We’ve been getting pretty busy at the new gym, Indianapolis Fitness and Sports Training, so I’ve kinda neglected the blog lately.
My apologies.
It’s amazing how diverse our clietele has become over the last few weeks.
We have professional MMA fighters, Olympic hopefuls, high school football players, professional golfers, weight loss clients, military academy students, and our highly motivated crew of general fitness enthusiasts.
It’s already starting to feel like a team atmosphere when the gym gets rockin’.
My buddy Rob Pilger just opened a new gym in Ohio. He dropped me a line that the opening celebration is on!
As a special opening bonus, Rob is offering his Ultimate Boxing Workout video at a huge discount.
I’ve blogged about Rob’s stuff before, and you know I love it. Rob brings real ring experience and fitness together like no one else can.
Mike Robertson and I have talked about putting up a few heavy bags at I-FAST to get people banging on to diversify our energy systems training and give folks a little something extra in the fun department. It is truly a blast, and Rob’s instruction is the foundation we’ll be using.
Here’s how you get Rob’s DVD at a discoutnt:
1 – Go to the website: www.theultimateboxingworkout.
2 – Add the product(s) to your cart
3 – BEFORE purchasing, go to the bottom left side and insert the discount code “SALE”; make sure to apply it. (dont’ put the quotes in there)
4 – Purchase the DVD’s at the discounted rate. This coupon is good through 8/28.
You’ve got 2 days left. Get it.
Bill
While there are tests or assessments I’ll do on just about everyone, I think you need to get more specific in your testing depending on the demands of the sport or activity in which an individual participates.
Case in point, I was working with firefighter recruit today who was having some ankle and achilles tendon pain when he ran.
[Note: Why do does every training academy feel it necessary to run their candidates to death. It's really not a great choice of training modality. Mike Berry at www.strengthcats.com has been promoting the importance of strength training for firefighters for years and rightly so. Check it out]
He’s been catching a lot of flack from his superiors because as long as he’s not running, he’s essentially painfree. They think he’s trying to get out the long runs.
In testing him in the clinic, there really wasn’t much that was influencing his symptoms. Range of motion, isolated and gross movements and strength testing, special tests, and several others failed to reproduce his pain.
So I had him run. And run some more…until he started to feel the symptoms in his achilles.
Then I retested him.
After running, his gluteus medius tested weak, he was unable to actively dorsiflex his affected ankle equal to his unaffected side, and his pronation increased during gross movement testing. The unaffected side continued to test normally.
With these findings, we can now address his weaknesses and provide some adaptive taping and temporary shoe modifications to get him back to normal training.
The take home point is that had I not tested him in the environment in which he was symptomatic, my conclusions may have agreed with his superiors and this guy wouldn’t have a shot at becoming a firefighter.
Make sure that your assessments give you the information you need by addressing the actual training environment.
Bill
P.S. You can get more info on the effects of fatigue and forces and how they affect testing and performance in the Indy Performance Enhancement Seminar DVD’s
I’ve blogged about stiffness and shortness before, but I’ve recently received some questions about the different approaches in each case. I also go into more detail in the Indy Performance Enhancement Seminar DVD’s…
I think it’s important to distinguish between whether a muscle is short or if it is stiff when determining a corrective plan. Treat each case the same and only half of your clients will improve.
A short muscle lacks length. It may be that the muscle is positioned in a shortened position frequently and the muscle fibers have dropped sarcomeres in series or the connective tissues have adaptively shortened.
If you actively and/or passively stabilize the proximal attachment of the muscle and move the joint into a position to stretch the muscle, the proximal attachment will move well before reaching the end range of motion of the joint.
A stiff muscle has greater resistance to stretch. This may be due to hypertrophy or a greater quantity of connective tissues. Think of two rubber bands made of the same material, but one rubber band is wider than the other. The materials would have equal extensibility but because one has greater width, it take more force to stretch it the same length as a thinner band.
In the case of a stiff muscle, if you actively and/or passively stabilize the proximal attachment and move the joint into a position to stretch the muscle, The joint will move through it’s full range of motion without movement at the proximal attachment assuming enough force is applied to stretch the muscle.
Short muscles require repetitive, prolonged stretching to encourage creep of connective tissues and the addition of sarcomeres in series to add length.
Stiff muscles can be corrected by balancing the stiffness across a joint by strengthening their antagonists and by holding the antagonists in a shortened position as they may have been adaptively lengthened over time.
I recently did an interview for Mike Robertson’s website newsletter. You can access it HERE.
If you missed the recent Indianapolis Performance Enhancement Seminar back in May, now’s your chance to get the DVD’s…AND you can get NSCA CEU’s to go with them.
You can buy them at the Indy Performance Seminars website.
Bill
Are you ready for the best sports training, fat loss training, or personal trainer Indianapolis has to offer?
Indianapolis Fitness and Sports Training is taking a select number of new clients as we approach our official opening date. This gives you an opportunity to get your foot in the door early.
You can check out our website and get more info here: Indianapolis Personal Trainer
Bill
