Tuesday 4/2/2013

The week from hell draws to a close, though it bumped my schedule by a day before it died! No worries though, because I got chest and back in today and I don’t have to work for the next 5 days! Huzzah!

The knee is doing better, still sore now and then, but better all the same. I’m still doing PT twice a week and they’re working on my butt, cause….my butt’s pretty weak. That’s okay though, it’ll improve! I’ve still been logging some miles running, which has been fantastic with the warm up, and the only thing keeping me sane in this crazy ass period here at work.

On my mini-vacation, I still plan on running AND…I’ve already made plans to visit my parents gym when we’re visiting them at the end of the week, so let’s get this train back on the rails!

Weight’s up by 2 pounds, at 248 but that’s due to stress and me trying to not go crazy with stress on the weekends and indulging a bit. It’ll buff out though.

Gooch2k2 Tracked a Workout for 1,096 pts Today
Barbell Incline Bench Press:
- 115 lb x 5 reps
- 125 lb x 12 reps
- 125 lb x 12 reps
- 125 lb x 12 reps
- 125 lb x 11 reps
Barbell Bench Press:
- 125 lb x 10 reps
- 125 lb x 10 reps
- 125 lb x 10 reps
Machine Chest Fly (Pec Deck):
- 100 lb x 15 reps
- 100 lb x 15 reps
- 100 lb x 15 reps
Dips – Chest Version:
- 10 reps || assisted || 100 lb
- 15 reps || assisted || 115 lb
Pull-Up:
- 10 reps || assisted || 115 lb
- 6 reps || assisted || 115 lb
- 5 reps || assisted || 115 lb
Bent Over Barbell Row:
- 100 lb x 12 reps
- 100 lb x 10 reps
- 100 lb x 10 reps
- 100 lb x 10 reps
Lat Pulldown:
- 100 lb x 10 reps
- 100 lb x 10 reps
- 100 lb x 10 reps
Seated Cable Row:
- 42.5 lb x 10 reps
- 42.5 lb x 10 reps
- 42.5 lb x 10 reps
Wide-Grip Pulldown Behind The Neck:
- 70 lb x 15 reps
- 70 lb x 15 reps
- 70 lb x 15 reps
Weighted Decline Sit-Up:
- 10 lb x 15 reps
- 10 lb x 10 reps
- 10 lb x 7 reps
fito2sa

Wednesday 3/20/2013

Day two of the new four day split! Like I had predicted, I was pretty sore this morning after the first day of the new program, despite if I thought I was working hard or not. It was a good kind of sore, (i’ve actually come to look forward to DOMS, in my mind, it means you worked hard!) so it’s all gravy. Mmm gravy. Today’s workout was all shoulders and tri’s. I felt the burn a little more during the workout this time but by the time I was done, I had some serious T Rex arms going as I tried to wash my hair! When I went to do my dips at the end, an exercise I’ve been busting out 30 reps on at the same weight, I damn near fell off the machine, my arms were jelly!

So, it was good workout.

Tomorrow’s the first day of Physical Therapy. Hopefully I’ll get told I can at least do the elliptical or something. No running is making me antsy and an antsy Casey is no fun for anybody.

Seated Dumbbell Shoulder Press:
- 25 lb x 8 reps
- 35 lb x 8 reps
- 45 lb x 8 reps
- 50 lb x 4 reps
Seated Barbell Military Press:
- 45 lb x 5 reps
- 65 lb x 5 reps
- 85 lb x 5 reps
- 95 lb x 10 reps
- 95 lb x 6 reps
- 95 lb x 6 reps
Dumbbell Side Lateral Raise:
- 10 lb x 20 reps
Reverse Triceps Bench Press:
- 45 lb x 8 reps
- 65 lb x 8 reps
- 85 lb x 8 reps
- 95 lb x 8 reps
Close-Grip Barbell Bench Press:
- 95 lb x 5 reps
- 115 lb x 10 reps
- 115 lb x 8 reps
- 115 lb x 6 reps
Cable Rope Overhead Triceps Extension:
- 32.5 lb x 20 reps
Dips – Chest Version:
- 5 reps || assisted || 70 lb
- 5 reps || assisted || 70 lb

Tuesday 3/19/2013

Well, today’s a bitter sweet day. After getting my back healed up, I noticed all the while that my right knee was feeling funny. Not all the time, but at random times I’d get done with squats and my knee would feel like I was wearing a knee brace. At first that’s all it was; a tightness around the knee. But as the next two weeks progressed, the feeling happened more and more often and then the acheyness would set in in the evening.

