Adjustment needed to follow GB

All,

Hoping someone can help me. 49 year old desk jockey, who has always worked out hard, but realized, through Fundamentals, that I have lost significant flexible movement.  I have progressed to Foundation and Front Stretch.  This means I am doing something three days a week (Foundation twice and Front Stretch once.) As someone who is used to doing something every day, if for no other reason for mental sanity, can I ask what you recommend for the other days?  Should I start the other stretching routines, do one of the online GB workouts, cardio, or keep doing my regular work out routine in-between GB workouts?  

I am committed to the GB process so I want to take the best approach, and value insights of those of you who may have started in the same position I am, in great shape but flexible zombie and new to GB.

Thank you!

I personally found the best thing for me to do during my off days and when I first started was to really hammer out the mobility from the F1 program. Spend time getting used to all the different mobility exercises and enjoy how it will make your body feel! I found myself improving A LOT by focusing on just doing mobility more so than the strength work. 

As always, listen to your body and don't go crazy hard when doing mobility. It will improve with time and consistency and you will be amazed at how much progress you make from just doing mobility exercises!

I have been making consistent progress through the course and spread-loaded my foundations throughout the whole entire week. Mondays is FL/HBP, Tuesday SPL, Weds RC/SL, Thursday MN, Fridays SLS. In between those I have the stretching course, the mobility course, the ring course and nutrition thrive course everyday. I have found that this way for me ensures those muscle groups receive a good week of recovery, while they get minimal work/stretch throughout the week from the other exercises.

Development completely depends on the body's LIMITED recuperative abilities. First, we have RECOVER, then the body has to REBUILD. That will never happen if you are going to burn it out everyday. Again, do what works for you, but do not do more than what your body can handle, as you will plateau.

Cheers.

As a fellow desk jockey I would recommend all three stretch courses. 

Mobility is a beautiful thing. A little every day has quite profound effects; it is about getting the body used to these things. At first it is a struggle, but after a while it really thrives on it

You've identified flexibility/mobility as your primary issue and so getting amongst that is logical. There's no reason you can't go for a run, or other activity you may enjoy in this time; just include a good mobility session in your warmup/cooldown, and keep in mind that as an active rest day, this is *not* your day to push it and cut into your recovery from your strength sessions

A number of people swear by something as simple as stretching in front of the TV of an evening. Personally I try to avoid this after about 8pm; tends to keep me awake, but YMMV>

10 hours ago, Jon Douglas said:

Mobility is a beautiful thing. A little every day has quite profound effects; it is about getting the body used to these things. At first it is a struggle, but after a while it really thrives on it

You've identified flexibility/mobility as your primary issue and so getting amongst that is logical. There's no reason you can't go for a run, or other activity you may enjoy in this time; just include a good mobility session in your warmup/cooldown, and keep in mind that as an active rest day, this is *not* your day to push it and cut into your recovery from your strength sessions

A number of people swear by something as simple as stretching in front of the TV of an evening. Personally I try to avoid this after about 8pm; tends to keep me awake, but YMMV>

 

Jon, thank you.

Perhaps it is because I am early in the process and things have not ramped up yet, but nothing I am doing feels like the strength portion so I am not getting sore at all and could certainly go again next day.  May I ask, what portion is considered strength, the Foundation?  I know it is working the connective tissue etc. so I am still ok just going slow, although I guess my question shows that I must be worried about not maintaining the muscle I have while I wait.  Regardless, I will continue on and thank you and everyone else for the great feedback.

Foundation is the basic strength work. You will have noted, I'm sure, how it begins from high reps and drops quite sharply; progressing through F2 and onwards these will generally stay around 5x5 for dynamic exercises and the load will increase commensurate with the drop in volume.

Connective tissue responds best to high reps / long holds, but F1 has a certain 'rehab' and 'mobility priority ' feeling to it too. An inability to complete everything in it represents development in some areas and inadequate development in others; for us as adults these are usually tiny weak links that we feel are like brakes compared to the big movers. In truth this is not the case. The brake exists in the imbalance and the under-development of that link, not the reliance on it in an exercise. While your larger muscles may feel under stimulated temporarily once the base frame is more conditioned the attention shifts to doing more with it.

For example, while the intensity is far and away easier in normal vs. Planche pushups, without regular pushups being an afterthought there isn't a chance of planche pushups. They may not be glamorous and it may not 'feel' like a workout, but putting in that work has put you a little further down that road. 

There's a fair bit of older discussion in the F1 forum about maintaining lifts and muscle. You may wish to have a browse