25 Feb

Exercise:
Run: 8:11s

Food:
Meal 1 (0930): Shake
Meal 2 (1100): Home made pizza
Meal 3 (1400): Shake
Meal 4 (1600): 2 CC + vegemite tortillas
Meal 5 (2000): Resteraunt - baked eggplant + vegies; pumpkin ravioli

Very happy with myself for going for a run this morning. I slept in a bit, so it was a bit later than usual. Had to push fairly hard to get as far as I did - I was buggered after about 5 minutes.

Because I'm running in the morning, I'm only doing TFS and situps on weights days (mon, wed, fr). I don't have the time in the morning to do both. So I'm thinking of replacing TFS with a yoga sun salutation. Because I'm not increasing the reps in TFS I don't think it's doing much in terms of muscle - it's more just a 'get the blood pumping' thing to wake me up. A sun salutation should have the same effect, with the added bonus of good stretching. I'll try it next week and see how it goes.

24 Feb

Exercise:
TFS; 70 situps
Run: 8:56

Food:
Meal 1 (0700): Shake
Meal 2 (1030): Work morning tea - cake biscuits, fuit
Meal 3 (1100): Pasta
Meal 4 (1230): Shake
Meal 5 (1530): Pasta
Meal 6 (1800): Yoghurt
Meal 7 (2130): Home made pizza

Very pleased that I ran this morning. Was pretty hard to start with as my legs were still a bit sore for Wed.

Unfortunately weights at lunch didn't happen, for various reasons. First, I left the only remote control to the garage at work. Second, the fire brigade turned up because the unit 2 doors up was quite on fire. Excuses, excuses :-) I'll try and get it in either tonight or tomorrow.

23 Feb

Exercise:
None

Food:
Meal 1 (0830): Shake
Meal 2 (1100): Pasta
Meal 3 (1300): shake
Meal 4 (1530): Pasta
Meal 5 (1700): Shake, couple of peices of garlic bread
Meal 6 (2100): Snack - sugar free icecream

Didn't run this morning. I've got a friendly cricket game this arvo, and my legs are still a bit jelly-like from deads yesterday. Plus it allowed me a nice (needed) sleep in.
Unfortunately my wife was sick last night, so no cricket :-(

22 Feb

Exercise:
TFS; 65 situps
Weights: Deadlifts(90.5kg) 10 sets of 3

Food:
Meal 1 (0700): Shake
Meal 2 (1000): Pasta
Meal 3 (1300): Shake
Meal 4 (1430): Pasta
Meal 5 (1730): Yoghurt
Meal 6 (1930): Pad Thai

Weights today was damn good. Hardest part was keeping the bar in my hands - 90.5kg is a significant step up from my previous program. I did well though and only lost my grip on the last rep of the last set.

21 Feb

Exercise:
Run: 8m16s

Food:
Meal 1 (0700): Shake
Meal 2 (1000): Pasta
Meal 3 (1230): shake
Meal 4 (1500): Pasta
Meal 5 (1800): Shake
Meal 6 (2030): Steamed vegies

Very happy with my effort this morning to go running. First time in well over a month that I have. Plus I didn't go too badly, and it definately woke me up!

20 Feb

New program starts today! Looking forward to it, but I'm pretty tired so I'm a bit worried I won't be able to give it everything. Will have to see at lunch time.

Exercise:
TFS; 55 situps
Weights: Bench(63kg) 10 sets of 3; Row(63kg) 10 sets of 3

Food:
Meal 1 (0630): Shake
Meal 2 (0800): Nutrigrain
Meal 3 (1200): Pasta
Meal 4 (1330): Shake
Meal 5 (1700): Pasta
Meal 6 (1830): Shake
Meal 7 (2030): Steamed vegies

Weights was hard work today, but well worth it. The extra 9kg over the last program's 80% weight made getting the bar back on the bench after rows a bit more difficult.

18 + 19 Feb

Bit slack in recording over the weekend. No exercise. Food was OK, except for a data and walnut roll that I ate on Saturday.

