Many
disciplines rely on a grand theory, or an overarching conceptual
framework -- something that ties all the pieces together. According to Carter
and Lubinsky,1 a grand theory provides
a “broad conceptualization of phenomena.” In other words, a grand theory
purports to address big ideas -- or even an entire discipline -- with one
theoretical context. It attempts to subsume the middle-range theories within a
discipline, which typically apply more to direct action or clinical practice. For
example, physics has a number of competing grand theories: The Grand Unified
Theory, The Theory of Everything, and String Theory. (They say competition is
good for business.) When it comes to healthcare professions, occupational
therapy and nursing have both given considerable thought to theory over the
last several decades.1–3 What about physical
therapy? Does it have a grand theory?
Sunday, December 11, 2016
Sunday, November 13, 2016
What Movement Means to Me
A few weeks ago, my friend Jen Bladon of Better Than Fit asked if I'd be willing to answer some questions for an interview series she's doing on movement. Her questions were so dynamite that I asked if I could re-post the interview here. Happy reading!
When writing a guest post about shoulder rehab for MOVE a couple years ago, Travis was kind enough to (heavily!) edit my article. Lucky for me, that introduced me to Travis’ online presence in the movement, exercise, and biomechanics world. Travis is both strong in mind and strong in body, as well as a true leader in the rehab, strength and conditioning field. He is committed to academics, (working on his Doctorate in Rehabilitation Science no less!), an accomplished athlete, and a dedicated coach. This is another great read. Enjoy!
-Jen Bladon
-Jen Bladon
J: What are your first memories of movement and/or activity? How was movement part of your life growing up?
T: Movement has always been one of the most important aspects of my life. Although I was born missing my left femur, I have very early memories of hobbling around on a makeshift prosthesis prior to having revisions done to my residual limb at age 3 in order to wear a normal prosthesis. Clearly, even as a tike I couldn’t be slowed down. After that, I remember loving to play basketball on my neighbor’s hoop, capture the flag during summer camp, and tennis on Fridays after school. Later on, in middle school and high school, I took up hand-cycling, rowing, swimming, and resistance training.
Wednesday, November 2, 2016
6 Ways to Build Muscle Under 20 Minutes [T-Nation]
It’s no secret that one of the keys to getting
bigger and stronger is training volume, or the total number of reps completed.
Sure, you could spend a few hours in the gym every day getting all the volume
you need in. Look no further than professional bodybuilders to know that this
strategy works.
But most lifters don’t have that luxury. We
have families, jobs, and other responsibilities that limit our time in the gym.
As a result, we have to find ways to increase volume without increasing the
length of our training sessions. What we’re really talking about here is
increasing “density,” which corresponds to training volume per unit time.
Let’s say you had only 20 minutes to spend at
the gym today. If you were to do your usual five sets of five reps with two
minutes rest in between, that would eat up more than half of your workout and
leave you with little time for much else. Don’t even think about talking to
anyone or taking a bathroom break.
So what are some ways to maximize density and
get the most out of those 20 minutes (or however much time you have in the gym)? In my new T-Nation article, I break down six proven set/rep schemes that will enable you to do just that.
Read it here:
Wednesday, October 12, 2016
How to Lose That First 10 Pounds When You're Too Busy to Exercise
Guest Post by Ridwan Mao
If you’re someone who doesn’t have time to lose weight because of work, family time, and other priorities, I’m going to show you how those things don’t have to hold you back. My goal in this article is to teach you a step-by-step system to reverse your weight gain. The best part is that you can starting using it today to lose that first 10 pounds.
No pharmaceutical conspiracies or ancient fat-burning chia seed cooking secrets here, just sensible strategy and a systematic process. My two favourite things.
Meet Kevin
Before we jump into that, I need to introduce you to my friend Kevin (he’s a great guy, trust me). Not too long ago, he was feeling stuck.
