I've moved to www.adamfarrah.net...

Thanks to everyone who's been following my blog! I'm now blogging at my new site: http://adamfarrah.net

ttys

Adam

Kettlebell Turkish Get Up with 24kg

Nutrition Books and Links..

A site that I think gives a good overview of Paleo diet theory is the Weston A. Price Foundation website (www.westonaprice.org). I don’t agree with EVERYTHING on this site. For example, some people just can’t digest cow’s milk in any form. The Price disciples see raw cow’s milk as a hugely important staple for everyone. I just don’t agree that raw milk works for everyone at all times and levels of health. But, I do agree with A LOT that they do say...

The Warrior Diet by Ori Hofmekler is a GREAT book and I recommend it to anyone interested in REAL health and REAL nutrition. It's particularly of interest to males.








The Paleo Diet by Loren Cordain

This is another great book on Paleolithic or "caveman" nutrition. Cordain gives a great introduction to sensible eating and eating the way we're programmed to eat by evolution.








ttys



Adam

Anthony from AOS on Metabolic Training...

Kettlebells and Firefighters...

Kettlebell Bent Press Videos...

Kettlebells in New York City News Clip...

Here's an interesting clip about Kettlebells in New York City gyms from youtube...

GREAT Kettlebell Snatch Form...

Since I'm now obsessed with the Kettlebell Snatch, I figured I'd post some video of the exercise being done by some top level Kettlebell lifters. BTW, the big, bald guy in the gray T-shirt is Ken Blackburn, one of the guys I was certified by...

Kettlebell Windmill Video...

Since I'm currently working on my Kettlebell Windmill variations, I thought I'd post this GREAT video featuring Steve Cotter doing Kettlebell Windmills. For those who don't know, Steve is one of the best in Kettlebells and he's also the guy who certified me...

Enjoy the video!

(BTW, the quality goes for a few seconds around minute 4)

Women, Kettlebells and Fat Loss...

I thought this was a great video of women commenting on kettlebells and fatloss. They're all in great shape and they all train with kettlebells...

IKFF Level One Certification…

What an outstanding weekend! I spent this past Saturday and Sunday training with some really fantastic people at the IKFF Level One Certified Kettlebell Teacher course. It was a truly fantastic experience. I'm sure not everyone would agree that spending 16 hours lifting heavy objects over two days is a good way to spend a weekend, but I couldn't think of a better way to spend my time!

We were hosted by Red Barn Fitness in Glastonbury, CT and Terri Parker did an absolutely fantastic job of hosting us. Thank you, Terri and everyone else at Red Barn Fitness!

Steve Cotter and Ken Blackburn did a great job teaching and coaching all weekend long. Both of these guys are so accessible, caring and patient in the way they teach. It's obvious that they are passionate about what they're doing. And, not only are Ken and Steve great teachers and coaches, each is an inspiring example of physical strength and conditioning.

I've done a lot of seminars over the past few years and have found that, many times, the personality giving the seminar is aloof, inaccessible and really operates inside a "bubble" of I'm-better-than-you energy. Ken and Steve were absolutely notable exceptions. They joked and talked and hung out with everyone at the seminar. No favorites, no being aloof. Just teaching and learning and sharing.

I got to spend one-on-one time with both Ken and Steve and was absolutely satisfied with the amount and quality of the individual attention I got. In particular, I noticed that both Steve and Ken took every break as an opportunity to connect and share with everyone. I don't even remember seeing either one eat – they both took lunch as an opportunity spend informal time with all of us and answer questions.

The level of technical instruction was completely outstanding. You really got the feeling that everyone got individualized attention from Steve and Ken and was a better lifter by the end of the weekend. Steve spent about 30 minutes one-on-one with me during the Saturday lunch break talking about timed sets, work capacity and the mental aspects of completing long timed sets.

