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Exercise and Fitness: bro science debunked


Iskaral Pust

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My work place is being totally renovated and they are hugely increasing the size and equipment in the gym allegedly. Getting paid to train is the best motivation of all, I just wish my shoulder wasn't so fucked, cardio bores me, though cycling and cross trainer do allow me to read my kindle at the same time. 

My weight is holding solid at 14 stone (6'1'), to get down to what I'd like to be at 13.5 would probably require sacrifices I'm not prepared to make permanently. 

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My office building just added a new gym at a very low price.  It's a lot of hassle to carry exercise gear back and forth (I walk to work) but it might be worth it to get one or two midweek sessions.

My workouts were going really well until this past week.  My parents came to visit for four days, and then I had a large client visiting our office for the next three days, and then I had to attend a lunch event today for a charity at which I volunteer.  So I've eaten restaurant food for almost every meal of the past eight days and no exercise in that time.  Plus I'm absolutely exhausted from having to entertain others for long days.

This weekend will be a chance to catch up on some sleep, eat some healthy food and get some exercise.

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On 5/16/2019 at 10:18 AM, Tywin et al. said:

I feel like a dodged a bullet last night. My knee felt a little funny while stretching, and during my warm up run I heard a staggering loud pop in my knee. It didn’t hurt at first, but within a few minutes I couldn’t put weight on it. I laid down for about 10 minutes, started stretching, got up and was just fine for the most part and was able to workout for another hour or so. I took it easy to be safe, but I feel absolutely fine this morning.   

Pretty common. You're getting towards 30 now right? Late twenties or something? Probably some loose cartilage rattling around in there if the pain went away that quick.

You'll live with it. Unless it's a torn meniscus (which would hurt a shitload more) you'd do more harm than good going in to clean it up.

 

Meanwhile, I've been struggling to jog for a while now and gave up the ghost about six weeks back or so. I just don't enjoy stationary bikes and fucking hate using the one I bought. So I've done something terrible.

I'm belly dancing now. And you know what, it's FUN! Fuck y'all losers, I get into it. It's really something. I've never been a dancer, ever. I played basketball in High School because I was mean and had a sharp elbow, I don't know if I'd ever made a graceful movement in my goddamn life before I gave this a try. And it's pretty dope. I really dig it. Way better than stupid yoga. (too fidgety)

I've only been doing it for a month now, and I will absolutely not stand next to the early twenties girls who look like they got their class fee paid by their fucking Patreon subscriptions, and I'm not particularly good or anything. But I'm waaay better than all the moms and only two of the boys are better than me. And for a shallow, hateful, creature such as myself. That's enough. And it really is just great fun. I can get an hour in every day without my bike's seat cushion trying to take advantage of me.

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My left thumb tendons are still bothering me and workouts are still a no go.

Couldn't force myself to go running in the crappy weather we've been having for the past couple of weeks. The plan is to go running tomorrow since the weather seems to be improving at least a bit.

Might try swimming to see if it bothers my tendons or not.

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On 5/5/2019 at 5:56 PM, Triskele said:

I see to have developed a weird injury in my left forearm, and it's frustrating that it's not that easy to say what or exactly where it is.  I think that it might be lifter's elbow, but I'm not `100% sure.  It's much more noticeable with pull lifts than push lifts.  I could give up bicep curls pretty easily and be happy, but I'd hate to have to cut back on back day too much.  I play guitar as a hobby and really notice it there too like to the point that I pretty much can't play.  A spot within my arm gets super exausted quickly around the injury, and this never happened before.  

Wondering if it's anything a physical therapist could help with.  

 

I had a miserable time for an entire year (in 2015-6) with carpal tunnel syndrome from tendinitis in my forearms.  Weight lifting, rowing and guitar playing was just too much.  

You can definitely fix that tendinitis with some deep massage (across the tendons, not in line with), ice bath dipping for forearms and taking a break from whatever seems to be the biggest trigger.  For me, it was guitar that had to go — I was a beginner and still straining too hard to control my fingers.  The massage felt painful because the tendons were so inflamed, but it was really important to unlock the knotted fibers so the inflammation would reduce and they could heal.

