Todays Workout - Sandbag Strength

Max Pull Ups followed immediately by max Heavy Sandbag Floor Press. Rest for 2-4 minutes and repeat for a total of 5 rounds.

Record your max weight and repetitions.

Train hard!

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Todays Workout - 5, 10, 15

5 Pull Ups, 10 Sandbag Push Press, 15 Squats. 10 rounds.

Record your time.

Train hard!

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Todays Workout - 10's

10 Sandbag Power Cleans, 10 Sandbag Back Squats, 10 Sandbag Push Jerks, 10 Box Jumps. 5 rounds.

Record your time.

Train hard!

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Todays Workout - 10 to 1

10 - 1 of Pull Ups, Sandbag High Pulls and Sandbag Round-the-Worlds.

Record your time.

Train hard!

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Todays Workout - Fifteen

15 Sandbag Deadlifts, 15 Sandbag Push Jerks. As many rounds as possible in 15 minutes.

Record your score.

Train hard!

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The Paleo Solution

For those of you with an interest in the Paleo diet (the style of eating that I follow) please take the time to read the Paleo Solution by Robb Wolf. Robb is both a scientist and a certified strength and conditioning specialist.

The Paleo Solution incorporates the latest cutting edge research from genetics, biochemistry and anthropology to help you look, fell and perform your best.

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Personalised Training Programmes

Due to demand I'm currently offering Personalised Sandbag Fitness Training Programmes. Head here for more details

Alternatively you can download the free 68 page Sandbag Fitness Training Manual

Train hard!

Matt

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Todays Workout - Dude where's your sandbag?

3 Pull Ups, 6 Push/Press Ups, 9 Box Jumps. As many rounds as possible in 10 minutes.

Record your score.

Train hard!

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Bobby Zuniga training with the Brute Force Sandbag

We just received this video from Bobby Zuniga, a Personal Trainer based out in Denver, USA. In the video he takes us through a metabolic conditioning workout with the Brute Force Sandbag.

If you're interested in getting yourself a Brute Force Sandbag then check them out here

To learn more about Bobby please take a look at his site

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Sandbag Fitness - Popular Around the World

I've just been checking through the downloads for the free Sandbag Fitness Training Manual and I thought it would be pretty cool to see how far and wide the manual had made it. We've had downloads in the following countries:

USA

UK

Canada

Finland

Australia

Germany

Sweden

Netherlands

Singapore

Ireland

Argentina

Italy

Russia

Norway

Thailand

Hungary

New Zealand

Philippines

South Korea

Greece

UAE

Israel

Algeria

Spain

Brazil

Ukraine

Denmark

Switzerland

Austria

Belgium

Romania

If you've download the manual we'd love to hear from you and put a name to some of those countries. And we'd really, really love it if you'd send us some photos of video of you training with the sandbag. If you haven't yet downloaded the manual - what are you waiting for?!

Matt

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10 Tonnes of Fun - Courtesy of Josh T

Josh T, one of our followers from Australia, seems to delight in recommending some pretty tough workouts for us to do. Here's the most recent one:

Lift a combined total of 30,000 kg using Pull Ups (your weight), Sandbag Back Squats and Sandbag High Pulls. Any weight allowed in the sandbag and you can break up the sets and exercises however you wish. But, you must lift a total of 10,000 kg for each exercise.

Something like this would be good:

5 Pull Ups,
10 50kg Sandbag Back Squats,
10 50kg Sandbag High Pulls.

Repeat for 20 rounds (or so).

Record your time.

Train hard!

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Todays Workout - Minute By Minute

As many repetitions in 1 minute of each of the following exercises: Squats, Sandbag Push Press, Sit Ups, Sandbag High Pulls. No rest between each exercise, rest 1 minute between each round and repeat for a total of 3 rounds.

Record your total reps for each round.

Train hard!

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Sundays :)

Good Morning Bloggies!

Or should I say goodnight? And what a long night it has been! And a great morning! Last night was actually a really great night work wise especially since the night before I only sat down for 20 min. the whole shift and left an hour late. On the other hand last night seemed to just drag by but I managed to get a chapter and a half of macro reading/notes done sooo yay - that means more sleep for me today!

