Leah is in the running for Search4Hurt season 2 - http://youtu.be/rHKvR2M-FNY

Within the next 24 hours, head to Search4hurt on facebook LIKE and SHARE if you think Leah will be a great TeamS4Hurt member. Just LIKES and SHARES count. 

Over 24 hours we will count the LIKES and SHARES: the original video is
Leah Richardson #sharethehurt

If you think she can do it. Please. Like. Share. http://youtu.be/rHKvR2M-FNY

Military Workouts 27 Jun 13

A.M
1,1,1,1 Deadlift
5 x 5 Wide Stance Straight Legged Deadlift
5 x 5 Lower Back Extension 
3 x 30 Good Mornings

P.M
Rest and Stretch

Military Workouts 26 Jun 13

A.M

10 x 400m Row @ 1:1 rest

P.M

6 Rounds of:

20 x Torsion Bar Shoulder Press

20 x Torsion Bar Sumo Deadlift High Pull

20 x Atomic Crunch

20 x Squat

Row 100m

Military Workouts 25 Jun 13

A.M
8 x 3 Bench Press
4 x 6 Bench Row
6 x 8 DB Clean and Push Press (each arm)
4 x 15 Rolling Tricep Extensions
Then:
5 Rounds of:
Max Heaves and Pushups.
Drop 2 Heaves and 10 Push Ups each round.

P.M
10 Rounds of:
10 x Power Clean
10 x Lying Heaves
10 x Burpee
Run or Row 200m

Military Workouts 24 Jun 13

A.M

1,1,1,1 Back Squat

5 x 3 Box Squats

8 x 2 Speed Deadlifts

3 x 5 One Legged Squats

Then:

8 x 400m Cycle Sprints @ 1:1 rest

P.M

AMRAP 20min:

40m Overhead Walk

5 x Tyre Flip

10 x Wall Ball

10 x KB Swing

Military Workouts 22 Jun 13

A.M
5 x 500m Cycle Sprints

P.M
3 Rounds of:
Max Hand Stand Push Ups on paralette bars
12 x Ring Dips
15 x Reverse Grip Lying Heaves

Military Workouts 21 Jun 13

A.M

3 Rounds of each block before moving onto the next:

B1

30 Shoulder Press

10 Heaves

200m Row

B2

30 Sumo Deadlift High Pull

10 Dips

200m Row

30 Bench Press

10 Lying Heaves

200m Row

P.M

1,1,1,1 Bench Press

4 x 6 Bent Over Row

Then 3 Rounds of:

15 x Rolling Tricep Extension

10 x Side Bends

5 x DB Shrugs

10 x Toes to Bar

Then:

5km Row as cool down

Military Workouts 20 Jun 13

A.M

8 Rounds of:

400m Row

15 x Ball Slams

15 x Sumo Deadlift High Pull

50 x Skips

15 x Front Squat

P.M

1,1,1,1 Front Squat

3 x 3 Deficit Deadlift (go deep)

4 x 10 Straight Legged Deadlifts

3 x 12 Lower Back Extensions

Then Later:

5 Rounds of:

Max Heaves and Max Push Ups

Drop 2 heaves and 10 Push Ups each round

Military Workouts 19 Jun 13

A.M
AMRAP 30min
10 x Power Clean
10 x Push Press
10 x Lying Heaves
10 x Wall Ball
10 x Box Jumps @ 24inch

Military Workouts 18 Jun 13

A.M
10 x 400m Rowing intervals @ 1:1 rest

P.M
5 x 3 Close Grip Bench Press
6 x 4 Bent Over Row
3 x 15 Rolling Tricep Extensions
8 x 5 Clapping Push Ups
Then:
150 Push Ups, when you break the set, sprint 50m. For Time.

Military Workouts 17 Jun 13

A.M
8 x 3 Back Squat
8 x 2 Speed Deadlift
5 x 3 Straight Legged Deadlift

P.M
3 Rounds of:
5 x Knees To Feet Jumps
10 x Jumping Lunges
5 x One Legged Squats
15 x Squat Jumps

Military Workout 03 Jun 13

I (Duncan) must apologise for not posting regular Military Workout posts as promised earlier in the year. Whilst Alex has been regularly sharing his wealth of knowledge, I have been preparing for another stint overseas. Thus the Military Workout posts have not been updated in quite some time.
I will post the daily Military Workouts when I can, obviously there are many factors that can prevent a soldier from accessing the internet at times over here.

With that said, here is today's Military Workout.

AM.

3 x Close Grip Bench Press
6 x 4 Bent Over Single Arm Row
3 x 15 Rolling Tricep Extension
150 Pushups, every time you need to rest, row 100m.

PM.

10 rounds of:
10 x Burpee
10 x Get Ups

Use anything you can find as a weight to lift on the get ups.

Back up and running!

For the people who have contacted us to ask whether Sydney Strength is back up and running, yes we are!

Sydney Strength is located at 136 Glencoe St Sutherland and we will be available for limited personal training and consulting sessions 0600-0700 and 1830-2030 weekdays and by appointment on weekends, we will try to accommodate your preferred time though.

We will be offering strength and conditioning/personal training, program design and nutritional consulting. Email, FB message or phone us to get a full service and price list.

Don't forget about our discount prices at Australian Sports Nutrition, please contact us for a full product list!

Caffeine and the strength athlete

Caffeine, as you probably know, is a central nervous system (CNS) stimulant.  It’s mode of action is similar to, but weaker than amphetamines.

There has been a lot of interest surrounding caffeine’s effects on sports performance with numerous studies showing its ability to enhance aerobic activity.  This is via a few different pathways, including enhanced fatty acid oxidation.  This means glycogen use is delayed which in turn delays fatigue.

With regards to the strength and power athlete, caffeines main effect seems to be on enhancing CNS function and hence motor unit recruitment.  This means that for any given muscle contraction there are more muscle fibres being recruited and this provides a stronger muscle contraction.  It has also been shown that caffeine increases the amount of calcium released into muscle cell, which is important for the speed of muscle contraction in response to nerve impulses.

In recent studies, caffeine ingested at a dose of 5-6mg/kg was shown to have significant effects on both strength and power output.  However, this effect was only seen in trained individuals.  Untrained subjects saw no improvement in maximal strength after ingesting 400mg of caffeine.  This seems to show that you need to have a decent amount of CNS activation anyway for caffeine to exert an effect.

As an extension of this, the use of energy drinks may be able to maintain maximal strength following an exhaustive bout of aerobic exercise.  Subjects performed 120 mins of interval cycling and were able to maintain their maximal strength on a resistance exercises compared to a placebo.  While not quite the same, this theory can be applied to multi-event sports carnivals or cross fit style competitions comprising multiple events in a day.

Again, there seems to be a classic dose-response curve with the optimal amount of caffeine being around 5-6mg/kg bodyweight.  It is interesting to note that below this (2.1-3 mg/kg), no significant effect was seen.

In case you’re wondering, with the current sporting climate in Australia especially, caffeine is not a banned substance,, at any dose, by ASADA or WADA.  The American NCAA have banned 15ug/ml dose in uranalysis however this equates to more than 9 cups of strong black coffee.  Unless you’re intent on giving yourself a heart attack, everyone should be fine keeping under the limit!

To sum up, caffeine helps strength and power athletes by increase CNS activation and allowing faster neuromuscular connectivity.  This allows you to recruit more motor units and hence contract the muscle faster and harder.  A dose of 5-6mg/kg should be all that is needed but bear in mind that doses of less than about 3mg/kg won’t provide any benefit.

How I train

I was asked the other day “how’s training going?”  For me to answer this is very simple, it’s always going well!  My performance in my chosen sport keeps improving and I rarely, if ever, get injured.  I don’t spend hours in the gym, I’m not so stuffed after a workout that I can’t do anything for days afterwards and because of these factors I’m always keen to train.

What more could I ask for?

This post is a breakdown of my training methods that have been tweaked over the last 3 years of reading, learning and practicing the conjugate method of Westside Barbell fame.

