Exercise You Need to Do: Constant Tension Hip Thrust

This tip today mostly goes out to the ladies but like I've written in the past; guys, lets not neglect glute work because chicks dig glutes too.

This version of the hip thrust is as effective as it is inappropriate looking. Rest assured that if you've been hip thrusting with any regularity and are not satisfied by your results the constant tension hip thrust will give you a kick in the behind. (See what I did there, one moment while I lol here at my own pun)

A few key points:

• You have to be confident with your hip thrusting technique, adding speed to any lift is based on the knowledge that your technique is sound. Otherwise you'll be speeding your way to an injury. 
• I like to give the cue it's like a piston on a car engine, you need to come down just as fast as you explode up into full hip extension. 
• For greater glute tension, try to move the hips into posterior pelvic tilt.
• Make Diamonds! That's how hard you want to squeeze your glutes at the top of every finish.

4 Tips For Ladies to Feel More Comfortable in the Free Weights Section

It's been close to 7 years since I last stepped foot in a commercial gym to train. I worked in one of the busiest facilities in all of southern California, and the one thing that remains the same is the crazy ratio of men-to-women in the free weights section. 

In that time I've had the pleasure to work with many women who have said to me they were very intimidated by the free weights area of the gym. Even after finishing their time with me and being more knowledgeable than their male friends "who lift", they still feel uncomfortable around the barbells and dumbbells at their local gym. 

Because of this many ladies stick to cardio classes, aerobics, or machine based strength training; all of which are good but inferior as it pertains to really making positive physique changes. 

Here are four tips to help ladies to feel more at ease in the weight room. 

1. Put your headphones on and wear something that makes you feel confident. 

AH! The universal sign to GET LOST AND LEAVE ME ALONE, earphones in (sadly some guys will ignore this).

Feel free to turn it up and rock out to whatever it is you're listening to and just zone out for that 40-60 minutes you're in there. You'll drown out the grunting, weights banging and annoying guy asking if you need help to refill your water because you know, you're a woman and you're a delicate flower who shouldn't lift more than 5 lbs!

What you wear will of course depend on what makes you feel like a badass. MOST guys will not bother you, but of course there's always one or two bad apples that stare and gawk in the most obvious way possible. No wonder many ladies feel weird lifting weights. So there's a creepy guy nearby and I need to perform RDL's. Yeah I'd rather hop onto the elliptical.

To this I would tell management about it if you don't feel like slapping this idiot upside the head yourself. I would routinely have to walk up to these guys and let them know we had received some complaints about uncomfortable levels of starring and if they didn't stop we'd have to ask them to leave. 

Get it together guys! Quit being assholes. We all pay the same amount for the gym you're attending, be cool!

2. Have a plan once you're in there.

If you have to wander around trying to figure out what to do, it will only lead to you feeling more uncomfortable and unsure about what you're even doing in there. 

There are many starter programs out there that would be beneficial for ladies such as Strong Curves by Bret Contreras and Kellie Davis and Lift Weights Faster by Jen Sinkler. When you have a direction, it allows you to go in there and handle business. 

3. Find a good gym. 

Finding the right gym is important to really excelling. If you aren't comfortable in your gym how will you be able to let loose and have at it!?

Independent gyms seem to be a better option but tend to be inconvenient with most only having one location. Certain commercial facilities are better than others and within each company there are better locations (equipment, parking, amenities, etc). 

I was a member of 24 hr fitness, and would rather drive 10 minutes to another location simply because I felt most comfortable there over one down the block from me. If it allows for better results, it's worth the commute. 

4. Hire a Trainer

Cough Cough...Hello there! Haha. 

I'm on the fence when it comes to this as I've seen my share of TERRRRRRRRRIBLE trainers at commercial gyms. 

I mean turrible. Thanks Chuck!

But what they can do is help show you the layout of the facility and some basic movement patterns. Beyond that it's a bit of a crapshoot what type of trainer you'll end up with. Some are better than others, ask around and you'll tend to find which trainer at the facility fits your personality and goals the best.  

Unless you hire me.
You're golden with me! ;-)

If any of this information here was helpful, insightful or even just a little funny and you know someone who might benefit from it...please do share!

Bear Crawls

Why Perform Bear Crawls

• Great for serrate anterior recruitment 
• Scapular upward rotation
• Improved anterior core function
• Great tri-planr stability

How To Perform Bear Crawls

1. Being by setting up on all fours.
2. Raise the hips up a little higher than the shoulders, moving into slight protraction of the shoulder blades. 
3. Maintain a neutral spine and begin by moving opposite leg to foot i.e- left leg-right arm, right leg-left arm. 
4. Take a big breathe before moving and exhale as you move. This forces you to slow down and with each big exhale you get the rib cage to drop down as well. 
5. As you move you want very little side to side movement. you'll get a little but you want to exhibit great rotary stability.
6. Remember deep breathe before moving and exhale are before moving. 

