Not the financial markets bailout Congress is wrestling with, but the good news coming out of Met-Rx gym in Costa Mesa which was due to close September 30th is that my gym will remain open.

Investors, including one who is a member bought the property just days from closing will keep things running and will also make some needed facility improvements. Needless to say, we are all jubilant! There is really nothing in our area even close to what our gym as been over the years. We are all thrilled we won’t miss a rep!

Met-Rx, Congress, Bailout

Here is what it should like, featuring Aimee Anaya.

Now that’s how get extension! Catalyst Athletics has this to say about extension:

“In order to remain balanced, the athlete must be leaned back slightly at the top of the extension of the snatch (this can often be avoided in the clean with compensatory movements elsewhere). Note that this does not mean the hips are pushed forward–as much as possible, the body is extended straight and in its entirely leaned back.”

So, that is my Oly lift project, full extension.

•Speaking of the snatch, Mike Covert reports a new PR @ 145 lbs with a body weight around 175 lbs. Nice job, Mike!

•Our gym is getting inundated with bodybuilder photo shoots. I guess if it helps pay the bills, fine, just stay away from the big boy toys, Mirror Muscle Man!

•Scott and his freaks have taken a hiatus from their strongman stuff to do an Olympic lifting cycle, now that I have two sets of my bumper plates residing over at the gym. Like their other lifting,  technique doesn’t seem to matter as much as how much weight gets on the bar. To their credit, a couple of the guys can clean and jerk heavy.

•Having learned chocolate milk makes for a good recovery drink, I don’t have to waste money on Muscle Milk. Chocolate milk is a good “treat” for a heavy lifting session. “Who wants Ovaltine?”

•Medicine balls do work better when you have someone throwing them back to you!

•As the weekend draws to a close, Bucky won and the Packers put on a show, especially at the end of the game and came away victorious. Both teams are undefeated! The Cowboys are in the house next Sunday. Should be a great game!

Continuing along the theme of freakish fringe female “sports” we investigate the burgeoning interested by Chinese women in pole dancing. Pole dancing? What a unique idea! I’ve never seen that before. (Ok, I’m lying).

It turns out this is the latest fitness craze in China, particularly in the cities. It is not, however, without it’s share of controversy. 29 year old accountant Xixi is not happy at all about the craze, but Jiang Li wants to be a pole dancing superstar. Go Jiang Li.

The Chinese Olympians excelled at everything else, so maybe they can get pole dancing in as an IOC-sanctioned Olympic event. It is far more interesting to watch than synchronized swimming and the floor routines passed off as sport. But until that happens, if I want to take in some complex, athletic pole dancing routines, I know where to go. (Don’t tell Val)!

Source: NY Times by way of OMB

This week, most of the world’s attention has been focused on US swimmer, Michael Phelps, who is poised to break Mark Spitz’ gold medal performance of 36 years ago and will go down as one of, if not the greatest Olympian of all time.

The United States has had very modest expectations for their prospects in Olympic weightlifting and even that took a blow a day before the opening ceremonies when Casey Burgener was disallowed to compete for the third men’s spot. Melanie Roach, one of three US women placed sixth in her weight category and set an American record in the process. Kendrick Farris notched an 8th place finish, breaking two US records in the process. Both lifters were impressive and have to be pleased with their showings.

Marty “The Purposeful Primitive” Gallagher has a new book and weekly column over at Dragondoor. The book is a must-read and his first column reads like it is too. No fluff. I like that.

“Stupid is as stupid does” according to Forrest Gump and if you are a gym regular, you see a lot of potentially dangerous and stupid things in the gym, which makes a great case for having your own garage gym. I wonder when, after “arm day” or “leg day” there will be a “brain day”. While not technically a muscle, when you use it and work it, it “grow”s as does the muscle.

I had a good week with my training with a solid kettlebell and sandbag day and the usual logging in of snatch lifts. I haven’t been too active with deadlifts and less so with squats so I did 5×5’s of each after some Oly work. But none was like MarkFu’s Big Lift. It was one for the ages. Speaking of age, I am about to move the ticker forward by a year to, <drumroll>, 53; the prime of my athletic life!

Sunday capped off my training with some barbell cleans in the gym and then went outside to do some “dinosaur training” by cleaning and pressing an 80# rock while on my knees! Great core work since I can use my hips or legs. I posted some pictures. Take a look. Fun stuff!

I like powerlifting and other barbell and kettlebell lifting, but here are the Top Ten Reasons I Like the Olympic Lifts:

10. The lifts use the entire body in one fluid motion. There is no isolation aspect about them.

9. They look cool, (when they are done correctly)!

8. The names of the lifts themselves are double entendres. You can use the words now in polite company.

7. You don’t look like a bodybuilder or a powerlifter, but you do look damn strong.

6. The speed, power and explosiveness generated transfer well into many sports and activities.

5, People in the gym don’t quite know what to make of you. One guy recently asked me, “Why are you doing high school lifts?”

4. They are very technical and therefore a challenge to learn and master.

3. You pretty much have free access to the proper equipment, at least in my gym, because you don’t have to compete with others on “chest day” or “leg day”.

2. Chicks dig you. (Ok, I made that up, but that’s Curry’s motivation for snatching “a wheel”).

1. When the lift is completed, you get to drop the loaded barbell from over your head and let it bounce around and make a lot of noise. Even a light load is loud.

Go ahead, use the Comments below to add to the list.

I enjoy the gym I train at, but 95% of it’s floor space is ruled by The Machines. It is the 5% of the floor space, “back in the corner” where I dwell and am grateful for that for it is there where the barbells, plates and squat racks are.

When I first started lifting years ago, my first introduction to a “real gym” was the Eagles Club in downtown Milwaukee on Wisconsin Avenue. My dad would take me there on Saturdays and sometimes I could go on my own, once I had my driver’s license. (It was on that busy street where Dad taught me to parallel park).

The large, landmark three story building had a large swimming pool reeking of too much chlorine and cloudy water with old-timers endlessly swimming laps in their birthday suits. Upstairs was a boxing gym, complete with an old, well-used ring, heavy bags speed bags, leather and wood jump ropes and a lot of barbells, dumbbells, chalk and bad lighting. It was there I learned to pick up a bar off the floor and put it over my head. I would leave that place covered in chalk and it was great. I was young and in awe of the place and had a sense of the history there. Famous boxers like Max Baer had fought there and other fighters looking to make it to the big time by way of the Golden Gloves got their start at the Eagles aerie. That was a man’s gym. (I should note that on the first floor there was a bar and a dance floor). Now THAT was a gym! But I wax nostalgic.

At my suburban high school our “weight room” was 14 x 14 space and in the center, a shiny new chrome Universal machine and little else. Gone were the barbells, dumbells and chalk. Those were from a bygone era, never known by most of the kids there. What I had in front of me was the future of weight training. As a young kid, the future is what is important, not the past and the multi-station machines were going to give me the big muscles I was after.

As the machines took hold and gyms switched to them, they advanced, grew and multiplied and a new industry was born. Gyms like Bally’s and 24 Hour Fitness sprouted up all over the country and barbells were largely forgotten or ignored. The dumbbells fared better, but it was the machines that ruled the day.

They rule at my gym today but in the 5% Corner, there are still bars and squat racks, and we can powerlift and even lift overhead with the Olympic lifts. In that corner, we are left alone, save for the occasional guy that wants to pick up a bar at a squat rack and do bicep curls. For most of the gymgoers, those who lift over there are at least a curiosity, some “hardcore” and a few freaks (strongmen lifters).

For me, the progression went from barbells to machines and now back to barbells. Which is better? Did the machines advance strength training? Without hesitation, the barbell has made the biggest difference in my strength training and it wasn’t until age 50 that I figured that out.