Speaking of timed sets, these were something completely new to me. I'd been working some timed kettlebell sets, about a minute or two, for a while now. But, I had never worked timed sets with periods of "rest" or recovery included. I'll be posting extensively on these soon, but the basic idea is to take a long time period and pace yourself through it on one lift. An extreme example was the 20 minute timed set of cleans we did. Yup, 20 minutes. The deal was: no putting the kettlebell down, one hand switch at the 10 minute mark and a minimum of 10-20 reps per minute. The only "rest" we got was in the racked position or during the swing back to the clean. Do you think I developed a strong rack and an incredible awareness of every detail of that movement? Absolutely! My clients are going to hate me, because there are going to be A LOT more timed sets coming up…



At the end of the course, Steve talked to us about building our training businesses and how he sees the role of IKFF regarding member support. What really impressed me about Steve's attitude is how member-centered he has made the IKFF. I've been a member of many different types of professional groups over the years including science, marketing, entrepreneurial, fitness and training and a few others. Every group SAYS they're "member-focused" but, my experience has found that few truly are. IKFF is absolutely the exception and is absolutely serious about their commitment to supporting their trainers and building relationships. My feeling right from the start was that Steve and Ken were old friends who care about and support every one of their trainers.




I was already aware of some of the high standard for support members get from Steve and Ken because of the great feedback I got from two of their more established trainers, Bob Garon and Sincere Hogan. Both of these guys recommended the IKFF cert to me with fantastic enthusiasm and both mentioned the high level of support that comes from Steve and Ken. But, still, I was thoroughly impressed by what I saw from Ken and Steve!

I'll be posting more on the technical stuff I learned over the weekend in the coming days and weeks, but I have to say that this IKFF event – not to mention Steve and Ken – absolutely exceeded my expectations in every way!

ttys

Adam

Adam Farrah is a Certified Kettlebell Trainer and Freelance Writer for Mixed Martial Arts, Kettlebell Training, Weightlifting, Bodybuilding, Power Lifting and Nutrition. He serves Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts and the online and internet community.

Adam's blogs are alphanolimits.blogspot.com and adamfarrah.blogspot.com.

Revisiting Heavy Single Rep Sets...

Recently I’ve begun experimenting with heavy singles again. For a long time I felt that singles just didn’t work for me but, recently, I’ve started using them in my training and I’m seeing some really good results.
The trick to making the singles work for me is in how I incorporate them into my training. Here are the major points that have helped me get singles working for me.

Incorporate higher rep “work sets” into the same workout as the singles

This is something I pretty much came up with on my own. What I do is, essentially, two progressions on the same exercise, with different rep ranges, in the same workout. For example, on squats I’ll warm up with sets in the 5-8 rep range, do my higher rep “max” for that workout at 12 reps and then do several sets of progressively heavier singles.

This accomplishes a whole bunch of good things:

1) It allows a very thorough warmup

2) It allows me to get used to having weight on the bar so I don’t get “crushed” when I start the singles

3) It allows me to find the groove of the movement and get confident before I start the singles

My two biggest complaints with singles in the past were not feeling warmed up and in the groove of the movement and feeling like the weight was “crushing” me when I first picked it up – even if it wasn’t that much weight. By essentially doing the exercise as a higher rep exercise and then following with singles or very low reps, I get the best of both worlds.

I’m not even sure I reduce the weight I can move on my singles with this technique. It seems that I’m much stronger and more engaged from the higher reps once I move to the singles.

Practice is a major advantage

The last time I tried training low reps and singles seriously, I noticed something very limiting about the singles. When training an abbreviated basic routine like a favor, I might only get a few reps of an exercise every week or so doing singles. And that really wasn’t enough to learn and perfect a movement. As it is, getting 20 or 30 reps of a movement every week or so probably isn’t enough.

Since I’ve been doing kettlebell training, I’ve started to see the value in very frequent, lighter training for learning movements. Another experiment I’m planning is to try benching or squatting a few times a week at different intensity levels. I’ll let you know how that works out for me as well.

Taking “double rep progression” for a test drive on bench presses

Today was my bench press day. In addition to working some of the stretches and techniques from Pavel’s Strength Stretching DVD, I incorporated this “double rep progression” technique as well. My results were really good! I did my basic sets of 5 reps and then followed with several heavy singles. I was able to train a single at 20lbs above my 5 rep weight. As I’m writing this, I can feel my arms and shoulders getting really sore. I’m sure handling that much more weight in a live set will really stimulate some growth.

