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Startup Fitness: An Entrepreneur's Guide to Working Out

derekflanzraich.com

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Re: Startup Fitness: An Entrepreneur's Guide to Working Out

#51

Post by derekflanzraich »

thomas11 wrote: post #7

This article essentially says "practice any sport, whenever and wherever, just keep at it". While that's not wrong, it's not very useful. For me personally, scooby1962's videos on Youtube were really helpful. Great advice on building muscle without doing crazy stuff, not requiring a gym and almost no equipment.

For general, practical, and relatable health & fitness tips, I'm obviously partial to http://www.greatist.com.

For the record, though, scooby's pretty sweet & his videos are for sure an interesting, if kinda goofy, resource.

Re: Startup Fitness: An Entrepreneur's Guide to Working Out

#52

Post by rluhar »

amalag wrote: post #42

I suggest buying Vibram shoes and start running gently. My minor back pain went away and it feels great. Gotta ease in the calves and lower legs though.

I second that. I had problems with shin splints and sore knees running which seemed to go away once I switched to VFFs (Bikilas). You must take it slow and really focus on your running form to avoid hurting yourself though. Also, in my experience, running in VFFs will not result in you going any faster (probably a little slower), but definitely more comfortable.

Re: Startup Fitness: An Entrepreneur's Guide to Working Out

#53

Post by Sukotto »

I got a lot of value out of the Couch to 5k jogging program. Just downloaded the Robert Ullrey weekly podcast [1]. Then it was just a matter of putting on my running shoes every other morning and following his coaching.

It helped to follow two rules:

1) As soon as the alarm went off I was committed to get up right away, pee, step into my shoes, step outside, and close the door behind me. Once outside, if I really didn't want to continue, I could opt out and go back inside.

2) The following morning I do it no matter what. No more than 1 skip between sessions.

It worked really well for me and I recommend others try it. No fancy equipment, no custom apps. Just my music player, running shoes, and a piece of paper with the 27 (9 weeks x 3 sessions/week)workouts for me to tick off as I did them

I really wanted to try ShovelGlove [2] but have too many kids running around for me to feel safe.

-

[1] Looks like his blog is gone, but you can download his podcast files here: http://c25k.com/podcasts.htm

[2] http://www.shovelglove.com/

Re: Startup Fitness: An Entrepreneur's Guide to Working Out

#54

Post by phil »

Attention Bay Area people!

If you are in SF: some of the best running terrain in the west is just over the Golden Gate bridge. Hop on your bike, ride to the Marin headlands, and go for a walk. If you're already pretty fit, go for a run. The trail network is amazing and you can go as far as you want.

If you are on the Peninsula: you're next to some of the best road biking on the west coast. You can make tons of loops up to Skyline Rd and they are all awesome. For starters try starting down in Palo Alto and riding over Arastradero to Alpine Road, work up to climbing Old La Honda.

Why go to a gym?

Re: Startup Fitness: An Entrepreneur's Guide to Working Out

#55

Post by damncabbage »

programminggeek wrote: post #30

Being overweight and having lost 35 lbs this year with plenty to go(I'm still overweight), I would say that you are more likely to work out and be active if you lose weight. That doesn't require much if any exercise, just an intelligent diet. I'm not anti-exercise and I've worked out a lot in the past, but I've found that being skinnier makes being active easier and more fun. Moving sucks if you're carrying an extra…

As a guy who went 110kg to 80kg, I can attest to it being easier and more fun when you don't have the equivalent of an extra sandbag wrapped around your torso. One particular thing that happened was that it just became so easy to break into a run to get somewhere it little bit quicker.

(Five years later I'm back up to 95ish, but I'm on the way down again. Remembering what it was like is a good motivator.)

Re: Startup Fitness: An Entrepreneur's Guide to Working Out

#56

Post by AndrewMoffat »

programminggeek wrote: post #30

Being overweight and having lost 35 lbs this year with plenty to go(I'm still overweight), I would say that you are more likely to work out and be active if you lose weight. That doesn't require much if any exercise, just an intelligent diet. I'm not anti-exercise and I've worked out a lot in the past, but I've found that being skinnier makes being active easier and more fun. Moving sucks if you're carrying an extra…

> Moving sucks if you're carrying an extra 50-100 lbs. around. Most skinny people don't really get this.

