More Muscle, Power and Speed Won The Game

The winning team looked more muscular, speedy and powerful. She said the other team looked "thicker." It took me a moment to understand what she meant. She meant the other team looked more muscular and powerful! And, that "thicker" team won the game.

I say it this way:

Other things being equal, a muscular, powerful athlete will outperform a fat, slower or skinny, weaker athlete. Sports Fitness Hut's Fat Blaster Athletic Power Training System will give you your "lean and mean" athletic machine!

I was watching a client play a baseball game one day and his mother said, "the other team looks thicker." She said a ton of things without really knowing what she said. Its not a coincidence that the other team won the game.

The evidence is clear when it comes to sports fitness training. If you aren't continually getting bigger, faster (and powerful) and stronger (muscular), you will be left behind. And, your team will probably lose against an equal or lesser team that is bigger, faster and stronger.

Weight lifting, speed training and power training can be done all the time. Its called periodization.

When you do periodized training, it prepares you to peak during the season. But, you never really stop training (you just take needed breaks or rest periods).

Those athletes and teams that do year-round periodized training will be more successful.

Download your FREE 10-Minute Strength and Power Workouts now!

Check out my other great blogs:

Her Fitness Hut Blog Her Fitness Hut is featured on EmpowHER, a great health issues website for women! Her Fitness Hut has also been named in the Top 50 Personal Training Blogs by Physical Therapy Assistant Schools!

My Fitness Hut Blog has been recognized by Stanford University Wellsphere as a Top Health Blogger! Quite an honor coming from that institution!

Improve Athletic Explosive Power in 10 Minutes

Use my Free 10-Minute Strength and Power Workouts to improve your explosive power. Short, effective workouts are better than long, tiring workouts. Its important to do these exercises at full speed when you are fresh.

If you have weak structures supporting your ankles, knees, low back, hips, elbows and shoulders, your power potential will suffer. And, you are headed for avoidable injuries.

Here are some general steps to take to improve your explosive power:

1. Bodyweight and dumbbell exercises are great for stabilizing your joint structures and core. For example, if your right leg is significantly stronger than your left leg, you cannot compensate for the weaker leg.

It will be forced to "catch up in strength" to the right leg.
These exercises will also prepare your body for heavier weights and intense plyometric and speed exercises.

2. Plyometrics and sport specific exercises are important but only if you have enough strength and joint stability to make these more risky exercises work effectively for you (to improve explosive power).

3. The core muscles are very important in preventing low back pain and stabilizing the shoulder girdle and hip structures. A strong and stable core will maximize your extremity strength (limbs) and explosive power. If your core is weak, you will not effectively transfer power from your legs to your upper body.

A core strengthening program involves using many muscles in a coordinated movement. Rather than isolating specific joints as in most weight lifting exercises, core stability exercises focus on working the deep muscles of the entire torso at once.

4. You can improve the ankle's joint proprioception (position sense) and dynamic joint stability with balance training. Doing one-legged balance exercises will accomplish this goal.

One-leg balancing on foam pads or disks for 4-5 minutes (each leg) is a great exercise. Other great exercises are lunges, single-leg squats, step ups and medicine ball rotations on one leg.

5. You will need to strengthen your knees and ligaments around them. Having strong, stable knee structures will influence how high you can jump. The deep knee bend exercise is good for this purpose.

Work hard and smart to succeed in your sport!

Download your FREE 10-Minute Strength and Power Workouts now!

Other things being equal, a muscular, powerful athlete will outperform a fat, slower or skinny, weaker athlete. Sports Fitness Hut's Fat Blaster Athletic Power Training System will give you your "lean and mean" athletic machine!

Check out my other great blogs:

Her Fitness Hut Blog Her Fitness Hut is featured on EmpowHER, a great health issues website for women! Her Fitness Hut has also been named in the Top 50 Personal Training Blogs by Physical Therapy Assistant Schools!

My Fitness Hut Blog has been recognized by Stanford University Wellsphere as a Top Health Blogger! Quite an honor coming from that institution!

Athlete's 10-Minute Strength and Power Workouts

Add more strength and power in your body with my FREE 10-Minute Strength and Power Workouts!

