Starting Strength in the Guardian

[Charlocity2]

Comments on articles like this are always amusing. Like Youtube comments on PCP.

I'd really enjoy hearing more of, "Like _____ on PCP" and less of, "Like _____ on steroids".

[mbdonner]

*raises hand* I'm the writer. Learning to lift has drastically changed my life for the better, and I wanted to get the word out.

And no, I'm not reading the comments - I'd like to keep the tiny fragment of faith in humanity that I have left.

I just learned that Sarah is the daughter of my first cousin. Very good article. Congratulations.

[m_sporkboy]

From the comments I learned that gardening is just as effective as lifting.

Luckily, my power rack is in the garden, so I'm gonna get *swole*.

My backyard gym setup - Album on Imgur

[shabu]

Definitely noticeable spike in app sales since that article came out.

[Sean Herbison]

Aw, no love for power cleans.

[gadders]

Great article. I knew if I lived long enough I'd see something in The Guardian I could agree with.

A friend of mine who is a competitive strongwoman in the UK posted this a few days ago, and I thought it was awesome:

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Last night, I was checking out my pressing war wounds, when I realised that over the winter, my back has gotten freakin’ huge. And I felt weird about it. Proud of the work that’s gone into building that back, but also, weird.
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I know I’m a big girl, but I’m used to seeing a fat girl in the mirror, not a hench girl. And it’s totally weirded me out, like I’m defying and denying some deep down, hard-wired, Barbie worshipping, Cosmo reading, wannabe girly girl, conformist and bullshit part of my brain that thinks women shouldn’t have muscles. Like being just fat is somehow more acceptable, because as a fat girl it’s easy to become invisible, to be apologetic about occupying space and to simply stop caring what I look like. And then I went to my wanky weekday gym this morning, and I noticed more than ever that I don’t look like any of the other women who were in the changing rooms, not even close, and that made it worse.
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But then I spoke to some female friends who lift, and they made me realise a few things.
1) My back is awesome. It can deadlift over 200kg, it is as worthy of love as my ever growing squat butt and most importantly it is healthy and it works and I’m not in pain any more!
2) I’m probably in the best shape of my life. Not perfect, still fat, still not very fit and lots of work to do, but when I’m old my bones won’t crumble into bits and I’ll still be able to get up out of my chair and stir up any mischief that I want to. If I hadn’t taken up lifting I think my chances of even seeing old age would be a great deal lower.
3) Girls with muscles are hot. Why wouldn’t I want muscles too?
4) It’s ok to be different. My goals are different to other women’s goals and I look different as a result. Not better, not worse, just different. Plus, hips that could birth a hippo and shoulders that could wrestle a bear are definitely gonna come in handy one day.
5) Everyone else already knows my back is huge. Like, get over yourself.