Day 38 of 365: Help Your Body Help YOU!

It's sad to say, but most likely you are dehydrated at this very instant.  

You may not think that that's a big deal, but you are very, very wrong!!!

HERE'S A TEST!!! 

As you learned in the 3rd grade, the earth is made up of 71% water.  It's the same for you....or at least it should be.  Some of us(including myself) do a shitty job of staying hydrated.  As a consequence, we are severely punishing our body and making it work overtime.  This is especially true when we require so much from our bodies and it's systems.

  Just think about it this way...If you were to go out and buy a brand new Ferrari, bring it home, drain all the oil out of it, then fire it up and FLOOR it - do you think it would run well and/or last very long?  

Hell No!!!

(If you did, I would hunt you down.)

 

You know better than that, right?!  

That idiotic move would result in a completely broken down, busted up, useless vehicle.

So why is it that we allow ourselves to do essentially the very same thing to our most valuable vehicle: 

OUR BODY?

It doesn't make any damn sense!!!

Here's the deal, people!  

I have committed myself to drinking, as a bare minimum, half my body weight in ounces each and every day!  Do you know why?  I'll tell you. 

I want to be a STRONG MOTHERF*CKER!!!  

If I restrict the amount of fluids I have, my body is forced to pull it from somewhere and/or take over and take control of my dumb ass, shutting me down whenever I try to run this "hot rod". 

You see, our body is a fantastic thing!  They do certain things to prevent us from redlining or "blowing the engine".  For example, if you take naps every single day, consider that your body is taking control and shutting you down so that IT can go to work to repair all the stupid shit you just did to it.  Whether that's eating 4 Big Mac's or if you simply haven't had enough water.

So here's my challenge to you:

HELP YOUR BODY HELP YOU!!!!  

Stop being an idiot and drink water; 71% of YOU is H2O...

Here are some great resources to get you started!!!

WATER! - Crystal Nelson

Dehydration Check - Kelly Starrett

A New Blog Project: "365 Days of Strength"

I am STOKED to announce that on Oct. 1st, I will be kicking off my new blog project,

"365 Days of Strength"

The purpose of this project is to provide you all with a unique perspective into all things STRENGTH!  

I want to take you inside the strength training realm, provide you with training tips, info-packed interviews with the area's/country's top strength coaches, and hard hitting SWODs(Strength Workout Of the Day) that you can take on to build that physical AND mental STRENGTH!!!! 

Here's the deal....I love this shit!!!  I am passionate about all modes of strength training.  Period.  This blog project will be a bare bones, stripped down work in progress for sure, but if you are serious about getting strong, and you're ready to take your strength game to the next level....all you gotta do is tune in daily.  Simple.

It's gonna be one hell of a year!  

Are you ready?

Mobility = Strength

Recently, the folks for Trigger Point Performance Therapy came by during one of our coaches' STRICTLY STRENGTH SWOD sessions and showed us their new techniques for quickly attacking "sticky" tissue to optimize performance output!  It was an eye-opening experience for sure!  Here's one of the videos...



Often times, people(specifcally CrossFitters) forget just how important staying mobile is.  CrossFit, as we all know, is comprised of all sorts of crazy, technical movements that cannot be performed at the highest potential if there are ROM(Range Of Motion) restrictions.  The great mojority of us have some limitation in some movement that inhibits our performance in that skill, right?  But, what do we do about it?  Nothing!  We simply expect that by doing the movement over and over and over again it will magically turn to perfect movement.  Not the case!  Your ability to perform that skill may improve slightly, but usually that's because you've(your body) has found some way to cover up the weakness and tightness that causes the issue in the first place.

No.  The answer is NOT do more to get better - this only goes so far.  The answer is to dissect the movement, find the root-cause, and attack it with tissue work and mobility.  Then, once the tissue is healthy and supple again, you can start to train that movement with an increased volume.

So, to all of those of you that know you have mobility limitations, I recommend several things:
1. Spend a lot of time on the MobilityWOD blog.  This is hosted my Kelly Starrett(K-Starr), and is jam-packed with awesome information and is always entertaining.
2. Find your local ART(Actice Release Technique) practitioner and schedule some sessions.  I did a BLOG a while ago on our guy, who is simply amazing!  Sam Sneed and his partner Dave Yansey are top-notch, and will have you moving like you've never moved before!
3. Purchase your own personal TriggerPoint kit.  You can take this with you anywhere and it is a great way to keep your tissues healthy without spending a fortune!  Well worth the $$$.