Barwis training and putting on weight
everything we here about the barwis effect is about turning everyone ripped and shredded monsters that will cause opposing teams to pee themselves in fear.
but, it seems that the barwis method - at least all i have been hearing is about gaining strength & balance - but not so much about putting on weight
for someone like wilkins - where his skills aren't as great as an LB, but maybe better to be a true DE - is there any proof - or does anyone know if barwis' training has shown in the past to turn someone like wilkins who is 225-ish and help them put on the 25-30+ lbs of weight to effectively play a position like DE? while deathbacker is great and all - we will need some actual DE's that can play against the run and will not get blown off the line by a 300+ lb lineman.
have there been any significant weight gains in a good way in the 1.5 years barwis & crew have been around?
just wondering
anthem, it's not like Barwis makes every player do the exact same workout. Barwis, like most strength and condition coaches, gives each player a personalized workout to fit his needs. So if a player needs to gain weight, he will give him a training plan to gain weight. If a player needs to lose weight, he will give him a training plan to lose weight.
Nice post. Its as simple as that. Barwis is not just about speed and balance. He wants to put the kids in a position to succeed. Its not like we are going to be seeing 200 pound DE's running around in years to come. We will see more cut DE's at their appropriate weight. And that will hold true for almost every position across the field.
Generally speaking for most of the human race, increased strength = stronger muscle = bigger muscle = more weight.
I'm not saying you can't get stronger and stay the same weight or not gain significant size, but for MOST people if you go up significantly on your lifts you will gain muscle size and therefore gain weight, or at least gain lean weight.
edit (hit post too quick) :
weight has often much more to do with your diet than with your training
that's kind of what i am asking.
while the old regimes idea to put on weight was - eat a pizza every night
has barwis shown that his methods are able to turn a LB'er into a DE if needed.
i would ask if anyone knew of any of these transformations @ wvu - but i doubt anyone who is here followed wvu that closely prior to RR's arrival.
i don't doubt that he can get someone to lose 10-15lbs of flab and turn it into muscle - but can he pack on the weight effectively if it needs to be 30lbs or more? i know it's only really been 1 year with him - just asking if anyone with a knowledge of his training methods has any idea.
maybe it's just a dopey question on my part - and diet is handled by someone else on the staff
It's entirely possible for Barwis, or any other trainer, to do that with his players. But the player has to put in the effort and follow their nutritional plan, which isn't always under the control of the trainer since they can't watch a guy 24/7.
Putting on 20-30 pounds of solid muscle isn't as easy as some people make it out to be and not many people do it quickly without anabolic help.
But yes, if Barwis wants a guy to bulk up, it's absolutely within the realm of possibility that someone can put on 30 pounds of mostly muscle during their career provided they follow the training and eat an appropriate diet.
In an interview with Doug Karsch last season Molk said he eats a pizza most nights to keep his weight up.
put on a lot of weight. Not sure it was all "good" weight, but he did make the switch to DT. I'm sure Rodriguez and Barwis know what approximate weight players at certain positions need to be to be successful. I think were Barwis play's a role is in developing functional, football-related strength and quickness, but the weight issue and the average weight of players at a given position is probably the same as it was before Barwis showed up (except for our receivers weighing 150 lbs). Maybe it is a different "kind" of weight, I don't know.
Looked like a fat slob when throwing shot put for the track team after football season. Also was called out by Rodriguez during spring practices for not working hard enough in the s&c system. I think he took the pizza approach.
"while the old regimes idea to put on weight was - eat a pizza every night"
it's really amazing and kinda sad how everyone has latched onto that one offhand anecdote. gitt may have gotten behind the times, but he's got a hell of a track record for someone who takes so much casual shit from people
if you are engaged in an intense physical training program, weigh 300ish pounds like an offensive lineman, and need to gain weight, you'll need like 5,000 cals a day to reach the surplus necessary ... in which case eating a pizza isn't a terrible idea
On one hand, I agree.
On the other hand (and a dolly) is Alex Mitchell's gut.
Part of me wants to agree with you, and the other part of me thinks that is more Alex Mitchell's fault than Gittleson's.
It's not like there weren't a number of great O lineman that came out of M under Gitt.
I guess the fact that Mitchell got to that point is a reflection on both of them. Idk, bagging on Gitt now is kind of stupid. He's gone, it's over, etc.
all i'm saying is it's hard to put 100% of the blame on gitt considering jake long came out at the exact same time. the player does have some responsibility.
You could use that as evidence that Gitt was bad at keeping all his players motivated. He was great with the Jake Long's and David Baas's, but couldn't get through to the guys who needed more motivation. That is a legitimate gripe.
Kind of like the teachers who are really good at teaching the A students but do a poor job at getting the average student to improve.
but to say it's the pizzas fault is assuming alex mitchell wasn't half assing it in the training department.
i guess i'm not advocating eating a large hot and ready every single night as an effective tool, but i don't really buy that gitt literally told him to eat an entire pizza every night either.
Everyone had good points and I think many of the players gain some weight naturally as they gain muscle, but I think in a nutshell this is the Barwis philosophy.
Fat is unneccesary and slows you down.
Player 1 Barwis Trained 6'4" 230lbs has leg strength and bench strength same as player 2 except he is quicker and has more endurance because he isn't carrying around 20lbs of fat on his back.
Player 2 Gitt Trained 6'4" 250lbs.
Not 100% sure the method is correct, but it makes sense to me. Never understood why Olineman were allowed to have huge guts didn't see the purpose. I think you'll see our Lb's playing at weights that may come across as too light for the B10 traditionalists, but we'll forget about it when they play like studs. B. Hawthorne should be test case #1.
Think Jake Long vs Alex Mitchell. Long was shredded do you think he needed the gut?? Seemed to work out ok for him.
if it was feasible and realistic to have an o-line composed solely of 6'6", 310 pound, shredded bodybuilders i think someone would have managed to do it by now.
the fact is that being big enough to move the weight o-lineman need to move is usually going to lead to some fat gain, especially considering they aren't Weider sponsored professional bodybuilders pumping six metric tons of gorilla hormones into their ass every day.
This is Michigan dammit don't lower expectations.
Jon Jansen-no gut
Steve Hutchinson-no gut
Steve Everitt-no Gut
Steve Schilling-no gut
Jake Long- no gut
That line is not so bad. I think Barwis builds up guys to their optimal weight given their body type. Most of the best Olineman are not "gut" guys. The top lineman drafted the last 3 years have been studs with no guts. These guys pound a lot of calories to maintain their weight so some are less motivated than others and get a little soft in the middle. I just don't see how it helps them play football. I may be wrong but I feel better knowing I'm on Barwis's side of the argument.
I mean, Jim Abbot pitched a no hitter, that doesn't mean pitchers with 1 hand are better. No one is arguing a gut is a good thing.
I'm not actually disagreeing with you now that I see what you are going for.
I consider this :
to be a "gut". so we're on the same page- i think that's a reasonable size for an o-lineman.
i thought you were trying to imply they should look like this:
to be a "gut". so we're on the same page- i think that's a reasonable size for an o-lineman.
i thought you were trying to imply they should look like this:
No further comment needed pictures some it up.
That pic is only slightly better than the corpse pic. Slightly.
I'd love to rag on that guy for having puny biceps just to see what sort of psychological issues that would trigger. Of course, I wouldn't do that, because he'd use his roid rage to pulverize my skull.
I agree. Players like Jake Long definitely don't need to be putting on extra weight in the form of fat.
As far as offensive linemen's guts in general, I think it might partially be a way of masking a slightly lower level of talent. If you've got an offensive lineman that's at one weight, but has topped out his skill level and is still losing some matchups, it might be worth it for him to throw on some extra fat just to make himself harder to push out of the way.
Greg Banks has bulked up significantly and so has Adam Patterson. Also, Marell Evans is now 237 lbs. When he came out of high school, he was around 205 or so.
read what these guys were eating
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/writers/george_dohrmann/06/03/she…
better stories that I have read recently. Very insightful well done IMO, and I personally used to always wonder what those guys did after playing football just because carrying around 300+ pounds on your frame for you whole life can just be so damn hard on your body .
i especially liked it when one of them said that they'll never run again, but jog every day.
i don't remember the 'eat a pizza' story being about mitchell - but about pat massey - who as brian has pointed out - was impossibly tall to be effective @ DT. it wasn't so much his weight that made him ineffective - but his inability to be low enough at the point of attack. i would assume the staff at that time felt that a 6'8" DT might work if he were heavier.
i just think the new staff's focus is on quickness more than bulk. i am sure gittleson's plan was to get everyone stronger - but it seems to me had a different philosophy that the focus was strength & size over strength & speed.
as magnus has pointed out - a couple of guys who have changed positions have added weight. that's basically what i was looking for.
my initial concern was with guys like wilkins, who may be undersized to play another position (only a high school junior, i know). what about guys like b smith or even marvin robinson if he makes the transition to lb from safety? can these guys put on weight effectively to play a new position if they are a tweener?
at the beginning of spring ball when the new spring rosters were published. Most of the freshman lineman had put on 20-25 lbs and some of the position players (Roy Roundtree) put on at least 15.
So yes, Barwis' system can do that too.
like i said, maybe it was a dopey question on my part.
the basis of my question was not to bag on the old way of doing things - because the zone blocking was only started in 2006? lineman didn't have to do a lot of getting to the second level. at the time - maybe bulk was better suited to the power-i offense. therefore - bulk em up.
it's going to depend on how much you eat, how much protein and how many calories plus other factors. Your bench can go up without gaining weight. My bench has gone up from what was 300 to 365 and I have fluctuated from 193 to 196 for around a year. Now if I was gaining more weight would my bench go up more? Of course it would but you can gain strength without gaining weight. Yes, I know you said youre speaking for most of human race and that does not mean all of human race.
oh bother, this was supposed to be to dex's 1st post.
On the scale, you only went up 3 pounds, but I'd bet you've done a bit of a transformation physically during that time and lost quite a bit of bodyfat % while increasing your lean mass.
So, congratulations. That's a pretty impressive bench relative to body weight.
Edit (clarification) :
So what I'm saying is your 196 now is probably much stronger than your 193 before. To relate to the OP, would you rather have a brick shithouse of a DE at 225 who can shove around people or a weak fatty at 245 who gets owned on the regular? The scale weight won't tell the whole story, especially in the case of fat guys leaning out.
And all you had to do was buy a bench press shirt.
I think the Barwis philosophy is to train in a manner that enhances your performance on the field and that therefore the method for each position is going to be different, at least somewhat. Furthermore, I think I recall that he actually spends a huge amount of time in customizing an approach for each player, which would indicate that he likely tailor the scheme for a particular position toward the needs of an individual.
I would expect that the overall approach Barwis takes is somewhat universal for all players in terms of improving strength, balance, speed and of course stamina (for both per play and longer term over the entire game).
Go back over the boards and there is ample evidence after the first year of workouts from various players that needed to drop bulk and add muscle doing just that, or players that simply needed to gain strength doing so while others have improved their speed, and seemingly all of them improving their stamina.