgrade, because I knew that if they'd taken the time to re-write the manual I'd benefit from the new material.

If I benefit, then my clients benefit. And that's what it is all about.

The upgrade took time, as instead of one course exam it was 18 chapter-length exams. This meant a lot of reading, then research and listening to lectures and answering workbook questions, then taking an exam. While this made is more digestible - lots of little chunks - it meant I ended up breaking up the upgrade over months instead of doing it in a matter of weeks.

The tests were open book, which is "easy" in the way any other open-book test is - if you know the material, and have the books in front of you, you can answer the questions easily. If you don't know the material, and you don't keep your references ready to hand, you're in trouble. I like to say, if you keep your references to hand, life is an open book test.

All of this is a long way to say, I've upgraded my nutrition knowledge (a bit) and my coaching skills (a lot) thanks to Precision Nutrition.

Pick One Goal, One Habit, and Go

2018-01-01T11:58:00.001-05:00

So it's January 1st, and many New Year's resolutions (NYRs) were made.

In my experience, people don't last on NYRs.

It's because so many of them, perhaps almost all of them, are aspirations and wishes, not plans of action. They aren't habits, they aren't process goals, and they aren't simple.

This isn't because people are bad, or weak, or stupid.

It's because we don't really learn how to make change.

We don't teach it in school. We don't teach it at work. We get down to specifics ("Do X to get Y") that we don't spend time teaching people how to determine what a good goal is, or how to build a habit to get there.

This post is really just more of that. But hopefully it will also teach you how to determine what a good X is, and how it'll help you get to Y.

If you made some NYRs last night, my advice is:

Pick One

Just one. No matter how many you made, pick one. Either pick something that will make the most impact, or is the easiest to do. If you want to take a shot at big changes, pick the first one - quit smoking, exercise every day, lose some body fat. But if you want to make certain you make small, progressive gains, pick the second - the easiest one to do.

You might think you could get better results by doing everything at once, and going for the biggest impact items. But that's like trying to pass a math test by working on problems 1-100 all at once. One at a time is the strategy we learned for exams - use it for life, too. Start with the easy stuff, solve each problem in turn, and then move on to the next one.

Decide on a Habit

You get to your goals based on what you do. Pick something that will get you there - exercises if health is the goal, eating extra veggies instead of starches and breads and pastas if losing weight is your goal, etc. Pick something easy to do - so easy it seems like you could do it 10 times out of 10. 100 times out of 100. Something where, even if you do occasionally fail, you can get right to it and do it. Make it a positive action - something you do, not something you don't do. This way if you forget, you can jump up right now and do it. If it is a "don't," if you do it, you've failed and need to restart. Don't put failures in your path and try to avoid them, put potential successes in your path and try to achieve them.

Get to the gym once a week, by Friday at the latest. Go for a walk X times a week. Drink an 8-oz glass of water before every meal and after every non-water drink. Mix a greens drink the night before and drink it upon waking every morning. Brush your teeth right after you eat (both for tooth health and to discourage picking and snacking).

Make it so easy that failure is harder than success. Just work on this one thing until it's a habit - something you do automatically.

And remember, it's easier to add than subtract - "I will go for a walk this week" is solvable by going for a walk today. "I won't eat any more junk food" is undone by even a single potato chip, ever. Potential success with positive actions, not potential failure with negative prohibitions.

Go

And go. Start there.

You can repeat this process as each habit becomes ingrained. Keep that list of NYRs around - you can pull the next one down as you achieve the first one. Good habits come from small changes ingrained over time. So pick one goal, one habit that will start you on the path, and go.

Every Day a Plus

2017-10-18T10:52:00.000-04:00

My philosophy of training boils down to a simple concept:

Every day a plus.

There are other ways to put it:

Every session a check in the win column.

Every day a step forward, no matter how small.

Every day a little bit of progress.

But I think of it as "every day a plus."

It doesn't need to be a big plus. It doesn't need to be the biggest plus I could get that day. This is about a minimal effective dose, aiming for optimal, and avoiding the tendency to push for maximal.

What I want to avoid is minuses. Injuries are minuses. So are workouts so stressful you can't recover in time to work out again the next time you're training. Pushing too hard for just one more plus is less valuable than just taking the easy wins and moving on.

This is an easier concept to read about and agree with than to implement. It won't always work out. You'll push too hard. You'll try a new exercises or variation or set and rep scheme and get hurt, get too sore to move, get too stiff to move well.

