I Can Transform

Well the five days at the gym this week were certainly a lot more productive than last week. No snow helped.
Managed to complete five full days with varying cardio, weights and core excercises. Really pleased.

Today in particular was an absolutely awesome day. Finished off the week with a training partner who really pushed me to keep using heavier weights and trying new exercises. It’s nice to do that from time to time to break the routine. Did a brutal core set after the weights which was so intense. Completed the session with a race between me a friend and a personal trainer who was working (it was getting late, not many people around), 500metre sprints on the rowers, with a 1min rest between each sprint. Five sprints in total. Didn’t take that long to complete however was so exhausting. Certainly felt the burn. When three guys line up on the rowers and start racing theres always a bit of friendly competition/male pride which helps.

Not expecting to see any changes in the photo this week, that would be silly, however perhaps next week we may see tiny, minute changes. Had lots of salmon, salad and a jacket potato for dinner. Not bad going.

Considering going swimming tomorrow as well. Loving it!

Well I had another great workout today but you don’t wanna hear about that every day. Nothing different to normal. However I did go shopping and was looking through the supermarket with “new eyes”. Am I the only one who loves just buying healthy food, I do like the food, but it makes me feel great just knowing that I’m becoming that health freak person haha. How sad.

Anyway, when it comes to cooking I’m a bit of a reject. Ok a complete reject. I can’t stand it. It’s not that I don’t know how to do the basics, but would rather spend my time doing anything else. Plus when you live on your own cooking for one, day in day out is a nightmare. Vegetables go off, everything comes in packets for two people. Then I eat two peoples worth, not good. If you now consider cooking vegetables, yes I should be but I really can’t stand it. I’m going to work myself up to peeling and chopping gradually.

Well anyway,  walking through the supermarket I suddenly had this eureka moment. Why not just live off stir fry? Genius! It’s easy to cook, you can get it pre-packaged cheap, it’s quick, you can have it with whatever and best of all its more than just salad. So I snapped up a few bits and pieces and will see how I get on this week.

Today’s bit of advice, if like me you hate cooking but need to eat more vegetables just make lots of stir fries.

In my continuing mission to not only try and build muscle but also try and lower my body fat to full hyper-low muscle rippling capacity I have been thinking what exactly is the best way to measure just how much body fat I have anyway? It’s not something I have ever measured before.

Well a quick Google search shows up quite a few options, the sort of things you’d guess I suppose.

The Tape Measure Method – Well, it’s certainly convenient. There are plenty of body fat calculators online that take your gender,  age, height etc into consideration as well which is good. Apparently though they can be upto 2% inaccurate either way at the best of times, which when your trying to get your body fat percent very low may not be a good thing. Ok it’s a bad thing. I will give it a go but I’d rather something I can rely on a little more.

Home Body Fat Scales – Again, very convenient although probably a bit more expensive than a tape measure. They work on “bioelectrical impedance”, big word, which basically means it sends a tiny current through your body and measures how much resistance it finds. Fat being more resistant to the current. Problem is that many other things alter your bodys impedance level, including doing excercise, temperature, eating. You can’t use them within 4 hours of eating or drinking and 12 hours of excercise which is going to be a massive inconveniene. Give these a miss.

Hydrostatic Weighing – The most accurate by a long shot but you need a massive hydrostatic weighing tank and an assistant, not exactly convenient but hey, I may give it a go for a laugh sometime. Next!

Body Fat Calipers – With a scary sounding name like that they have got to be worth investing in. It sounds like some mad torture device. Besides that they are actually supposed to be surprisingly accurate and after checking they are pretty damn cheap too. Only a tenner. They are very accurate only second to the hydrostatic weighing. I have read that you are usually measured by a professional but how hard can it be? Pinch a bit of skin, read what it says, right? Will have to have look into this but I think this is the way to go. We have a winner!

