Two Day Magazine

I’m writing this post from Nida, Lithuania.

I was called here to work with some professional basketball players.  This made me think: How can the 9-5er train like an athlete and see similar results?  So here are a few ideas you can take with you to your workouts before or after your daily work schedule.  

Plan - The weekend warrior will go to the gym and many times do the exact same workout day after day.  If you’re lucky, you may have 2 or 3 workouts that you keep cycling through.  Coaches plan their athletes’ workouts so there are different cycles which causes a progression to take place.  

Gain Strength - Athletes need to get stronger…and so do you.  Push heavier weights so that change takes place.  Your body will adapt to whatever demand you place on it. It’s called the SAID principle: Specific Adaptation to Imposed Demand.  Strength has been shown to be one of the keys to living a long, healthy life.  Strength doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll be big. In fact, many times that’s not the case.  Lift heavy weights (you too, ladies) and get stronger.

Sprint - Jogging will make you slower and fatter in the long run (No pun intended!).  It’s that simple.  How many sports do the athletes run at a slow pace? Except for cross, which I disagree with, none.  And those Olympic X-Country runners have a higher percentage of body fat (8-12%) as opposed to the sprinters, which have 2-5%).  Watch for this in the upcoming Olympics if you don’t know what I’m talking about.  Sprinters are healthier in virtually every way, including cardiovascularly.  So do short sprint intervals (whatever your mode of cardio is – running, biking etc) than long, slow distance.  You’ll be healthier and look better, as well.

Perform Soft Tissue Work Daily – High level athletes have been trained to take care of their bodies.  The modern human being gets tight in many places even if you don’t work out.  Working out can only advance that problem.  So every day you need to either stretch, do SMR (self-myofascial release) or get a massage.  Some sort of soft tissue work will be needed to keep your body in peak, functional working order.  SMR, typically with a foam roller, is a very effective tool seeing as the price of daily or even weekly massages can add up fast.  Most of the time I’ll have my clients roll on a plastic pipe, like plumbing pipes found at a hardware store, or even a medicine ball.  This will be a more effective tool at working out the kinks versus a much softer foam roller

Have A Goal - This might seem like an obvious statement but what is your current training goal? I was told a long time ago, “If you aim at nothing, you will hit it.”  What I recommend you do is each month have a different goal.  So, by the end of July maybe your goal could be simply to get to the gym 4x/week.  By the end of August, your goal could be to increase the weight of your dead lift by 20% (See next week’s post for some tips on this!).  And September’s goal could be to perform 5 chin-ups.  Those are just some examples.  The key is to set the goal, then map out how to get there by the end of the month.  Be efficient in your workouts and see results!

**********************************

twoday magazine wants to know: What sport are you looking forward to watching in this year’s summer Olympics? Share with us on our Facebook page.

Check out Phil Gephart's website which is full of great workout tips HERE

About Phil Gephart: 

Phil Gephart is a certified personal trainer with a Master's Degree (MS) in Exercise Science with a focus in Coaching & Athletic Administration, received in 2009 from Concordia University in beautiful Irvine, California. Phil’s passion for fitness is reflected in his involvement in sports throughout his life—in high school, he played basketball, baseball and soccer, in college he continued playing basketball and soccer. Phil also played basketball professionally for five years.