What's This?

The Strength & Fitness Newsletter is a weekly email newsletter which summarises the things added to Straight to the Bar (as well as a few gems from the archives). Absolutely free.

btw, I’d love to hear your feedback – both on the individual items and the newsletters themselves. Drop a comment below the relevant issue, or swing by Twitter ( I’m @scottbird ).

cheers,

Scott

Ready To Learn Even More?

I love learning new skills, and the many seminars & workshops available are a great way to do that. If you’re looking for a specific type of workshop nearby, check out the ones on Dragon Door. Great mix of kettlebell and calisthenics-based offerings.

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Podcasts

I listen to an ever-changing pool of podcasts, discussing the many aspects of training and nutrition possible. Most recently :
FoundMyFitness (Dr Matthew Walker on Sleep)

Over to you. Any you’d recommend?

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Strength Training on Instagram

It’s fair to say that we’ve checked out quite a few images over the years – on Flickr & Smugmug in particular.

A friend of mine just pointed me to Chris Stanciu ‘s Instagram feed, which contains a great mix of nutrition and workout images :

instagram.com/officialgainsthetics.

NB : if you’d like to share your own images, just add them to one of the sites noted above and send us a link.

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Strength Training on Facebook

I suspect you love talking about strength training constantly (certainly the case here), and you’re always on the lookout for places to do that. Comments on various sites, forums as well as various in-person communities.

Online, I gravitate toward both Twitter and Facebook. In addition to the SttB offerings, here’s another one you may wish to check out :

Garage Gym Reviews (Cooper Mitchell’s page)

We’ve noted a few of his videos in the past, and they’re great for diving in deep on a particular type of equipment. Nice one.

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Twitter Lists

I use Twitter for a number of things, as I’m sure everyone else here does. To talk about strength training, nutrition and many other topics. Works well.

To make this a little easier – and so people can dive right in to the topics that interest them – I use Twitter’s ‘List‘ functionality quite a bit. There’s a full list of them here :

https://twitter.com/scottbird/lists

Whatever you’re in to, it’s all there.

NB : the above lists are always being fine-tuned. If you know of someone who tweets regularly about a particular subject and should be on one of them, let me know.

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Other (Daily) Newsletters You Might Like

Finally, for a daily dose of tangentially-related information – check out the following. All are compiled daily, and cover the following topics :

Aging & Longevity (living for a very, very long time)
Electric Cars in Australia (great way to help tackle air-pollution)
Better Sleep Nightly (my favourite form of recovery)

And yes, they’re absolutely free.

Bruce Lee : The Art of Expressing the Human Body (Bruce Lee & John Little)

If you’ve ever watched a Bruce Lee film and marveled at his strength, speed, agility, endurance, flexibility or muscularity, this book should take pride of place in your collection. Unlike many other writings covering everything from Lee’s training methods to nutrition, this book is based not on the recollections of people around him; but on Lee’s own notes. Brilliant.

Definitely worthy of a place on the fitness shelf.

Bruce Lee : The Art of Expressing the Human Body.

Monday, 21 Nov 2011

This Week on Straight to the Bar

I’m constantly amazed at just how much my training is influenced by the people on this site. Whether you’re looking for a new piece of equipment, an unusual exercise variation or just an idea of how others approach things, you’ll enjoy these :

A Critical Analysis: Reaction Ball
Justin Andrushko
Justin takes a look at the most common reaction ball on the market (the Nike SPARQ eyeReact Ball) – how it works, and how it can help your training.
Straight to the Bar Flickr Group
Various authors
I love photography (pics here from the New Zealand trip), and there have been several great photos posted here recently (you’ll see some of them in the sidebar), notably by Roy Scott, Zach Wheeler, Davie Easton and Wild Kiwi. If you haven’t already, add some of yours. Love seeing where/how everyone trains and competes.

Ready to add your own opinion, workout log or training article? Just head over to the Forums, Training Logs, or swing by the Article Submissions page. They’re fantastic ways to share your ideas.

Video : 30lb Swingball

More swingball goodness. Nice one.

Gymchat 146 – Running

Bill ‘Body by Long‘ Long.

Although I’ve sampled a number of forms of strength-training, running isn’t one of them. Yet.

This week we’re taking a look at this enigmatic activity, and finding out just what I’m missing out on. How to train for it and how it helps with other forms of
your training (and overall condition).
Helping us explore this fascinating topic is none other than Body by Long‘s Bill Long. Fantastic.

Details –
Who : Strength-training fans
Topic : Running
When : Wed Nov 23, 9pm EDT (1am UTC)
How : Post a comment, question or reply
If you’ve never been to one of these discussions before, here’s how to join in the fun. Simple, quick to set up and free.
And to see when it’s on in your timezone, head over to the calendar.
See you there.

Jackie Burgmann.

Quick update on last week’s gymchat : Thanks once again to everyone who took part in the discussion on Training at Home. Some superb ideas in there.
For those who missed out on the conversation, here’s the transcript. Was a great one.

Tip of the Week: Setting a Gripper

Each week we publish a number of tips and techniques via twitter, Google+, the forums, the blog; and now the newsletter. Wherever you are, there’s always a way to improve what you’re doing.
This tip comes to us from the incredible Jedd ‘Napalm‘ Johnson, and takes the form of a superb video. Enjoy.

Incidentally, if you want to learn more techniques like this, check out Jedd’s own The Grip Authority.
Fantastic site.

Reading : Hot at Home

Hot at Home.

There’s some great reading here.
Jackie Burgmann‘s Hot at Home covers several of the topics we discussed in last week’s Gymchat (here’s the transcript), in a whole lot more detail. I’ll post up a full review shortly, but suffice to say, this is well worth checking out.
Fantastic read.

Quick update on the StrongerGrip Loadable Club Set we noted a while ago : I had a great discussion recently on club workouts for beginners. Great way to train.
When it came to the equipment part of the discussion, we both agreed on the loadable clubs from StrongerGrip. 3lb empty and around 8lb loaded up. Beautiful things.

Exercise of the Week : Dinnie Stone Training

The Dinnie Stones are certainly a superb test of strength. Well known, and a little unusual.
No matter where you are in the world though, you probably want to do some training before you see the real things. The video below shows exactly that – a pair of Dinnie Handles (Lifting Rings), two stacks of plates and a little technique. Good fun.

Incidentally, if you’d like to get in touch regarding this or any other aspect of strength, you can send me an email here. Look forward to hearing from you.

Free Straight to the Bar eBooks

As a Strength & Fitness Newsletter subscriber you get several great eBooks, absolutely free. Just head over here, save them to your hard-drive, and dive in.
Good stuff.
NB : This is an ever-changing list of books. If you’d like to put your own work in front of a fantastic strength-focussed audience, let me know.

Time for Some New Gear? Here’s What to Get, and How to Use It

Thanks to everyone who’s sent in feedback (via email, Facebook and Twitter) about the Straight to the Bar Guides – it’s greatly appreciated.
For everyone who hasn’t seen them yet, the Guides will help you decide what to get (and where), and how to train with it. There’s some great information in there.