Great article! My only knowledge of Oliver Sacks comes from his appearances on Radio Lab. I've just added On the Move to my wishlist. He seems like an interesting fellow.
If somebody wanted to get into weightlifting, where would they even start?
If you're just starting out, a newbie walking into the gym, I'd recommend looking at a 5x5 program like Stronglifts. It's an iPhone/Adroid app with a website and a ton of information. It isn't perfect because nothing is but it will give you a basis, a starting point.
You'll have a program of exercises, squat, bench, ... and sequence. You'll do the exercises and learn about form. It's a start.
Taking classes like Bodypump is another approach. You won't learn anything about form and the weights will be more about endurance and tone but it's a start.
I'm assuming you're a complete newbie walking into a gym needing a sustainable start. Do this for 3-6 months then try to connect with a powerlifting program.
If you really want to know a LOT, look at Stronger By Science.
I'm going to go against most of the replies and start with a question, because without a clear answer you're going to probably have mixed results, at best.
What is your motivation and what do you hope to achieve?
If the answer is clearly "I want to move as much weight as possible", then you should pursue a powerlifting track. It's very unlikely you would start with Olympic lifts an and end goal, but in the off chance, ditto that.
If the answer has a component centered around muscularity and body image, then you may want to start with an elementary bodybuilding program. What's the difference? You'll do more reps at lower weights (as %1RM), and you'll do a lot more accessory lifts, as opposed to primarily focusing with intent on [mostly] just the major compound lifts.
If your goal is to become more athletic, then you'll probably end up with a blend that combines the major compound lifts, accessory lifts, and explosive functional movements with resistance.
In my case, my first goal was "get stronger so I can perform better at my sports of choice", so I started with bootcamp style HIIT classes, then added more explicit functional movements and accessory lifts, and only then started adding compound lifts for total body strength & power.
Point being, identify your objectives first, then choose a training program. And, if you're a complete newbie, do not try to do this by yourself. Join a class, hire a trainer, or find an experienced buddy -- you'll have more fun, probably experience faster gains, and reduce your chances of injury.
Those are great questions but at this point in a newbie's path, I think they can be overwhelming even as they are well intentioned. I think it's best to just introduce them to lifting and get them into a gym with a sustainable routine and show them that they can enjoy it and make progress.
I'll be 50 years old next year and I'm losing my strength. I want to get stronger and add some muscle mass. I'm not concerned about weight and I'm not trying to get ripped.
I already have a bunch of equipment in my garage that I can use (pull up bar, lots of kettle bells, rowing machine, a bar and plates, and a set of dumbbells). I want to start with that and then I'm also thinking about signing up for a BJJ class, but first I have to drop something to make space in my schedule.
It's an updated approach to Starting Strength. It builds a weekly routine around the core lifts of bench, incline bench, overhead press, squat, and deadlift.
And while he dives into some iffy science at times and the diet section is – while informative and eye opening to me in the beginning about how much I needed to change my diet – it's also extremely unrealistic, especially for a beginner.
But, if you keep those things in mind, it's a strong base to build a lifting habit around.
I've been lifting 5 times a week for a couple years now and, while I've since modified much of the book to fit my personal goals and approach, it helped me get somewhere from no previous lifting experience (other than aimlessly wandering around the Y in my teens and 20s).
By finding a coach to set up a proper form for the lifts. That is, if we are talking about powerlifting, learning how to properly do bench press, squat, and deadlift. Internet is awash with materials about it, but each person is different and you really want someone experienced checking your lifts.
I have been somewhat seriously lifting for more than a year (~350 Wilks, raw), never had a coach and it's my only regret that I had not worked out the forms with someone early on. I didn't think much of the sport at first and was doing it just for fun. But as I hit heavier weights I had to re-learn all the lifts multiple times because the "canonical" forms I learned from youtube were often ill suited for my body structure.
