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(703) 444-0662 Hours 21620 RIDGETOP CIRCLE STE 150, STERLING, VA 20166
(703) 444-0662 Hours 21620 RIDGETOP CIRCLE STE 150, STERLING, VA 20166

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Embrace The Uncomfortable Pace

My friend Jordan has a brutally honest flag hanging behind the squat rack in his home gym. It reads: Comfort is a Slow Death. The fabric of the flag is yellow, and the type is bold and blue – it arcs across the middle of the flag. I love seeing it every time he sends...
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Is Your Gym Goal Worth It?

On a sunny spring day in 2012, I sat beside my girlfriend at the time as we looked out over the Juniata River. We were on top of one of Central Pennsylvania’s small, rolling mountains. We’d finished a hike called the 1,000 Steps and did a little exploring afterwards. I realized how tired I was...
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A Huge Benefit of Doing Cardio You Probably Don’t Know About

Slowing down is part of aging. It’s a deal with no opt out. That being said, there’s a lot that we can do to fight off age-related cognitive decline. Sleep, stress management, and nutrition are huge factors. But so is exercise, specifically what most people call cardio. (We call it aerobic training.) Did that shit...
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4 Stoic Quotes for Tough Workouts

I love Stoic philosophy. The Stoics have been my guides since I was a teenager. I’ve burned through copies of Epictetus’s Discourses and The Enchiridion. My copy of Marcus Aurelius’s Meditations is thumb worn, and I’ve bought more copies for friends than I could ever remember. The minds of these good men have molded my...
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How to Plan a Hybrid Athlete Training Week

There’s a lot to get in during a week of hybrid athlete training. It takes intelligent planning to get it all in without burning yourself out – and to get the best possible results.   We take a counterintuitive approach that a lot of other hybrid coaches disagree with. But, tell ya what, we don’t...
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How a Hybrid Athlete Should Plan Their Training Day

Hybrid athlete training requires a delicate balance between training and recovery. More so than other forms of training because you’re stressing the body in multiple ways during the same training program. And that often means two totally different types of workouts on the same training day.    That is a lot to manage if you’re...
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Lauren doing endurance training at Beyond Strength in Sterling, Virginia

4 Reasons Why Your Endurance Plateaued

You’re not getting faster and you’re not able to go for longer. Your endurance has plateaued. You’re consistently training, and you think you’re doing the right things to improve. But you aren’t? What in the heck gives?   It might be that you’re chasing exercise feelings while skipping out on the most important aspects of...
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Khatera and Kate training in Nike Retcon gym shoes at Beyond Strength in Sterling, VA

What Shoes Should You Wear to the Gym?

Gym shoes are an important, but often overlooked, piece of gym equipment. Folks make sure their shirts are right and their shorts are on point, then they show up to deadlift in cushy-soled running shoes that have them standing about four inches taller than they really are. That, my friend, is not how to set...
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some training weeks are HARD

How to Nail a Difficult Training Week: Skills and Tactics for Managing Increased Training Stress

Difficult training weeks are a part of the fitness process. You might curse your coach and everyone who’s ever loved them while you’re in the thick of hard a session, but we need those sessions to push ourselves forward. The rub is that we must be smart about how we approach them. But the good...
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Gaming Your Wearables: How to Beat Your Fitness Trackers Instead of Them Beating You

Lots of folks are hooked up to wearables and fitness trackers nowadays. I’m one of them. So are many of the Beyond Strength members. People are sporting Oura rings and Whoop bands. They’re checking their HRV with Morpheus and monitoring their recovery on their Garmin watches. The question is: how is all of this technology...
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How to Track Your Fitness Progress

We all want to see the fruits of our labor, right? Why would we do anything, other than something that’s purely pleasurable, if we can’t eventually note measurable progress? Well, unless we are seeing measurable results, or we’re getting some kind of pleasure, we typically stop doing the thing. So, we need to give ourselves...
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How to Set Good Goals

You want to set some goals, but you aren’t sure where to start. You wonder what even defines a goal as good. Well, let’s talk about it. We’ll start by assessing your goal-setting skill and we’ll talk about the two different types of goals and how they support each other. Then we’ll have a chat...
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Live Physically in 2024

There is a section of a creek here in Loudoun County that’s near and dear to my heart. It’s a secret, so I won’t tell you where it is. My friend Dave Hudgens (pictured above) showed it to me, and his friend showed it to him a long time ago. Over the past few years,...
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everyday adventure

Live Your Everyday Adventure

My friend Leann, who’s more of a sister, has a saying that I’m about to steal from her. It’s an entire philosophy, a way of living and being, condensed down into two words. The phrase will change how you see your life, and the world, if you let it sink into you and try to...
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Working Out During the Winter: How to Maintain Your Training Momentum During the Cold, Dark Months

“Man, it’s dark when I start working and it’s dark when I’m done. I had to watch the sunset from a meeting room today.”     A Beyond Strength member recently said that to me at the end of class. While he still made it to the gym that day, he outlined why a lot...
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Libby training at Beyond Strength during a muscle growth (hypertrophy) phase

3 Ways to Increase Muscle Growth

We started the final phase of our strength and hypertrophy training block this week. In honor of that, we’re talking about muscle growth and how you can increase yours. There’s a lot of convoluted information out there, so I’m going to do you a solid and make it simple. Muscle growth isn’t complicated. It just...
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When Can You Expect Results from Training?

