Fighting For Liberty

So JayG posts up about how workouts have lost their awesomeness. His post was from a post over at BP’s place regarding the same thing.

So … here’s something that may or may not help – advice from a newly minted Black Belt who charged through 1000 push-ups and kicked ass for nearly 5 hours on that BB test. :-)

How to learn to love working out all over again.

The key thing here is variety. People get attached to workouts like they get attached to sneakers. Eventually, they’re beat up, you know them well, they fit you perfectly, and they hold all those wonderful memories of where you walked and what you did. They’re YOUR comfy sneakers.

That sucks. Workouts should be like new sneakers. Exciting. Unspoiled. Uncomfortable. Miles still to walk, run, and play and memories yet to be made. Break them in, use them for adventure, then toss ‘em and do it again! That’s what you want! They still need to be your size, yes. They still need to be your style. We don’t need a bunch of 40-something-old male gun-bloggers walking around in hot pink leopard-patterned pumps, now do we?

Ick.

Anyway …

So here are some ideas …

1) Pick up a sport/hobby. Racquetball/Squash is a good one (Squash, in spite of the stupid name and stupider goggles you have to wear so you don’t lose an eye, can make grown men cry because of how hard a workout it is for you). Squash is a HARDCORE workout, and it’s competitive and fun. Tennis is a winner as well. It’s fun, it’s social, and you can get going for not much more than a half-decent $60 racquet and a place to play. Cheaper than golf, with all the country-club appeal. You’d be surprised at how awesome your cardio gets by running sprints side to side on a court for an hour and a half twice a week. There’s usually a membership fee involved unless you know a tennis player who likes to play outside for free – ask people, you’d be surprised at how many people like to play.

2) HEAVY BAG! It’s an excellent workout as long as you have a plan. You can get a decent bag for under $100 (don’t get anything more than a 70lb bag if you’re just starting), pick up a round timer at Amazon for $30 or $40, and a pair of decent gloves, and you have an instant, and very variable workout machine. It’s a bit of an investment to start, but the variation you can get out of a bag, timer, and gloves is SO worth it.

Here’s one that I do from time to time.

The great thing about a bag and a timer is that you can ALWAYS vary your workout, but make sure you always have structure. “Go hit the bag for 15 minutes” sounds like fun, but it sucks and after awhile you’ll have a pretty bag hanging in the basement that nobody uses. Structure – jabs for a round, jabs/crosses, knees, elbows, kicks. Do a workout with just your right hand, then one with just your left. Drop down and do pushups/crunches in between rounds, etc. etc.

Pick up a cheesy “how-to” boxing DVD just so you don’t injure yourself punching the bag incorrectly, and off you go. The other excellent thing about a bag and a timer is you can set yourself up with a 30-minute workout that’ll darn near kill you and you know it’s going to last 30 minutes. Let that timer go, and try to get through it. Start with a 15-minute session (one minute rounds with 30 second breaks or something similar), and work your way up to full 2-minute rounds with a 20-second break in between.

And one more thing …

If you have someone you can work out with regularly, split the cost for a pair of these. They’re great for kicking, punching, elbowing, and knees. You can easily get a full-body workout and the best part is you can go through a few rounds, then switch pad & gloves and have your partner do the same. Believe me, just holding those pads while someone’s wailing away for 10 minutes is a crazy good workout in it’s own right.

3) Learn to love failure.

In many of my workouts, I push myself to failure. So there’s no “25 pushups” here and “25 pushups” there. No. Keep going. When you’re dead and you can’t get another one in, do another one anyway until your arms buckle and your face hits the floor. Don’t even count. It’s hard to get used to, but it gets you a real good workout. Also – don’t just use weights. Use cinderblocks or patio blocks (I keep a couple of these in my home dojo for workouts), your kids (they like when you use them for bench presses!), whatever. Strangely shaped/textured items build forearm strength, offer a very varied workout, and you can walk into work on Monday morning and tell people you were doing sit-ups with a cinderblock for fun over the weekend. Sometimes I’ll go juggle three of these suckers for five minutes at a time. That’ll turn your arms into noodles, it’s fun, and a nice little way to throw something different into your workout once in awhile.

