G.O.A.T. and Mayweather's Pursuit for Perfection

The term G.O.A.T., or Greatest of All Time, commonly seems to be defined differently by each and every sports fan. It is an honor limited to one athlete per sport - and a title that is hard to obtain without controversy. But this past weekend, an undefeated, flamboyant, and technical Floyd Mayweather extended his win streak to 44-0, keeping an unblemished record...unblemished.

In every sport, there is an argument for who is the best to ever do it. In golf, its Jack vs Tiger; in soccer, people are starting to make an argument for Lionel Messi; and for the first time ever, basketball die-hards are starting to pin Lebron James against Michael Jordan - especially after this 4th MVP award in five years. People are interpreting the "G.O.A.T." differently, and for that, we get no real answer as to who is the best to ever play their respective game.

While this argument remains unresolved in many of the mainstream sports, the argument in boxing is a little different. One fighter, and only one, is undefeated in 44 fights. One fighter, and only one, has been undefeated professionally for 17 years. Boxing viewers have NEVER seen someone take such little punishment, and we have NEVER seen someone land significant strikes so accurately. Floyd has a long list of great and high-level fighters he has taken out on the way to his 44 and 0 record. Though some were closer than others (de la Hoya, Castillo), Floyd has continued to outbox his competition over twelve rounds. If they make it that far.

My first Floyd fight was Corrales vs Mayweather and I have been a diehard Mayweather fan. Since beating Oscar de la Hoya, I have considered him the best in the world. But now it is time to take that to the next level - simple and plain - Floyd Mayweather is the greatest boxer OF ALL TIME. Saturday night, Robert Guerrero failed to land even 20% of his punches, while Floyd landed at will... with ease. Leading up to the fight, many thought this powerful and nearly undefeated challenger could pose an actual threat to a Mayweather who spend a quarter of the last year in prison and hadn't fought in twelve months. Wrong.

Floyd responded to this off-year as the best-ever should. He picked Guerrero apart. He showed age (36) would have no influence on his performance. He displayed an offense that landed whenever and wherever he desired, arguably unlike anything we have ever seen in boxing. He even worked with his father to improve his defense - a defense that has already been considered the best defense in all of boxing. Not only did he evade 82% of Guerrero's punches, Guerrero didn't land a single hard shot to Mayweather in 36 minutes. On the contrary, 'Pretty Boy' landed powerful right straights whenever he felt like it and did so with a damaged right hand.

Robert Guerrero was a legitimate threat, someone who people thought could end his streak going into fight week, but now someone people will say he "had no chance" in there with Floyd. It seems boxing fans will do anything to write off Money Mayweather's opponents or accomplishments, yet they were the same people the week before saying Guerrero was 'the guy' to end the perfect record.

In combat sports, when recognizing someone as the best ever, there is trouble in stacking them up against the other greats due to weight classes and strength of opponent. But as a fight fan, you MUST realize these things are uncontrollable. Floyd was never going to be a heavyweight , but would defeat your beloved Muhammed Ali if he was. You all argued Manny would take out Floyd and that he ran from the fight. Where is Manny now? Weight classes and opponents are uncontrollable - statistics are not. All we can do is evaluate a fighter based on his record, skill, and performance. Let me do the math for you:

44-0 + 17 years Undefeated + Best Defensive Boxer All-Time + Prolific Offense = G.O.A.T.

This is not to bash other greats and the accolades they acquired in their day. Sports fans, more specifically boxing fans, will still disagree with Floyd being the best ever. I am unsure if this is influenced by his personality, their love for another boxer, or some other reason.  Surely, if they disagree with the notion of Floyd being the greatest ever, they are not looking at statistics. If its walks like a duck and it talks like a duck... it's a duck.

@fitnessphanatic

Nutrition for the Common Athlete

Almost every athlete wonders what exactly they should be eating before, during, and/or after an intense workout. While there have been theories such as carb-loading for runners and high-protein diets for body builders, it is unclear what the average athlete should be doing to maximize their results in the exercise room.

