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How to Deadlift like a PRO by Adding up to 50 pounds Weekly

September 27, 2021

What’s up my fitness family?

Would you like to know how to add up to 50 pounds to your deadlift weekly?

Well, guess what?

I’m going to teach you how to deadlift like a pro and add up to 50 pounds on your lift weekly.

But I’m gonna keep this short, sweet, and simple.

There are only four exercises that are going to help put the 50 pounds on your deadlift every single week, I promise you this. I’ve done this with hundreds and hundreds of clients, football players, a lot of them being athletes.

But guess what?

I’ve used this stuff on myself.

I like to think that it’s you know, for old men, too, just kidding.

There are four exercises, you need to know what each one of the exercises five reps, max it.

At the end of this, you’re going to find out the key two factors, why and how to put the muscle on.

Obviously, you got to eat right, no matter how much you lift. And what you do in the weight room is always affected by how you eat. Eating is how you perform, it’s how you heal.

The first lift that you’re going to do is called a high pull.

A high pull, you’re gonna grab the bar, it’s almost kind of like an upright row.

When you do an upright row, it’s nice high elbows, except it’s a full movement.

Alright, so full movement, meaning, when you pick the bar up, you’re gonna squat down and explode from here, right up to your chin.

Do that for five repetitions.

You need to know what your five rep max is for that so that way you can drop it all the way down nice and low, cuz you’re going to work your way up to that five rep max, you’re gonna be doing five sets.

In between each one of the five sets, you’re gonna be doing a broad jump, or a long jump. So if you know what a broad jump long jump is, there, the same thing, just keep different words. But you’re gonna start off in a squatted position. And you’re going to launch as far as you can see, when you get a full squat, and jump as far as you can, landing nice and soft. Alright, you’re gonna do five of those. You’re gonna add 20% onto the bar. All right, so you’re gonna take your five rep max 20% less, 20% less, 20% less, 20% less. So that way, when your first exercise, you want to be nice and light and incrementally increase to get to that five rep max, which will be your last set. Does that make sense? If not, go back, rewind and watch it again. So but yeah, questions, always ask me in the comments. So we can explain it in greater detail to you. Because I always want you to understand it. Cuz there’s no reason not to put 50 pounds on weekly. So I mean, this helps people all the time. Alright. Once you get done with those five sets, we’re going to go into a mid pull. So mid pull is wider hand grip. So this is like your deadlift grip, so nice grip. And it’s same thing. So obviously, you have a high pull, right? What do you think a mid pull is, this one’s going to be around the stomach area. So belly button, and sternum.

So same thing. So what happens is when you finish your high pulls, so you get to your last five reps to your max out. And that’s going to be the starting weight for your mid pulls. All right, so mid pulls starting weight is the last set for your high pulls. And then you’re going to go in a incremental difference to your max weight. So you know your max weight? You know what your mid pull is, or any of your high pull is and you kind of just make sure you break apart the differences in between it. So that way you can get to that end result. Those lifts are not our main important like they’re there to help you kind of get good and warmed up going into our deadlift, which is our meat and potatoes. And then also the exercise there right after. So with the mid pulls, you’re going to go ahead right into the long jumps, aka broad jumps also. So this gives you that ballistic movement, you’re firing from your hips, cores, waist, knees, ankles, you know, and you’re getting that nice huge launch in, I always recommend setting up two lines. And you can do it with either jump ropes, resistance bands, something, tape, whatever you want to put on the floor and jump over a mat, you’re jumping next to a mat, something to give you that incremental idea so that you’re not lazy with it, you will make sure you’re always improving on all of these lifts. Okay. So, as you can imagine, five sets five repetitions, working all the way up to your five rep max for your mid pull. The third exercise is your deadlift, this is the meat and potatoes. Okay, this is where you want to make sure your strength is dead on see feel great warmed up hearts beating, you know, we’re gonna start off with, obviously, the ending weight what you just did for your last set of five on your mid pulls. And we’re going to go ahead, take your five rep max where you’re at for your deadlifts, we want to hit that max at your third set. So you’re gonna have your max weight for high pulls, which is your starting weight for your deadlifts, you’re going to go ahead and split the difference between that starting weight and your max set for your second set. Okay, it’s making sense taking notes. This is good stuff, man. This is, you know, people pay me 1000s and 1000s of dollars to teach them this stuff. So this is a nugget that I’m giving to you right now. All right, so write it down. So third set is your max weight. All right, so you’re dead lifting with your max weight for five. Be like Brent, I got two more sets left, you’re right, you do. Alright. So same thing, broad jumping in between that every single time five reps. Now then, on your fourth set, we’re going up. So goal is to always get five. But three to five is a grid range, never less than two. So if you’re at two, then you’re kind of at that point where you shouldn’t be going up. Alright, but you want to go up every single time. All right. So deadlifting, like I showed you, it’s the same grip for your mid pull, you got to know how to deadlift properly, a lot of times people will use wrist wraps. So I can do a whole video on technique for wrist straps if you need it. I prefer the over under grip, which means you’re going to take that grip over under, but you want to make sure your back is nice and tall. Okay, so your backs tall, sitting that butt down. You’re literally dragging this bar right up and down your chin, get a good focal point on that wall. That butts down driving through your heels. Okay. So you’re obviously don’t want to be maxing out if you cannot deadlift properly. No point in hurting yourself. So, five good repetitions till you get to your last two sets, shoot for five, but at least get two and three. All right, shooting for three always shoot for five. So broad jumps in between. Oh man, what if you only get two deadlifts in then guess what? You’re still doing five broad jumps. Alright, I came out of it. The last exercise. So now here when we starting at your max weight that you just got to for your deadlifts, and now we’re getting super freakin heavy. All right. These are called rack pulls. So the bars on the rack, I always put it out like right about where my knees are, and you’re squatting down. And you’re just getting that

Top half part, squat and back down sitting right back on the rack. Okay, if you miss dropped away, if you don’t have something that can, you know, hold that much weight, such as a rack, he could put like a number of plates underneath both sides, getting you that height where you know, it’s at your knees, and you’re just getting maybe three to five inches in and getting that you know, solid pull. So why are you going up if your max deadlift is X number of pounds, and you’re still increasing the weight as much as you can, because your goal with this small movement, it’s not a big movement. And a lot of times where people get injured in their deadlift is from the floor, you know, to that first half point. So this is taking a lot of that injury prevention out because you’re going on to a top half rack or rack pull. So you’re hitting a very strong point and there before you’re able to take it to the next level, but it also helps your back, get used to holding more weight, it gets your grip used to holding more weight than you can deadlift, it’s getting a lot of your body used to carrying a bigger load. So therefore, when it gets down and dirty, you know you’re slapping on that deadlift, weight, you know, like shoo. It’s unbelievable. Like people are always mind blown, like, oh my god, I just freakin added like 20, 30 pounds on, I just added 30, 50 pounds on. Like, it’s honestly, it’s like when you’re doing this, you’re just whoo. All right. So those are the exercises that you’re going to be doing. To get to that point, I really hope that you guys understood this, and made sense. If you got questions, pop them down in the comments, I’d love to obviously give you some feedback. And also, just so you know, you know, this is this is what I do. Now I’m a strength coach, specifically, I love it. I love working modifications. I love helping people get beyond their plateaus, like teaching their strategies to everything and how you pair exercises together, and how you do certain things to get the most out of it. Because at the end of the day, if you’re just treading water and going through exercises, you know, it gets boring. And then you get bored and you want to stop and it’s just this whole spiral of stuff. So there’s always good goals to set and there’s good things to hit and to reach for and say you’ve accomplished. So, all right, Brent Kasmer BKPT, Brent Kasmer Personal Training, make sure you like subscribe and smash that notification bell and show me some love, give me some likes and I will see you in the next video.

7 Best Glute Exercises For Men To Get Rock Hard Glutes

September 20, 2021

I have seven glute exercises for men for rock-solid glutes. That’s right, man, these are for you. Why? I’m gonna tell you that in just seconds. Not only am I showing you the seven glute exercises for men to get those rock-solid glutes, but I’m also going to share with you at the end of this what might be holding you back from getting the most out of your glute exercises for men.

BEST GLUTE EXERCISES FOR MEN

1. How To: Barbell Hip Thrust

We’re gonna start off with the number one glute exercises for men, my favorite, the barbell hip thrust. I’m also going to show you some of the things that I see clients do wrong, things that I coach people through so that way they obviously get the exercise done right and not get hurt. So listen to all of the cues as I go through these.

You sit on the floor, back up against the bench, and you got a barbell. That would help if you’re doing barbell hip thrust to have a barbell. Alright, you can use a neck pad, or yoga mat, roll it up and you’re going to go ahead and roll the bar all the way up to your hips. You want to make sure that it’s centered, the last thing you want to do is pick this thing up and be kind of off-center, and therefore, some people will fight through it and do the whole thing kind of lopsided, or you should just set it down and restart the whole thing over again.

Sit nicely off, you want the bench to be right up against your scapula. Sit nice and tall pads up against your stomach, across your hips, and you’re going to put your hands on the bar and just drive your hips up. The big thing with this is you want to teeter-totter and drive and your goal is to get your hips higher than your knees to drive up higher than your knees that way you’re getting those glutes activated.

What you don’t want to do is blow your head to the bench and just ride that like that because a lot of times, it can be too much weight on your lower back and it just kind of tweaks your lower back. Make sure you’re not gluing your head to the bench. Make sure your whole body’s teeter-tottering. Make sure you exceed pass that table level so that way you’re getting a good glute activation.

2. How To: Barbell Sumo Stiff-Legged Deadlift

Now the next glute exercises for men, we have a barbell sumo stiff-legged deadlift.

What’s different between sumo and a regular stiff-legged deadlift? One, what’s different about it is obviously, you have a wider stance, you have a sumo stance. But this tends to really, it’s the ability to squeeze your butt a lot harder. It’s a nice wide stance, it is about double shoulder with your toes out at about a 15-degree angle.

You don’t have to grab like this biology isn’t over-under grip. That just helps to kind of obviously, get a better grip on the bar. For me at least, toes are at a 15-degree angle. You want to have the bar right up against those chins, so your butts back and you’re up and you get a good squeeze on those glutes. Good control all the way down, drive it up, squeeze on those glutes, right back down.

The things you want to make sure you’re doing. You don’t want the bar too far away from your legs, because then it really pulls into that lower back. You want to feel like you’re pushing your butt way back there trying to open as I always tell people, it’s like you have a bag, a handful of groceries and you’re backing up against the door and you push your butt back to get into the door. It’s the same thing.

You’re trying to drive those hips back up, squeeze through your hips, okay? That’s like the key factor that people do incorrectly. That’s one of those things that you just you got to make sure you’re feeling this the stretching your hamstrings, the stretching your glutes, and the contraction also.

3. How To: Barbell Power Clean

This is going to be the claim. The claim is going to be watered down like you’re into a deadlift position. The bar is up against your both hands overhand grip, and you’re going to explode up and get down underneath that bar. Okay?

Got it equally, to have it up, down in a deep squat, stand up and squeeze, bring it down and down on the floor. Get down and drive to your legs to get that bar up.

In these glute exercises for men, A lot of people do is they are standing in an upright position. Yeah, you got the bar up but you’re not getting the most out of the exercise. If your goal is to work the muscles that you’re supposed to be working on when doing a proper exercise, this is exactly what you’re trying to do. What you do is make sure you get down underneath that bar, and then get a good full extension and drive it up. Great glute exercises for men, dangerous, but when you’re doing it, right, you’re going to learn the right emotion before you go heavy with it. So make sure you take the steps, precautionary, to get to that point.

4. How To: Barbell Back Squat

When I do this glute exercises for men, I squat down to a box, so that way, you’re always hitting the right level. You want to make sure that you’re getting down to a level where you’re at a 90-degree bend in your knees.

A couple of things that people do incorrectly is pick up the bar incorrectly. You want to make sure you’re always grabbing the bar in the right spot, ducking up underneath it, making sure you’re centered. If you have your hands in the right spot, you’re going to obviously be sent your body up on there as well. Stepping back to the box, tap right back up. You want to be on your heels.

The good thing about having a box back there, it helps you to sit your button back, because you’re not afraid to fall back. You want to just tap your back, things that people do wrong all the time where they sit down, and under the rock, and then kind of push up. So, therefore, one it’s tying into the lower back again. These are a lot of things that people do to hurt their lower back and hurt their knees.

When you do these things incorrectly, that’s what it does. But when done properly, you get the most out of it. And it’s such a nice compound joint, that you’re going to build the most muscle with it.

Why are these glute exercises for men so much better? Why is it for men, and not for women? It’s not that there’s not for women, it’s just the fact that you’re going to build a lot stronger muscles, when you’re doing exercises that can be done heavy. These are all heavy glute exercises for men. They’re mentally done heavy, they’re meant to be making borders of muscle on your body. Specially, you’re done right, and then eat the foenum.

My favorite is pairing the hip thrusts with the squats, I think that this is one huge nugget of information to do. That way, you’re not only building your squats up, because you’re hitting your glutes really hard right there getting activated, jumping into a squat, keeping them activated. You’re going to also put on a ton of weight, a ton of extra strength, and your squat from doing that one paired with it. I’ll tell you that’s a hidden secret right there. He washed it to this point, you just got probably like $1,000 nugget right there.

Another thing that people do wrong is just leaning on their toes. Man, you probably see this all the time, is they’ll get to the point where they’re leaning forward on their toes because of the fact that they’re either looking down or not comfortable with sitting back on their heels because of the fact that they’re afraid to fall back.

5. How To: Split Squats

For our next glute exercises for men, I’m going to show you the barbell, you can do the hip dumbbells, also kettlebells, whatever you want to use as a weight. But you want to make sure that you’re in the right position first, right positioning, make sure you have the back foot up on a box so t’s elevated. You’re going to have your front foot forward when you need to drop your back knee towards the ground. You want to make sure your knees are behind your tub.

A lot of times people will get set up like this improperly and they’re all like leaning on their toe and doing it wrong. The good thing about the barbell is it keeps your back nice and straight and tall. When you’re holding dumbbells, you have the ability to kind of roll forward a little bit more. You put your back foot up and you shake it all around. Alright, so back foots elevated it to things that are put the positioning of your back foot. You can have it flat or up on your toes, it’s a preference, whatever feels better for you. You want to try to unengaged your back leg as much as possible. Great glute exercises for men, driving through the heel, your front foot driving through, and you get up to that top part and get a really nice squeeze on that glute.

