CPT Jeff’s BodyBlog

As I sit here at 2330 hrs in Kuwait, wondering how many more times the wireless signal I’m using is going to drop by the time I finish this, I think about how slow time is moving, and that this place seems to suck the life right out of you…  I look to the blogs of my friends (like Roger and Ryan) for motivation as it’s nowhere else in sight in Kuwait.  There is nothing required of us at this point other than waiting for the next freedom flight out of here.  As I mentioned before there are things that we can do to pass the time, like hitting the gym, playing games, trying to use the internet (mostly unsuccessfully), or watching movies.  But then there’s the rest of the day to deal with.  While most might view this as relaxing, most of us find it extremely boring.  However, as in the title of this blog, here’s another day done in Kuwait, which brings me one day closer to the flight, and one day closer to home.

As expected, I was able to hit the gym today, and to add a little spice we put together a game of volleyball.  We’re expecting to run another game of volleyball tomorrow.  It was good exercise and we were able to burn up a few hours and work up a pretty good appetite.

Today was shoulders and legs day.  I made a point of pushing myself harder on the squats to catch up to Ryan (someday).  I was able to get up to 8 reps at 235 lbs, which was better than last time.  I would try to look up what that equates to in a calculated 1RM, but that would take another hour on this wireless connection.

Tomorrow is back and biceps.  I’m looking forward to doing some more deadlifts and will take out all of my frustration with the wireless internet on my biceps.  I expect that I will be very sore by the time we start playing volleyball again.

As I’ve mentioned to a couple of people already, I’m no longer in Iraq…  Yea!!!!  I’ve moved with the rest of my unit to Kuwait where we are waiting for a flight back to the states.  There’s not much to do here in Kuwait, but they do try.  They have facilities set up for watching movies, playing video games, playing cards, pool, shuffle board and other games.  They also have some fast food places, like Pizza Hut and McDonalds, and they are very close to getting it right, but it’s still not home.  They also have two tents set up with cardio equipment and weights.  

Needless to say, I conned one of the people in my unit to go with me so that I could have a spotter, the proceeded to do chest and triceps.  It wasn’t among the best workouts that I’ve had, but it was good and I was able to hit 305 again.  I’m hoping that my next bench session will get me back to the 320 that I hit before…  I’ve got about two months left to hit that goal.  

Tomorrow I’ll be hitting shoulders and legs (yes, squats as well), and Friday I should be hitting back and biceps.  I’m not sure when our flight out of here will be, but I think that the next time I do chest and triceps, it will be back in the land of the free and the home of the brave…  

One final note, I do appreciate everyone’s kind words and thoughts while I’ve been deployed.  I wish I would have joined earlier in my deployment.  You all have been incredibly supportive, encouraging, and inspiring.  Thank you…

It’s really been four days since I wrote anything.  Time has really been flying by now that my replacement is here.  I’ve handed over all the duties and have been making myself scarce so that they can run with the job and spending a lot of time at the gym.  Speaking of which, on Tuesday I did chest and triceps, that was a good workout.  Wednesday I did some squats, deads, rows, and a bunch of other stuff, then jumped into biceps and smoked them for about an hour. 

Yesterday it was back to interval running.  I was on the treadmill for 77 minutes, burned off about 700 calories, hit between 10 and 10.5 miles/hour fifteen times for at least 40 seconds per time, but more often than not up to a minute.  Then I would scale back to a walk to get my heart rate back down to about 125, then I’d kick it back up and get my heart rate up to about 160.  After getting all sweaty on the treadmill, I hit the decline crunch bench again.  I really, really like that bench.  I first did 80 decline crunches, then did 50 russian twists on the same bench.  Then I laid back so that I was horizontal but not resting on the bench, and did 20 crunches.  Lastly I did 30 alternating oblique crunches… 

Well, it’s off to another chest and tricep day…  I love bench day….  Rock want’s me to add another 5 lbs to my PR…  Wish me luck…

We have at this point handed most of the daily responsibilities and tasks over to our replacements.  They are running full steam ahead and just about ready for us to disappear into the night.  I’ve started telling some of my Soldiers that they should planning on not coming in to work.  The new crew has this and is ready for flight.

While most of my Soldiers can now sit back and relax until we hit our freedom flight home, I will be stopping by work for a few hours each day to check in on the new guys to make sure that they don’t have any questions, and to update my workouts and blogs (obviously)….  The extra free time that I’ll be seeing outside of work should give me more time at the gym to get those extra two or three sets that Stryka spoke of…  just to prove a point… 

Well, yesterday was back and biceps.  It was a pretty good workout, but will be better/harder/more intense next time.  Today was my day off from the iron, so I did some interval training on the treadmill.  I’m actualy kind of impressed at how much better I did with it today as compared to last week.  So, I pushed myself harder to get more intervals in, and got them.  Then I finished up with some decline sit ups (75) followed by some decline twists (50), and a few more alternating lateral decline sit ups (30)…  It felt good…  What will feel better is that tomorrow is chest and tricep day….  which means, back to the bench!!!!  I can’t friggen wait…  I’m going to smoke the bench, then I’m going to smoke my triceps…

Over the last two to three months there have been days where we’ve scrapped by on each shift with only two people and have worked hard while doing it…  We are now swamped with people as we have two units doing one job.  Us that are providing the training and those who are receiving the training.  The really funny part is that it brings back the memory of when we first got here and the chaos that ensued as we were training up.

To help them pick things up better, I took off yesterday during the day for about 3 hours.  It was chest and tricep day and I wasn’t going to miss that…  I did go very light on the weights and kept the reps low.  I was still feeling the workout from Tuesday and I think some of the pain from screwing up on Tuesday.  It seems that my elbows hurt some.  I’m hoping that with a little rest and some light work, that’ll go away. 

Today is shoulders and legs day, so I don’t think that I’ll be putting too much stress on my elbows.  Also, as I start spinning down here, I’ll be spending less time at work and more time elsewhere, including the gym… 

I didn’t get any chance yesterday to write anything, but I did manage to get to the gym on both Wednesday (very good workout doing biceps and squats and deadlifts).  Then on Thursday I did my second interval training of the week.  I counted this time and did 10 sets of 30 to 60 second sprints (depending on how each felt), then rested for a little bit.  And for Rock23 and Stryka, I did two more sets just to push myself…  Then I did 80 situps, and some crunches, and some more situps….  Yeah, it was a good workout…

Groundhog day has been the running theme over here in my little corner of the International Zone in Iraq for the last year.  Well, today we woke up to a different song on the radio.  Our replacements are here and it’s only a matter of time before we hand them the keys to the building and remind them to shut the lights off when they leave.  It’s an awesome feeling.

Well, even though yesterday was a little screwed up I still managed to get biceps in before dinner.  Then I went back to the gym later and hit squats and some deadlifts.  I’ve never done deads before and even though I started light (really, really light), I still felt the areas where it targets. 

Today, when I get a chance, I’ll be heading over to do some intervals on the tredmill.  This is one of those workouts that I’ve got to kick myself in ass to go do, but I’ve been getting a lot of additional help lately with motivation. 

Tomorrow will be even more difficult as we have the training that we will start with the new unit as well as an awards ceremony for our unit.  Then after dinner, we have a get together which normally lasts for a good two hours.  If I get to the gym at all tomorrow it’s going to be very late.  That’s a big bummer as tomorrow is chest and tri’s…  meaning back to the bench…

Let me begin with the good part….  I hit a new PR on bench yesterday.  I felt very solid on the flat bench, and when I hit 57.5 kg on either side of the bar I was still going strong.  So I grabbed a fellow gym rat and asked him to spot me on two more sets.  I hit 60 kg on either side, then 62.5 kg.  Damn that was heavy. 

And now, for something completely different.  It’s said that a person can drown in as little as three inches of water.  As I said, I had a spotter with those two heavy sets on the flat bench.  I even had a spotter when I did the peak set on both incline and decline.  I like to think of myself as a safety conscience person, partly because of my military training (stressed heavily in the military) and partly because I really don’t like pain. 

So on the last set of decline bench, which was the last of three chest exercises I did, I didn’t ask someone to spot me.  I figured that I was dropping down by 25 kg, and that this would be easy compared to what I had just done.  That was the first stupid thing I did.  The second was when I tried to get one more.  Holy sh#t was that stupid.  While I did take 25 kg off to do this last set, I should have remembered that it was still 265 lbs that I was pressing and it was the 23 total set.  I got the bar up to the pegs but not over them…  My arms and chest had had enough.  The bar slowly came down, landed on the left side of my face (I had turned my head) and I had to struggle to get out from underneath it. 

As embarrassed, and stupid, and humiliated as I feel about this, I felt it very important to share so that others can learn from my mistake (I sure have).  I think that its my ego that’s probably bruised more than my face, but I was very lucky that I didn’t really get injured.  I’ll be kicking myself in the a$$ for a while on this one…

So, the moral of the story…  Don’t be stupid, even when you go down in weight, you can still injure yourself.  It only takes a second to ask someone in the gym to spot you, and generally everyone is always happy to assist. 

Stay smart, keep the faith…

I like to run, I like to run, I like to run, I like to run…  If I say it enough, I may eventually believe it.  Because, really, I hate running….

