Our ability to remember a piece of information depends critically on the number of times we review it and also the time that has elapsed since the last review. Repetition using things such as Google, talking with others, memorization strategies, types of visual cues all translate to less time working on needed or forgotten information to speed recall. This is why Rogers Athletic produces Catalogs that are available in paper or online, enabling a coach the ability to select important items that impact their program and over time help lead to victory.
Below are Catalogs available online that should be considered regularly.
From birth muscle mass and strength increase steadily. Around the age of 30 to 35 muscle power and performance tends to level and then diminish slowly and faster in the 60’s and 70’s. Not only is there a decline in muscle mass, normal aging is also associated with impairments in cognitive function.
Given there is no effective pharmacological treatment to change the effect and alter the progress of cognitive decline it has been determined that physical exercise has been and is one of the most effective tools to alter its age-related ebb.
The term physical exercise is all-inclusive referring to cardiovascular fitness, flexibility, balance, ease well as resistance training.
Published in 2026 in the American Journal of Lifestyle Medicine, Exercise and Brain Health: Expert Review, “Overall, both aerobic and anaerobic exercises are integral and complementary to preserving brain health through effects on cognitive function and brain structure.”
Recently published in Frontiers in Psychiatry, A systematic review and meta-analysis of the effects of resistance exercise on cognitive function in older adults, researchers concluded; Resistance exercise exerts selective benefits on cognitive domains in older adults, particularly enhancing overall cognition, working memory, verbal learning and spatial memory.
GeroScience, one of the leading international journals focused on the biology of aging and the pathophysiology of age-related diseases published this year a Randomized controlled trial of resistance exercise and brain aging clocks. Their findings were; In conclusion, resistance training slows down brain aging and supports its use as a preventive strategy for maintaining brain health.
There are numerous studies that support the importance of exercise and its contribution to the reduction of cognitive decline and studies relating to neurodegenerative diseases, improvement of memory performance and reduced hippocampal atrophy in Alzheimer’s, as well as diminished brain atrophy in Parkinson disease are resultants.
Once again – the term physical exercise is all-inclusive referring to cardiovascular fitness, flexibility, balance, as well as resistance training.So make sure that all are a part of your exercise regime throughout life.
Keep and Get your body, mind and spirit Strong, donot resist resistance exercise as an important part of your exercise regime.
The difference between winning and losing is often very narrow. Developing speed and quickness in athletics has always been important and the slightest differences in movement amongst competing athletes often determines the outcome of events.
All muscles play a role in development across sports. When looking at sprinting speed coaches, trainers and athletes all want to know which muscles seemingly have the greatest
influence on speed to help in an athletes’ improvement.
Muscle strength and thus size are considerations in sprinting speed. Researchers have and continue to study lower-body muscle volumes to discover and predict which parts of our anatomy contribute the most to speed of movement. The psoas major is a muscle that is not often discussed by athletic coaches and trainers or pointed to as an anatomically essential area to be targeted.
The psoas is located in the lumbar region of the lower back and connects the spine to the thigh. It is one of the most significant muscles that overlies the vertebral column. The function of the psoas muscle is linking the upper body to the lower body. Along with the iliopsoas muscle, the psoas becomes a major contributor of flexion of the hip joint. In conjunction with other hip flexors the psoas elevates the upper leg towards the body. These proximal hip flexors and extensors have emerged as possibly the most important muscles ‘especially’ the psoas major in determining sprinter speed. Sprinters tend to have a psoas muscle significantly larger than non-sprinters.
To target this area Rogers Athletic developed the Pendulum Hip Press Pro XT. The Hip Press should be a part of all athletic facilities as no other exercise equipment is designed to augment the psoas. This primary hip flexor is not only vital for running but much of all mobility. Get Strong, increase speed, become more athletic Get Pendulum.
As coaches, teachers and parents we all know that cellular phone dependence can result in behavioral and social challenges of everyday living. Excessive use of devices is
characterized by more than 4 hours of mobile phone activity per day.
