Fitness

Below are the 7 things you need to know about how to build a bigger back. I will also give you the top 10 best back exercises plus the ultimate back building workout. As always and with every other muscle group, building a bigger back simply comes down to choosing a few key exercises and then getting progressively stronger on them. I wish I could tell you it was more complicated and fancier than that. But it’s just not. The typical gym crowd is all about the chest and biceps, but a big back is what separates… continue reading.

Guest Post by Renegade Inner Circle member, Gary Deagle As you can tell from the puka shell necklace pic(they were popular in 2003 right!?), I had a lot of obstacles to overcome. At that point I had just been suspended from my first semester of college, felt like I had ruined my life, and on top of it was scrawny. My mom bought me a Men’s Fitness thinking it would spark my interest since I was big time into sports and an athlete in high school. 

Luckily for me I read an article in it… continue reading.

Question: What’s the best fat loss workout to help me lose 20 pounds over the next few months? I’m ready to get in the best shape of my life this year and want to make sure I’m doing everything correctly. Answer: The single most important factor for fat loss is diet. You can do ZERO cardio and do nothing but singles, doubles and triples in your training and still get ripped if your diet is dialed in. That doesn’t mean it’s the most effective way but it can be done through diet alone. There’s nothing else you can do to… continue reading.

Guest Post by Wil Flemming You have likely read about, or performed a complex of some sorts in your training experience. Yeah, you have most likely performed some gut busting combination of movements that made you want to puke. Something like, 10 reps of deadlift, 10 cleans, 10 RDL’s, 100 push presses, 33 good mornings, 14 punches in the stomach, until you yakked up what you ate 3 days ago (only a slight exaggeration). At least that is what I have read about complexes. “The hardest 10 minutes you can throw down in the gym.” “Guaranteed to… continue reading.

Question: Jay, I know you are a big fan of box jumps. How do I incorporate them in my training and do them correctly? Answer: Let me start by saying I rarely prescribe a bounding type of box jump where you jump on and jump off of the box, unless I’m working with advanced, highly skilled jumpers. If you have a very low (6-8″) box and are doing it for conditioning that’s okay for people with a decent level of athleticism. But you can’t have unskilled jumpers and average people off the street jumping onto a two foot high box… continue reading.

Guest post by Renegade Inner Circle member, Joshua Grant. A few years ago I decided to stop training. Completely. This was a kind of experiment on my part.  Having a naturally curious mind I wanted to see what would happen. What would happen if I stopped working out 5 days a week, doing bodybuilding routines, carrying food around in tupperware containers, worrying about the size of my biceps, and just gave up training/dieting altogether. Now you have to realize how big a deal this was.  Before this I had been training and dieting religiously. I started working out for… continue reading.

A lot of people ask me the moment when things started to “click.” When I was finally able to start gaining size and muscle and stop being a skinny punk. Or when I was able to take what I had learned and turn it into a successful business. The answer was I stopped trying to do everything on my own and found good coaches and mentors. Look at the people that consistently dominate at what they do and make good decisions. Successful athletes, businessmen, and musicians—they all have coaches. Michael Jordan had someone work on his… continue reading.

“Ya best protect ya neck.”
-Wu Tang Clan In the past I’ve always recommended neck training but said that it was optional. That was a mistake. It’s not optional. It’s mandatory. You look infinitely cooler and more badass with a bigger neck and it’s a life insurance policy. No one can argue either of those two facts. Countless athletes and lifters have sustained injuries that, based on their own accounts, could have been life threatening or left them paralyzed, had their necks not been as strong as they were. I was genetically cursed with a pencil neck so I will… continue reading.

Today we have a guest post from Renegade Inner Circle member, John P, detailing his last twelve weeks of training. *** Hey guys,

I just finished up my final week of Yoked so I figured I’d throw out my review in case it’s useful to anyone. A bit about myself: I’m 33 years old, I’ve been training seriously for approximately a year and a half. Starting this program, I had just completed a 3-4 month phase of trying to get lean, where I started around 19-20% body fat and got down somewhere around 11-12%, which was around 186-188 pounds. After… continue reading.

Guest Post by Keith Scott. Not all injuries are really injuries. Huh? What the hell does that mean? It’s simple…over the years I have “magically cured” a lot of people’s injuries quickly because so many injuries are not really injuries, rather they are muscle spasms or knots that are causing pain and dysfunction. This is not to say that these knots don’t cause major pain and problems…they do. It also doesn’t mean that they are to be ignored, because many spasms or knots are a sign that either something was tweaked and needs to be fixed, or that the… continue reading.

I hate doing cardio. There are very few things I find less appealing than the thought of getting on a stair master and huffing away for thirty minutes straight. I’d imagine five rounds with Mike Tyson in his prime to be less painful. Going for a long walk or bike ride a few times per week at a low intensity is a great idea and I think everyone should do it. Pounding your joints on a machine at a high intensity for 45 minutes, five times a week? Horrible idea. When I opened Renegade Gym back in the early 90′s… continue reading.

What’s up guys? I hope you had a great weekend. Although I doubt it was as wild as the one my friend Mike had a few weeks back. Mike came into my gym for the first time as a skinny 12 year old. His dad hired me to get him bigger and stronger for football and wrestling. At the time I was only training regular people, still earning my chops as a beginner personal trainer helping people lose fat. But I really wanted to get into high performance training and help guys get bigger, stronger and faster. So Mike became… continue reading.

Special guest post by world record holding deadlift champion, Andy Bolton The Deadlift is a superb exercise. Now you might think I’m biased, given that I’m pretty good at it (In case you don’t know – I’m that big dude that’s pulled over a 1000lbs. Twice)… that said – by the time you’ve finished reading this article I’m sure you’ll want to start hitting the deadlift HARD. Here are 7 reasons why the Deadlift is a superb exercise for serious Athletes… 1. If you’re a bodybuilder, or a guy who wants to be JACKED, very few things add slabs… continue reading.

There’s a helluva a lotta cats out there addicted to pre-workout stimulants. Gotta be cranked for your workout; bouncing off the walls or ready to run through ‘em. So you slug down a triple espresso and stack with it with some 3 Hour Energy Blaster, NO Explode-aria and whatever else they sell at the checkout counter of GNC. Anything short of an 8-ball of coke is fair game. After twenty minutes or so it starts kicking in and you feel superhuman. You’re no longer a guy who barely slept because you were stressed out all night or the guy who… continue reading.

An RSC Exclusive Report – Sign up HERE to become a member today. 13 Rules For Injury Free Training – By Keith Scott LEARN to listen to your body! Being intuitive to what your body is telling you is not easy, but if you take the time to really “listen” you will be able to master it and know when to back off, ramp up, or modify. The obvious sign is pain….if it hurts, stop doing it! But the more subtle forms of pain and dysfunction are harder to notice at first. Here are a few pointers: 1 –… continue reading.