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The One-Weight No Excuses Workout

The One-Weight No Excuses Workout

Ok, so what if you’re sitting there, reading this, and suddenly I’ve convinced you to get in shape and work on your physique. I’ve convinced you that weights, rather than just running, is the answer, and you’re ready to shed pounds, get strong, and build muscle. You’ve bought into my garage gang concept and have invited some buddies to get fit with you.

But you’ve got no weights, and no money to buy a fully equipped garage gym. No problem. Let’s get you started with the kettlebell. The kettlebell is an old Russian training device, and according to legend it was used as the sole training implement by Russian special forces while on deployment. I’ve got no clue whether that’s right or not. What I do know is that the kettlebell is an awesome tool to buy first for your garage gym. It’s cheap, and your garage gang buddies can buy their own so you can get started right away. You can also throw this in a car every time you take a trip and have a mobile gym based on the workout in this section.

Generally, men should start with a 16kg kettlebell. I’m not going to get mad at you if you just buy a 35lb kettlebell, but I personally believe it’s more respectful to go with the kilogram method as used in the Eastern Bloc. Whichever method you use, this one tool should last you for a good 3 months or so of work before you’ll need anything else. You’ll want to buy heavier ones over time, but this is fine to start. Ladies can use a 12kg kettlebell to start.

What’s cool about the kettlebell is that there’s a ton of barbell and dumbbell exercises that are easily adaptable. You can have literally hundreds of exercises available with a simple tool. But you’ve got to learn a few simple concepts about how to use the kettlebell first. There are five main exercises that are very important to learn:

the swing
the clean
the goblet squat
the press,
the get-up (often called the turkish getup).

There’s a ton of other exercises I’ll mention below in the workout, but most of those you can learn easily by watching them on youtube. The big 5 above take a bit of practice, and you should really study a TON of videos on youtube before training to reduce the risk of injury. I want to stress the importance of educating yourself on how these exercises are done, especially with videos. I’m going to give you some descriptions to the best of my ability, and hopefully you pick up a cue or two that works for you, but nothing beats visual, in my opinion.

I’d really suggest you buy Pavel Tsatsouline’s Enter the Kettlebell video for a first rate explanation of how to perform these exercises. It’s old school, funny, and is the best instructional I’ve ever seen on this topic from the master who popularized kettlebells in America. I’ll do my best to explain these five below, but you really need to do a little work here on your own. For written material, I really like everything that Dan John’s ever written on the exercises below as well.

Get to it! Here’s my description of the main five kettlebell exercises.

The Kettlebell Swing

The KB Swing is the first exercise you’ll need to learn. There’s a million videos on this via youtube, but

Basically, you’ll start in a bent over position as if you were going to hike a football. You’ll snap the kettlebell backwards to start, almost throwing your wrists at your crotch, with the bell traveling safely just under. There should not be a ton of space there. This is more of a hinge than a squat, and your focus should be on extending your tailbone back. Keep your chest up, and your head held high, which will prevent your back from getting rounded.

Once you reach the full back position, with the bell passed through your legs, you’re going to snap forward with your hips and hamstrings. You should not be using your arms to throw the bell forward. You should think of your arms like ropes, which are just attached to the KB to keep it from flying forward. Your grip on the KB is the only thing that is keeping it from flying 10 feet in front of you. Focus hard on hinging the bell forward with your hips.

Because you’re intentionally using your arms in the swing, you will be able to “catch” the bell with your lat muscles somewhere between your navel and pecs. Snap the bell back through your legs, and start the process again for the next rep.

Once you’ve got this down, it’s a good idea to learn three alternative swings, which you can insert in the workout below for variety. They are:

The one-handed swing;
The alternating swing: and
The American style (or overhead) swing.

The Clean

The clean is a fundamental barbell exercise that you probably learned in high school during weight class. It uses a wide variety of muscles in your body, including all of your legs, back, arms, traps, etc. The kettlebell variety is quite similar, with the exception that you’re going to start by swinging the bell back (just like a KB swing), and end up using your hips to snap the weight up to your shoulders. This is a bit of a difference from the barbell clean, where you’re effectively “jumping” the bar from the ground (power clean) or knee (hang clean) level.

That’s an important distinction, because while you could jump the KB from the ground or a hang, there’s a lot more risk in that motion than when one starts with a snap between the legs. The jump is looser, and more risk of injury, especially to the elbow joints when you catch the weight in my opinion.

Start with the bell on the ground in front of you, and snap it between your legs just like KB swing, except with only one hand, rather than two.. As you explode forward with your hips, instead of letting your arm hang like ropes in front of you, you’re going to keep your elbow tight to your ribs, and let the bell swing up to your shoulder.

This will take a little practice, but you’ll soon be able to swing the bell up to your shoulder, and have it fall into the space between your shoulder and bicep, coming to rest on both muscles. Your hand, controlling the handle of the bell itself, will come to rest at shoulder level with the part of the handle held between your thumb and forefinger pointing directly at the very end of your clavicle.

Now snap the bell back between your legs, taking pains to externally rotate your hand as you go down, and perform your next rep.

The Goblet Squat

The Goblet Squat is a pretty simple concept. Hold the kettlebell by the handles so the top of the handle is essentially touching your bottom lip. It’s like you’re about to down a large goblet of wine, hence the name. Then you’ll go ahead and squat down so that your thighs dip at or slightly below parallel, and you’ll come back up. Here’s a few things to think about.

Since the bell is under your chin, it’s center of gravity is a bit forward compared to a traditional barbell squat. Therefore, it’s easy to lean forward, and put unnecessary stress on your lower back if you’re not careful. Therefore, make an extra effort to keep your chest and chin high on these, to make sure your back doesn’t round.

Go super slow on these. A common theme with a lot of exercises, especially pushups and goblet squats, is that the tendency is to go WAY to fast and make it more of an endurance exercise, cheating your muscles in the process. This should be done on a 2x1x2. That means I want you to go down for a count of two seconds, pause for a count of one at the bottom, and go up for a count of two. This is not a race. Really focus on your muscles in your quads, hamstrings, and glutes firing to bring yourself up and down.

Goblet squats are not a race to see how many you can get in a short amount of time. By my method above, you should experience these times to complete sets using the following rep schemes:

4 Reps – 20 Seconds
6 Reps – 30 Seconds
8 Reps – 40 Seconds

This time under tension will become more important when we discuss the workout below. But just keep in mind that with all weight training, it’s really important to lift using control whenever squatting. Here, there’s going to be less of an emphasis on putting up heavy weight numbers, like with barbell training. You can’t add another 5 pounds. Therefore it’s extra important to make these slow and smooth, otherwise you’re just using momentum to bounce up and down, and you’re not really accomplishing anything.

The Press

The press is another simple concept that is much more complex in practice. It’s an awesome fundamental strength exercise, can help build muscle and core strength, and will be useful to you for a long time, so pay attention here.

The first step is to clean the bell up to shoulder level. Often, performance of this exercise will be in the form of a clean and press, so the two go hand and hand. What I don’t want to do is to try to muscle the bell straight up from the ground along my entire body up to shoulder level. My concern is stress on the elbow joint. I’ve heard stories about people messing up their elbows with kettlebells, and you want to be very careful of this issue with every KB exercise you do.

Once the bell’s up to shoulder level, you’re going to press it up straight vertically. Your elbow will be held tight to your rib cage as you start. As you press up, you’ll notice that your wrist will externally rotate. This is correct. This is also vastly different than the movement you’d experience with a barbell, and that’s just fine. It’s almost like a ¾ Arnold Press.

Your feet should be shoulder width apart. You’ll want to have your soles feel like they’re corkscrewing outward into the ground, with your legs and glutes engaged to keep yourself steady. As you press up, extend your offhand to the side and contract your entire core to hold you steady. Lift the bell with your arm, don’t jump it up with your legs. That’s a push press, which is a different exercise.

I’m going to repeat this next paragraph at the risk of sounding redundant. Go slow. This is at least a 2x1x2 (the 1 is at the bottom). This is one where it’s easy to use momentum to jerk the bell up and down. That will (a) increase your chance for injury and (b) reduce your muscle contraction and therefore muscle gains. Slow, please. Remember:

4 Reps – 20 Seconds
6 Reps – 30 Seconds
8 Reps – 40 Seconds

The Get-Up

The Get-Up, which is also called the “Turkish Get-Up” of “TGU” for short, is an extremely effective exercise that, while hard to learn, is REALLY good at targeting your full body. It is also a very “functional exercise” in that it will help your body perform a lot of general athletic activities much better.

Ultimately, the get-up is all about pressing a kettlebell straight up from a prone position to a standing overhead position. How different people get there is different, depending on whose version you watch. I’ll give some general pointers, but you’re going to need to fill in the gaps through video study. Again, there’s a ton of videos on youtube for this purpose.

Let’s break this exercise into some sub-movements

The prone press
The thrust-to-elbow;
The knee slide to hand support
The kneeling overhead position; and
The standup

The prone press starts with you on your back with the bell next to you at shoulder level. Let’s do a right side press first, so pretend the bell is on your right shoulder. Roll towards the bell, and grasp with both hands. Roll back to prone, now with the handle of the bell on your right pec. Push straight up with both hands, essentially bench pressing the bell up.

You’ll now perform the thrust-to-elbow. Using your abs and hips, thrust the bell straight up, while working your way up to support yourself on your left elbow. Your left butt cheek is on the ground, directly under the bell, supporting it. As with all parts of the get-up, focus on driving straight up, because if the bell goes off to one side, it’s going to fall.

You’re now going to thrust your hips up and slide your left knee through to the point on the ground that is directly under the bell. At the same time work your way up from your left elbow to left hand.

Now work your way up to a position where you are right knee up, and left knee down, with the kettlebell held up high with your right hand.

Finally, push down hard with your right foot and stand up.

Now repeat the process to get back down to ground. This is one rep.

The One-KB Workout

This workout is designed in an every minute on the minute format, and is designed for a working period of 20-40 seconds, and a corresponding rest period of 20-40 seconds, until the bell rings for the next minute. There’s a ton of apps you can get for free on your phone that will provide a ring sound each minute, so you know when to start your next round. I’d also suggest putting in another tone to signify when the working period is over, and the rest period beings.

The workout consists of several clusters of 4 exercises, all built around one of the big 5 exercises. You’ll perform each of the 4 exercises back to back, starting each exercise on the minute. Therefore each cluster set should take 4 minutes, and with 3 sets for each cluster the total cluster will total 12 minutes. The workout should therefore take 60 minutes total, which leaves time for a warm up beforehand.

We’re going to think in terms of time here, rather than reps. In fact, I’m not even going to list reps, but obviously the longer you’re “on” for each set, the more reps you’ll do. When you start, you’ll do 20 seconds on with each exercise, followed by 40 seconds off. As time goes on, you’ll increase the amount of time you’re “on” with each exercise by increasing either (a) the reps or (b) the time under tension. You should perform this workout for 12 total weeks, 4 times per week, and by the end you should be able to hit 40 seconds on and 20 seconds off for each exercise.

This workout is designed to help you strip fat, but you should see some increased muscle growth, provided that you pay attention to my time for the up and down portion of each exercise. One of the biggest problems you’ll see with weightlifting is going much too fast on both the up and down portion of each exercise. While this allows you to lift more weight for more reps, you cheat yourself, as the time under tension is a HUGE factor in muscle growth and strength gains. Go slow here. Make that a habit early on in your physique journey, and you’ll reap huge dividends. Again, think in terms of seconds, with 5 seconds for each rep, meaning:

4 Reps – 20 Seconds
6 Reps – 30 Seconds
8 Reps – 40 Seconds

Work on increasing the number of reps you perform as time goes on,

Here’s the workout:

Warmup 25 jumping jacks.

