If you're looking for me these days chances are you'll find me hanging with my wife and ferrets, out on the road logging skating mileage, jumping or grinding something with my other skates, behind a camera and another solid bet on where I can be found is my garage gym. I never really thought I'd have a garage gym, most my life I was active and played sports in high school, then after that continued with my aggressive skating that I had been doing since summer of freshman year. I was never super fit but also not feeling I needed to do anything different, I was young, aggressive skating was enough to keep me in some semblance of shape. But then life happened and I was hired on to what many would consider a dream job. The job was good but it was SEDENTARY, within a year I noticed myself gaining quite a bit of weight. The sedentary nature of the job coupled with less free time to skate due to work and weather conditions of where I was currently living. So I skated less, lost tricks, weighed more, and the only conclusion I could arrive at was that something had to be done, my main motivation was to stay good at skating and be able to physically perform at a level that would allow progression even if I wasn't always skating.
I didn't have to go far before inline skating showed me that it still had even more to give me in life. I began researching fitness skates and looking into that whole realm of inline which to this point had honestly been laughable to me, I mean SPANDEX, no thanks was my naive line of thought to this point. I finally settled on some starter skates with a 3x100 setup and when I first started it was rough, I could do maybe 2-3 miles. My work and life situation changed and I found myself back in Texas and was transferred with same company back to Austin, and also found the schedule to be a little more lax. That's when I really hit it, I did my first marathon in that 3x100 setup, probably took me 3 hours or so but I was hooked and wanted more until 40-50 miles became a pretty standard ride. Later on I got a more legit setup and that set the base for my next year of my life just logging mileage as often as I could, during this year I opted out for less aggressive and began more speed and distance skating.
As time went on I pulled more and more away from aggressive skating, which I was happy with the skating I was doing but aggressive skating was the whole reason I started this thing. Not only that but I wanted to be a more powerful speed skater, I wanted to be more explosive while aggressive skating, I wanted my balance to be on point, so again I began researching and slowly began building my garage gym, I like to call it, The Muscle Sauna, because of the conditions in the gym during the summer. It provides a very cleansing workout to sweat that much but it can be a hassle.
For my gym and the all research as well as common sense that went into it, I knew I didn't want to become a hardcore weight lifter and add mass, I'm already a solid framed dude, I can't be getting bigger and expect the results I want while skating. At a friends suggestion I looked into Gold Medal Bodies and Functional Patterns, 2 systems dedicated to human movement. This is what I wanted for myself, to be strong yet fluid and balanced, so I built my entire gym around aspects of those systems on top of my own base of knowledge, research, and decisions for what would be best for my body, my performance, and my expected results throughout out all my skating. Rings exercises are huge for me because just look at what gymnasts can do with their bodies and the strength they have pound for pound, I'm not doing crazy gymnastics tricks, these are simply an excellent training tool.
In my breakdown of my workout I will try and be as descriptive as possible of the muscle areas worked but I am no expert by any means and you should look into everything for yourself and your skill level. I will pull from youtube and fitness websites for specifics, credit where needed, most the benefits I will focus on are skating specific. This workout has ebbed and flowed, parts have changed, been taken out, and revised as I learn more. This entire workout I feel is excellent for aggressive skating and speed and distance skating.
Current Workout
All exercises in order in a circuit of rounds
4-5 rounds, rest as needed between exercises and rounds
1. 15-20 Hanging Leg Raises w/ab straps
I use the ab straps because when you hang by your hands you turn it into more of a grip exercise, also if you cant grip long you wont be able to get as many reps.
Hanging leg raises are amazingly effective for several reasons:
They work all the major muscles of the abdominals- rectus abdominus, and external obliques
They work other auxiliary muscles that you would use for an abdominal contraction such as the iliopsoas and pectineus muscles of the hip as well as the rectus femoris of the legs, .
They develop the muscles required for proper spinal posture while also allowing the spine to stretch during the movement.
The movement requires abdominal contraction from the beginning to end while keeping the lower back in a safe position, thus making it a safe way to develop both abdominal and the supporting hip flexor muscles.
The lowering (eccentric) phase of the exercise places significant stress on the muscles of the abdominals given the weight of the legs when they are kept straight. Maximal increases in muscle strength and development (hypertrophy) come from the negative phase of an exercise when the muscles stretch under tension and few other abdominal exercises allow for such a high degree of muscular overload in the negative phase without putting the lower back at risk.