I've been doing various sports on/off since I was a student (10+ years ago), mostly martial arts. There were some periods when I was out of shape, but in general I kept myself fit. I was never into lifting though, I could barely bench my own weight, and never even tried deadlifts. Two years ago I tore a tendon in my shoulder rendering me incapable of doing most MA things. While in recovery I started playing with free weights. A local powerlifter noticed me and told me that my numbers can win me local meets if I work on my form. So around January 2018 I started looking up powerlifting and went through two cycles of Candito's 6 Week Program.
Last June I attended my first meet and tanked it: failed all three deadlift attempts due to errors (not following commands, double movement, etc). I started working on technique and won the two local meets that followed. I cannot say I enjoy it as much as I enjoy martial arts, but at the moment I'm just curious to see how much my body can progress within my normal sleep/rest/nutrition regimen.
Weightlifting is easy. It's so easy that all sorts of misguided people can do all manner of stupid things and still make reasonable progress.
* Consistency: 3 to 5 times a week, every week, with periodic deloads (once every month or two, give yourself an easy week where you cut the weight in half or so).
* Intensity: you want to challenge yourself, but not overdo it such that it's hard to recover. Part of learning means you have to push to find your limits, but overall you shouldn't be going nuts until you're more of an advanced lifter.
* Movements: the core of lifting weights consists of the Squat, Deadlift, Benchpress, and Overhead Press. Any reasonable program will make good use of these movements. Add in accessory work as you like: rows, pull/chin-ups, arm work, ab work, etc.
* Diet: Sufficient calories and protein to support muscle growth. ~0.6g/lbs. of body weight is a reasonable protein target. You can count calories, but use the scale as the real test of whether you're hitting your calorie goal. If you want to get bigger, the scale better be moving up.
Starting Strength is good but IMO the best way to start is to book some sessions with a trainer and go and actually lift some heavy things. In my experience it is very helpful to have someone knowledgeable help you with your form early on and it also gives you someone to spot you and to push you.
A good lifting coach is much better than DIY Starting Strength, because they'll help you develop good form before you start lifting really heavy weights. Agreed.
However, there are a lot of unqualified lifting coaches out there, and many fitness certifications don't cover lifting well. So if you just walk into your local fitness club and ask for a trainer, you can easily wind up with the incompetent leading the ignorant.
A practical compromise might be to buy a phone tripod, record your lifts, and work online with a qualified coach. Just looking at the larger Starting Strength community, I've been deeply impressed by Barbell Medicine, and some people seem to like Starting Strength Online Coaching.
There are lots of other good programs out there besides Starting Strength, obviously. And honestly, all the uninjured, grey-haired lifters I've met were careful bodybuilders and not powerlifters (but my sample size is small).
Mark Rippetoe, the author, is a broken old man as a result of his methods. He is also known as a loudmouth that gets more attention than he deserves in the community. I would not recommend his methods or book. Although his book got popular among amateurs, it has no place in modern powerlifting and is considered antiquated and rife with bad advice.
Rippetoe has a video of him deadlifting 500 pounds at age 56. He's not the peak of physical fitness, but he is significantly stronger than most people.
To say that his advice is antiquated is controversial at best. SS is written for the brand new beginner, and is advertised as such. Its prototypical student is a high school freshman that weighs 140 lbs and needs to get bigger and stronger to make the football team.
Another commenter said it ignores other factors like diet and rest. This is objectively incorrect. The book harps on eating and sleeping/resting. Rest days are sacred. If you are trying to go from. 100 lb squat to 300 in a few months, you sleep and eat, taking occasional breaks to lift heavy. If you are fat, eat slightly less.
SS isn't about body building, it's about a brand new lifter getting to a non-embarassing level of strength. That means eating an adequate amount of food, erroring on the side of eating too much, and just cut back the calories after you have a 300+ lb squat. People like to make a meme of things like the 'Gallon of Milk A Day' advice. That's not general advice. That's for the 110 lb 15 year old who doesn't like eating food and wants to get bigger. It's not advice for the 20 something software dev trying to go from weak and fat to bodybuilder
On the contrary, Rippetoe is the only author who has a rigorous, physics-based framework that explains why he recommends doing the lifts the way he does. Speaking frankly, the rest of the industry is mostly jackasses selling lifting-bro bullshit and crackpot theories.
