Archives for general (page 11)

To accompany all the heavy spine and back injury talk, here is a very nice animated tutorial from the New Jersey Spine Institute that covers anatomy, various spine conditions, as well as surgical and non-surgical procedures. I saw this mentioned in the Back Pain Support Group forums, which appears to be a good place to take any back concerns.

History buffs and old timers will like the American Powerlifting Evolution site to accompany Sandow and the Golden Age of Iron Men. Laced with pictures, it takes you through the way it used to be 1900-1985, before American powerlifting drowned in the “alphabet soup” of federation acronyms and the equipment race began for real. As a result,

Powerlifting now finds itself in the throes of an absurd paradigm: lifts can no longer be compared between federations without qualifying an embarrassing number of variables. Record setting is curiously suspect at some venues and there are even those who argue that the sport is no longer in existence as originally defined.

I tend to agree with the general party line as presented by this site, but am also the first to agree that the issue is far from black and white. The opposite of unity does not necessarily have to be chaos, but can just as well be freedom of choice. Equipment can add a sizable amount to any lift and can thus easily be labeled an artificial strength boost, but the very same equipment can also help spare the joints. Pick your preference regarding federations and equipment, but with drugs I have no sympathy although I recognize their prevalence in modern powerlifting. For a well-balanced introduction to these issues, see Controversies In Powerlifting by Eddie White.

It is finally here… Chuck Vogelpohl’s XXX video sells for $53.95 VHS/$59.50 DVD at Elite Fitness Systems, and has been available at the Westside Barbell site since July 16 where it is also slightly cheaper. Besides being the reigning WPO middleweight champion - with a world record 450 kg/992 lbs squat, a 165 kg/364 lbs bench and a 370 kg/816 lbs deadlift - he also has one lean physique for being a powerlifter. Not going to order it quite yet, but this one is definitively in my pipeline.

The Saginaw News has a piece on our favorite chiropractor and NAP world-record holder Vince Scelfo. He sure has the right attitude to lifting:

“I think now I’ll continue competing as long as I can,” Scelfo said. “I see no reason why I can’t keep going for a long time. If I can keep myself relatively injury-free, why not? There was a lifter in Northville who was 68 and I’ve heard of a man in his 80s.”

The piece also says that Vince has plans for a quarterly symposium, Keys to Increasing Strength, in which he plans to cover the concepts of body balance along with training and nutrition. The article has his phone number if you are interested. I’ve never met Vince, but based on our e-mail correspondence and his generous advice, I think nobody would regret attending. If I were any closer, I would sign up now. How’s that for a hint?

Thanks to Scott for letting me know about this article that came up on a Google News search for powerlifting.

Going to our neighboring country for the weekend, so no rehab work on Sunday.

Scott has an interesting update on Bruce Lee’s good morning injury that goes into deeper detail on matters such as his recovery process than his earlier entry. Based on his reading of the process, he wisely suggests that he should add more low back work to his routine, which has evolved into a very powerlifting oriented mode over the last months, and goes on to note that

[Bruce Lee’s injury] certainly doesn’t dissuade me from using Good Mornings to their fullest extent. As with any exercise, Good Mornings are only dangerous if performed incorrectly (which may be due to tiredness or a brief loss of concentration, as much as poor technique); although there is a little more at stake than with other exercises such as a Barbell Curl.

Although I think Scott has the right idea here and I agree with the general gist of his statement, I would like to add that proper form boils down to a lot more, specifically neurological and muscle balance issues, than outwardly doing the exercise 110% correctly. Based on these observations, I think I have fairly good grounds for urging some caution with this exercise, while offering my own good morning injury as a good example of what happens when one goes too heavy on them too soon. This is a long one, so bear with me.

Acquired joint control

Let me begin by using McGill’s discussion of an injury that occurred while he was conducting a study on deadlifting powerlifters (Cholewicki, J. and McGill, S.M. 1992: Lumbar posterior ligament involvement during extremely heavy lifts estimated from fluoroscopic measurements. Journal of Biomechanics, 25(1): 17-28).

