My brother and I were sitting in our room at the Hampton Inn across the street from the Arnold Fitness Expo when he got the email. MIT wished him the best of luck at the 2012 Olympic Trials/National Weightlifting Championships but, unfortunately, they decided his time spent in the Olympic development program would not count towards his PE credit. Mike and I looked at each other incredulously before he broke the silence. “Well I guess they take ALL kinds of education very seriously.”

In fairness, they did write a nice article

Normally that would be the highlight of my week, but I was at the Arnold Fitness Expo and there were much crazier things waiting inside. I’ve been coming to the Arnolds for over 8 years and I still haven’t experienced anything quite like it. It is the most extreme of absolutely everything: strongmen, body builders, power lifters, Olympic lifters, MMA fighters, and even ping pong pros.

It’s probably the only place in the world where you can watch someone palm an anvil and then tear a phonebook and think to yourself “eh, par for the course.”

With Mike sitting in the hotel room and resting up for the meet, I went to check out the expo with some friends. In addition to being a major event for the represented sports, the Arnolds is also an expo for fitness and supplement companies. Being the fitness industry, this naturally brings out some famous representatives and some off-the-wall marketing gimmicks. After all, nothing says “lose weight” quite like a tank parked in the middle of a convention center.

I walked around for a couple hours and tried to get as much free clothing as I could. In the past, I’d also tried to make a meal out of eating free samples, but I learned my lesson the hard way a couple years ago. Apparently your stomach will be upset for days if you eat fourteen different types of protein bars and a dozen “weight-loss” cookies.

Who knew?

There were some really interesting booths. One booth had a competition to see who could do the most pull ups…covered head to toe in bags of beef jerky.

Another booth had this guy, who my brother snapped a photo with the next day. When he was walking away, Mike turned back and said “By the way, I loved you in Beerfest.” He replied “I remember my first beer!” in his accent.

Perhaps the biggest change over the last 8 years has been the rise of MMA. 8 years ago, when a company wanted to send the “be a tough guy message” they used a snarling photo of Brian Urlacher or Ray Lewis. Now, it’s guys like Georges St. Pierre and Shogun that are plastered everywhere.

In the span of 200 feet, I saw Matt Hughes, Forrest Griffin, Shogun Rua, and, best of all, Don Frye signing autographs. The lines were way too long for me to wait in (Mike was lifting later that day), so I didn’t get any pictures. But I did take this picture that I think illustrates how pervasive MMA has become. Introducing Cung Le’s energy balls:

And of course, I saw Arnold as he walked by:

It was getting close to the competition so I headed over to check out the lifting venue. This year, the lifting was in a room that had one side open to the general public so that passerbys could check it out. And they did. The place was so packed I worried I might not be able to get a good seat for Mike’s session.

I also noticed the meet was running a bit late, so I went back over to the expo. As soon as I walked through the doors I saw the Strikeforce weigh-ins and AMC’s Caros Fodor stepping on the scale. It was really an amazing coincidence. I knew Caros was fighting that weekend, but I had no idea it was in Columbus and I had no idea he was weighing in at that moment.

I checked online and bought some tickets for the next day.

Any time you can watch the AMC beatdown-industrial complex in person, I recommend it. Unfortunately, Caros lost the next day (I’m sure he’ll be back stronger than ever!) but it’s always fun to watch AMC fighters. They’re amazingly technical and conditioned and the coaches are some of the best in the sport. If you watch Tim Boetsch’s epic win again, listen to Matt Hume in between rounds. I’d rather have AMC in my corner than Yoda.

And of course, I saw Ronda Rousey’s vicious arm bar (as seen on one of the screens):

After the Strikeforce weigh-ins, it was time for the lifting.

I knew Mike’s session would be tough. It had Kendrick Farris, hands down America’s best male lifter, as well as a slew of other tough competitors. 85kg is always a brutal weight class. It’s really just bell curve math; 85kgs is right about where most humans fall in terms of size, so there’s more competition.

There’s a lot of attempts before Mike, who is closer to the top, so I refresh Sherdog every 5 seconds for the live blog of Demetrious Johnson vs. Ian McCall. Eventually Mike’s up. He’s opening on the snatch with 142kg. He looks like he has it and then loses it behind him. Something’s not quite right. He bumps up to 143kg and misses. Finally, he comes up for 143kg again.

Up until this point, it had been one of the most brutal snatch sessions I’ve ever seen. 3 different lifters bombed out (failed to make a lift). Mike just needs a make and he’ll be in medal contention. He comes up to the platform focused and lets out his patented primal scream. Two white lights and a red make a good lift! I asked Mike why he looked so confident walking off the platform even though the lift was a little shaky: “I always pretend it’s the greatest lift of my life.”

After about a half hour, it was time for the clean and jerk. Mike begins with an easy opener. Then he misses at 183kg a little later. It looked like he had it, but the way the bar landed actually cut off his air. He didn’t have enough energy for the jerk. After a little jockeying for position with the weights, Mike settles on 184kg and unloads. It was really easy.

He’s now in second place overall. He has the lead by 3kg plus the edge in body weight. The guy behind him, Travis Cooper, needs to make 188kg for second. And he does. He smokes it. Hats off to Travis Cooper, that was a hell of a lift.

Mike gets 2nd place in the snatch and 3rd overall. Full video of the 85kg session is below. Unsurprisingly, Kendrick Farris won in dominating fashion. You should watch him. Also watch Zach Krych, who makes a PR 195kg and then retires off into the sunset.

It was really late, so I ran off to get a bite and then came back to watch the 94kg class. There was only one lifter left when I came back and it was 18 year old Ian Wilson. Ian is an awesome guy and a little bit of a Youtube phenom because he posted a video of his 15 year old self squatting a ton. Even though Ian is a top level lifter and his age is easily verifiable through a cursory Google search, the internet was not ready for his strength. My favorite comment: “If this guy’s 15 then I’m a unicorn that shoots confetti out of my ass.”

Ian needed to make 192kgs to take home the title. He had two attempts. The first one was close. He missed it barely on the jerk. He had two minutes to follow himself for the last attempt of the day and the energy in the room was absolutely incredible. Ian walked up to the bar like a man on a mission and crushed the lift. The room absolutely exploded. It was one of the coolest lifting moments I’ve ever seen. Here are all of his lifts:

I was pretty tired afterwards so I went to sleep. The next day I walked around the expo a little bit and got some free stuff by lifting heavy objects at the different booth challenges (I do train with Joel after all). Mike and I discussed his training a bit. MIT had left him absolutely wiped out physically and mentally. He always trains better during the summer when he only has to worry about picking things up and putting them down without any of this differential equation nonsense.

We talked a little bit about Bioforce HRV. Mike had experimented with it before, but ultimately left it out of his preparation for Nationals because he didn’t have time to adapt to the recommendations before Nationals. But given what he’s trying to do, balance the absolute most extreme physical (elite weightlifting) and mental (MIT) stressors possible, Bioforce HRV is an absolute no-brainer.

Finally, it’s worth giving a shout out to Holley Mangold and her coach Mark Cannella. Holley, as some of you might know, was featured on MTV’s True Life as a weightlifter. Her brother Nick is an all-pro center for the Jets. Holley has developed unbelievably quickly and clutched to make the US Women’s Olympic Team. Mark not only coached Holley in this event, but he also organized the event itself (huge shout out to Rachel Crass as well). There’s really nothing else to say, Mark is the man.

Good luck in London guys, you’ve earned it!

As always, visit the USA Weightlifting site to support our team: http://weightlifting.teamusa.org/

Combat Strength Training 101

The topic of strength in sports has become a hotly debated topic in recent years. Some coaches believe that you can never have enough, while others believe strength is largely overrated. For those that train in combat sports, they know that strength, power, speed and conditioning are all necessary traits if you want to be a well-rounded combat athlete.

*Reprinted with permission from Fight! magazine

Today’s fighters can’t afford to be lacking in any of these areas any more than they can afford to have big holes in their ground game, stand up, or wrestling if they want to get anywhere in the sport.

Fortunately, when trained properly, strength is an area that can improve rapidly and it’s a weapon that can be used to control the fight and take it where you want it to go. Top wrestlers have frequently been known for their high levels of strength and this strength advantage has no doubt been a big part of why so many wrestlers have had such success in MMA.

Whether you’re a wrestler or not, if you’re lacking in strength and explosive power, you’re missing out on a key ingredient necessary for performance and you’re leaving yourself vulnerable to those that have it.

What is Strength, Anyway?

In the simplest of terms, strength is the ability to produce force and at the end of the day, producing force is all your muscles are really designed for. They contract to produce force and this force is what moves your body around, everything from walking down the street to throwing the knockout punch comes from your ability to produce the force necessary to do so.

In this way, strength is the foundation of every movement and every quality we can think of from explosiveness, to speed, to endurance is simply a different kind of strength. Explosiveness depends on how quickly we can produce force, maximum strength is a matter of how much total force we can generate and conditioning is really nothing more than how long we can maintain our force production for before we fatigue.

Different sports require different levels of each of these kinds of strength and to be successful in combat sports, you’ll need to find the right balance between all three. Unfortunately, finding this balance can be tricky and with most combat athletes already spending hours in the gym training to improve their skills, there is often little time left to devote to getting stronger.

Because of this, it’s absolutely essential that your strength program is delivering the results it should be and this means it must take into account the specific needs of hardworking combat athletes. Trying to follow a strength program designed for athletes in other sports is often a recipe for disaster. To get the most out of your strength program, make sure to pay close attention to the following guidelines:

Strength Training Tip #1: Don’t confuse strength with conditioning

Without question, one of the biggest problems made by combat athletes that are trying to get stronger is trying to develop strength and conditioning at the same time – often they even try to do this in the same workout! A great deal of recent research has shown that this approach leads to less than optimal results in both strength and conditioning and a better approach is to separate training for these different areas into separate workouts.

Also, lifting heavy weights with minimal rest between sets or performing high reps in circuit fashion is not the best way to improve strength. There is a reason you see the strongest and most explosive athletes in the world, Powerlifters, Weightlifters, Sprinters, etc., resting a long time between sets.

You would never see a world-class 100m sprinter running sprints with as little as 10 or 20 seconds rest between them an expect to get faster, so don’t think you can build maximum strength or power with this approach either.

A good rule of thumb is if you are getting winded during your strength workout, you may be working on strength-endurance, but you’re not going to improve max strength or explosive strength with this type of training. Always make sure to rest at least 2-4 minutes between sets of strength work if you are trying to develop either one, or both, of these two qualities, and save the conditioning work for separate training sessions where you can really focus on it. Trying to train every form of strength all at once never leads to the best results and should be avoided for all but complete beginners.

Strength Training Tip #2: Don’t be afraid to lift heavy

In order to get stronger, you can’t be afraid to lift heavy weights, but you must also remember that if you’re spending 4-6 days in the gym training combat sports skills, you can’t handle the same lifting volume as a Powerlifter or strength athlete that only trains strength. This is one of the biggest mistakes that combat sports athletes make far too often, they try to follow the exact same program as an lifter or athlete that isn’t putting in in the same number of hours training their sport.

You wouldn’t expect an NFL athlete to follow the same lifting program in the middle of the season that they follow during the off-season, so you shouldn’t expect to be able to follow the same high volume training programs as other lifters without eventually paying the price. Many combat athletes that have tried to follow training programs with strength training volumes that are too high eventually end up with sore and aching joints and/or injuries at some point.

Fortunately, combat athletes don’t need to develop the same level of strength as a Powerlifter, Weightlifter or other strength and power sport athlete so there is no need to try and train with the same volumes to begin with. Most of those athletes have been lifting weights for many years and need higher volumes to continue to improve, but combat sport athletes rarely need anywhere near the amount of strength work to get stronger. For most combat sport athletes, 12-14 total sets of strength work with reps per set in the 3-6 range for the majority of sets per training session are generally enough to get the job done.

Strength Training Tip #3: Stick to the Basic Lifts

With the amount of extra time available for strength work often limited, you have to get the most out of your time and this means sticking to the basic compound lifts. To improve your general strength, you should use the big lifts like squats, pull-ups, rows, deadlifts, bench press, etc., because these lifts use a ton of muscle and help improve your nervous system’s ability to active a lot of muscle at once and this ability is the foundation for both maximum strength and explosive power.

Exercises that isolate small muscle groups should be left to bodybuilders and fitness models, if you want to get strong and be a combat athlete, these types of exercises should be used minimally. While movements that use kettlebells and dumbbells do have their place in a strength training program, these exercises involve much lower levels of force and should be considered accessory exercises. Only once you’ve developed a solid level of general strength and developed your nervous system to a high level using the core lifts should you worry about focusing more specific combat sports exercises.

6 Week Sample Strength Training Program

 Weeks 1-2

Weeks 3-4

Weeks 5-6

Sample Program Guidelines:

• Rest 2-4 minutes between all sets
• Rest 3-5 minutes between exercises
• Perform 1-2 light warm-up sets before work sets
• Select a weight between 80-90% of your 1 rep max
• Try to increase weight in each lift, each week
• If possible, always try to perform strength workouts at least 4 hours before or after combat sports training session
• Accessory injury prevention exercises can be included during 10-15 dynamic warm-up period
• Do not train to failure, select a weight that will allow for 1-2 more reps per set than the prescribed number
• Following the 6 week program, make sure to take one “recovery” week with reduced weight and 40% less training volume
• Make sure to monitor your recovery throughout the program and adjust training load as necessary given your individual fitness level, schedule and goals. For the best results, use BioForce HRV to adjust training load on a daily and weekly basis according to your training readiness.
• More strength training methods and details on how to create your own training program can be found in Ultimate MMA Conditioning

]]> http://www.8weeksout.com/2012/03/14/combat-sports-strength-training/feed/ 7 http://www.8weeksout.com/2012/03/01/tim-boetsch-ufc-144-comeback-knockout/ http://www.8weeksout.com/2012/03/01/tim-boetsch-ufc-144-comeback-knockout/#comments Thu, 01 Mar 2012 10:18:27 +0000 Joel Jamieson http://www.8weeksout.com/?p=1424

If you saw UFC 144 last Saturday, then you no doubt saw one of the better 3rd round comebacks in long time in Tim’s fight against Yushin Okami. Joe Rogan went so far as to call it “one of the greatest UFC comebacks of all time” and there’s no doubt that Tim did a hell of a job and overcame a less than stellar performance in the first two rounds to a win a fight that he was clearly behind on the judges scorecards at the time. Here’s how he did it…

Tim Boetsch’s UFC 144 Training Camp

At this point, Tim has been coming to train with us for a couple of years, so we know know how he responds to training, what he needs to do and how to organize his training in a way that works best for him. This was also his third fight at middleweight, so his weight cut is becoming easier as well. He came into camp at around 215-220 and by the time he left for Japan, he was down to around 202 lbs.

As I talked about back in the series on his training camp for UFC 130 against Kendall Grove, Tim’s a guy that likes to work hard, but we have to carefully monitor him to make sure he doesn’t overtrain. Being a bigger, heavier, stronger fighter, his work capacity is not the same as a lightweight or smaller fighter and throughout all of his training camps, I monitor him very closely with BioForce HRV as well as with the Omegawave.

I’ve also just started working with Polar’s T2 system  so for his next camp, we’ll monitor all of his training with that as well. In the coming weeks, I’ll have some good article on my use of it and how it all correlates to HRV. I haven’t had a chance to work with the system for long yet, but I think it’s got a ton of potential…

Last week’s article on Roadwork 2.0: The Comeback happened to be particularly well timed given Tim’s comeback win because it’s a method I use frequently in his training. The reason is simple, it works, it’s low impact, and it doesn’t cause a level of fatigue that will keep Tim from doing the work that he needs to do in his MMA training.

Personally, this is an area I think many fighters get completely wrong. They try to literally kill themselves in their strength and conditioning work outside of their skills training doing endless high intensity interval work, and then when they actually get in the ring or cage to spar and do specific work, they are so fatigued that they don’t have anything left. The quality of their skill work is low, they get sloppy and practice poor technique over and over again. This is a HUGE mistake!

Getting in Shape to Fight

Of course you need to work hard in your strength and conditioning sessions, but during a fight camp – and especially in the last few weeks of it – your conditioning work needs to come in the form of your skills training. If the work you’re doing outside of that leaves you too fatigued to get the most out of your specific conditioning work, you’re doing things the wrong way.

This is the difference between general conditioning, and specific conditioning, and just as I talk about in Ultimate MMA Conditioning you need to understand the role of each in the overall training program.

Primarily through the use of Roadwork 2.0 and Tempo Intervals we were able to drop Tim’s resting heart rate from the mid 60s down to the low 50s within about 4-5 weeks. We would typically do 1-2 sessions of each type of work each week and as we got into the later parts of training camp, I also had him do some high resistance intervals and threshold work as well.

His BioForce HRV number started in the mid 60s and by the end of camp, was in the low to mid 80s. This change in heart rate variability represents a very big improvement in aerobic fitness and an increase in overall work capacity.

For the most part, a well conditioned fighter will generally always be in the 80s or 90s on BioForce HRV and have a resting HR in the low 50s.  There are exceptions fo this, but by and large these are the numbers I shoot for when getting a fighter ready for a fight.

Also, because Tim is naturally a strong guy and he doesn’t need to build muscle and work himself out of his new weight class, his strength work was more or less maintenance throughout the camp. We stuck to the core lifts, two days per week with low to moderate reps and a pretty low to moderate overall volume.

He doesn’t need any more than that to maintain his level of strength and power and during a training camp, his time and energy are best spent focusing on getting his conditioning level up while dropping the weight he needs to drop to get down to 185lbs at fight time.

The key to everything was to manage his overall training load to make sure he was responding well and not overworking because a high volume of training coupled with a diet that will lead to the weight loss he needed is a recipe for overtraining if you’re not careful.

Again, this something far too many fighters let happen during a training camp because all their strength and conditioning is high intensity work and then all their skill training is as well and sooner or later, fatigue accumulates to the point that the body’s preservation response is activated and overtraining results.

This is the real reason why we’re seeing so many injuries in the sport, something I talked about “The Truth About Injuries“ and why we’re seeing top fighters are gassing out inside of one round far more often than we should.  

If you’re in a constant state of fatigue for weeks on end, your quality of training suffers, your body ends up getting beat up and ultimately, you’re not able to get in the kind of shape you need to be in.

UFC 144: The Results

During the first couple rounds of the fight, things obviously weren’t going Tim’s way. In the first round, he was taking more hard shots than he was giving and he was making the mistake of staying just at the end of Okami’s range, something that certainly wasn’t in the gameplan. There was no doubt going into the fight that the fight was not going to be an easy one, Yushin was ranked the #3 middleweight in the world, after all and this was a big step up in competition for Tim.

Throughout camp, Tim had worked on getting inside on Okami, using his strength and power to his advantage and avoiding Okami’s punches by using his footwork to move and not just stand at the end of his range. In the first two rounds, he was obviously not doing what he needed to do and not doing what he had trained to do.

Who knows exactly why this was the case, perhaps the fact that Tim was fighting halfway around the world in Japan for the first time affected him, but sometimes guys get in a fight and don’t do what they should and the first couple rounds was definitely one of those times. Aside from that, Okami is a damn good fighter and has beaten a lot of top guys and he was fighting at home in front of the Japanese crowd and he came out looking sharp and fighting well.

I actually thought the first round wasn’t that bad, he lost the round, but he did land some shots. In the second round, Tim was taking more shots and certainly losing the stand up battle and after going for the guillotine, he ended up in a very bad spot and Okami did a good job of capitalizing on it.

Had Tim not gone for the choke, he may not have ended up with Okami on top of him and the round might not have looked as bad, but there’s no doubt he had to fight his way to get through the round and after round two, he had lost both rounds and things weren’t looking great.

Fortunately, Tim is one of those guys that never quits and in between rounds you could hear Matt telling him that he could still win the fight, he just needed to go out and be “super agressive” and obviously that’s exactly what he did. Tim’s aggressiveness and strategy in the third round was exactly what he should have done in earlier rounds.

Press the action, throw hard shots and don’t stand at the end of Okami’s range and let him use his striking and reach to his advantage. That was the gameplan and once Tim started following it and doing what he had trained to do in camp, he was able to put Okami away and get the huge comeback victory.

UFC 144 Wrap-Up

I’ve seen some people talking about the fight and some people are giving the impression that Tim’s win was “luck” or a fluke. I don’t think this is accurate, however, because when you implement a gameplan that you spent weeks training and rely on fitness that you’ve spent months developing and it works and you win a fight, that’s not luck. Luck is something that happens by accident or chance, if Okami had slipped on the canvas and knocked himself out in the third round, that would have been luck.

Tim used his skill, his conditioning his mental toughness, and the right gameplan to win that fight and that’s not luck by any means. He flew halfway around the globe, fought the #3 ranked middleweight fighter in the world in front of his hometown fans and he didn’t have the best couple of rounds. In the third, however, he came out, focused on what he needed to do and he followed the gameplan and finished the fight.

That’s not luck, that’s just a tough fight against a top opponent that Tim was able to win because he was mentally tough, physically well conditioned and prepared and Matt put together the right gameplan and in the third round, Tim followed it to perfection.

In the end, Tim’s fight was a great example of what it takes to win fights against top opponents. Many fighters may have mentally given up after losing the first two rounds, many fighters wouldn’t have had had the conditioning to still have that much knockout power after two hard fought rounds against a big, strong opponent like Okami and many fighters wouldn’t have been fortunate enough to have one of the very best coaches there is, Matt “The Wizard” Hume, in their corner.

Fortunately for Tim, however, he had all those and it was team effort between everyone here in Seattle that he works with while he’s out here and all his coaches and training partners back home that led to the win at UFC 144.

With the win over Okami, Tim is now 3-0 at middleweight and the road ahead certainly won’t get any easier. Middleweight is a brutally tough division in the UFC with a ton of great fighters and it’s a particularly strong division of wrestlers with guys like Sonnen, Munoz, and up and comers like Chris Weidman all in the mix. Not to mention Anderson Silva is at the time and is largely considered the best fighter in the world.

There’s no doubt that Tim will have to rely on all his strengths and his work ethic as he continues to work his way up the division but so far, Tim’s found a way to win and I think he’s got the right tools and the work ethic that it will take to continue to do so. Stay tuned for more coverage of Tim’s future training camps and more entertaining fights from the Barbarian!

For countless years, one of the most relied upon methods used by wrestlers, boxers and other combat athletes to accomplish this was challenging task was good old fashioned roadwork. Everyone from Mohammad Ali to Aleksandr Karelin to Nick Diaz has been seen hitting the pavement and putting in their miles when getting ready for a fight.

In recent years, however, despite the obvious success of those who have used it in the past, a growing trend in mixed martial arts circles has been to condemn any form of longer, slower paced training as outdated, overrated and unnecessary. The typical argument used to support such statements is that combat sports are not long and slow events and so training to get in shape for them should not be long or slow either – this is the basic principles of specificity, coaches often say. Many have even gone so far as to claim that anything other than high intensity intervals are a waste of time and can potentially lead to detrimental decreases in speed and performance.

Although there is little doubt that all combat sports do require explosive strength and power, of course, there is much more to the roadwork story than such perspectives are often inclined to admit. While proclaiming roadwork and aerobic training are unnecessary might make for catchy headlines and sound bites, in this article I’m going to tell you why longer, slower, steady-state cardio training will soon be making a comeback and I’m even going to give you a new twist on this age old training method that will make it more effective than ever.

The Great Roadwork Debate

Given the longstanding success and world class conditioning of some of combat sports greatest athletes throughout history that have been known to incorporate roadwork into their training, it may seem a bit surprising that it has come under attack in recent years as being an ineffective way to get in shape to fight. Along these lines, coaches arguing against the use of roadwork have frequently cited several reasons as to why they believe this type of training should be abandoned by combat athletes in favor of higher intensity training methods.

Although each of their reasons may sound logical on the surface, it’s important to take a more thorough look at their three most commonly named reasons to see if they hold up to the scrutiny of experience and the scientific method, or if there is more to the roadwork story than can be read in the headlines. Those advocating against roadwork most often argue:

• Research shows better results from high intensity intervals
• Combat sports are explosive and anaerobic, not slow and aerobic
• Roadwork takes too much time

What Does the Research on Roadwork Really Say?

There is no doubt that there is recent research that shows high intensity interval training can be a more effective conditioning method than longer, slower, steady-state training such as roadwork. Almost all of these studies have focused on using VO2 max, the most commonly referenced measurement of aerobic fitness in scientific literature, as the measuring stick of changes in aerobic fitness and conditioning. Virtually all of the frequently cited studies have been no more than 6-8 weeks in length.

These two facts alone underscore the need for context when it comes to interpretation of research. First, when measuring only a few weeks at a time, it can be very easy to misinterpret the findings and extrapolate the conclusions beyond their limitations. A closer examination of the studies comparing intervals to steady state conditioning methods reveals that those in the higher intensity groups do, in fact, tend make more rapid improvements in VO2 max.

The problem, however, is that they also plateau much faster as well when compared to those in the lower intensity training groups. The infamous Tabata research, for example, one of the most commonly cited pieces of literature used to disparage the use of roadwork, showed that the improvements in VO2 max of those in the interval training group plateaued after just 3 weeks. Those in the steady-state group, on the other hand, continued to make improvements throughout the study period.

Second, although research is often limited to measuring a single variable of aerobic fitness and conditioning like VO2 max for the sake of measurement and standardization, the real world of conditioning is far more complex than that. There is no single measurement or variable that will always directly correlate with an athlete’s aerobic fitness or conditioning level, there are many different pieces to the puzzle. Looking at VO2 max, or any other single variable alone, does not provide an accurate reflection of a combat athlete’s conditioning level.

The bottom line is that looking through the research can help provide clues and valuable pieces of information, but the evidence must be carefully examined within the context of practical experience and the inherent limitations of only measuring changes in a small number of variables over a relatively short period of time. Training and performance are complex, multifactorial, year round processes and this must always be taken into account when trying to use research to validate, or invalidate, the use of various training methods like roadwork.

Are Combat Sports Anaerobic?

Another of the arguments often used to support the exclusive use of interval methods instead of steady-state training is that combat sports are explosive and therefore anaerobic in nature. The biggest problem with this argument is simply that it’s not true. On the contrary, combat sorts require high levels of both aerobic and anaerobic fitness, but the overall majority, i.e. greater than 50% of the energy necessary to fight, comes from the aerobic energy system.

How do we know this is the case? Well, for one thing, performance in sports that really are highly anaerobic, sports like like weightlifting, Olympic lifting, 100m sprinting, field events, etc. cannot be repeated without very long rest periods. Try asking a sprinter to run 100m at full speed and then run another one 20 seconds later and see what happens – I guarantee he or she will look at you like you’re crazy!

In combat sports, the skills are certainly explosive, but they’re also highly repetitive and sub- maximal. You aren’t throwing every single punch or kick as hard as you possibly could. You aren’t putting every ounce of strength and power into every single movement because everyone knows that if you did that, you’d quickly gas out.

The bottom line is that all combat sports require a balance of both aerobic and anaerobic energy development. Writing off methods like roadwork that have been proven for years to effectively increase aerobic fitness simply because they may appear slower than the skills of the sport is like saying there is no reason to do anything but spar because that’s the closet speed to an actual fight.

Roadwork is Time Consuming

A lot of proponents for the “nothing but intervals” approach also argue that even if roadwork is effective, it simply takes too much time and you can get the same results with less time using higher intensity training. The truth is that roadwork does take more time than doing an interval workout, there is no doubt, but this also is part of why it’s able to deliver more long-term results.

As discussed previously, higher intensity methods often lead to greater progress in the short run, but this comes at the expense of plateaus and stagnation. Lower intensity methods may not work as fast, but they produce much more long-term consistent increases in aerobic fitness and when it comes right down to it, improving conditioning and performance requires time and hard work. As much as it might sound good to say you can achieve better results in 4 minutes than you can in 40 minutes, the real world has proven this idea to be nothing more than wishful thinking.

Just as a combat athlete shouldn’t expect to learn the skills and techniques of the sport in a short amount of time, conditioning and physical preparation should also be viewed as a long-term process that requires time and consistency. Those looking for the shortcut or the easiest route are often left lacking development and gassed out before those who are willing to put in the time it takes to get better.

