Posts Tagged ‘Omaha’

Believe-

            I wanted to write this post to those of you who wake up in the morning feeling depressed or emotionally drained. Your beliefs during this time of year can determine how your day week and month is. Let’s examine!

 So what is the definition! Belief is the psychological state in which an individual holds a proposition or premise to be true. Yes! I took that from the dictionary.

 So what we believe in is what we become. So if you think negative your going to be negative. Thinking positive makes you positive. In my world failure is not an option. I will flex and bend, but will not break. 

I’ve gone through some tough times just as you have. From what I read and experience, the people who go through struggles and succeed end up being some the happiest people in the world.

They appreciate what they went through and become grateful instead of resentful.  It also seems to me that people who are handed everything don’t feel this way.  

They go through the motions and let other people dictate their  life. I don’t want to be this way and I know you don’t. Lets take a look at what your beliefs can do if you focus and really BELIEVE. Lets hit it!

Joe

 

p.s. If you think that your life is hard there is always someone who has it harder. I have much respect for a man like this.

 

What up people!

I’ve been hearing a lot about The Men’s Health “Spartacus Workout” Challenge lately and how it’s all this and that.

I will attest to this and say it’s a solid workout and it will crush you if you’re not in good condition.

There’s almost another “300″ craze going on again with this whole spartan training thing.  I like it!

You should always train with a warriors mentality!  It’s like I say – IT’S ALL OUT WAR when you train!

Something about this program that you need to know is that it WILL NOT get you stronger and more explosive and here’s why:

When you do sets of exercises for longer periods of time, like 60 secs with this workout, you’re body produces tons of lactic acid.

This is great for wrestlers and other athletes that need HUGE levels of work capacity, but if you’re trying to get strong, you need to lift heavy weights!

This workout will crush your lungs and give your muscle a burn like no other.

Don’t confuse this with “cross fit” as it’s not.

I like to use this style of training to build strength endurance and work capacity.  It’s also very good for cutting weight and body fat as well.

I’m currently throwing it in to my routine as I’m in a deload week using lots of bodyweight and high reps.  Next week it will be back to crushing the heavy work sets and big lifts.

You can check out the original “Spartacus Workout” HERE to see the ten exercises Men’s Health had in the plan.

I put my own twist on it to make it more my style.  Here it is:

The Spartacus Workout – Forged Style

Perform 10 exercises in the circuit @ 60 secs of work with 15 secs of rest with a 2 min break in between rounds.  Repeat for 3 rounds.  I did 2…

1A) Sandbag Front Squats

1B) TRX Knee Tucks

1C) 1 Arm Kettlebell Swings

1D) 1 Arm Push Ups

1E) Sandbag Front Lunges

1F) Kettlebell True High Pulls

1G) Sledgehammer Swings

1H) Rope Recline Rows

1I) Sandbag Power Press

1J) Sandbag Get Ups

This is a killer group of exercises!  It will crush YOU!

Try it out and let me know what you think!

Check Part 1 of the video here:

Stay tuned for part 2!

PS – Leave you comments if you have any!

Hey Kids!

Hope you’re feeling strong!

If not, it’s time to make yourself your own home-made prowler.

If you’re on a budget, you can still get strong as heck!

I’ve been getting a lot of questions about the prowler we have.

It’s home made!  My dad built it for me.

Basically I gave him a pic of your standard prowler, we gathered up some different pieces of steel and welding em up and now we have two strength building prowlers that kick major ass!

My best advice on the dimensions is to look up the prowlers dimensions and mimic those as best as you can.

Our prowler is measured at 48″ long and 23″ wide.  I’d say a good guestimate of how much it weights is probably 55-65 lbs.

We’ve got a 1 1/2 bar that about 20 inches high on the back where you can load weights up on.

We took a T-bar row bar and stuck it on the back  bar to use for pushing.

You’ll see what I mean in the video.

If anythings for sure, I know a sled and even a homemade sled will get you into some good shape QUICK!

Go ahead and make your own and when you do, send us a video @ theforgedathlete@gmail.com and we’ll post it on the blog for you!

We’ll have a battle of the home made prowler contest to see who’s kicks the most ass!

Check the video below for more on our home made prowler:

Get Forged Strong!

Travis

PS – Leave any comments you may have!

Yo,

I get this question alot – “How can I increase the intensity of my workouts?”

The most common answer to this is to increase the weight.  I also hear adding setswill increase your intesity as well.

These are both true and work!  They work for ONLY a certain amount of time.

