Just Don't Do It.

Why bother? For all those who resent the high profile in the media given over to exercising and staying fit, especially as we get older, ESQUIRE staffers ask, "What is the point of exercising past the age of 40?" and thus generously provide us the perfect counterpoint to the Nike slogan: Just Don't Do It.

Read their brilliant justifications HERE.

Crossfit Is Far More About Ego Than Being “Fit”

What are people trying to prove anyway, with crossfit and similar injury-plagued, low-reward activities?

An injury is not a reward. An injury is not some badge of honor. In the fitness world, an Injury is the painful physical manifestation of a very poor decision to do something you are not physically capable of while using very poor form.

People struggling to flip a massive truck tire are saying “Look at me,” while people methodically pumping out bodyweight pull-ups week after week go unheralded—until their shirt comes off. People attempting a clean and press over their head with far more weight than they can handle find themselves over their head and in a world of hurts when the loaded barbell crashes down atop them. Watch “crossfit fails” videos on YouTube for many painful examples of what not to do.

Amateurs are often told “leave your ego at the door,” but even pro bodybuilders sustain stupid injuries in their attempt to showboat. The best crazy example is Callum Von Moger, who has initiated a series of preposterously stupid circus stunts that have decimated his once-spectacular physique.

Von Moger story HERE

 Proper form takes a hit when the chosen weight exceeds one’s ability to bear it, sending even seasoned pro bodybuilders to the hospital and ending their dream of coming out on top.

You can challenge yourself without putting yourself in danger. If your workout is performed more to show off to others rather than make personal progress, your results will be minimal—with injuries almost guaranteed.

A recent article on GQ’s website is a not-so-stealthy advertisement for Optimum Nutrition.

In a piece written by Mick Rouse he explains the importance of protein and the relative bargain that protein powder represents, it being cheaper than foods high in protein like meat, and more convenient to prepare and ingest, since a protein shake requires about one minute of prep time compared to a meat source such as chicken or beef.

The writer, and by association, Conde Nast’s GQ magazine, recommends just one single product, going on and on for two long paragraphs about it’s estimable qualities. Any newbie only recently being made aware of the importance of protein reading this might conclude that this writer or magazine did its due diligence and after much research rated Optimal Nutrition Gold Standard Protein as the best, when nothing could be further from the truth. Quality is the most important factor in protein powders, not taste or mixability. 

www.labdoor.com is an independent laboratory that tests all major brands of proteins, vitamins and other supplements, rating them in order of quality and cost. Visit their website to see where your current supplements stand in this regard.

Currently Labdoor rates the GQ-recommended ON Protein at #22. That means that 21 other products rated higher. Classic bodyuilder Arnold Schwarzenegger-branded Muscle Pharm brand comes in way down the list at #43, and 1980s phenomenon Rich Gaspari’s brand is currently being sued by UFC Fighter Lyman Good for its Anavite supplement surreptitiously containing a pharmaceutical steroid resulting in Good being banned from competition for 6 months. This ingredient was not listed in the ingredients section of the label and Good unknowingly and unintentionally consumed it.

The video related to this is HERE.

A Note To “Victims” Of Body Shaming.

Athlete Mark Smith

Humiliation is the only proper response to self destructive behaviors. No one has the power to shame you. Only you can decide whether to feel shame about something or not. Your feeling of shame is voluntary.

Whether we experience “shaming” by friends, family or co-workers due to our admirable progress with regards to fitness and/or weight loss—and their feeling threatened or shamed by our success—or due to the opposite, not making progress in fitness and/or weight loss—it’s our choice whether to shrug off their criticism, or not.

Those who have made the decision to allow themselves to deteriorate need to own this decision. For most, allowing their house or automobile to deteriorate to the point that their intended purpose to shelter or transport them was being irreversibly compromised, resultant criticism from others would be fully expected, like it or not. However, you can always buy a new car or house.

