When I first met Katie, she had worked with trainers before, but hadn’t been able to maintain long term fitness. Like many people, she seesawed back and forth with her dedication and often let life get in the way of her health. As a result, she was never able to make any significant gains in her strength and endurance.

Having shed a considerable amount of fat and built a healthy amount of lean muscle since we began training, Katie now recognizes that fitness can only be maintained with dedication and consistency. There are going to be bumps in the road, but Katie knows to keep the car moving.

When Katie and I started working out together, the idea of her doing a pull-up was out of the question, but now she can do one with confidence! We’ve also started working on more advanced leg exercises, like pistol squats.

Watch the video below to see Katie doing push-ups, Australian pull-ups and more during our last workout at Tompkins Square Park.

Man has yet to fly without airplanes or helicopters, but performing a back lever feels pretty close! Practicing this exercise can help you build total body strength while giving you the sensation of being suspended in mid-air. Back levers are fun and functional, plus they look bad-ass!

Skinning the Cat
Before you attempt a back lever, you’ll need to learn how to “skin the cat.” Don’t worry, I’m not advocating harming any felines! In this context, the phrase “skinning the cat” refers to rolling your hips and legs over and around to the other side of the bar from a pull-up position.

Start by hanging from a bar with an overhand grip, then begin raising your legs with your knees bent. When your knees are all the way up to your chest, rotate your body around to the other side, keeping your legs tucked tight so they don’t hit the bar as you pass through. From here, extend your legs and let your body hang before reversing the movement.

Performing a Back Lever
Once you can get your legs over to the other side of the bar, you’re ready to start practicing towards a back lever. I like to get into position by straightening my entire body so that I’m hanging almost completely upside down with my legs above the bar and my torso below.

From there, start to lower yourself one inch at a time while pitching your chest forward. The objective is to get your body parallel to the ground with your hips directly under the bar. It’s helpful to have someone watch you or videotape you while you are doing this as you’ll likely have a hard time feeling when you are in position. Remember to contract your abs, lower back, hamstrings and glutes while performing this move. Your arms are only one small part of the equation.

Editors note: This is a guest post by my brother Danny Kavadlo.

There are many paths you can take when putting together a home gym. Throughout my life, I’ve owned free weights, benches, push-up bars, and a pull-up bar mounted in a doorframe. However, as we progress in fitness and life, our goals change and so do our needs. Like our bodies, our minds and creative forces need to be challenged (it just feels good to make something). So when the itch to create a home gym struck again, it was a no-brainer: a backyard pull-up bar was the only way to go.

Why Build A Backyard Pull-Up Bar?
The way I train, a door-frame or stand up (power-tower) design would not meet my needs, which include plyometrics and aggressive kipping. I needed something that could withstand hundreds of pounds of explosive force.

The basic design is a bar supported by two posts dug deep in the ground; it needs to be SOLID. The plan was to leave 8’ of pole above ground and 4’ below. I wound up going about 6” deeper for extra stability. But even within that simple layout, there are a lot of choices to make.

Wood Posts Vs. Metal Posts
If you are working with wood posts, I’d recommend going no smaller than 6×6. A 2×4 is not going to cut it. Be sure to use “treated” wood (it’s the one at Home Depot with the green tint.) It’s worth the extra money to have something that will stand the test of time. Be aware that you’ll have to purchase circular metal flanges to affix the bar to the wood. These flanges range from $8-$20 depending on the style.

Wood is cost efficient, solid and looks great, but I looked forward to practicing the human flag on my bar, so my posts had to be metal. Generally plumbers’ galvanized 2” pipe is about $7 per foot. However, you can’t get anything larger than 8’ at a hardware store (even giants like Home Depot or Lowes). To make a 12’ post, you’d have to buy 20’ directly from a supplier, pay for each cut and buy 90 degree fittings (also about $8-$20) to attach each post to the bar itself. Instead, I contacted a local gate manufacturer to build the initial design (two 12’ iron posts welded to a 4’ bar up top, plus another 4’ bar 3 ½’ from the bottom—this lower bar gets buried for stability) for $180.

Another factor influencing stability is the amount of concrete used in the foundations. Most websites I consulted expressed remorse about not using enough cement. I decided to avoid that problem by using 600 lbs. per post. Remember, I said AGGRESSIVE KIPPING!

The Bar
A standard pull-up bar is 1”-1 ½” in diameter and 2-3’ in length. To get the most out of mine, I did 2” diameters and 4’ across. The 2” grip makes for a harder workout and is excellent for building grip strength.

Be aware that raw metal bars are open on the ends so you’ll need to seal them. I filled mine with cement and painted over them, but you can use nylon or rubber stoppers.

