rep upper body

forgot my log book but i think i remember what i did this morning

Circuit 1
DB press
60 x 10, 8, 7

Pull downs
130 x 10, 8, 6

Circuit 2
Machine row 3 sets can't remember the weight

DB side raises
15 x 10, 10, 8

Circuit 3
Bicep curls and tricep extentions 3 sets

Max-effort Lower Body

Front squats
45 x 10
95 x 5
115 x 5
135 x 5
155 x 5
165 x 5

RDL's w/ hook grip
45 x 10
135 x 10,10

Back extensions
10 x 10 (dumbbell held behind head)
body weight x 10

Hanging leg raises
body weight x 3,3

Treadmill
20mintues "calories 181"

Front squats felt awesome. A little hard on the fingers and wrist flexors but other than that they felt fine. Back squats have a history of hurting my low back and left hip. I never really done front squats so I am expecting to gain strength and stay healthy with these for awhile.

The hanging leg raises were awful. My core strength is shit right now. I will be doing daily low load ab work as well as some of my other weak points to get my strength up. For now still keeping the intensity/volume fairly low/moderate to prevent getting super sore.

I been walking 3-6 miles a day. Soon I will start mixing it up with walking w/ a weighted hiking back pack and jogging.

Cleaning The Rust Off, Upper body work

Max-effort upper body

Close grip bench press 
95 x 10
135 x 5
155 x 5
185 x 5
135 x 10

Circuit 
"Fat man" pull ups
body weight 10,10

Lateral shoulder raises
15 x 10,10

Triceps rope pushdown
40 x 10,10

Cardio 
3 mile walk outside

This workout was tough being that I haven't worked out in about 3 months. The weights felt heavy and shaky and my endurance sucked.

I decided to follow the "westside for skinny bastards"  http://www.defrancostraining.com/articles/38-articles/65-westside-for-skinny-bastards-part3.html with the temporary removal of the explosive exercises and true max effort for the lower body. This is because frankly my body and mind are just not ready for it yet. I also decided to do use this template over the "531" because in the past i have become discouraged when my hip would start to act up during squatting or if my shoulder started to hurt with bench pressing. This template allows me to sub in other exercises much quicker than following 531 would allow me. 

Squat 270 x 5 cycle 1, 1s week

Just went to the gym today to do some quick squats. I was tired and got in late so my plan was to squat then leave. My left hip felt weird in the hole and my form felt off but the 270 x 5 felt easy I thought of pushing the reps more but a mix of lazy and caution changed my mind.

Bench 190 x 10 Cycle 1, 1s wave

I didn't bother with a video today but today ended up being another really good workout.

Bench
190 x 1 was the goal

What I did
190 x 10 then did 205, 215, and 225 for easy singles with pause on chest.

I did 3-4 pull ups between each bench set plus the warm up sets not listed.

Dumbbell rows 65 x 10, 10, 10 super set with dumbbell single arm military presses 50 x 10, 10, 9

Spent after this, can't wait for my work capacity to start increasing again. 

Hip Thrust PR and Sumo Deadlift PR

I made a goal for myself that once I became strong enough to do a 225 x 10 hip thrust then I will start deadlifts again. I had a problem with deadlifts in the past because my glutes were not strong enough to properly lock out the weight. My erectors would take over and bam back pain. Well I hit 225 x 10 on the hip thrust way earlier than I thought. Now they were not pretty, I certainly could of locked out the weight by another inch and held it for another second at the top but that is close enough for me for now. I think my feet were too far out. Next time I will pull them in closer.

I then tried some deadlifts. I opt for sumo stance deadlifts because they keep my spine straighter than conventional stance. I also am using a hook grip (thumbs around bar 1st then fingers over thumb vs conventional grip of fingers over bar 1st then thumb over finger). I am using the hook grip for a couple reasons. The biggest reason is injury prevention. I simply can't afford a bicep tear. It also great for the Olympic lifts (clean and jerk, snatch) because I plan on getting into them soon when I have more time for training.   