By this past Friday, I said the hell with it and went into the Dr. The prognosis is not good…well, to be honest the prognosis was pretty ambiguous to be honest. The doctor left me with a physical therapy appointment and orders to stop running for the time being and no lower body lifts, which kind of sucks. When asked about doing say the elliptical or the stationary bike at least for cardio, I was faced with ‘it will slow your healing’. So, I’m faced with cutting my exercise down drastically, just as my plateau began to break! Yes, it sucks.

When looking at the change, I started thinking about my lifting. I was told specifically I could do all the upper body stuff. I had also had a conversation with a friend at the gym about how I’ve been doing the same program since September, and how it was good to change up lifting routines periodically to shock your muscles. It didn’t take long to put two and two together and figure out that this may be a good time to get off of Starting Strength and try something new.

Here I with day one of Alfalfa’s #4. It’s a bit different from starting strength and it feels like I’m back in noob mode, but I’m pretty excited to be doing something new. With this program being a four day split, with one day dedicated to leg stuff, I figure for the time being it will be pretty easy to just skip the leg day and add an extra cardio day once I figure out what cardio I can do safely. I’m not interested in being huge, but this program’s supposed to be balanced for strength and size and with the changes I’ve seen so far, I’m pretty stoked to have muscles once I drop the rest of this pesky stomach fat!

Here’s to day 1. It didn’t feel as tiring as Starting Strength’s A day, but then again, I probably won’t be able to lift my arms by this evening!

Dumbbell Bench Press:
- 30 lb x 6 reps
- 40 lb x 6 reps
- 55 lb x 6 reps
- 60 lb x 6 reps
Barbell Incline Bench Press:
- 90 lb x 5 reps
- 115 lb x 5 reps
- 125 lb x 10 reps
- 125 lb x 8 reps
- 125 lb x 5 reps
Barbell Bench Press:
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 145 lb x 10 reps
- 135 lb x 6 reps
- 135 lb x 5 reps
Machine Chest Fly (Pec Deck):
- 70 lb x 10 reps
- 85 lb x 10 reps
- 100 lb x 15 reps
- 100 lb x 15 reps
Incline Dumbbell Curl:
- 20 lb x 8 reps
- 30 lb x 5 reps
- 25 lb x 8 reps
Barbell Curl:
- 40 lb x 10 reps
- 40 lb x 8 reps
- 40 lb x 5 reps
Close-Grip Standing Barbell Curl:
- 40 lb x 15 reps
Cable Crunch:
- 52.5 lb x 12 reps
- 52.5 lb x 12 reps
- 52.5 lb x 12 reps
fito2sa

Thursday 3/15/2013

De-loading week continues and it still feels good to be back in the gym after a week off. The back continues to feel great, though I got a bit of a cramp in the middle of my back tonight during tonight’s workout, but a little stretching fixed that up. The problems come in when I realize that my knee’s aching quite a bit, which sucks. It started getting twinges about the same time as my back. It’s not constant, but some days are worse than others. It feels like I have a bandage wrapped tightly around my knee, tends to ache after awhile, especially when there’s a lot of walking involved, up into my lower thigh, etc. Oddly enough, the pain/feeling was really prominent when I started my front squats, then died off as I got into my working sets. Came back later in the evening though.

There’s part of me that worries that I’ll have to take more time off, but with the knee, there’s plenty more lifts I can do around it than the lower back. Plus, I don’t want to kill the running either, so I sucked it up and made a doctor’s appointment for today. I’m on too good of a role, better safe than sorry, right?

The weight’s still holding steady at 246, so we’re in good shape there. Looking forward to dropping more, but slow and steady wins the race!

