Dead lifting twice per week

A friend shot me a quick message asking my thoughts on the idea of dead lifting twice per week. I've been looking for some writing fodder, and really, who doesn't like to read and write about dead lifts?
; )    So I decided to type out a few thoughts here.

Context

This person has worked consistently at the training program that I laid out for him, and it's more or less how I train. The program includes relatively heavy dead lifts, three to four work sets in the four to six rep range, performed once per week.

Hopefully this gives you some context of where he is coming from. But still, the question remains, "Why save all the joy and tears of dead lifting for only one day per week?'

Sure!

...is my answer, in brief. Double up on the awesomeness! Dead lifting twice per week has the potential to help you progress in that lift more than doing it only once per week. But, in not-so-brief, there are some important points to consider, most of them having to do with the fact that IF you are training intensely and consistently on a well designed program, it's not advisable to keep adding  without taking other things away.

Don't do the exact same dead lift protocol. 

I wouldn't advise doing the same loading and rep range on the "other" dead lift day. Maybe do another dead lift variation (sumo or trap bar), do speed reps (that's crushing perfect form in explosive reps with about 60% of your top weight) or heavy singles or triples with no eccentric component (drop the weight from the top position if your gym/bumper plates can afford it). The potential for over training and injury is high if you get to the point of twice weekly grinding out multiple sets of heavy reps like we typically do on dead lift day.

Don't plan on squatting much. 

Part of the reason why I don't dead lift more than once per week is that I love to reserve some time and energy for dead lifts beastly cousin, Twenty Rep Squats. I've found that training these movements each once per week can get quite demanding on recovery ability. And if your squats or dead lifts are worth any thing, there's really no point (and some potential danger) in doing the other movement in the same workout. How are you supposed to seriously push the limit in 20 reps squats if your hips and back are fatigued from dead lifts? How are you supposed to dead lift even just your body weight when your legs are jello-ed from intense squats?

Always remember that long-term progress is not so much dependent on the amount of training that you can tolerate, but on the amount of training that you can recover from.

I tend to think that heavy squats compliment heavy dead lifts done on another day of the week, and vice-verse. But I don't think many intermediate and advanced lifters can improve on both of these for long before one movement must take a back seat (for that training cycle).

Rhythm is everything.

To end with a legitimate point of encouragement: the person who asked the question doesn't vary his training up every other week. He's established a rhythm of working brutally hard at a handful of exercises, and thereby has made a line in the sand for his body and his current abilities. He can tinker around with workout day, set, and rep schemes, keep it simple, and learn even more about what's truly best for his body and his goals just by paying attention.

That's exactly how I settled on my current training program that suits me just fine for now with relatively little time investment in training. Many individuals never get to the point of learning from this type of experimentation because they have no meaningful point of reference to begin with.

In praise of Farmer Walks

Never underestimate the value of Farmer Walks. Only in the last few years have they been appreciated for their relative safety and effectiveness in developing hip and core strength, leg, forearm, and shoulder stamina, and pure grit. Yes your back can handle it!  See below, but in most cases a properly controlled farmer walk is less risky than running or jumping. In farmer terms, carry buckets of water and feed is definitely less risky to the spine than prolonged sitting while tractor plowing. Chalk that up as another hit to industrialized farming.

Get off your butt and work the core!

In case you haven't heard, Farmer Walks can broadly be defined as the act of carrying something heavy until your legs throb and your forearms are about to explode. The legs are the prime movers while a fairly large load is held through the upper extremities, effectively working all the "core" stabilizers in between. For reference, a decent Farmer Walk is carrying your body weight for 3 or 4 "reps" of approximately 100 feet.

...If there were only a way to work all these muscles without

 placing shear and torsional forces on the spine.

 History

Paleolithic cave painting depicting Farmers Walks

Who invented Farmer Walks? God. Or earth nature. Or maybe God through earth nature. One way or another we were made to be capable of dealing with gravity by lifting and carrying things. Really - it is well known that the spinal facet joints and discs deal very well with compressive load, and it's the shear and torsional forces that primarily cause degenerative changes.

