Fit by 60! - TomO's Pledge

Did "Day 1" of my new weight training routine, mostly designed by Steve. I wish I would have met this guy a lot sooner -- I wouldn't have wasted so much money on personal trainers! Anyway, I think I have a pretty good routine for my weight loss stage.

Here's what I did today:
1. Barbell Squat: 150#, 5 x 5 (did ATG, because I read it recruits a lot more muscles, and if you're going to do a compound exercise anyway, why not use all the muscles you can?)
2. Barbell Bench Press: 130#, 5 x 5
3. One arm Dumbbell Rows: 55#, 5 x 5
4. Pullups: 4 x 5 (had to do machine-assisted here, set at 170 -- pitiful, I know)
5. Standing Barbell Military Press: 90#, 4 x 5

For each exercise, I write down a level of difficulty, from 1 to 3. 1 = too easy, raise weight next time; 2 = just about right; 3 = too heavy, couldn't complete test. If I mark an exercise with a 2 for 3 weeks in a row, I'll increase the weight. Everything today was at a level 2.

Following that, I did cardio for 45 min. Started trying to do intervals on the rowing machine. After 10 minutes, I realized that's a crappy machine to do it on. If you go faster than a 2 min/500 meter rate, the straps on your feet start working their way loose, the chain starts flying around, and it's not a good scene. So I did the rest on the elliptical. I was tempted to do HIIT, but my quads were a bit tired from the squats.

Today my daughter called and she got a great new job. She was ecstatic, and so was I. I don't think there's anything better in life than watching your kids make their way in the adult world.
 
great news about your daughter and very cool for you being as happy for her as she is for herself.. nice...

your workout looks pretty impressive to me :)
 
Glad to see you are doing full squats.

How is your form? Heels staying planted? Hips getting deeper than your knees?
 
Steve said:
Glad to see you are doing full squats.

How is your form? Heels staying planted? Hips getting deeper than your knees?
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The one thing I did do is have my PT check my squat form, and he said it was excellent. Eight years ago, I trained with a power lifter, and he taught me really good form. I got up to 350#, 3 x 8 back then. Don't think I'll get back there any time soon though!
 
TomO said:
The one thing I did do is have my PT check my squat form, and he said it was excellent. Eight years ago, I trained with a power lifter, and he taught me really good form. I got up to 350#, 3 x 8 back then. Don't think I'll get back there any time soon though!
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Very good to hear. Wait until you hit your goal weight and start really fine tuning the physique and tweaking the diet for muscle gains. That is when strength gains will sky rocket.

Still, even while dieting, you should make pretty good strength gains from neural adaptations, since you have not done some of these big exercises for a while.
 
Steve said:
Very good to hear. Wait until you hit your goal weight and start really fine tuning the physique and tweaking the diet for muscle gains. That is when strength gains will sky rocket.
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Problem is, I'll be past 60 by then! :eek:
Not too many old geezers like me still doing squats!
 
Last night, I and my lovely wife Marlene, with whom I've been together for 33 years, went out to dinner to celebrate our 23 year old daughter's new job. She noted that I really had a different attitude about losing weight and getting healthy this time. She said it didn't seem nearly as "gimmicky" or "temporary." She also asked me this: "If you had to give someone a '10 point manifesto' about losing weight, what would those 10 points be?"

I thought that was a good question. Here was my answer, based on the 10 things that I found most important to me.

1) Learn about the energy equation that runs your body. It's not as simple as "calories in and calories out." You have to learn about your basal metabolic rate, the calories you use for exercise, and the calories you consume in food and drink.

2) Get support. Getting healthy is not just a matter of will power. You need to find a group of people that you can share your triumphs and frustrations with. Some days, you will get motivation by helping them. Other days they will motivate you. It doesn't matter whether your support group is on the internet or at work or part of some other group, as long as it's there.

3) Develop an exercise program that includes both cardio and weight training. Sure, you can lose weight without it, but it's much harder, and you drastically reduce the odds of long term success if you don't exercise. On top of that, exercise creates the counterpart of a vicious circle -- let's call it a life circle. It makes you stronger, so you feel like doing more, and in doing more, you burn more calories.

4) Get serious about educating yourself. There is SO much crap out there -- about "spot reducing", about fad diets, miracle solutions, and every other trick under the sun. Ignorance will surely make you a victim.

5) Develop long and short term goals. First, develop a long term goal that's reasonable and attainable. You don't climb Mt. Everest in a day, and you won't lose the 100 lbs. you gained over 5 years in one year. But the long term goal is not enough. You have to break it down into short term goals. They could revolve around weight, but they also can be about other aspects of your health -- blood pressure, resting pulse, strength, etc.

6) Publicize your goals. Don't make it easy for you to slip by. Involve your support group in helping you meet your goals. Be accountable.

7) Don't beat yourself up over setbacks. We all fall off the wagon now and then. Just dust yourself off, get back on the wagon, and continue your journey.

