5 ms·

A friend asked me what gym I’m going to now days, I was delighted to inform him it’s a globally available 24/7 gym and I never have to wait for equipment. It’s

by nomilk 3y ago

A friend asked me what gym I’m going to now days, I was delighted to inform him it’s a globally available 24/7 gym and I never have to wait for equipment. It’s 2 square meters in “the park”. 120 bodyweight squats, lunges, and calf raises, 150 push ups and 200 sit ups, 3km run, and 10 minutes stretching. Challenging, requires zero thought or planning (other than wearing a warm top on cold days) and costs $0/month.

opportune 3y ago
I’m happy for you, but this is kind of phrased a little overly smugly to me. As someone who lifts weights, it sounds like “I don’t go to the grocery, I just eat potatoes and eggs from my backyard farm”. It’s certainly something you can do and get good results, but it’s also a limitation. If you want to build muscle or strength past a certain point it will be very inefficient not to use free weights. Maybe you don’t want to do that, and that’s ok. But it’s kind of weird to be smug about it
- kibwen 3y ago
  Smugness aside, it's still good advice because calisthenics is all that the average person needs to maintain a healthy level of personal fitness. For people to think that they need to have access to specialized equipment (and pay handsomely for the privilege) creates an artificial barrier that turns people off from exercising entirely and prevents them from meeting their basic fitness needs. For those out there, if you don't have time or inclination to go to the gym, I guarantee you will feel better in your skin if you go from doing zero physical activity to doing any at all, even a little bit. A few minutes of stretching when you wake up in the morning followed by single-digit numbers of squats, pushups, and situps is a great start.
- nomilk 3y ago
  It's more relief than smugness. Gyms always seemed to let me down: onerous contracts, complex or buggy booking platforms/procedures, unhygienic, stuffy, rigid class start times and open hours. Gaining self-sufficiency made me incredibly happy/relieved. The final straw was when I wanted to pause the membership the gym required "supporting documentation" (i.e. flight or hotel itinerary). I cringed so hard. When I cancelled they charged 2 weeks because that's just normal. Stripe and apple subscriptions let you finish your currently billing period when you cancel, but certainly don't charge you for the next 2 billing periods. I found it so backward. Charging people for what they're clearly not using is kinda sleazy IMO (I know the article sheds light on why gyms do that - that's how they make most their money!) Also, at least half of the utility of exercise for me is mental (as opposed to physical). So clicking on poorly made apps and dealing with contracts was the opposite effect I was hoping to experience, meanwhile breathing fresh air in nature while working out is very mentally relaxing and pleasant. Tl;dr I got bitten a bunch of times by super lame or unnecessarily onerous gym processes, hence why becoming self sufficient made me so happy.
  - Dr_Birdbrain 3y ago
    I also discovered outdoor calisthenics over the pandemic. Massive upgrade in every way :)
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
  - namaria 3y ago
    > onerous contracts, complex or buggy booking platforms/procedures, unhygienic, stuffy, rigid class start times and open hours. Damn. You pretty much just described civilization right there.
  - prodent 3y ago
    > rigid class start times This one doesn't count. Can't have a class without a fixed start time.
    - nomilk 3y ago
      Consider comparing to gyms that only offer classes. The gym might offer 10-20 time slots per day. Whereas self sufficiency enables infinitely many start times. Very useful under certain circumstances. Examples: finish work very late (when no classes are scheduled), intend to train but shortly before class recognise a need for more of a warm up (I've heard this happens with experienced gym goers, not just newbie folks like myself). With a class you can't always turn up late and you almost certainly can't delay its start time. But with self sufficient training, you can start late if your body requires more warming up; it can start any time you want it to.
  - creer 3y ago
    No need to go half way: It IS sleazy. The gym utility should be mental: encouraging you to go. But it's the incentive again: the gym owner feels they must squeeze money from any patron they get - and that includes not encouraging them to come. Making the gym more like home and a welcoming place means fewer memberships can be sold. Bad incentives all around. And so for me the answer has been to work out at home. Finding a routine that requires little equipment and doing THAT right.
- Erratic6576 3y ago
  Yeah. I am looking forward to going back to the gym but I don’t stop reminding my parents that there’s nothing like iron because it’s hard to find anything as heavy and compact. It’s not the gym what I miss, but the iron barbell
doix 3y ago
Have you been doing this for a long time consistently? Have you noticed your shoulders rolling forward? You do a lot of chest work but 0 back work. I'm not big into bodyweight stuff, but I did manage to cause myself problems in my early lifting days when I used to half-ass rows and take bench super seriously.
- nomilk 3y ago