Gooch2k2 Tracked a Workout for 1,295 pts Mar 14, 2013
Front Barbell Squat:
- 45 lb x 5 reps
- 65 lb x 5 reps
- 85 lb x 5 reps
- 95 lb x 5 reps
- 115 lb x 5 reps
- 115 lb x 5 reps
- 115 lb x 5 reps
Standing Barbell Shoulder Press (OHP):
- 95 lb x 5 reps
- 115 lb x 5 reps
- 115 lb x 5 reps
- 125 lb x 5 reps
- 125 lb x 5 reps
- 125 lb x 5 reps
Bent Over Barbell Row:
- 90 lb x 5 reps
- 90 lb x 5 reps
- 90 lb x 5 reps
- 110 lb x 5 reps
- 110 lb x 5 reps
- 110 lb x 5 reps
Lat Pulldown:
- 70 lb x 5 reps
- 90 lb x 5 reps
- 110 lb x 5 reps
- 120 lb x 5 reps
- 120 lb x 5 reps
- 120 lb x 5 reps
Pull-Up:
- 5 reps || assisted || 70 lb
- 5 reps || assisted || 70 lb
- 5 reps || assisted || 70 lb
Weighted Hyperextension:
- 10 lb x 10 reps
- 10 lb x 10 reps
- 10 lb x 10 reps
Weighted Decline Sit-Up:
- 10 lb x 15 reps
- 10 lb x 15 reps
- 10 lb x 15 reps

Yay! I got to lift again!

I spent the last week doing nothing but cardio due to hurting my back. By Monday, I was feeling pretty good so I decided to go back. I tell ya, I was really missing the lifting side of things! I found myself kind of looking forward to that muscle ache that comes later in the evening that lets you know you had a good work out. I had a good workout too! The back felt great! I played it smart this time; the last time I took a week off to heal, I tried to go back to the weights I had left off at and it was like the first day of lifting all over again. So, I de-loaded and stayed light for a bit and worked out quite well. My deadlifts felt good form wise, though I got a twinge in my hip (they were sore from the running the previous week) on rep #4 of 275, so I just dropped it and called it done. Let’s not push it, right?

Yesterday was my typical cardio day and it went well. I was sore from lifting again on Monday, but that’s to be expected. I was still surprised to see my pace though when I finished! It felt good! I’ve take to reading my kindle while I’m on the elliptical. It may look goofy, but an hour passes in no time and it really pushed me into zoning out on what I’m doing more so that music or podcasts, so it’s a great fit for the machine since it used to bore me to tears.

Weight wise, I’m still holding at 246 and I am ecstatic about it! That last plateau was a beast. I’ll be pushing through to 240 in no time!

Monday 3/11/2013

Gooch2k2 Tracked a Workout for 2,281 pts Mar 11, 2013
Barbell Squat:
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 185 lb x 5 reps
- 205 lb x 5 reps
- 225 lb x 5 reps
- 245 lb x 5 reps
- 245 lb x 5 reps
- 245 lb x 5 reps
Barbell Bench Press:
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 145 lb x 5 reps
- 155 lb x 5 reps
- 185 lb x 5 reps
- 185 lb x 5 reps
- 185 lb x 5 reps
Barbell Deadlift:
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 185 lb x 5 reps
- 205 lb x 5 reps
- 225 lb x 5 reps
- 275 lb x 3 reps
Barbell Incline Bench Press:
- 95 lb x 5 reps
- 115 lb x 5 reps
- 125 lb x 5 reps
- 125 lb x 5 reps
- 125 lb x 5 reps
Dips – Chest Version:
- 10 reps || assisted || 70 lb
- 10 reps || assisted || 70 lb
- 10 reps || assisted || 70 lb
Weighted Hyperextension:
- 10 lb x 10 reps
- 10 lb x 10 reps
- 10 lb x 10 reps
Weighted Decline Sit-Up:
- 10 lb x 15 reps
- 10 lb x 15 reps
- 10 lb x 10 reps
fito2sa

Tuesday 3/13/2013

Gooch2k2 Tracked a Workout for 199 pts Mar 12, 2013
Elliptical Trainer:
- 0:50:00 || Easy
- http://runkeeper.com/user/CinemaFromage/activity/156581437
fito2sa

Thursday 3/7/2013 and Saturday 3/9/2013

Oh. My. Gawd. It’s starting to feel like Spring time! As such, I hit the road with a vengeance the later half of this week and it was fabulous. I was hitting 8 miles on my long runs right before winter, then all winter I couldn’t break 4 miles on my outdoor runs. It was worrisome, but I’ve heard form other runners that it’s common to see the distance drop a bit in the winter months. Thursday and today though, I started feeling like my old self! Things were falling into rhythm, my legs didn’t feel like lead and it’s all coming back. I’m not quite to 5 miles yet, but by god, it’s coming. All this does is make want to get outside more and build my base mileage! That said, I’m planning on running my first 10k at the end of this month. Kick ass.

