Many people including myself and many readers of this site would say we do ‘functional fitness’. We use the phrase almost without thinking, but most people have never heard of it and it must sound very odd. This thought struck me as I was watching a climbing film, Alistair Lee’s Onsight where one interviewee comments that [...]

Photo by tobo I have just taken part in a Myers-Briggs exercise at work (INTJ in case you were wondering) and this got me thinking about how my personality dictates my approach to exercise and dieting – particularly dieting. For those who aren’t familiar with it, Myers-Briggs is a system for identifying your personality type, [...]

After a recent discussion here on strength standards for women, I have come up with some standards using the collective wisdom of All Round Strength Training! Click to go straight to table of strength standards for women (below) There’s not much general knowledge about what is “good” for women’s strength training. In many cases, a [...]

This is a question as much for my male readers as my female readers: do you have a conception of how much weight women can/should be lifting? Because relatively few women lift free weights and of those who do, many are new to lifting, it is deemed appropriate to be encouraging about any lifting stats [...]

Ever noticed how everyone seems to be obsessed with form these days? I blame books like Starting Strength – great book of course, but now suddenly everyone’s an expert! It’s one thing to know the theory; it’s another thing to apply it to an individual. If it was that easy, we wouldn’t need strength coaches [...]

I mentioned to a friend that I was training for a powerlifting competition and he said, “So you’ll be wanting to bulk up then!” I explained that you can be any weight you want since, like boxing, there are different weight classes. It is easy to forget that most people don’t know what powerlifting or [...]

I have been away from this blog for a while, spending much of my time rock climbing, surfing, hiking, cycling and generally enjoying the great outdoors down here in beautiful Cornwall. One thing my recent sporting activity has brought home to me is the importance of sport-specific training. If you are a generalist and a [...]

I’m interested in your thoughts about supplementation. I am talking about all the different types of supplements: vitamins, minerals, fish oil, creatine, stimulants, protein, recovery drinks and so on. I have rarely used them up till now as I have been unconvinced of the need for supplements for myself.  I reckon I eat a pretty healthy, [...]

I suspect all of us have emotional routines attached to our training sessions that play a big part in the training process. I often feel nervous before a workout, but at the same time I know this is a good thing. If I don’t feel nervous, a little voice in the back of my head [...]

I’ve seen some valid criticisms of the notion of “functional strength” or even “functional fitness”. After all, strength is itself functional, however it is developed. The “functional strength” crowd doesn’t have a monopoly on whole body or compound exercises. These are used across the strength disciplines by powerlifters, bodybuilders, martial artists and so on. I [...]