IGX

I review Pavel's book with my irresistible personal prejudice that stems from resenting unreal mentoring. Yet, Pavel proved himself by appealing to a majority of people who have been left out of the athletic world by virtue of the commercially motivated health clubs. Pavel benefits from the great opportunity of having a vast majority of customers hungry for motivation and challenge.

Many people have found a niche in Pavel's Kettlebell contests and exercises that enhance the upper body. It would be unfair to deny him such contribution to the field of folklore fitness. If left to my own device, I would give the book one star for poor planning and exposing readers to injurious activity. I opted for the four stars in crediting the highly motivated and innovative work of the author.

This book, published in 2003, shares the other criticized features of Pavel's books such as poor referencing, unscientific and unproven advices, commercially driven motives, and high risk and injury prone routines. The new features particular to this book that deserve criticism follow.

The book plunges into high-yield and high-risk bodyweight tensioning exercises from the get go. Push up, one leg squat, and pull ups assortments are principal routines described in the book. No single exercise will address the spinal erectors nor does any exercise address the spinal posture during squatting in particular.

The three exercises could cause life-long injury to the rotator cuffs, knees, and spines since the author admittedly states that "no routine is required". With no routine, the reader is left to believe in inconsistent training and quick short cut.

The author erroneously claims that "the harder you contract your muscles, the stronger they get". That defies the basic principle of physiology that muscles require external resistance in order to develop strength. Strength, the author claims, is a skill. The author further claims that only "tension" advances strength and bouncing and momentum motions is a form of cheating.

First, you could not get stronger by mere contracting your own muscles; otherwise the astronauts would have done that without resistance machines. Second, bouncing and momentum are essential in creating virtual forces that exceed static forces. All natural movements such as walking, running, and jumping require bouncing, impact, and inertia utilization. Without jerking motions, the fast muscle fibers would not develop strength, the tendons and ligaments would not toughen up, and the neural responses would not adapt to fast reaction.

A classic example of bouncing strength exercise is hand-hopping on horizontal parallel bars or the sides of a horizontally suspended ladder. That is an exercise which many top lifters have learned would strengthen the arms and upper body beyond any known weight training. It simply mimics what chimpanzees do on trees.

Pavel's light bodyweight enables him to do the one-leg squat, one arm push ups, and chin-ups far beyond the majority of the chubby and fluid-loaded American population. The limbs of the vast American population could easily buckle and incur permanent injuries with Pavel's macho routine of unsystematic and unorganized training. Of course, there is no one-hand pull-up in this book since that requires extreme power beyond what bodyweight training could offer.

The author's reliance on testimonial approval from participants of his web site does not lend credence to their objectivity or lack of conflict of interest.

Mohamed F. El-Hewie
Author of
Essentials of Weightlifting and Strength Training
Comment Comment | Permalink

T>1200 wrote:He's like Shaf with credentials.

The Venerable Bogatir X wrote:Do any of you recall his run on either DD or one of the old IG's?

Pinky wrote:

The Venerable Bogatir X wrote:Do any of you recall his run on either DD or one of the old IG's?

Wasn't there a gif of El Hewie doing some warm-up that people would post to make fun of him?