Results matching “Bird”

Powerlifting Watch points to an interesting conversation on the speed of descent when squatting. Does the gear make a difference?

Happy Holidays from everyone here at Straight to the Bar - hope you've had a great week. Here are a few highlights :

• Articles : John Fair takes a look at the inimitable John Grimek,Blaine discusses the reasons for taking advantage of your local running trails and Kat engages in some home gym DIY with some home-made Hanging Handles. Superb.
• Videos : Think you're too young to compete? Too old? Here's a 320kg deadlift from this year's Florida Senior Games, an 8-year-old with some great MMA skills and an excellent exercise at any age - the Clubbell Hammer Swing.
• Ideas : Make yourself a Slosh Pipe, try the Swinging Plank and put together a Prowler.
• Elsewhere : Check out the great video collections on the Guinness World Records and Monkey Bar Gym sites, take a wander through Adam Glass's stuff on Youtube and keep up with Scott Helsley at Rational Fitness Practice.
• Bonus : Via Fight Geek : Ready for The Contender Asia? Looks great.

Via the RMAX magazine : this is a great pair of exercises - the Swinging Plank and the Piston Press. Over to Mr Sonnon.

Take a wander over to Scott Helsley's blog Rational Fitness Practice. A slightly irreverent look at kettlebell training - a great read.

Looking for another dose of kettlebell goodness? Swing by BJ's Fitness Blog - a peek into the training of Fitness Coach and Kettlebell Instructor BJ Bliffert. Good stuff.

This is a guest post by bodybuilder, writer and lover of all forms of fitness - Kat 'The Mighty Kat' Ricker.
Lift with Your Head.


Lift with Your Head: The Training and Movement Philosophies of the Physical Subculture is anything but "just one more fitness book" to jam onto the shelf. Whether you're toying with the idea of starting out, getting back into shape, or whether you're a fitness fanatic, this is one book you can get into and get a lot out of.

Author Chip Conrad (owner of Body Tribe Fitness, a private gym in Sacramento that hosts art exhibits and speakers such as Found Magazine folks) has a snappy, down-to-earth, buoyant voice that belies his pleasure in a physically fit lifestyle. But he offers so much more than smart, unconventional exercises and diet advice. The first half of this book is alive with his philosophy on working out, living physically, and ... life.

So many books merely offer instruction. Lift with your Head offers insight and reflection. If deep down you've always had the inkling that we should play and have fun in order to live well, this book will articulate why that's valid, even vital. If you hanker for recess in your adult life, if you are turned off by today's corporately-run gyms, if you want to feel better without all the drudgery of "three 12-rep sets" and 12-week programs, this book will oxygenate a flame in you that has been quietly flickering. Passage after passage, Chip's thinking certainly resonates with mine.

The nuts and bolts? At the risk of cheapening it by spitting out some gems out of context - cleans, windmills, farmer's walk, deadlifts, beating tractor tires; dumbbells, kettlebells, clubbells, sandbags.

I must give props to the page design. Every clean, tidy, page is loaded with images - of real people enjoying using their bodies, not the soft-porn types of images you find in many fitness books.

I've got a lot of fitness books jammed onto my shelf. This is one of the few I'm taking from the bedside into the gym.

Lift with your Head is self-published and available only through the Physical Subculture Web site, for $21.95.

This review also appears over on Kat's site, The Mighty Fit Review. Pop over and say hello.

In this series Blaine and I will be looking at just some of the ways to take advantage of your location when it comes to working out. No matter what your idea of 'working out' is, there are several things you can do right where you are.

This week Blaine wraps up with a look at the reasons to explore your local trails and parks. A good read.

Looking for another daily dose of MMA goodness? Head over to Punch Kick Choke.

Horseshoe after being given the Adam Glass treatment. Nice work.