And it can be psychologically hard to learn to hold back. To just do what's useful and valuable. It's tough to do the warmup and skip the workout - not vice-versa - because you're short on time. Sometimes you'll go a little too easy and miss out on some benefits you could have gotten. Or worse, just think you're doing that and push too hard another day to "make up" for missing some easier benefits.

External factors can step in, too - stress is stress. It doesn't matter if it's from lack of sleep, a job change, a fight in a relationship, a tough commute, whatever. It's stress. You might push to exhaustion in the gym to "work off the stress" but you're swapping in the feeling of one stress for the feeling of another. It's useful, but it's stress. You need to recover from that.

Aesop's fable of the tortoise and the hare was written to illustrate something people know from experience even if it's counter-intuitive - slow and steady beats fast with breaks. If all you ever do is get a small positive benefit each day that you can, and cut down on the minuses, you'll make steady progress over the long haul. You will reach your goals over time. If you aim for the maximum benefits in the least time, rush for benefits, and push and push and push, you'll generally come up short on benefits for the same time invested in consistency.

I try to live this myself as best I can. I say it all sorts of different ways to my clients, until I find the phrase that connects with their viewpoint. I don't want them to work hard and feel beat after a workout. I want them to be better after the workout. I want to optimize the plus they get, and keep them moving forward more days than not. It's all about a plus, any size of plus, every day you can. Over time, that will bring success.

Planning my annual goals

2017-09-12T13:41:00.000-04:00

Every year, I set up a series of annual training goals.

I choose four.

Four is few enough that I have to make decisions about priorities. For example: Do I want to get a stronger deadlift, or do I want to lean out?

Four is enough that I don't chop off actual goals or start doubling up. For example: Get a stronger deadlift while I lean out. Sure, two nice goals, but I don't want to pretend they are one.

I write these goals down and I hand them to my trainer. Handwritten, dated, and signed. What he does with them, I don't know. I keep a copy of them pinned to my cork board behind my work desk in my home "office," where I do most of my writing and much of my research and studying.

Handing them in makes me accountable to someone else for my success.

What's notable about my annual goals is that I give myself outcome goals, not process goals. (Click here for the difference)

This probably sounds totally hypocritical, since I'm all about clients setting process goals for themselves.

What I have found is that I tend to naturally set my own process goals.

- I will train MMA as many times a week as I can, with a minimum floor of one day (work schedules for trainers, not surprisingly, overlap those of typical MMA class schedules - early AM and evenings.)

- I will do my posture drills every day.

- I will stretch every day.

- I will get in 2-3 full workouts and 1-2 small accessory workouts per week without fail. I've missed zero training sessions, not counting planned misses.

So for training, setting process goals is just a matter of writing down how I'll do things, not getting myself on the path to doing them.

I do need outcome goals, though.

I need to know where I'm going. So does my coach. There is this great Precision Nutrition article that says, "Elite coaches know that the outcome is their responsibility and that the behavior is the responsibility of the client." I take care of the doing, and I set the outcome goals so my coach and I both know where I aim to get.

They're always actionable, or at least, they eliminate training or workouts or methods that run contrary to them. If I put "increase shoulder stability" on my outcome goals, I know that skipping my shoulder warmups or programming in too little shoulder stabilization is not a good choice. If I put in "Add 10 pounds to my max deadlift" then I know I need to keep in glute exercises and low back exercises and a myriad of little hip exercises.

My goals can be really specific ("add 10 pounds to my deadlift.") They can be broad, but have a clear outcome ("Get on the record board and stay there.") They can be vague and hard to measure, but clear to me, personally ("Feel bulletproof.") They have to be goals I can know when I've gotten them. Pulling a weight 10 pounds heavier, walking into the gym and looking up and seeing "Peter Dell'Orto" on the record board, or walking into a gym and grappling with all comers for a whole class without a mental twinge of "Can I handle that guy? Will my body take this much effort?" All of those, I know when I've gotten there.

The more vague, feeling-based ones are tougher on my coach. So I try to keep at least some of them more concrete.

This is the time of year when I make these goals, because this was the time of year when I first starting doing it some years back. So goals are on my mind. I'll know mine by a week from yesterday. How about you? Where are you going this year?

Trevor Bachmeyer's Joe D Triple - 8 minute mobility combo

2017-09-07T19:12:00.001-04:00

A few weeks back, Joe DeFranco had Dr. Trevor Bachmeyer of Smashwerx on his Podcast.

