OptimusPrimarch

Stick work is awesome and practical! How easy is it to find an object to fill in for a stick should you need to defend yourself from a knife wielding assassin? (Just ask yourself What would Jason Bourne do and you'll be fine!)

Hey Mouse, good to see you. Don't dwell too much on being late to the party, just dive in and rip it up as you are prone to do. With regards to the pros or cons of social media related to getting a job a lot of it depends on the job and the company. If you're applying to HR-esque positions an online presence is (usually) a very important thing and even older companies are starting to realize that. Social media savvy has a lot of potential value for a future HR-ninja. First off it means that you'll be able to get your finger on the pulse of a company much more easily by know how its employees communicate. Second of all depending on how you use your social media it showcases your ability to be a mature, composed, badass of a human being. The most that you might expect is to be asked to use your social media in slightly different ways. Lots of likes for things related to your company etc. TL;DR: As long as you're not trolling around internet forums being a monster active use of social media in a constructive fashion can only benefit you.

So my week 1 recap doesn't have much in it, that's what I get for showing up late... Still trying to decide how to approach my diet goal.... really not sure how I'm gonna measure and grade this one. Was gonna do weights and stretch on Sunday but my Saturday workout before the general class was monsterous enough that I'm happy slotting it in the strength building routine slot. My current approach is to feed myself a smoothie whenever I do a workout and try and eat slightly larger portions for my meals as well as some snacking to help get my calories up (all mostly paleo of course). So there you have it. Week 1 grade: ???

10 is still T-shirt weather for me!

Huston? Why not just live in a volcano? I've been trying to find the place on earth where it stays between 18-22 all summer with a nice breeze.

YAY community theme. Love that show! It was on my list of themes... well played. Good breakdown of goals too, very organized.

Z! You knocked this challenge write up out of the park! Impressive. Goals look good too, gonna need to investigate this convict conditioning myself, looks interesting!

s'gud. Weather is finally going my way, no more +30 days for me. I was designed for Fall and Winter, can't wait to turn off my A/C!

Interesting formulas on his site. Useful info to help build a plan. Still not sure what my goals for success are going to be on this one... hmmm.

My knees aren't for running so as an alternative I did my cardio class last night at my max (good form) speed rather than the speed of the count. I was generally finishing my 50th rep when they were hitting 40... I just kept going until the count hit 50. Needless to say, exhausting.

*huff huff gasp* that was a long run through this massive thread! This will teach me never to go 5 days without looking at our challenge forum Loving your format and awesome theme Cheech!

Better late than never I always say. Been feeling unmotivated lately and my exercising and challenge mojo has suffered for it. Gonna put that all aside for now and put this challenge together. I wanted to shift my format to something that changed things up week to week but I was drawing a blank, so instead of doing that I'm just going to commit to doing stuff and then go do it. enough of that, on to the good stuff: The Theme! The image should say it all for most of you (You ARE nerds right?) but for everyone else my theme this time around is gonna be Final Fantasy VII which is the videogame that opened the door to a whole world of new games that I'd been missing out on. Its impact on me is so profound in terms of my nerdiness that I still consider getting the meteor symbol as a tattoo. So my main quest is unchaged from last time but now rebranded to reflect the new theme: Earn my rank as Soldier, First Class. And without further ado the goals: Swing the buster sword: (+4 str +1 sta) No idea how he moved that thing with one hand but I'm guessing gene manipuation and mako probably helped. Having access to neither of those things I will instead need to move heavy things around. Gonna try a non-bodywieght workout this time and instead do kettlebell routines. The fact that most kettlebell exercises are full body will really help me get back into exercising my leg muscles, which have been feeling better but need to start moving weight again. I'm hoping that this route will be a good stepping stone towards lifting really heavy things when I finally get it together and get a gym membership. A: 24 sessions B: 20: C: 16 D: 12 Earn the premium heart: (+3 wis, ) Tifa's utimate weapon, looks kinda silly but she was a monster and the only one who really used something approaching martial arts. My goal here is to improve my consistency with my techniques. Not going to focus on speed or power purely on form. Making sure my techniques are smooth and refined in their execution. 1 day of practice a week outside of class. A: 6 sessions B: 5 C: 4 D: 3 Bulk of Barrett (+2 con, +2 cha) Seriously, look at that guy, he's massive. My frame can hold muscle well so I want to work to put some more on. I haven't done many diet things because I don't want to start using it as an excuse to be less paleo than I currently am (which is about 80%) My goal here is to increase my bodyweight without increasing my belt size. Not sure how to grade it yet, once I get some feedback I'll plug in some numbers. (Hint hint, please give feedback on how to proceed here) Current stats: 32' waist 169.1 lbs. A ??? B ??? C ??? D ??? Grace of Red XIII (+3 dex) Red is a cat... cats are graceful... stretching makes you graceful? ...They can't all be winners. This is a repeat of a goal from last challenge but it did me a lot of good so I'm gonna carry it through to this one. Do 30 min of yoga/stretching once a week A: 6 sessions B: 5 sessions C: 4 D: 3

