Many people believe that intermittent fasting is the holy grail of diets. Countless athletes and celebrities tout this eating method for its ability to shed unwanted fat and build muscle. If you believe everything you read, intermittent fasting is both the cure to cancer and heart disease and the key to making you look like Chris Hemsworth. Intermittent fasting is...

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One of the most popular places to be in my weight room is around the scale. I have teen athletes checking every single day to see if they have "gained weight". The number one desire of nearly every young male athlete is to bulk up. But this obsession over the number on the scale can be counterproductive for a variety...

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The initial assessment of a client or athlete can be one of the most valuable tools for a Strength Coach. Baseline assessments provide an initial opportunity to understand the way the athlete moves and the location and extent of their limitations and imbalances. A good assessment helps a coach create a program best-suited for the needs of the individual. However,...

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The Push-Up is one of the first exercises humans learn. It's for this very reason most people assume they do Push-Ups correctly. In reality, however, there are very few people and very few athletes who perform Push-Ups well. The Push-Up can also be challenging to correct, because most athletes have been performing Push-Ups for so long that they have deeply-engrained...

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Golf is a wonderful game that many people are able to play for the majority of their life. While most people play it as a game of leisure, competitive golfers are athletes in need of time in the weight-room to optimize performance and reduce the risk of injury. I have previously written on 3 Factors to Consider when Training Swimmers,...

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Every athlete I train is looking for that edge that can put them over the top. Most young athletes believe that if they simply lift more often, then they will automatically get bigger and stronger. I previously wrote the piece Why Young Athletes Shouldn't Lift Every Day in order to dispel this myth. A high quality session followed by optimal...

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Every Joint in the human body has a combination of mobility and stability. To some extent, the more mobile a joint, the less stable that joint is, and the more stable the joint, the less mobile. Each of the major joints has either a greater need for mobility or stability for the body to function optimally, and this is referred...

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Multiple times a week, I see athletes walk into the weight room and within minutes they're doing an exercise that's supposed to be performed halfway through the workout. When I talk to them about how they could've possibly finished that much of their workout, they tell me, "there wasn't enough (insert equipment here), so I skipped ahead and was going...

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"Hey Coach, can you give me a good ab workout?". It's a question I get all the time. My response is usually something along the lines of "Are you attempting to look better, or are you attempting to play better?". Typically, this question causes some confusion, and I will follow-up by asking them if they're trying to train their abs,...

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When you think of athletes who strength train, swimmers probably aren't the first ones that spring to mind. However, every athlete can benefit from strength training, and swimmers are no different. Strength training can increase stroke rate, power off the blocks, and explosiveness on turns. It can also reduce risk on injury by stabilizing their shoulders and increasing bone mineral...

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