I would like to know how to start strength training at home - to counteract sitting at a computer (strengthen the core, etc) and to trade some fat for muscle, becoming lean.
any recommendations?
EDIT: thank you for the overwhelming response
any recommendations?
EDIT: thank you for the overwhelming response
The exercise routine itself matters less, IMO, than building the habit. Some basic calisthenics (bodyweight exercises) would be fine to start. You could add dumbbells or a kettlebell at some point to add weight for a minimum of space.
The exercise I "enjoyed" the most was barbell lifting: deadlift, squat, benchpress, cleans, rows, etc. Starting Strength was a really good read for that, and there are videos to go with them. I also worked with a trainer at the gym for a while to get the form correct. That all requires a fair bit of equipment or gym access, though.
The way to trade fat for muscle is to continually stress your muscles (by increasing the weight you can lift), and getting enough sleep (which I am bad at). Also, don't each too much (especially sugars).
+ Beginners: do air squats (multiple sets and repetitions) and static squats / wall sits (for as long as is comfortable. rest 90 seconds and repeat). Once you are stronger, do the same while holding a gallon of water.
+ Making Progress?: The above + yoga moves targeted at strength. Try out planks and wall hand stands. Single leg split squats (your back leg on your sofa).
+ Feeling Strong?: All of the above + adjustable kettlebells (let me know if you need recs) + gymnastic rings (you can attach the straps to a high place at a public park, or drill some hooks into your ceiling, or buy a doorway mount). Check out the bodyweightfitness community on reddit.
+ Advanced: This takes up space and costs a decent amount of $, but you'll need to build a home weightlifting gym with a barbell, olympic weight plates, and a squat stand / pullup bar / flat bench. Check out the homegym community on reddit.
Make sure you get the main items: Olympic bar, squat rack, maybe a multi-gym machine thingy with ropes and weights, and hand weights of some sort. Also get one of those modern scales if weight is one of your goals, it will record your weight to 2 decimals on an app for you.
For motivation, I pay an online gym some money to do a training + diet + measurements program. I've done weights for a good long while now, so I don't need the detailed instructions so much, but they do also offer videos of every exercise, exact recipes for every meal (with my goals in mind), and instructions about how to measure yourself, all on web/mobile. It even lets you record what weights you're doing and has a convenient clock to measure your resting time. Coach then checks in now and again to see how I'm doing.
I did all of the above many years ago and even went to a seminar taught by Mark. If you don't know anything about strength training, this is the path.
Diet is super important. If you do not eat correctly you will not make progress. More importantly, don't expect strength training to be a weight loss program. It is not. In fact, you could get fatter and stronger at the same time.
If becoming lean is your primary objective, go to a knowledgeable nutritionist and get on a keto-type diet. Train yourself to be strict and consistent about your diet. It might take you a year or more to develop the right habits. Diet is EVERYTHING. Go take walks every day as your exercise.
I cannot over-stress the idea that diet is the most important thing to focus on if one is interested in becoming lean. For most of us we have to shake really bad eating habits that may have been cemented into our brains over decades. This is tough. And this is the first thing you need to work on body composition is a priority.
Having changed eating habits you can then start to look into exercise to optimize muscle and strength to the degree that might interest you. There's a difference between body building and strength training. In a nutshell, someone with big muscles isn't necessarily stronger. I'd rather be stronger.
So, diet first, exercise moderately until you learn how to eat better and achieve the kind of balance you are after and then add a higher level of exercise to get stronger. You will need to eat more. That's why it is important to learn to eat well.
The best advice I read was to start small, make it a regular thing and go from there. Like seriously, I started only working out 15-20min each session 4-5 days a week for the first 2-3 weeks. I enjoyed it so much and saw great results that now I'm at 45-50min minutes each session a few months in.
Start with basically no weight (1kg x 2 + bar for anything with arms, 2kg x 2 + bar for anything legs). It's cardio + weights, and they cover all the major muscle groups, and you're doing fairly rapid repetitions of a bunch of different lifts.
After 3-6 months doing _that_ class, I would then start supplementing that with occasionally (once every few weeks) doing a smattering of the lifts, but "heavy" and only a few reps out on the gym floor.
It's a great way to expose you to the lifts in a group setting, the instructors (in my experience) are always up for a quick chit-chat afterwards about form + safety, and once you've mastered the movements, it's pretty low equipment to set up a station at home and follow along with videos.
...but... it's super helpful to have a professional who can monitor your posture + movements and guide you to good habits when you're starting out.
I was typical nerd in high school, and now I can rattle of all the different curls, chest presses, flys, squats, deadlifts, clean and press, lunges, planks, crunches, blah blah blah, and I've enough confidence in my form and not hurting myself to pick up a bar + some weights and do it at home. It's a really nice skill to have and it's something I really miss... I'll have to make time and pick it back up!
Honestly, a gym membership is worth it, if you live close to one. While you can get decent results from home gyms, I've found the jump from "decent" to "good" results takes a bit of money/equipment. There are muscles groups that basically require heavy weights to really get good results.
Leg workouts in particular are really easy to cap out on without equipment. I can personally do body-weight squats indefinitely (probably). If I tried to do weighted squats with dumbbells, I'm sure my arms would tire well before my legs do.
A good leg press machine will run you the same price as a decade of cheap gym memberships, and that's not even getting into weights or other useful equipment.
I personally find it valuable to travel to the gym. It's only 5 minutes for me, but once I leave, I'm committed to a degree that is harder to maintain when I workout at home.
Also, to answer your question: yoga is great. It's a very underrated exercise (particularly for men). It builds core strength and flexibility. The wrestler DDP has a series on it that people rave about.
They're small enough that you can store and use them in most rooms, and in my experience, the ease with which you can add and remove weight reduced the friction of deciding whether or not to work out, which helps a lot when trying to start a consistent habit.
They're not as versatile as an actual gym, but I got a pair of these when between gyms for a couple of years, and you can do a lot with them if you're creative. (For example--instead of squats and deadlifts, which would have required far more weight than I had available, I switched to lunges and one-legged squats).
I'll give a plug for Mind Pump [1] and MAPS Fitness Products programs [2]. No affiliation aside from being a customer. I just finished the MAPS Starter program (a three month program). With one of their 60% discounts it set me back less than $40. I bought a pair of adjustable dumbbells and a $30 fitness ball and was able to do everything in the program. I did get a bench, too, but it wasn't strictly necessary (though I preferred the stability of the bench for certain exercises).
Tao of Stefan [4] has some pretty thorough reviews of MAPS products.
As for their programs, you can get on their mailing list and wait for one of their (usually) monthly 50% discounts. Or you can get Sal DiStefano's book [3] and use some of the programs in there. There's one program that can be done entirely with resistance bands - at home or on the go.
Or you can just watch all their free content on YouTube and figure it out from there!
1. https://www.youtube.com/c/MindPumpTV 2. https://www.mindpumpmedia.com/maps-fitness-products 3. https://theresistancetrainingrevolution.com/ 4. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCyAV1LG0A66Hd75HSSco76Q/vid...
Do one set of pushups each day for the next week (one set of pushups for me is 30-40 pushups in a row, I basically keep going until I can't anymore). After the first week, add in another exercise, situps are a good one. And the week after that, get a pullup bar or some dumbbells and add in another exercise. Keep adding a different exercise until you have 5 or 6. Do one set of each exercise with little to no rest in between each exercise. This should take less than five minutes each day. At any point if you fall out of habit, go back to square one, i.e. one set of pushups each day.
Once you have made this into a regular habit, you can start adding more reps or add a second workout (i.e. one in the morning, one in the afternoon). Continue to add more reps/exercises/workouts until you feel satisfied with the routine. For me, I do one set of 6 strength exercises per day. It takes me less than five minutes each day. Keep in mind this is just my strength routine. I also run, hike/walk, bike or surf 3-4 times a week. If I wasn't already in the habit of doing that, I would add some cardio to my daily workout (jumping jacks, up/downs, etc...)
I wouldn't even consider getting a gym membership unless you have a very specific need for a certain routine or set of equipment. For example some folks like to mix in cardio on a machine (rower, elliptical, etc...) with weight machines in a single workout. Keeping all that gear at home would be tough. That is fine, but just remember that getting to and from the gym requires a time and effort, and that can result in losing the habit. So only go this route if you either have a very specific need that you can't replicate at home, or if you know you won't drop the habit.
https://renaissanceperiodization.com/rp-gym-free
The company is staffed nearly entirely by PhD researchers who also compete in sport:
https://renaissanceperiodization.com/team
It is imo the best source of cutting-edge science-based exercise and nutrition info, and while they work with elite athletes, they also produce a lot of guidance specifically for everyday people who want to casually get in shape with the minimal amount of effort.
After reading the book, I would still go to a personal trainer. A few hundred dollars to have someone help you learn an important life-long skill is good value. Book is great, but having someone watch over you and correct you in the beginning is still very important.
https://thefitness.wiki/faq/starting-strength-and-stronglift...
Both will be modified as you become more experienced - you might tweak your form to take account for EG short upper body, or you might find you respond better to volume rather than intensity in your programming. But it's like a lot of things - you need to learn the rules before you can break the rules. I'd say it's a good, simple starting point to find those things out about yourself.
There are also a lot of Starting Strength adjacent companies that also provide good programmes - Barbell Medicine, Barbell Logic, Andy Baker etc.
