Conditioning Research

Here is an interesting study - particularly in the light of the stuff I posted from Doug the other day: The abstract is here Here is the report : "If you want to bring about physiological change to help the development and endurance of back muscles, you must focus your training on those specific muscles and not other muscular groups such as hip extensors," says Christian Larivière, a professor at the Institut de recherche Robert-Sauvé en santé et en sécurité du travail (IRSST), who conducted the study with Université de Montréal researchers Bertrand Arsenault, Rubens A. Da Silva, Sylvie Nadeau, André Plamondon et Roger Vadeboncoeur. The investigation requested that subjects aged 18 to 65 – some healthy and others with low back pain – complete various exercises. Electromyography (EMG) sensors were used to measure the level of activity and fatigue in various muscles during the routine. "Thanks to this technique, we can target tired muscles which aren't yet showing a ...

I thought this was an interesting study Dr. Lee S. Berk, a preventive care specialist and psychoneuroimmunology researcher at Loma Linda University's Schools of Allied Health (SAHP) and Medicine, and director of the molecular research lab at SAHP, Loma Linda, CA, and Dr. Stanley Tan have picked up where Cousins left off. Since the 1980s, they have been studying the human body's response to mirthful laughter and have found that laughter helps optimize many of the functions of various body systems. Berk and his colleagues were the first to establish that laughter helps optimize the hormones in the endocrine system, including decreasing the levels of cortisol and epinephrine, which lead to stress reduction. They have also shown that laughter has a positive effect on modulating components of the immune system, including increased production of antibodies and activation of the body's protective cells, including T-cells and especially Natural Killer cells' killing activity of...

Stan points out some implications from a recent study . Conclusion: These findings suggest that dietary intake of menaquinones, which is highly determined by the consumption of cheese, is associated with a reduced risk of incident and fatal cancer.

A couple of videos from Dr Doug McGuff, on how to train the lower back: First the physiology: then the exercises: hat tip

Work is very busy so I'm not going to be posting much for the next couple of weeks. If I spot anything interesting I'll update the " What I'm reading " window to the right - >

I've been thinking about deadlift form and wanted to note down a few things. There are some good points here , especially Mistake No 10 - Starting with the Hips Too LOW : This is the king of all mistakes I see. Too many times lifters try to squat the weight up rather than pull the weight. Think back to the number of times you've seen a big deadlift and thought to yourself how much more the lifter could've pulled if he didn't damn near stiff-leg it. I see it all the time. Someone will say, "Did you see his deadlift?" Then the other guy will comment, "Yeah, and he stiff-legged the thing." Am I telling you to stiff leg all your deadlifts? No, not at all. All I want you to do is look at your hip position at the start of the lift when you pull and watch how much your hips move up before the weight begins to break the floor. This is wasted movement and does nothing except wear you out before the pull. The closer you can keep your hips to the bar when you ...

Rif pointed this out . Look at this guy's lower back musculature. Absolutely amazing.