Italicized text from: http://www.naturallyintense.net/blog/bodybuilding/the-most-effective-abdominal-exercises-hanging-leg-raises/
2.
20 Double Suitcase lift w/30lb KBs
I drive through the heels and do them quick and explosive.
"The load in [the] hand is a destabilizing torque that attempts to shift [us] into lateral flexion as contralateral core musculature fires to keep [us] erect….Our lower extremities operate in predominantly closed-chain motion on stable surfaces in the real world - and the destabilizing torques we encounter further up the kinetic chain are truly functional instability training." Eric Cressey
The people over @ Evolve Fitness and Coaching have all the benefits of this one down much better than I could explain.
3.
20 Calf Raises with dual 30lb KB
No video needed
Benefits from: Lisa M. Wolfe for Live Healthy.com
At The Ankle
Your calf muscles control your ankle motion. The stronger your calves, the greater control you have over ankle plantar flexion: pointing your toes. This strength is beneficial if you are a runner, as your push-off is stronger. Your running strides become longer and more powerful leading to a more efficient run. Ankle control is important in other exercises such as walking, skating and cross-country skiing. In addition, sport play that requires quick turns such as soccer and tennis, also benefit from ankle strength.
In Balance
The calf muscles support your ankle. When you improve ankle stability, you improve balance. Increase the balance benefits of the calf raise by performing the exercise on one foot at a time. At first, place your hands on a chair to assist your balance, but aim to perform the exercise without holding onto the chair. The single-leg calf raise improves the strength of both lower legs equally and trains your body to balance on one foot. This is important for daily activities such as stepping down a step, or up onto a curb.
4.
10 Atomic Pushups on raised bar
Need some sort of suspension trainer, I have rings. I do these on raised bar because you get more range of motion this way and also years of skating abuse to my wrists make regular pushups pretty terrible for me.
Benefits: This exercise helps engage your chest, shoulders, and triceps while challenging your entire core musculature.
5.
5 Killer KB Combo w/Dual 30lb KBs
I won't go into details with benefits of this one, you'll have to look into each individually but i assure you, it is one hell of a movement. Use 2 kettlebells here and not one like in the video.
6.
15 Rings Rows
7.
Rings Dips to Failure
All the benefits of regular dips with the added instability of rings.
8.
10 Pistol Squats per leg or 10 Side to Side Jumps per leg
The Benefits of Single Leg Squats (Pistols) by Antony Lo for Physio Detective
To do them correctly requires excellent strength, balance and control of your hip muscles. Most of the population have hip muscle imbalances from sitting too much or focusing on movements that they do a lot of. Sometimes, it is just a habit of doing something the same way all the time. Whatever it is, to get them right will give you an excellent base of support to do many activities well
They will help you develop your hip control - esp the deep hip external rotators. This means that you will be able to share the loading throughout the hip and not grind away at just a small portion of your hip - this often results in labral tears and hip impingement
Doing Pistols properly will mean that you have good strength and control through the full range of your ankle, knee and hip joints.
They look cool and few people can do them properly - a great party trick!
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9.
Rings Pullups to failure
All the benefits of pullups with added instability of rings, the rings also provide a more natural movement for your joints throughout the pullup.
Aaaaaand you've made it through one round, grab a drink of water and a breath because you need to do it all 3-4 more times for a total of 4-5 rounds. This is in an ideal situation of course, life happens and time constraints happen so sometimes I just see how many rounds I can bang out with the time I do have. Each round takes me 15-20 minutes.
As I mentioned earlier this is all in an ideal situation which here lately I've found myself on a solid schedule of some form of skating and working out every other day. It's working out so far and I can feel results, unfortunately I don't think I'll make Athens to Atlanta this year so I'm going to find myself in the streets and skatepark more doing more trick centered stuff, I think distance training will be cut back to 2 days per week. Some days I'm feeling real good, I will double up with aggressive skating and gym or distance and other skating, I never do gym and distance training on the same day. I don't want to skip any gym days and have been loyal to those, it's hard to skip when the gym is in your garage. As I said my workout ebbs and flows as needed, lately I've decided I wanted more explosive power that would suit me in all my skating so I'm going to focus on more plyometrics and other explosive type exercises. I feel strong and confident progressing into other areas as I feel I've built up a solid foundation to continue and push myself while remaining injury free.
Also if I could find a solid indoor cycle my gym would be more than complete.
