In collaboration with Cressey Performance Coach Greg Robins, here are this week's tips to get your nutrition and strength and conditioning programs on track.

1.  Avoid quad dominance on trap bar deadlift technique.

2. Eat more pumpkin!

Fall is here! For those of you who don't know, I love fall. The air smells better, the leaves put on their party pants, football arrives, sweats and hoodies become fashionably acceptable (by my standards), and, of course, pumpkin flavored everything becomes available! While pumpkin tastes great, it's actually quite good for you, too! For starters, pumpkin seeds are a great source of essential fatty acids. That's probably not breaking news to you, but you know what is? Pumpkin oil actually exists! It is delicious as a dressing, and an easy addition to shakes and smoothies. Just make sure not to cook with it, as the heat will destroy the important fatty acids.

You may have noticed that pumpkins are orange - very orange, actually. That means they, too, provide the health benefits found in other vividly orange fruits and vegetables. These include high amounts of carotenoids and vitamin C. Carotenoids help fight free radicals in the body, cardiovascular diseases and infection. Just like carrots, the high lutein & zeaxanthin content protects the eyes, and prevents formation of cataracts. You will also be happy to know that pumpkin is low calorie and serves up a tremendous amount of quality fiber. Do you like pumpkin too? If so, please do me a favor and let's get some recipes posted up in the comments section!

3. Be careful about looking to professional athletes for nutrition advice.

In a recent study conducted at the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity at Yale University, researchers investigated the use of sports references in the marketing of food and beverage products at supermarkets. Every product fettered in two major supermarkets with a sports reference was purchased and evaluated for its nutritional merit, via the Nutrient Profile Model. Researchers found that"72.5% featured a character exercising, 42.2% were endorsed by a professional sports entity, and 34.0 % were child-targeted." The median nutrition score, out of a possible 100 (being the healthiest), was 36! Additionally, more than two thirds of the beverages purchased were 100% sugar sweetened. Needless to say, the message being delivered to kids is not great. Therefore, it's important for the rest of us to serve as better examples for these kids. After all, many young athletes will not play sports professionally, but the lessons they learn in the gym and on the field can serve them for life.

As an example, just last week I was in the office with Chris Howard not even an hour after I had told one of our college prospects about my usual shake ingredients, when he received a text message: "Where can I buy chia seeds and coconut oil?" Furthermore, not a week goes by that I'm not greeted with the oh-so-pleasant sound of: "I made that shake, it was great!" or "I tried kale last night, it was actually pretty good!" Little tips and cues can go a long way when they come from the right person.

4. Shut everything off to really relax.

I (Eric) am a complete workaholic; that probably isn't a surprise to anyone who has followed me for an extended period of time.  One thing I've learned over the years is that I can't just shut my brain off for a few hours by going out to dinner or catching a movie; it's really always going.  That's a blessing and a burden.  On the positive side, it helps me to come up with a neverending content stream for this blog, but on the not-so-positive side, I can get easily distracted when I should be spending quality time with family and friends.

With that in mind, I've discovered that I need to really get away if I'm going to relax.  The only time my brain really turns off is when I don't have my laptop with me, and my cell phone is either turned off or in a dead zone.  I've discovered this on two trips up north to Maine this summer.  The end of the day rolled around, and I realized I'd managed to turn my brain off with respect to work for the entire day - and that's a big deal for me. With a view like this, my morning reading wasn't too stressful!

So, if you're a workaholic like I am, make sure that when you plan time off, it means technology off, too.

5. Taste the fish before you try to learn how to fish.

I'm sure many of you have heard the Chinese proverb, "Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime."

In the context of strength and conditioning programs, this means that many folks would benefit from learning to write their own programs.  However, it's easy to get overwhelmed with this task if you haven't already done a lot of strength and conditioning programs to get a feel for how a session should flow, what exercises should be included, how you respond to fluctuating training stress, and a host of other factors.  So, it's not a bad idea to taste the fish (try some programs) before you run out to buy a fishing pole and bait, then spend all day knee-deep in water (attempting to write your own program).

When you are ready to try to write something up for yourself, check out this webinar.

For more information, check out Show and Go: High Performance Training to Look, Feel, and Move Better. 

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For many minor league professional baseball players, the 2012 season wraps up this week. And, while the big leaguers won't be back for another month, this week still marks the beginning of off-season training at Cressey Performance. To celebrate the start of my favorite time of year, I thought I'd put my "flagship" product on sale. From now through Sunday, September 9 at midnight, you can get $50 off Show and Go: High Performance Training to Look, Feel, and Move Better.

Don't miss out on this rare opportunity to get a comprehensive, versatile resource at a huge discount. Check it out now:

Show and Go: High Performance Training to Look, Feel, and Move Better

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Here's this week's list of random tips to make you more awesome, in collaboration with Cressey Performance coach Greg Robins.

1. Optimize your strength training program's warm-up sets.

Too often, I see people make the mistake of moving a ton of weight before they reach their top sets for that day. Many strength training programs are based on hitting a certain “top set” or sets in a given lift for that day. While this number may be a good distance from the first weight a person touches that day, it is important that you work to this set in a fashion that has you prepared to attack the weight, but not exhausted to a point that you cannot give that weight a true effort.

