Greyhound’s BodyBlog

It’s been a long time since I last came to bb.com and a WHOLE lot has changed.  For a while, I was doing fine, just not updating my site.  I was up to 174 lbs and was feeling very strong.  I was at 315 deadlift, 225 bench and not sure about squats–I had to start over with ass2ground and not sure what I could do.  That was the state of things around end of July.  Then all hell broke loose…literally.

First, my 2 yr old son had to go back on chemo and radiation.  Obviously, I was glad to sacrifice anything to be with him and my wife for his treatments, but it definitely took its toll.  Not working our for a month, a lot of stress, nutrition out the window and a pretty nasty stomach bug during it all too.  End result was that he made it through just fine, which is the most important thing by far, but I lost 17 pounds of muscle in 2 months and at least 50% of my strength. 

On top of all that, I have some pretty bad genes when it comes to cardiovascular health.  I recently discovered that my cholesterol is through the roof–215 at age 30.  So rather than go on a boner melting statin, my wife and I decided to go completely vegan to avoid being on medicine for the next 45 yrs if I live that long.

Obviously, at first, I could not get enough protein.  I was barely getting much protein at all, but since then, we’ve figured out some really good meals and supplements that allow me to get the protein I need. 

I’m back in the gym and working on bringing my strength back up.  Its been a struggle, but I am determined to get back to where I was, even on a vegan diet, and then go even further.  Really, the main obstacle was the diet, but my wife figured out how to make these awesome vegan protein bars that are really good and really powerful. 

Now that I am getting roughly enough protein, I feel much more confident that I am supporting my work in the gym and it is encouraging.  I was working out before we got the diet straight, but it was disheartining knowing that I was not going to get enough calories/protein.  Now, my motivation level is high and I’m ready to prove something to myself. 

I’m going re-do my profile to include everything that is different, which is pretty much everything.  I’m going to try and keep track of all workouts also.  We’ll see if I actually have time.  

Haven’t been able to get on bb.com as much recently.  I think it is putting a damper on my enthusiasm.  I’m going to keep working and following my regimen, but for some reason, just not as motivated as in the past.  Maybe some new tunes…….

Chest was decent on Sunday.  Numbers-wise was pretty good, but energy level was the lowest that I can remember in probably the last 6-8 months.  May have been a result of eating a 6-in turkey on wheat sub with my kids before going to the gym–about half hour before!  

My wife spotted me and I did 6X155, 5X165, 5X165, 3X175, 2X185 and 1X200.  She had to help a little on the last set.  I can’t really complain, but last time I felt so strong with my last set at 195 that I even considered going up to 205 for the next workout, but I was really struggling on Sunday just to complete this workout.  Maybe this weekend I’ll feel more energy.  Weighted dips and pushdowns were good, abs were good, incline bench was a real struggle.  After struggling on the flat bench that incline was really tough–8X145, 6X150, 4X155.  

Well, tonight I have some time to check out some videos, maybe some new tunes and hopefully that will get me fired up for tomorrow.  Back to the rack for squats…you better come ready on squat day, or else……………

Squats:  6X225, 5X245, 5X245, 3X255, 2X265, 1X275 = pain.  My legs are hurting today.  As a matter of fact, I am not going to do my deadlift workout tomorrow.  I went much lower than usual after reading that in a powerlifting meet your hip/thigh joint must go below your knee/thigh joint for it to be considered a complete lift.  I don’t think I went that low and some reps were better than others, but I definitely improved.  I need an extra day to recover!  That is fine for me.  If I work out too often, I will loose weight.  I will just continue to eat well and be ready to crank it out on Friday.  I’m going to retry my deadlift workout from last week, but hopefully be able to complete the last set at 285 lbs.  

The rest of my workout was really good, nothing terribly special to report, besides the fact that I love doing db pullovers.  It makes me feel like my whole upper body just gets stretched out and then swollen up.  I think that is the idea of the exercise actually.  I’ve hear it described as expanding the rib cage.  

Well, until next time…hope everyone is kicking ass!

