I understand it’s a joke but I wanted to throw some other numbers out there for people to consider, since resistance training can massively improve your quality of life and it’s very common for people to believe it needs to be a full time job to see results. For disclosure, I am a trainer but don’t offer services via lemmy
But you can get head-turning, people-ask-you-questions-unprompted levels of muscular with <5 hours a week in the gym. And that’s the full time commitment for what I’d called a “serious trainee”, any more than that is mainly for people who simply love training as a form of recreation and actively want to spend more time lifting.
Most of my clients do 2.5 hours a week and still get great visual results, albeit more slowly. More importantly, you cash in on quality of life benefits with shockingly little weekly commitment. Even one session per week is enough to feel huge improvements in energy and endurance during day to day tasks, improve your metabolic health, improve your bone health, improve your mental health, as well as experience the whole cascade of improved injury outcomes (for example resistance trained individuals are less likely to fall, less likely to be injured if they do fall, and are more likely to make a full recovery if they do get injured).
It’s extremely worth starting, for all ages and genders. Again, apologies for being overly serious under a joke. I like to leave little comments like this under popular gym posts because it occasionally results in someone beginning or returning to training
Having an progressive program tailored to one’s goals is key.
In the first 6 months of going to the gym I wasn’t seeing a lot of results. It was certainly better than nothing; I was learning the exercises, developing the base level strength to handle beginner weight levels… But where were these newbie gains everyone was talking about?
It wasn’t until I got on a good plan that I started making noticable leaps in strength. A year in, I decided to add in some cardio (just a 2 mile run) and suddenly I started blowing up.
When I finally got my routine optimized I could be in and out of the gym in an hour. 3 times a week, that was it. If I was tight on time, I would simply do my run on my off days.
So daily investment of 30 to 45 minutes.
You can buy a cheap weight bench and you won’t even have to go to the gym. Hell, you can buy a cheap rack, too, like I did and do every exercise in your home for free.
You can accidentally lose 45 minutes just zoned out on the couch flipping through channels, so time-wise, it’s about the best ROI you could ever make.
Find a locally owned gym. Ask what their policy is on day passes, month to month, contracts, etc. The cost will be a bit higher than Planet Fitness, but they probably won’t screw you, and the community tends to be way better.
Also, if you want to get fit, I highly recommend finding a gym that is either “fun” or offers classes. Rock climbing, gymnastics/acrobatics, martial arts, etc tend to be more fun and engaging than showing up 3 days a week to do 3 sets of 8, and if your goal is to just generally get fit and healthy. For that matter, there are also often groups meeting up all over cities for free or cheap to run, cycle, walk, boat, play sports, etc. And if you’re really dedicated to some kind of lifting, having a time and place to show up, where you know you will see friendly faces trying hard together is far more likely to keep you consistent. This is why crossfitters are often ripped, despite crossfit being a dumb training philosophy - it got the fundamentals right: get people to show up consistently and try hard by making a welcoming community that gathers at a regular time and place. Often powerlifting, oly lifting, kettlebell, strongman, and off-brand/crossfit-style gyms will offer regular classes where people train together for this very reason.
Definitely, and actually you would be surprised. A lot of places introduced no-contract memberships after covid. Lots of places went out of business too, then all that equipment went up for sale for cheap and lots of new places ended up opening.
But the main thing to look for is small, privately owned gyms. I can really only speak to my area, but I have several. The most common arrangement is simply that you pay monthly, can cancel any time you want, but every time you sign up again there’s a sign-up fee. One other place I know simply charges an extra $10 per month for a no-commitment membership.
Keep an eye out, again for smaller privately owned commercial gyms in general, but also for specialized gyms such as those that cater to powerlifting, olympic lifting, or strongman. Usually they are lacking in “amenities” that drive the price up, and are less likely to have predatory subscription schemes in general. The only downside is that these places can seem very intimidating at first, but the community is likely to be very welcoming
As a sweeping generalization, this is only a problem with chain gyms.
If you need a solid litmus test though, call them during core hours and ask for a quick tour. Nearly all indie gyms will let you pay for a day pass or similar if you’re new (though that isn’t always part of their posted rates). If they won’t let you test the waters without signing up for recurring payment, it’s not a gym worth going to.