Surely humans have been Farmer Walking since well before there was such a thing as farmers. In fact, Farmer Walks are THE origin of the concept of progressive overload. The story goes that Milo of Croto trained by carrying a calf daily from its birth until it became a full-sized ox. At around 600 BC, he won 6 Olympic victories, dominated multiple wrestling meets and other events, and led the Crotoniate army to victory over Greeks from Sybaris.

How's THAT for some positive outcomes?? 


Does that story make you want to pick up non conventional objects and carry them around? [What, is it only me?] It also makes me a bit bitter how Arthur Jones convinced everyone that his sit-on, muscle isolation Nautilus machines are superior to free weights. I get the concept and cool physics principles involved. But I think Arthur would be rolling over in his grave if he saw all the soccer dads and moms and businessmen and women who sit on these things but absolutely cannot control quality functional movement with their own body weight. Nah, never mind. He'd be happy to cash in.

Variable resistance cam + isolation of muscles = huge and strong = NOT

Practically speaking
 
Do you know what happens when we structure such simple, old school methods with periods of work and recovery? We feel and look good, and become physically fit to handle what life has in store.
 

The Pope loves Farmers Walks

I would suggest with carrying 25% of body weight in each hand for 50 feet. Take deliberate strides but do not lunge and do not take little pp steps.

Nothing beats Farmer Walks as a workout "finisher." Just imagine what it would be like to skip the 10 minutes of ab machine, the various crunches and leg raises, and the 20 minutes of elliptical? Conditioning, strengthening, and cardio can all be had with less than half of that time invested in Farmers Walks. You (literally) won't be up for many activities that involve being upright after a series of intense Farmer Walks.

Caution. 

If you have sensitive feet (history of plantar fascitis etc) and load up with Farmer Walks on cement, you may have some issues, especially if your shoes are subpar. So do these in good supportive shoes and build up slowly.

Farmer Walks do not lend themselves well to commercial gyms, or anywhere there tends to be a high density of protruding metal and oblivous-to-their-surroundings-people wearing ear buds and staring at themselves in the mirror.

A friend and I once tried Farmer Walking in a Golds Gym, just for fun. There were odd stares, inadvertent near hits to the privates, and multiple awkward stop/starts near the water fountain. Should I ever again find myself in a commercial gym, I promise to lay on the floor or sit down on a machine and exercise in one place like a good little gym rat.

But I dare you to try a quiet, well controlled Farmer Stroll in a Planet Fitness. Let me know how it goes for a free, uh, T-shirt. Or something. Seriously, I will give you an original Bonny Lane Club shirt from my anti gym.

the best thing to do when your back goes out

I'm guessing that it went something like this:

You reached or twisted quickly.
You went to pick something light off the ground.
You lifted a heavy couch, sack of birdseed, or barbell, with or without good form.

Immediately or shortly thereafter, you experienced a dagger in or just below the spine. The pain went from nothing to searing. You held your breath. You swear that a vertebrae must have broke right in two. You didn't want to think about thinking about moving.

You, my friend, have thrown your back out. I've been there. On more than one occasion. What exactly is going on in there? It's difficult to say exactly what tissue is at fault. But we can make a few basic assumptions with some degree of confidence.

First let's try to define what kind of injury we are dealing with:

-There was a relatively abrupt onset of symptoms.
-The quality of the pain was sharp and intense.
-There was no numbness, pain, or weakness down either leg.
-The mechanism of injury was due to spinal flexion - like bending forward, prolonged sitting, poor lifting technique, or over striding while running. 

When this is the case, we are most likely dealing with one of three things:

-Strained muscle, tendon, or ligament. With these you can almost always palpate (touch or point out) the site of injury. The pain is very consistent, just like when you pull a hamstring or hip flexor after sprinting in the cold. Maintaining a rigid brace of the spine when you move often increases the pain because this places demands on the stabilizing muscles that are in question.

-Stress fracture. This is fairly rare but it happens. This pain is also very consistent, increasing with almost all loaded movements (standing on your feet). Almost all unloaded movements (laying down and sitting) cause minimal pain, though transitions back to sitting and standing will be difficult.

