Blowing the dust off in here...

*cough*

Well, then...

...it's been a while, folks.

I want to take a minute and just say that I really admire my wife. I don't really tell her enough.

Recently she made a change to her roller derby lifestyle/schedule. She still does her weekly Thursday night recreation with The Beehive Skate Revolution, and recently has moved on from her other once-a-week group to the Wasatch Roller Derby team which requires her to skate three additional days a week.

Last week was her first week with this group, and they really work out those ladies. She came home from her Wednesday session with totally dead legs. Turns out they have a personal trainer that works them out for an hour and a half to start. She's back at it the next night, anyway.

It's hard to keep up from the couch.

Yesterday evening, I walked over to the community center we now live across the street from (by the way, we moved at the end of last November) for the first time to use their gym. It's only been over two months. I haven't been in the gym at work since several months before I changed positions. In August of 2015...

I did a short workout (about 30 minutes) and felt like that was a good start. The hitch to this was that I also scheduled a workout this morning, since my wife wouldn't be home tonight until after the c.c. was closed. Alarm went off at 5:15 AM. I seriously wondered how it was possible to be time to get up already and snoozed it. I did pull myself out of bed after another snooze, and went to let the dog out, and got ready to go.

It's busy over there in the morning so I didn't get on any of the machines, but they have a nice indoor track to use, so I walked for 30 minutes. It's something when you see that you've already hit 5k steps before anybody else in the house has woken up.

So... in short, I'm back.

Expectations

I've not been very good at keeping this updated. Part of the problem has been that I haven't been very good at doing things that are worth updating.

I haven't been in the gym since February.

My eating was out of control.

The only thing I'd been doing well with was not drinking soda and hitting 10,000 steps 4 or 5 days a week.

Another issue that's been plaguing me has been my feet. Mostly my left foot. It's been hurting a lot over the past 8 - 9 months. I went to a doctor and had some medication and a couple of cortisone shots, and the pain has been relieved for the most part. Most days, I don't feel any pain and can walk normally. But it doesn't take much to set off pain, and the last couple of days have been intense since I had a near run-in with a nest of wasps living behind the circuit breaker outside my home. The sudden break into a sprint to get away to a safe distance really torqued my feet and my calves, so it's been pain from just below the knees on down for a few days. They feel much better today.

I'm starting to eat low-carb as of this week. My main goal is to try to stay around/below 50g of carbs a day, but not feel too bad about it if I get close to 100g - from some of the research I've done, 100g-150g is typical "maintain weight" amounts. Below 50g can help with faster weight loss.

Looking back over my diet over the past few months, although I'd cut out sugar sodas, I still piled on the carbs at an alarming rate. Potatoes, bread (sandwiches / fast food / bagels), pasta. A lot of pasta really, and that was negating other efforts I was making in portions.

I'm also going back to the gym this Sunday (my "Monday" at work) morning and getting in some time on either the elliptical or treadmill with some light weight work (and build up as I go). 

I need to revamp how I shop, what foods I prepare for dinner. I don't plan on making the whole family go "low-carb" but rather find alternative ways to prepare my portion of the meal. Some meals will be easy because I can prepare the main dish (the meat) the same way for everybody, but instead of having potatoes or pasta as one of the sides, I can have a salad, or a variety of veggies. Meat and veggies for me. :)

I'm participating in my first 5k ever in three weeks. At this point I'm probably going to be walking it.

So. Here's to better eating, and starting on the road to being great!

Updates and such

Things have been... eventful ... as of late.

I've tackled a couple of goals on my 2015 list, which is good. None of them directly relate to weight loss, but a couple indirectly do.

I'm signed up for The Color Run in Salt Lake City on August 22nd. 4 months and 10 days from now.

I've also been to a couple of doctors. One for a typical physical. Good news there, I'm still alive and doing pretty good.

Last week I also needed to see a foot/ankle specialist because of persistent pain in my left heel that just wasn't going away. I didn't have a shot because the doctor thought the ligaments were healing on their own, but gave me a prescription of an anti-inflammatory (naproxen) to help it along.

The main caveat to this, though, was that I needed to keep my walking to a minimum for the next four weeks until I go back to see him again.

Sigh.

Commit. Drive. Shin splints?

This weekend I took a big step (well, figuratively) toward some of the goals I've posted about recently. One of the top goals was to enter a 5k. On Friday I registered for the 2015 Salt Lake City Color Run.

Might as well be messy... this year's Color Run features GLITTER. My shower drain won't know what hit it.

So, to revisit my goals:

• Hit the gym on work days
• Walk a minimum 10,000 steps (15,000 if I didn't go to the gym - like today)
• Stationary bike on non-work days - 1 mile minimum in March. Increase one mile per month.

The Color Run happens on August 22, 2015. Time to get going. Not only should I be able to finish it, but with six months to get ready, I should able to jog/run the full distance.

Motivation

Motivation is a fickle monster. Getting up at 3:10 AM to go out into the cold (it wasn't that bad this morning), drive to work and get there at least an hour before I'm scheduled to work and go instead to the gym in the small building to go and do physical movements to break a sweat. All of that contributes to that little voice in the back of your head to say, "Eh. Stay in bed, get another hour of sleep. You were up late last night. You're tired."

So. I've been very bad on my goals this last week. Today was actually the first day I got into the gym since the beginning of the year. Guess I was waiting on the other resolutionaries to give up. You know, the zero other people that go in at 4 AM.

I don't know what it was that kept holding me back. I didn't stay up exceptionally late during the last week or so. I might have talked myself out of it because of my physical coming up on Friday. Which seems kind of dumb, but in any case I got out of bed this morning, and was on my way by 3:35 to hit the gym.

It's only 8:15 (as I'm typing this portion) and I've already rolled past the half-way point of my step goal for the day. Hit the elliptical machine for 33 minutes, so I've hit my 30 active min goal as well (all of this is programmed into my fitbit).

The week is off to a good start. I'm probably going to work on updating this once a week (sort of a summary instead of play-by-play) because it's getting tougher to come up with clever titles. :)

See ya next week.

No Time To Wait...

I decided that 2015 needed to come early. After hitting a major lull and packing on some pounds, it all had to start now. Not January 1. Now.

My wonderful wife gave me a Fitbit One for Christmas, and it's probably tied for my top Christmas present received along with a shirt my kids gave me with hand drawn art on it (they're 7 and 4; I'll take it out this week and put a pic up), and I did get some great gifts this year from my family. The silent alarm is great. It's just the thing I need to get up and going without disturbing my wife too much since it's set for 3:10 AM.

Rundown for today:

Bent Over Two-Dumbbell Rows 12 - 12 - 24 @ 10 lbs

Underhand Lat-Pulls (modified pull-ups) 12 - 12 - 12 @ 70 lbs

Standing Barbell Curls 12 - 8 - 7 @ 33 lbs (bar apparently weighs ~ 13 pounds)

Dumbbell Alternate Bicep Curls 10 - 10 - 10 @ 12.5 lbs

Elliptical 21 minutes

For reference (you know, if anyone else besides me cares), here are links to my goals page to view and workout tracker.

2015 Goals

Workout Tracker

I'll probably add some additional goals later on. Miscellaneous stuff.

I did have a bit of a slow time getting out the door this morning. I got out of bed fine, just not so quick to leave. My plan is to BE at the gym by 3:40 - 45, changed and out on the floor by 3:50 and done by 4:40 so I have time to get to my desk. My shift starts at 5 AM, but I try to be there by 4:55 and get stuff like this done. :) I just need to make my lunch the night before more consistently. Nothing like trying to hunt for stuff in the fridge a little after 3 AM when you're not eating it for a while, and you're not particularly hungry at that moment. Nothing seems appealing.

