Fitness - aka trying to live while we're alive

[thrill]

Fitness? Yeah I'm into fitness. Fitness burger into my mouth.

Speaking of burgers, being able to eat burgers without immediately going up in pants waist size is a big reason why I got into fitness.

I didn't do [expletive] to stay fit after high school beyond walking my dog and the occasional nature hike until I was 35. Obviously that's the time of life when our bodies have begun to degrade and we just can't do the stuff we've always done and expect to feel good. So I started lifting weights. I started with barbell compound lifts in the strength rep range (5 sets of 5 typically). Immediate newb gains took my major lifts way up, very quickly. I started with a max bench of 90 and now my max is 270, 4 years later. Deadlift 135, now it's 450, etc. These gains can be yours, if you choose. Pretty much anyone can get pretty strong with consistency.

Then I transitioned to globogym basic hypertrophy programming to spend more time with some friends who worked out together. Hypertrophy training is excellent in terms of low impact + huge health benefits, but its gotten boring/stale and I found that while it optimizes muscle growth and allows you to target specific aesthetic gains easily, I lost a ton of practical strength after doing it for a year without touching a barbell. The barbell compound lifts just aren't quite as good at isolation and they are much more taxing on the central nervous system, but the ancillary full-body strength and functionality gains are huge.

At my heaviest 4 years ago I made a note in my phone that just says: "Weight 287, depressed, blood pressure 142/100."

Fast forward 4 years and I've gotten all the newb gains, I'm very happy with strength and size, even though that was never the point. The point is feeling better. Now I weigh 225, I'm not depressed, and my BP is 110/75. Also went from a 42 in waist (v difficult to find pants in stores) to a 34 in waist (very easy to find).

I'm a wearable fitness tracker guy (whoop), I've drastically improved my diet without much effort or intention, and I get more/better sleep. These ancillary benefits happened pretty naturally because when I get good momentum, I make good choices. When I started feeling the immense physical and mental/emotional benefits of regular exercise, the diet and sleep hygiene followed pretty naturally.

Wearing the whoop I figured something out pretty quickly. HRV - heart rate variability. The higher this number is when I wake up and check my whoop, the better I feel. It does not matter what else is going on in my life - stress, grief, lack of sleep, hectic schedule - if that number is high I feel great and get stuff done. If it is low, I feel bad and I do not. Stress, sleep, etc definitely affects HRV, but with consistent zone 3-5 cardio work, healthy sleep, and healthy diet, that number keeps going up and I keep feeling better, despite exiting my physical prime years. To chase this dragon and out of boredom from 1-2 years of body building workouts, I am diving into incorporating more HIIT programming and considering trying crossfit (I've done the research, I am aware of the benefits and risks).

I'm turning 40 in a couple of months and I'm legitimately going to be in the best shape of my life by the time I turn 41 and that feels exciting. I really enjoy progressive overload training of all kind (doing a little more every time your workout whether it be weight, reps, durations, etc) because it just clicks with my brain and routine-oriented lifestyle. I'm excited to see where I can take focusing more on improving my cardio capacity/VO2 Max/HRV and building a ton more variety into my programming.

Working out/fitness has quickly become the dominant hobby in my private time and building workouts into my schedule has vastly improved sleep and diet consistency. I have never been an exercise guy. I played sports growing up, that was my exercise. When that stopped, I stopped. I promise you that if you have doubts about whether or not you can become an exercise person, you definitely can. I cannot stress enough to you how lazy and sedentary I was from age 19-35 and honestly even before that. I don't have specific goals for weights or looks, I just like trying to do a little more every time and I love feeling better. I didn't realize how trapped in my own body I felt until I started working out. Now I feel like I fully own and operate my body. I'm more comfortable in pretty much every possible way. I love researching and talking about this [expletive], so if anyone else here does too, let's talk about it.

[IMADreamer]

That's awesome man! I'm proud of you.

Personally the only thing I can say is I'm working on it everyday. Some times I can go a good stretch of being active, and sometimes I'm awful. I do eat significantly healthier than I ever have. This is thanks to my wife who is a fitness nut. It's also kind of her job. Thankfully though she has a thing for fat guys.

I don't want this to seem like an excuse but I played football until I was in my mid 20s. So basically everyday from about the age of 14 to 25 I was supposed to just focus on getting bigger. I found those habits really hard to break. Thankfully now in my mid 40s I have and I eat better and less. Exercise for me these days consist of riding a stationary bike and yoga. It's weird to say but I [expletive] love yoga. I feel so good when I'm done with it. I'd love to do more cardio but now after my MS diagnosis I have to be careful because sometimes I'm not so steady on my feet.

My wife wants me to start working in weights again. Not that I need the strength but because she says it will help with coordination with everything I'm dealing with. So that's next for me. I've have only lifted for max strength before but apparently what she wants me to try is different. So we will see.

Anyway, that's enough rambling about me. Keep up the good work and to all you guys working on your fitness best of luck!

[Arthur Dent]

@thrill Where do you go to lift weights? It's something I've wanted to try for a while but don't want to get some membership with a [expletive] gym and/or fumble around and look like a fool.

[Fat_Bulldog]

I have turned my garage into a gym as I can't handle being around other idiots in a public gym.

My garage gym consists of:
- Treadmill (with TV hanging on wall above it...)
- Olympic barbell bench with 300 lbs worth of plates
- Dumbell bench and dumbell sets from 5 - 55 lbs
- Cable/pulldown machine
- Heavy bag/speed bag combo

I usually lift heavy 4 - 5 days a week working in cardio doing rounds on the heavy bag. My workouts usually consist of 20 - 24 sets of lifting (progressive overload/pyramid) and about 15 - 25 rounds (45 seconds each) on the heavy bag.

I have lost a net 32 lbs since the end of January and my doctor estimates that I have gained about 20 lbs muscle since then as well. So, closer to 50 lbs of fat loss.

I am in a bad mood if I can't workout. And, the heat and humidity this last month have helped me drop about 10 lbs in a month.

[cardinalkarp]

Nice work fellas! I don’t do a ton of weightlifting or cardio per se but I always try to remain active whether that’s out tending to the gardens and yard, but just not sitting around makes all the difference in the world.

I’m a big proponent of intermittent fasting and try to only eat one meal and a snack per day limiting my eating times from 3-8pm which allows me to basically eat as large of a meal as I want (with it consisting of organic vegetables and organic grass fed beef and pasture raised pork/chicken sourced from local farms). This has kept me at a good weight (165 lbs) and feeling as healthy as I’ve ever been pushing 50 years old.

Like thrill, I have a whoop and track those same things. I too have found a direct correlation between HRV and how I feel. It’s really interesting seeing how your body reacts to different levels of strain and what it does in attempts to recover.

[Fat_Bulldog]

I hope to be able to bench close to 300 lbs by end of year.

[Popeye_Card]

I would say that I exercise more than having a heavy fitness regimen. After spending my 30's doing some very basic weights, a bit of cardio, and playing ice hockey through the winter, hitting 40 nearly simultaneously with COVID shutdowns derailed me for a couple years to where I was basically only doing 12 and 16 oz. curls (i.e. drinking beer).

So my wife and I started building out a small home gym about 3 years ago, mostly cardio equipment. We have a treadmill, elliptical, a spin bike, a water rower, and a power tower as the main equipment. I still go through phases depending on how busy I am at work or with other projects at home, but typically I get in 3-5 days a week of ~1 hour. My training regimen ebbs and flows - sometimes building out stamina, other times intervals, etc. Mostly just keep things fresh and keep up a good overall level of fitness. And I've gone back to playing hockey again, so I try to stay in shape for that.

Over the past year I've started doing Murphs as part of the regimen. If you're in good enough shape to add them in, they're a great routine for overall body fitness that you can fit in under an hour. I try to get 1 in each week (unweighted), but if I go a few weeks without doing one it takes a bit to ramp back up for the pushups and pullups.

