The Zen of Weight Lifting
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
One thing that has made it more enjoyable for me and helped me avoid injuries (I initially had some nagging shoulder issues) is to stop caring about the number of reps. Obsessing about hitting a certain number causes form breakdown, injury, a stunted range of motion, and discouragement when you can't reach your goal. It's far better to just do as many as you can on each set with good form and not focus too much on what number you hit. As long as you're pushing yourself on the last few reps, your muscles won't know the difference, and if you're consistent in your workouts and diet, the numbers will take care of themselves over time.
Within six weeks, I was back to most of my original routine, after almost a year not lifting -- and as you say, my overall pain level has been much reduced and my posture improved
Sadly the extra kilos gained in that time will take longer to vanish.
Besides, since force is a neurological stuff, you « memorize » lifted weight as you memorize playing guitar or riding a bike. It takes a short period of time to get started again, but the neural connections stay for sure.
Do you want to get big? Then train heavy enough that you can do 10-15 reps with good form.
Do you want explosive strength for sports? Then look for around 15-20 reps but do the pushing part explosively.
Do you want to get strong? Lift heavy. Do 5 sets of a weight you can lift for 5-8 reps.
Going for endurance? Then you're looking for weights that take you to 30-50 reps.
Adjust the weights if you're not in your rep range, and don't cheat. Rest longer between sets if they start dropping off.
Explosive strength and strong is more subtle. You basically have two sorts of muscle fiber: one is for short explosive strength the other more endurance. Different training results in a different mix of these fibers (as does genetics!). It's a case of getting the right kind of fiber in the right muscles for your sporting goal.
There are some fantastic youtube videos from people who are experts (for me it's a hobby), I can recommend Shredded Sports Science for the theory and Athlean-X for a mix of both theory and practice.
It's not exactly the same topic, but Mark Rippetoe gets to the spirit of it "My opinion about barbell rows is as follows: fuck barbell rows. Really. Fuck them. Stop wasting time worrying about barbell rows and get your deadlift up to 500. By then you'll have your own opinion and you won't have to worry about mine."
Until you get to the point of at least a 350lb squat and 400lb deadlift, it's far more useful to just stick with a program you can stick with than worry about optimizing it based on what "professional" athlete you want to be like.
It doesn't make sense to perform routines that don't aim to achieve the results you want and the routine you're most likely to stick with is the one that promises the results you want, has people who have done it and achieved the results you want, and is created by a guy who has the results you want.
1. Squat - 505lbs 2. Bench - 355lbs 3. Deadlift - 540lbs
Also, eat big!
1. Breakfast, a cup of espresso with milk, 6oz NY Strip, 1 cup of grits with butter, 16oz whole milk.
2. Lunch, 6oz NY Strip, 2 eggs, 16 oz whole milk
3. Snack, 2 - 4 pieces of fruit e.g, 3 apples with peanut butter.
4. Dinner, 2 - 3 pieces of fried/grilled chicken, collard greens, sweet potatoes.
5. Desert - a quarter slice of pie with 16oz of milk
I didn't take any supplements, just ate whole foods I cooked at home. Everything was made from scratch. The pies used lard we rendered at home from leaf fat (fat near the kidney).
For a deeper dive, I'd recommend this excellent article: https://www.strongerbyscience.com/vegetarian-and-vegan-athle...
I was also supplementing with whey (mainly casein) and creatine.
With the baby I've been eating a lot of crap sugars and put on 5kg of fat. I'm trying to drop 20kg of bodyfat now to get to down to 10-12% body fat. So far I've been able to drop without any real muscle loss as long as I still lift regularly.
I was strictly concerned with being strong, not being cut, so carrying around a little extra wasn't a big deal. The main thing, no one will think you are fat when you are strong, it is quite noticeable. Lastly, the meal I posted was at my strongest, lifting the heaviest. If I wasn't lifting those weights I would have gained quite a bit of fat.
If you are taking a few months off due to a baby, cut back on eating. Always think long-term. Two months off while you adjust to a newborn will do wonders when you get back into it. If you try to do it all, you'll be stressed and not enjoy lifting - or anything for that matter.
It's a bit harder for vegans, but still doable. Look up Clarence Kennedy, the vegan Irish weightlifter.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHrysja5lYw
Also another one of his videos
Leucine also spikes the insulin level regardless the source, it is better to take it with fibres and a bit of fat, e.g. avocado.
If you still struggle, you might give a try to a constant glucose monitor (GCM) to see what crosses your efforts.
I've been doing a bodyweight routine I got from Reddit for almost a year and I've seen very little progress. I want to try something different.
What bodyweight routine are you doing? The main thing to look at if you're working out consistently and aren't improving is your diet. Are you getting enough protein and calories? The general advice is to eat ~1 gram of protein per 0.7 lbs or so of bodyweight, and to have at least a 300 calorie surplus if you want to gain muscle.
Not getting enough sleep or being overly stressed out will also kill progress.
As far as my sleep goes, it's very good. I'm also not stressed at all.
I have made some progress, it's just been very disappointing. When I started I couldn't do a single pull up and now, 10 months later, I can do two. I'm almost to the point where I can do a reasonable dip as well.
With pull ups, for example, you won't see much improvement from just doing sets of one or two since it's not enough volume, so it's better to do something easier like negatives (where you just do the lowering down part slowly) or just hangs if negatives are too hard. You can also target some of the supporting muscles that may be "blockers" with dumbbells--for me it was the brachialis and brachioradialis especially (the forearm muscles on both sides of the elbow), and also grip strength. I started out with 2 lousy form pull ups, and it took me over 2 months to get up to 5 fairly clean ones this way, but in just the last couple weeks I've gone from 5 to 8, so it seems like progress accelerates once you pass that threshold, at least in my case.
For dips, I found that first focusing on normal push ups and then on diamond push ups, which heavily target the triceps, was very effective.
A beginning book I always recommend is starting strength. But, depending on where your current fitness is at you may need to check with your doctor first and/or find a good body weight program to get started. Burpees, pushups, pull-ups, thrusters for 20 minutes will destroy even the most in shape athletes. It's really not something you need to over complicate.
After like 6 weeks of doing that and improving a lot, I bought some dumbbells and started throwing some lifting in to mix it up, target weak spots, and work on muscles that the bodyweight stuff doesn't hit as well. I've found that the combination of the two really accelerates progress and improves recovery too by changing up the movements.
This has been working well for me, but of course there are many ways to approach it. Personally, I really don't like the gym vibe, so working out outside in the sun (with bodyweight) made it easier to get started and stick with. You also don't need to buy anything, and you can build up a base level of strength that makes lifting weights feel more approachable.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1PKNDlcnpUCAhjur_EEmlJp1PNsD...
It's a very stupid name and the accompanying article is kind of meh but the program overall is a solid start. I'm using as a way to reshape my body - I'm fairly overweight with a gut - and it's worked well so far. Pick any beginner plan like this and you'll probably be OK. As a beginner you'll make huge gains in your first year and that makes the day to day a lot easier to deal with while you build the habit.
I modified the plan on a few exercises that I don't like and used bodybuilding.com's alternate exercise lists to pick ones I prefer. At month 6 I plan to switch focus slightly to keep things mixed up and will probably switch to a 5x5 for a month or so then back to a more traditional regiment based on the 6+ month recommendations in the article.
The biggest thing is to choose any of the recommended programs in these responses and then start going. Promise yourself a month, a month of trying really hard each day and see how it goes. After that you can re-evaluate if it is really for you but that month will help build a habit and you'll start seeing some strength gains.
I feel so much better and I'm seeing significant body modifications that I'm really happy with. Getting healthy any which way you choose is worth the effort!
It's straighforward, manageable, and (importantly) it introduces the idea of autoregulation early on. Autoregulation is an important tool for helping to prevent injury due to innappropriate fatigue management. It also contains good information related to nutrition and how to perform the basic barbell movements.
From there, you have a wealth of options like his Practical Programming, Wendler's 5/3/1 books, and the Tactical Barbell books for combining strength and endurance training. The Barbell Medicine podcast and strongerbyscience.com are also great.
If you find yourself wanting to compete, Juggernaut Training and the Renaissance Training groups are great sources.
If you want something portable you can do at home, Pavel's Simple and Sinister is your best bet for kettlebell work, and Overcoming Gravity will teach you bodyweight work that only requires a pull-up bar.
For clearer writing and simpler programming, I would go for Tactical Barbell and Simple and Sinister over Wendler.
Doug Hepburn's programs (which can be found online with a minute of Googling) are also great for people looking at Wendler, but want something simple that can be run nearly indefinitely.
But yeah, working out is life changing. I've been lifting in some form for over 20 years now, and try to exercise every single day.
