Body Flow: Freedom from Fear-Reactivity
(24.95 + SHP)
By Scott Sonnon, www.rmax.tv
If you have never read a book or article by Scott Sonnon, you
will be in for an interesting experience when you read this book.
I can only describe it as philosophy in motion. His writing is
not dumbed down and is quite challenging to read. Not because
the writing is bad, but because the concepts in this book are
deep and thought provoking. Multiple readings are a necessity.
The basic concept behind this book is that over time, through
trauma or inactivity, sensory motor amnesia occurs. Essentially,
you forget how to control our own body. This generally manifests
itself as excess tension. People with chronically sore lower backs
often don't realize that their backs are constantly tense. After
a full day of unknowingly flexing their muscles, of course they
are sore! Your choice is to either hope that someday your muscles
will start ratcheting like those of a starfish or you can try
a training program such as Body Flow.
The idea behind Body Flow is that you learn how to move without
excess tension and unnecessary effort. Scott uses a radio analogy
to describe this phenomenon. He refers to it as signal and noise.
The signal is any information that your body gives you in order
to make an activity possible. The noise is any extraneous information,
such as muscle tightness, pain, discomfort, fear reactivity, etc.
Part of the practice of Body Flow is to tune into the signal and
learn how to block out the noise.
Fortunately, this book is not all philosophy. There is actually
a method behind the theory, which allows you to conquer your fear
reactivity and recover the movement you were born with. The book
contains pictures of 13 basic positions and pictures and descriptions
of 30 different biomechanical exercises. I found this to be an
adequate amount of exercises to get started in the program. However,
in a book where the "kinetic chain", or a flowing sequence
of these exercises, is the ultimate goal, it would have been nice
to have pictures, instructions or details of at least one of them.
This book might be viewed as a book of ingredients without the
recipes. Fortunately, the concept behind the kinetic chain is
laid out clearly enough that a person should be able to design
their own chains. Also, R-Max recently released a three-video
package on kinetic chains. There should be no shortage of chains
in there to try out, or to use as fodder for your own designs.
The exercises in this book have all been seen before in the Grappler's
Toolbox series, the Zdorovye tapes and a few of them in Maximology.
However, most of the theory and philosophy in this book will be
new to even the most season fan of Sonnon's work.
Many comparisons have been drawn between Body Flow, Yoga, Somatics,
Tai Chi and other movement health programs. I think the biggest
difference between Body Flow and the rest of them is that Body
Flow is about movement and the others are either static or fixed
into set movement patterns. The others focus on achieving ideal
positions, whereas the ideal in Body Flow is to move through each
position and recover your flow. Some of the styles mentioned above
have set patterns of movements, or forms, which have not changed
for thousands of years. In Body Flow, you are encouraged to create
your own and try new things rather than trying to recreate the
movements of an ancient master. A similarity is that there is
a lot of floor work in most of the aforementioned systems, but
that is about it. I think dynamic movement therapy is the way
to go and I think Body Flow is the best program out there for
re-educating the body. If you expect to become a martial arts
master in a matter of days, you have a very long couple of days
ahead of you. If you are looking to make the path to your goals
a little smoother, then this a great resource to look into. To
get any benefit out of this program, regular practice is necessary.
Further information is available at the publisher's website, www.rmax.tv.
Atomic Athletic
Adjustable Kettlebell
($269 + S&H)
www.atomicathletic.com
I recently had the opportunity to try out the Atomic Athletic
shot-loading kettlebell. It was loaded to 70 lbs with sand. The
first and most obvious thing about this bell is it's size. It
is a massive object, which would cause problems later. According
to the specs, it can be loaded up to 150 lbs, which is twice the
amount of weight used in kettlebell competitions. Talk about overload!
The weight was smooth and well painted. Unfortunately, the handle
was very thin and curved sharply, so that two hand work was slightly
less comfortable. The handle was thinner than regular fixed-weight
kettlebells and even thinner than a barbell handle. I saw this
as the second biggest drawback of this product.
The biggest drawback was the enormous size. It was way bigger
than any other kettlebell I had ever seen. It was so big that
2-kettlebell work was almost out of the question. It was worst
when we attempted clean and jerks. It was very uncomfortable to
shoulder this weight. Bad form is almost a necessity, just to
accommodate the size of this weight. We found jerks to be just
plain dangerous with these things. The weight hangs so far out
from your arm that it just pulls you over. The handle is also
much longer than a traditional kettlebell handle, so the weight
is even further from your hands. On the swing, this had an interesting
effect, because it lengthened the arc on which the bell travels.
However, for one-legged deadlifts, the handles were so long that
it cut out most of the range of motion.
Another problem is that bottom's up work is not possible with
these, because as soon as you invert it, all of the sand will
shift, causing you to undoubtedly lose control. Even if it was
emptied, the handle is too thin to make it worthwhile.
In conclusion, they are good for swings and not much else. This
is pretty much true of all of the adjustable kettlebells and plate-loading
handles that I have seen.
Tyler Hass is the publisher of Power Athletes Magazine
and a multi-sport athlete. After playing college tennis, he is
now focused on being in shape for anything. He recently founded
Power Athletes, LLC and manufactures the Power Rings. He can be
reached at
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