Lumbar stress fractures are seldom related to forward bending activities. They occur more commonly from extension overload, over arching, where the spine repetitively or traumatically undergoes compression with backward rotation (as when running, jumping, and tackling with a weak anterior core and/or tight hip flexor muscles).

-Disc derangement. As the years roll by and I manage hundreds of people with lower back pain, I'm almost certain this is the likely culprit for backs that "go out" during and after flexion based activities. Keep in mind that not all disc herniations cause referred pain to the lower extremities. It is well known that tears within the disc material (with no herniation displacement at all) and small to moderate disc herniations may give a sharp or intense pain without pressing on the nerves that go down to the legs. 

The pain is almost always increased with forward bending and prolonged sitting because you are reproducing the mechanism of injury. But otherwise, the condition is fairly inconsistent. Sometimes there's no pain at all and you're like, "whew, smooth sailing!" Then, just when you let your guard down and go to put the milk back in the refrigerator, **BAM** you're shot by the sneaky sniper.

With all things considered, here's the ironic kicker. Whether your abrupt, severe, non-referred lower back pain is due to a disc injury or a muscle/tendon/ligament injury, you should treat it nearly the same way. The absolute best things to do in the short term are as follows:

1. REST. Lay off it already! No, literally, lay flat on your stomach or on either side and take it easy. One way or another, you literally have injured tissue. There's no manipulation or particular exercise that's going to make it heal quicker in the short term. You can try some gentle press-ups and ice. Massage and modalities like electronic stimulation and ultrasound may alleviate muscle pain for a short while. But the main thing you need to do is quit nagging it and give it a chance to heal.



Press-ups are often indicated in the instance of acute, flexion-based back injury.

The mullet is not.

choice...

 

2. Ice is usually best in the first few days. But truly I say unto you, with back pain there are no hard and fast rules. When I experienced acute lower back pain, ice made me feel stiff and a hot shower was almost miraculous. If you tolerate anti-inflammatory medications, take them. Nobody is impressed with anti-medication heroics. Taking a moderate dose of Advil for a few days never killed anyone.





3. Avoid flexion/bending activities. I have found that in the acute phase of lower back pain, most people underestimate the importance of staying away from the type of movement that stirred up the issue in the first place. Avoiding slumped sitting and the recliner chair posture is critical.

To be clear, avoiding flexion means NOT standing and reaching to your toes. It means NOT kneeling and pushing your chest to the floor. It means NOT laying on your back and pulling your knees toward your chest. All of these stretches cause lumbar flexion and you should not do them!

(Sorry for the caps but you would not believe the number of people with flexion-based back pain that continuously and persistently do flexion based stretches, likely provoking their symptoms or keeping their injured tissue from healing).

Do nothing crazy. Really - lay off the back.

Yes, all the flexion type stretches do indeed stretch tight muscles. But it also reproduces the exact movement pattern that got you into trouble in the first place! The relief of stretching those muscles will be temporary at best. At worst you will further aggravate or progress a disc problem.

So technically, these three things to do when your back goes out are actually non-doing things. And in the immediate short-term, that's exactly what the doctor ordered to allow time for healing. But after 3 to 5 days, you need to get moving. You need to DO some things and still be careful to avoid doing others.

Prognosis?

By the numbers, you probably will get better with this simple advice. You will naturally take it easy, partly because you can't go hard, partly because you will be more cautious. For a while. But did you know, also by the numbers, that chances are that after you improve and get back to what you like to do, you will experience a more severe episode of similar or progressive symptoms in the future? The last I read on this topic, there is a 90% chance that symptoms will return, and they are usually progressive in nature. What once was a disc tear will have progressed to a full blown disc herniation with sciatica, and you won't be trying to call that a simple muscle strain.

Above all else...

Given the grim statistics on the natural progression of acute, localized lower back pain, let your personal episode of misery serve as a warning. Once you rest and ice and be very careful to avoid forward bending movements, it's time to get active. There are plenty of things you should be doing to mitigate or altogether avoid the natural progression. But that's another essay!

