March 24, 2010 in Articles, Stretching by James Dawson Martin

Dynamic Stretching

There are two main types of stretching – static (holding a stretching exercise in one position without movement) and dynamic stretching, which means moving while stretching – quick bursts of dynamic movement to stretch.

Static stretching works great for flexibility and recovery after a work out/inbetween workouts. However, when it comes to warming up, static stretching has been proven to be less than beneficial.

Static stretching, studies have found, has been associated with muscle damage. A study completed on mice illustrated acute stretching of muscle fibers just five percent beyond resting length resulted in a five percent loss of isometric force.

More studies have found that stretching twenty percent beyond resting length have been related to muscle damage and decrease force in humans. Therefore, stretching before sport or intense strength activity could provoke enough muscle damage to reduce maximum force and explosive strength.
Infact, the National Association of Sports Medicine and many other organizations agree with this.

Going Dynamic:

Dynamic stretching is aerobic, it elevates heart rate and gets the oxygen pumping – resulting in your muscles being warmed up for the workout to come. Dynamic warm up activates the musculature to prevent injuries and the body is in a heightened active state for the workload ahead.

Dynamic stretching will give you better conditioning, it will help with balance and co-ordination, and it is effective for warming up many specific muscles at a time for strength exercise.

Following a dynamic stretch routine will give you the most effective warm up you can get:

Below I list some very effective dynamic stretches that emphasize the quads, abs, calves, hamstrings, pecs, shoulders, and back.

Squat into Arm Raise

1. Perform a regular squat, keeping your arms at your side

2. As you reach the bottom of the squat, extend your arms back behind you.

3. Come back up out of the squat, raising your arms in a controlled fashion as you do, all the way above your head, stretching your lower back.

Chest Stretch:

1. Stand with feet hip width apart and knees slightly bent
2. Start with arms stright out in front hands at shoulder level, as you would a bench press.
3. Keeping you arms straight take your hands back as far behind you as possible so you feel the stretch around your shoulders
4. Still keeping your arms straight return your hands back to the front
5. Repeat these actions for 30 seconds, gradually getting quicker and quicker

Side Lunge with rotation:

1. With feet touching, bend your arms at the elbow and hold in front of your chest
2. Bring your right foot out, taking a wide stance from the left, which stays where it is
3. As soon as you do this, lunge down as far as possible
4. As you are lunging down,  rotate your arms and upper body all the way to the right at the same time as you lunge
5. Come back up and bring the right foot back right next to the left, as you are coming up from the lunge, rotate back up with your body, so it is back to where it was at the beginning.
6. Once practiced, this should be performed in one dynamic burst

March 17, 2010 in Articles, Celebrity Workouts by James Dawson Martin

Celebrity Workouts – Part one: Brad Pitt, fight Club

Celebrity Workouts:

The Fight Club Physique:

Fight Club is arguably one of the best movies of Brad Pitt’s career. However, the majority of buzz surrounding the movie was Brad Pitt’s ripped and toned physique, not his acting.

Below I list a workout split that would have been like the one Brad used to get lean and mean for the role of Tyler Durden.

The Routine:

Brad’s goal was to get ripped, functional and toned muscle. He didn’t want a bulky look for the movie.
With that said, Brad used an intense weight training circuit program a long with a cardio program to achieve the physique of fight club.

Weight Circuit:

This routine is an intense weight training circuit. 2 days a week will be multi joint compound movements and inbetween those days will be a mixture of multi-joint exercises and isolation exercises – more reps.

This routine would be perfect for Brad – The constant circuit training kept his heart rate elevated and the weight training helped tone and chisel his physique without adding bulk. Exactly what he wanted for the Fight Club Role!

Guidelines:

Do one set of each exercise of the circuit without stopping.

Once you complete the circuit once, rest a few minutes and begin again. End after doing 3 sets – finishing with the ab workout after completing the weight training circuit.

Monday:

3 sets of each, 12 reps
Do one set of each exercise until you reach the end of the circuit – then repeat another 2 times – this will equal 3 sets per exercise.

Squats x 3 sets -
Dumbbell Bench Press x 3 sets
Barbell Rows x 3 sets
Stiff leg deadlifts x 3 sets
Arnold Dumbbell Press x 3 sets
Dumbbell shrugs x 2 sets
Tricep Pushdowns x 2 sets
Barbell curls x 2 sets

Abs:
After completing the circuit, do 3 sets of each ab exercise
Planks x 3 sets
Roman Chair side raises x 3 sets

Wednesday:

Leg Press x 3 sets
Cable Crossovers x 3 sets
Lat pulldowns or pushups x 3 sets
Leg curls x 3 sets
Lateral raises x 3 sets
Dumbbell Shrugs x 2 sets
French Press x 2 sets
Hammer curls x 2 sets

Abs:
Decline crunches
Roman Chair scissors

Friday:
See Monday’s workout.

Cardio Program:

2-4 days a week. Following a HIIT (high intensity interval training) system.

2 minutes – warm up, slow jog pace
1 minute – all out sprint
2 minutes – jog
1 minute – all out sprint

*Continue this for 20-25 minutes