Fitness 2016

[Brazen]

Tyr, knee problem are often brought on by weak gluteal (bum) muscles. Get some bodyweight squats, deadlifts, static lunges (with your back foot on a bench if you can) and core work into your routine to help stabilise your hips and back chain.

More NHS-approved exercises here:
http://www.nhs.uk/Livewell/c25k/Pages/knee-exercises.aspx

[Brezel]

Weightlifting for over a year now with purpose of gaining mass and strength. I gained 5-6 kilograms pretty fast (I'm at 65 kgs now) but the progress has somewhat halted lately.  Doing squats, bench press, overhead press, barbell rows and deadlifts, loosely based on stronglifts program. My local gym only has one power rack that often is occupied which limits the possibility to follow a strict regime.

Current bests:

Squat 5x5x95kg (in december, have taken a step back since then)
Bench 5x5x65kg (or almost there)
Deadlift 1x120kg (only tried 1 rep max once, lack of grip strength makes it impossible to lift more)

[Liep]

Spent the last hour assembling my new bike. It's so beautiful.

[mongers]

Spent the last hour assembling my new bike. It's so beautiful.

Post a photo, languish needs more bike porn. 

[Josquius]

Tyr, knee problem are often brought on by weak gluteal (bum) muscles. Get some bodyweight squats, deadlifts, static lunges (with your back foot on a bench if you can) and core work into your routine to help stabilise your hips and back chain.

More NHS-approved exercises here:
http://www.nhs.uk/Livewell/c25k/Pages/knee-exercises.aspx

I'll give the arse muscle ones a go.
Quite shocking on them how much more I can do with my left leg than my right.

[Legbiter]

Weightlifting for over a year now with purpose of gaining mass and strength. I gained 5-6 kilograms pretty fast (I'm at 65 kgs now) but the progress has somewhat halted lately.  Doing squats, bench press, overhead press, barbell rows and deadlifts, loosely based on stronglifts program. My local gym only has one power rack that often is occupied which limits the possibility to follow a strict regime.

Current bests:

Squat 5x5x95kg (in december, have taken a step back since then)
Bench 5x5x65kg (or almost there)
Deadlift 1x120kg (only tried 1 rep max once, lack of grip strength makes it impossible to lift more)

Looks good and a year of solid lifting is just enough to get you your first taste of glory. 3 years of lifting is even better so stick with your new habit.

[Legbiter]

Tyr, knee problem are often brought on by weak gluteal (bum) muscles. Get some bodyweight squats, deadlifts, static lunges (with your back foot on a bench if you can) and core work into your routine to help stabilise your hips and back chain.

More NHS-approved exercises here:
http://www.nhs.uk/Livewell/c25k/Pages/knee-exercises.aspx

I'll give the arse muscle ones a go.
Quite shocking on them how much more I can do with my left leg than my right.

Brazen's right, many of these nagging aches and pains in modern people are office injuries caused by lack of physical exertion. The body dumps lean muscle mass if it's not using it. Watching the New Years Resolutionists at my gym is an object lesson in what decades of inactivity does to the body.

[Liep]

Spent the last hour assembling my new bike. It's so beautiful.

Post a photo, languish needs more bike porn. 

Took it out for the first ride today. Very windy so it was hard work, but the bike handled admirably with smooth and stable steering.

[Brezel]

Looks good and a year of solid lifting is just enough to get you your first taste of glory. 3 years of lifting is even better so stick with your new habit.

Thanks.  Yeah I'm definitely going to keep on lifting, deadlifts and squats are just too much fun to not to.

[alfred russel]

Maybe Zanza can give a few tips here (if he is reading)...

At the climbing gym I go to, they have a bunch of routes on the ceiling (you climb up the walls, and when you get to the top, you keep going on the ceiling). I've been trying the ceiling routes, and I suck so bad. I just lack any kind of strength to do it. I can get the first ceiling clip from the wall, and I can't make it to the next clip even with breaking, and even if I could, I don't think I have the strength to make a clip with just one hand.

Any tips on how to get more strength for this?

I think if I could climb on the ceiling I would look really bad ass.

[alfred russel]

The first part of 2016 goals is to continue to decline in 2015 to set a low starting baseline, setting the stage for significant 2016 improvements.

More seriously, I'm climbing Rainier in June, so I need to get fit for that. I'm thinking of Elbrus in August, but I don't have a partner for that, few prospects of finding one (I'd go with a guide, not solo), and the situation there leaves me a bit hesitant. Successfully completing those climbs are the main goals.

Other goals--
-Improve climbing to be able to do 5.11.
-Get back to a sub 50 minute 10k (last one run was 51 minutes, shouldn't be hard)
-Stretch goal: sub 1:50 half marathon.
-bench my body weight
-20 pull ups? I'm so far off right now--I can just do 7. 20 has been a goal for a long time, but getting all the way to 20 is probably not realistic. at least a dozen by the end of the year would make me happy.
-get under 22:00 in a 5k (there is a net downhill 5k near me, really fast track--I did it in 22:00 last time I ran, my best 5k time, I'd like to beat that.

As an update, I just ran the 5k I was targeting - waiting for my official time but I think it was ~22:15. So I failed. I got to mile 2 and realized I could do it if I ran the last 1.1 miles at about a 6:50 / mile clip--which is really fast for me but doable--so I figured I'd pull together all my strength and gut out a massive push to do it! And then right after upping the pace and mentally girding myself for the agony to come, there was a big uphill section that took all the fight out of me, and I failed.

[celedhring]

Tyr, knee problem are often brought on by weak gluteal (bum) muscles. Get some bodyweight squats, deadlifts, static lunges (with your back foot on a bench if you can) and core work into your routine to help stabilise your hips and back chain.

More NHS-approved exercises here:
http://www.nhs.uk/Livewell/c25k/Pages/knee-exercises.aspx

I'll give the arse muscle ones a go.
Quite shocking on them how much more I can do with my left leg than my right.

Brazen's right, many of these nagging aches and pains in modern people are office injuries caused by lack of physical exertion. The body dumps lean muscle mass if it's not using it. Watching the New Years Resolutionists at my gym is an object lesson in what decades of inactivity does to the body.

I can testify to that, Since I started going to the gym regularly one year ago, the amount of little pains and aches in my body has dropped significantly. I haven't had back issues in a while, for example.

My knees are still problematic, but that's because I had Osgood-Schlatters disease when I was a teen, so there's no getting rid of those.

[Scipio]

My fucking gym closed. Now i have to go back to the well-equipped, shittily-monitored student gym at the university that I work at.

FUCK FUCKING FUCKS.

[alfred russel]

My fucking gym closed. Now i have to go back to the well-equipped, shittily-monitored student gym at the university that I work at.

FUCK FUCKING FUCKS.

So no non college gym in Hattiesburg can stay in business? Way to break down stereotypes, Mississippi.

There should be cute girls at the college gym though.

[Scipio]

Actually, there are lots of gyms. Just not in my part of town. And the college gym is free.

Still logging the weekly mid-distance bike trip, though. This week was a bit of a slacker, only 27.3 miles.