Living with no regrets

No More POSTS!

2007-06-24T22:38:00.002+08:00

Yup thats right! no more blogging here!... but not to fear, all the posts have been transfered to my new blog.

Here is the link: www.singaporepersonaltrainer.blogspot.com

SIGNING OFF FROM BLOGGER! BUT GREAT THINGS AHEAD!

-captnJ

Impressive Taxi Driver

2007-06-14T20:22:00.000+08:00

Today I was taking a taxi... I met probably the fittest taxi driver ever. The guy is 55 years old and exercises daily. Maintains a 6 pack and wears the same pants as he wore 20 years ago as a member of the air force. Run's a 10 minute 1.5 mile. and a 65 sec 400m... It was pretty impressive. I even had the pleasure of helping him with some trigger points in his forearms which were possibly from spending all day gripping the steering wheel.

All wonderful news... except for a sad part of the story. He has a son who is a fat slob (his words not mine). The culprit: Computer games... no surprise but still quite a numbing thought. Most problems are traced to family issues and poor role modeling by parents. But this did not seem to be the case (from first contact).

It was scary that my children might end up like that! ... No computer games for them! That means that the entertainment will be ME. Read them books, play games, run around.

An observation...

2007-06-10T18:20:00.000+08:00

What is that worth to you?

I was walking past a food stall yesterday... there was this monster line formed at this famous wanton mee stall. That is something i would not do. Wasting life (time) and wasting health (processed food) all in one swoop! what a mistake!

This Year's NBA finals

2007-06-09T17:33:00.001+08:00

Its the San Antonio Spurs vs the Cleveland Cavaliers. The spurs are the ultimate basketball team. They play outstanding team defense, they play selfless offense, always making the correct passes. They do ZERO do fancy stuff. They WIN.

The Cavaliers have Lebron James. I like him. He's skillful, athletic, strong and big. Much more than that... he made for the mass market, hes made for TV highlights and Youtube postings. He sells lots of jerseys...But the cavaliers are not nearly as good a team as the spurs.

But there is one strange thing about this finals.

People are pretty sure the Spurs are going to win. Vegas Betting odds confirm it! But I feel that people are rooting for the cavs! Not because the Spurs are bad guys, just that they do everything SO EXACTLY RIGHT, ALL THE TIME that they get "boring!" how sad! Excellence is now called boring. No wonder so many people don't strive for it.

No sex, no violence, no stimulation, --> Boring. Thats Sad.

Excellence demands rigor, not being inflexible, but being throughly committed to greatness. Endless stimulation is just a weak way out of problems.

Excellence is what life should be about! Thats why I deleted all my computer games. Thats why I read books during all my free time... what about you?

The false stuff is still out there...

2007-06-04T18:08:00.000+08:00

I was recently at a lunch with my dad's friends. As expected, I got asked many fitness related questions. I am sorry to say that we as fitness professionals are, no matter what we may say, not doing a good job of getting word out about what is true and what is not. These are smart, professional people earning good salaries in the finance industry. But expertise doesn't transfer from one industry to another. However, they were open to learning and thats great news! Expertise does not transfer, but a learning attitude does!

Here were the fallacies that came up:

Core stability? How do you train it? - Stability exercises not sit-ups
Nutrition basics - whoa! a calories is NOT a calorie... the Quality of calories matters alot!
Isolations, slow, machine exercises - Oops, those combine the 3 LEAST effective types into one time wasting program!
Jogging - dangerous and unproductive
Eating more often makes me... LEANER?

Clearing these up person by person is not going to happen. Good thing we have the internet and I have my free newsletter (which is wonderfully well subscribed - thanks to all who signed up!) and my website and blog to post articles on. Maybe one day the old wives tales will be gone!

It took a while to learn that the earth was round. I will be patient!

CoachJon.com is up!

2007-05-27T20:11:00.000+08:00

I wanted a place to post more more "complete" articles and profile. A blog is great for day to day happenings, but a website gives a more stable place to post stuff that doesn't go "out of style"!

I will write articles as often as I can and will send out a free newsletter to all subscribers as well:)
Stay Tuned For more exciting stuff up there!

Kindness vs foolishness

2007-05-24T19:42:00.000+08:00

Note: no names will be revealed so that I don't end up destroying anybody's reputation. It is the principle that we are talking about here, not the facts themselves.

Recently I was asked to give a series of public speaking engagements on 2 topics. Posture and nutrition to a groups of youth who are at risk due to their sedentary lifestyles (yes... adults are at risk too!).

Thats easy. I love talking about this kind of thing. And to back up the talking (and uh... so my reputation as a fitness expert is not tarnished), I also love reading health, fitness and performance related books, DVD's and science journals.

However I faced a situation. In this series of talks (about 12 -15 in total) the first 2 were terrible logistically. No microphone, no working projector, no suitable area to project on, organizers were late getting people in, sudden changes in venue and timing. All in all an unprofessional organizational job...despite being given prior instructions to have these in place.

It happens. Not everybody matches our expectations.

But what to do about it? I thought it through. On the one hand, I want to give the talks because i really do care that these youth will end up dead prematurely with their current lifestyles. However with the support I am getting, the quality of the presentation and the perception of myself as a professional goes down...

So far I have kept cool about it and "shared" my views with the organizers. 2 times... is actually 2 times too many. But I'm trying to be understanding about it. I hope they can match the standards of excellence that I expect (and really, its not a lot that I am asking for as a speaker). Or else this will be an unpleasant experience.

Agility Is not just for athletes

2007-05-23T00:52:00.000+08:00

This is a pretty nutty story! Paula Abdul breaks her nose avoiding her dog. Ok while not poking fun at the misfortune of others, I'm a person who takes all "non contact" i.e. nobody hit you.. injuries as a training (or lack of training fault).

There are SO MANY non contact knee ligament tears, ankle sprains and back problems. Most people are no able to control their bodyweight well enough to avoid these injuries. Desk jobs and excess calories make this happen.

Thats why when I train people they first have to be able to accelerate and decelerate their own bodies before we start going wild with the heavy weights. Sometimes people ask me why my clients are doing "simple" stuff like push up and bodyweight inverted rows. Lunges and step-up's etc... Well... its because thats all they can handle at this moment and any more is irresponsible program design!

Yes... thats a woman! and thats good control of your bodyweight!

Back Pain is real!

2007-05-21T21:06:00.000+08:00

The statistics are pretty shocking... 80% of people will have some kind of back pain during their lifetime. Seems pretty accurate! I know 4 people who have recently injured their backs.

Injured While Sneezing
Injured helping an old lady carry her goods
Injured slipping on a badminton court
Injured helping a friend move furniture

All legitimate. All preventable.
The key is core stability.

Contrary to what is commonly thought, the core is NOT about endless crunches and other weird movements on a swiss ball. Just about every muscle in the core is set up to stabilize the lower back to PREVENT movement not create movement.

2 VERY basic core exercises that are safe for your spine, and train the core the way it was meant to be are the front plank and the side plank. Hold them for time 30-180 seconds depending on your ability.

FRONT PLANK

SIDE PLANK

Families are Important

2007-05-08T16:01:00.000+08:00

Fathers may be more important than mothers in determining whether a child becomes overweight or obese, according to a ground-breaking new Australian study by the Centre for Community Child Health at The Royal Children’s Hospital, Melbourne, and the Murdoch Childrens Research Institute.

“This study of a large cross-section of Australian pre-schoolers has, for the first time, suggested that fathers could be at the frontline in preventing early childhood obesity,” explains Associate Professor Melissa Wake of CCCH. “Mothers are often blamed for their children’s obesity, but this study suggests that for more effective prevention perhaps we should focus on the whole family.

“Given the importance of the family unit in a child’s preschool years, and its influence on their nutrition and physical activity levels, it is timely to look at the parenting roles of both parents and the impact they have on a child’s tendency to be overweight or obese,” she said. “This makes even more sense given that more than 40% of these young mothers and more than 60% of these young fathers were themselves overweight or obese.”

“We know from earlier research that childhood obesity is highly stable during the primary school years, right from school entry. For instance, the BMI of a prep- grade child has an 85% correlation with their BMI three years later. Obese school children are very likely to become obese adults,” warns Associate Professor Wake.

So dad's are even more responsible for the way kids turn out than moms... I am sure that this is not just a health related truth. Check out all the truly balanced, happy kids, they all have strong father figures.

Even more than running fast, lifting heavy stuff and being a successful and influential fitness professional, I want to be a world class dad and husband. Making myself a positive influence to the next generation is the stuff that legends are made of.

What if magic pill really work?

2007-05-01T09:24:00.000+08:00

More good news for the obese and overweight. Another "super pill". These just about NEVER WORK.... But lets say for a moment that they do and they work in 24 hours. But because of side effects, they only work 1 time before they become an overdose thats dangerous... wouldn't everybody just love that?

24 hours to --> hard abs, firm butt and thighs, slim waist, you know... all the promises that slimming centers and other services often give but never truly make good on...

Would anybody buy one? OF COURSE. It will be a top seller!

But I wouldn't recommend it. Here is why: IT WOULDN'T LAST. Instant abs can be lost with a couple of weeks

The journey to great health and fitness is absolutely necessary to long term sustenance. Getting those great abs with no effort or discipline. Will mean lose them just as fast.

Do you want long term success? Learn all the secrets along the journey.

Good Luck! And don't be taken in by instant gratification!

Fat melting, heart pounding training.

2007-04-30T19:41:00.000+08:00

This is part of today's workout. I did 3 sets of 8, 6, 6,reps. 135lbs. (60kg) One rep is:

Drop down and do a pushup
Grab the bar
Power Clean
Front Squat
Push Press
Repeat!

8 reps took about 65 sec. It was pretty tough but I like it! Its just one of the combination exercises you can do to really melt fat and work on your conditioning.

Results of 6 weeks of strength training on a golfer.

2007-04-26T20:16:00.000+08:00

Yeah that golfer is my DAD. Remember he wanted to get fit. He's been doing body weight circuits + kettle bell training for the past 6 weeks. Not only is he harder and his tummy smaller, his golf game took a nice turn for the better. He is averaging 15 m MORE ON EACH GOOD DRIVE.

He's even confusing himself as to which clubs to use because of the new range. Sure not every shot is a good drive but thats a technique issue so Tiger Woods has nothing to worry about.

Seriously, think about it, 6 weeks, 15m. On a NON Golf Specific Training program. Imagine if I had him on one of those! Golfers as a community tend to get alot of injures because they aren't big fans of conditioning, and all that repetitive twisting where they fling their lower backs around is BAD.

Power should be generated in the hips and legs, transmitted through a STABLE lower back and into the shoulders and into the arms and down to the club. Stability in the lower back is one of the things that correct strength training does BEST.

Golfers, this strength training stuff works.

I'm BACK!

2007-04-24T22:35:00.000+08:00

Ok I've been away for the past 2-3 weeks on army reserve. We went overseas for training. What did I learn? The main thing is that

DRINKING ALCOHOL IS ONE OF THE DUMBEST ACTIVITIES ON EARTH.

After our missions, the navy tradition is heavy drinking. I'm not in the navy but we were doing a combined mission so I was in on the drinking. I almost NEVER drink. I KNOW its DUMB and I don't like the taste of alcohol.

I ended up drinking 3 beers and 2 shots of whiskey. I think I can handle alcohol decently and I was alright. The next morning there was a little headachey feeling and a bit of s sore throat. You know alcohol dehydrates you right?!. But more than that, I woke up and I was PISSED OFF. I thought to myself why this was the case. My reflections...

