TLDR: Too Long Dad Recap

Hey everybody, this is a new thing I’m trying: a weekly post recapping things I watched, read, trained, ate, and taught my kids.  These weekly posts are just the beginning. I plan to get on a schedule of posting a second weekly post that has more info on specific fitness topics with lists and things. 

I’m doing this for a couple reasons:

• First, I have found my “why” for this website (and it starts with Why, as they say)
  • My “why” is: To educate and inspire middle aged dads to get fit, to look and feel better through strength. 
• Second, after around 22 videos on YouTube, I can confirm that the written word is the format that works best for me.  All the time spent on those videos hasn’t and won’t likely result in as much return as writing. 
  • I’ve been a blogger for more than 10 years and have a large following in the investment community.  
  • If I am to be successful with DadLifting, it’s going to be through writing. 

So, here goes…

Videos I Watched this Week

Fitness YouTube feels a bit stagnant lately.  Not many YouTubers are making fresh content, maybe because of the lockdowns.  Some of my favorite YouTubers aren’t posting much anymore. But I found a few interesting things to watch this week.

• Greg Doucette has become very popular in the last 3-6 months.  I remember when he had around 50k subscribers, now he’s up to like 500k.  He publishes at least a video a day.  
  • His videos don’t include any footage of lifting or any snazzy production value.  Mostly he yells at the camera, but the things he talks about are entertaining and educational most of the time.  Other times, he reviews other videos and critiques diets of other fitness influencers.
  • This week I watched a Q&A video of his where he talked about extremely popular fitness guru Jeff Cavaliere and how he used fake weights in his videos.  You can watch that video here.
  • It turns out Jeff at Athlean-X uses fake weights to appear he is lifting more than he is.  I found that news a bit disturbing and believe it was dishonest and does take away from his credibility.
• Alan Thrall video on resisting temptation during the lockdown
  • Alan has been putting out fantastic content on training at home and this latest video had some great tips.  
  • I would recommend this video and many others he has posted, including another video from this week called “How to Good Morning”
  • Video link here
• Kneesovertoesguy – given my recent knee injury, I was searching around for evidence that others had solved their meniscus tears with methods other than surgery. 
  • I came across this guy, who has some really compelling advertisements for his program for solving knee pain forever and learning to explosively dunk.  I don’t think I’m going to pay for his program, but he almost had me.
  • Video link here
• Reactive training origins video with Mike Tuscherer
  • I watched an interview style video with Mike Tuscherer.  It was cool to get more of a background on his powerlifting career and how he developed his programming.

Things I Read this Week:

• I didn’t read much fitness related content this week.
• Read lots of thoughtful posts about racism from friends of mine in the black community and those in the general community, including this excellent article/post at Medium from high school classmate of mine Gerard McGeary (read it here) 
  • This was well worth the read.
  • Good to get perspectives beyond my suburban bubble…from the comfort of my suburban bubble.
• The one fitness-related post I read was the review of the Marrs Bar by my friend Shawn at Morning Lifter  (click here to read)
  • I used the Marrs Bar on a business trip in Dallas in November and I loved it, but the bottom line for me was it was too expensive.
  • The post gives the history of the development of the bar and a very detailed review, worth the read.

Training update

• For six weeks before this week, I was doing my own conjugate program, employing giant sets and being more active between strength sets than normal powerlifting style. 
• Given the persistence of the knee pain, I decided to slow things down this week and not do any max effort squats and no giant sets this week. 
• Instead I worked up to a heavy single then back offs and accessory movements for deadlift one day, bench another and OHP a third. I did a dynamic effort upper and lower day, both with no accommodating resistance bands for a change. 
• I also did two targeted arm workouts to finish up a 4 week program I bought from my local powerlifting gym (PWR BLD) to support them. 
• I continued the daily lunges, still have a daily streak going that is at 45 days now. My knee doesn’t hurt when I do those and the doctor just said not to do stuff that hurts. 
• Looking ahead, feels like a cautious approach to loading up any squat movement is appropriate for a few weeks from here and probably until I get surgery. That’s fine, who wants to build giant legs and huge ass anyway? 
• For the next few weeks, I’ll probably still do a max effort deadlift day and reduce the frequency of training to 5 days a week. 
• My 9 year old (youngest) son has been training consistently for 6 weeks in a row, he worked up to 30lbs back squat for 10 reps and 25 pound bench for 7 reps. Keeping things light and working on form. He wants to change things up from here, so I wrote a new block of his programming this weekend. He wants to do two days in the gym with weights and one day of strongman fun stuff in the driveway. 

Nutrition update

Around 7 weeks ago, I started a plan to drop 10 pounds, as discussed in this post.  The plan was to go slow and eat a couple hundred calories below maintenance and work down from there.  I’m down around 5.6 pounds, which is good.

It’s been a bit slower than planned.  I was shooting for around 1 pound a week, and the actual rate has been around 0.8 pounds per week.  I’ve been a little less disciplined than planned, but it’s been pretty easy overall to keep the losses coming. 

Another 5-6 weeks of this and I’ll hit my target of around 177, but I’ll probably try to hit 175 before I stop, which will take around 8 weeks more at this rate, for 15 weeks total.

Losing fat slowly requires dedication and patience, but I have a goal of trying to maintain as much muscle as possible in this cut, so slower is better.

Dad Report: School’s Out!

The kids finished “school” this week, in the biggest anti-climax ever.  Summer plans remain in flux, but hopefully we figure out a way to take a longish break from our house. It all sort of depends on when Little League starts this summer and our willingness to drive across the country to my family’s place in the Texas Hill Country.

If we do end up going to Texas, I may endeavor to secure a squat stand and a barbell to leave in my parents garage so we can all keep up with our training while down there.

We celebrated the end of the school year by eating ice cream, grilling burgers in the backyard and watching movies, which wasn’t much different from a normal day, but it was still great.

This week my 13-year old daughter started to get focused on a goal of doing 5 real pull ups with no band assistance by the end of the summer.  Yesterday, she did 5 sets of 5 reps with a purple band.  The plan is to keep up that volume and reduce the assistance over time.  It’s really exciting that my kids are bored enough to come up with fitness goals!

One thing I taught my kids this week was how to change a tire.  We had a flat when the wife ran over a nail. I never seem to run over nails but she does like twice a year.  Anyway, I showed the kids how to jack up the car and remove the bad tire and replace it with the spare.  It is always rewarding to teach them small life skills when I can.

That’s it for this week’s TLDR. Thanks for reading, let me know if you have comments or ideas for things you want me to write about!