Joint health, bone density, and strength/muscle mass are things you will miss out on if, say, you just play ultimate frisbee. But getting stronger doesnt have to be 3 sets of 8 on bench. You can get essentially the same health benefits by engaging in sports that train strength, like martial arts, acrobatics, or rock climbing. That said, many people who do any kind of physical activity aggressively typically find that they enjoy lifting at some point in their athletic careers, as lifting itself can improve athletic performance and ward off sports injuries, due to the controlled and progressive nature of gym work, as compared to the more chaotic nature of real-world activities.
Its about control. Being active is great overall but could leave some weak spots or even be wearing things out. Certain muscles might not get worked quite right or to their full range of movement. Working out with good technique and variety should hit all your muscles and identify any tight or painful spots you need to work on.
If you’re after results, like increased strength, endurance, or a better physique, then thats where training comes in. You have to push to near failure to demand muscle growth. If you start biking 5 miles a day, those first few weeks and months you might grow a bit, but eventually that 5 miles won’t be as challenging and you’ll plateau in terms of strength and endurance. Thats where training, either training the muscles or doing more cycling, really starts to work. Thats how you grow and start improving again.
So “general activity” I can only assume is stuff like going on walks and hikes, playing sports, enjoying the outdoors, and so on. This will generally fall under the umbrella of cardiovascular exercise which is extremely good, and you should do
Resistance training is typically performed in much shorter bouts of intense activity. It’s very convenient in a gym, but you can do pretty much everything you need with the right setup (bench press is very similar to pushups, for example, which don’t require equipment.)
The biggest challenge outside of a gym is how to progress movements. For example, once you can do 50 pushups, how could you make it harder so that the movement would be appropriately challenging, and not take all day? And then another issue sometimes can be training the muscles of the back without equipment, typically done via pull-ups and rows.
But ultimately everything is doable! Check out the youtube channel “Hybrid Calisthenics”, he’s got a ton of excellent content aimed directly at this question. He also sells cheap gymnastics rings which handily solve the muscles-of-the-back problem, if you have somewhere to hang them from (even a tree!)
I mean, the limitation of calisthenics isnt the back, but the legs. Not to say there arent good leg exercises, but the legs are so strong that you have to get pretty creative pretty quickly if you want to keep progressing them.
The other thing I want to note is that a lot of people gravitate towards calisthenics because you can do it at home, and they feel uncomfortable in a gym, so they decide to try calisthenics rather than face their gym anxiety. And while this can work for some people, for most it will hamstring their progress since exercising alone at home is almost custom-designed to kill motivation and habit formation, and thus will stop people from staying consistent and getting the results they want. In addition, calisthenics progressions are often pretty big leaps, and it can be frustrating to be able to rep out 20 on one exercise, and then be shut down by the progression.
If you think that calisthenics is cool, or you dont have the money for a gym membership or equipment, or if there are no gyms around you, then go for it! But I would suggest you do your workouts somewhere other than at home (like at a local park) and that you try your best to meet up with others with a similar interest, as these are the things that will make the habit stick.
Honestly I would say consistency is somewhat overrated in the grand scheme of things
ALERT. ALERT. OVERRATED DOES NOT MEAN BAD
Consistency is obviously extremely good. I used to preach it. But honestly, I took on a client with severe intermittent health issues which results in them having about 50% adherence (meaning they miss, on average, about half their training sessions)
And they ended up progressing just fine lol
Actually I feel like a far bigger risk is for people to assume they need to have perfect consistency, then drop training altogether when they aren’t able to meet that high standard.
The critical thing to understand is that resistance training is EXTREMELY potent for beginners. Even inconsistent effort will do pretty amazing things for your health
What i really meant by consistency isn’t really being perfect anyway, it’s more about longevity, as in, being imperfect, but over a long period of time, ideally as long as you are capable.
I really appreciate all the info you’re giving! It’s really encouraging.
I was a high level athlete growing up, so my only previous example of what was “enough” is hard to live up to as an adult working in an office, but seeing as ive been going an average of 7-8 hours per week, that makes me feel a lot more confident that I am, in fact, doing enough.