I had a great bench workout yesterday.  My wife came and spotted my before she did some cardio.  Always motivating to have my lady spotting!  Again, with these powerlifting workouts, the first exercise has a lot of sets:  6.5.5.3.2.1.  I did 6X155, 5X165, 5X165, 3X175, 2X185, 1X195.  I felt strong and I’m ready to move up next week.  I think I definitely could have pushed up 205 on my last set.  I feel that this workout will have me at 225 by summer.  

I did 8X135, 6X145, and 4X150 on incline bench, then did some weighted dips and some tri pushdowns, superset with weighted hanging leg lifts and then finally some nautilus compound ab crunches.  It was a great workout.

I started loading creatine the day before and I think I could already start to feel the fullness of it.  

Next will be squat specialization.  Ouch.

Today was Day 2 of my new powerlifting routine.  It called for deadlifts in sets of 6,5,5,3,2,1, but I accidentally did 6,5,5,4,3,2,1.

6X225, 5X245, 5X245, 4X255, 3X265, 2X275.  My last set I tried for 285, but I lowered the weight to the floor and couldn’t pick it back up!  I’m pleased with my effort.  And I really think doing this routine is going to help my strength.  I did some shoulder press, some bent over barbell rows, some curls and some reverse hypers.  I was spent after this.  I didn’t even do any abs.

Overall, I am very pleased with my work and I’m glad to be doing something new and different that will hopefully stimulate growth.  We’ll see.  I started creatine back up today and will be loading for 5 days.  Hopefully this will help as well.  I’m really looking forward to the bench specialization workout on Saturday.

I’ve finally decided for the most part the direction I will be taking with my training.  I’m going to start on more of a powerlifting/powerbuilding routine.  I’m actually pretty excited about it.  I do need to get together with some more experience lifters at some point to help critique what I am doing, but I understand the simpler routines that I have read about.  I think this type of workout is what I need to do in order to continue building mass, size, thickness and of course, more strength. 

There are a lot of great articles and programs on bodybuilding.com that I have been reading.  I’ll continue to tweak my progam as I move along.  Right now, I have started the workout that won 2nd place in the "best powerlifting routine" contest on bb.com, I think…or was it another one from an article…not sure.  I have added a couple of things to it and like I said, I will be modifying as I go along to figure out the best mix of lifts for me. 

Since I had already done a chest and tri’s workout this weekend, I started with the squat specialization workout.  instead of doing the 6.5.5.4.3.2.1 sets they described, I tried the 20 rep squat.  I didn’t make it!  I put 215 on the bar and got to rep #8 and was like, oh shiait!  This is not good.  I began my deep breaths on #9 and was able to push through to #16 and that was it.  I really should have kept going on, but I just have this fear of vomiting in the cage.  I just don’t want to do it. 

Next was db pullovers.  I only used a 75 lb db.  I haven’t done those for a while so I expect to move up on those.  I am incredibly sore today.  then I went heavy on leg curls.  I moved up to 170 and did a set of 8, then 6, then moved down to 160 and did 8 and then a burnout set immediately at 110.  It was really great.  There were only 3 plates left on the leg curl machine!  I also moved up on standing calf raises to 320.  that was really tough, but I am not sore today.  did some shrugs and abs and that was it. 

I’m actually really excited about this routine.  I really like the idea of powerlifting better than bodybuilding.  It is even something that I would consider competing in one day (if I get a lot stronger!)  Heavy metal and powerlifting–its a good life!

Yesterday was very discouraging.  Ever since I hit my highest weight of 172, I have gradually been losing weight, about .5 lb per week or so.  I was down to 169 yesterday and I don’t know what is wrong.  Even though I did have a pretty bad cold last week, I pretty much stayed on my diet, although I know I missed a little bit here and there.  I don’t get it.  I’ve been increasing both squats and deadlifts and my diet has been as good as ever, yet I am slowly losing size.  Very frustrating. 

I generally eat like this:

shredded wheat, 24g ON Whey, 10 oz milk, ON opti man, flax oil and joint supp for breakfast.

