Friday, April 27, 2007

Poker Conditioning

One of the best ways to get in super condition is not through bike riding or running for miles on end. Take out a deck of cards and draw/shuffle them 2-3 times. Now flip a card over and do a number of reps of squats or push-ups. Try finishing the entire deck with good form. At a good clip this shouldn't be more then 25-30 min. Its one of the most brutal workouts you can be put through just ask the japanese wrestlers.

 This type of training was built by one of the greatest wrestlers of all-time Karl Gotch. Nicknamed "The God Of Pro Wrestling" in Japan cause not only did he influence pro wrestling and martial arts but a real test of ones conditioning training. He put the wrestlers through workouts that would make Dan Gable think twice about. Not only can you get a hell of a workout but it makes your mind much sharper and more balance for your workout and how much you can handle.

 Try out the push-up and squat workout and after doing the entire deck try other exercises like v-ups, isometrics ect. If you want to get into super condition w/out the use of weights and find other forms of training in the deck of cards these are the way to go.

Matt Furey

Scientific Wrestling and look for Submission Master and Conditioning For Combat Sports

Yours in Power & Might

Ben

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Strongest Bodyweight Practitioners: The Gymnasts

You won't find another athlete that is as strong using his/her own bodyweight then a gymnast. Gymnastics is a sport where you must use your body from many angles and most of them are very difficult. You would see a gymnast on the still rings, pommel horse, high bar, platform ect. and notice how they move themselves through such grace and power. There are well over 200 elite gymnasts in the world and there is a reason for that. Today when it comes to Olympic Gymnastics you first think of the Hamm twins. They're probably the greatest brother duo on the planet no question and they're huge for they're size at what 150 pounds.

The women are just as awesome as the men but I wish that the women had the chance to do other routines like the rings, you never see a female gymnast on the rings, I certainly havent. How awesome would it be if you saw a female athlete on the rings and having the strength to swing, hold and do the iron cross. Unfortunenitly many people don't see women having that kind of strength, to me thats total BS. They can already do unbelieveable routines and yet the one event they never do is the rings. I hope one day we see an olympic female gymnast do that event and win the gold.

Back to my writing here lol. Gymnastics is one of the hardest sports in the world next to wrestling. It takes balance, coordination, strength, flexibility and speed. One of the main ways to develop strength in gymnastics is through handstand training: walking on your hands, HS push-ups, free hand hops and walking up steps. It takes such great strength just to hold one of these, and you must keep the body tight at all times or you're on your ass or head. I haven't gotten up to free handing yet but I can do pretty well walking back and forth, side to side on the wall and i've put up some good strength in my upper body. Nothing makes you stronger then walking on your hands, think about it, we walk on our legs all day cause thats how our body is developed but imagine having the ability to walk on your hands, you know how much strength you're building. Crazy.

Whenever I watch gymnastics on TV i'm always impressed by what they do and I never believe the judges give them enough credit. My favorite event is obviously the rings cause its the one event where it tests your entire body through range of motion, your grip, muscle control, your core, shoulders, arms, back, hams, quads every muscle needs to be controled in order to hit the right movement or you're gonna fall. Hope I go to a USA Gymnastics event soon cause that'll be huge to me cause I practice a bit of gymnastics every day, even just doing bridging or walking on my hands with the Power Wheel its still a form of the sport.

If you want to see how gymnastics are in film check out the movie Stick It. Good story and a real teenage flick but has some surreal stunts.

Want to learn how to walk on your hands or practice handbalancing heres a couple guys that'll help get you there and one of them has a book coming out very soon keep checking daily with John Peterson's Site.

www.bronzebowpublishing.com

www.mattfurey.com

www.superstrengthtraining.com

Gymnastic Abs

Gymnastic Handstands


Yours in Power & Might

Ben

Monday, April 9, 2007

The Lifeline Power Wheel

This unicycle device can turn you into a machine, period. It has 2 sets of ways to work the core and entire body, one way is holding onto the handles and the other is strapping your feet in. Our midsections play a major role in our muscular development. Our abs built our entire strengths and weaknesses so in other words if you don't have strong abs you won't go far. Now with this device we can built strong, powerful abs without having to do sit-ups and crunches.

One of the best exercises that this 5 pound unicycle gives you is the ability to walk on your hands. Now our lower body is 3 times stronger then our upper cause we walk around all day long, but if you knew how to walk on your hands imagine the strength you will create. Its one of my favorites and my #1 reccomendation for a strong core and a powerful upper body. Although that exercise is a major one, the one exercise everyone knows is the Roll Out where you grab onto the handles and roll out as straight as possible either from standing or from the knees.

