In This Issue:
– Robertson Training Systems Updates
– Training Tip
– Nutrition Tip
– Exclusive Interview: Zach Even Esh
– Surpise Interview: Alan Aragon
– Upcoming Interviews
– New Articles
– Schedule
Robertson Training Systems Updates:
The BIG Annoucement
The 2008 Indianapolis Performance Enhancement Seminar is set!
Here are the nitty gritty details:
When: Saturday, May 17th, 9 a.m. – 6 p.m.
Where: Omni Severtin Hotel, Downtown Indianapolis
Cost: $129 Before April 1st; $159 April 1st and after
For those of you looking for NSCA CEU’s, we’ve applied for .7 NSCA CEU’s for this event!
Bill Hartman and I will be heading up this seminar, and I think we’ve got some great topics at hand. Below, I’ve attached links for the official seminar flier and itinerary:
I’ve received a ton of feedback from people who wanted to attend my Aussie seminars, but there were obvious issues regarding the commute! As well, I think Bill has some great material to talk about that’s really going to change the way we look at assessments and flexibility training.
If you’re interested in signing up, below is the link below to register. We look forward to seeing you in May!
Training Tip:
Learn how to deload!
As a newbie, you can see consistent progress from session to session. It’s awesome because every time you hit the gym, you’re adding weight to your squat, bench, deadlift, or just about any other exercise you train consistently!
But we all know that as we grow into our bodies and become more efficient, we incur more fatigue and planned time off becomes a necessity. For younger athletes, every 5-6 weeks is generally more than enough. For more advanced athletes you may need to deload every 3-4 weeks.
If you’d like to learn more about multiple types of deloading protocols, check out Eric Cressey’s new e-report, The Art of the Deload.
Nutrition Tip:
A Great New Meal
by Mike Roussell
A week or so ago Wegmans’ (my local grocery store) started carrying beet greens – I’m addicted.
These beet greens come triple washed, bagged, and ready to go. The convenience is very high. They are a great substitute for spinach as well (aren’t I always preaching about dietary variety?). Here’s what I do – this takes less than 5 minutes in the morning.
1 – Get Out 2 Containers.
2 – Split one bag of beet greens between the two containers.
3 – Sprinkle on some chopped walnuts
4 – Add a pre-cooked chicken breast (cooked earlier in the week)
That’s it!
I’ll have a piece of fruit with these meals as well. When it is time to eat I pop a container in the microwave for 1 minute to “steam” the greens. When they are done I add olive oil, sea salt, and fresh cracked pepper (all of which are in my desk in my office).
Done. Delicious, Healthy, and Quick.
Could you ask for anything more?
If you like this tip and want to learn more about Mike and his products, check out his Naked Nutrition website.
Exclusive Interview: Zach Even Esh
MR: Zach, it’s great to have you back on the newsletter for an interview! For those who may have missed you the first time around, please introduce yourself.
ZEE: Thanks Mike. I’m a Strength Coach located in Edison, NJ. I primarily work with combative athletes of all ages. I have wrestlers training at my gym as young as 10 yrs. old and Judo, BJJ and MMA fighters who are in their 40’s. I also train a lot of Football players at my gym.
MR: You’ve been doing the strength coaching thing for a while now; what originally drew you into the field?
ZEE: I have been strength training since age 13, and I was always drawn to the older style of training. I would read the Arnold Schwarzenegger Encyclopedia of Modern Bodybuilding every night, well past midnight, over and over again. I was inspired by the black and white pics, the camaraderie, the rugged physiques and the huge poundages they were all lifting. I still have my original copy which my Grandfather actually bought for my older brother while we were in Israel. That was actually before I was 13 and my brother was into lifting! Yes, that was over 20 years ago!!!
My involvement in training never lessened, it only grew. In high school I wrestled but I always wanted to get to the gym. Problem was, I loved working out more than wrestling, so I would cut school to go to the gym and then still have time for the wrestling club in the evening. I made sure I tracked my days of “cutting” to not go over the 12 allotted absences. No, I do not recommend this to your young readers, but I was obviously an addict, and I still am!
MR: Bill Hartman and I were working on some materials one day, and he showed me some pictures of your gym. I’m a sucker for cool gyms – could you tell the readers all the cool toys you have in there?
