The Best Shape of My Life!

Of course I would do something during week 3 to injure myself! When everything is going well, that’s usually when something bad happens.

During yesterday’s weightlifting workout, I hurt my lower back. I think it was the shoulder presses. I’ve done that exercise several times before, and I’ve even done heavier weight that I used yesterday. I figured I’d use a weight that I knew I could do but yet would still be somewhat challenging (considering I’m regaining my strength). Apparently, I placed my lower back in the wrong position, because it was in killer pain yesterday and some movements this morning are quite painful.

I was going to do yoga today but I’m not now. I know yoga is great for flexibility, which is probably a big reason I hurt my back, but at the same time, I really don’t want to do anything more to hurt my back. So I’m going to try some stretches and see if I can alleviate some of the pain. Other than that, it’s time for some rest and recovery. Hopefully I’ll be good enough to do my weight workout tomorrow.

Whew! I forgot how exhausting and taxing swimming is on the body. Went in for a 30 minute swim at the local YMCA this afternoon and about couldn’t walk out of there! And that was even with many many many breaks. I swam half laps, using different techniques. I think my heartrate is still elevated.

And I think I swallowed about a gallon of over-chlorinated water! I’m coughing like crazy and I can smell, taste, and feel the chlorine all over. I hate that part of it. But….the workout is worth it I guess. I just need to learn to NOT swallow the water.

Hopefully I’ll still be able to do my weight workout in the morning.

I’m up about 1,000 pounds lifted from last week. I lifted 45,420 lbs this week, short of my goal to get to 50,000. I was hoping I’d be able to make some more progress than I did, but there were a lot of factors preventing that I think. First, I haven’t been able to get a whole lot of sleep this week, as it was the week of my annual invitational debate tournament. Managing a large event requires a lot of work, and is extremely stressful. So with all that, plus just everything else that normally goes on in my life, I think I can explain why my progress wasn’t as good as I had hoped.

I still did extremely well this week. I was able to maintain everything I did last week, plus build on it. I still feel really good, and I know I’m making some progress. I think I’ve lost a couple pounds or so of weight, but haven’t officially weighed myself since last week. So we’ll see how that goes. I’m hoping that in about four more weeks I’ll have my bodyfat back down to at least 11-12%. I’m not going to make my Mar 1 check-in at 10%, but I think I still have that or lower by my 28th b-day in June, which is my major yearlong goal. So overall, I’m heading in the right direction.

Pullups are difficult, but that’s what I expected. I’m aiming to be able to complete 10 in a row, without assistance, by my 28th b-day. So I’ve still got about 4 months to get that going. I can do 2-3 per set, and I can complete two sets if I push myself. But I have to cheat a little and kick with my legs sometimes. But hey, everyone has to start somewhere, right?

Well, week 3 looks to be pretty good, too. I know I won’t be able to lift as much weight this week because I’ll only be doing two weightlifting workouts. I leave early early Friday morning to take my debate team to a tournament that is out-of-town. So I won’t be able to get into the gym. But that’s ok, because I’m hoping going swimming later today, I’ll have my weights on Mon and Wed, yoga on Tue, and a freestyle core/cardio workout on Thur.

I just hope that I can keep the steam that I started with a couple weeks ago. Sometimes I get burned out, and then I think about quitting. But now I’m riding pretty high, and I hope I can keep it going.

Yep. I weight as much as I did when my wife was pregnant with my daughter about 3 years ago. But this time around I don’t have quite as much bodyfat. When I postponed my intense workouts last semester, I wanted to still do whatever workouts I could, be it bodyweight exercises, and maintain at least a fairly decent diet. I didn’t do as well as I would have liked, but in the end I came out ok. I gained some weight (up to 192.5 lbs now) and kept bodyfat at 13%. Last time I gained this much weight, my bf went up to about 18%.

So overall, I’m chalking it up as a success. Now I’m hoping to put that extra weight to my advantage and turn it into more defined muscle. We’ll see.

Yeah……I did it for a week! That in itself, for me, is an accomplishment. This week was the first for me to head back to the gym after rejoining our local Y. I completed 5 morning workouts before heading off to work every day, and I feel GREAT! I’m a little worn out today, and EXTREMELY SORE, but overall I feel awesome, and I can tell that it has already begun to make a difference. I know I won’t see major results for another couple weeks or so (presuming I stay consistent), but I have already achieved quite a bit.

1. Strength levels. On the machines, I was able to lift nearly what I was lifting when I quit doing it regularly last summer/early fall. I was expecting my muscles to have lost their power/strength, but to my surprise, they picked right back up where I left off. That made me feel really good.