[U]sing video fluoroscopy for a sagittal view of the lumbar spine, we investigated the mechanics of power lifters’ spines while they [dead]lifted extremely heavy loads. [..] During the lifts, although the lifters appeared outwardly to have a very flexed spine, in fact, the lumbar joints were 2-3 degrees per joint from full flexion. [..] This explains how they could lift such magnificent loads (up to 210 kg, or approximately 462 lb) without sustaining the injuries that are suspected to be linked with full lumbar flexion. [..] However, during the execution of a lift, one lifter reported discomfort and pain. Upon examination of the video fluoroscopy records, one of the lumbar joints (specifically, the L2-L3 joint) reached the full flexion calibrated angle, while all other joints maintained their static position (2-3 degrees short of full flexion). The spine buckled and caused injury. [..] [T]his unique occurrence appears to have been due to an inappropriate sequencing of muscle forces (or a temporary loss of motor control wisdom).
McGill, Stuart (2002): Low Back Disorders, Human Kinetics: pp. 124-125.

Although only round-backed/hunched over good mornings seriously flexes the spine (bending over), it is quite clear that the difference between injury and success can boil down to such small matters as keeping correct form on the vertebrae level itself by skillfully contracting each joint. This kind of form is not visible to the naked eye and is to a high degree an acquired neurological skill that becomes exponentially more vital the more vulnerable a position the spine is in. And in the case of a good morning, the spine is in an extremely vulnerable position indeed (even compared to a deadlift).

Structural imbalances in the spine

Furthermore, as Vincent Scelfo has pointed out, injury can also be caused when there are small misalignments in the vertebrae, especially in the upper back. When I went to see the osteopath in April following the good morning injury, my upper spine was indeed a mess. I was also told that this is very common with people who lift weights. In my case, three of the upper back vertebrae had locked up preventing full motion of these joints. Outwardly the form might look divine, but if the spine is not properly aligned things can easily go awry when you bend forward with a barbell on your back.

Muscle imbalances in both strength and endurance

Imbalances between the large surface muscles is also asking for trouble. For instance, strong hamstrings and a strong static abdominal contraction is needed to keep the package properly together. Otherwise, you will not be able to sustain the proper position in the good morning with heavy loads, even if you think you are outwardly following the exercise instructions to aT. As Louie Simmons puts it in the context of the squat, you need to be biomechanically sound.

To become biomechanically sound, you must have proper muscle control. Very few people have great form. If your back is weak, you will bend over, causing bad form. If your glutes and hamstrings are weak, it is hard to sit back properly. If your abs are weak, you will be weak in the bottom and fold over.
Louie Simmons: Analyzing Your Squat Workouts.

The stabilizing core muscles around the spine also need to be strong enough to support the individual vertebrae during the lift, especially in the eventuality that the major surface muscles can’t cope with the load. After discussing the deadlifting injury reported above, the authors go on to note that the risk of this kind of injury increases when there is high force developed by the large surface muscles, but only low forces generated by the small intersegmental muscles (i.e. the core muscles are weak) OR even when all muscle forces were low (such as when picking up a pencil from the floor) following a demanding job. Bringing the core muscle strength and endurance up is precisely what the rehabilitation for my good morning injury is all about, as my therapist feels I have weak core muscles compared to the large surface muscles (based on my initial performance on the stability ball exercises I tend to agree…).

What needs to be realized when discussing muscle imbalances in regard to the good morning is that a lot of the supporting muscle tension required is of a static nature. For example, much depends on whether you can maintain a strong supporting contraction of the abs during the length of the set, i.e. muscle endurance. Absolute strength, i.e. how much weight you can crunch, matters a lot less in this regard. A couple of days ago, I was rewatching the Squatting Secrets video. On the tape, Louie talks about how both setting up for the squat and squatting itself requires continuously flexed abs. His remedy? Weighted straight-legged sit-ups in a low pulley with a static hold at the top (if you think sit-ups are all bad, you might want to read this entry).