Deadlifts worked out better than I ever hoped for. I havent pulled deadlifts in a very long time. I cant tell you the last time I pulled deadlifts. I did sets of 3 until I got to 315. I wanted 315 for a triple but my hook grip just gave out as I am just not used to holding a bar that way. So I threw on 365 and went for it. Watch closely at the end right before I grab my camera phone, I almost passed out. Not used to max deadlifts :) This is a PR for me. I have pulled 505 with a belt mixed grip years ago in a competition but I am considering this a PR since its sumo, no belt and hook grip. Then I finished up with 1 set of weighted crunches, side bends, and reverse hyper machine. Now that I feel I can deadlift safely I will start a deadlift day up 5/3/1 style.

Military press, Cycle 1, 3s week

Got me some good gym time today after work. Just did two exercises today. Hit some military presses and dumbbell rows.

Military press worked up to 130 x 7

Dumbbell rows 50x10,10 then 70x 10, 10, 10

Squat 255 x 3 Cycle 1, 3s week

Came in ready to pound some iron but had a really distracting text message right when I made it to the gym. Thought about leaving but said "no way just let me get some squats in then I will see how I feel." Well I still felt off so I just worked up to a really easy 255 x 5 on the squat and called it a day.

Bench press Cycle 1, 3s week

Today felt good to hit the gym. I been feeling stressed out and stretched thin these past few weeks. I haven't been hitting the iron as much as I should be lately and that's part of the reason why I been feeling this way.

Bench Work Sets Goals

140 x 3
160 x 3
180 x 3

What I did
180 x 10. It was easy I had a few more in the tank but didn't want to push it without a spotter. Plus felt it would of been dumb to hurt myself since I haven't been training as much as I should be. 180 x 10 brings the projected bench max to 239.94 pounds.

Pull ups body weight 3,3,3,3,3 total of 15 (super set this with bench press)

One arm dumbbell military presses 50 x 8,8,7 super set with dumbbell rows 65 x 10,10,10

Give the one arm dumbbell presses a try. Its simple, take a shoulder width stance and just press one dumbbell overhead then switch sides when done with that arm/shoulder. Its a great way to find out which shoulder is stronger/weaker and it really works the core muscles to. Keep the non-pressing arm down tight on your side, this is key in making your core do the work to stabilize you instead of holding out your arm as a counter balance.

Tonight I will walk the dog for 1.5 or 3miles for some light cardio work. I been wearing my "barefoot" shoes more and more, at first my feet and calves were fairly sore using them I had to wear normal shoes for a couple days but now my feet are getting stronger.

Finally I can post again

I am finally back to posting. My laptop had to be repaired and I tried posting with my phone but it was way too much of a pain in the ass. Not much has happened since I last posted anyways. I had to take about two weeks off because I had a nasty respiratory infection. As long as my laptop holds up I will posting again, unfortunately the computer guy said the laptop can't be fixed again without needing to replace the mother board. Right now I can't justify getting a new laptop unless I get one of them little net books.

Training update, I restarted the 5/3/1 program ahead of scheduled. I did modify the deadlift day to just be a higher volume squat/hip thrust day. I don't feel my lowback/hips are healthy enough right now for deadlifts. Right now I am using only 100-135 pounds for the hip thrusts. I am waiting for my hips to become stronger and more flexible. I am going to let my hip thrust numbers climb for awhile until I add deadlifts back into the program. I struggle to keep good form with 135 for 3 sets of 10 reps. Here's what real strong hip thrusts look like

I also bought a pair of Merrell barefoot training shoes. Learning about the human body and how it works from massage school has me convinces that modern day living is causes most of our aches and pains. Modern day living means sitting in nice cushion chairs, wearing built up shoes, doing the same activities over and over causing overuse injuries and poor posture. My feet and ankles have always been weak. I am going to try this barefoot style for awhile because orthotics have failed me. I even had a pair from a doctor but they only do some much for my flat feet.

My training for today
Deadlift Cycle 1/5s week

Barbell Hip Thrusts 135 x 10,10,10

Manta Ray Squats 135 x 10,10,10

Called it a day after that felt too lazy to do anything else.