The biggest diet obstacle I have is that I still drink way too much beer. If the suggested healthy limit for males is 2 per day (14 per week), I'm easily double that each week, and in some cases triple. I really need to cut back.

On the mental health side, I don't notice as big of changes in mood when I'm working out more, but a workout certainly is a de-stressor for me. Tough day at work, it is good to hop on the treadmill and forget about it for an hour.

[thrill]

@thrill Where do you go to lift weights? It's something I've wanted to try for a while but don't want to get some membership with a [expletive] gym and/or fumble around and look like a fool.

Totally depends on your goals. As a science-minded guy, you can dive as deep as you want. There are tons of apps and resources to help you with programming your workouts based on goals, but obviously being 2025 there's more nonsense/grifter stuff out there than valuable. If you get interested, you will be able to find good online resources to educate yourself before you go to avoid feeling dumb, but I'll say this about gyms - typically incredibly welcoming place and the biggest, most juiced out looking dudes are usually absolute sweethearts who love helping people at the gym feel more comfortable. Especially the older guys who are 40+. The most welcoming gyms I've found are barbell gyms with serious lifters. The least welcoming gyms I've found are your planet fitness type places with the least serious lifters. It makes sense, the people who are most into it are going to be the most open about sharing and teaching it and the people who don't love it but do it because they don't want to die just want to get in and out without taking their headphones off. They also have the most inconsiderate etiquette.

Casey Johnston's writing is what unlocked it for me. Finding a politically left, non-narcissist/non-toxic person who I connect with on multiple levels was my entry point to the online fitness community.

She has a blog - https://www.shesabeast.co/about/
She has a book about starting strength - https://www.couchtobarbell.com/
And she just released a memoir that I own but haven't read - https://www.caseyjohnston.website/my-wo ... -education

If you are interested in the science of strength and muscle building, youtube has a lot to offer. Jeff Nippard (natural bodybuilder and exercise scientist) has great stuff, Mitch Hooper (currently on a downswing but one of the best strongmen competitors of all time) has great strength stuff, and Renaissance Periodization is super popular with body builders and juice heads, but Dr. Mike Israetel absolutely knows what he's talking about when it comes to hypertrophy training and technique. Just keep an eye on where they algo takes you, because there's some absolute trash out there.

The basics of weight lifting are as follows:

Programming is what you lift, how much you lift, and how often you lift it. All lifting will get you stronger, more mobile (moving full range of motion for a joint(s) under load is more effective for flexibility than any bodyweight stretching), and healthier, but you can target specific goals and priorities by making minor adjustments.

I want to get stronger and feel healthier/more capable in my body - Lift 80% of your 1-rep max for 5 sets of 5 reps with 2 minute rest breaks in between sets.

I want to get swole and lean (optimal hypertrophy stimulus aka tearing down your muscles to rebuild more and bigger muscle tissue) - Lift about 60-70% of your 1-rep max for 3-4 sets of 8-20 reps with 1 minute rest breaks between sets.

How do I know my percentages relative to max if I've never "maxed out?" Great question. Maxing out is mostly about strength, but a not insignificant part of it is also about skill. Your body will get more efficient moving heavy weights the more experienced you are doing it. You will know you are lifting the right weight for your sets when the last couple reps of each set is difficult to finish. By the last couple reps of your last set, you should barely be able to finish and honestly its even great if you can't get those last 1-2 reps and fail. Proximity to muscular failure is how you know you've hit the spot. So say you're doing a 5x5 this is how it typically should go by feel:
Set 1, rep 5 - that was hard
Set 2, rep 5 (you're warmed up, you're peaking, you're an unstoppable super hero) - that felt great
Set 3 rep 5 - uh oh I have to do 2 more of these and I'm feeling it
Set 4 rep 5 - jesus christ
Set 5 rep 4 - I dont think I can do a 5th rep but I'll try

I didn't go for single rep maxes on any lifts until I had been lifting for 3 years. Why? Because I'm not 19 and I don't measure my value on stupid stuff like that and also, it can be dangerous. The less experience you have, the more likely you are to hurt yourself pushing your limits with big weights.