1. I was upset with this incredibly stupid drinking culture that is supported by high ranking officers and I was under a lot of authoritarian pressure to drink. DUMB.

2. I was upset that in this culture, drinking a lot is somehow linked to manliness...DUMB.

3. I was upset with myself that I was not able to find a way out of it. Without lying, disrespect for authority, or violence.

I spent a day recovering from this incredible stupidity. That was a day which I could have used productively. That was a day I will never get back. Remember time is a NON-RENEWABLE resource.

FOOLISH DRINKING...NEVER AGAIN

The Conscious and Sub Conscious

2007-04-05T17:39:00.000+08:00

I was just reading about self sabotaging thoughts. I think its a book by Joe Vitalle about marketing or earning money or something... Very interesting. Out Conscious mind wants something (money, muscles, fat loss whatever) but there are those sub conscious thoughts that get in the way. At the risk of sounding like meaningless psycho babble, here is an example.

(Conscious thought): I need to eat well to lose some fat. I want to get lean. I know that means no starchy foods unless I just did some exercise.

-I choose a few meat and leafy vegetable dishes from the stall.
-I begin to sit down and look at my plate

(Sub-conscious, self sabotaging thought): This is not going to make me feel full, where is the pile of rice I usually eat?...

(to me, the most damaging thought): "What is a meal without rice?"

With all those self defeating thoughts, the conscious mind can only overcome for a while, and it cannot continuously overcome them. And people quickly fall off the clean eating plan.

Some things that help: Write down you goal and read it 100 times in a row. "I want to lose 5 kg in the next 2 months". As you read it, there will likely be self sabotaging thoughts that come up. Cut these down by focusing on the image of what it will be like to have achieved your goal easily and painlessly. The Visualization of your success helps to cut out the negative nonsense. In this way both your conscious mind and sub conscious thoughts work together for success.

Training a woman!

2007-04-01T19:52:00.000+08:00

This is a picture of my sister, shes a occupational therapist by profession. She weighs 55kg only which is ... i would say... just nice for a girl of her height. She has been training in the gym for 3 months ONLY and has made more progress than any other person at the gym we go to. Her training is all compound movements. Core work and pre-hab for the hips and shoulders. Today was a NEW PERSONAL RECORD (with many more to come in the future I'm sure). 70Kg in the parallel Box squat. She tried 75kg but failed....we will get it next time. I'm really proud of her.

Next goal, man chinups... stay tuned!

What thrills me about coaching?

2007-03-23T22:56:00.000+08:00

I love to solve puzzles. Since i was young I loved them and I still do. When I have a client or athlete come to me and say "I need to run faster" or "I need to lose 5kg of fat" I don't make any judgments right away. I go into problem solving mode. Of course I'm not perfect all the time with my solutions, but as time passes i get more and more ideal solutions sooner and sooner.

I have more experiences and more education because I read/write/watch information on fitness, health and performance each and every day for an at least an hour (or up to 10-15 hours on some days when I'm really on a roll...).

But lately I have realized that I have many tools in my knowledge box of fitness. Now its time to master these tools. So with each client, I analyze the problem (the fitness problem not the person as an individual) pick a tool, and adjust that tool to the client's situation.

Lets take fat loss as an example. I watched a presentation by Alwyn Cosgrove (a very successful fitness coach) and he says 100 billion on fat loss products will be spent in the US next year alone. Wooo and most of those are scams... this means I had better be thinking of fat loss as a key problem (among others) that many of my clients will need to be solving.

There are several methods to use for fat loss and as a coach I need to adjust which one to use for each person. How much training experience do they have? How much TIME do they have? Do they play a sport that requires certain attributes to be maintained above others? Its all fun to figure this stuff out:)

BTW Great news, my formerly "golf only" dad has decided to get serious with fitness (I think he also likes the cute Kettlebells...)...

Good Job Dad!

New toys!!

2007-03-23T08:59:00.000+08:00

I just bought a couple hundred dollars worth of toys! Shiny beautiful toys:) I was using kettlestacks before those are good but these are the real deal baby! Authentic Russian Kettlebells:) this is gonna be fun. A Singaporean Kettlebell instructor was selling some excess stock off at a good price so i decided to take the plunge:) email me at jonathan@genesishealthonline.com to find out more if you want to get some good priced kettlebells for yourself

Are KB's magic like some gurus claim? I don't think so. But all the KB movements are pretty athletic so i think the average KB user is way more functional and athletic than the average gym goer.

The KB lifts are total body and are GREAT for fat loss circuits. And they are so shiny and pretty (see I have an artistic side!)...

From left to right... 8kg, 12kg, 16kg, 24kg and 32kg... and they somehow feel heavier than the equivalent dumbbells. Lets bring them to the park and see what people think...

Bye Bye TAF club...

2007-03-21T10:32:00.000+08:00

The Trim and Fit (TAF) - opposite of FAT...hehe??? Club has been officially disbanded. It was a "Club" in schools where fat kids are forced to gather during school breaks to do some exercise and to stop them from going berserk with potato chips at the school canteen.

Its a good attempt at getting the out of shape kids to do some kind of activity, and looking back I applaud the attempt.

Guess what, I was one of the long-time members. No recess for me, "4 laps around the track and a slice of watermelon for you... tubby."

But seriously did it help? Not at all. One of the key components as a fitness coach is to address the psychology of the person as a priority before we are able to address the physical issues. The stigma of the TAF club does nothing for the psychology of a child, its hard enough growing up already.

When did my body change? Guess what! when i started lifting weights when i was 15. I didn't know ANYTHING and i made alot of mistakes and had a few injuries but hard work on a poor program will still going to give a certain level of results.

Some suggestions for this post TAF era in public health:

1. Get off the slow cardio bandwagon. Ugh it seems I have to nag about this every post. The latest research shows that long slow cardio has NO ADVANTAGE FOR FAT LOSS over diet alone!! Slow cardio is all we ever did at TAF club. Bodyweight calisthenics and fast running are the way to go.

2. Fix the school food issue. I spend alot if time in school as part of my work with families and kids who are addicted to the internet and to computer gaming. School food is cheap (good!) but its also mostly starchy nonsense (BAD BAD BAD!!). Food stall operators want profit not healthy customers. I would go for a no sweet drinks policy as well. Get the kids to spend on food and drink water - it saves pocket money also.

3. Parent Education. There was this 90KG 8 yr old in england (not nearly as bad as the girl in the video) who's mother "could not" make him eat healthy food so he ate fast food all the time. Nonsense. Get tough parents. But even more importantly, set a good example. It's true that fat parents end up with fat kids but that (I believe future research will prove this) is much more to do with the home environment that it has to do with genetics. If genetic "fatties" train and eat the right way they can get lean... and faster than they think as well! Nothing to do with genetics (in 99.99 of all cases). I could go on and on about parenting and how important it is. Not just for health but in everything. Its just not computer programming or an advertising campaign. You simply cannot "outsource".

The benefits of this will be that kids realize that they CAN lead a non-0bese lifestyle! No need for diet pills (scams) or lipo (its not all its made out to be). The ineffectiveness of the TAF club gives the kids the "oh no, I went and it still didn't work why bother trying" mentality. That does not set them up for lifelong health. Hello high hospital bills and poor work performance - bad for the person, their community and even their country.

Worrying Trend?

Finally posting again...Nothing personal... but what you train for is what you get

2007-03-20T10:01:00.000+08:00

Yup I have been swamped lately with clients, work and conferences. But an interesting article came out a few days ago in the local paper. As you know one of the unique features of Singapore is our national service (i.e. ARMY). One of the things that we do there is this thing called IPPT - Individual Physical Proficiency Test.

In the article this so called "fit" guy was whining about how he has completed 3 marathons and other "fitness" events and yet fails his IPPT because of his lousy standing broad jump. He barely cleared 200cm - worse than many teenage female athletes I know. And the passing mark is an extremely unimpressive 216cm which is really not hard for a fully grown man.
There is the principal of specificity at work here - What you train for is what you will get. The poor fit-boy's muscles and nervous system are so tuned to jogging (with its bad effects) that when called upon to produce POWER they just can't. I can also be sure that joggers are super quad dominant (can't use their buttocks to generate movement) and thats a weak way to jump as well.

So don't complain that you can't pass, stop all the joggin and lift heavy stuff instead . Those 16 cm to the passing mark will fly right by under your feet.

As for the validity of the IPPT as a test for combat fitness... haha I have my thoughts on that as well but will save them for another article.

Endurance sports... for a cause:)

2007-03-07T14:10:00.000+08:00

I'm hard at work running a triathlon... no not participating, rather organizing. It's for a good cause. To encourage people with disability to join in some healthy activity. They can even take part in teams with 2 family or friends taking part together with the handicapped person. Its a cool concept but it will be hard work. Event is on the 9th of June. If you want to be a corporate sponsor you can email me:) I'll set you up. Every bit counts!

Watch out for this!

2007-03-01T19:05:00.000+08:00

NOT PART OF MY LONG TERM PLANS

I was helping out at a senior citizens activity center. Helping in running simple games. Its true you know. The elderly folk there that are the healthiest and have the highest quality of life are those who are the strongest with the best mobility. Duh... you may say.

But think about it, is that what most people are thinking about when they exercise for old age? No...everybody is thinking of cardiovascular health. But guess what, poor function in old age is not a problem of pushing the heart till it fails. Its a problem of simply not being strong and mobile enough.

The studies show this as well... here is one which reaches this conclusion:
"Among healthy 45- to 68-year-old men, handgrip strength was highly predictive of functional limitationsand disability 25 years later. Good muscle strength in midlifemay protect people from old age disability by providing a greatersafety margin above the threshold of disability."

Once again its a call to work on the muscular system not the cardiovascular system. Do i neglect heart health? certainly not. But remember that the cardiovascular system just supports the muscular one. So if you train the muscular system, heart health comes right along with it for FREE! If all you train is the "heart" the rest of you is still likely to cause you so many problems in the future that the heathy heart will do your wheelchair bound body little good.

Foam Roller Tutorial

2007-02-25T00:34:00.000+08:00

This is one of the best ways to keep your joints happy. It really helps all my clients and my self as well to live pain free. It can help EVERYBODY. Athletes because they use their bodies so much, and regular people because they use their bodies so little!!

PART 1:

PART 2:

Got to be balanced

2007-02-24T14:06:00.000+08:00

Not just using single leg and single arm training:) But in life. So many people get stuck into boxes that society and the people around them impose. Not to say I'm totally immune to this but I do want to live life with passion. Performance and fitness coaching is thrilling for me. I treat each client like a special and individual puzzle and work on him/her piece by piece till they are as good as they can be. But I would be BORING if all I talked about when you met me was how you should eat less cake (although i do a good amount of that!).

One of my other interests is photography. Its amazing that we can capture a moment in time! Here are some photos from my latest trip to Kusu Island.

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Its the "half truths" that are the most worrying

2007-02-20T08:38:00.000+08:00

Its easy to be vigilant against outright lies. Most of us won't get fooled by those. But its the half-truths and sneaky lies that can get us into real trouble. This is the way unscrupulous advertising, scheming adversaries and even the devil himself get us to make wrong choices. Check out the videos below. I found them very entertaining.