No matter what if you're a strongman, a tri-athlete or better yet a professinal/olympic gymnast the wheel can give anyone a run for their money. This is by far the best piece of abdomanial equipment and far better then the "ab sissor" or that crazy stupid looking "Boflex" The wheel can make those abs like granite and like it says "Strong abs create phenomenal power and might."

Want the Power Wheel here are the 2 best people to buy from.

www.bronzebowpublishing.com

Lifeline USA

Lifeline Power Wheel


Yours in Power & Might

Ben

Sunday, April 8, 2007

The Power Of The Animals

Theres an animal inside all of us and we all at one-time or another leashed out the animal in us on a rare occassion in fighting, business, bedroom endeavours (had to bring that up sorry if I offended anybody) and most obviously in the fitness world. Some of our personalities take on the form of a wild animal and most of us never really know how to use that trait. Mine consists of the powerful gorilla and its physical and mental strength. Now none can have the actual strength of one such creature but we can attain some and even that is enough.

In working out when us human train very hard and I mean where we are pounding iron hitting very difficult angles in BW exercises some people would say to us "Damn man you're being an animal" which is true. Now there are many ways to train the human body, we can lift weights, do BW exercises and we use certain peices of equipment to get is going but nothing makes you train harder then moving like the animals in the wild. I'm not saying we should pound our chests or jump and feed on prey or speed up and take action no i'm saying move in the form of any animal, a tiger, bear, crab, gorilla, chimpanze, lion ect.

When you see animals in the jungle theres always one thing you notice about them (this goes out to every expert who thinks weights is the only way to make you stronger), theres no barbell, no dumbbell, no machines, no racks and certainly NO WEIGHTS!!!! These creatues of nature are far stronger and far better skilled then us human beings. They stay strong to survive and to defend themselves. The bear chasing down a rabbit at a bw of 800 pounds and run on 4 legs, the gorilla pulling himself up onto a branch with one finger or the cheetah having the ability to take off faster then 350 horsepower muscle car in a matter of seconds. These are all the things we can learn from to increase our cardiovascular conditioning and over muscular strength.

If you haven't noticed already my fav. animal is the gorilla. The king of strength and overall power. They are the first to be developed into humans during the prehistoric age and gave us the ability to create superhuman strength. You notice a gorilla by the way it walks and how it climbs up and down the largest of trees and branches. Although we as human beings don't always understand how intelligent these creatures are but we should damn well know how to create their strengths. The strength of a 400 pound gorilla would be equivilant to the strength 10 heavyweight olympic weightlifters (check out Animal Planet sometime), wouldn't anyone of us would love to achieve that. I certainally would and i'm a big fan of great strength.

You see if you're a fitness fanatic and whatever animal you feel is connected to your personality or you feel you take "shape" of and by that I mean if you're lean and athletic you would have the animalistic shape of a cheetah or a chimpanzee or even a certain preditorial bird. If you're body takes an animalistic "shape" of a big, burely and thick billed you would take on as a bear, gorilla, rhinosaurs or a thick muscled lion. One-way or another we all have the personality or "shape" of an animal thats inside all of us. Which one are you?

Want to train like the wild animals heres the place to get you started and if you're like me and want to feel having somewhat of the strength of a powerful gorilla heres another place you can find.

www.wildmantraining.com

www.mattfurey.com

Yours in Power & Might

Ben

Thursday, April 5, 2007

Training Wherever You Go

When it comes to bodyweight exercises, no matter where you go you can either have a good, tough workout but also you can get the toughest of your life. Gym training is ok if you're into it but look at the contineous fees and equipment use to wait for and the this idea of whiping off someone elses sweat. Screw that i've had to do this more then a few times and its not great to do. I rather be my own gym and want to something for me and nobody elses. I pick the exercises and the time its never determained for me which is something we all want. Now we all need to create some overall development but hey wouldnt it be nice to have an alternative on the road. Try a few BW exercises and you won't be dissappointed if they're too easy do some with one arm or do them at a different pace there are unlimited possibilities.

If you want to get either into this system or amp it up John Peterson and Jom Forystek can help.

www.bronzebowpublishing.com

Yours in Power & Might

Ben

Wednesday, April 4, 2007

Ab Training + Bodybuilding Senarios

What makes great powerful abs? Is it doing crunches everyday, is it working out while giving them a good rest or can it be that some of the strongest looking abs in the arnt really that strong? Anyway you see it in today's modern fitness you see bodybuilders, pro wrestlers, baseball players ect. there is just some that seem to look like a greek god but have the strength of 5 year old. I love seeing homeruns smacked, I like seeing someone getting slammed and on a few occassions I think its cool how awesome a bodybuilder's ripped abs look like.