  About 5 times per week for 6 months. The exact workout is from 19m28s - 37:22 in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0WOTplwNlw&t=19m28s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0WOTplwNlw&t=19m28s (I do the whole thing twice, then 3km run then stretch) Imbalance is something that worries me. I figure it's better to do a workout that's imbalanced than to come up with a theoretically perfect workout that requires a gym that I hate going to or, worse, doing no structured exercise (which is what I did for periods in the past). If you have suggestions to better balance the workout, I'd love to hear them and will integrate changes immediately.
  - opportune 3y ago
    Pulling movements in general are pretty hard to do with just calisthenics. Anywhere in that big park, is there a nice sturdy pole or post? If so, you can get an elastic band set, usually very inexpensive and portable, and use that to do rows (and face pulls, if you want). I would also try to incorporate pull-ups (some parks have pull up bars, or you can install one at home) to work your lats. This might be tricky if you’re not at the point where you can do a body weight pull-up yet. If that’s the case, you can probably figure out how to do a lat pull down with elastic bands and the right kind of rigid surface. You can use your feet to stabilize the bands to do curls (biceps, some forearms) and shrugs (traps) to round out most “pulling” movements. Also you can isolate your triceps and side delts with bands. And do “harder” ab exercises than just sit-ups. They’re very versatile, like a much less expensive cable system.
    - nomilk 3y ago
      Superb feedback. I'll incorporate pull ups as of today on every day except where the bar is taken, as that would negate one of the joys of this particular workout: that it can be done absolutely any time without planning/thinking/waiting. Will research bands and band exercises (on youtube?) and almost certainly buy some and incorporate a few. Very much like the idea of some sort of 'row' as well as shrugs for traps. Forearms seems to already get smashed during pushups (especially the 'fingers out' and 'narrow grip' push ups [1]). Will check out banded ab exercises too. Thanks for the advice. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0WOTplwNlw&t=28m44s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0WOTplwNlw&t=28m44s
rambambram 3y ago
Just like me. Everything about a gym is opposite to what I want. It really is a road block. I have a small home gym, playing my own music, I can make the annoying sounds that I like while lifting, I can get a balanced fullbody workout, it saves a lot of money and also time. When I walk out of my door, there are literally three gyms within a 200 meter radius, but I prefer working out in my home gym.
valec 3y ago
These are nowhere near a replacement for weights or machines. I notice you didn't even mention doing pull-ups, the only body-weight exercise with enough resistance for you to actually build muscle from. Can you point me to a bodyweight exercise that can sub in for 450lb deadlifts for sets of 6? How about for 250lbs bench for sets of 6? While you can build good general health and endurance i n 2 square meters in "the park," you by nature of the exercises are putting a (very) low ceiling on potential muscle mass, which is very important not just for looks but also for general metabolic health (muscles act as a glucose sink, blunting the effects of blood-sugar spikes) as well as preventing frailty/immobility in old age.
- criddell 3y ago
  450 lb deadlifts and 250 lb bench press seems like a lot though. Surely general metabolic health and long health span doesn’t require that kind of weight, does it? I’m thinking with a lot of weight on the bar, there’s probably some point where the chance of injury outweighs the potential long term benefits.
  - Detrytus 3y ago
    Well, it certainly depends on a person. If someone is a big guy he might need that much weight to even break a sweat, exercising with 120 lbs bar would do nothing for them.
  - valec 3y ago
    It's decent but nothing crazy. I think most men could achieve it within 4-6 years. Generally, you can build muscle until age 40 without TRT at which point sarcopenia sets in and you lose on average 10% of muscle mass per decade. Thus it's better to have a reserve. When you look at causes of death for old people, there is case after case of falling -> broken hip -> catch something and die in the hospital. Having a good base of muscle makes this significantly less likely. WRT to injuries: in terms of physical activity, lifting has some of the lowest injury rates, leaps and bounds lower than something like basketball or sprinting. While they are possible, joints adapt to loads over time and having a strong back + spine makes it a lot less likely to pull something in daily life. With intelligent load management (sleeping + eating well, not putting in more volume than you can recover from, listening to your body) injuries are extremely infrequent and generally minor---I have not had a serious injury in the 5 or so years I have been lifting. I think lifting is too-often overlooked in health discussions, and, given how important avoiding metabolic conditions and immobility is for general health and happiness, I would argue it's just as important as cardio as a physical activity.
jl2718 3y ago
Pull-ups. All the pull-up bars have been removed from public spaces. They all used to have long rows of them from the 50s and 60s, some with iron gymnastics rings, sit-up anchors, parallel bars, etc.