Basics of the conjugate system

For an athlete to increase their maximal strength, three systems must be utilised, the maximal effort method, the dynamic effort method and the repetition method.  Each of these a crucial for the development of maximal strength and power for sports.  The conjugate system brings these three training methods together into a weekly “cycle” incorporating both upper and lower body days.  Each of these is broken up into a dynamic day and a maximal effort day, with each day being followed by accessory work using the repetition method.

                   The most jacked 65 year old you'll ever see...

Let me explain how this works…

Each workout needs to begin with a thorough warm-up including some dynamic movement representative of what you workout will entail and some light movements, again specific to the workout.

One aspect of powerlifting that is often overlooked is general physical preparedness, or GPP.  While some of the strongest lifters in the work may not look like they do much in the way of conditioning, the reality is that most lifters will be competing in a weight class with an upper limit and this means they will at some stage need to keep their weight in-check.  One way to do this is in the warm-up.  Something that won’t tax the body too much but will allow the lifter to get more work done, like light sled drags, are perfect.  Even walking with a weight vest will get the body warm and prepare the joints for the workout that follows.  This is something I try and do before most workouts, even if it’s just more repos with a lighter weight or a few more sets in there, anything to get some more work done.

The maximal effort method

This is just what it sounds like, lifting to a maximum weight with a certain exercise.  The benefit of this is that by lifting maximally, we can increase the number of motor units working during a lift and therefore increase our total muscle contractions and lift a heavier weight.  The downside of this is that after 2-3 weeks, the nervous system is weakened by the maximal lifting and performance starts to diminish.  To over come this, I change my exercises every 1-2 weeks which keeps my nervous system fresh and helps recovery. 

     This guy just broke 2300 pounds in a belt and wraps using this                                                       method

As an example of this, for lower body max effort work, I will choose a single exercise to lift to a maximum for that day.  This exercise will generally change each week, unless it is something I haven’t done for a while.  I rotate through a good morning, deadlift and squat and rotate reps from triples to doubles to singles to create at least 9 weeks of movements that won’t be the same.  I may start off with a concentric (bottom up) sumo stance good morning for a max triple, the next week might be rack pulls, again for a triple then a box squat the following week.  From there I’ll move to doubles but for different exercises, say close stance good morning, deficit deadlift and pause squat then move into singles for another three exercises.  This still focuses the work on the muscles required for squatting and deadlifting without over stressing my nervous system week after week on the same exercise. 

Following the max lift, a heavy accessory exercise will be performed for some heavy sets of 6, them some lighter, higher reps work finishing off with abs work.  Again, the accessory work will always be rotated and is worked to the individuals weaknesses, in my case my quads and hip flexors and lower back.  Everyone needs to determine where they are weak in each of the movements and this should to be the focus of their accessory work to bring up the weaker areas.

The dynamic effort method

The basics of this are to move light weight as fast as possible.  Why I do this is to develop my rate of force production and apply the maximum force that I can.  It is also a great time to practice technique and form for the three main lifts!

To lift maximal weights in competition, we need to be able to apply maximal force to the barbell.  The idea with the dynamic method is that if I want to squat 200 kg, I need to apply 200kg worth of force to a lighter barbell.  Same goes for the bench press and the deadlift.  During my dynamic day is when I get used to applying a large amount of force with the correct technique.  During this day I also keep the reps low per set.  This is to mimic the time spent under the bar during a competition lift.  A squat is completed in around 5 seconds and a bench press in around 4-7 seconds.  A fast double with light weight for a squat will last approximately 5 seconds and a triple bench press will last around 6 seconds.  This way I get used to applying maximum force for the duration of the competition lift.

As I compete in raw powerlifting, we don’t get to use supportive gear such as squat suits or bench shirts.  This means that during the lift, we will have sticking points.  To overcome these, I use a variety of jump-stretch bands or add suspended chains from the bar.  The idea with these is that the weight will be slightly lighter at the bottom of the lift and slightly heavier at the top.

During the extension of a joint, there is a reactive deceleration when nearing full extension.  This leads to a reduction in force and a slowing of the bar.  When the weight is steadily getting heavier, I need to apply more force to the bar, even to the limit of extension of the joint.  This means that when a constant weight is being held, I’ll be able to continuously apply more force and move through the sticking points.

