2015R1D26 – Update. Changes Are Coming.

Changed PrioritiesSo I am thinking about switching the weights up a bit for the time being.
I feel like my rep count is sufficiently high that I can split a 1 day deadlift program into 3 separate movements and still hit around the same rep count (90-150 most days). The point would be to work some accessory movements knowing that I am not going to be producing a 1 or 3 RM performance at all at the moment. What I would aim for is 50-70% max output on the main lift and then probably 5×5 at 80% on the accessory movements. It 2would break down something like this with some changes to the accessory movements over time.

Deadlift day becomes 7×5 DL, Good Mornings, bent rows
Cardio
Chest day becomes 7×5 Bench, flys, triceps
Cardio
Squat day becomes 7×5 Squat, leg extensions, hamstring curls
Cardio
OLY day becomes 7×5 cleans, snatch, OHP or cleans, front squat, DB OHP

That gives me a 4 day weight program and a 3 day cardio program which is fine for cutting. I will need to change the accessory movements, these are off the top of my head. 35 movements on each item for a total of 105 movements total.

Which brings me to my cut. It’s been not too painful but the results are also not too impressive. I am down about 4lbs in 2 weeks but the recomp is much better that it sounds.

There are 2 additional factors here, I gave up the CE stack I was using due to joint dryness which I think was the cause of my pain and also I started creatine which should add around 3-5lbs of water weight.

I also want to note here that I am having some pain since stopping the heavy Millennium cycle. I have found that cardio is aggravating my back and hips and is a great source of pain for me. So I am back with the daily stretching but to be honest I feel a lot more delicate since I started cardio again. My knees are painful when coming downstairs, even when I sit for a few minutes they hurt. I am hoping that in another week or so they will be getting used to it otherwise it’s out with the cardio and back to the HIIT instead. I have been doing a lot of dancing and bootcamp cardio type Xbox workouts including Insanity and P90X, whatever is free basically.
The numbers are far from impressive but here you go. Today was a little off, I think I have some hydration issues. If the creatine has added 3-5lbs then it’s possible I am down up to 9lbs which would be fine.
Weight-Fat-Water-Muscle-Rating-BMR-Age-Bone Mass-Visceral Fat

January-01-15 261 25.5 52 184.8 3 2649 48 9.4 13
January-05-15 257 25.5 51.5 182.2 3 2605 47 9.4 13
January-18-15 257 24.8 51.8 183.6 3 2614 45 9.4 13
January-23-15 258 24.5 52 185.6 3 2654 43 9.4 13
January-26-15 257 25.7 51.4 181.2 3 2690 48 9.2 14

Still a way to go but getting the hang of the workouts and keeping reminding myself to cut the calories a bit means a slow road. But then again slow is how you keep it off #fatlogic…

In reality, I need to focus more and eat less. Next week should show more of an improvement.

2015R1D12 – No Results Is Progress

keep calm move forwardFitness.

It’s been almost a fortnight of my cut and nothing much is happening but I am good with that. I have learned over the years that my body is like an oil tanker in the ocean, you can turn it any way you want just don’t expect it to react very quickly. In the distant past (as with many people I presume) I would get discouraged with my lack of (specifically) weight loss after a couple of weeks and give up only to realize the following week that I was then losing. By that time it was too late and the damage was done. I have learned that a couple of weeks of strict diet and training is what it takes to lay the foundation for change. My weight is about the same but I feel better already. Although I wouldn’t recommend 12 days without a break to very many people, I know that at the moment my body is OK with it. It’s not been very hard training compared to my Millennium project so to me it feels like rest. That said, I managed to fit my DL, cleans, squat and bench into a 7 day rotation with 3 days of cardio. I have been spending time with my old friends Tony (P90X Plyo) and Shaun T (Insanity) and it’s been a lot of fun. And a lot of pain. My cardio was way off optimal but I am managing to struggle through the workouts sweating profusely, swearing like a sailor and once again being faced with my body’s lack of cooperation but it’s working. I am invigorated by the Xbox setup and the built in challenges that have me marginally ahead of my age group which is somewhere between dinosaur and cro-magnon man.

I have been unable to shake the cold I have had for about 2 weeks now too. I had to take off Thursday and Friday from work with fever, coughing, shortness of breath and nausea so I am eagerly awaiting the return of my health that should give me a boost. As for the numbers, the weight has not changed and in the next couple of days I should have my new scale stats to run against what I was. Like I tell my girls at gymnastics, it’s all about moving forwards, sometimes at a sprint sometimes at a crawl but moving…

Speaking of the gym, I wanted to colour this blog a little with some more personal touches. I think the P90X blog has run it’s course and for a general fitness writer (such that I am) maybe some extra depth into my activities and interests is warranted. I am thinking of moving the blog to a new address, but I can’t really think of a catchy subdomain. I will probably just move it to fitness.iamcanadian.org or something else equally vanilla. Suggestions are welcome of course. Maybe I can invest in another domain if a name really grabs me but since I already have fulltimefitness.ca which was for me and sweetphysique.ca which was for Nicole I probably have picked over what was available.

Gymnastics.

