Strength Training

How to Get Your First Pushup, Pullup or Dip

Getting your first pushup, pullup, or dip can be a demanding but rewarding journey. It’s always one of the most popular topics on social media for personal trainers. The reason for this is simple – it’s a really common goal that lots of people want to achieve!

Like most coaches, I’ve made plenty of posts online demonstrating how to do negative pullups, assisted pushups, and dip variations to get your first reps at these challenging exercises. However, I wanted to go one step further.

A close up of a woman's hands on the floor as she performs a pushup
By Ayo Ogunseinde on Unsplash

The Strength Training Approach to Getting Your First Pushup, Pullup or Dip

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: if you’re looking to master a bodyweight exercise that you cannot currently do, then you need to approach it as a strength training exercise. People often assume that bodyweight training occupies its own space within training, and that it’s beholden to its own special rules.

This is not the case!

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4 Thoughts on Strength Training and Longevity

In recent years, strength training and longevity has become an incredibly popular topic. As a 35-year old personal trainer, I would be lying if I said it wasn’t on my mind. I’m reaching a stage of my life where training becomes an investment for the future, and I have to take my longevity seriously.

By Jesper Aggergaard

Longevity in training refers to our ability to offset mortality risks as we age, ostensibly allowing us to live longer. I would also argue that the current usage of the term goes further. When people talk about using strength training and longevity, they’re often also talking about improving quality of life at older ages. Our ability to retain our movement capabilities, perform tasks, and avoid injuries are a huge appeal of the longevity training movement. These are the pillars of a healthier later life.

Unfortunately, as with many fitness topics, the concept of longevity has been co-opted to promote any number of “life hacks,” snake oil supplements, and training regimes. The fear of old age and ill health is a strong motivator that can be harnessed to manipulate people into making bad decisions. That’s why I want to simplify the topic and discuss how we can use strength training to improve longevity.

a woman is standing in a gym holding a barbell. She is folding over at the hips to perform a Romanian deadlift
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4 Core Training Myths That Need to Die

In the world of fitness, nothing is more pervasive than a core training myth. The obsession with six-pack abs, the fear of back pain, and the desire for greater sport performance all drive us to hunt for the perfect core training exercise, programme, or overarching strategy.

The pursuit of core training greatness can cause us to eagerly adopt whatever core training myths we see online. Some of these are well-intentioned, but simply go too far in their application. Others misinterpret the findings of scientific studies. Some of these myths are perpetuated just to follow trends on social media. No matter their origin, the end result is the same: unsatisfactory results for you, and limiting beliefs about your capabilities.

A woman laying prone on the floor of a studio gym, lifting her chest from the floor in a "cobra" pose

With this in mind, I’ll discuss some stubborn core training myths and explain where they miss the mark. This should steer you towards a better method of core training, no matter what your end goal is.

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The Best Tips For Better Squats and Deadlifts

When you’re getting started in strength training, a good goal is to improve your squats and deadlifts.

Getting started with your big lifts is more straightforward than people make out, but mastering them takes time.

Some of these tips take a closer look at the technique used in training, whereas other tips are more focussed on exercise selection and programme design.

Man standing inside a hex bar preparing to deadlift

More Content to Improve Your Squats and Deadlifts

I’ve written a huge number of guides for squatting and deadlifting in this blog. You can find many of them in the “Strength Training” category on this site.

For this post, I want to focus on some of the video content I’ve made. This allows you to get some quick visual tips for improving squats and deadlifts instead of reading. I’ve been working hard on my video content lately, so please consider subscribing!

Image of me bending over a bar preparing to perform a clean
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3 Crucial Ingredients for Your First Pressup

Your first pressup is an important fitness milestone. It’s one of the keys to mastering your bodyweight and building upper body strength. It’s one of the most common goals my clients have, and I’ve helped a number of people build their pressup strength. You can learn more about their successes with my testimonials.

A close up of a woman's hands on the floor as she performs a pushup
By Ayo Ogunseinde on Unsplash

I’ve helped a large number of people build up to their first pressup. Thanks to this, I have developed a check list of prerequisites for building pressup strength. This isn’t as simple as “get strong at pushing”, although that is certainly a large part of the equation that we can tackle in various ways. There are other components that often get neglected, which we’ll cover below. Without further ado, let’s get started.

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The Most Important Differences between Deadlifts and Romanian Deadlifts

When my clients attempt to follow their training programmes outside of personal training sessions, one of the first things they forget is the differences between deadlifts and Romanian deadlifts.