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Plyometric eulogy

The classic wooden picnic table of Bonny Lane, Mechanicsburg, was put to rest last Saturday. It will chiefly be remembered as the original plyometric training table of the Bonny Lane Club. The table also turned in years of dedicated service as a hurdle, fort, bike ramp, soccer goal, out-of-bounds marker, commando crawlspace, and a platform for the placement of drinks, side dishes, and grilled meats.

Many children have played on and under it. It has caused many athletes to open their eyes to physical capacities, increased power, coordination, and confidence. It hosted many fun and meaningful conversations. This table will be greatly missed and is survived by a vinyl table, various deck chairs, and a new wooden table. 


As a final tribute, the table was an active member in its own bonfire service, where we cooked hot dogs and marshmallows over it. It would have wanted it that way.  

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I can't recall when I started doing plyometric drills on picnic tables. It was long before  we had a home much less an unofficial gym. I always loved the idea of taking something that's intended for one thing and using it effectively for something else. I love the idea of the anti gym; the instances when low tech and old school is truly better than the new; the process of building leg power, speed, and stamina while exercising outdoors with your friends and family.

There's something that seems right about all of that.

This image has me wondering what's next to depart the Bonny Lane Club. I'm guessing that it will be the Subaru. I mean, the '98 Forester has almost 200,000 miles. It's currently the one and only motor vehicle that's officially approved as the standard for Bonny Lane Club car pushes.

Other than tables, chairs, and the Subaru, all that's left is a heap of iron wrought into various sizes and shapes. Oh, and the hills that we jump and sprint on. That iron and these hills will easily outlast any of our sinew and connective tissue. I feel this in my bones every morning.

 

Yet I'm still not comfortable with the reality that their is a ceiling to our abilities. Nobody improves infinitely. Even with the best training, recovery, biomechanical knowledge, and community of like-minded believers in the way of the lifetime athlete.

I must say that I'm grateful for the time that we are given to train and be awesome and push limits. I'm certain there is value to this. It is best if I leave it at that.

All go to one place. All are from the dust, and to dust all return. 

            Ecclesiastes 3:20

Emily E. Zagoric, 86, of Camp Hill, passed away on Wednesday September 18, 2013 at Holy Spirit Hospital, Camp Hill.
Born on August 18, 1927 in Scunthorpe, England, she was the daughter of the late Walter and Doris (Palmer) Scrimshaw, and the widow of David R. Zagoric.
She was a loving Supporter and Sponsor of several Animal Shelters and Organizations.
She is survived two sons, Daniel J. Zagoric, of Ickesburg; Edward J. Zagoric and his wife Kathy, of Dillsburg; three daughters, Carol E. Schaar, of Middletown; Linda G. Zagoric, of Tampa, FL; Deborah A. Graham, of Marysville; seven grandchildren, fourteen great grandchildren, and three great-great grandchildren.
In addition to her parents and husband she was preceded in death by a son, David Morris Zagoric, two grandsons, David W. Schaar, Jr., and Daniel J. Graham, a granddaughter, Tammy Schaar, a brother, Morris Scrimshaw, and a son in-law, David W. Schaar.
A memorial service will be held at 1:30 P.M. on Tuesday September 24, 2013 in the Myers-Harner Funeral Home, 1903 Market St., Camp Hill, with Pastor Naomi Sease Carriker officiating. A visitation with the family will be held in the funeral home on Tuesday from 12:30 P.M. until the time of the service. A graveside service will be held Tuesday at 3:00 P.M. in the Indiantown Gap National Cemetery, Annville. - See more at: http://obits.pennlive.com/obituaries/pennlive/obituary.aspx?n=emily-e-zagoric&pid=167047934&fhid=22850#fbLoggedOut

