Brandon Charls

Heel Stike in Running

Feb 21

BrandonCardio health, Challenges, Speed and Agility No Comments

It makes you think differently about running and what shoes you buy.

Workout of the Day (WOD)

Jun 20

BrandonChallenges No Comments

Warm up:  135 lbs Barbbell complex (incorporating multiple exercises one right after the other just using the barbbell)

1. Clean -> thruster (front squat to overhead press) -> Front right lunge -> Front left lunge -> Push up (hands still on BB) 3 sets

2. Power clean -> 3 front squats -> 1 push press -> 3 back squats -> 1 push press from back squat position

The WOD:  Try to complete this workout as fast as possible (AFAP) of reps of  21 -15 – 9

21 deadlift @ 225 lbs
21 pull ups
21 plyo pushups

15 deadlift  @ 225 lbs
15 pull ups
15 plyo pushups

9 deadlifts @225 lbs
9 pull ups
9 plyo pushups

Workout of the Day (WOD) POWER!!!

Jun 17

BrandonChallenges No Comments

3  rounds for time…

10 power cleans @ 135 lbs
20 plyo push ups
30 wall ball
40 box jumps 24 inch
50 double unders

Time to Stretch!

Jun 16

BrandonChallenges, Fun, Speed and Agility No Comments

Stretching gets over looked a lot by many people and athletes who are trying to achieve an optimal level of fitness. The reason why flexibility training does not get much attention is because people do not fully understand the concepts of stretching. The main reason why flexibility training is so important is because it will fix muscle imbalances, decrease joint dysfunctions, and decrease overuse injuries. According to Micheal Clark (President and CEO of the National Academy of Sports Medicine) states,

Today’s society is plagued by postural imbalances, primarily owning to sedentary lifestyles caused by the advancements in technology. More people today are spending time in office-related jobs, which require individuals to sit for long hours. More than ever before, flexibility training has become a key component in developing neuromuscular efficiency and decreasing these dysfunctions. (140)

In addition, knowing what type of stretches to use before, during, and after your workout is crucial for correcting muscle imbalances and increasing neuromuscular efficiency. Here are some tips that will help you the next time you workout…

1. Ballistic Stretch: This type of stretching involves bouncing and skipping movements. This of movement is more of a general warm-up to increase the body’s temperature before you start your workout or activity. Arm circles, skips, and bouncing during your stretch are considered ballistic.

2. Static Stretch: Is the process of passively taking a muscle to a point of tension and holding the stretch for a minimum of 20 seconds (Clark, Lucett, & Corn 2008). Static stretching is the most widely used stretch that you see in fitness today. However, the best time to static stretch is after your workout or activity. The only time you should use static stretching before your workout or activity, is if you are really tight in a specific area and you want to loosen it up a bit more.

3. Dynamic/Movement Prep Warm-up: Is lengthening the muscles using force production of your own body weight. The reason that I also call it “Movement Prep” is because you are preparing the body for the movements that you will use during exercise or competition. This type of stretching should be executed right after a general warm-up (jog, jumping jacks, jump rope, etc.) and before your workout or competition. Some basic dynamic warm-ups consist of body-weighted squats, lunges, multiplanar lunges, push-ups, dips, figure skaters, etc. 1 set of 6-10 reps is enough for you to get warmed up.

4. Active Isolated Stretch (AIS): The process of using agonist (prime mover) and synergist (assist the prime mover) to move the joint into a range of motion. AIS is somewhat like static stretching but, in AIS you are stretching the muscle for 1-2 seconds and then relaxing. You would want to perform 1-2 sets of 5-10 reps of a stretch. AIS should be done before your workout or even during your workout to help clear up lactic acid.

5. Self-Myofascial Release (SMR): Also known as “Foam Rolling” this stretching technique focuses on the neural system and the fibrous tissue that surrounds and separates muscle tissue. This fibrous tissue sometimes sticks to the muscles and forms adhesions or “knots”. Using a foam roll (or softball, tennis ball, golf ball, etc) to apply gentle pressure (your bodyweight) to a muscle that might feel tight. Roll around that specific muscle and try to find knots or tender spots. Once you have located knot, apply pressure for a minimum of 30 seconds or until the pain goes away. The best time to SMR is after your workout or competition; however you can also SMR before you workout to loosen up muscles that might be extra tight.

