A Gaelic Greeting

Abu' Coimhde!
Failte Fuirbidh!

No that's not a typo and you haven't been put on the "Arabic for Dummies," newsletter list. That's a greeting in Gaelic.

It means:
"Hail forever God!"
"Hail strong man!"

So when we throw that little greeting at the beginning of our newsletter, you'll know what it means.

Now.... remember this because you'll be tested on it later. Actually, as I used to compete in the Highland Games and our families are Scottish and Irish, we are simply into Celtic lore. As we wish for us and all of our readers to be viewed as scholars, gentlemen AND freakishly strong mutants, we decided to throw in a little language lesson for the day. Just kidding. Actually we wanted to come up with a unique greeting that signified how we felt about all of our friends reading this letter. We do thank you all for your interest and for subscribing to this letter. We deeply appreciate it. While our first honor goes to God, we do respect each one of you for the effort you put in to building strength, training hard, living life,helping others and working and playing hard.

Okay, now you can take off your horn-rimmed spectacles and we'll talk some training.

Another thought on why "Twisted Conditioning" and really any of our videos could be great for you military and hard living types. Twisted Conditioning would be right up your alley because it gives you the kind of training necessary to benefit your job with the flexibility to adjust training schedules to anything that suits you both recovery and duty schedule-wise. More strength to do the job, more endurance to keep going. In fact, that combined with our videos is really a true adept, overcome and improvise system. Where ever you find yourself in the world or what ever equipment you might or might not have access to, with this information you can still get a killer workout and constantly improve.

www.strongerman.com


SPEAKING OF HARD MEN/MILITARY TYPES...

Last night I spoke to my friend, Jeff Martone. Jeff is one of the most soft spoken, low key and nicest people you'd ever want to meet. But if you didn't know who he was you'd never know he's actually tougher than a coffin nail.

This is the guy that high-level law enforcement and military types go to learn to shoot, fight, survive and get into shape. He is probably the kettlebell juggling and pull up master-of-the-universe. I kid you not. I'm not easily impressed with strength and I watched this guy do stuff that still drops my jaw. Such as, blind folded, behind-the-back, over the shoulder kettlebell toss and catches. Which is a feat equivalent to putting the ultra fine handling characteristics of a Ferrari into the power and durability of a monster truck. Though once you meet him what really strikes you, once you've recovered from seeing those amazing feats is his absolute accessibility as a man and teacher. We all know people who are tough, but unbalanced. Meaning that tough is the only side of them that you'll ever find. They're not good family men or really even friends. In fact they are very difficult to be around for any more than a short period of time. BUT... that's not Jeff. He and his wife Maureen are some of the most beautiful Christian people I've met in a long time. I don't mention any of that to take away from the fact that Jeff is one of the baddest cats walking. To point out that we should all be striving for that goal to be a physical and spiritual superior.

So now that I've introduced Jeff to you at least slightly. I'll go ahead and kick out our upcoming plans. This is just a tentative announcement, but we're going to go ahead and put it out because of some of you may be interested and would like to contact us about getting involved.

Jeff has an extensive travel and seminar schedule, but we're looking at doing a joint seminar here in Florida on January 1, 2005. We may also be performing at some churches in the area that weekend. Probable topics that we'll cover include advanced training concepts, reality and fitness training, kettlebell training and juggling, program design, mixing kettlebells, barbells and odd object lifting, etc. These are just a few of the proposed topics. As we come closer and set the details of this even to 100%, we'll definitely be letting you know.

What better way to kick off the new year than with a whole new powerful army of information at your disposal. Not to mention the hands on training with people who really know what they're doing. You just can't get this anywhere else.

Florida has also been a dead zone so to speak for training seminars for the most part. If you live here, this will be your opportunity to get that up close teaching without having to travel a long way. If you live somewhere else, then this will be your opportunity to hit some prime vacation spots as well as warm weather. How often can you incorporate that with picking up some tail-kickin' training and information at the same time?

For more info on Jeff take a look at his website, www.tacticalathlete.com or www.h2hkettlebells.com. They take you to the same place. I have his Hand to Hand kettlebells DVD. It's AWESOME! There will be a more full review up on my site soon.


WE FORGOT

In our last newsletter we spoke about Pavel Tsatsouline and having the chance to attend his RKC certification course. We also spoke of his new book and DVDs, "The Naked Warrior" and "Resilient." We got so caught up in giving the new information we were putting out and talking about all of the things happening, we forgot to put up links. So... here they are.

THE NAKED WARRIOR:
http://www.dragondoor.com/b28.html?kbid=1925&img=nakedwarrior_anibnr.gif

RESILIENT:
http://www.dragondoor.com/index.html?kbid=1925&img=pavel-products.jpg

Pavel is another one of those guys who is ridiculously tough, but still personally accessible and genuine. He has an ability to distill high level physiological science down to brass tacks, real-world training that is almost unparalleled.

Check out his stuff!

We'll be providing more links to some of the other cool stuff he has in the near future.

THOUGHTS
Don't be afraid to use your strength. Sometimes a weightlifter, it's easy to get caught up in the I-have-to-rest-and-preserve-my-strength mindset. However while you have to be smart about recovery, who wants to live their life that way? Have fun, play with the kids. I stopped in the middle of writing this newsletter to help a neighbor move a couch. I just happened to see him drive in home with it and went out to help him. Not to mention that to blow my own horn, just to illustrate the point. We all know it can be a hassle sometimes being the strong guy everybody knows and calls to move their heavy stuff. But bear the burden with joy. What would life be without the strength to live it and help others?

I have some stories about being asked to move things, but maybe we'll just save that for another time.


TRAINING TIP

Constantly be on the look out for little ways to make your training more effective and productive without adding extra movement. I'll give you an example.

I do almost all of my squats "starting from the bottom." Meaning that whether I'm doing a full range or a partial range, I'm going to set the rack at that height and start there instead of a traditional walk out and squat down style. I think there are many advantages to doing it this way. Not the least of which is safety, convenience, and real world applicability to the strength that you build. However recently I've been experimenting with doing an almost isometric hold while in the down phase of the lift.

Why?

Because I can build a very controlled, lowering type of strength without adding any extra repetitions or exercises. I can use it within the progressive distance system which I normally use. So I simply squat the weight up and then on the way down, stop about an inch from the pin before I set the weight down and do a short hold there. This way I'm continually building the strength to not only lift the weight, but control it more effectively and all I've added is few seconds to the repetition that I'm already doing. Should I choose to come out and do a powerlifting competition and squat in it, I have less trouble transitioning from one style of squatting to the next and I've already built an applicable style of strength with very little more work and time.

There are multiple other ways you can look at training efficiency without adding extra time to your workouts. Combining strength and cardio work, upper and lower body exercises alternated, using a "chain style" of lifting progression - a la Herman Goerner. Explore, experiment and think for yourself. If you come up with a cool tip... share it.


REMINDER

Coming soon: All our video products in DVD.... an affiliate program for your website... new products... seminars... demonstrations... articles... and links to hard core training info.

Don't forget to check out our Barrel Lifting video course. You won't find another one like it on the net.... or anywhere for that matter.

http://strongerman.com/odd_objects.html

30+ exercises using one of the most result producing, power giving, time honored, strength testing objects known to man. Standby exercises such as shouldering, clean and press, barrel squat, and totally unique ones such as a seated clean and press, the clean/press/kiss and shoulder and the barrel suplex. You could get frighteningly strong using just the barrel. Your shoulders, back, abs and grip will never get a tougher workout and it will shoot your conditioning sky high. You will be able to apply that strength to whatever you put your hand on, not just barbells. If you check it out and order it now, remember you get 20% off or 40% if you're a vet/military personnel.


A COOL SIGN

I saw part of a movie the other day and it had a little shot of this sign erected at a pioneer museum. I thought it might be an inspirational way to close this out.

It read:

"The cowardly never started the trip.
The weak died on the journey.
The strong survived.
They were the pioneers."

Take that spirit and strength and use it in your own life. Make that new lift. Hit that new level of excellence. Be inspirational.

God bless,

Bud