2. I had the energy to complete 5 workouts early in the morning. That’s tough to do, especially lifting fairly heavy weight for me. Being able to last an entire week is amazing, considering I haven’t been that intense in a long time.

3. I tweaked my diet somewhat and ate much healthier this week than I have in a long time. I’m hoping to really work on this more so that I can balance out my protein/carbs to get better results. I still have a ways to go with diet, but slowly and surely, I’m getting there. I’m almost to the point where sodas are entirely out of my diet. When I can get to that point, I’m going to start really hammering out the chocolate/extra sweets.

4. Yoga on Tuesday was AMAZING! I need some good flexiblity/core training, and yoga is one of the best ways to do it. I’m so happy that the Y offers a yoga class early in the mornings. I think I’m going to stay with it.

5. My seasonal downturned mood was lifted quite a bit this week. I started feeling better about myself, about my job, family, etc. Though I’ve never been officially diagnosed with SAD, I believe I do have quite a few of the symptoms for it. Getting into the gym really gave me a positive outlook for the week, and I noticed I have begun feeling better about everything I do.

6. My muscles are TIGHT. I still have fat I need to get rid of (one week isn’t a miracle cure for anything), but along with the soreness has come some of the tightness that I remember. I’m hoping to drop some of the excess fat I’ve developed over the months and show some more of the definition, along with add some more muscle mass. One day/week at a time, I know, but the tight, muscular feeling that I get from working out is a super positive, and I feel really good about what I’m doing.

SO…..What about Week 2?

I don’t know if I’ll continue numbering the weeks (I hate counting, really), but I am looking forward to next week. I have Monday off from work (advantage of working in a public school I guess), so I can do a really good workout on Monday. I’m also hoping to get into the pool either tomorrow or definitely sometime next week. All the workouts will stay relatively the same, but I’m hoping that I can up the weights/sets/etc. We’ll see. I think I might go all out on Monday, leave Wednesday for the light weight routine (with bodyweight exercises as well), and then see what I can do to hammer out everything I’ve got on Friday. Yoga’s on Tuesday, and cardio is on Thursday.

I feel great, and I know that in a couple more weeks or so, I should start looking a lot better too.

ONWARD AND UPWARD!

YOGA

The class at the Y started at 6 am, and I showed up at 6:10. I just couldn’t get out of my house early enough to get there by start time. But the instructor was really nice and they welcomed me anyway. I’m SO GLAD I went, because it was just how I remembered yoga being from the last time I took the class. AWESOME!

The class is offered every Tue at 6 am, which is the perfect time for me to do a workout before going to work. So I’m putting it on my calendar to do every week. That will give me a weights workout on M/W/F, yoga on Tue, and I think I might try the cycling class they’ll be starting up on Thur. Either that or use Thur as a general cardio day. We’ll see.

I completed my first workout today after newly rejoining the YMCA! It felt GREAT to get back into the gym, play with the machines, and give myself a nice wake-up call. Though I didn’t do a whole lot of weight, nor did I get everything done I wanted to get done, I’m just happy that I made it through and that I stuck with my plan to get in there. I’ve been missing it, for sure.

Today I did weights (workout is logged in my workout tracker). I’m going to try to keep record of everything I do with the Bodybuilding.com workout tracker. It’s free, and fairly easy to use. I wish it accounted more for cardiovascular activity and other things, but hey, maybe one of these days it will. Or maybe it does already and I just haven’t figured it out.

Tomorrow I’m going to attempt the early morning Yoga class! It’s been a VERY LONG time since I’ve done any yoga, but I know it will be helpful in gaining some flexibility, which I need to work on a lot.

Wednesday will be another weights day, followed by a strict cardio day on Thursday, and then hopefully another weights/flexibility mix workout that I’m still coming up with. We’ll see how this week goes and adjust as needed.

I’m hoping too to get into the pool at our local Y location with my wife and daughter this week. I have some evening commitments, so we might not be able to this week, but definitely soon. We’ll all enoy that!

So here’s to a new start, and hopefully a consistent "run" at it!

The local Y made a really good deal for employees of my school district, so needless to say, I took it. My wife and I have been wanting to get back to the Y, but around here, it’s typically pretty expensive. But with the rate we’re getting, we can start enjoying it again. We really like our local Y because it has two indoor pools, a heated one and a lap pool that one of the high schools uses for swimming as well. So it’s pretty neat. And, I like the attitude and the atmosphere at the Y. It’s a very friendly and family-oriented place, and the people are generally very helpful and supportive.

Anyway, this means that I can hopefully get back into a weightlifting routine (though it probably will not be my focus). I’m going to really enjoy getting back into the pool. Though I am no swimmer by any means, I love the workout that swimming provides!