Onfirefitness - Winchester

💥 FACTBUSTERS 0010 — DOUBLE TROUBLE 💥
We've made it to number 10, so this week we're busting TWO myths.
❌ MYTH #1: “Zone 2 is too easy to make you fitter.”
❌ MYTH #2: “If you want results, every conditioning session needs to be hard.”
💥 BUSTED × 2.
Let's start with something important.
ZONE 2 ISN'T NEW.
Before heart-rate watches, apps and everyone talking about “Zone 2”, fighters had a much simpler name for a lot of their steady aerobic work:
🥊 ROADWORK.
Steady aerobic conditioning has been a staple of boxing and competitive martial arts for generations.
Alongside the pads, sparring, strength work and harder conditioning came the steady stuff.
Running. Roadwork. Controlled conditioning.
Building the engine underneath everything else.
And there's a very good reason for it.
Your aerobic fitness helps underpin your ability to sustain work and recover between harder efforts.
That's important in a boxing ring.
It's important during a HYROX.
But it's also important in everyday life.
You don't need to be training for an event to benefit from building your aerobic base.
Maybe you're completely new to exercise.
Maybe you've been inactive for years.
Maybe you want to lose a few pounds.
Maybe you want to improve your heart and lung fitness.
Maybe you'd like to run your first 5K.
Or perhaps you simply want to climb the stairs, walk up a hill, play with the kids or grandkids and not feel completely knackered afterwards.
Start by building the engine.
And Zone 2 doesn't necessarily mean running.
For one person it might be jogging.
For somebody else it could be brisk walking or walking uphill.
It could be cycling, rowing, swimming or using the cross trainer.
The point is controlled, sustainable aerobic work that you can accumulate consistently without needing three days to recover from it.
And let's clear something else up.
If your goal is fat loss, Zone 2 isn't some magical fat-burning zone where body fat suddenly disappears.
Your overall nutrition and energy balance still matter enormously.
But regular lower-intensity aerobic exercise can increase your overall activity and energy expenditure while improving your fitness—and because the recovery cost is relatively manageable, it's something many people can perform regularly alongside their strength training.
That makes it incredibly useful.
Then we have people preparing for endurance or hybrid events such as HYROX.
And this is where people sometimes misunderstand the message.
I'm NOT saying:
“Just do Zone 2.”
Far from it.
If you're preparing for HYROX, eventually you need to train for what HYROX actually asks you to do.
You need intervals.
You need harder running sessions.
You need strength and power.
You need sleds, carries, lunges, wall balls, burpees, rowing and SkiErg.
You need to practise running after stations.
And you need to practise performing stations when you're already fatigued.
That's specificity.
But underneath all of that?
You still need the engine.
Think of it this way:
🫀 ZONE 2 BUILDS THE ENGINE.
⚙️ INTERVALS DEVELOP THE GEARS.
🔥 EVENT-SPECIFIC TRAINING TEACHES YOU TO USE THOSE GEARS UNDER FATIGUE.
It's not one versus the other.
You need the right mixture for the goal in front of you.
And that's the point of today's Factbusters.
We've become very good at celebrating the sessions that look brutal.
Sweat everywhere.
Heart rate through the roof.
Collapsed on the floor afterwards.
But harder doesn't automatically mean better.
Sometimes the intelligent training session is the one where you deliberately hold yourself back.
You accumulate the work.
You recover.
And then you're capable of training again.
So whether you're preparing for HYROX, trying to lose some body fat, beginning your fitness journey or simply wanting to become healthier and fitter…
DON'T UNDERESTIMATE THE EASY STUFF.
There's a reason athletes have been doing their roadwork for generations.
Build the base.
Build the engine.
Then build everything else on top of it.
Not every session needs to destroy you.
Some sessions are there to build you.
💥 FACTBUSTERS 0010 — DOUBLE TROUBLE
Until we meet again…
Top-Tier Training. Standards are high here… and that’s the point.
Tim – Your Friendly Neighbourhood Personal Trainer.