Lets say I was not a "Techie-boy", I think I would almost certainly give some of those methods a try! The guy looks like a scientist tech dude, he speaks like one, and GASP - He even has the screen shots to "prove" his points! Charts and tables... he's got those too!

Isn't this the same as what goes on in the health and fitness industry? Put a few pretty girls or fit looking guys on an ad, put together some unverifiable pseudo science studies, dress the speaker in a lab coat and "guarantee" results. "Ta-da" you have a money making product. Some products that fall into this scam category are:

All kinds of vibrating nonsense (belts, floors, seats)
Most supplements (besides fish oil, protein, amino acids and vitamins, most of the others are scarily useless)
Fat loss programs based on long slow jogging/swimming/cycling
Muscle gain programs based on weak movements like bicep curls

Ugh thats why I give money back guarantees on my services because thats the only way to separate the scammers from those who know what they are doing! Any of those vibrating belt companies (you know who you are!) give a similar guarantee? No? Didn't think so...

Usher in the new year... Helping my family

2007-02-18T23:00:00.000+08:00

Its Chinese new year, a time for meeting up with family (good) and excessive eating of fried and trans-fat laden goodies (bad). But what was amazing is the number of hours (3-4) of free consultation I gave to family members for various health issues. Let's list them down:

1. Nagging and occasional frozen shoulder (supaspinatus and subscapularis trigger points) - Free massage aunt!

2. Front shoulder numbness (infaspinatus trigger points) - Free massage cousin and get yourself a tennis ball for self-treatment

3. Achilles Tendon Pain (Gastroc and soleus adhesions and trigger points) - Here uncle, try my foam roller

4. Lumbar spine instability from previous herniated disc. - Increased glute activation and bracing techniques should help you play basketball at full speed soon cousin.

5. Here is the rehab progression for your patella tendinitis cousin - AND STOP ALL THAT JOGGING!

My extended family are NOT super unhealthy. They do exercise. They are successful, disciplined people who are socially alright, financially alright and generally doing alright in life. But none of us should consider chronic pain or poor health as "alright".

It's one of my motivations for giving fitness coaching. I love working with athletes to make them great, but there is also a thrill of fixing peoples health issues that have been lingering for months/years. Thats why I started Genesis Health and Performance.

Learn quick young one...

2007-02-13T22:17:00.000+08:00

I wrote about this young javelin thrower who was having no progress for a long while... Over training was the reason... but kids you know:) they need to learn the hard way sometimes! So he fell sick and missed a few trainings. Guess what, beat his previous best by 4 meters EASILY! Keep up the good work... and include some rest weeks!

Gifting + training = Wow!

2007-01-31T11:13:00.000+08:00

Here is Adrian Wilson from the Arizona Cardinals (its an NFL team) jumping over a 66 inch (1.68meters) hurdle. Most impressive video I have seen in the past week. He is listed at 1.88m tall.

U-17 Basketball: Game 4 - LOSS!

2007-01-30T15:52:00.000+08:00

We lost. Ugh. Its never nice to lose. The guys fought hard, but we lost 2 of our key players (and biggest mismatches for the other team to defend) early in the game both to ankle sprains. Add this to a 15 point deficit due to really off-form outside shooting, and things looked bad. But we fought hard and with good defense and some hot shooting from our point guard, managed to build a 3 point lead entering the 4th quarter against a good team. However the lack of offensive options made it tough to keep up, we lost by 5 in the end, 56-51. Fitness was good considering the intensity of the game, and the lack of depth we had after our 2 injuries. We will be back!...

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U17 Basketball: Preperation for the toughest game of round 1

2007-01-28T11:38:00.000+08:00

Our next opponents (playing on the 30 Jan 07) are fast and aggressive on defense, and they have good rebounders on the offensive boards. Most of their team is also older than us by a year which is tough. To win we will need to be focused on rebounding and patient on offense. Physically we had our last tough session on the 26th, speed work and some upper-body work. Stay tuned for the results! This tough opponent will be a good test of the low volume training.

U-17 Basketball: Game 3

2007-01-25T15:42:00.000+08:00

Best game so far. Excellent mental state, aggressive defense that forced turnovers without even trapping. Good hustle. Physically I thought this game was a bit of a validation of the lower volume of training we have been doing. In the first quarter we were only up by 5. A see-saw game. But by the 3rd and 4th Quarter we were getting every rebound and loose ball. we looked REALLY quick. Its really true that less volume of conditioning + a focus on "year round" speed training is raelly paying off. We ended up winning by 54!!

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U-17 Basketball: Game 2

2007-01-25T15:27:00.000+08:00

We came out much better mentally in this second game. Won comfortably with a trapping defense and efficient offense. Not hitting top stride yet, but decent. Physically the guys seem fresh and ready to play.

U-17 Basketball: Game 1

2007-01-25T10:25:00.000+08:00

Here is the match report. It was a BAD game. We were sluggish on defense and rebounding and offensively, not able to break down the opponent's zone defense like we had trained to do. Physically we were not out of shape. But we did not come out as the aggressor and let a weaker team hang around for far too long.

This game was not about lack of physical preparation, rather a sub optimal mental state.

U-17 Basketball: Pre Season Preparation

2007-01-24T11:56:00.000+08:00

I am in charge of preparing the team physically for the tournament. This is an all year process that is especially important in the off season. I am of the school of thought that we should train strength, speed and power all year, and only train for game specific endurance as the season approaches. That is what we have been doing. In the off season, the team lifts weights (squats, pulls, presses, single leg work) 2x a week. And does speed work 1-2 times a week. This is in addition to friendly games, and drills done in training.

Both strength and speed work are low volume. Gym sessions are 3-4 exercises of 4 sets each. Speed work is done to a maximum distance of 50m and in most cases is 5-20m, working mostly on acceleration.

4 weeks before the season started we began energy system specific training. Bodyweight circuits and court runs mostly. These are done together with intense skill drills as well. The reason to start late is because these guys have a 3 month long season and have time to play themselves into shape. In addition, more than 8 weeks of intense intervals tends to burn guys out (that would be just in time to be weak for the playoffs) so I am conservative early in the season.

The team entered the season fresh and ready:)

You can check out our progress at this blog here!

Next updates for this blog

2007-01-23T23:49:00.000+08:00

The Under-17 age group basketball team that I am working with has entered the inter school competition. I will be writing about their progress and state of physical preparation in the blog. You can find out how their games are doing here!

Running a website is quite a challenge

2007-01-19T13:49:00.000+08:00

I'm not famous enough to have a web designer in my staff haha. So all the feview.com stuff is done "by hand". Its quite fun to run a website, and there has been really good response to it so far. But I do have to make a conscious effort to keep writing and updating. I do about 1 review every 2 days and I have lots more stuff to review! Thanks for all the support so far. This is going to be the best health/fitness/sports review website on the net!

Hamstring Pull rehab story

2007-01-17T12:28:00.000+08:00

1 month ago I pulled a hammie. That is bad news because of my spritning aspirations this year. I think I overdid the volume on my tempo runs (130m at about 85% speed). Anyway it didnt hurt much immediately after the track session, felt like a slight pull. It was a pull at the hip insertion under the glutes. The next day - OUCH.

Here was my rehab progression:

day 0-2: ICE
day 2-4: Contrast ICE+HEAT and light stretching and self massage
day 4-7: slow speed dynamic stretching and self massage
day 8: - tried to do some striding on the track, it was a mistake, i think i set myself back about 4 days.
REPEAT day 0-4...
day 13-21: start rehab exercises, most significantly single leg dumbell deadlifts, they REALLY hit the spot with the single leg hip extension.
day 21-28: Heavier weights with the rehab exercises. Lots of single leg work. I will post some pics of the rehab exercises soon. As of today (17 Jan) I feel about 95% and will hit the track for some light work soon.

BTW This exercise only limited my hip extension strength but squatting was not affected much at all. I did full squats up do a 190kg double with no trouble at all.

Training hard.

2007-01-14T21:50:00.000+08:00

Here is a video i found of the US olympic wrestling team. Quite interesting for those of us who have not been into a high level athelte training facility (stuck in comfy, fancy gyms all our lives...)...

Its a happy day!

2007-01-11T20:12:00.000+08:00

My website is up. Its kind of a "dream" to have a website like this. The main aim is to review fitness/health products. Not jsut me reviewing but the entire online community. There is so much nonsense out there that its hard to tell what works and what just has good marketing. Well here is a place where the entire internet fitness community has a voice. Nonsense can't get sold anymore! and good products and coaches will get the credit they deserve. I really believe that this site will be helpful to many people! Do visit and check it out!

Its called "feview.com" Review with an F instead of an R. Short form for "The fitness review". Lets build a helpful and positive community there!

In Strength and Health,
Coach Jon

Drug Use in Sports

2007-01-09T11:51:00.000+08:00

My reading for the week was a book called the "speed trap" by charlie francis. He was Ben Johnson's coach when he broke the 100m world record (easily) in 1988. Its a very frank kind of auto-biography about how he (francis) became a track and field coach and how he helped his athletes from teenagers to world class sprinters. its called the "Speed trap" because it depicts how inconsistency and internal politics mess up the drug testing of world class atheletics.

The most "open" parts about the book were his thoughts on drug use in the top levels of world sports. How a large proportion of atheltes are on some kind of performance enhancing substance, and how unfair it is that in some countries, the olympic qualifying mark to make the national team is higher than ANYBODY has ever reached while drug free...thus forcing atheltes to use drugs even to make the national team. YET the same country has a 4 year ban for getting caught!

Personally, drugs are not something I have alot of experience with. I do recognise that at the top levels they are necessary to win, but I am against kids taking them to "look huge" when in reality they know nothing about training or eating well. Of course you will get large and muscular, drugs almost guarantee that. Any old training program will work, any old eating habits are likely to work as well.

My concern is what happens after they come off the drugs... since they knew nothing before drugs, and got results inspite of their training and diet, when they come off the drugs, they will still know nothing and they will regress rapidly. That would be a waste!

Being thankful for aggrevating past experiences

2007-01-04T21:35:00.001+08:00

For what?...

My aggravating past expereince was whats known as "higher education". It was 4 years of pure boredom. Somehow I came away with a degree in computer engineering... While I was in there, not much good stuff happened academically. Alot of foreign teachers who's english I could not understand, lots of assignments and programming projects that keep me up late at night looking for missing semi-colons in my code and class mates who REALLY liked this computer stuff! All computer code and no real-life interaction makes captnJ a bored boy.

HOWEVER, looking back, this annoying time did give me one positive. It made me unafraid of computers. Because "surely it cant be as hard as that annoying Natural Language Programming project...." And this is super useful since I'm designing a website that integrates my passion for human performance, with some techie web stuff.

Once again no credit to school, practical stuff like MAKING WEBSITES!! come on!! - WAS NOT TAUGHT. But the fearlessness of computer stuff gave me the confidence to dive in and start to make one myself. It took about 20 hours last weekend during the new year holidays, fiddling and trial-and-erroring to get the site up and running. (But I think if i did it agian it would take 3-5. woohoo)

Yes, all the suspense is necessary because Its in kind of a "beta" version (see, we can learn from google hehe). Eventually I want it to stand out from the many fitness websites out there, especially for its content and honesty. Stay Tuned! Its gonna be a cool ride on the waves of technological innovation!

