Jarric

Just a reminder for those who want to take part, Squatmas is right around the corner! Feel free to share you Squatmas results here: If you can, why not chuck in a picture or a video? Bonus points for Christmas jumpers and santa hats ?

Squatmas is almost here! So my plan is to do both squatmas and deadliftmas a day early. Tomorrow morning (Christmas eve) I'll get down to the local chain gym and get in my 50 squats at 50% bodyweight, then Christmas morning I'll get back in there early for 50 deadlifts at 100% bodyweight . Looks like I can get a free 3-day pass to this place too, which is a massive bonus. I've been feeling oretty rough all week - just low-key nausea which is slowly improving as the week goes on. I still managed to get in the gym, but just took things light. Yesterday was box squats, and I went for an extra low box on them and a bit lighter too. We also did some pistol squats, which I'm so close to I feel like they might be a goal for 2024. I am so grateful that I've got a few days off work now - it's been utter madness and I need a rest!

Thanks for the tip! I'll check it out if things don't clear up. No-one deserves to be tory'd

I've fallen a bit behind too. Working through day 18 at the moment. Amazing job hitting 50 in one day though, that's pretty awesome! I also wholeheartedly support the idea of you giving running a go; I never thought I would get into running years ago, but I find it so helpful now, as time to think more than anything.

Yesterday was tough, after my very boozy Sunday. I got through it, tidied some stuff up at work, and even wrapped a couple of Christmas presents after dinner. Crucially, I also got to bed at a sensible time. Not sensible enough though, as it turns out. My alarm went off, as usual, at 05:48 and, as usual, I picked up my phone to stare at Discord chats until the light woke me up enough to get out of bed. Despite the phone light in my face, I caught myself falling asleep, phone in hand, twice. I gave it up as a bad job and went back to sleep for another hour. When I did eventually get up I did a bit of yoga, which felt horrible but hopefully helped my aching neck and shoulders a bit. I'm feeling pretty rough today, not just tired but also a bad stomach - I'm hoping it's just something I ate and that it calms down soon. WW's stomach isn't great either today, so it seems I'm not imagining it at least.

Real tored indeed I've been pretty tired for weeks really. Looking forward to getting past December, when hopefully my workload should back off rather significantly.

^when you're so tired, you spell it tored. Aaaanyway, I had a good weekend. Saturday morning I slept in a little bit (having stayed up far too late drinking beer and watching NCIS on Friday night), then went climbing, and then a 6.5 mile (10.4km) run along the seafront. When I got home I was knackered so I did bugger all for a while, then tried to change a light fitting, then got frustrated because I couldn't do it and gave up and went back to bed for a bit. I was exhausted for the rest of the day, and did nothing but sit on the sofa. I had another lie in yesterday morning, then went for a short (3.5 mile ish) run. Then it was off into town to meet up with some friends who I always go an see at Christmas. We sat in the pub all day, and I drank far too much and ate not nearly enough, and we had a lot of laughs and some good chats. We left the pub about 9, and got home about half 10. It was near enough midnight by the time I staggered up to bed, and I'm feeling a little tired and drained today to put it mildly. Gym this morning was overhead press, and I got in 6 sets of 3 at 50kg (110#). Then we had some 1-minute sprint intervals of deadball over shoulder and skiing. I just about managed not to vomit, which is the best you can hope for from a gym session some days

Thank you ? Thank you! My weekend was very good, but in no way restful

Date Weight Weight change 23/10/23 174,1 -2,3 30/10/23 171,8 0,9 06/11/23 172,7 0,8 13/11/23 173,5 -0,8 20/11/23 172,7 -1,4 27/11/23 171,3 0,5 04/12/23 171,8 -0,8 11/12/23 171 -0,8 18/12/23 170,2 Absolutely no idea how the number's gone down this week - I've eaten and drank a lot, and had the lowest weekly calorie burn my watch has recorded since I joined this challenge. It's possible that I was just dehydrated this morning, but whatever, I'll take what I can get! It'll be lovely to get under 170 by the end of the year, or better still 168 (that's 12 stone).

