Be Right Back

No, I haven't fallen off the face of the planet. In fact, I'm in New York City -- the very center of the universe (at least according to a number of New Yorkers I know). 

We're spending a few days here on vacation before heading up to Boston for the 2012 Ancestral Health Symposium, which explains why I've gone radio silent for the past few days.

I'll be back to blogging soon, but in the meantime, you can check out Michelle's daily posts over at Nom Nom Paleo.

And yes, we're still on track for our 100-push-up challenge. (It's Day 47. Have you done your 47 push-ups today?)

Link Dump

I was going to post about my workout today, but that would require that I actually work out.



Instead, I've just been hanging out with the family and eating insane amounts of meat while on vacation here in Cabo (and plugging along on some extracurricular homework for Nom Nom Paleo). I did, however, gather a bunch of interesting reads for you to chew on:

• This op-ed piece in The Atlantic's been making the rounds. Three longtime vegetarians and vegans discuss how they came to understand that eating meat and other animal products is not only healthful, but also ethically and environmentally sound. Read it here.

• According to the New York Times, coffee can boost your athletic performance by "enabl[ing] more forceful muscular contractions and delay[ing] fatigue.” CoffeeWOD, anyone?

• You should already be reading all of the sites featured in Outside Magazine's list of the blogosphere's top ten fitness blogs -- especially MobilityWOD, Conditioning Research, and RunBlogger.

• Is Bob Harper really going to be putting his "Biggest Loser" team on a CrossFit-focused training regimen next season? I might actually have to start watching the show again.

• Serious Eats recently posted Pat LaFrieda's video responses to readers' meat-related questions. Good stuff -- especially if you're interested in butchery.

• I enjoyed the crap out of this post on Lift Big Eat Big: "10 Excuses For Not Exercising & Why They Are Horsesh*t."

• Health Tip of the Day: Do not eat cocaine out of your brother's butt.

Bye for now.

Priorities

I'm back. Thanks, everyone, for your kind notes, comments, and emails.

The past week has been surreal, but we're doing our best to keep things normal for our kids, and to settle back into a routine. Still, there are moments when I catch myself enjoying a giggle with the boys or exchanging jibes with M, and it suddenly hits me that my cousin isn't able to enjoy these simple pleasures anymore. I'm now keenly aware of how lucky I am to be able to hug my kids, and how I've taken it for granted that I'll always be able to do so.

Naturally, I've been reassessing my priorities. Don't worry -- I'll continue to obsessively blog bore you to death about health, fitness and nutrition. But I also recognize that there are more important things in this life. Hopefully, you do, too, and will forgive me for spending a little less time blogging and a little more time on other pursuits.

Anyway, I know you didn't visit this site for a dose of pathos. It'll take time for our family to grieve and find closure, but that'll happen behind the scenes. Going forward, I'll do my best to keep future posts focused on happier business. Stay tuned!

Someone's Burning the Midnight Oil

How Big-O vacations:

How Lil-O vacations:

How M vacations:

A blogger's work is never done.

Guest Post: An Achievable Goal or a Mid-life Crisis?

Believe it or not, this is the very first guest post I've ever featured on Fitbomb -- and it's a good one.

The author of this piece is Tim Huntley of My Athletic Life, one of my favorite fitness blogs to hit the scene in quite some time. It's chock-full of rich, informative articles, interviews, and even recipes. The meaty content on My Athletic Life speaks to dedicated athletes, trainers, coaches, and weekend warriors alike. If you haven't yet checked out Tim's site, do yourself a favor and head on over there after you read his post.

* * *

“If you can fill the unforgiving minute, with sixty seconds' worth of distance run, yours is the earth and everything that's in it.” - Rudyard Kipling

For the first 43 years of my life, I was a fairly sedentary person, with the possible exception of my time in college.  And I’m sure that I never had a goal related to fitness or athleticism until this past year.  As a kid, I grew up playing baseball, but I can’t say that it contributed much to my confidence as an athlete. It’s probably a poor reflection on me, but I have focused on things that I have an aptitude for and ignored activities that are challenging.

At the start of 2011, I did some soul searching and self-reflection.  My wife and I have twin 8 year old boys, and I definitely wanted to keep up with them for a long time.  And combined with my Dad’s “mild heart attack” the previous year, I needed to modify how I was living my life.  My diet was pretty good (Weston A. Price and Paleo) but it quickly became apparent that in spite of my self-doubts, I would need to invest in my own physical fitness.