Indeed, low muscle endurance of the stabilizing muscles correlates with a higher injury risk in many studies, although I am not quite sure how applicable the results are to max lifts. For example, in another study by McGill et al. they state that

[P]eople, from patients to athletes, must be able to maintain sufficient stability in all activities - with low, but continuous, muscle activation. Thus, maintaining a stability ‘margin of safety’ when performing tasks, particularly the tasks of daily living, is not compromised by insufficient strength but probably insufficient endurance, and probably insufficient control. [..] Having strong abdominals does not necessarily provide the prophylactic effect that had been hoped for - but several works suggest that endurable muscles reduce the risk of future back troubles.
McGill SM, Grenier S, Kavcic N, Cholewicki J. 2003: Coordination of muscle activity to assure stability of the lumbar spine. J Electromyogr Kinesiol. 2003 Aug;13(4):353-9.

… Breathing

Interestingly enough, in yet another study discussed in McGill’s book (Cholewicki J, McGill SM.: Mechanical stability of the in vivo lumbar spine: implications for injury and chronic low back pain. Clin Biomech 1996 Jan;11(1):1-15.), elevated breathing was also linked to bad motor control.

In our clinical testing we observed similarly inappropriate motor patterns in some men who were challenged by holding a load in the hands while breathing 10% CO2 to elevate breathing. (Challenged breathing causes some of the spine-supporting musculature to drop to inappropriately low levels in some people[..]). These deficient motor control mechanisms will heighten biomechanical susceptibility to injury or reinjury.
McGill, Stuart (2002): Low Back Disorders, Human Kinetics: pp. 126.

CONCLUSION

Based on the above observations, I would make the following tentative recommendations for the good morning. Take them for what they are; loud late night musings and blatantly broad generalizations of a man who is neither a doctor nor a powerlifting guru. In the final analysis, it is you who is ultimately responsible for how you decide to approach the good morning, if at all. This is how I would do it based on my current understanding. Comments and corrections are welcome!

1. Fine grained motor control comes only with a great deal of practice, so it is imperative that one does the exercise for some time with perfect form while not going so heavy as to risk injury due to the very lack of this control in the first place. This of course applies to all exercises to a varying degree, but with the good morning it is especially critical due to the vulnerable position. Perhaps a full year of doing the exercise with sub-maximal weights, say 50-70% of your hypothetical good morning max, before starting to go to failure?

2. Lack of strength in some of the major supporting muscles, such as the hamstrings, and weak core muscles, such as the multifidus, greatly increase the risk of injury. Furthermore, a lack of strength endurance (on the order of 30-60 seconds or so, this is no marathon) in these same muscles also increases the likelihood of injury. Therefore, both the strength and short time endurance of these muscles should be improved before going heavy on the good morning. This strengthening can probably be accomplished by doing a well-balanced routine during the year of doing sub-maximal good mornings. It is critically important that this routine includes not only absolute and dynamic strength exercises (glute ham raises, pull throughs, reverse hypers etc.) but also static exercises (ab holds etc.) AND core muscle exercises (recall that they are only activated when we are about to lose our balance, so this means labile environment training, i.e. stability/swiss balls, balance boards etc.). GPP, such as sled dragging, à la Westside should also beneficial in building up local endurance in a powerlifting specific way.

3. Consider seeing a joint mobility specialist every once in a while (the osteopath suggested once every few months I think) to see if your spine needs to be adjusted as having misaligned vertebrae will increase the risk of injury, especially in the good morning. As misaligned vertebrae are often related to muscle tension, massage of tight muscles should also be beneficial (the more often the better).

4. Don’t do very high reps on the good morning as it will make you more tired, and will hence make you breathe quicker, which has been proven to decrease motor control. I’ve seen the same recommendation made along pretty much the same lines for the deadlift, i.e. keep the reps low to keep form good. How low to go is perhaps subjective, but perhaps no more than five reps a set. A few quality reps with 100% concentration will always be safer than 20 reps done in a sloppy fashion.

