The Ability To Train Harder Using Hill Sprints

 When I was growing up in California, I was more of a baseball fan and basketball fan watching the likes of Barry Bonds & The San Francisco Giants (Had an opportunity to go to Candlestick Park several times) and Michael Jordan with the Chicago Bulls dominating the NBA for years. I wasn't a big fan of football but I did grow up watching the 49ers and watching the duo of Steve Young & Jerry Rice. I didn't understand conditioning and working out until I was in my teens and early 20's and how sports guys trained but once I understood it, I had a much higher respect for their craft and determination.

Jerry Rice will always be the GOAT of Wide Receivers but what made him remarkable and be able to last as long as he did starting in the 80's and ending his career in the 2000's was his conditioning, specifically hill sprints. Seeing footage of him running hills is just awesome. Hill Sprints is a simple but tough as hell form of exercise that not only burns fat faster than practically any other method but also has some great safety benefits as well: It helps avoid shin splints, reduce the risk of ankle and/or knee injuries and even saves you from pulling a hammy. If this kind of training can help even the greatest catcher in NFL History have a long career, why wouldn't it help you live a healthy life?

It doesn't cost you a damn thing to do Hill Sprints, it doesn't require any special equipment and it keeps your metabolism firing so freaking much that even after a workout you're not only revving it up in to the stratosphere but also burn tons of calories. Because they're hard to do in the first place, they build that mental toughness that helps you stay in the game not just in sports but in life as well. It builds confidence because when you can go hard on a hill and do it with that fighting spirit, it'll carry over to other areas of your life.

Now should sprints be the only workout you do? That depends on your goals but for the most part, they aught to be an addition to your regimen because they can help you develop insane levels of conditioning and explosive strength that in other workouts, it might feel easier to get through. One day after doing sprints, I put myself through a 30 min superset of Sandbell Carrying & Step Ups and it not only felt easy, I felt like I can go another 30 just for good measure. My stamina was just off the chain I couldn't believe it. 

Be smart and be sure to check with a doc to see if you're healthy enough. If you have the ability to do so, start with 4 sprints in the beginning for no more than 30 seconds and don't worry if you can't go full speed yet, just go at a pace for those 10-30 seconds that gets you out of breath. As you progress, picture being able to able to sprint like Jerry Rice, Rocky or Walter Payton, picture them as if they're cheering you on and telling you that YOU GOT THIS!!!

The P.A.C.E Method

Sprinting Hills To Make Fat Scream Like The Wicked Witch Of The West

 Warmth is in the air and it's getting nicer out by the day. Been in the 70's and 80's here the last few days and it feels like summer. Feeling incredible at 100% again, I started changing up my training to doing Sprints. Have only done 3 sessions so far starting back on Thor's Day. Sprinted on a hill about a 10-12 min walk from my house and ran 4 10 Second Sprints. 

Hill Sprinting was a favorite of mine back when I was living in Santa Cruz, CA and off and on for the last 10 years up here I would do them (been about 3 years or so since I've done them). I figured since I might want to drop a bit more weight and get rid of some body fat, nothing will do that better than Sprints. I love to train and do things that some of the greatest legendary sports heroes have done. Walter Payton is definitely at the top of the list as one of the greatest hill sprinters ever. 

The training is so damn simple and nothing beats simplistic training. Want to be explosive, sprint; want greater speed and burn fat like like a furnace? You Sprint. If you can't sprint, do something that you can give your all fast for 8-30 seconds. Go hard and slack off for 2-3 minutes than you repeat it a few times, how awesome is that?

What if it was so simple to burn unwanted fat in such a short amount of time that the fat is melting like the Wicked Witch Of The West right before your eyes. Be able to crank up your metabolism and burn calories during and long after a workout. Not only that but you don't need to do it more than 3 times a week. Start out by getting a feel for sprinting, you don't need to go 100% full speed, just enough to get out of breath. Just doing a few of them is more than enough for most people and the most you'll ever really need to do is about 10 bursts if that. Build up and little by little add time to your sprints and max out at 30 seconds because let's face it, even the greatest sprinters on the planet wouldn't last more than 30 seconds without slowly down at their highest peak of speed. 

Be smart about your training and get that beach body ready. Eat good and drink plenty of water.  

I Am Ready

 It has now been just a tick shy of two weeks since the accident and it has been a crazy road healing both physically and mentally. Slowly getting myself back to feeling like me again and seeing a chiropractor for adjustments and such. I have been eager to get back to doing my sandbell carries, kettlebell exercises and throw in some hammer work since it's nice out this time of the year. 

Yesterday was the day that felt made all of the difference in how I felt before and everything from my mind to my body telling me that I' am ready and I feel like me again. I went to a park nearby and just get in some animal movements along the grass, rest as long as needed and not try to kill myself. After a while, something within me decided to add in some sprints which I haven't done in a long time but I figured what the hell. Ended up doing 4 sprints from one end of the park to the other, walked slowly after each sprint back and took my time and as a finisher, I did some hanging exercises on the Monkey Bars to stretch and elongate the spine.

I jus felt incredibly happy and I wasn't in pain or any discomfort. Had an adjustment that same day about an hour or so after the workout. I talked to my chiropractor about what I did and how I felt, also told him how ready I was to get back into using the weights (sandbells mostly). I told him what size weights I had and planned on what to do with them and all he said was to keep it light for another week and see how they feel like the heaviest I can do is the 20 lb sandbell which is perfect for me to start with. The only thing not to told me not to do was to lay off the bridging for a little longer which is easy for me to do since I don't plan on doing bridges for at least a couple more weeks.

It's a continuous journey and my healing has come a long way but I feel like me again and I'm incredibly excited to train the way I want to again. When you're determined to do something, you keep that fire and passion within. Do everything you can to make things happen and little by little things will become bigger. Be strong and don't ever give up on what you love and what possibilities you can create to make an impact not only on yourself but others around you. 

Healing In Progress

 Since my last article, the healing process from our accident is coming along pretty well. My wife is just now starting to show some bruising and it's hard for her to take a deep breath at times but she's fighting the best way she can and I do everything I can to help her so she doesn't strain herself. For me, I'm very close to being 100% again, just a bit longer and I'll be back to doing my crazy workouts. We're both seeing a chiropractor whom I've got work done on before and I trust him and he's done a hell of a job with our adjustments.

My training has shifted a little more when I added in DDP Yoga the first few days and when it came to Isometrics, I was holding various positions for 1 minute each. I shifted back to the 6-12 second Iso Contractions and added in Hanging to my rehab training. The hanging has helped immensely, doing sets of different hanging positions and stretching the muscles while building strength in the tendons in my forearms along with building shoulder flexibility. I've also done a couple 30 min workouts with just the step ups at 12 reps per leg per set non stop. 

I still can't do the weights I normally use in my workouts (sandbells, kettlebells, hammers) for a bit longer (not that I'm tempted because of how I feel) but because even one tweak can set me back, I need to stick with bodyweight and isometrics. To test myself to see what I can do again, yesterday I did a 10 min non stop superset of Bear Crawling 40ft and 20 Step Ups (10 per leg) as many times as I could and afterwards, did various hanging exercises. It felt great and I didn't feel pain or discomfort, some tension yes but neither the first two.

The one workout that I've kept consistent with every single day since this thing happened is my mobility routine which consists of Neck Exercises in a slow fashion that doesn't use tension and focuses on breathing and dynamic flexibility, circulating the shoulders in three different exercises, working the wrists and forearms, rotating the waist, side bends, rotating the pelvis, tai chi waist turner, standing leg lifts, hip rotations, hamstring flexibility, 2 different knee rotation exercises, 2 ankle rotation exercises and calf raises. This workout hits the body everywhere and it's all from standing. It takes roughly 20-30 minutes to complete and it feels nothing short of amazing afterwards. 

Injuries are a part of life and the best thing we can do is doing what's possible to get back to our full strength. Some don't ever come back because of severe injuries that can be life threatening but do what you can and don't take life for granted. Take care of each other and be there for the ones you love when you can. 

Sometimes The Universe Prevents You From Going On Vacation

 Life throws curveballs at you and you never know when they'll hit you. For me and my wife, that curveball hit us hard. We were on our way to the Oregon Coast on Saturday for our 2 Year Anniversary and about 90 minutes into the trip, we had a car accident that totaled our car. I don't want to go into too many details but we did sustain some injuries; she had bruising on her chest and ribcage and I ended up with Whiplash, tearing some muscles along the left shoulder and a injured my Rotator Cuff. 

Scary couldn't even begin to be an understatement as we were really shaking up and there were 3 cars total (including ours) involved and one person went to the hospital for precaution. Last year for our 1st, Covid prevented us mainly but this time, it just wasn't meant to be. I'm just glad we are both safe and not severely damaged physically. The man who went to the hospital, I believe he'll pull through and has a full recovery. The first couple days were mainly getting over the shock of everything. We went to an urgent care the day of the accident and quite frankly, I didn't get a good vibe from the doctor and barely even looked at me and put me on a mild dose of muscle relaxers. The wife was to take ant-inflammatory. 

We decided to go to a chiropractor and that's when I found out there were tears in my muscles (mainly along the scapula and just below the neck line). Luckily my spine was still good. I'm going to be off some resistance training for a while (kettlebells, sandbells, hammers ect.) and was basically told to take it easy and stick with light stretching, yoga and joint loosening. I felt that when it came to that, do Neck Chi Gong, DDP Yoga, Aerobic Isometrics and my mobility training. Also needed to take Ibuprofen & Tylenol to help with the inflammation so it dies down and helps the healing process. My wife does need more work done due to also having a knotted up back and shoulders when it comes to adjustments. 

We ended up spending the rest of our anniversary vacation recovering and taking time to heal. We took care of each other and as much as it sucks, I'm doing my best not to shoot for the typical workouts I do and help my girl with stretches and keeping things mobile so things flow better. I feel so blessed to be in the shape I'm in and for the most part, the way accident happened, if there was even a second or more, the car that we collided with could've hit the the passenger side completely (where I sat) but ended up hitting the front end around my side. All that mattered to me during the shock was if my wife and all those that were involved were ok, I didn't give a damn about me.

Tragedy comes with lessons and we learn and find out who we really are in the midst of it. All we cared about was making sure we were all safe and coming together as a couple. Being overly emotional was bound to happen and being there for each other. Learn to love one another and we all know accidents happen and doing our best to come out of it alive. We are both healing the best way we can and taking it one day at a time. Real strength comes from how you react from suffering and having the courage to keep fighting no matter how small or big it is. 

Keep it up everyone and don't take anything for granted. We get only this one life.