17 Feb

Exercise:
TFS; 50 situps

Food:
Meal 1 (0700): Shake
Meal 2 (1045): Pasta
Meal 3 (1230): Shake
Meal 4 (1600): Pasta; yoghurt
Meal 5 (1800): Snack- 40g sugar free chocolate
Meal 6 (1900): 1/2 vegetarian pizza
Meal 7 (2100): Glass of milk

I'm pretty happy with how situps are progressing. I've added 5 every session so far. I'm sure that will plateau at some stage but at the moment it's good to wake up with a goal each morning.

16 Feb

Exercise:
TFS; 45 situps

Food:
Meal 1 (0730): Shake
Meal 2 (1000): Dahl + rice
Meal 3 (1230): Shake
Meal 4 (1500): Dahl + rice; yoghurt
Meal 5 (1800): Shake
Meal 6 (2000): Steamed broccoli

15 Feb

Exercise:
TFS; 40 situps
1RM tests (bench, dead, row)

Food:
Meal 1 (0700): Shake
Meal 2 (1000): Pasta (sm serve)
Meal 3 (1230): Shake
Meal 4 (1430): Dahl + rice
Meal 5 (1600): Snack - handful of m&ms (forgot my yoghurt)
Meal 5 (1930): Shake
Meal 6 (2000): 1/2 garlic bread

Very pumped after my 1RM tests today. I've added 10kgs to my bench and row, and 25kgs to my deadlift in the last 5 weeks. I think that's more than enough proof that this program's pretty damn good.

Let myself down a little with food today. Started well, but the M&Ms and garlic bread weren't my best efforts. Looking forward to starting the program again next week with my new weights. I'm not sure if I can make the same sort of gains in the next month as in the last, but if I can I'll be pretty damn excited.

14 Feb

Exercise:
TFS; 35 situps

Food:
Meal 1 (0640): Shake
Meal 2 (0930): Dhal and rice
Meal 3 (1230): Shake
Meal 4 (1700): Shake
Meal 5 (1830): Nachos (corn chips, baked beans, cottage cheese and tabasco)

Enjoying having a bit of a break, but I have to make sure that some time this week I get my 1RM testing in some time this week. Eating is a bit erratic because I don't have weights fueling my hunger during the arvo.

13 Feb

Exercise:
TFS; 30 situps

Food:
Meal 1 (0645): Shake
Meal 2 (0950): Shake
Meal 3 (1200): Vege quiche + chocolate cake (work thing)
Meal 4 (1500): Pasta
Meal 5 (1900): Shake

New Program

Week 1
Mon
Bench: 80% 1RM, 3 reps, 10 sets
Row: 80% 1RM, 3 reps, 10 sets

Tues
Run

Wed
Deadlift: 80% 1RM, 3 reps, 10 sets

Thurs
Run

Fri
Bench: 65% 1RM, 10 reps, 5 sets
Row: 65% 1RM, 10 reps, 5 sets

Sat
Run

Sun
Yoga

Week 2
Mon
Deadlift: 65% 1RM, 10 reps, 5 sets

Tues
Run

Wed
Bench: 80% 1RM, 4 reps, 10 sets
Row: 80% 1RM, 4 reps, 10 sets

Thurs
Run

Fri
Deadlift: 80% 1RM, 4 reps, 10 sets

Sat
Run

Sun
Yoga

Week 3
Mon
Bench: 70% 1RM, 10 reps, 5 sets
Row: 70% 1RM, 10 reps, 5 sets

Tues
Run

Wed
Deadlift: 70% 1RM, 10 reps, 5 sets

Thurs
Run

Fri
Bench: 80% 1RM, 5 reps, 10 sets
Row: 80% 1RM, 5 reps, 10 sets

Sat
Run

Sun
Yoga

Week 4
Mon
Deadlift: 80% 1RM, 5 reps, 10 sets

Tues
Run

Wed
Bench: 75% 1RM, 10 reps, 5 sets
Row: 75% 1RM, 10 reps, 5 sets

Thurs
Run

Fri
Deadlift: 75% 1RM, 10 reps, 5 sets

Sat
Run

Sun
Yoga

Review, Stats and Pics

I've decided to end the program and miss the last two outstanding sessions. I could have dragged it out for another week, but I think that's counter productive. So it's a week off to review, recover and plan for the next program. During the next week I'll still be doing my morning TFS, and hopefully I'll find time for a run or two.

Stats:
------
Weight: 72.3kg
Bodyfat: 14.6%

Note that with BF I moved age categories during the program (from 21-25 to 26-30) which means that for the same measurement I get allocated a higher BF%. The acutal measurement is much the same.


1RM Bench: 78kg (+10kg)
1RM Bar Row: 78kg (+10kg)
1RM Dead: 113kg (+25kg)


Review:
-------
Well overall I'm pretty happy. I think I look noticably better (and so does my wife :-)) and there's no doubt that I feel much much better than before I started.

The extra week (5 instead of 4) was necessary and unavoidable, however not getting the last two sessions in definately was neither of those. Admittedly I've got a lot going on in my life at the moment, but that's never going to change. I need to stick to the program except in 'emergency' circumstances.

The program has some obvious areas that need work. As mentioned I don't think that weighted situps are worth the time. 20 situps one morning made me feel like I'd made more progress than 4 weeks of weighteds. They'll be replaced in the next program with a yet to be decided exercise and situps will be included in morning TFS sessions.

The other obvious problem with the program is the non-weights exercises. I only ran once, and never did yoga. Both of those are important to me and I need to start treating the non-weights portions of my program with the same level of seriousness.

Another thing to consider is the timing. There wasn't a week where I could actually get weights done on mon/wed/fri for various reasons. Usually it was because I made appointments for one of the days without thinking about the impact on my training.

On the up side, I only missed two sessions (the last two) out of the whole program, and I also added TFS in most mornings which was never in the program. I think the short session only happened because I was feeling pretty crap and because there were people outside my garage and I didn't want to sound like a dick ;-)

The big plus of course in my increase in 1RMs. +10kg for both bench and row, and +25kg for deads! I'm very, very happy with that. It puts me pretty much back on par with the strongest I've been.

Pics:

12 Feb

Exercise:
TFS, 25 situps

Food:
Meal 1 (1100): Shake
Meal 2 (1400): Coffee + (huge) Anzac biscuit
Meal 3 (1430): Vegemite + CC tortilla

11 February

Exercise:
None

Food:
Meal 1 (1100): Shake
Meal 2 (1330): CC + vegemite tortilla
Meal 3 (1400): Shake
Meal 4 (1900): 1/2 home made pizza

9 & 10 February

Exercise:
TFS + situps on the 10th

Food:
Fell down a bit here. Ate a whole packet of choclate biscuits on Thurs and only had about 4 meals on Fri. No evergy for weights either day, which is really shit because I only have to more sessions to go. Quite dissappointed.

8 February

Exercise:
None

Food:
Meal 1 (0645): Shake
Meal 2 (1045): Shake
Meal 3 (1300): Brown rice
Meal 4 (1730): Spinach and feta pastie, milk
Meal 5 (1900): Shake

On a course at work for the next 2 days so I can't get home to do weights. Also had a doctor's appointment this arvo so couldn't do it after work either.

7 February

Feeling pretty good today. Bit of a rough night though.

This is the last week of my 4 week program (which is taking 5 weeks because of the Queensland trip) - so there's only two more weights days! Both are 75% 1RM for 5 sets of 10, so it'll be pretty hard going. Looking forward to it though.

I'm also looking forward to next week, where I'll review the program and my progress and also re-test my 1RMs in preparation for the start of the next program. I'm already fairly certain that I'll be dropping weighted situps, so that opens up a spot for something else. I'm thinking perhaps stiff leg dead lifts, but they'd need to be on the same day as benching, with rows moving to deadlift day.

