The title of this post is a little misleading. BUT it’s not the “ridiculously strong part” it’s actually the chin up and push up part. You see these principals I am going to share with you can be done with any exercise
- You want a stronger bench press?
- You want a bigger squat?
- You want to be able to perform single leg pistols?
Whatever your exercise poison these principles will make a huge difference
You have been doing it wrong
We are all lead to believe that in order to be stronger you have to do more. Exercise quotes like “the pain you feel today is the strength you will feel tomorrow “ and “the moment when you want to quit is the moment you need to keep pushing” don’t help.
Being strong isn’t about doing more. It’s about doing less better. Strength is a skill and it is built by tensing muscles harder NOT by exhausting them.
For most people the biggest hurdle for strength is letting go of the need to feel tired, fatigued and exhausted after a workout. I cannot stress enough – more is not better, better is better.
💪 Principal of strength 1 – create tension
In order to create tension you need to squeeze the pants out of every muscle in your body.
Let’s take the push up. A chest and triceps exercise ? Nope!! Every muscle in your body needs to be firing.
👉Your abs need to be braced
👉Your glutes need to be cracking walnuts
👉Your shoulders and palms are corkscrewing the ground
👉Your quads are zipped up
👉Your lats are drawing your shoulders hard down into their sockets
👉Your toes are wedged into the ground
👉Your chin is tucked
By squeezing and firing all these muscles they act as cheer leaders to the “actual” working muscles. Come on buddy you can do it!!
💪Principal of strength 2 – grease the groove
Grease the groove or GTG is just that. Essentially you are going to perform multiple sets of sub maximal reps throughout the day.
Every rep is performed perfectly with full body tension and never to fatigue. It should almost feel too easy.
This time we will take the pull up. Instead of blasting yourself, try to squeeze out every last inch of a rep you are going to perform just a small handful of times. Let’s say you could do 10 reps max of a pull up, you would do sets of 3 – 4 reps
My personal favourite way of doing this is to set up a pull up bar over the door frame. Every time you leave the room perform a set of 3 perfect pull ups.
In a day your goal is to shoot for between 15-30 beautiful reps.
Rest at least 5 minutes between sets but be good with resting 30 mins to 1 hour.
Principal of strength 3 – Power breathing
Power breathing is a form of breathing that creates huge amounts of intra-abdominal pressure. Think of it as creating a solid foundation or stable base to move from.
Sniff hard in through your nose. Doing this will compress your diaphragm down and push your belly out. At this point the air you have inhaled is your “lifting belt” it is what protects your spine and creates tension.
To breathe out, put your tongue 👅 on the roof of your mouth and “hiss” through your teeth.
This principal has been used by martial arts for centuries as a form of generating maximal strength. The key 🔑 is compression !!
To apply this breathing drill successfully timing is almost as important as the compression. A split second before the eccentric phase of the movement sniff in hard through the nose. Hold your breathe during the eccentric phase and as you move into the concentric phase breathe out by “hissing” through your teeth.
In the words of Charles Poliquin “you can’t fire a cannon from a canoe”
Wrapping it up for strength
>Never go to failure – more is not better. Better is better
>Practise the art of tension
>Grease the groove
>Breathe for strength
6 Week program and beyond
In the words of Arthur Ashe “start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can”
Let’s say your current level is no chin ups and maybe a few push ups
Chin up program
Weeks 1-2 Banded chin up
If you can perform 10 then do 5
Do this everyday for sets of 5-10 sets
Rest at least 5 mins but 30-60 min is better
Weeks 2-4 Negative phase chin up (no band)
Perform 3 reps with the focus on slow (not too slow that it induces fatigue)
Do this every day for 5-10 sets
Rest at least 5 mins but 30 to 60 min is better
Weeks 4-5 Jumping chin up
Perform 3 reps with a little jump of some help
Do this everyday for 5-10 sets
Rest at least 5 mins but 30-60 is better
Weeks 5-6 Chin up
Perform 1 rep, make it perfect 👌
Do this everyday for 10 sets
Rest at least 5 mins but 30-60 is better
Week 6-7 Take a week off
Do nothing
Week 7 + (3 efforts a week)
Session one Test day – this is where you get to go all out balls to the wall for one set and see how many you can do.
Session two 1,2,1,1,1,1,1,1
Session three 1,2,2,1,1,1,1,1
Session four 1,2,2,2,1,1,1
You get the idea 💡
If you’re serious about getting strong
Being strong is bad ass. There is nothing like the confidence you will get from the feeling of strong and I would encourage everyone to get involved in some strength training.
If you are used to always red lining your workouts you probably struggle to get your head around strength training. You’re not going to walk away tired, sweating or feeling spent. BUT like I said in the beginning more is not better, better is better.
I highly recommended you get yourself a door chin up bar so you can make it so easy to do a set of chin ups. Personally I use my pergola. Whatever you choose set yourself up to win.
If you still want to keep your “normal” workouts then do so. This can be done in conjunction with them.
As for push ups, it’s the same story.
Wake up – do a set of push ups
Do a set before you leave for work
Do a handful of sets causally interlaced in your workout
Do a set by the coffee machine at work
Do a set when you get home from work
Do a set while you’re making dinner
Do a set while watching Netflix
Just make sure you find tension and keep it sub maximal
That’s enough from me today.
Paul “chin ups” and Krystie “puush up” Miller
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