When it comes to weight loss, there’s no doubt a healthy diet goes a long way. After all, your diet makes up 50% of your calorie balance so it’s certainly a very powerful influence in keeping your bodyfat levels in check. One of the most popular weight loss methods is to “eat right” which usually involves trying to only eat …
The Stress-Free Healthy Eating Manifesto
Stress is the ultimate obstacle to a healthy diet. The more stress your mind and body are forced to endure the less healthy your diet is. Bear in mind, there’s always some degree of stress with any disciplined approach in life. This is especially the case if you’re looking to make some drastic changes to your daily habits. However, short-term …
Is Volume or Intensity More Important for Building Muscle?
This weeks episode of the Red Delta Project Podcast includes some of the top questions I’ve received this week. I cover the idea of undulating intensity, making progress with counter-productive influences, and looking at the importance of volume and intensity for building muscle.
My Top Tips for Fast and Sustainable Weight Loss
Weight loss can happen relatively fast or slow depending on how you go about it. Essentially, the more effort and discipline you bring to your diet and workout program, the faster you can expect weight loss to occur. The downside to such fast weight loss is that it can be very stressful and increase the risk of weight rebound. That’s …
3 Ways To Prevent Your Workout From Becoming a Waste of Time
These days everyone is busier than ever, and it’s easy to push the workout off to the side with claims that you don’t have time to get to the gym. It’s not an excuse, most people legitimately don’t have the time to workout. It’s not because working out takes a lot of of time; it’s because how most people approach …
3 Essentials for An Effective Training Progression Strategy
Effective workouts don’t happen by accident, and they sure aren’t the result of luck. An effective workout also doesn’t come from using the best equipment or an “optimal” workout routine. Instead, an effective workout comes from a simple, and clear, progression strategy. A progression strategy is nothing more than a plan to make improvements from one workout to the next. …
4 Proven Tips to Build More Muscle With Calisthenics
Building muscle with calisthenics isn’t rocket science, but it can be difficult if the stimulus for hypertrophy keeps slipping through your fingers. It’s quite common for people to work super hard and not building muscle regardless of what exercises or equipment they use or even what program they use. They hop from one program to the next, all the while …
Grind-Style Calisthenics Routines for Building Muscle
Today’s podcast/ post highlights my favorite weekly Grind-Style Calisthenics routines for building muscle. Granted, it’s not that actual routine that causes muscle growth, but rather the progression of the routine that does. The best routine in the world won’t do jack sh*t for you if you don’t strive to improve how well you do it from one workout to the …
Do Calisthenics Skills Build Muscle?
Do calisthenics skills, like front levers and muscle ups help you build muscle? Does squatting or doing dips with a deep range of motion hurt your joints? When should you level up to a more advanced technique in calisthenics? I answer these questions and more, with practical answers in this week’s episode of the Red Delta Project Podcast:
How to Make Calisthenics More Effective For Building Muscle
Calisthenics is fantastic for building muscle; provided you understand how to do it in an effective manner. One of the biggest obstacles people face with calisthenics, is the technical challenge involved with advanced exercises. Improving your calisthenics skills is a very rewarding and worthwhile endeavor, but it may not be the best way to build muscle. It can be difficult …
The Benefits of Emotional Eating
Emotional eating gets a bad reputation. Almost everyone I know is trying to do less of it or stop emotional eating altogether. I find the idea of not eating from an emotional foundation kind of funny. What are we supposed to do, eat without any emotion whatsoever?! Do the experts really expect us to eat like we are some sort …
4 Tips to Make Training Fun Again
Your training should be a positive and fun experience in your life. Sure, you’ll have occasional workouts that are a bear to get through, but these should be the exception and not the rule. If your workouts are becoming a drag, it’s time to make some adjustments to breathe the life back into them. One common strategy is to do …
Talking Next Level Strength with Al kavadlo
The latest Kavadlo book, Next level Strength, is set to release in a couple of weeks and I had a privilege to sit and chat with Al Kavadlo about it! It was very interesting to learn the origins of why he, and his bother Danny, wrote this book. You would think that with all of the books they are written …
Answering Your Muscle & Strength Questions of the Week
I’ve been getting a lot of very good questions about building muscle and strength this week. Many of which are about my new Grind-Style Calisthenics program which you can learn more about here. So without further ado, let’s get right into the questions of the week. How long should you rest between sets? Generally, resting 2-3 minutes between sets in …
