Farmer's Walk

Today I executed a very long and arduous, yet easy-to-do exercise task.

The Farmer's Walk involves passing along some indeterminate distance with an equal weight in either of your hands. Imagine a farmer carrying two pails of milk, two bails of hay, two cow heads...whichever bucolic or gruesome substitute you care to imagine. It's incredibly simple, but will significantly use muscles you might not even care to acknowledge while walking without any weights. Strong back, good traps, and a firm grip.

Today, I walked 1km with 20kg (a rough estimate based on what I can remember 20kg feeling like, could be more, could be slightly less) of groceries in either hand. This was not easy and I had to rest along the way. As a method of turning this ordinary and completely mundane activity into a regimented exercise, I used the city blocks in my neighbourhood as small tracks or 'sprints.' Each block was about 150m. After each distance i'd set the bags down and squat beside them. Then, lifting with my legs and arms, i'd stand up and do another 1-200m until I was home.

It was actually fairly exhausting, but as the strain on my arms became less and less avoidable, I started to employ little tricks to shift which part of my body was taking the weight. For instance, when I stood back up, i'd raise the bags so that my fists were just about in line or above my navel, and slightly "slouch" (someone with a better vocabulary for fitness can advise a proper word) so that some of the weight was on my biceps, and some was actually on my midsection/core. Made all the difference for the last few blocks.

While on the road, similar activity takes place during loading, which is the first real regimented 'road fitness' that I'd engaged in. Every band member loathes the load, since it involves lugging heavy equipment in and out of small spaces, up stairs, on to stages, off of them, and all the rest with great repetition. For extended misery there are a few variations: The rainy load-in, the short handed load-in, the spite load-in, the leave-before-you-get-arrested speed trial....etc etc. If you are on the road, though, giving a small amount of extra attention to how you're lifting those things that you are lifting actually turns into a great workout.

The Farmer's Walk is best applied to loading in with two guitar heads or two combo amps. The combos are generally heavier since all the machinery (speakers and electronics) are in one box. For an extra challenge, carry two at once up a flight of stairs.

My disclaimer for this exercise in a band, though, is to not try and descend stairs while balancing large amounts of weight. You're not a fireman and/or you have terrible balance; and, at the end of a show you're both tired, and likely intoxicated. Traversing steps with a hundred pounds throwing you off is certain doom. The Kinks and the Who can smash their amps, but we are probably not at liberty to do the same and especially not in the name of a workout. Shame, that.

Merely carrying your groceries might not suffice as an official Farmer's Walk workout, but whenever you're presented with the challenge to carry something weighty for some distance, keep it in mind as motivation ---- if that's your thing. Can be almost any weight. Enjoy (the discomfort of lugging around a bunch of heavy shit in your spare time)!

Responsible Lunch

Touring the world; touring a country; touring a state; touring a province; Each and all provide their own opportunities to deviate from your routine of eating whilst eroding your innards at very little expense. Fried food is cheap, creative, satisfying, and provides precisely the comfort a tired or irritated person needs. There have been numerous attempts by me and countless others, no doubt, at reversing the polarities of habitual dietary negligence in favour of 'eating healthy' on the road. Some are successes. But like so many other inevitabilities in life, you'll end up staring down the barrel of a banquet burger at some point on the road.

Home, however, is where your colon and mine gets a rest from the bodily civil war. Above is my go-to cleansing lunch. IN layman's terms, Salad. Duh. Sure, if this was a food blog, my next trick would be to teach you how to make a bowl of cereal -- and it will -- so don't think i'm trying to be impressive or cocky. Try and vary at your leisure:

Raw Kale -- 2-4 leaves, washed, and torn from the stem. Leave them out.
*i like to sub in/add arugula, chickory, or spinach
Red Pepper
Field Cucumber
Raw Tofu
Scallions
Fennel
Olive Oil
Balsamic Vinegar
Coarse Salt
Cracked Pepper
Dijon Mustard
garnish with - raw sunflower seeds/raw pumpkin seeds.

Enough to fill, plenty of vitamins, some protein, and if you've got a vivid imagination you can picture the kale scrubbing all the bad stuff out of your stomach like a plant-matter bottle brush.

SOUTH LONDON CIRCUIT

On what would have otherwise been the last day of tour, Ben and I did a little workout circuit using the best of our surroundings. We were staying in a 3 story house in Wandsworth Town, South London, where our record label office is located. On the top floor is an apartment where bands are allowed to stay. It's a pretty meagre spot, and there's bunk beds (for maximum activities), but it's great to have a free place to crash when we're in the busiest/most expensive city in the world.