Youthful Energy, Youthful Errors

2007-01-02T23:03:00.000+08:00

I was talking with a young javelin thrower 2 days ago. The guy wants to excel. This in itself is commendable but then again, there must be a method to the madness and it was no accident he had not been progressing much lately. Alot of overenthusiatic young athletes fall into the following errors in training and nutrition. Even more so in our "asian-city" lifestyle where acedemic persuits also take a toll on stress level and sleeping habits of our young atheltes.

1. Training Too Long - 2 hour workouts? nooooo!! we are trying to get strong, not show that we can do alot of training.

2. Too many sets - he told me he did something like 4 sets of squats, 4 sets bench presses, 4 sets shoulder presses, 4 sets snatches, 4 sets biceps/tricep isolation work, 4 sets core work and sometimes medicine ball stuff also... all in the 6-8 rep range. Unless you are on steroids, this is too much! 24-30 sets of training!!

3. Too light - This young man needs to gain some weight to be at the right weight to throw the javelin (add 10kg from where he is now) and thats not going to happen with these marathon training sessions that put the body in a hormonally disadvantageous state for growth.

Not to fear, after our talk he has agreed to manage his fatigue better by sleeping during class. KIDDING. no hes going to manage his training volume and do homework early so that he gets to sleep more. In addition, hes going to add in more meals per day so that he can meet his calorie needs for muscle growth (4-5000 cals a day as a ballpark figure). He will be great one day.

Tough past week - time for supersets

2006-12-29T22:26:00.000+08:00

This week was tough. Lots of basketball coaching and work... so that makes for less time to train. Luckily cooking for myself keeps nutrition in order. Nutrition is the first thing that goes down the drain when we get busy. Any old crap food will do. That has to stop. So nutirion is in order and that means we don't get fat. Now about training...

Shorter workouts - to get over that, I used more supersets (i may actually use this more and more becuase its efficient and trainign quality doesnt drop much) Today it was

Front squat
Rest 1 min
Seated Row
Rest 1 min
Thats 1 set
I did 5 working from sets of 5 reps and down to 2 reps at the end.

Followed by another superset
Single leg deadlifts (one foot in front of the other)
Rest 1 min
Close Grip Bench Press
Rest 1 min
Repeat 4 sets

Followed By another superset
External shoulder rotation
hanging leg raises
Repeat 4 sets

took only 50 mins and the volume of work is high. Supersets are nothing new and I'm not claiming to invent them. But they do have their place (sometimes) so that you can still lift pretty heavy (because you are still getting pretty decent rest time between the same exercises), and yet get enough work done in a short time.

Disadvantage is that there is some let down in terms of recovery between sets because you are doing some other exercse. But its probablty less that you think IF YOU CHOOSE THE PAIRS CORRECTLY.

I suggest an upper body pushing movemnt paired with an upper body pulling movement
E.g. Chinups + shoulder presses
Or a hard lower body movement with an easy( probably lighter weight, or isolation) upper body movement
E.g. Deadlifts + tricep extensions

Training anywhere

2006-12-25T13:30:00.000+08:00

I was in Australia for 2 weeks with no proper facilities (because we were moving around alot) but i did get in some training using "external" weight. Namely my 75kg brother.

Even had time to do some goofy poses! Holiday... its Fan-Tastic
Yes my tricep strenght was challenged...

Lunch at work - its easy

2006-12-22T12:46:00.000+08:00

Here is a sample of what I have been eating at lunch at work. It beats the heck out of anything at any reasonably priced food outlet that i know of. Total cost $1 US, thats about 1.50 Singapore bucks. Its also super easy to prepare. Even some guys can manage it... haha

Preperation: I marinade chicken pieces by the kilo the day before. In this case the mariande was cooking wine, chicken stock, pepper and soy sauce. Pretty much anything is ok. Mix it up. I think some more curry like spices will be up next. I leave the whole bunch in the fridge and bring it to work uncooked in a thermos container, or i leave the whole batch in the office fridge (if you have one). For Veges I buy what I like and whats in season. In this case multi colored capsicums and broccoli. One general guide for veges is to eat many colors of them.

Ok now for cooking ...

Step 1 - Grease aluminium foil (I use butter because its stable in heat and doesnt change to other kinds of crappy fats) and just lay the meat and veges on it. I wrap it up if its goin into a toaster. It will prevent burning. If you are using a microwave use a microwave safe container. Aluminium foil is NOT a good idea for MW cooking.
Step 2 - Toaster (you can use oven, microwave, hot coals, earthen oven whatever) but you will need to learn the timings since its not your home oven and it will be new to you. I reccomend trying a conservative setting like 10 mins then upping it 3 mins each time if the food isnt cooked. I use 15 mins at max power for my toaster.
Step 3 - Walk around holding your tasty, nice smelling, super healthy, super nutritious meal while trying not say judgemental things to those people who are having fried noodles with a large coke for lunch.

Yummy:)

If you have good recipies to share feel free to email me at captnj@gmail.com I'll give em a try and post them here!

Now what if i cared? - 5 Things I would get for people I care about this christmas

2006-12-22T09:51:00.000+08:00

After all that negative emotion in the previous post (yuck!) here are 5 things that show I care! Recieve one of these puppies from me this christmas and in some cultures we would be leaglly wedded haha.

1. Something to take care of my soft tissues quality. This probably deserves a few spots out of the 5 things mention. But its that important. Really made a big difference to my well being and happiness this year. Fixing my knee issues that plagued me for the past 2 years, upper back and neck tightness on the way to getting fixed, more pain free range of motion all over. Bye bye chronic pain, hello smooth joints and chronic pain free living. Here are some of the items that I used.

Theracane

Back knobbler

Deep tissue therapy books - search amazon

Foam roller
Tennis balls in socks - use these against a wall to self massage your back. Socks are not magic, but they do stop the ball from rolling around:)

2. Something to take care of active mobilty. There are pretty good information products out there. But even something as simple as:

bodyweight squats
overhead squats with an empty bar
walking lunges
Squat jumps
Unweighted shoulder External rotations
Bird dogs
Cat-camel stretches
Standing hip-flexor stretches

do each of the above for 15 reps before training (no rest between exercises). Add in a few warmup sets of the exercise you are about to do and you should be good to go (not to mention alot more prepared than doing 5 mins on the cycle).

3. Book(s) to build the mind and attitude for succecss. So many options here, it will be tough to list. But for a weightlfter i like "under the bar" by powerlifter Dave Tate.

4. Fish oil - here are some examples of how good it is. Or you could go to those medical journal sites (medline etc) and do a search... its a mighty long list

5. A bit of my techie side here since I used up so many "fitness" slots for the first item... get a Digital SLR camera. I love the thought that you can capture a slice of time that will never return. A digital SLR is the way to go. SLRs focus instantly (no need to wait...wait...wait "beep-beep") and shoot instantly. What you see is what you get RIGHT NOW (well maybe 50miliseconds later but for most purposes thats the same as right now) no waiting. For fun shooting I take a Nikon D40 and for sports and action and when I am getting paid I take a Nikon D200. Sure they are a little bigger, but the d40 in particular is pretty portable. Not pants pocket portable, but just wrap it up in some clothes or a towel and it can go anywhere. Batrries last 500-1000 shots (thats alot...) and a cheapo 1GB memory card can hold about 600 pictures.

5 things I would NOT get my loved ones for christmas

2006-12-20T13:01:00.000+08:00

Christmas is a great time for gift giving. But lets be smart about it! Show someone you care, don't give them things that will make them discouraged and upset.

1. Vibrating slimming machines. These come in many forms and are pretty much... there is no kind word...scams (I refrain from naming individual companies and products you know who you are!). There are those that wrap around your tummy like a belt and jiggle your abdominal fats...there are those that you sit on and jiggle your butt... there are those you stand on that jiggle your entire body. Uh...many of them are just excuses to put pretty girls in advertisements. Be assured, the purchasers of these machines just wasted a thousand bucks. Please don't let it be you!

2. Quick fix diet packages. An example is a liquid diet named after a british city starting with cam and ending with bridge. These are full of low quality protein and super low calories. You end up with huge amounts of muscle loss and eventual regaining of the weight. There are some fundamentals that all successful eating plans have. Super low calories is NOT one of them.

3. Sessions with the average personal trainer. There are great coaches and trainers out there, but you probably won't get one by "signing up" for the package at a commercial gym. Do a bit of research on your own so that you can smell a fraud (more common than you might imagine in this "profession") before you pay up.

4. Most nutritional supplements. Seriously. There aren't that many great ones. Besides Protein, fish oil, Creatine and BCAAs most are pretty much experimental and arent as good as fruits and vegetables. Advterising... isnt it scary!

5. Exercise material made by models or TV stars. Really. Do you ask a movie star to fix your car? How about your vehicle that will never be traded in, upgraded or replaced (your body). Nope, didn't think so!

Reflections on 2006

2006-12-19T11:11:00.000+08:00

Reflections - pretty to look at, and good for you!

End of the year again. At the start, we all have plans and at the end we have reflections on whether those came to pass or did not. Certainly some things won't turn out as planned but thats just food for thought and gives us things we can improve on.

This is true in terms of physical training (of course its true for friendships, marriages, spiritual growth, etc). But for this blog, I'll talk about physical progress. Whether I'm a coach, athlete, housewife, or even a person recovering from a life threatening disease, I want to end 2006 better than when i started it.

Things that went well:

Recovery from knee pain (80% done) - more progress in the past month than in the last 2 years this is something I'm really thankful for.
40 yard dash (4.5 sec) - did it! Practiced inproved start and running techinque
Broad jump 298cm - close to the goal of 300, and I know where to improve
Knowledge as a coach - handling chronic pain, joint mobility, posture, more of the "supplementary" kind of knowledge to become more well rounded as a perfromance improvement guy.
Got my Specialist In Sport Conditioning certification
Velocity diet - leanest time ever in my life!

Things that I can do better:

Lifts - did not progress much (sq close stance, all the way down - 200kg, deadlift 215kg, bench press 140kg) other lifts are pretty stagnant as well. There were too many other goals, as well as lots of work (I do work!)
Remaining physical issues - Tighiness in right side of body (from years of softball bat swingning in one direction only), slight knee issues, slight tightness in upper back and neck. All these are being worked on.
Velocity diet - not good for performance

Goals for next year:

100m dash in 11 sec - this is the key one, all training will be geared toward this
300cm broad jump - i think if I get the first one, I'll get this one along with it
Improve as a coach especially in terms of business strategy and in the area of pain relief and injury prevention/rehab

Australian Lifestyle

2006-12-09T10:35:00.000+08:00

Farmers market in the morning. Its open at 6am and its the highlight of saturday in Brisbane - not much else is going on at this time in the morning. Its pretty cool. Fruits and berries galore. And highlight of the day is salmon. Freshly killed, and deboned! Here is Mom lovingly preparing it.and here is the final result - turkey and salmon. Meat for the whole family! Seriously, there are huge amounts of organic and fresh meats that I don't usually get in Singpaore. They are not VERY cheap but they are availble for those times when you want ot give your self a treat.
There is also a park with playgroudn equipment to train on near my Sister's appartment (where we are staying) and lots of steep hills to run on. I think I'll run those slopes tomorrow.

IPPT - Part 2 the Standing Broad Jump (Part 2)

2006-12-07T21:53:00.000+08:00

Previouisy we looked at technique. But not we are starting to look at training. In this part we will need to check what kind of guy you are. Are you "bouncy" or "stiff". This will determine your training focus when you choose the kind of training you are going to do. A general test used to determine which kind of guy you are is to do the following.

