mikschu’s BodyBlog

It’s been about 2 months (9 weeks) on Madcow’s linear 5×5.  It’s been pretty good. 

Lifting stats grew as follows:
Squat: 185×3 -> 225 x 3

Bench: 165×3 -> 200×3

bent over row: 165×3 -> 190 x 3 (but I stopped the rows, I’m doing power cleans instead for now.)

Deadlift: 5×247 -> 5x 300

Standing military press: 5×95 -> 5×115

I’ve gained about 10 lbs, I could only do about 6 or 7 pullups at the start and now I can do 10 or 11 on a max effort set.  Not too worried about where the other assistance exercises are (i.e. curls, extensions, yadda yadda).

I’m pretty excited about these gains.  I haven’t sat down to write it out like yet, but now that I see it, it’s pretty huge.  Everything went up by about 21% from the start, that’s a lot for 2 months.  Hopefully I can perpetuate these gains.  I may try deloading and resetting the weight just a tad so I can keep seeing gains. 

I’m changing my goals.  It’s hot up in her.  I need to lose some of the fatz.  I’m going to just start cutting down, teh fatz have to go.  I’ll eat 500 calories of protein and fibre every day, stop lifting, and just run 22 miles a day.  vaporize teh fatzzztztztzz.

-shoe

First day on this biatch.  I found an altered version that subs bent over rows for high pulls, which I like because I love rows.  Anyway, I’m super-stoked about the program.  The reading was awesome and very informative.  I accidently ****ed up todays workout and loaded too much weight on the three lifts; bench press, bent over row, and squats.  I worked up to my 5 rep max on the fifth set.  Afterwards I went over the reading again and even found a template to guide my progress, I was supposed to go quite a bit lighter today than I did.  Oh well, no biggie (I hope).  I’ll just continue on as if I followed the guide, which means I’ll actually be lifting a lot less on next Monday’s workout, but after a few weeks I’ll work up to and even pass all the 5 rep PRs that I essentially hit today.

I think I got the nutrition aspect down…  I eat, and then I eat more, and then I eat again, and again, and again…  I eat a lot, every day.  I’m not cycling, I just eat until I feel like my body is satisfied (plus a little extra to be safe).  I don’t care about gaining a bit of fat right now, because even without a focused program I’ve put on some solid mass in the last month or so.  Now with a great, focused, and professionaly made program I am sure I will see results for a while and the scale will move up consistently.  I’ve never been over 200 (as far as I can remember, even when I was fat it was more of a skinny fat), so I’m excited to see what it feels like to get up there.

Ok now that I have your attention, haha!  Well the topic is sort of correct, I don’t mean bodyblog intercourse, but rather male/female bodyblogs.  I just think it’s kind of funny to look through people’s bodyblogs and see that girls usually have like 4 guys responding to every bodyblog, whereas guys usually have ZERO responses to theirs.  Thought I would just poin this out.  Guys, you’re not getting anything for the extra attention.

How many calories do I need?  What % of calories need to be carbs, fat, and protein?  When do I eat?  How often do I eat?  When do I work out, AM or PM?  How often?  What program?  What’s the most efficient protein?  What do I eat my protein with?  What if I drink too much water?  Too little?  What if I run too far?  What if I don’t do enough reps?
What if we stop treating this like some equation that needs to be perfectly balanced and just do what feels right?!?!?! 

This has been my approach lately, and it has worked wonders for me better than anything.  Yeah I’m eating wisely and getting plenty of protein, fats, and carbs and the timing is right on everything as far as pre/post workout nutrition goes, but I’ve stopped trying to overthink everything and have started going by how everything feels.  I’m going for hypertrophy, which means 10 reps is ideal for me.  But if I get down there and feel like doing 15 reps, then I’m going to do 15 reps!  I’ve stopped worrying about getting everything scientifically perfectly, and I’ve stopped counting calories and trying to get an optimum macronutrient breakdown.  All of this has led to the best results I’ve seen in a long time.  I eat a lot more when I feel like I need more, and on some days when I don’t feel like I need a lot, I eat less…  I’m inadvertantly carb cycling but I’m not treating it like some equation or strict rule that I have to follow, I’m just going by what my body tells me.  This has worked better than anything. 

I guess I just have a very great appetite that is very efficient at telling me how much or how little I need.  Ever since doing this I’ve had a much easier time controlling night-time cravings and actually haven’t had any crazy sweet binges.  I allow myself deserts when I feel like having some, but it usually just ends up being something small and then I’m satisfied.  I don’t eat to feel full, but I eat to feel satisfied.  I’ve been loading weights up on every movement and hitting all kinds of new personal bests.  All other activities (running, swimming, etc.) have been going really well also.

I’m not a body-builder, there’s no need for me to try to get everything perfect anymore.  This is a much happier approach to the healthy lifestyle (for me anyway) and it’s paying off.  I’m done dieting, I can’t do it anymore and no one should be "on a diet" for too long of a period of time.  They aren’t meant to last your whole life, you use it to get to your goal and then you just need to learn to eat normal (but still healthy) to maintain.  I’m done with the yo-yo diet/binge lifestyle.

For the first time in several months I decided to hold back on doing a long HIIT workout, instead I slowed down and ran the whole trail without stopping (save for a couple of water breaks).  It really felt great to just do a slow and steady run for once.  I forgot the feeling of an endurance workout.  Nothing gets you a runners high like trying to run for an hour straight, and I definitely had plenty of endorphines dumping into the blood.  I think I’m going to go back to just doing this every Sunday while keeping the other two run days HIIT and mile-repeat days.  With three days of full body circuits and one rest day, that should keep me happy for a while. 