I've not beed very good at updating here, because work's been kicking my arse. I'm getting somewhere with it at least; only a couple of major deadlines to go. Monday was farmers' walks - 3 picks combined with a 50ft walk. I worked up to 164kg total weight (361#), which felt pretty easy but I didn't want to push my luck. Then a workout of deadball to shoulder and rope climbs. Tuesday was running - it was slow as hell but I got in my 6 miles 9.6km). Wednesday was SQUATS. Built up to 110kg (233#) x 3, then 100kg x 5 and 90kg x 7. It felt pretty tough; might back off a bit next time. Then we had a horrible workout - 4 rounds for time of 100ft walking lunge and 25 situps. The lunges were hard and 100 situps is just gross, but I got theough it. Thursday was power cleans, 100m row sprints, and pullovers. I'm really excited to learn that I can do pullovers; I haven't been practicing them for very long. (Not me, obviously) This morning was more power cleans, muscle ups, and bench press. I managed 5 ring muscle ups in the workout (plus 1 in the warm up), and I'm super proud to finally cracked this. Still a long way to go to string them all together, but it's pretty cool. I'm very, very tored this week. Work is tough, I'm behind on studying, and really looking forward to sleeping for a chunk of the weekend.

It's all about progress! (And whatever you get this year, you've got a year of training before you try and beat it next year ) That sounds good, and simple which is always a virtue. I'm in the opposite boat that I have a hob and oven, but no microwave, so anything I can still make quickly is handy. That sounds good! See how you feel on the day. After your first set, you might surprise yourself...

Thank you for joining! Exercise should be something fun, not overwhelming or anxiety inducing, and having people doing it with me makes it much more fun. I usually just go with salt and lime juice for avocado on toast - it's simple but it's good.

I'm intrigued - letter as in post, or letter as in spelling something out with biscuits? That's incredible! Go get it man!

Yeah, I got caught up, felt nice and smug, and then I forgot about the 13th yesterday. Now I have to do 13 and 14 today ? Congrats on making progress with the dentist and medical stuff - that's a quick turnaround on all those appointments and tests! Hope you get some good answers soon.

Date Weight Weight change 23/10/23 174,1 -2,3 30/10/23 171,8 0,9 06/11/23 172,7 0,8 13/11/23 173,5 -0,8 20/11/23 172,7 -1,4 27/11/23 171,3 0,5 04/12/23 171,8 -0,8 11/12/23 171,0 Quite frankly stunned that I lost any weight at all this week, after two very beery Christmas celebrations. This week I'm going to put some effort into some extra discipline during the week, and I only have 1 Christmas gathering on Sunday, so I'm going to keep working on continuing this trend.

Yeah, Christmas is stressful! Have you found yourself coping in other ways, with support eating out of the equation? Nice one man! Sounds like a strong end to the year.

How's all that going? I'm caught up the the 9th on the advent calendar now - just need to do 10 and 11 today!

Workouts last week were ok - the ones I did anyway. Wednesday was bench press - built to 75kg (165#) x 3, then 67.5kg x 5 and 60 x 7. Followed that with some sled pulls and overhead yoke carry, at 50kg and 100kg (110#/220#/) respectively. Thursday was squats! Box squats this time, and I wasn't feeling fantastic, but I managed to stick in 90kg (198#) for 3 sets of 5. Then did an 8 minute ladder of 2 toes to bar, 2 overhead lunges, then 4s, 6s, 8s etc. Got up to and completed the 12s, with a pair of 12.5kg dumbbells overhead. Thursday night was our team Christmas night out, and we went to an amazing local tapas place, then over the road to a brand new micro pub that's popped up, and then finally to another local pub for one last beer. When I got home I decided that I should sober up a bit before bed, so I went and played Baulder's Gate 3 for a couple of hours. I started a Dark Urge run (Dark Urge is a character choice that gives you amnesia and a lot of very nasty thoughts as diologue options), playing as a sorcerer/warlock multiclass, and it was a whole load of fun. I eventually dragged myself to bed about 1.30am. When 5.50am on Friday rolled round I did get up, and spent a few minutes seriously contemplating whether it was a good idea to drive to the gym. I thought better of it, so skipped the workout and got the extra sleep. Saturday I got up and went for a run. It was notionally a 6-mile (9.6km) interval run, but in reality I was still not running on 100% and it was very slow. I then spent the day meeting up with friends for a Christmas day out - we had a great time just playing pool and drinking beer for many hours. Being a daytime thing I was home not long after 7pm, and then say and continued my BG3 Dark Urge run until quarter to 1 in the morning. Sunday I ran again, though again I wasn't at 100%. It was supposed to be 11 miles at a decent pace, but I ended up going slow and cutting it to 10 miles (16km) due to lack of time. When I got back I quickly got ready to run D&D for my group. The party were arrested at the start of the session, and spent quite a lot of time trying to explain to the watch and the magister that they were entirely innocent. It was quite different from our normal sessions, and I really enjoyed that. Towards the end of the session the party got a load of plot info from a magic artifact they've recovered, so that'll be fun when they get a chance to move on that. In the afternoon I did some studying (something that I desperately need to catch up on this week) and some life admin. Calorie tracking fell by the wayside a bit on Thursday and Friday this week, but I still managed to lose 0.8lbs despite all of the beer. Wow, that's a long update... How's everyone's squat training going?