IT’S BEEN ABOUT THREE WEEKS SINCE I LAST POSTED ANYTHING ABOUT MY HYROX PROGRESSION…

SO HERE WE ARE.
And actually, quite a lot has changed.
Over these last few weeks I haven't been trying to destroy myself with endless high-intensity sessions.
The focus has been much simpler:
Zone 2. Engine building. Getting used to running.
I’m still relatively new to running, so a big part of this process is simply getting my body accustomed to it, building the aerobic base and gradually improving my ability to keep working without constantly needing to stop and recover.
And this week I've really started to feel that work paying off.
First up was my first 5K.
For somebody who has never really considered himself a runner, completing it was a big mental milestone.
But what pleased me even more was that it actually felt fairly comfortable.
Then yesterday came a very different challenge.
A HYROX-focused session consisting of 10 × 4-minute rounds:
15 wall balls
200m run
10 burpees
20 lunges
Basically — work, work, work.
Very little opportunity to stand around feeling sorry for yourself.
I maintained the original prescription for five rounds, but eventually I couldn't maintain the required pace on the 200m runs.
So I adapted.
For the remaining five rounds I dropped the run to 100m and kept working.
For me, that's an important part of this whole process.
I'm trying to become more resilient to having very little rest.
To work while fatigued.
Recover while still moving.
Manage the fatigue.
And then go again.
Not every session needs to be perfect. Sometimes the win is recognising that the original target isn't sustainable, making an intelligent adjustment and still completing the work.
Then this morning I had a little spare time, so I decided to see how the engine felt after yesterday.
10-minute EMOM of hardstyle kettlebell snatches with a 20kg bell.
5 left.
5 right.
Every minute for 10 minutes.
And actually?
I felt pretty good.
My hands and the backs of my wrists definitely need conditioning again because I haven't been doing enough snatching recently.
But cardiovascularly?
Fine.
I wasn't particularly puffed or gassed and genuinely felt like I could have continued for another five minutes.
But there was no reason to.
Do the work. Get the benefit. Leave something in the tank.
And while I'm working towards HYROX, I'm certainly not forgetting about the other things I enjoy.
Strength is still a massive part of my training.
My barbell overhead press is now comfortably at 60kg for 3×3 — nine solid reps.
My one-handed press-ups are now multiple sets of five on both the left and right.
I'm still giving myself about a 6/10 for technique because my standards for myself are high.
My body is fairly straight, but I'm still slightly staggered.
Feet together, completely straight body and beautiful clean reps?
That's my 10.
I'll get there.
So three weeks on, where am I?
Running — improving.
Zone 2 — improving.
Engine — building.
Strength — improving.
Recovery between efforts — improving.
Tolerance to working with very little rest — improving.
Mental resilience — improving.
Nothing has suddenly transformed overnight.
It's simply the result of consistently turning up and doing the work.
And mentally, that's becoming just as important as the physical improvements.
Preparing for HYROX with Psycho Simon has given me something to aim at.
A target.
A challenge.
Something uncomfortable.
And something that gives me motivation to keep moving forward when other parts of life can sometimes feel pretty bloody difficult.
That's one of the reasons I train.
Sometimes you don't need everything figured out.
You just need the next run.
The next set.
The next rep.
The next session.
Build the base.
Build the engine.
Build the strength.
Build the resilience.
And keep moving forward.
January is getting closer.
Still plenty of work to do.
But three weeks later?
We're definitely moving in the right direction.

Until we meet again…

Top-Tier Training.

Standards are high here… and that’s the point.

Tim – Your Friendly Neighbourhood Personal Trainer.