![]() |
Meet Kevin. In real life, he has more limbs and less hair. |
Kevin had been waiting for "next Monday" to start his fitness program for months. He felt like he was the biggest he’d ever been, but if the topic of fitness ever came up he would just sort of mumble, “I’ll get back into the gym when my schedule clears up…”
“When my schedule clears up” is right around “next Monday” in terms of time, for those curious.
Kevin reached the tipping point when he realized 10 minutes into running around his backyard with his daughters that his knees and back hurt and he was completely winded. Due to his weight gain, he felt like he couldn’t keep up with them anymore.
But then, without committing hours every week to the gym, he figured out how to start losing weight in a way that fit his lifestyle. I told you he was a great guy.
We’re going to check back in with Kevin at the end of this article, because every good story needs a little suspense.
So Where Do We Start?
Sunday, October 9, 2016
The Three Dirtiest Words in Fitness
The three dirtiest words in fitness these
days are "Functional," "Movement," and "Screen" --
especially when used in that order [1].
For anyone who's unfamiliar, the Functional Movement Screen (FMS) is a series of seven functional movements (e.g. squat, push-up, lunge) designed to screen (i.e. check for) for pain, movement quality, and injury
risk.
By providing objective criteria for scoring the
various movements (‘0’ for ouch, ‘1’ for shitty, ‘2’ for passable, and ‘3’ for
perfection -- all my words, not theirs) the FMS enables practitioners to
establish a movement "baseline," as well as to identify mobility/stability
deficits and side-to-side asymmetries, which can then help guide program design.
![]() |
The actual FMS scoring system |
Sounds like a great idea, eh? In theory,
yes. But it’s created a whole crap-ton of controversy.
Some trainers are diehard proponents of the FMS [2], using it on all of
their clients at intake and follow-up assessments for comparison to baseline.
Others think it's complete garbage, citing studies that have found the FMS’s injury prediction capabilities to be moderate at best.
It’s true: in many of the populations that have
been tested, the FMS doesn’t do a very good job of separating people who are at
risk for injury from people who aren’t. Potentially due to having too few data
points (7 screens × 3 points = 21 total points possible), it
fails to do what it was designed to do. Yikes!
Why not just change the
scoring criteria to better differentiate between performance on each test, one
might wonder? Instead of scoring from 0 to 3, why not make it, say, 0 to 5?
It turns out that by
increasing that number, you actually decrease the reliability of each score.
This is because when there are 5 possible points it’s much harder to come to a
consensus about what a ‘1’ is versus a ‘2’ or what a ‘3’ is compared to a ‘4.’
Even the most skilled testers may not give a particular movement the exact same score on a scale from 0 to 5. At that point, chaos would ensue, and the results of the screen would have even less meaning than they do now. No bueno.
Even the most skilled testers may not give a particular movement the exact same score on a scale from 0 to 5. At that point, chaos would ensue, and the results of the screen would have even less meaning than they do now. No bueno.
Labels:
Beginner Training,
Evidence-based,
Mobility
Wednesday, October 5, 2016
The Secret to Maximizing Strength and Muscle
Shannan Maciejewski was one of the first fitness people I connected with on social media many moons ago. Lucky for me, he’s also one of the good guys. Despite residing a million miles away (in Australia), his genuine, caring personality easily bridges the great divide.
Over the years, I’ve learned a hell of a lot from Shannan. Today, I’m honored to share an original guest post he wrote for my site. His “tension-volume knob” analogy is worth the price of admission alone (which is free since it’s my blog!). Enjoy! -TP
The Secret to Maximizing Strength and Muscle
Guest Post by Shannan Maciejewski
Have you ever experienced that moment
in training when something just clicks?
It’s like an ‘aha’ moment where everything
falls into place. From then on, it seems as if all the puzzling conversations,
all the lead up work, and all the cues that once didn’t make sense, now for
some reason do.
Understanding the importance of tension
in training to maximize performance can be one of those times (especially
specific to certain exercises).