Soreness, first workout, foam rolling/stretching, and "before" pictures

Holy soreness. The yoga I did Sunday and the strength training I did Monday left me really sore. I only went about 70-80% effort on these workouts knowing that if I went 90-100% I would just be crushed with soreness. Well I am still fairly sore. That's OK though. I was expecting it.

I did about 45mins-1hr of the 1hr 30mins yoga p90x DVD. The strength training workout I did 3 sets of max reps (leave 1-3 reps in the tank the first two sets then last set go for broke) with one minute rest in between. I left my logbook in my car and feeling too lazy to get it right now. The numbers don't matter right now anyways since I left several reps in the tank but I did v-grip pull downs, Rear foot elevated single leg squats (aka Bulgarian Split Squats), blast strap pushups with feet elevated (this is a push up variation that really forces the shoulders to stabilize themselves hard.), ab wheel roll outs, and reverse hyper machine (slow and controlled with slight pause on top and no swing at the bottom).

I took about 20-30 mins foam rolling/stretching today. I have a lot of work to do. I found many "hot spots." Some of this was just because I am sore but I have a feeling many of them will stay once the initial soreness wears off. I will write about this more, maybe do some pictures or even a video as I create a routine but basically I used the lacrosse ball on the bottoms of my feet, glutes, upper back, and chest. I then used to foam roller on my calves, quads, IT band and erectors. For stretches I stretched my calves, hip flexors, hamstrings, chest, and lats. I did all this while watching TV.

When I first posted my stats post I didn't take any "before" pictures. This came from being a wuss and being lazy. I took a couple pictures today. I think they tell much of the story.  Unfortunately my phone isn't connecting to my computer or sending the photos to my e-mail. I played around a bit and can't get it to work so as soon as I can get this to work then I will throw them up on here.

First workout and adding a goal

I did most of the p90x yoga workout today. I was dieing. It was hot as hell and I was sweating so bad that I was slipping even on the yoga mat. Overall it was about an hour of yoga. I also did some walking around. I pushed mowed the lawn and did some walking around at the mall, BJs store, and outside. My girlfriend's feet were troubling her during the walk so she took her flip flops off and said that it felt much better. This sparked a conversations about the benefits of being barefoot vs wearing shoes all the time. Before this conversation I was just happened to be reading about barefoot training. On Joe Defranco's site about his training with Triple H and how he started using five fingers "shoes." Joe talked about how wearing shoes is essentially putting a cast over your foot. It makes the bones, tendons, muscles, ligaments, and fascia weak. It also screws up walking mechanics. I started researching a bit on the topic of barefoot training. This other site brought up the fact that when people run with shoes the majority of runners use the heel stike stride. Once you take the shoes off almost everyone switched to mid foot or forefoot strike stride. This happens because barefoot heel strike is way too painful and punishing to the body! Your body is the result of millions of years of evolution. Feet are designed to NOT be in shoes.    http://www.webmd.com/fitness-exercise/news/20100127/barefoot-running-laced-with-health-benefits

Back to tonight's walk. Ashley was telling me how in gymnastics they never wore shoes during training because you don't wear them in competition. They did everything barefoot. Ashley's feet are strong and tough as hell. Mine I always knew were pathetically weak and sensitive. I decided to give this barefoot walking a try. We were about 5mins away from getting back home so I took my shoes and socks off and walked the rest of the way. I couldn't believe how sensitive the skin on my feet were. It wasn't comfortable to me to walk on the street. At the same time though I noticed just how natural and good it felt. I could feel the cool night's air running between my toes drying them out. I always had a problem with my feet sweating and causing athletes foot. I also noticed a chance in my walking mechanics without even thinking about it. I was holding the arch up in my left foot better (my left foot is very very flat, my right foot works well).

So my new goal is to start doing more barefoot walking and training. To toughen up my feet I am going to slowly add time into walking totally barefoot. I am also going to try out getting a pair of five fingers or something like it. Unfortunately a couple months ago I dropped a lot of money on custom fit arch supports. They do help but they are just not cutting it. I still have left hip and knee pain at times. I can still feel my foot just slapping against the ground instead of doing some muscle work and absorbing the shock effectively. My left foot may never be as strong or functionally sound as my right but my new goal is to even it out as much as possible with exercise. I am going to start out with the barefoot intervention first then add on some inversion exercises to strengthen my foot's ability to hold its arch up.

