Hacker News Reader

Comment by beachstartup | Hacker News Reader

>practical advice

do compound barbell exercises. especially if you sit all day at work.

Careful about that though. If you have typical computer-user posture, you'll often have a weak back and tight chest muscles. If you jump into bench pressing (as everyone does) without correcting the imbalance, you can make it worse. Essentially I'm saying a big yes to weight-training, but beyond learning the basics of how to lift, your initial focus should be correcting any existing postural issues, ideally after talking to a physio about it.

Absolutely! One must learn proper technique of squats (low bar back squats specifically), deadlift, press and bench press. It is enough for start. Find a good training plan (I like Mark Rippetoe's but there are other great ones) and start training 3 times a week. After 6-8 months you'll look at your past, weak self with utmost disguise and your future strong self with admiration :)

And start with an empty bar and increase slowly. A lot of people let their ego get in the way and load up the bar their first times and try to force lifts way too heavy. Not only is that bad because of the load, but starting light gives you time to actually learn the lifts while the weight on the bar is light enough to maintain proper form.

For my part it was the squat that was a major issue - too tight hips is another typical "computer-user" problem. Some basic stretches for the hips and taking it slower fixed that very quickly, but I wasted lots of time before I realised what the problem was.

This is something that I wish the article would've focused on more, exercise. Simple things like going for a jog are underrated.

This is anecdotal, but a lot of people slump and have terrible posture when they jog.

Can confirm, used to be able to run a 18 min 5k and had the worst posture.

Jog? Maybe in 1986, these days it's all about the sprints.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com