Monday, December 15, 2008

Reebok and AstroTurf Join Forces



Reebok and GeneralSports Venue/AstroTurf Join Forces for First-Ever R&D Effort Focused on Footwear-Surface Interaction

Industry Leaders Seek Performance and Safety Gains for All Athletes

In a first-of-its-kind partnership, Reebok and GeneralSports Venue, the exclusive U.S. licensee of the AstroTurf® brand of synthetic sports turf products, announced today that they are joining forces to study the interaction between athletic footwear and field surfaces for athletes ranging from professionals to amateurs.

The goal of the research collaboration is to help improve athlete performance and help reduce injury risk through the development of better shoes and synthetic sports surfaces. Reebok will spearhead footwear product development while GSV/AstroTurf will focus on synthetic sports turf. The AstroTurf brand was selected based on the advantages of its vertically-integrated manufacturing assets, including the scientific research, design and engineering used to produce sports turf that is among the most technologically advanced in the world.

GSV/AstroTurf is clearly the leading innovator in synthetic turf, making them our first choice for this unique partnership, said Don Gibadlo, Vice President of Cleated Footwear at Reebok. Instead of studying the interface between the cleats and surfaces already in use, we will be the first to test these products in the conceptual phase, helping us produce innovations that will enhance performance and safety for athletes in field sports at all levels around the world.

The research effort will analyze footwear-surface interactions, on both synthetic turf and natural grass, for an evolving range of athletic dynamics and an array of athlete types, from NFL linebackers to NCAA soccer players and Little League outfielders.

As a global leader in performance athletic footwear and the official supplier to several of the world’s elite professional sports leagues, Reebok is the ideal R&D partner, said Chris Plunket, Senior Vice President of Operations for GSV/AstroTurf. As industry leaders, it is our shared responsibility to improve both performance and safety, the top priorities of athletes, coaches and management at every level, by leveraging our collective expertise to put the products of the future on a fast track to the marketplace.

The research will be conducted at various venues nationwide, including on a GameDay Grass 3D™ surface from AstroTurf recently installed at Reebok’s global headquarters in Canton, Mass., with state-of-the art equipment for mechanical and biomechanical testing. Until now, most shoe-surface interaction studies have used cleats and surfaces already on the market, focusing almost exclusively on the incidence of injuries as opposed to performance enhancement.

Wednesday, December 10, 2008

Stretch-Shortening Cycle

How does the stretch-shortening cycle work and how does it relate to exercise?

As a muscle lengthens, it contracts and produces elastic energy. The force applied to the muscle increases. When a muscle is stretched, it will attempt to rebound to its resting length. During the eccentric contraction, the muscle stores elastic energy. Muscular tension increases. The elastic energy that has been stored is available for powerful, explosive movements. By stretching the muscle before it contracts, the muscle contracts with greater force. When the muscles contract, the combined forces of muscle contraction and elastic recoil produce more force than either factor alone. The bench press is a good example of the coordination of stretch and muscle contraction. This movement uses the eccentric, elastic and concentric phases as a combination during the lifting and lowering of the weight.

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Quote of The Day

Competitive toughness is an aquired skill and not an inhereted gift. - Chris Everet

Monday, December 8, 2008

History of Powerlifting, Weightlifting and Strength Training - Part One

This is a six part series on the Eleiko site on the history of Powerlifting, Weightlifting and Strength Training

by Dr. Ken Leistner

There are many fundamental differences among the participants of the various aspects of the iron related sports. The emotional response and make up of the athletes involved in strongman competition differs from those who compete in bodybuilding shows and powerlifters think and often behave very differently than those who do Olympic weightlifting as their primary sport. It wasn’t always like this. Powerlifting wasn’t organized as a sport until 1964 and yes, I was there for that. It wasn’t seen as a momentous occasion and few of its participants believed that the “odd lift” contests that had been held on a more or less regular basis for perhaps a four or five year period, would significantly change just because the activity now had a name and an official organization. We were obviously wrong in that belief for both positive and negative reasons.

Through the 1950’s and early 1960’s Olympic weightlifting was the dominant sport for those who lifted weights. Some, myself included, realized early and accepted the fact that they were not athletic enough, explosive enough, quick enough, or patient enough to excel as proponents of the two-hand press, snatch, and clean and jerk. Those were the three official lifts and if anyone on a New York City subway thought you lifted weights or noted that your physical development was above average, and of course had the gumption to approach you about it, the leading question would always be “How much can you press?” Even the lay person or “unathletic” knew that the press was the measuring stick for those who believed themselves strong. Weight training of any type was considered to be a cult activity until the late 1960’s. Even in the New York City Metropolitan area with its millions of inhabitants, it was a cult and most of us were acquainted with each other or recognized each other on sight. In discussion about the Weider sponsored national level “Mr.” contests that were usually held at the Brooklyn Academy Of Music, in part to lend the occasions an air of legitimacy and elegance, there was a casual closeness to the audience. My comment to a young enthusiast who has a strong interest in the history of the iron game, was that “if 5000 people attended the 1968 grouping of contests that included the Mr. American, Mr. Universe, and Mr. Olympia contests on the same evening, 3000 of us would either know each other or recognize one another from the various hole-in-the-wall gyms, garages, basements, or storefront facilities throughout the City and Long Island. The other 2000 would be gay guys who stood in the bathroom and watched the big bodybuilders taking a leak.” Don’t shoot the messenger, it was a different time and that’s how it was.

Astounding to the past two or three generations of trainees is the fact that most of the big time bodybuilders were very strong and most of the Olympic and powerlifters had very good, well developed physiques. This was the result of having limited equipment to train with and the use of the same basic exercises by almost everyone who trained in a serious manner. For example, Olympic weightlifters would do squats or front squats as their primary lower extremity movements and supplement that with deadlifts, cleans, snatches, and pulls. Doing full squat cleans or snatches and arising from the bottom, the equivalent of placing oneself at a severe disadvantage before doing a front squat, gave obvious work to the hips and thighs. As the Odd Lifts of the bench press, squat, deadlift, and barbell curl in varying order and with varying rules grew into the official sport of powerlifting, competitors performed squats, front squats, and deadlifts as their primary lower extremity work, and supplemented this with cleans or power cleans ala the typical regimen of Olympic lifters. Serious bodybuilders, those big and hard enough to consider competing, did squats and front squats, deadlifts and cleans, and prior to competition “cut up” with additional leg extensions and leg curls. Upper body work for all centered around the standing barbell press and heavy rows and shrugs. The Olympic lifters would include snatch work, the bodybuilders would include arms and some pulldowns or chins, and the powerlifters would incorporate almost any of the basic movements done by the other two groups. With the emphasis on basic multi-joint movements, almost everyone who lifted weights in a consistently serious manner, over time, became quite strong and looked darned good if their diet wasn’t totally out of order.

In an age of specialization where most lifters and bodybuilders don’t even train in the same facilities, I’m sure this seems quite strange and pointless. However, everyone believed they were “in it together” because the general public viewed anyone with developed muscles and anyone who devoted more than a passing moment to lifting weights as “odd,” “off,” “a narcissist,” or misguided. Until the post-World War II era, few could devote any time to weight training because economic conditions demanded that everyone, meaning every male, be gainfully employed and often with two jobs. The leisure time that sprung from the prosperity of post-War America allowed for time and energy to be placed upon developing one’s strength and physique if one wished and only then did any of the weight sports begin to grow beyond the bounds of cult-status and become part of the consciousness of the general public.

More Growth Hormones

Add a light set to the end of your strength workout. In a study in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Reasearch, Japanese researchers found that your body will pump out more growth hormone if you finish your heavy-weight-lifting session with a single, high- repetition set of an exercise using a lighter load. "This could be partially responsible for greater strength gains," says Kazushige Goto, Ph.D., the study's lead author. A typical strength workout might be four sets at 90 percent of your one-rep max, followed by 20 reps at 50 percent of your one-rep max.

Sunday, December 7, 2008

Muscle Increases Brainpower

Listening to music while you exercise increases brainpower, say researchers at Ohio State University. People did twice as well on cognitive tests after exercising with a soundtrack than after sweating in silence. Exercise fights off decay in the area of the brain responsible for “executive function” tasks, such as reasoning and sequencing. Music may “enhance organization of cognitive material, which is also an executive-function task,” says lead author Charles Emery, Ph.D.

