Good Morning Karla,
Just started this forum today and wanted to stop in and say hello. Great job on the pullups. I can just do 6 and that is with help from a cord around my knee helping me
Faye
Hiya Faye and welcome to the forum.
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The BIGGER I get the smaller you look
SuperSet 1
incline Arnold db press
3x15 (15)e
cable shoulder swings
3x15 (1 or 2 plates) each arm
Superset2
prone jack-knife with push up
3x15
Medicine ball cobras
3x30
Seems like a short workout but the exercises took a long time. The shoulder cable flyes were each arm and the medicine ball cobras were weird. I laid on belly flat and he sat on bench. I had a 10lb medicine ball and he an 8lb one. He rolled his ball to me and I had to arch my back and throw (from my forehead) my ball up and over his.
It was hard and probably good for me but I wasn't impressed. I am getting bored of working out now since my strength is so down and since it is so nice outside. I would rather be out running.
He informed me today that I could cut back by 100cals a day if I could manage that. He made sure I understood it was 100cals and not 150 or 200 or whatever other number or excuse I could come up with. Apparently he was waiting for me to hold my 1700 cal commitment for 2 weeks before he granted my permission to go lower. I guess I earned that mistrust.
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The BIGGER I get the smaller you look
Good job sticking with the weights. I know its tough to be inside when the weather is so nice. I am right there with you. My motivation for the gym is fading. If it was not for my goal to train for this marathon and finish NROL all in the same year, I would have stopped the weights weeks ago.
Good job sticking with the weights. I know its tough to be inside when the weather is so nice. I am right there with you. My motivation for the gym is fading. If it was not for my goal to train for this marathon and finish NROL all in the same year, I would have stopped the weights weeks ago.
I think I need to set some sort of weight lifting goal now too. I don't know. Something to keep me motivated in the gym. It is so boring now that I am not lifting heavy. I am pretty sure I would have dropped this if not for the trainer. I can lose weight with cardio after all. All my muscle is gone anyway now....
You and Brent are actually partially to blame for my bad attitude. You guys keep popping out PRs and I can't do that. I mentioned this to my trainer today and he guessed that you were both men. He said that Testosterone is working for ya there and that he could arrange for me to have some of that if I wanted. LOL!
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The BIGGER I get the smaller you look
Well for me the PR's maybe misleading. PR for that type of exercise(ie. 1 1/4 squats, or Bulgarian Deadlifts). Not like a PR on a normal squat or DL. I don't think I could DL 315 now.
Keep your head up, just think after this cut you can then refocus on your next bulk. That is now the fun of lifting for me. I see many people at the gym doing the same weights and exercises day in and day out. I kind of feel sad, that is what I use to do. Now I know there is a much more interesting way of working out. Its nice to have "seasons" to my lifting. Kind of like my running. Training vs just running.
Okay and yet more irony. Just after I typed my "I need a goal" post I headed for home and stopped at the Body Building store on the way for some zero cal carmel dip. (That stuff is like crack man)
Anyway I was in my gym clothing which included a rather tight fitting shirt and shorts I am sporting a rather nice tan as well from the weekend. The store owner (the one who is a bbing trainer that I really respect but won't take clients 'cause he is booked full and only takes on people who show) compliments me on my look. He says I am really looking good. He then looked again hard and asked me what show I was preparing for. I told him no show because I figured I had about a year of training to do before I could show 'cause I wasn't naturally gifted. He appreciated that realistic perspective and seemed impressed with my slow and steady cut progress.
He offered to train me!!! Holy crap.
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The BIGGER I get the smaller you look
I told him that I could not commit to that right away as I am in training with a different trainer. He said to come see him on Sunday and make up my mind what I want to do. There is no question that I want to spend some time learning more about this world and even how competition is done. This trainer is physically located closer to me and he could do a Sunday session with me so I would be rid of my drives to downtown 2x a week during the middle of the week. The only downside is he only does early AM training sessions. I HATE early AM for almost anything. It would not kill me though. Really there is no downside except I really like my current trainer too and will miss him when I leave him. I also have to give 30 days notice to him so I cannot just move to this new trainer this month. It would happen not before Late August timeframe. Still I don't know. I have heard so much about how bad this world of bbing is so I am a bit scared. Scared is good though 'cause it means you are stretching your comfort zone. This always implies growth..... Stay tuned for more as it all unfolds. The fact that he offered this has me on a good high right now.
I rode my bike to work today. I don't have a computer installed on this bike yet so I cannot give exact miles but I clocked it at roughly 27 miles one way in my car last week. It was a pretty awesome ride 'cause I had a meeting about 1/2 way into it. When I first started the ride, the weather was a bit cool for my liking but the sun was coming out and the morning was nothing short of glorious for a ride.
