Top 3 items on my fantasy bucket list.
Number one: I travel back in time where I visit Hollywood (or wherever it is they actually shoot television shows) and pick up my girlfriend Valerie Bertinelli off the set of “One Day At A Time” and we spend a lovely day together. I’m also probably an expert guitar player in this alternate reality and start a world-famous band in So Cal.
I guess when I look at it that way, I basically become Eddie Van Halen.
Hey, I said it was fantasy.
Number two: I get into a Knicks game for 30 seconds and bury a long distance three. If that’s not possible I would simply accept shooting around for 15 minutes on the floor at MSG.
I haven’t shot a basketball in years but my 15 year old self would pretty much think I had become the coolest person who ever lived. And your high school-self is really who you should aim to impress.
Number three: I get featured on Body By Mark.
For those of you who don’t know, Body By Mark is an Instagram account (maybe it’s originally a Tik Tok account but as you can tell from the Valerie Bertinelli crush above, I am too old for Tik Tok). This guy Mark (who we never see) goes up to people on the street, on the beach, in the gym or at fitness competitions and asks them what they’ve done to get so jacked.
Simply, Mark sees a jacked dude or a ripped lady and starts asking them questions about their workout routines.
Number of push-ups, what supplements they take, whether they drink booze - you know, the stuff we all care about.
The whole thing lasts about 45 seconds.
I’ve started walking the streets in a tank top after a pump sesh (even though it’s been about -300 degrees in NYC for about 9 months now) just in the hopes of getting approached.
Recently I saw Mark feature a guy who was definitely not in NYC cause his shirt was off and there were palm trees in the background and he had a happy disposition that could not be achieved by anyone who has spent their morning traversing the slushy ice lakes that seem to occupy every street corner crossing at the moment.
They got to talking and this guy revealed that he mostly does calisthenics and works out a couple of times per day. So Mark asks him what he does for work that allows him to work out this much. The guy takes a quick pause and says “he is being taken care of by God” which is an amazing answer.
I too feel like I am being taken care of by God, however God has not seen his way to making my car payment.
And I get the feeling that there are more of you out there like me than like this blessed gentleman. And you probably spend more of your days making meals for your kids and working on spreadsheets than you do in the Miami sunshine for two 90 minute training sessions per day.
Which, of course, isn’t ideal but I do have some good news for you. Even if God isn’t paying your bills, you can still get very effective, results-driven training in a more constrained time frame.
In fact, I would argue that two to three hours per week is all you need to get the results that will make you happy and the envy of everyone at your high school reunion. Can you play like Ronaldo or be fitness competition lean with that amount of training? Probably not. But you can get about 85% of the way there and be in better health, have better body composition and be more capable than nearly all of your peers.
Seriously.
But, this will not happen simply by showing up at the gym, snuggling with a foam roller for 20 minutes, walking on the treadmill while you scroll social media because you just “have” to know what the Bieber’s wore to dinner last night (Hailey looked incredible, Justin looked homeless) or half-assing it on whatever machines are available.
In fact, you will need exactly three things to ensure that you can get maximum results in minimum time.
The first is a plan.
You aren’t experienced enough in training to just wing it every time you go into the gym. I don’t care if you’ve been training for 20 minutes or 20 years, you will not just intuitively create a roadmap to success for yourself by making up workouts every time you get your hands on a barbell.
Experience counts for a lot in the gym. It will allow you to ingrain movement patterns and give you a sense of what your capabilities and limitations are. But that is not a substitute for a well-suited, goal-oriented program. In fact, the more seasoned you are, the more critical the plan is. When you are new, everything works. When you have been training for a while, you need to be precise to continue moving the needle.
With that being said, don’t get cocky, newbies. You are also going to want to have a plan so you don’t injure yourselves and you get the most efficient and effective training possible. Sure, everything and anything will work, but some things work better than others.
Number two on our list is training with intensity.
Intensity can be defined in many ways on the gym floor (percentage of your 1RM or number of reps in reserve to name just two) but what we are talking about here is the very non-technical intensity of effort.
If you are only going to be in the gym for 2 or 3 hours per week, you must train your boobs off the entire time (this still applies even if you don’t have boobs). Training must be challenging. Uncomfortable, even. You must be near the edge of your limits to make the stimulus count and to adapt from it.
So if you walk out of the gym thinking “Huh, wonder what I’m gonna watch on Netflix when I get back to my apartment,” rather than, “Jesus H. Christ I have no idea how I am going to stay upright long enough to make it across the street,” you are probably taking it too easy.
Don’t feel bad. Most people take it too easy. Most people don’t make progress.
Lastly, you must stay consistent.
Like I said, 2-3 sessions per week can work really well. But it also means that you can’t miss days or weeks regularly.
Adaptation comes when you stack wins. Putting in the hours week over week for months or, God forbid, years at a time will allow you to see remarkable gains in strength, performance and aesthetics. But if your training has more stops and starts than a NASCAR race in a hurricane, you are always going to feel like you are starting over (probably because you are always starting over).
And that’s why I’ll be ready when my day comes. If Body By Mark were walking down the street during t-shirt weather and we crossed paths, he wouldn’t be able to get the camera up fast enough.
Not because of anything I did that day.
But because of the plan, the intensity, and the thousands of ordinary sessions that came before it.