SpeedRacer

Wednesday: Still sore like a boss today, those squats on Monday are causing me to limp like an old man everywhere, so I'll try again tomorrow. Other than that... Mathematics 4 hours Piano 0 hours ( ) Video Games 0 hours

Tuesday: Well the thing I like best is that I get a day off every second day. ;D This was secretly my reason for switching to a full body routine. I have to head off to piano practice, but I'll count it now because I'm a boss and I know how much I'll do. Mathematics: 4 hours Piano: 3 hours Video Games: 1 hour (maybe before bed ) In math news I finished reading another chapter . For those who don't know; math is HARD. Like Nintendo hard. As such you can spend a month reading a single 15 page chapter, which I did. I'm going to try Rollercoaster Tycoon after piano/fooding, it looks really fun but it only serves to make me want to play Theme Park. In Piano news I'm starting on Czerny's School of Velocity, Youtube it to hear what it's meant to sound like :S

Thank you, I still remember that as one of the best things I did working out.

Monday: Starting again. You're right of course. I spent all of Thursday and Friday working out why I was unhappy despite hitting my goals for math and piano on both days. Why I was binging and cheating on my diet and why my motivation was so low. Doesn't matter how many times you fail, as long as you keep picking yourself back up with a fresh attitude. I've been expecting too much (also not enough) of myself lately. Of course I can do 4 hours math and 3 hours piano every day. I can also fit in a social life and my workout routine around that. It is possible and I intend to prove it. On the other hand it's also okay to take a step back and realise that as much as I WANT to overachieve, there's still only 24 hours in the day, and any bit that I do is better than nothing, as long as I don't give up. I'm switching to Angry Birds btw, which means I'll be doing day-on/day-off, I'll also have to edit my daily posts with my achievements and progress' as they come. O-head squat 30/40/31 (**)Plank 55s/35s/30s (**)I'm ACTUALLY sweating after angry birds. Wow. Just those two were hard enough such that I'll have to complete my workout in the latter half of the day. I have piano practice at 6 and Quidditch at 4. Gonna be a good day. Also I decided that my three primary problems, sticking to my diet properly, improper sleep schedule and unhappiness with my workout/body were all linked so I'm giving a hard willpower style slog at fixing all three at once. End of day edit: Pull-ups 50lbs 5/4/2Dips 50lbs 5/5/3Quidditch training 2 hoursAaaaannd: Math 0 hours (one day I'll get over monday-itis and do math on a Monday) Video games 2 hours (dungeon keeper :3) Piano: 3 hours

It also depends on how you're doing the knee push-ups, there's easier and more difficult versions. The way I started doing them was with my torso at a 90 degree angle to my thigh, so that when I did the push-up I was only lifting my shoulders and head. Then just before I graduated from knee pushups my torso was at a 180 degree angle to my thigh, everything above my knees was flat like a board and the knees were a pivot on the ground. Also if the pushup is too easy when you go fast then slow it down. I found the most gain was when I was doing them slow and steady, 6 second pushups.

Wednesday: Day fail For what it's worth yesterday, I did do 4 hours of math and 3 hours of piano, just wanted to put that there for completeness sake, even if my pullup count was zero. There's something about my diet and exercise motivation which needs to be worked out at the moment, something subtle. I'll hack it out soon I believe, but right now I have to run to give a seminar.

Tuesday: Day 1 Decided to do day 1 today and skip day 5 due to the public holiday. From here on Tuesday will be day 2 like logic would normally dictate. I've decreased assistance to 60lbs and I really think that THIS is the correct weight. It feels good, a little difficult without being OMG KILL ME NOW after 5 reps. Pull-ups max effort 7/5/4/2/1Dips 5/5/5Long neg pullups 5When I say long neg I mean 6-10 seconds. It's really bothering me but I can not for the life of me remember what I did on Friday. I must have seen the counsellor, must have gone to uni, must have posted on Facebook. I have a feeling I skipped on piano practice and gym (otherwise I would have posted), I went to the comic book store and I played boardgames with my friends. I'm pretty sure I was feeling really down because of my pulled leg on Wednesday which meant I couldn't play in the Quidditch final on Saturday. Also because I was having difficulty with Math. The difference in recollection is crazy between days where you keep your log and days where you don't. Anyway, I'll edit post later with my math/piano times. Math 2 hours Piano 2.5 hours Video Games 1 hour I got to play Video games . I played Spiral knights and Canon Fodder. I was humming "War's never been so much fun" and my friend was horrified by the lyrics.