8) Gauge your progress by your past, not by other people. The point is not whether you look like someone else or are as fit as your co-worker. The point is really if you look better than you did last month, and are more fit than you were last month.

9) Embrace the complexity and difficulty of the process. It's not a simple matter of will power, as that supplement-bar huckster Dr. Phil would have you believe. It's a personal thing, a social thing, an educational thing, a psychological thing. It's tough. It's a battle that's fought on many fronts.

10) Each and every day, celebrate the fact that YOU have made the commitment to get healthy. That alone puts you ahead of the majority of people, skinny or not.
 
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excellent entry - you might want to copy that into on topic as a new thead for all to read - it's definitely worth reading :)
 
Just got back from the gym. . . this was a tough 70 minutes on the elliptical -- not because it was HIIT or anything, but because my quads were suffering big time. DOMS from the squats yesterday set in this morning, and my legs felt a bit like jelly all day. But Marlene and I are going out to eat tonight, and I wanted to make sure I burned a t least 1,000 calories to assure my deficit for the day.

Tomorrow's an "off" day. I think I'll walk on the beach and finally do a bit of photography again.
 
Good luck on your Journey Tom! You know most of the work out you are doing, I dont understand a single bit of it!!!!?????

Great job on the loss so far!
 
heidilw said:
Good luck on your Journey Tom! You know most of the work out you are doing, I dont understand a single bit of it!!!!?????

Great job on the loss so far!
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What don't you understand? I'll be happy to explain any part of it. :)
 
:confused: :confused: Today I actually couldn't wait to get to the gym to do my HIIT routine. I decided to do CardioCoach Press Play again. This is a 60 minute workout that consists of the following:
o 10 1 min. climbs/sprints at 85% of max HR, each followed by a 40 sec. rest
o 2 3 min. climbs, 1st 2 min. at 85%, last minute at 95%, with 2 min. rest in between.
o 3 1 min sprints at 90% of max HR, each followed by 1 min. rest
o 4 1 min. climbs at 90% to 95%, each followed by 1 min. rest
o 1 4 min. climb, 1st 3 min. at 90%, last min. at 95%:confused: :confused: What exactly are you doing here?
 
Oh, that one! :eek:

OK, let me explain. Almost 8 weeks ago, I started doing high intensity interval training, or what is called HIIT. I had read a lot about it, and it seemed that HIIT would be a great alternative to otherwise boring steady state (SS) cardio.

Someone on another site recommended the sound tracks from cardiocoach.com. These are mp3 recordings that include music and voice over. It's very much like a spinning class, except that you can adapt it to an elliptical machine, a stairmaster, treadmill, etc.

To do this, it requires that you know your max heart rate (MHR). The most common formula for this is 220 - age, but this is just an estimate. Especially for people over 30, it tends to be on the low side. For me, age 58, the formula would come to 162, but my real MHR is 168 or 169.

Once you know your MHR, you can calculate four different zones:
1) 55% to 65% of MHR - basic warmup and cooldown zone
2) 65% to 75% of MHR - aerobic zone, no stress on the muscles
3) 75% to 85% of MHR - "crossover" zone, where you go from aerobic to anaerobic, and
4) 85% to 95% - totally anaerobic. Moreover, at 95% of MHR, all your energy is coming from the glycogen in your muscles, the byproduct of which is lactic acid. After about a minute of this, you simply can't continue.

These soundtracks involve "climbs" and "sprints." The climbs result from increasing the resistance on your machine, but not necessarily increasing your speed. On most ellipticals, this is done simply by increasing the resistance setting; on treadmills, it's done by increasing the incline; on stairmasters, you often can't do it, which is why I rarely use them for HIIT.

The sprints are accomplished by increasing your speed. The critical thing here is to be able to ramp up and ramp down very quickly. This makes a big difference, because if it takes 10 seconds just to ramp up, and you are doing a 30 second zone 4 sprint, 1/3 of that is gone by the time you're up to speed.

The soundtracks I use generally are about an hour long. In reality they are a combination of interval training (Zone 3) and HIIT (Zone 4). That's what makes them so challenging! You might have 4 Zone 4 sprints, followed by 10 Zone 3 intervals.

In between the sprints, there is a "cooldown" period. The length of the sprint/climb, compared to the cooldown time is called the work ratio.

When you first start HIIT, it's best to start with a work ratio of around 1:2 or even 1:3. In other words, if you do a 40 second sprint, that should be followed by a cooldown of 80 to 120 seconds. As you get more fit, you can handle work ratios of 1:1 and even 2:1.

I often see posts in various forums from people who think your heart rate goes up instantaneously when you sprint. This is baloney. In reality, even though you are going "all out", it takes your heart 10 to 15 seconds to reach 95% of MHR, especially if you're coming from 75% of MHR.

Because of the stress it puts on your central nervous system, HIIT shouldn't be done on two consecutive days. Also, if you do weight training with legs on one day, you shouldn't follow it with HIIT the next day -- your quads won't have adequate recovery time.