Your one and only body is not replaceable. Allowing it to deteriorate is a voluntary act. Pretending that your willful deterioration, your voluntary partaking in smoking, drinking, drugging, obesity and all the other self-destructive behaviors is excusable due to extenuating circumstances only compounds the humiliation. Genetics? Nope. Metabolism? Old age? Nope. Look at the guy pictured above. You think YOU have obstacles?

Yes, it is your fault. Yes, it is wholly your decision. Yes, your excuses make you look a fool. Yes, people are judging you for the awful things you choose to do to yourself. Yes, the world does judge us by what we do and how we look and that will never, ever change, so get used to it.

Claiming your entitlement to do and say whatever you want while demanding that others accommodate you, when at the same time you deny others their right to say and do what they want, is called hypocrisy. 

If you get to do and say whatever you want, then so does everybody else.

Clickbait Is Desperate

(From mensfitness.com)

Speaking for myself, websites that stoop to engaging in clickbait scams lose a good portion of my respect instantly. It’s desperate.

Men’s Fitness presented this clickbait image/headline seen above. But when you click on it and read the associated article, they backtrack and state these featured exercises are really not bad after all.

Clickbait is insulting to the reader/customer, period. I for one would like to see what these self-appointed “experts” who write this crap LOOK like, wouldn’t you?

When Your Favorite Online Trainer gets it Wrong.

Even those online trainers who I think are excellent overall sometimes express views that, because of my experience, I do not at all agree with.

This is because those trainers and others who have not yet experienced negative results from their technique believe the reason is due solely to their doing it correctly, and that others’ warnings against that same technique amount to nothing more than “myths.” Unfortunately for such people, poor technique is not recognized until the damage is already done.

The opposite is also true. Another favorite online trainer of mine warns against the leg extension machine. In fairness, each manufacturer has a different design, so it could be he was just using a poorly designed version. My gym has two, each made by a different company, and one of these is awful IMHO. However, overall I always include leg extensions in my leg workout, and this particular trainer, from what he described, told me he simply wasn’t using proper technique. Leg extensions should not impact your knees unless you are using your knees rather than your quads to move the weight, which you should never do. The knees’ one and ONLY function is to BEND.

Knees (like all joints) are merely hinges. They are not muscles, but merely cartilage and bone. Knees are not designed to bear weight. Knees are not designed to lead an exercise. Knees are not designed to absorb shock. Knees are not designed to overextend. Knees are not designed to endure wear and tear: that's what the surrounding muscles—quads, hamstrings, glutes and calves— are all designed to do. Muscles are active; joints are passive.

Putting knees at risk in one's quest for stronger leg muscles is counter productive to say the least. Knees have one function only: to bend—and do so only within a predetermined range or arc.

No Matter What Our Age, We are The Sum Of All Our Choices Up Until Now.

No Matter What Our Age, We are The Sum Of All Our Choices Up Until Now.

23 And Me: What’s The Use?

Richard Sullivan @ Age 53

The US Marines have a great slogan: “Be All You Can Be.” Fitness is not about who or what the other guy or girl is or has, or about regaining the body and tight skin you once had as a 20-year-old, or erasing the so-called ravages of time. It’s about doing the best we can with what we have right now in the present time. 

People who have come to view their body as already “wrecked” or “hopeless” reject weight loss or strength training or stopping smoking using the same disclaimer: “What’s the use? It’s too late for me.”

Carting around 50 lbs. on your ass or waist 24/7 is crazy enough if you’re 20, but at 60 it’s both exhausting and potentially deadly. At best it diminishes your physical ability to perform everyday tasks. At worst it shortens your lifespan, either by initiating otherwise avoidable health problems, or by preventing you from escaping a crashed automobile, a burning home, a mugger.

The cure for “what’s the use?” is usually a good fright, one’s emerging intact on the other side of a situation that scared the shit out of them. People shouldn’t be required to nearly die in order to have that wakeup call. If you’re over the age of 23 and you are not strength training, you are deteriorating. If you are 23 and not strength training, your metabolism is slowing down. The downhill slide begins for us around age 23 when we have finished fully developing from child to adult, but it doesn’t have to.