Well, I’ve got a new way you can really crank up your intensity – I call it ATTACKING THE TIME.

What I need you to do real quick is forget about everything you’ve ever read about strength training.

If you’re a dedicated strength coach or trainee, you already know that when your working with heavy weight, you need to allow your body to rest for around 90 secs to 3 mins in between sets.

This is the scientific way of thinking about it.  It’s been “proven” through research and all that stuff.

I say – “SCRAP IT!”

Lets do some “REAL WORLD” stuff and go against the grain.  Let’s break the rules!

Back in high school and college, I always stuck to the books.

I would have my stop watch and I would make sure my rest periods were spot on.

I got results, yes, but were they THE BEST RESULTS?  I Don’t Think So!

Today, I ATTACK THE TIME no matter what!  My results are still just as good if not even better!

The plain simple truth about it is – You don’t need complete recovery time to get strong.

I say shorter break and rest periods make you tougher, stronger, and give you a mental edge!

What’s a 3 min rest period do got you besides help you get strong??

Mental toughness is real world stuff!  It’s built by Attacking the Time like a madman.

Next time you do your workout, time yourself and write down the total time it took for you to finsih your workout.

Now, instead of increasing the weights, keep all the weights the same but push the pace, attack the time and finsih the workout in a faster time.  Do that for three to four weeks in a row and see what happens.

If your real daring, add weight to your lifts and beat the time – that’s cranking up the intesity even more!

Attack the time and see what happens!

I’ve got a sample video here of myself attacking the time in my workout.  Check it out below.

The actual workout was this:

1A) Trap Deads 5 x 3-5

1B) Squat-Pause Box Jumps 5 x 4

2A) Sandbag Shoulder loaded + KB Squats 3 x 10

2B) KB Swings 3 x 12

2C) KB Turkish Get Ups 3 x 3/side

3A) Sled/Prowler Heavy x 6 mins nonstop

Total time – 43 mins including warm up.

It kicked my ass and the next time around, it will kick my ass even more!

It’s a race against time!  Attack it!

Check a highlight below:

Get Forged Strong!

Travis

Hey kids,

I saw these videos the other day – FREAKING INSANE!

This is some big time strength!!!  I’m very impressed!

Check it out ==>

This one is with a 409lbs axle – the bar DOES NOT ROTATE!!!  That makes the clean even more brutal!

This one is 414lbs same bar.  DAMN!

Imagine the explosiveness these guys might have.  That is if they know how to use it. You must be athletic to use strength like that.  Otherwise you’re nothing but strong.

Be strong AND athletic…

Leave you comments if you have any!

Get Forged Strong!

Travis

PS – Been getting a lot props from dudes outside of Omaha wanting to train at our gym.  Questions is – Where are all the “serious people” at that LIVE IN Omaha!?

PSS – If you live in Omaha and wanna throw down – All are welcome to come give it a go!  Our gym is your home.  We welcome you to come in…

PSSS – To those outside of Omaha, if you ever stop thru – those of you that are interested, def look us up and we will gladly invite you in to train!

What’s going on!

Hope you’re staying warm!

It’s cold here in Nebraska but that WILL NOT keep us from training hard.

There can be no excuses!  You must get stronger EVERYDAY.  You’re either getting stronger or weaker – you never stay the same.

Live by that rule!  Always strive to get a little better each day.  Even if its a little bit, make sure you’re stepping in the right direction.

Some of the members of The Forged Athlete have been taking steps in the right direction for sure.

They don’t find excuses.  They find a way to get things done.

Here’s a sick workout they just did this last week that really tested thier limits.  I like to call it “Bags, Bells, and A Rope.”

We use all the different tools to get them strong in this workout.

Here it is:

1A) Rope Climb or Recline Rope Climb 5 x max

1B) KB Double Clean and Press 5 x 5

1C) Sandbag Clean to Zercher Lunge 5 x 5/leg

* throw band pull aparts in throughout between the exercises and sets

We ended the workout with 8 straight mins of sled/prowler

It was a good one.  Simple and effective.

Check out the video of some highlights below:

Hey what up!

Hope everything is going strong for you with any and all adventures you may be embarking on.

I’ve been really hammering the pulling movements hard in my workouts lately.

One of my main objectives is to be able to hit 5 good single arm pull ups on each side.  Right now I can only manage just one.  That’s on a good day.

I’ve got to say that to be able to do a single arm pull up, you’ve got to build up some serious strength from your head all the way down to your toes.

It takes so much more than to just pull yourself up over the bar.

