Turning 30

Whoa! I started with bench press yesterday, picked up the 65lb dumbbells, they felt light, and did 12 reps. I'm already the strongest I've been in over 5 years! Unfortunately they're the heaviest DBs they have at the gym, and I can't do barbell benchpress, so I had to switch to the machine bench press which has angled handles.

Aside from my knees, I have a problem with my wrists, they won't rotate naturally as far as normally, this gives me an awkward barbell bench press angle at my shoulder which stresses the joint a lot. I tried ignoring it a few years back, and damaged the "cuff" that holds the overarm bone in the joint, it took a year to recover from :(

Workout yesterday:

Bench press DB 1x12 65lb each
Machine bench press 3x6
Barbell rows (underhand grip) 4x6 150lb
Pec fly machine 2x15
Lat pulldown 3x12 145lb (was getting tired at this point, lack of sleep and nutrition :( )
Seated shoulder press DB 3x12 40lb each
Incline curls 3x10 31lb each
Triceps Rope pushdowns 3x10 55lb

Food:
Meal 1: eggs and oatmeal
Meal 2: Steak burger with cooked potatoes, at a cafe with my sister
Meal 3: PWO "The Shake"
Meal 4: Pork with fullg grain noodles, asparagus and broccoli
A bit of cholotate, the gf bought some - I can easily not buy candy, not touching in when it's placed in front of me, that's a different story
Meal 5: "The Shake" and almonds

My weakest day yet, especially since I woke late.

Weekly progress report:
Diet compliance: I'm hitting my daily targets for protein and calories at well over 90%, but not eating as clean as BigStew wants me too ;) I've grown a solid hate for brown rice with dryfried meat in it :(
Weight training: I'm doing good here. I feel that my new workout is a bit light with all the high reps, but BigStew is telling me I probably was overtraining before.
Cardio: Sucked completely, but I'm starting on Krav Maga again this week which should fix most. I also need to get to the gym earlier, I don't have time for the cardio after the weight training with the gym closing.
Sleep: I did bad here, I need to get to bed earlier. Only got 6-6½ hours per night on average.
Body image: Not much visible fat gain if any, muscle is difficult to tell in just 1 week.
Body mass: Up 1-1½lb.

I'm going to be weighing all the foods I can this week and do the nutritional breakdown.

And I'm seriously in need of a new gym.
 
Are you adding any spice of low cal marinades to your brown rice and meat meals. That should make them taste alot better and is allow on the program. 1-2 pounds a week is a solid gain on a slow bulk. Keep up the great work
 
I've been adding some soy sauce to it. I probably just need to find something more interesting than that.

But I don't think I'll ever get to really like it. It also takes a lot of time to prepare. Something like bread with smoked salmon would go down much easier for me.
 
When you make the rice make a bunch stick it in a huge tupperware then leave it in the rig. Make your meat in a frying pan and then add the rice to it with the spice and soy. It takes a long time to cook the rice each time so bulk cook that is what I do to save time. Doesnt taste ask good as just made rice but if you mix it with the meat while it is cooking it comes out pretty good
 
Today was Krav Maga for 2 hours. On top of all the usual muscle endurance/light cardio training, lots of pad work today, mostly punches and elbows. Lots of sweat!

Here's what I ate today in great detail.

I'm not too happy with the spacing of the meals on my training days, with Krav maga from 19:00 to 21:00 it gets a bit screwed up, too far about during the day and too tight after workout. I'm thinking about going 7 meals, with a half meal during the day, and then a half meal before bed.


Code: 
			Weight	Protein	Calories
07:00	Egg		50	6	75
	Eggwhites	150	16	75
	Oatmeal		90	12	306
				34	456

10:30	the Shake		30	310
	Almonds		30	6	173
				36	483
					
14:00	1 Can of Tuna*	140	35	154
	2 Ezekiel Bread	118	6	212
				41	366

17:30	the Shake		30	310
	Almonds		30	6	173
				36	483

21:00	The Shake		30	310
				30	310

22:30	Turkey		170	37	202
	Brown Rice	125	10	425
				46	627

	Grand Total		224	2725
 
Strange morning.

Weight back down to 171lb, like last week. I don't know what reading is the fluke.

The measuring cup I've been using mostly turns out to be wrong. It's some fancy looking thing the gf bought, and the scale on it is all wrong. It gives cups that are 30% larger than real cups. I want some clear plastic thing that's designed by an engineer instead, sure it'll look crap but he'll at least get the scale right.
 
Looks like the weight gain is real, and the low reading was a fluke. Probably due to the weekend's subpar diet.

Tried finding some stuff to flavor the meat+rice meals, couldn't find anything lowcal. We have some stupid regulations that keep supermarkets real small (to prevent small, independant store owners from being out-competed by large chains), so there's a really low selection on almost everything. I live in Copenhagen, the capitol of Denmark and with over 1.5 mio people, and we have 2 big supermarkets, I guess I just have to drive over there and get some proper shopping done.

I'm starting on the Krav Maga again, which really burns some calories, if last week's gain was fine, shouldn't I increase calories to account for the larger burn?
 
Nicolasd said:
Looks like the weight gain is real, and the low reading was a fluke. Probably due to the weekend's subpar diet.

