if you know me at all, you know that  I have been researching physical culture material that dates back as far as 1806

from gymnastics(medical, curative, military, scholastic etc) to wrestling and boxing   

to circular strength (found this term in a manual from 1896) 

ie:indian clubs, jori, gada etc, weight lifting and muscle control

names like 

Jahn 

Gutsmiller

Posse

Checkley, Douglas, Warman, Kehoe, Burns, Cromie, Benedict, 

Sargent ,

McFadden et al

Dr Ed Thomas opened my eyes to a whole world of physical culture a while back 

He came here to Minneapolis where he kindly donated his time and a good deal of equipment to the North Minneapolis Police Athletic League program, teaching a group of kids how to use dumb bells, indian clubs, kettlebells (I got to teach a quick course) medicine balls, tubing (Jason Green from CES Fitness was the go to man for this and his crew including Nate and Laura were all excellent reps of the physical culture), bodyweight and agility ladders. 

He taught all of this over the course of 1 6 hour day 

It was inspiring for a couple reasons

1. the efficacy of the teaching method

2. the focus on skill rather than a "workout"

3. teaching the kids to teach each other and the idea of "docinde docimus" or "learn by teaching"

4. he did not make it into a mysterious and inaccessible secret, he kept insisting that we, me the whole group, the kids, anyone, could become proficient and even excel at any of the skills we were learning, and that even if the movement we just performed was not perfect, we could try to make the next one better, and continue to do that every time we moved

5. the idea of "precision, progression and variety" or that if we focus on precision, and use intelligent progressions adding variety as we become more skilled there is no end to the level of ability, always striving toward mastery

More than anything, it was awesome to meet him, he is an erudite and low key man

Humble and inspiring respect in most who meet him, and still able to crack a joke and be human.

So

where was I going with this?

right

I have noticed that there are common themes in all of the works that I have been researching

and they just happen to correspond with the 5 Rings of Fitness

Breath

Posture

Strength

Speed

Stamina

seriously, 

every manual has a section devoted to breathing and posture

all of the authors (though they seem to draw from each other in a linear time line going back to Aristotle-see the Arte Gymnastica de Mercurialis) have similar progressions that work through building quality movement and full access to range of motion at each and every joint first

then building strength through that range of motion

then adding speed of execution to the progression

and finally adding a stamina component as a last piece

so

breath, line your frame up in the most efficient manner for the activity, become strong, become fast, learn to maintain that activity for the longest duration without effort

this last point is key

all 

all of the works emphasize that one should stop when one becomes taxed, tired, or even starts to show signs of fatigue

sound familiar?

See Elements of effort

or

Elements of efficiency

or whatever you want to call them

its great to know where the starting point of any thread is

follow the thread long enough and you will discover that the warp and weave of the tapestry you are viewing has more common threads than not 

and that for every alteration in the direction of the thread, for every split and splice

all of the threads lead back to the same points

one thread binds them all together and that is the effort of mankind to express the human form and movement in the most eloquent means 

to speak with the body, a language of strength and beauty

if you want to know more about the works that I am referring to by Jahn, Cromie, Kehoe or any others, just ping me by email (use the contact form on my site) and I will be happy to share.

there are some folks that are making money selling many of the manuals I have been reading, the ones I have found for free on the internet as PDF's that you can download

so...

anyway

cheers mates

Get Strong

Stay Strong