The Web Developers' Strength & Fitness Resistance

“This is everything we asked for but not what we wanted.”

– Any random user

Let’s get one thing out of the way early.

Programming is an intensive way of life.

• We work long hours on tasks that require absolute concentration.
• We’re constantly searching for solutions to our issues.
• We pour over thousands of lines of code, hunting bugs, code smells and any other issue that might cause even the slightest bottleneck in our beautifully crafted masterpiece.

But the one factor we ignore is the most important cog in the entire process…

Ourselves.

The Resistance

How often have you ploughed on long into the night, forgetting to eat, drink or even use the bathroom?

How often have you skipped dinner, choosing instead to grab a coke and something from the vending machine, hero-coding yourself to oblivion?

It’s addictive, isn’t it?

It’s also the number one way to get soft in the middle, and no one wants that.

None of us is as dumb as all of us!

The other day as I was finishing up my work, it hit me!

I want to help 100 of my fellow programmers lose weight, gain strength and create a life of awesome.

Why?

Because we can!

“They did not know it was impossible, so they did it!”

– Mark Twain

Let’s start at the beginning.

We’ll nail our diets, conquer our health, demolish fitness and increment our strength.

Let’s create a movement that’s proud to call itself nerdy coders but also one that can live exciting, healthy, active lives.

Iterate your way to success

If we all aim to make small improvements, constantly investing in ourselves over time then we’ll soon make huge impacts – not only the quality of the code we produce but also in the way we live our lives!

We’re going to do it:

• without spending hours doing boring cardio!
• without resorting to minging, dull ‘low-fat’ meals!
• without spending hundreds of pounds on a gym memberships, equipment and supplements!

In short, we’re going to do it our way!

It won’t be easy and we’ll need focus, but we can get there.

Just keep your eyes on the prize. You’ll be more alert and you’ll feel great!

The Fitness Hacker

My aim with this site is to provide guidance, help and support for every single programmer out there.

I’m not an expert (not even close!), but I’ve felt the massive effect smart eating and regular activity has had on my life and I want others to benefit from it too.

Common Goals

First up, I think we all have some common goals:

1) We want it to be as efficient as possible

Hitting deadlines, learning about the next big technology AND getting in sufficient Xbox365 time is difficult enough without having to bother with exercise, right?

How many times has someone told you that the only way to lose weight is to spend hours punishing yourself on the treadmill?

Let’s clear one thing up early: This is NONSENSE!

Cardio is always the first form of exercise people try when they want to lose weight.

You only need to look out of your window and compare the amount of joggers you see in January with the ones still pounding the streets in March.

It’s not fun. It’s not effective. It won’t be a resolution that you stick to!

Few people have the time needed to get results from cardio.

Not only is it inefficient, if you’re anything like me, you’ll find it boring!

We’ll use workouts that will hit our entire body and be done in less than 20 minutes, three times a week.

In short, we’ll get more done in less time. Beautiful.

2) We don’t want to spend lots of money

While we’re at it, let’s destroy another fitness myth.

• You don’t need an expensive gym membership to make the fitness gains that you want.

Let’s use short, total-body workouts that can be done in your own home (or even the office) without investing in excessive, expensive gym equipment.

Exercising using your own bodyweight will not only burn calories, it’ll prepare your body for more exercises as your strength develops. And best of all, it’s free!

Done right, it’ll also help you avoid the joint wear and tear that often comes with beginners starting out with cardio.

At most you’ll need one or two pieces of inexpensive equipment (think a pull-up bar and some dumbbells).

What you don’t need to do is spend 25 minutes driving to a gym to spend 90 minutes using every machine in there.

We’ll use old-fashioned, uncomplicated workouts that’ll include:

• Push-ups
• Planks
• Squats
• The simple pleasure of running flat-out as fast as you can

Why? Because they work!

You wouldn’t improve your code by throwing more lines at it, so why improve your lifestyle by doing excessive amounts of cardio?

We’ll focus on three, high-quality, time-saving bodyweight workouts each week.

You’ll be free to stay active on your off days, taking part in fun activities you might have given up or even take up something new with your new found fitness!

3) We need all the support we can find

Like no other profession, programmers have harnessed the power of the Internet to share knowledge, support and ideas.

Why should our approach to health & fitness be any different?

Everybody has goals, regardless of where they’re starting from.

Whether you’re fifteen stones over your target weight or your two stones under, the support and accountability you get from others is vital if you are going to achieve all that you want to achieve.

• Get a friend or colleague to join you as your workout partner.
• Convince somebody to join you in improving your diet.
• Let me know your story! My own fitness battle needs all the support I can find!

It’s amazing at how many people are crying out for somebody to take the lead and get things underway.

Be that guy!

We’ve got work to do, gents! Who’s with me?

Related Post: Four Health Essentials for Programmers in 2011

I’ll be posting bi-weekly updates covering health & fitness from a programmer’s POV.

If you liked this post, I’d love for you to share it with others too.

You can also receive future updates by joining the Fitness Hack feed.

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In folklore, the silver bullet is supposed to be the only kind of bullet for firearms that is effective against a Werewolf, witch, or some monsters.

- Wikipedia

What was the “Next Big Thing” when you were starting out?

Was it one of the following technologies?

• Object-Oriented Programming
• UML
• Design Patterns
• Agile Development
• TDD

Each arrived with hype and fanfare. Early adopters told anybody who’d listen that the development world needn’t worry any more for it would soon be saved. Projects succeeded, others ended in failure. Eventually, the hype passed and the early adopters moved on in search of their new arrival. The rest of us took the useful principles these new technologies introduced, added them to our armoury and carried on regardless.

There are no silver bullets

At least, there’s no replacement for sensible development principles.

Take unit testing. Unit testing gained traction as part of the agile development process – but today, few would admit to skipping unit tests whether they use ‘agile’ development or not. It works so it has become widely adopted.

Likewise with our health; smart eating, hard work and dedication has out stayed any amount of ’4 minute abs’-style revolutions. Getting strong requires hard work, just like it did in Arthur Saxon‘s day. Losing 100lb requires hard work. Do not let anyone tell you otherwise. The useful thing is – once you realise this, it becomes a whole lot easier.

Kaizen – the art of Continuous Improvement

The discipline required for continuous improvement means we’re often battling with ourselves to keep ahead of the curve chasing an endless cycle of blog posts, conferences and code that can overwhelm even the best of us. The work-code-sleep cycle holds us back.

• We wake up late and skip breakfast.
• We grab dinner on the way home
• We sit at our laptops all-night, procrastinating.

Sound familiar?

I’ve been battling this for years and I know I’m not alone. You put off taking care of yourself in favour of ‘hard work’ but everyone is looking for a way out whether they realise it or not. Fitness magazines make the solution seem so simple whether its ’7 minute Abs’, ’6 minute Abs’… “It’s like you’re dreamin’ about Gorgonzola cheese when it’s clearly Brie time, baby”.

Step into my office, ’cause you’re f****n’ fired!

Look around you. You don’t need this over-hyped garbage. You don’t need to follow the masses and traipse from office to couch to bed. It’s not working for them and it’s not working for you either.

The software industry is not alone with its tendency to hunt for silver bullets. The fitness industry is just like that too.

Low Fat Food != Healthy Food

Fat plays a crucial role in the body’s health and performance. Fat has a bad name but quality fats are essential macronutrients.

The fact that low fat food is promoted as being ‘healthy’ is criminal, especially when it’s packed full of so much salt and sugar.

Start reading labels, learn what is in the food you are eating. You wouldn’t stand sloppy code so don’t make do with a sub-quality diet. Eat smart and know that healthy fats do exist. Monounsaturated, polyunsaturated and even saturated fats should all be consumed in even quantities.

You Don’t Need Expensive Supplements

If you want to lose weight, you do not need expensive supplements. A healthy diet combined with exercise is enough. This doesn’t mean stop eating and run yourself to oblivion. It means exercising to a plan and eating smartly.

You Can’t Out Train A Bad Diet

Diet is 80% of your success. Improving your diet gives your life an automatic upgrade. Include more vegetables, fresh fruit, nuts and lean meats to your menu and remember real foods comes from the ground, the sea or from animals not from a box or a bag.

You Don’t Need to Spend Two Hours a Day in the Gym

You can start working out right now in the comfort of your own home.

I have outlined a introductory workout in a previous post.

These workouts require minimal equipment and you can be done in 30-45 minutes max. Concentrate on compound exercises such as pull ups, overhead dumbbell press, squats, pushups. These exercises work multiple parts of your body at the same time making them incredibly efficient and incredibly effective.

Don’t make the mistake of looking for expensive solutions.

Practice. Always Practice.

Successful folk don’t wake up one morning and find they’re capable of achieving incredible things. They don’t discover the secret in a blog post or at a conference. Success takes hard work, commitment and most importantly effortful study.

Merely doing doesn’t count so step away from the text editor, find a problem that you don’t quite understand and do all it takes to grok it. It’s the only way to improve.

Effortful study means constantly tackling problems at the very edge of your ability. Stuff you may have a high probability of failing at. Unless you’re failing some of the time, you’re probably not growing professionally. You have to seek out those challenges and push yourself beyond your comfort limit.

-Coding Horror

We look at guys like Jon Skeet and wish we had his skills.

If only it was so easy. He committed to making it happen by dedicating himself to his craft every single day.

Or how about Ryan Reynolds in Blade 3. Do you think he got to look like this by signing up for a 4-minute abs commercial?!

Not a chance. He worked at it. Of course he had personal trainers, dieticians and got paid a bucket-load of cash but he worked to improve himself every single day.

And Now, It’s Your Turn.

Here’s where it gets interesting. Want to get active? Start now. You’re online. Google the first physical activity that comes to your head and you unlock an unlimited library of infomation. Let’s pick… I dunno. Let’s pick Parkour.

Parkour is a utilitarian discipline based upon the successful, swift and energy-efficient traversing of one’s surrounding environment via the practical application of techniques, based around the concept of self-preservation and the ability to help others.

-Wikipedia

First up, the two greatest Parkour videos on the interwebs.

Parkour Dojo – A Parkour Primer

Parkour Messageboards

Parkour on UrbanDictionary

And there’s more. Pages and pages of the stuff. And the same goes for any other activity.

Be like the sponge. Absorb!

Avoiding Mental Fatigue
Activity increases blood flow, not only to our working muscles but to our brains. This in turn will affect the amount of oxygen being transported to the brain.

Increased oxygen to the brain = increased concentration.

When you’re working hard on a project, remember to take time every twenty to thirty minutes and get active, even if it’s wandering to the bathroom or kitchen. The amount of information you’ll be able to retain will increase, your quality of work will improve and you’ll be able to understand difficult concepts quicker, too.

Find something that excites you. Do that.

People have had it worse than you and made it work. I know that you can too. But it’s not enough for me to believe it, you need to believe it. Take control. Create ‘Yourself version 2.0′ – stronger, faster leaner. There’s no reason not too.

Don’t wish. Make it happen.

Fitness Hack is a collection of like-minded individuals intent on making the most of the limited time we have. But when it comes to success, only YOU can make it happen. You’ll never be as young as you are right now. Choose your mission, commit to success and KNOW that it’s achievable.

You don’t need a silver bullet.

Make your choice. What are you going to conquer in 2011?

Thanks for reading!

This site is intended to provide health & fitness advice for web developers, designers, programmers, software developers and any other regular computer users. You can subscribe to Fitness Hack updates using RSS or email. You can also follow my own mission to lose fat, get strong and run fast on Twitter.

Important Posts:

• Join the Resistance – A Hacker’s Guide to Fitness
• The Computer Programmer’s Fat Loss Toolkit

Photo by Todd Ryburn.

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So updates have been non-existent. What’s my excuse? There isn’t one that’s good enough!

Training had been going well. In October, I began following Jason Ferruggia’s Minimalist Training program. It’s a great program. It cuts away a lot of the stuff that’s non-essential and allows beginners like me to focus on lifting without overcomplicating things.

Basically, my weeks looked like this…

I’d train in the gym three days a week on non-consecutive days and I’d focus on three exercises.

1. The Squat
2. The Overhead Press
3. Pull Ups

I started out pretty quickly and through October made some impressive gains. I was eating well and getting plenty of sleep which helped. For conditioning I’d be at a boxing gym on Friday nights, jumping rope, running sprints and also some bag work. My form was OK for a beginner and the regular gym sessions allowed me to focus on improving every other day.

This is continued into November and I was putting up numbers which I didn’t really think I’d achieve so quickly. I took my squat up to 240lbs for 5×5, got up to 90lbs on the overhead press (which helped with my scrawny shoulders) and put up PR numbers on pull ups too.

Then I decided to test my max pull ups.

This wasn’t a bad decision in itself. I rarely take myself to failure when I train and always aim for about 80% max. I just don’t see the point of going any further on a regular basis. Using pull ups as an example, I’ll do 6×5 three or four times a week but I’ll rarely go past 8 in a single set. I knew my max number would be going up so figured it’d be a good night to test it.

I wanted to be fresh so I tried it first thing in the gym. It was pretty empty so I found a free set of bars and got going. I flew past my last PR of 12 and stopped at 17. As I lowered myself, I felt a twinge in my right lat but didn’t think anything more of it and finished the session with push ups, pistols and jump rope.

I woke up the following morning in pretty bad pain and knew straight away I’d made the stoopid mistake of not warming up properly before I attempted my max. Schoolboy error.

That was just under a week ago and I’ve done little else in terms of training since. My back is only now beginning to recover and full range of movement is returning.

What’s the lesson? Well, I think when we train that we always have another injury in us but if we’re not careful we’ll run out of recoveries. I’m lucky that time is on my side but niggling injuries add up and if we don’t take care of them they can put us out of the game before we know it.

This has been a pretty humbling lesson to not let me ego get the better of me. I’ll be 27 soon and I’m learning that it’s time to start taking proper care of myself if I’m going to be able to keep going well into old age!

Healthy joints, mobility and flexibility are just as important to me as strength and speed (if not more so) yet 95% of the time is spent on the latter. It’s time to re-address that balance! The work of Steve Maxwell & Pavel Tsatsouline is essential reading!

That’s all for now. I hope to get back into the gym later this week.

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