Richard Sullivan Age 57

Mature Muscle Via Instagram

Today's Ultimate Challenge:

Talking on your cell phone while "working" the leg press machine might explain the complete lack of muscle on those pencil legs.

Priority: Tend To Your Lawn Or Tend To Your Body?

When I was a kid, in my town it was unusual enough to see a 20 year old guy with an awesome physique, let alone a 40 year old married man with kids—and that local Tarzan happened to be my next door neighbor Helen’s sister’s husband, and whenever he visited, I was in awe.

The men in my neighborhood, looking nothing like that, predictably were not at all impressed or influenced to follow his example—at least not outwardly. But his influence on me has far outlived him.

The culture in my neighborhood while growing up was lawn-pride. Men spent all weekend buying multiple sacks of varying amendments and spreading them on their lawn, clipping and edging and trimming and renting heavy equipment such as lawn rollers and a heavy gizmo that punched hundreds of holes in the lawn to aerate and hydrate. Men would spend 6 hours on a Saturday tending to their lawn, watering and weeding, and zero hours working out or engaging in athletic activities.

Then, as a grown up I’d watch This Old House and similar TV programs in that genre and there too would be men spending their entire weekend in quest of the perfect lawn, struggling to bend over due to their giant bellies and huffing and puffing after relatively little exertion.

It made me wonder at the logic applied by these lawn men for not providing the same care to their one-and-only forever body as they did their temporary lawns. It clearly was foolish to waste so much time, effort and money on something as fleeting as a lawn, especially in a climate where it snowed 7 months out if the year, when their bodies, which were called upon to perform 24/7/365, went ignored and disrespected.

That was the culture back then, and although things have improved remarkably in that respect, basically that remains the culture: people applying outsized disproportionate importance to the unimportant while ignoring what was truly important, crucial and irreplaceable: their body, their strength, their health and physical ability.

People’ priorities tell their story.

...And They Say Bodyweight Exercise Doesn't Build Real Muscle

Really, the more time we spend online, the more foolish people get. Take the “arguments” that the blowhards and know-it-alls engage in pertaining to strength, fitness and muscle.

Resistance is resistance, whether it takes the form of dumbbells, pulleys, body weight, resistance bands, isometrics or whatever. Resistance builds strength. Resistance builds muscle.

People debating the issue means they aren’t engaged in the very thing they are arguing against. Can resistance bands build real muscle? Can body weight exercises build real muscle? Go to Google Images and search “men’s gymnastics” and similar search terms to see with your own eyes the awesome muscle that gymnasts have built utilizing only body weight exercise.

The proof is in the pudding, as they say. People wasting their time debating is a obviously just a distraction from their actually doing. The Nike slogan is more pertinent today than ever: Just Do It.

Young vs. Old

90% of people are enthusiastic volunteers for old age. Bizarre but true.

An injured / compromised oldster is no different from an injured / compromised youngster. The difference is, the young person wants to get better. The young person works at getting better. The youngster sees a hopeful, better future. The injured / compromised young person envisions himself improved, stronger, better, happier, with a better physique in the coming weeks and months, whereas the oldster envisions and works tirelessly toward achieving the exact opposite, methodically concocting justifications to support their lack of effort and self-care.

 It is an indisputable fact that fitness and strength matter very little to people the older they get, which is wildly counter-intuitive. If you’re an older person and such excuses drive your general outlook on life, then that’s all on you. Who in their right mind welcomes infirmity? Who does not fight against weakness and immobility? Who decides to become obese at a time in life when their muscle and bone simply cannot handle dead weight, or tolerate the toll that added weight takes on their overall health, on their mobility, agility and optimism?

Old People, that’s who.

You can diminish yourself, your abilities and your goals in life by adopting the same excuses and rationalizations that 90% of all old people adopt. Or not. Getting fat is giving up. Descending into a state of compromised health, becoming less active physically thereby intentionally losing the very bone and muscle mass that you are made up of is a deliberate act. Surrendering your power, autonomy and independence and ultimately your life is crazy. Yet this is what the majority of older people sign up for.

The choice of such a lifestyle is not the result of physical illness, but rather mental illness. There’s no shame in seeking therapy. Brave people do it every day.

