Raw Strength

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You have got to train for speed! It’s no good getting strong as hell if you’re slow as hell! I’ve said it time and time again; When you’re an athlete, you have to be strong to be fast, but remember that lifting weights is not the main event! You have to be fast, skilful and have a never-quit attitude. Heavy strength training will give you the necessary foundations to develop all of the above, but you ABSOLUTELY MUST combine heavy strength training with lighter speed training. This is what will set you apart from everyone else. With that said here is a look inside the Raw Strength Gym on one of our dynamic lower body sessions so you can see how we develop speed, explosive power, strength and muscle in all the right areas to create BEASTS! Take some notes and start applying what you learn!     If you want to become the best athlete you can be, join Raw Strength by clicking on the menu bar above or visit the website . Join the gym for athletes at rawstrength.co.uk ONLY ...

Rugby players and other beast athletes! You gotta bench! Read the following tips and watch the video to learn how to immediately improve your bench! The bench press is what we call an ‘indicator’ exercise because when your bench press goes up it proves that your program is working. So periodic testing of the bench press gives us an INDICATION of the development of upper body strength. Benching allows you to lift HUGE amounts of weight and build a load of muscle in the arms, chest and shoulders. The stronger you get, the bigger you get. Simple as. So here are three techniques we use at Raw Strength that will IMMEDIATELY increase your bench: 1. Set up Properly The ‘set-up’ is the way you position yourself on the bench BEFORE you pick the weight up out of the rack, it’s so important it could literally have its own article! For now I’ll just give you a few tips…… Lie on the bench with your eyes in line with the bar Position your feet on the floor, underneath your hips and staying...

Welcome back to part TWO of my top ten training tips for in-season rugby players. This is how to MAINTAIN your strength and fitness from your off-season…and how to build more strength too. If you missed part one check it here 6. Train Your Hamstrings To become a monster on the field and protect your legs/hips/knees from injury, you gotta train your hamstrings! Strong and well developed hammies make you faster, stronger, heavier and an all round unit! Strong hamstrings will also support the box squat, which should be your main lower body lift! The simplest way to train your hamstrings is with a glute ham raise bench, throw them in as a warm-up on upper body sessions and work them hard after your squat on lower body days. Do them at least twice a week and you will reap the benefits. Now I know a lot of people don’t have access to a glute ham bench, you guys need to do good mornings and loads of glute bridge and hip thrust style movements for the above recommendations. 7. SLEEP! ...

You should be in shape right now! After a good 3 month off-season of sprinting, lifting, growing, eating and skills training, you should be the strongest you’ve ever been! The problem is, most players forget that you must MAINTAIN your off season gains during the playing season. Just playing rugby games on the weekends (or 2-3 times a week for the younger guys!) is not going to maintain your strength OR muscle size. You WILL, without question, get smaller and weaker during the season if you don’t MAINTAIN your strength! This is due to 2 things: 1.   Endurance or Long Duration exercise makes you weaker (and skinny!) The human body is incredibly adaptable, and will transform itself to perform as well as it can in any situation that you CONSTANTLY throw at it. So whatever you do the most of, your body will adapt to. If  the majority of your exercising hours each week are spent running and playing rugby, you will adapt to become better suited to endurance exercise. Your fast...

As I see it, strength and conditioning coaching for amateur sports clubs is an afterthought. Skills training and sport specific drills are always going to be, and should be, the priority. But there’s more to a team than just being good at the skills, you need to be physically fit for your environment, FOR YOUR SPORT, and there’s a whole host of other disciplines that sports coaches should be looking at, not necessarily to hire a team of professional nutritionists, physios, strength coaches etc. But you must review your sports club, see what you can outsource either partially (buy a book/dvd, learn it and implement it) or fully (hire someone else to come in on an hourly rate, rather than a full time salary). Just because your club is amateur doesn’t mean you should treat your athletes as such…..every pro athlete starts out as an amateur and I’m sick of hearing people blame pro athletes in the UK as being unfit to compete on a global stage, as we really should be focusing on improvin...

Picture the scene…. Its squat day, you’ve been visualising crushing the weights all day long whilst at work, and as soon as you feel the bar on your back you’re gonna smash some records! So you get to the gym, put on some heavy tunes, do a few bodyweight movements to get started, then some mobility/flexibility work, then you start out with the bar and gradually add plates until a weight you have never lifted before is on the bar…..here’s the moment you’ve been waiting for all day! You get set, lower to the box, and smoke it! You just destroyed your previous lift and it felt easy! New max!!! Now what? …..uh….dunno….didn’t plan this far ahead. All too often the above scenario occurs, we break records in the gym then go home, or do some half arsed workout and assistance movements cos we’re suffocated by our pride! Yeah, breaking records feels good, but should it stop you having a great workout? Hell no! Max out on a lift, then move to your second movement and go balls out on that ...