And if you’re a runner, change it up. Run hill sprints instead of a flat jog. Is there a hiking trail nearby? Well … run up it! It’ll come darn near killing you, but it gives you a goal. Time yourself, then try to beat the time.

And lastly … get an iPod and load it up with aggressive music. Working out to Country sucks. If I’m doing a bag workout, I want stuff like this in my ears:

(caution: If you’ve got virgin ears, or there are little ones within listening distance, don’t hit play)

Hell. Yes.

(and this reminds me – I have what is essentially a, “Kill Em All And Let God Sort Them Out” playlist on my iPod. I need to post up that list with some links one of these days.)

Anyway, that’s it for some random advice. Time for a new pair of sneakers …

David Awesome Sauce, Gettin' Healthy

UGH!

Weight tracking over the last five days:

5/01: 237.6
5/02: 236
5/03: 236
5/04: 235.8
5/05: 236.4

My goal: 235
Lbs away: 1.4
Days left: 11

Yeah, it’s just 1.4, but it’s driving me nuts. Had a great workout yesterday, lotsa sweating, lotsa soreness in the abs. Basically, I did a circuit training session. It took about an hour. 22 rounds each of two minutes with a 20 second break in between rounds. Jumping push-ups (where you push up and have both hands leave the floor, bag work, sit-ups, squats, and juggled three two-pound exercise balls (they’re weighted and about the size of softballs and yes … I can juggle. And yes, again, juggling 2-pound weights for two minutes is NOT EASY).

1.4. ARGH!! I’ll get there …

David Gettin' Healthy, Me

Missed the weight posting yesterday (horrible, I know, but a kid electrocuting himself with nipple clamps in shop class was a bit more entertaining).

Anyway, the weight loss has been slowing down lately. I dare say I’ve hit a plateau – but it’s still going down and I haven’t had a real hard workout in the past few days, so we’ll see once I crank it up some more.

Weight tracking over the last five days:

4/30: 237.6
5/01: 237.6
5/02: 236
5/03: 236
5/04: 235.8

My goal: 235
Lbs away: 0.8
Days left: 12

It’s weird seeing a 235 on my weight. The desire is there to say, “Bah! It’s within a pound! I’ve reached my goal!” but I’m not going to give myself that break. My goal is to hit 235 on the nose (and hopefully under), and maintain it until the day of my test. I’ll be pigging out on pasta the night before, of course, but I want to hold that weight for a bit before I do.

In boxing and UFC fights for lighter weight divisions you’ll often see guys “cutting weight”. Basically, they wrap themselves in sauna suits (fancy saran-wrap suits) and sit in a sauna sometimes even peddling an exercise bike in there to lose as much water weight as possible. They don’t drink or eat anything and essentially dehydrate themselves on purpose.

It makes them cranky and exhausted. My goal isn’t to do that. What I’m trying to do here is actually lose weight, not just water.

Cutting weight like a fighter, you can drop 20 pounds in a day with enough work and a lot of willpower. But with three kids and running a business, the last thing I need to deliberately create is a feeling of exhaustion and crankiness. Heh.

Anyway, I’m on track. 0.8 to go. Hoping to hit 235 tomorrow and then the goal changes from “lose weight” to “keep it off”. Less than two weeks ’til that test!

David Gettin' Healthy, Me

On April 2nd of this year, I was 252 pounds. I started doing the shake thing, working out a bit more, eating smarter, and it’s made a difference.

Weight tracking over the last five days:
4/28: 238
4/29: 238.6
4/30: 237.6
5/01: 237.6
5/02: 236

My goal: 235
Lbs away: 1
Days left: 14

One pound. Black Belt test is in two weeks. I’ve lost 16 pounds in the last month. Out of curiosity, I want to try 50 push-ups with 16 pounds of weight on me, just to feel what I’m missing.

