Some Stuff...

-- Why will some people readily take cholesterol medication but not change their diets. If they need to take something, why not fish oil? I asked this to an older friend recently who had started taking cholesterol medication and he said he wouldn't take anything like fish oil because he didn't know the dangers and heard that it thins your blood. So you opted for drugs instead?

-- If you are going to get a religious tattoo, that's your business, but I think it's a safe bet to say that getting the phrase "Only God can save me" or "forgive me for my sins" is, at this point, a horrible decision. You're not Tupac. People will laugh.

-- Like in-the-gym-training-volume, the volume of speed workouts should also be kept fairly low. Doing a few dozen forty yard dashes is overkill and will not lead to speed gains but over training. If you can get by with 5-10 total hard sets on your leg days of squats, step ups and glute hams, what makes you think you need to quadruple this number on the track? You don't. Speed work needs to be of a very high quality, not quantity. If you are not improving, you are regressing.

-- The best lifting straps are the old school $5 Harbinger's. Lots of companies have "the worlds strongest wrist straps," but they are usually too long and/or too thick and kind of defeat the purpose. Sure the cheapo straps will break in a few months but who cares? They're five bucks! And do you really want to keep the same pair of smelly, rancid straps for 18 years?

-- The Growth Hormone and testosterone increases you get from training are negligible. Most bodybuilders take several iu's of GH per day before they see any results at all. The amount you get from decreasing your rest periods or using a higher volume of training is nowhere near this amount and thus will do nothing. The same can be said for testosterone. Bodybuilders know that they need at least 500mg's of test per week to see results. You don't get anywhere near this kind of increase from training.

Competition also increases testosterone levels. But this doesn't mean that if I sat around and played John Madden football with my buddies all day that I would get huge.
Extreme temperatures increase GH but leaving my warm house and going out to play in the snow doesn't add inches to my biceps.

The concept of hormonal increases due to training is largely over rated.

-- Despite what you may have been led to believe by pop radio and MTV, there are still some bands making real rock n roll. I had the pleasure of seeing the Kings of Leon play Wednesday night at Radio City Music Hall in New York City. If you ever get the chance, I highly recommend seeing them. They are a very talented band with a different sound. Nothing like the crap they play on most radio stations.