Starting stats and some more words

This morning I weighed in and I am at 200.4 pounds. That is the lightest I been in awhile. A fair amount of that drop from 230 is fat but I know some of it is muscle. I was going to do all these measurements of the body but choose just to measure my waist since that is where the majority of what I need to lose is. I measured so the tape was right over my belly button. I choose not to measure everything else because my number one goal is to lose fat right now. Once I leave the leaning out phase I will start to track everything else. The rest of the progress indicators will be based on scale weight and performance in the gym.

So my current measurements are I stand at 5ft 6inches tall, I weigh 200.4 pounds and my waist measured 41 1/2 inches. My weight goal is to get in the range of 170-180. My waist goal I am not sure of. I just don't know where it should be at so I am just going to track it with my weight. Most of my indicators of success will be based on gym performance.

I came up with a rough schedule for what I will be doing as far as workouts. Its not set in stone. I have a problem with being flexible not only physically but mentally as well at times. I can get a bad attitude a times if I can't do something the way I want to. That is why I am not setting anything in stone in case something happens where I have to adjust. That way I am not saying to myself "well screw it then." Its stupid logic I know it but for some reason I do that to myself sometimes.

Monday, Wednesday, and Friday will be my main full body strength training workouts with some type of hard conditioning after the weights. Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday will be the yoga workouts. I will also walk and stretch/foam roll everyday. I am already thinking of ways to add on to this. I was thinking of doing extra movements that I am weak at right along with the stretching/foam rolling. For the first week or two I may not worry about this but after that I want to do some kind of combination of core, shoulder lateral rotators, hip medial rotators, and hip extension work along with the stretching since this is my weak areas. It won't be anything super heavy or exhausting, just enough to build that "mind-muscle" connection and give them some more volume.

The Forgotten Benefit of Exercise

When I was a child I was indestructible. Nothing in this world could hurt me because I was young and stupid. I haven't experienced any level of true physical or emotional pain during these years. I also had my mother there to protect me. Now that I am less young and a little less stupid I know I am not indestructible anymore.

Everyone knows the benefits of exercise. The majority of people know that exercise gets your body into shape and "tones" you up. Everyone knows that exercise promotes longer lives. It is just common sense. It is like knowing that eating healthy is good for your body. People know these concepts and know them better than they give themselves credit for. The only problem is not enough people engage in these activities enough, myself included.

So if people can't be motivated for vanity reasons or because they just love being strong and in shape I propose another reason. Being strong and in shape decreases your chance of injury or getting hurt by the world around you. Yes by simply being stronger you chances of survival dramatically increase.

Let me explain this more. The first time I heard about being strong acting as a barrier to injury was when I was in football. The head coach was talking to a group of players about the importance of strength training. He said something like "If there was only two exercises I would have you do it would be the power clean and using the 4-way neck machine." I was dumbfounded for a moment. "The 4-way neck machine? What the hell is he talking about that thing is dumb? Why isn't he telling us to bench press or squat more?" He then said, "I want you guys using that 4-way neck machine every time your in here to lift weights. You see if you get your neck strong, the chances of you hurting your neck, spine, or head go down."

That is when the light bulb went off in my head. Coach said some other stuff that made sense to. He talked about making sure we were getting stronger not just so we can kill people on the field, but so we don't get killed if we took a massive hit. The more mass, especially muscle mass I have the less chance I will get injuries when I am knocked to the ground.

This logic stuck with me. Lifting weights and being in shape just doesn't make me stronger and look better. It also makes me resistance to the blows of life. Now here is where the shit gets deep. Imagine you wake up in the middle of the night. You smell smoke, then the detector goes off. Adrenaline spikes and you shoot out of bed. Your husband or wife isn't waking up. They passed out due to CO levels and you realize you don't feel so well yourself. You have two children in different rooms of the house. What do you do?