Good trivia about this flat is that it's first resident was actually Ian Astbury from the Cult (or so i'm told). i'm sure he was doing precisely the same thing by himself in the mid 80s, contemplating the chorus to 'Nirvana.'

This short workout circuit was done in the middle of a (20kg) kettlebell routine. The kettlebell moves i'll leave anyone to figure out on their own, since a written description is a bit useless in the age of youtube (except for my long winded stories, which despite a photo telling a thousand words, usually exceed that and beyond. All totally necessary).

1) pull ups. Three sets. 5, 3, 2 (or whatever you're comfortable with). We clung to the ledge for dear life, staring certain spinal injury in the face. Actually worked pretty well to stay motivated, though.


2) Decline Pushups. Three sets: 10-15 each time using two 'push up handles' (best way I think I can describe these) that Ben brought along on tour.


3) Squats unweighted. Three Sets: 15 each time. I've no picture to accompany this one, but it was done in the same room as the kettlebelling, which was a tiny kitchen. On either side we were flanked by boxes of Fucked Up merch.



So that was some stuff done in tight quarters. Not the most intense routine, but a good way to round out a whole other circuit of working out. These were done in consecutive steps (1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3, etc) without stopping. I'm sure it will get more creative as time goes on. There was a great 'street workout' in Berlin, but no one had a camera on them.

Good stuff.

until next time

Hot for Heat's Sake

Hey --

Welcome to tour. We're in Nashville. I spent most of the afternoon nodding in and out of sleep while reading Charles Bronson's (not that Charles Bronson) instructional tome "Solitary Fitness." -- This is an account of one man incarcerated in the UK who has developed a work out routine completely independent of formal equipment, relying on your own body, and things one can have access to in prison. As soon as I heard about this book I new that not only had I been beaten to the punch on trying to keep fit in less than ideal places (also probably ten times over by every health and fitness magazine to ever exist), but also feel like a huge wimp for skimping on tour every now and then.

All literary pursuits have consequences, of course. It may be the heat of the American South or the long drives, but when the mind starts comparing the idle time in the van to what Mr. Bronson faces in the slammer, it sadly may be time for a reality check. Truthfully, I am living what otherwise is no doubt the life of riley, and using down time for neither intellectual or physical activity...just lunch. How dare I! Of course, in the grander scope of developing positive routines on the road -- as outlined in the 2nd last chapter of "Solitary Fitness," Solitary Cleanse -- I have little desire to suck water up my own butt with my anus muscles (but you never know what you'll need in the apocalypse) so i'll cut myself some slack for now. Living up to the challenge of making this account an interesting one, though, is thoroughly on me.

Part of this diary was supposed to be about the great failures of fitness on the road. Those times when no matter the dedication, or how great you feel after doing kettlebell in a vacant lot in 100 degree Georgia heat, you just need to ingest the most neglegent, delicious meal possible, and chase it with a cold beer. That is what I did.

This morning, I awoke from a solid sleep at a Days in somewhere outside of Atlanta, powered three runny eggs down my neck care of Waffle House, and let the highway do all the talking. Upon arrival in Music City, some of my bandmates and I dined in a crumbling little shack in East Nashville: The Award Winning "Bolton's."



The actual place is tiny. It's a single level hut, divided in to two sections: dining room and kitchen. The halves are spearated by a giant door with an iron knocker, and a small tinted window, where every now and then a face will pop out and ask if you're doing alright. The chicken itself is a substantial hock of bird, suffocated to a blissful spicy death in some kind of dry rub. The pieces themselves are dutifully prepared by a single man slaving over a single (humungous) cast iron pan. Such magic behind that tiny window. Each dinner comes with two sides. I ordered that famous souther sludge: "Greens," and corn on the cob, though I think i'd have been better off having the mac and cheese, since the corn ended up a bit spongey. Anyways. The chicken itself was pretty hefty, and the spices immediately sent us into sweats and colour matching the decor.



The heat compounded with every bite, and seemed to be most intensified by eating the corn. Each mouthful of maize and my face melted like a wax candle on the set of Dracula. Nothing could really penetrate the heat, including the mercifully basic Wonderbread, or the no doubt useless Sprite. I eat like I was raised by Yeti's and Jackals so I managed to ingest the whole thing in a few minutes, but the whole project posed a great challenge:

According to Bronson's book and many others, as long as your body can properly process and account for its intake, eating otherwise rotten stuff is mostly relative. Tell it to your colon in twenty years, maybe, but for now we're alright. SO how does one face up to Bolton's Tennessee Hot Chicken? Indeed a work in progress.