Emily E. Zagoric, 86, of Camp Hill, passed away on Wednesday September 18, 2013 at Holy Spirit Hospital, Camp Hill.
Born on August 18, 1927 in Scunthorpe, England, she was the daughter of the late Walter and Doris (Palmer) Scrimshaw, and the widow of David R. Zagoric.
She was a loving Supporter and Sponsor of several Animal Shelters and Organizations.
She is survived two sons, Daniel J. Zagoric, of Ickesburg; Edward J. Zagoric and his wife Kathy, of Dillsburg; three daughters, Carol E. Schaar, of Middletown; Linda G. Zagoric, of Tampa, FL; Deborah A. Graham, of Marysville; seven grandchildren, fourteen great grandchildren, and three great-great grandchildren.
In addition to her parents and husband she was preceded in death by a son, David Morris Zagoric, two grandsons, David W. Schaar, Jr., and Daniel J. Graham, a granddaughter, Tammy Schaar, a brother, Morris Scrimshaw, and a son in-law, David W. Schaar.
A memorial service will be held at 1:30 P.M. on Tuesday September 24, 2013 in the Myers-Harner Funeral Home, 1903 Market St., Camp Hill, with Pastor Naomi Sease Carriker officiating. A visitation with the family will be held in the funeral home on Tuesday from 12:30 P.M. until the time of the service. A graveside service will be held Tuesday at 3:00 P.M. in the Indiantown Gap National Cemetery, Annville. - See more at: http://obits.pennlive.com/obituaries/pennlive/obituary.aspx?n=emily-e-zagoric&pid=167047934&fhid=22850#fbLoggedOut

Sprinting Faster

Do you want to run faster? As fast as you can possibly run? That's absolutely doable. You may not become a world class sprinter, but I'm almost certain that with the right training, doing some things and not doing others, you can improve significantly.

Every athlete has their own unique set of circumstances, body structure, and function. It is highly likely that they're leaving something "on the table" in terms of reaching top speed.

Is speed genetic? Yes and no. An athlete with average genetic potential who trains intensely and intelligently will easily out sprint a genetically advantaged person who doesn't put in the time. I've witnessed that first hand on many occasions. I've also seen a handful of excellent athletes try to be all things at once (peak strength, peak endurance, and peak speed), only to be average in all of them.

1. You must sprint!

You must practice and be familiar with the skill of running with "all-out" effort.

I would suggest that you begin with about 40 or 50 yards for 6 to 10 reps. You don't have to kill yourself with a long sprinting beat downs. It's far more fruitful to have brief, intense workouts CONSISTENTLY. You don't have to sprint every day. Twice per week is often ideal (combined with plyometrics and relatively heavy, total body resistance training on other days).


...run...as if Ringraiths are chasing you.

You do, however, have to run hard. Hard! Not 98% as fast as you can. Not pacing yourself in any way, shape, or form. If you run out of steam too quickly and have to pace yourself, you are either progressing too quickly or you're sprinting too long of a distance.

Sprint. Walk. Recover. Sprint. This is difficult to put into words, but getting "a good workout" must take a back seat. Sprinting with full effort is hard work, especially over the first 4 weeks or so, but you need not feel particularly gassed. In fact it's better not to. You are trying to impose a specific demand/adaptation response, teaching your brain and body how to coordinate and maximize repeated explosive movement over approximately 5 to 12 seconds. Nothing, NOTHING, should come between you getting from point A to point B in less time than you did the previous month or week.

-Practice sprinting as a full body skill, and not as a tool for getting "in shape."

2. Include these two essential ingredients.,.

There's nothing that will motivate you to run at full bore game speed and not pace yourself like a friend (or group of friends) or a stop watch. Preferably you have both. Trust me. In the absence of Ringwraiths, I would even say that it (almost) can't be done without these two ingredients. 

-Get some competitive spirit and accountability with like-minded friends.
-Get a stop watch and draw a "line in the sand."

3. Sprint with less than full effort.

Wait. Didn't I just write that you need to practice sprinting with FULL effort?

This is a bit of a contradiction, but it's often beneficial to work on staying under control while applying somewhere around 90% effort.

The issue at hand is form. You may indeed improve with the two measures listed above, but still be slow as molasses. You may have a bit of detective work as well as corrective exercises in store. The details of sprinting mechanics (a skill), starts, and finishes (other skills) are beyond the scope of this writing, but if your arms are flailing, your lower back is arched, one or both feet are facing far in or out, or your stride is barely longer than your torso (to name just a few), you will have some work to do prior to sprinting at 100% effort.