Scenarios like this happen everyday in the world. One day, sooner or later, you will have to call onto your strength and endurance in order to survive. Maybe you fell off your house trying to fix the dish and now you have to crawl to get to a phone (you were too stupid to keep your cell phone on you). Or maybe you are caught in the fire scenario up above. Would you be strong enough and have enough endurance to save yourself and your family, or peter out halfway through because for the past few months you were too lazy and "didn't have the time" to workout. Obviously there are many more factors to this then just being in shape. But ask yourself this question. Is my body and mind ready to survive what life throws at me?

My Shiatsu poems and some written thought

One of the reasons of starting this log was to practice my writing skills. I have done some writing before starting this blog. I always really enjoyed writing research papers as long as it was on a cool topic. The research paper that I remember the most was for my Participation in Government class (aka P.I.G.). We had to pick a controversial topic. My topic was on legalizing prostitution. Great topic to stir up the pot. Also in English class when we started poetry I really enjoyed that. I wrote a few poems here and there. Unfortunately I lost them.

I went for years without writing any kind of poetry until just recently. Shiatsu class started and it was exciting. Explaining shiatsu is beyond the scope of this blog. Here is a quick and over simplified explanation of what shiatsu is http://spas.about.com/od/shiatsu/a/shiatsu.htm.

I like Shiatsu for a few reasons. The first reason is that the teachings of shiatsu and the way Chinese medicine looks at the body is totally different than the typical western method. Now at the same time shiatsu isnt all that different from other massage. In shiatsu one works on the meridians of the body. These are energy pathways that flow through the body and when something causes this flow to become inefficient then disease takes place. Awesomely enough these meridians match almost perfectly which the trigger point and fascia system charts in the western model. Thirdly I enjoy shiatsu because one doesn't have to deal with using a table. The massage is done on the floor and the client can keep his/her clothes on.

I wrote poems on shiatsu because we had to learn all these correspondences. They are correlations to imbalances in the meridians of the body. That is beyond the scope of this blog to explain more. My poems use these correspondences to help me learn them for class. It was effective. It also shocked me how writing these poems made me feel. After finishing them I wanted to keep writing. Its one of the few happenings in my life that sparked my interest in writing. So in order to stop rambling here are the poems I wrote. There are 5 of them based on the elements in Chinese medicine.

 

Water

Winter

Energy at rest

 Nail beds turn blue and black as the frost bite sets

The last of the meat is especially salty

The crushing cold makes thinking faulty

Ears hear the beasts in their fits

Fear sets in as the realization hits

A groaning churns from deep down

Grateful for the full flowing locks on my crown

Trembling to the bone warm only at the core

Winter’s job is essential

Everything must come to a halt

Bring everything back to its default

As we all must rest

So next time around we can do our best

Wood

Spring is in swing

Saplings showing their color green

Fruit still sour not quite ripe

Wind causes trees to snap, pop, and creak

Sky clear for miles, as far as the eyes can see

Ligaments lengthen with every reach

Anger smashes out from the depths

Shouting seeds and buzzing busy bees

Life clawing to reawaken from the sleep

Reasserting control the flora sprouts its feet    

A level of frustration is needed for drive

Playing safe doesn’t ensure you survive

Ambition can drain the mind

But it’s required for the find

Acquire what others may miss

Then enjoy the recreation of the summer bliss

A warning for those who sit around and complain

Doing nothing often results in self maim

Before you know it time has run about

Better get to work before life throws a knock out

Fire

Summer is the time to be free

Growth swarms and pushes up all the trees

Red feathered friends freshen up at the swimming hole

Bitter beer flows fast out of the party bowl

Hot chicken wings finished to the bone

Children lick the melting ice cream off the cone

Pulse quickens as boys battle with a ball

Joy erupts as girls go shopping at the mall

Men and women laugh as they flirt on the beach

Tanned and fit complexions are seemingly in reach

Melancholy is impossible as happy as a peach

Everyone should get out and play

Soon hard at work baling hay

Fruit of labor taste so sweet

Laying out in summer’s heat

Just be responsible with fire’s run

 Days like these won’t always be so much fun

Earth

The time of year is Indian summer

Maturation at times is such a bummer

Yellow lights give warning

Savor some sweets to kill the mourning

Humid air makes breathing daunting

The amount of mouths to feed is haunting

Muscles getting stronger tending the crops

Worry crowds the mind, can we connect the dots?

