Build the Shoulders Without Sacrificing Joint Health Using This Superset

 Build the Shoulders Without Sacrificing Joint Health Using This Superset

If you are following any competent strength training program, you should be performing a variety of heavy compound movements such as bench press, overhead press, rows and pulldowns/pull-ups for the upper body.  If you aren’t, it’s time to bail on your current program and start from scratch.  Those are the basic movements of which there are a million different variations but including them is required for gains in size or strength.  My holiday analogy would be to think of these movements as the turkey and mashed potatoes of your training program, everything else is a side dish. 

Product Review: Quest Protein Chips

Product Review: Quest Protein Chips

When it comes to snacking, it’s hard to go wrong with chips.  Pretzels and crackers are cool, no doubt, but chips are where it’s at.   BBQ, sour cream and onion, and if you’re around the Baltimore area, crab chips lead the way for me.  What’s not to love about a snack with great flavor, a good crunch, and just the right amount of grease?  Ahhh yes, the calories and macros.  There is a price to pay for that glorious snacking and it comes in the form of double chins and man boobs.

Working Out at Home: Creating Tension

Working Out at Home: Creating Tension

Recently, I have been getting a fair amount of questions about in-home workouts.  I have been reluctant to answer because my honest response is usually “join a gym”.  Depending on where you live, there is a gym in what seems like every square mile or so.  Gyms are good, even crappy ones are still pretty good because they have weights.  The science says weights make you sexy and strong.  My advice is usually go to where they keep weights and work-out there.

Alcohol's Effects on Body Composition and 5 Ways to Minimize the Damage

Alcohol's Effects on Body Composition and 5 Ways to Minimize the Damage

Outside of the small window of prohibition, alcohol has been a legal, socially acceptable form of altering your state of consciousness that everyone over the legal age could enjoy.  Booze is everywhere, it’s been handed out at church for centuries, you can get it on a plane ride, even some grocery store chains are encouraging getting a drink during your weekly food shopping run. 

5 Movements "All Day Sitters" Need to Include Every Day

5 Movements "All Day Sitters" Need to Include Every Day

I get it, you are stuck in a cubicle and have no choice but to sit down, bang on the phone, and send emails for 8 hours a day. However, you do have the choice to do something about it.  Here are 5 movements that can be done at home (or office) with minimal equipment that you need to be doing as often as possible to negate some of the disastrous effects all day sitting can create! 

Attention Ladies! Solve Your Upper Arm Issue With These 3 Tricep Movements.

Attention Ladies! Solve Your Upper Arm Issue With These 3 Tricep Movements.

It's no secret that the weight room section of the gym is made up primarily of men.  If I had to estimate, half of those men are pumping away at their arms in hopes of getting those sleeves to fit a little tighter.  While this article will certainly work for them, I wanted to call on the ladies here to get them over to the iron and reap some of the awesome benefits.

The Best Protein Shake I've Ever Made

The Best Protein Shake I've Ever Made

When it comes to protein shakes, I’m an easy customer.  So long as its palatable, comes with the amount of protein I want, and doesn’t have a bunch of other useless calories, I’m happy.  Every so often however, I make the extra effort to concoct a shake that satisfies my taste buds and my macronutrient requirements alike. 

Product Review: RxBar Protein Bars

Product Review: RxBar Protein Bars

Truth be told, I’m not a huge protein bar guy.  The average bar usually comes packed with a ton of useless calories, more artificial sweeteners than a 2 liter of diet coke, and taste like someone put a box of chalk in a Snickers bar.  9 times out of 10, I recommend making a shake with a high-quality protein powder in lieu of a bar simply because they are usually loaded with only protein.

How to Avoid Getting Hurt and Wasting Effort on the Lat Pulldown

How to Avoid Getting Hurt and Wasting Effort on the Lat Pulldown

When it comes to building the upper body, nothing beats a good set of lats.  They help stabilize other movements like deadlifts and bench press, they aid in proper posture, and generally make you look more bad ass overall.  In my opinion, when it comes to the pecking order of lat exercises, only pull-ups rank higher than lat pulldowns in terms of building size and strength. 

Don't Make This Mistake at the Gym: Define Your Goal

Don't Make This Mistake at the Gym: Define Your Goal

As trainers, we see all types of mistakes made in the gym.  Some are obvious, some aren’t.  Most people can tell you that the obese guy trying a handstand pushup on the cement floor while holding a 40lb dumbbell is a recipe for disaster.  However, other mistakes may not be so clear.  Some people may look like they are doing everything right, but are making the biggest mistake you can make in exercise, they are training without a goal. 

6 Fat-Loss Hacks You Can Add Daily

6 Fat-Loss Hacks You Can Add Daily

The basics of fat loss are simple.  There is nothing “quick and easy” about maintaining a caloric deficit for any length of time to drop unwanted fat, but that’s what is necessary to get it done.  Any blog post or infomercial claiming the next great fast fat loss system is usually trying to sell you something.  Or they don’t know shit, probably both.

Welcome to My Fitness Blog

Welcome to My Fitness Blog

If you've found this website deep in the nether regions of the internet, it's either because you know me personally and I sent you the link or you stumbled upon an article I have written in the past and wanted to see what's up.  As you can tell, I'm not a website designer. This modest site took me almost 8 months to put together.  In my own defense, during those 8 months I have been trying to maintain a quickly growing client load at my gym and raising a 3-year-old and an infant.  While WordPress is certainly user friendly, it's not something I recommend trying to learn in between cleaning up a diaper blowout from your daughter and playing trains with your son.  To say it's been a humbling experience would be an understatement.