The Return of Roadwork for Conditioning

Given the amount of misinformation that’s been used to support the idea that roadwork should be abandoned as a form of training, it’s no surprise that the current interval crazy has failed to produce the results so often promised by those advocating it. Despite the endless promotion of interval training as the only form of training necessary, the world of combat sports has not seen a noticeable increase in conditioning over this time. If anything, in fact, the general conditioning level of fighters today is worse than it’s been in the past.

Rarely does a major MMA event go by that we aren’t seeing at least one or more fights won or lost due to conditioning. This is happening at all levels and even in world championship fights no less!

If intervals really are the answer and roadwork and lower intensity methods of training are unnecessary, then where are the results? Why do we still see so many fighters gassing out even though the use of interval training is at an all-time high?

My prediction is that in the coming months and years, the combat sports community at large will begin to realize that although training with high intensity all the time might sound like a good idea in theory, it just doesn’t pan out in the real world. As a result, there will be a renewed interest in good old fashioned roadwork and we’ll start to see more combat athletes hitting the street once again in the name of conditioning.

Roadwork 2.0: The Comeback

When used properly, roadwork is an effective way to increase aerobic fitness and improve conditioning without putting the high level of stress on the body that’s inherent to higher intensity interval methods. Training for combat sports is already brutally demanding and trying to sprint at top speeds and use explosive conditioning methods all the time on top of hours of physically grueling skill work is not the best recipe for long-term success.

Likewise, hitting the pavement for hours on end isn’t always the best approach either and running large volumes and long distances can also take its toll on the body as well. There’s also times where running may not be the most practical option given different climates and times of year.

In order to solve these problems and make roadwork type training more effective than ever, I started using a new method of this age old approach with all the fighters I’ve trained several years and the results have been highly impressive. I’ve used this form of training with everyone from Rich Franklin to Tim Boetsch and they’ve all reported consistent improvements in conditioning and fitness using the principles laid out below.

Going Off Road for Conditioning

The biggest change in Roadwork 2.0 is that running doesn’t have to be the only form of training used. In fact, I often use other forms of exercise and training that are lower impact than running such as:

• Jumping rope
• Swimming
• Bicycling
• Sled dragging
• Shadowboxing
• Elliptical
• Rower
• Medicine ball Circuits
• Heavy Bag or Pad work
• Bodyweight Calisthenics

Using these types of activities can provide the same level of benefit as running, while putting less stress and wear and tear on the joints. There is no reason that all roadwork needs to actually be done on the road, there are endless other forms of steady state training that are equally effective, more practical and less monotonous than running. Because of this, I prefer to use a mixture of steady state running and Roadwork circuits as described below.

Roadwork Conditioning Circuits

Aside from expanding the type of exercises used overall, I’ve also increased the variety within a given steady state training session and often use a form of circuit training. Although most people associate circuits with performing an exercise for only a few seconds to a minute at most, I have my athletes perform each exercise in a roadwork circuit for 5-10 minutes at a time.

Not only does this break up the monotony of training, it increases the number of different muscles that will get worked within a given training session. When combat specific exercises like shadowboxing are included, it has an added benefit of increasing the specificity of the training as well.

Roadwork 2.0 Training Guidelines

There are just a few key guidelines that need to be followed in order to make roadwork 2.0 as effective as possible. As long as you pay attention to these simple details, there is literally an endless combination of possible exercises and roadwork 2.0 training programs that can be put together to improve conditioning.

• Keep heart rate between 130-150 beats per minute throughout the training session
• Perform each exercise for 5-15 minutes at a time with no rest between exercises
• Overall duration of each training session should be 40-90 minutes
• Ideally, Roadwork 2.0 should be done in a separate training session from strength work
• Include Roadwork 2.0 1-3 times per week depending on your individual needs and goals

Getting Started with Roadwork 2.0

Lower intensity exercise like Roadwork 2.0 helps promote blood flow and recovery, stimulates an increase in mitochondria (the cellular energy workhorses), builds work capacity and helps replenish levels of an important neurotransmitter called dopamine that gets depleted during high intensity training.

Countless athletes that I’ve had start performing this type of training have reported feeling and performing better in as little as a few weeks. Give Roadwork 2.0 a try and see for yourself what combat athletes across all generations have known since the beginning of the sport, roadwork flat out works. Within 8 weeks, it’s possible to dramatically improve aerobic fitness and conditioning with consistent training and an effectively managed program.

8 Week Sample Program

Measuring Progress

One of the most important components of training is being able to see where you’re at and measure your progress as you go along. The following three assessments will help guide you in your training and provide a simple measuring stick you can use to compare your results to the pros.

As with any training program, it’s important to keep track of your progress and monitor your results throughout. You can track your resting heart rate on a daily and weekly basis to look for trends and improved aerobic fitness and if you have BioForce HRV you can use it to help manage your loading to make sure you’re pushing to within your limits and not headed towards overtraining.

Keep in mind the sample program provided is purely an example and you should always develop a training program that fits within your own needs, goals and overall fitness levels. For more info on conditioning and how to develop an individualized training program, make sure to check out Ultimate MMA Conditioning

This article has been reprinted with permission from Fighting Fit Magazine.

Throughout my 30-year career in in the fields of Sports Rehabilitation and Athletic Performance Training, I have spent thousands of hours in conversation with many good friends and mentors in the Strength and Conditioning profession. In a specific conversation that occurred in 2009 with renowned NFL and Hall of Fame Strength Coach Johnny Parker, he expressed his concern upon reading a newspaper article reporting an 800-pound squat performance by a collegiate football player.

Coach Parker’s concern was the necessity of such a high intensity squat lift as a strength requirement for the game of football and is the risk of such a high intensity squat performance worth the reward? Certainly extremely high intensity loads are necessary in the sports of Powerlifting and Olympic Weightlifting, as the level of athletic achievement during these competitions is based upon the successful weightlifting performance of the heaviest loads possible.

In regard to athletes who are not competitive weightlifters, but are utilizing weightlifting to enhance athleticism, is such a high intensity squat, as the previously mentioned 800-pound performance, necessary for an athlete such as a football, basketball, or baseball player?

Coach Parker and I then reminded each other of an incident that occurred during my years with working him at the old New York Giants stadium. At that time both he and I were also studying with a former Soviet Weightlifter and Soviet Coach, Gregorio Goldstein.

On this particular day, Coach Goldstein was also at Giants Stadium, where a Giant football player, David Megget had just easily squatted 427 pounds at a body weight of 178 pounds. When asking Coach Goldstein how to make Megget stronger he replied, “You don’t have to make him any stronger, you have to make him faster”. This comment had a profound effect on each of us to this day.

In a very recent discussion with another renowned Hall of Fame Strength Coach Al Vermeil, regarding a professional baseball player that I am presently training, I posed the question that I am often asked during the rehabilitation and/or performance training of an athlete, “How much strength is enough?”

How much strength does this professional athlete need to successfully play baseball at a consistent optimum level over a long season? This topic of conversation with these, and other legendary strength and conditioning professionals has enhanced my appreciation of this subject matter.

So the question is raised, how much strength is necessary for optimal athletic performance?

Strength

Strength may be defined as the ability of the neuromuscular system of the body to produce force as placing tension on skeletal muscles stimulates neuromuscular adaptations. Neuromuscular force generation may be either isometric or dynamic in nature, and has characteristics that would include a magnitude, a rate, and a direction. It is this dynamic muscle force generation that results in movement.

Additional factors that will affect force production include the type of muscle contraction, as well as both the rate and degree of muscle activation. The significance of force production can be determined from Newton’s second law of motion:

Force = Mass X Acceleration (F= ma)

Therefore, the ability of an athlete to accelerate (a) one’s body mass (m) or an external object is highly dependent upon the musculature of the body to generate force (F). Additionally, power production is the product of force and velocity and, in the opinion of many researchers and strength coaches, the most important factor in determining athletic success in a majority of various types of sports of participation.

The neuromuscular strength characteristics to be considered for the achievement of optimal athletic performance include (a) maximal strength (MS), (b) explosive strength (ES), and (c) reactive strength (RS) qualities. The correct proportional development of these strength qualities during training is dependent upon the specific power type activity to be performed, i.e. football blocking, wrestling, running, jumping, track and field throwing events, sprinting, etc.…

Athletic performance training programs that enhance MS, ES, and RS qualities will have an eventual transfer to the power activity (athletic) performance via the neuromuscular system of the body. MS training alone will improve neuromuscular force production, however, only through the combination of MS with either or ES and/or RS training, will ideal power type performances be achieved.

Strength and Power In Sports

From the perspective of athletic performance, many researchers and strength and conditioning professionals, are of the opinion that there are two particular variables of high significance to the contribution of optimal athletic performance. These two variables include the peak rate of force development (PRFD) or “explosive strength” and power output. The concept of explosive strength is directly related to the athlete’s ability to accelerate objects including body mass.

Work is the product of force and the distance that the object moves in the direction of the applied force (Work = Force X Distance). Power may be defined as the rate of doing work (P = force X distance/time). Power may also be conveyed as the product of force and speed (P = force X speed).

Power may be evaluated as an average performed throughout an exercise range of motion or as an instantaneous value occurring at a particular moment during the exercise range of motion or during the displacement of an object. Peak power (PP) may be defined as the highest instantaneous power value found over a range of motion while Maximum power (MP) is the highest peak power output an athlete is capable of generating under a specific set of conditions (i.e. type of exercise or skill performed).

The body’s neuromuscular contribution of a movement sequence that results in maximum achievable velocities primarily depends upon power production (i.e. a MS component in association with a velocity component). Additionally, activities that require a display of “agility” i.e. change of direction and acceleration, are also dependent upon high “bursts” of power output.