Children still sing unaware of severe spells

Lips may crack and bleed due to dry wells

Coming to an end, days of belching and loud dinner bells

The last outside celebrations are here

Only hold onto what is held truly dear

The sinking energy of earth may strip it away

At least sun will rise another day

Metal

Autumn colors are pleasant to the eye

Reaping time is what gets us by

White hot fire is need for light

For cooking spicy food that is delight

Dry dead leaves crumble to dust

Nose flares enjoying the dry acrid musk

Skin losing its summer spark

Grief overtakes; everything is losing its magnificent mark

Some cry sadden by the coming slumber

Ladies stop shaving body hair, we all feel bummer

Here comes the first snow fall, a collective sigh signals out

The days are becoming rapidly small

The cold is setting in making us curl into balls

Reaping will be the last of the ceremonies

How the sun will be missed and all of its harmonies

The path is drawn. Plan of attack.

I laid out my brief story and goals yesterday. My main goals are to get leaner, improve my mobility, and get stronger. That is the vague goals. Here is what I mean by them to make them more measurable.

Right now I stand at about 5ft 6in tall at 200-205 pounds. Not HUGE but not lean enough for me. I don't like feeling/looking fat. My goal isn't to look a couple weeks away from contest ready to step on stage. I just don't want to feel/look fat and start to see the outline of my abs. Shelby Starnes talks about what healthy body fat levels are especially if the goal is to be healthy and put yourself in a good position to gain quality lean muscle. http://www.t-nation.com/free_online_article/most_recent/the_perfect_body_fat_percentage&cr=  "As for the midsection, you should always be able to see at least an outline of your abdominals (no great detail, just a general outline)." So this is my goal. As for body weight I am not sure what this would put me at. I remember when I was in high school I floated around 170-180 and was fairly lean then, so I am shooting for that weight range of 170-180 pounds and use the mirror, pictures, and how my clothes fit as a guide for leanness.

I want to improve my mobility. My main problem right now is I am just overall not flexible. I never been a naturally flexible person. This is something I always had to work at. I been lazy with it for a long time and now I am paying the price. It is a bad loan to try to save time by skipping stretching and taking care of your soft tissue. It did save me time but now its costing me greatly. It has taken away my ability to do heavy squat/deadlift work safely. Which I LOVE heavy squats and deadlifts. I hate it so much that I allowed this to happen to me. So I need to remedy this problem.

Get stronger. My heaviest weight that I allowed myself to get to was 230 pounds. I have dropped down to about 205 since then due to cleaning up my diet and going for long walks. Unfortunately I know some of that weight loss was muscle. I can just feel it. Though my "pound for pound" exercises I haven't lost strength in (by pound for pound I am referring to exercises that are affected heavily on current body weight like pull ups, push ups, dips, etc). My core and glutes I realized are weak as all hell right now.

How will this done? I have thought long and hard about this. I realized that I am way over thinking this process. I have learned much by reading different books, blogs, and articles. In a way I wish I haven't. I let myself start to suffer from "paralysis by analysis" which I believe is a form of procrastination.

So how will this be done for real? Getting back on the road to strength will be a two part phase. The 2nd phase is easy. I will follow the N.O.V. template of 5/3/1 or the Full body 5/3/1 template. I used 5/3/1 in the past and had great success with it. I just need to pass phase 1 before I get there.

How do I get through phase 1? Hit my goals. Get lean, get mobile, get stronger, and be in shape and in health. This is what my workouts and nutrition will focus on.