Coming from a functional fitness background, but having trained in boxing and spent endless hours weightlifting over the years, I set out to find what the best combination of nutrition would be. Keeping in mind maximizing my results, yet not consuming a handful of supplements every day, it was important to understand what should go through my body before, during and after my workout to maximize muscle growth and promote a speedy recovery.

Back in grade school, we learned the word “homeostasis”.  By definition, it is a process in which the body's internal environment is kept stable. When it comes to fitness training, the faster we assist our body getting back to homeostasis, the more energy it can spend on muscle recovery and growth. So the next question is, how exactly do we help our body reach homeostasis?

Exercising burns three major nutritional components of our diet: water, carbohydrates, and protein. The less water we have, the more dehydrated we feel; the less carbs we have, the less energy we experience; and the less protein we have, the less amount is available to be utilized for muscle growth. Back to what I was saying – about how we help our body. Since we burn water, carbs, and protein, it is very important that we replace these before, during, and after working out. This means a healthy meal with carbs and proteins before you workout (to provide your body with protein and carbs to use for energy and muscle recovery). That also means you need a supplement while working out that includes water, carbs and protein to replace what you are burning and stay to stay at maximum efficiency. It took Gatorade over 40 years to create their “G” product which contains a sufficient amount of all three of these components, but is your best option in the gym.

Keep in mind, guidelines say to drink 1.2x the amount of water you lose while working out, so you need to be sipping water constantly. Finally, we have the post-workout meal; which is the same as the pre-workout meal, some basic and healthy carbs with proteins to give your body back what it lost.

What happens when you constantly replenish your body with water, protein, and carbohydrates is you allow for your body to put all of its energy into muscle growth and recovery instead of searching for carbs to burn as energy or using the little protein it has for recovery. The importance of aiding your body in its need to become stable is immeasurable. By offering the smallest bit of assistance and drinking lots of water, you can really enable your body to take full advantage of your every workout.

@fitnessphanatic

Three Signs of a Bad Squat

As personal trainers, we all find ourselves dealing with clients that have greater, equal, or lesser physical capabilities than ourselves. Clients with all different levels of physical capabilities have one issue – they cannot perform a proper squat.

After spending countless hours in the gym, one of the biggest problems I have noticed amongst the general population is a lack of flexibility and the know-how to perform a quality squat. There are three signs to spotting this: Knees bowing in or out, heels lifting off the floor, and knees that bend far over their feet.

We build relationships with these clients, and over time, training them is just clock-work to us. However, it is VERY important to recognize, even if it’s your client of two years, it’s time to study a proper squat and make sure that every client can execute it. Feet are hip-width and pointed forward, knees bend over your feet, and the first motion is sitting back, making sure the glutes are activated. Clients unable to execute the perfect squat generally have inflexibility in their legs (specifically their calves) and are forcing their knees too far over their feet – causing a tremendous amount of pressure on their knees and a squat that only works the quadriceps. 

It is time for us to stop getting so comfortable with our clients and start making sure that we are ALWAYS working toward making them a more physically-able and athletic specimen. Correct their squats and help them improve their walks, runs, everyday lifestyle, and more.

1.18 Workout: Arms (Biceps/Triceps)

Goal: Strength/Muscle Growth, Sets: Mostly 3, Method: Single Sets, Super-Sets, Super-"Duper" Sets
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Biceps
Dumbbell Curls x 3
[Cable Peaks x Drag Curls] x 3
[Reverse Curls x Hammer Curls] x 2
[Zottman Curls x 20 Pushups x Weighted Band Curl] x 3
Triceps
[Standing Double Kickbacks x Bosu Widegrip Pushups] x 3
[Reverse Cable Pulldowns x Sagged Head Triceps] x 3
[Unilateral Kickbacks x Dips] x 2
[Tricep Pulldown x Overhead Tricep Ext x Bosu Closegrip Pushups] x 3
Lesnar (Explosive) Pushups - One set 'til failure