If we assume that these recommendations are valid, then it is painfully clear how unprepared I was to start going heavy on the good morning within a month of making the transition to powerlifting. As per the advice of my therapist, I am now making up for that by strengthening the core muscles, but there is indeed still much to be done on this front.

At this point, I am still unsure about whether I will ever again do good mornings for singles or even triples. Looking through the entries of my pre-injury max lifts on the good morning, fear of the lift shines through.

Decided to go for good mornings, but stop well short of ripping my back in two.
9 June 2003: 2 @ 80 kg/177 lbs

A triple at 90 kg/199 pounds was about as much as I dared to do without a power rack.
16 June 2003: 3 @ 90 kg/199 pounds

Rechecking the exercise description at Elite Fitness, where it says to stop “slightly above parallel”, makes me think that perhaps I should stop a little earlier. Going down that deep is plain scary.
22 September 2003: 3 @ 95 kg/210 lbs

After watching the Westside deadlift video, I came to understand that good mornings are done with pushing the glutes back and slightly bending the legs instead of just going down like a jack knife with straight legs. It sure feels about 5% less dangerous to do them the former way…
10 November 2003: 5 @ 100 kg/221 lbs

The thing is that good mornings felt nice and dandy up to about 80 kg/177 lbs, i.e. about 10 kg/22 lbs less than bodyweight. Anything heavier than that, and the strain on the lower back put me in fear zone. No matter, I would just acknowledge the fear and go for it. Still, this makes me want to add a final parting thought:

5. If you constantly fear injury on the good morning, it will happen sooner or later. By following the previous advice, perhaps you can rationally conclude that the exercise is now safe (it should feel a lot safer too if your supporting muscles etc. are freaky strong), and go for it. Perhaps this is the ultimate indicator of when you are ready to max on the good morning?

Got an early morning (well… 10am) text message from Måns who enthusiastically raved about this site, and with good reason. Sandow and the Golden Age of Iron Men: The Online Physical Culture Museum is a gold mine of old texts and images dating from the late 19th and early-mid 20th century. Although Sandow is the masthead, the site is also sprinkled with gems ranging from legendary Canadian strongman Louis Cyr (left) to Charles Atlas and his infamous muscle mail courses. The texts are soaked with the physical culture ideal of the time, where men and women were enlightened to the joy and aesthetic well-being that ensue once proper vigorous daily exercise and healthy habits are embraced. As Sandow himself puts it,

Its an astonishing fact that 90 per cent of men and women die without taking up half the good gifts of life that lie within hand’s reach. A well-developed body implies a well-developed brain, and for a full enjoyment of life both are absolutely necessary. There is, of course, no royal road to strength; but the high road is so plain, and the journey so pleasant, that, once pointed out, it can hardly be missed.
Eugen Sandow, 1902: The Gospel of Strength According to Sandow; Introduction.

This is a museum in the true sense of the word, that provides a fascinating insight into what cutting edge training meant at the turn of the 20th century when early strongmen looked back towards Greek ideals while working their chest expanders. Now it is time for me to head for the gym in order to combat Blaikie’s dire warning as he talks of the half-built boy whose kite flying and other pastimes ensure that he grows up having

[…] had nothing of yet of any account in the way of that systematic, vigorous, daily exercise which looks directly to his weak points, and aims not only to eradicate them, but to build up his general health and strength as well.
William Blaikie, 1879: How to Get Strong and How to Stay So; pp. 30.

In a way, some things never change. A BIG thanks to Roger Fillary and Gil Waldron for allowing us to realize this with their fantastic site!

It was pouring down the whole day. The rain was simply too heavy for me to want to not care and call it functional. Stayed inside in front of the fireplace and enjoyed watching Portugal beat Holland 2-1 in the UEFA Euro 2004 soccer cup. The rest of the time I was working my brains out on a Tibetan/Chinese digital library project that suddenly came up with a very tight deadline. I fear that Deadline will beat Sleep at least 4-1 for the next few days.

