I have had a bit of a rollercoaster ride over the last week or so…
I had 4 days away on the Isle of Mull - absolutely magic and a great family holiday. I took this as a ‘treat’ weekend and allowed myself to drink wine every night and eat 3 course meals too. I tried to keep my carbs low in the evening and not pig out too much. It did feel like a treat but not so much that I wanted to throw all my good work away. The biggest treat was buying fish and chips from the van in Tobermory - that is a bit of a tradition and they are seriously the best fish and chips in the country.
Anyway, I did one set of core exercises and one 30 minute run (including hills around Calgary Bay - beautiful - I felt like I was making a movie it was so stunning).
I came back ready for a really good session on Tuesday - ready to hit my targets for this month and make sure I am not on a plateau. Straight into interval sprinting and I manged to strain my quad/thigh muscle during the first set of sprints. Not sure how I did it - I was well warmed up and fed. It was pretty sore - I couldn’t put any stress on it at all so we had to abandon the training session after 10 minutes. To say I was really pissed off is putting it mildly - I was raging! All I could think about was being out of action for a week or two, losing muscle and getting fat.
I came home and put an icepack on my leg for 20 minutes, then off for 20 minutes and repeat 3 times. By the following morning my thigh was really stiff and I was walking with a bit of a limp but by mid afternoon (ie, 24 hours later) it was beginning to fade. I put more ice on again last night and it seems to be much better. I will possibly be looking at leg training again tomorrow which is amazing. I don’t know if it my desire to get rid of the injury that made it heal so quickly or just the regime of ice and rest.
Anyway - last night I did really focused upper body training - Chest, biceps and shoulders. 4 sets of 15 (where I could) with 2 press ups after each chest exercise and 10 seconds of shadow boxing after each shoulder exercise. I really feel like I pushed myself to the limit and it felt great. Afterwards I did some assisted stretches to ensure my chest doesn’t become too tight - they were bloody agonising. But I do feel good today so they must have done something right.
I’m taking Maximuscle Cyclone (protein shake) within 20 minutes of each training session to build muscle and recover quickly. I’ve been doing this for around 10 days now - let’s see if there are any obvious results at the end of the month. The protein shake tastes pretty good in Orange flavour.
My weight doesn’t appear to be shifting much and I think I have been a bit heavy on the portion sizes in the last couple of weeks. I’ll try to focus on that for the next few weeks too.
All looking good and feeling great now though!!! Summer holiday to France in 7 weeks so it is time to push on for those goals - I want to look great in a red pair of Diesel boardies - call me shallow - I don’t care. I don’t think I’ve ever looked good just in shorts so this could be a life changing moment for me 
I think I’m back on track with training and weight loss again….
After being a bit pissed off at myself last week for snacking on some chocolate, having a fair bit to drink and missing my target weight by a kilo, I feel I’m focused again.
I did upper body training at 6.30am this morning and it was pretty good. I wasn’t as strong on certain sets and I put that down to only getting 5.5 hours sleep. Just ddn’t have the mental energy to push through some of the sets I was finding difficult (such as the shoulder press). But despite this I still felt like I had a good session (especially the bench press).
I also did a 2 mile run around the golf course last night and it felt great.
I’m going away on Friday so I’m doing leg training tomorrow morning instead so I need to make sure I get a really good night’s sleep tonight.
I’m definitely making progress towards my ultimate beach body - I can feel my love handles disappearing, my chest being tighter and my abs becoming toned. No six pack yet. Can’t want to see where I am by the end of May.
Cheers, Mark
Today was the start of a new cycle of exercises - this is month 2 of my first three months of personal training. Today I did interval training (at 6.30am on a drizzly Scottish morning). We have a great place for doing this called the Kings Knot. It is a 400 year old mound just below Stirling Castle and has lots of levels to run up and down. There is nothing like training in a place steeped in history.
Basically I did 5 sets of sprints around the base of the Kings Knot - sprint around once (around 36 seconds first time), then walk around to gather my breath. Repeat 5 times. My glutes were killing me after the 3rd round. I think this is still a hangover from leg training last Wednesday. It is definitely doing some good though - my bum actually feels like it has some muscle instead of a big blob of lard!
Then there is the centre of the Knot where I started in the middle and ran down and up the next layer, turned around and ran back to the centre, then picked another route to run down and up. Did this for 12 different points around the Knot then took a 2 monute breather. Repeat 3 times. This was great for building leg strength and really pushing up the hills.
Then I repeated the first drill 3 times (sprint then walk around the base). Tried to keep my sprints below 40 seconds. Right at the top of my thighs was really painful - I didn’t realise that this was still my quad muscle - I didn’t think they went that high but I’m told they go all the way up to your hip. Anyway - they were really sore during my leg raises yesterday (last exercise as part of my weekend core workout). I’m sure they are getting stronger though - which is kind of the point isn’t it!).
All in all it was probably about 30 minutes of exercise but I was absolutely knackered. I think I could have tried a little harder on a couple of the laps and I’ll make sure I really push it next time.
Not sure what I’m going to do on Wednesday but I guess it will be some sort of upper body training. Looking forward to a new challenge.
Cheers, M
I have a stinking head cold but had a session doing upper body weight training today. I found it tougher than usual - everything felt like it took even more effort. However, as upper body weight training is not such a cardiovascular strain, it was certainly OK to push through. Actually it may even be a better workout because you are having to use even more effort to do the same thing - which is good for your body.
