What does your exercise routine look like AngerGeneral?

[ElJorge]

I make this thread every few years or so… always curious what some of you do to keep in shape.

Right now I’m nursing a strained right bicep so I haven’t lifted upper body in a little over a month. I do two miles on the StairMaster followed by one mile on a rowing machine so my biceps still get a little use… then 10 min of core. Mon-Wed for this routine… then Thursday I do legs (leg extensions, leg curls, calf raises, and leg press 4 x 10). I’ll also try to squeeze in a few miles of easy walking with my kids. I work Fri-Sun so I don’t do any exercise those days.

As the years of wear and tear add up recovery makes a huge difference. Had hernia surgery in March and now this bullshit with my bicep. Fuck getting old.

[Titan18]

Mostly just fucking

[thedangerouskitchen]

Total Gym and a heavy bag... high protein, minimal starchy carbs/saturated fats, and no sugar diet.

[thedangerouskitchen]

Artman does 20 laps a day, twice daily...

Spoiler:

...around the all-you-can-eat buffet tables.

[_Vcsgrizzfan_]

I've modified my routine to allow for more recovery in the last few years, and it has worked remarkably well. I'm very pleased. I think for years, I made the mistake of overtraining and didn't recover enough. I think I could have gotten bigger and stronger if I had lifted less.

What I do now is basically one major exercise a day, on 6 different days of the week. On Mondays, I do deadlifts. On Tuesdays, weighted dips. On Wednesdays, I do weighted chin ups. On Thursdays, squats, On Fridays, I don't lift. On Saturdays (bench or incline bench press) and on Sundays, standing military press. It's only one big exercise a day, but I do a ton of each. I warm up religiously. I will usually do 4 or 5 warmup sets ranging from the bar only to about 75-85% of what my maximum weight on any particular lift will be.

Then I start with my heaviest set. At that weight, I am definitely getting less than 5 reps before I know I will fail. I might do a few sets at that weight and then gradually reduce the weight to get into a "hypertrophy" zone of maybe 8-11 reps. Finally, I continue to reduce the weight until on my last set, I can complete something like 14-15 reps before failure. In total, I am usually looking at about 8 work sets on top of the warm up sets. I'm baked. One caveat. I don't do that much for deadlifts and squats. I keep those to a maximum of about 5 work sets. They just take too much out of me.

The kicker though, is that I do little else. I will usually do one or two other "bullshit" type exercises like preacher curls, or triceps pull downs for a few sets, but 90% plus of the day's effort is whatever the big exercise is that day.

I walk a ton every day. I average north of 15,000 steps a day. To maintain a semblance of VO2 max, I usually do one relatively steady state cardio session on an elliptical that keeps my heart rate at about 80% of my theoretical max for a half hour. And then on Fridays, I do Stairmaster and get my heart rate to about 90% of my theoretical max for maybe 10 minutes before cooling down.

I steam or sauna virtually every day and I push that hard. I never get out until my heart rate is at least at 140, and probably a few times a month, I get it above my theoretical max. The benefits of this are significant, but I won't get into it here. I also cold plunge regularly (on top of having a cold shower virtually every morning).

I have no meaningful injuries right now (again, I warm up religiously before I move a lot of weight) so I am very lucky.

I know virtually no other guys my age (65) who have lifted as long as I have that don't have regular aches and pains. I am very thankful for that. At my age, an injury now means a lot of off time and you lose fitness extremely quickly.

[ElJorge]

Total Gym and a heavy bag... high protein, minimal starchy carbs/saturated fats, and no sugar diet.

Is that like the Chuck Norris thing? I had to google what it is lol. I wanna eventually start buying home gym equipment… I have a small unused guest house in my backyard that I was thinking about converting to a gym once I get the extra money.

[ElJorge]

Mostly just fucking

[ElJorge]

I've modified my routine to allow for more recovery in the last few years, and it has worked remarkably well. I'm very pleased. I think for years, I made the mistake of overtraining and didn't recover enough. I think I could have gotten bigger and stronger if I had lifted less.

What I do now is basically one major exercise a day, on 6 different days of the week. On Mondays, I do deadlifts. On Tuesdays, weighted dips. On Wednesdays, I do weighted chin ups. On Thursdays, squats, On Fridays, I don't lift. On Saturdays (bench or incline bench press) and on Sundays, standing military press. It's only one big exercise a day, but I do a ton of each. I warm up religiously. I will usually do 4 or 5 warmup sets ranging from the bar only to about 75-85% of what my maximum weight on any particular lift will be.

