C.S. Sloan's Integral Strength

A Simple 3-Days-Per-Week, H/L/M Bodyweight Regimen      I received an email the other day asking me if I was going to write another part of my Bodyweight Training and Beyond series.  I wrote Part 3 of that series back in January, and mentioned at the end of it that I would soon do a 4th part.  I have yet to do so, however.  I have a tendency to get on “kicks” where I cover a certain topic for several different essays or for weeks on end before moving on to something else, and I haven’t written that much on bodyweight training of late.  I wrote back to the reader that, yes, I do plan on writing another part to that series, maybe even several.  I’ve made quite a few notes on isometric training along with “dynamic tension” that I plan on including in the next part.  The reader also had a request.  He asked if I had a suggestion for how to design a 3-days-a-week workout using only one’s bodyweight.  He has a chinning bar a...

  Some Slightly Rambling Thoughts, Musings, and Reflections on How One Should Train (and How I Train)      The other day I received a question from a reader who asked how I really train.  He said that, since I write about a lot of different training methods, he wanted to know how I actually trained.  He wanted to know this because he was confused about how he should train.  He said that he read a lot of the articles here on the blog, but he was confused because I seemed to recommend so many different training methods, and it left him a little bit bewildered and conflicted over the correct training methods for him—those weren’t his exact words, but I’m just paraphrasing in my own vernacular.      I have received questions such as this one before.  I even wrote an article over ten years ago entitled “My Training Philosophy” because of the confusion about the various lifting methodologies I recommend, but I figure...

 Utilizing the 5/4/3/2/1 Method for the Ultimate Combination of Strength and Muscle Mass ! Anthony Ditillo—seen here in all of his Bad-Ass glory—enjoyed 5/4/3/2/1 training as one of the methods in his strength and power arsenal. There is a lot to NOT like about our modern world, especially for “old-time” strength athletes such as myself.   We have become a society—hell, a world —that is over-politicized, and full of more “victims” than ever before in our planet’s history.  So, yeah, I could complain and rant if I wanted to, but here’s the surprising thing about our world: some stuff is actually better .  Yep, I said it.  Better.  Case in point: the workout presented here. Don’t get me wrong.  (Please.  Don’t.)  I’m not saying that “overall” the “lifting world” is more knowledgeable, and there is “better” information than when I started lifting 35 years ago.   There is definitely more CRAP than ever before.  But this is just becaus...

 A couple of months ago, I wrote the first part of this series on SERIOUS strength and power training for martial artists and other "combat" athletes.  When I wrote that first piece, I expected to write the second part within a week, and I should have already finished the series.  But life has plans of its own sometimes.  A few days after I wrote Part One, a dear friend of mine since my childhood died unexpectedly.  It has been very hard on me and my family, and is the reason the only thing I have even "felt" like writing since that time was my continued series on The Dokkodo .  But I finally sat down at my computer this morning, and realized that I really  want to begin writing again.  And writing more than I had previously been doing.  When death intrudes upon your life, it can often spur you to concentrate on the things that do matter in life, the things that are important to you, and  the things that you want to leave behind you when...