Ross Edgley Is Exhausting.

Ross Edgely gets my vote for Best Physique Ever. But I get out of breath just reading about the next challenge he has devised for himself.

His nutrition intake is insane, as it would have to be to fuel these grueling feats. Learn what he eats HERE.

Gizmos And Gadgets Aren’t The Answer To Your Workout.

So now there’s an AI (artificial intelligence) “Coach” available for $250 which is basically Siri shrieking at you through headphones to hurry it along. Then there’s the Fitbit bracelet, Pilates Circle and an endless line of crap I recall from TV infomercials stretching back to the 1980s that is designed to appeal to those who can’t get themselves motivated to do their pushups, jogging, etc.

The ultimate example is the treadmill, which sits in millions of apartments and home basements taking up space or serving as a clothes rack.

The psychology is, if you spend money on something, especially LOTS of money, you’ll feel obligated to exercise, if only because you feel guilty having spent money on that gadget that’s taunting and tormenting you by its mere presence. I myself have fallen for this flawed rationalization in my youth, much to my wallet’s detriment, in the days before my desire to become fit and strong was enough motivation to get me down on the floor or to the gym.

When I was very active as a personal trainer I realized what people wanted most from me was to somehow implant within them the desire to work out, to give them the gift of motivation so that going to the gym would become an irresistable burning desire. Of course no one can do that for yourself but you. Whatever it takes to get you enthused to go to the gym or hit the fitness bands hard—photos of others, youtube videos, movie superheroes, beach bodies you see at the shore, USE IT. Get more of it. On my days when I’m feeling like maybe I’ll skip the gym, I put on a couple of favorite YouTube videos to rev me up.

Don’t spend your hard-earned money on gadgets and gizmos that promise to make the hard work of fitness “easier.” Find yourself a role model or two, someone who exhibits the kind of body, strength or fitness level you ideally want to achieve, whether it be a neighbor, a celebrity or a Youtube personality.

Stop Allowing Your Smart Phone To Kill Your Workout

Yesterday at my gym I was surrounded on 3 sides by 20-somethings glued to their SmartPhones as they LOUNGED on a machine or bench. Each spent up to 5 minutes idly transfixed, scrolling and swiping, pausing only to lackadaisically fake a few perfunctory motions so they could quickly get back to their all-important swiping. Needless to say nobody was sweating, let alone breathing heavily. The girl was attired in the latest Lulumon separates and was performing ludicrously unchallenging lunges DURING an animated voice call. Hint: if you can talk on the phone while “working out” you’re not working out at all.

The males were transfixed to their screens, swiping away at who-knows-what. In the ten minutes in which I performed eight one-arm shoulder overhead presses, these people accomplished nothing. These are typical of those who angrily accuse (online and anonymously, of course) those of us who make impressive gains of “cheating” (If by “cheating” they mean “actually working out” then yep, guilty as charged), or being unfairly genetically gifted. In their eyes I assume they must somehow believe they are actually working out since their droopy asses are parked squarely on a HammerStrength machine.

There’s no rehab for screen addicts. If you cart your SmartPhone around the gym with you, you’re distracted. You’re sabotaging your own gains. You’re merely pretending to work out. I won’t tell you to turn it off and leave it in your locker, because you won’t. I won’t tell you to stop whining and complaining and snarking at those who are making visible gains while you remain the same old schlub, because you won’t. Long live the SmartPhone.

The $78 Baseball Cap

Spending lots of money unnecessarily on SUPREME merchandise or an item like Todd Snyder’s $78 baseball cap to make yourself more attractive or to feel better about how you look will never override the lack of attention you pay to your body. No matter how trendy or stylish or expensive, whatever you wear will look and fit so much better if your body is fit and tight. A $5 Hanes T shirt on a hardbody will always trump a $480 Gucci T shirt on a schlub.

I long ago noticed how some very overweight women were meticulous about their hair, clothing, perfume, makeup and manicures, obviously spending megabucks on these extraneous details as if they think these things will deflect from the fact their bodies are fat and unfit. It doesn’t. 