First measure your vertical jump. Start standing sideways against a wall. then do the same as broad jump technique. Hands up, tiptoe, throw them down as you descend into half squat. Then explode up. Use chalk on a fignertip to mark your starting position and touch the wall at the top of yr jump. Measure the distance between the 2 chalk marks.

Second, measure your depth jump height. same thing except that now you start on a 30cm tall box. You drop (not jump) off and then IMMEDIATELY jump as high as you can. once again taking note of the height to which you jumped. This makes use of your spriniginess to absorb energy and use your body's stretch shortening cycle to reapply that force.

So now you have 2 stats. Normal jump height, and depth jump height. I am going to give a simplistic interpretation of your results.

If your regular jump is better than your box jump, you are stiff and need to train more explosive and plyometric things.

If your box jump is better than your regular jump, you are bouncy but not strong, you need to train more pure strength.

If your two jumps are pretty close (within 10-20%) train some of everything

If your jumps are poor (40cm or less) and you have finished puberty, you are weak for your bodyweight and should probably lose fat (if you are) and train in an overall total body manner. There isnt much point training technique when there is no foundation.

In the next section I will show some exercises for both the springy guy and the stiff guys. BTW stiff is just a word i use to describe the athelte. Its neither good nor bad and some of it is even genetic. Its best to be both super strong(stiff) and super springy which is what you will be when you train up your weaknesses. Personally I am geared toward strong and not springy. So for me, springy training takes precedence in my training.

BTW take the test 3 times each with 3 mins rest between attempts to make sure you get consistent results.

Goal for next year 100m sprint- training starts now

2006-12-07T12:40:00.000+08:00

I have probably mentioned before, i have a goal for next year. to run the 100m sprint in less than 11 seconds. I am adding 1 tempo run day and one sprint start day to my training week. I feel I have the starting power to get that timing. I need the speed endurance and efficiency in my technique to run the remaining 60m or so after the acceleration peroid. I have no coach, only video and book resources. I will probably video myself and let some top track coaches take a look online and ask for their advice.

So far (past 2 months of training) i feel my start angle has improved (I'm taking off lower than 45 degres to the ground) and i think my first 6 steps are faster. This is quite a new goal for me so it will be interesting!

Maintainable leanesss for former fat boys

2006-12-07T09:16:00.000+08:00

Not bad! abs still visible haha

This is a picture of me as of december 2006. This is a bodyfat percentage i can maintain forever with just normal eating (4 healthy meals, 2 shakes) everyday. I believe i can go leaner if I ate slightly cleaner but currently I will be training quite hard so this level of fat is ok for me. Its not as lean as my velocity diet days. But I am certainly stronger (and about 4kg heavier than the end of the velocity diet). This is the leanest non-diet condition i have ever been in. I feel really fast and bouncy on the track, field and court.

Remember I'm a former tubby so it is possible to stay lean forever even for us fatties. What has helped me is not eating outside food at all during my lunch break. I marinade chicken in large amounts and bring uncooked meat to my office pantry. I wrap it in aluminium foil and put it into the toaster there. 10 mins on high heat is perfect for chicken! The overnight seasoning in the marinade makes it taste good! Self cooking is the best way.

Act as if

2006-12-05T13:30:00.000+08:00

This is a great concept that has ben around a long time. its called "act as if". When we are young its called "pretending". Sometimes this gets lost as we get older. pretending is "just not me" or "its so fake" but you know, its one of the best ways to learn and build habits.

Its a great concept to bring to training. Imagine if...

you lived, ate, trained and acted like a world class sprinter, lifter, basketball player or anything else (I'm assuming that your role model is worthy if emmulation). You pretend that you follow their training, their diet, their dedication. Guess what, in a years time you will certainly be closer to that ideal specimen than you were when you started. This "pretending" is a really powerful tool.

Didn't we use this tool when we were learnign how to write or do maths? just follow the teacher'e example on the blackboard. And in the end, after some "pretending" we finally were able to do it ourselves. pretending is really a valid training tool.

Note: Practice makes permenant not perfect so choose a worthwile role model.

Not quite what i mean... but you get the idea!

a tip on program design

2006-11-25T18:32:00.000+08:00

If anybody asks me for a tip on program design, I'll admit i don't have many groundbreaking "wow this guy is really doing something special" tips. But i will share one now which many people overlook.

Tip: Exercise selection is the LEAST important variable in program design.

Oh but what about that new double swiss ball kettel bell swing? haha

You body responds best to changes in rep ranges. not exercises. Just for an example....

I have two identical twins A and B.

Over the course of a year, A does 12 different exercsies to improve his leg strength. but he does each exercise for the common "3 sets of 10 reps". he does squats, front squats, lunges, overhead squats, blah blah blah...

B does 1 exercise. The front squat for example. But he varies the reps and sets each month instead of the exercise. he goes 5 sets of 5, 3 sets of 12, 8 sets of 3, etc

B will be much stronger than A at the end of the year.

Is either of these programs ideal, certainly not but its just an illustration. Many people look for that magic exercise but it doesnt exist. Stick to the basics and vary the reps, sets and rest intervals instead.

Happy training!

regds
Jonathan

Finisher workouts

2006-11-24T13:43:00.000+08:00

If you have never heard of these, these are things you do at the end of your main trainign session. I feel they have several purposes.

Fat loss - yup, i try to do anerobic kind of finishers that leave me gasping for air. 10-20 mins of these at the end of workouts are really good for fat loss.

"the PUMP" - hey! first time i talk about this. The main reason is to get blood into the muscles for flushing out waste and speeding recovery. Old time strongmen and weightlifters used to go for walks in waist deep rivers to get the blood going to their legs for recovery purposes

Conditioning - you can tailor finishing workouts to condition you for your specific sport.

I ususally do light weights or body weight exercises for a complex. For example.

15 burpees with a jump
20 lunges
20 pushups
20 squats
10 chinups
all with no rest between
thats 1 set

pant pant pant...

maybe do 1 or 2 more sets depending on how much conditioning i need at this phase of the year.

Training partner

2006-11-21T21:12:00.000+08:00

Derrick...hes the one in the pic who is not ronnie coleman...

I have never had a proper training partner. Sad but true. But I'm looking forward fo my friend derrick's return from australia. Hes a gifted lifter. Thickly built, and strong. Hes gunning for the strongman contest next year so we will be training together. stay tuned. it will be exciting (and hopefully well documented!)

No time to train? - no excuses!

2006-11-21T07:37:00.000+08:00

Sometimes things just don't turn out the way you want. I was supposed to be at 2 basketball games with my team yesterady from about 6pm to 8pm. Because of rain, we got delayed and finally postponed without a game being started. It was upsetting because it finished so late and I was unable to get to the gym. Ugh. No excuses. After dinner it was 930pm and there was still time before bed to get some productive work in. I did some jump-rope intervals spaced in with prehab, core and revcoery (from yesterdays training) exercises.

Jump rope x 100, 15 bent over rows with jump stretch bands
Jump rope x 100, 15 upper back band pull-apart with JSB
Jump rope x 100, 15 pushups
Jump rope x 100, 15 unsupported situp
Jump rope x 100, 10 reps/side shouder external rotations
Jump rope x 100, 10 leg raises

I did 2 sets of each of those for a total of 12 sets of 100 jumps. I alternate 1 set of double leg skipping with 1 set alternate leg skipping so thats 6 sets of each. This is an example of making the most out of a bad schedule. There are really no excuses not to train.:)

Nobody is laughing on the last few sets...

Whats next?

2006-11-14T21:45:00.000+08:00

Ok im getting out or army reservist this week friday. Coming up its full swing training for my basketball guys for the national under-17 tournament. We are going to go into some sports specific conditioning to prepare for the season. Strength training goes into maintanance mode for the next few months. Did you know that some guys with too much time to watch video calculated that there are 21 seconds between activity for a basketball player? I.e. move for 21 sec --> do something like rebound, shuffle, shoot etc... I am going to make use of this for the team's upcoming conditioning sessions:) Its gonna be painful but fun!

Dad does housework also

2006-11-14T21:38:00.000+08:00

My dad sets a good example around the house:) that is a good example for dads and kids everywhere...

egg "prata"

2006-11-11T21:57:00.000+08:00

AS you know, many people love "roti prata" or simply "prata" - its a flat, square bread like thing fried in oil so its pretty much lard and flour. As you would guess its BAD for us... carbs and fats in the same meal are instant fat storage because of the combination of insulin spike and fats. Today however i made my own! its PURE EGG with tuna and cheese on top! Thats breakfast!:)

6 eggs beaten
cooked in a square frying pan, lightly oiled
1/2 can of flavoured tuna (in this case teriyaki)
1 slice cheese.
AFter you get that square, fold it over to heat the tuna and melt the cheese... yummy!

Looks like prata! but doesnt give us the prata tummy!

Where have I been?

2006-11-10T18:26:00.000+08:00

The pic on the left is what my men and I have been doing for the past 5 days. EVERY DAY. On this deserted offshore island, we go every morning and lay this trackway onto the beach. Its a "toilet roll" on a truck and we lay it out so that vehicles can cross soft sand without sinking in. We are stationed on a landing ship and our equipment and people land on the beach from boats.

The good things:

I learn how old time explorers feel on ships - cramped, bored, constantly rolling and swaying, oh yes... if the boat is small... constantly wet as well no dbout those guys were tough
I got to know my platoon better. Many backgrounds and experiences. (uh languages also hehe) no much choice when after our job is done all there is left to do is WAIT to be picked up.
Beach is better than jungle - more wind, less insects in general...hehe

The bad:

The navy forgot about us and we were left on the island for 4 extra hours in the middle of the night... only being picked up close to 2am! uh guys we are not trying to become "lost" season 3 here!
The mustering of the boats takes HOURS before everybody is ready to attack. so its HOURS of sailing in a circle in a small boat till everybody is launched. Water splashes into the boat and breakfast starts to come out of the men. ugh
Our equipment and personal belogings (i.e. fresh clothes and food... ) got lost (put on ANOTHER SHIP!) so ... no change. Stay away from me for your own good hahah.
I got a bee sting! Middle of the night... something enters my clothes and OUCH! really really OUCH! Doc says its a bee sting...never mind, 6 hours later it was fine. But still it was like a hot needle.
I got softer and weaker because my high protein food was ALSO ON THE OTHER SHIP!!

Today most travelling in a long time!

2006-11-06T20:48:00.000+08:00

Wow today was... just wow... My excellent Combat engineers platoon did a great job laying down some trackways for vehicles to cross over bad terrain. Took them about 20 mins. That was excellent (for reservists and even considering some equipment problems...) but the travelling was really killer. for me

1 hour to camp
1 hour to naval base
1 hour to beach landing

(wait all day)....

1 hour back to mainland
1 hour to camp
1 hour home...

haha the joy of army. I need a longer book, and a ground sheet to sleep on.

IPPT - Part 2 the Standing Broad Jump (Part 1)

2006-11-05T21:57:00.000+08:00

3.

4.

Ok here is that Standing Broad Jump (Some call it standing Long jump) stuff many people have been asking for. Above are 6 shots capturing the important parts of the execution. This article is about technoque, the next one will be about training. It is VERY helpful to video yourself jumping. Every camera or handphone has a video function so no excuses.

There are 2 factors at work here,

1. strength/explosivness (whatever you want to call it in this case... i am just refering to being strong) - training this will be covered later.

