Competition vs. Participation

It seems like we are at a crossroads in youth sport.  Perhaps mirroring the politics of today, the opinions of how sport should be played appear to be as polarizing as ever. One camp believes we are in the midst of the “wussification of America”.  They believe that today’s children are given too much and participation trophies are creating generations of American’s who don’t know how to win.  They believe that success, failure, and learning from those experiences bring out the best in our children.  The “wussification” camp has it’s own site and has even claimed that teaching activities like yoga is breeding a generation of non-competitors.  Comedian Adam Carrola went off on the “Participation Trophy Generation” and talked about how it’s impacting our economy.  Even the Iron Man, Cal Ripken Jr., talked about his concern with where youth sports are heading.  There’s statistics that show that the millennial generation, who the Wall Street Journal labeled “trophy kids”, are as entitled as ever.  Let’s call this camp “old school”, where they believe we are softening up on our future leaders and creating a less competitive culture.

The other camp believes that sports have become too serious.  Rick Reilly, a popular ESPN columnist, wrote about Pee Wee Coaches imploring 8 year old football players to have a “killer instinct”.  Last month, The Bloomington South High School girls’ basketball team made headlines by beating  Arlington High School 107-2.  Athlete’s are being offered scholarships before they get to high school.  Parents are being jailed for fighting at games.  Sports have become big business, and many parents have become more interested in athletic scholarship, or making it to the Pro’s, then emphasizing academics and using sport experience as an opportunity to learn.  Let’s call this camp “new school”, where they believe our society has placed too much emphasis on winning and not enough on participation and having fun.

So, who is right?  Well, both believe our children may not be learning as much as they should.  And I am not sure either is wrong.  I don’t believe in “old school”, I don’t believe in “new school”, I believe in “right school”, and figuring out what mix of the past and the future is best for the present.

Clearly, this is a topic that will continue to garner attention and changes will be made.  Whether, the emphasis for change needs to be solely on increased competition or participation, perhaps, like our politics, the answer lies somewhere in the middle.

Friday Musings 1/18/13: Coaching the Overhead Press, Deadlift Program, Tying the Perfect Tie

No, it is indeed not Friday at the time of posting this....decided to do this round a day early.

1. Coaching the Overhead Press

There's something intrinsically satisfying about pressing a heavy weight overhead, not to mention the host of benefits it provides, provided you don't butcher it. I actually did a little Q & A on overhead pressing HERE, for those interested. Moving on...

A cue often given in the overhead press is to "push the head and body through" at the top, the goal here being to prevent the bar from drifting too far away from the body. However, I often see people woefully abuse this cue to the extreme and jut their head way too far out at the top, slipping into gross extension, especially at the cervical spine:

Those of us coaches in the crowd often experience profuse bleeding of the cornea when we see people perform a pushup with the oh-so-prolific forward head posture, so why is does it all of a sudden become a different ball game when we press vertical instead of horizontal? You can see, if I flip the above picture of Kelsey 90 degrees, where she would be in the horizontal plane:

Not a pretty "pushup" position, right?

Yes, you do want to prevent the bar drifting away from the midline of the body, but be sure to keep the head neutral - aka a packed neck - as you finish the lift at the top:

When we jut the head forward, all we essentially wind up doing is cranking on that levator scapulae - thus cementing a downward scapular rotation pattern (not ideal) - and substituting forward head posture for actual scapular upward rotation and posterior tilt, anterior core stability, shoulder flexion, and T-Spine extension.

Translation: Shoving the head forward turns you into a walking ball of fail.

Keep those glutes tight, abs engaged, ribcage down, and ideally you'll want a vertical line going through the bar, ears, and midfoot when at the top of the press.

2. High Frequency Deadlifting

Back in 2012 I wrote a post called A Little Deadlift Experiment, Part 1, in which I briefly discussed a high-frequency deadlifting plan I used to add 40 pounds to my deadlift in 4 weeks. I never ended up writing Part 2 (yes, fail on my part), but I received a number of questions, both on the blog and through email, on how it ended up.

