Fitness Ramblings 2023

I have no relevant credentials for this topic, and further am suspicious of this topic even when someone has credentials. These are just my ramblings after trying different things for many years.

I've been trying to be fit for many years now. Below I list my goals, fitness principals, and current theories.

For 2023, my understanding of the general fitness principals are:

  1. Strength training is vital
  2. Cardio training is very important
  3. Nothing new that I try can be judged in less than 6 weeks of consistent application
  4. For a specific result, add specific training

And my current goals are:

  1. Maintain weight now, then lose 20 lbs.
  2. Improve my functional strength
  3. Reduce my resting heart rate
  4. Avoid injury
  5. Improve climbing ability

Principals:

1. Strength training is vital

For the purposes of this principal, strength training means large, compound movements, and it is vital for the purposes of functional everyday strength and maintaining muscular and bone health. Maybe this is getting into theory territory, but it is my understanding that this kind of strength training is the best bang for the buck. Deadlift in particular I think is under-appreciated.

2. Cardio training is very important

This is important to me because I want to be able to do activities without getting tired and having to stop. Whether your activity is hiking, climbing, or juggling chainsaws, cardio is the way to be able to do that thing longer.

3. Nothing new that I try can be judged in less than 6 weeks of consistent application

When adding some new exercise or dietary element, I think six weeks is the minimum amount of time to judge it's effects, unless there are immediate deleterious indications that force an early stop.

Everything has a cost: adding a new exercise adds time in the gym, or means dropping another; switching diets brings inconvenience or discomfort. It makes sense to measure the effectiveness (is this working for me?) before committing more long her. Try it for six to eight weeks before judging whether it's worth that cost.

4. For a specific result, add specific training

Beyond the basic strength and cardio goals if you are looking for a specific result, add training that is targetted at getting that result. This might mean adding exercises, or just doing an activity a lot, in addition to the above strength and cardio.

Current Goals:

1. Maintain weight now, then lose 20 lbs.

Holidays, amiright? I am trying not to completely lose it, but I'm realistic to know that I'm going to eat more good food at this time of year. I will try to not go too crazy, and increase exercise to maintain current weight through the holidays and January. Then starting in the middle of February I plan on getting more regimented and focused on losing excess weight (while maintaining lean muscle, I hope)

2. Improve my functional strength

Having good levels of functional strength just makes the world easier to navigate. Some examples:

It also just feels better.

3. Reduce my resting heart rate

This is kind of silly, but resting heart rate seems like it may be a good metric for general fitness and health. My current resting heart rate is quite a bit higher than it was two years ago, and I would like to improve it.

4. Avoid injury

I don't mean in the everyday "don't get hit by a car" way. I have a bad habit of pushing myself in exercise to the point of injury and then needing to stop some exercise to recover, leading to me stopping nearly all exercise and losing progress on all fronts. Tendon injuries are particularly obnoxious for this. In 2023 I've done a great job of studiously avoiding this trap, and I'd like to continue that.

5. Improve climbing ability

Climbing is really fun. I'd like to continue to improve. Most of that improvement needs to come from skill, but secondarily I think weight loss and improved strength and endurance will help as well. My specific training for this right now is simply doing climbing and bouldering regularly. I also do pullups, but I was doing those anyway as a functional exercise, so not sure if that counts. There's also some light dumbell forearm curl variations that I'm doing to try and strengthen my grip and forearms; this is for climbing but mostly to stave off tendon injury.

Current Theories:

These are some theories that I have and am trying, but haven't properly researched. I hope to do actual research on these topics in the new year, in addition to judging the impact personally. I'm hoping there's not too much here that turns out to be based on bro-science.

1. Fasting has many benefits

For me, one of the primary benefits is the convenience of not having to make as many meals. I've heard a lot about "intermittent" fasting, and it's something I have adjusted to and quite like. I also am lead to understand that periodic proper fasts are good as well. I know I certainly feel more alive ending a fast, but I don't know if that can be quantified medically.

2. Zone 2 Cardio

Currently I'm about four weeks into my experiment with this. I'm doing four to five days per week of 30 minutes zone 2 cardio, but am looking to increase it to an hour four to five days per week. Zone 2 cardio is when you are still primarily using oxidation to generate ATP to fuel your cells, but at a level that is sustainable for longer periods. This oxidation primarily occurs within the cells mitochondria (which is apparently good for it) and also primarily uses fatty acids.

Determining zone 2 seems really tricky, and there are a copuld of different methods. The heart rate method is 70%-80% of your max heart rate. That's kind of a large range, and max heart rate can be tricky to actually figure out. I would just completely ignore any formula based on age, since that throws even more noise into the calculation.

There's also a "talking test"; during zone 2 you can comfortably carry on a verbal converstaion. If you can't do that, you're out of zone 2. What I've done is carried on a onversation while gripping heart rate monitors, and I use that heart rate as my goal.

Supposedly the benefits hit diminishing returns after about an hour of continuous zone 2.

3. More calory movement is better, even if balance is the same

The theory goes that even though increased activity increases hunger response, eating more calories to compensate is metabolically better than not exercising.

4. Protein intake

Protein is definitely important for muscle production and health, but I've heard some seemingly crazy things, like you can continue to gain muscle mass with a calorie deficit with sufficient levels of protein. This is something I'm likely going to test in the spring, even if I don't get to research it before then.

Current fitness routine:

I'm not going to lie, my life in 2023 was a disaster. My fitness routine was non-existent at the beginning of the year, and even now is far less than it was a few years ago. This is my routine, but especially right now around the holidays I don't always stick to it perfectly:

In the next year I'd like to: