Secrets of the Spartan Warrior Workout

This ebook is give you the lowdown on how to get the most from the book Spartan Warrior Workout and the companion website http://spartanwarriorworkout.com The SWW is based on a workout done by most of the actors and some of the crew, including the director, of the movie 300. The director wanted the actors to look as close as possible to their characters as depicted in Frank Millers 300 graphic novel. In it the characters are ripped but not big and bulky. The director contacted well known trainer Mark Twight to whip his people into Spartan shape. As aprt of their 4 months of training Twight developed one workout that came to be known as the 300 workout: 25 dead hang pullups 50 Deadlifts with 135lb bar 50 pushups 50 box jumps 50 floor wipers 25 dead clean and presses per arm with a 16k (35lb) kettlebell 25 more dead hang pullups

This workout was to be done as fast as possible using the prescribed weights. One of the actors had a time of under 18 minutes, a grueling pace. This workout was actually a challenge to test the mettle of the actor/warrior to see where they were in their physical training and to see how mentally tough they were. Someone somewhere heard about this workout and it was dubbed the 300 workout even though it was only done once. In 2009 I was contracted to write a book about how to train almost anyone to be able to do this workout as written. With such a wide potential audience, from someone who may have never touched a barbell or a kettlebell and couldnt do a pushup to save their live to high level fitness enthusiasts who do these kinds of workouts almost daily, I had to figure out programs that most anyone could do to some extent. What wound up in the book was a Beginners program (Program 1) and an Intermediate program (Program 2). Due to space we had to cut the Advanced workout which was pretty tough and focused and required minimal equipment. (The Advanced workout is available when you join the Spartan Warrior Workout Club, plus youll get access to all the videos of the exercises and were loading up more soon.)

The programs were designed to allow some flexibility in most aspects of the workout, you can scale the pullups and pushups so they are doable by making the movements a little easier e.g. incline pushups instead of regular pushups. You also can adjust the weight bearing exercises by adjusting the prescribed weight down so you can handle it. Follow the instructions in the book on how to determine where you are in regards to your pullups and pushups. What your 1 RM (rep max or how much you can lift once and only once) for your deadlift. The size of the box you should be jumping on etc. The programs then tell you to use a certain percentage of weight on DL and supplemental exercises as well as with the dead clean and press. It will also give you the appropriate reps to be working at on other exercises.

So what are the secrets? 1. Be consistent and stay focused on the goal. There is plenty of variety in these workouts, follow the plan and do the workouts in order, the way they were written. 2. To get the best results get plenty of rest at night and train no more than 4 days a week. Monday, Tuesday, Thursday Friday is one way to break it up. Without sleep your body cant recover and if it cant recover it cant grow, get stronger or otherwise improve. A little downtime is a good thing. If you come to a workout where you just feel beat up, take the day off! 3. Pullups and pushups take the most time to develop for most people Dont try to rush the development of your pullups and pushups. Follow the guidelines in the book. If you rush things youll wind up getting hurt. It could take months to be able to do 10 good dead hang pullups. It could take just as long for pushups. Stick to the plan, be consistent in your practice of them. 4. Deadlifts can take a while to master perfect form but your only trying to work with 135lbs and most guys should be able to do that weight right off the bat, if not you should develop the involved musculature fairly quickly; they are amongst the biggest in the body. 5. Floor Presses are just weird a. While the bench press movement is involved in getting the bar up it isnt necessary to do a lot of benching, pushups work the same muscles, so if you feel you are overtraining back off the bench work and floor presses. b. You are more concerned with being able to lock out the bar, or kettlebells, and hold them there for an extended period of time. Do a lot of static holds and use a spotter to help you get the bar in place if you cant get it there yourself. Make sure your spotter is

