Where to start for bigger guys

Slizzardman,

I would be very, very interested in how you've been making haste-slowly. Maybe your programming is something of a proprietary secret and I shouldn't ask, but I really wanna know!

Being very new to this (just doing the 2 exercises from the original article atm) I'm more than a little lost. I'm an advanced/elite level trainee in more main stream methods and am accustomed to laying out my training in cycles of 12-18 months. Knowing exactly what I'm going to do at any given time or under certain circumstances in order to get the response I'm training for. I FULLY realize I'm a babe in the woods here, but it still makes me nervous to know so little.

It is, this is the lightest I have been since 2002 and the leanest since 2005.

I haven't been eating very much lately, I have just been out and about. There IS something nice about being lighter, and while I will probably end up at 210 when I am at my strongest I am no longer worried about having muscle mass that I can not use. I intend to be at my highest possible relative strength for the rest of my life and that's where my efforts are going. It is fun to look good but then just drop jaws to the floor when I do something like a 3-4 second pull from dead hang to front lever, hold for a few seconds, go to straddle and pull to the top of a FL row, and then slowly transition through a muscle up. That makes me happy and it feels good.

Nearly all, if not all, of the lost weight has been in my legs and body fat. I have definitely lost some leg muscle since I haven't been doing them but now I'm starting up olympic lifting. Just power cleans and power snatches, really, both from the ground and from various hangs. I am still cleaning up form.

My shoulders are getting better but they are a large part of my stalled progress. I intend for the rest of this year to be slow and steady rehab, so keep that in mind as I make progress videos. I am being held back by old injuries that are healing slowly and I am still making excellent progress.

Hullo, I'm 6'4" and 235lbs so I've got a bit working against me, and I'm about 8 weeks into GB, and I'm pretty impressed with the speed of strength gains, but I've got a few questions

First, I'm having a lot of trouble doing the most basic of Manna work. When I first tried to do MSH bent holds I could not, and still cannot get my hips off my hands/arms for more than 1 second. Are there some exercises I can do to work up to MSH Holds? Or should I just continue with the four FSP's I've been doing for another cycle before trying again?

Second, when do you decide to go up a level with the FBEs? When you are able to do all 3x5 easily/smoothly? Or when you can do all 3x5?

And Slizzardman, its pretty damn inspiring reading about what you can do given your size. I used to be a tiny little kid who could do all sorts of things after 6 years of gymnastics, and after shooting up to 6'4" I figured I'd never be able to do half of what I used to. Furthermore, the guy who turned me onto GB is about 10 inches shorter than me and only about 3 weeks ahead of me and he's waaay further ahead of me in terms of the exercises he's doing. So its nice to know that one day I WILL be able to do yewkis and the like

Finally, forgive me if this seems like a relatively boneheaded question, but the WODs you mentioned are the ones here yes? And do I start from the first WOD posted? or just go straight into the ones that are posted daily?

And I suppose if it is the case that you go straight into the daily postings, one must scale down an exercise if they can't do the base one, yes?