Newsletter 052824

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Team,

Three new articles for this week!

We want to be transparent when it comes to links in this email. Some links within this email will be affiliate links that support Always Train as a business.

1. Food is medicine: – Take a look below at Dr. Mark Hyman’s food pyramid. If we just stuck to this advice, and similarly fitness in 100 words from Greg Glassman, and didn’t track a single macro, your overall health, body fat composition, and longevity would increase dramatically. The simple choices we make are where the biggest gains can be made.
2. Dr. Peter Atia’s supplement list –
   1. Magnesium – 3 types to look into (Magnesiums role in the body)
      1. Slowly absorbing magnesium
      2. Magnesium oxide
      3. Magnesium L threonate
   2. Creatine monohydrate (no surprise here!) 5g a day is enough, don’t worry about the loading.
   3. Methylated B vitamins – An excellent article with additional resources can be found here: (Read on)
   4. Theracurmin – a fancy version of curcumin.  Read more here.
3. Be specific in tactical training! – “Although all tactical athletes should have a varied program, specified performance-based goals may vary from one field to another. Blanket performance standards may not have the same applicability across the tactical athlete spectrum, requiring specified goals to be incorporated into well-balanced tactical or sport-oriented routines to help the athlete excel in their current field. Movement differences and job performance can be observed across the tactical population. Looking at movement patterns (e.g., rucking in soldiers, firefighter ladder climb in urban areas versus line digging in wildland settings, etc.) in each population would benefit from focused exercises specified to their common movement patterns” (Specificity)

100lb Murph: Usually, if you add weight to a Hero workout, it makes it easier. There’s more breaks. There’s more standing around. There’s more general muscle fatigue so you cannot continue the work out.

This was not the case for 100lb Murph. It was incredibly difficult mainly because you can’t escape the weight even when laying on the floor doing push-ups the weight is still there. There’s no escaping it.

I’ll be enough. I also did regular Murph this year and will compare the two in a workout video.

For now, hope you guys enjoy this one put together by 1stPhorm!

Postpartum With Alex

Want to rebuild the core strength and control to safely and comfortably perform Planks during pregnancy or Postpartum? Click here for the progressions I followed in my 3rd Trimester, and the same progressions I am currently following to get my Planks back Postpartum.

Step 1: Get comfortable breathing while maintaining deep core engagement in the Quadruped Position (hugging the baby). I spent weeks at this stage.

Step 2: The Bear Crawl Hold- I spent weeks practicing just lifting my knees off the floor for reps before having the control and endurance to hold my knees off the floor for over 10 seconds. Once I could hold for 30 seconds, I moved on to the next stage.

Step 3: Elevated Plank Hold- the key is getting the deep core engaged before stepping your feet back into the Plank. Once I could hold for 30 seconds, I moved onto the floor.

Step 4: I always warm up with all 3 steps to remind my body of how the pressure in my core should feel before doing Plank Holds! I started with sets of 10 seconds, and can now comfortably do sets of 30 seconds 😊

⭐️ Please remember that every pregnancy is very different, and only you know how your body feels and what is appropriate for you. All movements should feel comfortable during pregnancy, and you should always stop or scale a movement if you experience coning or pressure on the pelvic floor. Every week will be different as your body grows and changes, so just listen to your body and move at whatever pace feels right for you.

—

Alexandra Bailey

AlwaysTrain

M.S. Kinesiology, CrossFit L2, USAW L1, Pn1

Crossfit-Gymnastics-Weightlifting-Sports Nutrition

THE NEWS

Watching the semi final action unfold from the past weekend was amazing! I got to take part in testing many of the workouts that were used for semi final weekend and I have to say some of the times absolutely blew me away.

Especially anyone completing event 2 in under 12 to 13 minutes. 500 double wonders, 100 toes the bar and 50 front squats at 225#/155# is a staggering amount of work to get done in that little amount of time. More over, the number of athletes who were able to complete the work in that timeframe was amazing to see.

I can only imagine that the best time(s) may come down again next week with one more semi final to go.

Once athletes get a look at what’s possible it becomes very likely that someone will break the  “world record”. Keep your eyes peeled for the performances coming up next week.

Another cool thing that Alex and I have put together here on Always Train is the ability to have a app like experience when accessing the programming.

When you go to the website on your mobile device, you should be prompted to download to home screen.

If not, you can do this yourself by pressing the up arrow button or share button in your browser, and you should have an option to add to home screen.

You can also try the following link! https://alwaystrain.com?pwa-non-amp-install=true

This will provide a more immersive experience on the phone and once accessed faster loading through caching of webpages on your phone. You also have the ability to sign up for push notifications!

We are still working through some bugs with this new feature, but for the most part, it brings a great experience to the user and allows you to access programming in a very easy and efficient manner.

Alex also just started a new cycle for the CWC weightlifting program! You can check out and sign up for that program below!

#AlwaysTrain