The One Best Exercise for Everyone Forever

Do you know the one best exercise?

If I never hear that question again it will be too soon! Usually I hear it in this form: “So, what’s the best exercise for working my abs (butt, legs, arms, etc)?” I am often tempted to respond with some ridiculous and wrong answer like “You need to do sprangle hops, but be sure to wrap your ankles and wear a knit cap.” I don’t do this because one, it’s wrong, and two, I would have to spend the next half hour explaining what sprangle hops are. Note to those who are new to all this and can’t be expected to know any better: there are no such things as “sprangle hops.”

If there isn’t a “best” exercise, then how do you know what to do? Well, the easy and self-serving answer is “sign up for my program and I’ll tell you exactly what to do every day.” The free answer is this: do everything, but do more of the big exercises. By “more” I mean you roughly 85% of your time, and by “big exercises” I mean full-body exercises where you load the spinal column. Aw heck, sign up for my program anyway (you’ll save a bunch of time and effort.)

Still set on searching for the “one best exercise?” Ask yourself this: if a “best” exists, what does that make all the others? Are they second best? Worst? A pointless waste of time? If they aren’t the best, why does anyone ever do them at all? Seriously, if we knew of a “best” exercise, why would anyone do anything else? There are literally hundreds of exercises and exercise variations and each and every one of them work. How can I say this with confidence?

Simple, any time you use your body to apply force to a load, your muscles are doing work. If you are doing work you are exercising. Now we can debate quality of work all day. Yes, some exercises are better than others for certain people at certain times, but you have to look at variables. I can make very strong arguments for squats and dead lifts being two of the most effective exercises, but that doesn’t mean much for someone confined to a wheelchair, does it?

The working title of this article was originally going to be “everything works, but nothing works forever.” I also mention it in my introduction video, so as you might have guessed, it’s a pretty important concept for me. What I’m getting at is this: if pick out an exercise and really hammer away at it, you will get stronger. If you want to continue to get stronger, you will need to change your exercise selection a little bit. No, this has nothing to do with “tricking” your muscles (don’t get me started on that one). It has everything to do with over-use and boredom! Doing the same thing the same way will eventually lead to strength imbalances and you will almost certainly lose any excitement you once got from exercising. This doesn’t mean that you have to totally give up your favorite exercises. If you love doing squats but you’ve stopped progressing, why not change it a little? Have you tried sissy squats? Split squats? Front squats? Hack squats? Squats can still be an integral part of your program, but it will do you good to change things up once in a while.

“But Phil,” you say. “What about all those other sites that claim to have the secret of a ’super exercise’ that will render the entire fitness industry obsolete? They normally charge $379 for this super-secret stuff, but if I act now I can get it for $29.99. Why shouldn’t I try those guys?”

Easy. Just about anyone who claims to have the “one best way” to do anything is probably a lying dirt bag. There is a chance that they’re just wrong, but they’re probably dirt bags.

Oh, and for the record: I am not about to start calling out individuals or specific websites as I don’t feel like being sued this week.

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More on Dead Lifts

If you haven’t watched the video on dead lifts yet, you might want to check that out first. In this episode, Parker and Phil go over the Romanian Dead Lift and the Stiff-Leg Dead Lift.

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Is Your Cardio Program Working?

Ok, I’ll come right out and admit it: I HATE doing cardio!  Fortunately, I’m a power lifter and that sport doesn’t require a high level of aerobic endurance.  It also doesn’t require low body fat which is why many power lifters tend to be “built for comfort.”  Still, it isn’t a good idea to do NO cardio!  As much as I dislike doing cardiovascular exercise, I also have a strong aversion to dying from a heart attack when I’m 50.  So the cardio must be done…

How do we reconcile the blah of cardio with the need for doing it?  Simple!  Find a protocol that you enjoy (boy, “enjoy” sure is a stretch) that also elevates your heart rate and gets you huffing and puffing.  No, running up one flight of stairs doesn’t count.  You have to elevate your heart rate for an extended period of time, generally speaking for about 30 minutes or more.  Depending on your level of fitness, this may be accomplished by a brisk walk.  For those who are a little more fit, games like soccer or basketball are an excellent way to get your cardio in while still having some fun.

In the video, I mention my loathing of jogging.  The reason for this is twofold.  One, jogging at a slow pace for several miles is a great way to reduce your limit strength (max strength for a single repetition).  Since I compete in power lifting, that would be very counter produtive for me.  For a marathon runner it doesn’t matter since they don’t have to carry anything while they run, they just have to GO (and go, and go, and go).  Second, since I’m *ahem* “plus-sized,” jogging makes my knees and hips hate me.

So how do I get my cardio?  Tire flipping!  In the following video, Parker and I flip a 260 pound tire for reps.  It’s not all that exciting, so we edited it down to one set each.  By the time we were through, we each did four sets of 16 flips.  It was a great full body workout and it was actually kind of fun.

Fitness Supplements: Slightly Less Shady than the Porn Industry

To date, the worst fitness supplement advertisement I’ve ever seen made no mention of what was in the product or how it worked in your body, but it did say “Don’t be a P***y” in big yellow letters over a red background.  I’ve read lots of ads that tried to convey that same message in round-about ways, but this was the first time I’d ever seen it spelled out so explicitly.  Hmm.  Think that might sway some potential buyers?  Not you, of course.  You’re too smart to fall for that, but believe me, they wouldn’t run that ad if it didn’t work.  Does the product work?  Who knows?  The stuff isn’t tested by the FDA and I couldn’t find a peer-reviewed study, so I’m not going to say that it works or doesn’t work (mostly because I don’t feeling like being sued today).  Let’s just say that I’m not inclined to buy a fitness product just because it challenges my masculinity.

This is a short version of the talk I have every spring with the football team.  Since they’re college students, they usually aren’t awash in extra cash, but they are invariably willing to throw their money away on junk supplements that may or may not work.  Do you have unlimited money?  If you do, great.  Disregard this video and go buy one of everything.  If you don’t, spend about five minutes on the video and then go buy some real food.

Lifting Belts 101

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