Although it appears that the influence of power is critical for optimal athletic performance, it may be argued that maximum strength is the basic quality that affects power output. It may also be foreseeable, that MS would have a greater effect in sports of participation where the emphasis for the success of the sport is specifically to overcome maximal load intensities (i.e. Powerlifting, Olympic Lifting) followed by sports and activities requiring a high maximal strength component based on the nature of the sport as well as the position played (i.e. American football, rugby, track and field throwing events, sprinter’s starts, etc.…)

However, it is important for strength and conditioning professionals to acknowledge that maximum strength appears to affect power in a hierarchical manner with a diminishing influence as the external load decreases to a point where other such physical qualities such as the rate of force development may become more important.

Muscle Stiffness and Elastic Strength

Lower extremity muscle stiffness is essential, as well as a prerequisite to ensure an optimal Stretch Shortening Cycle (SSC)/Plyometric type exercise performance. Plyometric (SSC) exercise performance improves RS qualities, as higher stiffness levels of the lower extremities during SSC exercise performance will result in an increase in the amount of stored (potential) and reused (kinetic) energy.

There is a positive relationship between increased levels of leg and joint stiffness (the ability to resist flexion) and improvement in power, force output, rate of force production, and velocity parameters, as well as a very important decrease in amortization/ground contact times (GCT). A minimal GCT is essential for an ideal SSC resulting in optimal jumping, hopping, sprinting, and distance running (running economy) performance.

The stiffness of muscle is variable and is dependent upon the forces exerted. For example, a muscle is compliant when passive, yet stiff when active. Through various methods of training it is possible to maintain and/or enhance optimal levels of lower extremity muscle stiffness. Resistance training utilizing heavy load intensities (increasing MS levels) has been demonstrated to be a very effective way to enhance lower extremity and joint stiffness.

The “Strength Reserve”

During my recent conversation with Coach Vermeil he discussed an important phenomenon that he described as a “strength reserve”. As an athlete participates in a long and grueling season, it is quite common for these athletes to lose their high initial levels of MS qualities that were present at the start of the season.

Appropriate higher weight intensities in conjunction with specific and appropriate levels of exercise volume should be incorporated during the athlete’s off-season and in-season training in an effort to both increase (off-season) and maintain (in-season) athlete MS levels, as well as the benefits (force production) that are associated with high MS levels.

Maintaining this important physical quality will assist to ensure repeated optimal performance over time. Coach Vermeil recommends an increase of maximal strength levels of 5% to 10% annually to establish and progress the athlete’s strength reserve during their playing season and career.

Coach Vermeil also explained how MS qualities are extremely important to the aging athlete. As the athlete ages MS strength levels play a more important role to ensure successful athletic performance. Athletes begin to lose their elastic strength qualities in their late twenties, thus the counter balance to the reduction of this elastic strength physical quality is the continued enhancement of MS values.

The greater the amount of MS “banked” via years of strength training, the greater the athletes ability to maintain the “balance of the scales” so to speak, during the aging process where elastic abilities are lost and MS qualities are gained/stored.

In my discussions with Stan Bailey, a former Olympic Weightlifter who participated in two (2) Olympic games and is a coach at our Performance Center here in New York, he also spoke of the necessity of the development and maintenance of optimal MS levels.

Coach Bailey is also of the opinion that as an athlete has an initial decline in their elastic strength qualities in their late twenties, they will also eventually begin to initially lose MS qualities slightly later in life. It is recognized that an athlete’s MS levels will begin to decline at approximately age 30. Coach Bailey’s opinion, based on his empirical experiences as both an Olympic Weightlifter and coach, is that MS levels are maintained slightly longer, until the age of 32.

The consistent annual development or the “banking” so to speak of enhanced MS qualities over time, along with the associated benefits of MS qualities, will not only enhance an athletes performance during a long and physically demanding season, but perhaps also turn back the hands of time, providing an abbreviated “fountain of youth” so to speak, resulting in the fore mentioned offset of elastic strength loss resulting in a possible enhanced longevity of an athletes career.

The eventual loss of an athlete’s maximal and elastic strength qualities, as well as many other neuromuscular, musculoskeletal, and physiological qualities with age is inevitable. The initiation, timing, enhancement, and maintence of MS qualities may assist to delay this process.

The Relationship Between Strength and Sports Performance

It would make sense to derive that if athlete possesses greater levels of MS and/or power vs. their opponent, with all else being equal, the stronger athlete would have a distinct advantage over their opponent. However, considerations for the necessary MS levels include but are not limited to the following:

Sport of Participation

Requirements of MS levels may differ depending upon the specific sport of participation. The physical requirements of each particular sport will assist to determine the various strength levels that are necessary for the participating athlete. For example, does a fencer need the same MS requirements as a football player?

Position of Sport Participation

As many athletes participate in the same sport of competition, the physical requirements based on their specific position or role of play may differ. Although an offensive lineman and wide receiver both participate in the same sport of American football, is the required proportion of physical qualities necessary for optimal athletic performance the same? Does the wide receiver need the same level of MS level as the offensive lineman?

Competitive Level of Sports Participation

Participation at various (and specific) levels of athletic competition may require advanced levels of MS parameters. An athletes MS requirement may considerably differ when comparing the demands of a professional athlete to that of an amateur athlete. The same may be said of the differences in the competitive “levels” of competition.

For example, NCAA intercollegiate athletics are divided into three (3) divisions (levels) of competition, Division I, Division II and Division III. It could be derived that higher MS levels would be required for successful participation at the higher levels (i.e. Division I athletes vs. Division II athletes vs. Division III athletes) of athletic competition. It has been documented that differences in the displayed MS and power levels do exist when comparing the strength and power characteristics of intercollegiate Division I, II, and III football players.

Standards of Competition

There are levels of strength that are necessary, not for guaranteed success, but as criteria to allow (qualify) an athlete to compete. This is certainly common in Powerlifting and Weightlifting, but is very important in other sports of participation as well. I recall a conversation with an Olympic Track and Field throws coach who stated that in the three previous Olympic games, all medaling shot-putters had bench pressed at least 440 pounds. If this statement is held true, then an athlete would have to enhance their MS in the bench press to at least 440 pounds to compete for a medal, not guarantee them a medal.

The same may be said of various professional sports annual combines. Based upon the participating athletes displayed levels of various strength qualities, they are evaluated against their peers based on a standardized level to predict performance and athletic success. The athletes competing at these combines must meet or surpass specific “physical” standards for consideration as not only a possible draft selection, but what specific level of draft selection by the professional teams of the league.

“Staying Fresh” vs. “Staying Strong”

There are often times during the competitive season where a Head Sport Coach or Strength and Conditioning Professional will make the statement “We need to keep our players fresh”. Frequently this means having the players rest, or perform workouts at low sub-maximal intensity levels as not to “wear the players out” so to speak.

There are certainly times through a long and physically taxing season where such a thought process may be feasible under specific scenarios, however, to adhere to this philosophy for a significant extended period of time may prove costly.

For an athlete to avoid appropriately planned and timed periodic high intensity, low volume training in-season, will contribute to a deconditioning of the athlete and a forfeiture of the MS and power qualities processed at the initiation of the season.

Coach Parker in-season weight programs placed emphasis of not only maintaining MS and power qualities during the season, but also improving these physical qualities as the season progressed. During one of his NFL Super Bowl bound team’s seasons, 35 of his players performed a PR in at least one lift during the same playoff game week.

The in-season program design is beyond the scope of this writing, however, the lesson presented is that (a) there is a distinct difference between “staying fresh” and “staying strong, and (b) in-season MS and power quality enhancement can occur. Maintaining and/or enhancing an athlete’s strength qualities in-season is what will keep the athlete “fresh”.

There are certainly a number of factors to consider during the instrumentation of an in-season training program. A sport such as football may present a more organized structure for training as only one competition is scheduled per week, vs. the multiple competition’s scheduled per week in sports such as baseball, basketball, and hockey.

However, there are strength coaches in these for mentioned sports, such as Coach Vermeil who programed appropriate high intensity exercises not only during the in-season, but prepared his athletes with appropriate intensity and low volume workouts on game day as well.

Maintaining, if not improving MS and power qualities during the in-season may be one of the few advantages that an athletic team may have over their opponent in the present era of advanced athletic performance enhancement training.

Training Time

Discussions with former NFL and Hall of Fame Strength Coach Al Miller and Strength Coach Derek Hansen brought to light the relationship of excessive MS training in regard to the time considerations available for the athlete’s training. In addition to the “risk vs. reward” contemplation during the application of increased high intensities for exercise performance, the time available for training is an additional factor that should not be ignored.

Organizations such as the NCAA place restricted time allotments for the training of an athlete. The athlete’s work capacity or their resistance to excessive fatigue is also a factor of suitable programming (training time).

The question arises if additional training time is spent to increase MS qualities that may not be necessary or excessive, is there enough training time remaining to properly train the other important physical qualities necessary for the athlete to produce optimal and repeated athletic performance?

Training time restrictions, in association with the athlete’s work capacity to performance train efficiently, are definitive considerations in the program design for the enhancement of multiple strength qualities that are necessary for high level athletic performance. Unnecessary emphasis of MS qualities may result in an absence of sufficient training of other important strength qualities.

Strength in Athletic Performance Summary

Maximal Strength is a basic and important characteristic for improving athletic performance. However, MS qualities in association with power type qualities are essential for the achievement of optimal athletic performance. A MS strength reserve is a contributing factor to maintaining athletic performance throughout a long season, as well as enhancing the longevity of an athlete’s career.