An important gauge of your fitness level is how quickly your heart drops during the cooldowns. If you're up to 95%, and you have a 2 minute interval where you cut your speed in half, you should be able to drop to 75% of MHR before you start the next sprint.

This type of training isn't for everyone, but it's made a huge difference for me. My blood pressure has improved enormously, and my resting pulse is around 50 now. Most important, it's actually made me look forward to doing cardio, which I used to hate!

One last point about calories burned. During a HIIT routine like this, you will burn about the same number of calories as you would doing SS cardio at the top of Zone 2. However, studies have shown that with HIIT, you continue to burn calories at an accelerated rate well after you stop. I can actually feel the heat in my forehead up to 5 hours after my workout.

There - I gave you FAR more information than you ever wanted to know!
 
Hooray! Today is an "off" day -- no cardio, no weights, just some light walking on the beach. My quads are still aching with DOMS, so I'm glad for that!

Today I thought I'd write about weight fluctuation.

I'm one of those people who found that weighing every day works better. But the frustrating thing is, weight goes up and down every day, depending mostly on how much water you're retaining (we're about 60% water, so that makes sense).

So, to get a more "balanced" view of things, I started keeping a 5 day moving average on my spreadsheet. The two of them, for the past two months, are on this graph:
View attachment 2743

Looking at the actual numbers, there are some BIG fluctuations there - days where I "gained" 3 lbs., and other days where I "lost" 4 lbs. However, the 5 day moving average smooths out all that, and gives a more realistic picture.

The moving average line also puts the plateau I had a few weeks ago into perspective. If I just went by the actual numbers, I got quite frustrated. On day 11, I was at 246.5 lbs. Then, day 39, I'm at 246 lbs. Only 1/2 pound lost in 28 days??? Bummer!!!

But then I look at the average line, and the progress is much more visible.

Also, it seems for me, at least, that before I hit a plateau, I get a tantalizing taste of where I can get with a new low weight. This happened on day 19, when I got down to less than 245. I didn't see that weight again for 20 days!

On day 47 (about 9 days ago), I saw a new low of 241.5. I haven't seen that one again either! But I am pretty confident I will see it again soon. I just have to work my way through this plateau.

You might be thinking, "well, the reason you went back up is because you're not running a calorie deficit." But I am, as this graph shows:
View attachment 2744

Yes, I've had a few surplus days here and there, but a lot more deficits. And overall, I ran an average daily deficit of 200 calories.

All this just goes to show me that it's best to think of this as a long term project leading to a permanent change in lifestyle. When I was younger, the only thing I concentrated on was losing the weight as fast as I could. Now it's much, much slower, but for the first time, I'm starting to get some confidence I'll actually keep it off.
 
while i weigh every day - the only weight i record officially is fridays - it's interestng to see the fluctuations - though i was recording it daily in apaper journal just as an experiment - and also recording moods -and in myself -the more stressed out i was -the higher my weight was... I also could attribute weight fluctuations to fiber/sodium levels being not what they should be... everything really does play a factor.

But very cool that you've got the mindset that what you are doing now is permanent
 
wow Tom that is a very complicated system. Kudos to you for figuring that out... I have had alot of people reccommend HIIT, but all that math makes my head hurt. I just starting going to the gym and I love it. Its nice to get sweaty and know you are making a difference with your body.

A lady that I used to work with just got a new job at the University. She is the project manager for the Psych department, they are doing a study on how religion corrilates (sp?) with weight. But like Mal said, I think that stress has alot to do with weight. Would be an insteresting study!

Great job on your lower blood pressure!
 
heidilw said:
A lady that I used to work with just got a new job at the University. She is the project manager for the Psych department, they are doing a study on how religion corrilates (sp?) with weight. But like Mal said, I think that stress has alot to do with weight. Would be an insteresting study!
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I strongly believe that stress can affect your weight loss very negatively. The main way it does that is that it makes your brain crave for something that will calm you down. In the absence of anything else, you turn to food.

I'm not particularly religious myself, but from what I observed, that's got very little to do with anything as far as weight goes. I suspect there are just as many obese worshippers as there are obese atheists and agnostics.
 
theres a fad style diet out there that has basis in religion - called the maker's diet -I've spent zero time looking at it and i don't know if prayer is involved... But (without dissing anyone's beliefs as I am along time recovering catholic) prayer can have a bit of a placebo effect on disease - and people can get well - i don't see why it wouldn't work in conjunction with diet and exercise - kinda like a diet pill :) the diet and exercise are doing all the work but if people believe that prayer helps them - or it gives them something to lean on - then knock themselves out :)
 
Hey TomO. Congrats on the weight you've lost. From reading your journal it seems like you work very hard and are very goal oriented. I know you can reach all of your goals by your 60th birthday!

I too think that stress affects weight loss very negatively. I attribute a good portion of my weight gain in the last few months to stress as well. I'm working on my stress but, it's hard.

-Sam:)
 
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