Rowing Exercise Quotes

At Lockwood & Co., George was famous for not being able to throw or catch with any accuracy. Back in the kitchen at Portland Row, even the casual passing out of fruit or bags of chips became an exercise fraught with danger.

Most of us have participated in the trust exercise in which one person falls back and is caught by a peer. Even if the catch is made a hundred times in a row, the trust is broken forever if the friend lets you fall the next time as a joke. Even if he swears he is sorry and will never let you fall again, you can never fall back without a seed of doubt.

I’m glad your self-righteousness has given you some exercise, but you forget: we are not such a tidy, reasonable, and humane race. Our thoughts don’t stand in grammatical rows, our hearts don’t draw equations, our consciences don’t have the benefit of historians whispering the answers to us.

To any woman out there who is fed up with trying the same thing over and over, I offer this suggestion. Instead of getting back on the treadmill “one more time,” try this. Alter your diet so that you eat no grain-based carbohydrate: no flour, no sugar, no bread, no pasta, and no high-fructose corn syrup. Then go to the gym and perform a workout of leg press, pull down, chest press, row and overhead press. Lift slowly and smoothly but with as much effort as possible. Go to complete fatigue, or as close to it as you can tolerate. Work out once, or at most, twice a week. Make sure your workouts last no longer than 20 minutes. Then sit back and watch what happens. —Doug McGuff, MD

the last cell in the row, whispering a prayer beneath her breath, a prisoner spat, the small splat landing just beside Katie’s sneaker. In the exercise yard, Duvall grew chatty. “Haven’t seen you around. You been

Do you remember a little phenom called step aerobics? If you do, then you know how crazy it was to take two ninety-minute classes in a row. It’s incredible that I didn’t die from a blunt injury to the back of my head from slipping on my own pool of sweat.

Decolonization is the process whereby we intend the conditions we want to live and social relations we wish to have. We have to supplant the colonial logic of the state itself. German philosopher Gustav Landauer wrote almost a hundred years ago that "the State is a condition, a certain relationship between human beings, a mode of behaviour; we destroy it by contracting other relationships." Decolonization requires us to exercise our sovereignties differently, and reconfigure our communities based on shared experiences, ideals, and visions. Almost all indigenous formulations of sovereignty--such as the Two Row Wampum agreement of peace, friendship, and respect between the Haudenosaunee nations and settlers--are premised on revolutionary notions of respectful coexistence and stewardship of the land, which goes far beyond any Western liberal democratic ideal. Original blog post: Unsettling America: Decolonization in Theory and Practice. Quoted In: Decolonize Together: Moving beyond a Politics of Solidarity toward a Practice of Decolonization. Taking Sides.

heel (calf) raise leg (knee) extension leg (knee) flexion squat (one half – full squat) or leg press good morning hip flexion hip abduction hip adduction hip extension back raises back raises with a twist 45° sit-up reverse trunk twist reverse sit-up bench press bent over row, two variants overhead press, two variants full and partial range front arm raises full and partial range lateral arm raises lat pulldown biceps curl) triceps push down supination-pronation wrist curls reverse curls finger and grip exercises breathing exercises

The body responds daily to the activity it experiences whether we exercise it or not. For example, my body responds not only to the weight-lifting I do on Monday but also to my sitting at my desk, in airports, in the car, and in front of the computer and television on Tuesday through Thursday.

Every individual who walks, runs, rides bikes, swims, rows, paddles, skis, shovels or hoes is setting up a line of defence against the mad onslaught of machines; if he is a parent, grandparent, teacher, youth mentor or exercise instructor who also manages to win a few other people over to his side, he is doing an even better job.

Working on my book about refugees, I learned a great deal about trauma and recover, and with the help of the people I spoke with developed what I called "a healing package of treatments." These treatments could be medical interventions from Western doctors, traditional medicines from the refugee's culture of origin, or basic pleasures. For example, a common healing package for a refugee family included going to city parks, cooking foods from their homelands, and meeting people who spoke their language. All of us can create our own healing packages by thinking about that which makes us feel healthy, calm, and happy. We can write our own prescriptions for health that include nutrition and exercise, relationships, things we enjoy, and gratitude.

When Bruhn and Wolf first presented their findings to the medical community, you can imagine the kind of skepticism they faced. They went to conferences where their peers were presenting long rows of data arrayed in complex charts and referring to this kind of gene or that kind of physiological process, and they themselves were talking instead about the mysterious and magical benefits of people stopping to talk to one another on the street and of having three generations under one roof. Living a long life, the conventional wisdom at the time said, depended to a great extent on who we were—that is, our genes. It depended on the decisions we made—on what we chose to eat, and how much we chose to exercise, and how effectively we were treated by the medical system. No one was used to thinking about health in terms of community.

The takeaway is that you should build habits that work for your personality.* People can get ripped working out like a bodybuilder, but if you prefer rock climbing or cycling or rowing, then shape your exercise habit around your interests. If your friend follows a low-carb diet but you find that low-fat works for you, then more power to you. If you want to read more, don’t be embarrassed if you prefer steamy romance novels over nonfiction. Read whatever fascinates you.* You don’t have to build the habits everyone tells you to build. Choose the habit that best suits you, not the one that is most popular. There is a version of every habit that can bring you joy and satisfaction.

A few days after the fireworks, I gave them a lesson on category nouns versus exact nouns. I hadn’t heard of this distinction prior to opening the textbook. It transpired that a category noun was something like “vegetables,” whereas exact nouns were “beetroot,” “carrots,” “broccoli.” It was better to use exact nouns because this made your writing more precise and interesting. The chapter gave a short explanation followed by an exercise: an A4 page divided into columns. On the left were various category nouns. On the right, you had to fill in at least three corresponding exact nouns. I told the kids they could use their Cantonese-to-English dictionaries. Cynthia Mak asked what to say for “people.” Did it mean “sister,” “brother,” “father,” or “teacher,” “doctor,” “artist,” or— “They’re all okay,” I said. “But if I put ‘sister,’ ‘father,’ ‘brother’ in ‘people,’ then what about here?” She pointed to the box marked “family.” “Okay, don’t do those. Do ‘teacher’ or something.” “But what about here?”—signaling the “professions” row. “Okay, something else for ‘people.’” “Happy people, sad people?” “‘Happy people’ isn’t an exact noun—it’s an adjective plus a category noun.” “So what should I write?” We looked at each other. It was indeed a challenge to describe people in a way not immediately related to how they earned money or their position in the family unit. I said: “How about ‘friend,’ ‘boyfriend,’ ‘colleague’?” “I don’t want to write ‘boyfriend.’” I couldn’t blame her for questioning the exercise. “Friend,” “enemy,” and “colleague” didn’t seem like ways of narrowing down “people” in the way “apple” did for “fruit.” An apple would still be a fruit if it didn’t have any others in its vicinity, but you couldn’t be someone’s nemesis without their hanging around to complete the definition. The same issue cropped up with my earlier suggestions. “Family” was relational, and “profession” was created and given meaning by external structures. Admittedly “adult,” “child,” and “teenager” could stand on their own. But I still found it depressing that the way we specified ourselves—the way we made ourselves precise and interesting—was by pinpointing our developmental stage and likely distance from mortality. Fruit didn’t have that problem.

