There is a decent amount of information here. Further, I’d consider the following to be only a snapshot into what was divulged that weekend, along with being relatively random as it is a composite of my notes, memories, and pictures.
This blog post, while pseudo-permanent in nature, is merely my interpretation of the information CW provided, along with the understanding that each seminar will be slightly different. Take this with a grain of salt. Further, throughout this post, I have links to Charlie’s DVD Training Equals Rehab 2, in which I am an affiliate.
Firstly, the logistics of the seminar were handled amazingly well. Michael Ranfone and his staff at Ranfone Training Systems ran everything very smoothly. If you haven’t taken a course here, I recommend doing so immediately, because this is how seminars should be organized, planned, and run.
Moving on…
Charlie Weingroff is passionate, does his homework on the specific attendees that come into the seminar, along with understanding how to get his scientific justifications for what he does very quickly, while keeping the seminar itself upbeat.
If you don’t know who Charlie Weingroff is, you can read his “bio” here.
With this in mind, I’m of the belief that this seminar serves as two items:
- A sequel to the first DVD he had, Training=Rehab, and
- An updated view on his most recent work Training Equal Rehab 2.
Of course, you will have to attend his seminar to truly understand and digest the information that was presented. Simultaneously, I’m of the belief that I cannot fully iterate the depths of the information provided by Charlie during this weekend of events, as they weren’t merely just broad strokes of information – he went in, and he took us for a ride.
[Note: He is hosting another seminar in early 2015 at Drive 495.]
Taking a flashback in Tarantino-esque fashion, I met Charlie at his facility in NYC, Drive495, in early 2013. I had the opportunity to chat with him about his personal philosophy one-on-one, along with getting a tour of his facility.
However, after that meeting almost 1.5 years ago, CW is certainly in a different place professionally. He is now using his skillets and knowledge to help the Canada basketball team, along with accelerating sports performance in many other teams across the world, to my knowledge.
Training Equals Rehab 2 – Live Seminar
Many different items were discussed, and for me to disclose over 16 hours plus of information would be a disservice – however disclosing a few topics and glossing over the information provided is something that I can provide.
The first hour or so dissected CW’s personal philosophy of how to interpret information, how to apply ourselves within the fitness/S&C industry, along with the casual interjection of Transformers quotes.
“Learning [new information] is uncomfortable.”
The interpretation I received from this line is that the process of learning is going to be uncomfortable. Information received isn’t usually presented in a pretty linear line, where there is always new additional information being processed. The necessity for creating a filter for information is just as important as the need for understanding, interpreting, and then applying the newly discovered information in a systematic way.
And then of course, there is the process of “Did I do this correctly?” and “Can I improve upon my methods?”
One of the first discussions we dove into is the state of the industry, namely what are the subdivisions of the more commonly referred to “strength and conditioning coach?”
- Movement Specialists
- Recovery & Allostatic Specialists
- Sports Scientists
- Sport Specific Coaches
Movement Specialists
This can be allocated to the traditional strength and conditioning coaches position. Assessing whether or not your athletes or clients are ready for fitness and performance based goals is important. Coaching exercises from a general physical preparedness level is within the realm of this subset.
Recovery & Allostatic Specialists
If the human body is not ready to provide specific outputs necessary for fitness (life) or performance (S&C) purposes, what is preventing this from occurring?
This is where the question of “Are you overtraining, or simply under-recovering?” fits very nicely.
Instead of pressing on the gas, sometimes we need to remove the e-brake in order to move forward at a more rapid rate. Providing therapy in whatever format will allow recovery to occur, along with other methods that can be done by yourself (foam rolling, utilizing breathing, etc).
Physical therapists, manual therapists, and chiropractors fall into this category.
Sports Scientists
I’m of the belief that this will be the “next big thing” with respect to the shift in sports performance. If it isn’t already on your radar, let this be an informal announcement – interpreting data is important for advancing in the field of sports performance.
At the same time, this is admittedly my weakest area of information, as I simply don’t have a specific route to go towards with respect to learning information.
Start here for more reading.
Sport Specific Coaches
This role has been here for quite some time, and I’m of the opinion that the smartest sport coaches will do their best to listen to the above three coaches for increasing performance.
Without an appropriate movement foundation (movement specialist), how can you task an athlete to drive their knee higher when sprinting, if they lack the requisite joint mobility to move into more hip flexion?
“Getting lower” during skating likewise requires a neutral spine position on top of an adequate amount of hip extension and hip flexion – what do you do if your athlete is experiencing bilateral anterior hip issues?
Or what do you do if your OmegaWave scores (sport scientist interpreting data) are low due to going out on a Thursday night, you have practice Friday morning, and you have a game on a Sunday?
This thought process brings up several unique things to look at if you are a sport specific coach.
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Change is going to be uncomfortable.
(Personal Note: Lifting weights is uncomfortable. Achieving physiological change is going to be uncomfortable.)
Selye’s model of adaptation involves adapting to stress.
[Photo Credit: strengthpowerspeed.com]
- When discussing improving a certain quality, the idea of specific adaptations to an imposed demand should always be at the forefront of our [coaches, trainers, physical therapists] minds.
- If change is not elicited, did we at the very least maintain the qualities [of fitness]?
- “There’s an input… and an output.”
- Joint position is a sensory input to the brain.
- The output is whether or not the system (body) can put forth effort for performance based outcomes.
- If there is a lack of proper joint position, there will likewise be an inadequate output for motoric performance, and lack of input for further motor acquisition.
