Feel like you can't get any real training done stuck in lockdown with no equipment? Here’s some tips on how to produce actual overload while working at home: 1. Figure out the direction of the force, and make it work against gravity as much as possible.  The obvious way to do this is with your own bodyweight. If it’s a pushing motion, get as much bodyweight as possible above the movement. If it’s pulling, get as much bodyweight as possible beneath the movement. 2. Increase time under tension. The more time under tension your muscular system goes through, the closer it will get to overload, even with exercises with less weight involved. Instead of rushing through reps of an exercise to maximise reps, slow them down to maximise time under tension. 3. Use leverage - the longer the lever of an exercise because, the more force and control you’ll need to apply to make the movement happen. This is why a pushup from the knees is easier than a regular pushup, and why a dragon flag is way harder than a regular reverse crunch.  4. Increase instability If you’re used to doing exercises involving both sides of your body, on a flat surface, in one plane of motion, chances are there are parts of your musculature responsible for stabilising you that you are neglecting normally. Working through unstable movements will maximise the work your system has to do which, for overload, is exactly what we need. A good example of this is substituting regular squats for split, levitation or pistol squats The chest fly in the picture is a good example of all of these - bodyweight directly above the movement, easily adjustable time under tension, fully lengthened levers and highly unstable due to the smooth surface. The result, for equipment cost of £1 for a couple of dust cloths, is an exercise that beats the hell out of a regular pushup, and even gives the weighted gym equivalent a good run for its money. For more advice on adapting your workout to lockdown or for a full home program, feel free to DM

What you'll need to keep training through lockdown Welp. Here we go again. Another national lockdown coming up. It sucks, but we’ve got to face it. And with some creativity and less equipment than you’d think, you’ll be able to keep up a solid level of training till we open back up If you tried to get home training stuff last time you might remember there being a massive rush on almost all fitness equipment. No dumbells anywhere. Kettlebells became like gold dust. Everything that resembled a weight doubled in price and was instantly out of stock. The good news? You don't need them. With a little creativity and your own bodyweight, you can replace the majority of what you’d normally do. Throw in some resistance bands and you can do even more. Add some gymnastics rings and something to hang them from, and you’ll have pretty much everything covered. That whole setup should set you back less than 50 quid, no weights required. The last lockdown I was up north in the country with the luxury of a makeshift barnyard gym. This time I’ll be confined to a room (and possibly a park if I understand the rules). So I’ll be using that time and confined space to show you a few ways you can make the most of what you’ve got to maximise what you can get from training during lockdown. In the meantime, if you’ve got questions or would like a lockdown proof custom plan, with or without equipment, hit me up in the DMs. Good luck people! #homeworkout #yardworkout #backyardworkout #isolationgym #gymclosed #nogymneeded #nogymnoproblem #isolationtraining #backyardtraining #conditioningtraining #fightertraining #outdoorworkout #gymnasticrings#homeworkout#londonfitness #ptlondon #personaltrainerlondon #ptlondon #londonpt #londonfitfam #ptsoutheastlondon #southwark#southwarkpt #southlondonpt

Is training to failure always a good idea? Maybe not.  On my last post, I used the phrase “do less, more often” from a standpoint of improving your motivation and consistency. Turns out this philosophy can also be a smart way to increase your strength and performance. There’s a neurological principle called the Hebbian rule. At the risk of going out of my depth into neurology, let’s sum it up as “muscles that fire together, wire together”. In training terms, for a muscle to contract your nervous system has to send a signal to make this happen. The more often this happens successfully, the more efficient the process becomes - making the cumulative contractions stronger.  This gives us a principle that Pavel Tsatsouline called “greasing the groove”. Regular, submaximal training of a movement to increase neuromuscular efficiency and therefore strength. We want to perform the movement as regularly as we can to make this boost in efficiency happen. And (this is important) we don’t want to train even close to failure. This lets us perform the movement regularly without overtraining, fatiguing ourselves, or sacrificing form. Less. More often. Applying this can be simple. A few dips (say half of what you can do) whenever you get a chance. Half of your max reps of pull-ups several times a day, or every time you pass something you can hang from. Counterintuitive to what we’re normally taught, but doing this consistently can help get you past strength plateau you might struggle with conventionally. To talk strategies on how you can use this, feel free to ask in my DMs. #fitnessmotivation #accountability #londonfitness #traineveryday #dailyfitness #ptlondon #londonrunning #personaltrainerlondon #dailytraining #fitdaily #ptlondon #londonpt #londonfitfam #consistenttraining #ptsoutheastlondon #southwark#southwarkpt#londonbridge #southlondonpt

