In this weeks episode of On The Line, Tommy interviews Minnesota Viking Fullback Jake Bargas! Bargas Played for the North Carolina Tar Heels before signing with the Minnesota Vikings as an undrafted free agent in 2020. 

The kettlebell snatch is a powerful movement that builds full body strength and power. Once you’ve mastered the basics it’s time to get some rotation in! Here are three variations that will give you a new movement to master as well as build rotational power. 

For each of these variations it’s crucial to have the “float” at the top to allow for the bell to finish in the overhead position without slamming on your forearm. Regardless of what orientation or degree of rotation you’re in, maintain enough tension throughout your torso and during the movement itself to avoid putting too much pressure on your lower back. 

 1. Deadstart Rotational Snatch

This variation will require the least amount of coordination since you’ll be moving the bell vertically and across the body. There is no drop in the variation so you’ll only be getting the concentric pull.

2. Half Rotational Snatch

This variation will have the bell...

8 Hamstrings Stretches to Boost Your Yoga Practice

Jacquelyn Umof 

Hamstring flexibility plays a major role in your yoga practice development. Many people are after poses, like handstands, that require the posterior chain to be loose enough to achieve those challenging poses.

To access the full movement of your hamstrings, the yoga practice presents a series of increasingly difficult forward folds. Even reaching full boat pose (navasana) when working your core requires hamstring flexibility.

Two key principles are needed in order to safely attempt this movement — how to safely go deeper in your hamstring stretch, and how to relax all of the muscles that surround your hamstring — neither of the two is as easy as it sounds.

Each pose below will target a different area of the back of the legs to help loosen you up.

Most importantly, it’s important to never quickly enter or exit a stretch. Give the pose and your body the respect it deserves, and...

Nutrition can be incredibly confusing.

Especially when you are trying to get specific results, and it doesn’t help that there are a lot of opposing views being marketed to us all of the time.

How do we clear a path to a better you?

As the Education Director for Living.Fit, I give a pretty simple and effective way to create lifelong change in your nutrition, by a small and slow and steady approach.

Marcus Martinez, our Kettlebell Master Coach, gives another incredibly simple way to make effective and easy changes to your nutrition.

Finding what works for you requires some experimentation and tracking. The best diet in the world might not be the best diet for you personally. It’s important to be mindful of the way your body responds to certain foods and meal timing. Even the “healthiest” foods in the world might cause a gut reaction that makes it less optimal for you. 

The same goes for meal timing. Fasting is all the rage and has helped many...

Battle Ropes are already intensity in ten cities, but if you are ready to level up with them...check these 5 Variations to Intensify your battle rope training: 

1. Tall Kneeling - This position allows you to understand how much your legs give you power, even if you are just doing an “upper body exercise” like the alternating waves or lateral waves. The tall kneeling still allows you to use your hips and torso to generate force for and through your upper body and arms.
2. Half-Kneeling Right - I choose half-kneeling if I am trying to “turn-on” one of my glutes or get more muscular activation through one glute at a time. This will help force unilateral engagement and activation.
3. Half-Kneeling Left - Don’t forget to use both sides, unless there is a radical asymmetry in your musculature and engagement...no one wants to walk in circles from too much engagement on one side over the other.
4. Seated - If you thought your abs and upper back were...

• James Herrera Bio
• https://newsroom.woundedwarriorproject.org/JamesHerrera
  
  
  
• David Veros Bio

David Veros served in the US Air Force from 2004 through 2012 where after multiple deployments to Iraq he sustained injuries, both physically and mentally.  These injuries, PTSD and TBI, took their toll and he was medically retired in 2012.  David is a Purple Heart recipient, Air Force Combat Action Medal, Air Force Accommodation Medal, and Air Force Achievement with Valor device to name a few.  In 2018 David participated in the Wounded Warrior Project Physical Health and Wellness Coaching Program.  Through this program David has lost weight, gained flexibility, and improved his confidence. 

Currently David is a Warrior Support Specialist for the Wounded Warrior Project (WWP) Resource Center. He has worked at WWP for over six years supporting our nations warriors and their families. The WWP Resource Center connects individuals with resources as applicable....

Can we trust everything we see online?

Aaron Guyett and Marcus Martinez talk about this, as well as the good, the bad, and the ugly with online fitness personalities.

There are really excellent and very authentic online fitness personalities, but there are also money-hungry pretenders online as well.

Marcus and Aaron give a few tips on how to tell the difference between these two types of online fitness personalities.

Let us know what you think in the comments below.

Check out more interviews and articles from Marcus Martinez and Aaron Guyett in the blog, or get full versions by subscribing to our membership here:  https://www.living.fit/kettlebell-workout-plans-and-memberships

The Clean is a deceptive exercise. It looks like a curl, but moves from the ground to your shoulder in an entirely different way. The key thing for those new to the clean to understand is the trajectory the kettlebell needs to take and the primary movers. 

Here are a handful of regressions that will help you on that path! 

1. Two hand Cheat Curl Clean - This is helping you understand that the bell doesn't come end over end as it finishes in the rack. Even with speed the kettlebell should nestle itself in the rack like a baby bird as opposed to a wrecking ball. 
2. Two hand Hang Clean - Once the pathway has been set, now we want to add some hip timing of the hinge and extension. The primary mover is not the upper body, so this will help you practice that. You’ll still use your other arm for half the work here. 
3. Assisted Hang Clean - Now we’re speed and less intervention from the other hand. This will help use work the lower body with a powerful drive, but...

Strength and size typically go hand in hand. The more muscular a person is the stronger they are, but that’s not always the case. Building strength and building muscle have some key differences that need to be made aware of. The skill of strength can be acquired through better technique, increased neural drive, and better firing of motor units. Progressive overload is a necessity, but strength is primarily created in the 1-6 rep range with greater rest periods. While incredibly taxing typically the time under tension is minimal with much less blood flow into the muscles as compared to sets in the 8-15 rep range. 

Many athletes need strength, but also need to stay in a certain weight class. Take Olympic weightlifters for example. The practice of getting stronger doesn’t necessarily equate to muscular size gains. While their movements are very technique driven and work strength and power, you’d think many of the athletes would be bigger with the insane...

The swing is a powerful movement that helps the strongest and most powerful athlete get even more explosive. Two hand swings are great and have their uses, but here are five swing variations you might not have tried before.

1. One Arm Staggered Swing 

Here you’re going to take the mechanics of the swing (strong hip drive, tense upper body, tall standing position), but instead of staying in a bilateral stance with your feet at an equal distance you’re going to stagger your feet. This allows you to focus slightly more on one side (your front leg) as you drive through to the top of the exercise. On this variation avoid rotating your torso on the downswing. Sink into your front glute on the downswing to add a greater unilateral focus to the movement. 

1. Alternating Staggered Rotational Swing 

This is by far one of my favorite kettlebell exercises. You get the timing of the alternating position from the hand to hand transfer as well as your foot position, the...