NOTE: I DIDN'T TAKE ANY OF THESE PHOTOS

Laziest "Role Model"

Hey There -


So to all half dozen or so readers -- can I really say "readers," since the collective internalized word count has probably lapsed into fossil by now -- of this brilliant account of my soaring journey through fitness: I've been doing next to nothing to maintain any semblance of responsible activity in the last month or so.

On tour, I was in a consistent regime of floor exercise, kettlebell, and aerobic activity (care of drums), which left my now crenellating torso, chest, arms, and legs in a positively encouraging state. Since my return, with all the intention of really giving it gas, i've managed to drink some form of alcohol (albeit a moderate amount) every few days, eat rich food with family, have people over for bacon-y breakfasts, and i've most recently engaged in the reckless filling of a caloric void (late at night) with the refuse of the Golden Arches.

WHAT A BAD EXAMPLE I AM. Most people would dedicate this space to some structurally suspicious apology and commitment to do a better job, but you shall get nothing but the slow, lazy truth. I'll let ya know when something interesting happens.

BUT what sort of totalitarian would I be in danger of becoming if I either succumbed to the world of reckless consumption, or only preached the rigidity of my shaky guidelines for health. The only responsible thing to do if to offer, in the words of Supernaut, "both ways."

Here are some highlights from European Tour:

1) Anywhere is an incline, and thus acceptable to sneak in 30 pushups. Editor's Note: The only reason I decided to blast out a few reps is because I had just eaten a 99 Flake. Editor's Second Note: I chased these good efforts with a humungous portion of fish and chips somewhere in Northumberland, and then fell asleep in the van while trying to read Tony Judt's "Ill Fares The Land." INDEED.



2) Finding a suitable location to do theoretically embarrassing public calisthenics is crucial to your image. If you find the discreet spot, you can just appear to be 'in shape' all the time. If you get caught, you look like a humungous loser and/or a 'jock.' The latter isn't the worst thing in the world, but why alienate when you can magically appear covered in sweat and errant blades of grass. "Where could he have been?" Anyways HERE are some examples of suitably discreet Kettlebelling locations in the UK.





3) I brought a pair of sneakers on tour with the intent to go running. To tell you the truth, I was quite inspired by John Joseph's account of touring with the Bad Brains in the early 80s, running "Serious Miles" every morning on Cro Mags tour, and generally being fit. I saw parallels to my own situation on being on the road a lot, but instead of receding into real fitness dementia, i've opted to pretend to be a laissez faire globe trotting playboy. If it comes down to hoof versus gullet, I seem to have made my choice for now. I've only successfully logged miles on ONE tour, and that was in 2008. What a glorious summer it was, though.


So -- No apologies, but maybe a "better luck next time?"
Something positive ought to come out of this warm weather:

Back in the Swing of Things

Now that i'm back on tour there should be the opportunity to get into some actual travel fitness. Trying to keep a routine in less than ideal conditions and talking about it, rather than inventing blinding narrative about past glories doing push ups ha.

Brought a 20kg Kettlebell on tour and have thus executed one full workout......in the bathroom of CLWB IFORbACH in Cardiff, after a matinee and before an evening gig in another city (Bristol). While I don't really recommend eliminating any dignity from exercise to motivate yourself, given the limited availability of private quarters in otherwise really public spaces, finding these quick solutions is part of the fun on the road.

Onward

Wishful Thinking....

HERE is a BBC article that profiles the physiology of 'rock drummers' as being in line with "top athletes." Reading this article was actually a huge encouragement for me to take exercise seriously, and let it be as mentally fulfilling as it was physically challenging (and rewarding). I don't have the hubris to believe that my own personal methods can automatically represent an ideal, but being arbitrarily lumped in with one of the highest formations of physicality -- a professional athlete -- added a huge amount of confidence to the whole process. Maybe it's like waking up from a dream and finding out you weren't actually sleeping....if you dream about running.

If I was already an 'athlete' without being an athlete, the limitations seemed to fade away...

More information about the aging powerhouse Clem Burke and this experiment:

http://www.clemburkedrummingproject.com/

Been Too Long, The Humble Push Up.

Part of the inspiration behind writing this blog has been consistency. One imagines that when building an exercise regiment, how you decide to structure things will have the greatest impact on how you follow through with them. To me, demanding that a record be kept (this blog) provides the framework and will thus define the lines that have to be filled in.