One thing that I do want to remember is not to get too concerned by the number. I have never been a big one for weighing myself because I honestly cannot see the point, some people are naturally thin, some aren’t, some are tall etc. I know for a fact I’m nothing like over weight, so all a scale is going to tell me is I’m fine, or, you’ve put on weight, but your still fine. Is it muscle, is it fat? Can I really tell when it’s just a pound? Who knows. Body composition is much more important, a number means nothing.

As promised I have the details now of my exact workout. Again in the future I will be able to look back and see how much I’ve improved. It may also let some other people look over it and let me know how I can improve on it.

Warm up (Day 1 & Day 2)
10min – Usually on rower, bike or running. Medium intensity.

Weights (Day 1)
Lat Pull Down (wide) – 4 sets of 12 – 42kg
Lat Pull Down (reverse, narrow grip) – 4 sets of 12 – 42kg
Leg Press (machine) – 5 sets of 12 – 106kg
Bicep Curls (cable) – 4 sets of 12 – 40kg

Weights (Day 2)
Chest Press – 4 sets of 12 – 15kg
Shoulder Press – 4 sets of 12 – 10kg
Upright Row (cable) – 4 sets of 12 – 40kg
Cable Chest Fly – 4 sets of 12 – 25kg
Tricep Overhead Pulldown – 4 sets of 12 – 40kg

NB – Each of the weights excercises is performed with perfect form, not jerking or rushing, taking 1 full second to take strain and 2 full seconds to release. This makes it hell of a lot harder!

Core Exercises (Day 1 & Day 2) – Rinse and repeat 3x no breaks
Crunches – 20
Toe Touches – 20
Plank – 60 secs

Cardio – Varies from one of the following per session:
Rowing –  5min intensity building then 10x 100 metre sprints at 100% intensity at the start of each minute, with the remainder of the minute spent at 60% intensity recovering before the next sprint.
Treadmill – 5min running at 10kph, then increasing the speed by 0.1kph every 10 seconds until reach 16kph. 15min in total.
Treadmill – 30 min to 1 hour running at 10-12kph. Up to 10km.

Well thats it!
I alternate these 2 days giving the other muscles time to repair for the proceeding day. This is completed five days per week. Obviously with time the weights will increase quite quickly. Will keep this updated.
A few notes: I would possibly like to introduce some pull ups and push ups, or maybe I should just be doing these at some point during every session. Also doing more research on actually doing the weights regarding perfect form (which kills me by the end of every set) versus explosive and intense. Varying perhaps.

In a bid to get more protein and calories into my diet, about a week ago I ordered a bucket load of PhD Pharma Gain from MonsterSupplements. It won the award for their best mass gainer of 09 so I thought it would be pretty good.  Having used their Synergy product before which is pretty damn good I thought I’d give this a try.

This was however before my revelation that I no longer need to just raise my calorie intake and work out a lot. I was a bit worried that this would be working against me however on closer inspection 2-scoops is a measly 240 calories (compared to some 1000 calorie monsters out there). It also has a 50:50 protein:carbs split which is not so bad. I believe if I have one an hour or so before a workout the carbs should help there, plus it will help keep my protein levels up all day (which is vital apparently) and then have another immediately post workout.

In the future I think opting for the  synergy is probably a better idea which has 2:1 protein:carbs and includes creatine. Will have to get some opinions on them.

My one complaint about the product is that it really doesn’t taste all that much like chocolate (not with water anyway) and no matter how much you mix it, and how much water you mix it with, it always seems to be the consistency of tar, leaving a lot of residue in the shaker which seems like a waste. Also makes it ridiculously difficult to drink.

Anyway, I’ve got it now so I’ll have to drink it.

*UPDATE*
Just mixed my pre-workout drink with about 450ml of water (it advises 350ml) and it mixes fine and isn’t too thick. Probably slightly thin if anything so I’d say I’m being an idiot and the 350ml is good. Still doesn’t taste great though.

Well, we come to the end of the first week of this insane 52 week experiment and it wasn’t a great start. In the end I managed to get to the gym 3 times however not the 5 that I am trying to. Damn snow! Next week is going to be different.

