Many people set fitness resolutions every New Year’s; unfortunately few will reach their goals. One of the main problems is that they view fitness as a 1 hour, 1 week or 90 day sprint. Fitness is a life long pursuit and should be approached accordingly. Laying the solid foundation of strength will help you achieve every fitness goal and is worth a dedicated portion of your training year. Is your goal – better body composition? Stronger people = more lean body mass. Is your goal to increase your speed or power? Increase strength = increased force output = increased power/speed? Is your goal injury prevention for sports? Stronger muscles and connective tissues will reduce aches, pains and injuries.

   With that philosophy in mind, we would like to introduce our Linear Strength Program. Based off of strength expert’s Mark Rippetoe’s Starting Strength program, we tailored in to our athletes/clients.  It is perfect for any strength training beginner of any age. Are you a young athlete looking to improve at your sport? Are you a cardio-only client that isn’t seeing the results you want? Do you just use the weight machines? Do you base your workouts solely around the bench press?  Have you done 3 sets of 8 to 12 reps for as long as you can remember? Our Linear Strength Program is perfect for you.

   The program is based off of 6 core movements that will lay a foundation for   more advanced training in the future. The squat, deadlift, power clean will target your lower body and torso. The press, bench press, and supine ring row will target your upper body and torso too. The program is separated into two workouts – A and B. Every time you lift, you will alternate between workout A and workout B with at least one day in between the workouts. For example, you would perform workout A on Tuesday and workout B on Thursday then repeat A on Saturday. The following week you would start with B on Tuesday.

   Here is the trick. The first time you do a workout, you will start with extremely light weights; for most of you that means either 45# (the bar) or 30kg for the deadlift. Then every time you repeat a workout you will add 5lbs to the Press, Bench Press and Clean; and 10lbs to the squat and deadlift. Note: ring rows will be treated a little differently. You will stay at the same weight for all of the work sets of that specific exercise with rest being subjective to how strong you are feeling that day. You will continue the pattern of adding 5 or 10lbs each workout until you can no longer add weight without sacrificing form. Once you have reached this point, you have graduated from the linear strength program, which is a highly impressive achievement that most people will never match and your results will be astonishing.

Some notes before you get started –

• Don’t confuse strength and mass. Strength is the ability to produce force. Mass is size. Women won’t turn into the incredible hulk on this program. They will get stronger, fitter and firmer.
• Males – especially young males – have a hard time categorizing themselves as ‘beginners’ – but the stronger your athletic foundation the higher your potential. Take the time to build the strength and the dividends will far outweigh the blow to your ego.

How to get started? Talk to one of the trainers. Learn the lifts. Do the workouts. Be fitter.

Shawn