Capua, Shall I Begin?

Sunflower said:
All your food sounds AMAZING. I'm insanely jealous that you eat so well whilst on a diet. I'm useless in the kitchen. Good luck with starting Spartan Feb tomorrow!
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If I cooked all my favourites, I'd be two stone heavier in about 3 weeks, this is me keeping my cooking as minimal as possible lol. What got me in this pickle, as well as the beer, was learning to cook well.

February is gonna be BRUTAL, but well worth it! Time to get some discipline and self-respect I think! If I don't make my target by 1st March, then I think I never will, as I have other plans for March/April!
 
Oh dear, FAIL! :banghead:

To cut a long story short, typical David, good week followed by a bad week. Much shorter than the version I had planned on posting, which I'm fairly glad I didn't. I don't go in much for emo-style displays of fragility!

Here's the important stuff:

Day 28 (1st feb):

Food and drink:

Wake up: 8am
Breakfast - 8.30am: 2 x poached egg on dry wholemeal toast, glass of orange juice.
1pm: Chicken breast in Newman's Own BBQ sauce with couscous and mushrooms, with broccoli and peas, glass of orange juice.
8pm: Rainbow trout fillet with large salad glass of orange juice
12 midnight: 2 x slice wholemeal toast with peanut butter

Day 29 (2nd feb):

Wake up: 8am
Go back to sleep: 8.30 til 1pm - WTF? yes I know, seriously!
1.15pm: 2 x slices cheese on wholemeal toast, glass of orange juice.
6pm: Roast chicken, broccoli, peas, Roast potatoes, 2 x yorkshire puddings, glass of orange juice.
Rest of evening: 3 cups of earl grey tea.

Useless start to Feb, I know. NO exercise, just plain rubbish.
 
Day 30 - 3rd Feb:

Another useless day, no exercise, crappy food - no excuses, just haven't felt up to it in the slightest.

Food and drink today:

Wake Up: 2pm (WTF? YET AGAIN!!!!)
3pm: Chicken shredded in Sweet and sour sauce, huge helping of cous cous
11pm: Chicken shredded in BBQ sauce and another even more huge helping of cous cous.
Throughout the day: 1 litre orange juice, 6 cups of tea, and in the evening 4 beers.

So much for my ultra-disciplined February :banghead: SHAMEFUL PERFORMANCE, very embarrassing!!!
 
Have you considered joining any of the exercise challenges on the forum ? it might give you a bit more motivation to get that exercise in ?
 
Hey there!

Sorry that you're disappointed with your performance! :( That's a bummer, but hey...you seem very determined and motivated- just look at what you've done so far! - I'm sure that if you get that back, you'll be cruising through Feb :)

Perhaps you sleeping is your body telling you to rest. I know exercise is important, but you've been going pretty hard- perhaps it just needs a bit of recovery...and/or perhaps you're fighting a bit of an illness!

Just try not to get too down- although, you seem like a person who would take this situation and let it motivate them...whereas some other people might just give up. But that's not you :)

You can do this! Just think about tomorrow, and plan it out...set daily goals for you to reach!

And like Trusylver said, maybe join one of the weightloss challenges on here! Although, you seem to be liking the fierce treadmill yelling :D
 
Davey_Sprockett said:
If I cooked all my favourites, I'd be two stone heavier in about 3 weeks, this is me keeping my cooking as minimal as possible lol. What got me in this pickle, as well as the beer, was learning to cook well.

February is gonna be BRUTAL, but well worth it! Time to get some discipline and self-respect I think! If I don't make my target by 1st March, then I think I never will, as I have other plans for March/April!
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Sounds like you are trying to talk yourself right in to quiting, and Spring is right around the corner. Winter time is the hardest to lose weight. You made it this far, why not go the extra mile?

You could eat anything you cooked if you would watch portion sizes. If you desire to eat cooked meals just lay off all snacks in between. Eat a good healthy breakfast, salad for lunch, then a good healthy supper. If you would back off the 2 cans of beer a day you could have an extra skinless chicken breast and a sm. apple. You need to understand you are going to slow down a little after losing a lot of Fat! And a person that has more fat to lose, is going to lose more weight then those who doesn't have a lot to lose.

My first 14lb lost I ate a big breakfast, and a big supper. If I were to drink a beer, it would cost me 2 points for (1)12oz can. That could be a lg apple or a slice of turkey or a slice of cheese for me. If you are looking to lose 15.9 pounds by March 1, you would have to lose about 5 pound a week, and it may not happen! I am judging by your Ticker, you are slowing down, because you are close to your goal weight. But if you could lose 2 pounds a week until April, you would be at your goal weight, just in time for warm weather.

Its your choice! We would like to see you reach your goal:grouphug:
 
Ok this is a little embarrassing :blush5:, after making some quite achievable goals and plans for february I disappeared back into the black hole of my previous unhealthy lifestyle :banghead:. A couple of my friends had birthdays and before I knew it I was back in the pub every night, even smoking on the odd occasion. Not many, probably two a night while drinking when offered by a friend, and I didn't end up buying any so it looks quite promising that I won't actually form a habit again. Also, I didn't give up on the food side of my diet so the damage done to my weight loss wasn't really as bad as I expected. I'm up about 8lbs from my last actual loss, and I'm actually quite motivated to get going again.

I think making the plans in the first place are what lead to me failing. It changed my workouts from something I enjoyed to something I had to force myself to do, and I should know from experience that if something is expected of me, either by myself or by someone else, then it won't get done AT ALL. I know that sounds ridiculous, but it is one of the many strange personality quirks that tends to annoy both me and other people. Now that I'm back to working out I think I'll go back to my unplanned workouts, just whenever I feel like it. I tend to be more productive when I do things when I want to rather than at a set time and for a set goal.

Anyway here's today's important stuff:

Run time: 57.01
Distance: 5.3 miles
Calories: 623

I went easy on the treadmill today, it's probably best to gradually build up to the sort of times and distances that I was previously achieving.

Food and Drink:

Wake up: 9.30am
Breakfast - 10am: Omelette (2 eggs), with grated cheese and fresh cherry tomatoes, 5 x rashers of bacon, green tea (no milk/sugar).
Throughout morning and early afternoon: 2 cups of earl grey tea (no milk/sugar), 1 litre perrier water.
2pm: Skinless Chicken breast baked with chilli and garlic, large salad (lettuce, cherry tomatoes, cucumber, salad onions), grated cheese to add some flavour, cup of green tea (no milk/sugar).
4.30 - 5.30pm: 2 litres water during run
8.30pm: Chicken breast baked with chilli and garlic, cup of green tea (no milk/sugar).
Throughout evening: several cups of tea (no milk/sugar).

Finally, I'd like to thank Tik, Trusylver and Annagail, it was because I read your posts yesterday when I visited to post my weigh-in that I decided I'd had enough of the unhealthy lifestyle I'd reverted to. I owe you a massive debt of gratitude for making me realise before it was too late!
 
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It is good to see you back, look at the positive side, you didn't give up completely and you kept your eating mostly on track, It won't take long to loose that 8lb again :)
 
Right just a quick one this evening, then off to bed for an early night. Good day overall, I really pushed myself hard on the weights, skipping rope and treadmill today, until I had nothing left to push with, presently I'm moving with all the gusto of a George Romero style zombie!

Here's today's important stuff:

Weights workout:

Warm up: 3x10 push ups, 3x10 bench dips, 3x10 barbell pull ups (legs raised)
3x10 Barbell Overhead press - 30kg
3x10 Bench press - 50kg
3x10 Deadlift 70kg
3x10 Barbell Squats 50kg
3x10 Barbell curl 25kg superset with 3x10 skull crushers 25kg
3x10 Bent over barbell rows 40kg
3x10 Standing dumbell overhead tricep extensions 20kg

Skipping rope workout: 30 mins - 10 intervals of 2 minutes on with 1 minute rest

Treadmill workout:
Time:40.55
Distance:3.7miles
Calories:440

Today's food:
Wake up: 9am
9.05am: Protein powder (60g) mixed with water, 2 cups of coffee with a small amount of semi skimmed milk
Throughout morning: 2 more cups of coffee
11.30am: Protein (60g) mixed with water
12 midday: Weights workout - 2 litres of water
1.30pm: 3 egg omelette with cheese and tomatoes, and 5 rashers of bacon, cup of earl grey tea no milk or sugar
3.30pm: skipping workout no water
4pm: half an hour break.
4.30pm: treadmill workout 2 litres of water during and after workout.
5.15pm: Protein powder in water (60g)
8.30pm: Grilled pork chop with roasted parsnips, broccoli and spinach (large portions), 2 cups of tea no milk no sugar.


Cheers Trusylver, can I ask your opinion of that weights workout? Is there anything I can add or change in any way for my next workout? When I do my weights, I can't help but feel there's something missing. I can't really go too heavy as none of my mates have any interest in weights, and as such I have no spotter when I lift. Any help and advice you can offer would be enormously appreciated.
 
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it looks like you have a good basic plan, I don't know how much your feeling your hamstrings while your doing your squats and deadlifts because the hamstrings are only a synergist muscles and not a target muscles so you may want to add in some hamstring work.

also internal and external rotation for the rotator cuff are a good addition.
 
Cheers, I've thought there's been a fair bit missing from my workouts mainly from inexperience, and nobody to get any proper advice from in my personal life. I'm basically reading up on various websites and magazines and slowly learning. I have the Arnold encyclopedia of Bodybuilding, but it's such a HUGE book, and slightly daunting to start reading.

Can I ask you what exercises you'd recommend to target those areas you mentioned? I'm only working with free weights at the minute, and have no access to cable stations or specific leg machines. Also would you advise a 3 or 4 day split to target different bodyparts rather than doing it all on the same day? Or should I leave that for when I have more knowledge of what I'm doing?
 
Ok...firstly...you are a masochist- skipping rope for 30 minutes...ON YOUR OWN...legally crazy. Yup. No doubt!

Glad that your back! I love your determination and dedication. We all fall off the wagon, but you've just proven that you have the desire to reach your goal- because you're right back here! A lot of us, when we fall back into our routine that got us here, give up...but it's great that you didn't!! Kudos to you!

Regardless of how much you gained, you'll lose it- just look at your success the first time!!

Good on ya! And I'm glad to see you back! You put my workouts to shame- which means that you make me push to do more!!! :)
 
full body is fine to begin with, splits are good when you get to the stage of spending to much time fitting it all into one session. 2 good ways to split a routine into 4 days is to do either a push/pull split which is all the pulling type movements on one day and push type movements on the alternate day, there is also the upper/lower body split. The reason body builders use splits is they want to hit each part of each muscle in isolation (eg. each of the three heads of the tricep) which leads to a very long workout but is not essential till you get to the point of changing the way your muscle definition looks.

free weight hamstring exercise include things like goodmornings and straight leg deadlifts. My favourite is hamstring raises but you need a way to secure your ankles to the floor or a bench. I secure mine by placing a flat bench in the squat wrack with a bar set at a height just above the bench loaded with a few plates and hook my feet under it while kneeling on the bench.

Barbell Hamstring Raise done on a ham/glute machine

Self-assisted Hamstring Raise self assisted using a similar setup to the way I secure my ankles

Barbell Straight Leg Deadlift

Barbell Good-morning

Shoulder Articulations see bottom 4 exercises for the rotator cuff, also bacause you don't have access to a cable instead of the internal rotation then ABC's is a good exercise which involves lying on your back on a bench and with a light DB held at arms length above you, trace the alphabet in the air using the DB then swap hands. this can also be done standing with the arm outstretched in front.

also on your deadlifts I am assuming that you are doing a standard deadlift ? you may want to try doing your deadlifts sumo style to bring more of the adductors into the lift.