Well, I actually only ended up doing it for another month, but I did add another ten pounds to my total during that month. Excellent. I stopped it due to the pursuit of a few other goals, but I did want to share that I've "experimented" with the program on other people and it has worked wonders.

Mark - one of my buddies, and a physical therapist - called me up last year year telling me he made a bet with his supervisor that he could eventually deadlift over 400lbs. The kicker? He only had about 4 months to do it, his deadlift 1RM was sitting right around 300lbs, and he made the dreaded Alpo Bet, a la Dan John. So he called me in hopes I could help him add 100lbs to his deadlift in a matter of a few months.

Great.

After berating him on the phone for making me responsible to help him win an absurd bet he never should have made, I gave him the very deadlift program I used.

The result? His deadlift shot up from 300lbs to 435lbs in a matter of five training cycles, leaving him the winner of the bet and relieving him from eating a can of Alpo in front of his supervisor. What?!

Keep in mind, he had over three years of solid lifting experience under his belt, so these weren't newbie gains, either.

Note: All the credit goes to Mark on this one. He worked his tail off - despite the fact that he has a very demanding schedule and was undergoing some significant "life" changes - and trusted me every step of the way with the seemingly asinine program I gave him.  

I'm not going to share the program here yet though, as I may end up using it for future article or online program. Patience, patience....

3. Tying the Perfect Tie

This one's for you gents in the crowd.

Maybe I'm a bit of an anomaly here, given that I'm fortunate enough to wear t-shirts and athletic shorts to work each day, but getting ready for an event requiring a tie can be exceedingly frustrating. (Yes, you office workers in the crowd, go ahead and shake your heads in reproach, I realize I have it easy.)

Fortunately, Tim Ferriss seems to be an expert at doing any and every random task extraordinarily well, and tying ties is no exception. Here is a quick, extremely useful video on how to tie the perfect tie, every time.

It can take a couple tries, but once you get it, you're golden. Ever since employing this tactic I've been able to boast the best tie in the room at formal events. What what!

I've run out of musings for the time being, hope everyone has a great weekend.

10 Things I'd like to Share from 2012

As I opened my computer this morning, it didn't take long to realize I had a list of non sequiturs running around my brain. As 2012 is drawing to a close, why not allow them to run around on paper, forming a random thoughts post. Here are 10 things I either remembered, learned, or simply felt like sharing from the past year: 1. Taking the time to teach an athlete to "sit into the hip" during the foundational phases of jump training in the frontal and transverse planes will do wonders for their athletic development, as they progress onward to more "advanced" stages of change-of-direction training and force transfer outside of the sagittal plane.

Notice how in the video above, I use a "soft knee" during each landing and and push my hips back to decelerate. This displays the proper utilization of the glutes and other active restraints of the hip to create "tri-planar"  stability: eccentrially controlling flexion, internal rotation, and adduction of the femur upon each ground contact.

However, the video below shows how you'll typically see people perform lateral hurdle (or cone) hops. Note how I rely much more heavily on the passive supports of my body - namely, ligaments, menisci, and other joint structures - to decelerate each landing.

Many athletes will land with a "double step," or even fall over, when learning how to decelerate correctly for the first time. Investing ample time in mastering this entry-level progression will pay huge dividends later on within the realm of injury risk reduction, change-of-direction speed, and rotational power on the field.

2. I love coffee, and, as a result, one of the best parts of my day (other than a good poop) is preparing and enjoying a quality brew early in the morning. Either that, or visiting my favorite local coffee shop, Caffe Amouri, where I settle down to do computer work alongside my faithful squire, Aragorn.

caffe amouri aragorn

The best decision I made this past year to enhance the morning experience of home-brewing coffee was to purchase a Clever Dripper to prepare my morning elixir. Some of you may recognize it as the "pour over" or "hand pour" method.

With it, you receive all the benefits of a french press - full extraction of the flavors and sugars of the bean - but without the "mud" that typically resides at the bottom of a the mug. The Clever Dripper also WAY easier to clean than a french press.

clever dripper sapt

I highly recommend it for you coffee-lovers in the crowd.

3. Here's an important classification I like to use for differentiating between main lifts in and accessory lifts in program design: Any main movement can also used as an accessory movement, but not all accessory movements can necessarily be a main movement.

SAPT bench press chains

It may sound simple and borderline obvious, but it bears repeating for those that are unsure of how to set up their programs.

4. The wrong and right way to hip hinge during a squat. Be careful of overemphasizing the familiar "hips back" cue too much when either squatting yourself or teaching someone else how to squat, especially if an anterior-loaded squat pattern like a goblet squat or barbell front squat is being performed.

If you push your butt back too much at the start, then your body has nowhere to go but forward on the way down in order to find its center of gravity with respect to the bar position. I think it goes without saying that this is unfavorable, with regards to both safety and that whole getting stronger thing.

See the video above for a brief demonstration of what I'm referring to. The first two reps show what happens when you overdo the hip hinge at the start, and the third and fourth rep show how to properly push your hips back as you descend to the bottom.

5. I read through the Harry Potter series this year (yes, admittedly it was fantastic), and jotted down some memorable lines as I went along. Here are a few of them:

- "Indifference and neglect often do much more damage than outright dislike." ~ Dumbledore

- "If you want to know what a man's like, take a good look at how he treats his inferiors, not his equals" ~Sirius Black

- "It does not do to dwell on dreams, and forget to live." ~ Dumbledore

6. Speaking of literature, I'm currently reading A Game of Thrones, and it is spectacular, to say the least. The author, George R.R. Martin, does a phenomenal job of reeling you into the story relatively quickly, and the world he creates is a different than most fantasy stories in that he veers away from the typical character archetypes (few are totally good or wholly evil, you don't have the classic hero who overcomes impossible odds and is immune to corruption, etc.) and he breaks many of the "rules" of stereotypical fantasy.

Hint: Don't read it if you're afraid of your favorite and/or likeable characters to die.

Not to mention, Martin is an absolute master of metaphors, description, and overall wordplay. Read it, and thank me later.

And, while I've heard good things about the HBO series, it still doesn't count. Sorry. However, that still doesn't mean this picture is not awesome:

7. One of the most rewarding parts of my job, by far, is helping people to train around injuries. It's extremely humbling to have the opportunity to help countless individuals - be they just coming out of surgery or simply dealing with a "tweaked" ankle or knee - continue to get stronger despite an injury they recently received.

Below is a video of Conrad, a 64-year-old who recently underwent not his first, but SECOND, total knee replacement surgery within the past year. Instead of wallowing in misery over the fact he couldn't do lower body training for a while, he barged through the doors of SAPT, with a battering ram, asking us to prepare him for a powerlifting meet. Keep in mind this was just weeks after his total knee replacement.

We put him on a bench-specialization program, and the end result was him hitting a bench PR in an official meet.

He serves as such a great example to those - way younger than 64 years of age, mind you - who make excuses as to why they seemingly can't take time to care for their bodies.

8. The Hobbit was an excellent film. I honestly don't see how Peter Jackson, or anyone for that matter, could have possibly done a better job with it. Yeah, people are upset he's splitting it up into three parts, but to me that just shows how Jackson pays attention to detail, and wants to ensure they leave no stone unturned during the film. It also means we still have two more excellent experiences in the theater to look forward to around Christmastime.

thehobbit

I didn't want to read any of the reviews before I saw it, so I looked at them a couple days after seeing the movie. Upon reading just a few of them, it confirmed my notion that the opinions of movie critics are worthless and overrated.

9. When you set up for the basic plank (and its variations), choosing to go from the "bottom up" vs. the "top down" actually has significant impact on how much iliopsoas is recruited. Considering that heavy recruitment of the iliopsoas is generally unfavorable in core stability exercises, try setting up from the bottom up rather than the top down.

Plank SAPT

10. An admittedly strange and ungrounded pet peeve of mine is when people use the words "jealous" and "envy" interchangeably in conversation. They don't mean the same thing! 