My mind gets zapped by working every day at the computer, so for me doing something totally physical (and for bodyweight workouts being outside in the sun) is the perfect antidote. I now start feeling stir crazy if I miss a workout or two for some reason.
That said - there's a lot of ways to describe a heavy squat session, but boring isn't one I'd use.
It may sound like broscience (because it is), but you gotta find what works for you.
And you can make it interesting. Reading about how the body works, the biomechanics of the movements, etc. can make it more interesting.
Learning more about a subject tends to make it more interesting, even if you didn't begin with an interest.
When you're 70 with mobility issues and no longer have physical autonomy, you'll be wishing you'd invested the few hours per week of preventative medicine that would have vastly increased the likelihood that you would still have the strength and mobility to live a physically autonomous life with the ability to play with your grandkids. Not to mention the decades of benefits you would have reaped being in better shape than you ever dreamt was possible for you.
Your mind tends to be focused on the task at hand when doing the movements. After each set, when you're resting, you can listen to a podcast or audio book.
Or, you know, just stand there and do nothing and let your mind wander: perhaps not doing something may actually be good for you. Perhaps you may wish to examine the benefits of being bored once in a while.
* https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/hide-and-seek/201407...
Over time maybe a great overstatement depending on context. Context being sensible programming and genetics. Really mostly genetics. The extremely motivating newbie and even intermediate gains exhaust very rapidly. Lifting can become very monotonous and tedious grind after a few years. It helps to have adopt an analytical and zen attitude towards progress after that. Most advanced lifters will go through multi-year plateaus at some point, it takes an entirely different mind set to pursue the hobby then. Injury prevention also becomes significant considerations when you become sufficiently strong (and old), eventually it's about numbers and not health - training then is not a great health prescription for people. That said, a beginning strength regime is absolutely something everyone should pursue for longevity and quality of life improvements. Intermediate+ strength training will help most folks structure many parts of their life from routine to diet to work ethic. Anything more and like every hobby, it becomes a very time intensive pursuit that requires a lot of sacrifice.
All that is to say, strength training for most people will inevitably turn into a job, and like most jobs, make sure it's something you enjoy. For some people the joy is intrinsic and the process is easier, for others it's work, and and the level of fulfillment is correlated to what one makes of it.
I just had shoulder surgery on Friday. The problem was more than likely caused by other things, but weightlifting made the issue obvious and forced me to fix it.
Also, FWIW, don't neglect cardio. I know lifters will tell you that lifting gives your heart a workout, and it does, but from personal experience I felt a lot better as a whole when I was cardiovascularly in shape. Lifting, for me, helps with things like posture, back pain, self image and weight control. It does not, IME, increase average daytime energy level, help in the bedroom, or make climbing a few flights of stairs feel effortless. Look to cardio training for that.
Edit:
"For most, the plateau is a form of purgatory."
I can't agree less. Sure, there are lots of folks who go to the gym and pursue literally endless gains until some form of injury comes along and derails them. Personally I find having some realistic goals to be a much better approach. I hit a 400 pound deadlift and decided that's enough. Why the hell would I want to lift more? I'll never use it, and those gains will just require even more maintenance.
This. The heart "workout" from weight training is not even in the same zip code as cardio workouts. Best to do both.
I did ~no lifting for many nears and dove back in way too fast at 45 y/o. Got a little too ambitious in the squat rack and my knee has been sort of fucked up for about 6 months (slow recovery is also a fun part of middle age). Take it slow.
That it feels really good to move.
A sedentary programmer I will no longer be!
I walk to a local yoga studio to practice for an hour every day now and have literally never been happier in my entire life.
I literally break out into a wide smile every single time I begin preparing to go to yoga... and trust me... I was never that kind of happy go lucky guy.
It's no surprise that moving makes you feel good.
Science has documented countless examples of exactly how it does that.
Endorphins are released as a direct result of moving.
Moving is my favorite nootropic.
It's easy to get stuck sitting in a chair day after day.
It's just as easy to keep the momentum of movement going if you can get the ball rolling.
I really wish I knew that earlier, but I am happy to know it now.
Get out there and move around HN!
I’m also the kind of person that started off saying, “I’d like to be able to do a body weight pull-up” which soon became, “I’d like to be able to do 4 body weight pull-ups” which eventually became... you definitely get addicted to the gains and even if you plateau in one lift or another, there’s always another muscle you can train.
Once you start moving real weight there’s also a euphoria to hitting those big PRs which you can work yourself up for and then it’s a blast when you finally hit them.
I lift 3x a week - push, pull, legs. I do 6 week cycles of 12 reps, 8 reps, 5 reps (for the main lifts). And at the end of each 5 rep cycle I test my 1 rep max on bench, deadlift, and squat. 14 weeks ago I just missed adding those up to 1,000 lbs (a big milestone) and fully expect to exceed 1,000 when I test again in 3 weeks.
I was never a weight lifter / body builder. Aside from a brief stint trying CrossFit I had basically never touched weights aside from a class in high school. If you looked at a picture of me 5 years ago I was a completely different person. It took 2 years of cardio and yoga just to work up the inner strength and basic flexibility to feel like I could safely approach weights.
I like that it’s the number one priority for one hour, 3 times a week. The rest of the week you never ever have to think about it. Well, you will feel it, but it takes no mental strain. Then you get in and get it done and feel awesome that you’re just a little bit better than last week, and go on with your day.
The most important thing is doing it right, doing it effectively, and most of all doing it safely. Getting injured will set you back hard.
Pay a trainer once a week to do one of the three workouts with you, critique your form, and tweak your program. Go for the big milestones when you have a pro watching you, and listen when they tell you stop. Best investment of time and money I’ve ever made.
'I need to shape up - fast!'
'Well are you looking to just lose weight or do you want to have increase strength and flexibility as well?'
'I want to look good naked.'
I have tried almost every form of exercise, but the only thing that has truly hooked me so far is circuit/interval training (for both cardio and resistance). I have done almost 400 sessions so far, almost without fail at 5 days per week (which is the real testament to how addicting it is).
Actually I find the cardio classes to be more interesting and challenging than the resistance / weight lifting classes. Although the focus is cardio, they do not neglect training your muscles, they just tend to rely more on body weight than barbells (burpees, jump squats, sprawls, etc) with the occasionally machine thrown in (rowers, bikes).
I have not lost much weight (that requires a better diet) or gained a huge amount of muscle but my body feels way more tuned. The classes are pretty intense and burning 1000 calories/hour is common. My heart rate used to max out at 180 and my resting heart rate was 80-90. Now my max heart rate is 160 and my resting gets as low as 50. I used to struggle to do 50 push-ups now I can do 100 without much struggle.
The real benefit though is that I feel healthy and less afraid of things like heart disease.
Max heart rate doesn't really decrease with fitness unless there's some weird pathology going on. As fitness increases you can generate more power at the same heart rate, but max heart rate remains roughly the same.
I did this with a coach for about a year. After that I installed a squat rack in my backyard and train on my own (with occasional one-on-one coaching sessions every six months or so to make sure technique hasn't gone to hell).
There's nothing like gaining strength. It doesn't have to be monster strength either. Most people can't lift 250 lbs off the floor. Going from struggling to lift a 60 lb bag of dog food with two arms to carrying one bag in each hand is massive improvement for 95% of people. The funny thing is that this isn't a crazy goal at all and it is attainable within a year for almost anyone.
One of my favorite things to do once I got to 250 lb deadlifts was to go to the regular gym every so often, pick up a 120 lb dumbbell with each hand and go do standing rows. I don't look like a bodybuilder at all. All the big huge guys doing 70 lb dumbbells could not understand what was going on. I'd literally grab 240 lbs of dumbbells and go to the bench to do a bunch of reps. A few asked what the hell was going on.
There's a difference between strength training and bodybuilding. It is my opinion that, for the average person, strength training is what brings more benefits, particularly as you get older. Bodybuilding can look good (in terms of body shape) but I am not sure it carries with it the same benefits. This is just my opinion, never really researched the topic beyond the basics.
As others have said: If you are going to do this, get a coach. It is critical to ensure you are using proper technique. Without this you could get stuck and struggle to make progress, get hurt or both.
Also I thought we were past using the word "Zen" as a label for any kind of temporary abatement of stress or neuroticism. Not that we knew better, of course, but that it was thankfully out of fashion. I'm sad to see that is no longer the case.
Since I got started in cross country running in high school, which included just the most modest of weight training, I've been interested in it. I'd often have gym memberships, and dabble with the various machines, trying to cover muscle groups.
Eventually, I joined fitocracy.com when it was young and full of active members. It was there that I learned about Starting Strength, and where the programming rewarded logging barbell activities much more than running or using a machine. Before long, I had bought the Starting Strength and began teaching myself the movements. I began with little or no weight, and using videos I took of myself to improve my form. I also paid more attention to dietary intake, and used If It Fits Your Macros (IIFYM) to design my daily goals for macronutrients.