The repetition method

As the name suggests this is where you… you know… do more reps of stuff.  The idea behind this is to bring up weak points in your musculature to improve you lifts.  For me, my quads/hip flexors and triceps are the weak bits that need strengthening.  This is based on hypertrophy training as a larger cross section of muscle can apply more force and contract harder, thereby making me lift more weight, which is what it’s all about.  This means sets of 6-15 even up to 20-30 for certain exercises to increase hypertrophy and make that bit stronger.  Do this for 2-3 exercises

So there you have it.  One day lift something to a maximum, then do some higher reps stuff on things that a weak for you.  Another day, lift something light as fast as you can, then do some higher reps stuff on things that are weak for you.  Do this for both bench specific and squat/deadlift specific for a total of 4 workouts per week.  Add some conditioning at the start or end of your session.  It’s that simple, but none of this is easy.  For this to be successful, you need to lift with everything you have and be brutal in your assessment of yourself, which can be quite a revealing process.

I hope everyone has leaned something from this, if you have any specific questions, please don’t hesitate to leave a comment or message me via our facebook page.

Effects of Amino acids and their metabolites on Anaerobic sports

As always, if you just want the take home message, scroll to the bottom paragraph…

It is a well established fact that athletes need more protein than non-athletes.  It has been shown that, depending on the sport, athletes need anywhere from 50-175% more protein than the average person.  This post will be a bit of a continuation on the last one on nutrient timing.  We’ll have a look at a couple of specific substrates and what they do, namely essential amino acids (EAA), branched chain amino acids (BCAA) and glutamine, and their effect on the strength training athlete in particular.

EAA’s

The twenty basic amino acids can be broken up into two groups, essential and non-essential.  Non-essential amino acids can be synthesised by the human body and we therefore don’t need to obtain them from food.  Essential amino acids are just that, essential, as we can’t synthesis them.  There are 11 non-essential amino acids and 9 essential AA’s.  When looking at the quality of a protein source, it is the EAA content that is the guiding factor.  In this regard, animal and dairy proteins are higher quality as they contain more EAA than plant based proteins, including supplements.

What’s interesting is that EAA supplements have been shown to stimulate as much protein synthesis as whole protein sources containing the same EAA content.  The particular study found that a 180 calorie supplement, containing 15 g of EAA, stimulated as much protein synthesis as 850 calories of whole protein sources with the same EAA content.

It pays to look athe amino acid profile of any supplement you’re buying.  Some are a bit dodgy and while they might be marketed as a whole protein source, the fact is that they’re really not that good as they have a lower content of EAA.

BCAA’s

We looked at BCAA in the last post regarding their timing around training.  However, BCAA are unique among amino acids in their ability to regulate metabolism, neural function and blood glucose and insulin levels.  The synthesis of BCAA in vivo is low however and they’re seen as the rate limiting step of muscle protein synthesis.  This means that without them, protein synthesis can’t continue.

Orally ingested BCAA appear in the blood stream quickly which allows them to be supplied to the working or damaged muscles to stimulate protein synthesis.  It is interesting to note that BCAA have been shown to stimulate as much protein synthesis as EAA with the same BCAA content.  So, we can say that it is the BCAA component of EAA that is stimulating protein synthesis.  However, only Leucine was able to stimulate a comparable amount of muscle protein synthesis independently.

Supplements that contain a sufficient amount of leucine have been shown to shift the athletes net protein balance from negative to positive to promote an anabolic environment.  Additionally, whey  (which contains 36%more leucine than soy protein) can stimulate 33% more protein synthesis after exercise than soy.  This is due to the increase leucine content of whey protein compared to soy protein.

Therefore, we can say that an athlete’s protein requirements should be based on leucine content first, then BCAA, then EAA content of the post workout supplement.  Again, this should be dairy and animal based protein rather than plant based.

BCAA combined with resistance training were shown to increase lean body mass, strength and decrease body fat.  They also aid recovery by minimising DOMS and increasing testosterone.