When Can You Expect Results from Training?

“When will this start working? When will I feel the results? When can I expect to get _________?”   Fill in the blank: abs, faster, stronger, bigger, etc.   Chris, Rony, and I have gotten questions like this throughout our careers. As younger coaches, we’d stammer through physiological answers.   Well, strength gain typically takes...
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Anil and John ripping some cardio machines in a Vigor class at Beyond Strength

The Muderous Mile Challenge

Have you ever wanted to do a triathlon, but you’re not that strong of a swimmer and the thought of spending $5,000 on a bike makes you want to throw up?    Well, perk up! I’ve got just the thing for you!   It’s called the Murderous Mile.   Now, don’t let the violent name...
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Why Strength Should Be Your Main Focus During the Fall and Winter

There are lots of orange leaves, it’s cold in the morning, and today’s sunset is officially 6:17pm in Sterling, Virginia. Ladies and gentlemen, it’s fall – autumn if you want to be British about it.    As the seasons change, so does our training at Beyond Strength. We spend each season of the year focusing...
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Hiking across the Montana high plains

You’re Not Old, You’re Just Acting Like It

Two of my friends did two profound things within days of each other. These things were different. One was an action and the other was a statement. One was age-defying and the other was a slow walk toward decline, decay, and unhealth. Each illustrated mindset and belief.   “I don’t want to hold you guys...
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Why You Need to Test and Train Power

It was a Tuesday, and it was the worst day of Paul’s life. When you hear why, you might think that Paul’s led a cushy life. Maybe it won’t seem like such a big deal. But remember, we all create our own special hells and relegate ourselves to them. You see, that Tuesday was the...
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Jon training mobility at Beyond Strength gym in Sterling, Virginia

Building Resilience: How Mobility Tests Enhance Your Strength Training

Imagine a sweaty, dirty, grimy hole-in-the-wall gym in a small town deep in the hills of Central Pennsylvania. If you know me, knock about 13 years off of my age and place a 24-year-old Todd in your mind’s eye. I’ll help you. He’s about the same size, but there’s no red beard on his face....
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Relative Strength: What it is, Why We Test it, and How to Build it

Strength matters, you know this, I know this, hell, I bet your Aunt Edna from Altoona, Iowa knows this. But here’s the thing, lots of strength with lots of body weight isn’t the best thing for you. Have a look at the general health of powerlifters and strongman competitors. They ain’t too healthy. Relative strength,...
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Megan Galata: “Can I actually do this?” First Woman to Achieve Black at Beyond Strength

Megan Galata has transformed after two years and change of training at Beyond Strength. Like, big time transformed. She went from never really strength training before to achieving our current highest level of fitness standards, the Black Level. She’s the first woman to do it.   Her journey started with Beyond Strength started with hesitant...
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How to Plan a Training Week to Build Strength and Endurance

Something’s not working. You’ve been training hard; you’ve been training consistently, but you’ve plateaued. Or worse, you haven’t made any progress. You feel like you’ve got the elements of your training in line. You’re strength training. You’re conditioning. You’ve even added mobility training to your regiment. But something isn’t right. You should be a better...
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Injuries suck, but they're not a death sentence

Mindset for Training with Injuries or Limitations

“Pain is a part of life, but suffering is a choice.”   The quote is a paraphrase that’s attributed to a guy folks look up to: the Buddha. Most people think of, and use, the quote in an existential way, not to deal with a sprained ankle or bum shoulder. But physical limitations often lead...
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Make Your Hips and Back Feel Great: With These Mobility Exercises

We focus a heck of a lot on mobility at Beyond Strength. Healthy joints that move well are the foundation of an active life. We layer strength and endurance on top of them, but you ain’t building strength and endurance without healthy joints – at least not with any kind of longevity. So, we build...
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life beyond your gym goals

Life Beyond Your Gym Goals

In 2017, Chris and I were in a weird spot with our training. Neither of us wanted to do it.   That’s right, two gym owners that spent the balance of their adult life as coaches struggled with training motivation. At the time, we filmed a segment every week called “Coaches in Chairs.” We’d sit...
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A member of Beyond Strength using RIR to figure out weight selection during a class in Sterling VA.

Reps in Reserve vs RPE: What’s the Difference?

I started lifting weights when I was 12 years old. Initially, my brother took me along with him to work out at a gym in Bellefonte, Pennsylvania. Soon after, I hit the Juniata Valley YMCA with my middle school buddies. We’d scour the muscle magazines for the next program that guaranteed us bigger, stronger muscles....
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The Most Important Fitness Variables: Consistency and Continuity

Cory Hudson has done what you want to do.   He’s done what every person that’s ever lived has wanted to do.   He’s transformed.   Cory’s lost 40 pounds since joining Beyond Strength in November 2021. More than that, he’s improved his performance during all of our testing weeks, shaving significant time off of...
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