by Tom Furman
“There is no such thing as tough. There is trained and untrained. Now which are you?” ~ Denzel Washington as the character, “Creasy” in the 2004 movie, “Man On Fire”
Last year I wrote, “Becoming Durable: Most ain’t,” on this website. Before you read this article, you NEED to be familiar with this method, so go HERE
There were a number of questions. Some of which are of the most common type. “Can I change X,Y,Z?” Of course the answer to this is always the same. “You can change X, Y, Z,…but it won’t be DURABLE then.”
However with the questions I was motivated to do two things, be clearer and make things more streamlined. …
By Tom Furman
“Perfect is the enemy of good.” — Voltaire, quoting an Italian proverb.
Perfectionism is like a transcendental equation, which according to Mr. Spock, has no resolution. Since nothing is perfect, there is no satisfactory end point.
Perfectionism is a trait that makes life an endless report card on accomplishments or looks. When healthy, it can be self-motivating and drive you to overcome adversity and achieve success. When unhealthy, it can be a fast and enduring track to unhappiness.
What makes extreme perfectionism so toxic is that while those in its grip desire success, they are most focused on avoiding failure, resulting in a negative orientation. They don’t believe in unconditional love, expecting others’ affection and approval to be dependent on a flawless performance. …
by Tom Furman
“There are two types of pain.
The pain that hurts.
The pain that alters.”
Robert McCall, The Equalizer
The mantra of, “No pain, no gain.” is widely misunderstood. It probably originated from the bowels of a west coast bodybuilding gym in the 70’s, but was quickly adopted by the aerobics bunnies of the 80’s. As if beating your head against the wall did something. It’s more about the type or the difference. The question the is often asked is, “Are you hurt or are you injured?” There is a difference.
In training and life, there is hardship. When mistakes or accidents happens, there is injury. Physical, mental, metaphorical. We, perhaps, understand the first and try to avoid the second. …
by Tom Furman
It usually happens one morning. You wake up, sneeze, turn your head and something seizes up. You feel injured, immobile and well, really impotent. Your ability to hunt, kill and defend your tribe has been stripped by Father Time. Just yesterday you could wake up early, earn an income and then play rugby on the weekend with little training other than your ego. Now you have to be careful wiggling your leg to get it in your shoe or sciatica pain runs down your thigh.
The fix or cure, if you will, is addressing the issues, following a healthy lifestyle and developing good habits. Far easier to type than to install. Besides, it’s all so confusing to the average consumer. There’s yoga, running, lifting, spinning, Crossfit, aerobic kickboxing, Booty Funk and more. That is just the training. Then there are the diets. Carnivore, Paleo, Keto, Vegan, Lacto-Ovo, Zone, Pritikin, Fasting and the ever clever Intermittent Fasting. TMI. …
by Tom Furman
The idea of doing something regularly to achieve success is often frowned upon. Most advertising taps into our need for quick pleasure. It’s like offering magic, yet the information inundated consumer is willing to purchase smoke and mirrors before reality. The reality is that short cuts do not exist. However short term actions lead to long term success or what appears to be magic.
“I’m not doing the time. The time is doing me.” — Nicholas Hathaway (Chris Hemsworth) in the movie, Blackhat
While many say that, “Time is Money”, few view it as currency. Like money, we always think we don’t get enough. However when an objective analysis comes into play, we may find that our organizational skills are more emotionally driven than logically driven. That is not to say that humans should be worker drones or mindless task masters. It means that by having a consistent group of habits or tasks, given time, the outcome is quite demonstrable. …
by Tom Furman
Let’s get this straight, this article is about looking better naked.
While you should drop fat, increase strength and improve health markers, it is about appearance.
The first Mr. Olympia, long before Arnold, was Larry Scott. When Larry moved from the farm country to LA, he had primarily 3 bodybuilding mentors. Vince Gironda, Rheo Blair and Lou Degni. Vince provided the training technology, Rheo made the best protein and Lou, was, inspirational. His physique, for it’s time, was ahead of it’s time. He had a theory on how people viewed the human body. …
The Workout That Makes You A Younger, More Effective, Human.
by Tom Furman
Being able to move your body is a fundamental component of survival. Even with technology like wheelchairs and those electric scooters at Walmart, it becomes apparent, when you can’t move your body through space your time above the dirt is getting closer. In fact primitive man had to move efficiently to hunt or run from danger. The very idea of running from danger is humorous. It’s like men overestimating their ability to fight when they have never been in one or trained for one. …
By Tom Furman
Rather than write an article on how to eat, I’ll write an article on how I eat. It’s cool to look at ideas, charts, research and recipes, but it is perhaps more useful to see how it all gets implemented in a lifestyle.
I don’t like naming diets since it’s just food. There are THREE primary macronutrients..FAT, CARBOHYDRATES AND PROTEIN. We can list more like alchohol, fiber and water, but they will get mentioned later. Every diet book is a variation of the three macros. That’s it. No magic.
Body fat loss is primarily driven by a reduction in calories. To a lesser degree, exercise or activity. Despite what you hear daily, you can’t hack physics. If you want to optimize your leanness, you have to track calories through proper habits and honest feedback or by recording and measuring it. Most everyone is highly skilled at self deception. Their clothing shrunk or the scale is wrong. …
By Tom Furman
C50 stands for, “Chasing 50”, which is 50 reps or seconds. That is the goal. When you reach it, you increase resistance slightly and start over. The usual starting point is at 50% or 25 reps. The idea of, ‘chasing’, is that the race never ends. You keep on improving and gaining size and strength. This workout requires little equipment, but is of high quality. Not endless, ballistic, repetitions based on unrealistic times or arbitrary purpose.
C50 has nothing to do with age, but it could. 50 years old? Get 50 reps/seconds. Add ONE rep or second per year and age 60 you are doing C60. Then at 70? C70. One rep per year increase is manageable. Imagine at 70 doing a workout that would trash an untrained 20 year old?
The exercises are these.
1. Nordic Leg Extension. Move smoothly. Limit your range of motion until you are stronger and perhaps have a stability ball behind you in case you fail. Pad anything that is irritating you and have perfect form. This is negative or eccentric only and the name used here is, “Reverse Leg Curl”. You may count total time and shoot for 50 total seconds under tension.
By Tom Furman
Rather than glorify a life of incarceration, we can view the end result of a fairly controlled environment.
Prison life, whether it be about drugs, sex, violence or boredom can be ignored or studied. In this case, I and others are studying the methodology to stay fit, get strong and build armor.
The book series, “Convict Conditioning by Paul Wade”, or “Jailhouse Strong by Josh Bryant” have explored this area rather well. The following article is just one idea for a template and training method.
Rather than bore you with prison life stories that other with more experience and insight have covered so well, I’ll isolate the factors involved in the physical training during incarceration. …
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