On the weekly insistence of a friend and colleague, for like the last million weeks, I finally got myself a copy of Peak Performance by Brad Stulberg and Steve Magness. But, being the eternally busy and distracted person I am, I never had a chance to sit down and read it while also being awake and intellectually curious. Yesterday, however, I did the most brilliant thing: I downloaded the audio […]
We often talk about taking charge of our own success when it comes to training and competing in strength sports. This also applies to team sports, endurance sports, and pretty much any kind of competition you may engage in. But, what exactly, does that mean? As a last minute assistant lacrosse coach this past season, I actually saw this happen in real life at my son’s championship lacrosse game. I’ve […]
I routinely get messages from people who want to be powerlifters, weightlifters, throwers, or other things involving advanced athletics. If they want to work with me, I always ask them a series of questions revolving around this central concept: Where are you now? This was 2015. She’s still working on squatting better. In other words, what are you currently doing? Are you strength training? Training at all? Playing a sport? […]
Remember getting fussed at as a kid for slouching in your chair? I do. These days no one seems to remember the importance of good posture. Until of course the shoulder, back, and neck pain sets in. I can’t tell you how many new clients I get in their 40’s and 50’s who are in pain and whose main problem is their posture. Face it, we mostly sit (slouch) in […]
When you are a coach, you have to be a good listener. And sometimes its for problems not related to squatting or benching. For that reason I wrote the following quote on the whiteboard today. At first glance, it may seem mean-spirited, but it isn’t meant to be. Often when we are being tormented by others (or someone is tormenting a loved one), we feel powerless and confused as to […]
One of the hardest things to do as a coach is getting your athletes to listen and do what they need to do in order to improve. Its often not because they are unmotivated, instead, its because they want to be successful as fast as possible. They want to run faster, lift more, play better, etc., but unfortunately there just aren’t any shortcuts. The one thing that always works whether […]
My youngest son decided sometime in December that he wanted to play lacrosse for his middle school as a sixth grader. He had no experience, but a lot of enthusiasm so I encouraged him to go for it. Apparently, a whole bunch of kids had the same idea and so the team basically doubled in size this year. Unfortunately, the number of available coaches decreased by about half. And so, […]
So, there are those of us who work out regularly to look and feel better and improve our general health. There are those of us who just like to lead active lives and enjoy nature and the occasional physical activity. And then there are those of us who like to challenge themselves to push past our perceived physical limitations and see how far down the rabbit hole we can go. […]
*reposted from practicalstrength.blog Technique. Its something we as coaches are constantly correcting, describing, cueing, and obsessing over. Seems simple, right? If you want to perform at your best, you need perfect technique. And yet, that concept is probably the most misunderstood, misapplied, and outright ignored concept in physical training. In the interest of increasing the amount of time my son actually devotes to practicing his cello, my son’s cello teacher […]
