Twisted Mule™ (Patent Pending)

LOOK LIKE A STALLION… FUNCTION LIKE A MULE

Become muscled and sleekly cut like a majestic stallion. but preferring only steady terrain and less heavy loads, horses take a backseat to mules, who are stronger, can better handle heavy loads, and better negotiate difficult terrains. Grind out those push-ups on the Twisted Mule and you will see a stallion in the mirror while possessing, on the inside, the optimum functionality of the mule.

Intro to B.A.S.I.C. M.ule 101

B.uilding Belden muscle mass. A nod to Joe Belden, one of the finest college strength coaches in the US, who has pioneered the use of this push-up system for years.

The Twisted Mule™ is a total upper body gym which utilizes only compound movements; no isolation exercises. “Compound movements are the center of a body building program” -Dr.Jacob Wilson, PHD CSCS*D CEO of Applied Science and Performance Institute.

While doing twisting push ups, all your upper body muscles turn into prime movers, training muscles in multiple simultaneous concentric-eccentric (positive-negative) patterns that are hard to all identify, while supporting our body weight with your hands. Similar to a squat, where your feet bear your body weight. These are huge factors in making the Twisted Mule™ superior to conventional strength training for building muscles.

For example, on a Twisted Mule™ lat pulldown push up, your biceps and triceps, chest and lat muscles will all be engaged at the same time as you twist and go up and down. With conventional lifts, this does not take place – while doing a standard lat pulldown, the body forces the chest muscles to rest; while doing a standard triceps pressdown, the body forces the biceps to rest.

Various grip and bar positions will train muscles in similar exercise movements as bench pressing, lat pulldowns, shoulder flies, pec flyers, rows, bicep curls, dip/tricep grips… all while simultaneously doing pushups. Our two-year development, on top of Coach Belden‘s principles, and the best “time under tension” principles for this breakthrough exercise system, will build more muscle mass than conventional strength training when applied to a total upper body workout. A side comment, this would give you an exclusive upper and lower body home gym to meet all your strength training needs.

The ability to increase “progressive tension overload” will never reach an end… in other words, we will show you ways to continue to progress so that your muscles never reach accommodation, you won’t “plateau”, or become stagnant. There are infinite ways to increase resistance.

And if your goal IS NOT to build a lot of mass, we have protocols for that as well.

A.THLETICISM Just as the best movements for the lower body – squats, lunges – involve the hips moving and not in a fixed position, the same holds true for the best movements for the upper body – pressing, pulling – if the shoulders are moving via Twisted Mule™ and not in a fixed position. The most common exercises for strength and hypertrophy are when dumbbells, barbells, and bands are used in positions where the shoulders are in a fixed position. Twisted Mule™ movements consist of the shoulders moving and not in a fixed position.

Our initial training facility, the renowned 108 Performance baseball training facility in Knoxville, Tennessee, involved training baseball players who saw bat and throwing speeds increase. A past lead kettlebell instructor for CrossFit, and one of the founders of the kettlebell movement in the US, Jeff Martone, who trains on our systems, marvels at how all of your muscles feel so well connected. Can’t you just see how that would aid a football player blocking, a wrestling grappling, and a basketball player squeezing and pulling in a rebound, and on and on?

“My exit velocity off the bat went from 104 to 108 and my throwing velocity went from 88 to 92.” Jaxon Walker, University of Tennessee baseball player.

S.TRENGTH increases. Every user, again, EVERY USER of the Twisted Mule™ who went exclusively with our workout programming, and then went back to trying their conventional lifts such as bench press, pulldowns, etc., after just a few workouts on the Twisted Mule, has reported to us that their bench press, pulldown, etc. lifting capability goes up significantly.

A conventional strength training workout, that include bench press, lat pulldown, etc., involves isolation exercises that keep the shoulders in a fixed position. These do not give the connected feeling provided by Twisted Mule™ pushups that our CrossFit friend has experienced and explained to us. So, for example, after training on the Twisted Mule™, if you go on the bench press, you will feel a connected strength in your back, chest, and shoulders that you have never before felt or experienced on the bench press descent and ascent.

And these Twisted Mule™ strength gains are absolutely functional, as opposed to lying on your back under a bar, sitting on a pad and doing pulldowns, the “beach body” bicep curls, even suspended in the air on a dip stand. The functional Twisting Mule™…with shoulders rotating side-to-side and up-and- down.

I.MPROVED joint health and stability.

Weightlifters elbow (inflammation of the triceps tendon that links triceps muscle to elbow joint) is very common. If we see again, “to treat joint pain… ice, rest, use compression sleeve, take anti-inflammatory meds, see a physical therapist”; WE WILL SCREAM! Just use the Twisted Mule™ to keep us from screaming and eliminate your elbow pain.