During the application of high intensity exercise the “risk vs. reward” must also be considered, as excessive high intensity loads may place the athlete at increased risk of injury. The appropriate and proportionate level of MS necessary for each individual athlete is contingent upon a multitude of factors, and includes the “eye of the coach”, likely the most essential factor in determining the MS level necessary for the athlete. It is the coach’s eye, which is the “talent” that separates the great coaches from the good ones.

Bibliography

1. Fry, AC and Kraemer WJ, Physical performance characteristics of American collegiate football players. Journal of Applied Sports Science Research 5 (3): 126 – 138, 1991

2. Hansen, Derek personal communication

3. Komi, PV, Stretch-shortening cycle. In: Strength and Power in Sport (2nd ed). Oxford, United Kingdom: Blackwell Science, pp. 184 – 202, 2003

4. Lyttle, AD, Wilson, GJ, and Ostrowski, KJ, Enhancing performance; maximal power versus combined weights and plyometrics training. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research 10(3): 173 – 179, 1996.

5. Miller, A., personal communication

6. Parker, J., personal communication

7. Stone, MH, “Explosive Exercise” National Strength and Conditioning Association Journal, 15 (4): 7 – 15, 1993

8 Vermeil, A., personal communication

9. Zatsiorsky, VM, and Kraemer, WJ, Science and Practice of Strength Training. Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics, pp. 33 – 39, 2006.

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Today, I’m happy to have coach Dave Tenney of the Seattle Sounders (MLS) on the site. I first met Dave a couple years back when he asked if I could evaulate some of the players on the team using the Omegawave because the organization was considering purchasing one for Dave to use.

Since then, Dave and I have talked regularly about training and performance and he’s an extremely knowledeable and experienced coach that really gets the big picture. He’s also always on the cutting edge of technology and is in touch with the latest new training tools and solutions out there to help improve the training process.

Dave, I’m sure that as a coach for a professional soccer team in the US that also has ties to some of the biggest soccer clubs in the world you are well connected and hear a ton about some of the newer technologies and coaching tools that are out there and on the horizon, where do you see our field going in the next 5-10 years and what role do you see technology playing in that? Are there any particular systems or tools that you are particularly excited about or think have a lot of potential?

I just came back from Holland, and I think GPS and systems like the Inmotio system are allowing us to measure the mechanical load of team training far better than we ever have before. We have never been able to so accurately measure what we do in the team training environment than we can now.

That is changing.

This will allow us to better comprehend the overload that takes place. If we can measure the metabolic load of accelerations and decelerations, then we can begin to program more precisely. This is going to be a rapidly evolving field, as, within five years, we’ll probably have smart shirts that can measure all of that, but do it faster and more accurately than now.

Dave, it’s been a couple of years now since you first contacted me about my use of heart rate variability, can you tell us a bit about how you first become aware of the technology and what prompted you to get in touch with me in the first place?

We noticed there were some European teams coming though Seattle for pre-season, who used what I would call a scientific approach to training, and were starting to figure out how to use it with the OmeagWave program. After coming by your facility, and seeing the information we were able to get from it, I decided it was an investment in improving how we prepare our athletes.

When I first started using HRV with some of your athletes from the Seattle Sounders, what were your initial thoughts as far as the information it was able to provide you with as a coach?

Beyond using HRV, we were also at the time using the Polar T2 system to monitor training loads. However, I was slowly becoming frustrated, because I didn’t really know what a “high” measurement meant. Did the players perform too much? Why was a certain player high?

My first thought was that this would be giving me a better indicator of why an athlete would be high or low in his HR response. It filled in a big picture to the puzzle. When you begin to understand the metabolic make-up of your athletes, and then get a good picture in how they typically fatigue, then all the other forms of training monitoring – Polar HR, GPS, etc. – takes on a new relevance

Based on the HRV results and feedback that I was able to give you, what impact did it have on how you approached training the athletes that we were testing? How was this approach different than it might have been if you had not been able to use HRV with those guys?

We could individualize our loading structure so much better. We could make earlier interventions with athletes because the residue of fatigue was there to be clearly recognized. There was less of a “put him out there and hope he makes it through”. It also opened up a whole new world of individualization of recovery methods based on the results we were getting.

And, lastly, it helped us really understand what was taking place with a guy. Maybe he didn’t look right, lethargic… This gave us the tools to recognize he was fatigued, and he needed us to back off.

Can you give us any specific examples of big changes in performance or fitness or recovery and such that happened with any particular players that were included in that first test group?

The first test group was given some specific recovery methods. We have it programmed well enough now, where we know what athletes need which type of soft tissue therapy post training based on HRV data. We’ve had our starting center midfielder here, just end the season leading the league in tackles won, and playing over 1,200 more minutes than previous seasons – after having nagging quad injuries that previous two years. I attribute this to how well we managed our system using HRV.

A second example is our right back, who we actually kept on the field and played more than we normally would have because he continued to have very healthy parasympathetic tone. We were deep into our 2010 season, and had multiple games per week, and the coaching staff felt this player needed a rest, because we had no cover for him and couldn’t afford to lose him.

I was adamant that HRV indicated there was little residual fatigue there, and other players who had played less needed a rest far more than he did. This player continued on and played every match the rest of the year.

Obviously the coaching staff and team must have seen some benefits from using HRV since they went out and spent the thousands of dollars it costs to get the Omegawave system, what all went into the decision making process within the organization to go ahead and spend the money and begin using HRV on a team wide basis?

I think there are two elements to this: (1) if top European teams have been using it, then it will have instant credibility with the players and coaches in MLS. So, it was actually my head coach who asked me to look into it after hearing that Bayern Munich and AC Milan had used it. (2) We have such a crammed, busy schedule that the management that can avoid injuries and optimize performance can have a huge jump on the competition.

So, since our head coach was in favor of it, and our first experiments at your place made it seem that it could be a useful tool, our club decided to invest in it.

Can you tell us how you’ve been able to incorporate HRV assessments into the grand scheme of the team’s overall fitness training plan throughout the off-season as well as the in-season? What other sorts of assessments and monitoring do you guys do aside from using HRV?

As I said previously, I use HRV to cross-reference Polar T2 data to refine the way that we look at HR curves as part of our post-training analysis. If a player is “green”, fresh, and healthy from positive HRV scores, then I become less worried about high HR values. In fact, this may be the perfect time to over-load him.

However, I am going to watch my loading on someone who may start a training week overly sympathetic dominant. Beyond that, we also measure power (jump mat) during the year, we will use the FMS. This is what we would do above and beyond the pre-season measurements we may take.

I know that for me personally, using HRV over the last ten years has really pushed me to learn a great deal more about the body and performance in general. Is there anything that really stands out in your mind that using HRV has taught you as a coach that you didn’t know before and probably wouldn’t have learned without the technology?

Yeah, it just opens up a new world to understanding the physiological impact of your games and training sessions. You learn to see and understand residual fatigue. The effect that overall stress has on athletes and their ability to make quality adaptations to training. Normally, this is something that’s been very difficult to do.

In reality, people have put together 8 week programs, and hoped they worked based on such a program with past athletes. This allows us to periodize in a week to week manner so much better.

Obviously you guys are a big team with athletes whose careers depend on their performance, but what advantages do you see HRV offering the average guy who just works out to stay in shape for a recreational sport or even just to stay healthy and fit? Do you think using HRV can help them get better results?

I think in some ways, it’s even more important for these guys. We have a generation of guys who like get in the weight room, or put on some running shoes and “get it on” every day. They don’t feel like they’ve done something until they pushed themselves to the point of exhaustion. A guy like this, without a coach, is due for some serious overuse injuries as he gets into his 30’s. This is where HRV comes in. A motto that I like is: “Always train as hard as you should, not as hard as you can”

That’s a great motto, I might have to steal that one!

Last question…your club has made the playoffs in each of its first three seasons as an MLS team and became the first ever MLS team to repeat as Open Cup Champions so obviously you and the staff there are doing a fantastic job of getting guys ready to play.

From the bottom to the top, what are some of the biggest factors that you think have led the team to being very successful in such a short amount of time? Based on your many years of experience as both a player and as a fitness coach, what do you think are some of the most important components to finding and maintaining success, both as an athlete and as a team?

If I could list how HRV (and our other methods) have helped us, I would say we’ve been able to get an edge by:

1)      Measure residual fatigue on a weekly basis.

2)      Create an individualized recovery protocol for almost every player.

3)      Learn that training less often leaves our team fresher.

4)      Make accurate squat rotation decisions, because we know which players are most likely to bring an optimized performance.

Thanks a lot Dave! I really appreciate you taking the time out of your busy schedule to talk to everyone on the site. Is there anywhere that people can find out more about you or get more information on any future coaching opportunities like the mentorship weekend that you put together last summer?

Thanks Joel, just keep checking back here on your website, on strengthcoach.com, or find me on Facebook to find out about the Mentorship Weekend (will be in June 2012), or Internship program we have going on.

BioForce HRV Is Coming December 13th!

BioForce HRV is coming December 13th!  Make sure to download the FREE Report on The End of Group Training if you haven’t yet and discover how technology is about to change the game…

Originally developed in the 1960’s as part of the Russian space program, the science of heart rate variability has since found broad application in cardiac medicine, though in the last two decades this technology has spread into the elite levels of strength and conditioning.

Providing a glimpse into an individual’s autonomic nervous system profile, heart rate variability measurements accurately pinpoint an athlete’s location on the fatigue-recovery-supercompensation curve. Such data can provide the missing link in optimizing an athlete’s programming – especially those who require the highest levels of physical preparation.

