thread of getting sw0le

How did that happen!!

i dunno, somehow held a wrong position while sleeping, woke up in a panic because i couldn't move my neck it hurt so bad. some sort of strain deep within my trap. i was thinking i'd go to gym today but i just want all the pain to be gone first. maybe tomorrow.

some olds spouting racist bullshit at the gym this morning. this is why i wear headphones.

i went to a sports masseuse and she gave me a talking-to about my posture; said i needed to do more "pulling" exercises to balance out my pushing exercises (i.e. squats, presses etc) otherwise the muscles in the front of my shoulders and chest will be tight and pull my shoulders forward. i think she has a point but this does mean abandoning my "do squats in every workout" mantra. i guess it's time!

i'm no masseuse but i would definitely recommend adding some chest openers to your routine. upward-facing dog, shoulder wall slides, etc. even just standing straight watching yourself in a mirror, roll your shoulders down and back, don't stick your ass out, keep your spine stacked, lower abs engaged, breathe into and expand up through your chest cavity.

one stretch that gives me immediate relief if my front shoulders are hot and sore and tight from benching is lying on my stomach with one arm folded underneath me at the collar bone, sticking straight out the other side. other arm straight forward. then switch sides.

i got advice from an iyengar yoga teacher that when a particular muscle is tight, stretching the opposing muscle will help heal / relieve it. i.e. if your hamstrings are tight, stretch your quads, with hero pose (legs folded back underneath you, spine straight) or the like.

wow. wall slides are.. hard

I do a lot of the things map recommends but my shoulder is chronically tight (under/next to my right shoulder blade) -- problem started well before I lifted but lifting doesn't do it any favors.

Anyone ever get a cortizone shot?

I had a cortisone shot in November and it was helpful -- my shoulder stopped hurting for the first time in weeks, I got something like normal mobility back, and I was able to start doing intensive shoulder rehab almost immediately.

The shot simply reduced my pain and inflammation; the subsequent rehab work is what fixed my shoulder (more or less). Prior to the shot, I was already doing quite a bit of mobility and strength work for my shoulders, so I was somewhat skeptical that a rehab program would help, but I didn't realize the sheer volume of work I needed or the number of different stretches and different exercises required. I've scaled back how many of those I'm doing now, but if my shoulder flares up again, I'll resume the full rehab routine for a while before I think about getting another shot.

I've had em in my SI joint, they work a treat but then wear off and then you can't get another one for like six more months and you feel sad.

would the reduced inflamation at least aid me in doing some kind of rehab routine? Maybe seeing a physical therapist is more the right approach.

I mean it's weird, it's not really rehab since I've p much always had it, but I'd really love to do something about it as it's bothering me more as I age. And it interferes with my deadlifts at times to the point that I'm wondering if it's dangerous for me to keep doing them (can cause me to twist slightly or lift slightly asymmetrically if tight).

Maybe, ime it has gotten me over acute exacerbations where I can't sit, walk, or lie down without pain.

how long did it last?

About a month?

My squat form/mobility started to get worse again -- I videoed myself and I was both losing form and not hitting parallel.

I tried a different trainer, recommended by a friend who trains and owns a gym.

This guy p much ran a battery of mobility tests on me and said that it's more of an issue of muscle activation than flexibility for me -- apparently I have an unusually hard time activating my glutes for someone otherwise in decent physical shape and experienced at lifting. He did all kinds of weird exercises with me that got me to really feel the connection between my foot, hamstring, glutes and core in a way I never had before. He also suggested I goblet squat for a while and lay off the bar which is fine with me, as bar squatting had not been feeling right lately.

According to this guy, stretches and muscle release will just temporarily relieve the tension in my hips and ankles but never fix it, bc the tension is really a result of compensating for muscle imbalances and of neuromuscular connection issues (i.e. failure to activate certain muscles in connection with one another).

Also think I may finally get squat shoes on his advice.

wow i would be pissed if someone said i couldn't "activate my glutes"

I mean, it seemed accurate.

That trainer knows what's up ... often people have a good range of motion in a joint but haven't acquired the ability to activate stabilizing muscles in the ways needed to support moving through that range with good form.

Mobility screening is a trip; it's not unusual for high-performing athletes to discover they can't do certain simple movements, or can only do them with a lot of instability.

If you noticed large differences in left/right symmetry on any of the exercises, those are usually the ones to concentrate on first ... anything you do to reduce big asymmetries tends to have an immediate positive effect, even on apparently unrelated movements.

harbl's disgusting savages at the gym anecdotes for the day

older guy who is always there who talks to everyone and has a hunched back like he does too much bench pressing maybe, asked a guy i've never seen before to spot him bench pressing in the smith machine. calls the guy sarge and then in the course of asking what his name was again: steve? nick? but you're hispanic, not greek right? nick is a greek name. oh, [guy's name, i forgot]. you're samoan? wow! then he fails the bench press and says well i did it earlier, i'm not lying, ask [guy at desk who spotted him earlier]

one of my favorite things is incline bench. the gym was not very crowded and i admit i was taking my time but not going to any sort of extreme, and no one was using it, so...a younger bodybuilder guy who is there a lot and is quite strong and fit, but small, came up to me and says "how much longer do you have? it's been a while." wtf, dude? i told him i had one set left. after i was done he did one set, almost dropped it on his face, then abandoned it. i must have ruined it for him. why was that necessary. i would have gladly let him do his one set while i was working if that's what he wanted. JERK.

Imo Against swole code to complain about how long someone is taking on a bench or rack unless they’re not really using it and just fucking around. Ok to ask how long or suggest working in but not to get pissy.

exactly!

it goes without saying he would not have done that to a man

xp otm

the other day there was this guy using those elbow hanging straps for leg raises and i asked him if i could work in. he looked at me uncomprehendingly. i repeated it like three times and he sort of mumbled and i just went for it since he was just standing there haha. guy looked like maybe he smoked a j before coming to the gym. after i did a set he was like "oh sorry i wasn't aware of that terminology"

on a more keeping it positive note, on thursday i went during the day and found a 45-ish woman trying to rearrange the entire dumbbell rack. i am always going NUTS over people who put their dumbbells in odd spots, which results in others putting theirs away separately. she said "i can't be the only woman who hates this!" lol. i am not a neat person but putting weights back incorrectly really grinds my gears. but by today it was all messed up again. they did get a bunch of 2.5 increment dumbbells though.

what is this
https://i.imgur.com/TYcqIM3.jpg

absolutely disgusting

seriously, how hard is it to put equipment back properly and clean it. I clean like every single filthy rowing machine when I am forced to go to a regular gym.

I use a small office gym in the basement of my workplace. Mostly people just go in there to use the treadmills. I'm the only person I've ever seen using the dumbbells and bench. However, there is a mystery participant. Sometimes I get to the gym and the bench has been left in an incline position with the seat angled up, along with two 45 lb dumbbells just laying on the floor. On days when I'm not planning use the 45 pounders I really resent having to schlep them back to the rack.

being a jerk to others is so rude esp when you can just be like "hey do you mind if i work in"??????

guys im no longer Sw0le . had some injuries early last year and just never got back to it , so hard to motivate getting started again

man that's a shame :(

I decided to stop back squatting for a while, partly on the advice of the trainer. I'm just doing kettlebell squats with my heels slightly elevated, and I'm managing to hit good depth and keep my back straight, although the problem is that even the heaviest kettlebell the gym has (35kg) is harder to hold with my hands than it is to actually squat, so it's just not the same kind of overload for strength. But the trainer thinks holding the kettlebell will train me to use my core better to stay upright. Maybe I can transition to front squatting or something.

so hard to motivate getting started again

I jacked up my piriformis muscle last summer and I couldn't do any leg work outside of physical therapy type exercises for months. Now I think I'm pretty much back to neutral on the legs, but starting up again seems so much less enticing than just continuing to focus on upper body work. I also don't want to because I'm scared I'll screw up and hurt myself again. It doesn't help that I was only doing very beginner level work when I injurd myself.

I think swoleness culture gets in its own way sometimes. You get an all or nothing mentality and that leads, inevitably, to quitting. You don't have to be making massive gains or strength increases all the time. It doesn't always have to fall along a performance based metric. You don't need to obsessively track your progress. Just getting in there and squatting the bar or something is good too, it feels good, and you'll be happy you did it!

^^^
Won’t you please
Won’t you please
Please won’t you be. . .
My trainer

god that's so otm.

also ftr i died lolling at goole's "absolutely disgusting" comment. the clip at the end of the weight peg is the icing.

ryan massively otm

feeling good, getting healthier, gaining skill in functional movements >>>>>>>> getting sw0le

i agree

yeah except “gaining skill in functional movements” can be a progression trap too. i get a little tripped out by the “functional” mantra sometimes, like i know that being able to move in complex ways is awesome, but there’s a simulation aspect to it that starts to feel a little silly when it’s juxtaposed with bodybuilding as the less sensible thing to do. just like move your body expressively, no one end goal is better than the other imo. xp

oh yeah i don't even think about functional movements. any movement will do.

I have a really hard time letting go of the idea of doing "pure" strength lifting for gains even though I'm not training for a meet or anything. Honestly I'd probably look and even feel better if I mixed it up a bit more. But there's just something addictive about that clear, measurable progress of adding small amounts of weight over time and being able to check it against "standards" for your bodyweight. And admittedly a sort of ego boost to just knowing I can lift more than a good number of the other people in the gym.

map otm about some alleged functional exercises being excessively complicated and abstract ... "functional" gets abused a lot

imo if an exercise is really functional, a trainer can explain how it relates to normal human tasks

a lot of basic strength moves are functional, or can be done in ways that map well onto normal movements; front squat vs. back squat is a famous example, humans use the basic front squat pattern all the time to move heavy stuff around but rarely use the back squat pattern on anything other than a barbell

functionality can be a good test to apply in designing or tweaking a strength program ... if an exercise is highly functional (e.g. deadlifts) it's probably worth spending more time on; if an exercise is not very functional, it can be replaced or supplemented (e.g. do fewer sets of bench presses, more sets of standing presses and push-ups)

love this thread

i love to bench press. it's like a treat to me. but i should work on those other things more.

Bench press is functional for when I am pinned down by a bad guy and want to push him off

and back squat is for piggy back rides

for a more complete workout, push the bad guy off and then give him a piggy back ride

i hate to break it to the straights itt but it's a good guy not a bad guy

lol I have little kids you dirty-minded fuckers

and also I am a tier one operator frequently in combat situations

kind of on the fence about whether I want one of these tees or whether it's massively dumb
https://synagogueofstrength.com/collections/all

My gym is heavily frequented by russian jewish and bukharian jewish bros so it would def get appreication

yeah totally fine gym tee imo , i have some goofy ones too i think they are fine in that situation