Comment by Majestic121
3 years ago
> I've also passed the threshold of exercise feeling like a chore. It's now something I enjoy and even look forward to. This took over a year to achieve but it does happen, I promise.
This was the most surprising part for me : I used to be the stereotypical anti sport nerd when I was young, and when I started training, even a bit, it was a proper chore and something that required motivation.
But after running regularly for a couple of years, now going for a run is something that I do for relaxation, and honestly look forward to especially after a stressful day.
I could not say when it happened, the change is pretty gradual, but it's definitely there : not only does it get easier after a while but it becomes something you deeply enjoy
It took me until the pandemic to find an exercise routine that worked for me. When it all started, I knew that I had to get a healthy routine put in place or the WFH was going to really wreck me. So, I googled around a bit, tried some exercise routines, and found a good one. I've been on it since and look forward to doing it about 3x a week. The key for me was pairing it with a favorite podcast. I can only listen to that podcast when I'm exercising.
The routine is called the 'Deck of Pain': Choose 4 exercises (push-ups, squats, etc). Shuffle a deck of cards and take one from the top. For each suit, you do one of the exercises chosen, the number of pips being the how many of that exercise you do. So, for say, a 2 of clubs, you do 2 push-ups. For a 9 of diamonds, you do 9 squats. Etc. You chose your own workouts. Face and Ace are whatever you'd like, I choose 1 as the Ace, and 10 as the Face cards. Go though as many cards as you can. Do you heard that? That's the sound of your soul leaving your body.
It's real hard at first. I'd only start with a quarter deck and be wasted. It took me ~9 months to be able to get through all 54 cards. After ~2.25 years of it, I can get through a deck in about 45 minutes.
This sounds interesting and intriguing. Which exercise do you have for each suit? Do you also cycle through different exercise assignments (say, in different months or weeks)?
Yeah, thanks.
I rotate the exercises. Right now it's squats, push-ups, sit-ups, and pull-ups. I've done variations on all those in the past. Like, squat variations can be lunges, jump-squats, etc. Since all suits add up to the same number, the association between the exercise and suit is just incidental. I was working on single-arm push-ups, but hurt my shoulder and had to go back down to just regular push-ups.
I'll rotate card decks too. There are some fun little games out there that you can steal card decks from. For instance, take the cards out of a Catan set and then assign exercises and values to them. Go get a 5 suited deck online. Or grab a new game you've not tried before at Target or wherever.
Recently, I've been using a Tarot deck. Minor arcana as I described above, major arcana as individual exercises. So 5 of cups is still something like 5 pull-ups. But the Empress is 10 burpees, the Tower is a 1 minute plank, that kind of stuff.
The key for me was the randomization element. Having the cards and exercises come out at random kept me from 'counting down the miles', so to speak. It keeps my mind fresh and guessing at the next thing and not just waiting for things to be done with.
Although I never hated sports I had the same experience.
A few points for those who think about getting into running:
* make sure you are doing training units of at least 30 mins regularily. Going shorter than that is not really useful to get you actually trained.
* If you try to get better endurance most of your training should be aerobic (instead of anaerobic), this means it should be easy for you to do. Doing anaerobic training (so going to the max) is also useful, but it should not be the only thing you do
* regularily doing a little is always better than occasionally doing a lot. Set yourself some distance targets (e.g. 12 km a week). If it helps get yourself one of those sports tracker apps, or watches (Garmin, Polar, ...)
* with the right clothes weather does not matter at all (except maybe: too much heat/sun and not drinking enough)
* the most important thing are the fitting shoes (to avoid pain in the joints). Retailers will often offer a analysis of your running style and offer you the fitting shoes. Those should then be changed every 600 to 800 km.
* for certain people with bad joints or other related issues cycling or swimming might be better choices
Not an expert, but I don't think what you say represent the current state of knowledge. As far as I know...
> make sure you are doing training units of at least 30 mins regularily. Going shorter than that is not really useful to get you actually trained.
That's not true. Less time can be effective as well, given that the intensity is high enough.
> If you try to get better endurance most of your training should be aerobic (instead of anaerobic)
It's actually the opposite and interval training (mixed aerobic and anaerobic) seems to be more effective.
> the most important thing are the fitting shoes (to avoid pain in the joints). Retailers will often offer a analysis of your running style and offer you the fitting shoes. Those should then be changed every 600 to 800 km.
Running without shoes (or barefoot-shoes) is probably even better once you have adapted to it.
> for certain people with bad joints or other related issues cycling or swimming might be better choices
Even rope jumping is considered much better than jogging since the force is always distributed across both legs at the same time.
Wrong and easy to prove that its wrong, just look at a training regiment of any elite runner in any distance. Most coaches agree that 80% percent of your volume should be easy aerobic for any goal. Doing high intensity without a well developed aerobic base means you will hit a plateau with your performance sooner or later.
The Born to Run fad has been over for years now. Consensus is incorporating barefoot running into your training makes little difference to performance except you'll probably injure yourself if you're not careful.
I've been walking in barefoot shoes for 2 years now and I've gotten tremendous benefits, but running serious mileage in them is a completely different story. Unless you want to get better at barefoot running, it's not useful.
Again, if it was useful at all you would be seeing professional athletes doing it. The most they do is some barefoot strides on the grass by the track.
6 replies →
>> for certain people with bad joints or other related issues cycling or swimming might be better choices
> Even rope jumping is considered much better than jogging since the force is always distributed across both legs at the same time.
If your joints are bad enough, you have to specifically avoid impact. Rope jumping is slightly less bad than running but still one impact after the other.
Cycling and swimming require cyclical motions that you can perform without having to sustain impacts.
Speaking from close personal experience here (my SO), rope jumping is actually what caused the joint problems. She can't do running or rope jumping anymore. Swimming and cycling are no problem though.
All this just to back up GPs claim that swimming and cycling are great alternatives to running if you have bad joints. As parent said, rope jumping is indeed slightly better than running, but still not a great alternative due to impacting motion.
One more thing: not a doctor.