And for the Love of God, please knock it off with the boot camp style dynamic bear crawls. (How NOT to perform bear crawls)

Pancakes: Friend or Foe?

Good enough for The Rock, good enough for me!

The obvious answer: Pancakes in their typical form is not what one would consider to be a health food. Especially if you're consuming them on a regular basis, no matter how delicious they are!

They can be used to enhance metabolic function if used strategically, and I must add, this doesn't necessarily work for everyone. Typically for men around 15% and women hovering slight below 20%.

View fullsize

Consider the following: a 28 year old, fairly healthy male. Has been lifting weights for 2 years and has a considerable amount of muscle mass and is pretty lean. Let's say he's 14% body fat, which is pretty good. That's the kind of physique where you say "oh yeah, they workout". 

And lets say they want to get to 8%, which is where you start to really lean down and look "jacked". The problem is the nutritional protocol you had in place to get you down to 13-15% isn't going to help you get down to 8%. I mean otherwise you would've already gotten there by simply staying the course, right?

So this is where pancakes fit into the picture. If this individual goes from 70% adherance to 85% of the time, they'll make a lot of progress. After a couple months, they get to 10% but they're still not at their goal. Thus a strategic calorie surplus often helps kickstart the fat loss process again. This "cheat meal" also has a lot of psychological benefits by breaking up the monotony of eating healthy foods 24/7.

Keep this in mind whether you are vegetarian, paleo, ketogenic or a "clean eater": When losing weight, there are many roads that lead to a healthier you, this is simply one way. 

My Name is Gary and I Worked at a Drug Rehab Facility

Secluded up in the Hollywood hills I had the opportunity to work with a disordered eating and drug rehab facility. Six months ago I was contacted to fill in for 6 weeks and fill in as their fitness director for the patients staying at the clinic. It was a very rewarding experience and I would like to share a few things I learned during my time there.

1. Disordered Eating Affects Over 20 Million Women & 10 Million Men Sometime in Their Lives.

The current figures show that at some point 30 million Americans will suffer from some form of disordered eating. Some of the common ones include:

• Atypical anorexia nervosa (weight is not below normal)
• Bulimia nervosa (with less frequent behaviors)
• Binge-eating disorder (with less frequent occurrences)
• Purging disorder (purging without binge eating)
• Night eating syndrome (excessive nighttime food consumption)
• Orthorexia Nervosa (unhealthy obsession with "righteous eating")

We all at some point struggle with body image and being confident in our own skin. Don't jump to passing judgement on someone simply because they're overweight or what you might consider "too skinny". You haven't walked a mile in their shoes or spent a second in their mind, so what makes anyone feel like they should have the audacity to pass judgement on them. 

That person is FAT! Well what you don't see is that they just lost their significant other, and food has become their way of coping.

That person is too skinny. What you don't see is this person has been told they were ugly their whole lives and now compensate by trying to fit into the standards that society deems fit as 'beautiful" by starving themselves eating as little as possible, often times complaining of headaches and lethargy. 

Without coming off sounding like a hippie, we all have to live on this planet together while we're here; don't make life harder for everybody by being a jerk. We need to practice compassion and empathy.

2. Talk to the individual if you  believe they may have a substance abuse or disordered eating problem. 

The prevailing theme I got from all the people I was interacted with was that they eventually had an intervention to make some type of positive change in their lives. The problem was that for some individuals it came a bit too late. Whether they had become morbidly obese or having organ failure due to rampant drug use, these people didn't just wake up with these health problems. Many of them said they wish their loved ones had spoken up sooner. 

Often people have these problems and it sits in front of us in plain sight. So if you suspect someone you love has a problem, try to get them professional help before it becomes a chronic issue that will be even harder to overcome.

3. Learning to disassociate food as good or bad. 

There's no such thing as "clean" eating. Food is food and I for one LOVE all kinds of food. When an individual begins to think of a typical food like rice as bad or dirty, that gives some insight to both their knowledge of nutrition but also their relationship with food in general. 

Many have a fascination about fitting things into a category. I eat paleo, I eat low fat, or I eat gluten free. Most of the diets people think they're following is simply marketing. Everyone was all about juicing a year ago, the narrative has changed very recently.

Education is the key to truly being the master of your health.

What's a quality protein? How about carbs? What happens if you happen to eat too LITTLE carbs and fat? These are common dietary scenarios that individuals live everyday with. Learning more about what goes on in YOUR body will do wonders.

Related: Just say "no" to that detox diet or juice cleanse by Dr. John Berardi

Ultimately being healthy should be the metric we all strive to achieve. Being happy with who you are and striving to be the best version of yourself is what matters the most.