Strength Conditioning and Nutrition 101

Written By Vincent St. Pierre

After learning about how to do a proper chin-up /pull-up in the last post, I am sure many of you are at the point where I can’t do any or only 1. This post is meant to teach how to progress to a proper chin-up.

As I have stated many times, any form of training that involves your body moving through space is a superior form of training. Since this is the case, I am going to work backwards through the progression. Basically, you should only go down the progression if you truly can’t maintain proper form at least three chin-ups using the suggested alternative.

Table of Contents

• Intro 
• Research
• Practical application (If you are not interested in understanding why you can skip to this section)
• References

The greatest training exercises involve moving the body through space. The exercise that may be the single greatest exercise for measuring upper body strength is the pull up.

Beyond this, it is an incredible exercise for developing your muscles and creating wings that you could fly with. It is such an incredible exercise that it is commonly known as the upper body squat. The US military service academies have traditionally used the pull-up to assess the degree of physical fitness. Further, in terms of rehabilitation and the avoidance of injuries, it is so important to balance in push and pull exercises.

Today, people tend to be mirror trainers and forget completely about the back side of the body and become extremely disproportionate in strength. When ones upper body push and pull strength is disproportionate it has been found to increase the likelihood of shoulder complex trauma such as rotator cuff injury or strain.

When I am training athletes and the general public, I ask them if they know how to do a chin-up, they laugh and always say “yes!” However, on only one occasion have I ever worked with an athlete who knew how to truly perform a proper chin-up.

How this all comes together will be shown in a video at the end of the post 

Two articles will be released tomorrow at 8 PM pacific

1. Tips on how to improve your chin ups/ pull ups 
2. How nutrition can play a drastic role in avoiding and curing acne (guest writer) 

This is just a bit of an intro to a future article on how to deal with anemia from a nutritional standpoint.

Over 2 billion people worldwide suffer from anemia with most people having not been diagnosed. This health problem is typically found in women. It is so common and significant in women that on average women have 10% lower blood volume then males; this is purely due to anemia. This issue is so significant and affects the daily lives of so many (symptoms):

• Fatigue
• Organs not functioning properly
• weakness
• twitching, flinching
• restless legs syndrome
• pale skin
• tongue problems 
• reduced amounts of saliva
• brittle nails 
• Pica desire to eat non food items
• Headaches, dizziness, drowsiness, shortness of breath, and loss of consciousness
• Rapid heartbeat and chest pain

After looking at the health risks of using stimulants let us consider how to use them appropriately. I believe it always preferable to understand the risks in order to avoid going overboard when you hear the possible benefits. In case you missed the last post here is the link 

Do not abuse?
As Kelly Baggett wisely said “Low grade stimulants like caffeine can give you an extra boost if used intermittently and judiciously.” When selecting the stimulant to use, there are a few considerations:

• Select one that does not make you feel jittery 
• Avoid ones that contain significant amounts of sugar
• Consider additional benefits associated with the stimulant
• Side effects of the stimulant 

If you greet the morning with the aroma of freshly brewing coffee, you are one of billions of people worldwide who indulge in the daily grind of coffee consumption. According to the latest coffee statistics from the International Coffee Organization (ICO), we pour about 1.4 billion cups of coffee a day worldwide. That's a lot of coffee!  And about 45 percent of it (400 million cups a day!) is drunk in the United States. The United States is the single biggest consumer of coffee in the world - but that does not mean that the typical person in the U.S. drinks more coffee than the typical person in any other country.