2. technique (can also be called inter muscular coordination - coordination between muscles in the smooth execution of the movement) - This is what we will touch on in this article. BTW if you are not strong enough you can see it because you will not be able to perform the technique correctly.

Pic 1: Stand feet shoulder width apart, toes just behind line
Pic 2: Arms STRAIGHT UP and get onto tiptoes (this will feel unbalanced at first... practice)
Pic 3: This one is where i see the most problems (well there are many problems but this one is the biggest) - Many people like to sway here, back and forth, up and down... NO NO NO. From the arms overhead position, swing them DOWN - fast and hard! at the same time dropping into a half squat (butt back, whole body leaning forward as if you are sitting down on a chair but the entire posture is now leaning forward)
Pic 4: IMMEDIATELYafter hitting the bottom of the half squat Throw your arms up and extend your body fully like a spring (ankles, knees, hip all extend) - Look straight ahead or slightly upward, launch at about a 40 deg angle (most people launch at too low an angle) - arms are 15% of jumping power - yes! its true!
Pic 5/6: Swing your legs forward and prepare for landing.
Pic 7: Absorb the landing with a bending of knees

Why does this work? We are trying to use the "stretch shortening cycle" (spring effect) of throwing ourself down FAST and then IMMEDIATELY exploding up. Its WAY better than swinging back and forth. You dont make a spring boune high by gently playing with it. You make it bounce high by slapping it down and letting it rebound up fast!

If you are not strong enough you will know it because you will not be able to "reverse" direction quickly from pic 3 to pic 4 (not to mention you wont be able to explode up hard either). We will cover how to fix this in the next article.

Enjoy!

My schedule is pretty hectic! So what about training?

2006-11-04T07:54:00.000+08:00

In this year end period I am pretty swamped schedule wise. At work, we are opening our "Cyberwellness" center for more hours to allow more kids to have a chance to get influenced positively. For basketball coaching we have lots of games, training, and a trip to malaysia (AGIAN!). Personally I am off to australia for some time to meet my sister as she graduates as an occupational therapist in brisbane - Middle right of the map (University of Queensland). Pretty exciting... but what about training?

Training will be on maintainance mode for this period. I will be doing NO 1rms and working in the 5-10 rep range more. I will keep the diet clean and I will train less frequently with more emphasis on soft tissue work and massage to get all ready for next year where we get super strong again. I have never done such a long regenration period before but after 8 years of training i think its about time:)

I will also be working on my new website and a new ebook on how to get from "zero" to pretty much "very competent" as a person trying to exercise and eat as well as they can. I will be putting up some Q&A soon to see what people want, and how i can tailor the book to meet the most needs. stay tuned! Those who help me with feedback... well lets just say that I will be appreciative in a tangible way:)

Thanks for all the readership so far. I really appreciate it.

Wow somebody really did this! Loanshark's watch out!!

2006-11-03T21:45:00.000+08:00

Today on the "new paper" there was this article about this lady who used a spycam to take a picture of a loanshark vandalizing her home! so clever... my colleagues and I suggested that to my friend who is being victimised (WRONGLY!!) of having bad debts... could have been in the papers bro (name of friend withheld...hehe ) :)

IPPT today!

2006-11-03T19:27:00.000+08:00

the stations were easy, i cruised through at about 50%:)

20 chinups
40 situps
270cm jump
9.5 sec shuttle (4x10m)

All this on a slippery floor (really really bad for the jump and the shuttle)

Drumroll... now the moment of truth... can i really get a 10 min 1.5mile/2.4km run with NO specific training?

Ans: NO ..... hahaha

I was WELL on pace for a 9:30-10 min run.... till 6min 30sec. then i hit the wall. I ended up at about 10:40 or so. What does this show?

1. I have the speed to do the timing easily
2. I dont have the speed endurance to keep it up

BUT good news! Speed endurance is EASIER to get than speed! I think 3-4 sessions of race distance and I would have gotten it! So in the end i got $200 instead of $400... 40 sec away... next time... next time...

More "velocity diet" followers!

2006-11-02T23:05:00.000+08:00

Some of my female freinds have decided to attempt the velocity diet... I will support them and encourage them to record their experiences to post here:)

Tomorrow Its my turn - IPPT

2006-11-02T22:02:00.000+08:00

Well for all that talk about IPPT (don't worry the articles are coming up!) Tomorrow is my turn. I do chinups alot as part of regular training and the other stations should not be a problem. I did a bit of situp training just to build in a bitmore endurance in the abs over the past 2 weeks. The interesting part will be the 2.4km (1.5mile) run. I did not train it AT ALL. well... not specifically. I am trying to go under 10 mins with NO specific training. Lately i have only done suff like what is describe in this article. The work time is about 10-12 mins and the heart rate... well lets just say my chest wants to explode. Lets see if it helps my 2.4 tomorrow!:) will update asap.

- Still in the army 2 more weeks...,
Jonathan

Please be patient

2006-10-30T22:39:00.000+08:00

I will be in ARMY reservist from 30 Oct to 17 Nov. I'll post when I can but it won't be as frequent... There will be beach assault on this mission... quite cool except for the part where i stay on a crowded ship with many other stinky men... haha

Going "old school" for entertainment - settlers of catan

2006-10-29T11:15:00.001+08:00

Map building just like Warcraft!

SOme of my freinds came over last night to have dinner and play "settlers of catan". its a board game. Its outstanding. The map is "random" like a computer game and so its different each round. The game is constantly engaging because part of the game is about collecting resources and trading resources. Trading is done via "Real-time" bidding with other players. Its better than E-bay man! BTW this was "Board game of the year 1996" so it has credintials apart from my reccomendation.

Because of the live trading and bidding "Feature" I find this is an excellent game for today's digital age kids. This game FORCES the players to interact in REAL LIFE. Only know how to communitcate over SMS or MSN messenger or in maple story... get ready to lose badly!
It does take a bit of time to learn but its well worth it (and its ... uh easier to learn than lets say... DOTA?) Go get it! its not cheap (about $60-70, and $90 with the expansion pack for 5-6 players) but hey thats the same price of World of Warcraft right? This is much better for you.

IPPT training part 1 - situps

2006-10-26T11:23:00.000+08:00

Ok... lets get started. Firstly there has been some debate as to whether the sit up is a safe exercise. Well... all exercises have some form of risk and the way that I see some people do situps, yes they are unsalfe. they look like a fish who has just been thrown out of a fish bowl, flopping wildly on the mat. This is bad for the back and of course slaming the head back and forth like that...can give neck problems as well. Now... there is one key to managing the risk of the situp (besides doing them in a controled fashion). Its called... abdominal bracing.

Time to practice. Imagine you are opening a jar of your favorite peanut butter and its TIGHT, what do you do? you breath into your belly and grunt louldy as you try to open it right? another example is to imagine somebody is about to punch you in the tummy what do you do? you brace your abs as big and as hard as possible. Thats what we want here. Breathe into the belly and flex EVERYTHING. Abs, obliques and even the lower back muscles. Now yout lumbar spine is safe(er) - as safe as it can get actaully:). This is the way you should feel througout the situp station.

As for training, there are 2 things you will need to do. (most people train 1 or the other)
1. Get stronger
2. Build strength endurance (last longer)

We will do each of these things 2x a week. So you will "train" the situp station 4x a week. This leads to more recovery as well as better progress than killing yourself 1x a week.

Mon and Thrus we will GET STRONGER in the abs and lower back.
Choose 1 of these exercises and do 3 sets to within 2 reps of failure (if somebody is pointing a gun to my head i can do 2 more reps...but dont do it in trainining) keep the weight/difficulty high enough that you can only do 10 reps max. If you can easily do more, then that is too easy for you.

Hangning Straight leg raises
Weighted crunches
Roman twists
Reverse crunches
A more exhaustive list is here. do the WEIGHTED stuff:)
Pretty much anything that is safe (for your injury history) and is FAR more difficult that a regular situp. Remember to brace the abs all through the exercises.

Wed and Friday we get "better"
2 other times in the week, do 1 set of 45 sec of regular situps with perfect form, (braced abs, no jerking, etc). Just do it at about 80-90% of your best pace. No need to set records. but do try to improve each time by 1 -2 reps.

Whats the grand idea? The idea is to train your body to be strong so that the regular situp becomes "easy" and then also to train the regular situp so you become "good" at it. Its not just about strength, its also about efficiency so you can get the required number of reps easily. In the IPPT, you dont want to tire yourself out too much in the situp. It taxes your core, your hip flexors and your glutes even. you will need these for the other stations.

Total time needed: 3 sets 2x a week + 2x 45sec situp practices... well thats a grand total of...what? 5 mins? done over 12 weeks... thats... a total of only 60mins on this station...surely there cant be any excuses.

IPPT training part 0 - the basics

2006-10-25T14:36:00.000+08:00

I said "NO CHEATING"!!

I will get some general items out of the way first. these items apply to all stations.

1. Nobody is going to CHEAT on the test. I dont advocate it and I wont teach it.
2. You will need to train. There is no such thing as a free lunch for physical attributes. But we will train in the best, smartest and most efficient possible way.
3. You cant be a fat boy and expect to pass.
4. You cant be a super skinny bones-only boy and expect to pass.
5. If you are 3 or 4 please see here for some stuff on diet ... and get that in order. I reccomend the "making healthy eating a lifestyle" articles.
6. This will be different from "army" style training in some respects because while serving army, all we do is train. But now we have real lives and jobs and families so training cannot take up so much time.
7. As with all tests where we can prepare... practice is key so remember that besides the "fitness" that you need, there is SKILL in taking each item so you will need to practice the actual events not just exercise general fitness.
8. Most importantly, remember that this is the I-P-P-Test...WE know the questions that will be asked. How many people fail tests where the teacher TELLS YOU THE QUESTIONS BEFOREHAND? not many... but many fail the IPPT. Thats sad... so lets fet started

new series coming up - All singapore men look here: IPPT training

2006-10-24T10:56:00.000+08:00

The "joy" of all Singaporean men - Individual Physical Proficiency Test (IPPT). from 18 to 40yrs old, each year we have - At best, the "opportunity" to "earn" up to $400 from the government. Or at worse the chance to avoid spending excess free time in an army camp doing remedial training. Here is my attempt at an IPPT guide. This guide is NOT for expereinced athletes, rather for those tetering on the "pass or fail edge". If you are a super athelte this is not really for you becuase uh.. you should be dominating the test already. For the rest of us keep a lookout on thie blog:)

In this post I will be introducing the items in the test. In subsequent posts I will be going through the training methods and the technique methods for doing well on the tests. As we know well from out acediemic studies, we can STUDY for tests and there are examination "techniques" that we can use to squeeze the last few bits of performance from out brains:) similarly there are certain tricks we can use to squeeze the last ounce of performance from out bodies... anything to avoid remedial training!

What do i think of the IPPT? Its not ideal for military physical prepardness (I would like a test with no 2.4, rather sprints + exercises + decision making at unspecified points in the test to make sure the soldiers can make smart decisions under physical duress) but the IPPT is alright and is not logistically hard to set up.
1. Situps - Bent leg, partner support, elbows touch the knees at the top position. A test of abdominal, hip flexor, lower back strength-endurance

2. Standing broad (long) jump - test of explosive power in the entire body (I will explain later)

3. Shuttle run (4x10m sprints) - test of agility and acceleration/decelration

4. Chunips - A test of relative body strength and upper body strength endurance.

5. 2.4km run - test of aerobic capacity

Broad Jump...Failed attempt - for now.

