Kuzora Personal Training Raleigh NC

A Killer Fat Melting Squat Variation- Kuzora Persona Training Raleigh Wake Forest NC

For my money, squats are the all around most effective lift you can do. They add more muscle while burning more calories than any other weight training exercise. If you want to build muscular strong quadriceps or just tone and define your thighs and glutes, squats are the answer. More concerned with performance? Squats will help you jump higher, run fasted, drive your golf ball further, and make your tennis serve faster.

Here at the gym, we do literally hundreds of squat variations. Powerlifting squats, Olympic squats, front squats, box squats, squats with chains, jump squats, Zercher squat, kettlebell front squats, single leg squats, etc. But today I’m going to talk about a little known squat variation that melts fat while it improves anaerobic conditioning and builds muscle in your quadriceps and calves: Metabolic Rhythm Squats.

To perform metabolic rhythm squats load a barbell with a weight you would use for a set of twenty barbell back squats. Rack the barbell on your back and assume a shoulder width stance with your toes pointed forward. Perform ten quarter squats coming up onto your toes on each rep. Immediately perform ten more quarter squats, followed by ten more quarter squats to your toes, ten more quarter squats, and finally ten more quarter squats to your toes for a total of 50 reps. The amount of knee bend is small (four to six inches for most people) and the tempo is quick. The following video will help illustrate:

If fat loss is your main goal, try putting these at the end of a full body circuit. Here is one option:

A1)  Front Lunge with Forward Reach (left leg) – 15 reps

A2)  Standing DB Shoulder Press – 12 reps

A3)  Front Lunge with Forward Reach (right leg) – 15 reps

A4)  Negative Only Chin-ups – 5 10 second negatives

A5)  Metabolic Rhythm Squats – 50

By the end of this circuit your heart should be pounding out of your chest and your lungs should be on fire. If they are not, you took too much rest between exercises or the weights you selected were too light. Perform four circuits, resting three minutes between each circuit.

If you are trying to increase muscle mass while getting cut up, try the following workout:

A)  Wide Stance Box Squats with Chains (use a ten to twelve inch box) – 12×3 with 30 seconds rest between sets.

A good starting weight is 50% of your one rep max plus chains. If you squat between 250 and 350 pounds, use two chains. If your 1RM is over 350 use three. If your 1RM is less than 200 pounds focus on a more basic program like five sets of five: this workout isn’t for you!

When done correctly this should be a posterior chain movement. In other words, you should feel this one in primarily in your glutes and hamstrings.

B)  Double Kettlebell Front Squats – 6×10 with one minute rest between sets.

C)  Metabolic Rhythm Squats – 4×50 with two minutes rest between sets.

Be prepared to not walk right for at least four days!

Functional Training Myths by John Kuzora – Kuzora Personal Training Raleigh / Wake Forest NC

From time to time I like to search the web and see what my competition is up to. I like to be aware of there training styles and philosophies so I can better identify the advantages of choosing us over anyone else. And I strive to keep my prices competitive so I also search for session rates and special offers.

Lately I haven’t been doing this as much, mostly because anytime I look someone up it seems like they’re of business. I have been fortunate to remain a strong and viable business during these tough economic times. And while technically my competition shutting their doors is a positive for my business I find no pleasure in others misfortune.

But recently a new client came to the studio to try out some of the strongman workouts we have been specializing in lately. We took him through a workout consisting of five sets of backwards sled drag alternate with one minute Atlas stone holds. The second circuit alternated the keg load with farmer’s walk. Kettlebell man makers were the finisher.

This is a brutally hard workout that improves nearly every aspect of fitness. It burns fat, builds muscle, increases strength, and improves both anaerobic and aerobic endurance. By any definition you want to use, it is a “functional workout.”

I bring this up because this gentleman has worked with one of my competitors in Raleigh who professes to specialize in “function fitness.” It sparked my interest, and I decided to do some research.

The primary claim on this website was that “functional” training builds a lean, flexible body that is resilient to injury while traditional weight training creates a muscle bound physique that is inflexible, unfunctional, and injury prone. In addition, this website claims that functional training workouts are shorter and less monotonous than traditional workouts.

I have many issues with this claim, including the use of the term “unfunctional.” Although I wasn’t an English major in college, I’m pretty sure this isn’t a word. But let’s just assume it was a typo and this person meant nonfunctional…

No one would describe Adrian Peterson, running back for the Minnesota Vikings as nonfunctional. He led the NFL in rushing last season and is following that up with another all-pro year.

Yet in an interview with Men’s Fitness magazine he speaks about how he built his incredible lower body power with barbell squats and lunges, very traditional strength training movements. And while he trains to be a better football player, a side effect of his workout is a very impressive, lean physique.

Adrian Peterson, All Pro NFL Running Back

And did his “unfunctional” barbell training make Adrian more injury prone? I doubt it. He is routinely tackled by men that outweigh him by over 100 pounds, yet he was able to play in all 16 games last year.

While I have never tested Adrian Peterson’s flexibility, this claim is just as ridicules as the others. One of my former clients is a scholarship football player at Penn State. He is 6’2”, 300 pounds and can bench press a Kia. Yet while I was training him he was also able to do a full split!

Jillian Michaels

Don’t think traditional weight training exercises are just for men. Jillian Michaels, celebrity trainer from “The Biggest Loser” also focuses her workouts on basic moves such as lunges and bench presses. Would you describe her as bulky?

Are traditional workouts monotonous? I think that depends more on the abilities of the trainer than anything else.

The bench press is one of the exercises that almost every functional training guru despises. But nothing adds muscle and strength to the chest, shoulders, and triceps as fast as this basic movement. And like it or not many men are looking to build their upper bodies. With many of them we may bench press twice a week. Yet almost every client raves about the variety. How do we do this?

Take a look at the following two workouts.

Workout one – Vince Gironda Volume Training

A)  Bench Press – 10 sets of 10 reps

Load a barbell with 50-60% of your one rep max. Set your Gym boss timer to beep every minute for ten minutes. Every time it beeps do a set of ten bench presses. If you don’t have a Gym boss timer go get one. They are an amazing help when performing any type of timed or interval workout.

Workout two – The Chain Drop Set

A1)  Bench Press with Three Chains – 5 reps

A2)  Bench Press with Two Chains – 5 reps

A3)  Bench Press with One Chain – 5 reps

A4)  Bench Press – 5 reps

Load a barbell with a combination of plates and three chains. Make sure that you can perform 6-8 reps with the total load. Perform 5 reps and take a chain off each side. Immediately get back down and do 5 more reps. Continue until all the chains are off the bar and perform a final set. Rest three minutes and repeat two more times.

Both workouts include only bench press. Yet both are completely different. No one would feel like they did the same workout two sessions in a row if they were alternated.

Most of our female clients do some type of lunge or split squat every single workout. Most will also tell you that the thing they love most about training with us is that the workouts are always different. Why is that? Because we do over fifty different lunge variations!

One thing I’m not really sure about is why the functional training workouts this trainer puts clients thru are shorter than traditional training. My best guess is that shorter workouts allow him to see more clients in the same amount of time, creating more revenue for his business.