If your looking for a good book then "strength training anatomy" by Frederic Delavier is really good for all the basics showing how to do each exercise and exactly what muscles your working.
 
Hey Trusylver, that is some really amazing advice, I've repped you for it :hurray:, and I'll definitely try it out on my next weights session this saturday, thanks loads!

I've been thinking about building a squat rack for quite a while as the racks available commercially are a little out of my budget. At the moment I'm just using my barbell stands adjusted to the tallest height. I can only just about get under it, which is probably what's stopping me from going for heavier weights, as it's difficult to get a good starting position and it's very difficult to finish with the barbell back on the rack . I was going to use some scaffolding poles to build it, a mate of mine is a builder and offered to help, do you think this is a decent idea or not? I haven't really got the space in my flat, or a garage, so it'll have to be in the garden and won't be till the weather warms up in 2 months or so.

Also that ABC exercise sounds good, what weight would you recommend to start with? My shoulders aren't amazingly strong, do you think 5 or 7.5kg would be sufficient? Once again, cheers for all your advice, you've been amazingly helpful and informative and it is massively appreciated!!!
 
Tik said:
Ok...firstly...you are a masochist- skipping rope for 30 minutes...ON YOUR OWN...legally crazy. Yup. No doubt!

Glad that your back! I love your determination and dedication. We all fall off the wagon, but you've just proven that you have the desire to reach your goal- because you're right back here! A lot of us, when we fall back into our routine that got us here, give up...but it's great that you didn't!! Kudos to you!

Regardless of how much you gained, you'll lose it- just look at your success the first time!!

Good on ya! And I'm glad to see you back! You put my workouts to shame- which means that you make me push to do more!!! :)
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Hey there, how are you doing? Hope all is going well for you!!

Your posts always make me smile, and make me want to put even more effort in, I think I need a mini-Tik sitting on my shoulder all day long to keep my spirits high :p. I think you should consider a career in motivational speaking!

Your workouts are going great, by the way, keep at it and you'll get there. When I was just starting out I couldn't even run half a mile without nearly collapsing, and there are loads of people whose workouts put mine to shame too.
 
Just a short one tonight, I've got a long 13 hour work day tomorrow and have to be up at 5am to prepare 3 good healthy meals for the day, so I can avoid that eating-on-the-fly trap of getting whatever's available at some crummy motorway rest stop.

Didn't do any exercise today, just took a rest day, not out of any kind of laziness or lack of motivation. I was actually itching to get on the treadmill but I'm gonna be running up and down stairs all day tomorrow with heavy furniture and boxes, so I'd rather rest up and be fresh. I've worked long days with sore legs and back before, and it's definitely no fun at all.

Food for today:

Wake up: 8am
Breakfast - 8.30am: 3 egg omelette with cheese and tomatoes, 5 rashers bacon, cup of coffee with semi skim milk, and 1 litre of water throughout the rest of the morning.
12.30pm: pre-cooked chicken thighsx3, with salad (toms, lettuce, salad onion, cucumber) sprinkled with parmasan cheese and olive oil, Spiced apple and camomile herbal tea
Throughout afternoon: 2 litres water
5.30pm: Chicken thighsx3, with cous cous stir fried with chilli and onion, spiced apple herbal tea
Throughout evening: 2 cups of horlicks, and 1 litre of water

Stepped on the scale this morning and quite chuffed that I'm now down to 189.2, anyway off to bed now!!!!
 
there is nothing wrong with a home made rack, so long as it is strong and stable enough to hold the weight, but building in some safety bars is also a good idea especially if your training alone.

the 5 kg should be ok as a starting weight or possibly lighter, the exercise works the small rotator cuff muscles which don't need big weights, the reason for working them is mostly for injury prevention as they are often damaged during exercises like bench press and military presses, it is a very common injury site especially among bodybuilders.
 
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