That's news to me, but based on my gut reaction to the way Rippetoe writes and speaks (bloviating and seemingly over-certain about the science of things, which gives the impression that he actually knows very little about the science) I'm not surprised! Do you know of any alternative books or other sources that don't suffer from the same issues?
I have not read the book, but Chad is a respected competitor and coach in the community. I have watched the Juggernaut Training YouTube channel for a few years now, and they always have sound advice for both beginner and expert lifters.
FWIW it was a good bootcamp for me and helped me learn about the big lifts and what to use them for, but sleep, diet, and muscle imbalance are all left as an exercise for the reader. Wound up stopping the program to focus more on all those other things.
1. Resistance bands. These are a smaller, lighter, cheaper, and less intrusive investment than a weight set or a gym membership, and they continue to be a useful training supplement at all levels of training because the maximal resistance with bands comes near the end of the movement, when they're stretched, instead of at the beginning when picking up a weight. Lifters have devised combinations of weights and bands for a steady resistance gradient through the whole range of motion.
2. Focus the workouts on studying the technique. Even the simplest of movements has something to study in it. Initiation in a new technique can be done with books, videos, personal trainers, etc. but most of the work is in learning to do the movement more efficiently. Spend each workout sampling techniques and trying for good form before adding difficulty.
3. Log your progress. The real game of weight training is in the "progressive" part of "progressive overload", and logging each workout provides you with a benchmark to exceed in each session: you can aim to increase weight, reps, sets, try a more difficult form of a movement, etc. Calculations like "total volume" (weight × reps) let you adjust the composition of your training so that you don't stagnate. There are many apps that help you with logging - I started using "FitNotes" on Android years ago and never stopped.
There are lots of comments suggesting starting with a low-rep high-weight compound approach like Rippetoe's Starting Strength or Stronglifts 5x5. I also started there because it is everyone's go-to. It never worked great for me, I maxed out at like 185 squat and 135 bench. I'm now starting over with Michael Yessis's 1x20 program. This is a mixture of compound and single-joint exercises that are intended to build overall strength and avoid weak spots that can prevent progress in other approaches. I'll have to tell you how it works out but he has a lot of good arguments as to why it is best to start with an 8-12 week cycle of 1x20 before you start working on powerlifting 5x5 or 5x3. He's not opposed to powerlifting lifts, just doesn't think it's the right foundation for a new athlete.
Also, if you're like me and have long thighs and a short torso, the back squat is not the best exercise for developing strength as your leverages are bad. When I learned about that, and that the parallel-grip deadlift would be a better one for me, I was disappointed that Rippetoe didn't really promote alternatives to the back squat.
Also, if you want to learn more about Oliver Sacks outside of his weightlifting, check out Awakenings (his book, later made into a movie starring Robert DeNiro and Robin Williams, with the latter playing Sacks) or The Man who Mistook His Wife for a Hat. He wrote a number of other books that are also interesting - exploring the way the brain works by understanding when it fails - but those two are probably the best known.
Starting out all you need to do is go to the gym and figure out what exercises/activities make you feel good enough that going to the gym becomes a habit. The main battle for most people is just showing up, figure out how to win that one first. For me it was totally vanity, I did it for maybe 3-4 weeks and came home one day after lifting and was like "whoa I have muscles" when I looked in the mirror. Super cheesy and vain, but the endorphin spike from that kept me going 3-5X a week, and I still am 14 years later.
Secondly its a lifelong expedition, there are a million programs of exercise/diet/sleep/supplements online. Your body is unique so the only way to know is to try them out. Be ready to make progress, regress, get frustrated, get injured, feel really strong, and feel really weak.
My partner got me back into lifting via the her membership to NerdFitness Academy. Helpful for those who might benefit from some gamification and gives a decent set of "levels" to progress through to get into it without going the full on coaching route. That said, I agree with others that you probably would want to get some coaching, or at least do a lot of self study when progressing to heavier lifts (like the dead lift). Source: lots of thankfully minor injuries before I started really learning form.
