As athletes, the pressure to win has a very strong effect on us. The best athletes in the world are not only the strongest, or the fastest, but the ones who can keep their emotions in check during competition. Emotions before and during competition can define and influence how you perform. These emotions aren't just limited to the negative ones like fear, and anxiety, but the positive ones too. For example, too much confidence and a cocky attitude can leave an athlete ill prepared for a competition. To get a better understanding of how emotions affect our performance, we visited sports psychology expert, Dr. Lenny Wiersma, and Dr. Andy Galpin at Cal State Fullerton to dive into the science behind motivating athletes and developing a champion mindset. Renowned and respected in his field, Dr. Wiersma has worked with some of the top athletes in different sports including several CrossFit and endurance athletes. In this episode, you'll learn how he helps top athletes develop a champion mindset, strengthens their emotional muscles and breaks through mental barriers. You'll also learn how to start developing your ability to own your emotions and adopt a growth mindset around your training and life. We'll also touch on how, as coaches, we can better communicate with our athletes and mentally give them what they need to succeed and excel. Whether you are a competitive athlete or pursuing fitness for life, there are a lot of powerful take aways in this one. Developing mindfulness, harnessing your emotions, practicing being present and taking ownership for your performance can translate over to all aspects of life and help you inside and outside of the gym. Enjoy the show, Mike Mike

This week on Shrugged, we are talking to one of the strongest, intelligent and most athletic women we have ever interviewed. At a bodyweight of 123lbs, our guest this week, Stefi Cohen, pulls a 445 pound deadlift, squats 370 pounds, and benches 205 pounds. Stefi is also an accomplished and competitive Olympic-style weightlifter competing as a 53kg lifter, snatching 87 kg and clean and jerking 105 kg.  Relative to her bodyweight these numbers, needless to say, are impressive.   In this episode, Stefi shares the specifics of how she uses the hybrid strength training method to chase down a 4X bodyweight deadlift  and lift impressive numbers in the squat, bench, deadlift for Powerlifting AND the snatch, clean & jerk for Olympic Weightlifting, all while keeping injuries at bay. Aside from lifting really heavy weights, Stefi is highly intelligent and is currently pursuing a degree in Physical Therapy. Stefi, Dr. Galpin and Doug discuss how assess scientific literature and research and then explain some of the science behind the difference of hypertrophy (muscle-building) and strength training and why the “lifting weights makes you bulky” myth is entirely false. Hopefully this episode puts the final nail in that coffin. Do your part and be sure to share this episode with the next person you hear say that. If you want to learn how to get really strong in the 5 major lifts, squat, bench, deadlift, snatch, clean & jerk, listen to this episode. Also for you ladies out there who want to get strong and challenge the status quo about what it means and how it feels to be a strong woman, absolutely listen to this one. Enjoy the show, Mike

“If you are ONLY counting macros, are you really healthy?” That may seem a loaded question, but this week on the show, we have just the guy to answer it. On today’s show, we chat with Mike Dolce and bust some commonly misguided beliefs around nutrition.  Mike works with some of the top athletes in MMA world and has been a nutrition coach since before it was popular to post your food on Instagram. He has seen the evolution of the health and fitness industry and cuts through the BS that you may have seen on the internet. In this episode, we discuss the importance of food quality, the relationship between longevity and performance, and why you should avoid eating pop tarts and ice cream (even if it “fits your macros”) If you want to step up your nutrition game and pursue your best self, this episode is going to help you dial in the necessary components around nutrition. Enjoy the show, Mike  

So you want to compete in CrossFit and perhaps make it to the Games one day? Getting to the CrossFit Games is no joke. It never was, and now it's a full time job to even get to Regionals. Competition in the sport of CrossFit is more intense than ever, and there's no doubt that the bar is set higher every year. This week, we meet up with Games athlete, Wes Piatt, who just wrapped up competing at the California Regionals. Wes has been competing for 7 years and in this episode, he shares his journey and we get to look into the life of a competitive athlete to hear what it is really like to train for the Games.  You'll learn about the training, supplementation, and mindset an individual CrossFitter needs to compete at the highest level plus get Wes's insight on the evolution of the competition over the last decade. In addition. Wes dives into what it is like to coach aspiring CrossFit Games athletes.  If you have aspirations to get to the Games or you're curious how it's done you'll want to tune in for this one. Enjoy the show, Mike