Right or wrong, my approach was to come up with a very specific fitness goal, one that would require a substantial investment of effort over an extended period of time.

Beginning in early 2011, I made a list of 6-8 ideas – things like 100 pushups, 20 pull-ups, bench press my bodyweight 10 times, etc.  After seeking advice, I began to whittle down my list to a single goal so that I could focus my training.  Surprisingly, the one goal that I couldn’t seem to let go of, the one that seemed to light a spark was:

• Run a 400 meter dash in under sixty seconds before I turn 46 (January 2013)

I say “surprisingly” because at that moment, the following were all true:

• I hated to run long distances, but I was willing to sprint.
• My best time for the 400m was 1 minute 45 seconds – and after running it, I fell over in a heap.
• I didn’t personally know a single person my age that could run 400m in less than 60 seconds.

Go ahead, pass judgment.  I certainly did.

Spreading the Good Word

From a recent article in Fast Company about CrossFit:

Prior to CrossFit.com, Glassman's program was a tiny cult sensation in the lazy beach town of Santa Cruz, Califonia, where he began training clients in a functional workout program. The company's primary revenue stream, licensing entrepreneurs to start CrossFit gyms (for what is now a $3,000 annual fee), had only a few adopters, mainly from Glassman's friends who he says begged him to start an affiliate program.

...[But] while he could never find enough people in any particular city to get momentum, the Internet could pull together all the disparate islands of potential clients, "I found a few on the net, hundreds on the net, and then thousands."

Additionally, he says, the new blogging trend allowed recently deputized zealots to write about their experiences and pull in fellow fitness enthusiasts from their network. Today, the Internet is sprawling with CrossFit blogs, some from official affiliates, and others from specialists who post their expertise for free.

"Zealots." I like the sound of that.

[Fast Company, via CrossFit Chronicles]

Dining with My Twitter Feed

M (a.k.a. Nom Nom Paleo) and I shared a great meat-tastic dinner last night at Jar with a good number of Paleo blog superheroes in attendance at the Ancestral Health Symposium, including

• Bill & Hayley (The Food Lover's Primal Palate)
• Diane (Balanced Bites)
• Julie & Charles (Paleo Comfort Foods)
• Patty & Ron (Chowstalker)
• Badier (The Lazy Caveman)
• Caitlin (Grassfed Girl)
• Henry & Jo (Nutty Kitchen)

It was all kinds of awesome to hang out -- live! -- with a good chunk of my Twitter feed over humongous plates of meat. If you're a Paleo eater and don't already follow these guys, you're missing out.

I'm sure a full account of our dinner will show up soon on Nom Nom Paleo soon. Okay, back to the Paleo nerd fest...

After These Messages, We'll Be Right Back

I'm off to the 2011 CrossFit Games! I plan to keep busy this weekend, and may not have a chance to blog. But I'll be on Twitter, so you can follow me as I tweet out non sequiturs and unnecessary commentary about the Games. As for you Philistines who refuse to join the rest of us in the Twitterverse, you can keep up with my most recent tweets in this handy-dandy box:


But frankly, you shouldn't be doing anything this weekend other than watching the Games, which will run from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, and 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Sunday. You can catch all the action via live video streaming on the CrossFit Games site, or watch the "Live Premier Coverage" streaming online at ESPN3.com.

And of course, if you're at the Home Depot Center this weekend and spot a panicky-looking Asian guy in a T-shirt emblazoned with the words "Nom Nom Paleo," "CrossFit Palo Alto" or "SICFIT," please be a pal and kindly direct him to the nearest restroom. Thanks in advance.

Crass Cross-Promotion

Our buddy and comrade-in-arms, R (a.k.a. Post24th), has joined The Five Tribe as an author! For those of you not yet familiar with R, read all about her here, and don't forget to add her blog, After the 24th Grade, to your list of required reading list. Trust me -- you'll dig it.

Okay, CrossFit Palo Altans: Who's next?

I'm a Bad Dad

A few people have asked me how I manage to juggle parenthood, a full-time job as an asshole lawyer, a long commute, household chores, CrossFit, messing around with photography/design, writing for SICFIT, maintaining a handful of different blogs, helping M with back-of-the-house duties on Nom Nom Paleo, and staying relatively sane.

