Gut-Bustin’ 101

Well, reached my first plateau of this latest phase - my waist hasn’t budged in almost 4 weeks! It’s definitely a chance to tighten things up, run a comb through my nutrition program and re-double my efforts in the workouts. Injured my right elbow-area about a month and a half ago, so have had to ease up on any exercises that aggravated it, so the lighter exercise might have something to do with my lack of progress. Still eating pretty clean, but there are a few things I can improve on - less late-night eating is one, and watching my calories would probably help too. I don’t pay too much attention to calories, though I end up hitting about 1800-1900 a day pretty consistently.

Gotta be extra determined with the holidays comin’ up! No time to wimp out! LOL  Hope everybody’s doing well and sticking to their goals!

Hm. Not sure what to think about this, but I recently bumped up my cardio during the past two weeks to try and jump-start the fat loss again. For two weeks so far, I’ve done 5 days each week of 60-minute cardio sessions on the treadmill and/or elliptical, with each session made up of 25 min’s HIIT and rounded out with steady-state cardio to fill out the hour. With everything else - food intake, nutrient ratios, supplements, water intake, and workouts - staying the same, I’ve seen a whopping 1/8" loss on the waist these past two weeks. Don’t know what the heck to think about this - but I may back down to 30 minutes of cardio like I was doing before. It *could* be that I needed to increase my calories since I was theoretically burning more, so maybe I’ll go for another week or so like this and bump up the calories to see what happens.

Sorry for the boring blog entry - just thinking out loud while I go through some trial-and-error here

So it was a crazy busy day today - lotsa commercials to produce for the Labor Day weekend, and not a lot of time to whip up my meals. Figured I’d drop by GNC on the way to work and grab a protein bar and a shake for later in the day. All I can say is - what a buncha CRAP. I can’t believe some of the sh*t these "nutrition" companies are trying to pass off as "protein bars" these days. Drenched in chocolate, filled with sugar, oh yeah - "we’ll toss a little bit of protein in there and call it healthy." Unbelievable. These things should be outlawed by the bodybuilding community LOL

Well, I’ve learned that I’d better MAKE the time to prep more food, or at least make my OWN protein bars at home to avoid running into these little Blubber Logs again. "Protein bar" my ass hahahaha!

(check the video on my page with a recipe for homemade bars - it rocks)

Had my bodyfat tested by a friend who’s a personal trainer yesterday, and came in higher than I expected: 22.3%. That’s a pisser! I was thinking maybe around 19-20% max. But it’s incentive to  take another look at what I’m eating and work on those ratios (am I eating enough? Gotta figure that out too). We actually filmed the bodyfat test - kinda of a running video blog of the whole bodybuilding journey here. Just gotta get up some nerve to post it!

I’m in the middle of a Recovery Week after 3 months of getting back into exercise. I’m pretty happy with what I’ve accomplished so far: over 2 inches off the waist, and it looks like some muscle and strength gains as well. My overall weight has stayed pretty close to 155.

Taking time this week to plan out my strategy for the next 3 months: more attention to my food intake -  especially nutrient ratios, going a little heavier in the workouts, and upping cardio to 5-6 days consistently. Might add in one or two additional supplements - EFA pills for sure, and *might* experiment with some creatine, but that all depends on how fat the wallet is. These days it’s been leaning out faster than I am!

Found a great article here on Bodybuilding.com (http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/anabolic_nutrition_diet_plan.htm) that suggests a carb cycling plan for losing fat while retaining/gaining muscle. I’m trying this out for the next 1-2 weeks to see what kind of results I get from it. I’m on my second day of low-carb eating, and found I have to modify it a bit because extremely low carbs do all kinds of wack things to my brain. But I got through the day yesterday with a total of about 38g carbs, going for about the same or less today. Thurs I’ll do a high-carb day (5.5 days in a row of low carbs seems too much for me right now). Getting bodyfat tested this Saturday and taking measurements, so we’ll see how it turns out for the week.

Glad to say I hit my goal last week of dropping 1/8-1/4" off my waist - went from 33-3/4" to 33-9/16", a drop of 3/16" or just over 1/8". Wish it could go faster, but if I keep it up a little at a time, I should hit my waist goal of 32" by the end of the year.

Added more veggies to the meals, drank about a gallon of water a day, tried a few new P90X workouts, and did 4 days of cardio.

Hurt my right elbow area on chest day - might’ve been using too much weight on the twisted dumbbell flyes and it feels like an aching tendon when I move it a certain way. Gonna try to ease up on that arm this week and use lighter weights. This is Week 12 of my "Intro Phase" of getting back into training, so I’ve got a full week off of workouts coming up Aug 31st, which’ll hopefully help the arm recover more quickly.

I’ve scheduled a bodyfat test with a trainer next weekend, so I’ll post those results when they’re ready. My guess is I’ll come in at around 20-21% bodyfat - the trainer uses a 7-point measurement calculation that I think is way more accurate than my little plastic Accumeasures! I’m also gonna pick his brain on modifying my nutrition plan for optimal fat loss.

The pic below is from 8/19/2009 - I’m seeing a little more muscle, but DAMN that belly fat is taking forever to disappear!
Have a great week everybody!

Well, I dropped about a half pound last week, probably muscle cuz I don’t think I ate enough. Wasn’t prepped with my food like I usually am, and didn’t drink enough water. Hit the cardio and workouts just fine though. This week, I’m gonna add more veggies to the mix, get my gallon of water in each day as best I can, and focus even more on intense workouts and HIIT cardio. I’ll check back in at the end of the month with more results - hope everyone has an awesome, healthy week!

Checkin’ in real quick with end-of-the-month results…

Since June 1, 2009, I’ve been able to drop my waist measurement from 36" back down to 34"  as of 7/31, so that’s got me doin’ the Happy Dance! Bodyfat is just under 20%, but I’m doing the measurements myself with one of those Accu-measure things, and the charts don’t really have detailed numbers so I can only say for sure that I’m between 17.8 and 19.6 - which kinda blows. Gotta get an official measurement done soon.

My weight has dropped a couple pounds, but I’m not that concerned about my weight - it the Waist-from-Hell that i’m focused on, and those bodyfat numbers.

Nutrition’s been really clean except for a few cheats here and there - but that 16oz. T-Bone was DAMN tasty last night!

After two months of alternating basic upper-lower body workouts (and tossing in a few of the P90X routines just to test the waters), I think I’ll continue on that path for the rest of August. But I’m also gonna add in lots more of the P90X stuff to shake it up. I’ve done their leg workouts several times now, so I’m getting used to that craziness!

Updated pix… gotta get on it and post a few of those sometime this week too.

August is a tough month - two birthdays comin’ up (including mine) plus a few BBQ’s, so I’ll have to be extra disciplined.

That’s it for now - I’ll check back in a month with updated results, and until then grab more inspiration from everybody on Bodyspace!

Alright, gotta admit it’s been a rollercoaster ride since last October: our old gym closed its doors, found a new one but lost the motivation. After getting my waist down to 33" from 37"+, I dropped the ball and slid into the holidays with no goals and an appetite for sweets. Yeah, I said it. lol Needless to say, the results weren’t pretty. My body hung on to decent measurements as long as it could, but around late November it finally gave in and as of June 1, 2009 my waist bounced in at 36", and the scale said 158 lbs, 24% bodyfat. I felt like Bob the Blob from "Monsters vs. Aliens".

Anyway, after checking out some videos and inspirational profiles on Bodybuilding.com and looking at the results I was able to achieve last year, the motivation’s back. Since June 1st, I’ve been eating lean and clean, only one cheat meal a week, working out 3 times a week and doing HIIT cardio 4-5 times a week.

I decided to start off the first three months here with something similar to the Body for Life program: doing a full upper body workout in 45 minutes, cardio next day, then lower body, cardio, etc. I like it because it keeps the heart rate elevated throughout the workouts, though I could probably do that with any program by adjusting rest times, etc. I’m gonna stick with this until the end of July, then go back to a split routine and hit the muscles harder.

As of this morning, my waist clocked in at 34-3/4"  . Down 1-1/4" since June 1st, and my weight has slightly dropped from 158 to 156, which I’ll take ‘cuz it looks like I’m retaining/gaining some muscle while the fat’s dropping lower.

I ain’t lyin’ - it’s a bitch getting back to where I was before I had a brain fart. But at least I’m doing something about it I guess! I’ll have to hit up some of you guys in the community here for nutrition advice, because my next goal is to speed up the fat loss a lot more than what it’s been. In the meantime, having my morning coffee and getting ready for another upper body blast this afternoon.

Have a great week everybody!

Is cheating helping me lose fat? Have to post this cuz it’s really freakin’ me out. So for the past 5+ months I’ve been eating pretty clean nutritionally - 6 meals a day, clean foods, plenty of water, and only one weekend dessert (not even a full cheat meal.) Saw consistent results in the form of inches off my waist up until late July- early August, when my waist measurement hit a plateau. Kept eating well, but not much has happened since then, even with pretty consistent workouts, and cardio 3 - 4 times a week.

The thing that’s weird is that recently, after about a week of "slipping" a bit (it was bithday week after all!) - less water than I was used to (only 2-3 liters instead of a gallon or more), SEVERAL cheat meals and a few days where I only ate 4-5 meals instead of 6, my waist measurement has started to move down again. What’s up with that?

I noticed this phenomenon a few other times during the past several months, where I would see improved (or greater) waist-loss results after a night of adding an extra late-night meal, or indulging in a little more dessert or simple carbs than normal. I’m racking my brain trying to figure out why this happens. Could I not be getting enough calories, and my body sees these extra calories as a sign that it’s not starving, so it’s burning more fat? I’ve heard about the "re-feed" concept, could that be related? Could adding in some different foods (as opposed to the same food I’ve been eating for over 5 months straight) maybe confuse my body and get things moving again? Has this ever happened to anyone else here? Will I ever stop asking so many questions?

*whew* Well, guess there’s not much left to do but head to the kitchen for some late-night snacking lol