To clear the air: Envy generally implies a sense of covetousness or a desire for something that someone else has. Jealousy, on the other hand, relates to a sense of resentment due to rivalry or the fear of being replaced.

I readily admit I don't have grounds from which to stand upon this sense of annoyance, as I am far from a grammar expert myself, and I make grammatical errors all.the.time. but for whatever reason I can't get this one out of my head.

Note: If you enjoyed this list format, feel free to check out this post or this post that I wrote in 2011. 

Band Geeks Need Strength Too!!

This past weekend I went to watch my brother, a tuba player in the Marching Virginians at Virginia Tech, play in the halftime show at football games (let's be honest, anyone who has met me quickly realizes that the band is the ONLY reason I go to football games. Blasphemous Hokie am I!) And if you're unfamiliar with the MVs and how AWESOME the tuba line is, here's a little sample:

(My brother is the one on the end closest to the camera.) Aren't they awesome? That's my bro-pod! Anyway, being the geek that I am (both a Band Geek and a Strength Geek...yup, I was in band all through high school and a bit in college!) as I watched the MVs perform I started thinking that they could really use some strength training. Not just the tuba's either! The WHOLE band would benefit from lifting heavy things that don't make music!

The MAIN point of this post (besides offering this piece of advice to my fellow band geeks: LIFT WEIGHTS!!) is that EVERYONE needs to be stronger no matter if you're an "athlete" or not. Read that again: EVERYONE NEEDS TO BE STRONGER!

Ahem, excuse me, I got a little carried away. Moving on, here are some exercises that I thought of while watching the MVs perform (and thinking back to my own marching days):

KB Swings:

Admit it, you knew I was going to say this. But seriously, this would be perfect for the tuba players doing the hokie pokie and sticking their heads in and out and shaking it all about. Check out the hip hinge (or rather, lack of) that tuba players need from the video above. Wouldn't a strong posterior chain make that easier? (especially on the 5th rendition of the Hokie Pokey)...

And then the swing:

Not only would this help make lugging the 25-45 pound tuba (technically sousaphone) up and down easier, it would prevent lower back injuries for over-enthusiastic hokie pokie-ing. Besides, swings improve cardiovascular fitness and who needs to be able to produce a lot of air without passing out more than a tuba player? (and the floutist. Fun fact: tuba players and flute players pass out more often from lack of air than any other instruments.) Every band member should swing; it'll improve their ability to make through the loooong Game Day of pre-game practice, marching and playing throughout the game. ANNND (one more thing) swings improve upper back strength and band members have to stand up straight throughout their performance, hence the need for a strong upper back.

Rows/Pullups/Chinups:

Speaking of strong upper backs, let's take a look at what the drum line has sitting on their chests:

I used to play drums and I can tell you, those instruments are NOT light! Rows, chins and pullups would be ideal to strengthen those muscles. By doing so, it will take the strain off the lower back because the upper back will be able to support the weight much more easily. (Cymbal players, I'm looking at you too! Those suckers are heavy, row/chins will also improve bicep strength which is needed in holding/clashing cymbals repeatedly.) Which leads me to my next exercise...

Planks/Anti-rotation presses/Anterior Core:

In junction with a strong upper back, a strong anterior (front side) core is CRUCIAL to preventing lower back injuries or aches while standing for long periods of time. This post highlights some exercises. I really like the landmine as there's a lot of dancing around in the bandstand so being able to resist rotation of the spine during wild cheering would be awesome!

And more anti-rotation:

Having a strong core is very, very (VERY! I'm not kidding!) important to band members who want to have a pain-free marching season.

Farmer Carrys:

This one should be obvious. Practice walking around with heavy things. Here's a post I wrote a while back about. Band geeks, read it!

And last but not least:

KB or Band-Resisted Dorsiflexion:

My high school band director used to say (or rather, shout): "I want to see 'HI MOM' written on the bottom of your shoes!!' meaning we had to march with our toes straight up to the sky (it looks nice...). Therefore, band geeks need super strong tibialis anteriors!

