Hello friends. 👋

It’s been awhile since I’ve written anything. A couple of major things happened this past year: we had a baby, we bought a house, and I built a home gym in my basement. All great things, but needless to say the newsletter definitely took a backseat.

I put on some considerable muscle using Mike Mentzer’s High Intensity Training principles but I’m now looking to pull back a bit and focus on my big lifts. Years of traditional hypertrophy training has allowed me to build up some strength and size, but my mobility and compound lifts aren’t quite where I want them to be. I’m making some solid improvement in this category already, and I’ll share the results and strategies as I learn more.

In the meantime, here’s some fun stuff from the past months.

The Rower is King

For those of you who have worked out at a Crossfit gym or at a HIIT-style gym like Orange Theory, you might be well acquainted with the Concept2 RowErg. I had only used a rower as a “finisher” to my big lifts on days when I didn’t want to exhaust my legs running or cycling.

When we had the baby I knew I wasn’t going to be leaving the house to run during nap time, so I opted into buying a Concept2 instead of a treadmill. Our basement hadn’t been waterproofed yet (it is now, so expect some treadmill content soon) so I didn’t want to put anything electric into the space.

The Concept2 RowErg met all of my needs. It’s not cheap, coming in at about $1,000 after taxes and shipping, but compared to the cost of other at-home cardio equipment it’s a steal. These things last forever, have amazing build quality, and allow you to get a great workout in at half the speed of other equipment. It’s also battery operated so feel free to put this thing in your basement or garage without having to worry about damage from the elements.

I’m excited to get back into running soon, but until then I find myself wanting to hop on the rowing machine more than I want to lace up my running shoes.

The Tasty Pastry

I love buying “healthy” snacks. Yes, it would be more cost effective to just take a protein shake, but it would also be 100% less fun than eating something that tastes like dessert and gives me the macros I need.

The Tasty Pastry from Legendary Foods is one of the best tasting diet treats I’ve found. The macros are amazing at only 180 calories, 5 net carbs, and 20g of protein. For something that tastes like a Pop Tart and is more nutritious than a protein bar you can’t go wrong.

These things are pricey, so don’t go wild thinking you will eat these for every snack, but it’s a great alternative when you want a quick breakfast and are craving something to go with coffee.

Juggernaut AI

This past couple of months I have been balancing a pretty intense rowing plan with strength training. A couple of weeks ago I decided to try out JuggernautAI to do a bit of “powerbuilding” to build strength as well as mass.

So far, I’m loving the experience. I train four days a week using their app and it guides me through the program using RPE (Rate of Perceived Exertion) and RIR (Reps in Reserve) to ensure I’m pushing myself at the appropriate levels.

The combination of accountability through progress metrics and the smart programming that it provides is well worth the $35 a month. If you have a home gym or have a gym membership it’s a no brainer. Compared to a specialized powerlifting or Crossfit gym membership you can easily get the job done with something like this for much less.

Community Update

I mentioned previously that I was toying with the idea of creating a Discord or Slack to build an online community of folks who are training together and hitting their goals. I’m still planning on launching this! The tentative launch date is mid July.

It will most likely be free, but the community programming will be paid. If you’re interested, reach out and let me know! Would love to hear what you would want out of something like this.

Thanks for reading. 👊