paying attention, when your arms are trashed from holding the bar you arent going to want to re-rack it yourself! c. The leg/ab portion of the Floor Wiper makes holding the bar even tougher since your base of support is smaller once the legs comes up. The additional rotation of the hips to bring the feet to touch the plates adds another dimension in core stability. Practice the leg movement by itself to focus on the core without worrying about dropping the bar on your head! d. Lots of unicycles and other movements to strengthen the obliques. The body weight row is an awesome exercise for working core control. 6. Box Jumps will kill your legs and you may feel your abs the next day as well. The effort of bringing the knees up is a lot of hip flexor action which activates the core. a. Practice landing softly by doing toe jumps. Go into a deep squat and spring up like you are going to come off the floor but dont, youll be on the balls of your feet momentarily. Now reverse your movement sinking the heels gently back to the floor and drop back down into your squat. Once you can do that start coming off the floor focusing on the landing not on your height. Remember, be like a cat, no should hear your land and you should not be getting jarred or banging up your feet when you land. b. Once you have the landing down start doing jump tucks. Instead of squatting down deep and jumping you are really just standing up and quickly pulling your knees to your chest. Again, land softly, dont drive your feet into the floor. c. Now jump on the box, get one that is tall enough to challenge you but not enough to intimidate you. Most people are afraid of falling and hitting the box. Mens box height should be 24 but that is pretty high. Start with an 18 or 20 box until you are comfortable with that height. Ladies start with a 12 or 14 box. d. Do lots of high rep body weight squats and add in some kettlebell goblet squats. e. The book mentions barbell jump squats, but upon reflection these suck and can be dangerous even to those who are experienced lifters. The bar can come down hard on the spine causing all kinds of problems. Do jumps squats using a kettlebell held in goblet position. Both hands holding the handle in front of the chest, elbows down. Squat deep and jump as you stand. Oh yeah, this will kick your abs hard too! 7. Dead Cleans these are quad intensive, when doing them for high reps or low reps heavy weight you should feel it in your quads. You are not pulling the bell by the strength of your arms, even though they are obviously involved, it is the legs that do 90% of the work. The arm is just there to transmit the energy/force from the legs to the bell. a. Dont curl it. The palm never faces away from the body. This is the biggest issue Ive seen with guys, they want to curl everything. These are cleans, they can take some bit of practice to get the hang of and you may want to seek out a certified kb instructor to validate or fix your technique. Ask them who certified them: RKC, KBA, IKFF, AOS,AKC/WKC. These are the main groups doing top notch certs. Im certified by them all except AOS.

b. Keep the elbows close to your side as the bell is coming up and once you have racked the bell c. Use your legs to put the bell on the ground the bell falls off the hand and as the arm straightens the legs absorb the force and the bell gently touches the ground. You should not feel it it your elbow! 8. Presses stay tight keep your legs under the shoulders, squeeze the ground with your feet and focus on your lats. If your elbow is where it should be after the clean you shuld be able to flair the lat and tricep and press. The arm should end up directly over the shoulder, vertical not in front. If it is in front of the shoulder you need to get it cleared to make sure you have no injuries then work on your flexibility and range of motion. 9. When practicing 2 handed kettlebell swings do NOT swing them so they go above the head. Improper technique or bad shoulders can lead to a bad injury 10. Do the pre-hab/re-hab! I dont care what your age or your fitness level, do the warm-ups and cool-downs at each workout. A lot of people skip the cool-down especially younger guys, but doing them will help keep you healthy and moving freely and reduce the risk of injury. They can also prevent or lessen the dreaded next day I cant walk or raise my arms syndrome! 11. Drink Water Drink a LOT of water; your body weight in ounces every day! If you weight 170lbs you should be drink 85 ounces of water! 12. Ditch the sodas, diet or otherwise they are full of crap. Artificial sweeteners are worse for you than sugar. 13. Eat whole, fresh raw (WFR) Whole foods (organic whenever possible), as fresh as possible (no canned or processed foods), as raw as possible, especially veggies. The more you cook veggies the fewer nutrients they retain. Veggies should be crispy not a soggy mess of goo! Southern style cooked veggies have no nutrients lleft in them. Dont waste your time. 14. If you cant pronounce an ingredient on a food label, dont eat the food. You do know how to read a label dont you? 15. Stay away from white foods breads, pastas, potatoes etc. You can eat bread, sparingly but it needs to be a natural dense (heavy when you pick it up) bread with real whole grains. If the label says enriched wheat flour or enriched anything, dont eat it, its just a lot of empty carbs 16. Sweet Potatoes or yams are good, just dont load them up with tons of butter. 17. Speaking of butter, use real butter not margarine or other substitutes

18. Dairy drink milk sparingly, its a good source of protein but unless you are getting organic milk you are getting a lot of growth hormones and antibiotics in it, left over from when the cows got it. Even organic milk isnt all that good for you, the pasteurization and homogenization of milk removes most of the good stuff, like the probiotcs that naturally occur in milk. 19. The same goes for cheeses (except macaroni & cheese ) American cheese is passable, cheddar or mozzarella are great, so is Colby, and pepper jack. Just make sure they are organic 20. Whats more important your short term grocery bill or your long term health? More and more Im convinced that the crap the food industry pushes on us is responsible for the poor state of health in this country. Higher obesity levels coincide with more carb-based and process foods. Higher cancer rates appear to coincide with increased use of HFCS. Estrogen laden foods and container are having an effect on the boys and girls. Boys have less testosterone and girls are developing faster = too much estrogen. There you have it 20 Secrets to help you master the Spartan Warrior Workout. I hope this ebook helps you with the SWW. Check the website often for more tips and join the SWW Club and gain access to over 40 videos (so far) and our members only forum where youll find the Advanced program as well as being able to ask question of me and other forum members.

Dave