The girls are coming along, most have started to reclaim some of the skills that they “lost” before the break but since I don’t believe in “losing” skills lets just say that they are back on track mentally and are able to perform their skills again. It’s time for floor routines, they have to pick music and get to work on both their floor and beam routines soon since we only have 4 months to competition. My athlete with the broken leg should be back training lightly this week or next so the group should be back into the groove. My next job is to make sure that my level 6 athletes stay with their level 6 skills and my 2 level 4s have a shot at moving up if they can do the work in time. Level 6 is pretty easy to get into as long as you have the core skills they require such as kip on bars, handstand on beam, flight element on beam, 3 element tumbling plus a front tuck on floor and a decent vault. Once they have the basics they can add an almost unlimited amount of skills to their routines. It’s an exciting time, but nervy too with some girls still on the edge of having their basics ready.

 

2015R1D5 – Getting Serious and a Rude Awakening

srslystopimdriving

Thursday, 01/01/2015 1 Insanity Plyo Cardio 100%
Friday, 01/02/2015 2 30 min cardio Mossa MMA 100%
Saturday, 01/03/2015 3 Bench 160reps 225 10MinTrainer 100%
Sunday, 01/04/2015 4 Insanity Cardio Power Resistance 100%
Monday, 01/05/2015 5 Deadlifts to 185 100 reps 100%

My last few days are a fair representation of what a complete obsessive personality I have. I was supposed to be adding some cardio to my regular (albeit light) lifting program. What happened was 5 days of cardio and only 1 day of weights (plus cardio that day too). This was assisted by the fact that my new XBOX Fitness program has FREE Insanity workouts this month, I mean who can resist that? I also had a rude awakening after I stepped on my body measurement scale only to find out that my “bulk” phase has added an inordinate amount of fat to my body. 3% total which is scary. I know that my strength is way up and I know that does kind of go hand in hand but to be almost 26% is hard to swallow.

In December my stats for weight-fat-water-muscle were:

December-01-13 236.6 22.5 53.5 177
January-05-15 257 25.5 51.5 182.2

As you can see I added 3% body fat, but my muscle mass increased by 5.2lbs or approx. 3%. My bodyweight increased by almost 9%. These are mostly numbers that make me uncomfortable. In the picture over in the sidebar my stats were far worse and I was up over 33%fat. To be honest I haven’t been over about 20% in quite some time so I am not impressed. However, I look at my Millennium success and I have to take the rough with the smooth, I achieved an amazing goal, but obviously went a bit off track at the same time. In the nicer half of that picture I am 232lbs and around 16% fat which is still a bit high but acceptable.

Which brings me to my goals for 90 days from now.

I seriously need to be below 20% as son as possible. Within 90 days is totally possible, I have 65.5lbs of fat right now and so I need to get rid of about 16lbs to take me down to 50lbs fat or below. That fits nicely into my goals so far. 16 lbs of fat can be lost in about 8 weeks so this should be easily achieveable and then I can reset my goals once I am down to either 20% or 50lbs of fat total.

I don’t want to just be held to those two numbers I would like to see my total lifts not drop below 75% of my Millennium Max which would give me the following:

Total lift numbers max (% numbers are approximate according to plate thresholds)

Deadlift 295 – 75% – 225
Squat 315 – 75% – 235
Bench 395 – 70% – 295
Total 1005 – 70% – 750

And so there you have it. 90 days to get back to what I would consider to be pretty good shape and not too skewed towards power lifts. Wish me luck…

 

 

2015R1 – The Cut

shrek-and-hulk1I have to admit this is the worst phase for me. I assume it is for most people I mean who likes to be eating in deficit and having to work out just as hard? Anyway, it’s the price to pay for dirty bulking and achieving those strength goals. So to start I need to make sure I am doing all the things that are important before adding the extra cardio. Here is a list of what I need to be doing on a per week  basis this phase.

Deadlifts
Bench
Squat
Clean / Power Clean
Seated OHP
Pullups 100-300 per week
KB Swings
I would also like to not lose grip with
Barbell snatch
Overhead Squat
Front squat
Toes to bar
Add to this 2 days of Cardio and HIIT then you have a full program.

It will probably look something like this:

Bench, Dips, Pulllups
DL and swings
Cardio or HIIT / WOD
Squat and pullups
Cleans and OHP
Cardio or HIIT / WOD

As usual I will take days off when I require them, maintaining a 78% workout ratio.

I am looking to do high volume, lower weights HIIT training as much as possible. The cardio days will include doing Insanity since I now have access to some of the workouts through the XBOX which is great. Most days I will be doing some sort of 10 minute cardio portion but nothing that is worth recording here. If the mood takes me I can do bootcamp on the days that I have cardio since these workouts should not preclude me from doing partial same bodyparts on consecutive days. This is especially true since the bootcamps will be bodyweight only.

I do not expect that I will enjoy this. I do expect to enjoy losing some of the bodyfat I gained during the Millennium.

I actually started on Jan 1 with Insanity Plyo Cardio Circuit. I wanted to see what it was like with the xbox fitness element added. It was just as painful if not worse however I smoked men in my age category so there’s that… I did realize that bulk without cardio is not such a good idea. I should probably have stuck to my plan of doing one cardio workout a week. I am in so much pain right now from hamstrings and mid back ski abs pain…