Be a little bit more Charlie. ❤️

HYROX UPDATE — THIS IS BECOMING ABOUT MORE THAN FITNESS
It’s been about three weeks since my last proper HYROX update, and I can genuinely see things starting to change.
Not just physically.
Tuesday — my first continuous 5K.
And the biggest surprise? It felt comfortable. Controlled. I wasn’t hanging on for dear life. I finished feeling like there was more there.
Last night — HYROX simulation.
10 rounds.
4-minute blocks:
15 wall balls
200m run
10 burpees
20 lunges
I managed the first five rounds as prescribed before the pace became unsustainable, particularly on the run.
So I adapted.
Dropped the run to 100m and carried on.
That’s training.
Not failing because you couldn’t maintain the original numbers. Learning where you currently are, adjusting and continuing to work.
Then this morning, I came back in and did something completely different.
20kg hardstyle kettlebell snatches.
5 left.
5 right.
Every minute, on the minute.
10 minutes.
100 snatches.
And I felt fresh.
Breathing was good. Engine felt good. I could have carried on.
Three weeks ago, I don't think all of this would have looked or felt the same.
My running is improving.
My conditioning is improving.
My recovery is improving.
My strength and kettlebell work are still there.
But probably more importantly…
my resilience is improving.
HYROX was originally something to train for. A target. Something slightly ridiculous that Psycho Simon and I decided to take on.
But somewhere along the way, Psycho Assignment has become something else.
Life has been hard at times.
Training doesn't make those things disappear.
But it gives me somewhere to put some of it.
Run when I don't particularly want to run.
Finish another round when my head says stop.
Pick the kettlebell up again.
Accept that sometimes I need to adjust rather than quit.
And then come back tomorrow.
I'm building my engine for HYROX.
But without really realising it, I'm rebuilding other parts of myself at the same time.
Fitness.
Health.
Strength.
Confidence.
Mental resilience.
Sometimes you have to be broken to grow.
Still plenty of work to do.
But three weeks later, I'm fitter, stronger and mentally in a better place than I was.
And for now, that's progress I'm bloody proud of.
Psycho Assignment continues.
Until we meet again…
Top-Tier Training. Standards are high here… and that’s the point.
Tim – Your Friendly Neighbourhood Personal Trainer.
Be a little bit more Charlie.

There are 168 hours in your week.

I might see you for one, two, maybe three of them.
So here’s the question:
What are you doing with the other 165+ hours?
Because you can absolutely smash every session with me. You can do every rep, lift every weight, cover every metre and complete every run I ask of you.
But your results aren't determined by what you do with me alone.

What you do when I'm NOT there matters just as much and often more.

So let's talk about accountability outside the gym.
How are you doing with:
• Nutrition – are you eating in a way that supports your goals?
• Daily movement – how many steps are you actually doing each day?
• Sleep – are you getting enough, and is it good-quality sleep?
• Hydration – are you drinking enough water?
• Stress – how well are you managing work, life and everything in between?
• Work-life balance – are you actually giving yourself time to recover?
• Social and emotional health – how are you doing outside of training?
• Support – do the people around you support you, encourage you and want to see you succeed? Or do they bring you down?

There is a difference.

Let's Just pick one Social health....

The people you surround yourself with matter.
The can empower you or do the opposite.

Surround yourself with supportive, positive people who respect what you're trying to achieve rather than making it harder for you.

All of these things above can either support your progress or hinder it.
In my opinion, most of you are already succeeding inside the gym.

Its were you can instantly see, feel the results.
It's the other 23 hours of your day that I'm interested in.

Where are you doing really well?
Where are you struggling?
And most importantly:
Where do you need my help the most?

Being your Personal Trainer isn't just about counting your reps for an hour.

If something outside the gym is holding back what we're trying to achieve inside it, let's talk about it.

That's accountability.

Tim – Your Friendly Neighbourhood Personal Trainer

🕵️‍♂️ FACTBUSTERS 008

🎬 MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE

Walking downstairs after leg day…

We’ve all heard it:
“If you’re not sore the next day, you didn’t train hard enough.”

Let’s bust that one properly.

Being sore after training does not automatically mean you had a productive, effective workout.

Muscle soreness—often called DOMS, or delayed-onset muscle soreness—can happen after performing an unfamiliar movement, increasing your workload, using a greater range of movement or placing more emphasis on the lowering phase of an exercise.
A little stiffness or tenderness after a challenging session can be completely normal.

However, soreness is not the goal—and it isn’t a reliable measurement of how successful your workout was.
You can have an excellent training session, create an appropriate stimulus and make progress without spending the next three days walking downstairs sideways.

Hypertrophy and soreness are not the same thing
Training for hypertrophy, which means increasing muscle size, requires sufficient muscular tension, effort, appropriate training volume and progressive overload.

It does not require you to deliberately destroy yourself.
If you cannot walk properly, sit down comfortably, move normally or complete your next planned training session because you are in so much pain, that isn’t proof that the workout was brilliant.
It may simply mean that you created far more fatigue and muscle damage than was necessary.

That excessive soreness can:
❌ Affect your normal daily movement
❌ Reduce the quality of your next session
❌ Alter your exercise technique
❌ Interfere with recovery
❌ Disrupt your training consistency

More pain does not automatically equal more progress.
Does that mean training should always feel easy?