Mr. Sturgess ran the classes with iron, ex-military discipline. We each had spots on the floor, denoting where we should stand rigidly to attention, awaiting our next task. And he pushed us hard. It felt like Mr. Sturgess had forgotten that we were only age six--but as kids, we loved it. It made us feel special. We would line up in rows beneath a metal bar, some seven feet off the ground, then one by one we would say: “Up, please, Mr. Sturgess,” and he would lift us up and leave us hanging, as he continued down the line. The rules were simple: you were not allowed to ask permission to drop off until the whole row was up and hanging, like dead pheasants in a game larder. And even then you had to request: “Down, please, Mr. Sturgess.” If you buckled and dropped off prematurely, you were sent back in shame to your spot. I found I loved these sessions and took great pride in determining to be the last man hanging. Mum would say that she couldn’t bear to watch as my little skinny body hung there, my face purple and contorted in blind determination to stick it out until the bitter end. One by one the other boys would drop off the bar, and I would be left hanging there, battling to endure until the point where even Mr. Sturgess would decide it was time to call it. I would then scuttle back to my mark, grinning from ear to ear. “Down, please, Mr. Sturgess,” became a family phrase for us, as an example of hard physical exercise, strict discipline, and foolhardy determination. All of which would serve me well in later military days. So my training was pretty well rounded. Climbing. Hanging. Escaping. I loved them all. Mum, still to this day, says that growing up I seemed destined to be a mix of Robin Hood, Harry Houdini, John the Baptist, and an assassin. I took it as a great compliment.

At that hour of dawn Agilulf always needed to apply himself to some precise exercise: counting objects, arranging them in geometric patterns, resolving problems of arithmetic. It was the hour in which objects lose the consistency of shadow that accompanies them during the night and gradually reacquire colors, but seem to cross meanwhile an uncertain limbo, faintly touched, just breathed on by light; the hour in which one is least certain of the world's existence. He, Agilulf, always needed to feel himself facing things as if they were a massive wall against which he could pit the tension of his will, for only in this way did he manage to keep a sure consciousness of himself. But if the world around was instead melting into the vague and ambiguous, he would feel himself drowning in that morbid half light, incapable of allowing any clear thought or decision to flower in that void. In such moments he felt sick, faint; sometimes only at the cost of extreme effort did he feel himself able to avoid melting away completely. It was then he began to count: trees, leaves, stones, laces, pine cones, anything in front of him. Or he put them in rows and arranged them in squares and pyramids. Applying himself to this exact occupation helped him overcome his malaise, absorb his discontent and disquiet, reacquire his usual lucidity and composure.

Hello, my name is Francine Luftson and I’m from San Diego! And I just want to say, I’m such a fan even if you don’t believe in God! I was just wondering: Is there some sort of diet you recommend? I know I need to lose weight, but I really don’t want to feel hungry. I do take diet pills every day. Thank you!” “Thanks, Francine,” Elizabeth said. “But I can clearly see that you are not overweight. Therefore, I have to assume you’ve been unduly influenced by the relentless imagery of the too-thin women that now fill our magazines, destroying your morale and submerging your self-worth. Instead of dieting and taking pills—” She paused. “Can I ask?” she said. “How many people in this audience take diet pills?” A few nervous hands went up. Elizabeth waited. Most of the other hands went up. “Stop taking those pills,” she demanded. “They’re amphetamines. They can lead to psychosis.” “But I don’t like to exercise,” Francine said. “Maybe you haven’t found the right exercise.” “I watch Jack LaLanne.” At the mention of Jack’s name, Elizabeth closed her eyes. “What about rowing?” she said, suddenly tired. “Rowing?” “Rowing,” she repeated, opening her eyes. “It’s a brutal form of recreation designed to test every muscle in your body and mind. It takes place before dawn, too often in the rain. It results in thick calluses. It broadens the arms, chest, and thighs. Ribs crack; hands blister. Rowers sometimes ask themselves, ‘Why am I doing this?’ ” “Jeepers,” Francine said, worried. “Rowing sounds awful!” Elizabeth looked confused. “My point is rowing precludes the need for both diet and pills. It’s also good for your soul.” “But I thought you didn’t believe in souls.” Elizabeth sighed. She closed her eyes again. Calvin. Are you actually saying women can’t row?

FUNDAMENTAL FIVE  MONDAY - The first exercise you will do is the push-up. Try and perform 3 sets and as many reps as you can in each set. It is fine here if you use a raised platform for the hands as we are just trying to get stronger here. The second exercise you will perform is the dip exercise. Here you can do either a ledge dip if your strength is not strong enough, or some triceps dips if your strength is at a decent level. Keep trying to work towards the goal of doing 10 perfect triceps dips. Thirdly you will perform 3 sets of squats. Concentrate on good form here and try and descend as low as you are able to. Your target is to be able to perform 25 perfect reps before moving on. You can also do conditioning exercises here as well if that is part of your goal. Note that this is not required, as our main focus is to build strength. TUESDAY - On this day you will aim to perform a pulling exercise, ideally the chin-up. If you are not strong enough to perform any chin-ups, work with the row until your strength increases. Again, you should be aiming for 3 sets of as many reps as you can do, until you can do 10 perfect reps. The second exercise should be your core exercise. This can be any of the easier variations, such as the plank, crunch, dish, or hanging leg raise. Remember, that the sole aim here is to work up to performing 10 perfect hanging knee raises. WEDNESDAY - This is a rest day, and you should ensure that you get plenty of good food and sleep on this day. THURSDAY - This should be the same as Mondays workout. FRIDAY - This should be the same as Tuesdays workout. SATURDAY / SUNDAY - These are both rest days, as in the beginning it is important for your body to have enough rest and to be able to recover properly from the workouts. This also leaves you totally fresh for the week ahead. As was said before, only once you can perform the five fundamental movements and their required number of repetitions, you should move on to the next program.

