What are you reading now?
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@aqua-letifer said in What are you reading now?:
The best exercise you can do is whatever you're actually going to want to do on a habitual basis.
To a point. I redd a pretty convincing argument that emphasizes the importance of balance. That the tendency is to put more energy into muscles that hurt less and give more productive results, with the result that the weaker muscles get shorter and shorter shrift.
Success is measured by your discipline and inner peace. – Mike Ditka
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@catseye3 said in What are you reading now?:
@aqua-letifer said in What are you reading now?:
The best exercise you can do is whatever you're actually going to want to do on a habitual basis.
To a point.
No, always. My point was pragmatic, not scientific.
There's a ton of great information out there about ideal exercises for those of certain ages, body types, and physical strengths and constraints. The advice you just posted was good, for example. But for every one thousand people who read that kind of article, agree with it, and share it with friends, one out of that thousand actually puts that information into habitual practice.
I don't care how good the advice is or what you think your discipline level is, if you don't like doing the activity, then you will very quickly burn out.
Go out, have fun with being active, and if you ever get to a point where that becomes habitual, then maybe start caring about what the advice columns say. Optimize your fitness activities after you actually have some as part of your daily routine.
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@aqua-letifer said in What are you reading now?:
No, always. My point was pragmatic, not scientific.
I agree that it's the best point to make.
For some reason the easiest sort of exercise for me to stick to is walking up hills. (I could stick with walking on flat surfaces too, but that is truly a waste of time.) It hurts, but not like running or cycling. I used to live on top of a big hill and did it every day for years. My weight stayed at a good spot for those years. Then I moved 20 miles away and without the hill, I stopped exercising, and gained many pounds. I've recently started driving back to the hill every day.
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@aqua-letifer said in What are you reading now?:
I don't care how good the advice is or what you think your discipline level is, if you don't like doing the activity, then you will very quickly burn out.
Can't argue with that!
Optimize your fitness activities after you actually have some as part of your daily routine.
We probably more or less agree. I said 'to a point' because it is feasible that you could decide to go all out for a certain sport that puts uneven emphasis on one set of muscles over others -- baseball pitcher or archery, for instance -- and as one set of muscles grows stronger, you call on them to do more and more work and the lesser emphasized muscles atrophy. It may transpire that optimizing your activities may come too late, or require twice the work to redress the balance that you'd need otherwise.
Better to keep a weather eye on the whole system from the get-go.
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I have never exercised as much as an adult as I have since I rediscovered cycling, and the only reason is because I enjoy it.
Archery was great fun, but I looked at the physique of the people who were good at it at the club, and I figured it probably wasn't much good at keeping people fit and healthy.
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I just thought of an example. I'm drawing this out of left field and could be totally wrong, but maybe it will make sense to you (Aqua) or Phibes.
When you ride a bike, isn't one style of riding to work the legs, but pretty much lean on the handlebars? Would this not eventually result in a weakened core?
Just blue skying here.
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I don't know much about all that stuff, but cycling does exercise your core. Your legs aren't working in isolation, although most of the work is being done by them. You feel it elsewhere.
If what you're referring to is leaning on the handlebars when you stand up and peddle, then no, that really exercises everything. It's bloody hard work doing it for any length of time.
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The best full body cycling workout is when you "plank":
Link to videoDoing it downhill is one thing, but the best plankers do it uphill.
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You wouldn't want to hit a big pothole doing that
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@catseye3 said in What are you reading now?:
I just thought of an example. I'm drawing this out of left field and could be totally wrong, but maybe it will make sense to you (Aqua) or Phibes.
When you ride a bike, isn't one style of riding to work the legs, but pretty much lean on the handlebars? Would this not eventually result in a weakened core?
Just blue skying here.
Cycling isn't far and away the best core workout, but yes, it does work your core.
It's not like on a stationary bike, and you don't turn with your hands or arms. Not really, anyway.
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@horace said in What are you reading now?:
@aqua-letifer said in What are you reading now?:
No, always. My point was pragmatic, not scientific.
I agree that it's the best point to make.
For some reason the easiest sort of exercise for me to stick to is walking up hills. (I could stick with walking on flat surfaces too, but that is truly a waste of time.) It hurts, but not like running or cycling. I used to live on top of a big hill and did it every day for years. My weight stayed at a good spot for those years. Then I moved 20 miles away and without the hill, I stopped exercising, and gained many pounds. I've recently started driving back to the hill every day.
I love climbing. Absolutely love it. I also suck at it but I don't give a shit.
Climbing on a singlespeed is really fun. It really tests your balance in addition to being hard as hell. It's also taken me a very long time to actually enjoy it while hiking, but now I do. When you listen to your body and find the right pace that you can maintain, you can scramble up whole mountains in half a day, which I find incredibly cool.
EDIT
Just for goofs, I once made a fixie that I called an Up Bike: the gear ratio was thoroughly stupid but built for climbing up steep hills. But, it was a fixie, so when you're coasting at, say, 6 to 8 mph, the pedals are spinning far too fast for your legs to keep up, so I put BMX pegs on the front and rear wheels to give your feet some place to be.Going downhill on that thing, constantly putting pressure on your arms to hold you up—now that was a serious upper body workout. The first time I tried it my arms were shaking by the time I got down the hill.
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@horace said in What are you reading now?:
For some reason the easiest sort of exercise for me to stick to is walking up hills. (I could stick with walking on flat surfaces too, but that is truly a waste of time.) It hurts, but not like running or cycling.
That is a great workout. When I've been injured, walking on an incline on a treadmill is unbelievably good for cardio - and limits risk of injury.
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"OK, I've been tasked to join 6 other people on a ship to a backwater planet which might be invaded. One of them might be a spy.
But, before we arrive, each of us should tell us about his backstory."
A nice take on the Canturbury Tales.
Only about 10% into it, but it's engaging and fun.
"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... " - Mik, 6/14/08
The saying, "Lite is just one damn thing after another," is a gross understatement. The damn things overlap.
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@horace said in What are you reading now?:
For some reason the easiest sort of exercise for me to stick to is walking up hills. (I could stick with walking on flat surfaces too, but that is truly a waste of time.)
Interesting that you say this - I just finished the book "How Upright Walking Made Us Human" and it noted in there that we are such efficient walkers that we do not burn much in calories doing it, but somehow there are multiple other benefits that are not so well understood.
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@george-k said in What are you reading now?:
"OK, I've been tasked to join 6 other people on a ship to a backwater planet which might be invaded. One of them might be a spy.
But, before we arrive, each of us should tell us about his backstory."
A nice take on the Canturbury Tales.
Only about 10% into it, but it's engaging and fun.
That's one of my favorite books. Didn't care for the sequels though.
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@horace said in What are you reading now?:
@george-k said in What are you reading now?:
That's one of my favorite books. Didn't care for the sequels though.
Thanks for the feedback!
Is this one of those "trilogy" books that doesn't finish the story? It really pisses me off when I "finish" a book, only to realize that I need to read another thousand pages to finish the story.
As I said, I've enjoyed the first bite of this book. Hopefully it'll end on a note in which I feel satisfied, but not driven to get the next one.
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@jon-nyc said in What are you reading now?:
Re-reading it, first read it maybe 25 years ago. Exceptional book, holds your attention for all 1250 pages.
Shirer was an American journalist assigned to Europe, lived in Paris and Berlin and Vienna. He became one of Edward R Morrow's guys.
So many casual first person references, not as the story itself, just as side notes. Two examples:
He was in Vienna during the Anschluss.
I had emerged from the subway at the Karlsplatz to find myself engulfed in a shouting, hysterical Nazi mob which was sweeping toward the Inner City. These contorted faces I had seen before, at the Nuremberg party rallies. They were yelling, “Sieg Heil! Sieg Heil! Heil Hitler! Heil Hitler! Hang Schuschnigg!
He was at Munich in September of 38, and describes Chamberlain and Hitler as their meeting ended:
The ice, however, had been broken, and as the meeting broke up at 1:30 A.M. the two men seemed, despite all that had happened, to be closer together personally than at any time since they had first met. I myself, from a vantage point twenty-five feet away in the porter’s booth, where I had set up a temporary broadcasting studio, watched them say their farewells near the door of the hotel. I was struck by their cordiality to each other. Schmidt took down the words which I could not hear: ...
And on and on. It's really gripping. You don't really notice the length, any more than you do in a series that's several seasons long. I mean, other than it takes a couple months to finish. lol
I just finished finished it today. 1711 pages. Though I did put it down for about a month right before September 1st, 1939.
Fantastic book. Definitely the kind you re-read every 10-15 years.
DON’T let them eat cake.
- RFK Jr
