This exercise begins quite mild but has an excellent and advanced progression with great functional value that becomes very challenging.
When you first get familiar with this exercise – key points are
Use whole foot with good heel contact and glute activation to make the whole leg responsible for the push up
Keep a good erect upper body posture with the abs switched on to keep the liason between lower body and upper body forces
After warming the shoulders for pulling , keeping palms facing flat to floor and concentrating pulling through on muscles in middle upper back between and around shoulder blades has greater postural value
Once strong enough and broadly functionally conditioned the exercise can be progressed to pull with one arm only and drive up with same or opposite leg. Once this exercise has been progressed to this stage the abs securing the posture. A good dynamic (responding to changing pressures and forces) core activation means that forces in the soft tissue fix the body position and stabilise. (so that torsion forces are dynamically equalised in abdominal muscles. This protects joint architecture including the spine. Developing a good reflex to read forces travelling through the body and dynamically stabilise them through the muscles to protect joints is v healthy.
The progressed version of this exercise has much greater metabolic demand from both muscles and heart and lungs as well as core stability condition and skills – yet has no external load risks and is fairly steady and controlled .
This video is performed by Vey at our Wimbledon SW19 Personal Training Studio.
DNPT run a highly professional team of PTs – who are also good friendly company – and we can help you ahive your exercise goals at home, in our private gyms or outdoors (Mobile).
The exercise can be used as an element in workouts for weight loss and functional training and physique , its just a question of setting the right reps and sets etc. As functional exercise it would also have a role in its progressed form in other goals such as muscle gain and strength or athletic perfomance to populate the week withe exercises that keep dysfunction and muscle imbalance at bay and promote mobility and good core stability ( core includes hip and shoulder joints)
There are two moments when you gather your forces and prepare to change your habits for the better.
It could be for a completely new beginning or a reboot & refresh of your existing exercise habit
Its all about getting off to a good start – so how do you find that extra will power to get a great few weeks in that re-sets the habits and starts a new wave of results coming
Here are a few good tips
1.See it – use a visual tracking device like the one that gets sent to you in your initial food email ( ask us to resend it if you want one). The food and activity tracker we provide you should be printed out and stuck up on your fridge or somewhere you will see it everyday. Colour the squares for each day in green when you exercise and score your food and drink with a number out of 10- this becomes an instantly visible motivator and reality checker. It rewards you with feel good about your success to see those blocks lit up with exercise events and good food scores if you are doing well and provides a reality check and a boot if your plans are struggling. If you don’t have lots of lit up blocks and high scores – don’t get down – get on it ! Its okay not to feel like it with good scores behind you but this sheet will tell you when to stop making excuses and get it done if thats what you need to see. It will congratulate and reward you if you’re already doing well.
2. Know from the beginning these three things
i)Will power IS required to change habits and start a positive cycle – anything else is a lie. So gather the will power and get started with the new plan – it might be a tough start but it will feel great once done. We can help a lot. Will power is required. Use these tools and ideas deliberately and actively to charge yours.
ii)It gets much much easier. Positive cycles and good history of routine will later make will power unnescessary – you will enter a cycle where you love working out (or love the outcomes and positively want to workout)
iii)Good exercise habits typically re-inforce good food habits .
3.Reach out when you need a little extra help, updates to workouts or food method or menu’s is really useful. See the food articles here for snack and workout ideas but definitley do reach out and ask for help anytime its needed.
4.Follow inspirational stories , change isn’t easy but its fuelled and enabled by belief. We will be doing a regular newsletter and on the blog (and insta) we will be having a regular inspiring thought or story – tune in regularly and enjoy the boost.
5.Create short milestone goals and choose some inspirational measurements such as ‘clothes fit’ ‘exercise performance’ to track. Food habits and body fat are also good things to track. It may help to pick an event and target it, this could be signing up for a run or just an upcoming social event or date. Having a ‘when’ and ‘where’ to help focus your plans is a good idea. Tracking your actions such as in point 1 above with a view to that event date can be effective.
6. Have a very clear plan of action for your food and exercise week – then set rules that give you flexability, discipline and motivation. Ie know what your week of exercise is. You might have some fixed events like your PT sessions, a class, gym visit or a run but you may also have some opportunities for getting one extra in the bank envisioned in advance.
+1 Grabs
This +1 grab is a very useful thing to have ‘planned in’. Imagine you already have a plan to workout Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays. Then you decide in advance that you will grab an extra run or workout extras when the wind is in your sails. These are then banked so that when the day comes that you fall ill (or your kids arre ill) or work has gone crazy and you just can not exercise, you lose some workouts but your overall frequency will still be what you wanted it to be.
