RichRuff Training Exercise of the Week: Swiss Ball Plank w/Feet Elevated

The Swiss Ball Plank w/Feet Elevated is just a more advanced version of your standard prone plank. Once, you're able to hold the prone plank for 60 seconds with good form it might be time to move onto more advanced versions.

With the Swiss Ball Plank start of by holding for about 30 seconds and progressively add 10-15 seconds on each week. Take a look:








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Random Thoughts....

• I hate the Jets. I hate them even more this year with Brett Favre at the helm.
• Why do I see people performing squats on a BOSU Ball when they can not even execute a squat proprely on stable ground? Seems backwards to me.
• I think people still believe they can out exercise a crappy diet. If your stuffing your face with cakes and white breads, all the exercise in the world isn't going to help you with weight or fat loss. Sorry, it's the truth.
• No one cares, but I knocked out 16 pull ups for the for a new personal record. This is something you should be trying to do every time you workout. Not 16 pull ups, but setting a new PR. It can be one more rep at a given weight. Or it can be an additional 5lbs from the last workout. Or it can be completing your sprints with faster times. Go set a PR!!
• Why in the world would you join a gym just to do aerobic work? But I see the same people on the same pieces of cardio equipment all the time and that's all they do. Seems like a waste to me.
  
• Dumbbell concentrations curls might be the worst exercise I've ever done or I see being done. One, you're in a seated position. Two, you're hunched over in a seated position. How is this any different than sitting slouched over at the computer? If you really want to work the biceps and get some bang for your buck, go work on some chin or pull ups.
• Did I mention I hate the Jets?
  

I'm Sorry

Last week I posted "My Top 5 Reasons Why the Patriots Will Reclaim the Lombardi Trophy". Less than 48 hours later every Pats fan throughout new England incurs their greatest fear as our Hall of Fame quarterback's ACL is torn. Talk about a jinx. How many more punishing blows can we take as Patriots fans? We suffer one of the most agonizing losses in Boston sports history and then seven minutes into the first game of the next season our franchise quarterback is writhing in pain on the Gillette Stadium turf.

But unlike Jets fans or Steeler fans or Colt fans, I think this team is going to be okay. They have too much talent and too good of a coach to just totally fall apart. That and they may have the softest schedule in the league. Is Matt Cassell as good as Tom Brady? Hell no!! But take a look at the Tom Brady of 2001 when the Pats won their first Super Bowl. He wasn't the Tom Brady of 2007. During that 2001 season he mangaed games well. He passed for about 200 yards a game, threw 18 TD passes, threw 12 picks and had a QB rating of 86. Not great numbers, average numbers. And he was on a team that had far less talent than this 2007 team. Give me those numbers, even less than numbers, and I bet this team wins 11 or 12 games.

I'm already hyped up for Sundays game against those loser Jets and their overrated, aged quarterback. I think it's going to be a special season again, circa 2001.

RichRuff Training Exercise of the Week: Barbell Step Up

My Top Five....

.....reasons why the Patriots will reclaim the Lombardi Trophy:

1. They have the best coach in the league, Belichek.
2. They have the best WR in the league, Randy Moss.
3. They have the the best #2 WR in the league, Wes Welker
   
4. They have the best defensive rookie in the league, Jerrod Mayo.
5. They have the best QB in the league, Mr. You Know Who.

I could make this an extended list, but I'll leave it at that.

Beware of the Salad

I know you think you're making the right choice when you're looking at the dinner menu at what ever restaurant you're at and you decide to go with a salad. You think you're making a healthy choice. You think that salad has to be so much better for you than those other carb laden sandwiches or entrees. Heck, it has to be better than those delicious, thin crust pizza's that are screaming your name, right? Well don't be to sure of that.

Some salads at some restaurants may be more gut busting and artery clogging than anything else on the menu. How big is the salad? Can it feed a family of five? If you've ordered one from the Cheesecake Factory you know what I mean. What type of dressing is on the salad and how much? Hopefully your salad is not drowned in some type of creamy ranch or Caesar dressing. If the salad includes chicken, how is the chicken cooked? Hopefully grilled and not fried. What else is on the salad? Is it littered with croutons the size of your fist? Or even worse, it might be covered in fried onion ring strips.

Sometimes you might actually be better off with that small pizza.

RichRuff Training Exercise of the Week: Hand Walking/Push Up Combo

Why not walk on your hands now and then? It can build great upper body strength and endurance, core strength and and endurance and is a great way to train scapular stabilization. This is an exercise I'll use with a client in their plank progression. Once they've shown the ability to maintain core stability in a neutral position, now let's they if they're able to maintain that same stability while moving. Take a look: