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A Lazy Guy's Guide to Fitness
I started doing strength training a few years ago, and I'm proud to say that I've stuck with it. In fact, I generally exercise 5 days a week for about an hour each day. (Not to brag. Well, maybe a little.) The paradox is that I'm a pretty lazy person. I thought I would share how I approach fitness in case it's helpful or motivating for anyone else.
Build Instead of Burn
Part of the spark for starting in the first place was coming to the realization that, although strength training is great for you at any point in life, building muscle becomes more difficult in your 50's and beyond. In fact, as we advance into our senior years, we tend to lose muscle and strength and thereby trade vigor for frailty. Since muscle is much easier to maintain than to build in the first place, I figured I better get at it so that I would have a good foundation when the decline starts. And then there's the fact that I do not enjoy aerobic exercise. So if I was going to exercise at all, strength training was the way to go. Besides, I would rather build muscle than just burn calories. (I do recognize that I should incorporate some cardio. There will be time for that after I'm done building. Also, there are ways to do strength training that really get your heart going, such as minimizing rest between exercises.)
By the way, ladies, strength training is for you too. If you are worried about looking too bulky, trust me: There is a long way between there and where you are now. Significant muscle takes a long time to build, and you can dial back at any point.
Consistency is King
The most important thing to highlight up front is that the biggest key to fitness is establishing consistency. Bursts of activity are nice, but consistency is where the results are. Make consistency your first priority, and the rest will follow.
Tips for Lazy Exercising
1. I workout at home, which means that although I don't have access to all of the equipment that I would like, I actually use what I have and I save the time and hassle of having to go someplace else and wait for someone else to finish with equipment I want to use. I also don't have to worry about what other people think about what I'm doing.
2. I workout in the evening after I get home from work because 1) I hate getting out of bed any earlier than I have to, and 2) exercising in the morning makes me feel tired the rest of the day. I much prefer exercising and then going to bed than the other way around. I know some people prefer the opposite. The key is to do whatever works for you.
3. Since I'm doing strength training rather than cardio, I don't tend to get that sweaty. That means I don't have to take an extra shower.
4. Although I don't get that sweaty, I do change into exercise clothes. Changing clothes doesn't take that much willpower, and once I'm in them it's basically a done deal that I will exercise.
5. I didn't just jump into exercising for an hour 5 days a week. I started with a more modest goal of 15-20 minutes at least three times a week. You can do a lot in that little amount of time, especially when you are just starting out. My mantra was that some is better than none. However, as exercise became part of my weekly routine, my goals began to change and expand. Now I don't approach exercise from a time perspective (unless I'm under a time constraint). Rather, I approach it in terms of which muscle groups I want to work and on which days to acheive the number of sets I want to do in a week. I generally take Saturdays and Sundays off in order to help facilitate recovery (rest is important too!), but sometimes I will sneak in some physical therapy-type exercises.
6. I go for fatigue rather than burn. That's simplifying a little bit, but some people seem to think that strength training is about enduring burning muscles, perhaps because that's what following an exercise video usually makes you do. And since burning muscles are unpleasant, those people naturally grow to dislike lifting weights. There's a place for that kind of thing if endurance is what you after, but building muscle is about moving them under tension. You want to tire them out relatively quickly. I generally try to choose a weight such that I can't do another rep with good form somewhere between 8 and 20 reps. Rest and repeat for as many sets as fits my goal. There's a balance to be struck: Heavier weight and fewer reps is harder on the joints and tendons. Or you can go higher than 20 reps with lighter weight, which is easier on the joints and tendons, but then you are more likely to be in the burn zone and give up before the muscle has actually been fatigued enough to stimulate growth. Striking the right balance will vary by muscle group. On a side note, while you do need to push yourself into some discomfort, you don't have to destroy yourself. A few good quality sets is sufficient.
7. Compound movements give you the best bang for your buck. I do isolation movements as well, but there are a lot of muscles in the human body. It's more efficient if you focus on good compound exercises first, and then fill in with isolation exercises as desired.
8. Don't spend more time on your core than you need to. The biggest determinate of whether you have visible abs is how much fat you are carrying, and working your abs won't get rid of it. So unless weakness in your abdominal muscles is limiting your daily movements, ability to engage in other exercises, or some other goal, you probably don't need to spend much time and energy exercising your core. This may seem counterintuitive, since fitness influencers and exercise videos are always doing planks and crunches and such. A lot of this is fitness theater. If you want to have visible abs you'll need to focus on losing fat, which is best addressed by what you eat. Spend your precious workout time and energy on more productive exercises.
9. Don't follow a video. This is more of an issue of efficiency and efficacy than laziness, but I don't follow a workout video. They can be motivating and helpful for learning exercises, but a video does not adjust to your goals. You are under no obligation to do what a person on a video is doing for the amount of time they are doing it. If you are trying to build muscle, then your muscles are done when they are done, not when you reach an arbitrary timepoint dictated by the video. If you like following along with a video and find that it helps to push you, then that's great. Just make sure that your weight and rep range is appropriate for your goal (see #6 above). I would suggest that a better method is to watch videos to get ideas and instruction on proper form, and then go do the workout on your own.
Diet
I will be the first to admit that I benefit from good genetics with respect to metabolism and body size. However, good genetics can only get you so far, and as you become invested in your fitness you eventually have to pay some attention to what you are eating, if for no other reason than to make sure that you are getting enough protein to build muscle. After all, what's the point of doing all the work if your body doesn't have enough energy or protein to build the muscle you want? Thus far I have been too lazy to get very scientific about my diet, but I have some practices and rules of thumb that help.
9. I eat basically the same breakfast every day, and the same lunch every weekday. This is mostly a matter of laziness because I don't want to have to think about what to pack for my lunch each day. A side benefit is that my calories and nutrition for 2 meals a day are pretty much locked in, so then it's just a question of what dinner and snacks are adding to my diet. If I ever do decide to track my diet more closely, I'll have a head start.
10. I don't drink soda on a regular basis. I am not anti-soda by any means, and when I go to a work dinner or something I may suck down several glasses of my favorite soft drink. It's just that I don't want soda baked into my daily life because, over the course of a year, it adds up to a lot of calories. The same principle applies to other high-calorie/low-nutrition foods. I eat them, but I'm cautious about engineering them into my daily life.
11. In line with the points above, I don't count calories. However, I do try to pay at least a little attention to how many calories are in the packaged foods I eat. Years ago my wife and I split a frozen pizza. Afterwards, I looked at the box and was shocked to see that I had just consumed about 1000 calories. There's nothing wrong with that, per se, but eating completely blind day after day is like going shopping and never looking at the prices. You may be able to manage your weight (by which I actually mean fat percentage; see below) without counting calories, but it's still a good idea to have a sense of what you are eating. Incidentally, the holidays can be a great time to do a bulk (i.e. eating excess calories to fuel muscle building). Or at least that's my excuse.
12. Rotiserie chicken from Costco is awesome. My wife does the family cooking, but there are still plenty of evenings where I have to make my own dinner. Rotiserie chicken is a great solution for my protein needs. They are cheap and ready for eating. You can clean the meat off of them (even better if, like me, your spouse does it) and freeze it in a re-sealable bag. Then when you need protein, just break off a hunk and re-heat it. You can eat it plain, in a taco, or whatever.
13. Weight isn't everything. Worrying specifically about how much you weigh can be counter-productive because your weight can mask positive changes. For example, if you are gaining muscle and losing fat, your weight may stay about the same--or even increase--but this is a good thing! On the other hand, if your weight is dropping and you are working hard but aren't getting stronger, it may be a sign that you aren't eating enough to build muscle. So it's best to interpret your weight within the context of what else is going on in your life, and whether you are getting stronger. I do keep tabs on my weight, but I don't obsess over it. The point is to detect trends so that I can autoregulate. For example, last summer I returned from a long vacation with an approximately 7 pound gain. I knew that gain didn't come from building muscle! So it was a signal that I needed to be a little more conservative in what I ate for a while.
14. I don't use any dietary supplements. For one thing, aside from protein supplements, they are almost all a complete waste of money. The only non-protein supplement I have considered is creatine. The problem is that you have to use it everyday to keep your body charged with it, so to speak. I'm too lazy (and cheap) for that. Also, it pulls water into muscles making them look bigger. That sounds great until you stop using it for whatever reason. I think it would be deflating (pun intended) to see the pay-off in the mirror partially evaporate simply because I stopped taking creatine. I reserve the right to change my mind on creatine, and may eventually use it to fight muscle loss, but for now I don't bother with it.
So that's how this lazy guy does fitness. I hope you find it useful.