Like I did, if you go on this journey for years consistently, you're going to learn more and switch things up just to stay engaged/not be bored, so once you know what you're doing, you can mix and match your programming intuitively.

If you asked me to build a program for you to start, I would first ask where you're working out/what equipment they have, because like I mentioned, I'm a huge proponent of barbell lifting, especially when starting out, but many commercial gyms only have machines which don't provide the same functional stimulus in compound (multiple joints engaged) movements. Learning the basic fundamentals of form, breathing/bracing, and more functional movement/strength benefits you get from barbell lifts vs machines that isolate specific muscles more effectively or dumbbells, which are less stable because they aren't joined by a giant metal bar and thus you aren't able to lift as close to your max weight as you are with a barbell, is hugely beneficial to overall health and wellness.

Your program would look something like this:
Disclaimer 5x5 means five WORKING sets at your effective weight range. Before you start the first working set, do 1-2 WARM UP sets of 10 reps at half the weight you will do for your working set. Do this for all exercises just to prime your body and avoid injury. So if youre going to bench 135 (a barbell + one of the big 45lb plates on each side), do 1-2 sets of 10 reps at around 75 lbs (45 lb barbell + a 15 lb plate on each side).

Option 1: Push, Pull, Hinge/Legs
Day 1 - Push
Warm up - stretch, move a bit, get warm
Barbell Bench press - 5x5
Barbell Overhead press - 5x5
Dumbbell butterfly - 3x8-10
Dumbbell lateral raise - 3x8-10
Tricep Extension - 3x8-10

Result - We worked horizontal plane pushing strength, vertical pushing strength, and hit our major muscle groups multiple times (chest twice, shoulders twice, triceps 3 times)

Day 2 - Pull
Warm up
Pull-ups (If you can do pull ups or have a gym with an assisted pull up machine) 3x8-10 and if you can't do pull ups, substitute with cable pulldowns (machine)
Barbell Bent over row - 5x5
Reverse dumbbell flys or reverse fly machine - 3x10
Dumbbell, barbell, or machine bicep curls 3x10

Result - We worked vertical pulling, horizontal pulling and hit our back x3 and our biceps once as the primary muscle and twice as a support muscle. We also hit the shoulders a bit focused on the rear delt which doesn't get much stimulus on our push day despite shoulder work)

Day 3 - Hip hinge/legs
Barbell squat 5x5
Deadlift 5x5
Lunges (bodyweight, barbell, smith machine, or dumbbells) 3x10
Result - we worked vertical pushing from our legs, vertical pulling from our back (deadlifts hit absolutely everything along your spinal column) and if done correctly, stretched the [expletive] out of our lower body range of motion.


This would be an absolutely rock solid starting point that combines the best of strength programming and a little hypertrophy on some of the movements that are more awkward/taxing to do lower rep/heavier weights on. This is pretty optimized for any lifter, but the truth is, you can blur some of these lines and kind of be all over the place with your programming and still get immediate results, especially for a beginner lifter. You will be shocked at how quickly your strength and work capacity go up in the first two years.

Option 2 - Upper/lower split
Day 1 - Upper
Warm up - stretch, move a bit, get warm
Barbell Bench press - 5x5
Barbell Overhead press - 5x5
Cable Pulldown or pullups - 5x5
Barbell Bent over row - 5x5

Day 2 - Legs
Barbell squat 5x5
Deadlift 5x5
Lunges (bodyweight, barbell, smith machine, or dumbbells) 3x10

Result - we hit everything in the body and can do it 4x a week with a rest day in between

Option 3 - Full body
Barbell Bench press - 5x5
Barbell Overhead press - 5x5
Barbell Bent over row - 5x5
Barbell squat 5x5
Deadlift 5x5

Result - we have hit everything we need to hit in one day, we improve our overall strength and flexibility in a big way. We can hit these major muscle groups 4x a week if we take a rest day after every workout. Downside - full body can be very taxing on your central nervous system (deadlifts and squats are super mentally and physically taxing) and difficult to do every other day without, ESPECIALLY in the first few months when you will absolutely be destroyed by DOMS (delayed onset muscle soreness) for days at a time. You're going to be sore for the first month when you start, then your body will adapt. I found it easier to not have my entire body sore all the time by doing an upper/lower split when I started).

Take a rest day between every lifting day. There are free apps like the Strong app that allow you to build your workout, pre-load rest times (a little bell goes off when its time to lift again) and has videos for each movement showing you the form.

My garage gym consists of:
- Treadmill (with TV hanging on wall above it...)
- Olympic barbell bench with 300 lbs worth of plates
- Dumbell bench and dumbell sets from 5 - 55 lbs
- Cable/pulldown machine
- Heavy bag/speed bag combo

Helllll yeah brother. This is sick. This is exactly how I started, but having the cable/pulldown is a next level luxury in a home gym. Vertical pulling movements at home are really hard to recreate if, like me, you were way too fat and weak to contemplate a pull up until you had been lifting for like three years. I would do pull ups with bands to assist, but the deep hang ecentric part of the movement is assisted the most by a band and that's where you get the most effective stimulus, so its not ideal. I no longer work out at home because I don't have a garage anymore and my downstairs neighbors wouldn't appreciate me dropping 400 lbs above them if I'm deadlifting lol. The good thing is now that I'm way more confident in my lifting, I no longer hate other people in the gym because of insecurity.

I also have some fun home implements when I don't feel like going out that are not optimal, but still really fun and effective.
-88lb kettlebell (this is a beast to swing)
-53lb kettlebell
-25lb mace
-35lb thors hammer which is super impractical but I have fun using it
-75 lb sandbag
-adjustable dumbbells that go to 70lb each
-adjustable bench

On the mental health side, I don't notice as big of changes in mood when I'm working out more, but a workout certainly is a de-stressor for me. Tough day at work, it is good to hop on the treadmill and forget about it for an hour.

This might not be why because everyone's mileage varies on everything, but it is true that you don't get the same hormonal regulation benefits or the metabolic benefits from cardio that you do from lifting. Especially men for whom testosterone production is a key to mood, sleep, etc.

What I'm currently doing:
I've gotten more into dips and pull ups now that I can do them.

Day 1 - Push
Dips - 3 sets of as many as I can do (225 lb bodyweight)
Incline Bench - 3x10
Barbell overhead press - 4x8
Dumbbell flys - 3x10
Skull crushers (a modified tricep extension) - 3x10

Day 2 - Pull
Pull ups - 3 sets of as many as I can do
Bent row - 5x5
Dumbbell reverse flys - 3x12 (I have big front delts from all the pressing so I'm trying to fill out my side delts more)
Dumbbell row - 3x12
Seated incline bicep curls - 3x15

Day 3 - Legs
Barbell squat - 5x5
Dumbbell Lunges 3x10
Box jumps 3x10
Leg press - 5x5

Where I'm plotting to go next:

Sunday:
Full body barbell 5x5 (what I posted above as AD's option 3)
Monday - Stretching and zone 3 cardio outside
Tuesday - AMRAP (as many rounds as possible) 75 lb sandbag ground to shoulder 20 minutes
Wednesday - stretching and zone 3 cardio outside
Thursday - AMRAP single arm kettlebell complex (53 lb bell - right hand 5 swings, 5 cleans, 5 overhead squat, 5 presses and then do the left side)
Friday - dips and pullups
Saturday - rest

Also - because I am the proud owner of an energetic 2 year old chocolate lab, I average 15,000 steps a day.

[heyzeus]

Is GRB BSOHL?

[Popeye_Card]

Is GRB BSOHL?

Excluding high school, I have pinpointed my BSOHL as valentine's day 2024 (2/14/2024). According to my handy dandy fitness tracking spreadsheet, I was at 171 pounds and completed an unweighted Murph in 36:52. Three days later I completed a weighted Murph in 49:05. I can't think of a time since college where I could come close to that.