One of the things I decided when embarking on Westside training was to do at least a full year of basic training before even considering chains, bands, weight releasers and other such intensity boosters that have become something of a hallmark of the Westside school of powerlifting. It is not only because these gadgets are too advanced when just making the switch to powerlifting, but also because I wanted to save them for when my gains started slowing down. Simply put, don’t use the sledgehammer until you really need to. Having heard many people rave about what chains and bands did for their bench, I think it is now time to see if they can help me get out of the rut.

Chain theory and contrast with bands

Thin loading chains are used to hang thick chains from the bar sleeves and adjusted so that most of the heavy chain is on the floor at the bottom of the movement. What chains do is to progressively increase the resistance towards the lockout as more and more chain leaves the ground. In Westside terms, this is a way of accommodating resistance, of making the strength curve better match the resistance. Movements on which the chains are used usually get easier towards the top due to better leverage towards lockout and acceleration off the bottom. The chains offset this lightening, thus ensuring that the lift remains heavy to the [bitter] end.

Chains are especially valued for speed work as they force the body to accelerate against increasing resistance. Not only does this make the lift challenging, but, according to Westside theoreticians, the added resistance also forces you to drive the bar higher before starting the largely unconscious deceleration phase that stops you from either throwing the bar or injuring your elbows. Without chains (or bands) the bar simply moves too fast at the top forcing you to step on the break sooner so you have time to stop the bar. This dilemma can’t be solved by adding more weight to the bar, since the lift would then be too heavy at the bottom making the degree of acceleration insufficient for speed gains. With chains you have only the bar weight at the bottom and 10-20% extra at lockout. By allowing you to drive the bar higher at high speed, chains help produce a favorable neurological response that will teach the body to drive through sticking points with max weights.

Chains are also used for max effort work on such movements as floor presses and good mornings. As bar speed is low compared to speed work, the neurological response is largely lacking. But as chains make the movement harder, the muscles need to strain more thus leading to larger overload. Time under tension with heavy weight, an essential component of strength gain, is increased as it takes longer to complete the 1-3 reps than without chains. Chains can also be used in max effort work to combat specific sticking points by adjusting the loading chain so that the extra weight kicks in just below the problem.

The effect of bands (and bungees) is similar, but, unlike chains, the resistance does not increase linearly but exponentially as the resistance grows stronger and stronger the more the band stretches. Bands also create much more eccentric tension, i.e. it not only adds weight but also pulls against you. Drop the bar with chains and it fill “merely” fall on you, drop it with bands at it will be propelled down at you as if from a slung. Bands also tend to add more resistance than chains, i.e. in the neighborhood of 20-30% of bar weight at lockout on speed work. If chains are a semi-advanced method, bands are highly advanced and should not really be used extensively before reaching a plateau. At Westside, chains were introduced only in the late 1990s long after the club had reached fame, with Jump Stretch bands making their appearance a good three years later. These strong guys and girls certainly got their base strength from plain old straight weight before going for chains and bands. Barbender242 put it well over in the T-nation forums:

Chains and bands are just two more weapons in your battle to gain strength. I think too many new lifters want to do everything and use everything at once. When beginning, go ahead and cycle some chains in, it will help with lockout weaknesses. But the best advice on bands came from Chuck V., he said that you should not use bands until you have completely stopped gaining from straight weight and chains (for most people, this is longer than you think). That way by the time you get to the point where you need to use bands, you already have a solid training base and the bands will get you jump started to even bigger numbers. The problem is when you have people who have just started training and are nowhere near any type of plateau, trying to get under band tension without a solid base.

No bands for me for at least another year. Might be difficult as I ordered a pair of minis for use with GHR assists and rehab work.

Chain loading

Below is the recommended chain weight chart for speed work, an amalgam of this and that, to use with speed box squats and speed benching on top of what straight weight you would normally use for speed work. Recall that bar speed is ultimately the indicator, i.e. if you can’t complete three reps within three seconds you have too much weight on the bar and/or too much chain.

