Putting The "Free" In Freedom Of Exercise

 From a training perspective, spending time on it should be the only thing that costs you but alas the reality is, in order to train successfully, it does cost some dough if you want to learn from the best. However, investing in a course that gives you the real freedom to move and do some cool stuff is as great as you can get. That doesn't mean the quality of a course is equal to the investment you put in. 

When you research and find top quality information, it's important to be vigilant in how you proceed with that investment. If you're looking for top quality courses on a budget, check out my Fitness Courses For Under $10 article for some bad ass info that doesn't cost you an arm and a leg. Now, if you got enough saved up to where you're looking for long term training that keeps going without having to invest more than you need to, this is where it can get interesting. I've invested in many courses over the years and at this point, very few utilize the best quality of not just exercises and routines but how to apply them outside of their given program. 

I firmly believe whatever you choose to invest in, make the most of it if possible otherwise you spent your hard earned money on something that looks promising but is pure shit. Think about this for a second, there are books out there that costs on average of 35-250 dollars for a KINDLE on only training specific body parts or specific exercises at a time like one for squats, one for push-ups, one on pull-ups, one on just calisthenics alone and one on jump roping. Don't get me started on the paperbacks or hardcovers, it's ridiculous. The cost effectiveness isn't really there for somebody even if they're willing to put in the work, you might as well take out a mortgage to pay for all that. The guy selling them is also kind of what you call skinny fat, he "can" do these things but has a look that is relatively unappealing and some of the time looks like a hobo with fancy shades on. 

When it comes to cost effective and long term programming, I have found that very few can match the likes of Vahva Fitness. It's one of the best quality of training information around today. Once you buy a program, it's there for life and doesn't require much if at all to pay for more when they do addons with that specific program. Movement 20XX for example shows you how to progressively get better at various movements using nothing more than your own bodyweight. It has calisthenics, it has animal style movements, it has isometric type training and teaches you how to tie them all in together inside of one program. You get flow routines, animal movements you can do exclusively, push-up training to build up to levels of crawling, flexibility training, monthly workout routines and a hell of a lot more. This is all you can have with the cost of a one year membership to a typical gym. This alone would set you pretty much for life when it comes to bodyweight training.

Warrior 20XX is a course that creates more specific routines based on the type of goals you're looking for (Strength, Fat Burning, Muscle Density and others). You get to pick and choose whether to train 2x a week or more if you wish and learn exercises for specific body parts to train. It isn't the same as bodybuilding or purely "isolated" movements, everything comes into play but you target certain muscles more than others which can strengthen your weak points to create a complete physique. You can choose to do bodyweight, use a dumbbell or a kettlebell to do the exercises and routines, you can even create your own workouts once you mastered the basics and progressions. Along with all that, there are Bonus Routines with exercises and minimal equipment not shown in the main program which doesn't cost you a thing to learn. 

Athlete 20XX is just about as bad ass as you can get when it comes to specific training for conditioning and sports specific type training for beginners, intermediate and advanced routines. It goes into phases to give you the best progressions possible without the wear and tear on your joints and utilize the quality of speed, strength, mobility, performance and more. It focus on keeping the core tight to be most efficient with the exercises you are performing. 

Just one of these individually can do wonders for your health, fitness and physique. The guy who does all of these programs is not only fit like a Greek god but can go and has stupid conditioning and long term strength. One of the bonus routines he does is taken from a wrestling workout from Finland that has conditioned the very best athletes of that country. If you want to save more in the long run, getting all three programs is the best option. It may seem expensive but if you look at it from a perspective, that cost is a lifetime guarantee. They truly give you the freedom of training as you can create your own programs using one or all three throughout the week, one for one week, one for another or mesh-up anyway you see fit. Make it your own and build your own style. Learn new exercises as they come up and never have to worry about monthly fees or annual fees that can hinder your finances. 

Remember about the cost of the kindle books I mentioned earlier? The same guy that sells them, also has a "forum" or "membership program that costs around 1200 bucks annually, for a 5 year term, that's around 6000 out of your pocket. If you get all 3 Vahva Fitness courses, that's it, you don't need to pay more than what you're getting and be set for life, once again, no annual fees. Check it out for yourself, believe me when I tell you, these are a hell of a better investment than most and as a practitioner of Movement 20XX, you can learn some of the best movements on the planet and find your creative side that builds you flexibility in your spine, easy or hard beastly moves that take your strength to another level and create flows that tackle your conditioning to its very core without counting reps or sets. 

Be free to make your own style and invest in YOU without any financial burdens later on. Be amazingly awesome and move with grace, power and athletically strong. 

