Workman's Conditioning

In a nutshell, manual labor is tough work and will hit your body that very few can. Those in Construction, Truck Driving, Stone Breaking, Dry Walling & Hauling can attest to the strength it takes on a day to day basis and doing things that require lifting, dragging, pushing, pulling, carrying, drilling and more. Some of those men and women are tough people and have strength and stamina that goes beyond the muscles. I've helped carry canoes, couches, dressers & doors and that takes some serious strength, not just for a few seconds but at times for several minutes. I have huge respect for people who do that kind of work.

The average gym rat may not be able to handle that kind of stress and you're not going to develop that kind of strength from a bench press or a heavy squat. Some workers have hauled more weight in a week than most gym goers do in a month or more. If we want to simulate that into a fitness perspective than we need certain tools to get that ideal way of developing serious conditioning that is ancient and useful.

Sledgehammer Training comes to mind. A worker slugging out and cracking stones into pieces many, many times over the course of the day is back breaking work but develops incredible long term strength, tendon power and cardio that makes treadmill runners look like chumps. For simulating, we strike a hammer on a tire as many times as we can within a certain period of time. Some use the Tabata Method (20 sec. on, 10 seconds off), some do a certain number each side and other different ways. Once you get into the high reps of 100 or more, you're getting that old school strength and conditioning. If you're doing high reps with a heavy hammer (25-30 lbs or more) you might as well be a machine that pumps you up full of natural testosterone and lean muscle.

Farmer's Carry is a old school method for developing incredible grip strength and powerful legs, core and lungs. Pick up a weight whether it be a kettlebell, dumbbell, buckets of concrete or whatever and walk with it for as long as you can. One of my favorite forms of this exercise was to put a heavy rock in each bucket, fill it with water and put fat gripz on the handles for more of a challenge.

These are just a couple of ideas to give you an understanding of being strong with a purpose. You can lift weights, do bodyweight and run on a treadmill but there's something about training or working with your hands and training the body in a very old school fashion. Be more old school and you'll learn about strength beyond the muscles and beyond the typical gym training.

Train like a workman and find out what real strength looks like.