I'm Glad You're Sore!

I was standing in a checkout line (Christmas Shopping) at a local sports and fitness store this weekend. A lady behind me goes, "GPP!" 

How do you not turn around for that? 

I didn't recognize her (Shout out to my new friend from Ogden. I'm sorry I forgot your name. I'm lame.). It turns out we have never met. She follows us from off-site. Her SIL got her into us. It was fun to talk with her while waiting in line.

Our friendly chat continued into the parking lot where it took a nasty turn. While we were walking out of the doors, I noticed she was, sort of - gimping along.

"You busted up?" I asked.

"HELL yes, I'm busted! We did like 500 burpees this week! I can hardly move!" With that she gave me a rather aggressive push (it was REALLY a pulled punch) to the chest. I was shocked & confused - for a moment. Her language was thick with sarcasm, but there was a flash of REAL hostility in her eyes. Like, real enough that I quickly turned a hip to her for fear she was going to follow-up that chest thump with a nut shot. I'm positive it crossed her mind (Yours too?). 

Chuckling about the encounter on the way home, I started to slip into trainer mode. Why didn't I call her on that crap? Not the shove. That was funny. Why didn't I call her on allowing herself to become THAT sore? I should have told her, "You should NEVER allow yourself to become that sore." I should have said, "There is no fitness in beingSTUPID sore." Instead, I think I said something like (Read this next part in your best "derp" voice), "Oh, hahaha. Yep, sometimes these workouts can get you ..." 

As I drove along, I imagined it would have been so keen of me to take that moment and teach her about the rudiments and fundamentals of scaling. But I didn't. Why didn't I? I kept asking myself that. Then it occurred to me.    

Reminded me of the title. Hehe.

I'm glad she was so sore. 

"But Neil!" (a whiny voice from somewhere inside my head) "It's not safe."

I dunno. Anyone who has ever become successful at improving their health through exercise will tell you that "Gimping" is part of this process. It is a pipe dream to imagine otherwise. 

For the record: I don't advocate rookies throwing caution to the wind and just going for it. That would be stupid. Optimal Health requires more thought than that. It takes more hardening (mental & physical) than that. It takes more experience than that. Otherwise one can quickly go from "gimping" to permanently damaged. 

The most important part of working out is knowing: life's journey will take us each to terrible places we aren't comfortable being. These places are nasty, ROUGH and unyielding.  Having the health to withstand the pitfalls and challenges we have ahead of us will bless our lives, and the lives of those we love - beyond measure. On the flip-side we know: life's journey will also grant us extraordinarily wonderful benefits. Not having the health to fully reap these benefits will prevent us from blessing our lives and the lives of those we love - beyond measure. 

Forging our true capacity for avoiding pitfalls and reaping benefits isn't much different from forging the finest steel tools. To create the finest tool you must plunge raw steel (full of impurities) deep into the refiner's fire only to pull it back out and hammer it relentlessly. This must occur over and over again until every impurity is hammered out. It is a long process. Sometimes the fire is too hot. Sometimes the hammer bungs up the steel. But, even if we screw it up a little - it's cool. Just shove it back in the fire and go at it again.   

I'm sorry new friend from Ogden, but I'm glad you were sore. Not that I like seeing you in pain (much). More because I know being sore is part of the refining process. Please try to be careful, but just as importantly, keep heating it up and hammering it out.  

Chalky Hands

Chalky hands are the trademark of a GPP pullup day. 

Hours after a GPP pullup day, you'll see chalky hand prints everywhere.  You see them on the floor (especially if combined with pushups).  You'll see them on cars in the parking lot.  We once even heard of someone making a new friend while in a grocery store after noticing some chalky LuLu's. Yep, it was a peep. 

Chalk can be VERY helpful. We use chalk a lot at GPP. 

But, most of you aren't using enough. 

Chalking your hands has the effect of making the implement, or bar you are using less slippery.  This helps you stay connected to the implement (KB, DB, BB, Pullup bar) you are using.  It also helps prevent fatigue.  But the extra grippiness (word?) usually comes at a cost. 

Hand rips.

We've posted thoughts on preventing rips in your hands before.  Please refer to THIS article and/or THIS video.  But, there is a simpler way. 

Use an ABUNDANCE of chalk. (see pic below)

The mistake most of us make is using just enough chalk to make our hands extra grippy.  By using just a LITTLE bit of chalk your hands will be MORE grippy than you need.  Having hands which are more grippy than you need is (we promise) the LAST thing you want.  If you've ever ripped a callous or torn your hands, you know it's not something you want to soon repeat.  

What you really need is a caking layer of chalk.  Caking your hands with chalk will give your hands the grip you need for hanging onto stuff.  Plus it will allow for the little bit of slippage you need to prevent rips and tears. 

I Use Supps

by Neil Anderson

One of the worst things about having a conversation with me (phone, email, text, eyeball 2 eyeball) is, oftentimes the contents of those conversations end up here - on the site. 

If this has ever happened to you and you've taken offense, please forgive me. I totally GET that my one-sided presentation of our conversation is not fair. Not remotely. And if it seems like I've belittled your POV by being sarcastic or overly simplistic in my review of our conversation - it's NOT my intention. 

