Mark's September 2008 Nutrition and Training Journal

[dfmark1111]

Following same plan this month. 3000 calories a day, from natural and healthy foods if possible. Weight lifting Mon, Wed, Fri. Cardio Tue, Thurs, Sat.

Calories 3003
Protein 36% Carbs 23% Fats 41%

New food ideas:

Chicken Fahita Omlet (chicken breast, 1 red pepper, 1 onion, 2 eggs, milk, Cherry tomatos on top) This tasted great, covered 2 meals, and had an insane protein to carb and fat ratio.

Plain yogurt with blackberries.

Flax bread with almond butter on it.


Lower body weight lifting today. Switching to new lifts

5 sets Front Squats/ 1 set leg extension machine
5 sets Lunges/1 set wimpy chin ups (using chair to assist)
5 sets Leg Press Calf Extensions/1 set seated calf raises
5 sets Stomach machine/ 1 set bridges
6 sets Leg abduction
6 sets Leg adduction

I shredded my legs with this workout. I hope I can walk tommorrow.

The eating was great today. An emergency came up that made me miss a lot of calories, so I had quite a bit of mixed nuts at the end of the day to close the gap on calories. I was at about 50% protein 25% carbs 25% fats for most of the day.

You blasted your legs today. Your cardio tomorrow may be sitting in a rocking chair and knitting.

[dfmark1111]

Calories 3001
Protein 38% Carbs 37% Fats 25%

I'm cutting most of the nuts from my diet, I like the numbers I ended up with today. I hope I can repeat that balance.

For variety, I made a protein shake with goats milk today. It tasted about the same as cows, and I do seem to think it digested a lot better. I have a few more shakes out of that carton of milk, I'll let you know how that goes.

It was free birthday roll day at work (happens once a month), and I got a banana instead of a sweet roll.

Treadmill HIIT Cardio today (3.2 mph)
warmup 5% incline, main workout 6-9% incline, peak workout 10% incline.

I did cardio first thing in the morning. Oddly enough, my legs loosened up as I did it, but then stiffened up again and made me suffer all day at work. I walked most of the day at work, so it was a long day.

I think my max HR during HIIT was about 150. I was surprised how quickly my pulse dropped during the cooldown.

I lift upper body tomorrow, so I have 2 days to heal up a bit before hitting anything legs again.

I made an appointment to test body fat next monday at 2 pm. After taking next sunday off, this should make for a good reading. I'll post tape measurements, and body fat % after that test. I'm hoping to do this every 1-2 months.

[Lady C]

Interesting. Some people drink goats milk if they are lacotse intolerant. It supposedly digests easier. I tried it (I'm quite lacose intolerant) and it still made me sick.

About the heart rate returning to normal quickly. This quicker this happens, the fitter one is.

[dfmark1111]

Calories 3002
32% protein 42% carbs 30% fat

New Food items today:

Quality protein turkey lunchmeat (I look for packages with high protein and low fat) on some kind of flax hybred bread.

I ordered some muscletech shakes for post workout and it arrived today. I think these shakes seem pretty quality and have a lot of stuff in them. Got a case of chocolate and a case of strawberry delivered. This should add some variety on the post workout shake.

Upper body workout:

5 sets of chinups 1 set of lat pull downs (back)
(I put a chair under the chin up bar to help myself, I don't think I can do 1 real chinup, but managed 48 this way, varying grip close mid wide between sets.) I'll either do a chinup someday, or have REALLY strong legs.
5 sets front lat pull downs 1 set bench (chest)
5 sets shrugs, 1 set side flys (shoulders)
5 sets tricep dips - 1 set kickbacks - 1 set tricep extrensions on cables (triceps)
5 sets dumbbell curls - 1 set cable curls (biceps)

I'm trying to focus on the back muscles mostly to open my chest and work away my shoulder inpingement.

Social:

I had dinner with a nice woman tonight. I think the workouts and the improved fitness is really helping my social life. Confidence for the win. She's dieting too, which is cool that I only ate half my chinese dinner. It worked out the total calories matched what I wanted for the day. Going to a movie next week.

[dfmark1111]

Calories 2997
31% protein 35% carbs 33% fat

HIIT cardio on Treadmill today. I really had to work at it (my legs are still sore a bit) but I got a regular workout in. Tried my first ordered shake today, and it tasted great after the workout.

[dfmark1111]

3357 Calories
37% protein 36% carbs 24% fat

Lower body workout today. I forgot the ab/aduction exercises, but I'll catch those tommorrow when I do cardio. I tried to load up on food earlier in the day. I overshot 3000 calories a little, but pretty close. I was really spent from the workout, and hoped shifting some calories forward would help me recover a bit better today. I'm really looking forward to the body composition test on Monday.

[dfmark1111]

After a really long nap, I went back to the gym to do some exercises I forgot this morning. The split workout really gave me a lot of energy on the leg ab/adduction exercises.

To warm up, I did some steady state cardio on an exercise bike for 45 minutes. This allowed me to burn the extra 350 calories I went over my total today. As I try to move my calories forward in the day, I might use this tool more often.

On Monday I should receive some books on stretching. This might be a good fit for a split workout sort of thing.

I feel the fitness junkie coming alive inside. I hope to accomplish some fantistic things over the next year.

[dfmark1111]

Weight today was 278. (minus 14 of starting)
Average weekly change: 2.97 pounds per week.

It will be interesting to see what the body composition test shows as to the combination of fat and muscle lost.

[dfmark1111]

Calories 2,993

HIIT Treadmill cardio

Did a decent enough workout in the afternoon. I feel a little frazzled today, tommorrow's rest day will be very useful.

[dfmark1111]

Calories 2999
38% protein 28% carbs 32% fats

Day off from working out. I measured calories today, the macronutrients aren't very exact.

I had a Dairy Queen Banana split for a treat (meal) today. Otherwise pretty healthy.

[dfmark1111]

Body composition test was pretty mixed results.
Weight down 8.6 pounds
Body Fat up .8 pounds
BMI down 1.20
FFM down 9.4 pounds
Metabolism down about 100 calories.

At a glance, looks like I lost 9 pounds of muscle and gained a pound of fat for all my work the last few months.

Body measurements were better though

Neck lost 1 inch
Arm lost 1/2 inch
Thigh lost 3 inches
Waist lost 3 inches
Chest lost 4 inches
Hips lost 1 inch

I did my upper body workout today, and will end up at 3000 calories at the end of the day.

I'm scratching my head out here in cyberspace-land after reading your results. I'd be inclined to use the cheek bone test and how the clothes fit test this go around and see what the readings are next time.

Keep marching forward.

[dfmark1111]

Wow, comparing some photos from 2 months ago, to today, I can really see an improvement. I'm still a bit shy posting photos of myself, but believe me, I'm looking a lot trimmer. I hadn't looked at them before.

I think a 6 pronged attack is in order for progress for me:

1: scale
2: photos
3: measurements
4: body composition tests
5: Clothes fitting
6: How healthy I feel.

Only #4 is negative at all. The rest all are definately improving.

It can be a hard pill to swallow that I have to lose a lot of weight, but I guess there is no better time to start than now.

Originally Posted by dfmark1111

It can be a hard pill to swallow that I have to lose a lot of weight, but I guess there is no better time to start than now.

How bad do you want it?