Being Sore Doesn’t Mean You Get A Day Off

           Training is apart of life no matter what. It takes guts to keep going day after day, week after week, and year after year but in the end its all how you make it be. People assume because you’re sore you overdid it and you need a break when in reality that’s where the fun begins. You've worked out hard and you wake up the next day and you’re aching what do you do? You can either rest or not do any type of training or you can adjust and focus on something else to train on till you’re fully recovered.

            The late Karl Gotch once said “you must adapt and improvise” and what does he mean by this? From my point of view and personal experiences, you learn to adjust your training by how you feel and how you can switch things around. In this case of being sore, you don’t have to go hardcore but you can change things up like for example…Say you exercised with a deck of cards and all you did was push-ups and squats, you’re very sore the next day from going through that whole deck, instead of moaning and bitching just do a little bit of stretching and work on little exercises throughout the day to keep your blood flowing and keeping the body loose while you recover.

            You can always do something. I've seen a lot of guys in the gym who go all out one day and the next they don’t show up because they’re sore, give me a break. I've also seen other guys who have pushed to their limits and the next day came back looking to do something else to help them recover. Taking a break from your regular routine is a good thing but it doesn't mean you’re out of the woods. Focus on something that keeps you active, ride your bike if you have one, take a nice walk around the neighborhood, do some deep breathing to open up the lungs and work on other muscles and tendons that didn't get worked. Have a little fun with it. Go out and move like a wild animal even if it’s a few steps, juggle kettlebells who knows, make something work for you till you’re ready to go full blast again.

            Recovery is very important, there’s no question about that. Sure you get it that muscles get torn down and need some down time but its also important to stay active, keep on your toes, keep your blood flowing, your body is like a machine and can go more than you can expect. Your body will heal itself and the better shape you’re in; the more you can keep active without being so sore. Keep that in mind and rest if you need to but don’t just lay around like a chump, do something that makes you happy, have fun and get in the habit of improvising your exercise. Be smart, train hard and keep at it. 

A New Age Of Vampires

 In the old books of the Creature Of The Night, we have romanticized it’s characteristics, it’s strengths, weaknesses, it’s funny side and even it’s very much larger darker side but let’s not forget how we as a culture come to love and hate vampires. We all know the tales of blood, immortality, fear and the biggest name of them all Dracula. What if we took these old tales and turned them into something that is what we crave for centuries; a longer life, having super human strength & speed and the ability to have a high dose of great emotional power.

 Certain vampires you’ve seen in the movies and comics are different and either funny as hell or as dark as you can get. From Boris Koloff to Edward Pattinson, we have loved and loathed the idea of what it is to be a Vampire. Personally I prefer the Warriors of vampirism such as Blade and Kate Beckinsale’s character in the Underworld saga but this generation prefers the Twilight and True Blood types. We all have our likes and dislikes to Vampires but the truth of the matter is, we can use those capacities to become a stronger and healthier human being. We can become a much stronger human with the right tools and resources and not resort to taking shortcuts and making ourselves weaker as we age. Sure we won’t have the unlimited power of age compared to a Vampire but we can use methods to live longer, be stronger and have vitality beyond the average human.

 When I talk about Vampires I’m not talking about dressing up in gothic crazy costumes or having night clubs devoted to a cult, that’s for children and demented overzealous freak shows; what I’am talking about however is the ability to look outside the box and look to ways in the fitness world where knowledge for strength, speed, energy, flexibility and building a body that you can be proud helps bring life to what you want out of it. Does that make a freak in some way? Hell yes it does and I’m proud of it and I love being to learn how to keep my life the way I want it to be and move forward with it.

 Vampires have strength and energy beyond our own imaginations so how do we apply that notion for ourselves. We certainly do not need to suck someone’s blood for a life continuing capacity but we can keep our bodies fresh and ready to go by using small effective exercises and build our hormones naturally so we can look younger and have the strength of a wild animal. It’s something we can look at from a different perspective as a nation that has become accustomed to the growing disease of obesity. Being unhealthy isn’t a good thing no matter how you slice it, it eats your life away and you are just sucking energy just to even get off the couch and that’s sad.

 Do you want to have a life where you can energy that can go on for hours on end, have the strength to help others and what about being able to move pain-free and not have aching backs and busted knees? You can create the life you want, all you got to do is take one step in the beginning to start and build yourself up whether physically, mentally or emotionally, if you don’t move, you’re stuck in the same place. Remember that.

 The ability to move with grace, power and super human speed takes practice but at the same time, practicing with mindful intentions creates an even bigger place of building great strength and power in ways you can’t imagine unless you've experienced it. Certain things don’t just happen overnight, most people can’t get the concept of that because they want more than what’s already been given to them and than they want more than that. It takes time and patience. Think of a Vampire who has lived for a couple hundred years, don’t you think he’s learned patience and in that period of time? I’d like to think so in some cases, if he/she can live that long I believe you don’t have an excuse for something you wish to have at this very moment. It’s like saving money, you put a little in your account every now and then and before you know it, you have quite a bit of money built up, same thing with building a body and creating strength and agility, takes time and before you know it you’re far stronger and more energetic than when you started.

 Unlike a Vampire, you don’t need a thirst for blood, you should however learn to have a thirst for exercise, not to the point like a crack addict but using it to keep your energy levels up for things you need to do throughout the day like your job, taking care of kids, being energetic at a gathering, in the office writing up reports or delivering mail. It’s all about consistent action and reminding yourself that you don’t need a gym or a trainer to get you awesome shape, you can learn to do it yourself and save your money for the things you need in life. The only person that makes your life complicated is you and you can either keep running with the flow, or you can make something of yourself and be happier, live longer, have great strength and be able to handle things even your friends couldn’t do. Make it happen and learn from the Vampires. They’re not as messed up or dark as you might think.

How To Get Out Of Breathe Fast & How That Can Help Your Fitness

When we workout we feel that we need an hour and a half in the gym in order to get our blood pumping and our muscles jacked up. What if we can reduced that by not just a great percentage but even drop the timing to less then 10 min. Not only can your workout be incredible and challenging but you will be building muscle and creating natural human growth hormone at the same time. My 2 Favorite ways of doing this is to pick 4-5 different animal exercises and hammer them each for 30 seconds then repeat the sequance about 2-3 times. Another favorite is running hill sprints. Doing these can amp up your conditioning to levels unimaginable. You only need a hill thats about 50-70 yards long and need to do only 4-8 sets. Now for each sprint do you need to go at 100%? No just a good percentage say 25-35%. Each time you sprint try to go a little further each set. For rest just walk back down to the bottom of the hill slowly. For the Animal Circuits take a small break to catch your breath then get back to it. Hill Sprints are needed only 2-3 times a week because of the recovery periods needed in order to let your body build back up from really hard training. If you don't have hills then run sprints on a field. Adapt to what you can do and take your conditioning to the top.