A No-BS Approach to Looking Great Naked

Look, I know there's a ton of misleading and confusing information within the health and fitness industry.

Most of the time, it's hard to know which advice to follow, so I wrote a short guide detailing my entire philosophy on the fitness lifestyle and it's yours to download for FREE.

All you have to do is enter your best email address to the right, click submit, and it's all yours!

Get the Minimalist's Guide to Looking Great Naked.
April 23, 2012 By 27 Comments

Fitness and the Internetz: Battling Objectivity, Rationality, and Even Our Own Psychology

image credit: 4johnny5

A few days ago, my good friend Dick Talens of Fitocracy.com graciously tagged me in a Facebook thread he started that opened many a can of worms.  When I read his questions the first time through, I knew it would yield a ton of opinions, thoughts, rants, and some eventual trolling.

Dick’s basic question was the following:

“Why are people quick to get upset (butt-hurt) when you tell them there’s a better way to do something OR that what they’ve been doing is likely not the best method for their goals?”

I don’t want to go exactly into the same things he asked, but I will touch upon them.

Before I go any further, I want to make something clear – I don’t have the answers as to why we act a certain way.  I’m merely expressing my thoughts and would like to use this as a springboard for discussion.

– [Read more...]

Filed Under: beginners
April 19, 2012 By 9 Comments

FitSmart Podcast #4

What’s up everybody?  Roger and I just got done with our 4th podcast.  Below are the topics we discussed.  Please excuse us for the audio – lots of stuff going on outside when we recorded…

  1. What we do for our own training and nutrition
  2. How to go about setting goals
  3. Bulking or cutting? – Bret Contreras’ take on the matter

Have a listen with the player below

Alternatively, right-click here and “save-as”

You can download the podcast for free on iTunes – make sure you subscribe!

In the podcast we discussed Bret’s article titled The Pitfalls of Progressive Overload.

Also, if you’re interested in the Fitness Summit click the link.

Filed Under: Podcast Tagged With:
April 1, 2012 By 8 Comments

The Beginner Lifter: Starting Points and Avoiding the Potholes

A lot of questions I receive on a weekly basis pertain to getting started in the weight room – particularly the young guys (but also the female beginners now and again) looking to go from zero to hero in a matter of weeks.

There are so many websites, books, people and opinions that you can reference when it comes to the process of actually getting started, so I’m going to cover some resources I think are highly useful, along with some practical experience working with beginners.

First, let us state what a beginner is.

A beginner is someone who is new to strength training, and has very little to no experience navigating the typical gym setting of barbells, dumbbells, machines, and cardio equipment.

Also, according to the strength standards, a beginner is someone able to add weight to the bar every single workout.

A beginner is also someone who has not tapped much, if any, of his or her genetic potential for muscle mass or strength gains.  Now due to this second classification of a beginner, they could very well have experience in the gym, lifting weights and going through the motions, but if they never gain any appreciable strength or mass, they’re still labeled a beginner, simply because they ain’t made much progress. [Read more...]

Filed Under: beginners, Podcast
Former Fat Boy Syndrome Hangups
March 28, 2012 By 10 Comments

Former Fat Boy Syndrome Hangups

This article is a follow up from last weeks article, From Fat to Fit.  Both are written by Bryan Barletta.  This also is a nice expansion to my original article, The Former Fat Boy Syndrome.

As I write this, I question the former part of the title, and that’s bad but progress doesn’t happen over night. See it’s more than just physical with being a fat boy. You’re mentally fat too. Take it from someone who was called Fatletta most of his life.

As you progress through your diet and exercise plan and away from your old life, if you were ever fat or even chubby, there’s a lot you’ll have to let go of. I searched forums and websites for someone to commiserate with and I never found someone who went through the exact same experience as I did. No one will. But I’m sure that I can shed some light on some of the common problems or thought’s you’ll hit in your journey.

Eat Up, Fatty

It’s hard to convince a FFB (former fat boy) or FB (fat boy) to eat what they’re told. Forget about clearing the broccoli from your plate, I’m talking about the Macros. When JC first put next to the fat grams on my macros “lower fat to minimize fat loss” I undercut his 33g/50g of fat down to nearly 10g per day. Boy did I stall my progress. Your body needs fat and needs calories or it stops listening to your subtle suggestions. Because that’s what dieting is, subtle suggestions. If you go extreme, you stall. You’re your own worst enemy.

Document Your Before and After

I kick myself for throwing away all the “before” pictures I took and my measurements. I fell back more than a few times and got disgusted. Take them, lock them away, look at them every 3-6 months, no sooner. I’m sure you’ve already thought of recording this, but make sure you back it up or give it to someone you trust. The road ain’t easy, but it’s amazing when you look at the whole journey. [Read more...]

Filed Under: beginners, Guest Articles
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