We all want that cut, ripped, lean, toned, etc. body! There are many different words for it and we want varying degrees of that body type. Bodybuilders are probably the most extreme when it comes to "getting cut" for competition. Athletes need the lean body type to compete at a high level.

At Sports Fitness Hut, I have designed all of my exercise programs based on a Fat Blaster Athletic Power Training System. Why? Here are the reasons:

1) There is not a better or faster way to sculpt your body. You also get superior heart health. Research and my personal experience backs this up. Just look at an athlete's body.

There are varying degrees of athletic training---some techniques are more intense than others.

2) I am a former NCAA Division I athlete, so I'm not playing a guessing game when it comes to this type of training. I use research, evidence and real-life experience to develop training programs.

3) Forget about weight loss/gain and concentrate on FAT LOSS. Building lean muscle mass will BURN THE FAT and permanently SPEED UP YOUR METABOLISM. The weight loss or gain will take care of itself. And you will be a better athlete.

You could say Your Fitness Hut. It is about YOU and what YOU REALLY WANT! Don't let fear stop you from reaching your sports fitness goals!

4) It doesn't require marathon training sessions. We all have a tight schedule. These workouts are only 10 minutes. You can do 2 or 3 of them a day if you want!

Download your FREE 10-Minute Strength and Power Workouts now!

Other things being equal, a muscular, powerful athlete will outperform a fat, slower or skinny, weaker athlete. Sports Fitness Hut's Fat Blaster Athletic Power Training System will give you your "lean and mean" athletic machine!

Check out my other great blogs:

Her Fitness Hut Blog Her Fitness Hut is featured on EmpowHER, a great health issues website for women! Her Fitness Hut has also been named in the Top 50 Personal Training Blogs by Physical Therapy Assistant Schools!

My Fitness Hut Blog has been recognized by Stanford University Wellsphere as a Top Health Blogger! Quite an honor coming from that institution!

Power Step Ups Improves Explosion and Speed

Use power step ups to help improve your hip explosion and speed strength.



One of the top athletic training exercises is the power step up. Improve your speed sooner with power step ups. Do this exercise full speed with control.

Doing one-legged (unilateral) exercises will improve your speed because you use the same pathways that it takes to run. Sometimes, too much focus is placed on leg exercises done with two legs (bilateral).

These two-legged exercises, like squats, are needed in your exercise program. But, one of the best physical indicators of athletic success is dynamic balance (rate-of-force production or power is the other).

Do the power step up this way:

1. Face a bench or platform (knee high) and put your right foot on the bench. Your knee should be bent 90 degrees. Don't do this exercise with dumbbells until you have mastered the bodyweight version.

2. Alternate your feet on and off the bench or platform (you will be sprinting in place).

3. Explosively drive your knees up and pump your arms as fast as possible. Each set should be 20-30 seconds.

4. Do this exercise with correct running mechanics.

Challenge yourself to improve your hip strength/explosion and speed!

Get "Sports Fitness Hut's Hips and Glutes Training Guide for Athletes" It is a must training guide for any serious athlete!

Other things being equal, a muscular, powerful athlete will outperform a fat, slower or skinny, weaker athlete. Sports Fitness Hut's Fat Blaster Athletic Power Training System will give you your "lean and mean" athletic machine!

Check out my other great blogs:

Her Fitness Hut Blog Her Fitness Hut is featured on EmpowHER, a great health issues website for women! Her Fitness Hut has also been named in the Top 50 Personal Training Blogs by Physical Therapy Assistant Schools!

My Fitness Hut Blog has been recognized by Stanford University Wellsphere as a Top Health Blogger! Quite an honor coming from that institution!

10 Athletic Training Tips to Make You Better

My 10 athletic training tips will improve your success on the field or court. Training hard and consistently is the key. You can't lay off training for 6 months and expect to get better. Hard work (and not just talent) separates champions from all other competitors.



Everyone wants more strength, power and speed. Some of you are doing too much strength training and not enough power training.

To continually get stronger without an increase in speed, power and athleticism will not help you reach your athletic potential.

Here are 10 tips to make you a better player:

1. Train your body in all 3 planes of motion. Many athletic movements happen in the transverse plane (rotations, turning, twisting, etc.) and frontal plane (side-to-side, lateral).

Machine-based training concentrates on the sagittal plane (up- down, forward-backward movements). Do miminal athletic training on machines because they limit your natural movement patterns.