The barbell split squats or split squats in general, aka, Bulgarian split squats. By far, great glute exercises for men, just crushing your glutes, especially if you tie a couple of these together, you’ll feel the next three days.

Another way, I like to do is actually the smith machine as well, because it’s guided, helps you from falling over. You can really add some weight on there as well because it keeps you in that same lock position.

6. How To: High Foot Placement Leg Press

The normal position for these next glute exercises for men is shoulder-width apart, we’ll make sure your knees are below your toes. A lot of times, you’ll have to pick it, the leg press up, because you can’t get into that position. What your feet up high coming down, you’re not going to get a huge bend in those knees. If you over bend those knees, you’re gonna end up rolling your hips up, because your hips are in a very fixed position being on a lay press.

Going down about, I mean, you’re less than 90 degrees, so not quite 90 degrees, maybe like 45 to 60 degrees. And then just pushing up to your heels getting those hamstrings and glutes really engaged.

The reason I didn’t say anything nice was that you can literally slap on tons of weight, and really put some weight up against those muscles making obviously putting the more resistance you put against the muscles, the faster and harder it’ll get.

6. How To: Single Legged Leg Press

This is one of the great glute exercises for men. Why? One, because of the fact that you’re isolating one leg so the other leg can’t help. And two, you can get a little bit deeper on this motion because of the fact of your hips aren’t as locked, as if you have both legs up on that leg press.

Make sure your feet are aligned with your hips. You don’t want to have your leg over here centered on the actual leg press because this is the machine, it’s going to equalize this weight anyways. It doesn’t matter if your foot is in the middle or off, align with your hip keeping your hip set.

Make sure it’s aligned with your head. And the best way to do this is literally to have it set up as if you’re getting ready to do a leg press. And just drop a lay straight down on the floor. Have a safety catcher right in the middle, on the leg press.

A lot of times, what I use is that as my guide of how deep I’m going to go. I come now, tap that drive right back up. Great glute exercises for men. The same thing is because I mean, who’s gonna single leg like launch 300 pounds. You’re not like, this is 317 pounds right here. This is not really I mean, I actually do more than this. This is just me showing you guys on the video. But I mean, look at the amount of weight you can do with a single leg to mean that’s great resistance to build some serious muscle on those glutes. I mean, can you deny it? No. Make sure you’re in the right position.

Alright, those are the seven glute exercises for men. I know, they’re great. You can’t wait to run to the gym and try it right now. It’s good nuggets.

What do you think is possibly holding you back from getting the most out of your exercises when trying to hit your glute? I’m waiting. Come on, go into the comment.

Not being able to mentally understand the muscle. Not like in general like where did it come from? Adam and Eve. I’m talking about understanding it like feeling it and understanding like okay, this is my glute. How do I squeeze it? How do I tense it? How do I activate it? How does my brain can’t tell it the fire yet? So sometimes you have to do these. I know this was sad for the as I put this at the beginning, you might not have watched it but there are two factors. This is only one of them. So don’t turn it off yet. Once I show you this, you’re going to be doing some of the girly exercises that help you to activate.

Alright, these are all those ones you see in all those little bar classes and stuff. Kind of like leg lifts trying to get your glute firing, so leg lifts. Good fire hydrants out to the side, I’ll do these a lot of times with some, at least to make it look a little more manly exhaust and on a band, and just kind of walk in a stiff-legged position, just back and forth, trying to get those glutes firing. Small little side steps with band resistance, you can also use those circular bands that go right around your knees.

The other one is the climbing exercise. When you’re down on all your elbows, put on your other foot, but knees bent at a 90-degree angle, and you’re just gonna open and close. The same thing, the band’s right here, you want to either right below your knee or right above your knee. And you’re just going to open it up trying to activate the outside your glute here, Major, flip overdo both sides.

Also those kickbacks, you want to go to the floor and do you do that, do some bird dogs goal is just to get that glute activated. Trying to understand and get it fired before you start working that way, it’s like okay, cool, this is what might be working today. And then you go into the gym and actually hit it.

What do you think is possibly holding you back from getting the most out of your exercises when trying to hit your glute? Number one is understanding what is actually being worked on. Number two is inflexibility. There are two things that can really hold you back from getting your glutes activated. Also, other than, obviously, your central nervous system understanding how to fire it is flexibility. A couple of key stretches because hands-on lose his right leg over your left leg reaching down towards the floor, pinning this leg back to that low position, a certain tension and obviously, both legs.

The other one is your me laying up on a wall or a post. And you want to make sure your butt is right up on that post. And you’re just going to go ahead and take your leg and put it straight up. Feeling it nice and tight to the wall, the leg is straight up. And you can even grab the post if you really hitting that hamstring.

The other area that really can hold you back in these glute exercises for men is your hip flexor. This is what a lot of people have tight hip flexors because they’re sitting so long throughout their day. This gets locked up, this gets lazy. So nice big stance, opening that hip flexor up. Leaning forward as much as you can push yourself up one step further. You want to reach that arm up and open that all the way up. You can just walk for that’s one thing, meaning stretch on that really trying to stretch so that we get the full range of motion yet engage tightly can finish the motion to actually get the booth engaged because this is too tight to help them get to that position.

What you want to hear next. What do you like about this glute video? What glute exercises for men do you like?

How To Increase Benchpress 30 Pounds A Week To Blow Up That Ego

September 15, 2021

What’s up my fitness family! Today, I’m going to teach you guys how to increase benchpress by 30 pounds per week so that way you can blow up that ego. I know how it is as the number one question when you’re out and about, guys just asked guys. I don’t know why but a question that comes to mind when I am out and about is, “How much do you benchpress man?” I typically will say like, “Yeah, you know, I do like 135 for 100 reps, can throw some for a loop a little bit.”

But right now I teach you guys three exercises that I use with clients on how to increase benchpress and literally slap on 30 every single week, when that’s all nice, man, we can get that bench up there. And that way you get all the questions from everybody.

We’re going to start off with one instruction on how to benchpress before diving into ways on how to increase benchpress. Okay, so quick little one blip on this, because God forbid, can’t be jacking your bench all the way up 30 pounds, and you don’t even know how to bench. Typically, you want to grab the bar where your wrists and your elbows are aligned. That way, when you get into the press, you’re at about a 90-degree or a little bit less than a 90-degree. It’s not a close grip bench.

Watch your hands out, wrist above your elbows, find what grip it is on the bars that way you want some placements where you’re going to be making sure that you’re grabbing it in the equal spot on both sides. That way, you’re not picking it up all kinds of lopsided, if you’re rolling your bench back into the power rack, you want to roll it back to a position where when you lay on it, you want the bar to be across your eyeballs. That way, it’s not too far back and yet it’s not too far in front of you so when you’re doing your presses, you’re not hitting the hooks the whole time. You want to make sure you squeeze the living crap out of the bar. So the tightest grip, you could possibly grab it. You want to make sure your toes are back behind your knees so that when you push, all your force is going in one motion, opposed if your feet are out, and you’re pulling with your feet, trying to push with your legs, or you’re trying to push yourself into it like almost a decline bench as well. You want all the force and ladders or you want all the force going in the same direction.