How to Remove 5 Muscle Building Obstacles with Gring-Style Calisthenics
Grand Style Calisthenics was created to make it as easy as possible for you to build muscle and strength. This is done by removing several of the biggest obstacles that stand in your way towards that goal. Obstacle #1 High-maintenance exercise habits One of the biggest obstacles for building muscle and strength is maintaining consistent exercise habits. There’s no getting …
Calisthenics for Martial Arts 4- Things You Need to Develop
Calisthenics and martial arts have long been training partners. It’s even speculated that the development of martial arts and calisthenics happened right alongside one another. This is why I wrote the book, Bodyweight Training for Martial Arts. It’s time modern martial artists tap into the wealth of their athletic potential without needing to go to a gym or buy costly …
Why Nutritional Recommendations are an Educated Guess
It’s natural to strive and search for solid answers when it comes to nutritional recommendations. There is a certain comfort and security that comes from hearing that you have to consume an exact number of calories or grams of protein each day. It helps you feel in control of your diet and this your health and fitness. The frustrating thing …
Making Your Workouts More Effective With Training Alignment
An effective workout depends on the alignment of several influences. It’s not as simple as having the correct weight or number of reps. In order for a work out to truly be effective it needs to work along with your preferences, resources, and even your own body. The more alignment you have, the easier it is to accomplish what you …
How Alignment Makes Fitness Easier
Nothing makes it easier to achieve, and maintain a higher level of fitness than seeking a state of alignment. On the other hand, a state of misalignment can make it almost impossible to make even meager progress no matter how hard you work. What is fitness alignment? Fitness alignment is when the habits you follow flow along with the countless …
The Easiest Way to Start Making Progress Again
One of the most common questions I receive is from people who have hit a plateau and they want to start making progress again. They could be struggling to build muscle, increase strength, or lose weight but the scenario is always the same. In full disclosure, it’s almost impossible for me to know what the average individual needs to do …
5 Tips For Super Effective Home Workouts
Working out at home has several advantages. It’s a lot more convenient, you can potentially save a lot of time and money, plus you get to choose your own music and amenities. However, for all of the advantages, there are also several significant challenges that come from working out at home. But don’t worry, because I’ve got your back with …
Is the Bulking and Cutting Strategy Right For You?
I get a lot of questions concerning the bulking and cutting strategy. Specifically, if someone is on the right track when they are bulking or if they should start cutting. Some people also ask if they should bulk first and then cut or cut and then bulk. It may not surprise you, but I’m not a very big fan of …
Convict Conditioning Myths and Misconceptions
Convict Conditioning was first published a little over 10 years ago. Since then, it’s played a very influential role in making progressive calisthenics a popular and legitimate training discipline. For the years, I’ve received many questions regarding Paul Wade’s work so I wanted to take the opportunity to answer them as best I could here. #1 Is Paul Wade real? …
How to Stop Struggling and Make Progress in Fitness & Weight loss
I know how frustrating it can be to work super hard, but nothing seems to work. Maybe you’re learning all about the latest diet and exercise research or perhaps you’re working as hard as you can every day in the gym. Yet despite doing everything possible progress is slow or nonexistent so what’s the deal? Most frustration with diet and …
High Vs Low Fatiue Training
For years, high-fatigue training has been the order of the day. It didn’t matter what your goals were, the purpose of any workout was to push your body very hard, create a lot of stress, and spend several days recovering. This approach works very well for anyone looking to build muscle or improve their work capacity, but it’s not the …
The 6 Tools of Grind-Style Calisthenics
Last week, I discussed the Grind-style Calisthenics mindset. This week, I want to talk about the 6 tools GSC uses to bring your training to the next level. The ultimate goal of Grind-style Calisthenics is to teach you how to work your muscles more effectively. Note that effective muscle training isn’t always about making your muscles work as hard as …
Understanding the Grind-Style Calisthenics Mindset
Grind-style Calisthenics brings the experience of lifting heavy weights in the gym to the efficient world of body weight training. This is accomplished not just from using unique exercises or workout routines, but a different mental perspective on physical exercise. Taking a grind-style approach means focusing on the quality and quantity of the muscle tension you’re generating rather than chasing …
