My Fitness History

My early relationship with fitness was a mix of random sports, forced cardio, and a lot of false starts. I used to play basketball at Sporte Alges Dafundo in 2013 and even went to tournaments. After basketball, I did Taekwondo at a place called STAT in Portugal for about three years, so I built up some early striking experience.

I also had a short bout of Judo after school when I was younger as well but due to a lack of commitment and focus it never stuck. I believe the only reason I really went was to hang out with my best friend either way.

I started running before it was trendy when I was younger, from like mid-2015 to 2016 for about six months. My mom got the family (my mother, sister, and I) running because she thought our cardio was bad and wanted to improve it. Maybe I also wanted to get better at running because my running was really bad, it's hard to say, I don't really remember. We would run for like an hour twice a week for half a year. I remember one day I fell and cut my knee pretty bad (it's still my largest scar), and I guess I used that as an excuse not to run anymore. I think part of the reason I disliked running could have been the "forced" aspect of it, but it also seemed pointless and really annoying to me. I've had some times in the past where I started thinking about doing cardio and even gamifying it to track progressive overload like with the gym, but I never thought of doing that for running because of how much I still dislike it to this day. I have barely ran since; I hated cross country in school, but I really enjoyed P.E.

I technically started going to the gym in late 2018 to 2020 when I had a PT, but I feel like I wasn't focused, wasn't training to failure or with enough intensity, and my exercise selection wasn't great. I was going like two times a week, so my frequency was really bad. I personally don't count it, especially because I made almost no progress. My mom also trained with him and saw no progress, though she stuck to him longer than I did. Supposedly (according to my mom) I stopped training with the first PT because it was far, I didn't enjoy it, and I felt like I made no progress. I think he had a knowledge issue, or maybe he didn't want me to do the staples because of my age, but he would get me to, for example, do bodyweight rows on the TRX, which was a waste of time. I don't remember ever thinking about failure with him. I remember doing a lot of HIIT-like training, not pure hypertrophy or strength training. At the time, my primary motivation to lift was the same as any boy that age: so I could be big and strong.

I tried to take up skating between December 2019 all the way up until the end of 2020 however I was never consistent enough and didn’t try to learn anything crazy. I never even learnt how to ollie but I did have fun with friends and cruising around my home.

I also played rugby for like a season in 2020 and even went on a tour in Gloucester, but I quit because I thought it was too violent. I couldn't tackle my friends as I was scared to hurt them. I realized I didn't have the mindless violent aggression which I saw in rugby. This heavily contrasted to the gym, which I later picked up was great because I could have all the intensity my body and mind could muster, but I didn't have to harm another human being.

Finally, I did kickboxing in early 2021 for a couple of months, which was an easy transition from my Taekwondo days because it was a martial art and I thought it was cool. However, this coincided with periods of bad mental health, so it never really properly stuck for more than a couple of months and I gave it up due to a depressive episode.

In early 2022, I started working with another PT named Fred back in Portugal. Fred was pivotal. He was the one who introduced me to the actual culture of lifting. He would say things like, "When you slide the plates on the bar, make sure you do it loudly so other people can hear that you are lifting heavy." I think the aesthetic/mentality that he showed me really helped in burning the gym into my mind because I could adopt this aesthetic as my own, ingraining the gym into my ego, my sense of self. I eventually "outgrew" Fred when I wanted to lift more frequently and realized I could do it on my own, but he helped shift my mindset. However due to the lack of consistency and seriousness I still don't track this phase as actual lifting.

December 4th, 2022, was a major turning point, even if I didn't fully realize it then. I was in a rough spot, playing a lot of videogames, struggling with basic hygiene, and dealing with a deep depressive episode. That day I took my first progress pic and made a photo album for my gym progress. It was a messy period, but the desire to stop making excuses and change my body was definitely starting to boil over. You could even see it in my face in those pictures that I was deeply unhappy.

October 6, 2023, is what I consider my first official lift. I was attending St. Edwards University in Austin, TX. They had a really nice gym, and I started going with my friend Gui. The accessibility, having free time, and that deep, lingering disappointment from my "before" pictures created the perfect storm. Sticking to the gym this time meant breaking my lifelong pattern of abandoning projects.

I decided that I would finally approach fitness with the same mind for systems that I applied to my other pursuits. Instead of doing what I had always done and showing up just to spin my wheels and half ass it, I was going to approach it with the seriousness that I thought it deserved. Maybe I was a little inspired by the training Drago did in Rocky IV. I loved the scientific approach to physical development and decided to do it myself. I started tracking every exercise I did, every set, every weight and every rep. I started doing research on hypertrophy and learned a lot quickly. I started training to failure and with full intensity. I still had to learn but every day I learnt something new.

Initially, my lifting split was a standard PPL (Push, Pull, Legs) split. As I progressed, I noticed my arms were lagging behind, overly fatigued after their respective major muscle groups. I also realized I was skipping leg days semi-frequently as they weren't an important muscle group in my novice mind. I knew if I forced myself to do things I didn't find fun I would burn myself out so I took a different approach. I was going to build the most fun, but still optimal split, that's when I devised my Chest, Back, Arms split. On day one I would hit arms and hamstrings, on day two I would hit chest and quads, and on day three I would hit back, shoulders, and hamstrings again, repeating this twice leading to a 6 day a week split. (I actually use a modified version of this split now after briefly returning to PPL and trying out U/L).

After hitting a nasty dirty bulk in late 2023 (peaking at 104kgs) I started a long cut. I realized the importance of tracking the food I ate as that was part of the equation to get jacked, so despite not really being able to cook properly I still tracked all of the food I ate in the school dining hall which basically consisted of a shit load of grilled chicken and fries for every lunch and dinner.

By March 2024, the results were showing. I got abs for the first time. But I still had to fight the urge to slip backward. I caught myself spending entire mornings scrolling on Instagram and smoking a ton of cigs. I had to ask myself: "How am I meant to make history if I'm spending my time like this?" I decided to completely lock in. I gave away my last cigarettes, completely cut out smoking, and reduced my weed consumption.

That guaranteed return on investment fully materialized by May 2024. I remember waiting 20 minutes for a parking spot at a packed gym, not really wanting to work out, but refusing to make excuses. Nearing the end of my arm day, I looked in the mirror and realized I genuinely looked massive. I was looking at the exact physique the "skinny fat" version of me would have killed for just months prior. My confidence wasn't vain; it was due. It was earned through countless months of tracking meals, researching technique, and exerting force.

The external validation proved it, too. On that exact same day, a trainer asked if I had ever thought about competing. Around that same time, a friend's brother didn't even recognize me at first, and later asked my friend what steroids I was on.

Today, living in my body is certainly better than living in my body back in the day. An active body fosters an active mind. I basically get all the positives that everyone else gets from the gym, but above all, it proved to me that if I fully dedicate myself to a system, I can truly excel at it.