Getting lean is all about nutrition. I have counted strict calories and macro-nutrients in the past but that just drove me nuts. It did get me lean but it also took up a great deal of time and limited what I could eat. It made me not enjoy food. I also never liked eating 5-7 small meals a day. It just made me carry around Tupperware and made for many dishes. I been playing around with intermittent fasting. I bought and read the book "The Renegade Diet" http://www.renegadedietbook.com/?hop=cktraining and it really makes a hell of a lot of sense with the concepts it talks about. I really like intermittent fasting. I am busy during the day between school and work and I always liked eating before bed. I don't sleep well and the only ways that normally knock me out is a full stomach and/or sex before bed. Ever since I started eating the majority of my calories at night I been sleeping like a baby, I dropped from 210-215 down to my current 200-205 eating this way. I will be using an app to track roughly my calories to keep my calories under control.

Get mobile. I will be doing self massage and static stretching for at LEAST 20 minutes a day. I will post some routines later on this. (This is a research project I am doing for school on how to take care of your body as a massage therapist) I also have a yoga DVD from P90X that I will do 2-3 times a week. The main goal being able to maintain neutral spine in squats/deadlifts so I can do them safely.

For my strength training workouts. I will be doing 3-4 full body days a week of 3-5 exercises for 3 sets each. I will be doing a push, a pull, single leg, reverse hyper, and a core movement on these days. I am keeping the rest interval between 60-90seconds between sets. My goal on the work sets is to get my reps for the 3 sets to add up to 30 or more reps. (DB bench press set one got 14 reps, set two got 10 reps, set 3 got 6 reps= 30 reps.)If I don't get 30 total reps in the 3 sets then the weight stays the same until I am able to get more than 30 reps. I will keep the reps high and rest periods low. My body isn't used to that, for the longest time I used low heavy reps with long rest intervals. I will also add in some body weight exercises to keep as major indicator exercises to see if I am becoming more "pound for pound" stronger or not.

For getting in shape the strength training workouts will help much with the higher reps and short rest periods but I know I need more. I will go for walks and after my strength training workouts do some sort of "hard" cardio work like push the prowler. For me this and keeping up on the diet will be the hardest part. Smashing iron is fun but I always disliked cardio. I will find ways to make cardio suck less.

Quick breakdown of the plan
1) Clean up diet, intermittent fasting style, using a points calculator to monitor calories
2)Full body strength style workouts 3-4 days a week with high reps, short rest periods
3)Stretch and foam roll every single day for at least 20mins
4)Increase work capacity(fancy word for "getting in shape") by doing hard cardio 3 times a week and walk every day for 1-3miles at least.

Current stats will be taken officially Saturday morning. I am going to finish off the week not lifting and just focus on stretching and foam rolling and going for walks.


                                       

First post and goal statements

My name is Matthew Richards, this is my first crack at creating a blog so bare with me on this process of making this blog as cool as possible. Here is some quick information about me. I am 26 years old. Currently 205 pounds at 5ft 6in. I am a current massage therapist student and I have a passion for all things strength related. I am a student of the iron and been studying under the bar since the summer before I became a junior in high school.

My athletic life started when I was fairly young. I played soccer as a boy in them young children leagues. I was fairly good at this but when my growth spurt hit I started having very painful legs. They ended up being really bad shin splints and I was diagnosed with having very flat feet. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_feet

I had my arches after this but they only helped so much. I stopped playing sports, fast forward to 9th grade (it may of been between 8th-9th grade) we started expanding the lawn. At my mother's house there are plenty of trees. The back yard was in need of an extensions. The cutting of the trees began. At this time though I didn't know it I was what you would call "skinny-fat." I was a killer on the video games. Needless to say I was very out of shape.

It was summer and the trees started to come down. I had to help move them, chop them, and stack the wood. I remember hating it. It is hard work to drag, lift, swing, toss, and stack wood. I hated being sore, I hated my hands being torn up.

After about 2 weeks of this I started to really adapt, my body was becoming stronger. What was hard just a couple weeks ago was starting to become easy. I could feel myself starting to become leaner and feel my muscles working. It was a good feeling. I wouldn't call it "fun" work but I stopped hating it. 