I often get asked how should one work up to these top sets. The answer is really dependent on the person asking; over time, a person will learn what works best for them. Here are a few things you should keep in mind:

• “Treat the light weights heavy and the heavy weights light.” Move everything fast, be methodical in your approach, take advantage of every set as repetitions in good form. By doing so, you will set up for successful top sets, prime your CNS to deliver more powerful, coordinated efforts, and be more confident under heavy loads.
• Keep your weight jumps consistent. How many pounds each jump should be will depend on how dictate how many warm-up sets you’ll take on the way from A to B. Just make sure to keep the jumps consistent, 10, 20, 30lbs, etc.
• Just because the top sets call for multiple reps doesn’t mean the sets leading up to them need to be the same. I often take singles and doubles at the heavy weights that land near my top sets, and recommend you do the same. I advocate any additional volume (work done) you need to add be done via drop down sets, or via supplemental lifts.

Here are two examples of how to work up to the top sets in a program:

Deadlift 3 x 3 (Assuming my top sets will be between 475 and 505lbs)
135 x 3, 225 x 3, 315 x 1, 405 x 1, 455 x 1, 475 x 3, 495 x 3, 505 x 3

A1. Squat 3 x 5 (Assuming my top sets will be between 365 and 405lbs)
135 x 5, 185 x 3, 225 x 2, 275 x 1, 315 x 1, 365 x 5, 385 x 5, 405 x 5

You'll notice that the sets that "count" toward my working total follow the 90% rule that Eric outlined HERE.

2. Understand How to Modify Total Work as a Fat Loss Diet Progresses

You will be more successful with your fat loss dieting when you understand a simple concept: the harder you train, the hungrier you get.

The most important thing in losing fat is, has been, and will continue to be your nutrition. Your strength training program should be the priority in training when dieting. You want to maintain as much lean mass as possible, and what made the muscle (resistance training) is what’s going to keep it on you. However, you can’t just continue to strength train, add more conditioning, and eat less. It just doesn’t add up. Either you’re going to fail on the diet or get super weak. Neither of those sounds good to me.

So what’s the solution? Lower the volume as you lower the calories. Whether that comes in the way of shorter strength training workouts (focus on the top sets of big lifts and keep the accessory work limited), or you do less conditioning, you have to do less somewhere.

People are really into metabolic resistance training protocols nowadays, but in reality, all training is metabolic; your diet needs to come first, and these programs are just basic better management of total work done. Base your training around your diet, and as you eat less, do less. Pretty simple.

3. Make Kale Taste Better.

Kale by itself does not taste good. Fortunately, I have a simple recipe to make a delicious dressing to spice it up. I must admit that I am not the originator of this, so thank you to the person who showed me the recipe!

In a bowl, mix the following to “dress” four cups of uncooked kale:

• 3 TBSP Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• 3 TBSP Balsamic Vinegar
• 3 TBSP Dijon Mustard
• 1 TBSP Pepper
• 2 TBSP Crushed Red Pepper Flakes

Enjoy!

4. Make all Reps Quality Ones When You’re a Beginner.

When teaching a new athlete or client an exercise, trainers and coaches must understand the importance of using lighter loads. From a safety and development standpoint, it just makes sense. Moreover, a novice lifter can make gains from loads far below their estimated one-rep maximum.

In order to achieve technical proficiency with the exercise, make sure that you are also keeping the rep ranges low - even when the weights are light. While the person in question may very well be able to move the given load for 12 reps (as an example), you are better off splitting that into 3 sets of 4 reps. Even if that means they are doing 12 sets of 4 instead of 4 sets of 12 overall. Keep the rest a bit shorter, get quality reps, and don’t set them up to fail.

5. Make Sure Your Arm Care Program Includes Upward Rotation Training (from Eric)

I speak a lot to our staff about the importance of training scapular upward rotation to prevent and correct upper extremity problems (especially shoulders) in our clients, and one of my most prominent points is to consider not just "front to back" shoulder balance, but also "top to bottom."  This point was verified yet again by research from the Musculoskeletal Research Center at LaTrobe University in Australia.  Investigators found that "The major difference between groups was that the shoulder pain group displayed a significant downward rotation of the scapula in almost all shoulder positions. There were no differences between the two groups for training factors, range of motion, or in clinical test results."

Below are a few exercises we regularly include in our warm-ups to address these issues.  Forearm wall slides at 135 degrees stops short of full upward rotation and gives us a chance to train the lower trapezius in its line of pull.

Wall slides with overhead shrug and lift-off gets us to near full upward rotation of the scapula and recruits the upper trapezius more.  Remember, while upper trapezius recruitment has gotten a bad rap, the upper traps are actually tremendously important, as they elevate the scapula and directly oppose the depressive pull of the latissimus dorsi, which is heavily overrecruited in most folks.  As a heads-up, I generally teach this with the hands a bit closer together throughout the movement.