I understand it’s a joke but I wanted to throw some other numbers out there for people to consider, since resistance training can massively improve your quality of life and it’s very common for people to believe it needs to be a full time job to see results. For disclosure, I am a trainer but don’t offer services via lemmy
But you can get head-turning, people-ask-you-questions-unprompted levels of muscular with <5 hours a week in the gym. And that’s the full time commitment for what I’d called a “serious trainee”, any more than that is mainly for people who simply love training as a form of recreation and actively want to spend more time lifting.
Most of my clients do 2.5 hours a week and still get great visual results, albeit more slowly. More importantly, you cash in on quality of life benefits with shockingly little weekly commitment. Even one session per week is enough to feel huge improvements in energy and endurance during day to day tasks, improve your metabolic health, improve your bone health, improve your mental health, as well as experience the whole cascade of improved injury outcomes (for example resistance trained individuals are less likely to fall, less likely to be injured if they do fall, and are more likely to make a full recovery if they do get injured).
It’s extremely worth starting, for all ages and genders. Again, apologies for being overly serious under a joke. I like to leave little comments like this under popular gym posts because it occasionally results in someone beginning or returning to training
Can confirm.
Having an progressive program tailored to one’s goals is key. In the first 6 months of going to the gym I wasn’t seeing a lot of results. It was certainly better than nothing; I was learning the exercises, developing the base level strength to handle beginner weight levels… But where were these newbie gains everyone was talking about?
It wasn’t until I got on a good plan that I started making noticable leaps in strength. A year in, I decided to add in some cardio (just a 2 mile run) and suddenly I started blowing up.
When I finally got my routine optimized I could be in and out of the gym in an hour. 3 times a week, that was it. If I was tight on time, I would simply do my run on my off days.
So daily investment of 30 to 45 minutes.
You can buy a cheap weight bench and you won’t even have to go to the gym. Hell, you can buy a cheap rack, too, like I did and do every exercise in your home for free.
You can accidentally lose 45 minutes just zoned out on the couch flipping through channels, so time-wise, it’s about the best ROI you could ever make.
I know there’s probably isn’t your area of expertise, but I don’t know where else to ask.
Are there any gym memberships out there that aren’t completely sketchy and impossible to cancel?
Find a locally owned gym. Ask what their policy is on day passes, month to month, contracts, etc. The cost will be a bit higher than Planet Fitness, but they probably won’t screw you, and the community tends to be way better.
Also, if you want to get fit, I highly recommend finding a gym that is either “fun” or offers classes. Rock climbing, gymnastics/acrobatics, martial arts, etc tend to be more fun and engaging than showing up 3 days a week to do 3 sets of 8, and if your goal is to just generally get fit and healthy. For that matter, there are also often groups meeting up all over cities for free or cheap to run, cycle, walk, boat, play sports, etc. And if you’re really dedicated to some kind of lifting, having a time and place to show up, where you know you will see friendly faces trying hard together is far more likely to keep you consistent. This is why crossfitters are often ripped, despite crossfit being a dumb training philosophy - it got the fundamentals right: get people to show up consistently and try hard by making a welcoming community that gathers at a regular time and place. Often powerlifting, oly lifting, kettlebell, strongman, and off-brand/crossfit-style gyms will offer regular classes where people train together for this very reason.
Definitely, and actually you would be surprised. A lot of places introduced no-contract memberships after covid. Lots of places went out of business too, then all that equipment went up for sale for cheap and lots of new places ended up opening.
But the main thing to look for is small, privately owned gyms. I can really only speak to my area, but I have several. The most common arrangement is simply that you pay monthly, can cancel any time you want, but every time you sign up again there’s a sign-up fee. One other place I know simply charges an extra $10 per month for a no-commitment membership.
Keep an eye out, again for smaller privately owned commercial gyms in general, but also for specialized gyms such as those that cater to powerlifting, olympic lifting, or strongman. Usually they are lacking in “amenities” that drive the price up, and are less likely to have predatory subscription schemes in general. The only downside is that these places can seem very intimidating at first, but the community is likely to be very welcoming
If you have a community center nearby, you can see if they have gym equipment. Those memberships should be simple to get and cancel.
As a sweeping generalization, this is only a problem with chain gyms.
If you need a solid litmus test though, call them during core hours and ask for a quick tour. Nearly all indie gyms will let you pay for a day pass or similar if you’re new (though that isn’t always part of their posted rates). If they won’t let you test the waters without signing up for recurring payment, it’s not a gym worth going to.
Does it have to be with the gym? Is there anything that generally being active doesn’t cover?
Joint health, bone density, and strength/muscle mass are things you will miss out on if, say, you just play ultimate frisbee. But getting stronger doesnt have to be 3 sets of 8 on bench. You can get essentially the same health benefits by engaging in sports that train strength, like martial arts, acrobatics, or rock climbing. That said, many people who do any kind of physical activity aggressively typically find that they enjoy lifting at some point in their athletic careers, as lifting itself can improve athletic performance and ward off sports injuries, due to the controlled and progressive nature of gym work, as compared to the more chaotic nature of real-world activities.
Its about control. Being active is great overall but could leave some weak spots or even be wearing things out. Certain muscles might not get worked quite right or to their full range of movement. Working out with good technique and variety should hit all your muscles and identify any tight or painful spots you need to work on.
If you’re after results, like increased strength, endurance, or a better physique, then thats where training comes in. You have to push to near failure to demand muscle growth. If you start biking 5 miles a day, those first few weeks and months you might grow a bit, but eventually that 5 miles won’t be as challenging and you’ll plateau in terms of strength and endurance. Thats where training, either training the muscles or doing more cycling, really starts to work. Thats how you grow and start improving again.
A commercial gym is not necessary!
So “general activity” I can only assume is stuff like going on walks and hikes, playing sports, enjoying the outdoors, and so on. This will generally fall under the umbrella of cardiovascular exercise which is extremely good, and you should do
Resistance training is typically performed in much shorter bouts of intense activity. It’s very convenient in a gym, but you can do pretty much everything you need with the right setup (bench press is very similar to pushups, for example, which don’t require equipment.)
The biggest challenge outside of a gym is how to progress movements. For example, once you can do 50 pushups, how could you make it harder so that the movement would be appropriately challenging, and not take all day? And then another issue sometimes can be training the muscles of the back without equipment, typically done via pull-ups and rows.
But ultimately everything is doable! Check out the youtube channel “Hybrid Calisthenics”, he’s got a ton of excellent content aimed directly at this question. He also sells cheap gymnastics rings which handily solve the muscles-of-the-back problem, if you have somewhere to hang them from (even a tree!)
I mean, the limitation of calisthenics isnt the back, but the legs. Not to say there arent good leg exercises, but the legs are so strong that you have to get pretty creative pretty quickly if you want to keep progressing them.
The other thing I want to note is that a lot of people gravitate towards calisthenics because you can do it at home, and they feel uncomfortable in a gym, so they decide to try calisthenics rather than face their gym anxiety. And while this can work for some people, for most it will hamstring their progress since exercising alone at home is almost custom-designed to kill motivation and habit formation, and thus will stop people from staying consistent and getting the results they want. In addition, calisthenics progressions are often pretty big leaps, and it can be frustrating to be able to rep out 20 on one exercise, and then be shut down by the progression.
If you think that calisthenics is cool, or you dont have the money for a gym membership or equipment, or if there are no gyms around you, then go for it! But I would suggest you do your workouts somewhere other than at home (like at a local park) and that you try your best to meet up with others with a similar interest, as these are the things that will make the habit stick.
So I guess the trick is, and has always been, consistency?
Honestly I would say consistency is somewhat overrated in the grand scheme of things
ALERT. ALERT. OVERRATED DOES NOT MEAN BAD
Consistency is obviously extremely good. I used to preach it. But honestly, I took on a client with severe intermittent health issues which results in them having about 50% adherence (meaning they miss, on average, about half their training sessions)
And they ended up progressing just fine lol
Actually I feel like a far bigger risk is for people to assume they need to have perfect consistency, then drop training altogether when they aren’t able to meet that high standard.
The critical thing to understand is that resistance training is EXTREMELY potent for beginners. Even inconsistent effort will do pretty amazing things for your health
What i really meant by consistency isn’t really being perfect anyway, it’s more about longevity, as in, being imperfect, but over a long period of time, ideally as long as you are capable.
I really appreciate all the info you’re giving! It’s really encouraging.
I was a high level athlete growing up, so my only previous example of what was “enough” is hard to live up to as an adult working in an office, but seeing as ive been going an average of 7-8 hours per week, that makes me feel a lot more confident that I am, in fact, doing enough.
So thank you :)