by nomilk 3y ago

opportune 3y ago

I’m happy for you, but this is kind of phrased a little overly smugly to me. As someone who lifts weights, it sounds like “I don’t go to the grocery, I just eat potatoes and eggs from my backyard farm”. It’s certainly something you can do and get good results, but it’s also a limitation. If you want to build muscle or strength past a certain point it will be very inefficient not to use free weights. Maybe you don’t want to do that, and that’s ok. But it’s kind of weird to be smug about it

kibwen 3y ago
Smugness aside, it's still good advice because calisthenics is all that the average person needs to maintain a healthy level of personal fitness. For people to think that they need to have access to specialized equipment (and pay handsomely for the privilege) creates an artificial barrier that turns people off from exercising entirely and prevents them from meeting their basic fitness needs. For those out there, if you don't have time or inclination to go to the gym, I guarantee you will feel better in your skin if you go from doing zero physical activity to doing any at all, even a little bit. A few minutes of stretching when you wake up in the morning followed by single-digit numbers of squats, pushups, and situps is a great start.
nomilk 3y ago
It's more relief than smugness. Gyms always seemed to let me down: onerous contracts, complex or buggy booking platforms/procedures, unhygienic, stuffy, rigid class start times and open hours. Gaining self-sufficiency made me incredibly happy/relieved. The final straw was when I wanted to pause the membership the gym required "supporting documentation" (i.e. flight or hotel itinerary). I cringed so hard. When I cancelled they charged 2 weeks because that's just normal. Stripe and apple subscriptions let you finish your currently billing period when you cancel, but certainly don't charge you for the next 2 billing periods. I found it so backward. Charging people for what they're clearly not using is kinda sleazy IMO (I know the article sheds light on why gyms do that - that's how they make most their money!) Also, at least half of the utility of exercise for me is mental (as opposed to physical). So clicking on poorly made apps and dealing with contracts was the opposite effect I was hoping to experience, meanwhile breathing fresh air in nature while working out is very mentally relaxing and pleasant. Tl;dr I got bitten a bunch of times by super lame or unnecessarily onerous gym processes, hence why becoming self sufficient made me so happy.
- Dr_Birdbrain 3y ago
  I also discovered outdoor calisthenics over the pandemic. Massive upgrade in every way :)
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
- namaria 3y ago
  > onerous contracts, complex or buggy booking platforms/procedures, unhygienic, stuffy, rigid class start times and open hours. Damn. You pretty much just described civilization right there.
- prodent 3y ago
  > rigid class start times This one doesn't count. Can't have a class without a fixed start time.
  - nomilk 3y ago
    Consider comparing to gyms that only offer classes. The gym might offer 10-20 time slots per day. Whereas self sufficiency enables infinitely many start times. Very useful under certain circumstances. Examples: finish work very late (when no classes are scheduled), intend to train but shortly before class recognise a need for more of a warm up (I've heard this happens with experienced gym goers, not just newbie folks like myself). With a class you can't always turn up late and you almost certainly can't delay its start time. But with self sufficient training, you can start late if your body requires more warming up; it can start any time you want it to.
- creer 3y ago
  No need to go half way: It IS sleazy. The gym utility should be mental: encouraging you to go. But it's the incentive again: the gym owner feels they must squeeze money from any patron they get - and that includes not encouraging them to come. Making the gym more like home and a welcoming place means fewer memberships can be sold. Bad incentives all around. And so for me the answer has been to work out at home. Finding a routine that requires little equipment and doing THAT right.
Erratic6576 3y ago
Yeah. I am looking forward to going back to the gym but I don’t stop reminding my parents that there’s nothing like iron because it’s hard to find anything as heavy and compact. It’s not the gym what I miss, but the iron barbell

doix 3y ago

Have you been doing this for a long time consistently? Have you noticed your shoulders rolling forward? You do a lot of chest work but 0 back work. I'm not big into bodyweight stuff, but I did manage to cause myself problems in my early lifting days when I used to half-ass rows and take bench super seriously.

