abs for salad dressing ad
Here is a salad dressing ad that is using beefcake, rather than cheesecake, to sell product. Pretty low end way for me to show a guys abs being exploited. The article says that a women’s group finds it offensive, but other readers are happy to see men being treated as sex objects to sell goods the same way women’s bodies have been used for generations. What do you think?
Jun 4
Abercrombie and Fitch models
Here is a picture created by retailer Abercrombie & Fitch to sell clothes. I noticed the abs, before I paid attention to the jackets. Shows you where my values lie. But much more interesting is the whole A&F “scandal.” The company targets thin, beautiful customers who want to be cool. Some activist groups insist that the company should manufacture and sell clothes to all shapes and looks of people and have criticized the company’s strategy as being discriminatory. The CEO made some dumb statements reinforcing his position, and an internet debate is off and running. Seems to me the company can sell to any slice of the market they prefer. You can’t ask Ferrari to make cars for middle-income people. But the world loves controversy.
You can read more about it here .
May 22
Kate Hudson
Angela Simmons
The slide show of over 120 female celebrities on the beach promised great bodies, bikinis and ABS! But only two of the women had any definition at all. Maybe movie stars and singers just don’t work on their stomach muscles. Or it’s genetically too difficult to create any cuts. Someday I should look for professional female athletes to see what their abs look like as a group.
Mindless, but interesting. A nice change of pace from contracts and other responsibilities…
Mar 9
Shemar at the beach
Shemar at Canne
Shemar Franklin Moore is an American actor and former fashion model. His most notable roles are that of Malcolm Winters on The Young and the Restless from 1994 to 2005, Derek Morgan on CBS’s Criminal Minds from 2005 to present, and as the third permanent host of Soul Train from 1999 to 2003.
I never heard of him, but his abs caught my eye. Abs are teaching me a great deal about pop culture. Time to do a few crunches!
Feb 20
Check out the abs on this 60-year-old who is called CrazyDrummer
For all those who justify not going to the gym by saying it is impossible to get in shape after 50:
Apparently, it’s not.
This picture was posted on Reddit last night by CrazyDrummer, with a simple caption: “60 years old.”
The picture has already received 1,596 comments, 744,298 views and the admiration of some commenters in the Reddit community.
“That’s not fair. He has dad and grandpa strength,” said ISwearThisIsOriginal.
“Santa only works 1 day out of the year. The other 364? He lifts,” commented BOMPendragon 228.
While we can’t tell if this ripped bod came from lifting or Photoshop, this is not the first time the Internet has been amazed by incredibly fit post-50 bodies. In August many were in awe over world’s oldest female body builder Ernestine Shepherd, and in October we met then vegan bodybuilder Jim Morris, both in their 70s.
Dec 18
Flexing in 45 degrees in Kyoto, Japan—12/7/12
Back in town after two weeks in Kyoto, Japan. Too busy sightseeing and visiting my son to write here as well, but I did some exercise every single day…even when I was traveling 20+ hours to/from the continents. Now 402 continuous days of some exercise in addition to tennis or five miles of walking around Kyoto. Loved the hotel gym.
The Fushimi Inari Shinto Shrine shown above is made up of over 10,000 vermillion “gates” called torii that are set so close to each other they form 2 1/2 miles of tunnels. They are donated by businesses hoping for wealth and good luck. I couldn’t resist posing in this colorful backdrop in spite of the cool, damp weather. The locals just assumed I was a typical crazy American stripping to the waist in low 40′s temperatures.
It’s been awhile since I showed some abs. I’m glad that I still have a few cut lines, though my more modest workouts are not building any muscle. Doing the daily exercises at all is a source of great pride, because I am often so tired that I procrastinate for hours, even though it only takes 5-15 minutes.
a single torii with a fox messenger in pink bib at each side
Justin's back in the gym
I love learning about pop culture, especially when I can’t relate to it. For a few years I have heard about Justin Bieber. But I had no idea how big he is: He has over 30 million followers on Twitter, and he was named by Forbes Magazine in 2012 as the third most powerful celebrity in the world. He also did a music video that has over 800 million views!!!
Anyway who cares about that on this site. He recently sent out a photo of his abs, and that is what is really important…right?
Oct 25
Another Ira's Abs
This is too cute. Iras of the world, UNITE! Especially if you love your abs. This is the fake cover of an Onion magazine that has no inside pages. And those abs wouldn’t impress anyone. I prefer Amy’s abs from yesterday. And that’s why the Onion is often so funny…
Ira Glass is the host and executive producer of a radio/TV show called This American Life. Ira started working in public radio in 1978, when he was 19, as an intern at NPR’s headquarters in DC. Over the next 17 years, he worked on nearly every NPR news show and did nearly every production job they had: tape-cutter, desk assistant, newscast writer, editor, producer, reporter, and substitute host. He spent a year in a high school for NPR, and a year in an elementary school, filing stories for All Things Considered. He moved to Chicago in 1989 and put This American Life on the air in 1995.
Oct 24
Amy Serfass looks very fit
I mentioned yesterday a young woman I met at the Tough Mudder who stood out with her red hair and teal-colored top. Amy Serfass is a fitness trainer who is certified by the National Academy of Sports Medicine and the Australian Institute of Fitness. “My specialty is women and weight loss, specifically running boot camps for women.” Visit her web site here .
I found this fabulous photo of her on facebook, where her friend Megan said, “you could prob hold those rocks up in the background with your abs.” Hopefully she will write an article describing her activities and fitness routines. Sure looks like a lot is working just fine…
actor Shemar Moore has abs
unknown lifter
Shemar Franklin Moore is an American actor and former fashion model. His most notable roles are that of Malcolm Winters on The Young and the Restless from 1994 to 2005, Derek Morgan on CBS’s Criminal Minds from 2005 to present, and as the third permanent host of Soul Train from 1999 to 2003.
Hopefully these pictures will please two readers who asked for more abs pictures. The one on the left was sent in by my friend Chris (age 25) who was impressed by the story about the 72-year-old doctor on steroids whose body looks like he’s decades younger.
Interesting how some sets of abs line up and others don’t. I assume it’s genetics as opposed to how they exercise. Any explanations from you?
Aug 21
do you recognize him?
He’s got a pretty good set of abs and body in general…right? But there is something very unusual about him. His name is Jeff Life, and he is a 72-year-old doctor. See him working out below, something he does at least six times a week in the gym.
In an LA Times article , it says his regimen includes hard cardio, heavy weights pushed to the max, martial arts, Pilates, a strict low-glycemic carb diet and lots of supplements. It has also, for the last seven years, been hormonally enhanced by a program that includes testosterone and human growth hormone—a therapy Life views as entirely appropriate, even necessary despite the medical evidence questioning both its effectiveness and safety…
Like most people, Life didn’t give a thought to his testosterone level, his HGH or his fitness as he built his career as a family practice doctor in West Virginia and Pennsylvania. A lapsed Masters swimmer who became inactive in his mid 40s, the father of five became fat and borderline diabetic—”a typical stressed-out middle-aged doctor who ate, drank and didn’t practice what he preached. It was years and years of sloth.”
Dr. Jeff Life–2010
That changed the day Life, then 60, picked up Muscle Media magazine and read about “the Challenge,” a 12-week, before-and-after fitness contest. His competitive fires lighted, Life sent in his before photo and hit the gym.
Three months later, he’d dropped 25 pounds, cut his body fat from 28% to 10%, got genuinely ripped and was named one of the contest’s 1999 “Body for Life” 10 grand champions…
But by age 64, Life found himself shrinking.
His muscles didn’t respond to workouts like they did a few years before. Abdominal fat started piling up. He began feeling mildly depressed. And he wasn’t waking with an erection as often as he used to.
It was a condition he would soon know as andropause, the insidious creep of declining testosterone.
It was time for his second epiphany—and the photo that would change everything…
the whole Dr. Jeffrey Life
Dr. Jeff's ad for the company he works with
In June 2003, Life became a Cenegenics patient, ultimately taking daily shots of HGH along with once-a-week testosterone shots, a regimen he still maintains.
“I could feel the difference quickly. Clarity of thought, a new, sharper focus, increased sexual function, bigger muscles.” He was so impressed that he packed up, moved to Las Vegas and joined the company.
After six months of seeing clients, Life had an idea to keep them motivated: Show them his body.
“They needed to know that I walked the walk.”
That might have been the end of the story—until a year later, when a writer from GQ magazine, in to do an anti-aging story, walked by Life’s office. His eyes bugged out at the sight of the glossy 8 by 11 of the buffed, bald, jeans-wearing guy hanging on the wall.
The shot ended up in his article in the January 2006 issue of GQ….Now it’s been seen by millions. An old, bald head on the young beefcake body. The claim is that this is not digitally modified. Whats your reaction?
He lost 200 pounds in 19 months
Here is a really inspiring story about a kid who weighed 405 and finally decided to lose some weight. I always wonder what clicks to get someone to overcome their inertia—whether weight loss, healthy living, starting a new career—and choose a new routine. His father had died of a heart attack, but that didn’t prevent the son from gaining all that weight.
J. Roundtree, 21, from Lancaster, Ohio, lost 200 pounds in 19 months in order to join the Army, the Lancaster Eagle-Gazette reports. In November, he will begin basic training at Ft. Benning in Georgia, and he eventually wants to become a police officer.
So how’d he go from 405 pounds to 205? Roundtree started with P90X and then stuck to a strict 1,500 calorie-a-day diet and adopted an active lifestyle—spending his time jogging, playing basketball, swimming and using home workout DVDs. When hand and foot injuries threatened to hinder his progress, Roundtree persevered.
“There’s going to be days where you’re like, ‘Oh I don’t want to do it’, but you gotta keep doing it,” Roundtree told the station.
As a child, Roundtree played football, baseball and basketball, but eventually picked up video games as a hobby and began to gain weight due to lack of exercise. He went on to play in gaming tournaments when he was in high school.
Roundtree comes from a family of servicemen and women. His father, mother, and sister all served in the Army, according to the news outlet. But while he always had his sights set on serving himself, Roundtree found his poor health seemed to pose an insurmountable problem.
“I never would have imagined that he would do that,” Roundtree’s mother explained. “But when J. sets his mind to something, don’t tell him he can’t do it…because he’ll prove you wrong.”
And this attitude is exactly what has led him to where he is today. “I want to be better than I was today,” he said. “I wanna look the best I can. I wanna feel the best I can. I wanna run the farthest or the fastest.”
Oguchi has abs (in case you missed them)
I bumped into an article about the 30 fittest pro athletes. Of course I was focusing on their abs—some readers have actually asked me for more pictures than I am posting. So here you are.
“I had to add Oguchi into the list. After all, he’s a soccer player—fittest athletes ever. At 6’4″ 210 pounds, he’s one of the most feared men in the world’s game.
I’ve played against a lot of massive defenders. And no one has Oguchi’s strength. His shoulders and chest are so big that people confuse him with an NFL player. He can move anyone in the game with one arm, including the best strikers in the world. Guys absolutely fear him.”
Charlie Davies, FORWARD, U.S. SOCCER
Fitness Trainer Drew Manning gained weight (middle) and then lost it (right) to better understand his clients
Here are excerpts from a story about a fitness trainer who gained 70 pounds on purpose (then lost it) to better understand what his clients go through. His journey allowed him to empathize more with his clients and suggest new ways to become fit.
Always a fitness junkie, staying in shape comes naturally for Drew Manning. He’s that guy at the gym the rest of us love to hate. But his wife says he was a “judgmental” trainer who would look at someone who was overweight and say, ‘They must really be lazy.’ ”
In order to better understand the struggles his clients were facing, he had to face them himself. He gave up the gym and started consuming junk food, fast food and soda. In just six months, he went from 193 pounds with a 34-inch waist to 265 pounds with a 48-inch waist.
Manning says he didn’t realize the effects of his weight gain would be more than physical. It altered his relationships and his self-confidence. The fact that he had to do push-ups on his knees was almost humiliating.
Manning suffered through soda deprivation headaches and food cravings on his way back to fit. The journey was easier for him than for most, he’ll admit, but he’s eager now to provide tips for others to follow in his footsteps.
“The biggest thing [I learned] is that it’s not just about the physical. It’s not just about the meal plan and the workouts and those things. The key is the mental and the emotional issues. I realized those issues are real.”
Ira after 1000 non-stop crunches—4/5/2012
Today I am 71 years old and have been writing on this web site for exactly three years. Although the age number sounds ancient—and I am definitely a little scared to be this old—I am thrilled beyond anything you can imagine that I have survived at all for one more year. And I am still enjoying good health. I remain grateful for so many parts of my life, and I am constantly reminded by less fortunate friends—and strangers read about and seen in media—how really crappy life CAN be and actually IS for vast numbers of humans. Of course I have setbacks and disappointments, struggles, anxieties and fears. But they are in the past, and as much as possible, I keep on looking forward.
The Buddhists say Life is Suffering. M.Scott Peck (who lived and worked just a few miles from me) says in his book, The Road Less Traveled (10 million sold), that Life is difficult. It is filled with problems and pain. It takes discipline to deal with them. It is only because of the problems that we grow mentally and physically. Many people attempt to avoid problems and suffering instead of dealing with them.
Somehow I have been able to wend my way through and around many of my problems. It’s not clear to me how or why I achieved this. I attacked them obliquely or confronted others head on. But I credit much of the progress to chance, luck and good genes. All around me are contemporaries who have had serious illnesses, injured their limbs or were born with organs that let them down. Some of these incidents might have been prevented if they’d eaten less or exercised more or paid a bit more attention. But a few are sick, because their military service resulted in exposure to toxic chemicals. Maybe, like my father, they looked left instead of right and were hit by a car…or like a friend who looked straight ahead and broke legs, when he fell through a hole in a roof. Others went on vacations to remote places and came back with lifelong diseases. Life can be so cruel.
When I was working full-time, I almost never exercised. I just couldn’t make time for it. It’s only now that I am semi-retired, and not forced to work eight-plus hours every day, that I finally have the psychological strength and time to exercise and play sports. Many friends have been enjoying the gym and sports their whole lives. They had to do this. It was not a choice. It is who they are. And when you exert yourself like that, you will have injuries, soreness, and wear out your body. So by age 71 or younger, they are no longer able to participate.
Fortunately, my genes, my attitude, my diet and now my physical activities have brought me to this wonderful, but totally ridiculous, place, where I care about six-packs, tennis swings and low cholesterol. I want to be fully alive, and good health is the highest priority. I have been sick and confined to hospitals. Without health, you just can’t partake in many of life’s activities. If these words help guide you to a fuller, lengthier and satisfied life, I would love to hear about it. I don’t know how I became who I am. But here I am, making the most of a blessed journey.
I hope you enjoyed this day, my birth day. I just learned that April 5th is also the birthday of Colin Powell, Booker T. Washington, Thomas Hobbes Gregory Peck, Bette Davis, Spencer Tracy and Melvyn Douglas.
Novak Djokovic bares his abs after winning the Australian Open—1/29/12
Feb 9
A friend sent me a link to some unusual abs exercises, but they won’t embed. So in looking for them on youtube, I found thee two videos with simple workouts of just five minutes or so. And also two guys with nice muscles to inspire those who want muscles. Between them, the videos have been seen 4 million times. So something suggests these videos are worth watching. You don’t need to watch all of the longer one. I think I will try some of these routines tonight.
Herschel Walker does 1500 push ups a day
It’s now 42 days in a row (and 44/45) that I have done some exercise, whether bent over rows, push ups or bicycle crunches. A great achievement for me. It’s in addition to the sports I am doing. Especially on a day like today, when I played 3 3/4 hours of tennis continuously, am tired and still made myself do push ups before dinner. I am now up to 93, but this is comprised of many sets, so I did 40, then 9, then 7 then 6 sets of 6. I have to laugh, and you will too, when I tell you that the athlete pictured does quite a bit more each day: 1500. How does a human do so many??? My goal, which I have never achieved, is to equal my age in push ups without stopping. I couldn’t do it when I was 57, although I eventually reached that record number, and now I have to reach 70. This week my high was 50. A long way to go…
Here are some facts about Herschel Walker’s obsession: You can’t argue that 49-year-old Walker looks better then most men half his age. Unfortunately, it takes a very special kind of person to live Walker’s ultra-motivated, super dedicated, mega-healthy life.
Walker is a strict vegetarian and wakes up at 5:30 a.m. and does approximately 1,500 push-ups and 2,000 sit-ups, and has even used ballet training as strength training.
He is a former American college and professional football player. He played college football for the University of Georgia, was a three-time All-American, and won the 1982 Heisman Trophy. Walker began his professional football career with the New Jersey Generals of the United States Football League (USFL), before joining the Dallas Cowboys of the National Football League (NFL). In the NFL, he also played for the Minnesota Vikings, Philadelphia Eagles and New York Giants. He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1999.