Stress and the Autonomic Nervous System

The primary way in which the brain communicates with the periphery of the body is by sending messages down the spinal cord and out through the many branches of the nervous system. The branch of the nervous system that most are familiar with is the conscious, voluntary nervous system. This branch is used in performing a squat, kicking a ball, or striking an opponent – an athlete decides to move and it happens.

Behind the scenes, though, lies another branch of the nervous system that regulates a myriad of tasks we’d rather not spend our days worrying about. This branch projects to organs besides skeletal muscle and controls actions such as digestion, salivation, blood pressure, heart rate, and many others. Most of the communication occurring in this branch is unconscious and automatic – it is thus termed the autonomic nervous system and is highly responsive to stress.

The goal of the autonomic nervous system is to maintain homeostasis, and it does so by utilizing its two subsystems – the sympathetic nervous system and the parasympathetic nervous system.

In the most basic sense, the sympathetic nervous system acts to speed up certain processes within the body. In The Wisdom of the Body, the eminent 20^th century physiologist Walter Canon termed this our “fight-or-flight” response, effectively coining the phrase. The sympathetic system is responsible for raising our heart rate at the onset of a stressor, increasing blood pressure, and dumping glucose into the blood to fuel activity.

In contrast, the parasympathetic nervous system works in opposition, effectively slowing everything back down. The decrease of heart rate and storage of nutrients are two of the many “rest-and-digest” activities mediated by this system.

Homeostasis is then maintained through a physiological seesaw. For the athlete, intense training presents a large stressor to the body, invoking a strong sympathetic response to meet the increased metabolic demands.  Post-workout, as the sympathetic tone subsides, the parasympathetic system becomes facilitated and drives the rest and repair necessary to get things back to normal. Ideally, these two systems remain balanced in their efforts, each ramping up and down as needed.

If a technology existed that could assess this sympathetic/parasympathetic balance, coaches could gain an excellent understanding of an athlete’s physiological state and corresponding location on the fatigue-supercompensation continuum. Information like this could drive effective, evidence-based programming decisions. For example, adjustments in volume could be made on the fly specific to the recovery status of an athlete’s physiology.

Fortunately, this technology does exist and, as mentioned above, it’s called heart rate variability (HRV).

The Science and Measurement of
Heart Rate Variability

There seems to be a misconception by some that the heart, as it beats away in the ribcage, acts like a metronome, adhering to a strict cadence at all times. In reality, the heart beats through a wide spectrum of rhythms throughout the day – these beat-to-beat variations are what the science of heart rate variability is targeting. Given that the cardiovascular system is largely controlled through the actions of the autonomic nervous system, analysis of HRV provides some great insight into these control mechanisms.

For example, when the body is battling a stressor, the variation between beats tends to be lower (i.e., less heart rate variability) and it assumes a more metronome-like quality. This situation is indicative of higher sympathetic nervous system activity – the “fight-or-flight” response is ramped up to handle the homeostatic challenge. Conversely, as the variability of the heart rate increases, the body assumes more of a rest-and-repair status, indicating increased activity of the parasympathetic nervous system.

Specific to athletes, we want strong sympathetic nervous system activity during their training to fuel the highest levels of performance, but we also want them to be able to shut that system off so they can effectively recover for subsequent session.

To use an automobile for comparison, it’s hard to slow down if you can’t take your foot off the gas. Constant activation of the sympathetic nervous system creates an unfavorable shift in the sympathovagal balance, greatly increasing the likelihood of fatigue and overtraining.

Heart rate variability is typically quantified through the use of an electrocardiogram (ECG) and measurements can take between 5 minutes and 24 hours, depending on the goals of the measurement. For athletes, 5-10 minutes seems to provide an accurate picture; for things like circadian variation, longer exposure times are necessary.

The image below provides an example of what the ECG output data might look like.

The peaks in the above wave provide a glimpse into the cardiovascular electrical activity when the ventricles are depolarized – we call this the QRS-complex. The first order of business when assessing HRV is to identify the successive QRS-complexes, so that R-R intervals (drawn above) can be determined. It’s these intervals that provide the information necessary to determine a person’s beat-to-beat variability.

Further mathematical analysis, the description of which exceeds the nature of this review, provides a frequency polygon like the one pictured below.

The most important thing to recognize on the above graph is the LF and the HF, standing for low frequency and high frequency, respectively. These frequency measurements are used to quantify the activity of the two branches of the autonomic nervous system.

Work by Selman et al. (1982) and Eckberg (1997) has shown parasympathetic activity largely accounts for HF, while LF is comprised of output by both the parasympathetic and the sympathetic systems. A ratio between these two measurements, called the LF/HF ration, is often used to assess the fractional distribution between the two systems and is an important marker of sympathovagal balance.

While the application of this technology has been broad across its 50-year history, the following studies highlight its efficacy when applied to monitoring applied training stresses and predicting potential physiological exhaustion.

Weightlifting Performance and HRV

In the 2011 paper entitled Parasympathetic Nervous Activity Mirrors Recovery Status in Weightlifting Performance After Training, Chen et al. set out to determine whether measurements of heart rate variability, and more specifically parasympathetic power, could be used to assess recovery status after weight training.

The study design included a collection of seven male weightlifters (19.3 ± 0.3 years). All had been training for more than 6 years prior to the study and had competed at the national or international level.

To determine the HRV modulation during the recovery period, these men were subjected to a 2-hour training session following a 10-day detraining period – their performance was then reassessed at intervals across the recovery to assess changes. HRV measurements were to be taken before training and 3, 24, 48, and 72 hours into recovery. Along with HRV, blood samples were extracted to measure serum levels of DHEA-S and creatine kinase, both markers of tissue damage and neural repair mechanisms. Lastly, subjective muscular pain scores were recorded on a 10-point scale.

What these researchers found was a high correlation between the measured parasympathetic power and the markers of fatigue, recovery and performance. Note the similarities in the graphs below that highlight back squat performance, hormonal levels, and HF power.

As the performance declined after the initial bout, we see the simultaneous suppression of both DHEA-S and HF power, which slowly return to normal over the 72-hour period. The initial decrease in DHEA-S serum levels is explained by increased consumption to fuel neural repair – this biological response is evident in many stress conditions (Gudemez et al. 2002, Lee et al. 2006).

There is strong biological plausibility for the decreased HF power, as well. As the training load of these subjects increased, the autonomic nervous system shifted to a more sympathetic dominant-state, which signified an increased demand for recovery. In 2004, Iellamo et al. showed a similar shift from parasympathetic-to-sympathetic predominance in rowers as their training volume increased. Studies like these provide strong support towards the accuracy of HRV measurements with respect to fatigue state.

HRV in Middle-Distance Runners

A 1999 prospective cohort study by Pichot et al. assessed HRV in seven national-level French middle-distance runners, aged 24.9 ± 4.8 years, across an intense, four-week training block. The structure of the block was designed to present near-exhaustive training sessions for the first three weeks, and then deload in the fourth week.

Pichot et al. had this to say about their results:

“Our data confirm the impressive autonomic changes that occur with 3 wk of intensive physical training, consisting in a global and progressive decrease in heart rate variability and in a tendency toward a progressively lower parasympathetic and higher sympathetic drives.”

The graphs below illustrate the HF power suppression incurred by these athletes and the shift towards sympathetic dominance through the LF/HF ratio.

These results mimic those shown in a 1998 study by Uusitalo et al., which highlighted an increased resting LF/HF ratio in endurance athletes across a six-to-nine week overtraining protocol – an increase not incurred during a normal six-to-nine week block.

Many claim resting heart rate measurements to be an accurate barometer for assessing recovery, but Pichot and his colleagues make a point to explain just how unreliable resting heart rates can be in determining an athlete’s fatigue status.

Across the three intense training weeks, these runners experienced an average increase in resting heart rate of only 3.74 beats per minute – this worked out to about a 9% change across the seven subjects. Not only is a change like this rather insignificant, it’s impossible to isolate this physiological variation to a single component given its dependence on a multitude of environmental factors.

Now contrast this with the more than 40% variation in heart rate variability across the same time period. Sensitivity like this provides a much greater gauge of an athlete’s overreaching/overtraining status during a training block, especially given HRV’s consistent baseline accuracy (Hohnloser et al. 1992, Huikuri et al. 1990).

HRV and the Immune System

Modeling the relationship between stress and the immune system is one of the landmark discoveries in the field of stress physiology, first noted close to seventy years ago by the Austrian physiologist Hans Selye.

In his lab rats, Selye discovered that thymicolymphatic atrophy, or the breakdown of immune tissues, along with adrenal hypertrophy and peptic ulcers create a triad of symptoms forming some sort of nonspecific response by the body to generic unpleasantness. He would go on to term this the general adaptation syndrome, which we now just refer to as the stress-response. While some of Selye’s theories have since been disproven, the association between increasing levels of stress and immunosuppression remains well supported in the literature.

Though the pathophysiology is complex, the basic idea is that sympathetic nervous system hormones, beta-endorphins, CRH, and, most prominently, glucocorticoids all act to suppress immunity during the stress-response. For example, glucocorticoids can directly cause shrinking of the thymus gland, halt the formation of new lymphocytes, and make circulating lymphocytes less responsive to certain cytokines. They can even cause lymphocyte apoptosis through a variety of mechanisms.

All this leads to a simple fact – the more stress the body incurs, the more likely it is to become infected.

While this should worry just about anyone reading, it’s the elite athlete or coach who should be most concerned. Creating high performance requires the application of substantial stress, which invariably pushes one’s physiology closer and closer towards pathology.  In this regard, HRV provides valuable predictive data that can be useful in implementing prophylactic measures before illness manifests and performance suffers.

In a well-constructed 2011 prospective cohort study, Hellard et al. set out to examine the association between HRV and illness in 18 elite swimmers, each competing on either the national or international level.

The most impressive quality about this study’s design is its duration. The researchers measured HRV in these athletes every Monday for two full years, between 2003 and 2005. That’s over 1508 weeks of total observation across the cohort.

The main results of this study were the following:

1. During the winter, the national-level swimmers were more prone to illness than the international-level swimmers.
2. The weeks prior to the appearance of an upper-respiratory tract and pulmonary infection, and also soft-tissue pathology, were characterized by an increase in parasympathetic activity (more on this below).
3. During the weeks in which a swimmer had an upper-respiratory tract or a pulmonary infection, a shift in the sympathovagal balance toward sympathetic predominance was noted.
4. In the winter, measurements of lower parasympathetic power and higher sympathetic power were predictive of soft-tissue pathology. (Cold temperature was one of many generic stressors Selye used to produce the general adaptation syndrome in his rats.)

While most of the results should come as little surprise, the second item listed concerned me a bit. How, with so much discussion regarding the positive effects of parasympathetic power, was higher HF measurement predictive of illness? The authors of the study provide a brilliant explanation.

The period preceding the clinical expression of the illness could serve as the incubation phase for the pathology, which tends to be about five days for upper-respiratory tract and pulmonary infections. The boost in parasympathetic power is probably involved in the body’s attempt to mount an early immune response to foreign, inflammatory stimuli. Once the pathology has “won” and begins multiplying and scattering its viral and bacterial agents into the bloodstream, the body undergoes the classic immunological stress-response, characterized by an increase in sympathetic activity.

Though more research is required in this area to be sure, the researchers recommend increased medical attention and prophylactic measures be given to those athletes who experience a sudden increase in parasympathetic power followed by a shift towards sympathetic dominance.

Along with these results, Allgorve et al. (2008) showed increased exercise intensity characterized by a sympathovagal shift towards sympathetic dominance to be destructive to salivary immune cells known as immunoglobulins. Clearly, there is a link between training stress and immunological function – HRV provides an effective way to monitor the interplay between the two.

The Bottom Line on Heart Rate Variability

For the sake of brevity, I’ve only picked a handful of studies in support of HRV – there are dozens more showing similar promise towards the realm of strength and conditioning. Aside from its efficacy, heart rate variability is also much easier to measure than other fatigue assays such as serum lactate or hormonal testing. And with BioForce HRV, the technology will finally be affordable for everyone.

In the right hands, programming optimization through the science of heart rate variability can be the determinant in reaching new levels of performance.

BioForce HRV is coming December 13th. Make sure to download the FREE Report on The End of Group Training if you haven’t yet and discover how technology is about to change the game.

Q: “Do I have to have a smartphone in order to use BioForce HRV?”

A: No, aside from working on any phone with the apple iOS or Android OS, BioForce HRV will also work on the ipod touch as well as Android based tablets. It will not, however, work with PCs or laptops at this time. If you do not have an iphone or Android phone, the least expensive option to run the software is an ipod touch and this is what I’ve personally used to run it on and it works very well.

Q: “What is HRV technology and how does it work?”

A: In short, heart rate variability is a powerful technology that measures how much stress the body is under and how well it is recovering by looking at the autonomic nervous system. It is this system that is responsible for coordinating the body’s adaptive responses and by measuring its current state, we can get object look at whether the body is under stress or recovering from it or anywhere in between.

The technology has been around for close to 50 years and was developed by the Russians, but it’s also been widely used in the medical fields and there is a great deal of research validating its use. I’ll be discussing the technology more as I get closer to launching BioForce HRV as well.

“Q: I bought Ultimate MMA Conditioning, does that make me eligible to get access to the pre-sale a day earlier than everyone else?”

A: Yes, any customer that has bought my book, DVD, Polar RS100, Special Strength Training or any other product is considered a customer and as a special thanks, all customers will be given a 24 hour window to pre-order BioForce HRV before anyone else. Anyone who buys one of my products before BioForce HRV will be given this opportunity

Q: What happens after you sell the initial 250 BioForce HRV Systems?

After the first 250 systems that I am making available for pre-sale on the 13th are gone, people will be given the option to buy the system and be put on the waiting list for the next shipment to become available. I anticipate these second phase orders going out sometime in mid to late January. Those who purchase one of the first 250 systems will have their orders shipped out January 1st.

Q: “I’m not a competitive athlete, do I still need to use HRV?”

Anyone that trains hard and values their time should use HRV to monitor and manage their training. The technology helps personalize training in a way that’s simply not possible any other way and this individualization ensures you’ll get the best results possible.

I’ve used HRV for more than ten years to train everyone from world champion fights to housewives to Microsoft executives and everyone in between. Aside from fitness and performance, HRV also provides information that correlates very strongly with overall cardiovascular health and overall wellness, not to mention life expectancy. HRV is a very powerful tool that has broad implications and you do not need to be a world class athlete to get the most out of it. Anyone that wants to get the most out of their hard work and is ready to get more out of their training in less time should be using BioForce HRV.

Q: “What’s the difference between BioForce HRV and the ithlete app?”

The BioForce HRV app is built using the ithlete’s platform, but there are several difference between the two apps, both in terms of how the HRV test is done and also how it is reported. The changes that were made were done so based on my 10 years of experience using the Omegawave.

BioForce HRV was designed with the same function and testing protocol as the Omegawave in mind and it correlates very highly to the same readings the Omegawave provides. BioForce HRV uses a different testing protocol and different thresholds to determine states of overtraining than ithlete, so if ithlete and BioForce HRV were to be used simultaneously, they would likely not always provide the same training recommendations and there would be some disagreement between the two.

Q: “Are you going to show me how to use HRV in my training?”

Absolutely! HRV won’t do you much good if you don’t know how to use it so making sure that it’s simple and easy to use is my first priority. All BioForce HRV Systems will come with “The Ultimate Guide to HRV” training manual that will teach you everything you need to know to get the most out of HRV technology.

The great thing about HRV is that the information is provides is very easy to use when you understand how the body works. I’m going to teach you step by step about the training process and how HRV fits into it. This manual is based on more than 10 years of my work and literally thousands of HRV tests performed on hundreds of athletes. By the time you’re done reading the training manual, all your questions will be answered and you’ll be ready to put the power of HRV to work for you.

Q” “I’m a coach or personal trainer, can I use BioForce HRV with my clients?”

BioForce HRV was designed to be used by one person per app and does not support multi users at this time. The next stage of development, however, will be to let coaches and trainers view the HRV results of all their athletes/clients from a central website. This will give you the power to manage the training programs of a large number of people very practically and easily.

Also, if you are a trainer or coach, I will soon have a reseller option available for you to resell the app to your clients and athletes. All resellers will be required to have purchased the app and used it themselves, however, because this is the only way to learn how HRV works and how it should be used. I strongly recommend anyone interested in becoming a BioForce HRV reseller to get the system for themselves ASAP and begin using it to learn how it works firsthand.

Q “How much will BioForce HRV cost?”

I will be providing all of the details of the cost to order BioForce HRV when we get closer to launch, but I will say that it will be affordable for everyone and very reasonably priced. The system will start at under $200 for the base package. There will be two packages available, one with just the app, hardware and training manual and one that also includes the Polar RS100. If you don’t have a heart rate monitor, you will at least need a wireless transmitter and the system is compatible with most Polar models and others.

BioForce HRV also comes with a lifetime money back guarantee. If you use it and don’t feel like it’s everything I have said it is and it doesn’t help you get more out of your training, you can return it at any time for a full no questions asked 100% money back guarantee. This means you can try BioForce HRV absolutely risk free and experience it for yourself without having to worry about whether or not it is worth the investment.

Q “How can I get my hands on BioForce HRV?”

As long as you’re on my email list, I’ll be giving out all the details of when and where you can get BioForce HRV. If you haven’t yet downloaded and read my FREE Report, make sure to do that now so you can get all the details. Anyone who this report will be sure to get all the details on how to get BioForce HRV when the pre-release becomes available on December 12th for existing customers and December 13th for everyone else.

	Shocking FREE Report Reveals Why CrossFit, Bootcamps, & P90X Are Destroying Your Training & How HRV Technology is about to CHANGE THE GAME…

Today is an incredibly important day…one more than ten years in the making.

Ten years ago, something happened that changed the entire course of my career as a strength coach and it opened my eyes to a whole new way to train.

Now, for the first time, I’m going to reveal exactly what happened and let you in on the story of how I become one of the most sought after coaches out there.

If you’ve read my book, you might already have some idea of this story, but now I’m going to give you all the details and share something even more exciting with you…

A Revolution Is Coming

You don’t want to miss out on this

I’ve put together a special FREE Report to tell you all about my story and why I think the days of the popular Group Training approach are numbered and will soon be coming to an end.

A lot of people may not be happy about this, but I’m going to tell you why this approach was designed to make people money, not produce results and how the power of technology is about to change the game completely.

This is a report literally ten years in the making and there’s very few people in the entire world that have more experience using the technology that I’ll discuss with you in the report.

Whether you’re an athlete, strength coach, trainer, or just workout to stay in shape, this is something you NEED to know about.

If you want to find out how you can get your hands on the same technology developed by the Russians to help optimize your training and finally put an end to the guesswork, download the FREE Report now…

Download the FREE Report NOW

	Shocking FREE Report Reveals Why CrossFit, Bootcamps, & P90X Are Destroying Your Training & How HRV Technology is about to CHANGE THE GAME…