Unleaded: Old School Shock Training by Mark Hatmaker

 

 

Old School Fast Twitch Muscle

The Entry

·        You have an approximate 50/50 mix of slow-twitch and fast-twitch muscle fibers comprising your skeletal muscles.

·        Different muscles [muscle-groups] have different fiber type compositions, meaning the ratio is not a strict 50/50 across the body.

·        For example, your calves and postural muscles tend to have more slow-twitch fibers—Note this fact.

·        The higher ratio of slow-twitch vs. fast-twitch in the calves and postural muscles is one reason we see higher incidence of falls as we age.

 

Why?

·        Think of anytime you’ve stumbled [or actually fell] that quick involuntary sudden shift of balance and position to get a foot out to prevent the fall, that split-second alteration of the torso/postural muscles to preserve balance.

·        That is your fast-twitch fibers going to work.

·        Our calf musculature are the vital guy-wires and stays of this vast mainsail of a body we carry above the ground.

·        The postural muscles adjust to the balance of each sway, stride, leaning, shifting, squirming of position that we make.

·        As long as our strides are chosen the slow twitch will serve us well but ask of these slow-twitch fibers [decaying ones at that] experiencing inhibitory factors [loss of muscle fiber type and overall mass] we increase our odds of falls and the severity of said falls.

 

Fast-Twitch Muscle doesn’t just serve us in fall prevention, but as combat athletes.

·        As fighters, we don’t always get to choose when we fall.

·        We don’t get to choose the shift in footwork required to respond to an opponent’s move.

·        The more fast-twitch we have ready to activate in a “No-Mind” Musashi-sense the better we are, be we young and agile or aging and approaching the Great You-Know-What.

“Hey Mark, you mentioned decay, what’s that all about?”

·        As we age we are all subject to sarcopenia.

·        And what is sarcopenia?

·        A condition characterized by the gradual loss of muscle mass, strength, and function.

·        It is not a condition so much as a fact for all.

·        All of us [ALL] begin the slow slide into sarcopenia in our mid-40s.

·        The older we are the more muscle mass loss we will experience.

 

“Damn! That’s kinda bleak.”

·        Kinda. Fortunately, aggressive strength training and keeping your protein intake high, while it will not prevent sarcopenia it can slow it down a good bit.

·        But…the sooner we jump on the resistance training bandwagon, the better.

·        You simply want to have more muscle mass, so the inevitable loss is eating from this huge retirement account as opposed to trying to start saving for your retirement once you’re already in retirement.

·        Remember Kids, sarcopenia starts for all of us in our mid-40s.

·        The sooner we start—the Better.

·        BTW-The sarcopenia slide is more aggressive and can start earlier if we use Ozempic or any of the GLP-1 agonists.

 

Vital Fact About Sarcopenia

·        As we age fast-twitch fibers atrophy at a FAR greater rate than slow-twitch fibers.

·        Let me repeat that.

·        As we age fast-twitch fibers atrophy at a FAR greater rate than slow-twitch.

·        Recall---Areas that already contain fewer fast twitch [calves and postural muscles for example] will see the greater degradation—leading to the inability to “move in front of the fall,” a gradual slumping of the posture, a gait that slowly gives way to the “elderly shuffle.”

·        In other words, we lose the greatest number of vital preservation fibers from exactly the areas we may most require them as we age or when we need in combat.

·        It is also for this reason why SHOCK Training and not mere resistance training is a vital part of the longevity and performance package.

 

“Whew, that was close! Good thing  I’m already doing weight training and some calisthenics.”

Hold your horses.

·        Those of us already using resistance training must keep in mind….Fast- Twitch Fibers ARE NOT trained the same way as Slow-Twitch.

·        Meaning, you can hit the gym 7 days per week but if all of your training is by rote, sets and reps, well, likely you aren’t even touching the Fast-Twitch.

·        In fact, a not uncommon scenario is seeing retired bodybuilders and NFL linemen, athletes still carrying a good amount of reserve muscle in their retirement account still suffering from falls and fall injury.

·        Or, at the very least [if the aging athlete is still active] stating that “The first thing that goes is your speed.”

·        Exactly.

·        All the slow-twitch work in the world may not make a dent in fast-twitch recruitment, the very muscle fiber type we are losing at the greatest rate.

 

“OK, Mark, what if I’m already past my mid-40s is it too late to start fast-twitch work?”

Nope.

·        The human body has a remarkable ability to respond to training at almost any age.

·        Get on the stick—NOW!

 

“Hey, Mark, I’m in my 20s, I ain’t close to worrying about all this Old Man decay stuff; will fast-twitch/SHOCK work do me any good?”

Well, that depends.

·        If you want to be a fast agile cat, then Hell Yeah!

 

“Hey Old Man, I’m stuck on that 50/50 ratio of fiber composition. Doesn’t that mean if I only train slow-twitch, things like my bench, squat, pull-ups, dips, you know stuff like that I may be working only 50% of the pie?”

Exactly!

·        Fast and slow twitch are meant to bolster one another.

·        Whether we are working for strength, performance or aesthetics educating both types of muscle fibers provides a better-rounded athlete with a gratifying tweak on aesthetics.

·        Ignoring fast-twitch work not only sets the stage for a slower athlete, an aging human more prone to falls, but…an athlete that is not realizing the full aesthetic benefits of resistance training be that weights or calisthenics.

·        You can accelerate your pace in all of these via SHOCK Training.

 

“Cool beans! So if I hit some plyo box work and toss a medicine ball I grab some of that fast-twitch gold!”

Not so fast.

As we mentioned, we have a rough mixture of fast and slow twitch fibers at a 50-50 ratio.

Recall the calves and postural muscles possess fewer fast twitch [and more slow twitch] well…

·        Other muscle groups tip that balance in the other direction.

·        Your quadriceps and pecs tend to have a higher ratio of fast-twitch fiber.

·        It is this high ratio of fast twitch in these areas that makes training the fast twitch in upper-body and legs so persnickety.

·        Fast-twitch work in high fiber areas must be “gamed” by particular pre-fatigue methods and a bit of “shocking” the fibers awake where they are not usually called upon if fresh or even simply fatigued.

·        In essence, in these high fast-twitch fiber areas we’ve got to create this “Relaxed State to GO!” that we find in the startle reflex we experience when stopping an unexpected fall.

·        We must inhibit one fiber type to activate the other.

 

The Unleaded: SHOCK Battery

·        Demonstrates 3 Batteries for a 10 Exercise Total.

·        The Batteries are Classified as Lower Body, Upper, & Torso.

·        Each is performed ONCE per week.

·        Battery 1 takes 3-minutes.

·        Batter 2, 4-minutes.

·        Battery 3, 60 seconds.

·        Yep, all it takes is 8 minutes total in 3 sessions.

·        Gear: You and a 10# dumbbell or plate for 2 of the exercises.

·        We’ll demonstrate the extremely nit-picky HOW to do this, and the equally nit-picky of exactly WHEN to do these batteries. [This is KEY.]

·        I repeat: KEY.

 

Up your speed no matter your age, increase your muscle mass at a minute fraction of slow-twitch training time, fill in those aesthetic holes with this devilishly simple Old School Hack.

Unleaded: SHOCK Training