I figured by not doing conditioning I was just enabling all the young blokes on here to think it was OK to not do it too. Take it from someone who knows, of you don’t keep your conditioning as you age you will regret it. Strong is one thing but being strong and able to move is something else altogether.
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Dude I totally agree with you. There’s no good reason to be a turd
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Had a fun day!
My smoking hot wife got the job she’s been working for the last couple months at this gym that’s seriously like a resort. Then they gave us such a ludicrous discount I would have joined even if I wasn’t going to support her anyways. So far, it’s a great outfit that is treating her extraordinarily professionally; I’m sure those of you that have worked in gyms understand why I’m pleasantly surprised.
So I went to the gym today and:
- Tried out a billion new machines I’d never seen
- Did my regular chest and shoulder workout
- Did some treadmill that you can set like a sled and even dictate the weight and distance
- Played adult pickup basketball (note: some of these “adults” probably finished their D1 careers last month; I was incredibly outmatched)
- Used the hot tub
I had fun! It also really cemented for me: I have zero interest in doing bodybuilding workouts right now. I’ve been grinding through them, because it’s like I’ve actually forgotten how to train any other way and I can make myself put the work in. I’m going to look for new sparks of interest; I just really want to be an athlete again, and I don’t feel like one at all. In the meantime, I signed up for their strength and conditioning version of CrossFit (without paying the licensing fee for calling it that) classes the couple days I’m in town next week.
So it was a good day. Work has been extremely positive and the kids are thriving, which keeps making me feel good about the move here.
Most importantly, tomorrow UNC has a chance to earn a trip to the title game and simultaneously end Coach K’s career (who is a USMA grad and has my utmost respect, but still) in the first ever NCAA tournament meeting between the two teams. Go Heels!
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Tar Heels!
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Too much to love on that post to just give it a like. So glad things are going so well for you and the family and super excited to see how you training evolves as you strive to be more athletic.
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Thanks man! I’m a lucky dude
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Alright super friends, today was this gym’s version of CrossFit class… it was hard! It was a straight hour of deadlifts, KB swings, thrusters and burpees. I really enjoyed moving and the coach was great.
I’m signed up to do these until I leave Thursday. When I get back after this trip, I’m in town for awhile.
My plan is to keep doing these at least 2-3 times a week. More when I can, because I like it and I think it’s crushing my weaknesses. I’ll also play basketball a couple times a week during the pickup game times because it’s easy to do and fun (but, as I discovered again today, these dudes are pretty good!).
I also am going to go to a simpler barbell program that manages my stupid for me 3-4 days a week. Right now it’s a toss up between CT’s “jacked athlete” from his site or Wendler’s “SVR 2” from his forever book; those both look like easy emotional transitions from bodybuilding. If anyone has done one and has a vote, throw it in. Otherwise I’ll have my kids rock, paper, scissors choose for me.
That’s all for now!
Go Heels!
I will add for the game tonight: a championship is icing at this point; ending Coach K’s career with losses at Cameron and in the Final Four already put this team in the Dean Dome history annals for all time!
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What weakness are these crushing out of curiosity?
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Lungs and attitude
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Did a more strength-focused class today. It was still circuits and finished with a MetCon, but not nearly as soul-crushing as yesterday. This kind of confirms what I’m thinking that I’ll manage my own lifting but keep doing the conditioning/ puking classes.
And, although they fell yesterday, this year’s UNC squad was full of some absolute grinding kids - it was awesome to behold; I’m excited for the culture Hubert Davis is building!
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Do the classes interfere with your gym recovery time etc? Or have you lowered volume and or effort?
It’s a good question, but it’s too early to tell. I haven’t really done anything this week but the classes and a little basketball. I think I’ll be better able to answer maybe early May.
I will say, yesterday’s class was more strength-focused (still circuits, though). I think that’s more likely to interfere than the conditioning-focused ones.