Cluster 1

Kettlebell Swings

Pushups (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Kettlebell Swings

Pushups (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Cluster 2

Kettlebell Presses Right Arm (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Goblet Lunges Right Leg (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Kettlebell Presses Left Arm (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Goblet Lunges Left Leg (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Cluster 3

Goblet Squats Goblet Lunges Right (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Lying KB Bench Press Right Goblet Lunges Right (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Goblet Squats Goblet Lunges Right (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Lying KB Bench Press Left Goblet Lunges Right (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Cluster 4

Get-up Right (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Bent Over Row Right Arm (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Get-up Left (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Bent Over Row Left Arm (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Cluster 5

KB Clean Right (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

One Leg KB Deadlift Right (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

KB Clean Left (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

One Leg KB Deadlift Left (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

40/30/30 Chicken, Rice, and Salad

40/30/30 Chicken, Rice, and Salad

6 oz. Baked Chicken Bread

2 cups Uncle Ben’s Brown Rice (prepared)

1 tablespoon Butter

2 cups Spring Mix

1 Cup Matchstick Carrots

2 tablespoons Paul Newman Classic Olive Oil and Vinegar Dressing

2 teaspoons Lawry’s Seasoned Salt

Sprinkle about 1 teaspoon of Lawry’s Season Salt on Chicken. Cook for 18 minutes at 350 degrees until 160 degrees in the center.

Mix 2 cups of brown rice, after you’ve prepared according to the instructions, with 1 tablespoon of butter and 1 teaspoon of Lawry’s Seasoned Salt.

Mix spring mix, carrots, and dressing in a bowl.

Serve and enjoy. Adjust portion sizes for desired calorie goals.

Carbs: 86 grams

Fats: 38 grams

Protein: 71 grams

Calories: 961

40/30/30 Eggs and Toast

2 slices Ezekiel Bread toasted

2 whole eggs

3 egg whites

1 tablespoon strawberry preserves

1 teaspoon butter

Take your slices of bread, and put them in the toaster at your preferred setting. Heat a non-stick pan on medium heat. Mix your eggs and egg white thoroughly. Now pour egg mix into the pan, mixing the eggs and scraping the pan gently until the eggs are cooked to desired consistency. Put the eggs on a plate. The toast should be done by this time. Pat the butter and strawberry preserves onto the toast and enjoy.

Carbs: 44g (40%)

Fats: 15g (31%)

Protein: 32g (29%)

Arnold’s Golden 6 Workout

Arnold’s Golden 6

Squat 4×10
Bench Press 3×10
Chin-ups 3x failure
Behind the Neck Overhead Press 3×10
Barbell Curl 3×10
Bent Knee Sit Ups 3x failure

Simple Eating

There’s not a lot to eating for a good physique. It’s not that complex. In fact, here’s all you need to know, in one simple rule.

THE GOLDEN RULE OF EATING: Eat less calories than you burn.

If you do that, you’ll look good. If you don’t, you’ll look bad. Not too much to it.

The reality of our situation in America is that the vast majority of people are morbidly obese. As a result, they cost themselves (and their families) dearly in terms of health, finances, lifestyle, etc. It’s not because they don’t know how to eat properly. For the most part, everyone knows that rule above. It’s not about knowledge, education, theory, whatever. It comes down to making a decision to look good because (a) you want to look good and (b) you have a duty to be a useful, capable man.

Ok, if it’s so simple, why isn’t everyone fit? It’s because it takes effort and disciple. There’s a lot that can pull you off track. I want to focus on what will keep you on track, in the form of 10 principles that if you follow, will result in you looking good. It’s a no-frills system that will drive results…if you follow the principles below.

Principle 1: It’s All About Calories

Principle 2: You Must Track Calories

Principle 3: You Must Test Bodyfat

Principle 4: You Can’t Workout Enough to Counter a Bad Diet

Principle 5: Eat Your Desired Bodyweight times 15 in Calories

Principle 6: Eat Your Bodyweight in Grams of Protein

Principle 7: Choose a Macronutrient Count That Works for You

Principle 8: A Simple Diet is the Best Diet

Principle 9: No Processed Foods

Principle 10: Carbs Can Be Good and Bad

Principle 11: Eat Meat, Eggs, Fruits and Veggies…Little Else

Principle 1: It’s All About Calories

I’m going to start by reiterating the Golden Rule of Eating. Your success with your physique will begin and end with calories. If you eat more calories than you burn, you’ll be fat. If you eat less calories than you burn, you’ll be thin. Simple as that.

Note that I’m not saying that if you eat less calories than you burn you’ll look great. Just not fat. You could still look terrible, because you don’t lift, don’t eat enough protein, eat too much sugar, etc. But you won’t be fat..

By the same token, you could have the perfect lifting plan, even supplement with excellent cardio, and still be fat because your eat too many calories. Look at powerlifters. Strong, impressive lifts. But they have terrible physiques, all because of too many calories. Now, if you’re worried about winning powerlifting meats, by all means do so. But this is about getting a physique that will get you ahead in life, the Executive Physique.

This rule is steadfast, and can’t be broken. There’s a million trends in fitness. Some people say you need butter in your coffee. Some say no carbs after lunch. Intermittent fasting. Keto. South Beach. Zone. Mediterranean.

Guess what, it all works, and it all doesn’t. What matters is eating more calories than you burn. You may find that some of those diets works better for you, and some work worse, go ahead and try them if you want. But they all come down to the same thing, eat less than you burn. If you go vegan and eat 1000 more calories each day than you consume, you’ll be fat. If you eat less than you consume, you’ll be thin.

Even alcohol is a simple question of calories. I get that there’s some scientific evidence that alcohol causes fat retention and destroys muscle more than other drink choices, but let’s be realistic, beer guts are caused by calories, not chemical reactions

Do you get it yet? Eat less calories than you burn. It’s really that simple.

Principle 2: You Must Track Calories

If calories are so important, how can you possibly know how you’re doing unless you track your calories? You can’t, and as such you must track your calories.

In the old school days, bodybuilders would track their calories with a notebook. This forced them to keep their diets extremely simple, because it would be difficult to track calories beyond whole food staples like chicken, steak, eggs, etc. That’s probably a huge advantage in itself, as I discuss below.

Nowadays, we’re lucky enough to have apps like myfitnesspal and others that allow you to track a wide variety of foods automatically. Your favorite protein bars? It’s in there. Lunch at McDonalds? In there. Your favorite bourbon? You can track that too.

As with most modern luxuries, there’s good and bad to these e-trackers. The good news is convenience and a huge database of foods. The bad news is that the ability to track large varieties of foods can lead you to seek too much variety in your diet, and accept eating dangerous processed foods as long as you’re under your total calories and within your macronutrient count. This is a mistake, as processed foods will cause you to still be hungry and can easily cause you to blow your diet.

Yes, use these apps to track calories and make sure your macronutrients are in proper proportion, but don’t allow their vast database to pull you into poor food choices.

Principle 3: You Must Test Bodyfat and Weigh Yourself

Brutal honesty with yourself is crucial for improvement in life. This is just as true when it comes to physique. You must be honest with yourself as to just how much of a fat-body you currently are, so you can make the proper adjustments to diet to get yourself to where you need to be.

Skin calipers can be bought for less than $10, and are an essential tool that have been used for decades. An accurate scale is another great tool that allows you to track your progress easily on a daily basis to make sure you’re progressing.

Many people will tell you that a scale is not a good reflection of progress, and that you may be missing the picture if you’re actually adding muscle at the same time you’re losing fat. I’m not going to get into questions of whether you can add muscle at the same time you’re losing fat (the answer is maybe), but I am going to say that a scale is generally going to give you good results from a tracking mechanism. I will also say that most people who use this phrase are trying to sugarcoat the issue. For most people, the number on the scale needs to be going down, because you’re overweight. Period.

Combining a scale with body fat testing is going to be an excellent means of accuracy, because it will put context (body fat composition) behind content (your weight). The ultimate goal is losing body fat while gaining muscle, and you need to do both to get a good physique.

You should weigh yourself each day. Tracking body fat is a little more involved process, but is not that inconvenient, because you can do the calculations involved using free online calculators. Therefore I’d say once or twice a month is fine there, as body fat doesn’t change that fast. You should enter both of these numbers in your calorie tracker.

Principle 4: You Can’t Workout Enough to Counter a Bad Diet

One of the most harmful fallacies in fitness is the assumption that you can workout more to counter a bad diet. This is false. If you’re eating and drinking like a pig, you’re going to look like a pig, no matter what. Working out more will likely lead to overuse injuries, and you’ll be even worse than when you started.

There are many people who are “in shape” (from a lifting and even a cardio perspective) who simply look terrible. This is especially true in CrossFit, where you’ll often see people with excessive amounts of body fat doing extremely well in WODs. Success in CrossFit WODs is not directly correlated to physique. You need to dial in the diet to look good.

What about building muscle? Yes it’s true that eating more than your maintenance level of calories is necessary to add muscle. However, if you look at successful bodybuilders throughout time, their approach to overeating to gain muscle is still very disciplined, involving proper proportions of macros (protein, carbs, and fats). They’re not just binge eating donuts and drinking beer all day.

In addition, I’d say most men I come across need to work on reducing body fat before they worry about building muscle. For beginners or men who haven’t lifted in a while, the good news is that you’ll likely build strength and (some) muscle at first even if you’re in a caloric deficit as long as you eat enough protein (more on that later).

Principle 5: Eat Your Desired Body Weight Times 15 in Calories

OK, you’re tracking calories. You’re weighing yourself each day and tracking your bodyfat once a week. How much should you eat each day? Here’s a good rule of thumb. Take your desired body weight, and multiple by 15. That’s the number of calorie grams you should eat each day. Say you’re currently 220 pounds, and you want to get down to 190. Take 190, and multiply by 15, to come up with 2,850 calories. That’s a good starting point for getting down to 190.

What we’re doing with this method is having you eat at the proper maintenance weight for 190 pounds. That’s less than your maintenance weight for 220, and you’ll lose weight as a result. The reason is that your eating the proper amount for a 190 pound man, so you’ll eventually weigh 190 pounds.

Note that this assumes you’re working out 4-5 times a week lifting weights for an hour a day. If you’re not working out at all, the proper amount of calories is more like 12 times your desired bodyweight. Fill in the gaps using 13-14 times if you’re working out less than I described above.

A word of caution here. I wouldn’t go below a 30 pound weight drop using this method immediately. So in our example above, imagine if your starting weight was 290, rather than 220. I would suggest finding your maintenance calories for 260 lbs, which is 3900 calories, and start there. The main factor is comfort with your current level of calories, so you may find you can trim calories even before you hit 260 lbs, but be careful, because it’s easy to trim calories so much that you crash and blow your diet. Then when you hit 260, go ahead and lower your maintenance calories to 230 (3,450 calories). Continue the process until you reach your desired weight.

If you’re trying to cut massive amounts of weight, it’s tempting to go super low in calories. If you’re at the very beginning of your weight loss journey, it’s certainly possible to eat a super low amount of calories for a while, say 2-3 months. However, it’s tough to do that for very long. If you’re cutting calories and you want to jump start by going lower than my 30 pound rule, fine. In the summer I drop to as low as 2100 calories, which is more appropriate for a 140 pound person, and do just fine. But if you find yourself slipping, adjust immediately so you don’t fall off the wagon.

By the same token, if you’re trying to gain muscle, you need to increase your calorie intake. Generally, I’m shooting for 180 pounds (2,700 calories) in the spring and summer and 195 pounds (2,925 calories) in the fall and winter, although I frankly drop down as low as 2100 calories (equivalent of 140 lbs) when I’m cutting for jiu jitsu tournaments. I also go up to 3500 calories (233.33 pounds) for November and December when I’m really trying to build strength and muscle.

This is all a starting point, not a hard and fast rule, you may find you have a slower metabolism, especially if you’re older, and need to eat only 14 times your desired body weight in order to see results. On the other hand, you may need to eat 16 times or else you see weight and strength fall off too fast. Start with 15 times your desired body weight in calorie grams, and go from there.

Another thought here. Sometimes it’s nice to have one day of the week where you eat more calories than normal. This is especially true of low carb diets, where it’s good to take 1 day and eat about 20% more in calories (all coming from carbs) to refuel. Therefore I like to think of the calorie count as an average weekly total. This means you eat 20% (or whatever you’re comfortable with) on one day, and eat slightly less on the other 6 to compensate. This works really well for me personally, especially in the spring and summer months when I’m looking to cut some fat.

Principle 6: Eat Your Bodyweight in Grams of Protein

Once you’ve figured out the number of calories you should eat each day, the next step is to make sure you eat at least your actual body weight in grams of protein each day. Failure to do this will prevent you from (a) gaining muscle if you’re trying to get bigger or (b) keeping muscle if you’re trying to lose fat. It’s a big no-no, so make sure you don’t violate this rule, or you’ll end up looking skinny fat, even if you’re eating the correct amount of calories.

Protein can come from a number of sources, but the best way to get to your body weight in protein grams is lean meat and eggs. Meat like lean pork and chicken are great for this purpose. Steak is my personal favorite choice, because I feel like it boosts my testosterone and energy levels the best out of all the possible choices. The challenge with steak is that if you eat too fatty a cut, it’s tough to keep under your calorie count for the day. I prefer round steak for breakfast and lunch, with a bit tastier cut, like top sirloin, for dinner. When I’m trying to gain muscle, the fattier cuts like ribeyes and new york strips are my preference.

Canned tuna is extremely convenient for storage purposes. This had been a bodybuilder staple for years for this reason. Canned chicken and salmon work well too. Eggs (preferably pasture raised) should be an everyday occurrence as well. If the fat content of the eggs is too much for your diet plan and calorie count, use the whites only, which are pure protein.

I find it’s very difficult to get enough protein without a protein shake supplement. Getting 30-50 grams of protein in one shake once or twice a day makes hitting that bodyweight number of protein grams infinitely easier. That’s why protein shakes have been so popular among bodybuilders for decades. It’s difficult to recommend a specific protein powder, because it’s such a personal choice as to what works well for individual people. I personally use GNC Wheybolic. While I’m sure there’s better scientific formulas out there, Wheybolic is just about the only one (I’ve tried almost all) that doesn’t upset my stomach. Therefore it’s the choice for me.

What I can say about protein powders is that I would recommend straight protein, rather than one with too many additional calories coming from fat and carbs. While it’s the total number of calories that count, I find it infinitely easier to keep my hunger in check, especially when cutting fat, if I avoid processed carbs and fats. My point is that whatever calories come from carbs and fat in protein powders or meal replacement shakes are empty, and will not fill you up like real food. For me, literally the only value of the shake over real food is that it’s a quick and easy way of hitting my protein numbers. In addition, many meal replacement shakes have added sugar, the emptiest calories of them all, which you want to avoid like the plague.

Whatever form you choose, it’s crucial to your physique that you hit that magic body weight in grams of protein (or even more) every day. This will allow you to get stronger and build muscle while helping you keep off fat.

Principle 7: Choose a Macronutrient Count That Works for You

I want you to finish this Principle 7, and then go back and read 5,6, and 7 together because they form the basis of choosing a meal plan that will work for you. Here it is in a nutshell:

Eat your bodyweight times 15 in total grams of calories (total calorie count);
Eat your bodyweight number of grams of protein (minimum protein total): and
With respect to carbs and fats, choose the combo that works for you based on the previous two principles.

You may have noticed that there’s a million and one books out there on diets. Atkins, South Beach, Zone, Carnivore, Vegan, just to name a few. They all follow a basic principle I’ve outlined in the Golden Rule of Eating above, eat less calories than you burn. You can follow that rule using any diet. The real question is which one works best for you.

Many of these diets say they’re the best because of the macronutrients you’re taking in, or the vitamins you’re getting. But you can supplement macros (protein) and use vitamins in any of these diets to achieve the same goal of eating less calories than you burn.

You can also follow my protein rule above with any of these diets. It’s probably harder with the vegan option, but there’s vegan bodybuilders out there, so don’t think you can’t possibly do it even if you’re eating no animal products.

The main question I consider for diet choice is which diet helps me achieve my physique goals at any given time. When I’m trying to cut fat, I find that a low carb diet consisting mainly of meat, eggs, and veggies works best. Thinking through that, this type of diet, with fat and protein as the main macronutrients, is typically going to be the most satiating for anyone. Most people are likely to stick to the 15 times your desired body weight principle using this method because they feel full. That’s not true for everyone, and maybe you’re the type that will be able to stick to a reduced calorie count using the Zone Method, which is basically 40% carbs and 30% each protein and fats. Everyone’s different.

When I’m trying to add muscle, I add carbs. Protein and fat content basically stays the same, and I add carbs to increase my muscle building capacity. Most bodybuilding coaches will follow the logic that you need carbs to increase muscle and strength. However, everyone’s different. A lot of beginners find that they can add muscle and strength with a low-carb or even keto diet just fine. That probably will tail off over time, but it’s worth experimenting. Just remember that you need to stay under 15 times your desired body weight in calories, and you need to get enough protein. Beyond that, do what works for you.

Principle 8: A Simple Diet is the Best Diet

The famous Vince Gironda, bodybuilding coach to some of the best all-time (and a fantastic bodybuilder himself), used to extoll the virtues of a steak and egg only diet. He claimed to have once gone on such a diet for 10 months, leading to him looking his best ever. Why such a simplistic diet?

Well, one reason is that simplicity is extremely easy to manage. This is especially true when you’re tracking calories. It’s extremely easy to count the number of eggs you eat and weigh a steak on a simple kitchen scale. This will take about 10 seconds to enter into your app.

As you get more complex with your diet, and add more and more foods, your life will become more difficult. Your salad with goat cheese, nuts, strawberries and tomatoes is a lot harder to track than a spring mix, carrot, and balsamic salad. Your acai bowl with 15 superfoods is a lot harder to track than a 8 oz. chicken breast with a side of a ½ cup of brown rice.

Simplicity will make sticking to a calorie count, and tracking that count accurately infinitely more likely. It’s much easier to get accurate weight measurements with less food. A breakfast of bacon and eggs is simple. 4 eggs and 3 strips of bacon. When you go with avocado toast with a fruit medley…more difficult.

