Author: Pavel Tsatsouline
Pavel Tsatsouline is the CEO of StrongFirst, Inc.
In intense full body exercise our hearts can supply only 1/3-1/2 of the muscles. To deal with this limitation, blood vessels in muscles and organs that are not too busy constrict while those in the working muscles dilate. This redistributes the blood flow, delivers more oxygen where it is needed most, and eases the work […]
(An Excerpt from Kettlebell Axe) “Do you know what the difference between great people and regular people is?” says a coach to an athlete in Yevgeny Yevtushenko’s novel Don’t Die Before Death. “A great person is a gardener of self. He cuts off the unnecessary branches.” In AXE, as in other types of training, pros […]
With this article we would like to give you a taste of what you are about to learn at Programming Demystified, a new seminar with Pavel, Fabio, and Hector, this October in Phoenix, AZ or in your living room. Over a century ago Ivan Lebedev, a big name in strength training in imperial Russia, suggested […]
It is a tall order for a training method to live up to the title of this article—but one does. It checks off the following boxes: ☑ Power ☑ Strength ☑ Muscle hypertrophy ☑ Fat loss ☑ “Cardio” ☑ “Work capacity” ☑ Longevity through mitochondrial adaptations ☑ It “gives you more than it takes out […]
“If at first you don’t succeed, redefine success.” This caption for a New Yorker cartoon nails the “FOMO” mentality of a “workout of the day.” Then why, might you ask, is StrongFirst jumping on the bandwagon and introducing its own “WOD”? Please read on. The biological law of accommodation states that the response of an […]
Strong Endurance™ is our umbrella term for all anti-glycolytic training methods. Anti-glycolytic training is “anti-HIIT” that trains you to produce less lactic acid instead of tolerating more of it. AGT is used by many Eastern European national teams in a variety of sports: judo, cross country skiing, rowing, full contact karate… Broadly, there are three […]
In a recent article, I explained how varying your lifting speed can help you gain more strength. Today I will show you a couple of ways of applying this knowledge to boost your squat, barbell (back, front, Zercher) or kettlebell (goblet, double front). 3 x Gear Squat Protocol #1 The simplest thing you can do […]
Truth comes out of error more readily than out of confusion. —Francis Bacon What do successful athletes not blessed with Olympic genes have in common?—Patience to tweak their training, one variable at a time, until they have found “their” way. Contrast that with a typical trainee who impatiently switches programs before he has had a […]
Back in the USSR many gyms were closed in the summer “for repairs.” Out of necessity, lifters and bodybuilders switched from barbells to kettlebells and bodyweight for a couple of months. When they returned to the bar in the fall, after a brief re-entry most were able to set PRs. If you take a planned […]
The following article does not contain medical advice. It presents long term training strategies for increasing general resistance in healthy people. The author would like to thank Kristann Heinz, MD and Paul White, MD for their valuable input. Take care of your family and your other responsibilities. Then train. The following strategies should improve your […]