In “The Machines Aren’t Alright”, author and strength coach Matt Gary does a splendid job breaking down the difference between classic weightlifting equipment versus machines. Here is an excerpt:

Today’s gyms and training facilities are full of unnecessary items. Gyms are what society perceives they should be like…attractive, comfortable, and welcoming. How do those qualities equate to an atmosphere of physical achievement? I fail to see the connection. Gyms should be
entirely uncomfortable, unpleasant, and unwelcoming. Instead of appearing like a lounge, a support network of like-minded individuals should be present because an individual will push harder and risk more in the company of trustworthy peers. Instead of mirrors, there should be motivational thoughts, inspirational quotes, record boards, and photos of those who have
come before us and paved the highway of physical achievement.

——————————–

Before training, I had a pretty intense session with “Doc Jox”, my chiropractor. I have couple of nagging injuries, a “tennis elbow”, a C7 impingement on the left side causing tingling down the arm and scapular issues. Besides the adjustments, he performed ART and Trigger Point Therapy. Now that was painful and I believe would constitute “torture” these days. I asked if this was permisseable under the terms of the Geneva Convention.

My desire (and ability) to train hard was gone, so I went pretty light and basic.

Burgener warm-ups x 3.

5 x 3 snatches + overhead squats, 45/65/70/75/65/70.

5 x 3 Good Mornings. (Tapped the bar on the pins as my upper body was parallel to the floor and paused, negating the stretch reflex),

45/95/115/125/145.

Still enjoying my recent PR in the deadlift set on New Year’s Eve and wanting to go higher and yet bemoaning the state of my squat, I was reminded of an assistance exercise to both the squat and the deadlift that will make the numbers of each go up considerably.

That would be the Good Morning. Westside Barbell strongly urges doing more assistance exercises like the Good Morning and less deadlifts to increase the deadlift total.

Looks like I will be adding GM’s in once a week along with some Power Cleans. It will be really interesting to test my max lifts in both deadlift and squat occasionally along the way.

With the books closing on 2007, I don’t expect to be setting any PR’s but in that respect, I had a good year of increasing totals and lowering times, most notably in the deadlifts. More on that later.

I had injuries heal and got new ones to replace them. My right scapula is now good, but the left is kind of wobbly from overdoing sets of barbell snatches. I have tendonitis in the right elbow from either an errant kettlebell swing or a barbell clean that got too far away from me. I stayed pretty healthy with only a couple of bouts with allergens during the Santa Ana winds recently.

I found myself skating less, but swinging kettlebells more. In August, Val bought me my first KB, a 20 kg hunk of metal with a handle. Previously, I used a kettlebell only as part of a Crossfit WOD. Now I have four different weights and Val bought me instruction with a RKC trainer as a Christmas present and can do swings and snatches with the 24 kg kettlebell.

I have continued to mix up my workouts like the Crossfit programming model. Gone are the days of single activities such as speedskating, running and mountain bike riding, all of which I did largely at the exclusion of much of anything else, save an occasional trip to the gym.

Speaking of Crossfit, while I still enjoy doing their WODs and subscribe to their journal, I am no longer a “Kool-Aid drinker”. I never was someone who was attracted to cult-like organizations and their zealots, but I do continue to learn much about fitness from Crossfit.

My interest has steadily grown in powerlifting and Olympic style weightlifting and will get quality training wherever and whenever I can find it. I am even sticking my toe back in the water, so to speak with running, an activity I gave up years ago. I have no intention to ever be a big mileage guy, though.

I am enjoying the complexities of learning the Olympic lifts and I benefit greatly from the simplicity of bodyweight exercises I get from Ross Enamait of rosstraining.com and Crossfit. Mixing up workouts has been the best thing to happen to my physical training and I credit Crossfit for that and Crossfit Marina, with the Serranos as trainers and Brent O as a competitive foil for my sessions.