Obviously you need to have serious upper back and lat strength to pull yourself over the bar.  Your shoulders much be strong enough to stabilize your whole body and keep it straight.  To aid in your stability, you must have an extremely strong core to stay tight to prevent from swinging.  Grip strength is crucial and is the link between you and the bar.  Without a tight grip, your pull up will be non existent.

On top of all these qualities, you must be lean and in good shape.  If your fat and flaccid, you’ll have a lot of extra weight you’ll be trying to pull up over the bar.  This is just another reason why you need to eat clean and stay lean.

I’ve always had a love for pull ups ever since grade school.  I was one of the few students who could actually do pull ups back in elementary P.E. class.   I was one of the few that could climb the rope and ring the bell.  I had a peg board my father had build in my garage I would regularly climb.  My wrestling club had a 60 ft long jungle gym latter hanging from the ceiling we would have to climb around on at practices.

Pulling is such an overlooked movement with many athletes today.  Too many athletes focus on presses, curls, and tricep extensions.  Too many mirror muscles being used.

The back is the key to a lot of an athletes overall strength.  It supports most movements and is a HUGE part of the core.  It serves for good posture, stability and power development.

If you’re an athlete or avid strength trainee, you need to be incorporating pulling movements into your program.

Some guidelines when it comes to pulling abilities I like to go by when training my athletes are these:

• 6+ bodyweight pull ups
• 15+ reclined rope rows
• 10+ hanging Leg raises
• BW x 1.5 deadlift x 5

These are just a few of movements to require a strong back with all of the other qualities I talked about earlier.  Obviously, there are people of there that can’t perform these standards and with anything, you have to start somewhere.  With everything, there comes progression and regression.

I’m about to give you a few ways to increase your pulling abilities.  Try throwing these 2 exercises into your regimen as much as possible to increase your pulling strength.

1)      Reclined Rowing – This is using your own bodyweight but isn’t limited to this.  You can add chains and weighted vests to this movement to add resistance.

If you have blast straps or a TRX, you can use these easily to perform reclined rows.  You can also use a racked barbell or smith machine and simply set the bar at about hip height and walk your legs underneath to where you can pull yourself up.  I would build yourself up to being able to perform 20+ reps with added weight.  If you’re eating clean and dropping body fat, you should be able to move on to pull ups.

2)      Negative Pull Ups – This is basically taking your pull ups and cutting out the actual pulling part.  To do this, grab a bench and set it up near a pull up bar.  Jump up and squeeze your back as tight as you can while having your chin over the bar.  From here lower yourself as slow as humanly possible.  Repeat for 8-10 reps or until you can’t hold on any longer.  This is great to add eccentric strength.  You add good stability to your pull and in time should be able to perform good regular pull ups.  Its all about being consistent.

From this point on, its all about progression.  Once you can do 1-2 pull ups do multiple sets.  I like trying to get anywhere from 25-50+ total reps of that movement.  If you can only get 1 good pull up, split it up into 50 sets.  Throw in a set in between your other exercises while you rest.  Soon you’ll be able to perform 3, 4, 5+ pull ups in a set and it all just keeps goes up from there.  Just stay consistent and the results will come.

For me, the most I’ve ever done in a set was 34 good pull ups.  To increase this number I’m going to focus on single arm pull ups.  I’ll do weighted 2 arm pull ups, rows, and obviously throw in every different style of grip I can to keep increasing the bottom line.

I figure if I can get myself to 5 good 1 arm pull ups per side, my overall strength will go up in my pulling abilities and I’ll tear up my total reps of pull ups.  I’ll be also focusing on high reps work every now and then while I’m doing this to make sure and keep my strength endurance to perform lots of reps.

The main reason for this post is to get you focused on how important pulls are in your training.  If you’re not currently pulling more than your pushing, make the change.  I guarantee your results will go up!

Get Forged Strong!

Travis

Yo dudes!

Do you still do circuit training?

I bet you still think that’s for mostly women who go to the circuit training classes at the local commercial gym right?

WRONG – circuit training can still give you want you need!

I use workout muse for my circuit training.  It’s the best and ONLY audio interval soundtrack system of its kind.

It kicks total ass and I love it to death!

It totally automates my workouts when I want to train with circuits for speed and power endurance, and work capacity.  I really like crankin’ intervals on my de-load weeks when I hit up a lot of bodyweight movements.

I feel that if you’re a fighter, wrestler, or any sort of combat athlete, you need to have circuit training as a part of your training arsenal.

There’s lots of  intervals you can choose from.