There are many more exercises I could list off (Pretty much everything in here) but I'll cut it here as I know band practice takes ALL of one's free time. However, I would encourage band geeks to squeeze in at least 30 minutes to improve there strength levels. And if a band geek can fit in time to get strong, then anyone can!

LET'S GO HOKIES!

How to Get More Done in Less Time: Parkinson's Law

(Note: In Part 1 we discussed how to save massive amounts of time each day by reducing the frequency at which you check/respond to email. In Part 2 we briefly discussed how to cut out distractions that keep you for working on the task at hand. Now on to the third and final installment of this series...)

Meetings. Putting together a presentation. Writing a paper or blog post. Shuffling papers around in the office. Studying for an exam. Entering data into an Excel spreadsheet.

Ever notice how, at times, you find yourself spending wayyyy longer on a task than you know you should be spending to complete? I know I do. Or did, at least, until I discovered the beauty of using Parkinson's Law to my advantage.

What is Parkison's Law? You can view it here on Wikipedia, but I think Tim Ferriss summed it up quite nicely for us:

Parkinson's Law dictates that a task will swell in (perceived) importance and complexity in relation to the time allotted for its completion. It is the magic of the imminent deadline. If I give you 24 hours to complete a project, the time pressure forces you to focus on execution, and you have no choice but to do only the bare essentials. If I give you a week to complete the same task, it's six days of making a mountain out of a molehill. If I give you two months, God forbid, it becomes a mental monster. The end product of the shorter deadline is almost inevitably of equal or higher quality due to greater focus.

We can use Parkinson's Law to our advantage by setting extremely clear, and borderline impossibly short, deadlines for various tasks and 'To-Do' items. I've been instituting this over the past couple weeks and WOW, I can't quite express how much of a life changer this has been for me.

Personally, I've found E.gg Timerto be an invaluable source for helping me produce more output with less input (time) when doing anything at a computer. Heck, I'm using E.gg Timer right now as I type this. You can set the countdown timer for however long you wish - it will fill up your screen when it gets to zero - and it's amazing how the ticking clock will keep you inexorably focused on action steps instead of deliberation and procrastination. 

Again, quoting Ferris:

If you haven't identified the mission-critical tasks and set agressive start and end times for their completion, the unimportant becomes the important. Evern if you know what's critical, without deadlines that create focus, the minor tasks forced upon you (or invented, in the case of the entrepreneur) will swell to consume time until another bit of minutiae jumps in to replace it, leaving you at the end of the day with nothing accomplished.

How else could dropping off a package at UPS, setting a few appointments, and checking e-mail consume an entire 9-5 day?

Many of us subconsciously realize this, but never actually set self-imposed deadlines to force us to get more done in less time.

While I'm not necessarily proud of this, I unknowingly used Parkinson's Law to allow me to get an A on almost every exam I took in high school and college; it didn't take me long to realize that I got the same grade whether I started studying a week out from the exam, or only 24 hours (and sometimes as little as 1-2 hours) before taking the exam.

Why? Whenever I began studying far in advance, I'd inevitably allow myself to become distracted by phone calls, the internet, outdoor games with friends, you name it, as I knew deep down that I still had plenty of time to study. But when I knew I had a major (and quite difficult) exam looming in only 5 hours or less, it FORCED me to shut out anything that would steer me away from doing well on the test.

In fact, I recently received this text from a friend of mine who had graduated from his doctorate of physical therapy program, and was preparing for the physical therapist licensure exam, "So you know how in Undergrad you were the greatest Crammer of all time. Any advice for someone who has an upcoming licensure exam and is feeling really lazy about studying?"

I had to laugh upon receiving that text, as I didn't know which was more unnerving: The fact that I was known in college for being a talented crammer (if we can even attempt to glamorize that "skill") , or that an up-and-coming practicing PT was looking for advice on studying for the licensure exam!

Now, I am certainly not advocating procrastination. And, to clear my conscious....should any individuals be reading this that are currently enrolled in an educational institution, my advice to you is to study in advance for your tests, dang it!