The past couple of days I've been meaning to go workout when I finish my shift because that's what I had been doing in the past but Saturday and Friday morning I was just way to exhausted and I barely made it into bed out of my scrubs. Last night I broke down and ingested some caffeine which is kinda a big deal because I have managed to stay away from it for the last two weeks! I will say though that I do not regret in the least drinking a sugar free red bull. I felt so great this morning when I got off work but I also think that drinking 60 oz. of water might have had something to do with that. I never realized what a huge impact drinking half my weight in water in ounces. Seriously, if you've never done this try it!

Anyways, let's get back on track, after work this morning I went to the gym! I did half an hour on the treadmill at 4 mph (fast I know!) on hill intervals. So basically the treadmill just alternates between different levels of incline every couple of minutes. I like it because I don't have to do anything but not fall off. I can watch Food Network and read while letting the treadmill set the pace for me. After that I did a killer ab circuit and managed to complete it without stopping to rest which I normally never am able to do! I finished off my morning/night with 3 egg whites scrambled with broccoli (it tastes better than it sounds) and some water.

It is such a nice feeling having already done my workout when I wake up. It's like a weight is lifted off my shoulders and I can focus on all the other things I have to do during the day!

Now off to bed before I fall asleep and drool on my computer (I'm ashamed to say that it wouldn't be the first time...) because I have tons of this to do later....

HOMEWORK!

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Mastering Mastery

One of the most common themes I encounter as a coach is an individuals inability to stick at a particular training programme. I call this type of person a "serial switcher". They have tried practically every programme under the sun but never quite seem to get the results that they want. And they typically complain that they get bored easily and need lots of variety. My opinion is that this type of individual is unlikely to achieve what they want until they re-assess their goals and goal setting.

I think that fitness and performance are very simple things - we just need to focus on the elements of fitness that we want to improve on and apply progressive loading to these (make them harder as you get better). This is a principle that applies not only to fitness, but to many other things as well. The problem with fitness and performance is that there is an awful lot of conflicting information out there and this can make it hard to make the correct decisions all of the time. When I think of progression I'm often reminded of a (Greek, I think) tale of a young farmer...

This young farmer had a calf that he picked up every day. At first this was very easy as the calf was so light. But, as the calf grew, the young farmer continued to lift it every day. After a year or so, and with the calf now fully grown, the man was still able to lift it. The gradual increase in size had been small enough to allow the man to get stronger and adapt.

Now this story may or may not be true but it raises some interesting points about progression and the small increments that are sometimes needed to achieve this.

What happens when the increments are too big?

We get injured or we fail. And it is at this point that most people give up.

Life is full of stories about people who have managed to achieve great things with limited means by simply making small incremental changes to a programme, a skill or any other task.

Convict Conditioning - the story of a man who developed a training programme while in prison:

Convict Conditioning: How to Bust Free of All Weakness-Using the Lost Secrets of Supreme Survival Strength

And the Outliers, by Malcolm Gladwell, talks about a magical 10,000 hour rule to achieve mastery in any skill:

Outliers: The Story of Success

Read more

And Sandbag Fitness - the story of a man with a bag of sand is his garage is my own attempt to achieve a great level of strength and conditioning with nothing but a sandbag.

So, my advice to you is work with what you've got and work hard to get the best possible results irrespective of the options that you have available to you. Sometimes too many options are the problem so stick with the basics and aim for mastery.

Train hard!

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Todays Workout - Inspired By Crossfit Bath

Inspired by the guys at Crossfit Bath

10 Sandbag Push Press, 10 Burpees. As many round as possible in 15 minutes.

Record your score.

Train hard!

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Sucezz

Today I had my first successful complete Tone It Up/Eating Clean day! Well, I've had complete eating clean days but today I actually followed the cooler system and ate the right food at the right time, blah blah blah don't pig out or eat crap.

It was such a hectic day because instead of waking up for my usual 6am workout I slept in until almost 8:00am but hey! the body wants the body wants sometimes it's Justin Timberlake sometimes it's sleep and one is definitely more feasible then the other (I'll let you guess which one that is). Due to my late snooze I had to hurry in order to shower, make breakfast plus two snacks for the day, and lunch (I wasn't going to be home till 6:30ish) - I'm proud to say that somehow I managed!

My plan was to hit up the Western gym during my 4 hr break that I had (their gym is noiiiiice!) but much to my disappointment when I got back to my truck after macro I realized that I had forgotten my tennis shoes... I remembered my eyelash curler and a bottle of hair spray but not my shoes, really?!?!? I decided that instead of eating my mid-morning snack that I would just go ahead and get lunch (it was already noon...) at Wasabee, this amazing sushi place in Bellingham. It literally has the best sushi and it is so incredibly cheap. I'm very proud of myself that I didn't order my favorite roll with the tempura shrimp but settled on a Baja and spicy New York roll (nothing fried there just some prawn and crab).

Since I had such a yummy lunch I wasn't starving until the middle of my bio review session... Some major stomach growling going on there I'm pretty sure the people around me thought that I had a rabies infected cat with me. After class I wanted to go to Trader Joe's for some cayenne pepper and black beans (random I know) so in order to avoid going grocery shopping hungry I forked down the salad that I had brought with me in the car on the drive there, lemme tell you that was not smart. Eating the salad - yes, but eating a salad while driving - no. I'm soooo glad that I ate before I went in because I had great self-control in my food choices :) I bought...

• Pistachios
• 2 cans of black beans
• Chicken breakfast sausage
• Zico coconut water
• Peanut butter chocolate chip Lara bar
• Who knew that cayenne pepper is so hard to find!

I've never tried the coconut water so I decided to buy some since it has so many great nutritional qualities (what an awkward way to say that it's good for you...) and it's currently chilling out in the fridge for future consumption. I got the Lara bar and 'stachios so that I could have something in the car for when my inner mountain lion wants to ravage anything it can find, at least this way I'll always have a healthy snack nearby so you don't have to hide your children anymore.

My new and improved snack stock the Chevy manual wasn't cutting it:)

Once I got home I split half the nuts into a plastic bag and stuck it in the car and put the other half in my room to keep them away from the bros (hey! those puppies are pricey!). I'm really hoping the Lara bar won't melt (although I'm sure it will) with all the sun that we've been having (meaning today and yesterday... blurg WA weather). I've never tried this flavor and I generally hate anything with the flavor "peanut butter" even though I love actual peanut butter but we'll see how this works!

Once I got home I battled with whether or not to go to the gym or study for my big exam so I decided to do both!

I was running so fast the words were blurred! NOT

I did a half hour of elliptical on interval training and a .5 hr of intervals on the treadmill. I found that doing intervals and going up and done with speed and incline on both the treadmill and the elliptical is a great workout! I was definitely very, very sweaty and tired once I was done! Andddd I managed to actually get some studying done :)

For dinner I made myself a delicious Southwestern/Greek salad. I wanted a Southwestern-ish salad with spicy chicken and hot sauce but I didn't have any chicken so I settle for spinach (from mi padre's garden), tomato, 1/4 avocado, feta, and 1/4 c. black beans. All I had was homemade garlic herb dressing so I drizzled that over it. It was definitely an odd combo but it worked out!

Melting Pot salad nom nom...

So... Today's breakdown

Meal One:

• 1 egg white puff - delicious and quick!
• Whole wheat toast with about a tsp. of butter
• 2 tomato slices
• Meta-D

Meal 2

• This was *supposed* to be some Chobani but it coincided too close to lunch

Meal 3

• 6 pieces Baja roll
• 6 pieces spicy NY roll

Meal 4

• 1 cup spinach
• 1/4 tomato
• 1/4 avocado
• 1 tbsp. Italian dressing
• 1098403984 near deaths experiences from reckless driving salad eating

Meal 5

• see above (no need to beat a dead horse, right?!) + some stachios (I can't resist the green goodness!!)

So far I've managed to drink about 64 ounces of water (I'm trying to drink half my body weight in ounces) but I have more to go before hitting my mark (yes, sorry to disappoint I do weigh more than 128 lbs.)