On the front, work has been absolutely horrid this past week. Nothing but stress and frustration. For an example, I had the day off Friday to make up for the past two weekends I’ve had to work. I worked 15.5 hrs on my day off. I don’t get overtime either! But, last night, this brought force both some new mental battles, and some mental wins all the same time. I was so tired, befuddled and frustrated by the time I signed off, my first thought was ‘make it better with food’. And while I did eat a bit, I didn’t pig on and it wasn’t on horrible stuff either cause I knew all I’d do was be mad at myself for it. On top of that, for the first time in 2 and a half years, I thought I wanted a cigarette to curb the anxiety and stress. I knew for certain I’d hate myself for that for all the damage it’d do to the running and fitness. By the end of the night, I chewed a giant wad of gum furiously, played some video games and was straight by the end of the night. Plus, when I woke up this morning? All I wanted to do was go outside and run for an hour and just not think about anything. It was pretty sweet.

Then to cap off this shitty three weeks worth of work woes? I weighed in this morning.

I weighed in at freaking 247.4 lbs. Down 104 lbs.

My god damn plateau that I’ve been fighting since christmas is over. Kick ass!

Gooch2k2 Tracked a Workout for 507 pts Today
Running:
- 0:47:06 || 4.6 mi || 10:10.1 min/mi || track
- http://runkeeper.com/user/CinemaFromage/activity/155667771
- Comment Share
fito2sa

Gooch2k2 Tracked a Workout for 498 pts Mar 7, 2013
Running:
- 0:49:59.8 || 4.7 mi || 10:32.5 min/mi
- http://runkeeper.com/user/CinemaFromage/activity/155202242
fito2sa

I missed a few days due to a crappy work week or two. Here’s last week’s update:

Friday 3/2/2013

Welp. Turns out, my back is most certainly wrecked! I was feeling pretty good on Friday morning, so decided I’d head back to the gym. Plan A with squats, deads and more. Throughout the workout, I had some twinges but nothing major but by the end, I could tell my performance was slipping because the pain was coming back so I cut it short on the accessory work. A good 45 minutes after the workout, I was back into full blown lower back pain and not wanting to stand up straight or move to fast so I decided to go to the Dr. I’ve come too far in little journey, don’t want to blow it away by stupid injuries!

Thankfully, the doc says it’s just muscle inflammation, no herniated disks or nerve damage, so I’m loaded up on prednizone and muscle relaxers not doing over the head/back lifts for the next week! Thankfully, he did say to take two days off and then take a short jog. If it doesn’t hurt to bad, I can continue to run. I can do bench process and other stuff too that doesn’t involve the lower back/core so much, so that’s a plus. Any one know if I could get away with say leg presses or leg curls without using my back?

So…here’s to a couple days rest. If all else fails, I can keep riding the old stationary bike for a week or two.

Gooch2k2 Tracked a Workout for 2,420 pts Mar 1, 2013
Barbell Squat:
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 185 lb x 5 reps
- 205 lb x 5 reps
- 225 lb x 5 reps
- 255 lb x 5 reps
- 265 lb x 5 reps
- 265 lb x 5 reps
- 265 lb x 5 reps
Barbell Bench Press:
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 145 lb x 5 reps
- 155 lb x 5 reps
- 205 lb x 5 reps
- 215 lb x 3 reps
- 205 lb x 4 reps
Barbell Deadlift:
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 185 lb x 5 reps
- 205 lb x 5 reps
- 225 lb x 5 reps
- 275 lb x 4 reps
Barbell Incline Bench Press:
- 95 lb x 5 reps
- 115 lb x 5 reps
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 135 lb x 5 reps
Weighted Hyperextension:
- 25 lb x 10 reps
- 25 lb x 10 reps
Weighted Decline Sit-Up:
- 10 lb x 15 reps
- 10 lb x 15 reps
Dips – Chest Version:
- 10 reps || assisted || 70 lb
- 10 reps || assisted || 70 lb

