I am working on the linked stretch here. I started yesterday and noticed my knee was achey today. It seems like a bit of stress on that particular joint. How can I stretch it while avoiding that issue?
TLDR: Barbells take long warm ups. Pistols need high reps and you have to do those reps slowly to keep balance. Bulgarian Split Squats require kind of long warm ups and because they are unilateral you have to do 2x the sets. Regular bodyweight squats require tons of reps. Am I missing something?
My current routine is a little eclectic, but centered around the six movement patterns in the recommended routine. I workout daily for (maximum) 40 minutes first thing in the morning. I can comfortably fit at least 2 of the other exercises into each session including warm up, mobility, etc, but I have to give squats their one full workout. For the past year, my variation of choice has been bulgarian split squats. I currently do 3x10 (70lbs) [this is plenty as long as I am strict about really keeping the "back leg is just for balance" mentality and not allowing any seesaw motion]. I find it takes quite some time to get neurologically warmed up for that between both the weight and the balance component. I tried rushing through the warmup before. It resulted in injury. I also personally have to do a little bit of nerve flossing to prevent numbness during the movement. I am content with this because I can progress without indefinitely adding reps but I feel as though I might be missing something-though of course there is tremendous value in finding something imperfect and just sticking to it. Upper body work and even RDLs take far less time.
In the past, I focused on pistol squats for a year or two. I found the high rep sets very time consuming. In order to do sets that pushed my muscles and not just my balance, I found I needed to practice the movement (just a little) every day and have sessions where I really pushed myself once a week (though that could be more frequent if I had the time). A set of 30 was a good challenge, but just a single set was taking quite some time-staying balanced required moving slowly and then I had to do the other leg too. Adding weight is possible, but then form decay starts to become more risky.
I have considered buying a squat rack, but much of the information I've looked at online (Jeff Nippard, Renaissance Periodization, Eugene Teo, etc.) seems to say that barbell squats, while great for getting really really strong, require even more time than single leg variations due to warming up. I also have long femurs which gives me pause about this significant space investment. The people listed above seem to love their leg press/hack squat machines, but that requires driving to a gym.
I have tried the K Boges style of super high rep bodyweight squats. While this takes little to no warm up (50-100 of them is one of the first parts of my warmup), the sets themselves take pretty long and I already do a lot of cardio biking to work. I found I could get a pretty good quad pump in 2 minutes by going fast and skipping the top ROM, but progressive loading seems like an issue. If I hold a dumbbell, I'm going to need to move more slowly.
One thing that seems promising is to do quick pump reps of BSS: just the bottom part of the ROM. Use one hand to hold a dumbbell and the other touching a wall for balance. I get to failure pretty fast this way. Anyone else do that?
Mindful Mover does his pistols with arm support and a weight vest. That would be a financial investment for me and I wonder how long I'd feel the need to warm up for that although I know he doesn't take long. Does anyone else do pistols this way? Does it work for you?
So I guess this is me just kind of musing after my split squat session. The spirit of reddit is to start a conversation, right? What do you do?
I’m a 5’8” 33 year old male. I’ve been active my whole life but I can’t say that I’ve done any serious weight lifting. My goal with the bulgarian split squat is just to put my legs through decently heavy resistance in the 5-15 rep range. A few months ago, I had worked up to 10 reps of 85lbs (total), wanted to squeeze in a session early in the morning, and didn’t warm up as much as I should have. I developed a pain in my lower abs towards the right side doing the squats. The injury has healed completely, but I don’t want to start working up the weight again until I know I’m not going to have the same problem again. A form check is part of that, but if anyone has other advice such as working on a possible weakness that would be appreciated as well. I have been working my lower abs with leg lifts as well as opening and closing my legs in the bottom position.
Here is a front view as well. https://imgur.com/a/bss-front-8-12-2026-e7ODBa8
So we all know you can and should use dish soap on the cast iron skillet. Wash in the sink while it's hot, towel dry, heat it up to get super dry, possibly oil it, and then you're done.