ZEE: Believe it or not, much of what is in my commercial gym was in my 2 car garage. Lots and lots of this stuff was either made or snagged from E Bay. People think you need fancy equipment and beautiful machinery, but this is not so. My equipment doesn’t even match! I have white, bronze, black, red, silver and who knows what other colors! It’s not pretty, but I didn’t want pretty, I wanted old school. The set up, look and feel of the gym promotes an atmosphere unlike any other which promotes intensity in training.
Our stereo is always pumping, it makes it difficult for the athletes to talk and carry on conversations or pussy foot around. The focus is training.
We have one power rack from EFS, a half rack from Sorinex, dumbbells up to 150 lbs, over 30 Russian Kettlebells, sandbags up to 130 lbs, battling ropes, climbing ropes, 7 or 8 sleds, 1 prowler, 3 tractor tires, 4 sledge hammers up to 16 lbs, many grip training tools, many thick bars of all sorts, log bars, swiss bars, various curl bars, glute ham developer, 45 degree back raise, d balls and med balls, various pull up bars and handles, various shapes and sizes of stones, foam rollers, stability balls and probably a few other things I am forgetting about as well ?
MR: That’s a really sweet place you have man. I’m jealous!
What kinds of things have you been implementing into your programming in the last year with great success? Anything new or exciting?
ZEE: I am very intuitive and focused on listening to and reading signs of my athletes so I can change the intensity of the workout and deload or train intensely at the right times. Jason Ferruggia turned me on to this concept of REALLY listening to your athletes and taking into account the endless stressors young athletes may endure from day to day – school, family, friends, girlfriends, boyfriends, athletics, etc. – all of these can affect the athlete differently from day to day and must be taken into account.
Our program will have a pre-determined time to deload, but I’m always ready to change on the fly according to the signs and symptoms mentioned above. Too many people are set in stone and do not want to deload or train hard unless the calendar says so. This is the difference between the real world and what science states.
Not everyone reacts the same to a stimuli and this means being ready to change things as necessary, on the fly.
MR: The following question is from one of our readers:
A few months ago I purchased your Grip Experts ebook. I’m a physical therapist who works a lot with my hands doing deep tissue myofascial release on my patients and at the time I had been having a lot of finger joint, forearm and elbow pain.
Just by incorporating some of the grip exercises into my workouts (particularly plate pinches), I have seen phenomenal results in decreased pain after long work weeks. One of my weak areas that persists is my thumb joints as I seem to rely too much on them for some of the ‘release’ work I’m doing on patients.
My question is: would you have any particular suggestions for someone like myself of specific grip strengthening ex’s, specifically for the thumb joint to avoid eventual arthritic breakdown?
Kevin, thanks for the kind words on The Grip Experts e book (GripExperts.com) and the great question.
One point to be made is showing that because your hands are stronger, they are now healthier. One movement I would look into is using rubber bands around your fingers and opening them to work the finger extensors. Your thumb and fingers are always being flexed so you are working on one movement over and over which as you know can lead to an overuse injury. You can buy thick rubber bands from a office depot or go to the source at Iron Mind, and here is the direct link:
http://www6.mailordercentral.com/ironmind/products.asp?dept=31
MR: Zach, if you could give three traits in the successful athletes you’ve worked with, what would they be?
ZEE: Mental toughness, consistency and the powerful belief in themselves that they will succeed and be the best no matter what. I have had a few wrestlers here who believed no one could or would beat them and this had a HUGE connection physiologically. When the mind TRULY believes it has a huge carry over to how the body will perform. Even in the worst situations, I’ve seen these kids losing badly and at a point where most kids would give up, but these kids came back and pinned or did something that got them back in the match for the win. This is a rare, rare trait!
MR: Ok, last question and I ask everyone this at the end of the interview. What was one mistake that you’ve made during your coaching career? And along those same lines, what did you do later on to fix it?
ZEE: Probably this would be my lack of knowledge in the prehab / rehab area. Once we started doing simple things such as foam rolling on a regular basis our athletes began to reduce injuries, aches and pains dramatically. This is also why I have invested in your products and of course, as you know, I have e mailed you and Bill Hartman regularly regarding my own injuries and the injuries of my athletes. We are lucky to have a circle of friends who can e mail and call one another regularly to exchange ideas and ask questions. I am no expert in every area so I refer my athletes to a great Chiropractor on a regular basis and do my best to keep kids healthy from day one as opposed to waiting for an injury to occur and then begin working on it. Now, we have fewer overuse injuries with our athletes.
