I bet you perverts thought the title of this post was going to refer to something else. Typical.

You’re squatting your last set of five on your linear progression. You find yourself getting bent over a bit at the bottom of each rep; it happens regularly with hard or heavy sets. You hit rep number three and something tinkers in your back. Instantly the muscles seize around your lumbar spine and you dump the weight (on the pins, not your friend). What. The. Fuck. Happened?

I’ll tell you what happened; The Final Stroke.

If you’re like me, you wear flannel (Editor’s Note: If you’re like me, you pick your girlfriend up wearing flannel.). Flannel is perfect for cold weather, and it’s even more perfect for chopping wood. Chopping wood requires a tree that isn’t attached to the ground. The man-method of removing a tree from the ground is by chopping it. If you’ve read “Where the Red Fern Grows”, you can imagine what happens next: you chop the base of the tree with an axe until it falls. If you’re smart, you’ll get a good rhythm going; most of your strokes will be pretty equal to one another. The base of the tree will be chopped away, and eventually one of your even tempered strokes will fell the tree. It may take a thousand strokes, but it’s the final stroke — a stroke that isn’t any more significant than the other 999 — that brings the tree down.

This is the same thing that happens to your grandmother’s hip. She gets osteoporosis because she doesn’t regularly apply force to her bones, thus they don’t adapt to being stronger (ask Jack LaLanne if he ever fucking got osteoporosis). Grandma gets achy and has brittle bones. Eventually, she’ll step off the curb walking in the super market parking lot and will break her fucking hip. It’s not like stepping off the curb was a significantly higher stress than anything else she experiences on a regular basis. It’s that her bone was getting chopped at because it was so brittle, and the 1000th stroke finally landed. The Final Stroke is hardly ever more significant than the 999 before it, yet it’s the one that causes the biggest trauma.

To understand The Final Stroke, you need to look at the hundreds that occurred before. The Final Stroke is a regular event made irregular by inadequate preparation or by doing the wrong thing. The dude in the first paragraph didn’t screw up his third rep on his last set; he’s had some weird little form fault — in this case the “leaning over” thing — that has chopped away at some structures until finally, the structures gave away. This happens all the time. All the fucking time. Most training related injuries or mishaps occur because something wrong has been occurring for weeks, even months. The debilitating effects of a little form fault may not be felt until The Final Stroke.

Take notice of your knees coming in on the squat or shoving your head through when you lockout a press. Take notice of how you jerk the deadlift off the floor or how your pelvis shifts to the left in the squat descent. You don’t have to go out and McCarthy every exercise (half of you are now thinking, “Jesus Christ, is my pelvis even when I squat?”). I’m just saying, address those little form faults before increasing the weight. If you keep hacking away at them, you might have to eventually deal with The Final Stroke.

Atlanta Workshop – March 5th

The first 70’s Big Workshop of 2011 is scheduled for March 5th in Alphaertta, GA just north of Atlanta. This will mark version 3.0 of the workshop, and I’m busily working on improving the lectures, presentation, and material. The workshop consists of various lectures on strength training, yet will focus on programming for both strength and conditioning. We’ll have a laid back training session followed by a hearty dinner at a local restaurant (I’ll be drinking beer, too). If you are interested, then e-mail me at Justin@70sBig.com for sign up information. More details will be provided via the site and the Facebook Fan Page.

Debate

There was a debate raging yesterday on Facebook on whether pull-ups or chin-ups were superior. My stance has been that they are both equally important for shoulder strength and health because of the difference in the angle of the humerus. The chin-up (done with a supinated forearm) has the humerus pointed forward while the pull-up (done with pronated forearm) has the angle of the humerus anywhere from 45 degrees in front of the direction the torso is facing to perpendicular to the direction the torso is facing. The subtle difference will stress the various shoulder extensors differently, and thus both are equally important to maintaining and strengthening a healthy shoulder.

The debate raged with arguments of which had more musculature involved and which had more biceps involved. One party even repeatedly claimed chin-ups were “gay”. This study was even cited as research proof that biceps involvement isn’t all that different between a pull-up or chin-up (we’ll find why this study is very fucking irrelevant below). For your entertainment, I have provided my comments on the issue. I’ve left out the debate and mentioning the other participants on purpose so that they don’t have to deal with all of you stalking them like I do.

Comment 1:
1. Chin-ups aren’t gay.
2. Someone needs to make a compelling argument with a stellar mechanical analysis to point out that the lats are NOT extending the shoulders as well during the chin-up.
3. Neither chin-ups nor pull-ups are better th…an the other. They just are.
4. Both movements train the shoulder musculature differently because of the angle of the humerus when doing the movements.
5. Thus, they are both important

Comment 2:
Regarding that study, I have to pick it apart like I did in the writing assignment of my GRE:

1. Machines were used in the study, which has an irrelevant representation of a body weight controlled movement.
2. Machines also make the study ga…y.
3. The average weight of the MALES was 78.25kg (~172 lbs.). The average height was about 6′ tall. These “males” are pussies, and that makes the study gay.
4. Each “maximal voluntary contraction” test done with electrodes on the skin were three seconds of isometric contraction against an immovable object. Not only is this fucking irrelevant to real world training, but isometrics are gay.
5. They then used two reps of ten second isometric contraction at the completion of the movement for each exercise (exercises were wide grip pull down, reverse grip pull down, and two variations of the seated row). Again, the machines are irrelevant, but so are these measures. Gay.
6. Most importantly, there were only 12 subjects in this study. That can hardly be generalized to any population other than weak, pussy males, much less to everyone. Furthermore, the exercises that were used in the study are irrelevant to significant and effective training, so the point is moot anyway.
7. The majority of the people working on this study were from the undergraduate program, so the study and results aren’t that compelling anyway.

Comment 3:
I’m not mocking [the dude who posted the study] for citing the source, I’m mocking the fucking ineptitude in the Exercise Science community in studying irrelevant bullshit topics. Why even ask this as a research question? If you know anatomy, and do a mechanical analysis of how structures effect a movement — given the change in those structures relative to the joints and relative positioning to one another — then you can come to a pretty compelling conclusion without all this rhetorical bullshit. Furthermore, this line of study is so weak, nobody is gonna give a fuck to repeat the study, much less with varying populations. Even if we HAD seen a change in biceps involvement, or any other muscle involvement, we already know what does or doesn’t make a strong shoulder girdle. And even if we didn’t, it’s logical to work it from many different angles to ensure that the structures are as strong as they can be so that they can withstand the forces of other movements, whether they be lifting or otherwise.

But I guess you all are really focused on this topic because you don’t have fantastic biceps like me.

PR Friday

Post your training PR’s or updates to the comments. I am probably going to the beach this weekend, so you northerners can imagine me in a speedo as you tread through snow.

Donate
I started this site in September of 2009 and have aimed to entertain and educate readers. The site has existed completely for free during that span, and I hope you’ve gotten something out of it. Things are a little tight financially right now, so if you are willing to donate a few dollars via the PayPal button below, it would be very appreciated.
No donation is too small, and again, I appreciate it very much.

Projects
I’m working on some projects to further your education and entertainment. One version is a short podcast of interviews with various people, whether coaches or trainees. Another project is a writing project that will help at least 75% of you in how you program and train. New t-shirt designs will also be released today (I’ll update in this post) and completely new t-shirts will also be on the way. There’s a lot to be excited about if you’re a fan of 70’s Big.

In the mean time, amuse yourself with this video of Bjorn from Sweden:

Reality Shoveling & Cleans from Björn Uddenfeldt on Vimeo.

Question of the Day
What’s better: fried chicken or barbecued chicken?

New Shirts
There are two new shirts available on the 70’s Big Store. The first is a new version of the brown Throwback shirt, now reprinted in navy. It looks sexy.

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The second places the Reckless shirt on a red shirt — the color of blood and rage.

Both shirts, as well as all of the others, are available in standard heavyweight and American Apparel shirts. Be sure to check both pages on the STORE for all of the shirts.

I’m busy working on a project that will benefit at least 75% of you. In the mean time, enjoy some reader submitted material.

Here is a video that I was supposed to post a long time ago but I keep forgetting from Peter. He and his mates are from Sydney, Australia, and he’s been really campaigning for a 70’s Big Short Film Festival. Stay tuned for details.


Jeremey sent some pictures of his friend’s garage gym they’ve been putting together. First is a picture of one of them (I don’t know who) squatting in the homemade squat rack, and then the new plates they just got.

Charles sent me this video of his 405x5x5 milestone. Nice work.


Question of the Day
What’s your favorite kind of barbecue sauce?

The 70’s Big Chat is scheduled for this evening at 5:00 PM EST, and we’ll be joined by Dr. Michael Hartman again. Usually the chat is a free-for-all that is an open forum to questions. Dr. Hartman would take some questions regarding weightlifting and beer, and I’d answer things the best I could.
Link to chat: http://widget.mibbit.com/?settings=d979218505a306cbee7d9302470fe159&server=irc.synirc.net&channel=%2370sbig

Today’s chat will be a little different. Today is a live Q&A about Dr. Hartman’s new e-book “The Next 8 Weeks…” that I featured yesterday. Dr. Hartman will be taking questions regarding this book, but I encourage any of you current or future weightlifters to join as well. We’ll also have a topic discussion on Weightlifting Strength vs General Strength. Come with questions or just to spectate, but it’ll be an informative session.

Some of you may be reading this and think, “Who the hell is Dr. Hartman?” For the sake of validating his Olympic weightlifting background to you, here is his profile from the new e-book:

Dr. Michael Hartman is a Sport Scientist, and recognized expert in training for Strength-Power and Performance. He earned his Doctorate in Physiology and has previously worked as a Collegiate Strength and Conditioning Coach and Sport Scientist at the US Olympic Training Center where he was a member of the inaugural USA Weightlifting Performance Enhancement Team.

Dr. Hartman’s involvement in Olympic Weightlifting dates back over 10 years. As Associate Director and Assistant Coach at the former USAW Weightlifting Regional Development Center and Wichita Falls Weightlifting, he worked closely with Glenn Pendlay in preparing athletes for national and international competition. Additional responsibilities included talent identification, athlete recruitment, and long-term competition planning.

As a Professor, Dr. Hartman is responsible for the education and training of hundreds of future fitness professionals and coaches. To date, Dr. Hartman has
taught nearly 500 individuals the anatomy, physiology, and biomechanics of strength training and conditioning at the collegiate-level. Other areas of teaching emphasis include neuromuscular physiology and coaching education.

Dr. Hartman has an extensive history of publication in scientific journals, with nearly 20 articles and 50 abstracts to his credit. His primary research interest focuses on the adaptations associated with strength training and conditioning; including athletic performance, strength-power training, overtraining syndrome and recovery strategies. Dr. Hartman has been a featured guest on the Strength-Power Hour and IronRadio internet podcasts and is currently working to bring his knowledge and experience to a wider audience by maintaining the Doctor Hartman blog, where he publishes new information related to training for Strength-Power-Performance, and Olympic Weightlifting.

Dr. Hartman is available for coaching and training program consultations at
doctorhartman@hotmail.com or through the Doctor Hartman blog.