FC Strength

Neck training has to be one of the most overlooked and underutilized facets of programming. Strengthening the neck through its ability to stabilize and resist movement is extremely important not just for athletes, but for the everday gym-goer as well.

Why Train Your Neck?

First and foremost, a strong neck will help you to avoid serious injury in a collision. This doesn't mean you should become a bull-necked behemoth and go get yourself into a car accident to test your metal, but in case you were in a car accident, having a strong neck would help you evade some serious damage.

Take a look at sports like football, MMA, and wrestling. Have you seen many pencil-necked lineman, fighters, or D1 wrestlers? I think not. There's a reason for this. In their given sports the amount of collision they get into during gameplay is huge. Lineman get smashed on every play, fighters get punched, kicked, and kneed to the head, and wrestlers get slammed and pinned to the mat. Constant impact on the neck, cervical vertebrae, and the surrounding structures. Having a weak neck in these situations isn't an option, it's a necessity.

If you haven't read Part 1, Part 2, or Part 3 of this series, I suggest starting there before continuing.

The final installment of this series will include my go-to exercises for explosive power and rate of force development. Like I've said before, being strong is great and something that every single person who trains should be striving for, but strength is only as good as the speed with which you can demonstrate it. Slow strength is not as useful as explosive strength.

As with the others, we will break down our explosive movements into 3 subcategories including:

• Implement Olympic Lifts
• Medicine Ball Throws
• Jumps

I decided to only utilize these 3 subcategories because they are easy to teach and don't require any special equipment that you wouldn't be able to find in an ordinary commercial gym.

In Part 1 we covered the lower body, Part 2 covered upper body, and the next logical piece of the anatomical puzzle would be the CORE.

I really loathe using that word but technically it's in the middle and it's the direct connection between your upper and lower halves. This is a seriously important thing to remember. All of the power generated by your legs will have to pass through your core in order to reach your upper body. And this will happen in every plane of motion and at every angle possible. So keep in mind that your "core" is a lot more than just that ever-so-elusive 6 pack.

We will break down our core movements into 4 subcategories:

• Rotation/Anti-rotation
• Flexion/Anti-extension
• Lateral Flexion/Anti-lateral Flexion
• Complete Usage

This past Saturday I attended my first powerlifting meet at the Ramada Plaza Hotel in Newark, NJ. I did not compete but I got a chance to watch my friend and fellow iron addict, Bryan Tompkins, pull 3 times his bodyweight in his first meet ever. Needless to say, I spent the better part of the day in a conference room with a bunch of super strong dudes lifting heavy weight. It was so intense I wanted to either lift something heavy myself or punch some one in the face. I couldn't decide.

Anyway, after filming a few mind-blowing lifts I interviewed Bryan and here is the interview and the highlights:


Franco: Tell us a little bit about yourself, your training philosophy, and where you train.

BT: I just want to start off by thanking you for coming out and supporting me during my first meet. My name is Bryan Tompkins, from East Orange NJ, and I'm a Strength Coach/Kettlebell Coach. I'm am also the co-owner of Full Metal Athletics.

I started training when I was a sophomore in high school with some of my friends and like a lot of people, had no real clue what I was doing. I thought squatting would stunt my growth and had no idea what a deadlift was.

I'm not really a fan of using support equipment during my training but there are 2 pieces I  recently added that have made a HUGE difference. They are a powerlifting belt and weightlifting shoes. I have great confidence that these 2 implements will help me improve my numbers and get stronger.

Now I'm not suggesting that they will help at all without a solid program, proper nutrition, and a crap ton of drive, but rather that they will enhance my efforts and possibly make my gains come a little faster than they already are.

Weightlifting Shoes

I chose to pick up the Wei Rui weightlifting shoes mostly because of the reviews but also because of the price for the quality. Before I get into the details let me break down why I even chose to buy a shoe I was only going to use for squatting.