As coaches, we often communicate the
importance of certain focus points in relation to improved exercise execution
with cues like
- “Get tight.”
- “Bend the bar.”
- “Get the lats on.”
- “Crush the bar.”
- “Shoulders back.”
Oftentimes we find ourselves hammering
these cues until the cows come home with little to no effect. It’s our job -- the art of coaching, if you will -- to
figure out why our cueing is ineffective, and then devise a plan of attack.
It could be that they just don’t get
what you’re putting out. In this case, it may be time for another cue, another
demo, or a brand new approach to achieve the desired outcome.
That’s where today’s post comes in.
Labels:
Core Training,
Exercise Technique,
Guest Post,
Powerlifting
Thursday, September 22, 2016
Why You Should Care About Macronutrients
Guest Post by Jake Dermer
Bodybuilders and gym rats alike obsess over their
macronutrient splits, a term that refers to the ratio of carbs, protein, and
fat consumed per day.
When it comes to my online coaching program, I rarely call
clients’ attention to macronutrient splits, trying instead to make a
weight loss friendly split happen naturally. I like to have them track their
protein intake and aim for their target body weight in grams of protein per
day. Additionally, I tell everyone that vegetables should make up half of your diet.
So what does that look like on a daily basis?
Labels:
Beginner Training,
Bodybuilding,
Guest Post,
Nutrition
Sunday, September 18, 2016
My 5 Biggest Personal Training Mistakes
Most seasoned trainers and coaches will
tell you unashamedly that they’ve made a ton of mistakes over their decades in
the trenches. For instance, Mike Boyle himself wrote an article a few years
back called 25 Years, 25 Mistakes.
In 25 years, you’d expect a guy to make
a few boo-boos here and there. No one’s perfect. But what about relative
newcomers to the training game? I for one don’t have nearly the tenure of Coach
Boyle. (I obtained my personal trainer diploma in 2013.) Yet I have to admit
I’ve also made quite a few mistakes.
For younger trainers, however, there
seems to be a taboo surrounding this admission of fallibility. After all, if
people know I’m not always right when it comes to fitness, will they still want
to train with me? Or will they realize I’m nothing more than an imposter in a
personal trainer costume (i.e. sweatpants and a dri-fit t-shirt)?
Real
personal trainer or imposter?
I think it’s safe to say that eternal
professional damnation will not be in the cards if I admit to my snafus.
I state this with confidence for the following reason: You have to make
mistakes to stay fresh and keep learning. If you’re not screwing up every now
and then, you’re not improving at your craft.
It’s exactly these “Oh Shit! Moments”
that engrain in you the lessons you can’t learn from reading a textbook, blog
post, or T-Nation article. Not only that, but experiencing them firsthand
solidifies them in long-term memory, so you’ll never make the same mistake
again.
Sunday, September 11, 2016
How Being Born with One Leg Gives Me Strength
When I first met Jen Sinkler in person a
few months ago and she told me she was in the process of rebranding to
“Unapologetically Strong,” I thought, "Wait, I like Thrive as the Fittest!”
But as I reflected
more on the meaning of her new mantra, “Unapologetically Strong,” it quickly
began to resonate with me. Perhaps it does with you, too.
I’ve had the cards stacked against me ever since birth. In fact, when I was born there was a pretty good chance I would never walk, attend a regular school, join a swim team, or deadlift 175 pounds.
Yet, one by one, I
accomplished each of those feats. While they might not seem like much without
context, you can probably imagine what a big deal they would be for a guy who
was born missing a leg.
“Unapologetically Strong?” To me, this motto means being strong not just physically, but also
emotionally -- and not being afraid to
show it.
That's me.
That's me.
Sunday, August 28, 2016
The Best Way to Do Single-Leg Exercises for Booty Gains
The Best Way to Do Single-Leg Exercises for Booty Gains
Regardless of whether exercises on one leg or two lead to better performance on the field or court, one thing is for sure: single-leg exercises work the booty a whole lot more -- especially when performed with the twist I’m about to describe.