There was a boy at our school. He was the most extraordinary lad I ever came across. I believe he really liked study. He used to get into awful rows for sitting up in bed and reading Greek; and as for French irregular verbs, there was simply no keeping him away from them. He was full of weird and unnatural notions about being a credit to his parents and an honour to the school; and he yearned to win prizes, and grow up and be a clever man, and had all those sort of weak-minded ideas. I never knew such a strange creature, yet harmless, mind you, as the babe unborn. Well, that boy used to get ill about twice a week, so that he couldn’t go to school. There never was such a boy to get ill. If there was any known disease going within ten miles of him, he had it, and had it badly. He would “take bronchitis in the dog-days, and have hayfever at Christmas. After a six weeks’ period of drought, he would be stricken down with rheumatic fever; and he would go out in a November fog and come home with a sunstroke. They put him under laughing-gas one year, poor lad, and drew all his teeth, and gave him a false set, because he suffered so terribly with toothache; and then it turned to neuralgia and ear-ache. He was never without a cold, except once for nine weeks while he had scarlet fever; and he always had chilblains. He had to stop in bed when he was ill, and eat chicken and custards and hot-house grapes; and he would lie there and sob, because they wouldn’t let him do Latin exercises, and took his German grammar away from him. And we other boys, who would have sacrificed ten terms of our school life for the sake of being ill for a day, and had no desire whatever to give our parents any excuse for being stuck-up about us, couldn’t catch so much as a stiff neck. We fooled about in draughts, and it did us good, and freshened us up; and we took things to make us sick, and they made us fat, and gave us an appetite. Nothing we could think of seemed to make us ill until the holidays began. Then, on the breaking-up day, we caught colds, and whooping cough, and all kinds of disorders, which lasted till the term recommenced; when, in spite of everything we could manoeuvre to the contrary, we would get suddenly well again, and be better than ever.

Good. That's enough,” Deme said. “You may sit down.” Marus remained where he was, face now almost the colour of his robes, and a snarl forming on his lips. Ebryn felt the flow of force, gathering in towards Marus, the first lightning flickers forming around his hands. “That's enough — sit down,” Deme said again. This time the words came from her mouth like a lash, raw with power, and Marus rocked backwards as if struck. The force of her casting washed over the room like a dousing of ice water. Marus returned to his seat like a drunken man, tripping over the feet of fellow students, and lurching from side to side. “So, who understands what I did there?” Deme asked, moving around the floor again. “No? I used the deeper craft to control another's casting. Once you can do this, the inner nature of what we do is revealed to you, and you have achieved the beginning of mastery. “Much of what we will explore in these lessons is about improvement of your craft. So we learn what is common to all casting, not methods specific to any of the orders. Do you understand?” Deme stood in the middle of the room, looking around the chamber, at the rows of faces. “So, let us begin with a few simple mind exercises.

I rolled away from him with a gasp of laughter and hopped out of bed. “I need a shower.” Jack followed readily. I stopped short as I flipped on the switch in his bathroom, an immaculate well-lit space with contemporary cabinetry and modern stone vessel sinks. But it was the shower that left me speechless, a room made of glass and slate and granite, with rows of dials and knobs and thermostats. “Why is there a car wash in your bathroom?” Jack went past me, opened the glass door, and went inside. As he turned knobs and adjusted the temperature on digital screens, jets sprouted from every conceivable place, and steam collected in white drifts. Three rainfall streams came directly from the ceiling. “Aren’t you going to come in?” Jack’s voice filtered through the sound of abundant falling water. I went to the glass doorway and peeked inside. Jack was a magnificent sight, all bronzy and lean, a sheet of water glimmering over his skin. His stomach was drum-tight, his back gorgeous and sleekly muscled. “I hate to be the one to tell you this,” I said, “but you need to start exercising. A man your age shouldn’t let himself go.” He grinned and gestured for me to come to him. I ventured into the maelstrom of competing sprays, battered with heat from all directions. “I’m drowning,” I said, spluttering, and he pulled me out of the direct downpour of an overhead spray. “I wonder how much water we’re wasting.” “You know, Ella, you’re not the first woman who’s ever been in this shower with me—” “I’m shocked.” I leaned against him as he soaped my back. “— but you’re for damn sure the first one who’s ever worried about wasting water.” “How much, would you say?” “Ten gallons per minute, give or take.” “Oh my God. Hurry. We can’t stay in here long. We’ll throw the entire ecological system out of balance.” “This is Houston, Ella. The ecological system won’t notice.

As the weight gets heavy, there will be a pronounced tendency to allow your chest to drop down to meet the bar, completing the rep from the top down instead of from the bottom up. When this chest drop becomes excessive, the weight is too heavy. And “excessive” is a rather subjective concept here. Someone might decide that no chest drop is allowable, in which case heavy weights cannot be used in the exercise. Or someone might decide that as long as the chest can be touched with the bar, the rep counts. This degree of variability is one of the things that distinguish an ancillary exercise from a primary exercise: if a large degree of variability is inherent in the performance of an exercise, it cannot be judged effectively or quantified objectively. For this reason, the barbell row makes a very good ancillary exercise but a very poor contest lift.

You can also use supersets, where you do two exercises in a row nonstop, or decrease rest intervals between sets. These techniques can help busy people get great results in as little as 30 to 45 minutes.

In any medium, I also start out assuming—even planning—that I’ll delete the first thing I do, whether it’s a paragraph or the first few rows of a scarf. That makes those first steps far less precious and therefore less intimidating.

Follow with several more treats while she remains seated, to reward her for continued sitting. Then quickly move several steps away in a way that makes her want to hurry after you, and repeat. Perform these sits repeatedly. When the puppy can do these repeat sits 5 to 10 times in a row, go on to the next exercise.

The whole exercise is like trying to pick up a cow patty by the clean end.

