If you got a chance to check out my lastest post I put up that had ‘The 7 Min Ab Challenge From Hell” on it, you’d might of already gotten a chance to meet Todd Kuslikis.
He was the guy that sent me that challenge in the first place.
Within this post, I have a guest Q and A from my buddy Todd that gives you a deep inside look at what todd’s about.
This is good stuff.
Oh and before you get into the interview below, make sure to check out Todd’s Bodyweight Only System, Bodyweight Overload.
From the look’s of Todd’s pics above, I’d say the program works!
Let’s get into the Q and A I did with Todd…
Q – So tell me Todd, what got you into training?
I have trained to some degree all throughout grade school and High School. But I can tell out that I became serious about training when I began to practice martial arts in my late teens. My Tai Chi/Kenpo Karate instructor had agility like a deer. He had quickness and strength that few could match. He rarely lifted weights and often told me stories about his own instructor who could jump off of two story balconies, land on concrete in a tucked roll and hop out of it. From then on, I was hooked. I had to study how the human body could perform such feats. Its now been over ten years and I have invested a tremendous amount of time and resources into learning.
Q – Are you a full time trainer? Do you own a gym? If so, what where? Tell us about it? If not, what do you do for a living? What’s your PASSION?
I’ve actually never owned a gym and am a personal trainer however, its not my full time job. I work full time managing the closed head and spinal cord injury division of a home health agency here in Michigan. I absolutely love it. It gives me an opportunity to work with people that have had much of their lives taken away. It never ceases to amaze me that the greater percentage of these people have better attitudes about life than people with full mobility. For example, I met a man named Mike quite a while ago that was paralyzed from the neck down. You might think that he had every right to be miserable with his life. Yet, you know something? He wasn’t. He was making the most it and I was shocked to hear from him that he regularly hunts big game in Africa (with a specially designed cross bow), was working on his 3rd Masters degree, and was a master painter (I saw the picture he brought in and would have mistaken it for a photograph. He holds the paint brush in his mouth.) Life is what we make of it.
Q – What would you say your overall MISSION is with what you do online? What is your main objective?
My overall mission of A Shot of Adrenaline is to teach people that they don’t need to settle for their current life circumstances. Many people look at their life and think that they could never be more than what are currently. They settle for their body style, their job, their financial situation. My goal is to help people not settle… to strive for more… to be more.
I use body weight exercises not only because I love them but also because most people have a perception that they have to be in a gym to build a great physique. When people transform their own bodies in the comfort of their own home using just their own body weight it helps them realize something they haven’t realized before. Its like a mind shift. That is what I am after.
Q – I know you love bodyweight training from your program Bodyweight Overload, would you say that’s your “go to” method of training? In other words, how would you describe your METHOD of training?
Yes, for sure. Think of it this way. Body weight exercises are the great equalizer. Many 
extremely strong power lifters or professional body builders can lift hundreds of pounds but can’t lift their own body weight into a front lever or do a muscle up. When you perform a difficult body weight manuveur you are coordinating your body as a unit instead of just isolating a single muscle.
In general, my method of training falls under the category of “body weight” but their is an ocean of variation in this category. Right now I am focusing on improving my front lever, muscle up, handstand ability. When I was going through and leading people through Bodyweight Overload I was solely focused on muscular growth. Now I am focusing on ability. Jack Lalanne once stated that every 30 days you need to change up your routine. I agree with that but would extend it to about 45 days.
Q – Todd, I’m always interested in hearing about what you would do for a beginning trainee, one that is getting into serious training for the first time. How would you program for this?
Start slowly. Beginners have a tendency to jump into new workouts with great enthusiasm. Then they either injure themself or get discouraged because they don’t look like Arnie in 2 weeks. I once heard a story about a woman how was 50 lbs over weight and wanted to get healthy. For the first week of her new plan her only goal was to wake up and turn off her alarm at the time she wanted to workout. Then the second week her only goal was to wake up, put her workout clothes on then take them off again and go back to bed. The third week she actually drove to the gym but stayed in her car. It was not until the fourth week before she actually stepped foot in the gym. She slowly built up the habit of working out and she quickly lost the 50 lbs because she learned to enjoy it and she reinforced each step over time.
I start the same way with beginners. I don’t like to throw them in the deep end. I will usually have them work on their push ups and no-weight squats for the first couple of weeks. These two exercises alone are enough to build up strength for a beginner. From their I start adding exercises to round out the workout program.
