Tenacious DM and the Log of Destiny

[beesknees]

Wow! totes awsum.

Keep up the good work. Reading about your progress (and others here) progress helps me stay motivated. I am slowly creepin' towards the low 140's myself.

[Bytsi]

Hey DM - thanks for the PN snippet - that was helpful for me too!
Also YAY on the little fat lump starting to melt away - your consistency will win the battle!

[DirtyMartini]

Thanks, everyone, for your kind words & encouragement. It does keep me going. And, having this keeps me accountable.

Breaking News: I weighed in at 142.0 this morning. YEAH! Lowest weight since 1995, fittest body evar. So my whole week was spent around 144.2-144.4 and I was starting to wonder WTF was going on. I knew I was getting smaller - just took the scale about 4-5 days to catch up.

John was standing next to me when I weighed myself, and he said, "whoa, is that the lowest you've ever been?" and I thought he was being sarcastic (why am I so hard on myself?). I wasn't wearing my glasses/contacts so I couldn't see the number and said, "are you kidding?" and he said, "would I lie?" I thought it was funny.

Did Fat Loss I Workout B-1 yesterday

Barbell Deadlift
3x15x115 (will increase weight next time)

Incline Bench Press
1x15x25e
2x15x20e

Bulgarian Split Squat
3x15x20e (UGH!)

Mixed Grip Lat Pulldown (I always get nauseous doing these around rep 8-9. Disgusting burps arrived on the 2nd set. GAH.)
3x15x80

Romanian Deadlift
3x15x95 (increase weight next time)

Lateral Roll (these are hard and as a result my motion was very limited on these )
3x15 very sad lateral rolls

[DirtyMartini]

Originally Posted by T-Put

You have tended to extremes before. You really get into the things you're interested in and learn a lot and then you become hard on yourself for not adhering to best practices. Maybe this contributes to losing perspective and maybe some specific, realistic, achievable, measurable, time oriented goals would help. It takes dedication to be so committed and we all know that you can't get anywhere valuable in life w/o being dedicated.

I wanted to mention this because you reminded me of something - Lyle McDonald has a book titled Guide to Flexible Dieting that I found really helpful. He talks about planning and refeeds and how they provide physical and psychological breaks to help with dieting over the long haul.

A snippet is here - Lyle McDonald - Flexible Dieting Excerpt

I've enjoyed his stuff. I need a mental break from the fitness/nutrition/numbers stuff i've been reading lately (hence the photography) but will read his Ketogenic book next. Looks really interesting.


John's been doing Lyle's Rapid Fat Loss and I'm just so impressed at his dedication/adherence as well as results. He looks fantastic and he helps me feel inspired to keep on keepin' on. Initially I thought there was no way I'd do the rapid fat loss plan but now I'm thinking I might do it just to lose these last 5-7 pounds of fat and get it over with, so I can focus on strength. I'm still mulling it over because I have SUCH a hard time mentally on VLC diets. I don't know if I want to do that to myself. But it might be better to push through it for a few weeks rather than spend the next 2-3 months wading my way through these last few pounds of fat loss.... we'll see.

[stingo]

Originally Posted by DirtyMartini

Breaking News: I weighed in at 142.0 this morning. YEAH! Lowest weight since 1995, fittest body evar. So my whole week was spent around 144.2-144.4 and I was starting to wonder WTF was going on. I knew I was getting smaller - just took the scale about 4-5 days to catch up.

See, that one beer didn't hurt too much. Congrats.

[Bytsi]

Breaking News: I weighed in at 142.0 this morning. YEAH! Lowest weight since 1995, fittest body evar. So my whole week was spent around 144.2-144.4 and I was starting to wonder WTF was going on. I knew I was getting smaller - just took the scale about 4-5 days to catch up.

WHOOOOOT!!!!

I JUST got Lyle's Flexible Dieting book in the mail yesterday - read the first 3 chapters last night... I really think it's the kind of info I need, as I tend to be "on" or "off" my diet program, and I have NO idea how to do cheat / treat meals or even take a week break from dieting without losing it (either panicking or falling completely off the wagon)...

[DirtyMartini]

I need to read it again (and maybe a 3rd time) to really catch everything. I really liked it though.

The first thing I read by him was something Phaedrus linked to a while back and I thought it was really interesting. So my first impression of (or, introduction to) Lyle was that he was the guy who made me feel a little better about steady-state. He knocked some sense into me regarding the "all or nothing" mentality with cardio - I felt like if I was going to do cardio, it should be intervals or nothing at all.

Here are the links to the blog posts:
Lyle McDonald - Steady State vs. Interval Training: Getting to the point Part 1 | Lyle McDonald Speaks
and
Lyle McDonald - Steady State vs. Interval Training: Getting to the point Part 2 | Lyle McDonald Speaks
and
Lyle McDonald - Steady State vs. Interval Training: Finally, the end. | Lyle McDonald Speaks

Anyway... I did NROL Fat Loss I A2 today
Barbell Squats - 3x15x95
Ever so close to triple digits. Next time.

Seated Row - 3x15x80
Hard. I tried going to 85, lasted 3 reps and had to move back down to 80.

Supine Hip Extension - 3x15xBW
The first set is always like "why am I doing this?" and by the 3rd set everything between my waist and my knees is screaming at me.

Dumbbell Push Press - 3x15x20e
PR on the set/rep combo. The most I've done before is 2 sets of 10 reps (x25e)

Rotated Lunge - 3x15x20e

Swiss Ball Crunch - 3x15x15e
Focused on slightly slower tempo.