Absolutely not.

If everything stays the same, nothing changes. Your body needs an appropriate reason to adapt.

You may need to gradually lift more weight, complete additional repetitions, perform another set, improve your range of movement or increase the quality and control of your work.
But progression should have a purpose.

Planned, productive progression might include:
✅ Improving your technique
✅ Lifting with greater control
✅ Increasing the weight when appropriate
✅ Completing more quality repetitions
✅ Adding volume gradually
✅ Increasing your range of movement
✅ Improving your overall work capacity
✅ Recovering well enough to repeat the process

Simply doing more for the sake of doing more isn’t always better.
The aim isn’t to prove how much punishment you can tolerate. The aim is to provide enough stimulus to create an adaptation, recover from it and return ready to progress again.
A well-designed programme balances stimulus, fatigue and recovery. It challenges you without repeatedly burying you.
How should you judge an effective workout?

Instead of judging your session by soreness alone, look for improvements in:
✅ Strength
✅ Technique
✅ Movement quality
✅ Range of movement
✅ Control
✅ Work capacity
✅ Confidence
✅ Consistency
✅ Measurable performance

Soreness is simply one possible response to training. It is not a medal, a score or proof that the programme is working.
Hypertrophy is building muscle.

Crippling soreness is not the goal.

Train hard. Progress intelligently. Recover properly.
Don’t mistake being destroyed for being productive.
Until we meet again…

Top-Tier Training. Standards are high here… and that’s the point.

Tim – Your Friendly Neighbourhood Personal Trainer.

💥 FACT BUSTERS #007 — LICENCE TO LIFT 💥

THE MYTH:

“Once you get older, you should stop lifting heavy weights and stick to light weights.”

🚨 FACT BUSTED.

Getting older isn't a reason to stop challenging your body.
In fact, maintaining strength becomes increasingly important as we age.
From our 30s onwards, we can gradually lose muscle mass and strength if we don't give the body a reason to keep them. As we get older, that can eventually affect far more than how much weight we can lift in a gym.

It can affect our ability to:
💪 Get up from the floor
🛒 Carry the shopping
🪜 Climb stairs
🏡 Do jobs around the house and garden
🏃 Keep up with children and grandchildren
⚖️ Maintain balance and stability
🦴 Keep our bones strong
🚶 Move confidently and independently

Strength isn't just about muscles.

Strength is capability.

And resistance training is one of the best tools we have for maintaining that capability as we get older.

BUT WHAT DOES “LIFT HEAVY” ACTUALLY MEAN?

This is where people sometimes misunderstand the message.
Heavy is relative.

Heavy for a trained 30-year-old is different from heavy for a trained 60-year-old.
Heavy for someone who's trained for 20 years is completely different from heavy for someone walking into a gym for the first time.
We're not talking about loading a barbell with as much weight as possible and hoping for the best.
We're talking about progressive resistance training.
Learn the movement.
Build good technique.
Gradually increase the challenge.

Get stronger.

And, where appropriate, continue lifting progressively heavier loads for as long as you safely can.
Your age doesn't automatically determine what you're capable of.
WHY KEEP LIFTING?

🏋️ MUSCLE
Resistance training gives your body a reason to maintain—and potentially build—muscle tissue.

🦴 BONES
Loading the body through appropriate resistance training helps support bone health.

💪 STRENGTH
Strength gives us a bigger physical reserve. Everyday tasks become easier when they're well below our maximum capability.

⚖️ BALANCE & STABILITY
Strong legs, hips and trunk help us control our bodies and can contribute to staying steady on our feet.

🔥 METABOLIC HEALTH
Maintaining muscle and staying physically active are valuable parts of long-term metabolic health.

🧠 CONFIDENCE
There's something incredibly powerful about knowing your body is still capable.
And that matters outside the gym.

SHOULD YOU KEEP TRYING TO GET STRONGER?
For many people—yes.

If your technique is good, you're recovering properly, you're pain-free and your body is responding well, there isn't a magical birthday when you suddenly have to swap challenging weights for tiny dumbbells.
Progress might become slower.
Recovery may need more attention.
Your exercise selection might change.
Old injuries may need managing.
And what “heavy” looks like may change over the years.
That's training intelligently—not giving up.