Trevor shared his three go-to drills for a quick (well, 8 minute) full-body pliability.

It's a great video, and if you're stuck about what to do for stretching, mobility, and pliability, you can just start here.

Travel Exercise Equipment

2017-08-21T08:21:00.001-04:00

I always pack some training gear when I travel, especially if I expect to do a lot of physical activities or training.

This is my travel pack of exercise gear:

It consists of:

- half of my Mobility WOD floss band kit (just the thinner, weaker band)

- one of Jill Miller's Alpha Balls

- an EliteFTS light resistance band

- a CFF #0 band

- a tube of NatraBio's The Rub Arnica blend lotion.

This is my go-to collection of must-have gear to bring with me.

This trip, I used all of it to some degree:

- the floss band I used once, not on myself (as I'd expected) but on a friend who was complaining of Achilles' tendon and knee pain after running. One bout with this and some ankle exercises later and it was largely cleared up.

- the Alpha Ball was useful for some glute warmups and for a brief issue with tight pecs.

- I used the CFF band every day for 100 band pull-aparts and 100 low thumbs-back pull aparts every day plus pre-training warmups.

- I used the the EliteFTS band for band walks and for pre-training TKEs (Terminal Knee Extensions).

- I used the NatraBio rub for some post-training bruising.

Pretty much I pack gear I need for pre-hab and rehab. I don't worry too much about actual exercises. Especially when I travel, I walk far more than I do when I am in the US. Most of the time I'm concerned with making sure I'm properly warmed up and doing my daily warmups.

This is the minimal gear I'd consider bringing, and every part of it is useful. What do you bring when you travel? Let me know in the comments.

Fixing Diastasis Recti?

2017-08-08T02:09:00.001-04:00

There is an article on NPR about "flattening the mummy tummy."

It's more specifically about using ab contraction and draw-in exercises to fix diastasis recti. That is when your abdominal muscles have physically separated. It's fairly common after pregnancy, but plenty of men get this from a variety of other causes.

Flattening the mummy tummy with 1 exercise 10 minutes a day

I see no reason why 10 minutes of contraction, 2 minutes apiece over 5 exercises, wouldn't have a positive effect. I haven't tried this as I don't have diastasis recti. But I have used draw-in exercises, so-called "vacuum" exercises, and fully-exhaled deep contraction exercises on my abs with some success in the past for general strengthening. It seems worth a try if you have this problem. You can fairly easily glean a workout routine for this and do it daily for a few weeks and see if it improves your abs.

More Sleep, Less Fat?

2017-07-31T09:35:00.001-04:00

I recently came across this study while reading the news:

Longer sleep is associated with lower BMI and favorable metabolic profiles in UK adults: Findings from the National Diet and Nutrition Survey

Correlation is not causation. Lack of sleep might raise body mass and waistline measurements and body fat. But it might be that high body mass and large waistline measurements and body fat interfere with sleep. It could be (and probably is) a circular issue - lack of sleep raises body fat and body mass which reduces sleep.

But the evidence is showing more and more that lack of sleep is connected with bad results: more stress, less stress relief, less work effectiveness, less body effectiveness, etc.

It makes perfect sense in basic training terms, too. Sleep is recovery. If you are insufficiently recovered from a workout you won't perform as well at the next one. If your body isn't relieving all of its stress when you sleep, and the lack of stress also being a stressor, then you are more likely to gain and hold onto body fat.

I've had a number of clients who try to out-train bad sleep by working out hard to make themselves lean and/or tired. But the body isn't good at seeing stress from work as different from stress from a hard workout. It's not efficient at getting you to your goals so you can sleep later. And as much as it feels counterintuitive to break through a fat loss plateau by relaxing more, sleep is where you start and end. I ask all of my clients about their sleep. I want their sleep in order before we move onto more complex solutions to their issues. I start there with diet - how are you sleeping? How much?

It may only be correlation, but the links are getting stronger every study along these lines that comes out.

As a practical matter, consider adding naps. I have found that for me, a 20 minute nap is long enough to doze off but not enough to be groggy when I wake. I try to take one every day (it works out to be about 5 times a week.) That isn't always practical for everyone, but just laying back with your eyes closed for 5-15 minutes each day at lunch, or after a workout, or between activities might just get you a little closer to longer and improved sleep.