Feel like you’ve lost some momentum recently?⁠ ⁠ Like you get on a good track, training, eating healthy, treating your body right but just somehow keep falling off?⁠ ⁠ Ever hear the phrase “Go Hard Or Go Home”. It’s everywhere in the fitness industry. It sounds good. It’s also nonsense.⁠ ⁠ If you live by the phrase “Go Hard Or Go Home”, more often than not, you’ll end up going home. ⁠ ⁠ So am I saying never train hard? No. ⁠ ⁠ It’s not smart, productive, or even possible to train as hard as possible every single time you train.⁠ ⁠ Much as we’d like to think we’re superheroes or machines, in the end, we need to account for rest and progressive overload if we want to see significant results.⁠ ⁠ This is especially true for starting out or getting back into training. Go all out too early, too frequently, and if you’ll burn yourself out mentally and physically, as well as risking injury. It’s unsustainable long term.⁠ ⁠ But if you start off doing less than your max, slowly working up and allowing your body to adapt - not only will you be in a better position to keep consistent physically, but you’ll have the mental drive of knowing that next time you can get back in and give a little more.⁠ ⁠ So let’s say you have a big goal - like running a marathon. But you aren’t running now. If you go all “beast mode” and run 15km on your first day it might feel badass for the first half-hour, but the chances of you doing that every time are slim.⁠ ⁠ But what if you start off almost insultingly easy? Run down the road to the supermarket? Does it feel badass? Maybe not. Can you get it done? Yes. Can you do more next time? And more after that? Hell yes.⁠ ⁠ Start small. Build up. Listen to your body, and adapt accordingly. ⁠ ⁠ And if you’d like some advice on how to do that, feel free to DM⁠ ⁠ #fitnessmotivation #accountability #londonfitness #traineveryday #dailyfitness #ptlondon #londonrunning #personaltrainerlondon #dailytraining #fitdaily #ptlondon #londonpt #londonfitfam #consistenttraining #ptsoutheastlondon #southwark#southwarkpt#londonbridge #southlondonpt⁠ ⁠ ⁠

To be as strong as possible, you need to train stability. In fancy terms - "distal mobility requires proximal stability". In everyday terms - "You can't put a jet engine on a canoe".⁠ ⁠ Your core is a complicated thing, with multiple different functions. It takes a variety of different forms of resistance to train it properly. This is the main reason that just doing a bunch of sit-ups won't get you a strong core or decent abs. ⁠ ⁠ A big part of what your core muscles do is stabilize you and protect your spine against unwanted flexion, extension and rotation. By using exercises where we have to actively stabilize and use our abdominal muscles to resist these movements, we get a bigger payoff from our core training, both functionally and aesthetically. ⁠ ⁠ This is especially true if you're training for combat sports or other areas that require power production. By developing a stable base to work from, you help to maximise your ability to produce force as fast as possible while minimising the risk of injury⁠ ⁠ The Pallof press (pictured) is a great exercise to build anti-rotational strength. ⁠ ⁠ PTs available, DM for enquiries.⁠ ⁠ ⁠ #conditioningtraining #sportsperformance #unconventionaltraining #fightertraining #hardwork #mmatraining#mmafitness#mmaconditioning#outdoorworkout #abs #balance #posture #corestrength #coreworkout #coretraining #functionaltraining #antirotation #pallofpress #core #stability