The California Regionals are all wrapped up and the coach we are presenting in today's show is responsible for getting 30 athletes there. If there is a powerhouse coach in CrossFit®, CJ Martin of CrossFit Invictus is it.  In this episode, we dive into the mind of one of the best coaches in the sport of CrossFit and discuss the process CJ goes through to groom his athletes, the importance of sticking to a training program and the role of strength in the sport of CrossFit.  With the road to the CrossFit Games becoming increasingly more demanding, athletes are pushing their physical and mental boundaries further than ever before. As a result of this increasing demand, successful athletes must possess a strong mindset and it's just as important as being “fit enough”. Along with how he's training athletes to get to the Games physically, in this episode, CJ shares with us how he builds mental fortitude within his athletes and what it is like to deal with the pressure of being a competitive athlete in the sport of CrossFit.  Whether you aspire to compete at Regionals or the Games one day or you're just looking for some valuable insight to improve your competitive, athletic mindset, this episode is a must listen.   Enjoy the show, Mike

Our guest this week is as humble as he is accomplished. You can tell as soon as you walk into his facility, which just so happens to be one of the oldest weightlifting gyms in the country, that you are stepping into a historic place. We are taking about Sean Waxman. Sean has been a coach and athlete in the sport of weightlifting before it was even popular in the US. He has been a player in growing the sport to where it is today and has trained with and coached some of the best athletes in the sport. In this week’s episode, we dive into what Sean is doing to create elite-level weightlifters, his coaching and leadership style, and the history of the sport of weightlifting. Enjoy the show, Mike

If I were to tell you that using a BOSU® ball would help you squat more, would you believe us? Yes, we are talking about that half dome stability ball thing that sits in the corner at the globo gyms of the world.  Before you write off the BOSU® ball to the same category as the Shake Weight, you need to watch this episode. In this edition of Shrugged, we interview the inventor of the BOSU, David Weck, and it turns out there is more to this tool than meets the eye. David has dedicated his career to understanding biomechanics and how to help athletes move better. While his tools and methods are certainly unique, they are also every effective. In this episode we dive into all the experiments and practices David has explored and how he is helping professional athletes with his method. You'll probably learn some things you have never heard before and you get to see Doug bitch slap him in the face. Multiple times.  Enjoy the show, Mike

With all the sleep apps, heart rate monitors, supplements, air conditioners, coffee (and more coffee) we use, it's evident we live in an optimized world, and it is making us weak. In episode 259, we are bringing Brian Mckenzie and Andy Galpin back to talk about the research they are doing around performance, and what it means to be a resilient human in a comfortable world.  Never before have we had it so easy, and although we are training and optimizing our diet, our comfy lifestyle is holding us back from being as strong as we could be. It is one thing to have a training routine, but as soon as we go back to our air conditioned rooms and perfectly organized lifestyle, we lose the ability to adapt to the stress that our body has evolved to feel. Brian and Andy have co authored a book called Unplugged, and in it they have put in the work and laid out the practices we can adopt (and the one’s we need to abandon) if we want to create a resilient body and mind.  Every athlete should listen to this episode. If you want to learn how to build mental toughness, and a stress adapted body, you can head over to amazon and pre-order the book. Enjoy the show, Mike

When was the last time you did a conditioning piece that you actually enjoyed? Chances are (unless you did track in high school) you don’t find long spouts on the air dyne or rower all too fun. Neither do we, so when we met Aaron Guyett and got to talking about battle ropes, and all the practical applications they have when it comes to conditioning, we decided he needed to be on the show. Aaron is the master instructor for Onnit Academy’s battle rope program, and runs a facility in CA called Innovative results. We met up with him at his facility to talk about how you can use battle ropes in your conditioning workouts. When it comes to using battle ropes, most of us just know one or two exercises that we saw on Instagram. In this episode, Aaron dives into all the different movement patterns and practical applications that battle ropes have including grip strength, power, and the ability to train all 3 metabolic pathways. Tune in for this one and make sure to catch the break where Aaron does a hands on demo with the battle ropes. Enjoy the show, Mike

One thing that separates CrossFit from most other training systems is the fact that you are required to develop proficiency in a wide range of fitness modalities- weightlifting, gymnastics, powerlifting, etc The MMA game is very similar and unlike boxing, wrestling, or any specific martial arts, fighters are required to be generalists in all the systems. There are a lot of variables, and when it comes to coaching, that makes things a lot more challenging.  In this week’s show, we linked up with wrestling coach, Darryl Christian at RVCA headquarters to chat about how he is working with some of the top MMA fighters in the game like Dominick Cruz. We talk program design and get into the details of what he looks into when working with some of the top fighters.  If you are a fighter, a CrossFitter, or anyone who is looking to get more strategic in your training, there is a lot to take away from this episode. We dive into topics such as How to measure training volume When and why to focus on recovery vs high volume training weeks How to strategically train for strengths and weaknesses in multi fascinated sports (like CrossFit and MMA) How to work with and communicate with multiple coaches at the same time Enjoy the show, Mike