Additional Considerations
Aside from the posts and bars, if you’re making a backyard pull-up bar you’ll need the following:

– Post Hole Diggers
– Shovel
– Cement (I used twenty-five 80 lb. bags)
– Something to mix it in (You don’t need a wheel barrow. I got a huge planter for $18. Next year I’ll grow fresh herbs in it.)
– Leveler
– Six 2×4’s and some screws (for building a frame)
– Oil-based enamel paint (or lacquer for wood posts)

Building Your Bar
Make sure you have plenty of space. My posts were affixed 4’ apart so I set the holes 4’ apart. If you are using wood posts, I recommend building the 1st post completely and then measuring the 2nd one from it to ensure accuracy.

My holes were about 12” diameter at the bottom and about 18” on top. I also dug a trough about 18” deep from one post to the other, which when filled with cement, surrounded the bar at the bottom of the frame. Even with post-hole diggers, digging 4 ½’ holes is extremely challenging, which made for a great workout!

Each post has to go in perfectly straight. The bar connecting them must be level, and needs to remain so until the concrete sets. The best way to ensure this is to build a wooden frame out of 2×4’s around the structure before you put the concrete in. Take your time! This step is important and will require a lot of trial-and-error.

Once the structure is level, straight and properly framed in wood, fill the holes with concrete. When the concrete dries, remove the frame and you’ve got your pull-up bar!

Almost…

A New Life
Even with four and a half feet in the ground and a ton of cement, explosive muscle-ups caused my backyard pull-up bar to vibrate. It was just a tiny bit, but that wasn’t part of the dream. Changes had to be made. The bars needed diagonal support against one another. Vertical and horizontal were not enough.

I decided that in making it more stable, I’d change the whole shape and make it better! I had a smaller post/bar combo fabricated and set it up 4’ behind my initial bar (This one was 10’ high; I buried just shy of 4’ of it). It had to be parallel to the first structure, as well as level with the ground. Once it was in, I used four 7’ diagonal cross beams to mount the two structures together and two 4’ horizontal crossbeams for extra support. I purchased used scaffold clamps (“cheezeboros” in the production world) for $10 each to secure them. Finally, when the concrete dried and the smoke cleared…THIS BABY WASN’T GOING ANYWHERE!

The best part of this new design was that it wasn’t limited to pull-ups, muscle-ups, and flags. It could accommodate Australian pull-ups, dips and an unlimited variety of grips. My backyard pull-up bar had exceeded my expectations!

In this world, things don’t always go as planned. But when we move forward and roll with the changes, we may find ourselves grateful for the unexpected. That’s part of what makes life beautiful. I’m proud to say I have Brooklyn’s finest home gym – and proud to have made it with my own two hands!

Watch the video below for more:

If you’ve ever watched weightlifting in the Olympics, you’ve likely seen the clean and press. There are many variations on this movement, but in its most basic sense, it simply involves lifting a heavy weight off the floor and over your head in an explosive fashion.

There are many ways to fit the clean and press into your routine. You can load up the bar and do a single rep as a test of strength, or use it as a conditioning exercise by doing high reps with a low to moderate weight. In spite of these two terrific applications, I hardly ever see anyone doing them at the gym.

The Clean
I’ve often thought of the movement involved in the clean to be the opposite of a muscle-up. Instead of using your explosive power to get your body up over a bar, when you do a clean you’re using it to move the bar up over your body.

The clean starts like a deadlift, but continues all the way up until the bar is caught in front of your chest (similar to a front squat). The movement is initiated from the hips; as you pull the bar straight up in front of you, your heels should come off the ground. When the bar is as high as it can go, you drop down underneath it, making a shelf with your arms to catch it.

The Press
Just like the clean, the press is initiated from the hips and lower body. The arms should almost become an afterthought. The power from your legs should transfer up into your arms seamlessly as you complete the lift.

Kettlebell Clean and Press
The balance of a kettlebell is different than that of a barbell due to its shape. Get comfortable with the proper kettlebell swing before learning cleans. You must learn to use your hamstrings, glutes and core muscles to generate power from your hips.

Since kettlebells aren’t connected, you can rotate your forearms when you’re doing cleans with them. If the barbell clean and press is like a bar muscle-up, the kettlebell clean and press is more like a muscle-up on rings. Turn your wrist through to prevent the kettlebell from flipping over and smacking your arm too hard.

The clean and press is a complex movement; it takes practice to get the feel and the timing of it, so start with light weight. It is best to have a trainer present when learning a difficult new exercise.

Watch the video below for more on the clean and press:

Thanks to Nimble Fitness for letting me film in their facility.

I once knew a guy who threw out his back while getting a beer out of a cooler. Seriously.

If you don’t take care of your body, at some point you’ll wind up getting an (easily preventable) injury.

Flexibility is often the most overlooked aspect of fitness, but without a full range of motion in your joints, basic exercises like squats, overhead presses and even pull-ups can be problematic.

The most common areas where people tend to become overly tight are the hips, hamstrings, shoulders and back, though tightness in the wrists and ankles can also pose a problem when performing exercises like push-ups and squats.

If you’re inflexible, you need to devote as much attention to improving your range of motion as you do to increasing your strength. After all, without a healthy range of motion in your joints, you can’t fully work your muscles.

Hamstring Flexibility
The standard way to assess hamstring flexibility is the sit and reach test. (See photo above)

After warming up, have a seat on the floor with your legs extended straight in front of you. Without bending your knees, reach forward for your toes. If you cannot touch your toes, you need to work towards loosening your hamstrings.

Hip Mobility
To test the range of motion in your hips, you’ll need a sturdy table or ledge just below waist height. Pick up one leg and place the outside of your ankle on the table. Now rotate your hip to try to touch your knee to the table as well (your shin should be perpendicular to your body.) If you cannot touch your knee to the table, your hip mobility could stand to improve.

Shoulders and Back
Shoulder mobility can also be easily tested. Lay on your back with your knees bent and your feet flat on the ground. Reach both hands overhead and try to touch your wrists to the ground without raising your lower back off the floor. If you cannot do this, guess what? You have poor range of motion in your shoulders and upper back.

While men generally tend to be stronger than women, flexibility is one area where the ladies get the long end of the stick. Most men will not be able to pass all three tests (I can’t – my shoulders are tight!) so don’t feel bad. Luckily, there is a simple solution to this problem – stretch!

Improving your flexibility takes time, especially for older individuals as your body has had more time to get used to being stiff. You must be patient and dedicated if you wish to increase your flexibility.

Right: I’ve found this stretch, which I like to call a “wall dog,” to be helpful for my upper back, but it can also be useful for stretching the hamstrings and calves. Start by grabbing a bar or a ledge that’s a bit higher than waist level. Next, step back, push your hips out and press your chest to the ground. Try to avoid bending your knees or rounding your back.

For more information, pick up a copy of my new book, Stretching Your Boundaries.

In my early twenties, I could deadlift almost twice my bodyweight, but I couldn’t even run one mile. My weak link was exposed when I attended a personal trainer workshop that included a barrage of fitness tests, one of which was a 1.5 mile run.

Even though I didn’t finish last, it was a bit embarrassing for me. The experience prompted me to shift my focus from strength and hypertrophy to working on overall fitness. I started running and practicing yoga and in 2009, I ran the NYC Marathon.

The spectrum for endurance sports is quite large and it is constantly increasing. When I first heard of the Ironman, I couldn’t conceive of how that was even possible! I now know many people who’ve finished Ironmans (yes, regular people just like you and me!). There’s even a DOUBLE Ironman for those rare individuals who think 140.6 miles just isn’t enough. I’m not proposing that we all go out and start competing in triathlons, but developing your cardio conditioning can make everyday activities easier and more enjoyable.

Testing Your Endurance
The funny thing with cardio is that it doesn’t always carry over from one activity to the next. This is part of the appeal of triathlons, as they test your endurance over three modalities. It’s amazing how sometimes a person can be good at one activity and very bad at another. Take me for example, I’m a decent runner and cyclist, but I’m a weak swimmer. (I’ve recently started practicing more though – I’m hoping to do my first tri in 2011!)

I’ve also known a few good runners who couldn’t even ride a bike, so skill specificity has a lot to do with it. You get better at what you practice; it’s really that simple. Wanna be a good runner? Run!

With that in mind, here are some guidelines to judge your aerobic endurance. (I’ve decided to make these gender neutral.)

Swim 750 meters (just under half a mile) in under 20 minutes
Bike 20 kilometers (about 12.5 miles) in under 40 minutes
Run 5 kilometers (about 3.1 miles) in under 30 minutes

I’ve chosen these distances because they are the standards used in most sprint triathlons. You don’t need to be able to do all three in order to test your conditioning. However, if you can’t pass at least one of these requirements, you ought to work on your cardio. (Serious athletes can do these requirements in less than half the time.)

One more thing, I’m not talking about running on a treadmill or riding a stationary bike. If you want to truly test your cardio, don’t use machines! For the swim, feel free to use a pool.

Make sure to check out part three of this series for information on assessing your flexibility.

There are generally three categories used to assess physical fitness: strength, endurance and flexibility. Within each of those groups, however, there are many variables to consider.