Athletes align with greater predicaments as they have interactions, not only with classmates, teachers, academic programs, teammates, coaches, family, but invest a great deal of time in the rigorous demands of their sports be it in training for practice or competition.
Sports require not only physical abilities but psychological involvement which adds additional stresses. Competition, being coached, preparation, performance, injuries and much more add to one’s day-to-day feelings and behaviors.
Rest is imperative whether it be napping or bedtime. What is important is that sleep repairs muscle, energy stores and combines many of our short term memories into single unified stable and often lasting thoughts. Conversely sleep deprivation
can lead to higher error rates, motor performance decline, cognitive and emotional deficits. Skeletal muscle glycogen is an important energy source for muscle contraction. Poor sleep can reduce replenishment and reduce endurance the following day.
Needing to always check and use a mobile phone especially before bedtime is problematic behavior. The emission of blue light from the screen delays the release of melatonin, a natural hormone released by one’s brain in response to darkness signaling to your body it is time for sleep. Consistently utilizing a phone in this manner shortens the amount of sleep you will get and the quality.
The following are a few of the many reminders to continually instruct athletes with, and are important constructs of building a winning program and living a healthy productive life.
Limit cell phone use especially in the evening.
Blue light from your phone interferes with sleep
Insufficient sleep for an athlete is less than 7-8 hours
Sleep is an important fuel your muscles need for performance
Poor sleeping behavior can impair muscular strength, speed, and increase the risk of injury
Sleep is important component of reaction time
Sleep fights off mental fatigue, the feeling of training is harder than it actually is
Sleep is important to improve ‘precovery’, that is, when there is a stressful physical event it will help optimize the body’s readiness and accelerate post-event recovery
Sleep is critical for maintaining optimal cognitive function
Sleep is composed of a series of complex neurophysiological states that play important roles in learning, memory and cognitive processing
Quality sleep is important in academic success
Sleep is important in adapting to travel
Adequate sleep is important for social, behavioral and dealing with the problems of everyday living
Lat Pull Pro a Machine You Will Never Get Tired Of
Mike Gittleson was the Director of Strength & Conditioning at the University of Michigan for 30 years and was a part of 15 Football Championships in that time. He explains the definition of manual is: “of relating to or involving the hands”, “worked or done by hand and not by machine.” – and with Manual all you need to do is add a little Resistance.
Dan Riley (a former strength and conditioning coach) and I grew up in Manchester N.H., in the 60’s and 70’s. We both attended Manchester Central High. Weight training at the time was often avoided by the fear that many thought it would interfere with one’s movement, flexibility and athleticism. The majority of women feared lifting weights as they thought they would become ‘muscle bound’ a condition which would make them look and become bulky. But as we grew science began to evolve. The literature was confirming that not only developing stronger muscles improves one’s physique, but positively affects fitness, strength, speed and abilities in sport.
When we started training there were no gyms to choose from in town dedicated to strength training. Golds Gym opened 3,000 miles away in Venice beach California in 1965, Powerhouse Gym in 1974, Planet Fitness, Lifetime Fitness not until the 1990s, Anytime Fitness not until 2002. We found a place to lift weights at the local Y.M.C.A. The Y.M.C.A had housing, libraries, reading rooms, a pool, basketball and volleyball courts, wrestling mats, heavy bags and more. There was also a small area for weight training that had a squat rack, a flat back bench, a plate loaded combined leg curl and leg extension, which was totally flat, a glute/ham and a small dumbbell rack. It was the best and only set up in a city of 100,000. The good news: it was never crowded. The equipment was plenty, Dan, his brother and I and a few of our friends trained there.
After High School Dan and I went our separate ways, I was drafted and went off to Vietnam, Dan to College. After the service I attended several Universities and finished my Masters at Michigan. There I began teaching Exercise Physiology with no intention of coaching yet, I unintentionally became the first strength and conditioning coach in the Big Ten.