2006-10-22T11:00:00.000+08:00

I always say that setting goals and falling short is ok:) as long as you learn from it. So here is a failed attempt at what was my goal for this year. A 300cm broad jump. I got 298cm TWICE! but never cleared 300. The video is below:). I think a 3-4 week block of shock (plyo) training will be what i need to get those elusive last few cm. ARGH... 300cm you are goin down!

Oh man... the world of warbluff is getting famous!

2006-10-19T13:11:00.000+08:00

Its even on southpark. I wrote about the possible dangers. But when it gets on southpark you know its making waves (and free publicity for blizzard). More than a million total views on the video hosting site. WoW:) indeed. Southpark is crude and I dont agree with the language and some of the themes in there. But this eppisode does have some value in terms of how online games (like the world of warcraft and other MMORPGS) can take hold of people and not let go, wasting their real life time and opportunities.

Ok... lets talk about this -sex

2006-10-19T10:48:00.000+08:00
Ok why are such things on my tagboard (before i delete them)? there is a general obsession with sex. And its even more obvious on the internet where people are dis-inhibited (look at all the crap out there!) and say whatever they feel like whenever they like. I dont know if "sexgirl" is really a girl even (i would guess its some messed up guy...) but hey!!! look its the internet, its some guys' tagboard, nobody will ever find out who I am! I think ill post some meaningless sex related messages... yes thats what I'll do, in broken "internet english" furthemore!

Ok sex is all well and good! I think its an awesome expression of intimacy. And when I am married, my wife and I will act... how should I say... "extremely married" - If you know what I mean - And I think you do... hehe.

But all this obsession with sex (hey naked people on advertisements make products easy to sell if people are all addicted to sexual stimulation anyway - do you need to put much thought into advertising beer to an alcoholic?) is not healthy.

Sex outside of marriage (before also) messes up marriages. Cos it allows both parties to consider extra marital sex "acceptable" even at a sub-conscious level. affiars are the no.1 cause of messed up marriages, and messed up marriages ==> messed up kids ==> who will in turn become messed up spouses as well ==> a bad cycle thats very bad for everybody. This is happening already (How many families really like each other, are happy together, have a home that they like to return each day to that is peaceful, secure and loving... no ... really... how many do you know?) and it should be the primary concern of everybody.

Please, if sex if the prime obesssion of your life thats not healthy. If you are addicted to porn please stop. You are setting yourself up for failure as a spouse and parent. This is not judgemental, its just the way it is.
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

Tough choice... get fat or get senile?

2006-10-18T11:33:00.000+08:00
Just read new reasearch on TEFLON (yea yea TM) pans... Have been using these for about 3 years at home for my beloved eggs... so what will it be... teflon - no oil and lower calories? or heap on the butter so i can make a nice flip of the food halfway thru cookin? ... choices choices... haha. My family did get a new pan. Its quite expensive ($50) and high class stainless steel. I'll give it a try and write about it.
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

An example of relating action to goals (by... me hehe)

2006-10-17T13:14:00.000+08:00
Ok this year I had 2 physical goals. 1 was to run the 40 yard dash in 4.5 seconds. The other is to jump 300cm in the standing broad jump (please excuse the confusion on metric and imperial measurements ahah these are both standard atheletic tests). The 300cm jump goal is going down this weekend baby!! I came close in poor condtions so i think its possible:)

In light of matching goals to actions, I did the following to try for the 300cm mark.
Velocity diet to lose 5-6kg of fats (yup those dont jump)
Strength training (squat 2.6+ times bodyweight and pull close to 3x) so that strength will not be a limiting factor
Reactive (speed/plyometric whatever else its called) training to make sure i can use the strength fast enough
this week of the test, 1 last tough leg training session on monday (front squats and jump squats) these few days rest-up for saturdays test.
Plan the conditions for the test - nearby playground with the same surface as running track so i can use running spikes.
Yup thats all i can think of at the moment. but it does give some idea of what "matching goals and actions" should look like. BTW that is my favorite quote from coach Dan John. A good coach who gives really practical advice.
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

Goals and actions

2006-10-16T16:16:00.000+08:00

I just gave a talk last weekend to parents, teachers and other people who are trying to influence the next generation as part of my work with Touch Community Services. It was (as ususal) about internet related issues and how we can help our youth deal sucecssfully with the use and dangers of the internet. We get some really awesome feedback.

E.g.
"You must come to the talk! You will be shocked to know what your kid is doing"
"Its great, wonderful, informative, and the cost is too little with respect to the content of the talk"

All the comments are positive just less expressive than those above "its a must! so informative". stuff like that.

So the talk is good. But what i am concerned about is: What do parents say to their children who may be addicted to games/internet when they go home after the talk? Do they really change their parenting style to be more understanding of their kids becuase of the new information they learn (i.e. that games REALLY are attractive and we cannot be 100% condeming when it comes to games and our children)... unfortunately (from the interactions with some parents) iIbeleive some parents will not change, not cannot but for whatever reason (its not a good enough reason BTW) will not.... Then... NOTHING WILL HAPPEN.

The goal of gettign their children to become dis-addicted to games, and getting back to real life priorities must be matched with a willingness to change the parenting approach. Else... the actions do not match the goals.

This idea applies to all areas of life I'm just using this illustration as an example. Actions must match desired outcome (goals) in all things!

Don't study==> Fail tests
Eat junk==> Watch tummy grow!
Don't sleep enough==> Get sick...

and the list goes on...
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

The body is an amazing piece of machinery

2006-10-13T21:13:00.000+08:00

I do try to push my body to its limits. More often than not it responds with adaptation to the new stresses (i.e. stronger joints, bigger muscles, better movement techniques etc) but once in a while we push too far too fast and we get injured... But all things considered, the body is an amazing piece of creation. I was just reading about bones this week (as part of the fascial network that covers the whole body) and even something as "simple" as bone is really amazing.

If a bone is too damaged, why can't we just replace it with some super strong metal rod? Its really amazing that even something as "Simple" as bone is so awesomely designed. I was reading that bones in science labs are hard like dry wood becuase they dry them out in ovens so that they wun stink and rot.

So all we are seeing is the calcium salts of the bone. Those are hard. and are very strong in resisting compressive force (pushing). BUT if u take a bone and soak it in vinegar for a few days, the acid will eat away the salt and you are left with the "rest" ofthe bone. the softish part that will feel like thick rubber. This is super good at resising tension (pulling). So thats whate makes the bone cool! its strong resiting both stretching and squeezing. And this is just one individual bone... not even talking about how the whole body is one integrated piece... thats yet another masterpiece.

COOL !!
nothing can replace the original piece of creation
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

20K hits!

2006-10-12T12:21:00.000+08:00
Wow... this is cool. It took 5 months to reach 10,000 hits. from April to late Aug. But from september to Mid Oct we have reached 20,000! thanks again to all readers! I'm happy to write as long as poeple are finding this stuff useful in some way. From now I will be publicising other inspirational blogs more and more (and more and more shamelessly - starting with my mom's blog). I know that I write quite abit about health and fitness and strength and sports. But that will not make such a big positive influence on the internet because not everybody (how come??? how come?!!) is interested in those things. But with more "recomended reading" of other good blogs and insirational internet usage, I hope that more people will find the internet a place that helps us all do better in real life... rather than INSTEAD of real life! Look out for more recomendations from me:)
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

This computer game thing is getting out of hand! Parents take note please!

2006-10-10T21:32:00.000+08:00

Computers making Zombies out of this generation.

===>

Over the past week, there have been 2 reports (that I know about) in the newspaper in Singapore about kids losing their sanity due to excessive computer gaming. To the point where a doctor diagnoses it clinically as a mental problem. The guy was depressed from gaming (no supprise cos its all VIRTUAL!! you are gaining NOTHING in terms of meeting REAL human needs of ANY kind)

"oh well it happens".. yes... but as usual the reported cases are only the tip of the iceberg. In my work we see MANY kids and families who are breaking down and becoming totally dis-functional because of gaming.

Skip school
Total communication breakdown btw child/parent
Socal skill in real life = 0.00
violent/emotional when computer is taken away
Withdrawal symptoms
All around lifeless and souless expressions on their faces
This is sad. And this trend is accelerating (if the phonecalls for help, and the issues that educators and councilors raise to us are any indication)

As ususal it starts young. Parents please addict your children to REAL LIFE activities! The gameboy is NOT the way to make your kids busy so you can go for a facial and spa! Do things the old fashioed way. Play with your kids. This is SO important. You want great kids, make the sacrifice. Its not about $$$ and special education classes. Its about YOU! Thats how you make them great! Don't leave it to maids, don't leave it to teachers...

I feel I handle stress well and grow up well (not perfect of coruse) but pretty well rounded because my mother played alot of interesting things with me when I was young. Playdough, finger painting all over the toilet wall with colored starch, sand, all kinds of running around and playground activity. And guess what... Mom was RIGHT!!! (of course she is...whats new... read her blog, she is right there as well...)

Doctors today say that: "Unstructured play makes kids smarter, stronger and happier, the American Academy of Pediatrics says in a report to be released today at the organization's annual meeting at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta."
NO SUPRISE!!

Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

That was fun! - 245kg high box squat at 77.5kg bodyweight:)

2006-10-10T21:16:00.000+08:00
Here we go!...because of a slight hip flexor strain that i talk about, these 3 weeks my heavy lift will be a high box, narrow stance squat to slightly above parallel. Last week 225kg felt heavy... but today! I smoked 245kg. Like i have mentioned before, improvements come in jumps at more advanced lifitng ages (assuming training is fundamentally sound).

12
3
4
5

Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

Training density - More work in less time

2006-10-09T22:24:00.000+08:00

More work! Less Time

I believe this is a good way to do hypertrophy/accessory/supplementary training. I.e. anything that is not maximal effort, or dynamic effort (speed). This is the basis of excalating density training popularised by Charles staley. I find it useful for the above purpoese.

For maximal lifting and speed training, this kind of method is not ideal as it doesnt allow for enough nervous system recovery time. If I'm training speed today and i don't rest between sets, very soon its no longer speed. (this is a mistake i see many people make, they expect training to get pumped and feel breathless.... neither of these happen much with speed work)

For E.g today jsut to let my nervous system rest from yesterday jump training, I did upper body hypertrophy work (which i dont do often hehe) i did 100 chinups, 100 dips, and 50 hanging leg raises at my nearby fitness corner. 10, 10, 5 in a circuit. I timed the total event and rested as long as i needed to. Total time 20:36. Ill try to beat that next time. Once i can decrease time 10-15% i can up the resistance or difficulty a bit:)
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

Setting goals - 300cm broad jump

2006-10-08T20:51:00.000+08:00
Each year I set myself certain physical performance goals. This year it is jumping 300cm in the broad jump. I have been working on speed strength the whole year and today i tested again. In bad conditions (slippery floor, loose shoes, just after training, early in the morning, 1 day after Interval sprints...) I got 290 consistently. I beleive with spikes on a track, or boots on good grass, well rested on a good day 300cm is in reach... yay! This year 300cm. next year another challenging goal... 100m in less than 11 seconds. Can i do it? Dont know! but i will train so that i put myself in a good position to succede!
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

My mom is getting popular!

