Training - Well-being for body and mind

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Male, turning 38 this fall, 187cm & 88kg.

My childhood was spent playing outside and doing a bit of everything (ice hockey, football, running, gym, general messing around), but my main sport was karate at a club where it was possible to practice Hokutoryu Ju-Jutsu and kickboxing for the same fee. As the years went by, I shifted focus between these sports. BJJ (Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu) entered the picture when I was 16, and other sports fell away, but the hobby ended around the time of my military service for one reason or another (likely laziness, etc.). My time in the army was spent eating canteen donuts, but after that, I pulled myself together and started BJJ “more seriously.” I spent about 8 years in that sport until I happened to try bouldering, and I stayed on that path until COVID hit and my interest began to shift toward bodyweight skills, i.e., calisthenics. Up until that point, my training had been based on “feel” without any significant programming. I decided to start training bodyweight stuff more goal-orientedly at home, and I also started tracking macros and generally changed my eating habits.

Currently, I’m balancing life with kids (the younger one is 4 months old, so sleep is what it is), work, and home workouts, so I have to accept that I just can’t do everything. I aim to work out 5 times a week (2 pull, 2 push, 1 legs) and keep the sessions relatively short (under an hour). In addition to this, I do stroller outings as the situation allows, either walking or light jogging (though it doesn’t feel light at all when trying to navigate the streets with an “assault tank”…) to get some training in the base aerobic (PK) heart rate zone. In the long run, my strength goals are to pull my own body weight in weighted pull-ups and to overhead press it, to master handstands better than I do now, and to achieve a straight arm handstand press and a “straddle planche.” On the aerobic side, the goal is to improve it bit by bit.

I feel I have the nutrition side quite well under control; I prepare our family’s meals, and the main focus is currently plant-forward, while ensuring that every family member gets enough protein, fiber, varied fats, and other important vitamins. I no longer count or track macros, although I keep a daily protein target of about 1.6g/kg in mind. I found tracking macros useful at the time because it provided an understanding of a balanced diet, even though it doesn’t seem to differ much from the “plate model” (lautasmalli) we were taught. My weight has been around 80kg for almost my entire adult life, but I have consciously pushed it higher. The intention is to stay at this weight for at least a year and see where my body composition and appetite go; so far, I have been able to maintain the weight relatively reliably.

I could continue writing a novel about my workouts, but let’s end this by saying that the goal is to keep exercising for as long as possible and to pass on that same enthusiasm for movement to my sons—it really is the best medicine there is.

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Yeah. I guess it’d be a matter of just bringing the kid along. In a way, you can get a gym workout done quite quickly if you don’t overcomplicate things. That lack of sleep mentioned earlier can be tough.

I’m sure it’ll start working out somehow, on the child’s and spouse’s terms, of course. No need to stress too much in advance.

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Pulling your own body weight in weighted pull-ups is definitely a tough one. I remember doing sets of eight with a 20kg plate during back workouts. Now I have to settle for 15kg and sets of six. Overhead press (behind the neck) isn’t very far off even now – a background in the clean & jerk naturally helps.

Good start for the thread – great to see that exercise is a big part of life for many. :+1:

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I feel like I’m stronger at pulling than pushing – maybe my sports history has contributed to that somehow, who knows. My PR is currently +70kg with an underhand grip when my body weight was around 82kg, and now the goalpost has moved a bit further, but I’m sure I’ll reach it eventually. Right now, I’m training with an overhand grip to add some variety, and it’s lagging behind by about 10kg.

I neglected pushing movements for practically my entire bouldering period, but I’ve gradually been able to close the gap compared to pulling movements; my PR in the overhead press at the beginning of the year was 80kg. The progress rate for both movements is just painfully slow… :sweat_smile:

Naturally, my results pale in comparison to the best in the country, but I should still be happy with them :grinning_face:

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37y male. Height 190cm and weight a bit over 100kg.