So stretch dam it!  Correct those muscle imbalances and stay injury and pain free

“Yin Yang” Workout of the Day (WOD)

Jun 14

BrandonBuilding muscle, Cardio health, Challenges, Fun, Losing Fat No Comments

Complete this workout as fast as possible (AFAP) for time. After you have finished your workout, record and post your times.

Run 400 meters

21 Thrusters (squat to overhead press) 30 lbs dumbbells
21 Pull ups
21 Burpees
21 Sit ups

Run 400 meters

15 Thrusters (30 lbs DB)
15 Pull ups
15 burpees
15 Sit ups

Run 400 meters

9 Thrusters (30 lbs DB)
9 Pull ups
9 burpees
9 Sit ups

This workout should not take more than 25 minutes to complete.  If you cannot do pull ups, you can regress the exercise to jumping pull ups.

The Best Core Exercise

Jun 12

BrandonBuilding muscle, Challenges, Fun, Speed and Agility No Comments

The fitness world goes through these phases in which certain exercise and theories get the most attention. Today, core training receives the most popularity among people who are trying to shape up their mid-section and achieve 6-pack greatness. However, the core is comprised of muscle located in the center of the body that stabilizes the body when it is in an upright position. When you walk, run, jump, squat, and lift weights you are using your core muscles. These muscles also control the head, neck, ribs, spine, and pelvis (Dominques & Gajda 1982). In addition, achieving a strong core will allow for greater neuromuscular efficiency, an increase in functional strength, and leads to improved performance on and off the field.

I believe that the best exercise to train your core is the overhead squat (OHS). The overhead squat is a very physically demanding exercise that not only challenges your core but, also every muscle in your body. If you have never done an overhead squat before, you must first start out light and focus on maintaining proper form throughout the whole exercise. A good way to practice is to start out using a PVC pipe or a broom stick. Using a wide grip, extend the bar over your head slightly behind your ears by retracting your scapula (shoulder blades) and maintain that position. Set your feet into a good squatting position while keeping your torso upright and your eyes focused straight ahead. Now, take a deep breath and hold it as you descend as deep as possible making sure that your heels are flat on the ground and your hips pushed back. When you are ready to ascent from your squat, stand up slowing and exhale while keeping your chest upright and your heels still flat on the ground.

 Practice makes perfect!  The more OHS you do will lead to greater flexibility, strength, and core strength.  It is also a great way to correct a lot of muscle imbalances you may have, which will help you prevent injuries from occurring and allowing you to move more efficiently. 

Treadmill Training

Jun 11

BrandonCardio health, Challenges, Losing Fat, Speed and Agility No Comments

Put down the weights and tighten up those shoe laces for a workout that will have you burning more calories than you can ever imagine. In this workout you will have to be comfortable with running at high speeds on the treadmill and most importantly hoping off the treadmill while it is still going. For instance, on pretty much every treadmill there are ledges on the side of the rotating belt that are big enough for you to step on to and rest if you have to. You might have done this before when you were running on the treadmill one day and stepped off to the side to rest, get a drink of your water bottle, and then you proceeded to complete your run. However, in this workout you will be allowed to rest/hop off the treadmill after every assigned run, but the rest you take should not exceed past 45 seconds. In addition, there will be some runs in which you will hold on to the rail in front of you (usually where the heart rate monitors are) and perform the run. This workout is not easy! If you need to take more rest or adjust the intensity (speed/incline) do so to meet your needs. On the other hand…PUSH YOURSELF

Here’s how it goes…

This prescribed workout is for elite athletes who are comfortable at running high speed on the treadmill, as well as hoping off while the treadmill belt while it  is still moving. If you feel that you are going to fly off the treadmill because it is too intense, decrease the intensity (speed/incline) so you don’t kill yourself. This workout will allow you to burn a lot of calories and also increase your speed, agility, and joint proprioception (joint awareness).  Have Fun!

Motivation

Jun 08

BrandonBuilding muscle, Cardio health, Challenges, Losing Fat No Comments

60% of Americans live a non-active sedentary lifestyle. The lack of motivation of not being physically active has lead to the increase rates of obesity in America. In 2006, 33% of men and 35% of women were considered obese. In addition, 16% of children aged 2 – 19 years old fell into this same category.
Here are some tips to build, increase, and maintain motivation so you can stay physically active and life a healthy life style.

 
1. Write down your goals and post it somewhere in which you will see it every day. A good place to place your goals is in your bathroom mirror.

2. Tell family and friends about you fitness goals. This will allow the people around you to support you and keep you motivated on what you are trying to achieve. If you start to slack (trust me you will slack) they will be around to let you know that you are not doing all you can to achieve success.

3. Keep a journal of your thoughts and feelings about your workout and daily activities. This will allow you to adjust what you are doing in your everyday life.

4. Workout with other people and compete in challenges. This will allow you to work harder and have you strive to be the best. If you do not have that “Play to Win” attitude, you will not succeed on achieving your fitness goals.

5. Visualize! Take five minutes out of your day and close your eye to visualize yourself doing what you want to do, where you want to be, and how you are going to succeed. Make sure that the thoughts in your head are as vivid as possible. This is not easy…However, with practice you will get better at controlling your thoughts and feelings. The body and mind work as one, if you’re not mentally prepared you will fail in what you set out to accomplish.

Following these tips will allow you to stay focus and not give up on your fitness dreams.

The 5 Most Overrated Exercises

Jun 05

BrandonBuilding muscle, Challenges, Speed and Agility 1 Comment

1.  The Bench Press: 
“How much can you bench?” seems to be the question that every gym rat would like to know when you tell them you workout. In my option, I think the bench press is the # 1 most overrated exercise that is performed in the gym (especially on Mondays/National Bench Press Day). The reason I think this way about the bench press is because I am a man of functionality and I believe that you should train movements and not body parts (the body building era is over!). The only time you are lying on your back and pushing something heavy off of you is when you are getting your ass kicked in a fight or in competition.

2.  Bicep curl:  
I absolutely hate this exercise! I will just quote Alwyn Crosgrove who is a well renowned strength & conditioning coach and an overall great guy. He states, “If you cannot achieve 10 pull-ups on your own, you have no right doing bicep curls”. I’ll just leave it at that because I can go on for days about why this exercise is irrelevant…

3.  Leg press:
Ok, let’s load up 8 plates on each side of the leg press and have people be AMAZED about how much weight you are pressing. Let’s see…
8 plates x 2 sides = 16 plates total
16 plates x 45 lbs = 720 lbs that you are pressing while you are reclining in a chair with your feet up. That is amazing! So if you can leg press 720 lbs…How much can you squat???
(I had a professor once told me that “leg press is only functional for truck drivers”)

4.  Seated Adductions: 
Women love this exercise!…They believe that if they do enough reps, the fat will melt off of their inner thighs. Not only is this not true, but this will cause a major muscle imbalance in the body especially in women. For example, the next time you see someone squat notice their knees and how they move (in or out). If the knees move in towards one another then that is a perfect example of someone who has tight adductors. Having tight adductors will lead to someone having weak glutes and not having a strong ass will lead to sprain ankles and knee problems.

5.  Tricep Kick Back:
This exercise is ridiculous because for you to perform this exercise you must pull your arm into shoulder extension and maintain an isometric muscle contraction (no movement) in your latissimus dorsi and posterior deltoid. In other words, you are not just working your triceps in this exercise because your motor neurons are firing to your lats and deltoids to hold you in the proper position. You won’t be able to overload the triceps with weight and thus you will not see any gains by doing that exercise…throw it out!

Honorable mention
• Forearm curls
• Crunches
• Knee extension                                                                                                                                                               

Got to love Mondays

uh???

 Northridge CA, 91325

The Less We Move…The More Fat We Get

Jun 03

BrandonBuilding muscle, Cardio health, Challenges, Losing Fat No Comments

Less Movement = More FAT

I have nothing to say…this picture tells all.

Northridge CA, 91325