The Simple Formula for Unstoppable Fitness Motivation
Fitness motivation can be a very volatile thing. One minute you have it and the next it’s gone. Some lucky people always seem to be fired up while others around them struggle to just get their engine running. Fitness motivation, or the ability to stick to a diet or exercise program, isn’t so much about ironclad willpower or magic pixie …
Make Faster Calisthenics Progress With Grease The Groove
Sometimes, it can feel like some moves will never get stronger or easier. Times like this it’s a good idea to employ the “grease the groove” approach How to use it Essentially, grease the groove refers to practicing a technical skill very frequently outside of your normal workouts. You might practice a few reps every day, but most grease the …
How to Use Periodization to Avoid Workout Plateaus
Workout plateaus are a fact of life for every athlete. There’s really not much you can do to avoid them regardless of the routine you follow or how hard you work. In a way, a workout plateau is a good thing. It means your body has adapted to the stress of the workout. Even so, I know that doesn’t take …
Is Low-Fatigue High-Volume Training Right For You?
Low-fatigue high-volume training has been getting a lot more press recently so I thought I would address it here to clear up some confusion. The basic strategy of Low-fatigue high-volume training is you keep your reps and sets moderate to prevent yourself from accumulating too much fatigue during a given workout. With less fatigue, you don’t need as much recovery …
Calisthenics Training Wisdom w/ Jake Gay
Jake Gay is a relatively new name on the calisthenics scene having started seriously training in the discipline a year ago. Remember his name though because he’s going to be a household name in no time. It’s easy to see why through the content he puts out on his Instagram and YouTube channel, Jake’s simple and practical advice is down-to-earth …
How to Get Fit and Save Money at the Same time
January is a time of promise of weight loss and building the body of your dreams……for a price. There are memberships, programs, gadgets and supplements to buy. It just seems like it’s impossible to get fit and save money at the same time. I’m here to tell you that you don’t have to buy anything to get in shape. In …
Calorie Hacking For Weight Loss
Calorie hacking is one of the few weight loss strategies that works with the law of homeostasis rather than against it. Instead of adopting long-term habits like classic diet and exercise programs, it uses short-term “calorie hacks” that last a few hours or days. Why is homeostasis the key to fat loss? Homeostasis is the governing law of the universe. …
Making Sense of Conflicting Fitness Information
It seems like the world is filled with conflicting fitness information. One experts says eggs are good, another claims they are bad. One best selling book claims running will add years to your life while other claim it will shorten your life. The confusion seems to be the normal state of our fitness culture, but this isn’t necessarily so. In …
A Simple Plan for Making Progress in Calisthenics
Building muscle with calisthenics can be a daunting idea. There are so many technical variables to consider like range of motion, weight shifting, leverage, speed and tempo just to name a few. Lifting weights just seem so much simpler. You just add weight and you’re set, right? So that makes a pretty good case for weights and a strike against …
How to Make Your Body Your Own Weight Machine
Grind-style calisthenics is the art of turning your own body into your personal, portable and versatile weight machine. Just think of the freedom and cost savings to no longer needing to go to the gym or filling up your home with bulky exercise equipment. All you need is your very body and gravity. Best legal steroids for women safe alternatives for …
4 Effective Bodyweight Leg Training Tips
Bodyweight leg training can be a very effective way to develop the strength, mobility, and stability in your lower body. Here are several tips to help you get the most out of your calisthenics leg workouts. #1 Practice squatting every day Chronic sitting, at work and at home, is a major issue in modern life. It acts like a cast …
Subliminal Fitness Myths We all Believe part 1
Fitness myths abound, but most of these are pretty superficial and self-evident. Examples include the idea that lifting weights will make women bulky or that egg yolks raise cholesterol levels. These are fine, but they a) talk about old ideas most people don’t believe anymore and b) do little to induce meaningful change. So let’s get into some really deep fitness myths …
12 Ways You Can Self-Sabotage Your Fitness Goals
Self-sabotage is a big problem in fitness and life. Destructive beliefs and habits can make success impossible even with the best diet and exercise program. That’s why this week’s topic is all about exposing these self-sabotaging beliefs so you can identify and address those that are holding you back from your fitness goals. #1 Expecting fast results It’s hard to feel …
Does Fitness Research Ever Prove Anything?