One last point on designing a cycle

When I set up my training cycles I find that, in general, I like to “sneak up” on my maxes. What I mean by this is that I’ll do sets that are very near my max before I actually get to the max. This has the advantage I talked about above in helping me get used to the weight and find the groove of the movement before I actually go for the “max” set.

Here’s my bench press progression from today:

8 X 45, 8 X 45, 5 X 91, 5 X 91, 5 X 135, 5 X 135, 5 X 140, 5 X 145, 5 X 155, 1 X 165, 1 X 175

Again, I’m doing lots of sets and – at least in theory – decreasing the max weight I can handle, but my form and comfort in handling the weight more than makes up for any small loss in my max. This is particularly important right now as I’m working my way back in to more intense training and my weights aren’t all that heavy.

ttys

Adam

Adam Farrah is a Personal Trainer and Freelance Writer for Mixed Martial Arts, Kettlebell Training, Weightlifting, Bodybuilding, Power Lifting and Nutrition. He serves Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts and the online and internet community.

Adam's blogs are alphanolimits.blogspot.com and adamfarrah.blogspot.com.

What I Learned from Roy Harris Part I...

Interestingly, one of the biggest things I learned at this year's Middletown Roy Harris seminar wasn't strictly martial arts related. Since Roy trained with Pavel - The Man Himself - I asked him a few questions about kettlebell training.

One of the things I love about Roy Harris is that he always answers questions so incredibly patiently and always - and I mean ALWAYS - has something profound to say.

What I learned above all else, was the difference between kettlebell training and weight training. I grew up training typical bodybuilding and powerlifting routines and, although I had a strong interest in kettlebells, I didn't really "get it" about kettlebell training until I talked to Roy, asked questions and watched and listened to his answers. Some of the revelations were in what he said and some were in what he did...

Roy demonstrated the concept of "linking" muscle groups by having me clinch up with him and try to move him. He contracted or "linked" different sequences of muscles and noted the effects each time. First none, then the fist and arm, then the fist, arm and shoulder, then fist, arm, shoulder and core, then added the glutes and legs. By the time the entire side of his body was linked I couldn't even budge him. It was like trying to move a tree.

What I Learned - Kettlebells train you to link muscle groups and create functional strength. This has some really important implications for me. First off, it gives me a new dimension to consider when I’m training. Second, it showed me how much I wasn’t aware of when doing barbell training.

Toward the end of the second day, Chris (he runs Modern Self Defense) asked Roy something about HOW to remember and be motivated to train with KBs every day. Roy grabbed a 16kg and put it in the middle of the door of the school. Essentially forcing anyone entering or leaving to trip on the thing!

What I Learned - Don't make training a big deal. Put a bell where you'll SEE it and PRACTICE. I now have a 16kg in my living room and I pick it up every day and clean it and snatch it a few times a day. Both movements have improved in less than a week!

Something else I began to consider while Roy was talking was just how much kettlebells might do for my powerlifts. If kettlebells can increase “functional strength” and increase ligament and joint health as well as Roy has found in training at his academy, then I hypothesize that training with kettlebells could potentially increase my bench, squat and deadlift.

What I learned – kettlebells might best be used as auxiliary training for my powerlifts in addition to combat conditioning and overall health.

Roy Harris is always puts on a great seminar that’s packed with value. His website is www.royharris.com. Thanks also to Chris Wright-Martell at Modern Self Defense Center for hosting Roy. MSDC can be found at www.modernselfdefense.com.

ttyl

Adam

Adam Farrah is a Personal Trainer and Freelance Writer for Mixed Martial Arts, Kettlebell Training, Weightlifting, Bodybuilding, Power Lifting and Nutrition. He serves Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts and the online and internet community.

Adam's blogs are alphanolimits.blogspot.com and adamfarrah.blogspot.com.

Roy Harris MMA Seminar...

Had a GREAT seminar this weekend! Roy Harris on MMA at Modern Self Defense Center in Middletown, CT. I'll post more soon - I learned a ton of new stuff - I can't really muster the strength to write at the moment though LOL

Did I say it was a great seminar?

ttys

Adam

Adam Farrah is a Personal Trainer and Freelance Writer for Mixed Martial Arts, Kettlebell Training, Weightlifting, Bodybuilding, Power Lifting and Nutrition. He serves Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts and the online and internet community.