Truth is, our conversation fascinated and intrigued me. To the point that I sat down for, what takes me, hours and hours to peck out some thoughts on it. Sometimes I'll stew on a subject for days/weeks/months and yes, even years before writing some thoughts on our chat. Though my comments may seem terse, they are usually only theatrically so. I've come to learn that pinning emotions to a point helps the medicine go down (now you'll be singing that all day - HA!).

Please understand I hold you in the highest regard. So do the folks who read about our conversation. We all know this one-sided POV reeks of chicanery. But, sometimes the points we discuss are helpful to someone when painted in a new light, albeit sarcastic and simplistic. I've even heard (not super often) articles here have helped folks to change their lives. That's not because of me. It's all of us. Thank you for contributing.

Now let's get down to biz.

Over the last couple of days there has been some fascinating and intriguing discussion on nutritional supplementation. Some of the fascinating and intriguing points:

Supplements are cheating! They can be dangerous! They don't work! They are total waste of money and a lie! 

You make a good point. They really are cheating. Then again, so is deadlifting, right? If you are being honest, deadlifting is just a supplement for picking heavy stuff up off the ground. For that matter, so is cardio. I mean, 200 yrs ago you trudged your life-hardened backside everywhere it needed to go. Technically, everything you and I currently know about exercise is "cheating." To do it right, we'd need to be putting in 18 hours of running, jumping, walking, lifting, and ect. daily. That's the only natural way to do it. The only way of not "cheating."

Is there a difference?

It's totally different. These chemicals can be dangerous, even deadly.

What's NOT dangerous, even deadly? Think about it. 600,000 people in just the USA died of heart disease last year. That's 1 out of every 4 people who died perished from a condition mainly realated to poor lifestyle choices. How many died of thermogenic pills again? Of protein powders? Of multi-vitamins?

Besides, why would you use a truly dangerous supplement? How would that help you? Isn't the goal here to become Optimally Healthy? How can you imagine that taking steroids, or meth, or something similar could be healthy? Are these really our issues? Are people are taking steroids to become Optimally Healthy??? Common sense dictates that this is impossible. These obviously aren't the substances we are talking about here.  

I'm not saying that some supplements aren't dangerous - for some people. But you are painting with pretty broad strokes when you suggest NO ONE should use what might distress another. (Not talking about substances which are proven to hurt most people. I'm on board with not using them.)

Along the same vein, under contemptuous scrutiny, you could make a case against performing KB swings. It is no doubt that a mis-used KB swing can be injurious. So could a box jump ... so could squat ... so could a run ... so could a pullup ... so could a ... I could go on, no? 

It comes down to risk v. reward. If the potential reward far outweighs the risk, you should partake. NOTHING is more risky than sitting on your backside day after day, stuffing your pie hole with Twinkies. Yes, a misused KB could potentially (likely temporarily) mess up your life. But is more likely to add to it in innumerably positive ways. So, we confidently assume this risk while being smart and actively mitigating our exposure to it. The same as we would do with any supplements we choose to employ.    

Fine, but supplements don't work!

Are you claiming that supplements never helped anyone ever? I guess I have a hard time seeing the difference between that claim and the claims of hucksters.

Maybe you are saying that only certain supplements work? Cool, but you forgot the two most important words in that sentence - FOR YOU. 

To say supplements don't help (broad strokes or narrow) is to say those who've taken them and claim success are either lazy (couldn't do it on their own), an imbecile (too dumb to know the difference) and/or a liar (completely underhanded). Sorry, I have too much faith in humankind to believe this.  

Still, supplements are a total waste of money and a lie!

Those who have used them to restore their health might disagree with that statement. In fact, they are likely to do so emphatically. Just as emphatically as you. 

What is your health worth? If a friend of yours found health through supplementing with a placebo (sugar pill) would you condemn them for it? If they become healthy, is the money they spent wasted?

But long term effects and all that ... 

I don't disagree. The long term effects are unknown. This fact is unsettling. However, not as unsettling as the long term effects of NOT BECOMING HEALTHY. On this, we have the facts. The outlook is indisputably bleak. 

But shouldn't we try to do it naturally? 

I'm a pureist. I simply LOVE the thought of hardening up and doing it the old fashioned way (proper nutrition and exercise). In the old days I used to be more strict in my approach. Back then, I viewed the use of supplementation as weak, feeble and inadequate. I judged folks who were using sups as those who were looking for the "easy" way. I thought,

"Someone looking for the easy way will always find it - on the couch!" 

I've come to realize, that this mentality (mine about sups and the people who use them) was more deeply rooted in dogma than in practicality.

Here is the thing - it doesn't matter what supports (aids, crutches) you use to speed you along the path to obtaining Optimal Health. We all get there the same way. Anyone who as attained Optimal Health did it by painstakingly learning and employing the fundamentals of proper nutrition and exercise. There are no short cuts. That you might use a supplement to help you (and supplements CAN help you) won't negate the mandatory faithful daily execution of these healthy principles. 

I still firmly believe there is no substitute for proper nutrition and faithfully executed multi-functional exercise. In a perfect world we'd all use only that. But, in my opinion, the only thing that would make a world more "perfect" would be the obliteration of every iteration of that word.

Take sups if you need them. For some of you, they'll work wonders.