How do you warm-up? A couple of star-jumps? A bit of jogging and a few press-ups? Most people think that a warm-up is just to get the blood flowing round the body and prepare the joints for more intense work. The problem is, that’s only half the story, you could use your time more efficiently to really maximise your performance in the rest of your competition or workout. Here’s how…   1. Use corrective exercises. Corrective exercises are movements that you must use to correct weaknesses or imbalances in your body, the most common uses are to improve posture in the upper back and shoulder joint, improve abdominal/hip posture and getting the glutes to fire properly. Although there are many, MANY corrective exercises you can use for your specific weaknesses, these are the most common areas due to the majority of the population being sedentary and sitting down all day! This causes a badly rounded and weak upper back, tight hip flexors and inflexible and weak glutes and hamstrings....

I read a lot of books, one of which I’ve found has a lot of parallels with sport and the behaviour of athletes. The book I’m on about is called ‘The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People’ by Stephen R. Covey. Let me explain what I’ve found and how it can benefit you as an athlete. You must start with the end in mind. If you can’t visualise or don’t visualise what the end goal will be AND how it will make you feel then you will definitely be more likely to quit. So focus on what you want to achieve, like making the county squad or the youth academy squad, AND THEN focus on HOW IT WILL MAKE YOU FEEL. Proud? Happy? Satisfied? Always keep the focus on both of these points and your motivation will go through the roof! Be Proactive. Plan out your weeks diet. Plan recovery sessions and days off. Set a bedtime for yourself so you always wake up rested and relaxed. Be in charge of your day. Only you can make changes in your life. Let me make a simple point here…How do you think profess...

Welcome to another Ask Ant blog post where I answer any and all of your questions!   QUESTION: Hi, I’m a rower and I do a lot of pulling movements in the weights room. However I feel that my pull-up reps are limited by a weak grip. So what can I do to strengthen my grip for pull-ups? Charlie   ANSWER: Charlie, thanks for asking a question, lets take a closer look at your problem and what you can do to solve it. Pull-ups require a hell of a lot of strength but are one of THE best bodyweight exercises you can do, so stick at them, especially as you’re a rower with a need for a strong grip and pulling strength! The best way to improve your grip strength for pull-ups is to do more pull-ups! You need to improve your grip strength-endurance… There are two main ways to increase total strength endurance. 1) Increase your muscular coordination .  2) Increased growth of type IIa (fast oxidative glycolytic) muscle fibres.   Lets take a more in-depth look at these...

Welcome to answer time! You ask the questions and I’ll throw the answers straight back at ya! Here we go… QUESTION: Why do your legs tire faster when dragging the sled backwards as opposed to forwards? Tony   ANSWER: Thanks for the question Tony! If we take a look at how much muscle is located on the back of your legs, we find the hamstrings, glutes and calves. The combination of all of these muscles is a group commonly called the ‘posterior chain’, they are the strongest group of muscles in the body and you use them all when you drag the sled forwards. Now compare that to how much muscle is located on the front of your legs; we have the quadriceps and hip flexor muscles (iliopsoas, pectineus, sartorius and rectus femoris for those who are interested!). When these muscles are combined the total strength is less than the ‘posterior chain’ AKA the strongest muscle group, and these weaker muscles are used when you drag the sled backwards. So it’s harder to drag the sled bac...

There is a LOT of misinformation out there in the fitness world, I know, I’ve listened to some crap advice and done my fair share of ridiculous programs! But here is the TRUTH. Answers from PROVEN research and personal experience to protect you from the lies. QUESTION: I want to add definition to myself without adding extra weight, how can I improve muscle definition without hypertrophy? Matt   ANSWER: Hi Matt, thanks for the question! To increase your muscle definition you have to lose fat whilst maintaining your current muscle mass, and hopefully strength, I’m assuming that losing weight due to fat loss won’t be a problem so here goes: There are 2 things we need to take into account to achieve this goal: 1) Your diet has to change to decrease caloric intake AND increase the quality of foods you eat 2) Your training must increase your metabolism to burn more fat AND still maintain your strength and muscle mass   Your diet is the most important aspect of changing b...