Many of us have precisely this experience of dharma: a lifeboat! You cling to it because it is the only boat you have and the storm is rising. You work at it—you row as hard as you possibly can against the storm, because you have to survive. But gradually the seas calm, and you don’t have to row quite so hard, and you actually begin to enjoy the exercise. You get stronger from the exertion—as Gandhi did. Finally, the storm abates. You have a spell of beautiful weather. You feel your strength. You begin to love this rowing. You begin to love the sea itself. You see things in the waves that others do not see. You begin to see that rowing this little boat of dharma connects you to very life. Gradually the task of rowing itself begins to ease. At times it is effortless. There are moments of rapture.

DAY 1 CHEST & CALVES Incline Barbell Bench Press – Warm-up sets and then 3 working sets Incline Dumbbell Bench Press – 3 working sets Flat Barbell Bench Press – 3 working sets Optional: Dip (Chest Variation) – 3 working sets Calf Workout A If you can’t do dips, find out whether your gym has an assisted dip machine. If it doesn’t and you still want to do 3 more sets in your workout, you can do 3 sets of flat dumbbell presses. DAY 2 BACK & BUTT & ABS Barbell Deadlift – Warm-up sets and then 3 working sets Barbell Squat – 3 working sets Barbell Row – 3 working sets One-Arm Dumbbell Row – 3 working sets 3 to 6 ab circuits If you have lower-back issues, remember that you can swap the deadlift for a more lower-back-friendly variation like the sumo or hex deadlift, or you can drop it altogether and choose another “approved” exercise like the T-bar row. If you can’t do pull-ups or chin-ups, you can use a machine that assists you. If your gym doesn’t have one, you can do dumbbell rows instead. DAY 3 SHOULDERS & CALVES Seated or Standing Barbell Military Press – Warm-up sets and then 3 working sets Side Lateral Raise – 3 working sets Bent-Over Rear Delt Raise – 3 working sets Calf Workout B DAY 4 ARMS & ABS Barbell Curl – Warm-up sets and then 3 working sets Close-Grip Bench Press – Warm-up sets and then 3 working sets Alternating Dumbbell Curl – 3 working sets Seated Triceps Press – 3 working sets 3 to 6 ab circuits DAY 5 LEGS & BUTT Barbell Squat – Warm-up sets and then 3 working sets Leg Press – 3 working sets Romanian Deadlift – 3 working sets Hip Thrust – 3 working sets Calf Workout C If you’re going to lift 5 days per week, I recommend that you start with this routine for your first eight to ten weeks. It’s the first phase of the workouts you’ll find in the bonus report. In terms of which days to train on, most people like to lift Monday through Friday and take the weekends off, maybe doing some cardio on one or both of these days. This works well. Feel free to work your rest days however you want, though. Some people prefer to lift on the weekends and take off two days during the week. Work your cardio in as needed. You can lift and do cardio on the same days without an issue.

Your best compound exercises are squats, front squats, deadlifts, Trap Bar deadlifts, standing presses with barbells or dumbbells (or a single dumbbell), barbell and dumbbell bent-over rowing, pull-ups, chin-ups, pull-downs, weighted push-ups, bench presses (performed with barbells, dumbbells, or a single dumbbell), incline presses (performed with barbells, dumbbells, or a single dumbbell), shoulder shrugs (performed with a barbell, two dumbbells, one dumbbell or a Trap Bar), deadlifts from the knees (performed with the bar or Trap Bar elevated by resting the plates on sturdy wooden blocks), hand and thigh lifts, and Hise shrugs. (Many would add dips to the list; I don't because they're hard on the shoulders and can cause shoulder problems for many trainees, particularly older trainees.

Shawn teaches a set of five simple things you can do every day that, if you do them consistently over time, will make you significantly, noticeably, measurably happier. They are slight edge actions for happiness: happy habits.   Each morning, write down three things you’re grateful for. Not the same three every day; find three new things to write about. That trains your brain to search your circumstances and hunt for the positive. Journal for two minutes a day about one positive experience you’ve had over the past twenty-four hours. Write down every detail you can remember; this causes your brain to literally reexperience the experience, which doubles its positive impact. Meditate daily. Nothing fancy; just stop all activity, relax, and watch your breath go in and out for two minutes. This trains your brain to focus where you want it to, and not get distracted by negativity in your environment. Do a random act of kindness over the course of each day. To make this simple, Shawn often recommends a specific act of kindness: at the start of each day, take two minutes to write an email to someone you know praising them or thanking them for something they did. Exercise for fifteen minutes daily. Simple cardio, even a brisk walk, has a powerful antidepressant impact, in many cases stronger (and more long-lasting) than an actual antidepressant! According to Shawn, if you do any one of these things faithfully for just three weeks, twenty-one days in a row, it will start to become a habit—a happy habit. You will have literally begun to rewire your brain to see the world in a different way, and as a result, to be happier on an everyday basis.

The core idea of daily adaptation seems so obvious to me that it should not have to be stated. It goes against the grain for a competitive rower and rowing coach to advocate “moderate” rather than competitive rowing. Exercising every day seems extreme rather than moderate to many people. And rowing on a machine is not perceived as fun.

One reason was to overcome the many misconceptions about rowing and healthy exercise. Many people mistakenly think rowing is not for everyone because it has to be strenuous and is inaccessible. The common idea of limiting exercise to three days per week also must be reconsidered. These two misconceptions bracket what this book is about.

Your body is designed to be used more actively than occurs in the average, sedentary modern lifestyle. A simple conclusion follows from these two fundamental notions: A daily routine of breathing more deeply with moderate exercise will stimulate your body to develop greater fitness and energy.

The worst bad habit is not to exercise. The most important good habit to develop is to exercise every day.

Every day that you engage in exercise that safely and effectively causes you to breathe more deeply (but still comfortably) for thirty to forty-five minutes or more, your body will reward you with better lung power. Better lung power is the foundation of better fitness and that translates into yet more effective exercise. It is a cycle you will learn to use to your benefit.

Keep in mind that every day you skip, every day you do not engage in some exercise that causes you to breathe more deeply, you are instructing your lungs to become less efficient. The body does not coast; it declines without positive stimulus.

The beauty of indoor rowing as an exercise, apart from the easy access, is that it is a non-impact exercise that can be done at any age and at any level of effort. It can be done moderately, as I advocate here, and does not have to be painful or intense. As a result, it can be used in a way that is responsive to your needs and condition, whatever they may be.