⚠️ KNOW YOUR LIMITATIONS

None of this means ignoring pain or trying to prove something every time you walk into the gym.
Listen to your body.
Respect

Until we meet again...

Top-Tier Training.

Standards are high here... and that's the point.

Tim – Your Friendly Neighbourhood Personal Trainer. 💪🔥

TEST DAY: READY FOR WAR ⚔️🔥

Testing gives us data.
Training gives us progress.

This week was Test Day for Joshua.

And before we get into the numbers, I want to explain why we test in the first place.

Joshua didn't come to me as a complete beginner.

He was already training. He already knew his way around a gym and already had a foundation of strength.

What he wanted was to take that next step:

Improve his numbers.
Improve his technique.
Improve his form.
And ultimately, get stronger.

Sometimes that's exactly where coaching becomes valuable.

You don't necessarily need someone to completely reinvent your training.

Sometimes you need another pair of experienced eyes looking at the finer details, making adjustments, putting some structure around what you're doing and helping you turn the strength you already have into better performance.

And if we're going to do that, we need benchmarks.

THE PREVIOUS BENCHMARK

Back in February, Joshua's bench press numbers were:

65kg — 4 sets × 4 reps
70kg — 2 reps

Fast-forward to our latest Test Day:

🔥 70kg × 5

Then we moved onto our heavy singles:

🔥 80kg × 1
80kg × 1
80kg × 1

Three successful singles at 80kg.

That's not just a PB to celebrate.

That's useful information.

WHY TEST A 5RM?

A heavy set of five tells us something different from a maximum single.

We're not just asking:

“Can you move this weight?”

We're asking whether you can repeatedly produce force while maintaining the standards of the lift.

What happens to your setup?

What happens to your bar path?

Where does the sticking point appear?

Can you maintain your position as fatigue starts accumulating?

Does rep five still look like the movement we're trying to perform?

And, importantly, compared with our previous benchmark:

Are we stronger?

February: 70kg ×2.

Now: 70kg ×5.

There's our answer.

WHY TEST THE HEAVY SINGLE?

Because a heavy single gives us a different piece of information.

If one of your goals is maximum strength, eventually you need to know what happens when the load gets genuinely heavy.

Heavy weights have a wonderful habit of exposing things.

Your setup matters.

Your brace matters.

Your positioning matters.

Your bar path matters.

Your ability to create whole-body tension matters.

And your confidence under a heavy bar definitely matters.

Technical errors you might get away with at lighter weights become much harder to hide when you're approaching your limit.

That's one of the reasons I like testing both.

The 5RM gives us one picture of Joshua's strength.

The heavy single gives us another.

And in this case, Joshua didn't just get 80kg up once on a heroic all-or-nothing effort.

He successfully pressed it for three separate singles.

That gives us a solid new benchmark to work from.

BUT WHY BENCH PRESS?

Interestingly, we don't actually spend most of our pressing time barbell bench pressing.

We normally use dumbbells.

And I'm not going to tell you that the barbell bench press is somehow the ultimate exercise for building your chest or creating a great physique.

It isn't.

There are plenty of fantastic exercises available to us, and dumbbell pressing gives us a lot of what we're looking for during our normal training.

But that's not the purpose of the bench press on Test Day.

Here, it's a testing tool.

The bench press is recognisable.

It's measurable.

It's repeatable.

And, providing we keep our standards consistent, it's easy to standardise.

Same movement.

Same setup.

Same expectations.

That means we can put a marker in the sand today, go away and train, then come back months later and compare like for like.

That's what makes it useful.

THE BLOCK WE'VE JUST FINISHED

Joshua and I have just finished a rolling three-session training approach.

Across our main movement patterns — push, pull, squat and hinge — the emphasis rotated:

HEAVY → MEDIUM → LIGHT

So rather than trying to smash every movement heavily every time we trained, the stress and intensity changed across the sessions.

Heavy work had its place.

Medium work had its place.

Lighter work had its place.

We've accumulated the work, practised the movements, refined technique and built strength.

That block has now finished.

So this was the perfect time to test.

NOW WE CHANGE GEAR

The next phase is going to look different.

We're moving towards a more focused hybrid strength approach.

Instead of trying to cram lots of different exercises into every workout, some sessions may contain only two to four main lifts.

Potentially up to around five working sets.