Copied from my personal thread. One thing I've noticed over the past two challenges is that I usually start really strong and start to run out of gas by week 4 or 5. This time around trip didn't help things. I'm not sure if it is because the things I've been doing have become more routine or what but it has made me think that Cheechoe might be on to something with spreading goals across each week of the challenge keeps things fresh and exciting. So things have been quiet up in here because I've been away for the past week so I'll roll all my updates into one big mega recap! My results wavered in the last week but despite traveling I still finished fairly strong all things considered. Water: 34/30 A (+2 Wis, +2 Con, +1 STA I'm really happy about this, I was not as strong last week because there was a big change to my routine which impacted things but despite that I'm still drinking more water in general which makes me happy. Stretching:6/8 B (2.5 dex 1.5 cha) my knee is stabalizing but it is stabalizing at about 70% effectiveness which is really hampering my kicks (which require 110% effectiveness) Strength. 62/90 C (2 str .5 con) 36 pushups single set 92 max (across 5 sets) I've improved here but I think I set my expectations WAY too high here. Gonna average my two sets of results for a final value to grade on. Final Grade: B

So things have been quiet up in here because I've been away for the past week so I'll roll all my updates into one big mega recap! My results wavered in the last week but despite traveling I still finished fairly strong all things considered. Water: 34/30 A (+2 Wis, +2 Con, +1 STA I'm really happy about this, I was not as strong last week because there was a big change to my routine which impacted things but despite that I'm still drinking more water in general which makes me happy. Stretching:6/8 B (2.5 dex 1.5 cha) my knee is stabalizing but it is stabalizing at about 70% effectiveness which is really hampering my kicks (which require 110% effectiveness) Strength. 62/90 C (2 str .5 con) 36 pushups single set 92 max (across 5 sets) I've improved here but I think I set my expectations WAY too high here. Gonna average my two sets of results for a final value to grade on. Final Grade: B

Still alive... just distracted by life. Missed my Friday pushup session Results from Monday: 18,22,16,11,11 Painful fall off again but it is just motivating me to get back to it. Water is still going well, I'm already almost locked in for a final result of A, reduction in the number of headaches has been the most notable change as a result of my water drinking. The Grandmaster of my club is insisting that I get my knees looked at.... which improves the odds that I will do so dramatically.

lost a rep somewhere in the lurch but I feel like my form was a bit better. 18,22,16,16,13 = 85 On the plus side my pushup form is getting much better

Ran through all our usual punch routines doubled to get this one done. 120 jab cross (240) 80 jab cross backfist jab (320) 120 jab hook(240) 80 jab hook backfist jab (320) 120 jab uppercut 80 (240) jab uppercut springboard backfist jab (400) 100 double jabs (200) 120 (120) slip punches 80 slip punch combos (240) Grand total: 2280

So week 3 was good, my goals all feel attainable, not sure where I'm gonna end up with the pushups but I guess we'll see. Water Goal 5/5 Still staying well ahead of this one, only bad days were Friday and yesterday where I had more coffee than anything else... overall though I'm still very on top of this goal. Really noticed it in the Saturday Hapkido class, I was drenched in sweat after a relatively light workout. Push ups, 3 sessions. Progress isn't as strong as I'd like but I still have 3 weeks to get things in order. Stretching: 1/1 Did a yoga session that was extremely draining but felt good. Gonna aim to do it again this week.

Gotcha, will have to start doing some of those. Did my pushups, finally a bit of progress but still not enough to progress to the next day. 18,22,16,16,14 Progress is progress though

I am... conceptually aware of that fact... I'm pretty stubborn though. that said given how stalled I've been at this rough number I might try upping rest time to 2min per set until my number get closer then down it bit by bit before advancing to a new day.

Also, Did my pushups last night, 18,22,16,12,11 less than Monday but my shoulders were surprisingly fried from Yoga, I also kept the rest time down to 60 seconds.

interesting, I will have to give those a try. What about them makes them better for knee strength than a regular squat?

Nothing super formal, I just go through Ashtanga poses that I know one at a time.

You ain't kidding K, I did my 30 minutes of moving poses but it was not easy. Had to take 2 mini breaks, gonna start working on this more. Both my knees are worn out too. So much time with one knee or the other bent.

HELMET