In my youth, I did karate for a few years, but when we moved from Helsinki to “the sticks” here, I quit the hobby. A shame, really. I made it as far as the green belt. The next belt test (for blue) would have been a few months after the move.

I didn’t have any other hobby background until I got hooked on this gym stuff a little over 12 years ago. Or well, I did some home workouts for about six months first.

Before starting weight training, I think I weighed around 85kg.
I don’t know what’s wrong with me, but when I get into something, you can really tell. I’ve listened to training-related podcasts etc. for several thousand hours already. (E.g. Eric Helms/3DMJ, Mike Israetel/Renaissance Periodization, Revive Stronger, Stronger by Science, Barbell Medicine, Markku Tikka, Utti Hietala, Mikko Ellmen, Timo Haikarainen, Tuomas Rytkönen, Matias Nikula).
I also read a fair amount of stuff related to the topic. Nowadays, though, I also listen to a lot of material related to investing.
I used to hang out on Pakkis (Pakkotoisto) way too much back in the day, too.

On average, I’ve trained 4x/week. Training has been quite goal-oriented, even though I don’t compete in any sport. I’ve tried to build muscle and strength, but I’m not particularly gifted in either.
I’m happy that even after 12 years of training, it’s still possible to make progress. It’s damn slow, but as long as the goals are realistic and you put in enough effort to reach them, there are still “openings” to be found.

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Yo!

Age 42 Height 175cm Weight 90

I started exercising at age 34 after waking up to my own mortality. Before, I might start the gym/running/cycling etc., and 2 months was the absolute maximum before the enthusiasm ran out. Now I have 8 years of gym behind me, and road cycling and badminton have joined the mix. Occasional bouldering, skiing, and swimming. The idea is to “always do something 3 times a week”; the routine has settled at around four workouts a week, and usually 3 of those are at the gym.
Nowadays, restlessness kicks in and my body screams for a workout if, for some reason, there’s a gap week.
Maintaining the habit has done wonders for the mind and the body. I’ve developed a bit of mental toughness and belief in my own actions and commitment. Once I realized this, I started studying. Investing as a hobby came along when I started looking at life a bit further ahead.
Great stuff all in all!
I’m hanging around here in this peer support group.

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What kind of workout splits do you use? I did 35 sessions with a full-body (1-split) routine at the beginning of the year, but after a couple of months, I have to admit that my forearms don’t seem to be able to handle it anymore. I’ve had a strain injury in my arms for over a month, and it hasn’t improved at all with a week of deloading, massages, and stretching. Last night I gave in and started a course of Ibuprofen; gradually, grip strength is returning to my other hand as well.

With a 2-split, a couple of workouts a week feels like quite little, or the volume per session needs to be proportionally higher to achieve sufficient total load while considering basic movement patterns. Another option is a 1+2 split, which ensures enough stimulus per session, and it’s not the end of the world whether there are 1 or 3 workouts a week.

Of course, you need some imagination when training in a home gym equipped with a barbell + 160kg of weights, a half rack, a landmine, an EZ bar, and 2x15kg adjustable dumbbells.

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Clarify a bit for a boomer what those 1-split and 2-split mean.

I personally train every other day as follows: 1. Chest+abs+cardio 2. Back+abs+cardio 3. Legs+abs+cardio 4. Shoulders+abs+cardio 5. Biceps+abs+cardio.

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A 1-day split is the whole body at once, a 2-day split covers the whole body in two workouts.
For example, at a glance, it looks like you have a 5-day split training program, except for the abs.

