A quick twenty five pushups just before midnight, a glass of ice water, and some typing…
Realistically five to ten minutes a day is all the training one would ever need to be plenty strong for life.
5:00 of pushups
5:00 of kettlebell swings or bw squats (could alternate them)
The above covers everything with such a minimal time input, and a dollar cost ranging from free to a one time investment that’ll pass down for generations upon generations.
(Seriously how long will a kettlebell last? I think to great grandkids is a minimal expectation.)
There is no excuse to not train.
Being unable to find the time would be funny if it were not so sad.
You’ve got time for how many hours of television/endless scrolling/video games EVERY DAY, but can’t get on the floor for a moment, and can’t exert yourself with squats or swings in but 2ft² right here, right now.
It simply comes down to a choice ;
Will I be strong or will I be weak?
At fourteen years old I made my decision, absolutely bringing it late night in my grandma’s living room that summer – two amrap sets of pushups and situps.
Perfect? Maybe not.
They were the two exercises I knew, and I got to it.
I did them. This being the largest part of the equation.
Consistency. Effort.
For physical strength details don’t matter much.
CONSISTENCY & EFFORT
Be strong my friends,
-J
1215am
Looks like it’s time to knock out today’s pushups.
I’m enjoying the process ; filming, getting more comfortable talking to the camera, gaining skill at video editing (I’m proud of my turkey sketch) – all the while continuing to make training progress while staying consistent with making the videos.
Letting more and more of my personality shine through…
Thanksgiving Day 2024 One Bell 48kg Outdoor Workout
I’m real excited to see where I go with the 48kg bell during the next six months to a year.
With it I’ve now found a bell just about heavy enough to “right size” me, as…
48kg is nothing to scoff at from a strength perspective, and I’m already improving more and more in my ability to swing it – my looking to Bud Jeffries and Tracy Reifkind before me as inspiration as to where I can take this, and…
For swings to click you likely need a bell both heavy enough to be meaningful and heavy enough to truly incorporate strength training, while you must be both comfortable with the movement and be strong enough to train fitness with a bell of that requisite weight.
It’s a certain zone you must get yourself to…
I’ve gotten to that place over the past couple weeks having started to be comfortable with one arm swings at 48kg while being, chomping at the bit excited for my next session ie very into improving my ability to swing it.
The Two Kettlebell Goals I Have In Mind :
•Press 48kg x15/side
•Swing 48kg for 100 reps Unbroken, this can be 50+50, h2h, any combination is fine, though I lean towards wanting this with one arm swing variants moreso than using the two hand swing, and the reps to proper swing height.
See Tracy Reifkind inspiration above, she apparently did unbroken sets mixing one arm variants with the two hand, multiple styles of counting (ladders, reverse ladders, pyramids, straight sets, h2h, etc) basically freestyle keep the set going by any means throughout the set.
I don’t much care if they’re perfect “hardstyle” form, so long as I’m working towards the reps and swing height goals it’s good – I naturally use a more girevoy style form, the heel raising, how my leg kicks out, etc – a okay.
Continuing to improve my bottoms up press from x1 to x10 with the 48kg right hand is more a side quest from those two main missions.
…..
Today I slept right through my alarm to do a sunrise lift, instead ending up lifting near sundown – getting the editing done quickly so as to have the day’s video uploaded by my usual 5pm posting time, today’s video being filmed today and jumping the que since I wanted the holiday workout to be live online on the holiday itself.
It was 33-34°f, just ever so slightly above freezing.
Outdoor training always keeps me one foot in the world of cold exposure.
Remember how a year ago my idea was the blending of kettlebell strength and Wim Hof?
It rained decently hard most of the day.
I filmed and lifted in the rain.
Que sera sera – the weather (almost) does not affect me anymore.
I lift irregardless.
Coincidentally I need to find some sweats that fit well. My build, while not lean, STILL has the issue of pants with ridiculously overly large giant waists being like skinny jeans on my medium athletic sized thighs.
EVEN SWEATPANTS!
Note To Self : a rag over improvised tripod likely would dampen the rain’s pitter patter.
Happy Thanksgiving y’all!
And happy holidays.
-J Persistence & Tenacity
P.S. Starting tomorrow we can start listening to Christmas songs.
There’s exercise and then there’s movement for the joy of the thing.
Too much of our activity in adulthood is exercise ; the overly stiff lifting of weights, the going nowhere of the treadmill, and similar.
Children are physical, and it is all the fun of play. To a child to be outdoors and moving is all out joy – sprint, rest, drink some apple juice, laugh, giggle, repeat.
In adulthood most lose this in the seemingly never ending negative feedback loop of commute to job, commute home, turn on the television, slop down some microwavable “meal” that didn’t even fully heat through – will you get back up and heat it longer?
As an adult look to things that can be considered skills, things that don’t require intensity – not more than a focused sense of playfulness anyway.
I strongly suggest you find a physical skill or three to learn, and simply approach it as play.
Around the start of spring I arbitrarily decided that I’d pick up soccer juggling.
I’d never played organized soccer, hadn’t even kicked a ball around in over a decade (my buddy and I occasionally did as seniors in high school instead of “the game” with a rugby ball), and instagram had shown me some soccer juggling gymnastic stuff which I found cool, so I ran with it.
At the start eight or so months ago there was still snow on the ground and I’d get a few ct.
Six months ago I was in the 35ct area.
According to where I wrote down my PRcts whether barefoot or wearing shoes had not broke 70ct…until today.
Today I hit 82ct wearing shoes.
At the start of this I wanted to get to 100ct.
Six months ago my best counts were in the 30s whereas today I’ll get a count of 30+ in less than five minutes of practice.
Today was unseasonably warm, mid 50s, when late November could easily be 20°f.
I took the opportunity to get some sunlight and some movement in.
Shirtless because it was still daylight and the temperature, between tree’s being cut nearby as noise filming kettlebell might as well wait til no video and lifting after dark today.
I actually enjoy after dark outdoor lifting more anyway.
(But turns out I got a SOLID one bell 48kg session in during the last hour before dark – that video uploaded and posting monday.)
I’d never have expected it ; to be so far from a gym, to be so into, and so strong from kettlebells, and to up my time fill and playful activity with soccer juggling.
Certain old time lifts would be very useful in the present.
Humanity has become weaker overall, snd even the gym goer has become affected by this, most particularly in ability to lift weights overhead since…
The press was abolished from olympic competition (may the ioc never do to wrestling what they did to the clean & press).
The dumbbell swing stopped being, not only a main lift but done at all…
I was thinking about this as I swing snatched double 32kg kettlebells.
The double kettlebell snatch, even in the swing snatch which is definitely easier than in the dead snatch, is worth more than it’s weight on a barbell.
Being a 225lb/100kg power snatch has long eluded me (and I’ve been close plus done 205lbs on so many occasions, and even for a very noteworthy early am hurry up volume session) it strikes me that we’re I to swing snatch my double 40kg bells I’d be good for over 225lb/200kg on the barbell version.
Why?
The swing snatch has a much larger arc vs the relative vertical pulling line of a barbell snatch.
And turning the bells over on a double bell dead snatch would require as much pulling strength in an awkward way as can be.
The kettlebell forces you to improve at using your hips and is a more demanding implement on the upper back than a barbell is.
I was thinking about it, and realized a dumbbell swing would be the largest arc though, not having to turnover like a kettlebell needs to.
…..
October 28, 2024
As I came in from the day’s second session, the second being a quick 200 reps total of one arm swings and in mind I was writing the above.
(these partly done as sets with one hand switch, partly done as h2h which allows me to go higher rep as it’s easier mentally for me – I did 25 left + 25 right as my highest rep set with normal oasw vs 70 total reps in one set of x35 each hand done h2h)
I’m still chasing the 10x40kg bottoms up press, and do expect to soon be purchasing a 48kg bell.
It’d be cool to have a pair so as to be able to say “I’ve clean and pressed a pair of beasts”, but I don’t care to spend ~$200 twice when I only need one for bottoms up pressing, and prefer alternating c&p singles when I do heavy workouts.
I could very well “win the internet” on a 48kg/beast amrap pretty quickly, I’ve done 16x40kg right hand more than once, and I think the best set written of online is 18x48kg.
I’m close.
I’m pretty good at this kettlebell stuff.
And so far as I can tell very very few have bottoms up pressed 48kg on the english portion of the internet.
“Studies Have Shown”
The god of both the evidence based lifter and of the science based lifter is the study.
A certain type of person, due to religious belief or something will immediately defer to the invocation of “studies have shown”.
Therefore, to win any and all training based arguments, simply invocate these studies, and what they have shown (particularly best when these studies have been made up in the moment/on the spot…all in your head).