Labels:
Bodybuilding,
Exercise Technique,
Female Training
Sunday, August 21, 2016
Which Squat Depth is Best FOR YOU?
The other day I got into a huge argument with a physical therapist friend (and avid bodybuilder) over squat depth. It was so heated, it almost came to blows.
Well, maybe the physical violence part is a
stretch. (He's much bigger than me, especially in the biceps, and could definitely beat me up.) But it was a pretty fiery exchange — until we busted out pen and
paper, drew out the stick figures above, and realized we
were actually saying the same thing! Sit back, relax, and allow me to
explain.
First and foremost, we agreed that squat
depth is a highly individual matter. It depends on a slew of factors including
hip anatomy, limb lengths, training age, training status (i.e. time of season), and
goals. No one depth recommendation will apply to every single person.
With that said, there are certainly
instances where we can pretty reliably recommend one depth over another. Here are a few
examples.
Thursday, August 11, 2016
The Lats are the Glutes of the Upper Body [DeanSomerset.com]
A quick Google search reveals that only two other people in the history of the Internet have uttered the exact phrase “the lats are the glutes of the upper body.”
(To be precise, there were multiple search results, but the others were merely Retweets.)
Despite the fact that this idea is not original, it has yet to be expounded on. I gladly take the bait in my new guest post for Dean Somerset.
♫ I like big lats and I cannot lie. You other sisters can't deny that when a guy walks in with an itty bitty waist and a wide back in your face, you get sprung.♫
- Sir Pollenates-A-Lot
Read all about how the back muscles are the buttocks of the upper body here:

Wednesday, August 10, 2016
Will CrossFit Make You a Better Athlete?
Perhaps I enjoy the Games so much because, as a trainer, I watch people exercise for a living, so watching the best people in the world do it is all the more thrilling. Perhaps I’m a sadist and enjoy watching others suffer through impossibly difficult workouts. Or perhaps I’m just an aesthete who marvels at the beautifully sculpted bodies of all the athletes.
Regardless, the drama of the Games is palpable. Who will win each event? What will the events even be? (Many of them aren’t announced until the last possible second.) How will the outcome of each event affect the overall leaderboard? Whose dreams of being crowned the Fittest on Earth will come true, and who will have to continue working fiendishly for another year in hopes of realizing their goals?
It’s for these reasons that I got pretty fired up the other day when I read an article titled “Why CrossFit Doesn’t Make An Elite Athlete.” As something of a CrossFit connoisseur (after dozens of hours in front of the tube, in addition to years of friendship with box owners), I feel I have a responsibility to set the record straight on the issue of whether CrossFit will make you a better athlete.
Thursday, July 21, 2016
The Top 5 Bonafide Superstar Push-up Progressions
Push-ups. Everyone knows ‘em. Very few can actually do ‘em. In fact, I’d wager that only about 38% of gym goers — young or old, athletic or couch potatoic — can do a single good one, let alone multiple sets of multiple reps like I do in the video below. (Go me!) Maybe even a smaller percentage than 38, but 38 is my lucky number, so we’ll go with that.
Why the epically bad performance on such a staple exercise? First and foremost, there’s a definite lack of awareness about what constitutes proper form:
- Proper form begins with the setup: wrists stacked directly under the shoulders and a straight line from head to heels. To achieve that straight line, the abs must be braced and the glutes (butt muscles) must be squeezed. This will necessitate a gaze neither ahead nor directly at the floor, but rather downward at a 45° angle. If you don’t get the setup right, the actual movement is doomed for sure.
- Proper form continues with a slow and controlled descent at least to the point at which the upper arms are parallel to the floor (elbow angle equals 90°), if not deeper if you're able and pain free. On the descent, the elbows should track inward at 45°. When viewed from above, the torso and upper arms should form an arrow, not a ‘T.’