-Have a skilled therapist/trainer evaluate your alignment and movement patterns.
-Do the appropriate corrective exercises.
-Get said therapist/trainer to video your running form.
-Work on technique at less than maximal effort.

4. Strength matters.

Some sports scientists and elite sprint coaches note that the primary limiting factor to sprinting ability comes down to how much force you can generate into the ground. Not stride rate or frequency. Not "foot quickness," flexibility, or metabolic conditioning. In order to generate more force, many athletes who are already fit and active often need to a.) lift free weights intelligently and b.) stop all the endurance work.

-Deadlift, squat, lunge, loaded carry...then get out of the gym and recover.
-Quit "stealing your gains" in the gym by over-doing the conditioning.
-Don't try to make up for a poor diet by tacking on more and more training.

5. Mobility matters.

If your running form is a bit off, it's probably for a reason. I would venture to say that your hip flexors or hamstrings are tight, your anterior core and butt are weak, or you have some kind of structural foot and ankle issue. You may need to get checked out for solid alignment of the foot and ankle, getting your glutes strong, or loosening up the hips, to name a few.

-Don't just stretch. Find specifically what segments may need to move more (mobility), what segments need to be more stable.

6. Caution!

The younger you are, the more margin you have to sprint without consequence. As you age, if you have weakness or tightness throughout the lumbar spine and lower body, foot and ankle issues, or other structural issues such as scoliosis or leg length discrepancy, you are likely to injure something with too much sprinting and/or too soon.

There are many reasons why even young athletes strain their hamstrings, hip flexor, or lower back when they jump in recklessly. By middle age, you really don't want your plantar fascia, achilles tendons and knees to hate you.

7. Know if you're ready to begin sprinting.

Here are some guidelines for a quick screen to see if you are sprint-ready.

Can you actively straight leg raise to where the heel of one leg clears the mid thigh of the other leg?

 

Do you pass the Thomas Test for hip flexor mobility?

What about your hip adductors, can you display good form on this type of move, getting both hips adequately low to the ground?

Do you have adequate ankle mobility (you should be able to get your knee to about 4" in front of your toes).

Can you hip hinge toe touch. To what extent and how you bend forward and touch your toes says more than you think.

Working out while on vacation

This is an untimely post for the 99% of you who go on summer vacation during the actual summer. But while I'm at the shore I thought to share my vacation workout secrets.

FYI the east coast is awesome in September, if you can swing it.

Anyway, if you're serious about maintaining strength and awesomeness levels while away, you may want to purchase my new e-book called...

Sandxercise

You use sand for variable resistance on each body part, and it goes something like this:

Paw the sand with your arms, like a digging motion, to hit pecs, lats, and shoulders. Paw the sand with one foot then the other, like a raging bull, to hit hips and hamstrings. Reverse foot paws will isolate the quads.

Don't forget to breathe!

Hit some sand hip abduction and adduction, seated and standing versions, wrist extension and curls, etc, and in 75 minutes you will have sufficiently stimulated each muscle in the body.

Okay while Sandxercise is clearly a (lame) joke and goes against pretty much everything I believe about training, getting some physical activity while on vacation is no joke. Personally, I tolerate and appreciate all the leisure much better when I've pushed myself physically.

But hell, it's vacation. If you have trained consistently throughout most of the year and need a break, take a break. Try something different. Do not lock yourself in to the typical grind that your mind and body are accustomed to.

Unless it's convenient and you want to.

It wouldn't hurt me to just go jog a mile or 5, but I almost always opt for 2 or 3 sprint and/or plyometric sessions to get me by a vacation week. I may or may not do some pull-ups, muscle-ups, and push-ups at the park where my kids play.

Today I sprinted. The time wasn't really planned. I'm not sure when the "workout" began. I was coming off the heels of carrying and pulling kids up and down the boardwalks and beach, then digging (not for core, but to make a hole), and jumping around with the kids in the sand.

The beaches in September are fairly open for sprints. Still, seagulls were unintentionally being shoed. Parents 40 yards away were herding young children, shielding them from the mad man skimming over the sand.