Once for a laugh, as I gave a coworker a ride home, I explained this concept to him, then made up the most exaggerated of “facts”, stating it with the segue of “studies have shown”…”ah, no way – they have”…he bought it, I laughed, pointed it out…
“No way! It works!”
On one side is instinctive training, bro science, and all the n=1 anecdotes (my personal favorites).
One the other side is science based training, those who look for optimal training (and only optimal training), and those who want lab coats to say what is and isn’t possible for you based on studies done using leg extension machines and horribly unphysical college students.
October 20, 2024 ~545pm
Today was Day 365 Overhead Press Every Day.
I sit here eating dinner, chicken breast with white rice and shredded cheese, goat milk (a new discovery) to drink, reflecting on my training over the last year.
I’ve put on a lot of shoulders in the past year of, what could’ve been called, shoulders every day.
At the start I was using the barbell, and at the start I hit my what was only my second time pressing 225lbs (with a gap of about a year), and also early on this year I did it or heavier a handful of times having a PR last November of 235lbs.
About that same time I purchased a 40kg kettlebell, and with that everything has changed.
…..
Being able to both press and snatch the 40kg bell, both sides, about a month later I purchased a second matching 40kg bell, the idea to hit an overweight Sig Klein challenge.
I have not yet completed that challenge, but after a few months I started to bottoms up clean the 40kg bell, and there became a quest.
I started doing bup amrap sets with the 32kg.
Eventually I got my first 40kg bup.
My most recent PR was x9 right hand.
This, maybe six months, of bottoms up press as primary, now stacked with about a month of daily sledgehammer levering training – I’ve put on forearm size to say the least.
…..
The day after tomorrow, October 22, will be an entire year day to day.
I continue the streak, as I’m still actively chasing bottoms up press 10x40kg right hand…from there I’ll probably have to buy a 48kg…or at least get 48+ via bell with hat or stacked bell bottoms up press.
WHILE continuing to chase the 20lb sledgehammer lever.
My training has become fully outdoors, the feats like training for old time circus strongman.
A Tale Of Losing Muscle (Theoretical) :
I sit here just after midnight sipping on both a glass of milk, and one of orange juice…
A moment prior I had done the day before’s pushups, and as I got down on the floor I had the idea of what to write ;
How To Fail At Losing Muscle :
Now firstly my “post workout” macros are surely off, of which that I am certain.
~16oz orange juice, and the same of milk.
I have drank mostly carbs, and committed the heinous act of mixing fat into s “meal” which containeth carbs.
I’m not concerned.
If anything getting something quick into me, and just before sleep is anabolic as can be.
But that’s not the main point here…
So long as I do daily pushups it would be hard for me to lose muscle mass on my upper body.
With a decade and a half of experience, essentially daily and unbroken with pushups this entire time I get much out of them, even if the total on the day is some silly low count like 30 total.
I can put them into just about any muscle group, I can fly through them with zero range of motion and too I can do them very strict, very mentally focused, using perfect form, and a high level of mind-muscle connection for the ever gainful squeeze.
One simple exercise has become abundance, unlimited ability with just the one thing.
A few pushups backed by so much training history so as to never…it’s hard to define…
Need more.
Backslide.
& More…
…..
I can’t rightly say I identify as an advanced trainee.
I tend to look at myself as “a very strong normal man”, with the emphasis in my eyes on the latter, on being the normal, or at least what should be.
For a handful of years now I’ve identified my own goal in mind as to be “the best nobody I can be/the strongest nobody around”.
I don’t see myself as ever going to medal in weightlifting or win a world’s strongest man/arnold’s competition.
But I place high value on strength, have had so much adversity (it seems – all is perception) in my own training journey that I’ve simply adapted.
In any environment I’ll find a way to strength train, even if it’s simply “revert to pushups” which I can, and have done in the past.
I don’t view genetics as being all that important to 99.9999 or 99.99999%.
Maybe it matters to the one in a million or the one in ten million outlier “genetic freak”. To the rest, the “everyman nobody” whenever they may be, those NOT in the spotlight on the world stages of nfl sunday, or in the olympic games, the latter of which I haven’t watched since 2012, the former…the last, a single game in maybe 2018…
Just train.
Without an addiction to being a spectator, which is most in society you’ll end up pretty impressive in the real world, in your own life, in…the place that matters.
Real World
One moment, I’m pouring another glass of orange juice. I’ve been drinking mucho as of late, around carton a day honestly – it’s a kick.