- Throughout this descent, the same straight line from the setup must be preserved without deviation. Everything moves as one rigid unit. (Ipso facto, the push-up is really just a moving plank!) Hip sag and lower back sway are not okay, and the hip pike is also right out. Tension in the abs and glutes must be maintained.
- Proper form finishes with a strong ascent to return to the starting position. The ascent is the exact opposite motion of the descent. No funny business is to be allowed at the hips, lower back, or neck. The upper body should not rise up before the lower body. Unless you are a seal. Which you are not.
Saturday, June 18, 2016
The 5 Lower Body Technique Mistakes You've Been Making [Muscle & Strength]
"Your legs aren’t growing. You’ve tried everything: squats, deadlifts, Olympic lifts, lunges, low reps, high reps, two-a-days, protein powders, and blood flow restriction. You name it, you’ve tried it and it didn’t work. Your legs bring new meaning to the expression “hardgainer.”
The one aspect of training that you may (perhaps unknowingly) have failed to master, though, is proper form...."
Continue reading my new article, The 5 Lower Body Technique Mistakes You've Been Making, at muscleandstrength.com. The article includes side-by-side videos of proper and improper form. The videos were painstakingly crafted to make the errors crystal clear for your viewing and educational pleasure.
Click the link to continue reading:
Continue reading my new article, The 5 Lower Body Technique Mistakes You've Been Making, at muscleandstrength.com. The article includes side-by-side videos of proper and improper form. The videos were painstakingly crafted to make the errors crystal clear for your viewing and educational pleasure.
Click the link to continue reading:
>https://www.muscleandstrength.com/articles/5-form-mistakes-youre-making
Wednesday, June 1, 2016
4 Easy, Reliable, and Valid Fitness Tests to Measure Progress
“What gets
measured gets improved.” It may be clichéd to quote leadership expert Robin
Sharma in yet another fitness post, but you know why clichés are a thing? Because they’re based in reality. And
this quote nails it.
We’re flush in an age where tracking your fitness is fashionable. From Garmins to Fitbits to Apple Watches, collecting and measuring data has never been easier. But is there something they’re missing?
We’re flush in an age where tracking your fitness is fashionable. From Garmins to Fitbits to Apple Watches, collecting and measuring data has never been easier. But is there something they’re missing?
When clients and gym members ask how to measure progress, it usually turns into a discussion revisiting what exactly they’d like to achieve. If their method of tracking isn't measuring what they actually want to improve, I’m wasting their precious time.
At The Movement
Minneapolis, the gym I co-own with my husband, David Dellanave, we use
custom-built tracking software to measure every workout. In the context of
strength, we make it easy for members to see if they’ve loaded more on the bar
or if they’ve become able to perform a few more reps week by week. They
periodically test their strength in the way of five-, three-, or (for some
clients) one-rep max attempts, keeping the intensity appropriate for their
lifting experience.
As I mentioned
earlier, for a test to be valid, it needs to measure what you’d like to
improve. Another key piece of the puzzle is finding a reliable test. Meaning, you’re able to reproduce it so that you can
compare each data point objectively and learn if you’re headed in the right
direction or not. As we say at the gym, “better questions lead to better
answers.”
Measuring strength is pretty simple — achieving the same range of motion, can you lift more than the previous week or max attempt? Cardiovascular endurance is also straightforward — assuming you’re running the same distance each time, are your times increasing or decreasing?
Measuring strength is pretty simple — achieving the same range of motion, can you lift more than the previous week or max attempt? Cardiovascular endurance is also straightforward — assuming you’re running the same distance each time, are your times increasing or decreasing?
But how do we effectively measure athletic qualities?
The plot thickens, and I’m
so glad you asked. (Or that I pretended that you did, rather.)
Enter the Broad
Jump, 10- and 40-Yard Dash and Pro Agility tests. I like these tests for several reasons:
- They measure qualities that are applicable to training goals involving speed, agility, and explosive power.