My belts are loose, my pants are loose, my shirts fit better and I’m feeling darn good. There’s still two weeks to go of losing some more and keeping it off (ie: don’t “celebrate” by pigging out on cheesecake once I hit 235). I can do this.

This is the healthiest I’ve been weight-wise in at least the last dozen years. Strange.

What’s helped the most? The shakes, certainly, eating more veggies and fruits that my body can quickly consume and use (I’ve cut out a huge amount of pastas and breads), and eliminating late-night snacking. That’s been the hardest – for as long as I’ve been alive it seems like I’ve enjoyed a post-dinner bowl of cereal at 9:00 or 10:00 at night. Kicking that habit is HARD. But it’s working.

Two weeks to go. Paid for the test. Made the hotel reservation. Now two weeks of solid training and off I go …

David Gettin' Healthy, Martial Arts, Me

… how have I lived so long without you? Picked up a dual-band 2.4/5Ghz Netgear router, got everything (finally) hooked up and ooooooooh I like seeing those connection speeds.

Still have some fiddling to do, but it’s made quite a difference in file transfers and in managing incoming speeds (videos load and play much faster than they did with the old Linksys clunker I had on there).

Kinda crusing with some light workouts here and there. Another relatively light one today during class. I’m just maintaining right now, but that Black Belt test is coming up quick …

Weight tracking over the last five days:

4/27: 238
4/28: 238
4/29: 238.6
4/30: 237.6
5/01: 237.6

My goal: 235
Lbs away: 2.6
Days left: 15

Practiced some self-defense today. My back is fully healed. Yeah, there’s a little tweak here or there from time to time, but if I can hurl someone across the room with a shoulder throw, I consider myself to be doing just fine.

The toe is still bugging me, and it makes push-ups not a lot of fun as I put quite a bit of weight on my bent toes doing push-ups, but it’s nothing I can’t grit my teeth through, however. Honestly, apart from the Brown Belt test I had just a couple of weeks ago, this will be the healthiest I’ve been for a test. I’ve taken one with a fever, I’ve had two when allergies were in full bloom, and I think one where I had a 100 degree fever.

Paid for the test today, all that’s left is to go get the darn belt! Well, AND lose 2.6 pounds so I can say I’ve met my goal.

David Geekness, Gettin' Healthy, Martial Arts, Me

Achieved really no workout to speak of yesterday, too much else going on. Which is good. Activity is a good thing.

I also limited my snacking to pretty much just fruit. Mid-morning I had an apple, a bunch of grapes, and some walnuts. For dinner, I had two fajitas consisting of corn tortillas with some quick-cooked (I like seared veggies that are still crunchy, not over-cooked floppy veggies) green pepper, tomato, and mushrooms with spinach and a little bit of shredded cheddar. Also had a wheat roll (I’m a sucker for bread) and a handful of M&Ms (what can I say, I need chocolate). Munched on a few more grapes later last night, too.

I managed to avoid the store-bought cheesecake currently residing in our fridge. How? Simple … when my wife put it in there she mistakenly left the nutritional information facing out where I could see it. It’s really small, the slices take maybe four bites to get through, but each one has something like NINE-OCTODECILLION CALORIES, so I’m not touching the stuff. As a matter of fact, next time I get anything out of the fridge, I’m putting on a hazmat suit just in case. I feel my arteries harden when I’m in the vicinity of that infernal dessert tray. Really, the only safe thing to do is launch it at the sun and hope the corresponding obesity flare is small enough that everyone on Earth only swells up by 200-300 pounds eight minutes later.

Anyway …

Weight tracking over the last five days:

4/26: 237
4/27: 238
4/28: 238
4/29: 238.6
4/30: 237.6

My goal: 235
Lbs away: 2.6
Days left: 16

David Gettin' Healthy, Me

Weight tracking over the last five days:

4/25: 239.4
4/26: 237
4/27: 238
4/28: 238
4/29: 238.6

My goal: 235
Lbs away: 3.6
Days left: 17

I don’t like seeing the number go up.