The rowing motion involves sitting down and generating resistance based on how hard you choose to work. Since you control it, you stimulate your breathing to the degree that is right for you. Exercising in your comfort zone, you can do it every day. Using the monitor on the rowing machine, you can keep track of and record your improvements over time. Since rowing uses nearly the whole muscle mass of the body, it has the added benefit of stimulating heart and lungs more efficiently and completely than most other exercises. And since you row sitting down on a stable seat and without joint impact, it is safer and easier for many of us to undertake as beginners than most other forms of exercise. In short, it is one of the safest and most effective ways to stimulate your whole body each day to greater health.

Plan to exercise every day. You will do better for that attempt and can only gain more if you succeed.

But the exercise I am suggesting you do daily is well within the boundaries of comfort. The intent is to gain a maximum benefit over time by stimulating your body daily at a level that is just above your norm and does not cause strain. You might call this exercising within your comfort zone.

There was a pause. ‘I will not detain you, gentlemen,’ said Jack coldly. ‘Mr Parker, let the starboard watch be exercised at the great guns and the larboard at reefing topsails. Mr Pullings will take the small-arms men. What is that infernal row. Hallows,’ – to the Marine sentry outside the door – ‘what is that din?’ ‘Beg pardon, your Honour,’ said the soldier, ‘it’s the captain’s steward and the gun-room steward fighting over the use of the coffee-pot.’ ‘God damn their eyes,’ cried Jack. ‘I’ll tan their hides – I’ll give them a bloody shirt – I’ll stop their capers. Old seamen, too: rot them. Mr Parker, let us establish a little order in this sloop.

Seiji was not having a good day. He felt he’d been horribly misled by Eugene. He’d trusted him to be correct in his reading of social dynamics, but as it emerged, him was an imbecile, Nicholas hadn’t even been upset, and the whole prank had been an exercise in futility. As the illicit brown sugar sprinkled on this oatmeal of horror, he’d been hauled around like a deeply shamed sack of potatoes by weight lifters. Seiji wasn’t sure he could look anyone at Kings Row in the face right now. Any escape from their watching eyes and embarrassing congratulations was welcome. The last time Seiji’d been in the woods, he’d gotten lost in them. Seiji headed into the trees now, hoping he could again. Perhaps by the time he found his way back, everybody would have forgotten about the prank. He feared not.

The health benefits from regular activity are widely acknowledged and can be achieved by any adult willing to complete the weekly target of just 150 minutes of moderate intensity physical activity. This is the equivalent of just under 22 minutes per day so we would hardly be surprised if most able-bodied adults achieved these targets. Yet, survey data in the United States suggests that only 49 per cent of adults achieve these minimum recommendations, although some states fare better. For example, 60 per cent of Alaskans meet the minimum recommendations compared to only 39 per cent of Louisianans. Adults in the United Kingdom appear to struggle even more, with only 35 per cent of men and women achieving the same 150 minute weekly target. To make matters worse, these percentages are all based on official government statistics which were obtained by asking random samples of people to estimate how much activity they usually do. Using these types of self-report questionnaires introduces considerable bias, especially when the respondents are aware that they don’t do as much exercise as they believe they should. A better way to check how much exercise adults really do is to use electronic sensors worn on the body to record the number of minutes spent performing physical activity of moderate intensity or above. Using this more accurate measurement technique, only 6 per cent of men and 4 per cent of women in the United Kingdom actually achieved the minimum weekly amounts of recommended physical activity. Similar results have been revealed in other Western countries, including the United States. If most adults believe that regular exercise is important, then the low participation statistics suggest that it must be difficult to achieve in practice.

Strength Work Pull-ups: 3×5→15 with 3 minutes of rest at 10×0 tempo Dips: 3×5→15 with 3 minutes of rest at 10×0 tempo Wide Ring Rows: 3×5→15 with 3 minutes of rest at 10×0 tempo Rings Pushups: 3×5→15 with 3 minutes of rest at 10×0 tempo Squats (pistol progression or barbell): 3×5→15 with 3 minutes of rest at 10×0 tempo Deep Step-ups: 3×5→15 with 3 minutes of rest at 10×0 tempo L-sit for 60s total, in as many sets as needed, not to failure Compression Work for 3×10s (Organized according to: exercise, exercise order, sets × reps with progressive principle, rest time, tempo.) Prehabilitation, Isolation Work, Flexibility Work, and Cool Down 3×1 minute sets of Rice Bucket for the wrists 3×10 Biceps Curls 3-5×30s Splits Holds 3-5×30s German Hangs 3-5×20s Back Bridges 1 minute of Deep Breathing (in through the nose, out through the mouth)

Sample Strength Work Routine (with two additional exercises at the end): • Pull-ups: 3×5→12 with 3 minutes of rest at 10×0 tempo • Dips: 3×5→12 with 3 minutes of rest at 10×0 temp • Wide Ring Rows: 3×5→12 with 3 of minutes rest at 10×0 tempo • Rings Pushups: 3×5→12 with 3 minutes of rest at 10×0 tempo • Squats (pistol progression or barbell): 3×5→12 with 3 minutes of rest at 10×0 tempo • Deep Step-ups: 3×5→12 with 3 minutes of rest at 10×0 tempo • L-Sit for 60s total in as many sets as needed, not to failure • Compression Work for 3×10s • Planche Isometrics: 5×12s with 3 minutes of rest • L-Sit Pull-up Eccentrics: 3×(3 × 7s) or 3×3 with 10s eccentrics Legend: Exercise, Sets × Reps with Progressive Principle, Exercise Order, Rest Time, and Tempo

Exercise A “warm” niche is a niche where you have some kind of association. Perhaps you worked for a credit card company for a few years, your wife is a lawyer, you collect comic books, or your brother is a plumber. Each of these would be considered a warm niche, and introducing a product into this niche will be much easier than choosing a completely unknown market. Remember, you stand a better chance when you know who you’re selling to. Make two columns on a piece of paper. In the header of the left column write “Person” and in the right one write “Hobby or Work Experience.” Now for each row write the name of someone you know, including yourself, friends, relatives or colleagues, and write their work experience or hobby in the right column.

