Something For Everyone

As the name of this post implies, I’ve tried to include a variety of topics that you’ll find informative and entertaining.  Hopefully, you and I agree on things that are absolutely awesome in the world, so you’ll enjoy the numerous links and media sources that you’re about to see.

Let’s start with those of you who are educationally minded, or have a dibilitating case of The Mondays.  If you’re having trouble being productive at work or in class this morning, I’m giving you not one but two educational post lists to get your learn on.  Talk about upping the ante.  Check out Ben Bruno’s latest Good Reads for the Weekpost, as well as Juliet Gotthardt’s Fun Reads Friday post.  Both posts include links to some absolutely awesome articles regarding health, human performance, nutrition, and being more awesome.  Ben and Juliet do a great job with their own writing, and their compilation lists are top notch.  That was a not-so-subtle hint that you should follow their blogs, as well as click through and get your learn on.  Get clicking, and get learning!

If you didn’t need that extra enticement to learn some more about taking care of your body, then you’ll really appreciate this.  You may also appreciate it if you’re certified as a strength coach or personal trainer by the NSCA, and live in the New York area.

Two important things are occurring on November 5th this year.  Guy Fawkes day can be celebrated in the evening, but what’s more important is the NSCA 2011 Annual New York State Clinic.  I attended the conference last year and it was great, and thanks to some networking and hardwork I’ve earned myself a spot as a presenter, which I’m pretty damn excited about.  (I’ll throw in that I’m nervous as hell, and it’s still 3 weeks away.)  Several presenters from last year will be back with new material, and I’m excited to learn form them as well as get my feet wet with the NSCA. If you’d like to check out the brochure for the clinic, I’ve turned this entire picture into a link for you.  Check out the schedule, register for the clinic, and come say hi to me!

You’ve done a lot of reading by now, and I’m sure you’re getting hungry.  I grabbed dinner with a friend on Friday night from a local restaurant called Bistro, a few blocks from Adelphi in Garden City.  If you’re living in central Nassau county, I’d highly suggest you visit for an array of wraps, sandwiches, and salads.  I myself got the grilled steak panini, which was grilled steak, avocado, fresh tomato lime salsa, and pepper jack cheese, melted to gooey perfection.  If that doesn’t sound delicious, then it definitely looks delicious:

You certainly don’t need to head out to restaurant to eat that sandwich; I’m sure it’s equally as delicious made in the comfort of your own home.  Speaking of home, this past weekend was homecoming at Adelphi University, and it was quite the busy one.  Adelphi doesn’t field a football team, and they made up for this by scheduling about 20 athletic events in a 24 hour period.  Practically every team on campus had some sort of game, meet, or alumni event to participate in.  The combined score of the field hockey, (2x) women’s volleyball, and both men’s and women’s soccer games over the weekend is 13-1, meaning the Panthers did work this weekend.  I caught as much of the action as I could over the weekend, and enjoyed seeing the athletes in action.

When it comes to athletics, cheer leading isn’t commonly considered a ‘sport’ per say, but it certainly requires some athleticism.  I learned that quickly today, after sitting in on a local college’s cheer leading practice.  I attended Nassau with their coach, and she asked me to come in, work on some conditioning with them, and develop a training program that the girls can use as throughout the season.  When I first became interested in fitness and performance, I didn’t expect to be working with cheerleaders, but I’m looking forward to working with the team.  The girls got to play tug of war today, which is deceptively difficult conditioning.  Yes, you read that correctly.  Tug of war.  Awesome, I know.

The fun-factor of tug of war was distracting from how difficult it was, and I find it funny that some were asking for more attempts while gasping for breath.  The sprints they ran didn’t generate the same response; I tried running a few with them for motivation, but apparently I’m really fast, and they didn’t like me very much.  I’ll be sure to provide updates on some of the training that the coach and I put together.  I’m still processing the fact that I was at a cheerleading practice.  Wow.

Let me end with three of my own videos from the past week.  I’m the most excited about this first one, the Zercher RFESS from Pins.  I’m not quite sure what inspired the idea, but after a few days of dreaming it up, I thought it would work well after some heavy deadlifts with my friend Steve.  I’ve been moving up on my reverse lunges, with recent work sets being 205lbs for 8, but this RFESS made 135lbs feel like the same weight.  It’s definitely the hardest single leg exercise I’ve tried, and I’m interested in seeing what I can do with the lift.  I’d like to try this in a lower rack so that the range of motion is deeper; stay tuned for those videos.

Prior to those evil split squats, I took a deadlift PR of 440lbs.  That’s a nice 20lb PR for me, but it’s still weak as hell.  Slow and steady, eh?  Let me add that since I’ve been preceding my max effort days with banded speed work two days earlier, I’ve set a PR each Saturday.  It’s a system that works really well, and I’d suggest looking into using it in your own training.

Finally, here’s a quick battling ropes video from my finisher this evening.  The ropes are awesome, and they’re a blast to train with.  Sometimes it’s important to be really serious when you’re training; other times having fun is more important.  Certainly beats the hell out of the elliptical, doesn’t it?

I’ve got a busy week ahead of me, and I’m sure that you do, too.  Check back in during the week for some mediocre content you might like.  Just kidding, it’ll be awesome!  Have a good week!