Riley and I had not stayed in touch and unbeknownst to me having never in our lives discussed wanting to coach anything at all, he became the first strength and conditioning coach on the east coast. After college he started his career at West Point then moved to Penn State and from there the Washington Redskins and Houston Texans. He had a stellar career being part of three Super Bowls and four NFC championships.
When the first National Strength and Conditioning Association convention was held there were maybe 70 people, some being from equipment companies. In 1979 the second NSCA convention was held in Lincoln, Nebraska. The number of coaches were more than in 1978 but only a small fraction of the number of attendees that occur today and many of them in 1979 were not full time employees.
I needed to be present at the event, the profession was in its infancy and I wanted to find out how others were approaching fitness. I was totally surprised as one of the speakers was none other than Dan Riley, at that time he was the Head Strength Coach at Penn State. I was unaware he was a coach and was also at a major university, shocking for me and a pleasant surprise. Dan’s speech was not only great but was probably the most beneficial speech given in the area of strength and conditioning. He explained how he trained his athletes and most importantly introduced the Nation to the training method called Manual Resistance.
The timing was near perfect as weight training facilities in the 70s had limited square footage and even less equipment. Our room was 2,000 square feet with over 600 athletes on campus. The strength training method of Manual Resistance gave opportunities to train large numbers of athletes performing strengthening movements in which devices were unavailable, especially for exercises, such as neck training. Not only could a coach train large numbers of athletes, but they could include aggressive ‘finishing movements’ to any exercise which they thought necessary.
When I got back to Michigan from the NSCA I wanted to make sure that high school coaches knew how to train ‘Manually’ as there were very few in attendance at the conference. The more student athletes that had access to a variety of strengthening methods the better sports would become. So, motivated I wrote the following rules for Manual Resistance and then mailed them to over a thousand high schools:
Important Manual Resistance Considerations:
When training manually all athletes must understand the rules of performing each repetition properly.
The athlete should not only be capable of performing an exercise but have the ability to teach, as well as administer the exercise to others.
Once an athlete understands how to execute manual resistance it demands the same effort and motivation as if trying to improve on a bench, squat, clean or any other strength training exercise.
When training manually to progressively overload it requires a strength measurement to track progress. Taking a circumference, body composition and other physiological variables allows the coach and athlete to monitor results.
Remember when training the head and neck manually athletes should have clean hands especially during flu season.
The rules of Manual Resistance must be reviewed regularly!
The Rules of Manual Resistance
1). If you use Manual Resistance make sure you and your spotter know and understand the rules.
2). The Lifter begins each exercise with the goal of 6-8 reps. This requires pacing, in other words, the first repetition is not an all out effort. The effort must be increasing for every subsequent repetition.
2a). The Spotter should allow the lifter to perform each repetition at the same pace or speed of movement. This will require different amounts of pressure by the spotter during the rep (because of leverage). The lifter will feel as though the resistance is similar at all joint angles (the resistance will feel smooth).
3). The lowering phase of every repetition should be slower than the raising phase. A guide in learning manual resistance is to raise the involved limbs up in 1-2 seconds or at a 1-2 count and lower them in 4-5 seconds or at a 4 or 5 count.
3a). The Spotter must make sure that they feel more force by the lifter during the lowering phase of each repetition.
4). The Lifter should continually contract their target musculature during the raising phase and the lowering phase of every repetition.
4a). The Spotter must give feedback to the lifter to ensure there is always a constant contraction on every repetition performed. The spotter should identify any relaxation or loss of force by the lifter during the movement.
5). The Lifter should pause with pressure against the spotter’s resistance at the top of every movement. Pausing with pressure and no relaxation is extremely difficult.
5a). The Spotter should insure the lifter is applying force at the top of the movement. The spotter must feel if the lifter is relaxing. The spotter must ease slowly into the lowering phase of the exercise. Slowly easing into the lowering phase or descent is extremely important.
6). The exercise is completed when the athlete reaches momentary muscular failure.
What is interesting is Riley and I growing up and going to the same high school, working out in the same facility and then being selected to coach at major universities could at least be considered surprising. Yet, years later Ryan Day the head football coach of Ohio State, Chip Kelly former head coach of the 49ers, Philadelphia Eagles and Oregon Ducks went to Manchester Central High. Dan Mullen, former head coach of the Florida Gators and Mississippi State Bulldogs was also from Manchester. He played football and went to high school .8 of a mile from Central High. At the time there were roughly 600,000 people in the entire State of New Hampshire making it an interesting part of history for how and why these coaches evolved to such a high level in athletics from this area.
Kinematics and kinetics are used to determine the forces acting on the body. Greater neck strength and activating the neck muscles in bracing for impact reduces the athlete’s risk of concussion and other head and neck injuries during a collision by attenuating the head’s kinematic response after impact. This is true whether one is a male or female.
Not only is neck training for safety, it is as important as any other system in our human structure for athleticism. “Where the head goes the body follows.” – is an axiom that supports that eye and head movement is critical for reorientation of the head, trunk and legs. Having strong powerful head and neck muscles aids in movement and is extremely important in becoming the best athlete one can become.
Pendulum Neck Machine
Get the neck Strong not only to protect oneself but to become a better athlete.
The proximal hamstrings, semitendinosus and biceps femoris have a common tendon of origin on the ischium, which is the lower posterior part of the hip bone. The ischium has often been called the ‘sit bone’ as it supports the body’s weight when seated. The semimembranosus originates just laterally on the upper outer part of the ischial tuberosity. The distal hamstringssplit at the knee attaching to the tibia and fibula.
The hamstrings extend the hip, as well as flex the knee and the bicep femoris portion, also aids in external rotation. In sprinting these biarticular muscles provide intense backward extension and produce very high forces of the lower limb, which are necessary during both stance and late swing phases of movement.
The proximal end of the hamstring can be found more difficult to train as many do not have the appropriate equipment that allows an athlete to isolate and progressively overload this important area.
The Pendulum Reverse Glute-Ham was designed with the specific ability to isolate three areas all related to running, sprinting and other forms of movement. Using the Glute-Ham by extending from a bent knee to straight leg during the movement develops one’s hips. Keeping the knees bent through an entire movement targets one’s glutes. Targetingand overloading the hamstrings especially the proximal portion is done with the legs held straight from start to finish as seen below.
Despite being one of the largest muscles in the body in surface area, covering a significant portion of the back, the latissimus dorsi is primarily considered a shoulder muscle. It is an extensor and lateral bender of the lower back but is most notable in movement of the upper limb, through adduction, extension and medial rotation and raising the entire trunk in what is called brachiation. Brachiation, or often referred to as suspensory locomotion, can be seen and easily understood watching one hang and swing forward from one arm to the other on the popular TV competition America Ninja Warrior.
The optimal position for training the latissimus is a neutral spine. To fully maximize strengthening this structure the Pendulum Lat Combo Pull provides a variety of handles for wide and narrow gripping, pronation and supination as well as handles that follow the body’s limbs and musculature as it is applying force.
Get a better grip on your training – to Get Strong.
About 45% of the body weight of men and 35% of the weight in women is skeletal muscle. One of the natural changes of aging is the reduction of skeletal muscle mass and the associated reduction of muscle performance commonly called sarcopenia. Men and women’s limb muscles become smaller and have more fat and connective tissue than those of younger individuals.
The aged fast twitch muscle fiber loss means that muscle produces less force and a slowing of it’s mechanical characteristics, that is; the response to stimuli, stretch beyond its resting length, change in contractility and response to exercise leading to changes such as size and strength.
To minimize these losses that will occur, physical activity, diet and muscular development and the effort to retain it throughout life will slow the natural process. Exercise can lower blood pressure, slow the age-related decline in VO2 max, improve bone health, make increases in cognitive function, provide a reduction of disease risk factors and offset the loss of muscle mass and strength due to normal aging.
Enhance the quality of your life by Getting Strong and keeping fit.