No gym is required to get in great shape. A ton of bodyweight workout videos can be had for free on Youtube. You can sit on the sofa and binge watch Netflix, or you can get down on the floor and work out while binge watching Netflix.

In a world where we have little control over anything, taking control of your one and only body is a power move that pays continual dividends in looks, health, strength and ability 24 hours a day.

GQ INDIA Has Some Good Reading.

As much as I like to criticize GQ Magazine for its air-headed content, I will give credit to the list at the bottom of the GQ webpage that has links to all the OTHER GQ sites around the world—France, Australia, South Africa. Perusing these sites is fascinating at times and always educational.

American GQ gets really LOW MARKS for its “fitness” content, which they shove way down the page at the bottom, and rightly so because it’s usually USELESS.

However, GQ INDIA has a really good article about an Indian chef who lost a ton of weight and got fit, and this is no boast piece or humble-brag article. Check it out HERE. It makes for good reading.

REVIEW: Master of Muscle SHRED BANDS

A few weeks ago I ordered a set of Master of Muscle SHRED BANDS fitness bands on Amazon.com. My previous set was made by a company called Flexsolate/Gym In A Bag. With age and use, the Flexsolate bands finally gave out and snapped in half. Exercise bands of course do not last forever and it is recommended with heavy use they be replaced after 90 days.

What I liked about the Flexsolate band design was the plastic hooks for attaching the handles. What I don’t like about the Master of Muscle SHRED BANDS is all the metal used in their design, especially the hefty carabiners. Having been hit painfully in the hand by the small plastic hook when the Flexsolate bands broke, I am wary of the hefty metal parts used in the Master of Muscle SHRED BANDS model due to the potential for injury if the same thing happens.

On my very first set using the brand-new Master of Muscle SHRED BANDS model, using the heavy 20 lb. black band, the end of the band where it connects to the interchangeable handles broke. The plastic pellet inserted in the end of the hollow band popped out, disconnecting the handle. Luckily I was not injured.

What this taught me, because I am an advanced user doing heavy exercises, is never rely on a single band. Instead, utilize two (or more) lighter bands where possible rather than one single heavy band. This distributes the stress across two or more bands, diminishing the chance of failure, and if one does fail, the remaining intact band should minimize a fall. 

Exercise Bands Build REAL Muscle—If Used Correctly

Erik Janicki knows how to use exercise bands to their fullest potential.

Exercise bands provide a welcome additional method to take charge of our own fitness destiny via strength training. Performing the same exercise—let’s say as an example, dumbbell extensions for triceps—using bands instead of dumbbells gives a whole new feel and refreshes the experience obtained from that exercise.

I like dumbbells. I use dumbbells. But dumbbells are dead weight and must be managed carefully to obtain the best results and limit the stress placed on joints—elbows, in the case of extensions for triceps. Performing the exact movement with exercise bands provides a smoother ride. and the flexation of the triceps at the point of fullest extension is more satisfying with less stress on the elbow joint.

Practice makes perfect, and learning how to best utilize exercise bands is no exception. Bands allow a fluid arc of movement and full extensions not allowed by dead-weight dumbbells due to one’s need to balance and control the dead-weight dumbbell.

Since I began exploring the potential of bands a year ago I have watched, and been mostly disappointed by, exercise band videos on YouTube. The instructors are not using them correctly or to their full potential. Rather than stepping on the band with your feet to anchor the band in order to perform biceps curls, for example, it is far more productive and challenging to use a door anchor. There’s only one way to perform biceps curls with the exercise band if anchoring the band by stepping on it with your feet; there are about a dozen ways to do biceps curls utilizing a door anchor. BIG DIFFERENCE.

Erik Janicki is the only YouTube instructor who uses bands to their fullest muscle-building potential and his explanations are clear and concise. Janicki is very advanced, so if you are not, go slow in mimicking his methods. If I run across any additional YouTube people who have mastered the use of these inexpensive muscle-building tools I will post them here.

Erik Janicki uses exercise bands for a killer shoulder workout.