On the training side, I make sure I rotate in and out our overhead pressing movements. I know that back in the day the guys did a lot of Olympic lifting and overhead presses and stayed healthy, but they also were very agile and mobile because they practiced gymnastics and various movements, where as today, kids play one sport from age 5 for endless years and there is no variety in their training. Because of this lack of movement variety we see more overuse injuries and the kids of today can not handle the regular overhead pressing, especially our wrestlers and baseball players.
I recommend all other Coaches to create a network as we have, where we are able to help one another and exchange information. It has been priceless in my learnings and has been the big reason why I have been very successful training athletes. I did not invent this stuff, I just pieced together all the best information I picked up from you and our friends in our network.
MR: Thanks for the kind words and I can’t agree more about developing a great network of professionals.
I know you’re busy, Zach, so thanks a ton for taking the time to be with us here today. Where can my readers learn more about you?
ZEE: Thanks Mike, I appreciate you believing in me and what I do to provide your readers with information. The best places to see my info is at http://ZachEven-Esh.com and http://UndergroundStrengthCoach.com.
I’m also a regular contributor to Men’s Fitness Magazine and TapOuT Magazine.
Surprise Interview: Alan Aragon
MR: Alan, first off, thanks a ton for being here today. If you would, please take a minute to introduce yourself to the audience.
AA: I design programs for people who want to either improve their physiques or their physical performance, or both. I have a private nutritional counseling practice in Southern CA, but I also do distance counseling online.
Thanks to having been ‘scouted out’ by Adam Campbell upon recommendation by Alwyn Cosgrove, I write a monthly column in Men’s Health magazine (Ask The Weight Loss Coach), and I’m also their nutrition/fitness research consultant.
I’m a continuing education provider for trainers (NSCA, NASM, ACE) and dietitians (CDR/ADA). I also write my own monthly nutrition/exercise research review for field professionals and enthusiasts who are more technically inclined.
On a more personal note, I’m a father of 2 young boys who kick my ass almost as hard as my wife does.
MR: Could you also give us a little bit of insight as to how and why you got in to the industry?
AA: I’ve always been into fitness & physique development as long as I can remember. Originally I wanted to be the world’s greatest personal trainer. Ages ago, when I found out what trainers could make for the relatively small amount of time & resources invested into a certification, it seemed like a win-win. I figured that I’d cover my bases and get an edge over my competition by being a trainer with a nutrition degree, so I got my BSc in dietetics while training clients to pay for it.
During this process, I came to find out that I was not only better at – but much more interested in the programming and counseling aspect of client care. So, I decided to pursue an MSc in nutrition. My fellow students filed off to dietetic internships to become RD’s, but for some reason I never felt the desire to go that route, opting instead to get my 2nd personal training certification (both were NASM certs under the old Tom Purvis regime) while finishing my graduate degree. I’ve since been fully immersed in program design, counseling, teaching, research and writing – all of which I thoroughly enjoy.
MR: Ok Alan, let’s get to the meat and potatoes here. Give us your one minute elevator speech on proper nutrition. What are people doing right/wrong?
AA: Let’s start with the wrong, that’s pretty easy to recall, and it’s and more extensive.
People are either way too obsessed with their diets to the point of absurd micromanagement, or they are way too lax and inconsistent about it to make continual progress. Also, people who have an intense interest in nutrition read a mix of the good stuff as well as the pseudoscientific crap, and end up with a mediocre knowledge base for application to either themselves, others, or both.
One of the bad things about having an intense but indiscriminate interest in nutrition is the tendency to latch onto gimmicky stuff that has no basis in science. If something is as basic as staying consistently in the ballpark of your macronutrient targets over time, it doesn’t necessarily grab people’s interest. Now, if you start talking about trivial factors like glycemic index, and degree of peptide hydrolysis, then people think it’s cool specialized knowledge that will make all the difference in the world. Guess what? It doesn’t.
