The Naked Warrior: Master the Secrets of the super-Strong--Using Bodyweight Exercises Only

When the IAP bottoms out, the tension in all your muscles drops off. In my stretching book, I explain how to take advantage of this phenomenon and make dramatic gains in flexibility overnight.

Whenever you exert yourself, always start tensing in your lower abdomen. Then send that tension outward to be amplified by the tension of the muscles closer and closer to the periphery. Visualize how you are sending the pressure built up by the modified reverse breath along from your torso to your limbs,

You might find this a frustrating learning experience at times, but once you finally do get it you will have an awesome revelation of superpower.

B.K.S. Iyengar, a master of Yoga, says, “the traps belong to the back, not the neck.” Then shorten your armpit muscles even further so they pull your shoulders into your body.

The downward pressure exerted by your diaphragm is essential for upping the IAP. Recall that when you “breathe into your stomach,” the dome shaped muscle bears down and compresses your viscera. Breathing into your chest would pressurize your thoracic cavity and leave your abdomen weak; this does more to raise your blood pressure than your strength.

Instead of going down by yielding to the gravity, actively pull yourself down while still staying braced and tight. In the pushup, pull with your lats and other back muscles; don’t forget the inside-out corkscrew on the way down. In the squat, pull with your hip flexors, the muscles on the tops of your thighs whose job it is to jackknife your body.

When performing the pistol, direct the compressed energy down your hip and leg all the way into the ground, where you generate a static stomp. When performing the one-arm pushup, send the energy along your oblique and ribs, into your armpit, and then along your arm into your hand.

In a landmark slap to the Western gym beliefs, the exhalation group showed the lowest scores! The “inhalers” did better and the breath holders kicked everyone’s butt.

“If you punch and exhale, you have no punch, you lose your energy…No professional fighters punch and exhale because they would lose their strength, have no compression and therefore no energy…Compression and making a sound is not exhaling; exhaling is different. Boxers punch and you hear them making the ‘su’ ‘su’ ‘su’ sound. That is not exhaling, t