- Their simplicity allows for reliable results, allowing me to know for certain if I’m moving the needle in the direction I want to go, or if I need to make adjustments in my training.
- They’re easy to do with minimal equipment. You need only a little space, a tape measure, and a stopwatch.
If you’re
interested in measuring your current athleticism in this manner, try the tests
below.
Tuesday, May 31, 2016
4 Secrets to Faster Sprinting
If you’re on offense in American Football, a sack is the last thing you want. It often means an ugly hit to the quarterback (and his ego) as well as a possible loss of yardage. Ironically, though, SAQ is actually the best way to avoid getting sacked.
SAQ stands, of course, for speed, agility, and quickness. Having been a swimmer for the better part of a decade, I didn’t know much about SAQ until I attended the National Personal Training Institute of Philadelphia, where we did weekly SAQ training.
Being an amputee, I was a little reluctant at first to partake. I wasn’t able to do all of the drills, and even the ones I did do, I knew I looked funny doing them. Fortunately, I eventually overcame my fear of failure and embarrassment and just went for it. As it turned out, I was the best in the class at the single-leg locomotion drills!
Fast forward to 2016 and my recently completed internship at Endeavor Sports Performance, where I coached kids in SAQ every single day. Our warm-up was chock-full of locomotion drills like butt kickers, high knee skips, side shuffles, carioca, back pedaling, and sprints.
4 Cues for Arm Drive
Even more important than learning how to execute these drills myself, I had to learn to teach them to young athletes. As anyone who’s worked with children before knows, different children learn in different ways. Some are visual learners, some are auditory learners, and some are tactile learners. Therefore, I had to refine a variety of coaching skills in order to get the athletes to perform the way I wanted.
Sunday, May 15, 2016
The 10 Most Effective Mind-Muscle Connection Exercises for Your Upper Body
By James Harris and Travis Pollen
Hey! James here. A question I have long pondered is whether or not it matters if you “feel” a muscle actually working. I've had many trainees ask me this question over the years and I’ve always expressed my doubts in response. Well, now the research is out and Travis and I are here to talk about it.
Today, in the first of a two part series, we will be discussing muscles of the upper body that many trainees complain they don't feel. We’ll also talk about whether or not feeling it matters, and how to create more of a brain connection to the muscles you’re working in order to get a good muscle pump going.
Reminder: Don't forget to stay tuned for the next installment -- The 10 Most Effective Mind-Muscle Connection Exercises for Your Lower Body -- this Wednesday on www.titaniumstrength.org!
WHAT THE RESEARCH SAYS
Over the years, trainers and trainees alike have evolved in their understanding of the human body. We hear about the new research and immediately all jump on the bandwagon.
Low carb diets work the best.
WHAT THE RESEARCH SAYS
Over the years, trainers and trainees alike have evolved in their understanding of the human body. We hear about the new research and immediately all jump on the bandwagon.
Low carb diets work the best.
No! High carb works the best!
High volume, lighter workouts for muscle growth!
No! Low volume, heavier workouts for muscle growth!
You get the idea.
Here's the thing: there is no one right answer. Most things in fitness need context. Except rounding your lower back during a deadlift. That's unanimously agreed upon to be a bad idea.
You get the idea.
Here's the thing: there is no one right answer. Most things in fitness need context. Except rounding your lower back during a deadlift. That's unanimously agreed upon to be a bad idea.
Labels:
Exercise Selection,
Exercise Technique,
Mindset
Tuesday, May 10, 2016
Intervals: What Are You Really Training?
Here's a question I recently asked my friend and go-to on exercise physiology Marc Lewis regarding intervals and aerobic training. His answer made a ton of sense, and I think it's something a lot of trainers and coaches may not be aware of. #themoreyouknow
Question:
Hi Marc,
I have some questions about aerobic training. If I did hard battle rope waves for about 10 seconds, stopped to rest, my heart rate peaked at 150, and I continued to rest until it went back down to 120, then repeated in a similar fashion for several minutes, could I call that "cardiac output" training? Or not cardiac output since it’s not steady state, but still “aerobic” training?