Along the lines of indiscriminate learning, many people in both the lay public and professional realm rely on magazine and random internet articles to get info, and invariably, these sources are fraught with the biases and knowledge limits of the authors. This is why I’m a big proponent of digging into the primary research. And of course, even the scientific literature has to be viewed with a critical eye.
What people are doing right is beginning to recognize that nutrition and exercise are integral components to optimally achieving either physique or performance goals. If you under-emphasize either component, you won’t reach your full potential. It’s popular in some circles to say that nutrition is 80% of the equation, but I really think that exercise and nutrition play equal roles, and the motivation and discipline to stay consistent are really the glue that holds a program together.
MR: Another issue I see is a disconnect between people who eat “healthy” and those who want to eat for “fat loss.” What are some dietary changes that need to be in order to produce optimal fat loss?
AA: Definitely. With a lot of people who’ve hit a point of disgust or desperation with themselves/their physiques, health is of little concern. However, most of these folks are young enough to have the luxury of eventually finding out that health does matter.
Fat loss often is a temporary achievement rather than a permanent one, and that’s the crux of the problem with most fat loss programs. I’m at the point where I really don’t care how fast you can strip fat off, I’m mainly concerned about whether you can keep it off for more than a single summer. This is where the maintenance and/or gain of muscle becomes critically important.
The process of gaining or maintaining muscle has several built-in safeguards against the regain of bodyfat. If people would lift the focus off of net drops in scale weight, and shift the focus towards dietary consistency and exercise performance increases – that alone is sometimes enough to decrease bodyfat with the added bonus of looking dead sexy (it’s Valentine’s Day as I write this, so I’ll try to stay off of my singular line of thought for the day, woof).
MR: You’re absolutely right, and I like the idea of getting lean and staying lean as well.
Switching topics, I was privy to review your new product, the Alan Aragon Research Review and its great stuff! But, I’m also a geek, so take that with a grain of salt 😉
In all seriousness, tell us a little bit about the product and who it’s geared towards.
AA: I’ve shamelessly promoted this product as being the best thing since Ben & Jerry’s, although some might feel I’ve crossed the line with that statement!
AARR is a project that I conceived a while back, but only recently got the nerve and courage to carry out. I must say, I’m thrilled to death about both writing it and reading the positive feedback I get. It’s a rush, man. I learn a ton of stuff every month as I pour through the research, and I get to relay it to the (admittedly geeky) sector of the public & the fitness professionals. I also offer bits of wisdom from my private practice.
Each issue opens with a comprehensive article on whatever topic I feel is in need of clarification. It’s a dream come true for me to have all of my interests, talents, and experiences melt into one project that will help others and keep me busy for the rest of my career. A less emotional description of the journal can be found here. You’ve posted this in your blog before, but here’s a sample issue:
http://user210805.websitewizard.com/files/unprotected/AARR-Jan-2008.pdf
MR: That’s awesome Alan; thanks for the freebie!
Like I said before, I really liked the research review. What are some potential upcoming topics? Any new material out there you really want to cover?
AA: Thanks Mike, glad you find it useful.
An upcoming topic in the immediate future is the close of the nutrient timing series, which began with fat, and will end with carbohydrate and protein. Nutrient timing is one of the least understood aspects of sports nutrition. There are plenty of “it depends” clauses weaved throughout the elements involved. There are plenty of varying sports scenarios and differing goals that dictate both the importance and the actual execution of nutrient timing. This stuff is fascinating to me, and it’s been a worthwhile challenge to finally close out the series with post-exercise nutrition, where I talk about everything from leucine to waxy maize research. The goal is to let the scientific evidence speak, rather than the hype, marketing, and hearsay.
Future topics will include programming aspects of fat loss and muscle gain, health and/or performance aspects of various compounds and supplements. I like writing about controversies, just to see if indeed there should be any controversy due to a lack of conclusive data, versus a lack of understanding the data. I’m open to as many specific suggestions as possible, so let me encourage the readers to let me know exactly what they want to learn about, here’s the address for support, suggestions, and letters of debate: [email protected]
MR: Alan, you’re a gentleman and a scholar; thanks for being with us here today. Please tell my readers where the can find out more information about you and your products/services.
AA: I appreciate the kind words, Mike. And thanks again for the opportunity to promote my research review and offer a piece of my mind to your readership. I can be reached at [email protected]. More info and articles can be found at my site, www.alanaragon.com.