The best and most popular is probably the Tabata Protocol – 20/10′s x 8 total rounds.  Great for everything especially work capacity and power endurance.

I really enjoy 30/30′s which are good for strength and work capacity.   You can see this in the video below ==>

Some other options you have are 50/10′s which are specifically for work capacity and endurance.  Then you also have 40/20′s which are also great for strength and power.

Overall, intervals  are a bad ass way to train.

You options are limited by only your imagination.

Here’s the workout I crushed in the video (Thanks to Workout Muse for the audio track!):

I did 3 total rounds of 30/30′s (F-ing brutal, I wanted to die at the end!)

1A) Sandbag cleans

1B) L seat rope climbs

1C) Handstand Push Ups

1D) Shoulder Loaded Sandbag Lunges R/L

1E) Opposite Shoulder Loaded Sandbag Lunges R/L

1F) Blast Strap Push Ups w/ Feet Elevated

This is a killer circuit for any combat athlete or athlete in general lookinig to increase power endurance, strength endurance, and work capacity.  It’s NOT EASY!

This makes it easier to go to war with your workouts!

Get out there and blast thru some circuit!

Till Next Time

Get Forged Strong!

Travis

PS – Let me know what your favorite circuit is of all time and why!!

Hey kids!

It’s been COLD over here in Omaha but there’s no excuses to keep me from training.

The gym is cold and we have yet to crank the heat.

I feel I get a better workouts in the cold.  Forces you to keep moving to stay warm.

So, it’s Day 6 of Operation Get jacked!  This is the last day of the rotation.  Basically what you will do from here if you’re following the program is start back over at Day 1 and repeat the cycle 3-4 times.

I’ve taken days off when I need to.

This 1st cycle through I’ve gone Day 1, 2, 3 RESTED for 2 Days then hit Day 4, 5 RESTED 1 Day then Hit up Day 6, 1, ect…

I recommend you listen to your body.  Go hard when you feel good and cut back when you feel torn up.

I’ll go through this 6 workout cycle 3 times then I hit up a deload week with light kettlebell work,  lots of bodyweight, and probably some bands and light sandbags.  I’ll also through in tons of sled draggin of all sorts.

So here’s Day 6 – Strongman Part 2!

20 min Circuit

1A) Tire Flips x 8-10 (depending on the size tire you have – heavier go 3-6 reps, lighter 5-10)

1B) Sled Drag x 2 trips dow and back

1C) DB Farmer Carry x max distance

1D) Sledghammer Swing x 5/arm

Repeat for 20 mins.

That’s a good circuit.  I’ll add 5-10 mins next time around.

Keep hitting it and going to battle!

The war never ends!  Only when you surrender!  I’ll die before I surrender to the iron!

Get Forged Strong,

Travis

Yo dudes!

I hope the 1st 3 days of the program have treated you well!

Hopefully your picking the right intensities and pushing yourself hard.

One of the things about these workouts is attitude. Its all mindset. If you don’t have it upstairs you won’t get the progress and results your after.

So make sure your focused and make sure you’ve got the right attitude to kick some ass!

Remember its WAR!  You against the iron.

Take No prisoners.

Go by No Rules.

Just hard work and exteme intensity.

Now for day 4.

We’re hitting up the max effort day again. Hopefully you’ve taken a day or few off to recover and now your ready 2 rock again.

If not rest up and hit it when you feel refreshed.

I always can tell where I’m at during the warm up. If I feel ready to roll and I’m jumping around like nothing I know I’m ready physically.

Mentally I’m always ready but sometimes during the warm up you can tell your body isn’t prepared. Your still feeling sluggish and the explosivness just isn’t there.  This means you might not be fully recovered.

If your hitting a max effort day, you wanna have as much in the tank as you can.  It will prove for better results my friend.
So were coming back strong with a max effort day upper body.

Here’s the workout:

1A bench press 8 x 3  (pretty weak here but the number will go up!)

It’s not like the good ol’ college days where I benched 2 x a week prepping for the combine.  My numbers then were impressive for a 175lb wide reciever   I will say this, my shoulders feel alot better now!

2A Deadlifts x 5 x 10 mins EDT
2B Weighted Pull Ups  x 5 x 10 mins EDT (F***ing BRUTAL KIDS)

3A Double Kettle Bell Swings 3 x 15

4A Db Bench 1-2 x max reps

Foam Roll like a mo fo!

Stay Tuned for part 2 with the second half of the workout.

I’m gonna get into EDT training a little bit more.

You wanna talk about real mental toughness….

Till next time,

Get Forged Strong!

Travis