Hopefully, all that stuff makes sense. If not rewind it, watch the video on how to increase benchpress, it’ll make sense the second or third time you watch it.

Alright, so that’s all the proper techniques and getting into the benchpress itself. When you bench press, you don’t want your elbows flared out, make sure your elbows are tucked, but not too far. Having that right-hand position will help with all of that. Holding the bar up, you’re coming down, elbows are tucked underneath a little bit, and driving up. Bam, down, driving up, see what has really good control on the negative and you want to explode when you’re on the positive motion.

Those are kind of like the quick fundamentals of 101 benchings, so I don’t want to go crazy with it because this is obviously for blasting your max.

The three exercises that I’m going to teach you guys are going to be a Close Grip Bench Press, we’re gonna do five sets. It’s five sets of five repetitions. Alright, so you want to make sure what you want to do is know what your five rep max is, for your close grip bench, you’re going to take 20% off of that, that’ll be your fourth set, you’re gonna take 20% off of that, it’s gonna be your third set 20% off of that, it’s gonna be your second set, and 20% off of that will be your first set.

A lot of times your first set might feel like it’s super light, it’s because you’re not trying to find out or increase your cluster of bash. The end game goal is to put on 30 pounds on your benchpress so we don’t want to get too crazy with it when you get doubling your five sets of close grip benchpress. And when you do a close grip benchpress, same position, eyeballs lined up with the bar, you want your hands about nine to 10 inches apart. I typically will take my thumbs, make sure that they touch because my hands are about nine inches and then I’ll go ahead and open them up. So when I close grip bench to this is not like proper technique, but I’ll unhook my thumbs, it tweaks my wrist a little bit. That’s just a thing that I do. Pushing it up, your elbows are tucked up underneath you, right to that bottom part of your chest, almost your sternum, straight back up. Okay, you’re gonna be doing five sets of that, once you get to that fifth set, we’re going to go right into the benchpress.

The same thing with the bench press, you want to know what your five rep maxes, because that says we’re trying to grow on the bench press, you want your five rep max to be on your third set, okay? Why, because we’re going to be putting on more weight. Five rep max on your third set, you want to be halfway between where you end with your close grip bench because that’s where you’re going to start for your benchpress and your five rep max. So it’s going to be your second set, you’re gonna split that and that’s gonna be your second set, your third set your five rep max, and then we’re going to increase from that. So if we get three to five reps on your fourth set and three to five reps on your fifth set, it’s kind of like our end goal with it.

Alright, the third exercise is going to be a floor benchpress. So for bench press, is exactly what it sounds like, you’re laying on the floor, and you’re performing a bench press, guess what, your elbows can’t go down all the way. So, therefore, you’re going to stop at that 90-degree mark, and drive up. The good thing about the floor is there’s no give like a benchpress. We got the floor super flat, it’s hard, your whole back is supported, and you’re gonna have a lot more force to get to, you’re going to be able to go where your five rep max was, and beyond with the floor press, because aka the top half-press of the batch. Great exercise to just slap it on some serious size on your benchpress helps you with your lockout, not only that, but the negative motion as well, so that way you’re putting your joints, your ligaments, your tendons. Everything’s getting a little bit more resistance put against it, so that way you have room to grow.

It’s going to help you the following week, your holy smack as I did just put on 30 pounds on my benchpress. You know that I don’t ever just sit still and just bench waits two, three minutes, so that’s not happening. In between your bench press and your neck wall in between your close grip bench, and your next set of close grip bench, we’re going to be doing inverted rows.

I don’t know if you know what inverter rows are, but you’re laying upside down, you can either use TRS straps, you can use the bar on the actual rack itself, just pull the bench out in a pull yourself up to the bar itself, I would go up underneath it, and you’re going to pull your chest up to the bar. Legs are out in front of you. We’re going to be doing 10 reps of it every single time. We’re going to be doing 10 reps or inverted rows and then also either 10 goblet squats or 10 ballistic lunges.

Goblet squats is just holding a dumbbell up in front of you and you’re getting a squat nice and deep, not coming up all the way.

The reason why we’re doing this is it’s not super heavy, but at the same time, you’re trying to stimulate growth hormone trying to stimulate your testosterone, therefore, you’re getting better results throughout the whole thing. It’s not a burnout, it’s not to get tired, it’s just to get some blood flowing, trying it a little pump in the legs also, and then a kind of getting your windpipe moving so it helps your chest to expand the contract. Therefore, it can grow a little bit more.

Here, we are doing a tricep which is a close grip bench, inverted rows, and goblet squats or a ballistic lunge lithic lunges.

If you’re looking for ways on how to increase benchpress up to 30 pounds in a week, and blow up that ego, you’re in the right spot. So I can’t wait to hear in the comments below that you gave it a go.

It’s also very important to have a good spotter. You want to have a good spotter that understands not just to take the weight up off you, but to make you work through those sets, especially if you’re trying to get those extra reps. And then also being able to spot a negative as well to kind of help you grow beyond what you can actually push.

If you got questions on how to increase benchpress, pop them in the comments. You know, I’m here for you, but I can’t wait to watch you blow up and do as well as your benchpress.

Hopefully, those ways on how to increase benchpress techniques helped. Hopefully, this strategy is something that you’ve never heard of, and I’ll tell you what, it works. I promise you that. I will see you in that next episode.

How To Properly Spot Someone Who Is Doing Barbell Bench Press

September 6, 2021

I’m going to show you guys how to spot somebody barbell bench pressing. I have here with me Mr. Mason who is going to be being the wonderful victim so that way he’s going to be lifting the weight and I’m going to be spotting while he is doing barbell bench press.

When somebody is in a position to bench, there are things that you can really watch for.

Hand position in the bench press. We’ll make sure the hands are pretty much directly underneath the elbows, that is not inside the elbows, so that way it doesn’t turn into more of a shorter tricep exercise, or really make sure that we’re really engaging the chest.
Make sure that the toes are always behind the knees because when you’re actually lifting weight, for sure all the energy is coming back in those same forces instead of pulling your body away from benching the actual weight up.
Are they lined up, also make sure that their eyeballs are directly underneath the bench bar to only pick the bar up and I’m always hitting the actual books themselves. You always want also make sure that all those things are going on.
And last but not least, of course, with their hands in the same positions on both sides so I’m not picking it up off-center.

Those are all kinds of keys that I look for when spotting somebody doing barbell bench press, you’re getting them into the correct position.

When someone leaves on the bench, you want to make sure you guys can agree upon what I’m counting up to three, I’m going to be lifting away, spreading it out over the top of your chest, and then I’m going to go ahead and say ‘good’. And then when they’re good, I’m going to not let completely go all the way but go ahead and put my hands up already did just enough to know that I’m there if they need me.

For the majority of it, I was there just enough to not let that bar fall back down started going in the wrong direction. That way he was able to continue that push all the way through to the end.

Alright! Hopefully, you guys enjoyed the little tutorial.

See you in the next one.

How To Properly Spot A Barbell Floor Press

August 30, 2021

What’s up my fitness family! Brent Kasmer is here with BKPT.

I have a wonderful test victim here. I’m gonna be teaching you guys how to spot a barbell floor press. Mason is the victim. He has to endure doing for bench today. And I’m going to teach you guys how to spot it.

