The Alpha Protects

I’m here in Long Beach Island, NJ for a week of fun and sun with the family.  Today, however, was cloudy and cool so instead of heading to the beach we decided to stay at the house in the morning to relax a little bit and then take in an early afternoon movie.  So with…

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Powerful Book Recommendations

I am an absolutely voracious reader.  Usually I am reading 3-4 books at a time AND listening to a book on CD in my car.  The book on CD is key.  My car becomes a mobile library and I’m able to productively utilize my driving time.  I do occasionally jam out to my favorite tunes…

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The UN-Natural Athlete

I was never what you would call a natural athlete growing up.  In fact, I pretty much sucked at every sport I tried – baseball, basketball, soccer, kickball, tennis… you name it, I sucked at it.  To make things worse I was also ridiculously shy and introverted as a kid, so that combination, on top…

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Do You Have Fitness ADD?

I have to say it.  Fitness ADD is running rampant.  And, no I don’t mean math skills, I mean Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD)!  The misinformed, and some who should know better, running from program to program looking for, but never finding, the holy grail of fitness training.  They never stay with a program long enough…

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What Have You Done (to yourself)?

Do you people watch? I do. Traveling a few weekends in a row earlier this month gave me ample opportunity. The people watching was especially entertaining at the various rest stops along the highways, turnpikes, and parkways the length of the northeastern corridor from NJ up to MA, and out through PA on the way…

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Settling for Imperfection

I’ve got some news for you.  You will never be perfect at anything.  Not your strength, not your conditioning, not your martial art, not your job, not your relationships, nothing.  You will never even be able to make the perfect peanut butter and jelly sandwich.  Nope.  Not ever. So what does that mean? Should you…

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The Difference Between External Strength & Internal Power

For as long as I can remember, I have always believed that the body is meant to be used as a fully actualized, integrated unit – nothing can (or should!) exist in isolation.  By this I mean that muscle, tendon, ligament, and bone are all equally important and must all be unified in producing amazing…

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Never Take Ukemi Again

What if you never had to take ukemi again? Not because you stopped training or avoided it or anything negative like that, but simply because no one who came in contact with you was able to throw you. Interesting idea, eh? Although for the sake of paired training and being a good training partner, perhaps…

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The Hardest Push-up EVER?

I love push-ups.  All kinds.  Most of clients can attest to the fact that I come up with some of the craziest (and difficult!) variations of push-ups that they’ve ever seen.  But every once in a while, I like to take the simple, basic push-up and, without changing the form at all, make it one…

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3 Months to Live

I had a very interesting conversation the other day with an elderly Chinese gentleman.  At 74 years young he still works part-time as a medical doctor and is in excellent health.  He told me that back in 1982 in China he was diagnosed with a very severe lung problem, which was slowly reducing his breathing…

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