Once this work was finished I remembered in the basement stored away as my step father's old weight set. It was one of them old plastic filled with cement weight sets. It had a really old book filled with pictures of exercises and how to do them. I started working out with the weight set not knowing a damn thing. I remember loading up the barbell and doing 100 reps of curls until my biceps cramped up on me. I remember repping out on the bench to have it get stuck on my chest and needing to do the roll of shame or dumping the plates off the end. I started reading magazines and on the internet about bodybuilding.

A cousin of mine really wanted me to come out for football. It was the end of my 9th grade experience in high school. He showed me drills and exercises they make you do for football. I remember walking into the weight room at the school. They had a janitors closet that had a squat rack, a smith machine, and a deadlift platform. The other room had one of them super old universal machines. It was basically a bunch of circuit machines put together. In that same room there was a pull up bar, an incline bench, a flat bench, and a dumbbell rack. I believe the heaviest dumbbell was 70 or 80 pounds. I remember trying to pick it up and hardly budging it.

The program the school uses is http://biggerfasterstronger.com/home/home.asp. It is a great program. It was my 1st time using a program/template instead of just screwing around with a bunch of exercises. I started following this program the summer of before 10th grade. By the time I was a senior my bench went from around 100 pounds to 250pounds, my squat around 100 pounds to 405 with a belt (I don't know if it was parallel or not). I forget my other numbers but I remember my max power clean being around 250-275 and trap bar deadlifting mid 400s. My weight stayed about the same but I became clearly leaner at 175-180 range. I started on the football team 11th-12th grade and did track and field (track and field was really off season football training).

After school ended I messed around with powerlifting. I did two meets. The first meet was a great experience. I squatted 365? benched 225 (coming back from a shoulder injury) and deadlift 425 http://www.ironasylumgym.com/ap2006/mattrichards  After this meet I injured my low back training for the next meet. I was being stupid and squatting without spotters and without setting the catch pins in the rack (I became used to using the monolift and having spotters). I got stuck at the bottom of the lift and had to dump the bar overhead. This injury set me back many months. I ended up coming back from it and doing this meet http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=craWhcO7LN8&list=FLjaMA6Gsc2NahlEt6pB3Q6w&index=75&feature=plpp_video

I am proud of them numbers, but I was also fat. This was the last time I was serious about training again. I had a couple stints of working hard but allowing life to get in the way. I started becoming the concepts that I strongly disliked. I started saying shit like "I will start next week." "I don't have time to workout or eat right anymore." I hated this.

So what is the point of all of this. I am writing this blog for several reasons. One is to track my progress and share with others. I been following Gabe's blog. He did the 5/3/1 for a year and now his new blog http://600lbs.blogspot.com/. He has come a long way, amazing progress.

I am also writing this blog to practice my computer and writing skills. I have been thinking about writing for awhile now. "So I said well dummy you will only get better at it if you start doing it."

Goals: Get leaner, I want to see my abs again.
 Increase my mobility (I currently can't squat or deadlift without my low back rounding over and hurting my spine)
Increase conditioning (pushing the prowler will always suck, but right now it REALLY SUCKS)
Maintain/build strength

Why do I want to get leaner and increase conditioning? Because I am sick of feeling and looking fat. I am in the holistic health industry as student of massage therapy. It pays to be in shape. I believe it will make clients have more confidence in you. I want to be healthier. What is the point of being strong if you are too out of shape to go for a long walk or hike?

Why do I want to increase my mobility? Because I am fairly inflexible and it is hurting me. In high school we stretched all the time. It was part of the team workouts for warm up and cool down. After school was done and I worked out on my own stretching was slowly killed off due to time restrains. Now I can feel the difference. I used to be able to squat well below parallel without losing the curves of my spine. Now I am lucky to get halfway to parallel keeping my curves. Squatting and deadlifting with tight hips is a back injury waiting to happen.

Why do I want to maintain/build strength? I hope this is obvious. I want to build strength everywhere! Now saying that I know it may not happen. My number 1 goal right now is lean out and get my body moving healthy again. I do know my core, glutes, and lateral rotators of my shoulder are fairly weak. So I expect them to get stronger. The rest will do as they will.

My next post will be my plan on how to achieve this and more stats, I need to explore blog building more as well.