Been gone too long, need help rebooting

[Milo]

Hey, guys.

 

Two years ago, I worked really hard to lose weight and get in shape. Nerd Fitness, the community, the challenges, and the articles were a huge part of my short-term success.

 

And a year and a half ago, I quit working. Since then, I've been very stressed, have gone through major life changes, been very sedentary, and been feeding well.

 

 

I'm starting again. But it's been so long, I hardly remember how things work. And I'm not even sure how to contact the people I was working with, if they're even still here. Further challenges: I have no accountability buddy online or in the real world, I have less time for research than I used to, and my new (apartment) gym doesn't have have a power cage (where I did literally all of my lifting two years ago), meaning I can't follow the routine I spent so long researching two years ago.

 

That and two days in, I already feel like giving up on dieting, and I haven't made it to the gym yet.

 

 

What I'm looking for here:

 

- General encouragement

- An accountability buddy

- Perhaps a group to join

- A few pointers to help me set up a challenge again (lots of guides, I remember it being complicated, and it looks like some rules have changed)

- Perhaps even a welcome to the Denver area

 

Thanks,

Milo

 

P.S. It will be amusing to see if my signature is still around. It will have major updating to do, I'm sure, when I can find the time to do it.

[Ryuu1011]

First. Welcome back! Next, take a deep breath, its all going to be ok, you're home now  Finally, DON'T GIVE UP!!!  

 

To me it sounds like you could do with some time in the Assassin's guild (ok i'm a little biased) but they have lots of workouts and people doing all kinds of body weight style training so that should be able to help with the equipment problem. As for the challenges just jump right in, this is the first week of the new challenge so now is a great time to throw up some easy goals and get started. They even have a bunch of "how to do your first challenge" in the 4 weeks challenge tab. But for the most part its the same (except they are 4 weeks long now instead of 6) Pick 4 goals 3 fitness/ health related 1 level up your life. Start small and snowball so you don't get overwhelmed, small consistent steps will lead to great permeant gains in the long run. Hope that helps feel free to ask me any questions, happy to help

 

P.S. If you're in Denver and looking for a gym and are even remotely interested in Gymnastic Strength Training, check out Awaken  it is amazing and I was able to take a few classes there when I went to Denver for a business trip. Seriously Epic Gym. 

[Milo]

Ryuu, you're my hero. Thanks so much for replying.

 

You're right, I'm seeing challenges are now 4 weeks instead of 6. But the major part I'm confused about is that previously, we leveled up manually using our own math, posting everything in our signatures. Now, I see that there is a built-in leveling up system, except we start from zero. I thought maybe we do the same stuff, use goals for each challenge, but the pre-existing goals are not related at all, but one-time achievements for each class. And then the "sample" of Steve isn't related to either of those at all, but about traveling here, and speaking there, and gaining x00,000 followers, etc. Those seem like life-goals.

 

Do we still keep track of our levels from challenges manually? For our signatures? Is the new built-in leveling up portion separate?

 

 

As far as gyms go:

 

Awaken looks really nice, but does cost money. And I doubt I'm in good enough shape so far to do those kind of exercises.

 

My new apartment has a gym. It has A couple treadmills, a couple stationary bikes, a couple elliptical machines. For weights, there are dumbbells, a bench press, and two multi-function cable machines. I'm sure it's possible to build a routine out of those for a warrior, but I'm disappointed since I previously did my entire routine in a power cage: the StrongLifts 5x5 program. And my new gym doesn't have a power cage. StrongLifts focused on low repetition of heavy weights using just three compound lifts per day. When I did a lot of research two years ago, I liked the science, I liked the simplicity and speed of workouts, and I liked the app that spoon-fed me through my workouts.

 

Do you have any suggestions? A recommendation for a plan or a favorite workout app?

 

 

Concerning diet, I did a lot of reading yesterday. I now have a plan for what to do with my calories and macros. I've been dieting heavily all week, but yesterday was the first day following a plan. I'm going to keep that up.

[Ryuu1011]

OK, I totally understand where you are coming from, but it's now a lot simpler than you're thinking. 

 

For the most part, at least on the forums anyway, they've done away with the leveling and attribute system. (primarily because it was confusing and time consuming for new people to understand) and the site your talking about the "make your character" site is kinda separate with most people I know using it to track their "Epic Quest". That said if you want to continue to use the leveling up and attribute system like we used in the past you could easily continue to do so. I know a few of the veterans still use it, and you can find all the info for it still in the Rule/ F.A.Q section  if you want to still use it. I personally stopped because although it was fun, it was time consuming and I decided to just put that energy towards my actual goals. 

 

Yeah I totally understand riding the broke bus. But if you ever get the chance they have a pretty good "starter pack" if you wanted to try it out. I wouldn't worry about your current ability level either, they were great about helping me when I went and most of the students, especially in the beginner classes, were of average starting strength. 