Tried finding some stuff to flavor the meat+rice meals, couldn't find anything lowcal. We have some stupid regulations that keep supermarkets real small (to prevent small, independant store owners from being out-competed by large chains), so there's a really low selection on almost everything. I live in Copenhagen, the capitol of Denmark and with over 1.5 mio people, and we have 2 big supermarkets, I guess I just have to drive over there and get some proper shopping done.

I'm starting on the Krav Maga again, which really burns some calories, if last week's gain was fine, shouldn't I increase calories to account for the larger burn?
Click to expand...

Are there are boutiques that sell spices. That sucks about only having small grocery stores. Dont worry about the scale so much. Worry more about the mirror and strength gain.
 
They got loads of spices, yeah. It's not like they're super small grocery stores, but they're not big enough to have an assortment of narrow products. Like frozen berries, they only have 3 kinds in the biggest store near me.

Another really stupid thing is that stores aren't free to open on sundays, they just eased the regulation last so year so now they can at least be open 22 sundays of the year, before then it was 9 iirc. Not being able to shop on sundays, how stupid is that?

I don't worry about the scale, but I think it's good to keep track of the weight still. It can be tough to track small/slow progresses in the mirror - I think weight gives some good pointers in addition to the mirror, like now where I don't seem to be adding much fat but my weight is going up, so that's probably a good thing.
 
I know how you feel. Here in Vietnam it's worse I'm sure. There are not very many supermarkets, and they are poorly and inconsistently stocked. One week they'll have something, then the next week it's gone and I've got to go somewhere else. The problem here is that the stores are terrified of any kind of surplus stock, they want the stuff always moving. I have to literally go to 12 different places(supermarkets, mom and pop shops, outdoor markets, etc) to get everything I want. Anyway, sounds like they've got some unique rules in Denmark.
 
BigStew said:
When you make the rice make a bunch stick it in a huge tupperware then leave it in the rig. Make your meat in a frying pan and then add the rice to it with the spice and soy. It takes a long time to cook the rice each time so bulk cook that is what I do to save time. Doesnt taste ask good as just made rice but if you mix it with the meat while it is cooking it comes out pretty good
Click to expand...

The rice tasted great when reheated on the pan with meat and soy :) I even think it tasted better than just made - I'm probably going to start tossing the just made rice into the pan too ;) I also found some spice paste, it doesn't add as much liquid as I would've liked, but it still gives a nice taste.

I've been too busy to write the journal lately, got the hunter's license test on Tuesday so been reading up for that, practicing range estimation and so on. But I'm still sticking to my workout and diet (well, as much as usual at least ;) )

@philsaigon: I'm sure it's worse in Vietnam, yeah.
 
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I am glad that the rice thing worked out well.
Good Luck with the hunter licneces. You will have to fill me in on that later when you have more time
 
2 week progress picture. Looks like some muscle, and a little fat, and if that's correct I'm on the right track. Several of my slimfit shirts are getting a really tight fit, I'll soon grow out of them :(

Weight went up about 1 pound this week.
 

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BigStew said:
It is going to be hard with a picture like that
Click to expand...

What's going to be hard? Telling progress? Perhaps I should learn some BB poses ;)

But anyway, 2 weeks of slow bulk won't that always be pretty hard to tell on a picture? I don't build muscle that fast, and some fat is going to be covering the progress. After all, less fat makes you look more muscular.
 
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You do not need to learn BB poses. It is just hard to tell progress with pictures like yours. it would have been alot easier if someone took the pics (full body) from the front side and back. But you are accurate you shouldnt see much progress ova 2 weeks but I can definately see some improvement
 
I'm taking a 1 week rest break from weight training.

Last week I was so tired every evening, I think I napped on 3 days.

Then I read some guys here posting about rest breaks, lack of motivation, etc.

I've been training and dieting without a break for 10 weeks. The first 8 was on a big split (9 sets of low rep per muscle) before BigStew got me doing it differently. On top of that I started doing Krav Maga, which was both a big increase in training volume but also it's hard work in ways I haven't done in over a decade, and I've often been really sore from the workout.

With the tiredness I'm experiencing, I probably need a break.

I've reduced the calories a bit since I figure I won't be building muscle without the workout, good or bad? Should I even reduce to cutting levels to shed some fat to use the time effectively - on the face of it it doesn't seem like a good idea since I'm doing it to recover?
 
Try to keep your calories around or a little below maintance 14-15 x bodyweight. The week off should recharge your batteries and u should ready to hit it full force come next week
 
Well, I ended up not sticking to my goals. The work required, sticking to a diet and such, was just too much compared to how motivated I was in the long run.

So, I'm just back to eating sort of ok, and training about 2 times a week on average, which is enough to keep me healthy and looking ok :)

The fun thing is, even with this schedule, my strength keeps increasing. I've been much bigger than this, I used to exercise and diet sticking to the program perfectly in my early-mid twenties - and I'm much stronger now. I can lift heavier weights for more reps. The gym only carry 30kg dumbells, which are now too light for even high rep bench press sets. Several of the technogym equipment at the gym I'm using with max loads now, give it another month or two and I have to find a new gym.

Now, over 30 years old, eating and exercising too little, the only explanation for this can be BigStew's excellent guidance :D It's amazing how much I've gained from dropping my old school big split programs and going to more FBW-oriented workouts.

So big props to you big guy :) Thx for the help :D
 
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