You definitely can’t hit your legs as hard as you can with a bar and a rack, but kettlebells are much much more “small apartment friendly”. You can hide them in a closet easily.
You can get a lot of value starting off from just bodyweight exercises as well.
YMMV, but the app FitBod has done wonders for me.
https://www.hybridcalisthenics.com/routine
I've never been able to keep doing a program like this, but I'm a couple of months in and loving it.
Now put it back down
Nice, repeat 10x
All jokes aside, check out athlean-x on youtube
it can be you, do some pushups, or half pushups even.
> check out athlean-x on youtube
yes
A barbell and some plates w/ rack will cover the main lifts. Squats, deadlifts, presses (chest and shoulder) are the first ones to build. I recommend Starting Strength for an on-ramp to get going. Adjustable dumbbells are great too- plenty of options out there. Some of this equipment is expensive, look for used and consider it an investment in health.
Happy Lifting!
For me the key is consistency and social pressure. I try to exercise every day (because that is more instinctive than any other schedule) at the same time (when my kids go to sleep). That means, when the time to exercise comes, it feels natural to do it. I keep a log which days I exercised and which days I did not, and I report the data to my friends. By the way, I don't exercise all muscles every day; I alternate two types of exercise on one day, the remaining two types on the other day.
Another thing that works for me, psychologically, is outcome independence. I treat my exercise as a virtuos thing, whether it brings the desired results or not. If I exercised, I did my duty; if I didn't exercised, I failed to do my duty. Whether the muscles actually increase and the fat actually decreases, that depends on the gods; I am just making sure that I did my part. This is useful, because the progress is real but happens on long time scale, and I need encouragement on short time scale. Of course, after you succeed to exercise regularly for a few months, you will see the progress, and that will motivate you to continue; but the problem is that you need greatest motivation at the very beginning, while you still have zero results. (It is easiest to give up during the first month. After half year, the change will be so obvious that you will want to stay that way.)
Don't overdo it. Muscles also need some time to recover; for me it is rougly two days (which is why I alternate the exercises). Take sufficient breaks between the sets; this is easier to do at home, because it doesn't feel like you are wasting your time; between the sets you can browse web, watch TV, or do dishes. Sometimes I just watch a movie, pause it at a random moment, do a set, unpause and watch again... and at the end, it doesn't even feel like I exercised; I was just watching a movie and taking an occassional short break. Generally, if you can somehow make it fun, that helps a lot. (After a few months, you will not need external sources of fun; the exercise itself will become pleasurable. But first you need to get there.) Never punish yourself for failing to exercise; reflect on the fact, then forgive yourself and start again.
In addition to strength training you should also do some cardio or take a walk regularly. Once I had a job that was 20 minutes by foot from my home; that was optimal. I try to minimize car use, and during covid also started minimizing mass transit use; now I always check the map first, and if my destination is within 30 minutes walking distance, I go there by foot. I think about it as saving time, because I am going to where I need, and I am exercising at the same time.
Now, strength training itself can add you muscle, but will only remove a little fat. People usually overestimate how much energy is burned when exercising. Most energy is spent by simply keeping your body alive (body temperature, breathing, heartbeat, etc.), which is more or less a constant amount each day. An exercise will probably just add 5% or 10% to it. The inevitable conclusion is that to lose fat, you need to eat less. Even worse, you need to eat less every day, otherwise the calories you lost in a week can be regained in a day. On the other hand, starving can hurt you; your body needs enough proteins and vitamins. That means that you need to change the proportion of proteins and vitamins to fats and carbohydrates; on other words, not (just) eat less but eat differently. Raw vegetables with every meal. Proteins from meat, fish, eggs, diary, beans. (That means lots of beans, if you are a vegetarian. Like, literally every day.) Avoid sugar, coke, white bread. You don't need to get religious about this, just remove the greatest sources of sugar/carbs, learn three new recipes containing beans, and always take a raw vegetable as a side dish. (If you ignore this advice, you will get muscles hidden under fat, which is where I am now; but even that is an improvement over all fat and no muscles.)
etc. What others already said. Enough sleep (that means 8 hours minimum).
By the way, being healthy can take a lot of time. Eight hours of sleep + eight hours at work + commute, that already leaves you like 4-7 free hours on a workday. If you want healthy meals, you probably need to cook them yourself. Then you exercise... and there is little time left. Plus, you probably have other duties, maybe also kids, etc. You need to be smart about this. (It is one of the reasons I exercise at home instead of going to the gym; a few minutes saved every day.) I don't have a perfect solution for this, but two important components are: short commute (even if it means somewhat lower salary) and a big freezer (so I can prepare meals for several days at once).
If you want lean, its diet. Only.
If you want fitness, circuit training. Can be done in your living room.
If you want swoll, hit the gym.