Before I get to the Underground Strength Session (UGSS) I need to take care of a little business first and bring everyone up to speed with what’s been going on around here. Don’t worry – I’ll be quick and even use bullet points.

My career as a strength and conditioning coach essentially began at the University of Washington when I interned under a great coach named Bill Gillespie back in the late 1990s.

In a world full of fast food and high dollar gourmet coffee houses, fitness has become somewhat of a joke, and the major players in the game are doing nothing to help matters. By major players, I mean those monstrous facilities with all of their chrome machines, pencil neck trainers, and high pressure sales people.

If you’re in the military, or you’re a police officer or fireman, or you work some other job where you’re under considerable amounts of stress on a regular basis, you’re going to want to read this article.

Aerobic exercise is often very rhythmic, and many people detest it because it is so boring. Every time I go into a gym, the so-called cardio section is full, and the weight area is somewhat like a ghost town.

Were you fed through a bottle, or were you fed naturally? Did you eat from plastic plates? Stand too close to the microwave? Did you grow up in the ghetto? Are you a recovering drug addict? Is your life a living hell? Are there things about yourself that you don't like? Do you procrastinate?

Recently, I’ve been on a 10-week decline in the gym. It began with a powerlifting meet that I entered back in November.

That’s it. I can’t take it anymore. These sissified commercial gyms and their clipboard holding trainers have just about ruined the weightlifting world.

Players need overall lower body strength, single leg strength, upper back and shoulder strength, mobility, and a solid core. The game also subjects players to pounding and stress on the lower body.

Here is a question I was just asked on the Q and A. I do not watch or read the news in regards to political issues so my answer is...

As I sit here at my computer, I am battling a certain EliteFTS employee on his desire to become a Metro-sexual. Yes, the current trend of being an androgynous male has invaded the holy ground of the Compound and it is my job, nay my civic and Holy duty, to prevent this at all costs.

What you’ll see is that he takes about two or three pulses of pull in order to get his weight from his toes back onto the middle of his foot before the bar leaves the ground. In other words, he’s using those little tugs to pull the slack out of his hamstrings after he sets his lumbar spine.

It might seem like I’ve been doing many interviews lately. There’s good reason for this. A few weeks ago, I did an interview for EliteFTS, and I was asked the question, “Who do you feel is getting it done in strength and conditioning?”

I’ve been fighting it for a few weeks, but I’m definitely overtraining again. I don’t do shit anymore, but I keep overtraining. One of my training partners asks me what I expect, because don’t sleep. That’s easy. I’m Chad Aichs, and I expect to train hard every day while still getting stronger.

Same old, same old. Just training. I just did a meet about eight weeks ago, and I’m still feeling like hell.

In the November 2006 issue of CrossFit Journal, Mark Rippetoe published, “A New, Rather Long Analysis of the Deadlift.” He concluded this breakthrough article by identifying three criteria for a correct deadlift starting position:

“A man has got to know his limitations.”

I moved from Greenville, South Carolina, to Columbia, South Carolina, to go to school at the University of South Carolina almost three years ago. I considered myself a hardcore powerlifter, and at the seasoned age of 19-years-old, I thought I knew what I was doing.

Hello Everyone! My name is J.L. Holdsworth and I’m an asshole.

Wabush, Labrador, Canada. A small mining town nestled in the cold and desolate woodland of northern Canada. Seven months of the year this isolated town in the middle of nowhere is covered in a deep and cold blanket of snow.

Figure 3 exhibits an example of the progression of strength from the developmental strength workout for the compulsory age group.

Before I get started here, I want to say that I am in no way, shape or form a badass. I’m simply an average guy with a little better than average genetics, and a good work ethic. I know a hundred guys that are tougher and more hardcore than I am. They just haven’t written their stories down on paper yet.

As gymnastics coaches, sometimes we get caught up in sport-specific strength training because that’s what we know best. The belief is that if we strength train for sport-specific movements repetitiously, the gymnast will not only become stronger during those movements but will have less cause for injury. However, it is that frame of mind in which we fail as coaches.

Under the Bar: December Update