If we hear again, “to prevent joint strain from returning… warm up properly, use proper form, if you feel pain take time off, pay attention to your body’s signals, blah-blah-blah”; WE WILL BEAT OURSELVES ON THE HEAD WITH OUR TWISTED MULE™ PUSHUP BAR!

Those above advice items, that are said, are an insult to many people who train properly but still develop joint issues. In many ways training in the basic lifts with barbells, DB’s, and even bands where the shoulders do not move, and sometimes the elbows as well, are basically not sustainable. For many it is not a matter of “if” you will sustain a joint injury, but “when”. JUST USE THE TWISTED MULE™!!!

Obviously, with any exercise program you must proceed at your own risk, and consult a doctor with any questions or concerns you might have. And, of course, with our relatively new product, a doctor or PT won’t have any knowledge of twisting pushups. We are not out to tell you that if you have suffered some traumatic joint injury, such as tearing your rotator cuff, this will be the solution to such things. But if you have a nagging injury or you want to strength train in an amazingly intense but simple fashion and limit unavoidable conventional strength training joint stress over time, the Twisted Mule™ will be the best system you could ever try.

The Twisted Mule™ could act as both your personal therapist and your holistic injury prevention specialist. The list is long with users who have said, for example,

“I fractured my wrist years ago; I have wrist pain and can’t do pushups” – wrist pain gone after two workouts. (The round, thick handles keep wrists straight – not pulled back like a push-up on flat surface.

“This has really improved my neck’s range-of-motion.” Instead of neck strengthening exercises that just focus on the neck itself, the twisting motion works the neck - and shoulders, back, and core - in a compound movement from the trapezius covering the back of the shoulders and neck with areas below including the spine, scapulae, clavicles and ribs. Turning the neck while doing a twisting pushup strengthens all the aforementioned areas at the same time, working and connecting all of the areas simultaneously. It is worth a football team to get the Twisted Mule™, for their lineman’s stiff necks in season, for this reason alone.

Physical therapists have lots of neat shoulder exercises that hit - by isolating - small and auxiliary muscles. Twisting pushups hit those same muscles while engaging the big, prime mover muscles at the same time.

C.ORE   

In a standing position, put your hands out in front of you and turn your hands and shoulders side-to-side. That is probably all we need to say. But if you are reading this, you have already decided to take a deeper dive. So now consider your hands and shoulders turning side-to-side, in a plank position, while going up and down performing push-ups. The Twisted Mule™ is so simple yet so complex!

You are combining max muscle and strength while simultaneously working your core. We are talking two 12-15 minute workouts of the upper body per week to get three areas… max muscle, strength, and core. Then live your life, or play your sport and hone your skills; be incredibly exercise time-efficient. Conventional core work is generally auxiliary-type exercise training. The Twisted Mule does not have time for such trivialities. We also have numerous exercises for very enhanced core training – while still combining with pushups - in our video library of workouts.

M.ETABOLISM    What a superior metabolic training protocol, combining Twisted Mule™ upper body training and lower body training! Supporting your body weight on your hands while doing, say, lat pulldown pushups or chest pressing pushups, is much greater intensity and the firing up one’s metabolism than laying on your back bench pressing or sitting on a pad doing a cable lat pulldown. And higher metabolism-firing from doing these Twisted Mule™ compound-muscle-pushup movements which work multiple major muscles simultaneously while doing say, a bicep curl twisting pushup. A bicep curl twisting pushup requires full use of the pecs, lats, triceps, biceps, and all the auxiliary and core muscles necessary to plank and twist during this biceps curl pushup. Perform an 18 exercise-circuit alternating a pushup exercise and a lower body exercise. The lower body leg exercises must be weightbearing as in our Posi-Trak credo “Ground Based Training for Winning on your Feet”. See our section for workout examples utilizing our Posi-Trak revolutionary leg strength training machines, or do conventional gym exercises, or do our unique leg strength training exercises on the Twisted Mule™ which makes for an incredibly inexpensive and small footprint-total home gym. This unique, 30 minutes or less and two days week circuit protocol, leads to metabolic benefits that eliminate the need to have added cardio exercising or H.I.I.T. or the dreaded burpees. All strength exercises; nothing else. Leads to us having been told:

“I lost six pounds after my first four workouts.”

“My breathing has improved.”

“After my first two workouts, my pants already felt loose around my waist.”

“My resting heart rate dropped 9 beats after a month.”

“I am off of my high blood pressure and A1C meds.”  

Belinda from Knoxville, a 67 year old woman speaks on her benefits from consistently working out on the Posi-Trak circuit.

It’s never too late to start at any age!

88 year old with no recent strength training - first attempt on the Twisted Mule™.

Twisted Mule™ sled drag

Twisted Mule™ bear crawl