[realcdn]

Originally Posted by DirtyMartini

Breaking News: I weighed in at 142.0 this morning. YEAH! Lowest weight since 1995, fittest body evar. So my whole week was spent around 144.2-144.4 and I was starting to wonder WTF was going on. I knew I was getting smaller - just took the scale about 4-5 days to catch up.

Sometimes it's just a shock when you get up on the scale. I've seen that before, like you're retaining water, and then boom it's gone. Anyway, congrats!

[T-Put]

Originally Posted by DirtyMartini

I felt like if I was going to do cardio, it should be intervals or nothing at all.

Heh. For some people, just getting off the couch and walking is important. The BC gov't has a slogan to get people active that "Any move is a good move."

I think it's important to do what you like. If you don't like intervals and avoid exercising because of it, then you should do something else. You can change your intervals to chasing people around. When Chris and I throw the disc around, I chase him and he runs away from me. He's fast; I rarely catch him. I suppose people naturally do "interval training."

[DirtyMartini]

Hey that's not a bad idea. John's extremely fast and I've always been the slow, lumbering one. I'm kind of curious now, actually, how much better I'd be at kickball compared to last year. I considered joining again this year, but it's more a sport of drinking with some kickball thrown in and I KNOW I would be tempted to drink a LOT in that environment. But we live near a park & some grassy areas, which would be good for kicking around hte soccer ball. I get so bored doing that but I dunno. Maybe being better at it would make me enjoy it more.

Anyway. I'm at a hotel in Dallas and was able to reasonably adapt my workout to make it a good one:

NROL Fat Loss I, B2

Dumbbell Deadlift
3x15x50e

Incline Bench Press
1x15x25e
2x15x20e

Bulgarian Split Squat
3x15x20e (still love/hate these)

Mixed Grip Lat Pulldown
3x15x40 (given I recently did 80 on our home stack, I'm assuming 40 is about equivalent)

Romanian Deadlift
1x15x45e
2x15x40e

Weight Bench Crunches (instead of lateral roll; no swiss ball)
3x15

I have a new visible vein on my left arm - this time it's on my bicep. YEAH! That baby was really sticking out in my workout today. I love it.

[DirtyMartini]

I'm in the Dallas area the next 3 days for work and headed out by myself for lunch today. I wasn't sure where to go, so I used my little GPS unit to take me to some deli place down the road. I couldn't find the deli (it wasn't "on the right" as the Garmin said it was) BUT as I was looking for it I saw this place and went there instead:

Welcome to Healthy Me Marketplace

Healthy Me Marketplace was founded by concerned parents of a two year old. As busy professional parents, they couldn't find the time to prepare healthy meals at home, or the meal service to ensure the family was eating healthy. They were convinced that other families were struggling with this issue as well, and decided to open a business with the mission of providing healthy, tasty food to busy people.

The founding leadership team consisted of people about healthy, including business professionals, educators, and cullinary and nutrition experts. This group helped evolve the concept that extended the business concept beyond prepared foods to go, into healthy cooking classes, a healthy in-store "experience," and healthy grocery.

Didn't disappoint!! I was so excited. It was just what I was looking for - a place with a quick salad. The salad I got was mixed greens with chickens, almond, blue cheese, and a homemade dressing (made with ff sour cream, ff yogurt, dill, and hot sauce - interesting and good!). And I got a Metro Mint water - cherry mint, which I've never seen before. Tasty.

I was a happy camper. I mean, how on earth did I just happen to stumble across this place?!

[realcdn]

Nice find, especially when traveling!

[DirtyMartini]

Did FLI A3 in my hotel gym last night:

Dumbbell Squats - 2x15x40e, 1x12x40e
I forgot I was supposed to reduce reps.

Seated Row - 2x15x80, 1x12x70 (tiiiiired)
The water cooler was right behind me & I kept bumping it with my elbow. Really annoying when trying to exert force but not hit things.

Supine Hip Extension - 3x12xBW
Dumbbell Push Press - 1x12x25e, 2x12x20e

Rotating Lunge - 3x15x20e
Crunch - 3x12

Not bad, but a little limiting given the "gym" in the hotel. At least they had one, however, and the dumbbells went all the way up to 50 pounds.

I had a dream last night I was under 20% body fat and my stomach was super flat. I kept feeling my stomach because it was just skin then muscle and felt so cool. :p

[stingo]

You can do a lot with a set of dumbbells up to 50 lbs. Last program I was doing kicked my butt just using one 30lb dumbbell.

[DirtyMartini]

Here are my comparisons from Feb 10 to Aug 2.
Pretty dramatic changes in my midsection.
I'm not sure I took measurements correctly in February (I'm pretty sure I didn't at my waist since I was doing it at the narrowest point instead of at my navel)

Feb:
Weight: 150.6
Bust - 36"
Natural waist - 29.5"
Hip - 38"
Right thigh - 21.5"

Aug:
Weight: 142.0
Bust - 35"
Natural waist - 28.5"
Hip - 37.5"
Right thigh - 20"

I know I've lost more than a half inch on my hips and more than an inch on my waist. Oh well - I think the pictures speak for themselves anyway.

First picture is about 3 weeks into NR4W. 2nd picture is after NR4W and two weeks into NROL Fat Loss I.




sorry about the shadows on this one. I was in a hurry this morning and will fix that next time. And I need to work on my side shot, as you can see my left arm as well, preventing an accurate profile of my torso.



here's one for future reference. I've noticed an increase in the imbalance between my right & left sides, especially in my delts. So, I'm going to work on this through the rest of the year.