Friday, August 10, 2007

Bunch of Crazy $%^&*#@!



Yesterday our Football crew finished a tough workout, 1/2 of them wenbt home when they were finished, the other 1/2 decided they weren't finished!

A little extra credit or bonus work if you will...

Sometimes you need these days for mental and physical testing, it keeps you in check and determines if you will only do what is required, or, will you go above and beyond?

They rolled out the tractor tire, dragged out a sled and carried out the prowler.

Sometimes, or, actually, OFTEN times, I feel a tractor tire, sled, prowler and bodyweight is PLENTY to get a lot of results, especially at the high school level.

This will keep kids away from sitting down and laying down all the time.

Imagine this:

- tire flips
- push ups
- pull ups
- squats
- lunges
- hand walking
- sled drags in all directions
- prowler pushing

compare the above list with the below list:

- leg extensions
- leg curls
- lat pulldowns
- bench press
- half squats (most high school teams squat half way - ** don't get offended if YOU"RE team does full squats ** - I said "most")
- barbell and dumbbell curls

Which team will win?

I'm sure you can figure it out.

You can get increasingly larger tires for the upper grades and / or bigger guys.

There are tractor tires that are as light as 100 lbs. out there!

Back to the story....

One of our guys must have flipped the 400 lb. tire well over 30 times!

He flipped it down the parking lot and back, an easy 150 total ft. Then he alternated flips with his team mate in an "I go - you go" fashion, an excellent way to develop strength and power endurance, as well as mental toughness.

Now, 3 kids stayed after and did the extra, without me telling them to do so, this was their choice and through their own motivation.

What if there were 20 or 25 kids on that team with the same attitude and work ethic?

Now that would be a HUGE problem for the other teams, wouldn't ya say so?

Take a look at yourself, or, if you're a Coach, take a look at your athletes.

Do they have the eye of the tiger?

If not, what can you do to help them get there?

Some people believe you either have it or you don't, but, I'll tell you this much, being around the wrong people (lazy, unmotivated) will bring you down BIG time. In fact, these "wrong" people will make you feel bad for being so motivated because it makes them look bad!

My suggestions:

Remove yourself from the lazy asses, stay away from the losers with the loser mentality and stay away form people and places that accept and encourage mediocrity!

Until the next time,

kick ass!

--Zach--

PS - Check this out, this is how we train our guys and this is exactly how you cna start doing the same for yourself or for your team.

Tuesday, August 07, 2007

What if you only had one________?

What if you only had one dumbbell?

That's it, nothing more....

Could you still get in a GREAT workout?

Could you still pack on serious muscle?

Could you still get STRONG?

The answer??

HECK YEA!!

I was chatting yesterday with a guy who trains at the gym next door to The USC Gymnasium.

He is prepping for a strongman contest but he goes away to college soon AND has to do his internship. He was worried, until I told him what could be done with limited equipment, which is exactly how The Underground Movement began.

I told him to find river stones near his dorm, stash them near by and get ready to train with them.

Get an olympic dumbbell with lots of 25 lb. plates and GOOD collars and you'll be able to train using only one dumbbell, I have spoken about this in REAL Man Fitness.

Using only one heavy dumbbell, check out some of these "Money" moves that bring great results in:

- adding muscle

- developing greater strength

The Money Moves:

- one arm snatch
- one arm military press variations
- one arm rows
- 2 hand zercher squat
- one arm floor press
- turkish get up
- one arm farmer walk variations

Those movements alone will add muscle like you never would have imagined possible.

Heavy weights, clean eating, regular HARD training - put it all together and the recipe for success is there.

You can get it done in 15 minutes if you wanted to!

No worries, there's is always an answer!

--Zach--

PS - Short on time? Check this out.

PPS - Limited equipment? Check this out.

Monday, August 06, 2007

Just Returned from Vacation

Oh man, a little get away always does the mind and body good.

No e mail, no cell phone, little communication, just time with the family and nature.

I talk about this stuff a lot, getting away from your normal regime and doing something different.

I did lots of kayaking in the quiet mornings in the Lake I go to.

Lucky for me, this lake truly is quiet.

Very few boats go by, and in the morning, you're lucky to see one boat.

My friend has a place in Pa. and man the water is like a brutal day in the ocean - it's supposed to be a lake, not white water rafting on a boat! That place offers little to no quiet time.

I'm glad I'm not there - I'm actually kinda close to throwing my cell phone out the car window, too many phone calls for no reason, I was fine back in the day without the cell, weren't you?

Imagine watching the sun rise while kayaking on a quiet lake and hearing only the sounds of nature.

It's amazing and kayaking works the upper body plenty! Call it a workout, call it active recovery, no matter - it all helps the mind AND body.

I speak a lot of active recovery in The Ultimate Underground Manual.

This is actually a great way to improve your strength - the body reaps the benefits of all your hard training when it gets time AWAY from the hard training.

Last summer I played tons of Volleyball - it was brutally fun :)

We had the over 30 and under 30 team...I was the over 30 team and we never lost 1 game! One day we played 6 games in a row and we won them all!

I wonder if I could set up a team with Yanik Silver, ha ha, now that would be pretty wild!

So now it's time for you to think about what YOu can do to get away from the norm and do something different to give your body what it needs.

I've got other friends who go surfing, sea kayaking, hiking, hunting and mountain biking.

As always, there are NO rules :)

Stay cool till the next...

and...stay tuned for a NEW e book
coming to the Underground this week :)

--Zach--