In June 2003, I was injured during my apprenticeship to become a truck driver. An 830kg stone, the size of an oak barrel, fell from my truck and hit me on my lower back as I was standing leaning forward. The result was three broken vertebrae, a broken pelvis, and both legs broken all the …
From Wheelchair to Sinister: The Importance of Mental Strength Read More »
“If at first you don’t succeed, redefine success.” This caption for a New Yorker cartoon nails the “FOMO” mentality of a “workout of the day.” Then why, might you ask, is StrongFirst jumping on the bandwagon and introducing its own “WOD”? Please read on. The biological law of accommodation states that the response of an …
I would like to share a training method with you that is rarely understood in the realm of fitness but so powerful it completely saved me from persistent hip discomfort and tension within a few days. Over the course of a few months, I saw improved performance while hiking steep hills and a more powerful …
When I teach the bench press during the StrongFirst Lifter Certification, the path of the bar section is one of my favorites. In the deadlift and the squats (Zercher, front, and back), the bar path is generally a straight, vertical line. However, in the bench press, many people curve the bar path from the start …
Kettlebell snatches are one of my personal favorite lifts. They are athletic and explosive. They can be done with a variety of weights, tempos, rep schemes, and in my experience, give more “what the heck” (WTH) effects than anything else. There is a unique and gratifying sense of completion when you lock out each rep …
The Snatch Pyramid: Optimize Your Snatch Training Read More »
Co-authored by Jonathan Pope Special operations selection courses are not just physically challenging. They’re also incredibly mentally and emotionally stressful. One of the most common ways of creating this stress is to shroud students in a constant cloud of ambiguity. You never know what’s coming next, how long it will last, or how much more …
Results are What Matter For decades I have heard about thousands of training related products that claimed to work magic for athletes, oftentimes supported by “abstracts” of research and clinical studies. But very few of them were ever mentioned again just a couple of years later. Similarly, the internet and social media expose us to …
As the COVID-19 quarantine closed gyms and found many of us stuck in small spaces with little equipment, kettlebells suddenly became a hot commodity. When a single piece of equipment gives you the ability to build strength and endurance in equal measure—all while taking up very little of that precious space—they are bound to be …
I often describe that my personal training career took a fortunate turn in the road when I attended my very first kettlebell level 1 certification back in 2009. I had already been training for a number of years, held several nationally accredited certifications, and was three years out of grad school with a master’s degree …
A Minimalist Kettlebell Program for Busy Professionals Read More »
The Swing is the Center of the Universe If you have been to a StrongFirst kettlebell certification or course, chances are that you have heard this statement. It doesn’t mean that we only do swings, or that we always do swings. But the swing is at the core of the kettlebell quick lifts: one- and …
One-arm/One-leg Pushups and the Center of the Universe Read More »