2. Train on your feet because most athletic movements in games are done standing and running.

3. Stabilize and strengthen the core first and limbs (arms and legs) later.

This can be done using exercises like bridges, planks, bird dogs, cobras, supermans and back extensions. You would later progress to full speed core exercises on your feet like medicine ball chops, medicine ball slams, 2-arm and 1-arm medicine ball throws and medicine ball rotational throws.

4. The same holds true for body strength exercises. Start with dumbbells to stabilize your joints. Dumbbells also don't allow you to cheat when 1 arm or 1 leg is weaker than the other.

Also, bodyweight exercises work well to stabilize your body strength. You can get to the heavier weights once your joints and muscles are stabilized and balanced. If you can't do bodyweight squats correctly then you won't do heavyweight squats correctly.

5. Continuing with strength exercises....concentrate on compound (multi-joint) exercises like squats of all types, lunges of all types, bench press, rows, step ups, and deadlifts.

One-legged squats, step ups and lunges improve your running strength and power because about 80% of running is done on one leg. Do less single-joint exercises like bicep curls, calf raises and leg extensions because you get little benefit.

6. And, improve your muscular balance. Quadriceps shouldn't be significantly stronger than hamstrings. Likewise, the frontside of your upper body should have muscular balance with the backside of your upper body.

7. Train your muscles with all contraction types (eccentric, isometric, concentric). All muscles function eccentrically (reduces force or deceleration), isometrically (stabilizes force) and concentrically (produces force).

Eccentric contractions are able to produce the most tension development followed by isometric contractions and lastly, concentric contractions. If eccentric contractions are able to produce the greatest tension development, then more time should be devoted during training for eccentric contractions to reduce the risk of injuries such as knee ACL tears.

Also, strong eccentric contractions are critical for athletes to produce maximal power since all force production (concentric) must be preceded by force reduction (eccentric).

8. Improve your flexibility and correct postural problems in the early stages of your training to avoid injuries when you get to more intense training.

9. Progress to more intense exercises like plyometrics, speed training and full-speed sport specific exercises after you have stabilized and strengthened your core, joints and overall muscle structure.

At this stage, you will train athletic movements in your sport (transfer-of-training effect) and not just muscles. YOU MUST TRAIN FAST AND EXPLOSIVE TO GET FASTER AND MORE EXPLOSIVE.

10. Rate-of-force production (how fast your muscles produce force) and dynamic balance are the two best physical predictors of athletic success. Your training program (strength, power, speed, flexibility, etc.) should be pointed toward improving these 2 physical traits.

Train harder, smarter and safely!

Go here now and get your Free Sports Power Workout Book and Speed Training Tips!

"Other things being equal, a muscular, powerful athlete will outperform a fat, slower or skinny, weaker athlete. Sports Fitness Hut's Fat Blaster Athletic Power Training System will give you your "lean and mean" athletic machine!"

Check out my other great blogs:

Her Fitness Hut Blog Her Fitness Hut is featured on EmpowHER, a great health issues website for women! Her Fitness Hut has also been named in the Top 50 Personal Training Blogs by Physical Therapy Assistant Schools!

My Fitness Hut Blog has been recognized by Stanford University Wellsphere as a Top Health Blogger! Quite an honor coming from that institution!

Bigger, Stronger Athletes Perform Better

Train to be bigger, stronger and better for next season. Two players with equal ability will be separated in performance---by the stronger player. A stronger, more powerful version of you makes you a better ball player.

Are you strong enough to play your sport? You should train for the type of strength you will need to compete at a high level. For example, you will not need maximal levels of strength to play baseball or tennis.

Even though you don't need to win a strong man contest, you do need a certain amount of strength to enhance your power and speed.

Improve your strength in these ways:

1. Optimum Strength – The ideal level of strength needed to perform in your sport. Continually getting stronger will not continually increase your power, or speed strength.

Speed strength is the ability of the neuromuscular system to produce the greatest possible force in the shortest period of time. Obviously, every athlete wants and needs this type of strength. You should know the levels of strength you need to play your specific position.

2. Stabilization Strength – The ability of your body’s stabilizing muscles to provide dynamic joint stabilization and maintain postural control during athletic movements. All athletes need this type of strength.