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Lost Empire Herb Of The Day: Rhodiola 

Do We Have To Do Pulling Exercises To Develop The Back? Or Is It A Myth?

We HAVE to do Pull-Ups & Rows to build the back right? Is it actually a myth? A lot of the framework for developing the body and understanding how it's developed usually is from Bodybuilding and Exercise Science. Now Bodybuilding training has its place to an extent (look to the old timers when I mean this) for targeting weak points and as a form of building size and strength, it isn't the Babe Ruth of developing the our bodies.

We have taught that pulling exercises are the only things that build the back. Not necessarily true. Afterall, if you don't do Pull-ups and Rows, you'll develop imbalances and weakness in that area right? Pull-ups are a great exercise and their variations along with rows ranging from weights to bands work really well but it doesn't always have to be conventional to get the back going. Think of people who have incredibly developed backs like those in Yoga, Dance and even Qi Gong. Many of these people don't even do pull-ups almost at all yet some of their development is just jaw dropping, traps and all. How can that be?

Working with weights aren't the only things that stimulate the muscles. Contracting and utilize tension or TUT, you can stimulate the muscles to a great degree. That's where something like Athlete 20XX can come into play, it's another look at how to utilize the mind/muscle connection. Qi Gong is another example that has helped developed muscle whether practicing soft or hard Qi Gong. It has many exercise that hit the upper back and rear delts. Matter of fact, if you pay attention, there can be better developed natural muscle stimulation than from poorly executed weight training movements. 

Some Yogis have some bad ass development because of the practice of building that posture from spending a lot of time on the mats. They're structured and controlled. A lot of people take their eye off the ball in the sense where the back muscles are more than used than just to Pull & Row. The big picture of the functioning muscles is the stimulation of the Shoulder Girdle & Stabilization of the Spine. You can build some solid development in the back from doing Push-ups or even Push-ups held in Isometric fashion because it puts a lot of emphasis on the shoulders and spine which also connects to stabilizing the Core Muscles. It may sound contradictory because these are pushing exercises but the principle still applies here.

Animal Style Movements train the back and spine to a really high degree. Think about it, the scapula is in constant motion and your spine is working like crazy in order to stabilize you in various postures or awkward positions. The muscles in the middle back are the (no pun intended) backbone when it comes to being engaged in order to hold the scapula in place or stabilizing as well as needing to move the scapula in different directions.

The low back or in this case the Spinal Erectors are worked big time throughout the Animal Moves as well along with static holds and various postures in Qi Gong. As you can see, you don't need to do a ton of deadlifting, pull-ups or row in order to experience the benefit of a powerful back. 

Where the hell is this really going? Am I putting down Pull-ups and such? Fuck no. Pull-ups are awesome in their own right and have variations that work the back like a charm along with bad ass Isometric Holds that help with the weak areas of the exercise, but they're not the king, no matter how much of a hard on some dude has for Pull-ups. I want to give people the opportunity to see how they can develop themselves without always looking to the conventional ways. 

Athlete 20XX takes you to different level of understanding the ancient form of the mind/muscle connection and learning the aspects of stabilizing by mastering the mechanics. 

Have fun, learn new and exciting ways to train your body and keep being amazingly awesome.

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In The Words Of Karl Gotch Regarding Bodyweight Training And The Evolution Of Animal Movement Training

"Go back to nature and you'll find that animals in the wild are in the greatest of shape because they use their own bodyweight and stretching." That's what the old man said in Conditioning For Combat Sports as he narrates while his student Tom Puckett demonstrates the squats, jumpers and rope skipping. Although he preferred conditioning exercises from the wrestlers in the Middle East, it still doesn't take away how profound his words were to how animals are as strong, conditioned and powerful as they are. 

The profound impact knowing that the greatest teacher when it comes to natural exercise is nature itself. After studying and training on the teachings of Gotch and those that came after, it become an evolutionary transition from the pushups, squats, bridges, handstands and pulling exercises to the animal movements that have shaped my philosophy on fitness and it's history through physical application. It wasn't about moving away 100% from those exercises I learned at first but to generate interest and going down a path that led me to my all time favorite form of training. 

Sometimes words in a complete sentence are more than just letters put together or phrasing something that is simple. What I took from Gotch's words after really hearing them and interpretating them to my own goals and journey, it became clear that this is what I was meant to learn. I didn't really get into the animal stuff till I was 23-24 which was around 2008 and getting Ed Baran's Animal Kingdom Conditioning course at the time. This gave me the foundation for what these last 14 years of doing this specific style of training. Sure I did other things along the way and always experimenting but animal movement always pulls me back in and I can't help but do it. 