Q – Coming off the last question, how would you program for someone that’s SUPER advanced? What would you program for them?
If they are only using body weight exercises they need to make some major modification to each exercise. Two techniques that I teach to advanced people are to change the angle of each exercise and change how your body weight is distributed. Lets take the angle technique first. Say you wanted to work out your chest muscle. Most people would start with the normal push up. By placing your feet on a chair you change up the angle to focus more on your upper chest. This increases the difficulty. If you want to further increase the difficulty while you are in this decline position you can shift your body weight over to one side and do the push up. After you are done with one side shift over to the other. You can literally do both of these techniques with almost any body weight exercise. I also have more advanced people do higher volume of sets. This technique wears down the muscle more effectively and provides for a better workout.
Q – I’m always interested in hearing about favorite workouts or most memorable ones. What is your FAVORITE FULL workout of all time? Why?
Here is my most memorable workout of all time. A few years back I did a 6 day fast (no food, only water) by myself deep in the dunes of Ludington State Park (miles and miles away from civilization). This park has lake Michigan on one side and a huge lake called Lake Hamlin. It is one of the most beautiful places on earth and covers miles of huge dunes with pockets of forests inside large bowls. Not sure if you can picture this but if you were to stand on top of a dune you could see for long distances. Its amazing. Well, on the the third or fourth day I decided to do an intense workout. For about an hour I ran along the peaks of the dunes while intermittently doing squats and push ups in the sand, climbing trees and lifting large objects and carrying them up and down hundred foot dunes. I think the combination of it being really intense and being in the midst of nature and through a 6 day fast makes it one of the most memorable.
Q – Todd, not sure if you’ve seen my weekly “Thursday Throwdowns” before or not, in short they’re fast and short mini challenges I put up on my blog. If you were to put together a short, mini challenge workout like these for me and my Aggressive Strength tribe members to go through, what would it look like?
Ahhh.. I love a good throwdown. Here you go folks if you dare. This is one of the simplest but most brutal workouts you will go through. Get a deck of 52 cards. Assign the black cards to plyometric burpees with push ups on the down position and a quick knee tuck to your chest on the jump (up position). Assign the red cards to a diver bomber push up. The face of the cards will tell you how many reps to do. For example a black five will tell you to do five reps of plyometric burpees. Face cards (Jack, Queen, King) are ten reps and Aces are 11 reps. Go through the full deck without rest.
Q – Tell us a little bit about your Bodyweight Overload Program? What is it? Who’s it for?
Bodyweight Overload is for individuals that struggle to build muscle and want to workout using only body weight exercises. It is for men and women and is designed to allow beginners and advanced body weight exercise enthusiasts participate. In the program I show how to adjust each exercise and workout to your fitness level.
My primary goal when creating Overload was to show people that you can build muscle using body weight. The general perception of the public is that weights are for getting bigger and body weight exercises are only for toning and looking more slender. I want to smash this belief. Your own body can be one of the greatest forms of resistance imaginable and if you know how to position it properly and train it in the right way you CAN gain muscle mass along with looking ripped.
Q – Any exciting developments in the making that we can look forward to?
Yes, I am putting together a tutorial on how to create your own full home gym using PVC piping. I spent hours and hours at Home Depot cutting PVC and talking to the guys on how to put this thing together. It has stations that allow you to practice human flags, muscle ups, front levers, iron crosses, and a ton of other very difficult body weight exercises. Definitely be on the lookout for it. I’ve been using it at home and have fallen in love with this piece of equipment. I made it for less than $150 and it is wickedly awesome.
Weight vest. It elevates body weight training to the next level.
Q – Last question – Your favorite song to train to? Go!
I have a playlist on my ipod that has only one song. Or actually its not a song but a speech called “How Bad Do You Want It?” You have probably heard it before. I listen to that over and over and over again. Never get sick of it.
Thanks brother for taking the time to share!
Great info right there.
Got questions for Todd? Drop em below in the comments.
Live and Train Aggressive!
If you want MORE from Todd, make sure to check out his Bodyweight Overload System, which as he said within the interview is a unique Bodyweight ONLY Training System that will add not only get you strong as all heck by using your own bodyweight, you’ll also pack on some pounds of muscle as well.
Todd’s got KILLER SALE going on right now ==> CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFO
