hiking rsm

Alwyn Cosgrove is mean

and so is my wife. So is Gray Cook. Mean, all of them.

On Facebook, last week, Alwyn posted a quote by Gray Cook – "You can't put fitness on top of dysfunction."

Rehab sucks

No one really likes to hear this crap, but it's very good advice. It's advice that I've heard a million times, but never listened to for longer than a week or so. I would start getting things in order, but stop. Why?

• rehab sucks
• it's not fun stuff
• it stands in the way of the fun stuff you want to do
• it's hard
• it takes time
• it's boring
• it makes you weak
• it can be exhausting

Most people will immediately agree with most of the above bullets, but the last two may surprise people. When you begin a serious rehab/prehab program, your central nervous system (cns) can be fried after a few seemingly simple and easy exercises. What we don't think about is the effort it takes to get a muscle to work in a way that it's not comfortable working. It's hard work in the brain, and all that cns work is draining on your strength and energy. The first few actual training sessions – post rehab exercises masquerading as a warmup – can be very frustrating. (I got pissed and quit once...)

Look at those bullets and tell me that you won't want to quit. That you won't want to ignore what you know is good advice.

The biggest problem with ignoring such advice is not that you delay getting better, but you can actually make things worse. This has happened to me. It's not irreparable, but it's time lost.

The past two years, I started doing less in the gym and more at home. Kettlebell sport replaced my intervals and cardio; a good thing. A good thing, yes, but the sport whose aspects I love for fitness has taken my dysfunction(s) to the next level.

I've never been the anterior pelvic tilt type. I'd been straight and even. One of my few areas of "normal." I had been. Had.

So, Galya comes back after months away to find me worse than ever. I had followed her advice to give up the dangerous squatting that my lack of good hips presented me. No squats. Although I followed her advice about what not to do, I also ignored her advice about what to do. That would be all the prescribed stretching, mobility, and exercises to strengthen the [not very interesting] weak muscles. I didn't really do that stuff.

Enter the kettlebell [sport]

I'm actually a believer that most people would benefit from what Kettlebell Sport has to offer. 10 minute sets of cardio, escalating in intensity, pace, and weight over time. A hip dominant, glute and hamstring sport that also provides a relatively safe overhead lift in the kettlebell jerks and snatch. Shoulders, hips, glutes, hamstrings, rotator cuff, and core work, all rolled into an activity that pushes your heart rate up and burns a ton of calories. I like it; the exercise and the challenge.

Dysfunction on top of dysfunction

Unfortunately... I have crappy hips, tight lats, and poor thoracic mobility. It seems that in order to get in a "good" rack position I have to go so far into posterior pelvic tilt that the Keep On Truckin' guys would be envious.

As if that wasn't enough, I have poor overhead mobility, and I (apparently) compensate in the lumbar spine, with a dramatic arch that's just not good. I've piled dysfunction on top of dysfunction, leading to poor posture and a vicious circle of problem causing problem causing problem.

It's been about two months with Galya's hands on training, rehab, and therapy, and I'm getting better fast. In fact, that she is here to point out where things are better is keeping me going. Although I have to get over the fact that I've wasted two years of getting better, and actually made things worse, it's good to know that things are coming together. Her story of one day being better than ever really does help.

I see and feel the benefit (to me) of having a good trainer for the first time.

Alwyn Cosgrove is nice

and so is my wife. So is Gray Cook. Nice, all of them.

Alwyn Cosgrove is not mean. He's nice. It's not the kind of nice you want to hear, because it's a hard nice to live. But, take the advice now, not later. It won't make it easy for you, but it will be easier now than it will be two years from now.

Kumquats!

it's never long enough

It's been a whirlwind week, full of fun, family, friends, love, wedding, and marriage. Somewhere, there are a million thoughts I want to put down, a million feelings I want to share, and a million pictures yet to be found.

One day. One day... well one day will never fully happen, because this life gives us so much new joy each day that taking the time to list it all can never allow us to catch up. That's really my one area of sadness here; that there's something that I need to get out that I'll miss or simply gloss over.

My new wife of one week and two days (Married just March 12th, 2011) is a joy to me, and I spend more time laughing and trading ideas with her than any friend before. As a result, my list of blog ideas runs longer and longer, waiting and aching for a day when I can finally use them all. I just hope that my cryptic notes are still understandable when I get back to them.

In addition to all that "stuff,: I've had requests. Requests which seem simple, but still take some work. These things are coming:

• my carnitas recipe (for the carnitas served at the wedding reception)
• my cheesecake recipe (the top two tiers of which were delicious...)
• wedding pictures (must remember my external harddrive today!)

In addition, Galya and I stayed at an amazing little desert inn/bed and breakfast that was just beautiful, serene, and relaxing.

Full review of Hacienda Hot Springs Inn to follow (probably), but you can see a bit of it at Gal's place.

Off to work!

The bare necessities

For a long time, I've been trying to think of a good name to call my own style of eating. I eat pretty close to what many consider the Paleo Diet, but I find that term to be a turn off to many. I cringe so much when I say it, that I no longer say it to the newbie. Even many paleo diet proponents suggest that the way to get more people to follow it is to rename it. I agree, but what name?

Listening to a podcast the other day, the term "Real Food Diet" was presented. Despite the accuracy and emotional feelings that a follower of said diet must feel, it's really an insult to someone sitting across the table to proclaim your diet to be "real," as it implies that theirs is not.

"Whole Food Diet" could mean anything, because aren't oatmeal, honey, wheat, and quinoa whole foods? A baguette is merely wheat, yeast, water, and salt. That's a whole food to many people. Make the wheat whole grain wheat and it's now "whole" to another group of people. Using sea salt and making the water artisan helps to bring in a whole new group of whole food aficionados.

"Artisan" water. ;)

I've toyed around with the term "Ancestral," but I'm not sold yet. While looking back to the way our ancestors ate does point us in the right direction, it leaves so much wiggle room to mix and match inappropriately. It's not just what they ate, but how much of "what." How the "what" was prepared. How often they had access to the "what."

I can't just tell someone I eat like your ancestors, because I don't. I might eat the ingredient types that they ate, but for them it was the time, place, culture, work habits, spending money, and more that drove food choices and opportunities.

So, what's a good term?

I posed this question to Galya, and she almost instantly suggested the word "bare" to me.

"Take a food and distill it down to it's bare elements. That's the part of the food you really need."

"Take your diet and focus on those foods that are the bare elements or provide the greatest nutritional benefit."

In the end, my own diet is focused on meat and vegetables, with as few "extras" as possible. We don't need those things, and just because they exist doesn't mean we should to eat them. As your mother probably told you, life isn't fair.

I do eat some grains here and there, but grains tend to stand in the way of being able to eat more vegetables and meat, which are more satisfying and closer to required eating.

"If you want to think of the opposite of a bare food, it's a fun food," Galya added.

Fun foods seem to provide those feelings of happiness and nostalgia that tend to make us want to eat more and more of them. Chocolate, cake, ice cream, and other sweets provide little nutritional benefit compared to their bare counterparts or some of their basic ingredients.

Even a fun food made up of bare ingredients can be problematic, since it propels us toward eating for fun, rather than for nutrition. I love these foods, but they need to be a rare spot in my diet, or I'll overeat them.

Meat and veggies are the bare necessities, followed closely by fruits, nuts, potatoes and squash. Grains and sugars are treats to me, and I save them special occasions. They must be delicious and rare, or I'll just have more meat.

Does the word "bare" give my friend across the table enough to go on? No, but I hope it give him something to think about. The days are numbered for the term "paleo," one way or another. What will take it's place?

The Six Million Stotinki Man

I finally got my program, after a month or so of prying (literally, in a sense) to get it down on paper.

The benefit of having a girlfriend fiancée who knows stuff is that I get all the help I need to get my body in order. I wish it was in order again, but the reality is that I've never actually been in order. 

I'm pretty messed up, it seems; stiff and immobile, and it goes way back to my childhood. I grew up as a toe walker, just like my uncle and grandfather did, and I while we all three broke the habit, we never ever got our shit (or hips) in order. Doctors stuck me in Forrest Gump-esq leg braces that stretched my calves, but did little to keep my stride in stride, so over time I reverted and the calves returned to their old ways.

As I understand it, all my stuff is connected somehow, so my tight calves, introverted hips, and toe walking may either be the cause OR the result of themselves and not necessarily of each other. ...or something. (She's so pretty when she explains all this, though).

The Six Million Dollar Moustache

Whatever the pretty lady from Bulgaria is saying, we don't always know, but what we do know is that I'm being rebuilt, like the Six Million Dollar Man, only in Bulgarian currency. The exchange rate is very mysterious, but when I asked if I'd be worth Six Million whatever you call thems in the end, I was told something in the affirmative, like "six million statinki."

It's been a month of hands on help from my Eastern European Personal Trainer/Massage Therapist/Chef/Author, and I'm already feeling better. I'm more mobile and have fewer aches and pains. I can't wait to see how things have changed after another month.

Six Million Stotinki program

Daily Stuff (abridged)

• roll foot or get massage, 2-3 minutes each side
• high step calf stretch, 1-2 minute each side
• glute bridge, 2x12-15
• side plank, 2x1-1.5 minute per side

This is to be done daily, but that's not all there is. I also have a whole lotta mobility and activation to do before any training, depending on the training. It's all good, and like the NROL4A warmup and mobility, it goes a long way to getting me lifting better, rather than annoying me with stuff that seems and feels meaningless. In addition, I think Galya's done a good job of keeping it interesting and helping me out.

In a month, I hope to have the perfect mustache, better working body parts, fewer bionics, and slightly less sasquatch stank than Steve Austin had.



Talk to you later!

making chocolate dipped strawberries

the aftermath!