Big Changes

The bad news: I’m planning on updating this regularly again.  Which means there are going to be more horrible pictures of me up.  Yay!

The good news: I’ve been working out steady for more than 10 weeks now.  I’m lifting more weight than I’ve ever lifted in my life.  That’s fun.

Quick update on everything that’s happened (to my workout life): I went on that trip in March.  It was fun.  I climbed 300 feet up the side of a rock, which was freaky, but awesome.  After that trip, I gained 20 lbs back because I stopped doing everything, getting up to 270.  That sucked.  I’m now back down to about 260, working my way down slowly.  I workout 4 or 5 times a week, doing weights, then usually climbing at the rock wall and playing racquetball for an hour.  My muscles have never been bigger.

Pictures (and yes, I do go out of my way to look happy in these):

I am at 251 and around 28% body fat.  I missed my goal of 245 by the end of February, but I’m just happy that I’m finally making progress again.  New goal: 235 by the end of March.  I’ll be spending a week on the camping trip, which should be good on the whole.  I’ll still be pretty active, so I won’t gain any weight due to being sedentary, and it’s about time for a break from lifting anyway (you’re supposed to take breaks to “deload” every 8-12 weeks).

My overall goals are this: I’d like to weigh around 220 with 8-10% body fat.  Once I’m down to 220, I’ll worry less about losing weight and more about dropping body fat.

Now, for the pictures.

Me, Relaxed

Me, Relaxed

Me, Flexing

Me, Flexing

Keep your eyes on the links to the right of the screen.  Pretty soon (later today?) there will be a link to a page showing the most recent comparison.

I was right at 255 this morning.  My weight-loss seems like it has stagnated.  Therefore, I’m changing some things up.

First and foremost, I’ve changed my workout.  I never told what my old one was, so there will be no basis for comparison, but my new workout is available in an easily linkable ebook, which is VERY convenient.  Feel free to check it out and use it.  I tried it yesterday for the first time, and my ass is a little kicked.

I switched for a couple of reasons.  I like the whole-body focus.  I want to work my whole body every time I get into the gym.  I really love squats, and I want to start working on my back more.  Fortunately, this workout includes a lot of back exercises.  I also like the simplicity.  A and B — that’s it.  The weight is increased at a very easy-to-figure-out schedule, very methodical.  I dig it.

The other thing I’ve started doing is rock-climbing.  Our gym has the tallest indoor rock wall in Texas.  I’ve yet to reach the top, but every time I try, I get a little closer, which is exciting.  I’m heading out to Hueco Tanks State Park for spring break.  A week of camping and rock-climbing.  I don’t know what the hell I’ve gotten myself into, but I’m sure it’ll be fun.

Taken this morning. I weighed 255.8.

Me, Relaxed

Me, Relaxed

Me, Flexing

Me, Flexing

This morning I weighed 260.0. My goal is to be at or below 245 by the end of February.

I woke up and worked out this morning and it was great. I was full of energy and I felt like I could lift more than I’ve been able to in a long time. Everything was too light. I’ll up it next week.

This past weekend I and four friends went out to Lost Maples.  It was gorgeous. We’re heading out again the weekend of the 14th to Enchanted Rock and we expect at least 7 for that trip.  Possibly more, thanks to word-of-mouth and meetup.com.  If you want to come, just let me know!

I took a shitload of pictures, but I need to figure out how to set a gallery up on this thing.  That native interface is too much of a pain in the ass.

I’ve decided to pick up healthy new hobbies.  In light of that, yesterday I went to Hill Country State Natural Area (first link!) with my friend Steve.  In some ways it was awesome, in other disastrous.  Mostly, it was awesome, but I completely over-packed and ended up heading out with a pack that weighed close to 60 lbs.  Any backpackers reading this know that this is ridiculous.  But it was my first time out and I had a really good time.  I learned a lot and next time my pack will be much lighter.  

This morning I was up at 7:30 and hiking by 8:30 (after breakfast).  We saw all the trails we wanted to, probably hiked between 7-10 miles, then headed back to camp, shut down and went home.  All in all it was a really fun time.  I took lots of pictures, which I’ll link to later.

Right before I began writing this post, I weighed in at 264.4, which tells me I’ll probably weigh in under 264 when I weigh myself tomorrow morning.  I’d been hovering around 265 all week, so this is good news.  Eventually I’m going to start recording this info on an excel sheet and show charts of this.

These were taken this morning, shortly after I woke up.  I want to thank my sister for being the photographer.  I weighed 268.2.  I’m not sure what I did to put on the extra pound, but I’m sure it had something to do with drinking massive amounts of water last night.

Me, Relaxed

Me, Relaxing

Me, Flexing

Me, Flexing

This morning, I was at 267.2.  I’m still above 30% BF, but I forget exactly what the readings were from this morning.

As previously mentioned, I skipped my workout on Wednesday due to too much soreness, but I did weights yesterday and cardio today.  That puts me on track to do weights tomorrow, cardio Sunday, then back to weights on Monday, which is back on schedule.

The food’s been going pretty well.  I’ve yet to have a slip-up there.  I’m actually worried I’m not eating enough.  I’m going to try to up my protein intake.  This week, I’m going to up my carb intake, though I still expect these to come mostly from my veggies and the oats in my after-workout shake.  

Pictures tomorrow!  (Like anyone’s excited about this.)

Meta: I don’t know if this is going to be a daily blog, but I doubt it.  I think I just don’t have a lot to do this week.

Milestone: Under 270 lbs.  Before starting all of this, I’d seen the scale tip over 283.  I didn’t take accurate measurements when I started this, so I’m roughly estimating my weight to be at 280 when I began this.  This means I’ve officially passed the 10 lbs. lost mark.  Additionally, to get the most accurate readings possible, I’m going to start taking a BFP/BMI reading in the morning when I weigh myself.  I weigh myself every morning as soon as I wake up with no clothes on, to remain consistent.  This morning I weighed 269.8.

Failure: I didn’t workout today, even though it’s Wednesday which is officially a weight-lifting day according to my schedule.  This is due to a couple of reasons.

1. I didn’t do my workout as well as I’d planned on Monday and my legs were too sore to do any squats.  This was probably compounded by my walk/jog yesterday.  I don’t like doing only partial workouts.
2. I ate too much dinner and wouldn’t have been able to do a partial workout anyway.

I was active today: I went for a bike ride with my sister and then helped my dad for a couple of hours to break down our fireplace.  I plan to workout tomorrow morning and also do my running in the afternoon.  I’m going to strive to be careful in the amount of weight I use.

Today, I walked/jogged 2 miles.  I jogged approximately a quarter of each mile, though not straight.  I broke it up into a quarter of each half mile (there’s a half-mile track by my house).  It took me 28:20 minutes.  Speaking of, I’m going to break out what my workout schedule looks like.  I’ll detail each section more thoroughly later on.  

Monday/Wednesday/Friday:  Weights.  Before, I alluded to the fact that I have a weight set in my garage.  I just purchased it recently.  It’s 300 lbs. of weight, a squat rack/bench, and a cable system for isolation exercises as well as lat exercises (pulldowns).  I also have a couple of dumbbells that I can load some weight on and a curl bar.  A pretty solid setup, so if you’re in San Antonio, you want to lift weights, and I know you, give me a call and we’ll set something up.

Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday:  Cardio.  I intend this to take two forms: running and gaming.  By gaming, I mean basketball, football, whatever I can convince my friends to play (lazy bastards).  As far as running, the half-mile track at the nearest park is very convenient.  As in, within-three-minutes-walking-distance convenient.  I want to get back into running shape, where I can pick a 5k and then go out and do it.  Toward this end, I intend to run every one of these days.  Even on days where I game somehow, I still intend to get out there and run for 30 minutes or so.

Life:  I want to get a little more active in general.  I’ve let myself get somewhat sedentary; I’ve been too happy lounging around the house.  Now, this doesn’t mean I’m going to start taking the stairs instead of the elevator or any such nonsense.  But, I’d like to get out there and do more, whether it’s rock-climbing or hiking, or even something ridiculous like kayaking.  Maybe I’ll start going out dancing again.  

Measurements:  This morning I weighed 271.2 lbs.  I bought a “fat loss monitor” today which tells me my body fat percentage and BMI.  My BFP is 31.4% and my BMI is 35.8.  I’m a fatty.  But it’s ok, because I’m going to improve!  Pictures this weekend.