A lot of times people have questions out there on the proper technique of spotting, which is the other direction of normally doing the exercise. Alright. I am here for you trying to teach you guys what the questions are you’re asking me. Alright!

Go ahead basic lining up on the floor. You’re on weight, so you go baby yea, one of us is. I’m gonna slide this bar all the way to the end, you always want to make sure that it’s at a point where you can get to it, but also they can get to it.

If you need to start off on the floor with a bar and the actual barbell itself, then you would go into as a spotter into a stiff-legged deadlift picking it up, and then, you know, handing it to them.

I usually have them already have their hands on the bar. Mason is going to go ahead and lay down and I have this up on the spotter handles already. It’s a little further out, giving me room back here to actually spot him.

Since it’s on the end, you want to make sure that the individual has their eyeballs lined up with the bar itself so that way, when you give it to them, they’ll be able to take it out, bring it out over their chest.

Alright, I’m gonna get myself into a stiff-legged deadlift position. I’m going to go over under grip just a little bit stiff-legged. I’m going to pat it out, you don’t always give them the pat out so that way they know when you’re lifting, and also, you know when you’re lifting.

So one, two, and three up, all right, I’m gonna take it over his chest, down, holding on to the bar, work baby, push. One, we’re gonna do three reps down, two – down, three. Good job and I’ll walk it back, okay? Or he would just throw it back onto the rack and get the heck out of the way.

As you saw with that, keeping my back straight and tight and using it like a deadlift. When people are doing floor press are typically doing more weight to make advance trying to overcome plateaus, or just really, really trying to blow their triceps out of water.

I’m going to do this one more time so Mason scoots down that way. I’m going to show you if it was on the floor position. Okay, laying down just like you were.

Obviously, you can’t lie with his eyes over the bar, but I do want to just be behind him. You would grab your normal bench grip, so he’s already set, the individual will not do anything until you can get it up over the top of their chest. So when I count to three, he’s done engaging his muscles too much, because all of this is a very awkward position getting into that chest press itself. I’ll get that same stiff-legged deadlift position. So one, two, and three, up, and I’m gonna walk it out in front of him and down, up, down, up, down, a little more. Good, alright.

The same thing with this one, you want to be right their hands on the bar, don’t just throw it on and see when they start struggling and then try to help because usually, at that point, they’ll freak out, you’ll freak out and you’re just grabbing the weight and it’s over, they’re not getting any more extra working.

With your hands, all these other bars, you’re able to just make sure that that bar is always moving. So they’re not getting stuck and jammed up. Always moving, which is barely or just barely helping them get through that motion.

Those are all the proper ways to actually spot a barbell floor press so that way, you know when you go into the gym when someone’s asking you to help them or if you’re a trainer and you want to be sure that you’re just upping your level then this is kind of the technique to use to get them the best results.

All right. So hopefully you guys enjoyed this little episode on how to spot a barbell floor press. I’ll see you in the next episode.

Chest Workout Challenge for Mass Day 1 Upper Chest

June 17, 2021

I’m going to be teaching you guys about chest workout for mass or the chest exercise challenge specifically for your upper chest. These are exercises you need to do on your chest workout for mass day.

I did a video on this like an actual whole chest workout for mass challenge. Now, I take this into slightly different categories. We’re going to do day one and build your upper chest. I want to strategically come after this to give you guys the best results. So I want to challenge you to a 14-day challenge. And if you have a lagging body part, I mean, obviously you’re on the chest video, I’m assuming as your chest and you’re wanting to build up your pecs. We’re going to go ahead and take what area if it’s your upper chest, lower chest, or your whole chest. And as a whole, I want to build you a quick little program to get the best-built chest in 14 days.

I’m not only going to explain the exercises, we’re going to go through how to do it, and then also how to put this into your program.

What we’re going to do is if your upper pecs are lagging, and you really want to build them up, how we’re going to devise your chest workout for mass program is for 14 days, we’re gonna take a couple of exercises and do them every day. That way you can conquer that area, you’re going to look significantly different in 14 days.

Does that mean you need to not rest and just keep going for 365 days? No, it doesn’t mean that at all. But we’re going to do a little stance to kind of help build different areas of your body.

People will talk about it all the time, like, “oh, what’s his body parts specific training?” And you can’t do that, you can’t target a certain area. Why? I’m not saying that it should be your whole workout, and you just target that one spot. But you need to implement it multiple times throughout the week. That way, with your regular workout, you’re not missing your other parts of your body.

We definitely want to say, hey, you know, we’re going to take a second, every single day, we’re going to go ahead and knock this out so that way we can really focus on our chest for this little series.

DAY ONE: We’re going to go ahead and knock out the upper chest using our Chest Workout for Mass routine.

Big compound movements for building the chest would be the incline bench, incline dumbbell, and barbell bench. Paradigms that would go along with that would be the chest fly or upper chest squeezes, or uppercut, or upper pec shrugs. These are all things that you can pair together to hit that upper chest, so that way, you’re working on building it. I’ll show you how that kind of looks. I’m gonna give you a couple different scenarios so that way, you can have an idea of going into this program, and how to better attack it. Alright!

How you really want to get started are you want to do one of several things. There are several different ways to do an upper chest fly. This is not meant to be a heavy exercise, this is just a teacher body, have your mind going to what body part you’re trying to actually hit. You want to draw it away from your strong points. It’s like your lower chest is super strong. And it’s like a superbill, a lot of times it’s because you can’t get away from it. You’re trying to bench and everything’s drawn to that area, that’s what pushes the most. Then your upper chest will always lag or vice versa so that way, we got to really try to say, “Hey, you know what, tell your nervous system, this is what we’re getting ready to hit.” I want you to know, so that way you can push the most from that area.

How to do to Chest Workout for Mass:

There are a couple of ways to do chest workout for mass. One, you can just do it standing. And these are the things you want to do in front of the mirror or at least use your hand so that way you can at least feel okay, it’s engaged. You want to do a couple of repetitions like 6, 8, or 10. Just try to get it kind of moving. Get it moving. Get it going, doing both hands.

This is a standing dumbbell upper chest fly. I’m going to give you a couple of examples. Because what we’re going to do is we’re in a pair, two exercises are new five sets, and then boom, right into your regular workout, whatever it is for the day. This is just to help develop that area. You’re going to do this for 14 days, we’re going to do upper chest, if upper chest is lagging, or new upper chest, and middle than upper and lower and upper than middle. Did you get it? Good.

Alright, so you would do this like if it’s the lower, that’d be lower, middle, lower, upper, lower, middle, lower upper for 14 days, five sets every single day before your workout. That would be your dumbbell standing, just depending on what you have with you. And you would do this in between every set with your compound movement, whether it be your barbell bench or your dumbbell bench. Your goal is to just get the squeeze going.

If you’re going to do dumbbells, for a fly, you’re going to lay down. You can do dumbbell fly, same thing, you want to just make sure you’re trying to engage that upper chest. Really get a good stretch, good control. Like I told you, this is not a max outset. I hate seeing people maxing out on chest fly. It’s not smart. Everybody has different weights they’re going to use. Some people are stronger than others, some of them using 80 pounds for an inclined fly might suffice. Just don’t think like, “oh, they’re meathead, they’re going super heavy, but they might bench like 400 pounds.” Those are things you got to take into consideration also. So that would be your dumbbell incline fly.

Cable Chest Workout for Mass:

If you did cable, you can do cable single-arm, I’m just showing you cables, bands, dumbbells chest workout for Mass. That way, you’re like, “Oh, well, I don’t have that equipment, I can’t do it.” You can do it, doesn’t have to be one specific thing, you’re just trying to get the circulation there. So inclined cable fly, you see it tucked in down low, and you’re coming up. This is how your upper pec attaches to your collarbone and attaches down here. He’s got to find that angle, and really kind of get it to get the blood circulating there. Make sure you have both arms, getting the blood circulating, you can do it with both hands.

If you’re going to do an incline fly with the cable machine, a couple of ways I do it would be facing the cable. And that way we’re coming like this up and across the body. I like doing single arms just because it gets that good. You know, cross them, the midpoint really getting a good contraction on it. Alright, that would be your cable incline fly. Dual cable if you want to do it on a bench dual cable fly.

Bench Press Chest Workout for Mass:

As I said, these are all exercises that you’re going to do and use to superset with your bench press chest workout for mass. The bench press is to grow. This is to train it where to go. The chest fly is to show where the blood needs to go and teach your central nervous system what you’re hitting. And then this is your major muscle compound push.

So I got the cable fly, dumbbell fly, single-arm standing fly. You could do this same thing with the band, it’s literally the same exact thing. A lot of times I’ll hook it onto the post, just push it through like that. So that way it’s on there nice and tight, and you would do the same exact motion, obviously hooking it down low. So that way you can do it down low and across the body. I’m not going to go into detail with that, because it’s just the same as the cable. Honestly, it’s just except it’s a band. You just want to make sure you’re getting a good range of motion so that way you can get that full contraction.

Upper Chest Workout for Mass:

The uppercut one is the big thing when you’re doing your uppercut crossbody. You just keep your elbow bent at a 90 degree angle coming up across the body. And you’re just getting that upper squeeze. It’s the same thing as an uppercut squeeze. It’s not twisting your whole body, not turning into a cardio core exercise, it’s fixed. And it’s just squeezing those upper pecs and then the last one, I would think the client would squeeze. You want to start off down low. Same thing, if you’re doing it with a cable machine, you’re starting here, keeping it together and just squeezing them together while pushing it up. And that’s cable. It’s the same thing with dumbbells.

I actually love this exercise but the key factor is you’re literally pushing the cables or dumbbells together when pushing them up. If you take that tension off of it, of pushing it together, then you’re not really getting a good engage what you’re trying to hit, so it’s about driving them together. And it’s a great exercise. Alright, so those are all the exercises you would use to teach your body where it’s going to go. That way you can make it grow.

Alright! So you go right into your barbell, incline press, bow popping it up, coming down, good range of motion, do three to five repetitions, and then right back to your fly, or uppercut, or squeeze, but it’s just trying to create that blood flow. And you’ll be going back and forth, three to five reps, five sets, and then bam, right into your chest workout for mass itself.

If you’re going to take the challenge, 14 days, it’s five sets. You would start off, if you’re going to focus on the upper part of your packs, it’s going to be any of those isolated joint movements, which is your fly’s uppercut workflow to a compound joint movement, which is your incline press, or incline barbell bench. And remember, each time we do this, we’re going to change those angles. Tper chest workout for mass routine.

I’m hoping that all of that makes sense. I’m really looking forward to hearing about your results. Definitely comment below how this is helping you and comment as you’re doing this chest workout for mass, day one upper body, upper chest, day two regular bench, day three would be one upper chest, day four would be your lower chest, day five would be your upper chest. Just to kind of give you an idea of how that goes.

If you have more questions, go ahead, hit me up, send me a message and that way I can go ahead and give you some good feedback.

Engage Glutes with 5 Strength Exercises for Your Kettlebell Workout

June 2, 2021

What’s up my fitness family! I have the five best strength training exercises for your kettlebell workout. I am not a kettlebell expert, by any means. I do like them, I do use them, but I am no expert. Alright, I’m just saying.

I have a client of mine that actually is a phenomenal kettlebell expert. He’s a master in kettlebells. But he comes to me to not use kettlebells, which is kind of funny. He showed me a lot of stuff along the way, which is very interesting. So, Dan Leonard, man, he’s freaking a master of these things. And I know he looks up to several people for all kinds of different kettlebell information.

So I do want to show you the five best, these are the ones that I found that I just honestly, they’re my go-to’s when I do use them. And you can do one of two ways, you can either use one on each hand or use the larger kettlebell.

You can kind of go through the whole circuit with one hand and flip it over and go into the other hands. That way you’re kind of keeping your body off balance, and your core and everything’s engaged a lot more so that way, you’re getting double the benefit out of it. Anyways, here we go.

#1 How To: Kettlebell Swing

Let’s get started with a kettlebell swing for your kettlebell workout. If you are a beginner just getting into this, the one thing that you can really take to heart is a lot of hip movement. When you’re going into a swing, your shoulders should not be doing any of the work. Your arms are attached to the kettlebell by your hands. And you’re literally just throwing your hips forward.

I kind of joke with clients when I’m training them on kettlebells, it’s almost like you’re coming up and spanking somebody. So they’re like, “Whoa”, and they pop their hips forward.

#2 How To: Kettlebell Squat

You want to go into a tiny bit of a squat, and then just thrust your hips forward almost to the point where they’re locked out, but you really want to focus on engaging your glutes. A lot of times, if you want to start off on the ground, and work on your hip hinge or your hip thrusts, that way you can kind of learn how to engage your glutes prior to going into the kettlebell thrusts or kettlebell swings.

When you lean forward, grab the kettlebell you want to use, it’s called an okay grip. You’re grabbing the kettlebell, it’s down in front of your face, you’re literally hiking it back behind you. Throwing your hips forward using your butt. Squeezing your glutes and you would set it down the same way right out in front of you is just called parking it. You start off by hiking it, and then parking it.

You would do the same thing if you’re going to use two kettlebells. Right there from your eyes hike back, and just frost and frost. The same thing, setting it down on our switch.

All right, that’s your kettlebell swing.

#3 How To: Kettlebell Push Press

You’re bringing these up to your shoulders, wrapping them over your wrists, and we’re saying go ahead and do a squat. Press. Squat. Press. Squat. Press.

The push press or a thruster, the same thing, you could do this with just a single kettlebell as well. It holds it by the horns, like so. Just get a good squat. Squat. Press. Squat. Press.

The same thing, single-arm, squat, and press. You want to get a good lockout especially if you’re doing a single arm.

#4 How To: Kettlebell Bent Over Row

Next on our strength exercises using kettlebell that you can do for your kettlebell workout routine is the bent-over row. You can do it with one arm and just place your elbow on your knee. Grabbing that kettlebell and just dragging that right beside you. Straight up.

#5 How To: Kettlebell Shoulder Press

This is just a strict form, just like you will with dumbbells, honestly, it’s just what you have at home.

If you’re running through something, you’re trying to make it fast. You’re going through all of them. The same thing, you’re blocking it out. Course tight. Kind of like sitting your butt back. Push pressing side angle, head straight.

These are the five best beginners’ at-home strength training exercises that you can add to your kettlebell workout. If you guys haven’t seen the previous ones, I’ve done the bodyweight exercises, dumbbell exercises, I’ve used the resistance bands showing you the five best exercises.

And like I said, I’m trying to teach you these exercises. Because at the end of the day, you need to know the ones that are gonna work the best for you. So you don’t want to be doing curls and extensions, and stuff like that, where it’s a single isolated joint movement. You want to get the best bang for your buck. If you’re sitting there working on what you’re putting in the work, you want to make sure you’re doing the best ones, get the best results with it.

5 Best Strength Exercises for Dumbbell Workout for Beginners

May 23, 2021

I try to teach people time-saving strategies. And to have time-saving strategies, you have to do the best stuff, because that’s what’s gonna get you the best results. So today, I am going to show you the five best exercises using dumbbells, and to help you with your dumbbell workout for beginners, and that way you don’t have to waste time.

#1 Dumbbell Bench Press

We’re going to start off with a dumbbell bench press. Why the dumbbell bench press?

It’s not number one of the most, highest, or best for our exercises or for dumbbell workout for beginners, but it is because there’s a compound joint movement, which means multiple joints are working. You’re getting the most bang for your buck, or hitting the majority of your chest by doing the flat bench because you hit not only the upper of them, the major but also underneath. That way, you get the majority of the chest muscle as opposed to if you’re lagging and you want to just hit the incline presses. Incline presses are great as well as chest hips or decline press.

A big thing with the dumbbell bench press is to make sure you get a good position when you’re picking the dumbbells up. Set them on your thighs. I want you to lay back into position bringing them to your shoulders, and we’re going to press them up and together.

With your dumbbell press, you don’t want your elbows flared out to the side straight aligned with your shoulders. You want them tucked up under about a 45-degree angle coming down as deep as you can. Don’t hurt yourself. If your body really doesn’t want to go that deep then don’t because you don’t want to hurt yourself. If you can, and you have no ailments, you want to definitely get that good range of motion, because not only you are getting the positive contraction, but you’re also getting that stretch along the way.

Also, stretching those muscles out so that way you’re not so super tight. And anytime you get a good strong long stretch on it, it seems long gating that muscle also. That way when the contraction is there, the muscle looks nice and full.

#2 Dumbbell Bent Over Row

If you’re a beginner just getting started, I would prefer you to do the single-arm dumbbell row. That way you’re giving yourself back that support needed to get a good motion, but at the same time not putting yourself in danger by just doing a bent-over row by itself.

You want to make sure your hands planted on the bench, grabbing that dumbbell, dragging your arm straight up beside you. Good control, explosive on the way up, exhaling on the way up and then coming down. Don’t overextend your shoulder.

It’s the same thing on the other side as well, hands directly under your shoulder and just pulling it straight up, spines align. Looking down, keeping that spine align, and dragging that arm up. That’s the one I was explaining. If you’re a true beginner getting started, dumbbell single arm row, definitely a great one.

If you’ve been around the block for a while, you’re just looking for the five best, the bent-over row is a great exercise for your dumbbell workout for beginners.. But make sure your cores’ tight so that way you do not get injured. Dragging those arms right beside you, pulling up, and good control on the way down. You always want about a one-second to two-second negative motion on the way down.

#3 Goblet Squat

Heads up back straight, and you want to make sure you hold the dumbbell nice and want your feet shoulder-width apart. I typically set something behind most clients just for the fact of them sitting on their heels. Once you understand the whole sitting on your heels, you don’t need it because you can go a little bit lower as long as you’re able to. Same thing, no knee issues, no problems. And definitely, you can go deeper.

There are several ways to hold the dumbbell. If you want to, you can use two dumbbells. You can also hold them right up in front of you. Same thing, nice squat, and holding those dumbbells in front of you.

#4 Stiff-Legged Deadlift

You can pull the back end of the bench up. You would want to have something a little higher than your hip. You’re not keeping it in front of you pushing off of it, it’s just for balance. Do you have to have anything? No, we want to make sure you keep that hand nice and tight to your shin.

Keep in tight to your shin, and straight-up driving through your head. Make sure you feel that stretch on the hamstring that is on the ground. If you get too jerky and you go too fast, you can get a really good high hamstring pull, strain. Definitely, be careful always, nice and control on the way down. You can drive that up. What I mean by that is nice and controlled. And then you can drive up nice and fast. Driving up squeeze, driving up the squeeze. You almost want the dumbbell to straddle your foot.

Alright, so that would be your dumbbell single-leg RDL. If you’re working on balance, you can do this with no support for that opposite hand.

You can also do both legs just like if you’re holding a barbell, down, up, squeeze, always pushing that butt back. Whenever you’re doing a stiff-legged deadlift, I always say it’s like you have a bag of groceries and you’re trying to push that door open when you’re trying to get through the house.

#5 Shoulder Press with Dumbbells

A lot of the major muscles, you got to think with the chest, shoulders or chest, back, hamstrings, quads, and then also your shoulders. The same thing gripping up some dumbbells.

The big thing here with the shoulder press, and I have videos on this as well to get the most out of it, this is one exercise you really don’t want to lockout because if you lock it out, you’re getting it into your traps. You’re popping up to your shoulders, you’re coming up, and it’s about 85 to 90% of the way up, and then right back down. Go ahead and try it on your own. Then go ahead and do one where you lock it out and you can feel that pressure transfer right into your traps. Popping that straight up really getting those front deltoids.

Alright, so there are the five best beginner at-home strength training exercises using dumbbells for your dumbbell workout for beginners.

Pop in the comments right below if you have a favorite dumbbell exercise that you love, that way I can see it and check it out. And I’m excited to see what you guys have to say.

5 Best Resistance Band Exercises for Strength at Home

May 16, 2021

I have a topic for you that I get many questions about exercises for strength, which is, “If I’m a beginner, and I want to do strength training, and I’m at home, what do I do?”

I got a whole series of strength exercises for you guys. I’m going to do all of the different things depending on what you have at home. Whether it’s just bodyweight getting started, or going to use anything, whether it’s a resistance band, whether it’s dumbbells, kettlebells, barbells, you name it, I’m going to try to educate you on this.

Today, we’re gonna use the resistance band. I have the 5 Best Beginner At-Home Strength Exercises Using a Resistance Band.

Alright, if you haven’t seen it already, check out the bodyweight one.

#1 Chest Press

I’ve done several videos on chest exercises, and chest workouts using resistance bands, but I’m going to share with you how to do this.

Hook the resistance band into a pole or a fence post, tree, whatever you have but make sure it’s sturdy. You don’t want to be doing something and then all of a sudden gets slapped in the back of the head with not only your vein slipping off of it but the object that you’ve had hooked into.

Make sure you stay nice, tight, and straight. Press out the resistance band a little together, not all the way together. Keep your fist nice and tight. You’ll notice your upper chest is lagging.

If you want to, you could turn this into an incline press as well, but when you’re doing a flat press, you’re not only hitting your major but also your lower part of your chest as well.

Staying nice and tight, and then just pressing them out. Getting a good squeeze. Make sure you’re feeling it where you’re supposed to, otherwise, your elbows are just a little too flared out sometimes.

You’re trying to hit that angle where your elbows aren’t straight out with your shoulders, but they’re tucked under just a little bit. That way, it really helps to engage the chest pec muscles.