1 can of tuna and a piece of wheat bread ~ 10:00 am

chicken, rice/quinoa, and vegetables for lunch, I’m guessing about 35 grams of protein on average

protein bar and wheat bread ~ 3:30 or 4:00.

dinner is about the same as lunch

glass of milk before bed at about 10:00

I know I need to add eggs in the morning.  I plan to do that.  I should also be more careful with my afternoon snack–sometimes its only a 10g protein bar and bread for a total of 14 grams–that’s not enough.  Maybe a natural pb sandwich with my milk before bed.  I’ve got to do something.  I’ve set a new goal weight of 175 by April 17th.  I know creatine will help when I add that back in on the 21st of this month.  I took a month off of it. 

After having a fever for 3 days and taking off since Tuesday, I was skeptical about being able to hit the gym Saturday.  It went really well though.  I started with incline and did a set with 75 lb db’s, then 70s for the last two sets.  I moved to an Atlantis chest press machine and was surprised how easy it felt to do 180.  After a set with 180, I decided to load it up and put 230 on there.  I got two hard sets of five and it felt great.  I did a set of 8 and a set of 6 with 100 on the decline cable press and then a set of 10 with 90.  I’m not sure what 100 or 90 means on that machine, but it was my best performance on that one so far, so it was good.  

I did 2 sets of weighted dips and then one set with bw and then moved to flyes.  I tried rotating my wrists outside-in this time as suggested by a friend.  I don’t know if it made much of a difference, but what did make a difference was focusing on the stretch and going down as far as possible.  On the last rep of the last set I just let it stretch all the way out and kept it there as long as I could.  I’m am extremely sore today.  I think that is the key-really focusing on the stretch.  I’ve had a lot of trouble with flyes and so I’m glad to have it figured out better.  I still definitely miss having a pec deck in the gym though.  I really felt like you could burn it out much better there than with db’s.  

At the end, I did some tri pressdowns superset with weighted hanging leg raises.  It was really a good workout especially coming out of a cold that’s the worst I’ve had in years.  I still have a lot of congestion going on and hopefully that will go away soon.  I’ve been killin the zycam, vit c, echinachea, green tea, etc…so hopefully it won’t be much longer…  

it sucks–all 5 of us are sick–Daddy (me), Mommy, Hannah, Isaac and David.  Running fevers, coughing–just feeling miserable.  I guess hopefully, since we all have it now, we’ll all get rid of it around the same time.

I probably won’t get to the gym until Saturday it looks like.  I hate that.  So, I’ll be out for a while, but I’ll be on bodyspace, wishing I was in the gym and when Saturday rolls around, I’ll be fired up.

I’ve been continuing to crank it up with deadlifts.  It seems like my strength is just increasing each time.  Probably because its still a relatively new exercise for me.  I’ve only been using the bar (as opposed to cable machines) for less than one year.  Today I had to use the MaxRack, which is not ideal, but not too bad either.  My goal was actually the same as for my squat workout Friday–I wanted to hit 5 sets of 5 at 245.  But when I did a set at 215, I felt like I could go up easily, so I went up to 265.  Even after that, I felt pretty strong still, so I went up to 285.  This was killer.  I was sweating like a fountain and on the 4th rep, my form really started to fall apart, so I ended there, so as not to snap something.  Went back down to 265 and finished out the last two sets of 5 and it was really hard. I don’t think I’ve ever produced that much sweat in the Iron Dungeon yet.  

I’m really happy to be able to say that I pulled 285.  When I first started deadlifts with the bar less than a year ago, I was working out with 155 and it was pretty hard.  Then I increased my strength to where I was up to 185 and sometimes 195, but my grip was failing.  My wife and kids bought me a belt and some wrist straps for Christmas this year and suddenly, I jumped up to 225.  It took a while for my back to catch up with my grip ability with the straps, but it did and now I keep pushing it up each time.  This has got to be helping me increase my strength and hopefully, my weight.  

I also did bent over rows for the first time.  I’ve known that I need to do these for a long time, but I just haven’t figured a good place to work them in.  My friend suggested that I just do them before or after deadlifts, alternating.  So I did them today for the first time.  I used a cable machine with pulleys on the floor and that worked pretty well.  Next time, I’ll use the bar.  

Biceps were fine, nothing special.  I’ve struggled to go over the 170-171.5 mark.  I’m sure when I get back on creatine on the 21st, I will start to increase again.  Each time I’ve restarted creatine so far I’ve put on about 5 lbs.  So we’ll see.