By Pete Ryan  On average we gain weight over the holidays[i]. Unfortunately, for many that weight gain is cumulative and permanent[ii]. Many people believe we add around 5-10 pounds over the holidays, but in fact we only add between a pound or two a year (0.5-1Kg approx.) during the holiday season. The bad news is we do not tend to lose that weight...

By Pete Ryan There are many attributes a human needs to thrive, one of the most time consuming to develop is strength, although strength is not the first physical attribute to fade with age (that honour goes to power – strength with speed), strength can begin to decline not too long after we reach our physical peak (mid-20’s) if we do not work to...

By Pete Ryan Many people have dreams, goals and desires that they wish to achieve. You may want to be Mr Olympia, become a champion powerlifter or have 6-pack abs. Whatever the goal or dream, remember this fact. It is not the goal that is the important feature of this idea, it is the journey to that goal that will decide if you achieve it or not....

By Pete Ryan I believe that exercise has a good analogy with the person on the treadmill. If you slowly walk forward, you stay about the same, if you stop, you are going backwards. To move forward you have to run! It takes some effort to actually stay still, let alone move forward. I believe training is the same (once you reach adulthood). As a...

By Pete Ryan You often hear the quote “I want to maintain”, or “I just don’t want to lose any strength/size”.  This might be a reasonable sounding goal and it can often be the outcome in the older trainee, but I do not believe it should be a goal. I will give my reasoning below. The human body is a dynamic organism. It is not like a car or a bike....

By Pete Ryan  People can spend years accumulating every detail of a practice and yet this does not lead to success. How can the army of armchair experts on the internet know so much, and yet accomplish so little?To answer this question we need to learn the difference between knowing and doing, also how to translate knowledge from the theoretical into...