Roosevelt was a brilliant, vociferous, combustible man, not the type who ordinarily reaches the presidency. In his whirlwind career, which had taken him from college to the White House in less than twenty years, he had been many things: a historian, lawyer, ornithologist, minority leader of the New York State Assembly, boxer, ranchman, New York City police commissioner, naturalist, hunter, civil service reformer, prolific author, devoted husband and father, voracious reader, assistant secretary of the navy, war hero, empire builder, advocate of vigorous physical exercise, governor of New York, and vice president of the United States. He was a big, broad-shouldered, barrel-chested man, with tan, rough-textured skin. His hair was close-cropped and reddish-brown in color, with bristles around the temples beginning to show gray, and his almost impossibly muscular neck looked as if it was on the verge of bursting his collar-stays. He wore pince-nez spectacles with a ribbon that hung down the left side of his face. When he smiled or spoke, he revealed two very straight rows of teeth, plainly visible from incisor to incisor, their gleaming whiteness sharply accented by his ruddy complexion.

Do not freak out about training the same movement or the same body part for two or more days in a row. It is a standard operating procedure among Russian athletes. For example, the Russian National Powerlifting Team benches up to eight times a week. The key to successful frequent training is constant variation of the loading variables: weights, reps, sets, rest periods, tempo, exercise order, exercise selection, etc.

Why promote daily exercise? The reason is simply that when one exercises moderately, the more the better. The body functions on a daily cycle; use it. But also consider this viewpoint: The body functions better at a higher level than when it is at rest. From another angle, one might say, being physically at rest really is for rest and is not the preferred normal level of physical activity for a healthy body; it is preferable to move. Having said that, even if your pace or energy output is moderate, if you continue long enough you may begin to leave the range of moderation and achieve an extreme outcome

Grip strength, how hard you can grip with your hands, which involves everything from your hands to your lats (the large muscles on your back). Almost all actions begin with the grip. Attention to both concentric and eccentric loading for all movements, meaning when our muscles are shortening (concentric) and when they are lengthening (eccentric). In other words, we need to be able to lift the weight up and put it back down, slowly and with control. Rucking down hills is a great way to work on eccentric strength, because it forces you to put on the “brakes.” Pulling motions, at all angles from overhead to in front of you, which also requires grip strength (e.g., pull-ups and rows). Hip-hinging movements, such as the deadlift and squat, but also step-ups, hip-thrusters, and countless single-leg variants of exercises that strengthen the legs, glutes, and lower back.

The real problem is posed by those countrymen who are complete slaves to machines from a shockingly young age. All exceptions aside, it is impossible to make the average Finnish country dweller of over fifteen years of age ride a bicycle, ski or row — or even exercise in the fields. The spell of the car and its antecedent — the scooter — is unbelievable. A young man will travel a hundred metres to the sauna by car; as this involves backing the car, reversing and manoeuvring, opening and shutting garage doors, it is not a matter of saving time. In the case of farmers, moreover, the more technology advances — every sack of fertiliser now being lifted by a tractor, the spread and removal of manure being a mechanical feat — the more will their physical activities be limited to taking a few steps in the garden and climbing onto the benches of saunas. Lumberjacks have already been replaced by multi-tasking machines, while fishermen lever their trawl sacks with a winch, haul their nets with a lever, and gather their Baltic herrings with an aspirator from open fish traps.

Fundamentally I structure my training around exercises that improve the following: Grip strength, how hard you can grip with your hands, which involves everything from your hands to your lats (the large muscles on your back). Almost all actions begin with the grip. Attention to both concentric and eccentric loading for all movements, meaning when our muscles are shortening (concentric) and when they are lengthening (eccentric). In other words, we need to be able to lift the weight up and put it back down, slowly and with control. Rucking down hills is a great way to work on eccentric strength, because it forces you to put on the “brakes.” Pulling motions, at all angles from overhead to in front of you, which also requires grip strength (e.g., pull-ups and rows). Hip-hinging movements, such as the deadlift and squat, but also step-ups, hip-thrusters, and countless single-leg variants of exercises that strengthen the legs, glutes, and lower back.

also going to get their rights. Meanwhile, large numbers of Black women were manifesting their commitment to freedom and equality in ways that were less closely connected with the newly organized women’s movement. The Underground Railroad claimed the energies of numerous Northern Black women. Jane Lewis, for example, a resident of New Lebanon, Ohio, regularly rowed her boat across the Ohio River, rescuing many a fugitive slave.56 Frances E. W. Harper, a dedicated feminist and the most popular Black poet at midcentury, was one of the most active lecturers associated with the anti-slavery movement. Charlotte Forten, who became a leading Black educator during the post-Civil War period, was likewise an active abolitionist. Sarah Remond, who lectured against slavery in England, Ireland and Scotland, exercised a vast influence on public opinion, and according to one historian, “kept the Tories from intervening on the side of the Confederacy.”57

Now fully see, feel, and enjoy executing this skill throughout each moment of the movement. Maintain full attention throughout the entire activity and complete the routine by sinking the basket with a swish or serving an ace down the line. Challenge yourself to do this exercise successfully three times in a row with full focus and a positive result. If you visualize missing the basket or hitting the ball into the net or if you lose focus, keep repeating the process until you can visualize yourself doing it right straight through. This will further anchor your physical self to a gold medal performance.

The Maori of New Zealand, for example, used to sleep communally in longhouses and still sleep this way at funerals to accompany a corpse on its journey from this world to the next.38 The Asabano of New Guinea never let a stranger sleep alone because of the dangers of nighttime witchcraft, and the Warlpiri of Central Australia sleep under the stars in rows whose order is determined by strict social rules.39 In

Arizona arrived in Pearl Harbor from San Pedro on July 8, 1941. For the remainder of the summer, the ship spent two weeks at a time moored along Battleship Row adjacent to Ford Island, interspersed by a week of training exercises. These exercises included everything from range-finder calibration on the big fourteen-inch guns to antiaircraft practice. Sometimes Arizona operated independently, escorted by several destroyers, and at other times the battleship steamed in concert with Nevada and Oklahoma, the other ships of Battleship Division One.5