The Fitbit app and site are great because they layout a bunch of goals (that you can modify) such as 10,000 steps in a day, 10 flights of stairs climbed, 30 active minutes, etc. And you can modify these, plus some of them have multiple tiers, like the stairs, after you hit 10, the site offers a badge (did someone say "achievements?"), and then shows your next badge can be earned by climbing 25 floors.

Challenges can be set up and sent to Fitbit friends. One of my friends in California, who also got a new Fitbit for Christmas sent out a "Weekend Warrior" challenge to see who can get the most steps on the weekend. There's 10 people in it (all invited by my friend from Cali), and I'm currently 5th. I do get a lot of steps in on Sundays though since the parking lot here at work is far, far away. The leader already has almost 30k steps, and it's only 6 AM on Sunday...

See you tomorrow.

Ghosts of the Past...

So... even before 2015 begins, I have some goals I want to share, some may not be possible to complete by December 31, 2015, but there should be some significant progress made:

• Ultimate Goal 1: 200 lbs or lower
• Enter the 2015 Color Run for Salt Lake City (8/22/15) - Registration deadline: TBD
• Enter the 2015 Dirty Dash (6/6/15) - Registration deadline: TBD
• Hike to Timpanogos Cave
• While I'm there, tour the cave. It's been 25+ years since I've been there.
• Hike Dry Canyon again (somehow, I didn't hike anywhere in 2014 after going on a few in 2013)
• Hit the gym on work days (seriously, how hard is this... I work 4 days a week. There's a gym where I work. No brainer, anyone?)
• Stationary bike at home on weekdays off (Tuesdays / Fridays and this ties in to another goal below)
• Take Saturdays off, unless working on any hiking or 5k goal above. (because there should always be one goal that's pretty much a 100% slam dunk).
• Walk 10,000 steps per day (usually hit 7k + on work days. Walking the dog could get the job done, and would make my wife happy)
• Get a Physical (because it's been a while)

• Ultimate Goal 2: Embrace a new hobby
• Read 30 books (we don't have a TV where the stationary bike is... books/kindle app will work)
• Placeholder for list of books read in 2015
• Study coaching for soccer and football (hey, I wonder if there's a book....also because...)
• Begin process toward alternative teaching certificate (this is a long range goal, I still want to have my third sabbatical at eBay in 2018)
• Volunteer (in conjunction with my wife's plans, together we'd like to teach our kids the value of helping those who are less fortunate than we are)

So, there we go. Bring it, 2015!

That moment when...

Welcome back!

You, me, everybody... well, a few people anyway.

So next year's Spartan schedule was released about a week ago. I was checking for pre-registration options when I noticed something about Utah's race next year.

Utah is getting the Beast in 2015.

What now?

Ha.

12 miles.

Double Ha.

I'm going to run the Dirty Dash instead. Maybe the Tough Mudder.

At least in 2015. I'm guessing that the races rotate (sprint, super, beast). I hope the Ultra Beast isn't coming here, lol. (full marathon). At least, not in 2016. :)

Today's breakdown:

Weight: 295.8 - definitely going in the wrong direction. Maybe it's because I haven't been hitting the gym regularly. Gee, what a thought. Also, need some significant changes in food consumption. Working on that.

I did hit the gym today, though. I almost talked myself out of it. Was woken up multiple times through the night. Cat. Dog. Whatever. Didn't feel like getting out of bed any earlier than was necessary to go to work (even with the time shift). These words kept running through my head:

So, I got up and get my stuff together, went to work, and hit the gym.

See you tomorrow.

Monday, Monday, Monday!

Typically Monday is the second work day of my ... well, week.

I work Sunday, Monday, off on Tuesday, back at work for Wednesday and Thursday, then off on Friday and Saturday. I work 10 hour shifts. I got into the gym at about 3:50 AM today, and won't leave work until 3:30. Basically, I'm present on my work site for 12 hours a day, 4 days a week. About an hour in the gym, 10 hours working, a half hour lunch, and the other half hour (almost) is basically walking to and from my car. It takes about 7 minutes to walk from my car to my desk, 3 minutes maybe to go from the car to the gym locker room. Our parking lot is way out there.

It was a good workout today, spent my time on the elliptical machine doing the "weight loss" work out which alternates from an incline of 1 (flat) and 4 resistance, to incline of 8 and 10 resistance. Since machines all vary, this means almost nothing to everybody else. :)

Did some work on my arms and chest and called it a day (in the gym) and headed back to the car to drop off my gym clothes bag and grabbed my lunch, then headed to my desk where I am now.

Speaking of lunch (and breakfast which I bring), here's the rundown:

Coffee (w/ creamer which I'm now measuring out to make sure I don't just absorb an extra hundred calories for almost nothing in return).
Muscle Milk (1 scoop of powder)
Cottage Cheese (1/2 cup - 2%)
Grapes (about 14 oz.)
Chicken Chipotle Flautas (lunch, 2 sticks)
Fruit Snacks (1 pouch - maybe)
Granola Bar (Peanut Sweet & Salty - Nature Valley)
Ritz Crackers (on standby in my desk drawer)

All of that comes out to about 1,257 calories. Not sure about dinner yet. Was going to make tacos (we bought like 5 pounds of hamburger at Costco, I sectioned it out and froze 4/5ths of it), but wife and daughter aren't thrilled about that, so I have to figure something else out.

Overall, I should stay under 2,000 calories today. The biggest challenge, probably, is keeping myself disciplined on my three off days and not mindlessly eat little things here and there that add up super fast. It's like Fighter Diet founder Pauline Nordin says (paraphrased), "It doesn't matter the work you do during the week if you're undoing it on the weekend."

Also, it isn't much, but between 2 weeks ago when I weighed in (293.8 lbs) and today (291.4 lbs) the scale is at least headed in the right direction.

The Two-Step...

Two days in a row? Might be something going on...

Hit the gym again this morning after getting to bed at a decent time. Getting up at three isn't easy if you're going to bed (sleep) after 10. I was pretty much out around nine last night, so I only did the snooze dance one time this morning.

Decided it was time to get back to the weights as I have not been on those in quite some time. Nothing big since I'd been away for far too long. A few sets with the bench press (95 lbs), shoulder press machine (uh, not very much, I'm shocked at how weak my shoulders are), and the triceps extension machine (again, WEAK!). After all of that, I hit the elliptical machine again for my 33 minutes. I went a little harder this time, getting my heart rate up into the 150s and burning around 400 calories (according to the machine - my Lose It app says around 600).

It's about consistency right? Time to find that rhythm and keep at it.

Almost 5 months...

Somewhere along the way motivation wandered into a dark room and decided to stay for a while.

Now, I've gone to the gym here and there and just never got back on track.

Inspiration comes in different forms. Heroes. Best Friends. Striving for health. The list goes on and on. My wife is an inspiration for me to get back on track. Mostly out of fear of being totally left behind.

About nine months ago my wife was struggling with weight loss, like well, pretty much all of us. She'd been doing roller derby for about a year at that time and was still considering herself one of the "big girls." Those are the rare gals that somehow combine weight and speed to be formidable blockers and intense hitters. They kind of remind me of football players that line up in the trenches. You know the big guys, that look like couch potatoes (sometimes), and then totally shock you with their speed and quickness.

So, my wife began cutting her portions. A lot. Now, it kind of comes easier for her than others because when she eats, she pays a price. It (eating) makes her sick a lot of times. She has to eat, but sometimes it's a gauge of how sick she wants to tolerate that day. The weird thing is, nobody can figure out what's wrong. Doctors haven't figured out the trigger, and for all intents and purposes, the triggers are everything and nothing.

Some days she'll eat a salad and be fine, a couple of days later, she'll eat the same type of salad and wish she was dead because of the pain she's experiencing. Same for burgers, fish, dairy, bread, oh hell, I'll save some time and just say "everything."

In the last nine months, still doing roller derby, my wife has shed an amazing 65 pounds. Sixty-five! She's gotten to the point that she can push it really hard and compete with some of the jammers.

Even when I was hitting the gym consistently, I was seeing nothing happening. Granted, I sure didn't give it a year. Messing up that muscle (excuse coming) in my back/neck back in March just made me revert back to being only "slightly" active.

Food consumption changed only a little bit. Portion control was anything but. Probably more like "outta control." One of the problems is that I sit at a desk. Four days a week. 10 hours during those days. Work is interesting, if not repetitive. And I ALWAYS feel like eating something. I bring my breakfast and lunch to work. But always feel like there needs to be more. Juice and soda is free here. Talk about a fight every day. We do have coke zero, diet, etc. But you know how it is. Why get those when there's a cherry coke RIGHT THERE!?

So the transition needs to happen, instead of spooning out three tablespoons of cottage cheese, I need to measure it. Turns out I can easily get a full serving (half of a cup) from a heaping teaspoon. I made sure I came with just ONE serving of cottage cheese today. A couple of clementine oranges. Leftovers from dinner the other night (homemade beef-a-roni), and we'll see how it goes from there.

Spent about a 33 minutes on the elliptical machine this morning. Weight loss mode.

Inspiration comes in many forms. My inspiration is my wife and her toughness, consistency, and determination. Inspiration is knocking on the door where motivation is hiding and inviting it to come out to play.

It's been...

I'm finally back. Did you miss me?

It's been a rough month and a half. First my neck and back issue, and then, when I thought I was all set to go again, I had a rough bout with a head cold (still clearing out some sinus issues, but overall feel pretty normal).

So, here's the rundown for today:

Bent Over Dumbbell Row: 2 x 10 @ 12.5 lbs; 1 x 15 @ 12.5 lbs
Lat Pulls: 2 x 10 @ 70 lbs; 1 x 12 @ 70 lbs
Standing Barbell Curl: 3 x 10 @ 45 lbs
Dumbbell Alternate Bicep Curl: 3 x 10 @ 12.5 lbs

I also spent 10 minutes on the bike. Cardio is SO not my thing, but it needs to be done. I plan to work my way into it gradually, though.

It's good to be back.

That's probably a setback...

This morning I seem to have hurt myself a little bit while doing my workout. On my second group of lifts, the side laterals, I pulled, or tweaked a muscle in my neck and right shoulder. That's probably not good. I can somewhat turn my head to the right, and almost not at all to the left. This could take a few days to feel better from. I'm not at all happy about this.

I don't know if it was because I had less sleep last night (thanks Daylight Saving Time!), or if I just wasn't warm enough yet. I'd finished my inclined presses okay, but on my second set of the side laterals, I just suddenly felt off and the muscle in my neck was not right. Or I pinched a nerve. Something.

Needless to say, today's workout was not up to snuff compared to normal.

Checked with my supervisor today (who is working his once-every-three-months weekend) who I know works out down at the gym, but he doesn't carry any Icy Hot or similar product. Called security to see if they have any hot packs or something (nope). So, I get to sit here and suffer today. I do have some ibuprofen to take the edge off. My neighbor has a heating pad at her desk, but she's pretty unhappy about people touching her stuff (which most of us are, so it's understandable).

So, for the next couple of days, I might just be on the treadmill or elliptical while the issue with my neck heals up.

It's not all about exercise...

I'm still working on dropping weight. I have 15 months until the 2015 Spartan Race in Utah, and it's going to be take a LOT of work to get there. (My father-in-law thinks I can make the 2014 race. To that I say ha ha!).

I've started a better balanced meal plan over the last several days, and my wife and I have been doing more of the "outer circle" for shopping. We still have bread and pasta, but we're pushing for less bleached out items, and I've been making a stronger effort to bring veggies w/ my lunch to balance out the fruit. It's easy to throw in a banana or apple, but then your carbs (sugars, not fiber) end up way out of balance with everything else.

For example, today I packed 100 cal yogurt, a bagel thin (110) w/ laughing cow wedge (35), carrots, an apple, a cutie orange, two pieces of beef jerky, some reduced fat cheez-its, and leftovers from dinner last night. The dinner last night was actually really high in fat (it's made with prosciutto, a lot of Parmesan cheese and cream, so there you go), but portion control is a big thing.

I remember feeling particularly hungry when I got prepared to make dinner, but I still only had one serving and didn't over eat. Sure, when I made the protein shakes last night and filled our travel bottles (we re-use 8 oz. Ensure bottles for easier grab and go), I drank the rest of what didn't fit, but that stopped me from having a bowl of cereal before bed (something I haven't done in weeks, and it used to be a REGULAR, every night kind of thing).

I broke "code" today and stepped on the scale before my workout (usually only weigh in on Sundays), and found I'd dropped 1.8 pounds since last Sunday (sure, I'm still 292.6, but progress is progress).

Anyway, thanks for reading my additional run on...

See image...

Yup, learned the hard way that leg presses aren't even close to the same thing as squats. Ha. I knew that, but wow, it's like I never used my legs before yesterday, jeez.

Today was a return to biceps and the back:

Lat Pulls 2 x 10 @ 80 lbs

        1 x 12 @ 80 lbs

Bent Over Dumbbell Row    2 x 10 @ 15 lbs

                                   1 x 15 @ 15 lbs

Back Extensions 3 x 10

Concentration Curls 3 x 10 @ 15 lbs

Preacher Curls    1 x 8 @ 50 lbs

                   2 x 8 @ 45 lbs

I liked the change up in the exercises from "Day 1." The routine still worked the same muscle groups, but in different ways. Keep the workouts interesting I guess, and the body from adapting too fast.

So, I expect to be in 100% pain tomorrow, and somehow pull off an active rest day with 26 - 32 minutes of cardio.

Bring.

It.

On.

Leg day, Leg Day, LEG DAY!

My legs think they're dying. I'm pretty sure they're not, but they maintain that they indeed are.

Let's show you why:

Squats: 2 x 10 @ 45 lbs (yes, that's the bar - but even squatting with just my body weight is a workout).
            1 x 20

Squats are not my friend; I feel off balance and very unsteady. I'm glad I'm by myself when I am in the gym, because I do a lot of feet shuffling getting in place to where I feel comfortable starting my dip. However, I'm also happy that I actually executed squats, and didn't fall on my butt.

Dumbbell Lunges: 2 x 7 w/ 12.5 lbs dumbbells

Also not my favorite. Upper body weight makes it difficult to maintain the proper stance to execute these safely. I try, but once I get out of balance, that's usually the end. I don't need to hurt a knee or anything.

Leg Curls: 2 x 10 @ 80 lbs
                 1 x 20 @ 80 lbs

Stiff-Legged Barbell Deadlift: 2 x 10 @ 45 lbs
                                             1 x 20 @ 45 lbs

Another new workout for me, so again I only used the bar to make sure I was working the set properly. Watching myself is not fun either. But, I did something new today, so that's a good thing.

Standing Calf Raises: 3 x 10 (feel the burn!)

Crunches: 3 x 10 (was so tired by this time, lol).

Was supposed to do lying leg raises, too. But after doing crunches, my body said "yeah right," and I managed to do just one.

Me tomorrow:

When I was walking through the lunchroom on the way to my desk, one of the security guards that passes through the gym sometimes when I'm still in there, came through at the same time and asked if I was on my way to work out and I told him I was done for the day and he told me that I was doing a good job with that lately. It's nice to be noticed for something positive like that.

My legs were trembling when I was filling up my water jug (72 oz... more like water tub); just standing there and I feel small muscle twitches in my quads.

It's time to stagger to the breakroom (or as they call it here, the refill station) and get some more coffee. Until tomorrow!

Better than nothing...

Today was difficult to get up and get into the gym. I'd skipped the last two days at work, was dealing with some issues with my house that the weather had decided to show me, and just flat out didn't have the motivation to work out yesterday.

It could have easily slid into another day, or week, or month. I really didn't want that to happen, so last night I made sure I had my meals ready for today at work, got up at 3:30 and got dressed, grabbed my lunch bag and headed right out the door.

Here's where I picked up today:

Bench Press: 3 x 10 @ 105 lbs

Incline Flyes: 3 x 10 @ 12.5 lbs

Seated Dumbbell Press: 3 x 10 @ 12.5 lbs

Dumbbell Side Laterals: 3 x 10 @ 10 lbs

Triceps Extention: 3 x 10 @ 12.5 lbs

Bench Dips: 1 x 6

Yeah, my bench dips are laughable, and so are my dumbbell weights, but part of building strength is getting that stability in check. I don't always feel the most stable lifting the free weights, so I'm working on those to become more comfortable with my abilities.

I really had to fight with myself on the Bench and Incline this morning. I guess something I did working on the house over the weekend strained my right pectoral muscle, so it was definitely complaining as I lifted. It didn't have any kind of searing or sharp pain, so I felt okay to keep lifting, but it definitely made itself heard while I was working.

While my chest, shoulders, and triceps are complaining a bit right now, that's probably nothing compared to what my legs and back are going to be doing on Wednesday when I hit them for the first time in about two weeks.

It's good to be back to work.

Hitting reset

This last week has been a bit rough. Motivation can be difficult to find sometimes. It's when you start to think that gets you into trouble.

Pauline (Fighter Diet) Nordin said it well in a tweet not long ago when asked what to do when you have trouble with motivation in that you "don't think. Go on autopilot" - basically, get going, get the workout done. Think later.

I would go find the tweet to get the quote completely right, but she tweets/retweets so much that it'll take ages to track down.

So, today I hit the reset button. Packed a fairly clean breakfast / lunch, I think. Salad w/ a roasted chicken breast (separate); apple, two cutie oranges, protein drink powder, greek yogurt, and a thin bagel w/ laughing cow spreadable cheese. Coffee and water to drink for the day. - sugar content is still too high, will need to adjust shopping and lunch packing to include more carrots / celery / radishes, etc. over fruit to keep the sugar/carb levels much lower.

Hit the gym this morning with a repeat of last Wednesday's workout - tried pushing it:

Bent Over Two-Dumbbell Row: 2 x 12 (15 lbs); 1 x 30 (failure - also at 15 lbs)

Lat pulls: 1 x 10; 1 x 7 (100 lbs); 1 x 5 (90 lbs); 1 x 10 (80 lbs) - next time I think I'll stick with 90, so I'm not dropping down so quick.

Standing Barbell Curl: 2 x 12 (45 lbs); 1 x 11

Dumbbell Alternate Bicep Curl: 2 x 10 (15 lbs); 1 x 9 - this felt much better than the 12.5 I did last time. Really had to fight at the end. I got 10 with my left arm but couldn't quite get a full curl out of my right, so I didn't count it as 10 this time.

So, I felt the work in my arms for sure, especially when I had to go back to change. :)

Now, I haven't worked on legs for over a week now. According to my schedule on the 12 week program, that's going to fall on Saturday, when I'm off of work. I will need to suck it up and head into the work gym (wonder if Saturdays are as abandoned as Sundays... or does the custodial crew clean it out on Saturdays too? guess we'll find the answer to that this weekend). But, looking at it, it should be a challenging workout. Squats, I want to be your friend, but you keep me off balance.

