Workout: What did you do today?

[Guybrush]

Tired is good but it's important to make sure it's not a painful chore, you know? Otherwise your motivation will drop, no matter how much you know that you must go on for your health.

Tore, it does sound a bit like you have an expectation of quick and uninterrupted progress. The main thing is consistency, developing mind-muscle connection, making sure your form is always on point. Once you have those down, the increase in weights follows naturally.

I have had quick, uninterrupted progress, just not in every exercise.

Looking at studies, as far as I can see, gains/progress from exercise is dramatic the first few months and then the slopes start to even out. I understand I'm at a place where the slope is steep and that if I can turn this into a lasting lifestyle change, progress will slow down or even stop at some point. I'm also in my 40s.

I'm not actually worried about progress as much as it may seem here. What I'm most interested in is not getting hurt because I fear a prolonged break could change me back into a slob and I want to find motivations to keep me going. Getting a sexier bod is just the easiest one right now 😄 but more importantly for the long run, just being healthy and feeling better (my mood has improved) will be enough for me, I hope.

[jadis]

Yep. Great, then you already know what I was saying.

Is there a gym in your town btw?

[Guybrush]

Yep. Great, then you already know what I was saying.

Is there a gym in your town btw?

There are several, but I haven't gone to one since I became a parent. I also okayed buying gym equip for one of the empty rooms in our biggest wastewater facility and gave it a small yearly budget. The guys have been buying stuff over the years. I checked that out last week. It looks pretty good, so I'll see if I can spend some time there between office hours and having to pick up the kids.

There's a couple of rowing machines, a huge range of manuals and a really neat rack thing where a bar is locked in these tracks and you can easily secure it at whatever height with these attached hooks thingies. A little hard to explain, but probably common in gyms. It looks like just the thing for squats.

Today, I swam a kilometre in the pool. My daughter has a swim course, so we brought the whole fam and I got tome off from dad duties to swim a bit. I'd forgotten goggles, but it was still really good. It felt like it was going to be hard at first, but then I found a rhythm and I felt like I could keep going for quite a while.

There was a guy there, quite hot and with a super trained upper body. Big arms and chest, yet lean. His legs were kinda like mine, though, so a little unproportional 😄

Still an impressive physique.

[grindy]

Been doing a PPL split for the past two years or so, best split for me so far. I like working out almost every day but don't like long workouts so this is perfect for me. Focus on compounds (squat, deadlift, bench press, overhead press, rows, pull ups) with a bit of isolation after that. Have a workout room in my cellar now with a proper squat rack, helps a lot.

[jadis]

There are several, but I haven't gone to one since I became a parent. I also okayed buying gym equip for one of the empty rooms in our biggest wastewater facility and gave it a small yearly budget. The guys have been buying stuff over the years. I checked that out last week. It looks pretty good, so I'll see if I can spend some time there between office hours and having to pick up the kids.

There's a couple of rowing machines, a huge range of manuals and a really neat rack thing where a bar is locked in these tracks and you can easily secure it at whatever height with these attached hooks thingies. A little hard to explain, but probably common in gyms. It looks like just the thing for squats.

If I were you I'd check them out to see if there's one with an experienced and friendly trainer who can check your form and give you tips, for instance with the exercise where you feel your progress is relatively slow. But emphasis on if I were you... cause I enjoy the social aspect of the gym, esp right now that my social life is pretty limited. And since I don't know anything about the anatomy and physics behind it, I don't trust myself to get everything right even with the exercises I know inside out.

But since you are science-oriented and treat working out as "me time" maybe you don't need to. 

[jimmy jazz]

Been doing a PPL split for the past two years or so, best split for me so far. I like working out almost every day but don't like long workouts so this is perfect for me. Focus on compounds (squat, deadlift, bench press, overhead press, rows, pull ups) with a bit of isolation after that. Have a workout room in my cellar now with a proper squat rack, helps a lot.

Nice work. I'm doing PPL but I added an extra day for calves and shoulders because they weren't getting hit enough during their days.

One of the benefits of training alone or at home is you can strip down to your underpants. Really prefer it.

[grindy]

Nice work. I'm doing PPL but I added an extra day for calves and shoulders because they weren't getting hit enough during their days.

One of the benefits of training alone or at home is you can strip down to your underpants. Really prefer it.

Calves are probably my biggest weak point. I do single leg calf raises twice a week really emphasizing the eccentric and stretch but due to my build and insertions they still look really small. What do you do for them?

[jimmy jazz]

Calves are probably my biggest weak point. I do single leg calf raises twice a week really emphasizing the eccentric and stretch but due to my build and insertions they still look really small. What do you do for them?

Same but with weight also, on a slant board. I've seen people say doing them every other day helps them but I haven't tried that and don't know if I care about them enough to do that.

[Guybrush]

If I were you I'd check them out to see if there's one with an experienced and friendly trainer who can check your form and give you tips, for instance with the exercise where you feel your progress is relatively slow. But emphasis on if I were you... cause I enjoy the social aspect of the gym, esp right now that my social life is pretty limited. And since I don't know anything about the anatomy and physics behind it, I don't trust myself to get everything right even with the exercises I know inside out.