If anything, basketball seems to be worse. I think the impact my knees take makes everything else harder.
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Another cross training class in the books! This one was all sprints, lunges and core. My legs are getting heavy.
I also spent a couple hours today trying to hang a zip line for the kids. There’s still too much slack in it so I’ll have to fix it when I get home. That was a much more difficult project than I anticipated.
Next week we’ll figure out how to layer lifting back into all of this!
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Don’t forget the slow-down at the end! Unless you’re cool with small human-sized indents in your tree
Props on the zip line though, they’re a lot of fun for kids… probably less for the adult that has to run the handle back up to the start though… perhaps also a child-operated retrieval system too 
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That picture is hilarious!
Right now they can only go like 5 feet anyway because I hung the lower side too low and there’s too much slack in the line. I’ll fix it Sunday.
There is a rope on the bottom of the swing so they:
- Can bring it back themselves
- Have to work together to launch from the high side
Two birds!
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Got home yesterday and finally got that zip line taut. It was pretty cool when they were able to get going on it.
Today I had lots of time, so I did the gym’s complimentary PT session which was a lot of movement. The dude was actually great and very on it in terms of assessing strengths and weaknesses and that sort of thing. I’m not going to sign up for PT, but I liked him.
Then I shot some ball, did a little cardio, ate, did a leg workout and sat in the hot tub!
I just picked up the kids from school and now I’m dozing off while they get ready for their afternoon sports.
Tomorrow we’ll rinse and repeat.
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I just discovered The Last Kingdom, and binged all 5 seasons. Now I am sad that it is over. An observation I had about the show is how much emotion they gave male characters. Normally, something bad happens and you get a shot of the character looking stoically at the sunset or something. Uhtred’s character had a lot of shit happen to him, and I think the showing of him crying or what not made the character more relatable than most of these types of characters.
I am surprised I hadn’t heard of this show until now? Was it always just on Netflix? If so, I will distrust Netflix’s recommendation algorithm, because I think it only recommended it to me when season 5 started.
Destiny is All!
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Love it! Yeah it was always on Netflix.
I completely agree with you on the depth of the characters.
They’re long, but I highly, highly recommend the books. They’re incredibly well-written. They’re able to flesh out Uhtred‘s development and maturation over his entire lifespan in a way the show simply can’t. They also go pretty deep into the battle planning, the terrain and the decision-making (not to mention plain luck), which was really entertaining for me.
As one final plug, there are 3 major story points season 4 absolutely blows that the books handle beautifully. I don’t think you lose anything by “knowing” what’s coming if you read them now after watching the show; it’s more about the journey.
Glad you liked it! I do feel like it’s relatively under the radar and I don’t really know why since it is so fantastic. The show drove me to read (or listen when I was driving a lot) every Cornwell story I could find!
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The way that over the decades some characters change seemed different from a lot of shows as well. It seems a lot of shows, you know the characters and they are predicable. That is true for some of the characters, but not all. Aelswith is predictable for example (inherently good, but kinda stupid, which causes trouble), Aethelwold and Brida are chaotic. I really thought that Aethelwold was going to be a “good” character (after thinking about it, he may just be evil and not chaotic). I thought Brida was going to be good after Uhtred revealed that he swore to Alfred (I liked Alfred a lot) to save Ragnar.
I may have to check out those books. There hasn’t been a show I have enjoyed this much since Chernobyl.
The character names at times did become confusing though. A lot of the same or similar named characters. They also did very little to age the characters as time went on.
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That’s a huge change in the books. Uhtred lives an abnormally long time for the era, and the books do a lot to view four generations of English kings and Viking invaders through his eyes.
I like your point about “agents of chaos”. It makes it a lot more real to me. Real people aren’t always altruistic nor totally evil; there are different motivations and competing emotions at different times. Brida is a great example: she’s not evil, but as she sees Christianity winning over time, she grows increasingly desperate and irrational.
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