Hey folks. I've posted some results updates here before, but a few people asked me to walk through how the whole thing actually came together. So here's the full arc.
May 2024. I went to put on a pair of shorts and they didn't fit. Not "snug." Didn't fit. I'm 40+ yo software engineer background, and I'd spent years telling myself I was "still in decent shape." The shorts disagreed.
My first move was almost embarrassingly on-brand for someone who optimizes things for a living: I joined Chelsea Piers... because I know I'm cheap and it was expensive enough that I'd be forced to actually use it. Sunk cost as a behavior change tool. It worked, sort of. I started training consistently. I dropped some weight. And then I stalled.
That's the part nobody really talks about. The first 5-8 lbs come off because you started doing anything. After that the body shrugs and says "okay, what else you got."
What I had was nothing, because I was guessing. I didn't know if I was losing fat or muscle. I didn't know if my "cardio" was actually in a useful zone. I didn't know if I was eating enough protein to hold onto lean mass. I just knew the scale wasn't moving and I was annoyed.
So I bought a Hume Body Pod. Not because I love gadgets, but because as an engineer, I couldn't run an experiment without instrumentation. Fat mass, lean mass, muscle mass, separately, every morning. Suddenly I could see what was actually happening underneath the scale weight.
December 2025 I ran what I called my "December experiment." 5-day training split, protein target I actually hit, cardio in a defined heart rate zone for a defined number of minutes per week. That's it. No calorie counting. No weighted vest. No two-a-days.
Here's the thing that surprised me, and it's the part I didn't expect going in: it worked because of what I deliberately left out, not what I put in. I had escalation levers ready (calorie counting, quitting alcohol, a weighted vest, more cardio) and I kept waiting for the moment I'd need to deploy them. That moment is the part I wrote up on Medium, because it changed how I think about training at 40+
The takeaway for the 40+ crowd specifically: you do not need to be precise. You need to be consistent on the few variables that actually move the needle, and you need to be able to see what's happening so you know whether to adjust. Most of us over-engineer the inputs and under-instrument the outputs.
I built the protocol into a free app I'm beta testing right now called CourseCorrect. It generates a workout plan based on how many days you can train (the 5-day is the one I ran), gives you a target cardio heart rate and weekly cardio minutes, sets a protein target, and tracks workouts. It's the system, not a coach. Free during beta because I want feedback.
I wrote up the full method, the numbers, and what I'd do differently on Medium if anyone wants the long version: [https://harry-phan.medium.com/the-levers-i-never-had-to-pull-8f7d594196d8]
Happy to answer questions in the comments. The 40+ angle on this (protein, lean mass preservation, recovery) is genuinely different from what younger guys need, and I think it's underserved.