Weight loss is going to have it’s ups and downs, that’s for certain. Yesterday, I didn’t get much of a workout in spite of attending class as we did mostly self-defense work which – while a great deal of fun – is not a crazy sweating cardio workout by any means. It’s more technical.

Today that will be fixed. I’ll push myself through a good, hard workout.

Received all of my new networking doodads and I’m currently trying to fix everything up and get things going properly. Still found something unexplainable from a technical standpoint … I can’t open up an Access database on a mapped drive on my own network because of a stupid proxy bypass checkmark in Internet Explorer? Seriously? Organization fail.

Though I realize where Microsoft has gone with security. Basically, if they get it to a point where you can’t open ANY files and you don’t receive ANY emails, you’ll never be exposed to malware! Next up? A security “feature” that prevents you from viewing any web pages. Voila! 100% security!

David Geekness, Gettin' Healthy, Me

I was going to go running yesterday or today, but that whole FOOT OF SNOW IN LATE APRIL thing kinda messed up those plans.

Yesterday I had a good, hour-long workout in the basement. 500 push-ups, 400 hand strikes, 400 kicks, and my traditional practice. I’m not all that sore today though that may change when I start more push-ups.

Weight tracking over the last five days:

4/24: 240.8
4/25: 239.4
4/26: 237
4/27: 238
4/28: 238

My goal: 235
Lbs away: 3
Days left: 18

I’m highly encouraged that I’m holding at 238 now for two days. Days like this where it’s all snowy are kind of rough though as you can’t get out and do things like you normally would, which means I spend more time in the vicinity of the kitchen and all of it’s little delights. Must stay away!

I’ll be “office busy” today, too. My NAS is arriving and I can’t wait to play with the darn thing and start (re)organizing the office data. But data doesn’t burn calories, so I’ll have to get in some work in the basement dojo today.

Until then, Linux-y goodness reigns!

David Gettin' Healthy, Me

Working on light construction helping out a friend of mine yesterday. So I didn’t eat much and I didn’t drink much. And it shows.

Weight tracking over the last five days:

4/22: 240.8
4/23: 242
4/24: 240.8
4/25: 239.4
4/26: 237

My goal: 235
Lbs away: 2
Days left: 20

My guess is, nourished properly, I’ll be somewhere in the 238s. Still … it was nice seeing a 237 on the scale this morning. I haven’t been this light on my toes in at least the past 12 years.

I’m gonna celebrate with cake and cookies! WOOHOO!!! Or not …

David Gettin' Healthy, Martial Arts, Me

Broken toes suck. Generally, I don’t feel it – just walking around, sitting down and typing or driving it doesn’t really bother me. But if you twist in just the right way, yikes. Pain. I hope that little reminder goes away by the 16th of May because I’d hate to yelp on a Black Belt test because of my widdle tootsie. Not very … uhhh … Black Belt-y, that is.

So after Tuesday’s Brown Belt test I took a few days off to recover and re-nourish. Friday I went running up a steep trail here in town, yesterday I was running wire and playing with electrical all day, so I’ve had two solid days of plenty of activity, and it shows.

Weight tracking over the last five days:

4/21: 239
4/22: 240.8
4/23: 242
4/24: 240.8
4/25: 239.4

My goal: 235
Lbs away: 4.4
Days left: 21

Three weeks.

Right now, weight-wise I’m right about where I was right after that excruciating Brown Belt test. I’m not thrilled with the last five days being even weight-wise, but it was bound to happen since I had to take some time to recover. At any rate, just over four pounds in three weeks is a great target for me. The goal here is to be active every day. If I can maintain that, this weight will fall right off and I’ll be in a nice happy place come test-time.

Let’s do it!

David Gettin' Healthy, Martial Arts, Me