Fitness research is often sighted as supposed proof in various diet and exercise debates. It makes sense to do this, but is it as sound a strategy as we think? Does sighting scientific research actually prove a given side on a debate is correct? When sighting scientific research offers valid support Sighting research is one of the best ways to lend support …
How to Prevent Diet Relapse
Diet relapse is a very common occurrence when you tend to eat very “clean” for a given period of time and then fall off the wagon and overeat thus setting yourself back. This can happen at random times, but it can also follow a pattern. Two of the more common patterns of dietary relapse is eating well all day, but falling …
The Importance of Instant Gratification in Fitness
Instant gratification is often seen as a bad thing within our fitness culture. Supposedly, the path to long-term success in fitness and weight loss runs through denial and being able to deprive yourself. I used to believe this myself until I started to see some serious flaws in the plan. For one, denying yourself what you want can be a great way …
Achieve Fitness Independence With Fitness Alignment
Fitness alignment is the number one goal of the Red Delta Project. Achieving it means you experience less stress, greater results and have a lot more fun. Unfortunately, there are a lot of malevolent forces within our fitness culture that can easily pull you out of fitness alignment. Many of these dogmatic ideals are like wolves in sheep’s clothing. They are …
6 Questions That Will Change Your Body and Your Life
I want to present you with 6, simple yet profound questions that have the potential to change your body and your life. These 6 questions are part of the new Smart Bodyweight Training Digital Workbook which you can download here for free. This workbook is a quick-start guide to help you get the most out of my recently released second book, …
How Many Sets Are Best for Building Muscle?
I get a lot of questions regarding how many sets are best for building muscle working on skills or losing weight. A lot of these questions come from reading a lot of conflicting recommendations from various experts. Some advocate doing no more than 1-2 sets. Other’s claim high volume is the key to build muscle and strength. With so many …
How to Avoid the Most Common Diet and Exercise Trap
Diet and exercise traps are everywhere just waiting to trap you, and your progress for years on end. Some of them are outright scams that steal your time and money. Others are pseudo-science fads that have little merit. Today I wanted to expose on the biggest and most damaging traps that almost everyone falls into. I’ve fallen victim to this fitness trap …
Getting Wild With Monkii Bars Co-Founder Monkii Dan
I recently had the privilege to sit down with Dan Vinson, (aka Monkii Dan) who is the co-founder of monkii bars suspension trainers. In a world of me-too generic suspension systems, monkii bars are in a class all their own. The level of craftsmanship and detail that’s gone into these things is unprecedented. That’s why they are the only commercially available …
Overcoming Diet and Exercise Resistance
Diet and exercise resistance can make achieving your fitness goals very difficult, if not impossible. It’s just like riding a bike with the brakes rubbing. It makes you work much harder while gaining little benefit. This week’s episode fo the R.D.P Podcast is all about the 3 biggest sources of resistance that can hold your potential in check. The first …
The Link Between Your Muscle and Health
Muscle and health go together like peanut butter and chocolate. In many ways, it’s very hard to have much of one without the other. However, a recent comment on my YouTube channel got me thinking that the two may not always be linked. In some ways, the artificial pursuit of muscle could be even an unhealthy pursuit through the abusive use …
What You Need to Know About Unilateral Calisthenics
Unilateral calisthenics training is when you use one side of your body is working differently or harder than the other side. The most common examples are archer push-ups, one arm pull-ups, lunges and single leg squats. Sadly, unilateral calisthenics is still not very common which is a shame because they do wonders for helping you build muscle and strength. …
How Technical Erosion Effects Your Muscle Growth
Technical erosion is the process when the quality of your technique breaks down as you train. It could be a shift in body position, a decrease in range of motion or even how you apply tension in your muscles. In either case, the quality of your technique is slowly eroding like a sandcastle in the surf. In some cases, this …
