3 ½ ‘Stupid Simple’ Ways to Get Stronger, Faster
I’m a big fan of going through obscure articles, avant garde strength athletes’ musings, and other highly original and non-traditional approaches to building strength at all costs (well, almost all costs — no steroids or injurious practices included).
Some of the stuff I’ve found along the way has either matched or re-affirmed things I already know, but others are some head-slappingly simple, ‘why-didn’t-I-think-of-that?’ type of things.
And all of them — whether used by themselves or in conjunction with each other — will work wonders at getting you way, way stronger than you are right now without complex formulas, weird practices, or ridiculous supplements.
So let’s check ’em out!
3 ‘stupid simple’ strength strategies
- Grease the groove
This is probably my favorite of them all, not only because of the insane results that I and countless others have had from doing it, but also because it’s literally a no-sweat way of building strength.
Essentially, you pick 1–2 exercises (but no more than that) to do throughout the day, EVERY day, and you simply do a super-easy set just whenever you think about it. That’s it. You’ll want to put at least 15 minutes between sets, and ideally an hour or more between them, and you just do 50% or less of what you COULD do in that time.
So let’s say you can do 10 pushups on a desk or counter and 10 lunges per leg. Every so often throughout the day, do between 3–5 reps of each and that’s it.
Whenever the thought occurs to you or you have 30 spare seconds, just do it again. Every 2 weeks or so, test yourself to see how far you’ve come (and take the rest of the day off after testing). You’ll likely be shocked at how much stronger you’ve gotten.
I did this years ago with pistol squats and was able to go from 8 per leg to 20 per leg in 2 months, without ever doing more than 5 reps at a time (and usually only 2–3 per set) and simultaneously took my one-rep max from 16 kg per leg to 32 kg per leg WITHOUT ever doing them with added weight.
It takes patience but works like magic.
2. Back off sets
Now this is something you may not have heard of, but the concept is one that will revolutionize your quest for greater strength. Like Greasing the Groove, it’s ridiculous how much strength you can build with this.
The crux of it is this: in addition to lifting heavier weights or doing harder exercises (as you should be doing already), throw in plenty of light-weight exercises as well for higher-rep sets. Not so high that you have to sprint to a puke bucket afterward, but far higher than normal — say, 20+ reps. Bare-bones basic calisthenics and kettlebell drills fit the bill for this perfectly.
So once or twice a week, you could switch out elevated one-arm pushups and assisted pistols with standard pushups and lunges and aim for 20+ reps in multiple sets spread throughout the day. The added muscle and connective-tissue strength you pack on from this will speed your strength gains along faster than you can say “Hey, you there…feel my bicep”
3. Specialized variety
As much as we all love our favorite “pet lifts” (for me it’s pullups with a shoulder width grip and pistol squats), if that’s all you ever do, you’ll end up with muscle and strength imbalances that will make your life needlessly hard on you, and you’ll probably rack up some soft-tissue injuries and inflammations as well.
Specialized variety is probably the simplest way to switch things up for the better in your training. Here’s a sample workout:
‘A’ day
Military press — 5x5 per arm
Chinups — 5x5
Front squats — 8x3
‘B’ day
Tall kneeling press (military press while ‘standing’ on the knees) — 5x5
Wide-grip pullups — 5x5
Goblet squats — 3x8
This specialized variety will keep your training entertaining while also speeding you forward on your strength journey faster and with fewer speed bumps. Best of all, you will be less likely to encounter tweaks and injuries along the way as you are varying the way you stress your body so that your muscles and soft tissues develop better and in a variety of different ways, without necessarily having to switch to a different exercise all together.
3 ½. Put your specialized variety exercises into your Grease the Groove practice
This gets a ½ ranking since we’re combining two of the above strategies.
Basically, what you could do is this: Stick with the traditional strength exercises for your organized training sessions, and play with some variations throughout the day. So if you’re doing chin-ups in your regular practice, toss in some wide-grip or neutral-grip pullups throughout the day every day and watch as your chin-ups feel so easy you’ll need to start adding weight or doing more reps in order to keep your sessions from all becoming way too light.
On that note, if you like training that:
- Gives you more strength than it takes from you
- Improves your stamina and resilience simultaneously
- Powers-up every nook, cranny, crevice, and corner of your Soft Machine
Then you just might like my 9-Minute Kettlebell and Bodyweight Challenge.
As the name indicates, it’s just 9 minutes long, and it’s designed to be done WITH your current workouts — NOT instead of them.
Even cooler:
Many find that it actually amplifies their strength in their favorite kettlebell and bodyweight moves, like presses, squats, pullups, and more.
And best of all, it’s free.
How free?
I’m talkin’ freer than the 4th of July, my friend.
Get thee thine own copy here => http://www.9MinuteChallenge.com
Have fun and happy training!
Aleks Salkin