Then I start with my heaviest set. At that weight, I am definitely getting less than 5 reps before I know I will fail. I might do a few sets at that weight and then gradually reduce the weight to get into a "hypertrophy" zone of maybe 8-11 reps. Finally, I continue to reduce the weight until on my last set, I can complete something like 14-15 reps before failure. In total, I am usually looking at about 8 work sets on top of the warm up sets. I'm baked. One caveat. I don't do that much for deadlifts and squats. I keep those to a maximum of about 5 work sets. They just take too much out of me.

The kicker though, is that I do little else. I will usually do one or two other "bullshit" type exercises like preacher curls, or triceps pull downs for a few sets, but 90% plus of the day's effort is whatever the big exercise is that day.

I walk a ton every day. I average north of 15,000 steps a day. To maintain a semblance of VO2 max, I usually do one relatively steady state cardio session on an elliptical that keeps my heart rate at about 80% of my theoretical max for a half hour. And then on Fridays, I do Stairmaster and get my heart rate to about 90% of my theoretical max for maybe 10 minutes before cooling down.

I steam or sauna virtually every day and I push that hard. I never get out until my heart rate is at least at 140, and probably a few times a month, I get it above my theoretical max. The benefits of this are significant, but I won't get into it here. I also cold plunge regularly (on top of having a cold shower virtually every morning).

I have no meaningful injuries right now (again, I warm up religiously before I move a lot of weight) so I am very lucky.

I know virtually no other guys my age (65) who have lifted as long as I have that don't have regular aches and pains. I am very thankful for that. At my age, an injury now means a lot of off time and you lose fitness extremely quickly.

I was just watching a vid on Dorian Yate’s routine… and in his prime he was doing two days on/one day off and then repeat. Only 45 min per session but he’d go “beyond failure” with a spotter. It’s funny seeing him now though… he’s all about yoga and stuff like that.

I’ve tried cold showers and they’re torture… not sure how people handle that shit. The sauna sounds fantastic though and I’ve thought about having one installed.

[lettherebehouse]

Golf and tennis

[ElJorge]

Golf and tennis

My daughter is into tennis. Played her freshman year. Kinda bothered her knees though… all that “stop on a dime on concrete” movement IMO.

[lettherebehouse]

Golf and tennis

My daughter is into tennis. Played her freshman year. Kinda bothered her knees though… all that “stop on a dime on concrete” movement IMO.

It’s rough on the knees. I was able to lose a little weight the past year so it’s gotten easier for me but it’s not like I’m playing Jon Mcenroe so after 2 or 3 volleys one of us is hitting it into the net lol.

[kobeunderbite]

Heavy compound lifts 3x per week, pickleball. I like to break a mental sweat too, which is why I hit AG 19-20x per day.

[ElJorge]

Heavy compound lifts 3x per week, pickleball. I like to break a mental sweat too, which is why I hit AG 19-20x per day.

I definitely had some ring rust after coming back to AG. Trying to get my posting game back in shape.

[thedangerouskitchen]

Total Gym and a heavy bag... high protein, minimal starchy carbs/saturated fats, and no sugar diet.

Is that like the Chuck Norris thing? I had to google what it is lol. I wanna eventually start buying home gym equipment… I have a small unused guest house in my backyard that I was thinking about converting to a gym once I get the extra money.

Yes... it's fantastic. Low impact on the joints, using your own bodyweight as resistence with an adjustable incline so you can build/maintain muscle mass, or lower the incline for a more cardio/aerobic workout. You can literally do a fully body workout in 15-20 minutes.

[AlaskaHawks]

Total Gym and a heavy bag... high protein, minimal starchy carbs/saturated fats, and no sugar diet.

Is that like the Chuck Norris thing? I had to google what it is lol. I wanna eventually start buying home gym equipment… I have a small unused guest house in my backyard that I was thinking about converting to a gym once I get the extra money.

I did the PRX setup in my garage. Set me back about 5k but I love that o can fold it up, it only sticks off the wall about 8". I have a treadmill and a TV out there so I can hit my workouts year round. I usually do compound exercises 4x a week, a cardio day, and some stretching the other days. It was spendy but damn do I love not having to drive to a gym or share equipment.

[_Vcsgrizzfan_]

I was just watching a vid on Dorian Yate’s routine… and in his prime he was doing two days on/one day off and then repeat. Only 45 min per session but he’d go “beyond failure” with a spotter. It’s funny seeing him now though… he’s all about yoga and stuff like that.

I’ve tried cold showers and they’re torture… not sure how people handle that shit. The sauna sounds fantastic though and I’ve thought about having one installed.

Funny. And you live where it is "relatively warm". I chuckle when I hear people in Phoenix say they have a cold shower in the morning. Dude, the water just NEVER gets cold in Phoenix. You are NOT having a cold shower. You are having a cool to lukewarm shower.

It's not that hard once you get used to it. In Calgary here, the water is freaking freezing in the winter and still reasonably cool even in the summer months because our nights never get that warm. I'll be honest though, despite the fact it really isn't that physically hard, I still dread the first few seconds most mornings. I've been doing it for a long time now, but I still get mild anxiety almost every time before the water turns on. Almost invariably though, within a few seconds that ends and it goes relatively quickly. I take a full two minutes, then turn it to warm to wash my hair... before putting back to cold to finish off.

[_Vcsgrizzfan_]

Total Gym and a heavy bag... high protein, minimal starchy carbs/saturated fats, and no sugar diet.

Is that like the Chuck Norris thing? I had to google what it is lol. I wanna eventually start buying home gym equipment… I have a small unused guest house in my backyard that I was thinking about converting to a gym once I get the extra money.

I did the PRX setup in my garage. Set me back about 5k but I love that o can fold it up, it only sticks off the wall about 8". I have a treadmill and a TV out there so I can hit my workouts year round. I usually do compound exercises 4x a week, a cardio day, and some stretching the other days. It was spendy but damn do I love not having to drive to a gym or share equipment.

I like the gym. Part of it is I've been at the same place forever and there is a social component to it now. I've made good friends over the years. It also is motivating for me. I'm not sure I could keep my routine if I worked out from home. There would be a temptation to "tomorrow" things too often.

[zombiesonics]

I switched to a push/pull/legs routine.

Monday: push
Tuesday: pull
Wednesday: legs
Thursday: calisthenics/cardio

So much better than isolating each muscle group.

[ElJorge]

Total Gym and a heavy bag... high protein, minimal starchy carbs/saturated fats, and no sugar diet.

Is that like the Chuck Norris thing? I had to google what it is lol. I wanna eventually start buying home gym equipment… I have a small unused guest house in my backyard that I was thinking about converting to a gym once I get the extra money.

Yes... it's fantastic. Low impact on the joints, using your own bodyweight as resistence with an adjustable incline so you can build/maintain muscle mass, or lower the incline for a more cardio/aerobic workout. You can literally do a fully body workout in 15-20 minutes.

Yea getting the most bang for your buck is important. I keep my workouts to 45 min max… it starts to get overkill after that IMO. I have a friend in his early 30s who spends hours at the gym and it just seems ridiculous.

[AlaskaHawks]

Is that like the Chuck Norris thing? I had to google what it is lol. I wanna eventually start buying home gym equipment… I have a small unused guest house in my backyard that I was thinking about converting to a gym once I get the extra money.

I did the PRX setup in my garage. Set me back about 5k but I love that o can fold it up, it only sticks off the wall about 8". I have a treadmill and a TV out there so I can hit my workouts year round. I usually do compound exercises 4x a week, a cardio day, and some stretching the other days. It was spendy but damn do I love not having to drive to a gym or share equipment.

I like the gym. Part of it is I've been at the same place forever and there is a social component to it now. I've made good friends over the years. It also is motivating for me. I'm not sure I could keep my routine if I worked out from home. There would be a temptation to "tomorrow" things too often.

There's been some days where I do that, but I find that I can pop out there for 45 minutes to an hour early am or right when I log off for the day. I also put some hooks for a swing in the garage frame so I can push my son in between sets and still get the workouts in. I do miss the gym for my hoops, but we have a 3/4 scale court 2 blocks from the house I get down to. Hard to keep up with some of the younger guys now - especially these 2 samoan boys that play for the local high school. It works for me, and my wife loves doing her workouts out there too.