The 11 sprints of approximately 80 yards took a total of 18 minutes, including one time-out for a massive horseshoe crab.

Done. Feeling awesome. Ready to sit around and play and eat!

Tomorrow I will probably bike with the kids. And play in the sand. And haul massive amounts of stuff to the beach only to haul it all back 4 hours later.

The first point is to be active, have fun, and give yourself a break if you need it. Secondly, there's nothing that will help you enjoy the rest and relaxation of vacation like a few doses of discomfort scattered throughout the week.

 

 

Strength Tests - how to know if you're strong

There sat a new test
Much harder that you bought in
As for the unseen
just take care of what you will...                  -Chevelle (Sleep Apnea)


Are you physically strong?

How much force can you generate from dead earth, overcoming gravity's effect on the mass of your body and anything you may want to move? How do you really know if you're strong? The answer is less straightforward than you may think.

There is no single, perfect Gold Standard strength test. So you must define what kind of strength you are looking to measure and how you will be measuring it. I mean, nobody really cares how much you can bicep curl. Many tests that are thought of as measuring strength like running, jumping, throwing, etc, are actually better measures of power. Which leads to point number two.

All strength tests measure more than strength.

Every strength test demands various amounts of flexibility, stability, and coordination. Research has repeatedly shown that a simple test of grip strength correlates very well with other upper body, lower body, and total body tests of strength. My observation from over a decade of working as a physical therapist definitely confirms this. Still, I think it's far more meaningful and interesting to say that "she can squat twice her body weight," or "He can do 20 pull-ups," than it is to simply know grip strength.

Any given strength test poses a different challenge to each person. 

On the surface, you may think that a 250 pound bench press is better than a 150 pound bench press. The one guy successfully lifted more weight so he is indeed stronger in the bench press. But what does that mean? What if I told you that the one pressing 150 pounds only weights150 pounds, 50 pounds less than the other guy? Now who's stronger? Or maybe they weigh approximately the same, but the guy with a 250 pound bench press has arms that are two feet long and a big 55-inch barrel chest, while the other guy is 6' 5", with 45 inch chest and arms almost three feet long? Which one would excel at blocking in a football game? At wresting or rebounding in basketball?

This whole scenario is even more obvious if you take something like a pull up test.

Strength depends on more than big muscles. 

If all else is equal in terms of leverage, motor control, stability, flexibility, and neurological efficiency, a bigger muscle will always exert more force than a smaller muscle. But rarely, if ever, is all else equal. A 35-year old with some degree of normal degenerative "stiffness" in his spine will always be able to dead lift more weight than someone 15 years younger. The younger person requires more stability demand before they can pull the weight off the ground.

Some people have huge muscles simply to help make up for poor alignment or leverage. Have you ever witnessed the huge calves of someone with laxity in their foot and ankles? These people are almost never very fast. Those big muscles are  simply making up the difference for poor stability or leverage.

Strength is context specific. 

In power lifting circles, a "raw" (no belts, wraps, braces, etc) 1.5 X body weight bench press, 2X body weight squat, and 2.5X body weight dead lift are respectable. In most commercial gyms among serious gym rats, these numbers are stellar. In most athletic endeavors and especially in the general population, these numbers are unheard of. In reality, there is strong, and there is strong enough. For athletes interested in sports outside of power lifting and Olympic lifting, I'm most definitely interested in promoting and informing you on how to be strong enough.

Strong enough in the legs and core to run or jump in various athletic pursuits without hurting yourself (minimize the risk of ACL/knee or UCL/elbow rupture). Strong enough to lift a grocery bag or suitcase with good form and without straining something. Strong enough to maintain good congruency between the bones of the shoulder joint when throwing or reaching over head. Strong enough to stand for a while with good posture instead of hanging on the ligaments in your neck and back.

Most people do not possess adequate strength to function well. Honestly, I have to say that even by the lowest standards, most of us are pretty weak. But don't take my word for it. Here are a few of the more simple, not too extreme, ways to see for yourself:

Stability Push Up and Push Up tests:

Deep Squat/Squat tests:

Single leg sit-to-stand test:

Pull Up:

In-line Lunge Test:






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