I have been more consistent in going to the gym than I have in many years and almost always look forward to my sessions there. I also like training at home or in a park. To that end, I have been buying useful fitness “toys” like Elite rings, fitness bands, weighted vest, weightlifting shoes, racing flats, jump ropes, chalk, a stopwatch, an Ab Mat and a kick butt ab roller from Lifeline. There are more things I will be getting in ‘08, but training at home is a now a viable alternative.

In ‘07, my diet largely went to crap and my weight crept up. That will change in 2008. ‘Nuff said about that.

I made some modest gains lifting over the year, and in all cases form has improved but much needs to improve in that area over the next year. At the beginning of the year I could clean 145 as a 1RM and the last time I tried, I was doing 175 lbs, but I am certain I can beat that right now. It will just have to wait! The Crossfit Total, (CFT) consisting of the best lifts in the squat, overhead press and deadlift was 760 lbs in January and is now 910, with the biggest increase coming with a 415 lb max deadlift, which increased by 75#. My overhead press increased by 25 lbs to 185 and my squat went up by 45#, a bit of a disappointment. My 5K run time at the beginning of the year sucked and stills sucks with no improvement to speak of at 28 minutes.

This year saw, what I believe were growth changes to the Barbarian Blog and I will continue to tweak it next year.

There were a lot of “Good times” in 2007 as Brent was fond of saying, (where have you been dude?) and more to come next year. Stay tuned.

Check below for a couple of workouts done this weekend…

Saturday:

Kind of an active rest day and ran around the block a couple of times which took all of 19 minutes for just under two miles.

Sunday:

Ran 2 x 800 meters

Sit-ups: 50/40/30

Push-ups: 50/40/30

Overhead Squats: 50/40/30

Back Extensions: 50/40/30

One arm Overhead Squats: 25# overhead, holding 53# with the other hanging arm x 12 and again x 20. 18/25#, 2 x 20.

Kettlebell Swings, 24 kg: 10/10/10/10/10

Kettlebell Snatches, 24 kg: 10/20/20

This time of the year, there isn’t a wait at the gym. It’s pretty quiet in there now. People who would normally be there are running up their cortisol levels at the malls trying to satisfy everyone on their gifts list. They are eating and drinking at Christmas parties, adding a little extra weight as they go along, all the while obsessing they are “getting fat” and “losing conditioning”. I say, enjoy it while it lasts because come January 2, they will return along with the “Resolutionistas” who are bound and determined, once and for all to have the bodies they know they must have for “beach season”. They will try to impose their will on the “indigenous peoples” who never left. It’s just all part of the annual gym cycle and part of what makes going there interesting in the first place. I’ll curse them for the riff-raff they are, but for now, it is pleasant to train as if this is my own personal gym and chat with a few of the natives who will have to fight off the returning hordes in January with me.

Most of my session tonight seemed like a warm-up and that was fine because I am battered. Tendonitis in the elbow, traps and scapular muscles tight and strained and a bit fatigued in general. Nothing too serious; just at the bottom of the cycle. This is the time to take it easy and be smart about training so as not to add to the aches and pains.

I started off with a good 800 meter run in the brisk outdoors to break sweat and clear the mind. What came next was,

Kettlebell Swings, 1 x 20 with the 35#, 2 x 20 with the 53#.

Kettlebell Snatches, 35# 3 x 20.

Burgener Warm-up with the empty 45# bar, 3 sets.

Overhead Presses, 5 x 5, 95/115/125/135/145.

Scott at straighttothebar featured a neat tool to find out your maximum weights lifted by use of an Excel spreadsheet. This has been a handy thing to have and I keep a copy on Google documents and use it often. Last night, I plugged in the numbers to tell me what my 3RM would be for the deadlift, based on my 1RM and 5RM numbers and the number it gave me was exactly what I lifted during a 5 x 3 session. (It was a PR)! I doubt if I could have lifted another pound more! Go ahead and download the file and try it out for yourself. rep-max-calculator.xls