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Attempting to achieve physiological change is uncomfortable. This is the body’s method of “learning,” as there are multiple avenues of providing opportunities to learn how to move.
Movement
I’ve always appreciated movement since I was a teenager learning to dance, but I always find the categorization and application of movement based principles to be fascinating. Charlie uses the FMS to primarily identify movement limitations for performance based goals. And he is brilliant at what he does.
Say what you want about the FMS (and/or SFMA), no system is going to be 100% perfect. If you take it for what it is, it is a useful tool used to extract neuromuscular and biomechanical limitations, with the aim for extracting joint positions based on a neurodevelopmental-minded philosophy..
[Interpreting] movement is [accessing] windows of opportunities. Neuroceptive input influences mobility of that specific movement pattern. If you lack the requisite input or movement, where will your window of opportunity go with respect to outputs of performance and physiological adaptations?
Output
Start with the finish. With this in mind, not only can you move and adapt to stressloads, but can you also provide the necessary outputs, whether it is power, strength, or energy system minded goals, in order to be successful?
Further, CW went into detail regarding various methods of achieving output for increases in performance, from energy system development, to positioning for human movement and the exercises that follows suit.
One thing that will always continue to intrigue me, as with many others who are more intelligent than myself, is the thought process that goes into detailing and discoursing movement.
Take the idea of “output” for example, with respects to speed of movement.
If you have a car, and you have a capacity for 200mph for its top speed, sometimes you might not be able to achieve that 200mph for various reasons – you’re going uphill, weather conditions, worn tires, etc.
One thing that might be limiting us from achieving “top speed” is that the e-brake might be cranked on. So, let’s utilize reflexive movement patterns, and various mobility drills to take the e-brake off, instead of cranking endlessly on the gas pedal to gogogogogo.
This came across in an example that I’m already relatively familiar with – post-activation potentiation, in which you perform a heavily loaded movement pattern (back squat), and then a lighter movement (barbell squat jump, or bodyweight vertical jump) to potentiate the motor units to “light up” faster.
However, instead of pressing on the gas pedal with the weights, take the e-brake off by performing various rolling/crawling exercises or mobility-minded exercises, and then go back to the speed-strength oriented exercise.
Beautiful and simple.
Readiness
This is one aspect of the seminar that I was most intrigued by, for the simple fact that I have only a slight introduction towards this idea. [Kevin Neeld utilized a Grit Score with our athletes at Endeavor Sports Performance, along with utilizing heart rate monitoring for all conditioning.]
I probably took 4-5 pages of full notes on this, for the mere fact that I needed to find resources to discover how to incorporate these items into my current practice.
The biggest takeaway I received from this is that utilizing only HRV is a detriment, as it provides only a small vision into what is the whole body. There is much more to “readiness” than simply just accessing the heart rate and its variability with rest and training.
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The above is simply a snippet of the information that was divulged from the mind of Charlie Weingroff. I highly recommend attending his upcoming seminar.
However, if you cannot attend his seminar for whatever reason, I recommend purchasing the DVD Training Equals Rehab 2: Lateralizations and Regressions.
The following is what I believe to be of entertainment value, along with notations, continuing education seminars/certifications, and links to other items to read if you feel inclined to do so.
Quotes from the Weekend
- “You have to believe in something.”
- [From my notes] “Believing in everything, and believing in nothing, is still believing in something.”
- “BRING THE HEAT.”
- “Egregious.”
- “Can your joints load and adapt to stress?”
- “Magic is being the smartest person in the room.”
- “Or you could be a 110lb soaking wet breakdancer, jumping on one hand!” (speaking about me)
- “I like the way you think. You done good, son.”
- “Breathe. Squeeze.”
- “You can take the blue pill, or the red pill…”
- “What is the cost of doing business..?
- “Everything matters, and everything is done for a reason.”
- “The B Team team plays on Thursday.”
- “#BestInTheWorld”
- “You can look both ways before you cross a street, but this doesn’t guarantee you WON’T get mugged before you get to the end.”
- “Be so good that people can’t ignore you!!”
- “You don’t train mental toughness.”
- “You cultivate mental toughness.”
- “Read everything written by Pavel.”
Some Other Key Items You Probably Didn’t Know About Charlie (That I Didn’t Know)
- CW can rap, and pretty damn well too, if you ask me.
- Digital Underground is on the tip of his tongue at any moment.
- He can speak Spanish. And fluently, if I may add.
- CW has some really good impersonations up his sleeve. [I’d like to see a Christopher Walken one, however.]
- He likes Redline.
- Charlie is 5’4.5” (5 foot 4 and 1/2 inches) tall, and approximately 195-200lbs on any given day.
- He can squat the house, and he is probably (definitely) stronger than many of you reading this. (I did know this.)
- He doesn’t eat bread.
Certifications and Seminars to Look Towards
- Titleist Performance Institute – http://www.mytpi.com/
- Functional Movement Screen – http://www.functionalmovement.com/
- Selective Functional Movement Assessment – http://www.sfma.com/site/ (Medical Professionals)
- Dynamic Neuromuscular Stabilization – http://www.rehabps.com/REHABILITATION/Home.html
Terms and Books for Further Discovering/Reading
- Long Term Athletic Development
- Allostasis, Homeostasis, and the Costs of Physiological Adaptation
- Supertraining, 6th Edition
- Energy Crisis Theory (regarding Trigger Points)
- Pneumo-Muscular Reflex
As always,
Keep it funky.
