<story><title>Why the conventional wisdom on how to grow muscles is wrong</title><url>https://mennohenselmans.com/optimal-program-design/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>epistemer</author><text>I have lifted for 30 years.&lt;p&gt;The standard bullshit line in the fitness industry has always been &amp;quot;everyone else is wrong&amp;quot;. Practically what every single trainer ever in the world has said.&lt;p&gt;The reason is because of all the things I have done in my life, lifting is the most trivially simple activity there is. It is as complex as shoveling dirt. The only way to differentiate if trying to make money is to bullshit. Pick the weights up, put them down, eat food. It just not that complicated.</text></item><item><author>jasondigitized</author><text>&amp;quot;Everybody wants to be a bodybuilder, but nobody wants to lift no heavy-ass weights.&amp;quot; - Ronnie Coleman&lt;p&gt;I have gained quite a bit of muscle mass after building out a home gym during covid.  I&amp;#x27;m no scientist but following the Reddit PPL[1] workout and eating lots of protein did the trick for me.&lt;p&gt;[1] - &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.reddit.com&amp;#x2F;r&amp;#x2F;Fitness&amp;#x2F;comments&amp;#x2F;37ylk5&amp;#x2F;a_linear_progression_based_ppl_program_for&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.reddit.com&amp;#x2F;r&amp;#x2F;Fitness&amp;#x2F;comments&amp;#x2F;37ylk5&amp;#x2F;a_linear_pr...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Taylor_OD</author><text>Yup. Everything else is either bull shit or an attempt to optimize. Unless you are a body builder or a pro athlete you really should focus on consistency more than  optimization.&lt;p&gt;Getting 1% better results for the average person is going to be nullified by the beers they drink on the weekend&amp;#x2F;the multiple days they skip because they dont feel like working out&amp;#x2F;any number of other normal life actives that are not optimal.&lt;p&gt;Find a way to exercise that you enjoy it and do it often. After that don&amp;#x27;t think about it too much.&lt;p&gt;Recently I&amp;#x27;ve been riding an exercise bike after work while playing a video game on my computer with an xbox controller. Every 5 minutes I hop off the bike and do some weight training then get back on the bike. I ride for an hour. Doing this most weekdays has lead to far better results than when I used to go to the gym because I actually do it everyday&amp;#x2F;most days and I don&amp;#x27;t rdread it.</text></comment>
<story><title>Why the conventional wisdom on how to grow muscles is wrong</title><url>https://mennohenselmans.com/optimal-program-design/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>epistemer</author><text>I have lifted for 30 years.&lt;p&gt;The standard bullshit line in the fitness industry has always been &amp;quot;everyone else is wrong&amp;quot;. Practically what every single trainer ever in the world has said.&lt;p&gt;The reason is because of all the things I have done in my life, lifting is the most trivially simple activity there is. It is as complex as shoveling dirt. The only way to differentiate if trying to make money is to bullshit. Pick the weights up, put them down, eat food. It just not that complicated.</text></item><item><author>jasondigitized</author><text>&amp;quot;Everybody wants to be a bodybuilder, but nobody wants to lift no heavy-ass weights.&amp;quot; - Ronnie Coleman&lt;p&gt;I have gained quite a bit of muscle mass after building out a home gym during covid.  I&amp;#x27;m no scientist but following the Reddit PPL[1] workout and eating lots of protein did the trick for me.&lt;p&gt;[1] - &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.reddit.com&amp;#x2F;r&amp;#x2F;Fitness&amp;#x2F;comments&amp;#x2F;37ylk5&amp;#x2F;a_linear_progression_based_ppl_program_for&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.reddit.com&amp;#x2F;r&amp;#x2F;Fitness&amp;#x2F;comments&amp;#x2F;37ylk5&amp;#x2F;a_linear_pr...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>JeremyNT</author><text>The problem here is that there really are many little optimizations that could be applied to &amp;quot;pick up, put down&amp;quot; and some do work. Injury avoidance and recovery in particular are easy to overlook.&lt;p&gt;Of course the magnitude of the effect from most optimizations is small, so it&amp;#x27;s pretty easy for con artists to claim some secret or new breakthrough.&lt;p&gt;At the very highest levels people want every edge they can get, but it&amp;#x27;s silly for most of us who aren&amp;#x27;t devoted to competition to go down these rabbit holes. Pick up &amp;#x2F; put down &amp;#x2F; don&amp;#x27;t get hurt goes quite a long way.</text></comment>