Since releasing Off The Floor, one of the questions that keeps coming up is “does biofeedback really work?” This is certainly not a new question me, as someone who has been advocating the Gym Movement Protocol and this style of training for four years. At first glance, people think it’s ridiculous that simply doing a movement can affect your range of motion – and even further that this actually means something.

Until someone decides to do a proper study on this (and it’s going to awfully difficult to do an RCT) we’ll have to rely on what we know so far, and what evidence we have. Here are a few things to consider:

• Every single client at The Movement Minneapolis is taught how to test. I’d estimate I’ve taught somewhere around 400 people. The vast majority diligently test everything. Every day I observe changes in people’s ROM based on the movements they test. Sometimes people are surprised that the exercise they hate the most tests the best. Other times people predict that a certain exercise won’t be good based on how their body is feeling and they are affirmed by the test. Day after day I observe people testing, and there is a clear and repeating correlation between their testing and their bodies.
• I’ve had several instances where people actively ignored a bad test, continued with doing the exercise and ended up tweaking something. This doesn’t seem to happen with exercises that tested well.
• I have several clients who are members of another type of gym that involves doing an arbitrary series of exercises for a completely arbitrary number of repetitions – regardless of if they’re good or bad for them. For these people, the same exercise or type of exercise they just did the day before doesn’t test well. We usually test the opposite, and that does test well which is consistent with our training model of testing the opposites of movements when the target doesn’t test well.
• Critics have said “You’re obviously just doing what you wanted to do anyway.” Well, just about anyone who has done this for a week or two can tell you that very often the exercise you least want to do is the one that tests the best.
• Using biofeedback is not a new idea, even if this context is new to you. If you’ve ever used a heart rate monitor at all, you’ve probably used biofeedback. If you’ve ever taken your own temperature, and then taken action to lower your temp, you’ve used a rudimentary form of biofeedback. The question isn’t really “does biofeedback work” because that part is indisputable, the question may be “does biofeedback tell us something useful specific to exercise.” To that end:
• Have you ever had a day where each set of the exercise you’re doing seems to feel better and go better than the previous set? In terms of biofeedback testing, this is an indication that the exercise “tests well.” Why is it so hard to believe that you can quantify this effect and compare disparate movements?

The other day, someone asked this same question, “does this biofeedback stuff have any validity” of my friend Jon Fass. Now, the thing you should understand about Jon is that he doesn’t pull any punches. He and Bret Contreras run a podcast called the Strength of Evidence where they expertly dismantle myths and unsupported beliefs using facts and evidence. He often gleefully takes apart outdated beliefs in a well-crafted argument laced with the evidence that works against them. Asked about biofeedback testing this is what he said:

I think that there’s enough evidence from other areas to suggest that it may be plausible; in other words, no, I don’t know if it’s actually working as promised (because, to my knowledge, this kind of training has never been studied), but I don’t think that this is likely to be untrue, at least on first inspection. David and I have discussed writing a thing or two on the subject to be published, basically a “plausibility paper” to encourage further investigation, maybe a case study or two. I definitely find it intriguing, and I have tried it as well. I’ve noticed what appears to be changes in my ROM between different exercises, before and after, etc. What that means, I can’t tell you, but I don’t think that it’s implausible at all when we consider certain hypotheses concerning tissue extensibility, pain research and protective posturing, etc, etc. I think that at worst, it doesn’t work and you instead benefit from the potential of exercise/movement variation, which is still beneficial; at best, there’s something to this and we are benefiting from superior methods of assessment

Intriguing, right?

-Dr. Jonathan Fass

So, there’s that.

Ultimately, I don’t want you to take my word for it. I just want you to try it. You don’t have to buy any equipment, and it adds only a few seconds to your workout. At worst it tells you nothing useful and you’re no better or worse off than before. At best, you are empowered with a tool that completely changes how you train and helps you get exponentially better results. Just test it.

P.S. Have an interesting anecdote of your own? Share it below.

This week I launched my magnum opus to the world: Off The Floor: A Manual for Deadlift Domination.

 

I thought I would share a few of the amazing things that have been said around the Internet about it.

These are just a few of the amazing bits of feedback I have gotten about the book. If you’re at all interested in getting stronger or becoming a better deadlifter check out Off The Floor.