#2 Standing Row

This engages your rhomboids, your lats. It’s always great to do some pulling exercises, just because most people are so internally rotated because of occupational stuff. Like sitting here and there and typing and all that type of stuff.

The question I always get is, “Does it matter where my hands are?”

Yes. It does hit different muscles, but similar.

Obviously, you’re always hitting your back, you’re hitting your biceps at a different angle, too. You’re engaging more biceps, keeping them underhand. Right more in the middle of the back, more upper back, with the high pool or with the overhand grip pool, neutral grip, and pulling it to you.

A lot of times when I’m getting started with somebody new and I’m trying to understand their strength, and how strong they are, I’ll have them pull the resistance band tight and walk away until it’s nice and tight, but they can still keep it beside them. Then that is where we will start because that’s where they’ll get that good squeeze. Eventually, as they get a little more fatigued, I’d have to take a tiny step in. That way, as they fatigue, they’re still keeping the proper form.

#3 Squat

You’re going to stand on a resistance band, always make sure it’s about shoulder erminia. Make sure it’s nice and equal. Lay flat, let it relax. As you pick your foot up and kind of get yourself situated, you want to make sure it’s under the arches of your feet. Arches of the feet more towards the back of those arches.

You can do this in several ways, you can hold it up in front of you depending on the strength of the band. If that makes it difficult for you, you can keep it beside you if that’s enough pressure. You can wrap it up on top of your shoulders to give you a little bit more pressure, depending on obviously how strong the band is, and how strong your legs are. You can also hold it straight up over your head.

Getting a good squat, you want to make sure you’re getting that butt down nice and low. And getting a good squat in other ways to make it more difficult is obviously laying it flat. Bringing the slack in and stepping out because obviously, it’s giving you less band to work with.

Another quick thing when using a band too is making sure there are no cuts throughout it so that way you find out the hard way, whether or not it’s durable or not. Obviously, you don’t want to snap it on you with being in the butt, shoulder, head, face, neck, or anywhere else more dangerous.

#4 Pull-through

This is a great exercise. It’s kind of a hip thrust or kettlebell swing, obviously, you get to use bands for this.

You’re just going to wrap it around the post, whatever it is you have that’s nice and strong, and make sure it’s always equal. Hold the resistance band, both hands on the handles, walking forward to get some good tension on it. And you want to just go back with your butt in an arm exercise, and drive your hips forward, squeezing your tushie. Keep those arms nice and straight, and drive through your hips.

You’re getting exactly what you’re trying to hit, which are hamstrings and glutes. It’s a very important exercise. Why? Because a lot of times most people sit all day long. And when sitting, your hip flexors are super tight and eventually cause a lot of back issues. Therefore, this helps to counteract.

#5 Shoulder Press

Step on the resistance band right in the middle with one foot. Do not wrap it behind you, step through with your other foot to press it up. This all depends on a – your strength, and b – the strength of the band.

If you know you can do a little bit more, just make sure it’s equal and pressing straight up. This is going right behind your shoulders and going straight up over your head, not forward.

If this is not enough, guess what? I have something better for you.

Hook the resistance band in a post, leaning forward, arms are out, walk forward as much as you can. Keep that back nice and flat and do your shoulder press so that you are hooked on to something and you’re able to give yourself more resistance due to the fact of walking further away from whatever it is you’re using.

All right, those are the five best beginner at-home strength training exercises with a resistance band.

Hopefully, you guys are enjoying this content about exercises for strength. As I said, I got the kettlebell, I got the barbell, dumbbell. I also have a bodyweight one so that way you’re getting the best exercises that you can do at home as a beginner with some educational tips on what to do and what not to do so that we are getting the most effective, efficient workouts possible.

Share this with other people you feel is helpful. And also comment below any exercises that you like, that you think is the best exercise with a resistance band.

What is Agility? Definition, Benefits, Key Factors & How to Improve It

May 10, 2021

What is agility? Can I improve it?

This is actually a pretty interesting question because there is not a year that goes by, a season that goes by that parents, kids, athletes don’t contact me and ask me, “Hey, are you able to help me get faster?” or “Are you able to help me get more agile? Which is two completely different things. And guess what, I’m going to explain them both to you.

It’s important to understand the differences because there are lots of variables that kind of go into this type of stuff. Agility is your ability to change directions quickly. And then speed is how fast you can go from point A to point B. All right.

There’s a lot of people that are fast. You’ll see people on the football field or soccer field or in many different athletic platforms where someone’s running, and they make a move, and you see someone go right by him. Usually, it’s on ESPN, it’s a highlight, and everybody laughs and makes fun of that person. And that’s the difference, they were coming at him full force, full speed. And then the offensive person was using agility to get around them.

There are ways to get faster, more agile, stronger, powerful, all those types of things. But it’s kind of in unison. You don’t want to just specifically work on one thing the whole time. You don’t want to sit there and just work on your ability to change directions and that’s it. You don’t want to work on just your 40-yard dash out of the gate and trying to get fast. You don’t just work on your strength portion of it, and just get stronger, especially if you’re an athlete because if you’re a powerlifter, another scenario, those are all key factors.

Even off the field hitting cone drills and hitting different drills, it’s different to be physically agile versus cognitively agile also. People joke with me all the time, like, “Oh, man, you get the spidey senses.” Sometimes, you’ll bump something off the table, and you reach down and you grab it really fast because you already know that it is falling down, and you just need to get your hand underneath it to grab it because it’s gonna drop that fast. Until you go through all of those things, so many times and repetition and repetition and repetition, it’s how you perform at an elite level. You’re not going to just snap your fingers or wave the magic wand and get faster and more agile on the field when practicing off the field and not in real game situations. All of it is like spokes on a wheel, you need to all have them all firing to get better in unison.

Agility is the ability to change directions fast – you’d be able to see a ball coming in the air change directions, and be able to adapt and react to that type of situation. Speed is going fast in one direction, and power is the ability to lift.

That’s how I like building my athletic programs. I’ll literally encompass all of that, obviously, not the fieldwork at the same time has been lifting, but I’ll incorporate all of it literally in the same exact program.

You go from squatting, right to a vert jump, right to, speed step-ups, right to ballistic, jumping and rotating in the air off of one foot back and forth all across the room after you’re doing walking lunges. So, you’re building power shrank, heavyweights, with agility and work with the sprints. They’re all in unison to make your body and your muscle fibers in your central nervous system and your cognitive ability to be able to do all of those things at the same time. It’s huge. It’s important and all of it goes together.

Hopefully, you understand the difference between agility, cognitive, and physical. And speed, which is quickness, being able to be fast in one linear direction. Also, powerful that you need all of it.

When is too young to start training? When to start training for these things?

These are all huge questions that come up when clients, parents, athletes come to me and ask me these things. Everybody’s body physically matures at different levels but to get started, you don’t need to be maxing out, you just need to be starting to perform so that way you can get better.

Don’t hold yourself back from not training and not making yourself better and not being picked on the field for that specific sport. There’s not an age requirement. You don’t want to be crushing all of your growth plates, but to make sure that you are bettering yourself always. All right?

Well, that was a lot of good information. Hopefully, you guys enjoyed it and understand the differences between agility and speed, and also how to make yourself better at all of them.

Brent Kasmer