Adam's blogs are alphanolimits.blogspot.com and adamfarrah.blogspot.com.

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Great video of Chris Leben posted on Limitless MMA.

Embedded Video

http://www.limitlessmmablog.com/chris-leben-the-evolution-of-an-icon-episode-1

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Little Discs for Small Increments...

A few people have asked me how I got to 201lbs on my bar. I've been using small discs for years now. I originally got these from Piedmont Disc Association back in 1999. I couldn't find them online, so I suspect they aren't around anymore.

I have a full set that includes 2 each of 1.0lb, 0.75lb, 0.50lb, 0.25lb, 0.125lb and 0.0625lb. Not sure what I'll EVER use the last two for, but I wanted a full set!

Here they are:




So, here's how I got 201:

Bar - 45lbs
Bumper Plates 2 X 24kg = 88lbs
2 X 25lbs
2 X 5lbs
2 X 2.5lbs
2 X 1.0lbs discs
2 X 0.50lbs discs

Total = 201lbs

And there is is...

ttys

Adam

Adam Farrah is a Personal Trainer and Freelance Writer for Mixed Martial Arts, Kettlebell Training, Weightlifting, Bodybuilding, Power Lifting and Nutrition. He serves Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts and the online and internet community.

Adam's blogs are alphanolimits.blogspot.com and adamfarrah.blogspot.com.

Cutting Back...

I'm not sure when he first said it - probably in BRAWN - but I'll never forget Stuart McRobert's words: "Cut back, cut back and then, cut back some more!" When I was in my 20s and bodybuilding I didn't find them particularly empowering, but now that I'm training full time they make a lot of sense.

I've had a hard time with keeping my workouts consistent lately, because my Mixed Martial Arts and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu training is so demanding. A good friend of mine got me to realize that, if I'm over training, I'm not going to reach my goals anyway. So, this crap about being "ambitious" and "pushing hard" doesn't really make sense - I was training hard for a week or two and then needing to drastically reduce my activity to get back on track.

Yesterday, I started cutting back.

Based on a great article in an old HARDGAINER, I drastically cut back on my Back/Deadlift workout.

Here's what it looked like:

KETTLEBELLS

Sumo Deadlift (1min, 30s rest) - 16kg, 24kg

Swing (1min, 30s rest) - 16kg, 24kg, 2-16kg bells (30s work set)

Get Up - 1rep X 12kg (right and left side)

DEADLIFT

Warmup - 5 X 91, 5 X 91, 5 X 91, 5 135, 5 X 165, 1 X 165

Work Sets - 1 X 185, 1 X 195, 1 X 201, 1 X 201, 1 X 201

And that's it. Not a ton of work, but the swings and final deadlift sets were pretty tough.

I could have done more, but I'm going for SUSTAINED and incremental improvement. Currently, my consistency has just been too far off to make steady progress.

Using this example, in one year with a 2.5lb increase weekly, I'll be pulling 315 in the deadlift. Again, not earth shattering, but not too bad either.

Here's my video of one of the 1 X 201 sets from yesterday:





ttys

Adam

Adam Farrah is a Personal Trainer and Freelance Writer for Mixed Martial Arts, Kettlebell Training, Weightlifting, Bodybuilding, Power Lifting and Nutrition. He serves Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts and the online and internet community.

Adam's blogs are alphanolimits.blogspot.com and adamfarrah.blogspot.com.

Putting a crappy workout in perspective....

So, I didn't have a great workout today. Back is usually a great workout for me, but I haven't been eating as well as I should and my sleep hasn't been great the past two nights. So, I had a low energy workout and didn't get to have that great "elated" feeling I always look forward to after good training. I DID hit my target weight and reps, but it felt really heavy and I had the "I don't want to be here" feeling.

I figured I blog some of my thoughts on days like this as they might be useful to someone else out there.

I learned a long while back (about 10 years) that what REALLY matters in your training is the cumulative effect of everything you're doing. I was doing the first Muscle Media contest back in the 90's. This was the first "high pressure" training I had done, in that I had a time line and really wanted to do well. It was a period of about 5 months of hard, committed training to learn from.