Often I eat like that, on kicks…
…..
Okay, I’m back, with another tall glass of oj to sip.
Maybe the writer’s stereotype was an alcoholic alone in his madness, maybe now it’s the yuppie in a coffee shop with laptop.
Here I am flow writing, at the kitchen table, smart phone plugged in charging as I type. Between midnight and 1am.
Initially my point was going to be how hard it’d be to lose muscle.
That so long as I train some, it’d be pretty hard to even starve off on me.
I feel for all that it is more truly this way.
It’s a cultural psyop, supplement companies or something selling you on the belief that you have to not only struggle to build, but struggle to maintain muscle.
Maintaining muscle is the easiest thing.
Like many (including my mother) say “oatmeal sticks to your ribs”, that’s the case with muscle.
Once muscle has been built it sticks to ya.
The built muscle ain’t going anywhere.
Believe THAT
It’s now 1230am, I’ve finished sipping the second glass of oj, and I’m off to bed.
Have a good night, or a good day, and a good life.
Be strong, and best to ya,
Persistence & Tenacity
crossposted from youtube community posts in full, and instagram in part with
Jimmy Soul – If You Wanna Be Happy
as the choice of music
If you hit 200g of protein a day, likely for anything shy of marching siberia in winter whilst wearing rags that’s more than plenty to feed your muscles.
To remain anabolic.
(the picture just ain’t uploading)
Even 150g is probably plenty, though it’s not going to hurt to be the type who eats more meat.
Ribs being most preferable, but messier to cook or more expensive to buy.
It’s real easy to get to 150g.
A pound of chicken breast is 100 to 110g.
Six Eggs = 36g
Nine Eggs = 54g
A Dozen Eggs = 72g
So easily, and realistically you can cut up some chicken breast, pan fry it, crack some eggs over your now fully cooked chicken, fry that up (now together), pour a glass or two (or more) of milk, and hit all of your necessary nutrition in one meal of chicken, eggs, and milk.
Playing 1800s Farm Diet
roll film
Now, maybe as a beginner it helps to have some pretty rigid and structured guidelines for eating and training, but do so long enough and it all mostly become minutia.
The part that matters is progress.
If you’re making progress it’s working.
You could put the pedal to the metal, but too it’s okay (and only recently have I started accepting this) to simply keep doing what I’m doing
SINCE IT’S WORKING!
Right now I want the scale to move downwards, a laissez faire cut (rather unstructured, not too many guidelines in effect) with a hands off approach to “I know my pullup reps will increase with dropped weight and continued kettlebell workouts”.
That’s it.
Now, what works for me is eating infrequently.
I just don’t like having to digest outside of the evening/night generally.
So one meal a day is a guideline, but if I’m still hungry my nutrition was already covered by the meal, and my calories are pretty low overall…I’ll have a snack or two if I instinctively feel it’d be better to eat.
And I’m not a snob about this.
As I type it’s a couple extra glasses of milk, a few cookies, and a pack of top ramen.
The calories aren’t wild, and there is now some more protein to add to the day’s count.
See, whenever I eat really, my go to is dairy.
There’s going to be some protein every time (rare exceptions) I take in calories as most every time I do is drinking a glass of milk or eating a little cheese (often with some honey roasted peanuts – these being the most affordable and always convenient nutritious thing to eat known to man).
Spend $2.50/lb, buy three to five jars, and throw one in your car, in your backpack, etc.
Might not be a particularly low calorie option, but it’s good enough nutrition – very low dollar cost and with perfect travel logistics.
At home lately I’ll just drink a couple glasses more milk, and have a pack of ramen.
THAT might not be the best source of protein, being wheat, and even still that’s another eight or ten grams to add to the day’s total.
In a way, in the strength game, the picky mouth starves, stagnates, doesn’t grow.
The not picky eater, the human garbage disposal, this type puts on muscle much faster, and as I’m now finding…
My lack of discernment has made cutting not terribly complicated.
I actually like chicken breast sans even salt and pepper, a little butter in the pan, the raw meat chopped into little pieces, then fried up on all sides to a nice golden brown.
Like that.
Boom. Delicious.
Crack the day’s eggs over that.
Cook two or three pounds of chicken (in batches) back to back, have a couple or a few days of meat ready to go.
The rest fills in around that pretty easily.
…..
Even if I never hit any of those barbell goals I had in the past…
I’m getting pretty strong on the kettlebells.
