The Secret to Sticking With Your Fitness Goals - Setting Targets with Rewards

We all know the ultimate reason to get healthy and fit: you want to look and feel better. You want to wake up with more energy, feel confident in your clothes, and maybe even get that toned, athletic build you’ve always wanted.

But let’s be honest with ourselves. That ultimate goal, the finish line can feel a very long way off when you are just starting out or grinding through a tough week. Because that long-term vision takes time, it is incredibly easy to lose track of it and lose your motivation.

The solution? You have to answer the question, "What’s in it for me right now?"

To build a sustainable routine, you need to set smaller, achievable goals along the way and tie them directly to rewards. Here is how you can structure your targets to keep your motivation high from week to week.

The Weekly Win: Food-Based Rewards

Start by setting weekly goals. For example, if your target is to stick to your eating plan from Monday through Friday, your reward could be a "cheat meal" out at a restaurant on the weekend.

Having this specific reward in mind helps keep you focused throughout the week. When you are tempted to break your diet on a Wednesday, you can remind yourself that you have a planned, guilt-free meal waiting for you on Saturday. You are earning that reward.

Monthly Milestones: Treat Yourself

Next, look at the bigger picture and set a monthly reward. If you stick to your overall health and fitness plan for the entire month, it's time to celebrate.

This reward should be a bit larger than your weekly cheat meal. It could be a special night out, or perhaps treating yourself to a new piece of clothing.

And here is a crucial point: don’t be too hard on yourself if you have a little bobble along the way. Nobody is perfect. As long as you stayed on track the vast majority of the time and you are seeing positive results, you still earn that monthly reward. Consistency, not perfection, is the goal.

The Ultimate Payoff: Your Long-Term Reward

Once you finally reach your long-term goal, the accomplishment will be incredibly rewarding in and of itself. You've put in the work, and you have the body and energy to show for it.

However, having an additional, massive reward planned for when you cross that finish line will give you the ultimate motivation to stay on track during the final stretch. This could be booking a holiday or vacation, or maybe even doing a complete wardrobe overhaul to fit the new you.

Ready to Take the Next Step?

You don't have to figure this out on your own. If you want a complete, step-by-step guide to finding the right balance of food and exercise, without giving up the things you love, I have something for you.

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Finding the Right Balance Between Food and Exercise

If you've been trying to get back in shape, you've probably realized that figuring out the exact ratio of eating to exercising can feel like a moving target.

Here at Get Fit Over 40, I see guys spinning their wheels all the time. They train hard but eat too much, or they starve themselves, have zero energy for the gym, and eventually crash. To build a sustainable, healthy lifestyle, you have to understand the fundamental relationship between what goes on your plate and what you do in the gym.

Here is how to find the right balance between food and exercise so you can finally see the results you are working toward.

The Golden Rule: Calories In vs. Calories Out

Let’s cut right to the chase and get the absolute truth out of the way first: no matter what you do, what diet you follow, or what supplements you take, you will need to eat less food than you burn to lose weight.

There is simply no way around this biological fact. Your body needs a reason to tap into its stored energy (body fat), and that only happens when you are in a caloric deficit. Depending on your ultimate goal, you have to set realistic calorie intake targets and then offset those calories with your physical activity.

The Great Trade-Off

Finding your balance comes down to understanding the trade-offs you are willing to make on a daily basis. It’s a sliding scale, and you are the one in control of the sliders.

• If you want to eat more food: You are going to have to exercise more. It’s that simple. If you love having larger meals or you don't want to drastically change your eating habits, you have to commit to a higher volume and intensity of exercise to ensure you are still hitting that daily calorie deficit.

• If you want to lose weight faster: You are going to have to attack the problem from both ends. You will need to reduce the calories you consume as much as safely possible, while simultaneously increasing your exercise output as much as you can recover from.

The 3 Questions You Need to Answer

Because we all have different bodies, schedules, and preferences, there is no one-size-fits-all formula. To figure out the right balance for your unique situation, you need to sit down and honestly answer these three questions:

1. How much weight do you want to lose each week? Are you looking for a slow, steady, and easily manageable half-pound a week? Or are you trying to be more aggressive to hit a specific near-term goal? Your timeline dictates how drastic your deficit needs to be.

2. How much time do you actually have each week for exercise? Be completely realistic here. If you only have three hours a week to dedicate to the gym because of family and work commitments, you cannot rely entirely on exercise to burn off excess weight. Your diet is going to have to do the heavy lifting.

3. How much are you willing to restrict your diet? Are you okay with tightly measuring your macros, skipping the late-night snacks, and cutting out the liquid calories? Or do you need more dietary freedom to stay sane? If you want dietary freedom, refer back to the trade-off: you better be ready to put in the work sweating it out.

