This demonstration of 44 bodybuilding exercises is beyond belief, if you are like me and have never seen or heard of some of them. Unfortunately they are not do-able if you are a mere mortal. I suspect gymnasts could do some of these, but not many ordinary humans. There is one of them I might take a crack at. I will let you know if I break or tear any body parts…I did it, and I am sore all day…
Paul Ryan works out often
It’s 1:30 am, after the Vice-Presidential debate, and I have been procrastinating doing today’s exercises. So in reading the post-debate analyses, I bumped into this story about Paul Ryan’s interest in fitness and working out. Once I post this, I will do some of my own exercises…
When TIME named Paul Ryan a runner-up in the 2011 Person of the Year issue, many were familiar with his proposed budget, but few knew that the Wisconsin Congressman stayed fit with the now best-selling P90X workout plan.
Ryan says he keeps his body fat between 6 and 8 percent. At six-foot-two, the congressman says he weighs about 163 pounds and tries to get his heart rate to 165 during cardio. He says he wears a heart pulse monitor while working out. “I’m kind of a skinny guy,” he told Politico. Ryan held down three jobs right after graduating from Miami University in Ohio in 1992, one of which was as a personal trainer. Ryan’s father died of a heart attack when Ryan was sixteen, one reason, for Ryan’s dedication to fitness.
Tony Horton, the stand-up comedian turned P90X creator, says the rigorous workout has been boosted from both sides of the aisle. “I think Paul Ryan’s been very good for P90X, as much or more so as Michelle Obama,” he says. “I’ve worked with the First Lady and her Let’s Move campaign. Some of the Secret Service came up to me and said, ‘Hey man, we’re really loving the P90X.’ I’m well aware that they’re using it in the White House.”
According to Horton, you don’t need a lot of equipment to get fit. Ryan likes to use weights, but they aren’t a necessity. “You need the human body, Mother Earth and Sir Isaac Newton’s law of gravity,” Horton says.
TIME asked Horton to suggest a get-fit regimen that could be implemented alongside the presidential campaign but still leave time for careful consideration of the issues. He recommended an upper-body exercise, a cardiovascular interval exercise, a core exercise and a leg exercise.
Confusing the electorate is unwise, but according to Horton, confusing the muscles is a plus. This involves changing the routine often so muscles don’t get accustomed to any one exercise. To get the full benefit of this regimen, you’ve got to make like the party and diversify. “Do a different push-up every time,” suggests Horton. “Add kenpo karate or jumping jacks or whatever on that second move. On the crunches, modify your position to engage the abs or core directly. You can do squats with your feet wide, your feet narrow. It’s a workout that might also give you a bounce. As few as two rounds of that will release norepinephrine, dopamine and serotonin.”
Perfect for when the poll numbers aren’t going your way.
After 14 months of avoiding the place, I finally made it to the gym. It was a minimal workout, just 30 minutes, but it really felt great to be pumping up. But knowing I was going to be near the gym after a friend’s afternoon lecture, I thought the gym visit would be easy.
In fact it was absolutely necessary. At the lecture, I saw an acquaintance who told me his wife had died just three months after learning she had cancer. They had been together almost 30 years, had both recently retired and were planning “a decade or two of travel and relaxation.” I was so stunned I could barely stand up. I became a bit dizzy and thought I was going to fall down, that my legs wouldn’t support me.
So I raced to the gym to burn off my fear, anger, tension, adrenalin, whatever. It was a welcome relief from a horribly upsetting encounter. I feel so bad for this man who is struggling with his new and unexpected circumstances. And for his deceased wife, who had almost no time to prepare. I didn’t ask any questions about lifestyles and health habits. It just reminded me yet again how fragile and unpredictable our health and living is. It’s a constant gift that needs to be appreciated, treasured and cared for…
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?
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.”
Two days ago, I played my best tennis ever, and my team won both sets over very tough competitors…the same duo who had beaten us two out of three sets last time. I know that watching top players on TV at the Australian Open helped a lot. But more importantly was being taught the proper way to hit a squash backhand at a clinic I went to on the 8th of this month. I applied the same principles to tennis, and it worked beautifully. My net game was sensational, my serving improved, and I was able to lob well over and over. Funny but most of the time I play as the weakest player, my stronger partners always choose the forehand side of the court. This leaves me having to be the backhand guy, and it is my poorest stroke…as it is for most of the people in my club. Tuesday it was working great. Thanks to squash lessons.
And just for the record, I have now done some exercise at home 75 days in a row. This is in addition to all the tennis, squash, skiing, etc. I am proud of this major achievement in my life, because I am a guy who can’t do anything regularly. I have been undisciplined about exercise my entire life…except for these last 10+ weeks. I also set a new record for push ups: 177. Of course this is just 45 non-stop and then 20 sets of 6-8 with no more than 10 breaths in between each set. At least I am doing something, rather than months of nothing.
More typical is that I joined a gym again and haven’t gone at all in the three months or so since I paid. Fortunately they have a plan that only charges me for each time I go. I bought eight visits. Let’s see how many I use up in a year.
Also happy to report that another friend told me today he looks on this site for inspiration to keep himself exercising and living healthfully by reading the stories of others. Do you have a story to add? Let me hear about it…
There is something intriguing about seeing muscle development of this magnitude. I know there are numerous magazines and videos that display these outsized examples of human anatomy, but I don’t look at them. So this video I bumped into is very confronting. How many hours did it take Bobby to reach this level of musculature. And now he has to maintain it as long as he can. What discipline. What obsessiveness and devotion.