 

Every so often the idea of squatting more often than once a week makes the rounds. Just within the last year Tony Gentilcore wrote a great article called Squat 4 Times Per Week Experiment, Matt Perryman wrote a fantastic book I think you’d like to read called Squat Every Day, and of course the Jon Broz mantra of squat every day continues to make the rounds.

Despite the popularity of this idea with squatting, no one wants to touch the topic when it comes to deadlifts. Apparently putting a barbell across your back and squatting with it is a more natural movement than picking something up off the floor. Doing the former is sure to pack muscle mass on your frame, and doing the latter will guarantee your spine shoots out your ass before you make it to thirsty Thursday.

On the contrary, I think you can deadlift frequently. In fact, if your goals lie in the regions of strength and/or muscularity, I think you might want to give frequently deadlifting a shot. To me it’s obvious why you would want to deadlift daily if you could, and in fact I can’t understand why someone wouldn’t want to pull that often. But if you’re wondering why you would want to, here are a few reasons:

• You’re going to get better at deadlifting. Practice makes permanent, or perfect, or potential, or whatever depending on who you ask. Either way more practice is a good thing, and the more you practice deadlifting the better you will get at it.
• Aside from squatting, there aren’t many ways you can utilize more muscle than a deadlift. Stress a lot of muscle with a lot of weight frequently, and you’re well on your way to packing on some mass.
• You’re going to improve in associated strengths, like grip. Deadlifting frequently is going to involve picking things up off the floor in ways other than a plain old barbell. As soon as you start introducing axles or pinch deadlifting, now you’re talking about strengthening otherwise totally neglected areas like your forearms. Have you ever seen a guy whose forearms have the same girth as his upper arms? Yeah, you want that.
• Cardio. That’s right. Cardio. Deadlifting lighter weights for high volume in short time frames (take 315 for 100 in 30 minutes and call me on Monday) is my favorite way to Lift Weights Faster.
• It’s the gym opposite of your life movements. Just as a good program seeks to balance push and pull, it’s good to balance your life movement with opposing movement in the gym. If you’re reading this, it’s a safe bet you spend too much time sitting – in the car, in front of the computer, at work, etc.- and the deadlift, moving into extension against resistance, is a perfect opposition movement to that.

Listen, it’s just a fact that deadlifting is awesome and doing it often is by definition more awesome. Sure, you could squat, but why would you do that when you can deadlift? I make no apologies for the fact that I don’t like squatting, and I do it the least I can possibly get away with.

Here are a few considerations that will help you pull it off:

• You might be able to do the same deadlift every day, but I wouldn’t recommend it. Instead, use testing and a range of variations to find the best testing variation every day. Simply changing the variation will not only mean you stress very different tissues, but it will also change everything else about how you lift like the load, sets, and reps.
• Acknowledge that you aren’t going to be able to lift at the same intensity day in and day out. Fortunately, there are two more metrics of progress you can use to vary your workouts. Intensity, volume, and density can all be tweaked and manipulated so that you can deadlift day after day. For example, you might lift very heavy one day, but very light the next day for many reps and total volume.
• Vary your rep ranges. I want you to know your 8RM, 10RM, 15RM, and 20RM just as well as you know our 1, 3, and 5RM. Think rep work doesn’t build strength? Go tell that to the Juggernaut guys who are currently laying waste to the powerlifting and strongman fields.
• Along the lines of varying intensity and rep ranges, train sub-maximally for the majority of your lifting. The idea that you need to be at >90% to make progress is bullshit.
• Don’t miss lifts. Ever.
• Don’t train to failure. Training to failure is training to fail. You’ll also significantly increase the amount of time you need to recover, which kind of throws a wrench in deadlifting frequently.

Consider this your written permission to deadlift two, three, even four times per week if it continues to test well and you continue to make progress. Don’t let someone else’s bad idea be your limitation. Go and get after it.

 

P.S. If you’re not sure how to put this into practice, my deadlift book Off The Floor gives you a comprehensive plan of how to deadlift frequently, including using your biofeedback, for maximal strength gains. This template is the exact template I used to skyrocket my deadlift from a measly 245 pounds to not one but three different 600+ pound deadlifts in 3 variations, including a world record.