I was always a skinny guy most of my life. 4 months ago, I was 5'11", 140lbs, really lean. I recently got serious about weight training and bulking up, lots of high calorie/carbs/fats/proteins, and I'm now up to 177lbs. I'm not exactly fat, but that extra weight is killer. All of my movements are slower, walking up stairs gets me out of breath. I never really understood how much extra weight affects people until now.

Re: Startup Fitness: An Entrepreneur's Guide to Working Out

#57

Post by georgieporgie »

Me: generally fit, bicycled from Canada to Mexico last fall, climbed for years, weight trained off and on for more years, did a lot of yoga from 2005 - 2008. Right now, I go to a gym every other day, (almost) no matter what.

I'm currently focusing on muscle. I've reduced my workout to simply doing squats, bench presses, and pull-ups. I've gained 20 pounds in six months. This is way better than any previous cycle, when I had much more intricate, varied workouts.

Here's the thing, though: the absolute fittest and most prepared for anything I've ever felt was when I was doing yoga 3 - 5 times per week.

Yoga? Yeah, yoga. The first month is absolute hell. After that, it got better. Over a few years I bumped up more and more until I was going five times per week. I was more prepared for random climbing, hiking, and cycling adventures from that than when focusing on any of my other activities. Of course, a lot of it had to do with finding teachers who consistently taught difficult classes.

Additionally, if you're stressed, the whole yoga 'mindfulness' thing really works. I'm not spiritual at all, but it really had a terrific calming effect on me, and was invaluable when I was having a stressful week at work.

Re: Startup Fitness: An Entrepreneur's Guide to Working Out

#58

Post by arnorhs »

I don't think I could go to a gym and exercise just for the sake of exercising and I'm guessing a lot of internally-motivated startup guys/gals are the same way, so I encourage you to pick up some sort of exercise that is also FUN.

I wake up at 5:00 am on Tuesdays and Fridays and go bouldering at Planet Granite (In Belmont, I'm currently located in Palo Alto (well, for a short time anyways))

For rock climbing/bouldering you need a fair bit of effort and it is also a very enjoyable exercise (it's kind of like playing).

This also fits nicely into the rest of my schedule.

Highly recommended

Re: Startup Fitness: An Entrepreneur's Guide to Working Out

#59

Post by jessedhillon »

j_s wrote: post #29
jessedhillon wrote: post #6

I've been using the BodyMedia FIT ( http://www.bodymedia.com/ ) to get detailed stats about my fitness level -- calories burned, level of physical activity, sleep quality and duration. As a data geek, it's made all the difference in my motivation to stay fit: I feel a level of control and certainty about my fitness decisions, now that they are informed by data.

Scott Hanselman referenced http://www.fitbit.com/ (hardware for $99 instead of $150 to $250) and http://www.loseit.com/ (tracking software currently free in beta instead of $13/mo) in a recent blog post about continuous improvement measurement. http://www.hanselman.com/blog/ProductivityAndContinuousImpro...

That's cool, but the BodyMedia is in actual contact with your body. The determinations it makes about calories burned factor in body temperature and galvanic response. AFAIK, the FitBit is a wireless pedometer.

True, you do have to spend ~$7/mo for the subscription, unless you hack it with Python (there is a module for interfacing with it over USB.)

Re: Startup Fitness: An Entrepreneur's Guide to Working Out

#60

Post by dnlk »

ulisesroche wrote: post #43
dnlk wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

just in case somebody is searching for it on youtu.be, it is scooby1961. i discovered scooby through a friend of mine a long time ago and his tips really helped getting me started with weight lifting. i have lost all my back problems since then. just remember, as long as an exercise feels good, it is unlikely to hurt you. i had to learn this the hard way, i pushed too hard on an exercise, ignored the pain and was lef…

Another good source of information is Ross Emanait @ rosstraining.com. His plan is geared more toward boxing and other combat sports, which I just always found more fun. E.g. throwing a heavy sand bag around as if you were getting ready to fight a bear, and so on.

Thanks for the reminder, I totally forgot I have his book Infinite Intensity lying around, been wanting to look into that for quite some time now.
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