To accessorise: to add something to something else to improve usefulness, versatility, or attractiveness.

It’s not in the best interest of your progress to skip exercises, but it happens. Sometimes you just have to leave the gym earlier that anticipated, time gets away from you, you’re chatting too much or you’re just absolutely spent on energy, so not all exercises are going to make the cut on that day.

When that happens, here are some tools for your tool belt so you can modify your training in the least detrimental way possible.

Oftentimes we have people come in to the gym that have been training for 2-5 years or more. They have gym experience. When it comes time for them to perform fundamental movement patterns though, they really lack confidence in how to execute them, or what loads to use. This is absolutely no shade on them; it’s just a reflection of how services are commonly rendered in the fitness industry.

One of our fundamental values at TSF is cultivating independent lifters. Our service delivery is entirely reflective of this. We coach in such a way that we not only help people get stronger, but also to teach them the skills to be able to resistance train safely and effectively in any gym, without guidance, for as long as they see value in doing so.

In this article I unpack why we think developing autonomy is so important, and how we go about cultivating autonomy as coaches.

The 2023 Team Champs was a blast. Here TSF Head Coach Josh Luu gives a thorough recap of the day, providing insights in to what it is like to coach at one of the most hotly contested competitions of the year.

In powerlifting circles, cardio is often viewed as a dirty word. How many times have we heard “cardio is hardio” or “six reps is cardio bro”. Nah man, six reps shouldn’t be cardio. Improving your cardiovascular fitness can be of huge benefit not only to your health, but also to your powerlifting training. Excess specificity or specialising for powerlifting too much can come at a cost for your health and overtime, ironically for your performance too. Cardio training can help that.

The third edition of the TSF Team Champs is set to take place on March 12th. Camaraderie, teamwork and the social aspect of sport have always been fundamental pillars and values that we’ve strived to uphold at TSF, and nothing highlights that more than the Team Champs.

I’d like to unpack with you a little history, some stories and some of the reasons why we think running the Team Champs is so damn important.

At TSF, we typically program in five-week blocks and we are staunch on sub-maximal training. Understanding the “why” behind coaching decisions can help you as a lifter to attack your training with the intention that is built in to your program. If you don’t know why certain exercises are in your program or what the purpose of an intro/deload week is, it’s hard for you to execute them with the desired intention.

In this article I explain how we structure our training at TSF and in line with that, how you can best execute each week of your training block to achieve the best training outcomes.

Across a five week training period, we want to first recover from the fatigue accumulated in the preceding training block, then build training momentum across the block to launch us in to the next one. This is how we do it.

Barbells, dumbbells and machines are not as different as they appear on the surface. They all apply external load to the body with the goal of making the trainee stronger. You can get stronger, you can get more jacked and you can change the shape of your body with any one or combination of those tools.

Based on factors like your skill level, your goals, what equipment you have access to, your access to a coach, etc, you may be better using one training tool over another, or using them in various degrees.

I unpack that in this article so you can make best use of your time in the gym!

New to barbell training? Here are some must-knows for your first few weeks.

Getting started in strength training doesn’t need to be a super intimidating, complicated process. If you can move, you can strength train.

At its foundation, strength training is about adding load to human movement. It’s one of the things that I love about it so much; that it is infinitely scalable, which makes it incredibly accessible. Even an 80 year old with no experience with sport or exercise can start strength training in some form.

Perhaps you’ve read a little about strength training and it’s benefits and you want to get started. In this article I discuss where to start and what to focus your efforts on in your first six months in the gym.

Training for a powerlifting meet can be so much fun and can really encourage you to push hard in your training. You see all of your hard work come together as you step on the platform. You have a blast making friends in the warm up room and making some noise on your stage.

Then the bar hits the floor after your final lift. Now what?

The “post-comp blues” are a very common experience. Many lifters will report less consistent and less productive training in this post-competition period, which sucks. How you approach your off-season training is just as, if not more important than slamming your meet prep. This is where we lay our foundations.

So how can we set ourselves up for a productive off-season, rather than sinking deep in to the post-comp blues, and the lousy training that comes with it?

Accessory exercises are included in a powerlifting program to foster the outcome of lifting the maximum load possible in each of the powerlifts. To get better at powerlifting, some may think that all you need to do is squat, bench and deadlift, repeat forever. However this is not the case. While performing the SBD is valuable for improving at them and they are certainly an important part of your program, when performed exclusively they will inhibit your powerlifting performance. That is because they are not the best tools for developing technique, building muscle, nor reducing injury risk. And so, we include other exercises in our program.

I believe that it is extremely important for a lifter to understand why a certain exercise has been included in their program. When a lifter understands the purpose of an exercise, they can execute the exercise in such a way that it achieves that purpose. Furthermore, psychologically they will also have much more buy in to their program when they understand how it is working to shuttle them towards their goals.

I competed a few weeks ago at the JPS Spring Showdown. It was an insanely fun day; the most fun I’ve ever had at a competition. I made some good lifts. I also made some shocking mistakes.

Each time I compete, I always have a period of self-reflection where I go through what I did well, what could have been better, my future competition aspirations, how I want to train on the other side of comp and any ideas for my training that I’d like to flag with my coach.

Here are my reflections from the JPS competition. Perhaps you learn from my mistakes. Or perhaps this just prompts some more reflective practices in you.

In a couple of weeks time, I’ll be hitting the platform in my 32nd powerlifting contest. Seven weeks before this meet, I flew to Singapore and the Philippines on a 23-day holiday. In that time, I trained three times — and one of those sessions was a dumbbell only workout in a hotel gym.

So it’s fair to conclude that I won’t be achieving anything spectacular at this upcoming meet. I won’t be in my best physical condition and I won’t be hitting any PBs. That said then, why am I doing it?

I’ve been strength/barbell training for almost eight years now. That sounds like a really long time, and it feels like it. I have learned a lot in my time in the gym. That sounds really philosophical, I get it. But I really have learned a lot from pushing my physical and mental limits.

Through all the phases of my life, physical exercise has played some part in it. As a kid, I played basketball and danced. While I didn’t really understand why at the time, I always felt good after a training session so I kept it up. When we played a tough game, or had a hard dance practice, the feeling of being able to push through the pain - physical and otherwise - gave me an unparalleled feeling of accomplishment.

As for my journey in to powerlifting, let me break it down in to timeline order for you

Powerlifting is a strength sport in which athletes practice the disciplines of the squat, the bench press and the deadlift. The total weight lifted across the three lifts are ranked against other athletes in the same weight class. The athlete who has the highest total in the weight class wins the competition.

It sounds pretty dry on paper, right? But many of us have found a huge amount of love for the sport. That’s not just because we’re strong and have won some big trophies. Our love for powerlifting comes from a lot more than our three-lift total.

I’ve learned a lot through powerlifting. Here’s where some of my love comes from.

I first wrote a version of this article in mid 2020 on my personal website. It is one of my most-read articles. With so many changes in the Australian Powerlifting landscape over the last two years, it is due for a refresh.

In contemplating entering your first powerlifting competition you probably have a lot of questions: What are the rules? What do I need to wear? How much does it cost? What does the belt do? What’s with the suit?

This is not a comprehensive guide, nor is it designed to replace the role of your coach in educating you on how to prepare and what to expect. Rather, my hope is that this article will give you a little more insight in to how competitions run, and some things to consider in preparation.