Simple But Effective Exercises: Sled Dragging and the Farmer's Walk

If you have run through all the standard exercise programs, if you need to break out of your exercise or fitness rut, if you want to build power, increase cardio fitness, lose weight, gain muscle, get stronger arms, legs....

How do you do all that?

Let me introduce you to two simple yet fantastically effective exercises that most people have never heard of: The Farmer's Walk and Sled Dragging.

The Farmer's Walk

This has got to be one of the simplest yet most effective exercises you have ever done. All you do, ha ha, is walk around with a heavy weight, kettlebell or dumbbell, in each hand.

That's it?

Yep! But, before you move on to the next web page, let me tell you what this "simple" exercise can do for you. It can make you stronger, improve your cardiovascular condition, strengthen shoulders, legs, and even your hands. It is a great exercise for strengthening your core. It is also a popular exercise with weightlifters, bodybuilders, and athletes in almost every sport.

 

Sled Dragging

Another simple exercise, sled dragging requires a bit more space and equipment than the Farmer's Walk. For one thing, you need a sled...which can cost about $85 on up! You will also need space in which to drag it.

 

The power sled used can come in many forms from pretty simple to a bit complicated. One of the key matters, depending on your level of fitness and how hard you want to push yourself, is how much weight you can load on the sled. 

So, what can dragging a sled do for you?

Depending on how you load it and do it, a power sled can increase strength, increase power, improve coordination, improve your cardiovascular condition, and even help you burn body fat. Load it light and move it fast or long, or load it heavy and drag it forwards, backwards or side to side. 

Grab the straps and drag it with your hands for a really strong grip.

One thing that serious weightlifters and bodybuilders like to do with a sled is to load it light and drag it during recovery periods after leg workouts. It helps warm up the muscles and feed them with blood for quicker, and more complete recovery.

 

Sled dragging can even be part of a circuit training regimen, including other forms of exercise and using the power sled in many different manners. The ways in which sled dragging can improve your physical condition, appearance, and performance are many and varied. 

 

While you can just buy one, load it up, and start dragging it around the back yard, you will get the best results with guidance specifically designed for sled dragging.

Source : Donovan Baldwin | Go 

Bodyweight Training - And Real Functional Fitness

Bodyweight training- and real functional fitness

Most trainers and fitness gurus and so called hard guys only read about functional fitness they have no idea what functional fitness really is. Reading about functional fitness and working as a labor for a few months does not make them an expert.

You want an expert on functional fitness you find a laborer that trains and is extremely fit. Flipping tires, pushing wheel barrows, pulling a weighted sled for an hour 3 times a week is not labor intensive. This type of training is for the pencil pusher. The non laborer.

I have watched men hit a tire with a sledge hammer to build some core strength try breaking up some rock and then tossing it in the back of a truck.

I seen a video's of MMA training camps where they were pushing wheel barrows with weight plates and the wheel barrow had two wheels on the front, where's the strength building in that ?

A wheel barrow with one wheel is twice as hard and will work a ton of stabilizing muscles. Watch a laborer who fills a wheelbarrow full of stone weighing 300 to 600 lbs using a shovel in a one wheeled wheelbarrow. Think of the stabilizing muscles of the core and the grip strength it takes to move this wheelbarrow and he will do this all day long 8,10,12 hours a day.

I have seen videos of men pulling weighted sleds with 50 or 100 lbs on them, try using a pallet jack and pulling a 2,000 lb pallet around a warehouse or on a loading dock. Who's getting the better workout ? The man pulling the weighted sled or the man pulling around 2,000 lbs.

 

How about the man the loads and unloads a 48' tractor/trailer full of truck tires. Check out the man that has a job as a furniture mover, picking up all odd objects bending , twisting, reaching, climbing steps backwards holding on with their finger tips these are some of the jobs that the average man does to make a living.

Do you think a man has to have a high level of functional fitness to do this day in and day out? What the average laborer does in a day would cripple the fitness guru, if I needed back up in a situation that took heart and real strength it wouldn't be pencil pushing 3 time a week functional fitness trainer.

I have seen college football players,weight lifters, wrestlers, so called tough guys fail in the world of labor they were just not functionally fit and if they were they were for a short period of time and couldn't handle the work day in and day out.

This is where body-weight training will separate the men from the boys.The fact is that a lot of people will tell you that you won't get strong using body-weight only exercises and the fact is that using your own body-weight can and will get you to a different level of fitness that most people will never know. A level of functional fitness that will never let you down. You will go longer. You will stay stronger longer. You will become more explosive and faster. You will become more athletic.

Here's a workout that will build some functional fitness.

You need a 50 to 100lb sand bag or heavy bag and 10 yards.

With the bag on the ground bear crawl around the bag 10 times as fast as possible.
Shoulder the bag and run 10 yards put the bag down bear crawl around it 9 times
shoulder it with the other shoulder continue this until you reach 1 then go back up
to 10. 

Remember to switch shoulders each time.

Source John Grube B.C.S