While leucine is the BCAA that is responsible for the majority of the effects of protein supplements post workout, it is currently thought that it achieves this via its metabolite β-hydroxy-β-methylbutyate (HMB).

HMB

This metabolite of leucine, HMB, has been shown to speed muscle repair, and hypertrophy after resistance training in both trained and non-trained individuals.  However, it is most effective when the training stimulus is novel.  Novel training stimuli cause more breakdown of muscle tissue and hence HMB can stimulate more protein synthesis and a larger adaptation.

HMB therefore is best taken during periods of training when novel stimuli are introduced (crossfitters take heed!) rather than maintenance or off season training.

  If this was a novel training stimuli for her, she could benefit from                                                    HMB.

Glutamine

Glutamine is an amino acid, the synthesis of which, under stressful conditions, is impaired.  Intense exercise decreases blood levels of glutamine, therefore limiting its availability as a source of nitrogen for protein synthesis and for immune cells, which use glutamine as a fuel.

Glutamine also has a role in whole body carbohydrate storage in that it has been shown to induce net muscle glycogen synthesis.  Further to this, when taken with glucose, glutamine also promotes storage of glycogen in sites outside the skeletal muscles (i.e. the liver), which is an important step in blood sugar regulation.

The take home message

In terms of amino acids, 8-10 g of EAA or 3g leucine combined with 1.5 g of isoleucine and 1.5 g of valine taken before exercise is sufficient to maximise protein synthesis to aid recovery and increase the protein balance.

To further benefit the athlete in terms of decreasing muscle damage from training, 3-6 g of HMB can be taken daily before exercise.  Again, this is most effective when combined with novel training stimuli.

Glutamine is best taken in 6-8 g doses consumed after exercise when carbohydrates are being consumed to increase the muscle glycogen and whole body glycogen stores.

So there you have it.  If anyone is after any more specific information on what presented here, please don’t hesitate to message me or leave a comment.

Leah Dansie and Spartan Race

I thought I'd do a post about, Leah Dansie, who is using the Sydney Strength training program and someone who I’m proud of for various sporting achievements, all whilst keeping busy with study, work and a range of other commitments. For those of you that don't know, Leah competed in, and came 3^rd in, the Spartan Race Australia’s Sprint distance held in Sydney on the 16th of March.

Leah was one of over 3,000 competitors across multiple waves over the course of the day.  All were going over a course designed to test the participants mental and physical toughness:  7 km's of hills, rivers, obstacles and even a spear throw to test the participants in every mode of physical fitness.  For each of the obstacles however, the participant could also choose to complete 30 burpees if they didn't want, or couldn't complete the obstacle. A lot of people chose to enter the Spartan Race as a test of their true character, just completing the race was a great achievement.  

For Leah, she went to her first Spartan Race to compete amongst the elites. In the lead up to the event, Leah's training included various strength and conditioning sessions, including CrossFit and with a lot of days being multiple days of added weight training. She also competes in all length of triathlons, from sprint to half ironman distance. Although you may not think it, Leah only did minimal running during the lead up to the race.  Averaging a few km's per week in the form of sprints or during conditioning workouts.

Leah finished 3rd of 1178 female finishers in Spartan Sydney and although happy with the result has identified various areas to improve on for future races.

Leah did find some of the obstacles challenging, such as the rope climb out of a muddy pit which proved a completely different challenge to rope climbs in the gym. She has given herself the task to work on these weaker areas of her training in preparation for other obstacle races, including the 3.5 hour, maximum distance race in Wagga Wagga coming up on the 6th of April.  

Leah also has aspirations of competing in the Spartan Ultra Beast 42km obstacle race on Nov 2 and 3 in Sydney this year.

Top 3 females: Deanna, Melissa and Leah   

                                     Podium Finishers

We’re seeing a lot more obstacle course races, like Spartan Race across Australia and the Obstacle Course Racing community is continuing to grow. Good luck with your training and if you are after information on competing in OCR give us a shout.

                                       

To find out more about Leah, you can check out her facebook page, Absolute Health and Fitness http://www.facebook.com/AbsoluteFitnessTraining