Since retiring from professional football, Walker has also been known as a mixed martial artist.
Nov 13
Jonathan Lipnicki stole the show from Tom Cruise in Jerry Maguire and is now a gym rat
I love to see how people change over the years and decades, so I was amused by pictures of child actors who work out as older guys. I was familiar with just one of them as a kid—Jonathan Lipnicki from Jerry Maguire—and felt badly that he built up his muscles for a movie requiring a buff body, and then his shirtless scenes were cut from the film. But he still works out 4-5 times a week, so he is on a healthy track…
Danny Bonaduce is funny: he goes to red carpet events topless. Maybe he should next follow Lady Gaga’s lead: she just stepped out bottomless.
Aaron Carter
Danny Bonaduce was in The Partridge Family
Andy Whitfield as Spartacus
Added to the September 11th sadness was the death yesterday of actor Andy Whitfield, the former star of TV show “Spartacus: Blood and Sand,” which launched in January 2010. Portraying this muscular superhuman character was Whitfield’s big entertainment break. Two months later, a routine check-up revealed that he had non-Hodgkin lymphoma, and in 18 months he was gone. Life is a bitch sometimes.
Whitfield was from Wales but lived in Australia and was a relatively unknown actor until he was chosen for the series, a sex- and blood-soaked version of the early life of the Thracian gladiator who led a slave rebellion against the Roman ruling class from 73 to 71 B.C.
In December 2009, Andy was highlighted in a Men’s Health article (below) about how to exercise when you are busy and build up those beautiful muscles that earned him the part. Who would have imagined what was waiting for him just three months later. I hate it.
Ponder this scenario: You’ve just received a treasured job offer—a dream situation for your career, in fact—but it comes with a few unusual requirements. You have to go shirtless on the job, millions of people will watch you work that way, and oh yeah, you need to achieve and maintain 10 percent body fat or they’ll fire your ass. However, because you’re so busy doing this job, you have only 45 minutes, 3 days a week to exercise. Assuming you take the position, what would you do with that time? Go for a run? Hit the elliptical machine? Search the job boards? Hire a body double?
Andy working on his abs on set
It’s natural to assume that an actor has far more time for exercise than the average guy does. But Whitfield’s schedule probably isn’t much different from your own. After all, he has a wife and two young children and spends most days on set from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. “For Spartacus, we’ve committed 100 percent of our production time to creating great scenes,” says Whitfield. “So all the training I do is on my own time. And that’s pretty limited.” Sound familiar?
Now consider that job offer again. If you were Andy Whitfield, what kind of exercises would you do to stay lean on the job?
The list of exercises can be found here . The one he is doing in the picture above is described here :
Daniel Craig
I love the teasing headline and first sentence of this British newspaper article…which never delivers much. But the man does have abs…
We reveal how to get the enviable physiques of the stars. This week, Daniel Craig’s torso…
Daniel Craig follows a regimen of weights, running and interval training.
To maintain his legendary abs, 007 is said to work out five days a week and follows a tailored diet to aid muscle growth and repair.
Craig has worked with personal trainer Simon Waterson, who prescribes a remorseless regimen of weights, running and interval training.
Exercises include press-ups (push ups) as well as jumping and bounding to produce power.
Jul 4
Tommy Haas
Off to an ATP tennis tournament this week in Newport, RI. I hope to hit balls on that surface myself. On Saturday, I will applaud Andre Agassi, when he is inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame.
The highest ranked player in the match is John Isner (#46), who beat Nicolas Mahut (#95) at Wimbledon last year, 70-68. This was the longest pro tennis match ever. I always felt sorry for Mahut…to lose such a marathon of a match. Mahut is also in the Newport draw. I hope he does well.
Tommy has abs
Another player whose name I recognize is Tommy Haas, who in 2002 was ranked 2nd in the world. What an achievement! However he has had numerous injuries over the years and even been unable to play for long stretches, so that now at age 33, he is ranked 768. But in tennis, 33 is ancient. What is it like to have been so high in the rankings and then to fade out so low. I feel sad for him too.
In reading about his career, I bumped into some pictures of him that show he has—or had—very pronounced abs. What do you think?