Simple also generally works best in terms of nutrition and avoiding excess calories. This is true especially in potential trap foods like salads, smoothies, and bowls, foods that have a healthy reputation, but can often contain significant excess calories. It’s also easier to avoid processed foods with a simple diet, which is an important part of reducing hunger.

Eating simple will also help you when you’re eating out. It’s often really hard to determine how much of each ingredient is in complex dishes, not to mention if any oils and butters were used. It’s a lot easier to eat a steak with a side of asparagus or green beans. You can then easily add a tablespoon of olive oil or butter if that was used in the preparation of the dish.

All and all, it’s best for your diet that you stick with simple and easy for your diet. This will give you the best chance of sticking with your calorie tracking system, which is the key to ensuring you’re eating properly in order to lose fat and keep muscle.

Principle 9: No Processed Foods

Piggybacking on Principle No. 8., which was keeping it simple, I want to add that you should avoid processed foods at all costs. There’s two main reasons here, one long-term and one-short term. In the long-term, processed foods will lead to a number of health issues. In the short-term, processed foods will increase hunger and increase your chances for blowing your diet.

Long-term, processed foods will cause health problems when eaten frequently. Look at America in general, stuffing it’s collective face with fast food, packaged crap, and look at the general trend of health compared to 100 years ago. Terrible. To pretend that it’s not directly related to processed foods is crazy. As a result, we’re overweight and have terrible diseases and afflictions that were non-existent 100 years ago.

Processed foods, regardless of the content, and not as filling as their natural equivalent. Eating a breakfast hot pocket will not fill you up like bacon and eggs. Eating chicken nuggets from McDonalds is not the same as eating chicken breast. Eating candy is not the same as eating fruit. It is simply much easier to stay under your calorie count if you eat natural food, specifically meat, eggs, fruit, and vegetables. Anything else will give you problems in terms of sticking to the calorie count that will get you to the physique and weight you want.

Realistically, I have to loosen this standard sometimes, especially when traveling. When I’m on the road and can’t cook myself, I’ll make use of (a) protein bars; (b) deli meat and cheese; and (c) fast food sandwiches (never with fries and a soft drink) to meet my caloric goals easily. But this is just temporary for convenience, cost, and necessity and ends when I get home.

Even with regular foods, like meat, eggs, fruit, and vegetables you can get a certain amount of processing. This is especially true with things like bacon, which can be loaded with nitrates. I personally have found that natural meat, without processed antibiotics, generally works best for me, as does pasture raised chicken eggs. I’m a little less stringent on the need for organic fruit and vegetables, as I believe that a lot of large farms are able to qualify for organic status because of their scale, without necessarily being healthier in fact. Likewise, many small forms are “organic” as all getup, but are unable to qualify for the certification necessary to claim this status. In general, most fruit and vegetables, when washed, are just fine for consumption in my opinion.

Principle 10: Carbs Can Be Good and Bad

Keto diets, which is basically an extremely limited carb diet with less than 50 grams of carbs eaten per day, have become all the rage lately. In reality, the diet has been around forever in various forms, such as the Atkins diet. Vince Gironda’s meat and eggs diet is a keto-style diet as well, although Vince wasn’t concerned with the state of ketosis, considering he suggested a carb refeed every 7-10 days (depending on whose account of this diet you read).

I do keto diets for long stretches at a time, with a carb refeed every 7 days. I find this helps me drop fat very efficiently while not losing muscle and strength. However, I really feel that the benefit, rather than ketosis (burning fat rather than carbs), is that it helps me hit a low calorie count while not getting hunger urges. It’s that simple for me.

You may find this is the case, or you may find that you do just fine with a 40% carb/30% protein/ 30% fat type diet. Everyone’s different, and you should experiment with what works for you. My main point in this section is that there’s little practical experience that suggests that keto is a magic pill (in and of itself) for every single person from a weight and physique perspective. Note that there is some evidence of other health benefits, especially as it relates to easing certain health problems, but that’s beyond the scope of this article. Again, you need to find the diet that makes you most likely to follow your correct calorie count.

I will say that personally I have a hard time getting stronger and building muscle while going low carb. In the winter, when I usually do a more strength and muscle growth oriented routine (i.e. 5 sets of 5, german volume training, etc.) I will up my calorie intake, and almost all of these increased calories are going to come from carbs. You may find this is the case for you as well.

Summary

Proper nutrition is not rocket science. I’m sure there’s not a ton I’ve written above that’s that enlightening to you. The fact is, everyone “knows” what they need to do…eat less calories than they burn. The problem is putting it into practice. Following the principles above, all 10 of them, will give you the best shot of actually following through with what you already know is the proper way to eat. Now you’ve just got to go out and do it!

One Kettlebell Workout

The One-KB Workout

We’re going to think in terms of time here, rather than reps. In fact, I’m not even going to list reps, but obviously the longer you’re “on” for each set, the more reps you’ll do. When you start, you’ll do 20 seconds on with each exercise, followed by 40 seconds off. As time goes on, you’ll increase the amount of time you’re “on” with each exercise by increasing either (a) the reps or (b) the time under tension. TYou should perform this workout for 12 total weeks, 4 times per week, and by the end you should be able to hit 40 seconds on and 20 seconds off for each exercise.

Here’s the workout:

Warmup 25 jumping jacks.

Cluster 1

Kettlebell Swings

Pushups (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Kettlebell Swings

Pushups (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Cluster 2

Kettlebell Presses Right Arm (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Goblet Lunges Right Leg (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Kettlebell Presses Left Arm (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Goblet Lunges Left Leg (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Cluster 3

Goblet Squats Goblet Lunges Right (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Lying KB Bench Press Right Goblet Lunges Right (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Goblet Squats Goblet Lunges Right (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Lying KB Bench Press Left Goblet Lunges Right (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Cluster 4

Get-up Right (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Bent Over Row Right Arm (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Get-up Left (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Bent Over Row Left Arm (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Cluster 5

KB Clean Right (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

One Leg KB Deadlift Right (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

KB Clean Left (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

One Leg KB Deadlift Left (2 seconds down, 2 seconds up)

Super Eights Program

Super Eights Program

Program Notes

Overview: This program is designed as a fast paced program to lose body fat while keeping your existing muscle and strength. You should combine this with a caloric deficit so you can burn fat, however, you should be careful to eat enough protein (your body-weight in grams minimum) so you still look good when you drop the pounds. This is perfect for early spring so you look good with the shirt off in the summer months.

This program is based around super-sets with three exercises in each superset (except for leg day). You should be going a little lighter on your first set and progressively working up to your final set being at a weight where you struggle to get all the reps (or even miss one and need assistance from your spotter).

The general pace of your lifting is 2x1x1, meaning 2 seconds down, hold for one second at the bottom, and two seconds going up. This means that each set should take approximately 40 seconds. You should complete all three exercises back-to-back, and take a 1 minute break between super-sets.

Day 1 Chest, Back, and Abs

SuperSet 1

Bench Press 4×8 2x1x2
Pull-ups 4×8 2x1x2
Band Crunches 4×12 2x1x2

Superset 2

Band Dips 4×8 2x1x2
Deadlift 4×8 2x1x2
Band Reverse Crunch 4×12 2x1x2

Superset 3

Slow Decline Pushups 4×8 2x1x2
Barbell Rows 4×8 2x1x2
Band Twists 4×12 2x1x2

Day 2 Shoulders, Calves, and Abs

Superset 1

Seated Military Press 4×8 2x1x2
Barbell Calf Raises 4×8 2x1x2
Banded Ab Pulldowns 4×12 2x1x2

Superset 2

Lateral Raises 4×8 2x1x2
Seated Band Calf Extensions 4×8 2x1x2
Band Side Bends 4×12 2x1x2 (each side)

Superset 3

Standing Press 4×8 2x1x2
One Legged Band Calf Raise 4×8 2x1x2 (each side)
High to Low Band Chops 4×12 2x1x2 (each side)

Day 3 Arms and Abs

Superset 1

EZ Bar Curls 4×8 2x1x2
Triangle Pushups 4×8 2x1x2
Weighted Crunches 4×12 2x1x2

Superset 2

Dumbbell Curls 4×8 2x1x2
Skullcrushers 4×8 2x1x2
Weighted Russian Twists 4×12 2x1x2 (each side)

Superset 3

Barbell Curls 4×8 2x1x2
Banded Tricep Pulldowns 4×8 2x1x2
Weighted Leg Raises 4×12 2x1x2

Day 4 Legs and Abs

Superset 1

Squats 4×8 2x1x2

Superset 2

Barbell Bugarian Split Squat 4×8 2x1x2 (left leg forward)
Banded Leg Curl 4×8 2x1x2
Barbell Bugarian Split Squat 4×8 2x1x2 (right leg forward)
Banded Leg Extension 4×8 2x1x2

Superset 3

Dumbbell Step Ups 4×8 2x1x2
Jumping Goblet Squats 4×8 2x1xjump

Crazy 8’s 02052022

8 sets of 8 each Every Minute on the Minute

Go lower weight on 1st 2 sets. All of these weights should be lighter than you think, really focus on the muscle contraction rather than just going through the motions of the exercise.

Each exercise takes 8 minutes. It’s OK when switching between exercises if you don’t quite make the “on-the-minute” bell, since you’re going light with your first set or two anyway.

Incline Press 2-1-2

Pull-ups 2-1-2 (go to negatives if you fail)

Push-ups 2-1-2 (on a bench or knees if you fail)

Goblet Squats 2-1-2

Shoulder Press 2-1-2

Worry About Yourself

It’s interesting to see how concerned we tend to be about the actions of others. We comment on the actions of others on social media, gossip about the actions of others to our friends, and consume media commenting on the actions of others (particularly politicians, athletes, and celebrities). We think we have all the answers and espouse political philosophies with comments about the way the world ought to be.

One would assume that we do so because we are perfect, but that’s really not the case, is it? The fact is that we all have significant sins and shortcomings that demand our attention. But isn’t it so easy to ignore our own faults, and focus instead on the supposed malfeasance of others and the world-at-large?

This external focus is better known as your opinion. Your opinion covers two broad areas, let’s call them micro (focus on the actions of a single person or small group of persons) and macro (political opinions). We tend to express our opinion in a variety of manners, and social media platforms have made it easier and more socially acceptable to express our opinion.

Micro Opinions: Critiquing Others Behind Their Back

People express their micro opinions in the form of critiques of other persons. A very rare, but extremely respectable version of this, is to go to a person and directly criticize them, assuming your critique is legitimate. Jesus actually does this a lot. He’s got the guts to call out sin and hypocrisy and do it right to people’s faces. We could all stand to follow his example, because if the fault of the other is so pronounced we need to say something to their face, it’s probably worth saying. “If your brother sins, rebuke him, if he repents, forgive him” (Luke 17:3). Pretty simple stuff.

But we don’t do that, do we? In reality, we generally talk behind the backs of others. When we talk behind people’s backs, we tend to get REALLY brave with our opinions. We also say things that are pretty stupid in the big scheme of things. Again, if you had to say it to someone’s face, it’d probably be a pretty big deal, right? A major problem with talking behind people’s backs is that it gives us the ability NOT to address issues that truly affect society. After all, if the person you’re talking about is truly sinning, how can they repent and become a better person dauntless you say it to their face? Content to gossip, we don’t address wrong behavior head-on. Adopt a policy of refusing to say anything you’d be uncomfortable saying to a person’s face. The world would be a lot better place if we all did that. Instead, make a conscious effort to address real problems with the people in your life, with compassion and love. Better is open rebuke than hidden love. Proverbs 27:5. If you can’t say it to their face, don’t say it.

Online micro opinions are EXTREMELY interesting, because it almost acts in reverse of talking behind someone’s back. In fact, you will actually say things online to someone that you would NEVER say to them in person. It’s odd, to say the least. Sometimes you’ll even say this stuff to one of their actual friends, or at least someone from their local community.

What’s incredible is that someone will post a seemingly innocuous question, and instead of answering the questions, other people will criticize the poster for some unrelated reason. You could ask “where’s a good vet for my labrador retriever”, and without fail someone will respond “I can’t believe you would buy a full-bred dog rather than go to the pound and adopt”. It’s incredible to me that the poster of such a reply wouldn’t think to themself (a) should I post this; and (b) should ANYONE care what I have to say.

Let me focus on what I mean by should anyone care about what you have to say. Jesus says the following:

Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? 4Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when there is the log in your own eye? 5You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye. (Matthew 7:3-5)

This is some very powerful advice about your opinions. Before you concern yourself with others, take care of your own problems.

How much do you focus your attention on the faults of others and ignore your own? More to the point, what are you doing about your own problems? Are you independent, or are you a burden on your parents or society? Are you adding value as an employee, or are you constantly lazy and expendable, stealing time from your employer by consuming social media instead of working? Are you a good husband, or if unmarried someone a worthy woman would consider marriage-material? Or are you too busy playing video games and watching porn to add any generational value to society?

The point here is to limit your critiques of others, and focus on yourself. Let your actions speak, rather than your words. Everytime you’re critical of others, you may think you’re winning, but you’re not. First off, this takes your focus off your own faults and sins, because it allows you to focus on others. Some readers may be too young to remember the Jerry Springer show, but it had a fascinating allure to watchers. Mr. Springer would have oddball losers on his show, with massive self-destructive lifestyles. Cheating spouses/significant others were his bread and butter. The show was wildly popular. The reason people watched the show, it turned out, was because watching stories about these losers made them feel better about their own lives. Any focus on the shortcomings of others removes the focus from where it belongs, on you. Don’t let that happen.

Again, a good barometer of whether you should espouse a micro-opinion is whether you’re willing to confront and address the sins of the other person to their face. If this is not the case, you should keep your opinion to yourself. Gossip is harmful to society, and it drags you down as well. Worry about yourself, and be very careful about espousing your opinions on the actions of others, especially if you’re not willing to do it to their face.

Macro-Opinions

On to political opinions, which are what I’d classify as “macro-opinions”. Social media has become the great equalizer, allowing anyone to post on political matters. You can post your opinions to generate responses, and also respond to the posts of others. Your opinions can be in the form of ultra-short thoughts that don’t even have to be coherent. There’s no barrier to entry, as there was in the past, of requiring you to go through the effort to write a book, develop a radio or television talk show (and generate sponsorship revenue), have a reputation (and earning potential) worthy of a newspaper column, etc. You, Joe Nobody, can enter the fray with your political opinions.

My commentary here has two components. I’m going to focus on social media posts, but these thoughts apply to your interactions with individuals and groups as well. First, obviously, you should follow the same general thought process described above when thinking about posting ANYTHING political on social media: (a) should I post this and (b) should ANYONE care. Another component would be when you decide to address someone else’s political opinion. Your thought process here should be: (a) should I care; (b) will I influence or change anyone’s mind; and (b) is there ANY value to what I’m about to post.

My point in this article is that you SHOULD be asking yourself these prior to putting forth your opinion, either in person or online. If you truly thought through these questions, you would likely behave completely differently. You would likely come to the conclusion that NO ONE should care about your micro or macro opinions. As such, there’s absolutely no value to you or I engaging in personal or online discussions about our opinions. Your online behavior should change significantly based on that thought process.

This is particularly true given the transition of online fights to “mostly-peaceful” protests over the course of the last year. Every night on a variety of news sources, you can see young men talking about “fights” for a variety of social issues. They protest this, that, and the other thing. They battle against supposed foes on the opposite end of their political spectrum.

Yet I wonder how many of these young men are financially independent, goal oriented, and looking to add value to society? How many are ready (or becoming ready) to lead a family and raise healthy, Godly kids. Not very many, judging by their sloppy appearance, sophomoric language, and aggressive tone. The truth is we are all sinners who could stand a little humility and internal focus. Again, before you complain about the speck in our neighbor’s eye we should pull the log out of your own.

A much better way to make your opinions felt is through your actions. You should earn the respect of others through your life, legacy and integrity. You should only be giving your macro opinions when directly asked, rather than do so unsolicited. You will advance your cause much more by first warranting the respect and admiration of those around you prior to espousing anything. Also, political opinions are very similar to gossip when thrown online through social media, as opposed to discussed openly, to the other person’s face. People say things online that they would NEVER say directly to the face of another person. That should clue you in that online political conversations are toxic and should never be engaged in. Say what you have to say when directly asked, in person. This is the only way you will ever have any positive output regarding your macro-opinions on politics.

Summary

To break it down, here’s a few rules when thinking about how to express your micro or macro opinions:

Say what you’ve got to say to the person, not to others or online.
Think about whether ANYONE should care what you have to say?
Worry about yourself and your own actions first.

Pretty simple stuff.

Kettlebell Workout 10/9/2021

WARMUP (10 minutes)

20 Jumping Jax

10 Air Squat Hamstring Stretches

10 PushDogs

Lunge Knee Circles (10 each way)

10 Rollover V Sits

Dirty Dogs (10 each way each leg)

Windmills (10 Each Direction)

Cossack Squats (10 each way)

5 Sets of Goblet Squat Complex (5 minutes)
5 Goblet Squats (take 10 seconds with each)
3-5 Standing Presses Per Arm

Two Arm Swings
20 seconds on 10 seconds off for 5 minutes

Elbow Prop Bench Press
5 sets of 3-8 each arm
Switch every 30 seconds for 5 minutes

One Arm Snatches
Up to 10 snatches per arm
Switch arms every 30 seconds for 5 minutes

KB Rows
20 seconds on 10 seconds off
Switch Hands for 5 minutes total

One Arm Clean and Press (Jerk)
Up to 8 cleans per arm
Switch arms every 30 seconds for 5 minutes

Lunges
Up to 10 Per Side
Switch sides for 5 minutes total
(Start in Goblet, Go to Suitcase carry, no KB if necessary)

One Arm Swings
10-15 swings per arms
Switch arms every 30 seconds for 5 minutes

Goblet Squat Holds
20 seconds on 10 seconds off for 5 minutes
Go to back squat rack when you fail
Drop KB when you fail that and do air

Pushups
20 Seconds on 40 Seconds Off