Please note though, I don’t know Adam from, uh, Adam, so I am not claiming any special insights here…

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1. The Investments Series – Adam wrote a series of articles for Straight to the Bar in which he described the basic lifts that he believes are essential for any lifter, regardless of their goals.  It’s a great series that really makes you think about what you are trying to achieve with your lifting.

- Investments 1 – the Zercher Squat and Suitcase Deadlift

- Investments 2 – the Turkish Get Up and the Halo

- Investments 3 – the Jump Stretch Band Crush Lift

- Investments 4 – the Plate Curl and the Hot Potato

- Investments 5 – the RKC Arm Bar

- Investments 6 – the Hammer Curl, Pistol and Sandbag Bear Hug

Regular Garage Gym goers will be surprised by the lack of the competitive power-lifts: the standard (or sumo) deadlift, bench press and back squat.  Also conspicuous by their absence are the standard assistance lifts: rack pulls, good mornings, box squats, front squats, floor presses and board presses.  Fans of the Olympic lifts will note that there are no snatches, cleans, jerks or variants.

As a huge fan of bodyweight exercises, I am slightly put out by the lack of pull-ups and dips.   I concede that not everyone is designed to dip but I would definitely stick my chin out on the pull up.  Maybe one day I will do my own investments series.  But first, I need to invest a bit more!

After re-reading the series again prior to writing this post, I remembered a post on Mike The Machine Bruce where he describes a linear progression routine for added mass.  That routine was:

- Deadlifts 5 x 5

- Pull ups with weight 5 x 5

- Dips with weight 5 x 5

- Shrugs 5 x 5

- Swings 5 x 5

Leaving aside my thoughts on the details of Mike’s programme and with the caveat that Mike’s routine is couched as a mass-gainer and not an Investments in Strength routine, it is interesting to note his emphasis on bodyweight plus weight exercises over Adam’s more revolutionary choices.

2. Interviews by Josh Hanagarne – this blog post on World’s Strongest Librarian has links to all parts of Josh’s interview with Adam.  It also promises a review of Josh’s upcoming week of training with Adam, which will be compulsive reading for me and many others, I have no doubt.

3. My Thoughts on Strength – this article by Adam on Dragondoor is the best advocate of consistency, time and hard work that I have read.

4. Leverage lifts – this article is just brilliant.  I would add the shovel deadlift, Thor’s hammer, and the front lever and planche progressions to this great list of innovative exercises.  What’s more, they require very little equipment.  What more could a Garage Gym goer require?

5. Adam’s taste in music – a lot of people underestimate the importance of good training environment.  Music is a big part of that environment for me and Disturbed is undoubtedly the best music to listen to while you are hitting the iron hard.

Just writing this has inspired me to mess around with some leverage lifting (and I confess, I went downstairs and tried some plate curls halfway through a paragraph).  You’ll see the results in my next workout plan on Friday.  I hope you find Adam as motivating as I do…

1. Applied Strength is one of dozens of blogs about getting stronger and fitter using kettlebells.  Brett Jones is an RKC and writes programmes with Gray Cook, one of the legends behind Perform Better.  I’m not currently into kettlebells, but I like Brett’s inquisitiveness.  I also appreciate the new exercises and techniques that he takes the time to post on his blog.
2. Chasing Strength is another kettlebell blog by Geoff Neupert.  Infrequently updated, the content is nevertheless excellent when it appears.  Like this pressing tutorial, which I have started thinking about combined with a “grease the groove” approach in some feeder workouts…
3. Adam T Glass is one of those genuinely unique and larger than life characters.  He also seems to be entirely in a class of his own.  Basically, if he can get his hands around it, he can bend it, lift it or tear it.  I really wouldn’t want to upset him…
4. Conditioning Research does exactly what it says on the tin.  Well, it started off that way but now it includes lots of cool videos of people doing strong stuff.
5. Extreme Human Performance is another descriptive blog that focuses on documenting the extraordinary feats of strength that people can achieve when they put their minds to it.  I was probably one of the few people who were disappointed by Mike T Nelson’s moving there as I was already following him beforehand and figured that whereas I used to follow two blogs, now there was only one.
6. Precision Nutrition is the place to go for the nuts and bolts of your nutrition information.  I couldn’t decide whether to put this in the website or the blogs list.  I came down on the blog side because that’s the part of the site I benefit from most.
7. The Science of Sport provides a fascinating analysis of the current sporting events, breaking down the barriers between the (generally) ignorant media and the curious public.
8. World’s Strongest Librarian defies description.  Josh Hanagarne is a remarkable human being.  Just go and have a look and see.  You won’t regret it.  Along with Carl Lanore of Superhuman Radio, Josh seems to be one of those people whose main activity in life is making other people feel better about living.
9. Tony Gentilcore at the Boston Herald.  Tony is light relief for when things strength and fitness related get too serious.  I just wish I could get Google reader to pick up an RSS feed for his blog at the Boston Herald…
10. Brian St Pierre is the resident nutrition guru at Cressey Performance and an all-round knowledgeable guy with regularly updated posts on foods that are good for you, bad for you and downright ugly for you.

So that’s my take on the best strength and fitness blogs out there at the moment.  If you know of any other great blogs, please let me know.  I can always fit another subscription into my Google Reader!