They blinded me with science.

Today let’s take a quick look at what happens inside our body when we start a weight lifting/ resistance training program. This style of exercise is called anaerobic training.  Anaerobic training is defined as high-intensity, intermittent bouts of exercise like weight training, plyometric drills, speed, agility, and interval training.

Anaerobic exercise results in benefits and increased levels of these functions listed below.

Cardiac output & Stroke volume: Heart can beat faster and harder to provide more oxygen and nutrients to active muscles.

Heart rate: Decreases resting HR & blood pressure.

Oxygen uptake: Increases ability to take in oxygen from the respiratory system and deliver it to the working tissues

Neural adaptations: Motor cortex activity increases when the level of force developed increases and when new exercises or movements are being learned. Aka learning new exercises will create a “muscle memory”.

Bone & connective tissue: Strengthens bones, tendons, ligaments and fascia.

Muscular growth: Muscle hypertrophy is muscular enlargement from an increase in the cross-sectional area of the existing fibers.

Strength & Power: Mean strength & power increases up to 73%  in untrained athletes.

Body Composition: Increases in lean tissue mass, daily metabolic rate, and energy expenditure during exercise are outcomes of resistance training.

Flexibility : Anaerobic training potentially can have a positive impact on flexibility, primarily if the individual has poor flexibility to begin with & completes the exercise with use of full range of motion.

Aerobic Capacity: Circuit training and programs using high volume and short rest periods have been shown to improve VO2max.

Motor Performance: Resistance training has been shown to increase running economy, jumping, sprinting, golf swings, throwing and hand eye coordination.

Come toss some weights around on a regular basis and reap all these neat benefits and gains with these adaptations to anaerobic training.

Get Bumpy,

CEJ

It’s that time again! In 10 days we will be hosting the 2022 Texas Power Bar Open, right here at our very own Union Fitness. This will be the 10th sanctioned meet that we have been fortunate enough to hold here at Union Fitness since opening in November of 2016. Each one has gotten bigger, better, and more exciting for the lifters, as well as the spectators and fans. Obviously, we couldn’t do it without the help and support of our amazing staff, along with our good friends Doug and Candi Nostrant and their awesome team who always provide the best experience possible.

If you have never been to a powerlifting meet, I highly recommend that you check one out! Especially our meets here at Union. I may be bias, but we are very fortunate to have an amazing facility and support that allows us to hold some of the best meets that I’ve ever been a part of. Regardless of if you’re a competitor, or a spectator, there is something for you. This year we will have many great sponsors and vendors on hand providing a ton of support for the lifters and the spectators. Businesses such as Live Large, Fortifix, Victory Float Lounge, Athlete Recovery Lounge, and At War Athletics, will all be on hand with their products and services. Along with this, Edgar Snyder will be giving away $500 to the best overall Male and Female lifters, Texas Power Bars will be giving away two of their power bars, and Iron Rebel will be giving away gift certificates.

This year, we have four members who will be competing. Diana Jordan, Ava O’Brien, Brian Steinmiller, Eric Price, Jenn Robinson, and Zane Augustine are no strangers to the platform, and have been training extremely hard over the past few months to prepare. Along with this, our very own Miranda Gard and Toria Crispin will be competing in their first meet. It has been an absolute blast watching all of these individuals showing up every day and giving their all to each session.

So be sure to stop by and show them your support! If you would like to stop by, lifting will begin at 9am right outside of the main entrance. Admission is $10 for adults and free for children. We look forward to seeing all of you here, and maybe we will even see you on the platform at our next event next June.

– Curtis Miller

It’s no secret that one of the things we are most known for here at Union Fitness is our Powerful class. During my time here at UF, I have first hand witnessed the class evolve from 3-5 members back in our crowded strength lab, to 10-15 members in our purpose built Performance Lab. During that time, I have also seen members who were once new to lifting walk in feeling slightly nervous and hesitant, who now have the confidence to walk into any gym and manage their own weight training routine wherever they go. That is a very Powerful feeling.

If you are new to our Powerful class, let me fill you in on what you can expect. As you walk through the doors, you will be walking into a 3,000 square foot facility outfitted with 5 power racks, a variety of different barbells, adjustable dumbbells, kettlebells, med balls, battle ropes, sleds, and 100 feet of turf, just to name a few. Once inside, you will be greeted by our amazing coaches who will take the time to get to know you before class begins. You will also be greeted by our awesome class members. Some who have been there since the early days of the class’ beginnings over 5 years ago, as well as some who may have just walked in for the first time just a couple days ago. Regardless of where we are in our Powerful journey, we all started in the exact same place, walking through those doors for the first time, and picking up a barbell.

If you are one of our members who have been with us for quite some time, we are going to continue to provide you with the best service possible, while bringing you some new ideas to each class going forward. Going into the end of summer, we will continue to stick true to our roots of being Powerful, strong, and conditioned, all while continuing to focus on movement quality and technical mastery. As the fall and winter months begin to roll in, we are going to make sure that we get a head start on the holidays. This means that we will not be waiting until the new year to start working towards those goals that we have. We are going to begin that right now. So, over the next couple of weeks, we want you to think about some goals that you have for finishing out the year. What are some things that you told yourself at the beginning of the year that you wanted to accomplish before this year was over? We are going to write those down and work together to hold each other accountable each day that we step foot in class. These goals can be large or small, broad or specific. But whatever it is, write it down and look at it weekly. We will do everything in our Power to help you get there.

– Curtis Miller

Hello Everyone!

We’re now well over 8 months into the year 2022, so I wanted to come back to a blog https://unionfitness.com/torias-goals/ that I wrote back in January about this year’s top goals for me personally. While I go back and reflect on my goals, I want you to think about yours and how many of them that you feel like you’ve accomplished or could be doing better with, too.

My top 5 goals for the year were:

1. Continue to build resilience.
2. Develop new leadership skills.
3. Have a solid regular training schedule.
4. Increase my frequency of cardio sessions.
5. Create better reading habits.

Looking back at this, I would say that I have currently reached 4 out of my 5 goals. I have continued to cultivate resilience in the past year, and I would like to continue to stay strong and build up resilience in the upcoming months.

I have definitely developed new leadership skills during my time here at UF. I’m constantly learning from my coworkers and staff members here, and have developed my own new leadership skills as well.

I have decided to compete in my first powerlifting meet that’s happening here at UF in just under 3 weeks, so having a solid regular training schedule has come a long way for me.

While cardio is still not my friend, I have increased my cardio levels immensely throughout this year. I’ve tried my best to make it enjoyable by either going on more local hikes, or I now have a bike that I try to ride either on the trails near my apartment or throughout the city a few times a week as well.

My final goal to create better reading habits hasn’t fully happened just yet. I plan and hope to read more throughout these last few months of the year and make it so that I reach all 5 of those goals.

How many of your goals have you reached this past year?!

Toria

What’s up, my wicked Wednesdayers!

The time has come to perform a proper warm-up before tossing your weights around. The days of slapping your quads, hitting some arm swings and getting right under the bar are over, you’re probably too old for that anyway.

Now let’s RAMP up your warm-up for your next training session. RAMP is a systematic approach of warming up that promotes the physical, psychological and technical skill of the participant  for their immediate and long term wellness development. The acronym RAMP stands for Raise, Activate, Mobilise and Potentiate. Time to break it down.

The Raise phase focuses on raising blood flow, muscle/internal temperature, muscle elasticity and firing up neural activation(mind and movement connection). This is achieved by using low intensity general movements. Some of these general locomotion movements include, jumping rope, jumping jacks,high knees or general gym cardio machines. If you played sports growing up or now, think of the first part of your dynamic warm-up. Take about 5 minutes to get the raise phase going.

During the Activate & Mobilise phase we are working to engage our muscles and mobilise our tissues to improve our range of motion and movement skill that we are going to be using during our training or game. We are still considering the prior phase here as we move from a more general movement pattern to specific.

The Potentiate phase is essentially a rehearsal of gradually increasing “stress” on the body to prepare for your training session or competition. Let’s think build up sprints/jumps or build up sets to your squats or even light and explosive medicine ball slams, throws and exercises.

Here is a quick example of the RAMP warmup for someone who is about to get into a Squat session at the gym.

Raise- 1-3 sets x20 reps of Jumping Rope, Jumping Jacks, High Knees, Forward & Backward Skips, Side to Side Shuffle

Activate- 1-2 sets x 10 reps of Banded Monster Walks,Banded Good Morning, Bodyweight Walking Lunges, Cossack Squats

Mobilize- 1-2sets x 5-10 reps of Squat to Stretch, Inchworms, Spiderman with Rotation, Cat Camel, Glute Bridge to Reach

Potentiate- 1-2sets x 5 reps of Medicine Ball Slams, Medicine Ball Chops, Box Jumps, Lateral Skater Hops, Build-Up Barbell Squats

Try the RAMP warm-up in your next training sessions and If you have any questions about RAMP, just let your Dude know.

Stay Warm,

CeJ