SPEED BENCH
Raw bench max	Chain weight at lockout	Sample chains by link size
Under 200 lbs/91 kg	20-30 lbs/9-14 kg	one 1/2″/13 mm
200-400 lbs/91-181 kg	40-50 lbs/18-22 kg	one 5/8″/16 mm
400-500 lbs/181-226 kg	60-70 lbs/27-32 kg	one 1/2″/13 mm + one 5/8″/16 mm
500-600 lbs/226 kg-271 kg	80-90 lbs/36-40 kg	two 5/8″/16 mm
Over 600 lbs/271 kg	100 lbs/45 kg	one 1/2/13mm + two 5/8″/16 mm
SPEED BOX SQUATS
Raw squat max	Chain weight at lockout	Sample chains by link size
Under 200 lbs/91 kg	40-50 lbs/18-22 kg	one 5/8″/16 mm
200-400 lbs/91-181 kg	50-60 lbs/22-27 kg	one 1/2″/13 mm + one 5/8″/16 mm
400-500 lbs/181-226 kg	60-70 lbs/27-32 kg	one 1/2″/13 mm + one 5/8″/16 mm
500-600 lbs/226-271 kg	80-90 lbs/36-40 kg	two 5/8″/16 mm
600-800 lbs/271-362 kg	90-100 lbs/40-45 kg	one 1/2″/13 mm + two 5/8″/16 mm
Over 800 lbs/362 kg	120-140 lbs/54-63 kg	three 5/8″/16 mm

Note that my Westside Barbell DE Bench Guidelines script can make all the calculations for you. Generally about half of the 5 foot/1.5 meter chain will be on the floor at the top of the lift, which is a good rule of thumb if you need to find out how much weight a certain chain will add to the lockout.

For max effort work more chain would generally be used, having up to 50% of the weight come from chains is not uncommon. There are two basic ways of working with chains for max effort work: 1) work up to 50-80% of max and then add chains to failure, 2) add a set number of chains first and then add weight to failure.

Setting up chains

The same set of chains can be used for all lifts by simply adjusting the length of the loading chain to satisfy the rule that most, if not all, of the heavy chain should be on the floor at the bottom of the lift. The exception is floor presses, where the chain is draped directly over the sleeves as the bar is too near the floor for loading chains to make any sense. Here is the setup directions straight from the big horse’s mouth as given for box squats:

To set up the chains you’ll need a five foot 1/4 inch chain to act as the support chain. This chain is suspended from the bar sleeves. A metal ring will be suspended in the 1/4 inch support chain. Then the training chains (five feet long, either 5/8″ or 1/2″ thickness) will pass through the metal rings so one half of the chain falls on each side of the ring. You’ll set the support chain so three links on each side of the training chain are on the floor at the top of the lift. When you sit down on the box most of the training chain will be on the floor. You have to keep a certain amount of the chain on the bar to avoid the chains swaying back and forth throughout the movement.

A man and his chain

My plan is to first add the chains to the speed bench. When I have a power rack at Toffe’s Gym, I will also alternate with doing them on ME exercises like floor presses and benches. While surveying material for the rack, I stumbled upon a guy selling 1/2″/13 mm chain. Although I should be using a 5/8″/16 mm chain, I figured they would be good for easing into chain benching. I ended up paying 28 euros for two pieces slightly longer than 5 feet/1.5 meters. It took another 6 euro for two 5 feet/1.5 meter pieces of thin loading chain and two attaching links before the package was complete. I have a feeling 5/8″/16 mm chain will be more expensive if I can find it. Elite Fitness Systems sells these for $99.95, but the shipping would kill me.

Being as anal as always, I did not want to rely on the math to find out how much weight the chains add to the lockout. After adjusting the chains to a suitable length, I had Sanna determine how high the bar is off the floor at the bottom (71 cm) and the top (112 cm, I have a 41 cm stroke with my current minimal arch). Next, I piled enough junk on my soon to be retired Weider bench so that I could get a scale up at the 112 cm mark. Then weighed the bar (19 kg/42 lbs) and added the chains. The final 26 kg/57 lbs reading told me that the chains added 6½ kg/14 lbs to the top. I gather that a 1/2″ chain with smaller loops would reach the full 9 kg/20 lbs generally expected of a 1/2″/13 mm chain. Tomorrow it remains to try them out.