nomilk 3y ago
About 5 times per week for 6 months. The exact workout is from 19m28s - 37:22 in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0WOTplwNlw&t=19m28s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0WOTplwNlw&t=19m28s (I do the whole thing twice, then 3km run then stretch) Imbalance is something that worries me. I figure it's better to do a workout that's imbalanced than to come up with a theoretically perfect workout that requires a gym that I hate going to or, worse, doing no structured exercise (which is what I did for periods in the past). If you have suggestions to better balance the workout, I'd love to hear them and will integrate changes immediately.
- opportune 3y ago
  Pulling movements in general are pretty hard to do with just calisthenics. Anywhere in that big park, is there a nice sturdy pole or post? If so, you can get an elastic band set, usually very inexpensive and portable, and use that to do rows (and face pulls, if you want). I would also try to incorporate pull-ups (some parks have pull up bars, or you can install one at home) to work your lats. This might be tricky if you’re not at the point where you can do a body weight pull-up yet. If that’s the case, you can probably figure out how to do a lat pull down with elastic bands and the right kind of rigid surface. You can use your feet to stabilize the bands to do curls (biceps, some forearms) and shrugs (traps) to round out most “pulling” movements. Also you can isolate your triceps and side delts with bands. And do “harder” ab exercises than just sit-ups. They’re very versatile, like a much less expensive cable system.
  - nomilk 3y ago
    Superb feedback. I'll incorporate pull ups as of today on every day except where the bar is taken, as that would negate one of the joys of this particular workout: that it can be done absolutely any time without planning/thinking/waiting. Will research bands and band exercises (on youtube?) and almost certainly buy some and incorporate a few. Very much like the idea of some sort of 'row' as well as shrugs for traps. Forearms seems to already get smashed during pushups (especially the 'fingers out' and 'narrow grip' push ups [1]). Will check out banded ab exercises too. Thanks for the advice. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0WOTplwNlw&t=28m44s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0WOTplwNlw&t=28m44s

rambambram 3y ago

Just like me. Everything about a gym is opposite to what I want. It really is a road block. I have a small home gym, playing my own music, I can make the annoying sounds that I like while lifting, I can get a balanced fullbody workout, it saves a lot of money and also time. When I walk out of my door, there are literally three gyms within a 200 meter radius, but I prefer working out in my home gym.

valec 3y ago

These are nowhere near a replacement for weights or machines. I notice you didn't even mention doing pull-ups, the only body-weight exercise with enough resistance for you to actually build muscle from. Can you point me to a bodyweight exercise that can sub in for 450lb deadlifts for sets of 6? How about for 250lbs bench for sets of 6? While you can build good general health and endurance i n 2 square meters in "the park," you by nature of the exercises are putting a (very) low ceiling on potential muscle mass, which is very important not just for looks but also for general metabolic health (muscles act as a glucose sink, blunting the effects of blood-sugar spikes) as well as preventing frailty/immobility in old age.

criddell 3y ago
450 lb deadlifts and 250 lb bench press seems like a lot though. Surely general metabolic health and long health span doesn’t require that kind of weight, does it? I’m thinking with a lot of weight on the bar, there’s probably some point where the chance of injury outweighs the potential long term benefits.
- Detrytus 3y ago
  Well, it certainly depends on a person. If someone is a big guy he might need that much weight to even break a sweat, exercising with 120 lbs bar would do nothing for them.
- valec 3y ago
  It's decent but nothing crazy. I think most men could achieve it within 4-6 years. Generally, you can build muscle until age 40 without TRT at which point sarcopenia sets in and you lose on average 10% of muscle mass per decade. Thus it's better to have a reserve. When you look at causes of death for old people, there is case after case of falling -> broken hip -> catch something and die in the hospital. Having a good base of muscle makes this significantly less likely. WRT to injuries: in terms of physical activity, lifting has some of the lowest injury rates, leaps and bounds lower than something like basketball or sprinting. While they are possible, joints adapt to loads over time and having a strong back + spine makes it a lot less likely to pull something in daily life. With intelligent load management (sleeping + eating well, not putting in more volume than you can recover from, listening to your body) injuries are extremely infrequent and generally minor---I have not had a serious injury in the 5 or so years I have been lifting. I think lifting is too-often overlooked in health discussions, and, given how important avoiding metabolic conditions and immobility is for general health and happiness, I would argue it's just as important as cardio as a physical activity.

jl2718 3y ago

Pull-ups. All the pull-up bars have been removed from public spaces. They all used to have long rows of them from the 50s and 60s, some with iron gymnastics rings, sit-up anchors, parallel bars, etc.