One would think that regeneration is not exactly a topic that fits in with christmas. Also, build-up training is not really an issue. You want to make a christmas story out of this? But sometimes there are unexpected developments in life. Read for yourself!
A long, long time ago …
My wife Andrea and I were 27 years old when we decided to get married. The wedding took place in 1992, and so did the honeymoon. We had chosen the USA as our destination – it was our first and so far only trip to the United States.
Think about workout even on vacation?
What do you think of as a dumbbell swinging, sufficiently testosterone supplied and newly married man on his honeymoon? Right – to training, of course. After all, you want to stay in shape – not only for your own ego, but also for the newly wedded wife. So selfless.
So what could be more obvious than to buy the best-known magazine on muscle building that was available at the time: Muscle & Fitness from Joe Weider’s bodybuilding empire. Not a completely new thing for me, since I had been a loyal reader of the German-language offshoot of this magazine for many years, the Sportrevue by Albert Busek. It was a bit thinner, but pictures and articles were the same – except for the language.
Build-up training: Also interesting for the daughter?
The days came and the days went: We had to go back home, and there the everyday life took its course. The job played an important role. But also the family, and so our daughter Julia was born in 1994: a lovely baby.
Already in her childhood I noticed that she was very strong, especially on her upper body. Time passed and I never tried to get her to train. However, she always saw what I was doing in the cellar with the dumbbells. So the relationship was established.
And how life plays out: Julia began her education as a certified health and fitness trainer in 2018, among other studies. And when it came to graduation, the question arose: Which subject should the diploma thesis actually have?
Regeneration as a topic of trainer education
The title of the diploma thesis was finally: “Optimization of the muscle build-up under consideration of regeneration and supercompensation”. And at some point I noticed that Julia referred to a table from her script which listed different regeneration times for different muscle groups.
I was sure I’d seen it somewhere before. The thought behind it: Small muscles regenerate faster than large ones, low intensity requires less regeneration time than high intensity, and the fibre composition of the respective muscle also seems to play a role. Well, this topic is still present.
Developing a prototype of the new web app
Parallel to her education as a trainer, Julia was busy studying business informatics at the university of applied sciences. And during her studies she chose the development of a prototype as a topic for her master thesis. After recording the performed exercises, this prototype calculates when which muscles are ready again for the next workout. As a programmer and father, I was certain of joy and pride.
A prototype is a programmed application (“app”) that cannot yet do everything that is ultimately planned, but should give a feeling of what the product could look like in the end and how it could be used. And so the very first version of the web app called “myTRS – My Training Regeneration Status” was created in the course of her master thesis.
The table from John Comereski’s article
And the most remarkable aspect of the whole thing was that I could actually find this table with the regeneration periods of the individual muscle parts in my magazine fundus. And yes, you suspect it already: This article was in the magazine Muscle & Fitness from 1992 – the first and only original magazine I own from the USA.
The author at the time was John Comereski, who wrote many scientific articles and reports for the Weider Group. I wasn’t aware of it all these years, but: I had the decisive article for our daughter’s work in the original!
The presentiment, 27 years too early?
Now, of course, you can play the most adventurous mind games: Was it fate? Was it a kind of premonition? Or was it simply a coincidence that I bought a magazine that our daughter would need 27 years later?
I’m a very rational person. But I find this coincidence quite remarkable. Anyway, the surprise was big, and somehow the whole thing is a “good story”.
And the moral of the story?
Well – you can probably not draw any life wisdoms from all this, and also no recommendations for action. But there is one thing you can do: make a christmas story out of it.
Why a christmas story?
Because this article in this magazine became a central component of the web app myTRS, which we – my wife, our daughter and I – now run as ” family business ” so to speak. It is a great pleasure to see the product grow and to help people who do build-up training.
And just now, in the advent of 2019, we have released the web app as well as the website, the blog, facebook and instagram. From now on you can register free of charge and without obligation. Merry christmas!