I have been needing to add cardio into my workouts for months now and have been putting it off because I really don’t like it.  I know that there are other cardio exercises that I could do in place of running, however, running is the best cardio exercise there is, from a total body workout.  What makes this even worse, and I don’t know why this is happening yet, the muscles on the outside-front of my shins keep getting rock hard (to the point of being painful) very quickly (within the first two minutes of a light jog) and I have to stop to stretch them out.  If I don’t and try to just muscle through the pain, my feet will eventually fall asleep, then I’m screwed.

So today I tried something different.  Today is one of my two rest days from hoisting the iron, so I decided to hit one of the tredmills at the gym.  As I expected, the front of my calves locked up again and I had to stretch them out to loosen them up.  Then I started doing 30 to 40 second intervals.  I would kick the tredmill up to about 10.5, and as soon as it was going at that pace I would start the 30 second count down.  After which I would slow the machine down to about 2.7 to walk it out for a little bit.  That also gave me a little opportunity to stretch my legs some more.  As soon as I dropped the speed I red my heart rate, mostly at 167 after each time.  I’d let it get down to about 125 then I’d kick the speed back up to around 10.

I was on the tredmill for 75 minutes when I decided that was enough.  I had burned around 650 calories, hit those peaks at least 10 times (wasn’t counting - was watching Fantastic Four on gym TV) and thought to myself, I can do this.  So, starting today, Monday’s and Thursday’s will now be my interval cardio days…  I’m going to try and limit myself to this to see what improvements I can make with doing this just two days a week.  After I was done on the tredmill I did about 15 minutes of abs work.  That felt good as well….

Hey Rock23, keep up the motivational blogs, I have a feeling that I’ll be needing them.  Why, because I hate (I mean) love running….

And the definition of a complete waste of time is…  being forced to go to a townhall meeting at the new embassy compound (I could write a book on the things that vex me about that place) with the topic being life inside the new embassy compound when I’m not even allowed access to the new embassy compound without an escort.  And even if they did say something that had any relavance to me at all, which they didn’t, with only about two weeks left, my attention span for these irrelavent events dwindles….  The part that really burns me is that it cut my gym time short, and while I gained no benefit from this useless meeting, I do gain from going to the gym. 

I did manage to get at least 90 minutes in.  I would have preferred to be there longer, but I’ll take what I can get.  I did my back and bicep routine.  I had to go 30 minutes earlier just so that I could get the 90 minutes in, which meant that I went to the gym on a pretty full stomach (from lunch).  So, when I took that one scoop of Black Powder I really didn’t notice anything this time.  I think that before I hit the gym tomorrow (bench day) I’ll eat a much lighter lunch so I can take the Black Powder on an empty stomach to see what the difference really is. 

I started out with Lat pull downs, then one arm dumbbell rows.  I was going to move on to the t-bar, but someone else was using it.  So, I sub’ed bent over dumbbell rows.  I think I need to change things up more often as I’m still feeling that one today.  After these I did a couple sets of wide-grip pull ups, then moved on to biceps.  It was a good session and, like my back, I’m still feeling them today, but I wasn’t able to do as much as what I did last Wednesday.  I think that I’m able to do more with my biceps on Wednesdays because the compound exercises that I do on Wednesdays don’t tax my biceps as much as what I do on Sundays. 

Well, today’s a rest day, no lifting, and I feel like I can use it.  However, as I mentioned before, I really need to start kicking up the cardio.  So, I think that I’ll take the opportunity today to do some running.  It may only be on a tredmill in the gym, but any is better than nothing, and I’ll likely finish it up with some abs work.

And the number one way to make fruit punch flavored Black Powder taste even worse is….   by mixing it with grape Gatoraide.  Wow, bad move…  Although, I still managed to choke it down. 

Ok, so Saturday is shoulders and legs day, but I was running late getting to the gym.  I didn’t get there until about 3:30pm, and jumped right in with the shoulder press machine.  I really don’t like that machine, but it gets me around not having a spotter.  I think that on the other day I do shoulders I’ll switch it up with the dumbbell should press.  I did add a couple more exercises into the shoulder routine, and felt pretty good doing them.  After shoulders I jumped over to the leg press.  I’m starting to get some funny looks each time I put seven plates on either side.  Oh well, at some point I’ll move to doing squats instead. 

After I finished the leg routine, and since I really had nothing better to do over here, I hopped on a treadmill for another 30 minutes.  I’m not a huge cardio guy, lets face it I dislike running.  So, I started out just walking at a fast pace with the elevation up to 3.5.  That got my heart rate up to about 135.  I really do need to kick up the cardio routine if I’m going to make any progress on getting my body fat down. 

All in all, it was a good 2.5 hour night at the gym.  Today is going to be a little more difficult.  I have to be at the New Embassy Compound at 1700 for a townhall meeting.  I’m going to try to disappear by 1330 so that I’m not losing any quality gym time.  It’s back and bicep day and I’m not going to cheat myself out of that…