How to Finally Reach Your Fitness Goals in 2018
2018 is the year you finally reach your fitness goals once and for all. Whether you want to burn fat, build muscle or improve performance, 2018 is your year. This isn’t some New Years motivational garbage either. This week’s podcast is all about the essential principles that will bring you the results you want. The more you satisfy these principles the …
7 Myths About Progression
Progression is the essence of what makes your fitness habits effective for fat loss, building muscle and improving performance. If you want your body to change in any way, then progression should be the focus of everything you do. Simply put, you get the results you want when you progression your training and fitness habits. If you fail to progress your …
Training for Your Body Type
Training and eating for your body type can make it easier for you to achieve the results you want. On the other hand, losing weight and building muscle can be very difficult if you use methods that don’t work for your type. If you’ve ever felt like a particular diet or workout wasn’t a good fit, there’s a good chance it …
Training For Stength vs Building Muscle
All forms of strength training are great for both building muscle and growing strength, Despite the similarities between the two goals, building muscle and improving strength (or any other aspect of performance) actually require different training methods. In this week’s podcast, I discuss some of the major differences between building muscle vs building strength as per Coach Paul Wades advice …
3 Things Every Effective Workout Must Have
An effective workout needs just 3 things to help you lose weight, build muscle and improve performance. Anyone can acquire all three with relative ease but very few ever do which is why most people fail to achieve the results they want from their workouts. In this week’s podcast I discuss each of these three things in detail. I also …
How to Gain Personal Trainer Benefits While Training Alone
Nothing beats working with a personal trainer or coach. They help keep you accountable, provide motivation and teach how to make your workouts more effective. What if you don’t have access to a trainer or coach? How can you gain some of the benefits without the expertise? Flying fully solo in your workouts is seldom the best way to go, …
What is the Best Muscle Building Routine?
What is the best muscle building routine? Is it 5×5? Maybe it’s drop sets. What about volume training? According to some, it’s about going heavy or going home. Maybe you can build muscle from all of them. Maybe it’s not even about the routine at all. In this week’s podcast, I discuss the important elements of an effective muscle building routine …
Is Your Workout Effective or a Waste of Time?
I received a great question on the RDP YouTube channel the other day asking “how do you know if your workout is effective?” This is a very important question because it calls for brutal honesty in understanding if your workout is really effective. Chances are if you can’t say for sure that your workout is effective it probably isn’t. If it …
Does Muscle Fatigue Really Make You Grow?
The recent science seems to suggest that muscle fatigue is the primary stimulus for muscle growth. reputable sources like strongerbyscience.com and even Paul Wade’s C-Mass, point to muscle fatigue as the primary reason why a muscle grows. The evidence is compelling. It seems that as long as you bring a muscle to a high state of fatigue then it will grow …
Improve Your Physical Performance in Anything
Your physical performance is the foundation of your workout. Whether you want to burn fat, build muscle or Just move better, your physical performance is the key to making those things happen. That’s why it’ important to strive for better performance even if you’re not a competitive athlete. This week’s podcast is all about how to train for better …
This is Why You’re Struggling to Build Muscle
Many hard-working athletes are struggling to build muscle for a variety of reasons. Some may not be eating very well or sleeping enough. Stress is also a factor that can slow down muscle growth. Most of the time, the struggle to build muscle comes from inconsistent training. Changing up your routine or workout too often can send mixed signals to …
Top Fitness Myths in the Media
Fitness myths abound and many of them are fueled by the media that’s all around us including the internet, TV, and magazines. Many of these myths are not created as a way to purposely scam or con you. Most of them are the by-product of years of subtle, almost subliminal, messages you’re told about how losing weight or getting in shape …
Do You Really Need a Workout Routine?
A workout routine is a staple in the diet and exercise world, but how important is it to the calisthenics athlete? Do you even need a strict routine at all? Some folks claim you must have a routine and that doing random exercises will only produce random, and inconsistent results. Other’s seem to have a bit more of a freestyle …
Build Stability to Build Muscle and Strength
Stability the gatekeeper to your strength and muscle building efforts. Simply put, the more stability you develop, the bigger and stronger you can become. On the other hand, a lack of stability will handicap your ability to build muscle and strength. Don’t think that building stability means standing on balance disks and doing crazy “functional” training exercises. All exercises require …
Switching from Weights to Calisthenics 4 Things You Need to Know
So for whatever reason, you may be thinking about making a switch from weights to calisthenics based workouts. Maybe you’re looking for something new, or perhaps life isn’t allowing you to get to the gym. Whatever the reason, the pull-up bar is calling your name and the barbell feels like it’s less appealing each week. Despite the allure of not needing …
How Stress Makes You Fat and What To Do About it
Stress and fat are best friends. Where you find one, you usually find the other. This is why many of the best weight loss strategies are just as much about controlling stress as they are about controlling fat. The link between stress and fat Both mental and physical stress can influence how your body functions which in turn can alter …
Understanding the Source of Fitness Stress
Dogmas are the biggest source of fitness stress. They restrict your ability to make the best diet and exercise choices for your body and lifestyle. In other words, they prevent you from doing what’s best for you while forcing you to adhere to rules that place stress on your body, mind, and lifestyle. Like with all things in life, overcoming …
The Myth of the Muscle Building Rep Range
The muscle building rep range is hallowed ground for anyone looking to get jacked. If you want to get bigger that coveted 8-12 reps is home base for your workouts. Heaven knows I’ve spent most of my time there, and the results have been great. Lately, I’ve been putting some pieces together and it’s making me question if the existence of …
Exploring Freestyle Workouts w/ Adrienne Harvey
Freestyle workouts can help you break out of workouts that feel like a soul sucking dead end job. It’s easy to forget that working out is supposed to be fun and an enjoyable part of a healthy lifestyle. Adding a little playfulness and creativity can breathe new life into any stale routine. Freestyle workouts are a great example of how …
Use Peak Set Training to Know How Many Sets You Should Do
There’s a lot of debate regarding how many sets you should do to build muscle. On one hand, you have examples like Mike Metzer and Dorian Yates who endorse using only one or two work sets. On the other, you have guys like Arnold who embrace volume training and grind out many sets. Science and empirical evidence have shown that both …
How to Use Peak Set Training for Optimal Workouts
This week’s topic is something I like to call peak set training. The benefits include improved recovery, less stress on your joints decreased nervous system fatigue and ultimately, more muscle growth. Sound good? Then let’s get started. How does peak set training work? Phase 1: Warm up sets Peak set training uses the natural bell curve that occurs when you …
3 Body Weight Training Lessons I Wish I Learned Years Ago
I’ve learned a lot of things about body weight training over the years, some of which I wish I knew a long time ago. If I knew even half of what I know now, I would have gained a lot more muscle and strength without enduring so much stress. The good news is that I know these things now, and …
How Chronic Fitness Stress Kills Your Progress
Fitness stress is the #1 enemy in your quest to build muscle, burn fat and improve performance. It erodes emotional motivation while beating up your body. Almost every challenge you face in fitness is due to stressful diet and exercise habits. Wait, isn’t some fitness stress necessary for progress? Yes, some types of fitness stress are important. You won’t …
Why You Should Still Practice Isolation Exercises
Isolation exercises have become less popular lately. Some experts turn their noses up at hip and shoulder exercises claiming that big compound moves are the best and they are all you should do. There is a lot of value to compound moves like dips, lunges, and pull-ups, but are they really all you should or need to practice? Are isolation …
Should You Always Train To Your Limit?