Core strength would fall within this category. Many athletic injuries can be traced to inadequate core strength. Core strength enhances your power.

3. Functional Strength – You should train movements (not just muscles) during strength training sessions. Producing dynamic, multi-planar eccentric, concentric and isometric contractions quickly and efficiently is the goal of training for functional strength.

Do your strength training in all 3 planes of motion.

Strength train your muscles with all contraction types (eccentric, isometric, concentric). All muscles function eccentrically (reduces force or deceleration), isometrically (stabilizes force) and concentrically (produces force).

Are you strong enough to compete? You can't just show up at the gym and do any kind of workout! Don't lose your position because you are weak!

Train hard and smart!

Go here now and get your Free Sports Power Workout Book and Speed Training Tips!

"Other things being equal, a muscular, powerful athlete will outperform a fat, slower or skinny, weaker athlete. Sports Fitness Hut's Fat Blaster Athletic Power Training System will give you your "lean and mean" athletic machine!"

Check out my other great blogs:

Her Fitness Hut Blog Her Fitness Hut is featured on EmpowHER, a great health issues website for women! Her Fitness Hut has also been named in the Top 50 Personal Training Blogs by Physical Therapy Assistant Schools!

My Fitness Hut Blog has been recognized by Stanford University Wellsphere as a Top Health Blogger! Quite an honor coming from that institution!

Captain Derek Jeter, Your Hard Work Rewarded

Captain Derek Jeter had the day of a lifetime: he reached 3,000 hits, hit number 3,000 was a homerun and he went 5-5 at the plate with the game winning hit! It sounds like a Hollywood movie script? No, I watched it happen this afternoon at Yankee Stadium. Congrats Derek! You have always played the game hard every day and you had some day dude.

One of the great players of all time, Jeter became only the 28th major league player to reach 3,000 hits. And, he is only the second player to hit a homerun for hit number 3,000.

You need baseball training tips from Jeter! He is also a champion with 5 baseball world series titles, the latest being in 2009! Jeter won 4 titles in his first 5 years in the major leagues (1996-2000)! Enough said!

Jeter is also my favorite baseball player so I will listen to what he has to say about baseball training tips. Young players need to follow Jeter's example! If the King of New York trains for and plays the game "with all-out effort," you should too!

In the April 2008 issue of Men's Health, Jeter talks about his training regimen. He plays one of the most demanding positions in baseball (shortstop) so he must be in peak condition for the long season. He doesn't go into a lot of detail about his workouts but he does list some workout principles.

1. Do a thorough, dynamic warmup before each practice or game like jumping jacks, lunges, arm circles, pushups and bodyweight squats. Research has proven that a dynamic warmup will prepare your body best for competition.

2. Jeter does a balanced weight training workout in order to prevent injuries and muscle imbalances. Some examples are deadlifts, pullups, rows, squats, lunges, shoulder presses, bench presses and core training. Rotational core training is critical for baseball players.

3. For his explosive training, Jeter does sprints and jump training (plyometrics) to keep his fast twitch muscle fibers tuned and working at peak performance. Fast twitch muscle fibers are crucial for speed and power and also the ones you lose the quickest as you get older.

Keep playing hard Derek!

Download your All-Star Baseball Power Workout Manual now and get better!

"Other things being equal, a muscular, powerful athlete will outperform a fat, slower or skinny, weaker athlete. Sports Fitness Hut's Fat Blaster Athletic Power Training System will give you your "lean and mean" athletic machine!"

Check out my other great blogs:

Her Fitness Hut Blog Her Fitness Hut is featured on EmpowHER, a great health issues website for women! Her Fitness Hut has also been named in the Top 50 Personal Training Blogs by Physical Therapy Assistant Schools!

My Fitness Hut Blog has been recognized by Stanford University Wellsphere as a Top Health Blogger! Quite an honor coming from that institution!

Top 2 Vertical Jump Improvement Tips

Improve your vertical jump height with hard work and more hard work. You have to train correctly to improve your hops. It will also improve your speed. At the NFL Combine, those with the highest vertical jumps typically have the fastest 40 yard dash times.

So, here are my Top 2 Vertical Jump Improvement Tips:

1. Improve your total body strength, especially leg strength. Overall strength training (including core training) is needed to stabilize joints, build muscle, correct postural problems and improve flexibility.