Anyway, I rarely - if ever - had a perfect workout or a perfect day of eating or rest. I did have a few and I had plenty that were good to very good, but I used to get frustrated very often beacuse I rarely got everything "right" consistently. "Right" being PERFECT, of course.

The learning in all of this came at the end, when I was in fantastic shape and felt great and had learned a ton about my body and training and dieting.



In the end, I realized that what really mattered was the NET accumulation of good workouts, good diet days and good rest. I rarely got it perfect, but I probably averaged out to an A- or B+ in the end and I got a great result.

Whenever I get down about not having a great workout, I remind myself that I'm still accumulating the workouts I need to get here I want to go in the end.

ttys

Adam

Adam Farrah is a Personal Trainer and Freelance Writer for Mixed Martial Arts, Kettlebell Training, Weightlifting, Bodybuilding, Power Lifting and Nutrition. He serves Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts and the online and internet community.

Adam's blogs are alphanolimits.blogspot.com and adamfarrah.blogspot.com.

The HUGE ARMS! Kettlebell Routine...

I'm feeling great about the basic kettlebell arm specialization routine I've put together. I'm calling it HUGE ARMS! because it's "markety" and makes me laugh. It will no doubt undergo a lot of refinement over the next few weeks, but the basic idea and format is already showing results.


In one week I've gained 6lbs and put 1/2 inch on my arms. My arms are pumped and sore pretty much all the time - this is all with 2-3 weight workouts per week and only 2 of these kettlebell specialization routines done TO DATE so far. Not a bad deal, huh?

I'll post the routine itself in the next day or so but, make no mistake, I am on to something here...

ttys

Adam

Adam Farrah is a Personal Trainer and Freelance Writer for Mixed Martial Arts, Kettlebell Training, Weightlifting, Bodybuilding, Power Lifting and Nutrition. He serves Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts and the online and internet community.

Adam's blogs are alphanolimits.blogspot.com and adamfarrah.blogspot.com.

New Squat Cycle Begins Today...

I started a new squat cycle today. I'm going to stay in the medium-high rep range of about 12-16. I've done 20 rep squats before and I tend to stall out after a few months. 20 rep squats just get too intense from a recovery standpoint for me with all the other training I'm doing.



A few points on these squats:

1. I'm using a "Rest/Pause" rep style based on Stuart McRobert's writing in Brawn and Beyond Brawn. This is a really demanding style of training because there's ZERO momentum to move the weight. It's all just strict muscle power and tight form.
2. I have pieces of automotive heater hose over the pins on the rack to keep the bar from bouncing around when I touch at the bottom. The rubber makes the bar contact completely dead.
3. I'm still deciding how I want to cycle this exercise. I'll either add on 5-10lbs per workout or do a double progression doing 12, 14, 16 reps and THEN adding weight and back to 12 reps. If anyone wants to post a suggeston on this, I'm open.

ttys

Adam

Adam Farrah is a Personal Trainer and Freelance Writer for Mixed Martial Arts, Kettlebell Training, Weightlifting, Bodybuilding, Power Lifting and Nutrition. He serves Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts and the online and internet community.

Adam's blogs are alphanolimits.blogspot.com and adamfarrah.blogspot.com.

The push toward HUGE ARMS starts right now!

If I've ever had a "weak" bodypart, by bodybuilding standards, it's always been arms. Everything else - chest, back, legs, shoulders - have always come along really well when I get to hard training. But, arms have always been tough. I'm definitely NOT one of those guys with the big, freaky arms that fills up a shirt sleeve really nicely.

So, I had a brainstorm a few days ago. In the spirit of the old Stuart McRobert/Brooks Kubrik mini-books "Big Arms" and "Big Bench" I decided to do some "specialization" work on my arms this summer and make them huge.

If you don't remember or aren't familiar with the McRobert/Kubrik books, they're an OLD SCHOOL approach to weights and body building. Abbreviated training, heavy basics (squats, deadlifts, bench press), lots of food, etc. The classic approach from the early days.

I suppose I could just follow Stuart's approach in "Big Arms" but I wanted to put a modern twist on it. I've been playing with Kettlebells a lot recently and I've been doing a lot of research on them. I was also inspired by Mike Mahler's writing and physical development (http://www.mikemahler.com/).

