Fitness

It just wouldn’t be a party if I didn’t get at least a dozen random fitness related questions from strangers, family members or long lost pals. Kinda like the exchange I had with my old friend Kevin last week… “Hey Jay, good to see you, buddy. Glad you’re here, I have a couple questions for you.” “I probably don’t have the answers, but fire away.” “My shoulder’s been killing recently right here, when I bench press. Here, feel this clicking thing it’s doing,” he says as he places my hand on his shoulder. Another party; another guy placing my hands… continue reading.

I wish I had a guide about how to avoid elbow pain when I first started training, because I certainly have had my share of it. Although this is not my main area of expertise, and guys like Bill Hartman and Keith Scott know a lot more about this than I do, I’ve trained a lot of people for a lot of years and have seen almost every injury you can imagine. I’ve also experienced quite a few of them myself. So today I’m gonna share some tips and tricks with you about how to avoid elbow pain. And since… continue reading.

Riding a stationary bike sucks. Sure, it’s convenient and often the only option for a lot of people, but let’s be honest; enduring 30 minutes of water boarding would probably be more fun. If you can ride a stationary bike, you can ride a real bike; and that would be a much better choice. Sprinting would be far superior to either of those. Doing so on a hill or with a sled or Prowler is often even better. Below are some of my favorite conditioning drills that I do myself and with all of my clients. continue reading.

Guest Post By Brad Pilon You may not have heard of intermittent fasting, and so you may not know why it can and should be a part of your workout and fat loss plan. Intermittent fasting is the practice of abstaining from all but water for a period of usually 24 hours to help with the goals associated with fat loss and weight loss in general. The way in which it helps in this arena is by cutting out a full days caloric intake, while still being able to maintain a full workout schedule. Let’s look at… continue reading.

I always advise all beginners and hardgainers to concentrate on making linear progress (either by adding more reps or more weight) at each and every workout. Add a rep or a plate and you will make pretty consistent gains for quite a while. This is one of the key components to the Muscle Gaining Secrets program. Eventually, however, you’ll no longer be a beginner or a hardgainer and then the whole game changes. It will become more and more difficult to make linear progress on a consistent basis. This can be hard to accept at first and become quite… continue reading.

The last post I wrote about how to improve your chin ups detailed how to get from zero to one. Once you get to one you will, in time, work your way up to sets of five or even ten reps. But again, you will hit a wall at some point and be unable to make any more improvements. So today I am going to offer a very easy, completely unscientific method that will help you add more reps to your chins. One of the major problems is that for most average guys a set of chins is a… continue reading.

Now I know what you’re thinking; “What a boring ass blog post topic.” But it’s a topic I feel needs to be addressed because some people just don’t seem to have a clue what they’re doing. Or maybe I just feel that way because I’m so OCD and incredibly analytic that I see and think about things that most people never do. But I promise I will do my best to make this worth your time. Go to a public gym and watch ten different people perform a set of ten reps. You may see speed reps, grinder reps, death… continue reading.

Originally written For Elite Fitness Systems in 2004 When Part One of this article was written a few years ago the focus was on college strength coaches. Unfortunately the unmaking of an athlete begins long before college. It starts at a very young age with uninformed but well intentioned parents. By doing what they think is best for their kids; many parents actually end up destroying their children’s athletic futures. For this story to be complete we have to go back to the beginning. The father of three high school aged boys I used to coach is one such example… continue reading.

This is an old article from 2004, originally written for Elite Fitness.  Since it was quite popular and many of you may have missed it, I figured I would reprint it here today… **** I sometimes wonder if there are any prerequisites at all to getting a job as college strength and conditioning coach. As the owner of my private athletic training company (Renegade Strength & Conditioning) I have had the opportunity to work with athletes from numerous colleges and universities across the country and have witnessed their disgust with their schools strength and conditioning programs. Some athletes, such… continue reading.

While everyone’s busy searching for the perfect rep scheme or newest miracle supplement, one of the greatest progress boosters of all is constantly overlooked. The concept of taking an afternoon nap is foreign to most of us yet it can do more for your training than 90% of the other minutia bullshit people waste their time obsessing on. There’s a popular MMA t-shirt that reads “Tap or Nap.” While the intended meaning of the t-shirt is obvious, this slogan can also be applied to your training. Taking naps is so important that if you don’t find the… continue reading.

Q: Jay, everyone thinks they know how to build muscle mass. But as you and I know, most people never really even get close to their true potential. What is the biggest mistake people make when trying to get big and strong? A: They follow the same old, traditional bodybuilding routine. That means they are training each body part with too much volume, not enough intensity, probably too much intensiveness, and not enough frequency. Just so everyone is on the same page, when I say intensity I am referring to percentage of one rep max. That means that they… continue reading.

1) Include a lot of close grip chin ups and dips in your workout program. 2) Never go ultra heavy on curls or direct triceps work unless you want screwed up elbows. 3) If you already have tricky elbows I’d recommend some neoprene elbow sleeves when training arms directly. 4) Get a massive pump. That’s more important than moving big weight when it comes to direct arm training. 5) Let your bench and overhead presses take care of the heavy loading for triceps. Then pump on pushdowns and extensions for higher reps with low rest periods. 6) Consider training biceps… continue reading.

Question: Jason, I just wanted to let you know that I have been following your stuff since 2003 and am a huge fan of your work. I am thinking about opening a small, hardcore gym like yours and had a quick question for you. Would you mind sharing with me what kind of application form you use and how you determine who gets to train at Renegade Gym? From what I understand you don’t just accept anybody off the streets, correct? Thanks for all that you do and keep up the great work. Andy Answer:… continue reading.

You’re busy and have little time to spend researching how you should be training and eating. So let me make it super simple for you. First, let’s cover your workouts. You’re going to strength train three days per week and you’re going to get in and out of the gym in 45-60 minutes. This helps to keep your testosterone levels high and allows you to maintain maximum focus throughout. You’re always going to choose big, compound exercises for each body part. Starting from the top down you will do the following movements: Traps- Deadlift, high pull, clean, farmers… continue reading.

I was interviewed for a big name fitness magazine recently and they asked for my top five muscle building and fat loss tips. This is, of course, very hard to narrow down and come up with just five. But I did my best and here’s what I told them… Train Like an Athlete Just about everyone I know wants to look like Reggie Bush, Nate Marquardt or even Dwight Howard. So why train like Ronnie Coleman or Flex Wheeler? Train like the guys you want to emulate. When you train like an athlete you always end up looking significantly better. continue reading.