New recruit from London

[Rob Barrett]

Hi guys and girls,

I'm Rob, and I've just signed up for the Rebel Army A little about me... I'm 26, and I work as a designer during the day and an illustrator in the evening and at weekends. My job means I'm at a desk for a lot of my day. I've always been skinny, and never really been able to build any muscle (although, truth be told, I've never seriously tried before).

Most of the past year, for a few reasons, has been a bit of a crappy one for me, and I've found that I've put less effort into myself. I've hardly been exercising (a certain amount of depression causing lack of motivation, along with the coming of winter and dark nights), and I wasn't eating as well as I should (I can cook pretty well, and usually ate home-cooked meals, but for at least a couple of nights a week I'd choose to work late and just buy myself a ready meal instead).

Now, I've found myself at a point where I fit right into Steve's "skinny fat" description - skinny legs, arms and chest, and a little, growing gut, and low energy for a lot of the day. It's not something I'm impressed with. I wouldn't be proud to take off my shirt in the park, come the summertime. I don't feel fit.

So, where am I today? At the beginning of the year, my circumstances changed and I realised that the things I was holding out for weren't going to come to me, and that it was time to move on and get my life back in order. I've started to get myself more organised at work, I've been keeping up with budgeting my spending, and then - by chance - I came across Nerd Fitness. I happened to click on a link in Twitter to Steve's "Open Letter to Conventional Wisdom." I had no idea it was about fitness, I just got pulled in by the title.

I had been planning on sorting out the health aspect of my life, with the idea of starting running (not one that appeals very much, but I knew something had to be done). But then reading this post, and the posts that Steve linked to throughout it, NF sounded like the kind of thing I didn't even know I was looking for. Efficient training, not taking hours on a treadmill or in a gym, and sensible, logical reasons why things should work.

Also, and this is probably the biggest draw for me, the fact that the guides provide a clear entry and progression points. Do this, and once you reach this level, move onto this... No getting overwhelmed, just having a ready-to-use plan available.

My ideal, initial target is to lose the gut, build up my chest muscles and arms and get some definition. I've got a particular t-shirt that I'm using as my benchmark - I need to be big enough to stretch the sleeves!

I bought the Rebel Strength Guide on Saturday night and, after a bit of a read, started to get going on it yesterday - I'm concentrating first on bulking up and following the Basic Training for now. I bought in a load of food and cooked a big batch of stew to save myself further cooking for a few nights this week, and I've just done my first workout session this evening.

Diet: It seems pretty apparent that I have been undereating for a while - enough to get by and add a bit of fat (from poor calorie choices, I presume), but not enough to grow healthily or provide enough steady energy through the day. It's been a surprise just how much I'm going to need to eat, but thankfully it doesn't look like it'll be much more expensive than my usual food expenditure. I'm up to about 80% of my calories today, and feel confident I can get up to 100% from tomorrow. I've made myself take-to-work snack bags of 140g mixed dried fruit and almonds - at 500+ calories, it looks like they're going to be my friend!

Exercise: Mostly went well. I was disappointed with my press-ups, but that'll improve (a couple of concerns though, below...). I don't have a lot of space to exercise in, and neither do I have a jumprope, but I did have fun substituting that with dancing like an idiot to loud music instead!

Concerns: During my press-ups, I was getting a 'clunk' from my left elbow - to me, it sounded lounder than a regular popping joint. I've no history of trouble with my joints, so I don't know if it's something to worry about, or it's just because it's not used to that movement? I didn't do many push-ups, but my elbow was aching a little after I'd finished the whole workout. Same for my knee with the squats, but without the post-workout ache. No actual pain, just a bit noisy and concerning.

Anyway, that's probably enough for now, I had no idea I'd end up writing so much...

I'm glad to be here (thanks for having me!), and excited to get started on this adventure!

Rob

[Rosie]

What up, fellow slumdoner!

[ebm1224]

welcome to the community! sounds like you have some great goals. i'd give the exercises a few more trials for the joints to "shake off the dust" but, if it doesn't get better after a few session (or if you're in actual pain) maybe look at some potential issues. there are lots of guides out there on proper form so that would help. some people even like to post videos of themselves on here for others to critique their form.