This is a showcase to demonstrate the great efforts and hard work of all the clients at Raw Strength. First up is Jacob, age 15, he plays rugby union for Warrington and Lancashire. In his first month of training Jacob had the following stats: 37 barbell press-ups (Hands on a bar raised off the floor) Unable to do any pull-ups 60kg box squat for 4 reps Unable to flip the big tyre   During 3 months of HARD training twice a week Jacob has achieved: 60 barbell press-ups 30 press-ups with his feet on a box (feet higher than hands) 6 pull-ups 67.5kg box squat for 12 reps 5 flips of the big tyre   Jacob has put on some visible muscle mass throughout training, is considerably fitter and much stronger and is about to start an intense off-season program for rugby to further increase his improvements! Check the following video, Jacob is the second guy… I’m really excited about what he can achieve over the next 3 months of training. So congratulations to Jacob for steppin...

Here’s part 2 of the ‘Eating For Winners’ Series of articles. Part One is Here. WHY YOU NEED TO EAT DURING COMPETITION During any high-intensity exercise your body is going to need a lot of energy, the reason athletes get fatigued, cramp up and injured during the later stages of competition is because they just run out of ENERGY! High intensity exercise includes weight lifting, rugby, football, tennis and any sport that requires repeated, intense activity for upwards of 60mins. The energy source used is called GLYCOGEN, and it is derived from all the carbohydrate (carbs) you should’ve eaten if you’ve read Part One! The benefits of ingesting carbohydrate during exercise include: You can play at a HIGHER intensity for LONGER when you eat or drink carbs DURING your performance. Your skill performance is going to be helped as you can last LONGER before exhaustion. You will immediately use what you ingest for energy, saving your body’s stores of glycogen, so you will perform BETTER ...

Here is something you’ll undoubtedly hear all the time……."If you aren’t eating correctly, there’s no point in training!” Now whilst I’m not quite inclined to agree with this it does carry some merit, especially if we look at the benefits of correct nutrition, PRE, DURING and POST exercise. The benefits of eating in the right ways include: 1) Greater fat loss 3) Greater mental clarity 4) Greater physical performance 2) Greater rate of recovery (Think muscle growth!)   WHY YOU NEED TO EAT BEFORE COMPETING For athletes competing in the mornings, the PRE-COMPETITION meal takes on a greater significance. The overnight fast whilst asleep has depleted a lot of your stored carbs. You gotta break the FAST, refuel the body with CARBS and RE-HYDRATE  the body. It takes 3-4 hours to digest, absorb and most importantly, STORE energy in your muscles.   Stick to eating carbs and lean protein BECAUSE: 1) Carbs digest and absorb into the body faster than anything else 2) ...

So you wanna be a rower? Ask yourself the following questions: 1) Are you doing HEAVY strength work using basic exercises?  e.g. squat, deadlifts, pull-ups 2) Are you doing sport specific conditioning? AKA do you get in the boat often enough?! 3) Are you complementing your HEAVY strength training with assistance exercises for the correct movements? You MUST be answering all 3 of the above questions with a resounding YES in order to succeed in rowing. Not to mention other questions on diet, recovery, sleep, tactics, teamwork. But as I’m going to assume that you are constantly rowing throughout each week lets just look at how to get as strong as a VIKING!   THE MOVEMENT Simply; the rower is constantly pushing with the legs and pulling with the upper body. So all of your training MUST centre around standing up with and pulling heavy weights. THE BASICS FOR STRENGTH To intensely stimulate the correct muscles in a similar movement pattern your basic strength training m...

This is part 1 of a series of articles giving modern updates to tried and tested and AWESOME OLD SCHOOL methods of strength and muscle building. Part One: Super Squats (Information from the book ‘SUPER SQUATS’ by Randall J. Strossen Ph.D.) The ‘super squats’ or ‘squats and milk’ program is famed for its ability to pack on muscle, quickly, and also infamous for its intense and difficult workouts! It has to be the BEST example that “simple does not necessarily mean easy!” Method: Super Squats proposes to help you quickly gain muscle and strength by completing the following: Pick a weight for squats that you can lift for ten reps and no more Do one set of 20 reps without putting the bar down Seems impossible! But there lies the biggest, perhaps only theory on how this program will increase muscle mass…. DOING TEN MORE REPS THAN YOU THINK YOU CAN DO, WILL MAKE YOU GROW There is also a basic program in the book which I probably can’t share here completely due to copyright laws but...