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Bit late to the party here, but basically, what slowman said. Charlie Francis himself ridicules the idea that elite athletes' techniques should be "fixed." Or, to put it differently, that they should be changed to conform with somebody's idea of "perfect" form. IIRC, one of Ben Johnson's feet turned out a little bit while he sprinted. If Gay or Bolt moves side to side or pumps their arms funny, it's because over the 10-15 years they've spent becoming the best in the world, that hitch or whatever helps them be awesome.

If you've got a beginner with goofy technique, then you can try to fix it, but in the end everyone is idiosyncratic and once someone is at an elite level, anything that looks weird or off is probably not a bad thing.

Sorry if there's an obvious answer to these questions that I'm missing, but:

- i need to get leaner

Okay, but

- i need to put on muscle using bodyweight movements (pullups/pushups) somehow

I'm sure you know this, but given where you're at right now, there's no way in hell you can add muscle while getting leaner. Only super fatties can do that. You are pretty lean to begin with. And why can't you use weights?

In Baltimore over the weekend but I managed to squeeze in a run and a light workout in anticipation of the new routine, starting today. About that, I forgot that I have a one-day ultimate tournament this coming Saturday, which will obviously prevent me from working out that day as well as compromise me for the following couple of days (should be a good 4.5-6 hours of ultimate).

Saturday:

work
run @moderate pace x20mins (in VFF)

I was in a huge rush and didn't have time to stretch or anything. Bad planning. Also this was my first extended run in a while in my VFF's, and I haven't been in barefoot-style shoes in over a month, so my calves and soleus muscles have been crying the past couple of days. Going down stairs is a bitch. Should have been smarter about this. Barefoot running is tops, but I thought I could jump right back into it after a layoff and I was clearly wrong about that.

Sunday:

warm up
bike @easy pace x10mins

work
bench 3x5x170
pullups 4x4xbw+25

nice walk back from the gym to my girlfriend's apartment, then

7DVJS (except the hip flexor raises and glute bridge... girlfriends can be distracting...)

cool down
stretch

Like I said, my calves are hurtin' from the run on Saturday and discipline on Sunday was bad. But that's okay, I can't beat myself up as bad about that as about what happened at work this morning: I had edited this research paper and it was really a godawful mess, so I made all kinds of comments (in Word) to myself like "WTF?" and "this makes my head want to explode." Then I took them all out and just left in the constructive comments. Or so I thought, because I got the response back from the person who wrote it and apparently I left in "this makes my head want to explode." Oh and that comment was selected to apply to like three entire paragraphs. In my defense, they were, and still are, totally incoherent.

Still, how fucking embarrassing is that for everyone involved. Oof.

Also, more depth jumps instead of squats.

This post is going to be a little long.

At this point I think I really need to get into a jumping-dominant focus because my explosiveness and movement efficiency suck ass. My strength could be better, too, but I've been working on it as a primary focus for the past, what, six months. Some okay gains in that time. I'm going to retest everything this weekend and then start the next phase. Basically looking at 4-6 weeks. Will still do max strength work once a week just to maintain (and maybe gain, who knows?).

Here's what I'm thinking for the next month, starting next week based on the power block from the MSEM article. Your thoughts are appreciated if you can make it through the whole thing:

Week 1
Monday upper body
warm up
SLRVJs x6-8
footwork (e.g. agility ladder)
bench 5x165, 5x175, ?x185
weighted pullups 4x3
SS1 clapping pushups 3x10
SS2 fast rope climb x3
core

Tuesday
ultimate

Wednesday lower body
warm up
SS1 KB swing 3xheavy
SS2 max-effort DLRVJ x4-6
LLLRRR bounds x5x20y
jump squats 3x3x95, max effort each rep
squat 5x245, 5x265, ?x275
DL 5x310
core


Thursday
ultimate

Friday
total rest

Saturday lower body
warm up
max effort DLRVJ xdropoff
sprints xdropoffx40y
lots of rest (walk to gym)
squat 3x255, 3x275, ?x285
walking lunge 3x10x110
core

Sunday
warm up
low-intensity cardio (REALLY low, like a long walk or something)

Week 2
Monday
same as W1 except
bench 3x175, 3x185, ?x195

Tuesday
ultimate

Wednesday
same as W1 except
squat 3x265, 3x275, ?x295

Thursday
ultimate

Friday
total rest

Saturday
same as W1 except
squat 5x255, 3x285, ?x315

Sunday
same as W1

Week 3
Monday
same as W1 except
bench 3x5x165
bw pullups 3x3

Tuesday
ultimate

Wednesday
same as W1 except
squat jumps 1x3x95
squat MSEM 2x3

Thursday
Warm up
Steady-state cardio x30-40 mins

Friday
total rest

Saturday
same as W1 except
cut jumping/sprinting volume in half
squat MSEM 2x3

Sunday
same as W1

Week 4
Monday
test bench and weighted pull ups

Tuesday
rest

Wednesday
same as W1 except
squat MSEM 2x3

Thursday
warm up
footwork, maybe some low-intensity hops and stuff
core

Friday
total rest

Saturday
Test RVJ, SVJ, squat, DL

Warm up
usual
no jumps

Work
OHP 5x105, 3x115, 3x120
DB row 5x50, 5x55, 8x55
box jumps 2x5x30" - not intense or anything, just wanted to do them
7DVJS

Cool down
stretch

Sore, as expected, but I sucked it up and did the whole thing and feel good about it.

I dominate you both. Can't figure out how to screen-cap it on this computer but I averaged 194.