What is ATG?

1. Working from the ground up.

Your feet/ankles need to be able to support your body weight before we can start applying external load (weights). Even if your goal(s) is to strengthen your upper body, it is still important we give attention to the lower extremities.

2. Training light to heavy.

If you are new to strength training or if it has been a while since you've had continuous training, expect to perform body weight or very low-weight exercises to start the program. Building a strong foundation will allow your body to support everything above it.

3. Short-range movements vs. long-range movements.

Short-range (rewiring) movements will be performed with higher reps and more frequency. These movements initiate blood flow to that specific area which helps healing and recovery.-Long range (remodeling) movements will be performed with lower reps and less frequency. These movements will cause more inflammation, more tendon strain, and more muscle damage(good damage), which will require more time to recover.

4. Tension training over strength training.

A mistake I see made a lot (I am guilty of this for many years) is people want to lift weights to increase their muscle strength but neglect to train their joints, ligaments, tendons, etc. When you have poor joint health and mobility, it hinders your ability to stay active and ultimately decreases your quality of life. Continuously neglecting mobility and range of motion to lift heavy weights and do high impact aerobic exercise is often not sustainable.

As long as mobility allows, getting stronger in longer ranges of motion exercises will be a focus. Training your body to handle its own weight (and eventually more) in multiple ranges of motion and planes of motion will help minimize the risk of injury and increase your overall quality of life!

5. Structural balance

A term coined by the late Charles Poliquin who once said, “Structural balance refers to the major muscles of the body being in balance with each other. This means balance between opposing muscle pairs (such as the biceps and triceps for the arms, and quadriceps and hamstrings for the legs) and between the limbs (such as the right leg and the left leg). So, it’s not enough just to have the proper strength ratio between the hamstring and the quadriceps, for example, the strength of the quadriceps and hamstrings on the right leg should be equal to the strength of those muscles on the left leg.