C.S. Sloan's Integral Strength

 Every week, I receive emails from folks who count their calories, know the exact percentage of macronutrients they are consuming, weigh their food, and train with apps full of charts, graphs, and whatever other things  those apps track.  They also keep meticulous journals, and can tell you the exact repetition tempo performed for all of their machine work at the gym.  I only mention this because just yesterday - while I was relaxing at home, drinking a Coors light, and grilling out for Juneteenth - I checked my email, only to see that I had received an email from a reader who explained to me he is having trouble getting "psyched up" for his workouts - despite taking a pre-workout pill, wearing his state-of-the-art lycra pants and mesh "cooling" tank top, along with his brand new, brand name workout shoes.  So he wanted to know what I did pre-workout to prepare for my training sessions, and what I wear.  I told him I try to remember to wear some shorts, and...

  Welcome to the World of High-Intensity, High-Volume Workouts-Of-The-Day! First things first: read Part One of this series from September 15th of last month if you haven't already done so.  If you have, then we can move on... Let's keep things as simple as possible for the sake of "ease of workouts".  The workouts themselves will be hard enough without overcomplicating the program. Start off by training each of the core lifts - squats, bench presses, and deadlifts - on one day per week.  I like to train during the week when on this program - or when training someone on this program - and then take the weekends off for rest, relaxation, drinking cocktails, throwing down the gauntlet at an arm-wrestling tournament; ya' know, whatever it is you like to do with your weekends without having to think about also performing a hard-ass training session. So the split would look like this: Monday: Squats - pick any of the WOD below Wednesday: Bench Presses - pick any of the...

Over at the "Iron Samurai" (see my "links" section), Nick Horton has a post that I wish I would have written myself.  It's entitled "Overtraining Doesn't Exist." I imagine the title alone would enflame many of your H.I.T. pundits or others who may think that Mike Mentzer was actually on to something. Here's a portion of the article : I’m going to say something many people in the fitness industry will get pissed at me for. But I believe it to be true (within reason). OVERTRAINING DOESN’T EXIST That’s bullshit, of course. Overtraining is a medical syndrome that some people do get themselves into. But… it is EXTREMELY rare, and YOU have never had it. I want you to avoid ANY thought of overtraining. In all of the years I have been coaching, I have not EVER overtrained a single athlete. Ever. CNS fatigue is not overtraining. Feeling tired is not overtraining. A loss of appetite is not overtraining. Being massively sore is not ove...