If you grab the occasional extra workout to your plan, then you create a bank of extra workouts and your actual frequency will fall only back to what you wanted it to be anyway ( as opposed to finding your ‘best laid plans’ to exercise 4 times a week turned into an average of 2.2). Life will take planned workouts away , creating a contingency by using times when your energy and motivation is up to get ahead – is the only way to come out on plan – its a better strategy than ‘catch up’. Use +1 grabs and getting ahead when it feels good. Use catch ups when you have to.
Catch Up Rule and Flexability
When its just the wrong day …. if you do push something to another day, then decide exactly when and what it is going to be and diarise it as soon as you can. Use this principle of flexability only in tandem with this principle of discipline to move a workout once but don’t move it twice. If forcing yourself to go when your actually quite ruined undermines a positive relationship with fitness – don’t do that, instead allow yourself to kick it on once – but the second time ideally, third definitely – since you’ve already favoured a rest once (or twice) shut up , get up and go 🙂
Once you have both these rules functioning to support really good frequency – you will be in a positve cycle and the habit and routine will fuel the motivation, outcomes will fuel it again and increase the strength of the positive
Functional or integrated exercise is crucial to keep the body ,well….functioning properly
These sorts of exercises keep the workout interesting too (and more fun/appealing ).They can be good calorie burners when more of the body is tasked at the same time.
Lots of benefits to physique , performance and function.
Andy’s personal training sessions are always demanding and always v integrated for functional strength.
So many exercises fall into the same repetitive path of motion and while this strengthens the body it can have the consequence of reducing its functional ability to stabilise and express forces in more natural 3 dimensional ranges – such as you would while climbing, dancing , fighting. If the same muscles get stronger and stronger but only in the same anatomical pathway – such swart/deadlift/kettle bell swing all being a straight hip drive…. then mobility can be reduced and other dysfunctions introduced
The core acts as a junction for forces form lower and upper body periphery and at the same time stabilises and anchors the body for safety and to fomr a solid base for the expression of forces on the environment ( floor or pull up bar for example ) or external objects ( bar or Handle for example)
Functional strength exercises like these are common in sessions at DNPT
Its important to ensure that the weight of the legs is not held on the hip flexors – the core should maintain enough tension to keep the neutral shape of the spine and the effort should be felt front and centre abdominally , there will be some sensation at back and hips – but if you feel most pressure at back and hips then your core is not holding the position
Benefits form 1:1 coaching – its great exercise done right
Like all abs exercise a good coach will train you how NOT to use your hip flexors as the dominant muscle group
Happy new year to all in 2016 Now a team of 10 PTs with 2 gyms in Wimbledon and a 3rd on the way in 2016 we have thrived because we provide the trainers that work with us an environment to thrive in and we protect our high standards as though our reputation depended on it 🙂 We don’t do lots of social media or digital broadcast of our thoughts and achievements as frequently as many do , preferring to keep our concentration on the job at hand rather than the social media broadcasting but in 2016 we are likely to get a lot more vocal with our digital life and will be launching regular videos and workout content. For now the best way to reach us is still directly.
To be the most professional Personal Training service anywhere To provide a better service than any 1 trainer alone could provide with excellent support and client care To get each and every client their best possible result To enjoy it
Something I seem to have been talking to people a lot about recently are the variables that go into how your body responds to exercise and how each individual reacts to the same stimulus. Some key variables would be Goal: Weight loss, muscle gain, athletic performance or general health and wellness ? Mode: What exercises are you doing Set Intensity: How close to your maxcimum is each set of exercises Rest between sets: This one is obvious right Volume of exercise: Both in the session and across the week. Frequency: How often do we exercise (Lifestyle, work and time available often dictate) Food: Quamtity, quality, variety, frequency, portions Sleep: Again fairly obvious – are you sleeping well Toxins: Most relevant is – are you out on the lash pretty often? Recovery: Food, sleep, stress, and pro-active recovery strategies such as days dedicated only to warming up, mobilising and stretching. Age, Hormonal State: The above variables might need adjusting according to the exercisors age. This is largely due to hormones and rate of recovery – but any hormone treatments, or states such as pregnancy, menopause – constant high levels of stress, or constant lack of sleep are also relevant. Genetics: Your own personal response to exercise When we make a plan it’s fair to say that each individual has a different list of the above. The goal basically sets what sort of exercises we want to do, but after that, how many times a week you can reasonably be expected to make time for exercise, age and opportunity for recovery will start to dictate the actual approach. Once we get under way with a good plan, there are a lot of things for your trainer to keep an eye on if we are going to have successful outcome. Most importantly the only options available to us are those with an acceptable level of risk – that means if you can’t make time to be pro-active about recovery, then we will have to include some of that in our hour or stay shy of your maximal performance. We want you to work at your safe maximum all the time – and as often as possible, eat well and recover well. You are are largely in control of how hard and how