Lower rep ranges.

Heavier loads.

Appropriate recovery between sets.

And a lot of focus on the quality of those lifts.

Fewer movements. More intent.

Because getting stronger doesn't always require adding another exercise.

Sometimes the answer is exactly the opposite.

Strip things back.

Choose the movements that matter.

Practise them.

Load them.

Recover properly.

And get exceptionally good at them.

AND THIS IS WHY WE HAD TEST DAY

Before starting that next phase, I wanted data.

Where is Joshua's strength right now?

What are the numbers we're working from?

Where are the technical strengths?

Where are the weaknesses?

And what benchmark are we going to use when we eventually come back and test again?

That's what today gave us.

We're not going to max out every week.

We're not going to constantly test whether we've become stronger.

Testing doesn't make you stronger. Training does.

Test Day simply tells us where we are.

Then we take that information and go back to work.

And after another period of structured training, we'll come back to these numbers.

70kg ×5.
80kg ×1 ×3.

Then we'll find out whether we've moved the marker again.

That's the difference between simply going into the gym and lifting weights...

…and training with a purpose.

Joshua came to me wanting to improve his numbers, technique and form.

From 70kg ×2 in February to 70kg ×5 and three successful singles at 80kg.

I'd say we're heading in the right direction. 👊🔥

Fantastic work, Joshua.

Enjoy the win.

Because now we've got the data...

it's time to get back to work. ⚔️🔥

TESTING GIVES US DATA.
TRAINING GIVES US PROGRESS.

Until we meet again...

Top-Tier Training.
Standards are high here... and that's the point.

Tim – Your Friendly Neighbourhood Personal Trainer. 💪🔥

🔥 BODYWEIGHT MOVEMENTS — A TO E TIER: THE FULL BREAKDOWN 🔥

Following on from my Instagram post, let's go a little deeper into WHY I've chosen these movements and why I've ranked them where I have.

First, something that's really important:

THIS IS NOT A RANKING OF DIFFICULTY.

A-tier does not mean hardest.

B-tier does not mean beginner.

I'm ranking these movements according to how useful and fundamental I believe they are for developing and maintaining a strong, capable, functioning human body.

These are general recommendations, not individual prescriptions.

Male or female, 30, 40, 50 or beyond — we're all coming from different starting points.

Different strength.
Different mobility.
Different bodyweight.
Different injury histories.
Different coordination.
Different experience.
Different skill levels.

Knowing what your body can currently do — and understanding its limitations — is actually an incredibly empowering position to be in.

Because now you know where you're starting from.

And everything can be built from there.

🅰️ A-TIER — FUNDAMENTAL HUMAN MOVEMENT

🔥 WALKING

Probably the most fundamental movement on the entire list.

It's human locomotion in its simplest form.

We should be able to walk, cover ground and continue doing so throughout our lives.

Simple doesn't mean unimportant.

🔥 FLOOR GET-UPS

Can you get yourself onto the floor and get yourself back up again?

Without panicking about how you're going to do it?

That's strength, mobility, balance, coordination and confidence working together.

For me, this is one of the clearest examples of functional human capability.

🔥 SQUATS

Sit down. Stand up.

Simple human movement.

There are countless variations and starting points — supported squats, partial squats, full bodyweight squats and eventually loaded versions.

Your squat doesn't have to look like somebody else's.

Start with the range you can control and build from there.

🔥 PRESS-UPS

A press-up is far more than a chest exercise.

You're pushing while maintaining tension through your shoulders, trunk, hips and legs.

And it's incredibly scalable.

Wall press-up.
Elevated press-up.
Knees.
Floor.
Then increasingly advanced variations.

There's almost always another level.

🔥 PULL-UPS

One of the great demonstrations of relative upper-body strength.

You're controlling and moving your own bodyweight.

Can't do one?

Fine.

Start with hangs, assistance, negatives and other pulling variations and begin building the strength and skill.

🔥 LUNGES

Single-leg strength, balance, stability and coordination while moving through space.

Forward.
Reverse.
Walking.
Lateral.
Assisted.
Eventually loaded.

Another enormous movement family that can grow alongside your ability.

🔥 INVERTED ROWS

A fantastic horizontal pulling movement and one that's incredibly easy to adjust.

Changing your body angle can take it from relatively accessible to seriously challenging.