The (unfortunate) answer? I ignore my kids. I didn't even realize the extent to which I've become an absentee parent until my kindergartner decided to make this the subject of an illustrated story -- which has now been posted on his classroom wall just in time for Open House night at his school.

Time to take it down a notch.

The Silver Lining

Hey, look! My latest post for SICFIT is up -- go read it and let me know what you think!

(Unless you think it sucks, in which case I'm frankly not all that interested in your feedback.)

[Source]

1,000,000

Some time ago, when I wasn't paying attention, FITBOMB surpassed one million pageviews.

I noticed this yesterday while checking my site statistics. If I'd seen this coming, I'd have run a contest or something. You know: Millionth visitor gets a commemorative Shake Weight or decorative throw pillow. (I have a coupon from Starbucks for a free cake pop, but if you want to claim it, you'll have to come pick it up. Postage is kinda pricey these days.)

I know what you're thinking: Big whoop. Sure -- to many other bloggers, a million's a drop in the bucket. But to me, this is a big milestone. After all, this site began as a personal workout log, and for the first month of its existence, it had just one reader: Me. (I didn't even tell M that I was blogging.) I never thought anyone -- beyond some family and friends -- would ever read this.

But as this blog has continued to evolve over the course of the past year-and-a-half, I've been fortunate enough to pick up a group of loyal readers and commenters, a number of whom have become valued friends and mentors. (I've also attracted a few readers who have informed me via email that I'm a "retard" and "a little man," but hey -- at least they cared enough to write.)  I used to blog because it kept me accountable to my exercise routine, but now I do it 'cause I love this stuff. Besides, I know you'd miss me if I stopped blogging every day. (Right? Right? Hello?...Anybody...?)

In all seriousness: Thanks for reading.

The New Guy

Check it out: My first blog post for SICFIT is up!

After close to 1,500 posts here on FITBOMB, I'm in shock that I'm getting paid to write about the stuff I love. How sweet is that?

Monday’s Workout

My alarm went off at 4:20 a.m., jolting me out of a dream. And in that dream, I was blogging.

I need to get a life.

Today's WOD -- after the jump...

Feeling SIC

Holy crap! I'm totally over the moon about today's announcement that I was selected to join SICFIT's Pro Blogger team.

Thanks to everyone who cheered me on, "liked" my video application and left supportive comments -- I was floored by the testimonials and kind words. (I'll try not to let it go to my head.)

More to come!

It's a SICness

On Friday night, SICFIT -- the CrossFitter's sports and lifestyle site of choice -- announced that it's on the lookout for a few(?) new correspondents. Interested applicants had two days to put together a brief video application. Four applicants -- including yours truly -- applied by the midnight Sunday deadline.

To check out my video (and the others, too -- they're pretty sweet!), click here. It looks like viewers get to help decide who gets the gig, so if you're in a particularly generous mood, please hit the "like" button, rate it, and/or leave a comment over there -- I'd appreciate it.

And now back to our originally scheduled programming...

I'm Not a Unique Snowflake

M and I aren't the only CrossFit Palo Alto members who blog relentlessly about eating Paleo and lifting stuff. We happen to work out at an affiliate that's a veritable hub of social media -- which shouldn't come as a shock, given that we're smack-dab in the middle of Silicon Valley.

Expand your horizons. Go check out my CFPA homies.

(Besides, I know you're tired of looking at the stupid workout video clips I've been posting.)

Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

I started this blog as a personal workout log. When I started P90X, I took to heart the advice in the P90X Fitness Guide to share my experiences with others, and to hold myself accountable to working out every day. So that’s what I did -- in blog form. That’s how Fitbomb was born -- way back in the fall of 2009, when I thought no one would visit the site except a few friends and family members. Happily, I was wrong.

But in the past eighteen months, a lot has changed. And now, I'm reevaluating what I want to do with this site and with my blogging.

Continue reading after the jump...

Look Who's on Twitter!

It's my wife!

Follow her on Twitter for Paleo-centric updates, food porn, recipes and more.

(And don't forget to follow me, too, dammit.)

Swamped

Sorry about the lack of posts today. (Life happens.) Be back shortly.

In the meantime, visit M's blog, check out my new CrossFit landing page (which is still a work in progress, by the way) and catch me on Twitter. Or go do something really productive and game-changing, like uploading a picture of Voltron in place of your Facebook profile photo, thereby eradicating child abuse once and for all.