Here's what I'm gonna do: I'm going to take the summer - starting right now - and develop a Kettlebell specialization routine for arms. To some, this is probably a perversion of the "Kettlebells for core strength and all around functional development" but I really don't care :-P I want to seriously bring up my arms and I want a context to explore Kettlebell training within.

The routine is going to be based around a standard abbreviated, heavy basics routine that I'm already working with. I'm going to drop some of the barbell exercises and substitute in Kettlebell work.

Part of my plan is to create a "modular" Kettlebell routine that focuses on arm and shoulder development that I can do as a standalone routine or after the big basics in my larger weight routine.

So far, the Kettlebell routine looks like this (It's still under refinement):

Dead Clean and Press

Renegade Row

Bottoms Up Clean and Press (Dynamic)

Crush Curl

Halo

This is a 2-3 times per week routine at this point, but I suspect it could lead to some overtraining and I might have to either lower the frequency or slow down on my core powerlifting program.

My lifting program looks like this:

Monday

Deadlift

Bent Over Row

Chins

Wednesday

Powerclean

Flat Bench

Incline Dumbell Bench w/ 2in Handled Dumbells

Dip

Friday

Squat

Stiff Legged Deadlift

Front Squats

The Kettlebell work, plus the weight work, plus regular training in BJJ/MMA is going to, no doubt, prove to be a lot of work. I'm expecting I'm going to have to adjust and manage my frequency as I go along, but I wanted to start off ambitious and at least find my current physical limits.

Let me know what you think, and I'll post more soon.

ttys

Adam

Adam Farrah is a Personal Trainer and Freelance Writer for Mixed Martial Arts, Kettlebell Training, Weightlifting, Bodybuilding, Power Lifting and Nutrition. He serves Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts and the online and internet community.

Adam's blogs are alphanolimits.blogspot.com and adamfarrah.blogspot.com.

My Training and Nutrition Philosophy...

I thought I'd take a few minutes and set out my overarching philosophy on training and diet.

I take a somewhat unusual approach to training and physical development - particularly based on my background.

My approach?

Low tech, minimalist, simple.

I say this approach is "unusual" because, in virtually every other area of my life, I'm a complete technophile. If it's new and cool and slick I'm all over it.

So, why low tech, minimalist and simple when it comes to training and nutrition? Easy, because our bodies are really quite primitive and simple. This is an idea that runs throughout all of my training and nutrition thinking and I'll repeat it often. Depending who you ask, we've been around - as a species - for about 2.5 million years. That's in our current form, walking upright and with our nice big brains. Depending who you ask, that's also how long we've been omnivores - that is, eating a combination of meats and plants on a regular basis.

That's right, the "technology" that is our bodies is a few million years old. Our bodies are miracles of evolution, but they are very primitive, simple and low tech.

I want to digress here for a minute, because I want to differentiate between seeing the body as a "simple and primitive" system overall and the complexity and high tech nature of fields like nutrition, biochemistry, medicine and sports conditioning. I spent years studying engineering, chemistry and biochemistry and eventually emerged from college with a BS degree in chemistry. I took all my cool new knowledge and went into the pharmaceutical industry to do early stage drug discovery or "biotech" as it's known. Like every other scientist in that type of field, I was fascinated by the seeming unlimited complexity of biological systems. Different feedback loops, hormone production, enzyme inhibition, gene expression, metabolic pathways. It was like an endless playground where you can keep exercising your thinking process (science types REALLY like to do this) and reducing things down into finer and finer and finer detail.

Of course, this was all made even cooler because I was also working as a sales consultant in a vitamin and supplement store part time. How cool was it to know all the minute details of how a lot of the supplements worked on a biochemical level? I thought it was pretty cool at the time and, on some levels it still is. There's a problem with this approach, though - and it's a problem that runs through virtually all of medical and nutritional science and, to a lesser extent, training science.

The body is a single, living breathing, thinking, feeling human being! You could even go so far as to say there's a completely unquantifiable and indefinable "spirit" in there as well. I believe that one of the great follies of science and medicine during the last century, and this one so far, is the further fractioning and isolation of metabolic events in the body. Yeah, if someone is anxious or depressed or their blood sugar is bouncing all over the map throughout the day, you can use certain chemical compounds (otherwise known as medications) to force that particular system in the body to do what we think it should. But, the body is "malfunctioning" for a reason. And the "malfunction" is one that has served and preserved us for millions of years.

But, again, the current approach is to look at each system in complete isolation and regulate it with some kind of chemical or medication. Current mainstream approaches do virtually nothing to look at the system as a whole and treat the person.

Science isn't completely to blame for this approach though. It was made profoundly obvious to me during my years selling supplements in a retail environment that the great majority of people out there want the easy approach. They want the pill and don't want anything to do with radical lifestyle or diet changes. Many don't even want effective training methods. They'd rather waste years doing the same training program - with no results - and then spend a few hundred dollars a month on supplements to "break through the plateau."

I think I need to emphasize here that I'm not anti-science or anti-technology by any stretch of the imagination. What I am against is treating the human body as a collection of isolated, unrelated systems that can be tinkered with and tweaked individually - as if we are smarter than millions of years of evolution.

What I propose, in terms of nutrition and training, is to look at the body as a whole and treat it as such.

One of my favorite weight training authors, Stuart McRobert, has some great practical examples of this approach in most of his routines and training recommendations. He's particularly fond of the squat and the deadlift and tends to center all of his routines around one or both of these movements. Why? Because squats and deadlifts impact the entire system. They aren't isolation exercises like curls or cable pushdowns. Steady poundage progression on squats and deadlifts - "the big basics" - results in overall weight gain, increased metabolism and a fantastic to the body's anabolic processes. This is the training version of "treating" the body as a whole system. You can ask anyone who knows anything about real training what's more effective at building real size and strength, heavy squats and deadlifts or isolation exercises. Heavy basics are ALWAYS more effective.

I think this is one of the fundamental principles behind the effectiveness of kettlebell training. Kettlebells train the entire body as a system - muscles, balance, joints, timing and hormonal and cardiovascular systems. When you think about it, this is exactly how our systems would have evolved to be trained. In our primitive days, we would have engaged in various activities that would have taxed all of our systems to varying degrees. Hunting, fighting, climbing, carrying. Our body systems evolved to be trained as a whole, not as isolated systems.

Adam Farrah is a Personal Trainer and Freelance Writer for Mixed Martial Arts, Kettlebell Training, Weightlifting, Bodybuilding, Power Lifting and Nutrition. He serves Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts and the online and internet community.

Adam's blogs are alphanolimits.blogspot.com and adamfarrah.blogspot.com.

Gymboss Interval Timer...

I just got done with my weight workout today and I used my Gymboss Timer for the first time. This thing just flat out KICKS ASS! I had been using a basic old timer from a sporting goods store with a choice of 2-3 minute rounds and, if I recall correctly, 1-2 minute rest. I don't really "recall" because I used the thing like twice and never used it again. As I started getting more and more into kettlebell training and combat conditioning for my BJJ/MMA training I knew I was really lacking the ability to progressively train my work and recovery rounds. I tried using the second hand on the clock, I tried a stopwatch, but nothing worked very well. It was especially tough when I started to really focus on a high intensity round or when I got fatigued - I'd lose track of the time and then thinking about the time would make me lose focus on the training.

About a week ago, I saw an ad for the Gymboss timer (www.gymboss.com) in FIGHT! Magazine (Great magazine, BTW) and I ordered one that night.

It's as good or better than they say on the site. Basically limitless adjustability with virtually any number of rounds and rest - 2 seconds to 99 minutes for rounds and/or rest and up to 99 rounds. There are also different alarm and vibrate settings. It was pretty easy to program once I read the instructions a few times. The instructions could be a little better, but I figured it out fine and I expect I'll be using this thing enough I'll be expert at setting it in a week or so.

Overall, it's a great product. I'm curious to see how it holds up under heavy use but, there's a 1 year warranty on it as well, so I'm not worried.

For like $25 with shipping this thing is great. I'm all juiced up to do more interval training now!

ttys

Adam

Adam Farrah is a Personal Trainer and Freelance Writer for Mixed Martial Arts, Kettlebell Training, Weightlifting, Bodybuilding, Power Lifting and Nutrition. He serves Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts and the online and internet community.

Adam's blogs are alphanolimits.blogspot.com and adamfarrah.blogspot.com.