[jacquesm]

> Lifting weights and enjoying it to the point where you want to better yourself at it? I don't see it as extreme.

I do. It is moving for the sake of moving rather than to achieve some productive effect. To me exercise is riding my to a place where I need to go rather than going by car if the distance is about right and the weather on the way out not too brutal. Walking, playing with the kids and so on. Lifting weights would indicate that I have calories to burn that go towards nothing else that helps. Usually at the end of the day I'm tired enough that I long for a bed rather than for more movement, especially not movement involving weights bought for the specific purpose of making that movement harder.

If I really did have energy to burn after a full day I'd probably take up some sport or spend that time and energy improving the place that I live in.

[laichzeit0]

If you feel like you're lacking energy it could be that you're not eating enough calories during the day.

I took up resistance training a few months ago and it required I increase my daily calorie consumption by about 500kcal. I only realized how little I was eating after using an phone app to meticulously record everything I put in my mouth on a daily basis for a few weeks.

Since I started it really forced me to learn a lot about human physiology (because you can injure yourself if you do it with bad form), nutrition (because I want lean mass gain and optimal recovery), I sleep more (recovery) and stopped smoking. There's an amazing euphoric feeling after a heavy weightlifting session when you've got a good pump going. It can be quite a "technical" sport once you start factoring in all these things. The actual process of lifting a heavy object is the easy/least time consuming part.

Just yesterday I completely changed my sitting posture after I was having trouble with my infraspinatus muscle (bad posture at the desk). Now I'm finally sitting up straight at work because it negatively affects my weight lifting if I don't. Man there are so many benefits...

[dasil003]

> Lifting weights would indicate that I have calories to burn that go towards nothing else that helps.

I don't mean to put words in your mouth, but this smacks of the whole calories-in-calories-out theory of weight gain that always comes up in diet threads in HN.

The reason I mention that is because I think programmers have a tendency to view things abstractly and quickly generalize. Sometimes this comes from an obsessive quality that makes us want to avoid spending any time thinking about anything that is not interesting work (witness the Soylent guy). However when it comes to the human body and our health reducing things to a simple equation comes at our own risk. Animal bodies evolved to survive and thrive under varied physical conditions and stresses.

If you don't like weightlifting then by all means do something else. But for all the people I hear complaining about RSI, and knowing what a combination of aggressive mountain biking and moderate weightlifting did for my RSI issues, I think it definitely comes with some very tangible benefits for programmers.

[deanproxy]

> Lifting weights would indicate that I have calories to burn that go towards nothing else that helps.

Resistance training does go to something. It goes to conditioning your muscles and building bone density which are both incredibly important the older you get.

I also agree one should do other things, which is why I mountain bike, do martial arts and kayak.

[astral303]

Lifting weights doesn't burn that many calories, compared to walking, running, etc. You can also have substantial strength gains by doing it just 2-3 times a week.

"Resistance training" gives you muscle mass so you can live longer. It gives you strength so you can do more in your daily life--lift a heavy object and without injuring yourself, for example. Having good leg strength can help prevent knee injury when you're out hiking with your kids.

Are you chopping and stacking wood at home? Lifting anything heavy (as trite as that sounds) at work? Or anything physically challenging that requires strength throughout the week? Chances are, like many of us geeks, the answer is no or very little. Lifting weights is a way to fix that. If you were working a physically demanding job, you wouldn't need to lift weights.

And anyway, don't interpret lifting weights too literally! Don't buy weights, use your body: pushups, pullups, etc. You can do pullups off the edge of a desk. Dips off the edge of a chair. Lunges and squats and "jumpy" versions thereof will give you plenty of leg and hip strength without any weights.

[edraferi]

> Lifting weights doesn't burn that many calories, compared to walking, running, etc.

Doesn't increasing your muscle mass increase your metabolism? That is, your body's base calorie burn rate increases when you have more muscle to maintain.

[eru]

Lifting weights is a sport. A solitary one, just like running or rock climbing. No need to disparage it.

[vidarh]

If you exercised more, you would have more energy to burn.

Few things leaves you feeling more physically exhausted than being in bad shape.

[jacquesm]

For 48 I'm in excellent shape, thank you. In fact if you're over 30 I'll race you on any bike of your choosing ;)