Your Unique Path

The answers to these questions are going to be completely different for every single person based on your specific goals and lifestyle limitations. What works for a guy with a flexible schedule and a home gym might completely fail for a busy executive traveling three days a week.

Figure out the lifestyle you can actually sustain, do the math on your calories, and put in the work.

Ready to stop guessing and start seeing real results? Watch my Get Fit Now Training Videos Here

Ditching the "Bro Split" - Why Training Smarter is the Key to Building Muscle After 40

If you’ve spent any time in a gym over the last couple of decades, you are probably intimately familiar with the classic "bro split." It’s the routine most of us grew up reading about in fitness magazines, and it’s the default setting for almost anyone deciding it’s time to get serious about lifting.

You know the schedule: Monday is chest day, Tuesday is back, Wednesday is shoulders, Thursday is legs, and Friday is arms. You dedicate five or six days a week to completely destroying one specific muscle group per session, and every week looks exactly the same.

When you’re in your twenties, you can get away with almost any training style because your body is a highly efficient recovery machine. But as we age, our approach to building and maintaining muscle has to evolve. If you're over 40 and still running a strict bro split, you aren't just working harder than you need to, you are leaving a massive amount of growth on the table.

Here is why the traditional one-muscle-a-day split might be holding you back, and what you should be doing instead.

The Missed Growth Window

To understand why the bro split is inefficient, we have to look at the reality of muscle recovery and muscle protein synthesis (the biological process of building new muscle).

When you train a muscle hard, you trigger a growth response. However, that window of elevated muscle building doesn't last all week; it typically peaks and returns to baseline within 48 to 72 hours. This means you only need about two to three days for that muscle to recover, repair, and grow.

Think about the math of a typical bro split: if you train your chest on Monday, you are resting it for six whole days before you hit it again the following Monday. That means for three to four days, you are doing absolutely nothing to stimulate that muscle. You're completely missing out on the biological opportunity to trigger growth.

When we optimize our programming, we should be looking to hit each muscle group two, or even three times a week. Frequent, high-quality stimulation is the key to signaling your body to hold onto and build muscle tissue as you age.

The Volume Trap and the Pacing Dilemma

The other major flaw with dedicating an entire day to just one muscle group is what I call the "volume trap."

If you're forcing yourself to do four, five, or even six different exercises for the exact same muscle, you run into a serious pacing dilemma. Let’s say it’s leg day. Are you going to go all-out on heavy barbell squats for your first exercise, completely fry your central nervous system, and have absolutely nothing left in the tank for the lunges, leg presses, and extensions that follow?

Most people subconsciously solve this by pacing themselves. If you know you have to survive an hour of chest exercises, you hold back on the bench press so you can make it through the incline flyes. But if you aren't really pushing hard on those primary exercises, you're just pacing yourself to the finish line. You end up accumulating "junk volume", reps that make you tired and sore, but don't actually stimulate new muscle growth.

Furthermore, hammering a single joint and muscle group with 20 sets in a single day is a recipe for severe inflammation and excessive soreness, which can be incredibly hard on older joints and tendons.

The Solution: A Smarter Split for Longevity and Growth

Instead of mass-hitting one muscle to the point of severe overtraining and then waiting a week to do it again, a much better option is a split that targets one to two muscle groups per day with less overall volume per session.

The benefits of a higher-frequency, moderate-volume approach:

• Maximum Effort, Zero Pacing: When you only have to do two exercises for your back instead of five, you can give those two exercises 100% of your effort. You don't have to pace yourself to survive a bloated workout.

• Better Joint Health: Spreading your weekly volume across multiple days prevents you from overloading your joints and connective tissues in a single, punishing session.

• More Growth Opportunities: By training a muscle, giving it a couple of days to recover, and hitting it again, you are maximizing the muscle protein synthesis window all week long.

Effective Alternatives to the Bro Split:

• Upper/Lower Split (4 days a week): Monday and Thursday focus on the upper body; Tuesday and Friday focus on the lower body. Every muscle gets hit twice a week with adequate rest in between.

• Push/Pull/Legs (3-6 days a week): Grouping muscles by their function (Pushing muscles like chest/shoulders/triceps, Pulling muscles like back/biceps, and Legs).

• Full Body (3 days a week): Highly effective for older lifters who want maximum frequency and have limited days to get to the gym.

• My Personal Favorite (6 Days per week): Day 1 - Chest & Back, Day 2 - Sholuders & Arms, Day 3 - Legs, with Calves and Abs/Core at the end of each workout. I do that twice a week.

The Bottom Line

Building a great physique later in life is entirely possible, but it requires strategy. You don't have to kill yourself in the gym to get results. Work smarter, push harder on fewer movements per session, and stop waiting a full week to train a muscle again. Give your body the frequent stimulus it needs to grow, and the adequate recovery it needs to thrive.