It may be different if I was going for a big run as I may struggle to breathe properly.
Anyway I pushed on through and it was fine - although I have strained my back a bit. I think I was slightly twisted when I was doing kneeling lat pulls. I’ve taken an anti-inflammatory pill and hopefully it won’t turn into anything worse.
Well I’m nearly at the end of month 1 of personal training. My last session is tomorrow morning at 6.30am. As part of it I will be measuring
- weight
- body fat percentage
I have been monitoring my weight and first thing this morning I weighed in below 14 stone (13st, 13lb, 6oz) for the first time in 10 years. In kilos that is 89.2KG. I am well chuffed. I’ll wait to see how I meaure on Scott’s scales though before I really celebrate. I think I was 92.5KG at the start of the month (but that was in my running gear and 30 minutes after a bowl of porridge). This means my BMI is just over 25 - meaning I am still overweight but only just
As for my body fat percentage, I haven’t had that measured since I was at school. It will be great to get a baseline with something to work towards for next month. I think it is going to be done with callipers rather than electronically, as the callipers are more accurate.
Leg training went well last night - weights are increasing each week and I can certainly tell today that I have been training. But I’m not in agony like the first week so it seems that we have the balance right. However, as we are at the end of the first month, we are going to change my routine about in order to “keep my body guessing”. No plateau for me!
Cheers, M
Today I received a Nike+ Sportsband to try out and review. First impression is that it looks fantastic - rubberised wrist band, really light but strong.
The idea is that it has a detachable USB dongle which will team up with a chip that goes in your Nike+ running shoes (although many people sellotape them onto their laces if they don’t have Nike+ shoes). You can do your run and then upload the results to nikeplus.com
As far as I can see it is exactly the same as the Nike+ kit for your iPod (which I already have and think is great). This is aiming for the rest of the market who either don’t have an iPod or don’t like to run to music. There is a big debate as to whether running with music is a good idea or a bad idea. I’m undecided at the moment and will spend the next few weeks trying out both methods.
Looking forward to seeing what results I get.
Everything else is going really well and am going to get my official weigh in on Friday (after 4 weeks of personal training)….
I’ve booked up for a 10k run in Bellahouston Park in Glasgow on Fathers Day in June. I’m really looking forward to it as this will be the first proper run I’ve done since the BUPA Great Winter in Edinburgh in January - and that was only 5K.
I’m not sure how quickly to push into the running training or whether all the legs and general aerobic fitness that I’m doing with my personal trainer will take me most of the way anyway. I think I’ll need to try doing a few 7 or 8 k runs at least. That will be easy enough to manage at the weekend - even with the rest of the stuff during the week.
I am an avid reader of Mens Health Mag and I plan to get into the reader section - photo of how I used to look as a fat bastard and how great I look now Still got a way to go but certainly still making great progress. I keep getting amazing comments from my wife - even walking back from the cinema last night she had her arm around me and said it felt great as she held onto something resmbling muscle rather than dodgy love handles.
I am feeling really happy that the weight loss and the general ‘tightening’ is happening in the right places (ie, my love handles and my moobs (man boobs)).
Keep on truckin….
Got up at 6.30am today - ready to climb the Dumyat, a nice little hill near Stirling (http://www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/stirling/dumyat/index.html). I climbed up with my best friend Jonny and it felt great. My fitness levels were pretty good and I really enjoyed the fresh early morning air. I saw one guy running down as we were climbing up - that looked great. I think I’m going to try that over the next fews weeks.
Yesterday (Saturday) I went for a good 2 mile hilly run on grass/dirt. My knees felt much stronger since starting with the personal training - really happy with that.
I did take a good 10 minutes to get my second wind though which was longer than I thought - we’ll see how that goes over the next couple of weeks. I don’t want to push back into running too quickly and get injured. I’ll stick with the personal training and slowly get back into running over the next 4-6 weeks.
Ta, Mark
After upper body training yesterday, I though my arms would be killing me today. I remember doing bicep curls etc when I was younger and really getting massive DOMS (achey muscles) the following day. Have you ever had it where you cannot straighten your arms for 3 days? It is agonising.
Anyway, I’m happy to report that I can feel that I’ve trained my upper body but I’m not in agony. I’m very happy with that.
Back onto legs tomorrow night - my 8 year old son is going to come along too as every other week my Wednesday training is at night time instead of morning. My son loves his rugby and has been promised stronger legs for mauling - I hope he likes it.
Today I started the upper body training - let’s face it, this is the bit that people really care about. Up at 5.50am for a 6.30 start and all was looking good (despite only getting to sleep at 11.30pm and having a late night the night before).
Upper body workouts are totally different to standard cardio workouts or leg workouts. I did loads of sets on upper body and core strength this morning and hardly broke a sweat. Totally different to the leg training last week which was a complete cardio workout at the same time.
My plank time is now 1 minute (if you don’t know what the plank is: it involves propping yourself up on your elbows and keeping you body totally straight for as long as possible). The aim is to get this to 2 minutes. It really helps strengthen all the core muscles. Try this link - http://exercise.about.com/od/abs/ss/abexercises_10.htm
Stuart is promising to lay weights on my back during this which should be interesting!