Recommended readings

Chain Reaction: Accommodating Leverages by Louie Simmons. The classic article, which has some interesting things to say about the neurological effect of chains. “Training with chains in this manner accomplishes three things. 1) We have maintained our original weight in order to use the correct percentage for explosive training. 2) We have overloaded the top portion of the lift, which normally does not receive sufficient work because of increased body leverage at this position. 3) A neurological response to build explosive strength is developed. This training will train you to drive to the top because you cannot slack off at the top phase as you used to.”

Accommodating Resistance: How to use bands and chains to increase your max lifts by Dave Tate. A pocket bible on the topic. “I don’t care how you lift the weight, at some point you have to begin to decelerate. If not you’d have to actually throw the barbell. Now at what point do you begin to decelerate? Is it at three or four inches before the lockout, or three to four inches off your chest in the bench? I don’t know for sure, but I can guess it’s different for everyone and is based on several individual things such as joint angles, fatigue, and previous training experience. Bands and chains can train you to break through these sticking points.”

Chains and Bands by Louie Simmons. Talks about loading in detail. “If you want to excel at powerlifting or any sport, then you must develop speed strength, increase acceleration, and gain absolute strength. Bands and chains can be instrumental in developing these aspects of strength. I highly recommend that you try them as soon as possible.”

Researching Resistance by Louie Simmons. “This is exactly why you must use bands or chains to accommodate resistance [when doing speed work]. Without them the bar moves too fast at the top.”

Workin’ on the chain gain?and more by Ken O’Neill. Excellent article with pictures that also discusses purchasing chain and has a nice chart of how much various thickness of chain weigh by the foot. “Chains provide a low cost way of doing what Arthur Jones set out to accomplish with his original Nautilus machines.”

Bands, Chains and Bungees by Bob Strauss (photos). “Chains operate differently than bands or bungees. They add the exact same amount of weight per unit of distance moved, whereas bands increase, and bungees increase further. The fact that chains start adding an even amount of resistance make them good for helping a point lower down than bands or bungees.”

The Science Behind Bands and Chains by Rob Haan. “Is the use of bands and chains some magical tool that will create supermen? No, the process of getting stronger is slow and takes years of hard work, bands make the work harder not easier. The bands and chains are just a way of stimulating the muscle in a different way and changing the strength curve and the force velocity curve.”

Looking through my web statistics, a chain of events somehow led me to discover Mark Reifkind’s blog where I found him doing kettlebell work standing on a stability ball. Mark, who is operating the private training studio Girya, seems to be able to lure even some of his older clientele on top of a ball. Me thinks there is another challenge around the corner after I master my balance board… But, one should never forget that there is always another challenge! Ad infinitum.

Mark also has an interesting article on combining kettlebells and powerlifting (scroll down).

Remember Vincent Scelfo, the chiropractor who sustained a good morning injury shortly after resuming powerlifting training at age 46 after a 15 year break? We have kept in touch ever since and he has kept me updated on his progress. Some three weeks ago, Vince told me he had heard of a new association, NAP (National Alliance of Powerlifters), and since their drug-free status, meet location and equipment rules felt right he just decided he would make his comeback in one of their meets on 12 June. Imagine my surprise when he wrote me that he is now the official NAP world record holder in the 148 lbs/67 kg Masters 45-49 division with a 358 lbs/162 kg squat, a 178 lbs/81 kg bench and a 297 lbs/134 kg deadlift at a bodyweight of 143 lbs/65 kg! Yes, NAP is a new organization with a clean world record slate, but this does not at all detract from Vince’s great achievement coming back from a long layoff and a potentially chronic injury. I just hope this doesn’t mean that Vince is going to retire again now that he finally has become a world record holder… We want more! We want more!

Hats off for Vince!