Monday: Public holiday again so no workout, this is the last public holiday until Christmas I believe so I won't be affected by them anymore. Quidditch Training 2 hoursAlso had my first piano lesson in quite a while. Teacher says I'm doing pretty well. I was really inspired to keep up my practice by her playing and she gave me a lot of hints for a bunch of my pieces. I'll be forced to do a few annoying things though like playing slower and playing at my worst speed. It feels like an age since I've last seen her even though it was only maybe 9 days? Time really slows down when you dedicate it to training, dieting, playing and mathematics. My head's getting into the game again now, even though I didn't do any reading today, I'm over a small hump I was having, which happened on Friday, I'm feeling more rhythmic in my work and everything seems set to really kick my life into overdrive. Piano: 3 hours Math: 0 hours Video Games: 0 hours

Thursday: Day 4 Somehow Chel you read my tired grumpy rant and got my meaning out of what I was rambling about. Kudos for that. Since today is the "testing" day for the training routine, I thought I'd test my pull-up count at half the assistance I'm currently using (i.e. 40lbs instead of 80lbs) I succeeded in doing 9 sets of 1. You can tell my disdain for the speed of my workouts because I didn't even bother getting changed into trackpants today. I think I'll re-test my level for the work-out and do Day 5 at 60lbs, if I can manage 8 in my first set I'll use that for my new level. Pull-ups 1/1/1/1/1/1/1/1/1 I did some other stuff, negative dips and knee pushups (since the neg dips killed my pushing motion) just so I was doing at least 2 exercises in the gym today. My upper body was really dead at the end of it which is pretty cool. I'm thinking I might train push-ups more with the same sort of training set mentality this routine uses (i.e. do one or two push-ups randomly then move on as if nothing happened). Piano's not going to get done tonight because I'm going to a musical, Math has hit 4 hours I believe despite my lousy supervisor cancelling my seminar, and gym is done, I might play video games tonight Piano: 0 hours Math: 4 hours Video Games: ? hours Other coolness: I went to the comic book store and bought some more #1's from the new 52. I still have a few that I'm missing, but I'm sure I'll be able to find them in the next few days!

Wednesday: Day 3 Pull up training sets were easy peazy. I'm not really feeling the regular gusto at the moment. Posting near bed-time and feeling a bit down about a few things. Pull ups 2/2/2/2/2/2/2/2/2Quidditch training 1.5 hoursMathematics: 4 hours Piano: .5 hours Video Games: 0 hours I can't wait until this program is over, I'm not really liking the focus on the singular muscle group. I don't feel sore from it or anything. That being said though, I'm not going to quit until I'm rocking 10 straight dead hang pullups. I may decrease the assistance. I can't decide whether or not I'm happy with my appearance. In a lot of ways I am. I mean it'd be a stretch of the imagination to call me a fatty fatty 2x4. On the other hand I don't really think there's any advantage to being attractive. I mean, beyond studies which say that the more attractive you are the more competent and intelligent you appear. There is no physical advantage whether or not you're elephant man or Orlando Bloom. I guess whether I'm happy or not shouldn't be the issue. I'm doing what I do because I care about myself and who I am. I'm not at the stupid pull-up machine going "3 more reps till I'm good looking" or anything ridiculous like that. I desire strength because it's something I don't have, something I've never had. Sure, in this day and age there's nothing to be gained from picking up 90kg off the floor, but you know what? I want to do it. I want people to know that I can do it. Tomorrow's another day. Every meal's a feast and every paycheque's a fortune.

The hardest lift is your ass off the couch. Once you decide to take control, the rest of your life falls into place quite easily.

Tuesday: Day 2 My push-up count is pretty low, I managed to catch myself in the mirror doing push-ups when I was playing piano last night, they look pretty bad-ass now. I'm pretty sure I can still use some straightening. One good thing about this routine, because it's the same exercise on consecutive days, is that it takes no time at all. We'll see if it's actually effective or not in a month though. Push-up sets: 10/9/3Pyramid level/failure/+1 5/4/4(?)Will edit this later with my math, piano and video game values. Mathematics: 3 hours Piano: 3 hours Video Games: 0.5 hours

Monday: Embarassingly enough I didn't start my new routine because it's a public holiday and I have no assisted pull-up device of my own. Quidditch training 1 hourPush-ups randomly throughout the dayMathematics: 0 hours Piano: 3 hours Video Games: 0 hours Woke up late, almost was able to get up on time, but almost isn't good enough. I've designed myself (in my procrastination) a couple of sheets I'm gonna blu-tak to my wall, they're pretty cool, I'll see if I can take a picture to upload.

Yeah I'm curious too to be honest. If I feel overtraining ocurring I'll tone down the workout. Saturday: I feel rather overtrained right now to speak of the devil, my legs feel completely shot. BalanceQuidditch trainingNot going to talk much today because of exhaustion, time for piano playing.

This times a million, wife carry is basically holding a weight in zercher position.

Thursday: I'm all tired and exhaust-y... guh... Quidditch training 2 hoursI'm getting better at Quidditch. Thinking back to when I just started I feel I've really improved. The secret I found was to use my size and strength to push people over. Hehehe. In seriousness though I was very nervous with the whole full contact thing when I first started, so much so that even though I'm 6' and 90kg I might as well have been 5'6" and 60kg, just because I was afraid to push back or hurt/run into people. So the ability to functionally use my strength has really helped I think with my overall fitness. I'm also considering joining Suicide frisbee (I may have said this earlier) and touch football is a possibility, if only for the training aspect of it. And 2 hours of piano. I can really see (or hear, as it were) the difference in my piano skill already, I /really/ didn't think it'd be as soon as a week of playing to see results in this area, especially considering I played for 14 years with a 6 year break from it. I've improved by what I would call about a fortnight to a month's worth of 'performance value'. I am playing very seriously though, which is a new thing. As for my diet... well... it's an area that needs improvement. I think I may go back on Myfitnesspal, as much of a pain as it was it /did/ really help out with the food tracking functionality. For the next challenge I might add some sort of Starcraft 2 goal to the videogames section. Speaking of which I'm setting up the Wii and going to go for broke at Mario Galaxy and Sonic Colours soon, I don't think Fire Emblem 9 is going to get done though, it's a pretty hard game. In conclusion, I like DC comic books. :B The new 52 is awesome. Edit: Oh yeah, mathematics can eat me. I spent my day procrastinating on that front, :/ I'm getting a serious urge to knuckle down and do my damn 4 hours per day every day instead of every second as it has been, so now I'm going to track it in my battle log as well. I can't decide whether to list it before the fitness stuff or after, I guess after.

Hmm that's true, I haven't really been thinking about my plate the last few weeks. Actually I'm going to do a routine switch until I can do a pull-up or two. It's the one on this site http://pull-ups-training.com/ I really like the look of it, it should be good.

Wednesday: I feel that my program isn't intense enough, or at least has some ineffective stuff in it. Maybe this is just a plateau though. Negative dip 10/10Negative pull-up 10/5 neg chin-up 5/10Assisted pullup 80lb 5/5/5/5Assisted dip 80lb 5/5/5Lateral pulldown 45kg 5/5/5/5Barbell row 35kg 8/8HMMMMM... Feh, who knows, I shouldn't think about programs when I'm down, at least I'm not doing "fork-to-mouths". I guess I am a little down about gaining fat, but I have to keep reminding myself it's all about how strong I am. All about getting my chin over that damn bar. Edit: Oh! I think I performed a dip! Yay! I say think because I'm not sure if I went through the full range of motion.

Tuesday Woke up late, workout was smaller than it should have been Prisoner/overhead squat 20/20/20Front squat 35kg 5/5/5Back squat 40kg 5/5 45kg 5And that's all folks! I feel pretty down today, I have to get stricter on my goals. My weight is up to 91.3kg or some such. It doesn't bother me so much, I'll just have to eat a bit less to get it back down.

That's the one. Believe me that horse suit was /HOT/ I actually had a nightmare about wearing it and not being able to take it off. Monday: Heh... back from my Brisbane trip for the week. I feel like making a real blog style entry about it all but this is meant to be a workout log and not a holding hands wipe eachother's asses arty farty personal diary. I have GOALS dammit! "Quidditch" trainingI say quidditch in quotations because we did AFL drills for an hour and a half. The first drill was a fitness drill which involved mostly a combination of agility training and some calisthenics. It was awesome! It really pointed out my weaknesses to me so I know I have a long way to go and a lot to learn yet before I can really call myself a quidditch player. I'm also thinking of joining a frisbee team, apparently they train after Quidditch. I made the intervarsity team (by "made" I mean I wasn't sure if I should try out for ages because of my personal issues with feeling useless at team sport but then the club president invited me which made me feel good about myself so I decided to come) Piano There's a lot in my head I have to organise with Piano. I came up from brisbane with a good 10kg of sheet music that's all in my sights to learn. I have too many songs I want to learn at once, so I'll have to come up with a practice program that suits me. So far I think I'll be able to manage an hour of Practice a day. This will be great compared to my six week goal of only getting up to 3-4 hours/week. Mathematics I want a do over on this goal, over the last three weeks I think I've put in a week or so of solid effort? Hopefully now with Brisbane behind me and being over the mugging and all I can really start knuckling. In the next 5 weeks I promised my supervisor I'd have 3 chapters knocked over and to give a seminar on isoperimetric inequalities. Writing Ehh... don't ask. I'll try to get on top of this soon, I don't want to fail this goal. Dating Failed. I met a nice girl at Kabuki and I've spent the last week or more pining over someone. I'll try again next time. Weight-loss You know, with leading an active lifestyle and having good friends around you, this becomes a much less important goal than you'd think. I think over the last three weeks I've done a pretty solid job of maintaining my current weight, though I wouldn't be surprised if I'd gained. I will be surprised if there's any loss, Brisbane involved a fair amount of pancakes, drinking and indulging in life's little tasty pleasures. So... failed. But it's not like I binged my little heart out or anything. fitness Haven't reached any of these yet, I think I'll do the Squat, Bench Press and Deadlift without too much trouble though. The ability to plank for more than 30-40 seconds eludes me though, and the dead-hang pullup might not get done either. As for the 50 push-ups in 3 sets... heh... that might be a pipe dream or I'll redefine what I mean by push-up, but I'll try. Video Games Forgot about these :x

Wednesday: Believe me, when I started I didn't think I could do it either. I had about a month to get strong enough for the performance and I was pretty stressed that I'd fall over or she'd be too heavy. I had a warm-up of basic yoga poses (like child's pose, warrior 2 and Down Dog into Striking Cobra if you know Les Mills Balance), arches, bridges and other basic back stretches. These were all just so I didn't hurt myself on the lift, I'd say what really gave me the strength was doing the 5x5 deadlifting on Fridays. I'm glad to see your log updating again as well, I was afraid you'd given up which would have been a pity with your... what... 200 second planks now? Today's log: I finally did a pull-up meter - 1/2 ish maybe 1/3Neg pull-up 10/chinup 10/pullup 10/chinup 10/cinup 5Fat man chinups 10seconds/10s/5sLateral Pulldown 45kg 5/5/5/30kg 12Barbell row 30kg 10/10/10My friend suggested I try kipping to practice pull-ups, I'm intrigued, I think I may be strong enough to pull it off now...