A friend is going to show me some Kettle-Bell workouts this week, I’m pretty excited about it.  It sounds exactly like what I’ve been wanting to do lately (i.e. very high rep puke circuits).  So if I really like it i may end up taking my wallet out and joining the kettle-bell band-wagon.  Besides it will be so different, I’m guaranteed to see some good results in the beginning.  Who knows, maybe it would be a good idea to switch between kettle-bells and traditional weight lifting every so often, like in half-year cycles or something.  That would certainly keep the workouts fresh and keep the body from getting used to one boring workout routine.

Ever since I gave up the idea of "being on a diet" and just started listening to my own appetite to dictate how much food to eat I’ve been having a much easier time staying clean and avoiding junk.  I don’t count calories and try not to pay too much attention to how much is in something.  This doesn’t mean I’m just eating whatever the hell I want, I still eat clean healthy food and avoid things that would ruin a diet, but if I eat a meal and still feel hungry afterwards, I’ll find some more food and eat until I feel like I’m really done.  I don’t stuff myself to satiation, but I just eat until I feel like I’ve had enough.  It goes the other way too, if I’m eating and I feel like I don’t need to finish the meal, I throw the rest away or save it for later.  I stick to the 5 or 6 meal a day plan, eating a meal every 2 to 3 hours.  So basically I’m eating like a dieter, but I’m not on a diet, and I don’t freak out about how many calories are in something.

The results: success!  I feel great, I have energy, and I feel like I’m getting back into a great relationship with food.  I don’t have nearly as many cravings and at night time I don’t feel like eating very much.  That’s big for me because whenever I’m thinking like I need to cut calories to trim body-fat, I get really wicked night-time sweet cravings, and they usually win (I’m only human), but now I don’t feel like that at all.  And I let myself have my deserts once in a while, but now that they don’t come as often I can enjoy them more for what they are: an occasional treat.

I haven’t even mentioned the best part.  The workouts are feeling much better and more energetic.  I’m really outperforming myself on every workout.  I’m done with cutting calories to try to drop some BF%, it doesn’t work for me.  It gets inside my head and screws with my cravings and makes me want to eat ****.  I’m better off with the more natural approach, I have a pretty good connection with my appetite and can listen to it when it’s telling me to eat more or less.  And that works a lot better for me than any calorie schedule or macronutrient break-down.  I can even feel when I need to eat more meat for protein, more carbs, or more fat.  Who knew our brains and bodies were so good at controlling the intake without any food scales or measuring cups?

I’m tired of worrying about everything I put in my mouth.  From now on I’m eating until I feel like I’ve had enough.  No I’m not stuffing myself until I’m "full," as I know eating to fullness every time will result in waste-growth.  But If I really feel hungry after eating a meal that seemed like not enough, then I’m going back for seconds.  If I feel like it’s too much then I’m not finishing it.  I’m just going to eat like a normal human being and stop counting calories for a little while.  I’m getting sick of it, it takes too much energy and it’s even taking a toll on my mental well being.  To elaborate on that a little bit, I’m starting to become a dieter!!!  I don’t want to diet, I don’t want to be that for the rest of my life.  So I’m taking a hiatus on that for a while, maybe forever.  Humans aren’t supposed to count every single thing that goes into their mouth and if we do that for the rest of our lives I think it’s called an eating disorder.  The last thing I want is to develop a complex about what I eat.  I’m at the point where I’ll skip meals with the family just because it’s not healthy enough, or something was cooked in butter…

Well screw it!  I’m done with that, it’s BS and I hate it.  All I want is to eat enough food to have plenty of energy when I’m lifting weights, running, or swimming.  I love being active and I just want to be athletic.  So I don’t really care if I can’t see my abs, because I would take performance over showmanship any day!  It’s our stupid cultures fault, every guy wants a 6-pack and every girl wants to get rid of her cellulite. 

Come on people, let’s just be normal and have a fun, healthy, active life, and forget about what our tummies look like in the mirror, because it’s really not the most important thing.

Hilly trail running today.  Last week I broke the whole run (about 5 miles) up into intervals and did a sort of hybrid long-distance / high intensity interval workout.  Instead of doing really short sprints though I would just find a good upbeat song (generally between 3 and 4 minutes long) and just run as fast as I could for the whole song, then slow down for a minute or so to rest (sometimes had to walk).  It felt awesome and I’m going to do it again today.  I’m probably running about as fast as I would if I were doing a mile as fast as I could, but by taking more frequent breaks I’m keeping it up for several miles.  Last time it felt great, should be able to go faster and not require as much downtime this time around.  I’ll probably jump in the pool for 5 or 10 laps just to relax my body after the run…  Go time!

I started a little swimming the other day, I did it after a pretty intense HIIT workout around the neighboorhood.  I had to idea how fast I would get out of breath from swimming!  I was doing breast stroke, and I was kind of trying to go fast, so that’s probably why I got winded so easily…  But still, I expected to go longer before I had to slow down or stop and take a break.  I jumped in again later on towards the evening and did some more laps, this time I was able to pace myself just a little bit better, plus I had some time to eat and rest from the morning’s sprint workout.  I was able to last longer but after a while I could definitely feel a burn in my arms.  Getting ready now for the gym; it’s going to be overhead squats, torso twists, decline bench, and chinups.  Then I’ll finish off with some meat-head movements (a couple sets of curls and tricep extensions).

Adios!