I subscribe to John Wood’s excellent newsletter. Lots of good info there. When he was promoting Calvert’s Super Strength book, he said that Calvert listed in order the most important parts of the body to develop. Sucked me right in.
What I’m interested in is most effectively training the body to be as strong and capable as possible as intelligently as possible. The first thing to develop for super strength, Calvert says, is the rib cage. Then you consider how the body functions and train accordingly. For instance, you need strength on all sides of the spine—stomach, back, and sides. That mean you do exercises like the ab wheel, swing, and windmill.
Of course, to support the spine, you have your legs and butt. And those should be developed. And you gradually move out from the center to the periphery with the most importance put on expanding the rib cage.
Anyway, lots of interesting variations on exercises in this book and some very inspiring photos of the old timers like Hackenschmidt, Saxon, Sandow, Klein, and others.
I haven’t had a major overhaul to my training in about a year. It’ll be nice to have this change and do some different exercises. And, make my rib cage bigger. The first thing I’ve done is to work the pullover – everyday one set, sometimes two. Next I’ve introduced a special focus on hand-to-hand swings, windmills, and squats.
What Calvert says makes a whole ton of sense. This stuff is the foundation of the body and really is about improving posture and giving more space to the vital organs.
I’ll be posting a lot more about this as I’m really starting to get immersed in Calvert’s work.