And who can blame them? The differences may seem clear if you’ve been training a while, but there are enough similarities to muddy the waters.

image of me standing up straight holding a 100kg barbell, after completing a deadlift.

I recently made a Youtube video explaining the differences between deadlifts and Romanian deadlifts. It has been pretty successful (at least by the standard of my channel!). This goes to show that there are plenty of people out there that struggle with the distinction between deadlifts and Romanian deadlifts.

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4 Tricks for Strength Training and Weight Loss

Many of my clients want to train for strength and weight loss simultaneously. Strength training has grown in popularity for its wide range of benefits, but for many people these benefits sit alongside the desire to become leaner.

I don’t talk about weight loss much as I think it is an over-emphasised aspect of getting fitter and healthier, but I think it’s worth discussing how to lose weight and get stronger at the same time as these are such common goals for the new clients I meet.

It can be challenging to get stronger and lose weight at the same time, although this depends on your approach to weight loss. These goals are not as closely aligned as strength training and muscle building, which I have discussed previously. Strength and weight loss do not have much in common in terms of the processes that occur in the body, and this means the steps we have to take in training are not complimentary.

Common mistakes when building strength and losing weight include:

Picture of a woman gripping a barbell and hinging over in a deadlift movement.
  • Pursuing overly restrictive diets that stifle recovery and do not provide adequate fuel for training.
  • Overemphasising high-intensity cardio that leaves less energy for strength training.
  • Thinking that weight training alone will burn enough calories to create a meaningful calorie deficit.

As with any attempt to address two goals at the same time, a delicate balance is needed. There are several options at your disposal.

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3 Tips to Build Strength and Muscle in One Programme

Many of my clients want to build strength and muscle at the same time. Strength training has grown in popularity for its wide range of benefits, but for many people this still doesn’t trump the appeal of changing their physique as well. It helps that building additional muscle tissue is also beneficial for everyone.

It helps that getting stronger and building muscle can be complimentary processes. This means that the two goals do not clash with each other as much as, say, getting stronger and losing weight.

That being said, gaining strength and muscle are not exactly the same process, as I have detailed with some analogies in the past. This means there is some potential for these training goals to clash if a programme isn’t balanced properly. Some common faults are:

black and white photo with barbell in the foreground, and me sitting on a bench in the background
  • Too much hypertrophy work, which can lead to fatigue that hampers strength performance.
  • An overemphasis on strength work with long rest periods can take a lot of training time, leaving less time to work on volume.
  • Treating strength and muscle building training as completely separate blocks, which leads to too much time away from either adaptation.

Training to build strength and muscle at the same time is a delicate balance, and these tips will help you get it just right.

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4 Great Accessory Exercises for a Bigger Squat

Including the right squat accessory exercise can revolutionise your squat training. They can help you get a bigger squat whilst also broadening the focus of your training programme. They can also be used to vary your training if you’re getting bored!

A close-up of atattooed woman's shoulder as she holds a bar on her back for a back squat

How to Choose the Right Squat Accessory Exercise

The right assistance exercise for your squat is one that allows you to continue training the squat pattern without detracting too much from your squat training by taking too much time or energy to perform. Depending on your programme, this might mean performing another variation of the squat or it might mean performing a completely distinct accessory exercise. Whichever you opt for, consistently completing your assistance exercises will reward you with a bigger squat long-term.

Image of me smiling and loading plates onto a barbell that is sitting in the squat rack.

The key to choosing the right assistance exercises for a bigger squat is to look at your weaknesses. If you’re constantly failing the squat in a particular part of the movement, you may wish to work on that position more. Feeling unbalanced in the squat? You may need to work on your weight distribution and technique. If you just want to add more volume to the legs without a tonne of extra systemic fatigue, you may opt for isolation exercises.

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How to Train Around Grip Strength Limitations

One of my favourite parts of training beginners is getting them strong enough that their grip strength becomes a limiting factor in compound lifts. This may seem like an odd boast, but let me explain.

As your skill, confidence and strength grows over the first couple of months of training, you will reach a point where the target muscle of an exercise can tolerate more work than your grip can. This is a great early milestone in training, but it can quickly become an obstacle.

When grip strength fails, people usually notice the following symptoms:

  • Unable to keep the hands closed around the bar/dumbbell;
  • Burning forearms;
  • Regularly needing to adjust the hands on the implement;
  • Unable to concentrate on the exercise for fear of dropping the bar/dumbbell.

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