Back in the golden age of Physical Culture, Strongman, Wrestlers, Gymnasts ect. trained every part of the body including the inner portions to keep them strong (the organs of the body) and yet not a single I have read did crunches it wasn't even invented yet. Yet today we see these gadgets, gizmos and "Guarentees" going on that some expert can get you the abs of Zeus or whatever. Personally ripped abs arn't all that appealing and do most of them have any REAL strength. Lets look at a bodybuilder with the biggest looking set compared to yesteryear shall we?

Bodybuilder #1- In this day in age the average muscle man is 5'9 around 225-265 pounds who's ripped to shreds everywhere, strong as hell on the weights he grins and grunts on ab lounge and does several sets of sit-ups/crunches and possibly do a few sets on a stability (to them its too girly its only for chicks) and creates this magnificant 6-8 pack of muscle chromed abdomen. Eats like a horse on meat and protein supplements and eats about 6-9 times a day and then drain themselves to get ready for competition. Lets put him to the test, he gets into a fight or has to pull off a very difficult Keg Toss. The moment he gets punched as hard as the opponent can hit this ripped up looking god goes down in a heart beat screaming in agony. Now the Keg Toss (trust me there needs to be plenty of ab strength to pull this off) he grins and grunts and yet as he gets ready to toss he pulls a muscle in the oblique area at mid range of the toss.

Bodybuider #2- An old time physical Culturist, in the days where strongman and developed human speciamens trained the entire body (including the internal organs) and were very active, ate healthy foods even to gain or lose or to stay at a particular weight. They did ab training through deep breathing, basic exercises in weight lifting and bodyweight. He's very lean at 5'7 maybe 185 pounds of ripped solid muscle (this is in the early 20th century mind you) and just has a great way to devote himself to fitness while maintaining a healthy social lifestyle. Lets say he gets into a fight and wanted it to get over with and gets punched very hard in the abdomen but yet doesnt have very much affect on him, he still keeps going until the opponent can't take it anymore. Now the Keg Toss, even at 185 a keg can weigh around lets say 250, he grins and grunts and without missing a step he swings up then leans back and throws it with every ounce of strength he has and yet never came out hurt or felt injured.

You see the difference in those senarios, they both trained very well in their field and can draw a crowd with ease but yet who do you think was stronger and less injury prone. The first muscle man was todays modern fitness magnet that although he looked big and strong he couldnt take a lick of a punch or the toss. Yet somehow the old time muscle man was stronger and can take monsterous shots and doesnt come out hurt in the toss. These are true stories and i'm sure you can find whom. When us society get sucked into the whacky world of bodybuilding and the so called "experts" show us the way to better to a healthy life and have us take their supplements and yet don't get anywhere as aposse to the old-timers that didnt have supplements and worked hard to get themselves really strong at very lean weights.

Whenever I get asked if I do weights cause i'm big and a bit muscular for my height and say no they don't believe it cause thats where they're brainwashed to thinking that to look good and be strong hit the iron when you can use basic commonsense. Never believe everything you read or heard cause of what they tell guarantrees, if we all had guarantees in life we'd all be a perfect world. Yeah Right! Check things out for yourself and if it works for you and you alone. Train the way you want its your decision not the advetisers who tell you too.

If you feel you want a change in your training and see whats best for you that you feel is right, go to John Peterson, Matt Furey, John Wood or Brooks Kubik and they'll show you the right path as they have for me.

www.bronzebowpublishing.com

www.mattfurey.com

www.functionalhandstrength.com

www.brookskubik.com

Yours in Power & Might

Ben

Tuesday, April 3, 2007

Pull-Ups/Handstand Push-ups Build Gorilla Strength

When it comes down to building upper body power and strength there are many ways to develop it since most bodybuilders and other fanatics are upper body crazy. There's the Bench Press, there's lat pull-downs, dead-lifts, push-ups, chest expander ect. But I feel the best and most healthy way to develop super strength is through 2 exercises that take you beyond the levels of strength and that's Pull-ups and Handstand Push-ups. Either one of these is not easy to do and to me that's a good thing.

Pull-ups build super strength in the back, grip, arms and shoulders. When you can do these at about 15 reps you got something going my friend. Why does this exercise seem like the strength builder? Look at the gorillas, they're strong, agile and massive, they have powerful looking back cause why, they climb and pull themselves up on a daily basis and they do this to survive and they start learning to hang as babies like a human baby learns to walk, apes do the opposite. I like to train in ways of the primates cause when you learn to swing around and grip and pull you're building strength in places you didn't know you had.

Handstand Push-ups are the upside down version of pull-ups, now holding a handstand alone can be difficult so you're already building strength by holding one. Once you get to the point of going down and back up you're building more power. It takes a great deal to pull off 1 HSPU but if you keep working on them you'll eventually hit 10 or more, my best is 25 consecutively at a body-weight of 230 pounds so think about how much strength I'm building pressing my own weight. This exercise was used by some of strongest men in the world and are a common exercise for gymnasts and look how strong they are. HSPU build strength in the arms, chest, grip, back, shoulders and abs.

