A Website Dedicated to the Study of Strength, Health, Fitness and Sport Across Centuries, Countries and Contests.
Though few exercise programmes maintain a venerated status for long in the Iron Game, the mystique surrounding 20 Rep Squat programmes has endured. As hinted by the name, such programmes require lifters to back squat twenty times before unloading the bar, and in my own experience, lying on the ground questioning your decision-making. Primarily touted... Continue Reading →
Whether you want to get toned, lose weight, gain weight or just spend some time active, gyms have become such a staple part of our routines. There seems to be a gym on every corner, and they are all filled with an amazing variety of equipment. But have you ever wondered how this all started?... Continue Reading →
There are some exercises so basic, so ubiquitous and so difficult that their origins are often taken for granted. Previously when detailing the history of the squat, we encountered the difficultly of tracing a movement found in every culture and arguably every human movement. The Chin Up and the Pull Up exercises offer a similar... Continue Reading →
Whether you’re an Olympic lifter, powerlifter, strongman, or crossfitter, there’s this cliquish attitude in the iron sports that what ‘we’ do is better than the other. Now it’s a lot less than it used to be, at least form what we can see on the internet. But it is still holding a lot of us... Continue Reading →
Whether you bodybuild, power lift, cross fit or simply keep fit, there's no denying the importance of the barbell to your training. Easily adjustable, stable under enormous weights and challenging to the nth degree, barbells are a time honoured means of building muscle and strength. Yet despite the barbell's unrivalled popularity amongst the current gym... Continue Reading →
We’re not going to be starting a war on which system is better and why it is. The simple fact is that CrossFit has made a big impact and it doesn’t look like it’s going anywhere too soon. There are a lot of people who have been getting into exercise through this particularly high-intensity system... Continue Reading →
It's not everyone's cup of tea but there's no denying that Cross Fit fills a need in the fitness community. Adam Park takes an insightful stab at why that might be.