Not to toot my own horn or pat myself in the back but toot toot and pat pat because I turned a nutso day into a great one with good choices.

I hope that your Monday/Tuesday was a great one!

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Todays Workout

5 Pull Ups, 5 Knees-to-Elbows, 10 Sandbag Deadlifts, 10 Sandbag Back Squats, 15 Press/Push Ups, 15 Sandbag Round-the-Worlds. 3 rounds.

Record your time.

Train hard!

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Todays Workout - Sandbag Strength Complex

Sandbag Deadlift, Sandbag Overhead Press, Sandbag Back Squat. Load up your bag with as much weight as you can handle and complete as many repetitions on each exercise before moving on to the next exercise. Take 2-3 minutes rest between each complex and repeat for a total of five rounds.

Record your weight and reps.

Train hard!

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Exciting News!

So, so, so sorry for the long absence I know that I've lost a few subscribers since the blog has kind of started going on a tangent this year and my not-so-stellar updating skills! Thanks to those that have stuck with me, ya'll really mean a lot to me :) There's been some craziness in my personal life lately - definitely both blessings and not-so-happy happy events but... on to the exciting news! (I will say that even the exciting news also has it's downside - I ended up spending quite a bit of this $$$... it was worth it!)

SO many good things to list that I guess I should put them into some sort of order...

1. The Eat Clean Diet by Tosca Reno isn't something new and it's actually been on the market quite a while with multiple revised editions and spin-off products. I've often seen this book in bookstores and such but wrote it off as just another "no-fail diet" book that would promise weight loss and lifestyle change but would result in great temporary results but eventually fail you (South Beach Diet [yeah I know hypocrite here], the HGC diet, Atkins, etc.). I've seen it happen so many times to friends and family but then I cam across this little beauty on here. The Biochemista is a blog that I discovered a while back In essence, Lauren suffered from migraines, poor eating habits and an assortment of other troubles. After her friend read the book and got great results from it Lauren decided to try it out and it really improved her life! Migraines - gone! Skin issues - gone! Fitness performance? Improved! Soooo.... after reading this I thought you know what? what do I have to lose (other than some dollar bills)? I didn't want to invest a large amount of money into something that I was still skeptical about. After doing a little bit of research I found the diet book and a recipe book for a total of $20. Great buy!

This book is so great! I've already made quite a few of the delicious recipes and am really loving it!

2. My biology class is covering nutrition right now so not that it's exactly exciting news but I've definitely learned a lot about micro-anatomy in relation to our diet health and cholesterol. I've learned some really great stuff that I can't wait to share with you! I'm definitely gong to have a separate post about this kind of stuff! (maybe a separate tab...)

3. After two years of wanting to buy this and wishing I had it I finally bought the ToneItUp fat burning system!!! This is also a lot like the eating clean book - so it's really more of a lifestyle than a 'diet plan' per se. I know it seems weird to have the ToneItUp plan and the eating clean books but when I bought the eating clean books I didn't think that I actually was going to buy the Tone It Up plan but I'm definitely planning on keeping them! The plan was really expensive but I don't feel bad about spending the money because I really support Karena and Katrina's business so I'm glad I did!

Reading it on my Nook... thanks Ty :)

So your probably thinking that all that sounds great... in theory. Since I don't have a good track record with actually sticking to stuff I'm excited to say that I've drastically changed my lifestyle with all of my new found information about nutrition and health. For the last two weeks I've been eating clean and following the ToneItUp rules of what to eat when and it really has made a difference. I've had so much more energy and I rarely get headaches anymore! Yesterday I didn't eat clean and I really felt the effects on my body. My mom made dinner for my brothers and instead of making my own I just had some of theirs and boy I felt so sluggish and just blah. So I can really say that eating clean makes a difference!

Challenges.... like with anything this has its challenges the hardest really is getting the meal plans of the ToneItUp system to match up with my schedule. Since I switch from having a normal schedule to a nocturnal one every four days at night I don't really know when's dinner or if I eat breakfast when I come home... My goal this weekend is to figure out some sort of schedule.

Expect more posts and know that you mean tons to me!

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