Basically, I’m wondering if you can still call it aerobic if an anaerobic system predominates during those 10 seconds — even though you don’t work long enough for your heart rate to get above the aerobic zone.
Would it be more akin to "cardiac output" or “aerobic" if the exertion level were lower and the work periods were longer so that the climb up to 150 took longer than 10 seconds and the work-to-rest ratio favored more work than rest?
Thanks,
Travis
Answer:
Friday, May 6, 2016
13 Exercises You Should Never Do and Why
The information contained in this blog post is for educational purposes only. The reader assumes the risks associated with performing the exercises described within, which may (or may not) be dangerous if performed incorrectly. Please consult your physician before beginning this or any other
exercise program.

1. Back Squats: Because they cause your knees, hips, and back to explode. Except if you do them correctly.
2. Bench press: Because your pecs are already strong from sitting hunched over at a computer all day... right?

3. Deadlifts: See back squats.
4. Pull-ups: Aren't those that flailing exercise that the CrossFighters do? I heard they cause rhabdo.
5. Upright Rows: Because they automatically impinge your shoulders (unless you have healthy shoulders and they don't).
6. Face Pulls: Because they strengthen the oft-neglected posterior deltoids, which deserve to be neglected. Stupid posterior deltoids.
7. Military press: Because putting weights over your head is just dangerous. Everybody knows that. And don't forget about that pesky shoulder impingement.
8. Bicep Curls: Because they are so non-functional. They only help you pick things up and bring them to your mouth.
9. Power Cleans: See bicep curls. Oh wait, you mean power cleans aren't just explosive reverse curls?!
10. Crunches: Because Stu McGill says so, and you don't mess with that mustache.
11. Glute Bridges & Hip Thrusts: They just look so... sexual. How embarrassing.

12. Burpees: Because when do you ever get up and down off the floor in the real world? That's almost as bad as bicep curls.
13. Turkish Get-ups: see burpees, glute bridges and hip thrusts, crunches, AND military press.
Bonus. Shrugs: Because they will make you jacked and tan.
RELATED: For more 'Things You Should Never Do in the Gym,' CLICK HERE.
P.S. This entire list is in jest. Lists like this are stupid. There's no need to vilify exercises, for there's no such thing as bad exercises, only bad exercises for a particular person.

1. Back Squats: Because they cause your knees, hips, and back to explode. Except if you do them correctly.
2. Bench press: Because your pecs are already strong from sitting hunched over at a computer all day... right?

3. Deadlifts: See back squats.
4. Pull-ups: Aren't those that flailing exercise that the CrossFighters do? I heard they cause rhabdo.
5. Upright Rows: Because they automatically impinge your shoulders (unless you have healthy shoulders and they don't).
6. Face Pulls: Because they strengthen the oft-neglected posterior deltoids, which deserve to be neglected. Stupid posterior deltoids.

8. Bicep Curls: Because they are so non-functional. They only help you pick things up and bring them to your mouth.
9. Power Cleans: See bicep curls. Oh wait, you mean power cleans aren't just explosive reverse curls?!
10. Crunches: Because Stu McGill says so, and you don't mess with that mustache.
11. Glute Bridges & Hip Thrusts: They just look so... sexual. How embarrassing.

12. Burpees: Because when do you ever get up and down off the floor in the real world? That's almost as bad as bicep curls.
13. Turkish Get-ups: see burpees, glute bridges and hip thrusts, crunches, AND military press.
Bonus. Shrugs: Because they will make you jacked and tan.
RELATED: For more 'Things You Should Never Do in the Gym,' CLICK HERE.
P.S. This entire list is in jest. Lists like this are stupid. There's no need to vilify exercises, for there's no such thing as bad exercises, only bad exercises for a particular person.
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