The more I got sucked into the physicality of animal moves, the more I wanted to learn from other places and how they interpret this style of fitness. Some of it is weird and some seemed like a rip off or taking one thing and morphing it into something else but the one place that takes those exercises and shaped them into an all-around athletic endeavor was Vahva Fitness. Eero Westerberg & Samuli T. Jyrkinen have taken bits and pieces of some of the very best teachings and molded them into their style that just keeps evolving. When you learn the true aspects of the course Movement 20XX there are similarities with the style of Animal Flow, Gold Medal Bodies, Primal Movement, MovNat but Vahva took them and shaped them to create something beautiful and incredible to watch and learn. 

Eero is a Finnish Trainer that's roughly in his 30's I believe. Although young and has a model type look, his enthusiasm and incredible athleticism is just unbelievable and can move with such power yet limberness. He's a poster boy for the current ideas on animal movement training but I say that with great sincerity. He can do some incredible things and have learned quite a bit from him by observing and testing out his style of training. Some of it is way to advanced for me and can't jump even 20% of what he can do (100% chance knowing that we're about 60-80 lbs apart and our way of moving is different) but I take in what he teaches and experiment with my knowledge and physicality. He utilizes old school methods in a modern setting that blends the two worlds together. 

Like him, I've taken bits and pieces of things and shaped them to my goals and have done pretty well with them. Is he the end-all-be-all? Hell no, nobody is but I love his passion for this stuff and continues to work hard on making the most of what the human body is capable of doing. Of course not everyone is able to move like him or be able to do everything he's capable of, fuck I wish I had half of his ability and I'd be happy but we all come in different shapes and sizes, move and train differently and go at different speeds of progression. As we age, we may not even move 65-70% of what we use to do but we can make a difference in how we shape ourselves physically and mentally. Train in ways that aren't the norm and explore our capabilities without risking our health. 

The quote in the first sentence of this article for me has evolved to exploring my body in ways I wasn't doing even in my teens and my 20's. At 38, I'm finding more and more ways to move like a beast in the wild or even format my own flexibility and agility. I'm losing weight, gaining strength through awkward movements, progressing little by little with my coordination and everyday is a chance to have fun and play. From a fitness stand point, there's no way of knowing what will happen and what will come next. All I know is, there's a whole universe to explore and the road just keeps going on.  

Be strong, get wild and be amazingly awesome. 

Turning Imagination Into Reality

Throughout history, creativity has been a cornerstone for what has become civilization and the people that have made things happen, from the pyramids to Mickey Mouse, creativity and vision became a reality. As humans we have built monolithic structures, ruled and conquered civilizations, made sportsmen warriors, became heroes in battle and we used our minds and our imagination to create theme parks that started with a cartoon character. 

Throughout all of this, we have also tackled areas of physical fitness that have stood the test of time. From weightlifting to yoga, bodyweight conditioning, sports training and bodybuilding. All of these have turned men and women into athletic specimens. Now granted some areas of fitness have been lost or have changed gears due to decades of practice, trial and error and the formation of scientific inquiries and studies, we still use creativity to utilize what has been done and make it greater or more interesting.

Primal Training isn't a new concept, it's been around a while but in recent years, we have taken movements based on Animals & Gymnastics to create formulas of incredible athleticism and conditioning programming. From MMA Fighters to everyday Joe's, doing Primal Movements is a powerful idea that shows amazing creativity. The Flow, the Sequences, the coordination and the strength & agility is just phenomenal to watch. Once you understand the movements and practice the transitions, you can come up with some crazy athletic moves that are just phenomenal. Sticking to the basics is key, but never underestimate the power of imagination and creating your own style to create your reality.

Some movements are not for everyone especially those who have severe injuries but the majority can do some awesome stuff with the right tools to cater to their individual needs. It's that evolutionary need to move the way we were meant to and conquer our own selves in order to become the best version of our selves. Move like you were a young kid, become Athletic using building blocks that help reduce injuries and develop that Warrior from within to become the best YOU. Training can be fun and exciting the way it should be and learn things about yourself through physical movement that showcases what the human body is capable of. 

Turn your imagination into reality and get creative in your fitness endeavors. Don't ever let yourself get bored and do kick ass workouts that keeps you strong and healthy well into your golden years. Feel the fire in your veins whether you're 25 or 75 and bring something to life that makes you feel like you can do anything. Be strong, move with vim and vigor and be amazingly awesome.