Anyway, that's the recap for today. Back to work.

Push it better...

Changing my shirt was probably the hardest thing I've had to do today, post-workout. Hitting arms, but different parts, a second day in a row really put the burn into them.

First up was the Bench Press: 3 x 10 @ 105 pounds. Now, the way it's supposed to work is to do 10 -12 reps in the first two sets and then lift until muscle failure on the third. I struggled so much with the 10th rep on the third set that I knew the next one would fail and probably pin me to the bench. Since I'm the only one there at 4:12 AM, I knew better than to hope the cleaning lady in the women's locker room could help me. So 10 was it. Maybe next time I can get 11 out of my bench press on the last set. :)

The rest as follows:

Incline flyes: 1 x 10 @ 12.5 lbs dumbbells; 1 x 10 @ 15 lbs; 1 x 16 @ 15 lbs

Seated dumbbell press: 3 x 10 @ 15 lbs.

Dumbbell side laterals: 2 x 10 @ 10 lbs; 1 x 7 @ 10 lbs (seriously. weak. shoulders.)

Triceps extension (laying on my back on the bench with dumbbells, not a machine): 1 x 10 @ 12.5 lbs; 1 x 10 @ 15 lbs; 1 x 9 @15 lbs. So close to getting that full 10 on the last set, but couldn't get my arms quite back to starting position, so I didn't count it.

Last night I asked my wife to indulge me and feel my arms when flexed just to see what she thought. I was pleased at her surprised reaction to how solid they're starting to feel after about a month. Now that I'm on a tougher routine for the next 12 weeks, I'm looking forward to the progress again around this time next month.

One last exercise I was supposed to do was Bench Dips. One, I didn't really have a proper place to put my feet other than the floor (no prop up spot around, and I didn't see any aerobic steps) and two, after what I had just done above, trying to make my triceps and shoulders lower and push up my 294 pound frame was honestly asking too much. I'd just end up sitting on the floor and possibly having to pick up an overturned bench behind me for my trouble. I know my limits. Usually.

Tomorrow is an active rest day. So, I'll either spend some time on our little used stationary bike at home, or hit some Kinect cardio exercises on Your Shape, or maybe even break out my Jillian Michaels Fitness Adventure game. We recently added a new (used) couch to our living room, so workout space in there may be a little tricky.

Shaking things up...

Getting back into the swing of things after another long weekend. Over the last 5 days I only worked one of those (Sunday) because of the holiday. And, I actually skipped the gym that day. Bad me!

Last night, I decided that I needed to change things up to work specific muscle groups and build smarter while looking for a way to lose weight. I'm hoping this has been a good find:

http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/lee-labrada-12-week-lean-body-trainer.html

So, today was Day 1 (Back/Biceps Workout) and here's the breakdown on the exercises and what I did:

Bent Over Two-Dumbbell Row: 2 x 12 (15 lbs); 1 x 16 (failure - also at 15 lbs)

Underhand Pullups (yeah, I can't do these, so I did Lat pulls instead): 2 x 10 (80 lbs); 1 x 14

Standing Barbell Curl: 2 x 10 (45 lbs); 1 x 11

Dumbbell Alternate Bicep Curl: 2 x 10 (12.5 lbs); 1 x 19

Cardio comes later in the form of my 30 minute walk .... hoping the weather is okay, but forecasts are not looking good.

This workout was good, it left my chest alone, and didn't do a lot with my triceps (I looked ahead, that's tomorrow, but no cardio). My biceps felt like they were swollen to double their size when I was done lifting though, it was kind of a weird feeling. I guess that's what muscle concentration is all about.

Thanks to my friend Elaine for pointing me to the bodybuilding.com site; I'm hoping it really helps with getting my training in the right direction.

Now, I just need to work on that kitchen stuff. That site has a lot of good suggestion for nutrition, so I sent it to my wife, too. Hopefully help with shopping / meal planning / weight loss.