Abs
75 Situps - One set
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Duration: 45 minutes
Concept/Explanation: This was my first workout in a week, so coming off my longest break in a while, I kept it short. Lots of supersetting (back-to-back exercises) in my attempt to create muscle hypertrophy. A really good superset is Cable Peaks and Drag curls, which I will post videos for or you can look up. Both work your Bicep in a unique way and compliment eachother well. In my last Bicep sets I introduced pushups to warmup my Triceps. As always with Triceps, I like to superset weighted exercises with different pushups. There are SO many different kinds that stress the Tricep at different angles that it's always a great supersetting exercise. Sagged Head Tricep Ext is also a great exercise because it does a good job of putting the Tricep through full extension/flexion - yielding great results. Lastly, Lesnar pushups are an exploding pushup where one arm is on/ one arm is off the Bosu and you do a pushup, exploding and switching hands so the opposite hand is on the Bosu and the Bosu-hand shifts to the opposite side of the ball. Great for burning out - generally do these at the end of Tricep workouts until I collapse. Explosive exercises build muscle the fastest.

Client (DO) Workout #5: Caloric Expenditure and Total Body Workout

This was a mixture of Cardio, Weightlifting, and Conditioning all at once.

Incline Treadmill (Speed over Incline) - 10 min
Total Body - Calf Raises x MB Squats x Russian Twist x Back Ext. x KB Obliques x Crunches x Lat Raises x Tricep Pushbacks x DB Hammers
Bosu Conditioning Drills - 3 min

Elliptical - 10 min
Total Body - Calf Raises x Sumo Squats x Gorilla Swing 1 x Back Ext x Tai Crunches x Gorilla Swing 2 x Tricep Pushbacks x DB Hammers
Bosu Conditioning Drills - 3 min
Bosu Plank

Incline Treadmill (Incline over Speed) - 10 min
Bosu Conditioning Drills - 2 min
Plank x Reverse Plank

Client (GB) Workout #4: Weight Training (Chest/ Back/ Core)

Weight Training - 45 min
[DB Bench x Cable Bench x Face Pulls x Bent-Over Rows x Plank] x 2
Bosu Flies x Cybex Pull-Togethers x Incline Pushups x Upright Rows x Reverse Plank
Unilat. Bosu Fly x Cybex Pull-Togethers x Double-Bosu Pushups x Upright Row x Bosu Reverse Plank
Unstable Unilat. Rows x Cable Rows x Cats&Dogs x Bosu Unilat. Pushups x Bicycle Crunches
Unstable Unilat. Rows x Unstable Cable Rows x Bosu Swans x Bosu Pushups x Side-to-Side MB Crunches

Lower Body - 15 min
Incline Treadmill Intervals w/ Kettle Bells (Max w/o KB = 3.4mph @ 9, Max w/KB = 3.1mph @ 7)

Awesome workout, but there are way harder ones in her near future.

Client (L&L) Workout #3: Caloric Expenditure, Total Body Strengthening & Flexiblity Training

Flexibility Training - 13 min
Hamstring Stretch
Butterfly
Individual Hamstring Stretch/ Glute Stretch/ Lower Back & Lat Stretch
IT Band Stretch
Hip Flexor Stretch
Quadricep Stretch
Standing Calf Stretch

Total Body Strengthening - 25 min
[Stability Ball Squat w/ Lateral Raises x DB Hammer Curls x Individual Rows x Tricep Extention x Plank x Cats & Dogs x Heel Touching Crunches x Medicine Ball Squats x Calf Raises] x 1
[Stability Ball Squat w/ Lateral Raises x DB Hammer Curls x Cybex Rows x DB Kickbacks x Bicycle Crunches x Cats & Dogs x Thai Crunches x Medicine Ball Squats x Calf Raises] x 1

Cardio/ Caloric Expenditure
L1: Bike @ Constant Speed for 20 min
L2: Incline Treadmill Interval Workout for 20 min (peaks: 3.6 mph @ 8 degrees and 3.4mph @ 15 degrees)