In the past I have made the mistake of doing things without consulting the internet first. When first starting dating a few years ago I wandered into a few random sites with a notable lack of success before I finally figured out that "polyamorous internet dating" would return lots of Google hits that all sent me to the right place. I tried cooking lots of things on my own until I found out that effectively leveraging Google results like "cream of mushroom soup" created way better food than my paltry experience could produce. A few weeks ago I started an exercise routine that mostly is focused around lifting weights and I thought AHA! I must consult the internet!
Turns out the internet is pretty stupid when it comes to exercise. There are lots of sites urging me to consult my trainer, which is entirely useless. If I wanted to pay a person a boatload of money to tell me stuff, I wouldn't be on the internet looking for free advice, now would I? More specifically, if I *was* paying somebody a ton of money to train me my money demons would lead me to quit training in a hurry, so that isn't of any use.
The advice is also all kinds of contradictory. Don't exercise too much, you won't gain strength! Don't exercise too little, you won't gain strength! Sure, right, but how much is too much? I know that multiple times a day is too much, and once a week is too little, but some solid advice in the middle would be great.
Unsurprisingly there is also a ton of advertising and special workout routines you are supposed to pay for and all kinds of other nonsense like strength pills and other junk with less plausibility than homeopathy.
Now I am sure if I dig deep enough I can find something useful on the internet. There must be people out there with concrete advice I could put into action. Unfortunately it is buried in endless mounds of useless and worse, and sifting through it is tricky because I can't just test what I find. Unlike dating websites, I can't make an account in thirty minutes and figure out if this is for me. Unlike recipes I can't average a ton of results and find out an hour later if it tastes good. Averaging some random advice and then waiting three months to see how much stronger I am is far too slow for my tastes.
So, given that the internet isn't actually able to communicate the truth to me this time, does anyone who is into weight training able to point me to a good resource for developing a basic routine? Focusing on upper body strength and general health, as those are the two things that interest me at the moment.
Possibly people are all different, the science isn't solid, and thus the best results come from someone with experience monitoring you?
ReplyDeleteOf course, it has to be someone with experience who actually knows what they are doing, which seems trickier to determine if there isn't solid science and they can always blame you for not doing the exercises wrong and hope you forget things over the long term results period.
Or possibly the information is so valuable that people don't actually give it away?
Or possibly it's so dangerous, because if you do it wrong you'll hurt yourself, that people don't give it away?
If you get a routine, let me know - I'm interested in the outcome (though given my useless right arm at the moment, I can't put it to any use).
If you beat down your money demons, I can recommend a trainer.
ReplyDeleteIt really is good to have some advice about form so that you don't injure yourself.
My doppelganger has been on the StrongLifts, um, regimen(?) for a while now and has put on some significant muscle that way (I've come into a bunch of hand-me-downs that no longer fit their shoulders etc :P). There's a free app for it and all.
ReplyDeleteMaybe hire a trainer once to teach you a routine and good form then go from there? Seems worth the money.
ReplyDeleteOr stop this stupid idea of training and start doing Belegarth. I can't figure out why you haven't already been doing this. Passion would friggen LOVE it. You run around, swinging foam covered weapons and try to whack people.
ReplyDelete