My massage therapist was a big help.  A physio could be very helpful too.

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1 hour ago, Triskele said:

That is useful but kinda terrifying feedback.  

I basically have only two hobbies at the moment being lifting and guitar.  I would absolutely hate to give up either, but these past few weeks I notice issues anytime I pick the guitar up.  

This all happened about a year ago, and I probably mentioned it in the thread.  But I figured out it was only caused when I did a certain angle of bicep lifts.  So I thought I'd figured out that I only had to give up one type of lift.  And that was actually working just fine, so it was really encouraging.  

This time around there was no particular moment or anything, but I suspect it was lifting rather than guitar that started it, but guitar also seems to really exacerbate it (and for what it's worth, anything that requires more of a stretch like a barre chord is worse).  

I had a frustrating thing happen this weekend too which is that I felt the elbow thing tweak just grabbing a weight and not even doing a particular lift, so this thing is apparently quite sensitive at the moment.  

 

That sounds very similar to my experience.  I first noticed some slight elbow tendon strain doing preacher curls. I dropped that exercise and it seemed to help, but I gradually got generalized carpal tunnel symptoms that were no longer specific to lifting.  Guitar barre chords or anything that required extra contortion for reach & pressure would leave the tendons twanging a bit.  It was never so painful that I thought I couldn’t play guitar or lift weights, but it was a persistent background problem affecting my sleep, requiring wrist brace for typing, etc.

Oddly enough, since dropping the guitar I’ve had no recurrence from weightlifting even though I now do tougher weights for forearms like deadlifts and pull-ups.

Your experience won’t necessarily be like mine, and you’ve played guitar a lot longer, but do get that tendinitis cleared up before it gets entrenched.  

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On 5/18/2019 at 2:42 PM, Jace, Basilissa said:

Pretty common. You're getting towards 30 now right? Late twenties or something? Probably some loose cartilage rattling around in there if the pain went away that quick.

You'll live with it. Unless it's a torn meniscus (which would hurt a shitload more) you'd do more harm than good going in to clean it up.

 

Meanwhile, I've been struggling to jog for a while now and gave up the ghost about six weeks back or so. I just don't enjoy stationary bikes and fucking hate using the one I bought. So I've done something terrible.

I'm belly dancing now. And you know what, it's FUN! Fuck y'all losers, I get into it. It's really something. I've never been a dancer, ever. I played basketball in High School because I was mean and had a sharp elbow, I don't know if I'd ever made a graceful movement in my goddamn life before I gave this a try. And it's pretty dope. I really dig it. Way better than stupid yoga. (too fidgety)

I've only been doing it for a month now, and I will absolutely not stand next to the early twenties girls who look like they got their class fee paid by their fucking Patreon subscriptions, and I'm not particularly good or anything. But I'm waaay better than all the moms and only two of the boys are better than me. And for a shallow, hateful, creature such as myself. That's enough. And it really is just great fun. I can get an hour in every day without my bike's seat cushion trying to take advantage of me.

Sadly I just turned 31. :bawl:

Also, pictures or it didn’t happen. :P

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Went for a run this morning and it was an eye opener :( Couldn't even manage to run what was once my usual route (6-7km) without walking.

Not that surprising result really, when I consider that for the past two, two and a half months I've ran 12km (today's run included) and did nothing else due to the rather persistent tendon inflammation in my left wrist. Will need to up my running until my tendons get back to normal and I can get back to crossfit.

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4 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

Sadly I just turned 31. :bawl:

Also, pictures or it didn’t happen. :P

I have no use for a man over 30, please stop contacting me. 

If you have a son, send 'em my way old man.

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On 5/19/2019 at 6:56 PM, Triskele said:

After a little perusing online one video suggested that skullcrushers are often a hidden cause of elbow pain by causing inflammation of the tendons.  Not sure if that's the case for me or not as I've never really felt the pain during that exercise whereas with bis and pulls I have.  

I also saw a suggestion that a thing someone might try would be to just eliminate isolated arm lifts altogether, so I might give that a shot.  

Ice baths and rest from guitar worked for me.  Was practicing 6-8 hours a day and had to drop that to basically zero, just enough to gig and rehearse with my band, and then ice baths from elbow to wrist every day, along w/ massage.  Took about a month before the pain went away, but it eventually did, and while I can't do long practice sessions anymore, I can still play generally when I want pain free

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2 hours ago, Jace, Basilissa said:

I have no use for a man over 30, please stop contacting me. 

If you have a son, send 'em my way old man.

I think what you're laying out is a serious crime. Also, a few months back you killed off everyone who is younger than you.

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37 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

I think what you're laying out is a serious crime. Also, a few months back you killed off everyone who is younger than you.

So many plots. They're hard to keep track of! 

I'll never speak another word of disparagement about those fucking hacks D&D.

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21 minutes ago, Jace, Basilissa said:

So many plots. They're hard to keep track of! 

I'll never speak another word of disparagement about those fucking hacks D&D.

I guess you're reduced to just making obscene gestures with you smallish hands.

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Had a great workout today. 4x1600m (mile) repeats with a 3min rest between. Hit up the first couple in ~6:30 (4:05/km), the third was uphill, usually the slow one but still managed a 6:24 (right on 4/km), and the last at 6:12 (3:53/km). Felt better doing that workout than I have since late last year, and could've pushed it and done another repeat if needed. Really happy with how the fitness is coming on.

On 5/21/2019 at 4:25 AM, Leap said:

Yesterday's "long run" was brutal. I only did 10k in anticipation of a full half next Sunday, but it was so hard. I don't know if it was the heat or the fact that I hadn't eaten (large meal the night before), but even maintaining what felt like a slow pace was like running through mud. Somehow, I ended up finishing in 49:44, which all things considered I'm pretty pleased with...but fuck doing another run like that. I think I'll be avoiding any daytime runs until September.

I really do hate it when the legs don't respond. Had a long run like that a few weeks ago that was just painful. Felt like I was doing 4:30s, turned out it was closer to 5:30s, which then turned into near 6min/kms... So <5min/km for a long run is pretty bloody fast in my books! I'm a big proponent of just plodding through the miles and not worrying about the pace for long (and tbh most shorter) runs.

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If you can do a lot of longish runs you can do them slowish. If you run only 3-4 times a week and/or cannot run for an hour or more everytime, I think it helps cranking up the intensity which includes doing the slowish runs faster. Or adding fartlek elements into the otherwise slowish runs.

But the best rule of thumb is that the "quality units", i.e. the fastish race-pace or similar workouts (like your mile repeats) should never suffer from too much intensity of your easier runs. It does not make sense to crank up the speed of the base/steady/slowish runs if you are then too tired to meet the specs of your intense workouts.

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Oh absolutely. I just find it's easy to get very hung up on pace and have a tendency to over analyse workouts. Very often guilty of that myself.

Even if you only run every few days there's far worse things than occasionally slowing down, putting a decent podcast or some music on, and just cruising and enjoying the scenery. 

Not talking about anyone here, but imo the most common mistake newer runners make Is to think they need to feel like throwing up after every session. Isn't fun, is demoralizing, and often ends in injury.

 

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9 hours ago, Triskele said:

Holy shit, that is some serious practice time.  I'm proud of myself when I get an hour of focused practice in.

How long would you keep the forearm in ice?  

I was pretty crazy at the time, doing all kinds of muscle building drills while watching TV and whatnot.  It was a bit over the top, but I got pretty good really quickly.

Ice baths work best in short stints, 5-30s, then letting the arm warm up and do it again.  I would do that for 30 min to an hour at a time, 2-3 times a day.  Pain was gone in a week or two and I was able to play again on a regular basis after about 6 weeks.

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I exercise but would love to exercise more. I wanted to change the way my muscles looked when I had them, so I grew chunky and today is the perfect date of this jiggle being created to be a way of making my abs into a different look because I'm going to exercise differently. 

Tell me I'm not always there now because it would be true. 

 

I love just the fact that my blood pumps when I do something strenuous because like everyone knows, exercise just releases chemicals in the brain that make you happy. It works on me at least. Music is the same way. It makes you happy. Just listening to it. 

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