Monday 2/25/2013

Monday was a crappy day at work. Worst I’ve had in awhile, when you figure in that I worked all weekend. It was so busy, I had to skip the gym at lunch time! My first reaction was ‘that sucks, guess I have to go lift on Tuesday instead!’ But then, I realized that I had time after work to go. The first reaction to that was, “YOu know it’s been a bad day, I just want to go home and veg out.” Then it dawned on me that if I did go, I’d burn off all the days frustration plus I’d be mad at myself for skipping it. Worked out pretty great really and was nice to see how my thought process to the gym has changed over the past year.

Weight’s still holding tight at 251, -100lbs. Driving me nuts! I’m going to kick it’s arse though. March 1st marks 1 year since I started this journey, it’d be pretty sweet to start year two at -101 lbs. So let’s do that.

Gooch2k2 Tracked a Workout for 1,567 pts Feb 25, 2013
Front Barbell Squat:
- 45 lb x 5 reps
- 65 lb x 5 reps
- 95 lb x 5 reps
- 115 lb x 5 reps
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 145 lb x 5 reps
- 145 lb x 5 reps
- 145 lb x 5 reps
- 155 lb x 5 reps
Standing Barbell Shoulder Press (OHP):
- 95 lb x 5 reps
- 115 lb x 5 reps
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 145 lb x 5 reps
- 155 lb x 5 reps
- 145 lb x 5 reps
Bent Over Barbell Row:
- 70 lb x 5 reps
- 90 lb x 5 reps
- 90 lb x 5 reps
- 115 lb x 5 reps
- 110 lb x 5 reps
- 110 lb x 5 reps
Lat Pulldown:
- 70 lb x 5 reps
- 90 lb x 5 reps
- 110 lb x 5 reps
- 140 lb x 5 reps
- 140 lb x 5 reps
- 140 lb x 5 reps
Pull-Up:
- 5 reps || assisted || 70 lb
- 5 reps || assisted || 70 lb
- 5 reps || assisted || 70 lb
Weighted Hyperextension:
- 25 lb x 10 reps
- 25 lb x 10 reps
- 25 lb x 10 reps
Weighted Decline Sit-Up:
- 10 lb x 20 reps
- 10 lb x 16 reps
- 10 lb x 15 reps
- Comment Share
fito2sa

Wednesday 2/20/2013

Well, I was working from home this wednesday and since my gym’s in the same town as work, I normally have to wait to drive over there after I get off at 4. This Wednesday? Just wasn’t feeling it. I was kind of tired, I was enjoying being home and driving back to work (gym’s across the street) just felt …blah. So, I ran instead. It was kind of a crappy run…slower than normal and my legs are feeling it this week. But, I got out there and I”m getting my mileage back up. Today though, I’ll be hitting the gym after work since I’m over here. I can’t go at lunch do to my weight loss group meeting, so evening workout it is! I’ll be bumping Friday’s workout to Saturday as well since I’m off this Friday due to….working all weekend. Yah, work kind of sucks lately. It pays the bills though!

On the bright side, I woke up this morning (writing this on Thursday) to 251.2 lbs on the scale! This means I’m back to -100 lbs for certain! I’m a bit of a pessimist, so I worry that it’s just going to bounce right back up to 257 again, but this gets me excited that the plateau is starting lose it’s fight. OH MAN let’s hope, cause that shit is demoralizing!

So to make it official;

251.2 lbs -100 lbs total

Running:
- 0:23:46.7 || 2.2 mi || 10:49.7 min/mi
- http://runkeeper.com/user/CinemaFromage/activity/150941002
fito2sa

Monday 2/11/2013

This week’s shaping up to be interesting. The weight’s been on the move in a big way and so far…it hasn’t rubber banded back to where it was before. I’m remaining skeptical since I’ve seen my weight go down and bounce right back up but at the time….it’s a bit exciting! After my workout in the gym, I had to knock the scale down to 200 from 250, so there’s that.