Physical change requires hard work, but do you always need to train to your limit in each workout? I always believed the body only changed when you pushed it right to the edge of what it can do. Holding back, even a little bit, would fail to stimulate any change. This sentiment has been echoed in internet memes and social media …
Do You Need to Eat After a Workout?
Do You need to eat after your workout? The knee-jerk answer is “of course you need to eat after a workout! If you don’t you might seriously handicap your ability to recover!” You may not need to eat anything at all. The first reason is that your workout may not be a very big influence on your daily calorie and …
Circuit Training for Muscle and Strength
Circuit training is very popular these days and for good reason. It’s very efficient which makes it easier to fit into a busy schedule plus it provides a variety of benefits including strength, endurance, and mental stamina. But what if you want to focus on building muscle and strength? While circuit training can build those qualities, it usually isn’t done in a …
How to Change Your Fitness Set Points
Fitness set points can seem pretty scary. The idea that your fitness destiny is predetermined by your genetics threatens the promise of making positive changes. What’s the point of even trying to lose weight or build muscle when your own body will default to the same set point? While there is some debate over whether such set points exist, it’s hard …
What is the Best Calisthenics Diet?
Nutrition is a turbulent topic of debate and this is still true when considering what diet is best for calisthenics athletes. Most dietary advice tends to favor one of two approaches. On one side you have the “eat big to get big” crowd that emphasizes food quantity. These are the same folks who claim you need to be in a calorie …
How to Achieve Infinite Calisthenics Progress
Calisthenics progress is often perceived as something that’s very limited. Even well-educated fitness experts will claim that, while calisthenics is a sound training method, it can only take you so far. This perception is one of the reasons why many people don’t want to devote their time and energy to calisthenics. Why invest yourself in a limited system? The reality …
Is Your Healthy Lifestyle too Stressful?
The Red Delta Project was created from the belief that a healthy lifestyle should improve your quality of life rather than compromise it. Unfortunately, the common belief is that you must adopt stressful diet and exercise habits to get in shape. There are a lot of memes out there portraying the idea that you’re supposed to suffer for your results. it’s …
The Unstoppable Power of Fitness Beliefs
Your fitness beliefs make or break your success in everything from weight loss to building muscle. Even though the Henry Ford Quote about “whether you think you can or can’t your right” is becoming a bit old hat, it’s absolutely true. Your success hinges more on what you believe than what you may know. In this information age, we’re told the key …
Improve Your Leg Raises w/ Supportive Tension
Leg Raises are becoming the gold standard for my core and abdominal training. The more I learn about them the stronger my abs get. Recently, I’ve been playing with adding a lot more tension in my arms and upper back while doing them from a hanging position. While the muscles in my back don’t lift my legs, they do play …
Calorie Balance vs Calorie Counting for Weight Loss
The debate over calorie balance is a common example of how many people mistake a principle of fitness for a fitness method. Those who argue against calorie balance point out that counting calories or severe calorie restriction do not work very well. I agree that calorie counting and calorie restriction are not very good methods for long-term weight loss. However, …
Maxick’s Muscle Building Wisdom
Maxick’s book, Muscle Control, is filled with muscle building wisdom. In it, he makes a strong case for improving muscle control to enhance the effectiveness of exercise. One of the biggest points he mentions is the importance of focusing on using your muscle as opposed to just getting the work done. Maxick spent time working in manual labor and he observed how many …
The Simple Truth About Abs
Building up your abs and core strength isn’t very complicated yet a lot of experts seem hell bent to make it seem like it is. Each year there are new books, products, and gadgets that turn a simple process into a complicated mess. Some of these myths are half-truths that have been warped by time and bro-science. The old adage …