To make this point, I often do the same coin flipping exercise that I explained during the probability discussion. In a class of forty students or so, I’ll have each student flip a coin. Any student who flips tails is eliminated; the rest flip again. In the second round, those who flip tails are once again eliminated. I continue the rounds of flipping until one student has flipped five or six heads in a row. You may recall some of the silly follow-up questions: “What’s your secret? Is it in the wrist? Can you teach us to flip heads all the time? Maybe it’s that Harvard sweatshirt you’re wearing.” Obviously the string of heads is just luck; the students have all watched it happen. However, that is not necessarily how the result could or would be interpreted in a scientific context. The probability of flipping five heads in a row is 1/32, or .03. This is comfortably below the .05 threshold we typically use to reject a null hypothesis. Our null hypothesis in this case is that the student has no special talent for flipping heads; the lucky string of heads (which is bound to happen for at least one student when I start with a large group) allows us to reject the null hypothesis and adopt the alternative hypothesis: This student has a special ability to flip heads. After he has achieved this impressive feat, we can study him for clues about his flipping success—his flipping form, his athletic training, his extraordinary concentration while the coin is in the air, and so on. And it is all nonsense. This phenomenon can plague even legitimate research. The accepted convention is to reject a null hypothesis when we observe something that would happen by chance only 1 in 20 times or less if the null hypothesis were true. Of course, if we conduct 20 studies, or if we include 20 junk variables in a single regression equation, then on average we will get 1 bogus statistically significant finding.

muscle-only approach often exacerbates common muscle imbalances. For example, an exercise routine that leans on heavy pressing, rows, and lat pulldowns builds the shoulder’s internal rotation muscles while neglecting the posterior (rear) muscles. This front-biased training combined with slouching over a desk all day causes shoulder impingement and pain.

Here is an exercise that I do with my students to make the same basic point. The larger the class, the better it works. I ask everyone in the class to take out a coin and stand up. We all flip the coin; anyone who flips heads must sit down. Assuming we start with 100 students, roughly 50 will sit down after the first flip. Then we do it again, after which 25 or so are still standing. And so on. More often than not, there will be a student standing at the end who has flipped five or six tails in a row. At that point, I ask the student questions like “How did you do it?” and “What are the best training exercises for flipping so many tails in a row?” or “Is there a special diet that helped you pull off this impressive accomplishment?” These questions elicit laughter because the class has just watched the whole process unfold; they know that the student who flipped six tails in a row has no special coin-flipping talent. He or she just happened to be the one who ended up with a lot of tails. When we see an anomalous event like that out of context, however, we assume that something besides randomness must be responsible.

The tools a competitive rower uses to prepare to race are useful for the everyday rower, as well. They include double workouts (exercising two times per day), weight lifting, core exercises, and cross-training such as cycling.

A bear, however hard he tries, grows tubby without exercise.” A.A. Milne

It is amazing how out of shape some muscles can be despite our other, general physical activity. Getting sore does not mean you hurt yourself, but it may mean you overdid it. More importantly, excessive soreness can be discouraging. The best response to that is to keep at it, but more moderately. The best solution to the issue of excessive soreness is avoidance, not of the exercises but of the excess: Start easily and build gradually.

Simon’s version of exercise was riding women, not rowing machines. His

Beatrix, are you there?” “Two rows away,” came her sister’s cheerful reply. “Medusa found some worms!” “Lovely.” Harry gave Poppy a bemused glance. “Who . . . or should I say what . . . is Medusa?” “Hedgehog,” she replied. “Medusa’s getting a bit plump, and Beatrix is exercising her.” To Harry’s credit, he remained composed as he remarked, “You know, I pay my staff a fortune to keep those out of the garden.” “Oh, have no fear. Medusa is merely a guest hedgehog. She would never run away from Beatrix.” “Guest hedgehog,” Harry repeated, a smile working across his mouth.

Beatrix, are you there?” “Two rows away,” came her sister’s cheerful reply. “Medusa found some worms!” “Lovely.” Harry gave Poppy a bemused glance. “Who . . . or should I say what . . . is Medusa?” “Hedgehog,” she replied. “Medusa’s getting a bit plump, and Beatrix is exercising her.” To Harry’s credit, he remained composed as he remarked, “You know, I pay my staff a fortune to keep those out of the garden.” “Oh, have no fear. Medusa is merely a guest hedgehog. She would never run away from Beatrix.

Workout A All exercises, except for kettlebell swings, are performed for 10 repetitions using a 13-Repetition Max2 (RM) weight. 1. Heavy dumbbell front squat to press (ass to heels)—squeeze glutes at bottom for one second before rising 2. One-arm, one-leg DB row 3. Walking lunges with sprinter knee raise 4. Wide-grip push-ups3 5. Two-arm kettlebell swings × 20–25 Repeat sequence 2–4 times. Workout

I realized I was actually in some Hilton Garden Inn somewhere in the middle of America, and I had to remind myself of what I had been doing for the last ten months. Literally, step by step, campaign stop by campaign stop, I had to rebuild my memory. Think about that for a second. I had to remind myself of breaking up with my boyfriend, leaving my home, and following a man some call a maniac around, trying to keep up with the daily lies and outrages. He lies a lot. That sounds overly negative. But you have to understand something. Most people, even those who would qualify as political junkies, have other things going on in their lives. They follow politics—but they also go to work, pick up their kids, exercise, shop for groceries, daydream, and live a full life. I do not. I live the Trump campaign. That means I live every lie. And I live every controversy. And they pile up daily. Every time Trump opens his mouth in public, I get a verbatim log of it sent to my e-mail.

We applaud your efforts to hit the gym. But if you don’t take a break from the same daily exercise regimen, you could be at risk of experiencing an overuse injury, like tendinitis or a rotator cuff tear. You don’t need to be a fitness newbie: Our colleague Keri Peterson, a New York City internist who’s been a regular exerciser for years, got tendinitis in her shoulder from using the elliptical machine every day for a few months. She recommends that patients never repeat the same routine two days in a row. So if you jog on the treadmill today, do yoga or strength training tomorrow.

