Photo: Nikolas_jkd (Shutterstock) The best and the worst thing about social media is that it lets us compare ourselves to others. When it comes to athletes and fitness influencers, those comparisons can inspire us.

If you tried to imagine the perfect gym teacher, youd probably come up with someone a lot like Hampton Liu.

Rich Froning was CrossFits earliest breakout staryou might say hes the Michael Jordan of the sport (with Mat Fraser being the LeBron, naturally).

In the pandemic weve had to shift our lives to be socially distant we work remotely, we shop online, and we workout at home. Last year, I signed up for a virtual reality workout app called Supernatural, which runs on the Oculus Quest.

It seemed like an odd question coming from a college basketball player in elite shape: Mom, do we have any P90X videos? It was late March, in the midst of the first pandemic shutdowns that sent students home and moved classes online. Jordan Schakel had climbed fences to shoot at outdoor courts in his Torrance neighborhood, but now rec departments were removing rims and gyms were all closed

When San Francisco CrossFit co-founders Kelly and Juliet Starrett reopened their gym outdoors this summer, they had to adapt the handshakes that usually start each class for the pandemic.

Speaking to Express.co.uk, Bulk Powders ambassador Hayley Madigan shared her top weight training tips. She said: Weight training has a vast range of positive benefits for women, not just physically but mentally too! Weight training loads a resistance to our muscles, which allows them to rebuild stronger

Staying at home has never felt as good as before.

As a teenager, Dominic O'Connor played rugby at a national level, where his larger frame was counted as an advantage. "I didn't have a huge belly, but at the same time I didn't have a six-pack," he says in a new episode of Brand New Me

Now more than ever, athletes are reaching for lentils, edamame, and chickpeas instead of biting into steak dinner, to raise their strength, fitness, and overall performance levels.