But it brings up a valuable point. Deadlines, whether self-imposed or not, allow us to ignore minutia and focus on the important. So I encourage all of you to begin setting deadlines on those "open ended" tasks that can take hours on end to complete, and adhere to those deadlines!

This is especially true for us perfectionists in the crowd that agonize over every single detail within a project we're working on. Set an unrealistic deadline, and stick to it. The earth will continue to spin, I promise.

3 Practical Steps: Get More Done in Less Time and Create Time to Enjoy Your Life (Part 2)

In Part 1, I discussed the first step in producing more output via less input, and how to increase your "free time" by drastically reducing the deceptively voluminous time spent on unnecessary email checking. For you those of you who missed it, you can check it out HERE.

What follows is the second step in creating more time in your day. I promise I'll spare you the waves of prolixity I may have drowned you with in Part 1.

2. Eliminate All Time Wasters In Your Day

We humans are experts at creating distractions in order to avoid completing the tasks that are actually of greatest importance. I can't tell you how many times I'm sitting in a coffee shop, or walking by an office window, and catch a glimpse of someone who's clearly supposed to be working but has Facebook, YouTube, Pinterest, or a Blog pulled up on their computer screen.

And I won't try to fool you by preaching that I'm the most self-controlled guy of the bunch, nor that I'm immune to the time-wasting practice of fools. So what are a few things I recently instituted, and would be remiss not to recommend them to you as well?

1. Block all the websites you're addicted to out of pure entertainment. 

For those of you who have worked on your laptop while traveling via airplane, even notice how much more you were able to accomplish in the short time you sat there? As is kinda obvious, it's because you didn't have any access to internet (I'm pretty sure some airlines may have internet access on planes now, but I digress...)

When we're connected to the internet, we almost can't help ourselves but go to our favorite "fire gazing" web domains. These websites do nothing but allow you to delay doing what will actually provide you the greatest return for investment.

The problem is, sometimes you need the internet to accomplish the task at hand (using an online program or app, for example), so it's not always a matter of simply turning off the internet to get something done. Besides, even if it is, you can always click the "On" switch should you lose self-control and desire to browse the web rather than complete your work.

So how to remedy this issue of our own depravity?

If you use Google Chrome, install Google Nanny, and if you use Firefox, then install Leech Blocker. I personally use Google Nanny, and I love it.

The beauty of these is you set a pre-determined time in which it will prevent you from logging on to particular websites. You can choose what days you're blocked, and what times within those days you are blocked. I have personally chosen to block, from 8AM-10PM on weekdays, Facebook and all the popular fitness and "lifestyle design" blogs I tend to lurk on to distract myself. I can check up on them during the weekend, to see anything I may have missed. I do schedule a 15-minute window for Facebook to open up so that I can post these blogs online, but outside of that it's an extremely refreshing media fast.

And don't worry, contrary to popular belief, the world isn't going to end if you left of the loop for a few days in the blog-o-sphere.

I chose 8AM-10PM because those are the hours I'm typically near my computer, and I can't tell you how many weekday evenings I've gotten to bed wayyyy later than planned due to some pointless internet roaming. 10PM keep me from logging on the web when I should be climbing into bed.

 I can't tell you how much time this has saved me, and how much faster it has allowed me to accomplish tasks. As when Jacopo reminds the Count in The Count of Monte Cristo, "I must protect you, even if it means protecting you from yourself."

2. Stop checking your email so darn much.

Yes, I had to repeat this, even if I already belabored the point in part 1. It's funny, as I feel that all of us across the board tend to enjoy checking email much more than we enjoy sending email. If you don't batch your email and make your checking/sending an efficient and time-saving process (as discussed in part 1), this leads to the creation of an enormous gorilla on your back, constructed from all the emails you haven't replied to.

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Next week, in the last installment of this series, I'll cover a critical action step to that drastically cuts down on the amount of time it takes to finish an important task. Up until now, we've learned how to remove distractions, but next week we'll go over a bit of the actual "process" in task completion.