Keeping it going

[scholarstones]

Ohaithere!

 

I'm a 28 year old professional math geek, (very) amateur dancer, avid gaming nerd, and mildy into a lot of geeky stuff.

 

After a fairly dramatic set of events in the past December, I made the decision that I needed to make some major changes in my life.  This falls after a total life reset button hit in 2010. There've been a lot of components to these changes, including fitness, diet, wardrobe overhaul, professional credentials and more.

 

The fitness component has gone really well.  Since January, I've totally redone my diet (not paleo, but with some paleo concepts), lost 20+ pounds, completed the 200 squat challenge, and added crunches, chair dips, and push ups to a workout routine.  However, I've struggled in leveling up and it's time to make some changes.  These struggles include the following problems.

 

• I've tried to add chin ups to my routine, but I still weigh 240 lbs. and they are impossible.  I've been working with chair assisted chin ups and when I try to hold onto the bar and lower myself from the chair I tend to overexert myself, which screws up my workouts and my dancing.
• I've been doing things like the 200 crunch challenge and 100 pushup challenge and I haven't been advancing quickly, and I've been getting tired and/or bored with the process.
• I'm going on vacation to New Orleans soon which will take me off my diet for a week (which I'm fine with because the purpose of these changes is to live better and I want to experience NOLA food culture) and I will be getting back 2 days into the next challenge period, so this seems like a good time to reset and work on new things.
• June and July are by far the busiest work months for me, and it's going to be very difficult to mantain my diet and excersise program (due to time constraints) as well as keep up with mental health needs.

I've been looking into high intensity circuit training as a logical next step to give me a more well rounded and interesting set of body weight workouts.
Both this option

http://www.washingtonian.com/blogs/wellbeing/fitness/the-scientifically-proven-7-minute-workout.php

and the intermediate option here...

http://www.nerdfitness.com/blog/2009/12/17/advanced-body-weight-workout-warning-this-will-kick-your-ass/

 

seem promising.

 

I'm going to try to do the next 6 week challenge.  My goals will include getting to 2 chin ups, doing a circuit routine 3x a week (or more?) maintaining my diet through a busy 2 work months, and probably something to do with dating.  This probably makes me an adventurer right?  I feel like I've already passed level 1 in real life, but I'm happy to start there in the game.

 

Play. To. Win.

[rogaecia]

Ha! I was just going to post a link to the 7-minute work out too.

One of my bosses forwarded it to me. I wanted to ask others if it was a good idea to include it in the beginner's body weight work out. 

Great job on losing 20 lbs!

[sylkamaru]

Hi !

Courage !

Nothing's impossible with a strong will.

 

For chin ups, if hanging or negatives burns you out, you can try rows.

Door rows to begin with, horizontal rows when you're confortable, elevated horizontal...

Important thing is to keep straight

[scholarstones]

Thanks friends!

 

I just did my the 7 minute workout (3 times) yesterday.  I'm definitely feeling it.  It's really comprehensive (minus the pullups, and missing those right now is a plus while i let my arms heal up).  I think it's a good idea to use numbers for as many excersises as possible though.  Constantly timing myself is annoying.

 

I've had a hard time finding a pace to do horizontal rows in my house, my tables aren't built for it.  I could try door rows but I think I'm past that point.

[sylkamaru]

You can try putting something tall in front of your pull up bar, like chair, piece of furniture...

I used my mobile air cooler back then, (which is quite big) to build back endurance with rows

 

Or if someone can train with you, putting your feet on his (her) shoulders