Thank you! Its been a fun adventure. I have recently beeb thinking about trying Highland Games. I checked your log out your a one strong dude for being so young!
JCMPG you have inspired me. I have been lurking arond this site for a while and after reading your story I signed up. I too have lost a large amount of weight and still have a large amount that I need to loose. I haven’t started lifting again yet but have been doing some walk run intervals and riding my bike on a trainer in my basement. I have an appointment with an orthopedic on Wednesday and hopefully find out something about my shoulder. Congrats on your sucess and you have inspired people you don’t even know.
Sportsman congrats on your weight loss and life chnages! When I started back into lifting I started with a full body routine that I did 2-3 days a week with 2 sets of 8 reps. Nothing earth shattering but it let me ease back in without being some sore that I couldnt function. What happened to you shoulder?
I’m not sure I don’t remember a pop or anything like that but it began hurting in the front of the socket. I have no strength lifting in front of my body and it hurts when I try to lift just my arm up in front of me. It has been nearly 8 weeks ago that I hurt it, but I gave it some time to see if it got better on it’s own but no luck. Little more background on me. I weighed 452 at my biggest, that was 6 years ago. at the end of the summer last year I weighed 290 and was running and lifting. I got up to running 4 miles without stopping. I went on a couple 40 mile rides on my bike. I’d like to get back into good shape. I am interested in doing some adventure race, mud run kinda stuff.
How tall are man? From the sounds of it we have alot of the same interests. I guess it is from some many years of not doing anything and then not being able to do anything I am just about willing to give anything a go. Good luck with the sholder man!
I am 6 feet even. Yeah I feel like I have aquired a new freedom from myself with the weight loss. My wife and I got into tri-athalon a little last year but it takes a lot of training time to keep from drowning. I think the adventure race will offer a better level of fitness also. I just need to get motivated to stay consistant in my dieting and training. Been lazy lately and your story kinda got me thinking how I don’t have any excuses. I was in the best shape I had been in for a long time last fall. My son tore his ACL in a football game and all I had going my way as far as my fitness went down the crapper. I got to recover now. Life is too short.
Yesterday was a cardio day so I decided to do a little running. My wife is wanting us to run in the local St. Pat’s Day race which is a 5k and I am not one to go into something unprepared so I ran 3 miles on the treadmill. My knee is a little tender this morning but overall still feels pretty good. I ran the 3 miles @ a 2% grade to mimick running outside and kept my pace around 9:40.
Last year I ran this race in a 26:01 and there is no way I can come even close to that this year. Last year I was in half way through training for a half marathon and running on avg 15 - 20 miles a week. I feel pretty good about where I am at right now given my objectives are different right now. I am am still working on getting my meals choices squared away and am feeling pretty strong when I am in the gym.
Cardio Only Day
5 min stationary bike warm up.
Cosgroves 8
I made it thru 4 rounds. I started in with 105lbs and reduced to 85lbs after 2 rounds
1st - 6 reps 105lbs
2nd - 5 reps 105lbs
3rd - 4 reps 85lbs
4th - 3 reps 85lbs
20 mins walking hill intervals.
2 min 5% grade
2 min 10% grade
I took yesterday off completely, its the first complete day off I have taken in several weeks. Today workout consisted of a 45 min snow shoveling session. To add to the brutalness of shoveling the snow it was sleeting and windy so it felt like I was being sand blasted.
I worked out in my basement today for the first time in many years. I forgot how great it is to not have to deal with all the nobs at the gym. For now I am going to keep my gym memberships until I can expand my home equipment. Todays workout was legs and I am going to go to the gym later for my cardio.
Leg workout - I lowered the weight on all my lifts and focused on exploding out of the whole.
5 x 8 on Split squats with DB’s
15lbs
20lbs
35lbs 3 x 8
Reverse Lunges
20 lbs x 20 (10 each leg)
35lbs 2 x 10 (5 each leg)
Box Squats with 1 sec pause (I used my moveable bench, next time I am going to use some stackable exercise steps my wife has. They are about 2 - 3 inches lower.)
5 x 8
135lbs
155lbs
175lbs
195lbs
215lbs
RDLS
3 x 8
225lbs
I will be heading to the gym later for 40 mins of walking hill intervals on the treadmill.
How’s the diet?
I really enjoy this thread. Keep at it
The diet is marginal at best right now, I am still hovering around 295 - 300lbs. I am going to have to take control of my food choices, right now my wife does all of the grocery shopping and then I look around and I am eating things that are way more calorie dense then what I want to be eating. I have to get more vegatables and less bread based carbs.
At this point the scale is not moving as much as I would like it to but my clothes are feeling looser so its not all bad. Since Thursday of this week we have been pretty much hanging at home do to snow and my wife alter ego Betty Crocker appeared and has been a baking fool. She made home made pretzels and pecan sticky rolls which are a majro weekness for me.
I may need a week just to recover from the last couple of days. How do you guys handle food preperation? And what does a typical days food intake look like?
Champions are made in the kitchen!
Teaching yourself how to cook, making the right food choices and sticking to a lifestyle (it’s not a diet, it’s your life!) is what makes all the difference. You have shown incredible power of will doing that much cardio (I could never even do it, I’m honest), so apply this to your diet now and you will FLY.
No nachos, no milk (not even fat-free), no Cliff bars, etc. There’s a ton of food out there and a million ways to make it delicious. The pizza’s I make myself, gluten-free, low fat and moderately low carb, beat any pizza you can buy at a store or pizza place. This is all knowledge I have gained from this wonderful Testosteron-fueled place. Shugart’s articles offer so many inspiring dishes and options, it’s not even funny.
Hang in there, you’ve got this down… just perfect it and apply it to all facets of your life. No diet, lifestyle!
The challenge that I face like everyone else I am sure is cooking things in manner that I am willing to eat them for several days in a row. Do to my job I do not always have time to fix a meal every night and I can only handle so many salads. My wife and I are both pretty good cooks and just struggle with finding a good rotation of wealthy options. Especially in the winter time when its hard to find good fresh produce. I know these are all excuses and I just need to take the time to do it. I find this harder than exercising!
Today’s at home Chest and Shoulder workout.
I decided I would try for my 1 RM on bench today, I havent gone for a 1 RM in a long time and with being at home why not. I actually feel better about benching at home then I do in the gym. Here at home I have a Safety Cage that I can set the pins just right that if I fail I can drop down to them and squeeze out from underneath. I started with just the bar for 10 fast reps just to get the blood flwing. Went to 135 lbs for 6 reps then 155 lbs for 6 reps. Added another 20 lbs and did 3 reps, added another 20 lbs and did another 3 reps. At 215 lbs I did 2 reps, 225 for 1 rep, 245 for 1 rep which is a PR for me. At this point I feeling pretty confident and decided to jump to 265 lbs. I got a little cocky and it sank like a rock and buried me. I still feel great about it and probably could have gotten 250 or 255 if I had thought about what I was doing instead of getting all fired up. After the 1 RM effort I dropped the weight back to 135 lb and did a set of 10, added 20 lbs did a set of 8, added another 20 lbs and did another set of 8. By this time my chest is on fire!
Next was:
DB Fly’s 3 x 10
35lbs
Seated Shoulder DB Press 4 x 6
50lbs
Rear Delt Fly’s
3 x 15 @ 50lbs partial range of motion. Like John Meadows describes
1 x 15 @ 20 lbs full range of motion.
Close Grip Bench
135lbs x 10
150lbs 2 x 8
Today’s Workout
20 min Hill Intervals on the treadmill
2 min @ 5%
2 min @ 10%
10 min on stationary bike
Back workout:
My back is feeling pretty tight and sore from all of the snow shoveling so I decided to take it easy
Assisted Chin Ups (115lb assist)
3 x 8
2 x 6
Bent Rows on Smith Machine
3 x 10 @ 155lbs
Todays workout consited of an hour of shoveling the 7 inches of wet ass snow off of my drive way this morning and then legs this sfternoon. I had to rest for a while after the shoveling as I was wiped out.
Legs -
Split Squats rear foot elevated on a bench.
4 x 8
30lbs DB’s for 3 sets
35lbs DB’s for 1 set
Box Squats (low box below parrell)
3 x 8
135lbs
145lbs
165lbs
RDL’s - I decided to lighten the load a bit because of all of the snow shoveling.
3 x 8
145lbs
[quote]JCMPG wrote:
Todays workout consited of an hour of shoveling the 7 inches of wet ass snow off of my drive way this morning [/quote]
Must have been the storm we had on Sunday. Got about a foot.
We have had a combined 15 inches from 2 different storms that have come thru since last Thursday evening. I am very tired of snow. The piles of snow at the end of my driveway are around 6ft tall.