Posts by cnichols2000

Maybe take a week without running. Do plenty of walking, and next week pick up where you left off. That'll help relieve the accumulated stress without causing any loss in fitness.

If I'm going to be running at lunch and I skip breakfast, I don't eat until after the run. At that point, I'm pretty much in a fasted state, and my body is running at steady-state. My glycogen levels are not exactly topped out, and my pace will be somewhat limited, but I find it's a whole lot easier to run for an hour on an empty stomach. Otherwise, I have maybe 500 kcal in my stomach, I'm going out to burn 800 or so, and it just doesn't work out the same.

Original Post by iggs:

I don't think there could be a more succinct and accurate distinction than that.

Hey, man, that's just like, your opinion, man.

Yes, if you're trying to lose weight. Standard recommendation is a small, consistent deficit (300 - 500 kcal/day).

Original Post by gordomoose:

This topic is about newbies, and neither of us are newbies, so our current lifts & PRs aren't relevant.  I've already shown Solid and Cnichols how SS is not the only factor in their success, and how their lifestyle doesn't reflect the general population of sedentary newbies.  Personal experience is anecdotal evidence, so it's a fallacy to assume your experiences apply to everyone.

I do have experience with the lifts in NROL and SS, but more importantly, i have a formal education in exercise science & kinesiology.  When you have a proper exercise science background (which i suspect you don't yet) you can understand and evaluate any exercise or sport, even those you haven't done.. sort of like how a doctor can treat a condition he personally hasn't had.  It's amazing what reading the right books can do.

Well, I agree with your first sentence, in that this thread is about the best option for someone with minimal base strength. And after reading your posts and the information you provided as reference, I haven't found anything to change my recommendation.

You're also right that reading the right books can make a world of difference. I don't have formal education in exercise science, but I have read NSCA's Essentials of Personal Training, and it reinforces my recommendation.

My understanding of human physiology says that a heavier load will allow a faster increase in strength, and squats/presses/deadlifts together allow much higher loading than out-of-plane or single-leg exercises. And since the abdominals are postural muscles, the isometric strength developed with squats is directly translatable to compound or awkward lifting scenarios.

You haven't shown me how another weight training regime could have better benefited me. At the time, I was pretty close to a sedentary newbie; I had spent years doing largely endurance work and had just run a race that took just about every bit of fitness out of me, and followed it up with two months of pretty much nothing at all. And yet my body responded well to this training, just as any sedentary newbie's will.

If you're going to intellectualize it, consider the body as a means for ensuring survival of the self as well as of the species. The crude analysis of you is "thing which needs to attract a mate and reproduce". As long as that need's been met, you have very little evolutionary drive to push yourself any harder. So that leaves you with brainpower driving yourself forward. That conflicts with the body and mind's tendency to conserve resources.

Keeping your family's best interests at your forefront is dangerous. That's setting the stage for your resenting them, even if only at an unconscious level. I'd think you can get the same boost by realigning your affirmation to yourself: "My family's needs are best met when I am healthy, fit and in optimal shape emotionally and physically.  When I am emotionally and physically fit, my family benefits the most because I am able to give [my family] my best, without compromising my own needs."

Specific to your situation, it's nice that you're considerate of your husband's daughter's needs. But have you discussed it with her? Have you presented your own needs to her? I think that doing so and negotiating times that would better accommodate you both would be far more appreciated by her and set a great example for her. And that would eliminate one of your hurdles. Hell, maybe she'd join you, and you'd have an even bigger asset.

Literally bigger? What are the measurements? Do you have any underlying asymmetry in your shoulders/chest, e.g. torn rotator cuff on one side?

What you're doing is pretty great in and of itself. Maybe sub running or cycling for one or two swims/week; either will give you a good amount of weight-bearing activity (for that matter, adding bodyweight squats and/or jump squats to your morning after swimming will as well). But as far as really growing muscle, you're going to need to add some resistance. Starting Strength is my gold standard for building strength and muscle. If you need a little more variety, any of the New Rules of Lifting series are good options as well. The key for building is progressive overloading and adequate recovery, and increasing the number of reps of a bodyweight activity is only going to take you a little ways.

Regardless of what you do, the regular morning exercise is good, and "fairly active during work" is huge. Combine that with clean eating and you're a step ahead.