How much lower body strength do you need to develop optimum power? A male should be able to squat his body weight 8-10 times and a female should be able to squat about 75% of her body weight 8-10 times. If you are not able to squat, then you should be able to leg press about 1.5 times your body weight 8-10 times.

Powerful athletic movements initiate with or transfer through your core area. Translation: a weak core will severely hurt your power output and vertical jump.

2. Explosive weight lifting will improve your power and set you apart from your athletic competitors. Make your total body more explosive.

Just as you can do medicine ball exercises, plyometric exercises and light dumbbell exercises explosively, you can also lift heavier weights explosively.

Lifting weights explosively is an advanced form of exercise and shouldn't be done by beginners or youngsters. Your body should have the needed stabilization and strength before beginning explosive lifts.

It doesn't help you improve as an athlete to continually get stronger if power development is not there also. Power, or speed strength (how fast your muscles can produce force) is one of the best physical predictors of success in sports.

Research has proven that only lifting heavy weights at a moderate or slow pace will not improve your explosive power.

Plyometrics help you to increase leg power and arm power.

Work hard, expect success!

My friends at JumpUSA have been around for 20 years and their products will help you improve your jumping ability and overall game.

"Other things being equal, a muscular, powerful athlete will outperform a fat, slower or skinny, weaker athlete. Sports Fitness Hut's Fat Blaster Athletic Power Training System will give you your "lean and mean" athletic machine!"

Check out my other great blogs:

Her Fitness Hut Blog Her Fitness Hut is featured on EmpowHER, a great health issues website for women! Her Fitness Hut has also been named in the Top 50 Personal Training Blogs by Physical Therapy Assistant Schools!

My Fitness Hut Blog has been recognized by Stanford University Wellsphere as a Top Health Blogger! Quite an honor coming from that institution!

Sports Fitness Training in Hot Weather

If you're training for your sport in hot weather, take precautions or you could be putting your life in danger!

In the heat, you should always stop competing during practice or a game if you feel sick, have chills, headache, severe muscle burning or aching, dizziness or blurred vision.

If your symptoms don't subside in a few minutes, you could be headed for a heat stroke that can kill you. During athletic competition or training lasting 2-4 hours, fatigue, dehydration, muscle weakness/cramps and decreased coordination is caused by low levels of fluids, salt or glycogen (fuel from carbohydrate calories).

It is important to keep your fluids, salt and glycogen levels adequate during competition because it is often too late once the symptoms show up.

When you sweat, you lose water and salt. If the sodium levels in your blood get too low (hyponatremia), you will no longer be able to move water across your body's membranes and you will become dehydrated - even if you are drinking enough water.

Some of the signs and symptoms of hyponatremia include bloating, upset stomach, nausea, headaches, cramps, disorientation, slurred speech and confusion. Untreated, hyponatremia and dehydration can lead to collapse, convulsions, and sometimes even death.

Everyone is different, but generally you should try to ingest 1 gram of sodium per hour during a long event, practice or game. You should also increase your sodium intake in the days leading up to the race or event. Ingest about 10-25 grams of salt per day before a race like a marathon.

Endurance sports require your heart to efficiently pump oxygen in your bloodstream from your lungs into your muscles. A study from the University of Connecticut shows that with dehydration, your heart beats with far less force, so it pumps far less blood with each beat. Therefore, an inadequate amount of oxygen reaches your muscles unless you condition your body.

Again, don't depend on thirst to tell you when you lack fluids! When you are going to exercise for more than a couple hours, especially in hot weather, drink small amounts of water frequently and eat salted snacks or consume a sports drink.

Go here now and get your Free Sports Power Workout Book and Speed Training Tips!

"Other things being equal, a muscular, powerful athlete will outperform a fat, slower or skinny, weaker athlete. Sports Fitness Hut's Fat Blaster Athletic Power Training System will give you your "lean and mean" athletic machine!"

Check out my other great blogs:

Her Fitness Hut Blog Her Fitness Hut is featured on EmpowHER, a great health issues website for women! Her Fitness Hut has also been named in the Top 50 Personal Training Blogs by Physical Therapy Assistant Schools!

My Fitness Hut Blog has been recognized by Stanford University Wellsphere as a Top Health Blogger! Quite an honor coming from that institution!