As I type there’s a nice, light soreness in my traps from doing a decent looking swing-snatch with double 32kgs.
With a little more violence of pull/extend I can make it a better rep, but what I did earlier…it would count (video up in about a week), and snatching double 32kgs seems to me that it’d be something to the kettlebell community.
And too I have double 40kgs. There’s no doubt in my eyes that I’ll get there, from here – eventually, over time.
That’s what’s cool about the kettlebells.
To a degree, just train with what you’ve got.
Occasionally try out a harder movement.
You may have it.
What’s the worst case?
You stick to c&p, add reps to ∞ with a moderate weight…something real real world useable via a handful of kettlebells used for…half hour a week.
Easy.
Just don’t stop at only the sig klein challenge.
Aim for more reps. Aim for heavier bells.
Aim for both. Mix the sig klein challenge with the grace wod, train their bastardized child…
30 reps clean and press with as heavy a pair of bells as you can (kb or db – either is fine).
Dang, now I just typed up the point of a talking “podcast” that’s not yet live.
Haha!
Okay, it’s about 615pm, and I’ve finished eating, a meal that I’d sat down for an hour to eat, this breaking a little longer than forty hour fast (~42).
There is no fasting in american culture, and this is a shame.
Just one occasional twenty four hour fast will show you that not only are you eating more than necessary as far as quantity, you too are also eating far more often than is necessary (first world problems).
My eyes were bigger than my stomach. I ate about half of what I made intending an after fast feast!
Now, in my weight training journey I’ve long been good at bulking, naturally an endomorph I can put down quantities of food, gain a pretty substantial amount of muscle (some fat to go along with it, but not slovenly, and seemingly no upper limit to this physiologically, just logistically), but I don’t much like stopping to eat more than twice a day.
So fasting was something that made sense to me, for me to try out.
I think once in the past year I’d done a 24 hour fast, prior to that maybe one a year for a year or two, prior to that I did one every month or so for a few years, and once I’ve done 48 hours of which I believe half that particular period was also without water.
Normally I drink water freely – not wanting to play with dehydration, I just call a fast zero calories with water allowed, and for me I consider a little salt acceptable as well as genetically I sweat profusely, but mostly this isn’t included. Normally just water.
These are all rather individual practices.
You have to do what’s right for you.
Psychologically I find they reset my relationship with food in a healthy manner.
At the very least you’re very thankful for that “break fast”, whether it’s a massive feast or something rather light and simple.
I can’t help but think of the spiritual implications to a people who never fast, as every religion the world over has some manner of fasting built in as a practice.
Man in optimal state fasts to a degree.
For clarity. To feel hunger. To strip unnecessary fat off the bones.
What I see online about fasting is often far too “primal, trendy, and yuppie”. If your finances aren’t there it’s okay for your fast to end with a pack of ramen and some $2/lb chicken instead of the organic bone broth and raw dairy “everyone” is eating on reels.
Don’t compare yourself to social media, you’re probably doing far better in real life than it’d say.
Health, fitness, and spirituality (religion) are meant for all, so do not see gatekeeping as a turn away, experiment as best as you can for yourself, see what works for you, where you are, with what you have, right now.
Best to you friend, Persistence & Tenacity
P.S. Probably 2300 calories at once, this with no joke having prepped about double the ramen and chicken, dropped a giant scoop of peanut butter in them, drank a good deal of milk, then had dessert (m&ms) – still I’d say the past two days were “weight loss days”.
2300 calories across two days at a bodyweight probably in the high 280s.
At 18yo, right around high school graduation, I squatted 50x195lbs while weighing 225lbs.
I was actually doing one or two high rep sets daily or nearly so, and at that point had simply gotten bored with the sets of 50 reps.
Walking around I felt very real world strong from that training.
It’s funny to me, that at 30yo, here I am now with the kettlebell – a single 40kg bell or pair of them, training with a similar but different approach.
I look to amrap every movement ; 2h swings, dbl bell front squats, one arm press, bottoms up press…
Cause if you’re hitting a set on any of these x50 reps with 40kg/dbl 40kgs, you’re SOLID.
50x40kg is not a weak person, it’s a solid level of strength and amazing level of strength endurance.
People often look at limited equipment as a limitation, while the reality of it is that you can achieve something quite impressive by pushing rep range into the stratosphere.
A 50rm is often at a % of 1rm much closer to that of a 10rm than is commonly believed.