The lifts were going stellar last week though today, I just didn’t feel quite as strong. Where benching 205 felt pretty solid last week, today they were a fight. My squats I dropped weight intentionally working on form since I switch to low bar and got super low, aka parallel, so that’s cool. Deadlift, I got 315 x 3, but they did not feel good at all. I’ve been getting 315×5 for the last two weeks but today, those last 2 reps just weren’t there. I ate good and slept alot over the weekend, but I did lift satrurday. Maybe I’m just tired.

Actually…I can think of 2 reasons my deadlift’s petered out once I apply some brain power to it. Saturday as I had posted, I did front squats for the first time. I got up to 135 for my 3 working sets and the doms were pretty crazy on Sunday. Thinking about it, I’m sure that was a MAJOR factor since there’s a lot of new muscles being users there. The second is that my low bar squats today were far lower than I’ve been doing, so there was some new fatigue there as well! So…okay, not so worried about that deadlift now that I’ve talked it out.

All in all, I’m pretty excited for my new low bar & front squats. I can tell from the burn that they’re working pretty good!

Keep your fingers crossed for me on crossing the 250 lb threshold.

Barbell Squats
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 185 lb x 5 reps
- 205 lb x 5 reps
- 225 lb x 5 reps
- 255 lb x 5 reps
- 255 lb x 5 reps
- 255 lb x 5 reps
Barbell Bench Press:
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 145 lb x 5 reps
- 155 lb x 5 reps
- 205 lb x 5 reps
- 205 lb x 5 reps
- 205 lb x 5 reps
Barbell Deadlift:
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 185 lb x 5 reps
- 205 lb x 5 reps
- 225 lb x 5 reps
- 315 lb x 3 reps
Barbell Incline Bench Press:
- 95 lb x 5 reps
- 115 lb x 5 reps
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 135 lb x 5 reps
Dips – Chest Version:
- 10 reps || assisted || 85 lb
- 10 reps || assisted || 85 lb
- 10 reps || assisted || 85 lb
Weighted Hyperextension:
- 25 lb x 10 reps
- 25 lb x 10 reps
- 25 lb x 10 reps
Weighted Decline Sit-Up:
10 lb x 15 reps
- 10 lb x 15 reps
- 10 lb x 15 reps
[sub][url=http://www.doomers.org/fito2sa/]fito2sa[/url][/sub]

Saturday 2/9/2013

Today I was introduced to the Front Squat and with it, a whole new set of soreness! Feels pretty great though!

Gooch2k2 Tracked a Workout for 1,514 pts Feb 9, 2013
Front Barbell Squat:
- 45 lb x 5 reps
- 65 lb x 5 reps
- 95 lb x 5 reps
- 115 lb x 5 reps
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 135 lb x 5 reps
Standing Barbell Shoulder Press (OHP):
- 95 lb x 5 reps
- 115 lb x 5 reps
- 125 lb x 5 reps
- 135 lb x 5 reps
- 145 lb x 5 reps
- 145 lb x 5 reps
- 145 lb x 5 reps
Bent Over Barbell Row:
- 70 lb x 5 reps
- 70 lb x 5 reps
- 95 lb x 5 reps
- 95 lb x 5 reps
- 105 lb x 5 reps
- 105 lb x 5 reps
Lat Pulldown:
- 70 lb x 5 reps
- 90 lb x 5 reps
- 110 lb x 5 reps
- 140 lb x 5 reps
- 140 lb x 5 reps
- 140 lb x 5 reps
Pull-Up:
- 5 reps || assisted || 55 lb
- 5 reps || assisted || 85 lb
- 5 reps || assisted || 85 lb
Weighted Hyperextension:
- 25 lb x 10 reps
- 25 lb x 10 reps
- 25 lb x 10 reps
EZ-Bar Curl:
- 60 lb x 9 reps
- 60 lb x 12 reps
Lying Barbell Triceps Extension (“Skullcrusher”):
- 60 lb x 12 reps
- 60 lb x 12 reps
Weighted Decline Sit-Up:
- 10 lb x 15 reps
- 10 lb x 15 reps
- 10 lb x 12 reps