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Yeah, there’d be no way to recover from your workouts :flushed_face:

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Not for me either anymore :confused: The problem is that when you’re doing it for yourself, this program design is an endless quagmire. Planes of movement, injuries, sufficient frequency, equipment used. It’s quite a lot of work :grin:

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It might not necessarily fit your goals, but I personally do 2 x pull, 2 x push, and 1 x legs. For pull days, I do vertical pulls (pull-ups), horizontal pulls (rows), and rear delts and biceps as isolation. For push days, I do vertical pushes (overhead press), horizontal pushes (dips/weighted push-ups), and triceps as isolation. For legs, squats (either Bulgarian split squats or back/front squats) and hamstrings (Nordic curls). That is the maximum I can do in a week; otherwise, recovery starts to suffer. I take rest days based on my recovery, but in practice, I do Mon-Tue-Wed (push, pull, legs) workouts and then usually Fri-Sat (push, pull).

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Doing a full-body routine to save time. And usually quite few exercises. A workout might be something like back squats, RDLs, dips, machine rows, and then I’m out.

Maybe not optimal, but surprisingly, that’s enough twice a week. At least for me.

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Male, 30-40y, 170cm / 90kg.

Childhood was spent doing a variety of different sports. The main focus was on football, floorball, cycling, and badminton.

At age 20, I started martial arts. Shotokan karate, taekwondo, and most recently Muay Thai were part of my repertoire for over a decade. My football background helped here, as I could already get my leg up high. Of these, karate was formally the toughest, as you had to stay statically in difficult positions for long periods. I didn’t really like it, and besides, the teacher was totally crazy.

Muay Thai, on the other hand, is genuinely tough stuff, as it requires both the footwork typical of boxing combined with various striking techniques (like the elbow strikes typical of Thai boxing) and sharp, whip-like kicks to head height. At the same time, you have to keep your guard up. A really effective form of exercise, I recommend it! You’ll sweat, your healthy self-confidence will grow, and you’ll learn how to take a hit.

I started gym training at 22, and it turned into goal-oriented strength training at maybe age 25. At some point, the main focus shifted from building muscle mass towards a more holistic direction, but I still try to always go all out in training – meaning pushing the muscles to failure (to the point of shaking, heh). Nowadays, I do bodyweight exercises, for example. The classic 3x10 pull-ups is a good benchmark for anyone! A couple of years ago, I hired a personal trainer for the first time and managed to improve all my gym results from deadlifts to bench press even at age 35, so there might have been some slack in my training after all.

During the COVID era, exercising dropped off for a bit and my weight peaked at 105 kg. Now it has dropped to around 90 kg permanently. I could drop to 85 kg for the summer, which would mean being in really lean shape. Even now, the six-pack is visible – at least on those good days. :grin: I’m not exactly aiming for the fitness level of a hunting dog, though, just for well-being.

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Great mass and the six-pack is visible :+1: You’ve really packed on the muscle.

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Male, turning 62 this year, 175 cm and 85-90 kg.

I’ve exercised regularly all my life. The disciplines have changed over the years, but I’ve aimed to stay active in a versatile way 4-5 times a week for 1-2 hours at a time. Currently, my main activity is strength-oriented gym training. I’ve been training with two programs. The 5x5 program is my go-to for about three months, and as a second routine, I do the 5-3-1 program for about two months. Those programs have a logic that suits my mindset and my body. They focus on compound movements that work multiple muscle groups at once. You can find instructions for both programs online. If I had to name an “idol” or a role model here, it would definitely be Esko Ketola. A true “iron grandpa” and proof that strength training isn’t just for the young. Esko and his thoughts can also be found online.

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I’ve become more active in basketball again. I played until the regional national team training camps when I was young, but I lacked 20cm in height to make a profession out of it, even though my physique and skills were sufficient. Well, I’ve been playing in a recreational team for a couple of years now and the plan is to start playing in the men’s 4th division next season. For this reason, I need to burn off some fat, and I’d even gladly give up some of my muscle mass, but it just won’t go away. Muscle gains made as a natty (natural lifter) are stubborn.