The strength required to throw a baseball 90 miles-an-hour is very different from the strength used to deadlift 700 pounds or that which is needed to perform a back lever. (I challenge you to find one person who can do all three of those things!)

The same is true of endurance; climbing stairs requires a unique type of stamina when compared to swimming or running.

Even flexibility gets tricky to gauge; throwing a roundhouse kick at eye level requires flexibility, but it’s different than the flexibility needed to perform a back bridge.

While specific skills like the ones mentioned above can be used to assess strength, endurance or flexibility, I believe an individual should meet several requirements to be deemed fit.

Notwithstanding my belief that goals are far less important than the actual practice of regular exercise, I’ve decided to put forth the following guidelines to use for self-assessment. Let’s start with strength.

Assessing Your Strengths (And Weaknesses)
There are basically two ways to measure or improve your strength: move your own bodyweight (my favorite) or, as Mark Sisson likes to say, “lift heavy things” (which is also very effective).

To meet my standards for basic strength, an individual should be able to perform the following:

Men
40 Push-ups
10 Pull-ups
50 Squats

Women
10 Push-ups
15 Australian Pull-ups
50 Squats

You might be thinking, “Al, doing 40 push-ups is a test of muscular endurance – not strength!” And you wouldn’t be wrong to think that. I told you these types of assessments can get tricky!

If you are looking to test your strength for one rep, then use weights. Keep in mind that even with weight training, it is best to judge your strength relative to your body weight. A 250 lb. man should be expected to lift a lot more than a man who weighs 165 lbs. With that in mind, anyone who I consider strong will likely meet the following minimum criteria:

Men
Clean and Press 50% of your bodyweight
Squat 90% of your bodyweight
Deadlift 100% of your bodyweight

Women
Clean and Press 35% of your bodyweight
Squat 60% of your bodyweight
Deadlift 70% of your bodyweight

Remember that these are not hard and fast rules with which to judge yourself. Simply use this as a way to assess what aspects of your game might be worth giving extra attention – then get to work!

It should be noted that technique is a factor in performing these lifts as well. Make sure you understand the mechanics of any given exercise prior to testing your limits.

In parts two and three I discuss my thoughts on assessing endurance and flexibility. Use the comment section below to share your thoughts on assessing strength.

October 2010 marks the one year anniversary of AlKavadlo.com. My blog has grown a lot over the last 12 months and so have I. Thanks to everyone who’s been supportive, followed this blog and left comments.

This blog is as much for you as it is for me so please continue to tell me what you like and don’t like, as well as what you want to see here in the future.

In order to commemorate this milestone, I put together a video montage featuring some of my favorite moments, along with outtakes and other never-before-seen footage. Enjoy!

You might not know it by looking at him, but John is one hell of an athlete, having completed multiple marathons and Ironmans. Since his last marathon, however, John had gotten lax with his training and diet. Nothing lasts forever; if you don’t use it – you lose it!

A few months ago, John decided it was time to get serious again and enlisted me as his trainer. John has since lost over 25 pounds; his conditioning is coming back and he says he feels stronger than ever. Not bad for a guy who just celebrated his 40th birthday!

John loves healthy competition, so when he heard about the 100 Rep Challenge he wanted to give it a shot. I designed the following 100 rep workout to test John’s strength, conditioning and balance.

John’s 100 Rep Challenge consists of:
20 Push-ups
20 Lunges
20 Australian Pull-ups
20 Squats
20 Dips

All that is to be done in succession with as few breaks as possible.

Watch the video below to see if he can make it:

Don’t forget to check out the 100 Rep Challenge official website for more info.

If you think pistol squats are the be-all-and-end-all of bodyweight leg exercises, think again. The shrimp squat is a challenging single-leg bodyweight movement that can humble any sharpshooting pistol squatter.

Instead of being positioned in front of the body as it is with the pistol, when you perform a shrimp squat, your non-squatting leg is held behind the body.

As a result, the movement pattern becomes more hip-driven, which almost makes it closer to a lunge than a squat.

To perform a shrimp squat, begin in an upright position, then bend one knee so you can grab your ankle behind your back (just like you would if you were stretching your quads). From here, slowly lower yourself down until your knee touches the ground, then stand back up. Easier said than done!

When performing the shrimp squat, reach your free arm out in front to counterbalance the weight of your leg behind you. Like most other squats, you’ll need to pitch your chest forward on the way up to keep from falling backwards.

To regress the shrimp squat, you can try holding both arms in front of your body. Conversely, you can place both arms behind your back to make the move more difficult. This will put you at a serious mechanical disadvantage, plus you’ll no longer be able to use your free arm for balance.

You can also stand on an elevated surface to increase the range of motion for an additional challenge.

Watch the video below for more: