Wednesday, May 5, 2010

The Washed Up Athlete Program - Part 1

As I sit here and try to write about topics that will appeal to the audience that tunes in here, I keep coming back to the demographic of the typical reader. You know, the people who I run into on the street who say they loved the last blog or the people who chime in from the comments section or through facebook messages, etc. The typical reader and most of my good friends are the following type of people:

  • 24-30 years old
  • former collegiate athlete, with a few pros thrown in there
  • currently sitting in an office for 8-10 hours per day
  • living in Boston
  • time being the biggest hurdle to getting the physique they want
  • pretty active with a decent knowledge of exercise technique from playing days
  • looking for a simple way to get more out of workouts
Let's start with one of the biggest problems I see in this population. The warm up. Or the lack of warm up. And for the record, doing a few trunk twists, a couple arm circles, and finishing with a set of bouncing hamstring rippers is not a warmup. Here is the type of warmup you need:

1. Foam roll or some soft tissue work - 5 mins
2. Static Stretch - 5 mins
3. A couple of mobility and dynamic drills - 3 mins

(this week I will film a good, quick workout for you at the gym, that can be done in a commercial gym).

Notice there is no, "hop on a bike, or go for a quick jog." These do not warm you up for anything except jogging or pedalling slowly on a bike. I want you to start rethinking your warmup. Stay tuned for the warm up video. Later in the week I will address abs or core training, and finally with a couple of sample workouts.