2006-10-07T20:05:00.000+08:00

I just added a site meter to my mom's blog 2 days ago and its already 50+ hits:) Outstanding! It sure is more than I had in my first 2 DAYS! :)
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

Singapore in the 1950s - Where i get my nuts: "Guan Say" Victoria Street Whole-Sale Center

2006-10-06T18:30:00.000+08:00
Check out this old picture from... earlier today! (film grain + excessive shapening if anybody is wondering how to get the effect). I thought this is the kind of scene from 50 years ago in our entrepot trade island city:)
Anyway here (in more arty farty B+W) is Richard, the boss of Guan Say, where i get my nuts. Just go there and say Jonathan sent you:) you will get great service and good prices on wholesale nuts. The entire wholesale center is a throwback to past age. Quite interesting. And the colors of teh dried foods really make for good photos. This place is along Victoria Street and its opposite the Golden Landmark hotel.
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

Whats next on my learning list - soft tissue therapy excellence

2006-10-05T21:56:00.000+08:00
Ok. In physical performance there are so many things, things dealing with skeletal muscles, joints, biochemical stuff (linked to nutrition as well) and neuroloigcal stuff. I've been growing in understanding in those areas. But now my focus is on soft tissue therapy. not just massage, but understanding and fixing pain and refered (pain not where the problem area is) pain.

So these are my readings for the next few weeks... I'm gonna give this stuff a try on anybody who will let me (who dares?).... Bye bye neck, back, head, arm... pretty much everywhere - chronic pain! From testimonies of top level therapists and athletes, this stuff really works. Well its time for me to see for myself! I personally have some minor (doesnt affect lifting or performance, but it is annoying) neck pain (over 2 years of this!). I'll try to get to the bottom of that first:). Wish me luck!
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

Being a good Son. (shamless promotion of my mom!)

2006-10-03T22:34:00.000+08:00

CaptnJ teaching mom to blog and use MSN messenger!

I am super proud of my mom. She really does a great job as a mother, wife, guide and advisor. Now that she has done a great job with my brother, sister and (can't you tell?)... ME. She wants to share her experences so that other younger mothers and families can benefit as well. In this day and age there is not better medium than the Internet (of course!). One problem with the internet is that its generally considered "for the youth". My mom (no matter how you would like to push the definition of 'youth') is not a youth. In fact my mom enjoys her seniority, it lends weight to the words she says!

Instead of just useless idle words "oh i want to help other moms..." my mom is really doing it! You have to understand that while people probably don't get more "inteligent" as generations pass by, they do have the same tendancy to be hard to change in mindset and habits. It takes a great level of "discomfort" to learn something new and out of our usual practice especially in the area of technology. Thats why Im so proud of my mom. she has ventured into blogging. This is a MAJOR discomfort for a 50+ year old (dont worry she's very secure about her age =D) non techie. So here we are... soon to be the BEST blog on the web for mothers and families everywhere

No joke, my mom is a great writer, and super wise. If only more people would just DO WHAT SHE SAYS... the world will be a better place. I don't say that flippantly I really mean it. Hope you enjoy her blog!
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

Training Around Injury

2006-10-02T17:52:00.000+08:00
I am currently dealing with a psoas strain. Like all injuries, its frustrating. But injuries do happen when you push the body to its limits. So there is a correct way to deal with training when injured.

There are 2 wrong things that people do when they are injured.

1. They just train as ususal, play the same sports, do the same exercises... this is unwise. Of course there is the risk of further injury (takes even logner to heal) and there is the risk of devloping compensotory motor patterns that are wrong and (body compensates for weak injured area by overutilising other parts in a way they were not designed to be used leading to long term problems).

2. They stop training alltogether. "oh poor me, I'm injured, I need to eat some cake and chocolate!"... you can see how this is bad. You get detrained and if you dont watch it, you lose diet consciousness as well. (naturally bad eating is made even worse by lack of training... d..d..d..d..duhz).

So the correct way to train with some injuries is to train around the injury. Train to the point where pain starts. Thats the general guideline. This may seem common sense but how mayn people fall into the previous 2 traps?

As for me, deep squatting is out because the psoas gets really shortened in the bottom of a deep squat and starts so spasm (try turning your head to the side where you are having a neck ache haha not plesant huh...). So i train AROUND it. I did high box squats using the formerly girly "reebok steps" hehehe. So i get to keep the max effort training, and i set the steps to be just above the point where i feel any discomfort. This principle works for all injuries.
Note: This does not work for chronic soft tissue injuries like scar tissue adhesions and trigger point problems. Those will not go away till you get some soft tissue therapy/massage done.
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

So where do kids get to be kids?

2006-10-02T09:06:00.000+08:00
Wow kids in singapore dont know what "after-school" means... I think im my time (And thats not too long ago) there was such a thing as after school. You went to play, run around and be a kid. but now days after school means extra tution lessons, and school activities... it does keep them out of trouble. But they do become boring kids its a tough balance to strike i'll admit. What does worry me is that the kids are not very happy.

2 years ago i went to a orphanage in thailand with come Boys Brigade guys to teach english now talk about happy! check out those kids! They have very little materially, but they do live in a happy environemnt (considering its an orphanage) and they do get alot of love from the house parents. They also have a well managed school schedule that educates but does not overload. I wouldnt say its outright better, but these are a fun bunch of kids to be around.

Spoiling kids with fancy clothes and toys does nothing for them besides easing the guilt of a parent who spends too much time in the office. Thats not the most important thing to a kid.

Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

Velocity Diet day 21+3 - some glycogen in muscles

2006-09-30T16:51:00.000+08:00
Of coruse when we go on a low (near no) carb diet for an extended period, we lose water and muscle glycogen. So thats what happens on the velocity diet. But 3 days after eating some regular food i took more pics to see what happens. This is the first time that i have tried such a low carb diet. And this is the first time i am coming off it.

3 days After
Overall quite good. a bit bigger looking:) haha and i went to run 8x250m sprints yesterday... wow i felt LIGHT! its great! and i finished it with much less suffering that I expected (still quite alot of pain though ahah)
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

Do I really listen to people?

2006-09-28T21:54:00.000+08:00
I'm asian and my supposed first language is chinese. But because I spent alot of time overseas when i was young, i did not learn chinese. I am what you would call self-taught (i.e. not good) at chinese. However some of the characters are really meaningful. My friend just pointed one out to me! The "ting" character which means "listen".

Its very representitive of what "listening" really is. And I wonder to myself: "how much do i really listen when people are trying to communicate something to me".

There are several parts, the ear symbol on the left, the "10" symbol on the top right, the "eye" below it and then followed by a "1" and at the bottom right the symbol for "heart".

So listening means to listen with the ear, watch closely for all expression and body language as if i had 10 eyes, and focus on understanding what is being communicated with all my heart... uh...lets see thats often not what happens. Arent most fights/marriage/family/relationship/etc problems of misunderstanding?

Often we may get caught:
Not listening/Pretending to listen
Not noticing subtle signs (no 10 eyes)
listening but distracted (not with 1 heart)

I am personally trying to listen with the full meaning that this chinese character when people talk to me. I have to say that I have gotten better but this kind of thing is a long process of practice till it becomes part of my character.
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

Velocity diet day 21 - Pics

2006-09-28T00:56:00.000+08:00

START 6 sep 2006

Ok i weigh 75-76kg lost aobut 6kg from my starting weight. These are the latest pics:) unpumped. I will take some 3 days from now ater eating a few carbs and we'll see what it looks like full! At the top is the start pic, on the Left is 5 days in, top and right are current pics. Lots of veins... but not that much abs considering the vein amount... ahha former fat boy syndrome?

Things I liked: feeling light, joints feel good (all that fishoil i think), feel quick, abs look nice hehe

Things I did not like: feeling hungry (worst only during the first week), cannot do as much sprinting and metabolic conditioning (walking is boring), got weaker (but may be CNS fatigue as much as anythign else as i did quite an intense block of training, we shall see after a couple of weeks)
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

Velocity Diet day 21 - coming back to food!

2006-09-26T21:42:00.000+08:00
I have reached a weight and fat percentage that i like:) any less and i feel strength will be overly compromised. Still this is my leanest ever. will post a few pics and a few more a few days after i start eating more calories again.

Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

Velocity Diet Day 19

2006-09-24T11:05:00.000+08:00

Sep 10 (82kg)

Sep 17(78kg)

Sep 24(77kg)
Ok fat loss seems to have slowed. But The arms are clearly more veiny and the tummy is a bit tighter, weight is down 1kg to 77. Also this week was the lower volume training week in the 4 weeks of diet. Its a 4 week training block of moderate, high, low, very high training volume. Am nursing a slight hip flexor strain on the right leg (not sure from where!) weird...
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

Lantern Festival

2006-09-23T21:41:00.000+08:00
I used to do this with my family with I was young. I thought its WAY ouf of fashion but I was wrong. This traditional festival is alive and well. I went to see it at my local community center.

All Photos done with Nikon d200, Built in flash (sometimes), 18-200mm VR AF-S

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Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

Nikon stuff - part 2 18-200mm AF-S VR

2006-09-23T17:01:00.000+08:00

18-200mm AF-S VR - gaffer taped up as ususal for its own protection

AF-S means that the lens focuses silently (or close to silently) becasue is uses a tiny motor in the lens rather than the screwdriver twisting type of focus mechanism. Its supposed to be faster... and I feel that it is but its only noticable at longer focal lenghts (maybe 70mm and above)

This lens is my most used. It covers a huge zoom range! more than 10X (200(longest)/18(shortest) zoom. Ususaly such zooms are not very good picture wise. The Nikon one is the very best in the world (as of end 2006). Its sharp (very good at 18mm and only good at 200mm), it has good contrast and it is not as slow at the 200mm end (f5.6 as oppoesed to other 10x zooms which are f6.3). f5.6 is not good enough for indoor sport. But is good enough for decent outdoors action. Indoors you cannot use this lens to capture action shots.

But what is good is that you can use this lens to capture still shots using the VR function. I have hand held 1/4second shots at 200mm indoors with decent % of sharp ones... maybe 50%. Thats quite amazing. Great for places I don't usually visit museums etc where the objects dont move.

This lens covers from wide angle to zooming in so thats great. Unless I need a shot where there is alot of action indoors, this is the lens that will be on my camera:) Its quite amazing that the same lens took both the pictures below from the same place all handheld at 1/10s shutter speed. This lens costs 2x the price of other 18-200mm zooms. But i feel that the VR and the AF-s and the picture quality are worth it. Its also in VERY short supply at the moment. When it is in stock it will cost you 1250-1300 Singapore dollars.

Wide - 18mm there is a bit of light falloff at the corners, thats normal and not noticable in 95% of shots especially outdoors. Its EASILY fixed in photoshop

Zoomed in (taken from same position as above) - 200mm. Those 2 little bottles are at the center of the previous shot. yes, ZMA is a good supplement to take. Many people are severly zinc defficient - hehe totally off topic! But you wouldnt even have this topic without the 200mm zoom range of this lens.
Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

Interesting video of the day - nice idea for dads!

2006-09-22T20:24:00.000+08:00
Some people take interval shots of stars moving across the sky. This dad did some pretty good shots of his son to be ahah.

Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong

Velocity Diet - Day 17

2006-09-22T20:22:00.000+08:00

Woo i feel so ... "bouncy" and light... ballerina like if you will... Thats the feelin I have at this weight!... and that pic is years of deadlifting and olympic pulls revealed from under my fat!

Thanks for reading my blog! any suggestions and constructive comments are welcome! regds Jonathan "captnJ" Wong