Each morning, write down three things you’re grateful for. Not the same three every day; find three new things to write about. That trains your brain to search your circumstances and hunt for the positive. Journal for two minutes a day about one positive experience you’ve had over the past twenty-four hours. Write down every detail you can remember; this causes your brain to literally reexperience the experience, which doubles its positive impact. Meditate daily. Nothing fancy; just stop all activity, relax, and watch your breath go in and out for two minutes. This trains your brain to focus where you want it to, and not get distracted by negativity in your environment. Do a random act of kindness over the course of each day. To make this simple, Shawn often recommends a specific act of kindness: at the start of each day, take two minutes to write an email to someone you know praising them or thanking them for something they did. Exercise for fifteen minutes daily. Simple cardio, even a brisk walk, has a powerful antidepressant impact, in many cases stronger (and more long-lasting) than an actual antidepressant! According to Shawn, if you do any one of these things faithfully for just three weeks, twenty-one days in a row, it will start to become a habit—a happy habit. You will have literally begun to rewire your brain to see the world in a different way, and as a result, to be happier on an everyday basis. An interesting thing is that you don’t have to do all five at once—in fact, Shawn actually recommends that you don’t even try to do that, but instead start with just one and keep repeating it until it becomes a habit, then add another, and so on.

From the beginning, I was a believer in the basic movements, because that was Reg Park’s preference. At the times Reg hadn’t accelerated his workouts for some major competition, he would stay with the basic exercises—bench presses, chin-ups, squats, rowing, barbell curls, wrist curls, pullovers, leg extensions, calf raises. These were the movements that worked most directly on all the body parts. I was following his example to the letter. And as it turned out, I could hardly have chosen more wisely. The basic exercises were creating for me a rugged foundation, a core of muscle I could later build upon for a winning body. Reg Park’s theory was that first you have to build the mass and then chisel it down to get the quality; you work on your body the way a sculptor would work on a piece of clay or wood or steel. You rough it out—the more carefully, the more thoroughly, the better—then you start to cut and define. You work it down gradually until it’s ready to be rubbed and polished. And that’s when you really know about the foundation. Then all the faults of poor early training stand out as hopeless, almost irreparable flaws.

Early May 2012 In response to Andy’s Email, I wrote: Hi Andy, I’m glad to know you are doing well, and I trust that you are coping with the loss of Albert. Without doubt, your daily meditations and rowing exercises will do wonders for your healing process. We have both been through rough periods after our separation. We grew stronger in body and spirit through these experiences. Although we have matured, you are still the person I’ll always love and cherish. I’m sure there are many men who would be thrilled to have the opportunity to be in a relationship with you. Your charismatic personality traits and stunning good looks ensure that you will come out on top, every time! If I were single, I’d be the first in line to solicit a relationship with you, you handsome man! Are you currently dating anyone? My life partner Walter, is the person who spearheaded my search for you. He’s enamored with the way I describe you as God in human form. The two of you have very similar personalities; that’s the reason I love you both very, very much. This, my friend, is the undeniable truth. I am extremely grateful for the years we shared and I look forward to meeting again. For now I am grateful for our long distance friendship…

My regular rowing kept me from falling into depression. I am actively involved in a rowing club near my home and our group travel to different places on rowing expeditions; frequently to Asia and parts of Australia, New Zealand and Tasmania. This assertive exercise assisted my wellbeing enormously during the early months of Albert’s passing. Being at one with nature is a staggeringly positive way to heal the aching heart and connecting with a group of likeminded compatriots eased my pain, during those long lonely evenings without my life partner. I have long given up those bacchanalian years of debauchery and one night stands. I prefer friends and companions I can talk intimately with. Several of my friends had asked me to give online dating a try but I’m hesitant. I believe that the appropriate time will arrive for the right person to manifest, without any desperate attempts on my part to go cruising for a warm body to share my bed. Maybe, the universe has bought us together for a reason after such a lengthy absence. I firmly believe that our reunion is not by coincidence but by universal design. I suppose the best way to find out is to live and let live and the rest will take care of itself.

To cool off mind and body, she went rowing on the lake in the Bois. “O healthy exercise, distract me from such thoughts that might unsettle a sturdy creature of my kind!

sculpted and refined by hours upon hours of exercise, walking stairs that lead nowhere, riding bikes that go nowhere, rowing phantom rowboats, wearing immovable cross-country skis.

Did you get a VO2Max? They are a bit hard to come by, but tend to cost under $100. They can also be estimated using your two-kilometer rowing time on a Concept 2 rower. Though not as good, these machines are at least widely available, being found in most gyms. VO2Max measures your ability to huff and puff. It’s the maximum rate you can use oxygen. The higher the healthier, and it is a great exercise marker because many things must be operating well to get a good score. If your exercise is effective, your VO2Max will climb. This is a good way to monitor your overall progress.

Kеttlеbеll Renegade Rоw A very роwеrful соrе еxеrсiѕе when реrfоrmеd рrореrlу and аlѕо grеаt for building the bасk оf thе body. You will nееd 2 kеttlеbеllѕ fоr this еxеrсiѕе. Start in a Puѕh Uр роѕitiоn with bоth hаndѕ on thе handles of thе kеttlеbеllѕ. Nеxt row оnе kеttlеbеll bасk tоwаrdѕ уоur hiрѕ kеерing уоur body аnd bасk niсе and flаt. Return thе kettlebell tо the grоund and rереаt оn thе оthеr ѕidе. If уоu саnnоt remain in a good plank position throughout this exercise thеn it iѕ tоо аdvаnсеd fоr уоu.

Kеttlеbеll Suitcase Rоw Thе first of the rоwing movements аnd thiѕ one iѕ ѕimрlе рrоviding уоu gеt your bасk in thе соrrесt position. Bend over аt thе hiрѕ еnѕuring thаt уоu mаintаin a flаt back аnd thаt your сhеѕt iѕ liftеd. Lооk dоwn at about 2 mеtеrѕ in front of уоu. Keep уоur fееt аt shoulder width араrt. Grаb the kettlebell with one hаnd frоm bеtwееn уоur lеgѕ аnd row thе kettlebell bасk tоwаrdѕ your оnе hiр. Yоur back ѕhоuld rеmаin ѕtаtiоnаrу аt a 45 dеgrее angle tо thе flооr during thе whоlе еxеrсiѕе.

Kеttlеbеll Row Hold thе kettlebell handle in уоur lеft hand with your arms hanging ѕtrаight at уоur ѕidеѕ. Stер уоur lеft fооt a fеw feet in frоnt оf your right fооt. Bеnd at your waist so уоur tоrѕо iѕ аt a 45-dеgrее аnglе tо floor, kеерing уоur ѕрinе lоng. Lift the kеttlеbеll tо уоur rib саgе (аѕ shown in thе imаgе bеlоw). Pause and lоwеr it bасk dоwn.