Relentless

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What do Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Dwayne Wade, and I all have in common?  We have all read Tim Grover's new book Relentless:  From Good To Great To Unstoppable.

Grover, arguably the most highly-respected basketball trainer in the world, has been the personal trainer and performance coach to hundreds of players, three of whom are mentioned above.  Despite his impressive list of clientele, this book is not about the physical aspect of training.  On the contrary, what Grover admittedly reports 80% of his job consists of, this book is about what it takes to mentally go from good to great to unstoppable.

Grover breaks down people into three categories:  Coolers, Closers, and Cleaners.  In a nutshell, coolers are people who follow other people's lead and need to be told what to do.  Closers are people who show up for a big performance at the very end but struggle with the day in, day out consistency.  Cleaners are people who are great every single day and expect nothing less of themselves while they're at it.  There's an associated lack of emotion with achievement with Cleaners as they are continually striving for better, for more, for unstoppable.

Throughout the book there are some really cool stories about MJ, Kobe, and Dwayne and how they approached things in life and on a day to day basis.  Being a basketball fan and a huge Jordan fan, these stories were really fun for me to read, but they also gave an inside look into what makes these three people of world-class caliber tick.  It reminded me of the summer I spent seeing Drew Brees and Aaron Rodgers train right before each won their Super Bowl rings (Drew was a year before Aaron).  It was an inside look at the mindset of greatness.

For me this was a really fun book to read.  If you are looking for a training book, this isn't your stop.  But if you are looking for rare insight into the minds of people who are considered the best of the best, this book is a must-read.

Be great.

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Muscle "Isolation": Teres Minor Chest Flyes

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A lot of exercises are often considered "isolation" exercises by a good majority of the mainstream fitness community, meaning the exercise is believed to only work one muscle.  Typically, these exercises involve motion around only joint, which often leads to the false understanding of only one muscle being challenged.

In addition to this blatant misunderstanding that there are potentially certain neuromuscular demands placed on the system in order to simply hold all of the rest of the joints still (think about it like performing the almighty plank for part of/the entire body except for the one or two joints that is/are moving) as well as to maintain the integrity of the moving joint, I would like to demonstrate that muscles that oppose motions performed by the "isolated" muscle will need to contract as well in order for a specific position around one axis to be controlled while the majority of the motion occurs around another axis within the same joint.

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For this post I want to discuss dumbbell chest flyes, which are often said to "isolate" the three divisions of pec major.  Mechanically, the three divisions of pec major have the ability to internally rotate the humerus (turn your arm in) in addition to horizontally adducting the humerus (bring the arm across the chest), which is the motion often associated with a chest fly.

Now, as I discussed in the post "Real" Weight, muscles control the distance between their two points of attachment.  They bring their insertion towards their origin or vice versa without any regard to which of the cardinal planes the trunk or limb is moving through.  Therefore, if the trunk or limb is moving through a plane that does not exhaust everything that one muscle is mechanically capable of, such as performing a chest fly motion without any associated internal rotation of the humerus, then there has to be another muscle or group of muscles involved in counteracting the mechanical ability of the targeted muscle to do so.

Going back to the chest fly example, because the targeted muscle group (pec major) has the mechanical ability to internally rotate the humerus, in order for pec major to horizontally adduct the humerus without internally rotating it as well, there have to be other muscles involved that are trying to externally rotate the humerus, such as teres minor.

What's the takeaway?  Next time you see someone performing chest flyes, compliment them on their sweet teres minor pump.

Your body.  Your training.

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Three Reasons for MAT™ for the Post-Physical Therapy Individual

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Three reasons why you should consider checking out Muscle Activation Techniques™:

1. You want to continue progressing the great results you achieved during your physical therapy.

2. You are looking for the next step in improving how you move.

3. You feel like your rehab didn't get you to the exact point you need to be and want to explore additional options.

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Do any of these sound like something you want?

Interested in finding out more?  Check out the Muscle Activation Techniques™ page!

Interested in setting up an assessment or discussing this subject further?  E-mail Charlie at charlie@selfmadefitness.com!

Your body.  Your training.

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Cold Showers

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Something I've been doing most mornings for a while now is taking cold showers.  I set my watch for two minutes and hop in.  No second thoughts.  No trying to convince myself otherwise.  I make the decision to do it, turn the water as cold as it will go, and step in.Why?  Because when I step under that cold water, all I want to do is get out.  But I can't.  I have to stay there and wash off.  I can't just stand there and endure.  I have to do something and succeed.

The water runs over my head and it gets harder to breathe.  But I can't worry about that because I have to keep moving.  After two minutes the water is shutting off whether I am clean or not so I can't waste time.  And I know from years of ice baths that after two minutes my body is going to go numb anyways, so then the water will no longer be uncomfortable.

So that's what I do.  It's just my little reminder most days that whatever happens during the day I can get through and not just endure the situation, but succeed in it.

Be great.

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Blink

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For the first 276 pages minus two sentences I did not really enjoy Malcolm Gladwell's Blink.  I enjoyed the other book of his that I read and reviewed, Outliers, so I had high expectations for Blink.  However, what was presented as definitive correlations in Outliers was presented as ambiguous speculation in Blink as Gladwell often sighted examples that both were in favor of and went against the point he appeared to be trying to make.

Essentially, the premise of Blink is that there appears to be some mechanism by which we can subconsciously make highly accurate judgements and therefore better decisions based off of our first initial impression of a situation.  The rest of book is purely examples throughout the course of history of situations in which this has held true, such as judging the authenticity of artwork, as well as situations in which this hasn't held true, such as cops opening fire on a civilian who looked suspicious but was not carrying a weapon or being threatening in any manner.

Very few conclusions are drawn from these examples, and even when they are there are still examples given to discredit the conclusions.

While I read the entire book, it wasn't until I got to the last two sentences that I found value in what Gladwell was saying.  Although there wasn't any science (that I recall) presented to verify his theory, his concluding remarks gave me something to think about and go off and research on my own if I so choose.  But, I will not spoil the ending for you here, so you can go check out what he has to say yourself.

Your body.  Your training.

Enjoy this review?  Get a copy of Blink in the Self Made® Book Store!

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