often that actually is. Lets imagine that your desired result is at the centre of a large block of stone and you are hitting it with a pick everytime you exercise.You could reach the triumph at the centre quicker by hitting it more often, or harder or both more often and harder. Too little exercise that is too mild will still get you somewhere eventually and it will be a lot closer than if you do nothing – but if you want to reach the triumph in the centre of the block in 12 weeks then hitting it often enough is going to be important and so is hitting it hard enough. The body has a level of tolerance to exercise – it can work out at a more gentle level more often and remain safe, or workout hard with adequate recovery. Every individual is going to have a different tolerance for how hard they can hit it, and how often. What’s most important to know is how hard or often is too hard and too often – because all exercise carries risk, so we don’t want to be recklessly increasing that risk – ie you want to chip away and reveal the triumph as quickly as possible but it’s essential not to break the pick when you’re halfway there. Its easy to focus on the workout, but you’re only looking at half the picture if you’re not looking at the recovery. Assuming all is well, some clients retain muscle tension more than others, or require more/less/different food for the same result. Part of this is genetics but a lot is lifestyle, stress at work, how you sleep whether you spend your day hunched over a laptop or behind a wheel, or on you feet. Basically your training plan takes something that is hard to you now and makes it easier and easier as you become fitter and stronger, once its easy you can do it more often and maybe a bit more hard again and recover well enough to continue with effective and regular strikes at the rock face. Eventually what used to be dangerous to do becomes very safe and you get to chop into the stone and pull out your result with ever increasing effectiveness And what dictates how hard, how often and in what way you should hit the block are all the variables at the bottom of the list above – age, sleep, food, pro-active recovery, stress, lifestyle. Some of that tolerance is genetic but lot’s is about whether you sit behind the wheel of a car most the day, sleep well, eat well or booze a little or a lot. Our trainers will be taking all of the above into account when they lead your overall plan and take your session. Not everyone has the opportunity for great rest and recovery or regular low intensity workouts where they are pro-active with recovery – if that’s you and your lifestyle means you want to get the most out of the little time you are able to make for exercise, it’s even more important that your PT is professional enough to be considering all the variables when deciding if you should be doing more or less or differently. Your body doesn’t care about your job, or how little time you have to sleep well, eat right etc – so it’s important to have a PT that can help you manage those things, and understands what your safest and most exciting maximum is.
Another good week at DNPT – The Merton Abbey Mills gym keeps on rocking. The riverside location here has no equal, along with the cafe’s on hand and scenic running routes – there is no more inspirational or motivational place I can think of in all of London to have a gym. This will always be the spiritual home of DNPT, even when we open the second building. There are lots of weddings getting close or having gone by already and lots of new clients with exciting goals and new journeys ahead, while others go through their original goal and look for new ones. Vicki – I’m very very impressed with your regular 5k running ! Nothing less than awesome how you managed to fit that in alongside your maniac work schedule ! Hope you’re enjoyng the weekend. Only a few of my favorite sessions this week… Andrew made me laugh as always the whole way through, a good start to my Saturday morning, this session began in a low energy but we built up a circuit, cracked on through that and broke a PB on the 2000 metre row none the less. I’m still laughing about the ‘finish him’ Mortal Kombat moment. Jeff broke out of basic compound moves, and exercises to do at his gym, into a solid functional workout at my gym and accounted for himself well – nice work. Cristina did some awesome sprints on wednesday and a solid 5k run on the Saturday before. Nidhi – Really good glute and hamstring work, plus run, box,run,box, run, box (Was nice to see Sahil too) Chris (Trainer) taught nick the kettle bell swing and Nick did great with that – good to see Chris’s skills in action since he newly joined us. Matt (Trainer) always does cracking sessions, which I always enjoy watching when I’m there at the same time. Saw a new exercise of his I will definately be using. He and Andy J are progressing nicely and getting close to a step change (Andy – are you running ?) Rachel is on fire ! Great deadlift technique. Dan and I got into the Bulgarian Bags, which will help his judo through the grip workout alone, along with the olympic lifting for explosive power. If we can get your work, rest schedule and nutrition sorted then all will be ticking along nicely. (good luck with university visits) Krupa – Your endurance is very impressive – Thanks also for introducing me to your brother – looking forward to it all, the steady beginning and the full on training to come. Laura – Always a pleasure – You are nuts turning up at 6.30 on your day off work but I salute you Jailesh – Lots of fun as usual – good progress with Biceps and DB Press…It’s all about reducing the rice and bread now. Sam – I know I’m your PT but I think you may also be my business advisor 🙂 thanks for all the fun and the advice – excellent ‘muscle selection’ during the abs. Jacob – Because you took the dumbbells on holiday with you and did the workout session while away ! Maria – It’s been a pleasure enjoy your holiday and see you in September. And everyone else – for anyone who didn’t get mentioned – thanks for everything – I always have a great time with you, and I’m very grateful for the opportunity you all provide me to make a living doing what I love. Thank You – and see you all again next week !