The Practice & Benefits of Micro-Workouts
I predict the next big thing in fitness will be the use of shorter, yet more frequent workouts. You might look back and think “I can’t believe we use to workout for over an hour 2-3 times a week!” There are many reasons why daily 15-20 minute workouts might work best for you. Easier to fit into a busy schedule. Not …
The Truth About Deep Squats & Knee Pain
I know, I’ve heard it before too. The notion that deep squats cause too much stress on the knees and that you shouldn’t bend your knees more than 90 degrees. It’s well-intended advice, and might even help, but is there more to the story? Are deep squats and lunges really bad, or are they only bad in certain circumstances? More …
How to Improve Muscle Tension in Your Lats
Your muscle building potential depends largely on how well you can direct tension through your muscles. If your mind-muscle connection isn’t strong you’ll struggle to make progress regardless of how you train or what equipment you use. The good news is improving your muscle tension skills will improve your results even if your routine isn’t perfect or you’re using old equipment. In this …
How to Find Reliable Fitness Information
Despite having more diet and exercise information than you’ll need in 10 lifetimes, it can be pretty hard to find reliable fitness information on the internet. Even simple questions like how much protein you should consume or the difference between split and full body routines can lead you down an endless rabbit hole of debate. How are you supposed to comb …
Do You Need Sore Muscles to Make Gains?
Nothing beats waking up and feeling a little stiff and sore from your workout. It lets you know that you really pushed yourself and maybe even stimulated some muscle growth. As satisfying as a little DOMS (delayed onset muscle soreness) is, it can be quite elusive. You can crush a workout and not feel a thing the next day. Other …
The Freedom of Exploratory Progression
Most calisthenics methods use a method of progression that’s like those old-school video games that progress from point A to point B. They work in levels with the idea that you ascend in a number of steps. It’s a good method, but it sometimes forces you to fit a square peg into a round hole. progression requires improving many skills …
5 Reasons Why I Don’t Use Steroids
I was asked the other day why I don’t take steroids. After all, I am in the muscle and strength business so wouldn’t it make sense to be at least a little tempted to juice up once in a while? Well, I don’t have a single good reason to avoid taking steroids; I have 5 and here they are. #1 …
How to Do Leg Raises on a Doorway Pullup Bar
Doorway pull up bars are great. They are cheap, easy to set up and turn any doorway into a bodyweight gym. The only downside is they are a bit low to the ground for most people. This means you won’t be able to get a full body hanging stretch without your feet resting on the floor. It’s not a deal …
My Quick Ab and Core Workout
You don’t need a long abdominal workout to get great results. You don’t even need a lot of exercises done for countless reps either. All you need is one, maybe two, exercise that you do for a few super hard sets. Take my latest core workout for example. It only uses one primary exercise (leg raises) for a few hard sets followed …
Harder Pullups Without Weight
There are many ways you can increase the resistance of your pull-ups. You can add extra weight to your body with weight vests or a dip belt. You can also progress your technique as explained in Convict Conditioning. Both of these methods are effective, but they also each have a drawback. Adding weight to your body can place more stress …
2 Muscle Building Rep Strategies
Building muscle goes far beyond how many sets and reps you do. It’s not always about the numbers on a spreadsheet, but what the reps are doing to your muscles. You can do the same number of reps and sets, yet cause different levels of muscle stimulation. Take for example the following strategies: One involves going all out and pushing …
Are Dead Hang Pull Ups Good or Bad?
Dead hang pull ups are a point of debate in the world of progressive calisthenics. Some people say they are great and make pull ups harder and more effective. Other’s say they are bad for the joints and might even make pull ups less effective. As usual, the truth is somewhere in between. There are pros and cons to doing dead …