The results were manifold. Of course I got stronger - barbell lifts done right are so much more efficient and effective than any chaotic routine, or even somewhat organized attempts with machines. I was visibly in better shape. But I was also naturally more confident, more in tune with the world around me. As the article mentions, I was seeing how my own decisions were affecting my life, and I would direct myself in other areas to zero in on decisions within my areas of control and concern. My energy increased and my focus improved on the job. I was able to find a healthy relationship that continues today.
However. I lost my way. Eventually the habit was interrupted and was never fully restored. Today, I'm distracted, procrastinating on a task I've procrastinated for too long already. I'm irritable and I don't want to waste my day at the office, but I'll go home, and I won't make good use of my time their either. I'll snack too often and grab unhealthy things.
Of course I'm not saying that this one habit will fix all of your problems, but it is a bit of a foundational habit, and it can leak into other areas of your life. And, of course, strength is helpful! You can move furniture and chop wood and have the bad posture on your office chair you were going to have anyway, but with a stronger back, you'll find yourself injured less often. So I recommend it, and I hope I can take my own advice!
Working full time and (if you want to do more) studying or coding at home becomes hardy sustainable and a problem in 30s. It is in our interest to prioritize the health of our only body, the holder of our brains, a thing we so heavily rely on for basically every activity.
It is so amazing how our bodies can reshape and adopt to physical activities we do! You can pick sport to shape your body in a desired way. My example: I am quite small, sturdy, with tendency to become fat if I do not do enough sport. I did bjj + gym for a few years - I looked like “squared”, the mixture of wide shoulders, muscles, and fat - a bit like Fedor Emelianenko. A few months ago I fully switched to running (2-3 times a week 10-15 km) plus endurance 1-2 times a week of bodyweight exercises. Within 2 months my body adopted to my new activities - I became slimmer, lighter, with stronger legs.
I spent a lot of years trying to get in shape, but never getting there, because I would hurt myself. I finally decided to get a trainer a few years ago for other reasons[1], but the biggest benefit has been a total lack of injury. Injuries often come from bad form, not working on small stabilizer muscles and/or over-doing it - a decent trainer will be able to correct for these cases. I'm almost 40 but I'm in as-good or better shape than I was in my late-teens because I've been consistent and working with someone who knows how to get good results.
A trainer does add to the expense, but at least for me, I'd rather pay more for a workout that I actually do regularly, than paying for a gym membership I can't use half the time because I'm injured.
[1] The other nice thing about a trainer is that they provide some accountability. It's much easier for me to blow off a workout day if I'm not also screwing up someone else's schedule/income.
If you want to nerd out lifting theory, I suggest https://www.barbellmedicine.com/ .
As an academic, I like the way the doctors approach terminology of lifting and describe evidence-based reasoning for recommendations.
About a year ago, I got a shoulder injury doing bench press. (Not the first time, but this one was from a lighter weight and it lasted longer.) I saw an older gentleman in the gym this week and thought I'd ask him how he keeps from getting injured.
The older gent (his name is Ralph) said he recommends lots of warmups. He was benching pretty good, about half of what I was, I think I do ok for a mid-50s weightlifter. Ralph looked pretty fit, but his hair was totally silver. I was floored when he mentioned he has a son that's 61!
I remain committed. I think it's really good for health.
I've been lifting for around 10 odd years now with a break of a few years in between. The hardest part for me was stepping back into the gym and trying to figure out what had worked in the past. After trying out a few other workout apps, I just decided to bite the bullet and build my own. It was a really fun exercise and tracking my workouts now really motivates me to keep upping my game.
I've also opened it up to the public - registration and use is absolutely free - it's been around for 2+ years so the chances of it going dark are slim: https://ewolo.fitness :)
Check your ego at the door and maintain form, otherwise you are fucked when you start lifting real weights. You will get hurt. You will learn the bad form and fuck up your shoulder or joints. Don't do it.
Those beginner gains are crazy fast, and in six months you will be totally changed. You will be stronger. Push yourself.
"To minimise injury risk, practitioners should aim to maintain the acute:chronic workload ratio within a range of approximately 0.8–1.3."
Figure 6, https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/50/5/273
https://youtu.be/wlLpCh-lE54?t=71
(for the record, I also sometimes pick heavy things and put them back down, but it is an inherently silly activity :D )
I wonder what people will do in 25 or 50 years for recreation that we today consider work.