But since you are science-oriented and treat working out as "me time" maybe you don't need to. 

I don't want or need it for the social aspect. But before I became a parent, I probably would've done as you suggested. Now I feel like I need to find ways to make effective use of time.

About saving time, I tried an alternative way of doing biceps curls today. You may all be familiar with it already.

You start a higher weight and do reps until failure, then go to a slightly lighter weight and do reps until failure, etc. There's no pause in between changing weights

I tried manuals at 15 kg, then 12,5 kg, then 10, 8, 6 and 4 though the last one or two felt a little pointless.

The YouTube video I saw suggested doing this no more than once per workout, so one set. It's a crazy set, though. I never felt that sort of intensity just doing biceps curls before.

I might see if I can transfer that philosophy to some of my other exercises, though it definitely helps to have a while bunch of weights/manuals for this.

[DJChameleon]

Been doing a PPL split for the past two years or so, best split for me so far. I like working out almost every day but don't like long workouts so this is perfect for me. Focus on compounds (squat, deadlift, bench press, overhead press, rows, pull ups) with a bit of isolation after that. Have a workout room in my cellar now with a proper squat rack, helps a lot.

Yeah I don't like long workouts either. My trainer has a program that makes my workout the most efficient with the shortest time. So we aren't there for a long time. It's usually 30 to 40 mins. then we are done.

If I were you I'd check them out to see if there's one with an experienced and friendly trainer who can check your form and give you tips, for instance with the exercise where you feel your progress is relatively slow. But emphasis on if I were you... cause I enjoy the social aspect of the gym, esp right now that my social life is pretty limited. And since I don't know anything about the anatomy and physics behind it, I don't trust myself to get everything right even with the exercises I know inside out.

But since you are science-oriented and treat working out as "me time" maybe you don't need to. 

Yeah I end up using the gym as a social space too. Pre and post workout mostly, I end up talking to the front desk person along with a few people that come in that's how I ended up getting a podcast started. My podcast is from a guy that I met from the gym and some of the people that we see come in are going to be our guests. I'm pretty much the producer of the podcast.

I don't want or need it for the social aspect. But before I became a parent, I probably would've done as you suggested. Now I feel like I need to find ways to make effective use of time.

About saving time, I tried an alternative way of doing biceps curls today. You may all be familiar with it already.

You start a higher weight and do reps until failure, then go to a slightly lighter weight and do reps until failure, etc. There's no pause in between changing weights

I tried manuals at 15 kg, then 12,5 kg, then 10, 8, 6 and 4 though the last one or two felt a little pointless.

The YouTube video I saw suggested doing this no more than once per workout, so one set. It's a crazy set, though. I never felt that sort of intensity just doing biceps curls before.

I might see if I can transfer that philosophy to some of my other exercises, though it definitely helps to have a while bunch of weights/manuals for this.

I do something similar but I go up instead of down and I do a specific number of reps. So I start with 20 lbs and do 15 reps then 30 lbs and 12 reps 40 lbs and 10 reps etc until I get down to 6 reps.

[jimmy jazz]

About saving time, I tried an alternative way of doing biceps curls today. You may all be familiar with it already.

You start a higher weight and do reps until failure, then go to a slightly lighter weight and do reps until failure, etc. There's no pause in between changing weights

I tried manuals at 15 kg, then 12,5 kg, then 10, 8, 6 and 4 though the last one or two felt a little pointless.

The YouTube video I saw suggested doing this no more than once per workout, so one set. It's a crazy set, though. I never felt that sort of intensity just doing biceps curls before.

I might see if I can transfer that philosophy to some of my other exercises, though it definitely helps to have a while bunch of weights/manuals for this.

Yes it's called a drop set. Very good tactic to bust through a plateau or for the pump.

There is other stuff you can do like forced negatives, supersets, pyramid sets (which is what @DJChameleon just described) or just high volume.

Also yes, you can definitely do drop sets with most exercises. It's more difficult training alone though obviously.

[Guybrush]

Perfect! Thanks for your tips and helping out with the terminology 🙂

[grindy]

Perfect! Thanks for your tips and helping out with the terminology 🙂

Another intensity technique you might want to try are myoreps. You use a weight you can do around 15-20 reps with and go to or very close to failure. You rest for a few breaths and do another set and then another and so on. Those minisets will be somewhere around 5 reps and you will be able to do fewer and fewer reps. You can either do a fixed amount of those minisets or go until you cannot do more than a fixed number of reps per set (let's say 1 or 2). I prefer those to drop sets because changing weights is a hassle for me.

[grindy]

Same but with weight also, on a slant board. I've seen people say doing them every other day helps them but I haven't tried that and don't know if I care about them enough to do that.

I do them on a stack of plates for that sweet painful stretch.
Yeah, calves can recover very quickly and you are supposedly even able to work them every day. But I also don't care enough, even if I sometimes look like I skip leg day when wearing shorts.

[Guybrush]

Brilliant grindy! Maybe I'll save that for when I'm toning next year's summer bod 😅