The upper and lower traps work with serratus anterior to get the scapula upwardly rotated (serratus recruitment is already optimized because we are slightly protracted and above 90 degrees of humeral elevation).

Summarily, remember the importance of scapular upward rotation when you see arm care programs where all the exercises are done with the arms at the sides.  Assuming folks can get there pain-free, get the arms up and start training upward rotation functionally.

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Tyler Beede Draft Reaction - This was a fun night not just because of the obvious excitement of having 120 people at your house (yes, this is my living room), but because it was awesome just to appreciate just how far Tyler had coming as a person and an athlete since he started training with us back in 2008.

Reverse Crunch Technique - This two-minute video on coaching the reverse crunch was part of a popular blog, Down on Lumbar Flexion in Strength Training Programs? Enter the Reverse Crunch.

How to Create a Real Strength and Conditioning Program - This is one of the webinars I created around the re-launch of Show and Go back in October.

How to Create an Imbalanced Strength and Conditioning Program that Works - I released this webinar just a few weeks after the first one, as I was feeling the "webinar mojo" and this had been a topic I'd want to cover for quite some time.

Those were my top five videos of the year, but there were definitely plenty more you may have missed.  Luckily, you can check them out on my YouTube Channel.

I'll be back tomorrow with one last "Best of 2011" feature.

Show and Go was released last September - just prior to us getting a new puppy, Tank, who is now the official facility mascot of Cressey Performance (he even has a Twitter account).

He weighed in at a scrawny 5.6 pounds when we got him, but we put him to work right away using the principles of Show and Go.  Here he is learning how to foam roll with one of our pro guys in his first week at Cressey Performance.

He was great about getting proper rest between workouts:

And making sure that he was fully hydrated:

The end result?  He's tipping the scales at a lean, mean 31 pounds now - with some outstanding mobility.

Anyone else find it very interesting that Tank's weight has increased six-fold in the time that he's been around the Show and Go program - even without doing it?  This program works even by simple association!

Get it now!

The only thing we can do is draw on personal experience and the lessons that it's provided to us.

A 30-pound increase in a bench press with no change in body weight in under eight weeks is a serious accomplishment - but doing it at the age of 47 makes you a freakin' rockstar in my book.

What can you learn from Dr. P's success?  A lot!  Here are the primary things that come to mind for me when I think about why he finally hit his goal:

1. He made time instead of finding time - We know that Dr. P is going to be at Cressey Performance at 12pm on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday.  He blocks it off in his schedule at work months in advance.  For a guy who has a wife and two kids, a thriving business, it would be very easy to just find time to get to the gym.  It was important to him, so he made time for it.

2. He recognized that there was always something he could do to get better - From hands-on treatment of patients, strength training, and yard work, Dr. P has somewhat of a chronic golfer's elbow condition that we've worked around on and off during his training at CP.  Many folks would simply skip the gym entirely until something like that resolved - and with a chronic condition like this, it could be months or even years to get symptomatic relief (if you do at all).  Instead, Dr. P and I collaborated on strength training programs and specific strength exercises that would allow him to maintain a training effect without exacerbating his symptoms.  There was no pity party.

3. He didn't try to ride multiple horses with one saddle - Here's a shocker: when it came time to make a run at this bench press goal, we wrote up a bench press specialization program geared toward not only increased upper body volume, but a specific attention to his weaknesses. It constantly amazes me how people will state their specific goal, but not change their training program to focus on it.  Specific results come from specific actions, not doing everything under the sun and keeping your fingers crossed.

4. He found what worked best for him - A big mistake I see in up-and-coming lifters is that they try to conform strictly to one training or learning system.  As you can tell from the video editing above, Dr. P's very technologically inclined - and he used that to his advantage by using video with his iPhone during training to tinker with his strength training technique.  Others might not like video, but they may prefer a specific hand-off person on the bench, a certain kind of music, a specific warm-up protocol, or particular strength exercises to bring up weaknesses.  One man's trash is another man's treasure, so you have to put in the time to find the strategies that help you the most.

5. He got in a great environment - During the winter, Dr. P's training time coincides with our professional baseball guys, and at this time of year, he's surrounded by a lot stud college athletes.  There's no choice but to push yourself when you're surrounded by guys who won't let each other slack.

6. He told others about his goals - Our entire staff and many of our regular clients knew about Dr. P's 315 bench press goal.  There's something to be said for making yourself accountable to a goal by telling those around you about it.  You increase the likelihood that they'll bring it up, constantly refocusing you on the task at hand - and you also have a built-in support network that will encourage you every step of the way.  A 30-pound bench press increase seems less daunting when you've got 30 people pulling for you. Plus, the immediately post-lift celebration (which unfortunately wasn't caught on camera) becomes all the more epic.

These are just a few examples specific to Dr. P's case, but there are surely many more success secrets my readers have used to accomplish lifelong goals.  Please share some more ideas in the comments section!

Congratulations, Dr. P!

Need some structure n your strength training program to help you closer to your goals? Check out Show and Go High Performance Training to Look, Feel, and Move Better.