Tuesday: Back on the wagon. So, squatting day today. Ever since Kabuki I see more people I recognise in the gym which is pretty cool. They all think I'm awesome because of the whole horse thing and I just say, "Squats and deadlifts" with a smile to explain it. Squat form work, back front and zercherSquat with 10kg medicine ball throw 15/11/13Burpees 10Back squat 35kgx5/40kgx5/45kgx5/50kgx5/55kgx3The 5x5 really takes up a lot of time, but it's a lot of work and really takes it out of you. I talked to a nice bodybuilder guy on my squat heavy set and he gave me some advice on things I'm doing wrong, so that's much appreciated. I'll reduce weight and focus on perfect form, I'll also stop using my arms to assist me sitting down in chairs. My lower back's a little sore atm I guess that's form related. Anyway, today's more of a log post than talking about workouts. So the whole falling off the wagon thing happened last week because I got mugged. Basically I just said, "You know what? I'm going to eat whatever the hell I want, sugar, spice and everything nice!" and so I did. The food therapy helped me in a lot of ways keep my head and not go crazy emotional about control and restriction. But even though I was eating whatever I wanted, my own control over my life was still present. It was telling me "It's fine for this week, just have a ball." And now that the week's over i'm back to eating well. I guess what I'm trying to say is even though I wanted to, I didn't let myself spiral. It also helped in a big way that working out in the form of Kabuki rehearsal was mandatory. I mean if you want a lower back exercise, just try doing what's in the pictures above. My friend Brenton, who's apt to make very poignant observations told me this when I was complaining about falling off the wagon on Sunday: "Dude, you're not off the wagon, the wagon's just gone for some drive-thru Mcdonalds. It's not the worst thing in the world!" Anyway, suffice to say I wouldn't be able to hop back into fitness so easily if it wasn't for a) my public accountability, my supportive friends and c) my desire for a healthier, stronger lifestyle where I'm living instead of just waiting to die.

Monday: I've fallen ill over the last week. No workout until I'm better. So, last week I had the mugging on Monday night which kind of threw me. I didn't however let it affect my workouts, but at the same time I didn't work out. This was because my workouts for the week were all kabuki related. Every day we had a full rehearsal (or two) and the following pictures demonstrate the uh... lift I had to do. I kept her on my back for about 20 minutes total each day. On Saturday I also had a quidditch game, I was playing for hufflepuff, but unfortunately we lost against slytherin, 30/80. I was impressed with the game though, despite having no substitutes where Slytherin had a full team of substitutes we kept the game 30/0 in our favour until the last half. Then the other team caught the snitch causing us to lose. On mugging related news, I've so failed the 6 week challenge on dieting. So failed.

The whole exchange I was perfectly calm. I assured him I wouldn't make any sudden movements and put my things on the ground. I assumed he could run faster than me as running isn't something I've trained, and acceleration in particular is a weak point of mine. He showed me the axe and I hung up the phone, remained perfectly calm without raising my voice and did what he asked me to. He did take my phone but he's only getting like 30 bucks worth of credit off it. All in all he was pretty nice once he saw I was being cooperative. I mean losing $40 and a phone sucks but it's not the worst thing that's ever happened (i.e. Bruce Wayne origin story) I didn't get or feel scared during the event, only mildly annoyed by the inconvenience. Of course I assumed he'd hurt me with his weapon if I didn't do what he wanted, even though logically that'd be a stupid move by him. I'll agree I could have had much more awareness, but Canberra feels so safe I don't even think about crime. Thank you for the offer, if I lived in Sydney I'd bite at it.

Well I certainly thought it was interesting. Thanks for the concern. I guess this is motivation to take kung fu class after all.