Oh ok, I'll bear that in mind for a quick dinner. I think a jar sauce would probably be the way forward, because actually it was the rest of the meal that was disappointing - the rice was weirdly crunchy, the chicken was bland, and there were no vegetables at all. Chucking a jar of sauce on some fried meat and veg has to be a better bet. Well now I need to catch up again, but sounds like you're well on your way. Thanks for telling me about it, it's a nice way to break up the day. You probably don't want the version I heated up though . But a real one would be great. I thought that might be entirely up your street. I'll let you knwo when we next play :lol:. (Disappointingly it won't be until the new year now - why is RPG schedulling so hard?)

I was all caught up on this, then I forgot yesterday. So need to do 6 and 7 today. The dice and an exercise table sounds like a great idea. I bet you can find a pre-made rolling table somewhere like Darebee as well. Oh yeah have, have you?

Sounds like an excellent plan - if the scale isn't making you happy, and it isn't making you motivated, then ditch it and enjoy your Christmas! You will be successful in 2024.

Yesterday was a good day, and another busy one, after my extra time in bed and skipping my run. I was working from home, so I just put in a solid stint on trying to get 1 thing off my desk. I did not achieve that, but I've at least progressed it a bit further. Which is good, as it's very much due. I did catch up with @Loveable_Bouncer's squat/pushup advent calendar, wanted to get on that while the day number were still small! It was nice to have something to get my away from my desk for 30 seconds to be honest. For dinner I heated up a pierce and ping chicken tikka masala and some onion bhajis. It's nice to occasionally remind myself that my home cooking is infinitely better than this cheap pre-made shit, because I sometimes wonder whether cooking is really worth it . Clearly I should have just heated up a pizza instead, but it did the job. In the evening we played Liminal - an urban fantasy TTRPG based heavily on the Rivers of London books by Ben Aaronovich. We've been investigating a stolen book, known ominously as the Book of Blood. This session we discovered that the driver who was supposed to be delivering the book was probably charmed, by someone who is definitely a vampire, and we've got CCTV footage of him handing the book off to her. So our next step is to go and visit the vampire in her lair, which happens to be a small pub on Brighton seafront. Should be fine, right? Calories for the day were a little high, thanks to 3 black forest mince pies (because, come on, black forest mince pies??). It was a good evening though.

Thanks man! I'm looking forward to trying! Sleep is important. It's taken me 34 years to start believing this, and I still only sort of believe it. That's true, I could just double track... Damnit, I'm starting to think you're more of an enabler than bigm That makes sense, I think. I know that when I squat a2g my arse tucks under at the bottom, which then changes the stretch and load on all of the leg/posterior chain muscles. Which is fine unloaded, but I just don't go that deep with a barbell on that basis. Lovely to have you both, as always ❤️ Yeah, I miss him too, I loved that crazy dutchman ❤️ Crazy squat challenges feel like a good way to remember him though. I bet you'd smash it too.. (I don't know why I get that gif when I search 'squat', but it was too good not to share.)

Ah that uncertainty sucks man. We need a fucking general election sooner rather than later. Fucking Tories. I gave up even considering keeping up with games long ago. My current plan is to play Baldur's Gate 3 for a few years until I actually get bored of it, by which time there'll presumably be something shiny I want to play next.

It's good to see you back lifting mate, good on you for fighting that depression.