I timed the leave time so that I could be sitting at the court-house in a littlel town about 1/2 way outside in the sun beside these beautiful giant redwood trees for my meeting at 8:00AM. That was so cool and the meeting went awesomely too!! I felt so European sitting there with my bike doing business. It took about 30 minutes to finsh up my agenda with my engineer in Israel and then I jumped back on the bike and made it the rest of the way into my office. The total ride time was around 2.15 hours including my stop and meet. Totally awesome way to start the day and it saves me about 6 bucks in gas since my car gets only 28 mpg or there about.
Since I am a total "lizard" (love the heat), I am really looking forward to the ride home in the 90 degree or more weather. That is what I call a good time.
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The BIGGER I get the smaller you look
Stay tuned for more as it all unfolds. The fact that he offered this has me on a good high right now.
Sometimes it's just nice to have the options.
There's a website - mapmyride.com that you can plot your ride on if you don't want to drive it first. They also do the same for run and walk, but I think the cycling one has elevations as well.
That's very exciting about being offered to be trained by someone who is offically booked 'full' .
Yet can totally understand you're comfy with the current trainer and also : it is totally true that it is a ZOO in the actual bb-world. Barely anyone ever competes w/o being 'assisted' .
What's more, someone I know who competed 'au natural' in a 'au natural' contest was trained by a trainer who only knows how to train assisted people. On chemical assistance you can train harder and cut harder w/o muscle loss. Naturals can't do this. With assistance you aren't even supposed to eat a high fat diet, as the fats in a diet that normally are needed to keep the hormones 'ticking' aren't needed anymore as there's external hormones.. etc. All rules change more or less.
So, what happened to my friend? He lost way more LBM than should have happened when he'd had someone train him who was working with naturals more often. Something to keep in mind before deciding to be trained by that guy. Ask him if he knows how to work with naturals.. at least in case you decided to forgo chemical assistance.
Back to something else.. i love how open & honest you are about your endeavours and paradigm shifts (see the vacation discussion). Mind you , my food preferences are totally different from yours in case you've forgotten . Used to have a 50-60% fat diet for a long time and only NOW am going through that shift where I'm finding a new balance between carb & fat intake while eating a healthy amount of protein.
There's 1 thing though I really would love to persuade you to change! Shift your thinking from doing everything by %s. 40-40-20 is NOT something you have to live or die by. What works best is to set your protein and fat intake as grams per lbs BW (or LBM) and then play with the carbs : more on lifting days, a bit less on cardio days and less again on rest days.
That's a better and more useful approach than trying to hit 40-40-20 (CPF) regardless of calories since that just doesn't make sense. Especially not since protein requirements go down when carbs and calories increase and go up when they carbs/calories decrease. That's called nitrogen balance
Speaking about protein, there's a new book out from Lyle McDonald on the subject and I just saw he added an article about it to his article database Lyle McDonald - Protein Requirements
You might want to read his other articles as well in which he debunks some existing bodybuilding myths.
PS: and I totally forgot to add another comment. Do you eat consistently the same amount of calories/carbs/fats/protein every day? You might want to try calorie cycling with mostly extra carbs added so that you get extra calories on lifting days.
Perhaps you wouldn't lose as much strength then as you are losing now?
Strength loss is not a must on a well-designed diet. Especially not when you eat only slightly below or even above maintenance on lifting days and decrease calories more on rest days. Think about it
Whew... Espi, thanks so kindly for your words of encouragement. Alas my posts are not always understood so it is better perhaps that I don't share them outside of this log so much.
I have switched to a new paradigm some time ago RE macros. Basically I do protein at 170 g a day or better and everything else as I feel it. I am trying to listen to my body more. Today I felt the need to have some fat so I incorporated some peanut butter. Most of the time though I feel the need for carbs. Yesterday I did a 50+ mile bike ride (in two segments) and the last 7 miles where nothing but torture for me as I was so damned hungry. I was craving carbs in a HUGE way. When I got home I ate an entire meal of chicken, yams and veges and then chased it down with a big bowl of hot sweetened oats.
What I am finding out in looking at food this way is that I still end up near or even exactly at 40,40,20. I am not sure if that is because I trained my body to eat or if that really is what my body wants. I tried forcing fats higher and the result of that is I feel heavy and still not satisfied. I am doing some amounts of calorie cycling now too. Yesterday (that big ass ride day) I made sure I was at 2K cal for the day. The day before I was fine at 1500. I am slowly learning to listen to what my body is trying to tell me and not just push through when I feel weak or badly. That said the goal for me is to hit somewhere around 1600 average per day for the week. When I post my stats those are averages not daily actuals. The net here is that I am definately experimenting and trying new things and ways to grow.
With respect to the loss of strength I had an epiphany today at my training session. I am working with a trainer. Part of that process means that I have to adjust my form and when I correct my form it almost always results in my having to reduce weight. A great example was in the tricep push down that I did today. He had me stick my elbows down near my waist and get the movement primarily from my upper arms. That caused me to loss a great deal of leverage (ie strength). I know that some of the folks posting all these PRs are not under the eyes of a trainer and therefore not having to correct their form. They are just upping their weight. That makes a huge difference. Since my cut we have been really focusing on form.
Today I had a kick ass workout with trainer. We did tris and bis and I was feeling very strong.
Warmup on tready .5 miles (3% and 4.7mph)
SuperSet 1
db bench press flat (narrow grip)
1x20 (20lb)e
1x15 (30lb)e
1x12 (35lb)e
db alt curls
3x10 each arm (20lb)e
RE the new trainer.... He only shows in natural shows and was testing just last year. They pulled his card and he had to submit. So he understands the natural thing. His girls always do well and he places 1st in most of the local shows. I can't say if he is on to some sort of training secrets or if he knows how to hide his usage. He claims he is clean.
I would not even attempt to compete in a non-natural show btw. That would be silly. I don't even think I have the body to do well in a natural show without a TON of work.
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The BIGGER I get the smaller you look
I know that some of the folks posting all these PRs are not under the eyes of a trainer and therefore not having to correct their form. They are just upping their weight. That makes a huge difference. Since my cut we have been really focusing on form.
I suspect this is me a good deal of the time. I know with some of the moves that I go higher and likely my form suffers. Of course, I have generally crappy form because my body isn't the one I think I have.
I fall victim to the bad form at times. When I feel myself hit a stride of bad lifts I regroup my focus on the next rep or the next set. If I still can not get the form correct I either drop the weight the next time or stay the same. Your correct though that not working with a trainer or a workout partner makes it easy to cheat/lose focus.
Thanks guys but of course you are fine with my posts or you would not waste your time in here.
It is in other forums that I am often misunderstood actually. This blog is a place where people who get me can chose to come and read and respond and others can just ignore.
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The BIGGER I get the smaller you look
Very true about how when unsupervised by a trainer, form can become crappy in the quest for higher weights or more reps. Falling victim to that myself
Interesting you mention triceps pushdown as it's precisely there I can try to be a bit more strict. Mind you.. it's not always a bad thing, but probably, making it a 'total body exercise' defeats the purpose of doing isolation work for tris/bis etc. Isn't it?
Good to read how you aren't just eating 40-40-20 as planned but also spontaneously. Probably a combination of both nature/nurture
While %s as such are useless for planning, I'm fond of looking at them for average intake and it's more or less consistent 35-30-35 CPF at the moment (formerly 30-30-40 CPF)
I'm a victim of losing form for higher weights at times as well. I like to think that I catch myself a lot of the time, but there's no guarantee to that. I sometimes think that I would really benefit from a trainer, but I don't like what I've seen from the trainers at the gym I go to.
I love reading your log. You're post are insightful and extremely relatable.
Looking good in here, Karla. I agree with you on the trainer thing. Mine is very adamant about form and so I know that helps me to learn from him. He has also done the same thing with me and the triceps.
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Ginger
"The miracle isn't that I finished. The miracle is that I had the courage to start." ~ John Bingham
Was it Anne that predicted I would end up riding to work more than 1 time a week. So today I rode my bike again. This is a killer ss-cardio day. Trainer says it is fine so longn as I keep HR down and eat very well in between the two 1:45 min rides. I get to eat a few more cals on these days so it is all good. Weather here is unbelieveable. 80 degrees by mid afternoon and 45 degrees in the evening and early mornings. Does it get any better?
This morning on the scale I clocked in at 121.8 lbs. That is a new low for me since starting body composition changes. I always weigh a little bit low on Fridays though so we'll see where that settles out for my Tuesday (stats day) report. Still things are moving in the right direction. I am a tiny bit concerned that BF isn't dropping so quickly but I will be paitent and wait it out. I am lifting hard 3 times a week and eating boatloads of protein and keeping cardio HR down so I think I am doing things right... We'll see...
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The BIGGER I get the smaller you look
Espi when is your special day? I turn 45 on Aug 4th.
Hiya Greg! Funny you should mention that. I am lately getting dizzy when I stand up sometimes. But my friend says that is due to my RHR being so low. He says it is pretty common as people get really fit that they cannot stand up very quickly 'cause the heart doesn't pump fast enough. Good for the race but not so good for resting and standing. LOL!!
Otherwise there have been no probs with me physically. I am keeping my cals right at 500k lower than my spend and losing almost exactly 1 lb a week. This really hasn't been so hard on me. I am learning just now though how important that 8 hours of sleep is. My brain says I only need 6 but if I don't get 8 my workouts suffer.
Logging today's activity (all cardio I'm afraid)
AM: Bike ride for 1:45 min at HR 150ish average (whoops)
Noon: 1 hour easy walk
PM: Bike ride for 1:45 min at HR TBD (I am going to shoot for no more than 140)
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The BIGGER I get the smaller you look
?
. Used to have a 50-60% fat diet for a long time and only NOW am going through that shift where I'm finding a new balance between carb & fat intake while eating a healthy amount of protein.
I wish I could say I'm as fit as you at my age, but you're kicking my butt!
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