CCS Athletic Training

Dedication.

For those on the path to a healthier lifestyle, dedication is at the core of everything. Without it, your path will wander. With it, you have a clear direction of where you are going.

However, this is not to say that dedicating yourself to a new lifestyle will directly result in dedication. It's a life skill that needs just as much cultivation as your efforts in the gym or kitchen, day in and day out.

There is no easy way to develop dedication to a healthier lifestyle, it comes with each step you take in the right direction. Getting a workout in when you're exhausted from dealing with work, choosing the stairs over the elevator, putting down that second helping of dinner. All of these take dedication to the goals you're hoping to aspire to accomplish.

Take it in stride when that dedication falters, don't punish yourself too harshly, we all make mistakes on our way to the top. Take a minute, regroup, and then take note of how that made you feel. I'll bet it probably felt good in that moment, but in the long run, you know you can do better.

Achieving a healthier lifestyle isn's something that happens overnight, in a week or even a year.

ITS A LIFE LONG COMMITMENT TO YOURSELF.

Read that again.

Dedicate yourself to a better you and the rest will fall into place.

- Coach Corey

Training for strength should absolutely, 100%, without question, be part of every individuals training. As we grow stronger through physical training, our bodies become more resilient. When weight training is done right, muscle tissue, ligaments, and tendons all become more adaptive resulting in increased stability and support in our joints.

Tracking this is done through ABSOLUTE strength. The most amount of weight you can lift with one attempt. Absolute strength testing is usually done on big compound exercises like squats, deadlifts, bench press and overhead press.

Be sure to warm up thoroughly, perform a few light warm up sets, and then progress towards achieving an all out effort on one single attempt.

Write this number down. Continue training for 3-4 more months. Then retest!




Over the next few days, I will be discussing ways to measure progress when it comes to your physical health. Today we will be covering METRICS. 

Metrics are an important part to your physical development and progress, but shouldn’t be the only measurements. These are tools to give you empirical data on how you are moving along. First up, BODY FAT PERCENTAGE.

In my opinion, this is the most important metric for long term health and well being. Fat plays a vital role in various body systems, from your hormones, to your bone health, to your hair and teeth. However, when body fat gets out of hand and remains high for long periods of time, it wreaks havoc on your internal organs and circulatory system by blocking blood vessels and major arteries. Focusing on lowering your body fat will result in not only looking great but also improving long term health.