This aspect of Dear Dietary has kind of warbled in and out of solidity like a weak pull up. So here's a long awaited (maybe) and much needed first entry -- The Humble Push Up.

I, being the writer of this blog, have a different perspective on engaging with fitness while travelling since the circumstance of my work actually allows me (and demands of me) a certain level of fitness to begin with, so i'm at an advantage.

The Norms, The Beginnings --
Drumming for 40-60 minutes a night at high speeds at the very least works up a sweat, and at best can be a surrogate work out. This exercise is generally bookended by two bouts of heavy lifting and general exertion: load in and load out. Admittedly, these days while the playing remains the same intensity (if not above and beyond as the sets get longer, the songs more complex, and the tasks gain facets), the loading has been pretty low impact in the past months. It was, however, this combination of exertion that kind of lead me down the path of keeping fit.
Life on the road is monotonous and repetitive. Regardless of the peaks and valleys, the day to day remains the same. Van; Road; Club; Load; Wait; Play; Load; Sleep; Repeat. Once I discovered that this was a way to use my body to burn energy in a productive way, I was off to a roaring start. Since not everyone has the "luxury" of touring in a band, i'd suggest replacing 60 minute sets of drumming and loading Marshall stacks with a short jogging routine annnnnd:

The Humble Push Up --

This was the gateway to any kind of fitness for me, and is the ultimate travel workout. Can be done anywhere, anytime, and in as many different ways as you can imagine. At the beginning of the trek towards some semblance of being in shape (i'm certainly not perfect) I could do about 1 push up. They are the easiest exercise to learn.

Keep your back straight, and your hands on the ground right about where the edges of your shoulders are. On the way down, make sure to keep your back straight and bring your waist down with you as your arms bend. On the way back up, make sure you're moving all at once. Tighten your middle, back straight, etc and voila!

Start with 1 full push up. Rest, maybe do a second one later that day. Do that for about 4 or 5 days or until you're really bored of it.

After you've mastered one, try two. Maybe do it twice in a day. Do it daily until you've had it or are ready for more.

Once you've mastered two, try three. Same as above.

Once you've mastered three, try five...and so on and so on until you're incrementally higher and higher. Pushups -- once your mortal enemy -- will then become the effortless act of shoving planet earth away from you with two hands 65 times a day. Pushups use every major muscle group if you're running them properly. Back, legs, arms, chest, core....the more diverse ones use of the push up becomes, the more strenuous and challenging the workout can become.

Next time...push up variations and using a tight corner to your advantage.

It's a long way to the top....

World Eater:

Vs.

World Eater:


No this won't turn in to a blog that is just filled with youtube links and disposable camera photography....

Soon the deluge of brilliant insight and tips on fitness will come. As punishment for the luxury of starting a blog and not posting, enjoy the above.
See you soon.

The Great Divide

My name is Jonah, I play drums in the band Fucked Up. Usually any person who chooses a topic to publically discuss would likely pick up from where his day job, or most obsessive hobby leaves off, but instead of talking about the thing that occupies both of those areas for me - music - i've decided to talk about keeping fit. (*musings about music, and other personalized pursuits can be found at my other experiment livethebeatlife.blogspot.com*) This might not really be a legitimate close second to the other interests in my life, but I can happily report that people have stopped saying "That's really, really too small for you" and have mostly been saying "Are you sure you're eating??" Somewhere between those extremes is the sweet spot which balances self-care, the psychological lift that comes along with fitness, and all the other sopor that comes along with getting in shape.

The great divide between home life and life on tour in a band -- the life that takes you from city to city night after night; floors to bunks, to births, to chairs, to sofas, to car seats, and other uncomfortable recliners -- can be vast. There is certainly no obvious connection which reconciles life on the road with the picture of health, but i'm writing to you in order to report that "There is a way." I'm certainly no guru, and most importantly I AM NOT A PROFESSIONAL TRAINER. PERFORM THESE FEATS OF (likely embarrassing in front of your friends) STRENGTH WITH CAUTION. However, i'm a happy reference for a few regimented tips on keeping in shape while being out on the road or travelling in general. Each post should hopefully be from somewhere interesting as well!

Last but not least, no man or woman can be truly 100% dedicated to fitness in the face of exhaustion, dwindling levels of comfort, and varying degrees of privacy, so this will also reveal some great moments of glorious diet breaking. In fact I can guarantee some of this will be born entirely of my inactivity (unless GoogleTalk work when you jog). Stand up, tense up, and welcome to the first entry. Dear Dietary...