For me I got a great intro by doing Crossfit. They’re pretty welcoming to newbies and they include both powerlifting and olympic lifting (although they usually don’t do bench presses). The gyms use rubber weights & floors so that you can always drop the barbell, which is pretty nice while learning.
Either way, definitely find something where you have an in-person coach. Its way too easy to develop bad form habits if you’re just learning from Youtube or something.
Former competitive powerlifter here. Find a team. If you search around, you are guaranteed to find some dungeon gym that has a group that trains together. It won't be a big-box gym. It will have rusty iron. This is where you want to be, this is essential. You need 2 or 3 people to properly spot a powerlifting squat, don't bother doing it alone.
I’ve wondered about this. Is there no way to do it well with the safety bars? I know with a bench press you can get benches with safety bars that seem quite effective.
But squats are more complicated. Are the safeties really useless? It’s a bit hard in my area to find such a group, though I could look around. Have taken time off of lifts to fix some muscular issues.
The safeties are a fail safe when every other safety system fails. It is not your primary safety component.
A team or partner serves many needs:
- safety in terms of spotting
- safety in terms of feedback to guide you to proper form
- safety in terms of damage control if you suffer an injury and need medical attention (especially if you have a stroke or aneurysm during a lift)
- encouragement to maibtain your routine
Thanks! I’m going to see if I can find one when I return to lifting. So minimum team number is 3. How long do sessions usually last? I’m guessing you lift during others’ breaks, so it doesn’t add as much extra time as if it were all in sequence.
It depends on what you mean by safety bars. If you mean a smith machine, yes, don't use those.
But if you mean "I have failed my lift, prevent me from crushing myself" safety bars, there shouldn't be a problem with those as long as they are set at an appropriate height.
Safety bars keep you from dying if you have to bail, but bailing is still bad. Basically you want to say "take" and have the weight immediately removed. There is no use in straining yourself or risking injury on a bail; you have the lift or you don't.
Front squats are also not so bad if you have safety bars to drop the barbell forwards onto.
Starting Strength style low-bar squats are trickier. I've previously found myself having to sort of roll forwards until the safety bars catch the barbell, then crawl out on hands and knees. Slightly scary the first couple of times but still pretty safe.
Thanks! With front squats can you just drop it, or do you need to jump as well? A friend had recommended those as being safer on the back.
My worry is I won't really need the safeties until I have 200+ pounds on my back and if I exit wrong I could hurt myself. I tried practicing at the gym but it was very loud and the staff warned me not to.
You shouldn't need to jump, just be moving backwards yourself as you push the bar off forwards.
I don't think front squats are inherently more or less safe than back squats; both are safe if performed with good form.
I understand the worry about heavy weights. If possible, you should try to find a gym that will let you drop weights (one mark of a good gym). Then you can practice to your heart's content.
He has almost certainly failed countless reps in his training and he's still alive and training like this :)
On the other hand - he appears to have injured his wrist few months ago, although not by failing to finish the lift but by missing the rack when putting the bar back.
I'd like to put my hat in to support the 5/3/1 approach over traditional 5x5s. I managed to get my way to a ~317 wilks on a 5x5 program and after taking a few years off and getting back in with 5/3/1, I wish I had had the patience to leverage a more well rounded approach like 5/3/1.
I love 5/3/1 but I don't know if I would recommend it to a beginner. The progression is just too slow compared to one of the daily progression programs like 5x5 or StartingStrength.
Yeah, I totally agree - you don't need to progress that slowly at the beginning, so why would you? 5 lbs a workout is totally doable, not 5/10 lbs a month. I'm a big fan of slow and steady, but there's a difference between that and a flagrant waste of time.
You don’t even technically _need_ a program if you’re just doing it for fun.
I work out twice a week, bench both days and squat/deadlift on each of the other. Some days I do 6 sets of 5-10 reps, some days I do heavy doubles/triples, whatever I feel like doing, depending on how I feel that day. I’m almost 40 so I’m sure if I had started 15 years ago I’d have way better numbers.
~325 wilks with a poor squat because of an old hip injury (it’s less than my bench)
If somebody wanted to get into weightlifting, where would they even start?