Dusting Off the DJI Avata 2 - A Backyard Rip and Keeping Sharp After 40

Welcome back, everyone! Here at Get Fit Over 40, we talk a lot about the gym, nutrition, and physical health, but staying fit also means keeping your mind sharp, your reflexes quick, and your stress levels down. Sometimes, the best way to do that is to just get outside and engage in a hobby that gets your heart pumping. For me, that means strapping on the goggles and taking my DJI Avata 2 out for a spin.

To be completely honest, it’s been a minute since I’ve taken the drone out. When I first powered it up and took off from the patio, I was definitely feeling a little rusty. My thumbs felt a bit shaky on the sticks, and that familiar FPV (First Person View) orientation took a second to click back into place.

But the beautiful thing about hobbies you love is how quickly the muscle memory returns.

Within a few minutes, the rust shook off, and I was right back into it. What started as a cautious hover turned into a full-on backyard rip! There’s nothing quite like the feeling of dialing in your focus and just flying. I started looking for some interesting old and new lines around the property, threading the needle and hitting a few tight gaps between the trees that I normally might have second-guessed.

Once I had my confidence back, I decided to push it just a little bit more. I punched the throttle, getting up nice and high to just take in the scenic views of the neighborhood from above. It’s always breathtaking to see your everyday surroundings from a bird's-eye perspective. Then, to get the adrenaline really flowing, I brought it back down with a couple of aggressive, sweeping dives right back into the low-to-the-ground perspective.

The best part of the day? Absolutely zero crashes. I managed to keep the props out of the branches and brought the DJI Avata 2 home safely to the landing pad at the end of the session.

It was an incredibly fun time and a great reminder of why I love this hobby. It requires focus, hand-eye coordination, and split-second decision-making, all things we want to keep sharp as we get older.

So, this is your reminder: whatever that hobby is that you haven't touched in a while, whether it's an RC car, a bicycle, a camera, or a drone—dust it off this weekend. You might be rusty for the first five minutes, but the joy of getting back into the groove is absolutely worth it.

Get out there, have fun, and keep moving! 

• Buy the DJI Avata 2 Combo

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold8 Unboxing - Initial Thoughts and Use Cases

Every couple of years, I typically look at upgrading my phone. For the past two years, I’ve been using the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra. While it’s been an absolute workhorse, looking at the standard candy-bar upgrades just didn't do it for me. Marginal camera improvements or minor processor bumps aren't enough motivation to drop serious money on a new device. I wanted something genuinely different, practical, and exciting, which brought me to the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8.

Here are the key takeaways from my unboxing and initial real-world test.

The biggest selling point for me over standard phones or even the Fold Ultra model is the form factor:

• Passport Dimensions: Folded up, the Z Fold 8 has a shorter, slightly wider footprint than tall, narrow slabs. It slides into front and back pockets much easier without awkwardly sticking out.

• iPad Mini in Your Pocket: Unfolded, you get an inner screen comparable to an iPad Mini. It provides massive screen real estate without having to carry a dedicated tablet, a separate gear bag, or fuss with tethered mobile hotspots.

• 4:3 Aspect Ratio: The inner display layout is ideal for browsing web pages, reading documents, and viewing full-frame photos without the cramped cropping typical of traditional phones turned sideways.

Content Creation & Vlogging on the Move

For running Get Fit Over 40, recording workout clips, and posting updates on social media, this setup streamlines mobile production:

• Rear-Camera Selfies: Opening the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 allows you to frame yourself on the front screen while recording with the main 50 MP wide camera. You get maximum sensor quality and dynamic range without being forced to rely on lower-grade inner lenses.

• Minimalist Rig: Paired with a slim MagSafe-compatible case and a compact magnetic selfie stick/tripod, it doubles as an ultra-portable vlogging rig that requires zero bulky camera gear.

• Versatile Field Testing: Initial tests while walking outdoors showed solid stabilization and crisp 4K recording, with easy switching between the ultra-wide, 1x, and 2x digital zoom levels.

In the Box & Initial Setup

The unboxing is standard modern Samsung, minimalist and straightforward:

• Included Accessories: The box includes the phone itself, the SIM removal tool, and a USB-C to USB-C charging cable capable for fast charging. (You will need to supply your own wall adapter).

• Specs Chosen: Opted for the 512 GB graphite model with 12 GB of RAM, which hits the sweet spot for storing high-resolution fitness video footage and daily multitasking.

I’ll be putting the Galaxy Z Fold 8 through its paces over the next few weeks at the gym and outdoors to see how it holds up as my daily driver for workouts, productivity, and video creation. Stay tuned for a possible follow-up review, and make sure to follow along on the website and Rumble for upcoming updates!

• Buy the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8