Fitness Is Free

Growing up on a farm I never really had to “work out”, I just had to “work”.  Starting from about the age of 6 I was helping my dad out in some capacity or another, and that carried on until after I got out of college.  As I got older and left the farm for the office life, the years of inactivity and sitting behind a desk, not to mention poor diet choices, eventually caught up with me.  Before I knew it I was fifty pounds overweight and getting out of breath walking up a flight of stairs.

I didn’t really start taking care of myself until I was in my late-30’s. My dad, who had never really had any heart trouble, had a heart attack which ultimately resulted in sextuple bypass surgery just a few days later. His doctor told me that it was a miracle he was even alive, that some of his arteries were 90-100% clogged, although my dad had never had any heart trouble before. The reason he never noticed it was that it had been gradually building up over the years. The doctor estimated that the problem really started when he was in his 40’s and it had just taken 20+ years to get this bad.

That was a wake up call for me, as I was nearing 40 and realized that I needed to lose the gut and start taking better care of myself or I would be heading down the same path. After spending a week in the hospital with my dad as he recovered, I knew that was something that I did not want.

Fast forward a decade or so, and I am now in much better shape. They won’t put my picture on the cover of any fitness magazines, but I’m in a lot better shape than most men my age. My health & fitness journey has varied over the years, and I have learned a lot along the way. For a while there studying proper diet and exercise became a big hobby of mine. I listened to podcasts, subscribed to newsletters and daily emails, and would try to research and study up on things that cut through the “bro-science“.

Here are few things I have learned along the way:

Diet is more important than exercise

Before I ever even started working out, I changed my diet.  I took small steps to start with, trying one thing at a time, but I saw almost immediate weight loss with just a few changes.  First I cut out all drinks except black coffee, unsweetened tea, and water, then after a few weeks of that I started cutting back on meal portions and eating more vegetables and less french fries.  I lost several pounds over a few months just by making these changes. 

What you put in your body determines what you get out of it. 

There is a saying in the fitness world that I like: “You can’t outrun a bad diet.”  This basically means that you can’t exercise hard enough to counter all of the junk you eat.  And if you fill up on junk, your body will feel and perform like junk.  You will be tired, sluggish, overweight, and out of energy.  Even when you start exercising you will be able to notice a direct correlation between the food you eat and how well your workouts go. 

You have to be dedicated to a workout schedule or routine

When I first decided to get in shape, I did what everyone else does.  I joined a gym.  I’ll admit that I didn’t really know what I was doing, I would run on a treadmill for a bit and then try to go through a few of the workout stations.  My membership gave me 1 free session with a personal trainer, which consisted of about 20 minutes of him showing me how to use some of the equipment.  That was helpful, and for a while I would go pretty regularly, but I didn’t have a set schedule so I didn’t go consistently, and eventually after a couple of years I just stopped going altogether and cancelled my membership.

After that I got into the home workout videos.  Surprisingly, I was pretty dedicated to this.  I would work out each night after the kids went to bed, and having a set schedule with a designated workout each day seemed to work pretty well for me.  Over the course of a couple of years I went through multiple iterations of workouts like Insanity, Insanity Max:30, P90X, and P90X-3.  I never got ripped like the guys in the videos, but I did get in pretty good shape.  However, eventually I fell away from this as well.  I was becoming bored with the same old workouts, there weren’t any new workouts I wanted to try, and I was finding that I had less and less interest in doing it.

Exercise Equipment Is Expensive

There is a reason gyms charge money. When you start buying workout equipment for your home, the cost can add up pretty quickly.  Even when doing the home workout videos, I would sometimes need to purchase equipment like a pull-up bar or some dumbbells and a weight bench.  And it is never ending, as the stronger you get the more weights you need.  Some people eventually go all out and turn their garage or basement into a full blown gym, which will wind up costing some serious cash. 

Fitness Is Free!

In 2019 I discovered F3.  I had never heard of F3 when a friend of mine invited me to a Saturday morning workout.  They were just starting up an F3 group in my area and trying to get new guys to come out.  All F3 workouts are free of charge and meet outdoors in public parks and parking lots around town, and this group was meeting about a mile from my house.  My wife and kids were out of town that weekend, and I had nothing else to do at 6AM on a Saturday, so I decided to give it a try.  At my first F3 workout, we wound up getting in the nearby creek and doing push-ups and sit-ups.  I was hooked, and I’ve been doing F3 workouts ever since.  I have even worked out with F3 groups all over the country.  If I am out of town on a trip for work, or on vacation with the family, I look up a local F3 group and try to go work out with them.

So for me, fitness is free.  Every day.  What I have learned is that you don’t have to pay to go for a run, or do jumping jacks or pushups in a park or your basement/garage.  I have always been a big fan of bodyweight workouts. They are free and can be done almost anywhere with just you and gravity.  You rarely need equipment, and when you do it can usually be something as simple as a $2 concrete block from Lowe’s. 

And you would be surprised at how effective park playground equipment can be for doing pullups!