Friday, December 5, 2008

Baseball Winter Meetings


This year the Baseball Winter Meetings will be held in Las Vegas at the Las Vegas Convention Center & The Las Vegas Hilton, December 8 - 11.

This is the 107th annual gathering of the baseball convention, a place where club owners, front office personnel, league officials, just about everyone from the business side of the game whether from the Major Leagues, the Minor Leagues or internationally, will gather in one spot.

This coming week leads to a lot of conversation regarding free agents, league meetings and policies.

Quote of The Day

“Weak Men Wait For Opportunities; Strong Men Make Them" Joe Paterno

The Architect

Maxboxing.com

For those who follow boxing and are excited about tomorrows fight between De La Hoya and Pacquiao here is an article you might like. Strength and Conditioning coaches have begun to work with boxers to improve strength, speed and power levels over the years.

On HBO's infomercial series '24/7', much has been made of the work being put in by Oscar De La Hoya and his long-time strength and conditioning coach, Rob Garcia, as he prepares for his first fight at the welterweight limit in seven years. Not much however, has been focused on the task at hand for Manny Pacquiao, who after winning his first title at 112 pounds, boxes for the first time on Saturday night at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas as a full-fledged welterweight.

The responsibility of making sure Pacquiao keeps his speed and quickness while adding the requisite size is one Alex Ariza.

"The main thing here is that we didn't have to worry about moving up so much in weight," he says. "For the David Diaz fight we did focus in a little bit on strength. Our main focus was the speed. This fight here, for the first weeks we introduced Manny to a more ballistic, high-intensity, interval training system. And then the latter half of this camp, we focused on the speed."

Speed is the one clear advantage the 'Pac Man' has over De La Hoya, who has fought as a middleweight in the past. The challenge is to make sure that his blinding speed isn't held down by the extra poundage.

"It's a challenge for every conditioning coach out there. There's always that balance, trying to hold strength and have speed at the same time and the hope is that conditioning will piggy-back on those two things. Speed is such a key factor in this but, at the same time, we have to know that Manny has to be able to sting Oscar when he hits him," said Ariza.

He explains his general philosophy thusly, "High-intensity, interval training is what's out there right now. It's the most modern method of training. Long runs, those more antiquated techniques of conditioning, they just don't exist anymore with your top conditioners. We believe in taxing heart rates, recovering, and things like that which will improve and condition an athlete."

In the early morning a few weeks back, as he conducted the roadwork of one Amir Khan at a local park near Freddie Roach's Wild Card Boxing Club in Hollywood, you see that Khan isn't just running several miles straight at a steady pace. Instead, a constellation of cones are set up over 100 yards and Khan, as he reaches each landmark, steps up his pace till he goes into a full blown sprint the last 20 yards. He is given a certain time to get back to the original starting point, where the process is repeated. As Khan begins to stride out, Ariza harps on the young fighter to pump his arms at his sides and to lift his knees. Each set of sprints is meticulously timed.

Afterwards, Khan worked on some 'ladder' drills, which are used by many athletes to improve their quick twitch muscles. In the past, many football teams would lay spare times side by side and have their players step through the tires as quickly as possible, pumping their knees as high as possible. Nowadays, instead of a garage full of Goodyears, trainers like Khan just carry rollaway materials that can be laid out to simulate the same process.

"It's all about plyometrics," Ariza explains of the drills that had Khan moving forward and laterally through the squares as if he were almost playing a game of hopscotch. But regardless of what they do, it's just as important to Ariza the pace at which they execute the workout.

"Conditioning right now is in its formative years still with boxing. So what we try to do is simulate a boxing round in everything we do when it comes to either the intensity of the plyometrics or the ballistic training or sprint training. It's always going to be interval, it's always going to be erratic heartbeats, high heart-rate with short recovery. And that's always going to be the focus.

"It's about taxing your heart rate, getting heart rate that's similar to what they experience in a boxing ring and then having that ability to recover and then do it again, recover and then taxing it again and recover. So it's gotta simulate what a boxing match is. Running a long distance, you can time your breathing, you can adjust your pace. When you're doing interval training, you can't do that."

And yes, Ariza did put Pacquiao through some resistance training - which is still considered taboo in many boxing circles.

"I do use weights, but in the sense that they're not for cosmetic reasons," says Ariza, who stays away from compound lifts such as the bench press and military press. He believes in high reps with movements that will benefit a boxer inside the ring. "They're more to develop a quicker, faster response, a faster twitch-muscle fiber. They're designed to target those things like that. So the idea behind using light weight is also for flexibility and to develop a faster reflex."

Pacquiao's work ethic, according to Ariza is, "Phenomenal. As a conditioning coach you are always trying to be a motivator, somebody who keeps athletes at a level of intensity. But with Manny, it's almost reverse. Motivating him isn't a problem. Getting him to work hard isn't a problem. It's keeping him from working too hard that's the problem."

But there is still the fear of the unknown, and Pacquiao and his long-time Filipino crew have balked at a few things and have been reluctant to make some changes. "Some of the stuff we cut out a little earlier than normal with Manny because Manny's just not used to it," said Roach. If it ain't broke, why fix it? That seems to be the philosophy at work here. But what helps his cause is that Ariza has the support of Roach, an old-school trainer, who is receptive to new ideas.

"I think there's room for it. Every sport in the world, we're getting bigger, stronger and technology is better," says the respected trainer. "I'm old-school, but if something makes sense to me, I'm going to go with it."

Roach harkens back to a time when he was fighting when he performed tried and true drills that, in retrospect, make no sense now."Like the medicine ball," he says with a laugh. "They used to pound the medicine ball into me so you got used to body shots and stuff like that."

So that didn't work?

"No."

Really?

"I think you get your body in shape to take punches by doing sit-ups and doing exercises. If I keep hitting you in the head, are you going to get used to it?"

Then there was the custom of doing your roadwork in heavy duty work boots to strengthen your legs.
"I used to run in boots," admits Roach. "I actually didn't believe in it back then and I still don't believe in it because it's just so bad for your legs, shin splits."

So why'd he do it, then?

"My dad made me. You did what you were told."

Perhaps all of these past missteps (whether in Red Wings or Nikes) has made Roach the ideal trainer to work under.

"Actually Freddie is an outside-the-box kind of trainer," Ariza states. "He's one of those guys who is more cutting edge, more modern. He thinks that conditioning and nutrition is an invaluable facet of a fighter’s training. His training is very intense, he's high-intensity, a lot of volume punching. So in order for his fighters to be able to maintain that kind of pace he keeps with the mitts, they have to incorporate this kind of conditioning."

Alcohol Slows Down Muscle Growth

Some of the great weight lifters and boxers from the early 1900s trained in the back saloons. Typically, they would drink beer, do a few reps or box a round, then drink some more. While this makes for a great story, it’s lousy way to train. Dr. C.H. Lang and colleagues from Penn State University found that even moderate drinking decreased the rate of protein synthesis by 20 percent. Alcohol interferes with the way amino acids are lined up to make specific proteins. It also blocks the action of the powerful anabolic hormone, insulin-like growth factor (IGF -1). This is important information for athletes and other weight trained athletes. Even a few drinks can erase all the work you did in the gym.

Thursday, December 4, 2008

Performance News

Fruits and vegetables can be muscle foods. In a recent study, Australian researchers found that men who reduced their antioxidant intake by eating just one serving of fruit and two vegetables daily for 2 weeks felt as if they were exerting more effort than when exercising on a diet rich in antioxidants. Eating several servings of fruit and vegetables daily can make exercise seem easier and help you finish those last few reps.

Exercise will help you stay sharp as a tack. In a study conducted on mice at the Salk Institute in La Jolla, California, it was found that exercise rejuvenates the brain. Of 15 young mice and 18 old mice (equivalent to 70 human years), half were given exercise wheels. After one month all 33 mice underwent maze test. Both young and old mice who exercised performed equally well, but sedentary mice took twice as long to finish the maze.