Return of the goals!

Is it really the last day of the year? Wow. What an eventful year! I began 2010 as a grad student - no blog, no business, no clear idea what the future would bring. Now, just 12 months later, I've graduated, I have a website, a business, a clear sense of purpose... I even have business cards! They have my name on them and everything!

This is normally the time when people start laying out goals for the new year, but I prefer to take some time to review previous goals. Specifically these goals - remember them? Let's see how I did:

Pull

Strength: One arm wallclimb & one arm chinup: Check! But the OAC comes and goes for my right arm.

Power: “good” dyno: Got it, then lost it... still working on getting it back.

Endurance: 50 kipping pullups: Check!

Push

Strength: 5 perfect 1 arm pushups (each arm): Meh... I can do 5 sloppy pushups with each arm.

Power: 30ft. shotput (20 pound stone): Close, but no cigar with my left arm. Less close with my right.

Endurance: 100 pushups (in a row): Not even close - 80 was my best.

Squat

Strength: 10 perfect pistols (each leg - no knee dive): Oy... still can't do a single perfect one.

Power: 50 inch box jump:  Nope. I'm somewhere around 40.

Endurance: 500 air squats: I've done it in the past, but haven't tried it since making the goal. So, no :(

Gait

Phosphagen: sub 5 sec. 40 yard dash: I'm decently close, but haven't gotten a reliable measure.

Glycolysis:  Sub 55 sec. 400 m:  Arg... best was around 57 sec.

Aerobic: Sub 18min. 5k (barefoot for extra credit):  I clocked in somewhere around 18:50, wearing vibrums.

So, overall, I still have some work to do, but pretty decent progress in 6 months. I feel like I would have done better if it hadn't been for the injury.... bum BUM BUUUUM.

I haven't really written about the injury in detail but it's been a thorn in my side (or my butt) for the past 6 months. It started in the beginning of June and has come back to haunt me twice since then. In short, it's a hip/SI joint/glute issue on my right side that's led to a lot of sciatica and a severe loss of mobility. At this point, I am in active rehab and making good progress, but I expect it will still be a few months before I am back to 100%.

The injury has prevented me from pushing the limts of my power, but I've taken it as an opportunity to improve my control. If I couldn't broad jump 8 ft, I could try to jump 6 ft. and land precisely, quietly, and perfectly every time. It's been humbling and rewarding.

I wish all of you a safe and happy 2011. If you're in the North Carolina area, I hope to see you outside for some training soon!

Fifth Ape photos!

A short but fun post today - I've uploaded a selection of photos from a recent session we did with Beatrice Yaxley (she's very talented - you can find her website here.) Bea also did our first photo shoot and many of those pictures were used in the spiffing-up of the website a few months ago.

Here's a brief selection from the latest session:

The full album can be viewed here.  The first photo shoot album can be viewed here.

The photos are also up on Facebook - do you like us yet? You really should like us - we're great. You can use the widget on the right!

A big thanks to everyone who helped make these photos possible - some of them will be showing up in various Fifth Ape propaganda soon!

More inspiration!

Here's an early Christmas present for all of you: Erwan Le Corre demonstrating some MovNat training.

Great stuff, huh? I say this a lot, but you really need to go see Erwan as soon as possible - you won't regret it.

And now, fair warning: I am about to go off on a long highly didactic rant. If you'd rather not hear it, this would be an excellent time to navigate away from my humble website.

...

Still here?  Okay... I warned you...

Let's take a moment to compare this style of training with some others. First, there is no comparison to a standard health club workout. The environment here is rich with all sorts of stimuli - visual, tactile, auditory, olfactory, etc. A standard big box gym is sterile and dead by comparison. Erwan's movements are integrated vs. the isolation inherent in machine training and bodybuilding exercises*

*A quick note here: I feel like I rag on bodybuilding a lot. Building muscle is a legitimate goal and "standard" hypertrophy training protocols are a great way to do it. But your foundation should still be solid movement/athletic skills and mobility. For evidence that big guys can move, see my last blog post.

Now let's compare this to Crossfit. Remember that Crossfit is "constantly varied functional movement performed at high intensity."

First, constantly varied: For Crossfit, this means each WOD is quite different from the one before it, but within each WOD there isn't a lot of variation. For example, each box jump is 24 inches, each thruster is with a 95lb. bar, each pullup is chest-to-bar, etc. There are movement standards. (which I now know after my judging experience at the Carolina Fitness Challenge!)

With MovNat training, there are no standards and there is plenty of variation within the actual training session. That rock Erwan is throwing around? Not perfectly balanced - which means the grip changes every time, affecting how it is cleaned to the chest. The ascent/decent? The topography provides a different experience every time. The climb depends on the thickness and angle of the tree trunk. The balancing requires constantly varied body adjustments.

How about functional movement? For Crossfit, this means multi-joint, "big" movement involving high degrees of midline stabilization - like squats, deadlifts, olympic lifts, etc. That's great, and certainly an important piece of it, but it's not the whole story.

Watch Erwan and note that there is a context to all of his movement. There is a specific, real task that is accomplished, like getting on top of the tree trunk. The line is blurred between specific arbitrary exercise restrictions (i.e. "Was that a regulation-perfect clean?" "Did he start from a full lock-out on the pullup?") and asking the simple question of "Did the task/objective get completed?" This emphasis on completing real tasks is a key step to maximizing the cognitive benefits of exercise - for more you should check out Kelly Lambert's work on depression and the "effort-driven reward system."

I've harped on intensity before (here) but here it is again in brief. For Crossfit, intensity is all about power output - pure physics. Again, good, but not the whole story. Erwan's work output is pretty high during this combo, but when he's balancing on that tree trunk I guarantee he's not worried about his average wattage - he's solely focused on not falling off the trunk! The focus and mindfulness required here is a very different type of intensity - one that is extremely valuable if properly cultivated.

"Okay," I hear you say, "This type of training is great and Erwan is quite a guy, but I don't live near an incredible temperate rainforest in the Pacific Northwest - I can't do this."  I think Erwan would be the first to tell you that MovNat training doesn't require a forest - it's more about developing movement abilities that suit your environment. Work with what you've got and be creative! From my perspective, the most important part of all of this is to have fun with your training.

One thing this video does not show is the importance of group training - a key part of the MovNat experience! So, I put it out there - Erwan, how about a group video next?