It's also a brilliant way of developing the pulling strength required for harder movements.

🔥 DEAD HANGS

When was the last time you actually hung from something?

Grip strength. Supporting your bodyweight. Spending time in an overhead position.

And it's a fantastic foundation for pulling and hanging movements.

🔥 CRAWLING

This one might make some people laugh.

"I'm 45 years old. Why would I crawl around on the floor?"

Because when did you stop?

As children, we crawled, climbed, rolled around, got onto the floor, stood back up and explored movement constantly.

Crawling requires your arms, legs and trunk to work together while you move through space.

That's coordination, control and whole-body movement.

🅱️ B-TIER — HIGHLY VALUABLE MOVEMENT & SKILL

🔥 DIPS

A brilliant upper-body pushing movement.

You're moving your entire bodyweight and developing serious pushing strength.

But they demand more strength and shoulder control than basic pushing movements, making them less universally accessible.

🔥 KNEE / LEG RAISES

Another movement with a massive progression pathway.

Lying bent-knee raises can be accessible.

Hanging knee raises increase the challenge.

Straight-leg raises take it further again.

You're developing trunk strength and learning to control your lower body rather than simply throwing your legs around.

🔥 PLANKS

A great introduction to bracing and whole-body tension.

But there's a point where holding a basic plank for longer and longer isn't giving you much more.

That's when you progress it.

Make the position harder rather than simply chasing minutes.

SO WHERE ARE C, D AND E?

They're empty.

Deliberately.

I've selected these movements because I believe they're ALL important movements to cover.

I'm not going to take good movements and pretend they're rubbish just so I can fill every row of an A–E tier list.

Some are more useful than others.

Some are more accessible.

Some require significantly more strength, mobility or skill.

But none of these deserve C, D or E.

They're all movements I believe we should aspire to being able to perform in some shape or form.

WHY WALKING, HANGING AND CRAWLING?

Think about what you did as a child.

You walked.
You ran.
You crawled.
You climbed.
You hung from things.
You squatted.
You played on the floor.
You got yourself back up.

You moved.

Then adulthood happens.

For many people, life becomes increasingly sedentary and our movement becomes less varied.

We sit at work.

We sit in cars.

We sit on sofas.

We spend hours looking at screens.

And gradually we stop asking our bodies to do many of the things they once did regularly.

Then years later we're surprised when some of those movements have become difficult.

Use it or lose it.

That doesn't mean you need to crawl around your house every evening or start hanging from every tree you walk past. 😂

It means we should try to keep as many physical options available to ourselves as possible.

YOU DON'T NEED AN EXPENSIVE GYM MEMBERSHIP

This is another massive advantage.

You can start working on many of these movements at home, outside or with very little equipment.

And you don't need to perform the finished exercise on day one.

Can't press-up from the floor?

Elevate your hands.

Can't squat comfortably through a full range?

Work within the range you can control.

Can't pull yourself over a bar?

Start with easier pulling variations.

You can regress movements, use assistance, change the leverage, shorten the range and gradually build towards more challenging versions.

Start where you are — not where you think you should be.

With a little knowledge, sensible progression and consistent practice, you can go a long, long way using your own bodyweight.

WILL YOU EVENTUALLY OUTGROW SOME OF THEM?

Of course.

As you become stronger and more capable, some basic bodyweight variations won't provide enough stimulus anymore.

That's progress.

Add resistance.

Change the leverage.

Increase the range.

Slow things down.

Move towards a more advanced variation.

Develop greater skill.

But don't throw away your foundations.

Keep them in check.

Keep them on point.

Because when you're travelling, on holiday, away from your gym or simply don't have your normal equipment, you've still got one incredibly useful piece of training equipment:

YOUR BODY.

Walk.

Push.

Pull.

Squat.

Lunge.

Hang.

Crawl.

Brace.

Control your legs.

Get yourself onto the floor.

And get yourself back up again.

Know what your body can do.

Understand its limitations.

Work on your weaknesses.

Maintain your strengths.

And continue building your capabilities.

Because these aren't simply exercises.

🔥 They're the building blocks to staying functionally human. 🔥

Until we meet again...

Top-Tier Training.

Standards are high here... and that’s the point.

Tim – Your Friendly Neighbourhood Personal Trainer. 💪🔥