I think the main focus of my next program though will have to be non-weights days. This time round I added TFS on most mornings (which wasn't/isn't in the program) but only ran once in the whole 4 weeks and never did yoga. Both of those are important parts of the program and I need to treat them with the same level of seriousness as I do weights.

Exercise:
None

Food:
Meal 1 (0730): Shake
Meal 2 (1030): Pasta + TVP sauce
Meal 3 (1300): Shake
Meal 4 (1400): Yoghurt
Meal 6 (1430): Chocholate thickshake (small)
Meal 5 (1645): Brown rice
Meal 6 (1900): 2 tortilla pizzas

6 February

Slept well last night, but still woke up tired. Ankle is feeling a bit better - hopefully by lunch it'll be OK for deads.

Exercise:
TFS
Weights: Deadlift (70kg) 10 sets of 5; Situps (22kg) 2 sets of 5

Food:
Meal 1 (0700): Shake
Meal 2 (1030): Pasta + TVP sauce
Meal 3 (1310): Shake
Meal 4 (1600): Pasta + TVP sauce; Yoghurt
Meal 5 (1800): 2 tortilla base pizzas (tortilla, tomato, CC, onion, mushroom)
Meal 6 (2000): Shake

Interesting weights today. I've been thinking for a while that weighted stitups aren't doing much for me, and today I couldn't be bothered doing them for no real reason. I think I'll go back to non-weighted high volume situps for a while as part of my morning TFS.

The interesting part is that because I usually alternate sets, I had much less of a break between by deadlift sets. This resulted in much grunting, growling and sweating. It was pretty damn good :-)

I strapped my ankle fairly tightly and did a few light lifts to warm up. I was surprised to find that there's actually very little ankle movement/stress. I'll keep strapping it till it feels better though, just to try and prevent any accidental injury.

5 February

Exercise:
None - resting my ankle

Food:
Meal 1 (1100): Shake
Meal 2 (1300): Yoghurt + Vegemite and cottage cheese tortilla
Meal 3 (1500): Healthy nachos (baked + refried beans, cottage cheese, tabasco, baby spinach leaves and baked tortilla 'chips')
Meal 4 (1900): Pasta + TVP sauce
Meal 5 (2130): Snack - Glass of milk, sugar free chocolate + cheese & onion chips (v small amount of both)


Achillies is feeling a bit better today after deep heating it last night. I'll strap it tomorrow for weights and keep an eye on it.

Need to eat more of a weekend to stop myself snacking!

4 February

Caught up on a lot of sleep last night. Spent the day washing, vaccuuming and changing the oil in the 2 cars.

Exercise:
None (other than the car stuff)

Food:
Meal 1 (1030): 1 cup oats + milk
Meal 2 (1630): Pasta + sauce
Meal 3 (1930): Home made pizza (pastry base)
Meal 4 (2300): Snack - cheese and onion chips

Unfortunately I think I've damaged my left achillies slightly. In Friday's session I had the bar in my hands (54kg-ish) and accidentally moved most of my weight onto my left foot and twisted it slightly. Pretty sore today, hopefully will be fine for Monday.

Not much food today because I was pre-occupied with the cars. Plus I drank a fair bit of pepsi max so didn't get hungry. Felt really good to do stuff with the cars today - it's been way too long since they've been cleaned properly. Changed the oil in my wife's car for the first time and it's a royal pain compared to mine. Oil filter's too small for the clamp and in a hard to reach position surrounded by hot stuff. Needless to say I got the job done and survived, but ended up just a little oily in the process ;-)

2 February

Lots of sleep last night, but still tired.

Exercise: None

Food:
Meal 1 (0830): Shake
Meal 2 (1130): Pasta + TVP sauce
Meal 3 (1330): Snack - Coffee and a couple of chips + salad
Meal 4 (1400): Shake
Meal 5 (1500): Mud cake (birthday at work)
Meal 6 (1800): Pasta + TVP sauce, yoghurt
Meal 7 (2130): Bean, cottage cheese and salad tortilla

Worked late to make up for a few short days and a late start, so no time or energy to run tonight.

Apologies again for the damn ordering of the last few posts. Not sure exactly why blogger wants to post them in a different order to how I publish them...

1 February

Food on the Qld trip wasn't too bad. Kept levels of junk to a minimum on the way up, but on the way back a couple of ice creams snuck their way in ;-) While we were up there diet was OK too. We ate out a fair bit but I mostly chose healthy stuff when I could, the only major badness being a heap of chips the first night we were up there.

Got home late last night after a 13ish hour drive, so today was never going to be a particularly useful day. Because I lost the last couple of days of last week and the first half of this week, I'm going to pick up my program tomorrow as if it's last Thursday. HOpefully that should work out OK.

Exercise: None

Food:
Meal 1: 2 vegemite and cheese crumpets
Meal 2: Pad Thai (work lunch)
Meal 3: Spinach pasta with TVP etc sauce
Meal 4: Packet of mint slice biscuits(!!!)
Meal 5: Nachos


Yeah, meal 4 was not a good choise. Not sure why but I'd been craving cholocate all day today and couldn't go past the mint slices. Overall food was decidedly average because 1) We had pretty much nothing in the house and 2) I had an unexpected work lunch.

Back on the horse tomorrow, so to speak.

25 January

Slept better last night, but still not great.

Exercise:
TFS
Weights: Deadlift (63kg) 4 sets of 10; Situps (27kg) 4 sets of 10

Food:
Meal 1 (0700): Shake
Meal 2 (1100): Pasta with TVP, spinach and tomato sauce
Meal 3 (1300): Shake
Meal 4 (1400): Yoghurt
Meal 5 (1600): Beans + spinach


Very happy with weights today. Last time I did the same routine (with lighter weight) I could only push out 3 sets and decided that would be all I'd aim for. I had a bit left in me so I did another set (barely). Was a good feeling.

I start the 14 hour drive to Brisbane tonight, and won't get home till Monday at the earliest. I'll need to make up for this Friday's bench + row next week, as well as possibly monday's dead + situps.

It also means blogging will be hard/impossible for the next few days. I'll try and keep track but I expect I'll slacken off with no exercise to report.

23 January

Exercise:
Weights: Bench (48kg) 5 sets of 10; Bar Row (48kg) 5 sets of 10

Food:
Meal 1 (0700): Shake
Meal 2 (1030): Shake
Meal 3 (1300): Beans + spinach
Meal 4 (1430): yoghurt (no jam!)
Meal 5 (1830): Shake
Meal 5 (2100): Pasta with TVP, spinach and tomato sauce


Feeling a bit off colour this morning so had to have my lunch shake early coz I couldn't face the beans.

Weights was quite good. Pushed to the limit but still managed to complete it.

24 January

Bad night for sleep last night. Very tired.

Exercise:
TFS

Food:
Meal 1 (0645): Shake
Meal 2 (1045): Pasta with TVP, spinach and tomato sauce
Meal 3 (1300): Shake
Meal 4 (1530): Pasta with TVP, spinach and tomato sauce
Meal 5 (1745): Shake
Meal 6 (2030): 3 baked bean, spinach, cottage cheese and tomoato tortillas

Too tired for weights at lunch today, which I'm pretty disappointed about. Especially as it means I nw won't be able to get all of this weeks weights in because I'll be in Qld for the rest of the week.

3 February

Exercise:
TFS
Weights: Bench (54kg) 10 sets of 5; Bar row (54kg) 10 sets of 5

Food:
Meal 1 (0700): Shake
Meal 2 (1030): Pasta + TVP Sauce
Meal 3 (1300): Shake
Meal 4 (1430): Yoghurt
Meal 5 (1600): Pasta + TVP Sauce
Meal 6 (1830): Shake
Meal 7 (2030): Vegetarian fried rice
Meal 8 (2200): Snack - suger free chocolate + sugar free ice cream