I’m currently training with a modified 1-split, MET-focused program based on Scott Abell’s “Hard Gainer Solution.” I’ve deeply fallen in love with this and recommend it to everyone over 30. In practice, you can do these workouts even 7 days in a row. The workouts are very simple and usually consist of 3 exercise combinations. I’ll include an example below. The idea is to leave 2 reps in reserve (RIR) in every set so that recovery doesn’t suffer too much. A workout like this takes me about 50 minutes. The exercise combinations are done in one go, and actual recovery happens only between the combinations.

1a. Squat 5x5
1b. Lateral raises 5x12

2a. Bent-over row 4x10
2b. Bicep exercise 4x10
2c. Abdominal exercise 4x

3a. Incline bench 4x10
3b. Tricep exercise 4x10
3c. Maybe an extra ab exercise here if you feel like it.

Remember the most important rule of fat burning:

Nothing tastes as good as being in top shape feels

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I wonder if you’ve come across a site like this: https://symmetricstrength.com/

It provides a great and illustrative analysis based on your own results and shows where you have the most room for improvement. Sorry if this is old news. Here are my own graphs:
image

Squat as well as bench and overhead press are the ones needing the most improvement. This isn’t an absolute metric, of course, but it certainly looks at symmetry quite nicely. The fact that I don’t know my actual one-rep max surely causes quite a bit of variance, as I used the site to estimate them from my normal sets.

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Here is an old classic calculator for calculating 1RMs.

Oops, there was already a calculator there as well. Well, I’ll leave the link here anyway.

Thinking back, I actually used to train like this. For my part, it stopped because I don’t really enjoy training only with long sets. Your way of implementing it might actually work, even with my weekly training volume. Rotating squats, bench + bent-over row, and deadlifts as the primary lifts across three different workouts, and building the rest of the session around longer triple sets.

@Wallet_Nahlroos how did the philosophy go again—the goal wasn’t necessarily to train opposing muscle groups in those double/triple sets, right?

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Male, 47y, 166cm, 80kg

This feels like the right thread for me. In my childhood, all sorts of ball games, skiing, and ice hockey were mostly the focus, and days and evenings were often spent at the rink. I have gym experience from when I was in the 5th-6th grade of primary school, as strength was needed for hockey. However, a brain tumor was found in 1992, and that put an end to my hobbies for a while. I survived that blow reasonably well. Over time, I tried to get back into skiing and skating, but it didn’t really work out. The speed was gone. I haven’t put on skates since then. However, I got into gym training when I was in high school; that seemed to go better. Well, adulthood didn’t quite want to work out, and alcohol started to play too big a role in my life. I felt like a failure. Years went by in that haze, and this period includes some truly unpleasant events. All exercise was gone during those years. Well, in 2009, I had a stroke; I survived that physically reasonably well, maybe? But mentally, it was hard. I was quite anxious and lacked any future prospects. However, I got professional help and realized that if I continued my own messing around, the grave would soon be ahead. Sometimes you have to go deep enough to be able to rise! In 2010, I smoked my last cigarette when I left the hospital; well, it still took a few years, but the decision was made then. In 2010, I started gym training again, and I was hooked pretty much immediately. I found the same passion I had in my childhood. There was way too much of everything—too many exercises and more enthusiasm than sense. In 2015, I brought in a professional coach until 2018. The results were good, and the guy bulked up :grinning: I’ve been chasing strength in recent years, but nowadays my knees don’t want to hold up, and I have to listen to my body. PRs: Deadlift 190kg, Bench 135kg, Front Squat 145kg. I’m not sure about the back squat, but at least 140kg for three reps. My weight has varied between 65kg and 80kg, and at my best, I was around 10% body fat. Diets were part of the program back in the day. Now I’ve been going to the gym for 14 years, summer and winter, but these days it’s on the body’s terms; I intend to keep this up as long as I can. It’s part of the routine and a lifestyle. It gives a lot, but it also wants to take a lot when you’re stubborn. I have to mention Inderes and the forum here as well. It came just at the right time in my life when I already had to give in a bit on the gym hobby. This is how we roll.

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