Shaf, you should contact M Lauren and ask for a commission.
Yeah it's pretty awesome. So as you know there are four routines, I started with the beginner one (the lowest one). After a week, I got kind of annoyed and felt like it was too easy so I progressed to the 2nd of 4 levels. I can do pretty well on the lower body stuff, but man the upper body routine wrecks me. Especially the let me ups.
Re: cardio, I don't doubt that it's not that great for muscle growth, but I can't quit it. I lost 35 pounds and a ton of cholesterol doing it, and a sick part of me enjoys it. I just make sure to eat a ton of food.
It's great IMO. No monthly membership fees and it's a legitimate workout. To each their own though. It's perfect for me. 11lbs down now. Science can tell us a lot about a workout but everyone is different.
The point and purpose of the philosophy is that your own body weight provides all the resistance you need in order to gain a high level of functional fitness. (Which, to me, is really the only purpose of non-athletic fitness) The guy who wrote the program is a former USAF Special Tactics Officer, and he has some very interesting science factoids to back up his claims. The moves are things that you wouldn't necessarily think of as 'exercises' in many instances, but they do crush you good.
Equipment? Maybe a door frame pull up bar. You can use saw horses and something across those that's strong enough to support your body weight. You can use the jungle gym down at the park, or two picnic benches. Whatever. You alter the intensity of the movement by changing hand or foot position.
The book was a $2 pickup on Kindle/Android, but it's already changed the way I look at exercise..... mostly because I don't have to do cardio anymore. Confirmation bias, FTW!
What i'm trying to get out of this is: are there any gains beyond the initial gains made by any change in routine? I have a hard time believing its some miracle routine.
I don't think it's a miracle routine, nor would I say anyone is positioning it as such. Are you going to do this program and end up looking like Mr Olympia? No, that's not what it's about. Can you use a program like this to drop 20 pounds of body fat and pick up 15 pounds of lean muscle, and then maintain that over time? Yes, absolutely.
No one is answering my question. People are talking about quick results. That is what happens anytime you switch to a new routine. I want to know if this is any different. It sounds like its not. I really don't understand why the question is being danced around. Its not like you have anything to gain or lose either way. It sounds like a convenience workout, which is fine.
No one's dancing around anything. I answered the question based on how I interpreted it - the focus being on long-term results, which is where the "and then maintain that over time" bit came from.
It's definitely a convenience workout, that's one of the biggest features from my perspective.
Yeah it's pretty awesome. So as you know there are four routines, I started with the beginner one (the lowest one). After a week, I got kind of annoyed and felt like it was too easy so I progressed to the 2nd of 4 levels. I can do pretty well on the lower body stuff, but man the upper body routine wrecks me. Especially the let me ups.
Okay, I had spent the past several days just learning the movements and working a few of them into my regular routine. But this morning I thought I'd give his actual program a go.
Yeah it's pretty awesome. So as you know there are four routines, I started with the beginner one (the lowest one). After a week, I got kind of annoyed and felt like it was too easy so I progressed to the 2nd of 4 levels. I can do pretty well on the lower body stuff, but man the upper body routine wrecks me. Especially the let me ups.
Okay, I had spent the past several days just learning the movements and working a few of them into my regular routine. But this morning I thought I'd give his actual program a go.
WHO DOES PUSHUPS FOR 7.5 MINUTES?!?
Oh my god, I can't feel my spleen.
haha, I will say the "ladder" nature of the workout doesn't make it quite as bad, but I agree (20 seconds on, 20 seconds off, etc). That being said, boy do you feel the burn when you are done. Although I found the military press much harder than the standard pushups.
Are you getting enough iron? That is the first thing that comes to my mind. Or perhaps you aren't drinking enough water.
A comprehensive blood test certainly won't hurt. A lot of hospitals offer them bi-anually to the public. Mine was $40 a couple of months ago.
The easiest way for me to make sure I get enough iron is to eat frosted mini wheats for breakfest with a 20 ounce glass of water. This goes against a lot of people though, notably Tim Ferris, who suggest boosting metabolism by eating protein first thing in the morning. If you want to be perfect, I guess you could always have steak for breakfast.
Throw in a good deep tissue massage too. It can help relieve pain and soreness along with helping blood flow better to the muscles. In the summer when I'm riding my bicycle quite a bit, I usually get one every 2-3 weeks does wonders for legs.
Serious form question tho: On the Let-Me-Ins, I had a hard time keeping my feet stable and the exercise ended up being as much of an isometric quadriceps thing as it was the pulling muscles in the arms and torso. It also made it difficult to isolate the upper body through the movement, so there was a bit of ab shenanigans as well. Is that normal? Or am I an idiot?
If your feet remain stable you should be able to use more upper body. Can you compensate by using different shoes or a different floor surface? Try and keep the legs as a solely stabilizing body part. All they are doing is keeping you from falling down. Don't push down with your feet. Keep the knees slightly above 90 degrees and pull yourself up a little while also pulling in. Squeeze your shoulder blades together at the top of the movement to make sure you are working the lats.
Okay, good pro tips there. I might do a set or two when I get home to see what's what. Is there any utility to be had by extending the legs out straight and resting the heels on the floor? Does that increase the intensity/resistance? Or does it change the physics of the movement and render it silly?
You want to have your legs fully extended instead of bent? That could help and it wouldn't change the muscle groups doing the work. It would actually increase resistance. These are basically rows. I prefer to do this exercise on a TRX but since I don't have one this is the next best thing.
This is basically the same exercise working the same muscles:
If you can hang a strap or something from the ceiling somehow then you can pull this off.