When it comes down to it I find no other exercises for building great power in the upper body, walking on your hands is also a great exercise to build that kind of strength but just these 2 where you go up and down. If you want pull-up and handstand strength then check out these guys below and they're courses will get you to where you want to go.

Ultimate Handstand Push-ups

Pull-up Strength Training Workout


Yours in Power & Might

Ben

Monday, April 2, 2007

Brooks Kubik & Dinosaur Bodyweight Training

Brooks happens to be one of my top favorite fitness authors and is tough as hell when it comes to training. 5-time Bench champion and record holder in his age group when he was champion. A firm believer in hard work and the right ways to develop strength/power in every area of the body. All you gym rats and strongman know Brooks by his book of Dinosaur Training: Lost Secrets Of Strength & Development. Fascinating book and well deserved in the fitness world. Great talk on thick bar training and teaching the trainee to built the power he/she so desires and built heculean-like strength without the use of drugs or steriods.

He was a writer for Milo Magazine one of the biggest strength magazines in the world and he wrote countless articles on strength training and the types to get super strong. After a few years his body started to tear from the weights and needed an althernative. All who read on him know he had to come up with something. So he wrote a course that was unheard of and had a row of exercises many never thought of putting in a book. This book was to be known as Dinosaur Bodyweight Training. What exactly is this course and why would it be a BW course knowing that this man who looked he was carved out of granite was a 5-time national champion in Drug Free Powerlifting?

He came up with the idea that with certain elements and change in exercise you can develop a physique thats the symbol of a Greek Statue. From reading this course and doing most of the exercises personally I believe it. I didnt become a Greek Statue but I did develop muscle mass I never put on before. People get the idea that BW training can't get you muscle mass and you have to lift weights to get stronger. Thats pure BS cause once you see a video or picture of brooks doing the exercises the man is massive and is strong as hell for his size so he proves it works.

There are 100's of exercises he put in that cover every part of the body even exercises that build muscle in places you didnt think were working. The course has a vareity of equipment that is used during some exercises and he clearly states you don't have to use them to get in a great workout. They're great to a degree where if you want to increase the difficulty its a good idea to use them. Theres rings, pull-up bars, push-up bars, ab wheel, stability balls ect. So you have a great deal of equipment to use for BW exercises.

Is it worth getting the course well you be your own judge, the course sells at $197 plus 15 for shipping. In my personal opinion its worth getting cause its different then anything you've seen or done before. If the price is not your cup of tea, then get it on ebay if you can find it or don't get it all you've got other things you can try but take my word for it. If I didnt have it and can afford i'm right there. Its an awesome course and the DVDs that follow from his site can give you a better prespective watching him then reading about it. He goes into greater detail on the DVDs so if you don't want the book then get those seperatly or all together.

www.brookskubik.com

Yours in Power & Might

Ben

Sunday, April 1, 2007

Life Without The People In Your life!!!!

When I was growing up I didnt have the luxery of having tons of friends and have a great group of family to back me up in my goals and being the best I can be. Most of them wanted me to be what they thought I should be and so I rebeled against them. In my teens I didnt have the best of athletic ability or have a killer physique. I dont have much of the latter even now but thats ok its who iam even though I wanna drop a few just to experience it. Anyway, Over the years i've dealt with deaths, depression, crying a lot, getting beat up both ways and being put down by some of the very people i love and care for but yet its hard to imagine me going through that cause most people see me as a nice guy who doesnt bullshit anybody. I used to keep many things to myself and its pissed quite a few people off but you know what I dont care anymore lol.

I'am who i'am and I can never change it. The thing to remember is that with everything going on you can't not think about the people who got you here even the ones I rebeled against got me to where I'am but the people who encouraged me to do what I love to do best. There are many people I can name off who inspired me and admired so i'll just name a few:

John Peterson- The man that has put me through torture and brutal workings through his books and dvd. This is the guy that can never put you down for what you believe in and if you have something to ask hes got the answer. The few times i've talked to him I get nervous but excited cause i'm just not talking to any old physical culturist but I a wonderful human being. Thank you my friend.

Josh- One of my new friends that has helped me push even further into my writings and training. A kick ass guy that doesnt stand down for what he believes in and does his best. I'm honored to call this soilder and fellow physical culturist my friend and i'll always have his back as well as he'll have mine. Keep it up bro and I know someday we'll put each other through torturous workouts.

Matt Furey- For introducing me to bodyweight exercises and teaching me how to strengthen my legs again through Combat Conditioning and Gama Fitness.


Never fall short on who is pushing you or inspires you or motivates you cause those are the true people to have in your life and the ones you dont want to let go. Thanks guys and you know its gonna get better from here.

Yours in Power & Might

Ben

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