Above is Photo#2. I am not expecting to see ANY difference from week to week and over the past week I am certain I can see zero difference. That would be some sort of miracle. However I do want to keep a weekly photo log, 1) so I can make a video of my transformation in a years time and 2) so I can pinpoint the changes within my diet and exercise to the changes in my body.
Simples.

One week down, Fifty one more to go.

Having literally just mentioned Tyler Durden it suddenly sprung to mind that I hadn’t actually told you what I am looking to achieve this year.

Everyone has a different idea on what the perfect body is and how to get there. Some people like looking like body builders, some like twigs, some like fatties, some like athletes. I’m not here to tell anyone what the perfect body is however I do know exactly what I want my body to look like. The ultimate goal this year.

For anyone who hasn’t seen Fight Club. Tyler Durden is the most badass, crazy, outgoing character to ever set foot on screen. What really matters is that his body (Brad Pitt) is exactly what I’m looking to achieve. I don’t want to look like a beefcake, or a bouncer, or a body builder on steroids. I do not think that big and bulky looks good. I want to look chiselled, lean and athletic.

I’m no personal trainer and honestly I’m not sure how realistic aiming for the body above is in 12 months from where I am now, however, I am going to give it a million and one percent. I am going to put everything I have into this next 12 months. I will make it.

So this is my goal. I’m going to need to gain lean muscle and burn fat like there’s no tomorrow. Watch this space.

Well, I think its safe to say we haven’t had snow like this in a long time. Not that I remember anyway.
It’s made getting to the gym very difficult as I don’t have a car and the it’s about 3 miles from my house, all up hill.

Anyway, I managed to make it yesterday and had a great workout completing day 2 of the new programme. I also increased the intensity of the cardio work I did, completing 10x 100 metre sprints on the rowing machine in 10mins (slowing after the 100m  is completed until the next minute starts). I decided to do this after reading numerous articles that explain the benefits of doing cardio at max intensity versus slow and steady, in particular for burning fat. Top Fat Loss Trainer in particular has some fantastic articles

That also brings me to the next subject.  Losing fat versus gaining muscle. Up until recently I thought the road to gaining muscle was quite easy, increase your calorie intake, eat lots of protein, work out as much as possible and watch the muscles grow. This was literally what a personal trainer told me a few years ago. Whilst true I think that is more of the attitude needed to end up as massive beefcake/body builder and not the Tyler Durden look that I’m aiming for.

It is becoming ever more clear that getting a low body fat percentage is going to be even more important than putting on muscle. I will be researching this continuously over the coming months to maximise how quickly I can lose it. As important as working out will be my diet which has been calorie packed until now.

I also mentioned to Brad of Top Fat Loss Trainer that I would be completely transforming myself this year and told him, straight up, that I would be the biggest transformation he see’s out of all his readers. The challenge is really afoot. I have until Christmas 2010.

Ok well that time has arrived to post my first photo. The longer I delay it the longer I wont want to, nobody’s gonna see it anyway so I’m not sure why i’m worrying.

All photos in the future are going to be taken in as similar way as possible. No breathing in. No tensing muscles at all. Nevermind.

This is just the benchmark that I will be comparing myself to in the future.

Taken 03/01/09

Well, the country has been covered in snow over the last couple of days however, when I woke up this morning God had decided to take the whole, white powder thing a bit too far. Not impressed.
I didn’t manage to get to the gym yesterday as 1) It was snowy and 2) My little sister came down to see me.
She’s off back to uni soon so we made the effort to go out for dinner. I decided Wednesday would be one of my 2 days off this week. I usually have Sundays off as well. However today the snow is even worse! Probably about half a foot so I really doubt it will be open. Think I may just have to call today another day off and just hope that the rest of the week I can make it up there. Not a good start to the new year.

On the plus side dinner out was lovely. Pizza Express. I went for the highest calorie pizza on the menu to keep my daily calories nice and high. Making the effort to eat as much as possible. This has also got me thinking I may post weekly updates on exactly what I’ve been eating and calulcate the calories etc and that way it will give me another aspect of the programme to critique.