Wednesday Wrap Up #2.
This week I get cold, play with bells, find good nutrition data, listen to the second coming of Naval and more!
Brook Slagle • 2023-10-13
Yo! Brook here.
Welcome to Wednesday Wrap Up #2.
This week I get cold, play with bells, find good nutrition data, listen to the second coming of Naval and more!
If this interests you…. Read on!
where i am at: it’s cold in the midwest now. take me back to mexico.
I am (still) just outside of Lincoln, NE, USA.
It’s cold now, but it is really making me appreciate the few warm days that we will hopefully have left before winter hits.
We had the first flurries of the season.
I might run away before we get to the freezing parts of the year.
Maybe the Canary Islands?
Who wants to go? reply to this email to let me know!
how I am keeping warm? (training): Enter the Kettlebell & mo-ability
Kettlebell training -
One of the shining features of the kettlebell is it’s capability of absolutely berating the body with hard work in a short period of time.
The time investment for a good workout is incredibly low.
I have been doing Pavel Tsatsouline’s (CEO of StrongFirst and the bringer of the kettlebell to the USA from Russia) Simple and Sinister training protocol.
As named, it is simple and sinister. Here it is:
10 swings left; 1 snatch left (to get the kettlebell overhead); 1 reverse get-up left (start from standing, descend to the floor, return to standing); reverse snatch the kettlebell into a swing to switch hands
10 swings right; 1 snatch right; 1 reverse get-up right; reverse snatch the kettlebell into a swing to switch hands
Repeat for 5 total rounds
And that will murder you. And if it doesn’t, buy a heavier kettlebell.
This whole thing takes like 25 mins including warmup and cool down. And it is fun as hell. No excuses.
Mo-ability -
Due to my work being primarily in front of the computer, my shoulders can become very tight.
One movement that has released my shoulders like none other is the kettlebell halo.
Here is an information-dense and equally funny feature length video on Pavel’s protocol and how to do the basics of kettlebell movements.
Along with KB training, I have been following and researching the protocols of Lucas Hardie from Range of Strength - https://www.instagram.com/rangeofstrength/.
My primary mo-ability(flexibility and mobility) goal is a full pancake splits.
Lucas has a phenomenal tutorial here on the pancake splits that I will be following.
He has science based and seriously effective flexibility, mobility, and old-time strength tips. Highly recommend dropping him a follow on all platforms.
My notes of a condensed version of a pancake split protocol coming soon. (check back maybe next week!)
Always sun and h20 maxxing when I can. A good KB workout will keep you warm in the winter. no wonder the russians loved this thing.
what i am reading: Turning Pro by Steven Pressfield
Last week, I finished The War of Art Winning the Inner Creative Battle by Steven Pressfield.
Naturally, I have now started reading Turning Pro by Steve Pressfield.
As he states in the book: just as everyone remembers where they were during 9/11 (not me, I was born only a few months before it), they will remember when they “turned pro”.
We are all pretty much amateurs. And this book is hopefully going to guide me (and hopefully you too) to taking my shit seriously and turning pro.
It is another short read, I will finish it before next week’s wrap up. So far so good!
You can find it here: https://blackirishbooks.com/product/turning-pro/
what album do i have on repeat: V I N C E N T by FKJ
V I N C E N T is a largely instrumental album from the multi-instrumentalist FKJ from across the pond in France.
One song that I recommend you check out off the album is Greener. It features the heavy hitter Latin guitar god Carlos Santana.
As well, FKJ is known for his smooooth and spicy saxophone work, if that piques your interest, check out Us.
Give it a listen and let me know what you think!
I have listened to songs off this album over 60 times in the past 7 days. I like it.
how i am reprogramming my mind to win with The Danny Miranda Podcast - #377: Alex Hormozi - Reprogram Your Mind To Win
Hailing from another favorite podcast, this episode of The Danny Miranda Podcast features Alex Hormozi.
I believe that Alex Hormozi exibits traits that are very similar to, another favorite, Naval Ravikant. The way that he strings together ideas into analogous statement blows me away. It makes things just click for me… He is an excellent communicator and even better entrepreneur.
This episode goes into the struggles of being on the come up, meta skills and which ones you should invest your time into, resetting your minimum inputs, and more.
A highly recommended listen. It is a stupidly dense 1 hour and 35 mins.
“There’s a study, there’s probably a lot of studies been done on this, but you can become proficient in any skill in about 20 hours. So playing the piano, riding a bike, whatever, 20 hours of concentrated effort gets you proficient. It’s the largest gain in skill improvement is 20 hours of concentrated effort. The problem is, is that people will wait a decade to start the first hour. And so you’d be amazed at how much progress you can make if you cut down the time between when you acknowledge the work and when you start doing the work.”
link here to video of the podcast
quality nutrition information for all! - only kinda cool.
I have recently been in search of the best resource for finding the most accurate nutrition information as elegantly as possible.
There are surprisingly few nutrition databases out there that are actually useful.
My criteria when choosing a resource:
Complete data of food (not just macros, I want to see vitamins, micros, acids, etc.)
Easy to search and use
Fast and efficient
There still isn’t something (that I am aware of) that satisfies all of my criteria yet.
But there are some decent choices.
Here they are:
Food Data Central - for general use and 99 percent of users. The only issue that it is kind of slow. It has everything most people will want.
FOODB - an open source and slightly nerdy option for those curious about the serious chemistry of food. Biohackers look no further.
If someone wants to create a food database that removes duplicates, uses laser fast text-search, and has a good ui with accurate data from Food Data Central… That would be great.
I hope you have had a killer week, and you find some of these useful!
Let me know if you enjoyed this format by dropping me a reply! I am here at all times to answer any questions.
As always…
KEEP GOING
B.S.