However, I'm thinking about if this is always necessary. To show two contrasting situations, yesterday, I made oatmeal. Kind of a weird thing to make in the skillet but I did it and cleaned pretty diligently afterwards. I later heated up tortillas. I just wiped with one of my towels after that.
Do you ever just wipe it off? If so, where do you draw the line?
Also, is it a problem that it got lighter in color?
I seasoned both pans according to Serious Eats guide online in the oven in the spring. I really only use the larger one though. I dry completely and heat it up on the stove afterwards to make double sure all moisture is gone. I do not however add oil after doing so. I stopped because heating the oil every time made the whole kitchen smell bad. Is skipping this recommended step the problem?
I eat tofu straight out of the package. It is my convenience protein.
I obviously don't do this with vital wheat gluten, but I'd like to know the absolute easiest way to prepare it. Ideally, this is not turning it into faux-meat, but I am open to that. It helps me get used to cooking with something when I buy a whole bunch and know I have a super easy (though maybe not gastronomically ideal) way to eat it.
I recently went from vegetarian (5yrs) to vegan. I decided I'd do a year and evaluate afterwards. A possible long term strategy for me is to get myself used to eating no animal products, switch over our family to as many ethically sourced products as is feasible, and then eventually start making exceptions for those products while remaining essentially vegan in public.
"Are you vegan?"
"Pretty much yes, but I do make a few exceptions."
Then the conversation would go from there if the person cares to chat about it.
More details: I've always approached this from a welfare standpoint rather than a rights standpoint-believing that there's nothing inherently wrong with animal agriculture just that factory farming is clearly abusive. I've always thought of ethical omnivore as the most logical way to live out my belief but am held back by
finances - this is changing as we have more buffer now.
social expectations - I have always been worried that it is more offensive to live this way as the vegan says: "I simply don't eat animal products", but I am scared people will hear the message of "I eat animal products, but yours aren't good enough" when someone is showing me the generosity of offering food/hospitality.
It is about this second point that I am inquiring your experience. Do you hurt a lot of people's feelings?
I am the household cook. A family member is open to the idea of switching from chicken on weekly meal prepped salads to tofu but wants to be sure it is actually good. It needs to be tofu rather than fake meat because that is competitively priced (per gram of protein) with factory farmed meat.
Here's the current process:
Press the tofu, cut the tofu, toss in a tupperware with soy sauce, bake at 350 F for about 30 minutes.
How do I make it better?
PS these are salads consisting of spinach, carrots, peppers, green onions, a variety of dressing from week to week etc.
My wife and I are considering buying a half a pig. The farm's website says we can expect to spend about $300 depending on how we want the pig processed. I'm wondering this:
How big is the variation in price, typically?
What can one request to save some money and how significant are the savings?
I'm looking for things that will have a high savings to extra-time-on-my-part-ratio. If something's not going to save a lot of money but makes a lot of work for me, I'm less interested than I am in the opposite situation.
Hoping this isn't overly specific.
My wife and I are looking to buy half a pig. However, we are very inexperienced with this. I make carnitas with pork butt and that's the extent of my experience.
Anyone have recommendations for which cuts to order from the butcher and how to cook them?
More details: I am currently vegetarian as a protest against factory farming, but I see this as a way to support ethical farms. The idea of getting back to my Mexican roots is a side bonus. I also want to avoid putting sugary BBQ sauce on everything.
I've read it in Overcoming Gravity before: once you reach a certain point in manna training, little aches and pains in the shoulders are a thing of the past. Obviously, this means Steven Low believes it to be true. He's awesome! But, for other people who train manna, has this been your experience as well?
This is coming from a guy who does face pulls all the time and doesn't neglect rows but still can't scratch his own back. I don't really enjoy training static skills, but this aspect of training for the manna makes it sound quite attractive. I think it'd be helpful to share for the whole community.
We have a bunch of french rolls. The only way I know how to eat these is with liquid rich meat like Italian beef. How do I make tofu or beans go well with this?