 

Wow that apartment gym was way nicer than what I was expecting you to say. Most just have cardio equipment lol If you're truly set on doing pure strength stuff, I don't think you'd need to deviate from the strong lifts routine at least to start. You can do almost the entire strong lifts routine with dumbbells (provided they go up high enough) and by slightly altering the exercises (goblet dumbbell squat for regular squat, dumbbell deadlift for regular deadlift  for example) and for a better answer of how to make the most of the gym equipment that you do have try posting your questions in the Warrior's Training Yard they're sure to know how to help you out. 

 

Awesome glad to hear that you've got your nutrition back on track, in their current challenge the Warriors are doing an awesome cooking mini-challenge that you might want to check out too. Hope that helps!

[Laghail]

On ‎01‎/‎12‎/‎2017 at 11:17 AM, Milo said:

My new apartment has a gym. It has A couple treadmills, a couple stationary bikes, a couple elliptical machines. For weights, there are dumbbells, a bench press, and two multi-function cable machines. I'm sure it's possible to build a routine out of those for a warrior, but I'm disappointed since I previously did my entire routine in a power cage: the StrongLifts 5x5 program. And my new gym doesn't have a power cage. StrongLifts focused on low repetition of heavy weights using just three compound lifts per day. When I did a lot of research two years ago, I liked the science, I liked the simplicity and speed of workouts, and I liked the app that spoon-fed me through my workouts.

 

Do you have any suggestions? A recommendation for a plan or a favorite workout app?

Hey and welcome back Milo. I really understand the sense of loss without a barbell or power rack. Stronglifts is how I got started and that slick little app made figuring out lifting that much less complicated. If you wanted to stay cheap, you could work a dumbbell high-rep program for a few months. But if you're like me, the linear progression and ease of use for stronglifts and powerlifting are gonna pull you back haha. The good news is any gym outside of a planet fitness should have that setup. And the apt fitness center can be a nice fallback for days when you can't manage to get out.

@StarGazer actually might be able to steer you to something in your area that's affordable (or she could tag someone who does).

[StarGazer]

WELCOME TO DENVER! (I live and work in the Denver Tech Center)

In your welcome packet (this link here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/617599061715957/) you will find that if you are interested, we have a FB group of Nerds in Colorado if you want to be able to reach out locally. I can't promise that there is anyone close to you or that there would be anyone to be a workout buddy or anything, but there are occasional meetups and there is access to good people who know the area. I wish I knew a particularly inexpensive gym to direct you to, but do let me know if you join the Facebook group. We have a non-forum nerd who recently moved here and was popping around at a lot of gyms trying to find the right home for him (he's a personal trainer) so he may have some knowledge of ins and outs of particular gyms and what the costs look like.

That said, as much as no, it would not be stronglifts spoon feeding you a program, finding a program based on dumbbells would be a solid place to be looking in my opinion. If you find something that looks good and that fits the available equipment in your gym, I really like to use the FitNotes app on my phone for my workouts. It doesn't automatically add weight like the SL app, but you can build out template workouts (I've currently got ones built with the day of the week) so on a given day you just need to load that day's template and it  autofills with the weights you used the previous session. It can also auto time rest periods so when you check off a set it starts counting down to your next and alerts you when that time is up. It has a whole bunch of exercises built in and tracks a bunch of metrics (most of which I don't use, but it's there!). Sure there are no workout plans built in, but that just means I can either build as I go in a given day or use one of my templates and adjust up the weight (or keep it the same if I was on the struggle bus the previous session).

So I would say that finding a beginner/been-away-from-fitness-for-a-while ish dumbbell program and using an app that you can build out templates to make it as simple as you can for each session would be a great place to start. I know there are other apps out there that do similar things to the one I use, I just use that one because it was recommended to me by a few nerds and I've really liked it. You can work around what you've got available to you and you can take away many of the barriers it feels like you have in front of you preventing really getting started with a little time up front. But you CAN do this. And we've all got your back.

[Milo]

Thanks so much, all three of you. I have a lot of links to follow up on.

 

I'm not a Facebook user, but I'm considering it.

 

I'll try to find a dumbbell routine, and I'll try out the apps you guys mentioned. Will post back.

[Mr.Six]

Hey Milo, have you checked out Darebee?  I've got two kids under two and don't have the extra cash or time for a gym membership, but have loved the free workouts on Darebee.  You can also filter for dumbbell specific workouts which might help you leverage the gym at your apartment...

 

 

[Thrima]

Welcome back! I recently started over and just wanted to let you know that it gets easier with every day. Just don't give up, do even small things, but do them every day. You can always make a goal of building solid workout plan and develop it slowly, while working out with simplier one. Good luck fellow Rebel!