CHANGE IS GOOD

I just noticed my last post was on May 5th For those of you who know me, you know what a challenging spring and summer I have had both in my personnel life and my set backs I have had with my back and the surgery I had. Well this week, everything feels like it is coming back together and I am expecting a full return to my training and active lifestyle beginning in September.

So 1 goal I want to start working towards is riding the Seattle to Portland ride next year. I am hoping to find a few others that will be interested and start training for it by doing some weekly rides that range in different distances and difficulty. If anyone is interested in doing the ride next year, let me know.

Other then that, I just can't wait to get back into the gym and get my fitness level back up to where it used to be. However, I am not looking forward to starting off and becoming all sore like I did when I first started. haha

I have a slack line being delivered to my place today. I don't remember if you have seen people using these before, but they look like a lot of fun and good for the core and balance. I figure that I can start using this now as it is low impact but will still be a challenge.

Anyways, it feels good to know there is an end to all the bad luck I have been having and I want to thank all my friends who have been so supportive and continue to give me words of encouragement. I look forward to seeing all of you back in the gym!

It has been awhile since posting. I have been extremely busy for the past month so hopefully I can get back into blogging a little. My work outs have been going really good. I have been going through a cutting phase in my diet and have lost about 15 pounds in the past 3 weeks. Now before you start freaking out and thinking that is too much in that short amount of time, let me say that I don't believe this is for everyone and when I did this I followed a strict diet and was still eating 6 times a day and was strategically adding carbs, fat and protein where needed. The great thing about this is that I was able to still have great work outs and don't feel like I lost any strength in the process. Usually that kind of cutting will result in loss of muscle and energy. But because of the foods and supplements I was taking it worked out great.

So anyways, I am looking forward to finishing up my dieting and start eating like a normal human again. I have been dieting now for about a year and a half and have lost 150 pounds. I can't wait to get back to eating normal. I love the foods I am eating now and won't change that, but I will not have to be so strict anymore.

I posted a while ago about doing a small photo shoot with a friend of mine up in Seattle.  Well I finally got the chance to do it on Saturday.  The weather was crappy and we were able to get in a few shots between rain storms.  The location isn't what we had planned but with the weather being iffy we took what we could get.  Here are a few of them.

So I decided to to go do a couple things today to see where I am at medically speaking.  I scheduled a physical with my Dr. and also scheduled a hydrostatic body fat test.  

I stopped into REI yesterday to pick up a small gift for a friend for his birthday yesterday.  While I was in there I started looking at back packs and hiking equipment because I keep toying around with the idea that I want to jump into it this year.  Well after having dinner with him and his friends last night and hearing some of their stories and advice,I really want to start hiking.  I have always loved the outdoors and walking trails, but for whatever reason I have never followed through with actually going out and doing it!  I live in the Great NW for goodness sakes!  It isn't like I can't find anywhere interesting to go.  Between all the great places within an hour of Portland and all the trips I make up to Seattle there are probably hundreds of easily accessible challenging trails.  I want to find ones that are challenging and scenic so I can also do my photography while I am hiking.  I am curious to find out how my fitness level will work out on some of these difficult hikes/climbs.  I am sure I am in for a rude awakening!   So now the obsessing and research begins and equipment, trails, safety, rules, what to bring, etc...  Good thing I have some good friends that are very experienced with hiking and climbing to give me some advice. 

Of course yesterdays post was an April fools... Those pancakes looked good in that picture though. I might need to make some this weekend.

Work out:

travel-
burpees
pushups
modified wall push ups
sit ups
tgu
went to the small gym in the hotel....
lat pulls
press
tricep extensions

food
smoothie
trailmix
turkey sandwich, fruit
protein bar
sushi

I give up! All this eating good is too hard for me. I think I am ready to go back to eating bad and just sitting around. So I decided to start it off right with a nice big breakfast as you can see in the photo of what I ate this morning. That was some good stuff, I think for lunch I am going to head over to McDonalds for a couple Big Macs and fries! I haven't had anything like that in over a year and a half. Then for dinner...hmmm Maybe a whole pizza or someting will be good. Ohhhh then desert! I am definately going to have to go out and find some Pecan Pie!

I didn't realize it until today but today was my 6th day in a row of working out. The last time I did that I was hurting bad for a few weeks afterwards. This time I feel great and that is even after a long day of snowboarding yesterday. (which was flippin amazing!!) So now, I am going to to be heading back out of town the rest of the week and do some other things such as hot yoga, swimming, and just doing body weight exercises in the hotel.
So, I am glad to keep seeing progress like this even though it is small....I couldn't do that 2 months ago without feeling totally wrecked! We will see how I feel after doing work outs while I travel.

Work out:

Warm up:
2 rounds:
5 halo
5 around the body
5 good morning
5 spinal wave
5 goblet squat
5 clean&press
10 push ups

Strength:
thrusters
2 warm up rounds of 5, then 5 work sets of 5 reps, followed by 5 pull-ups:
warmed up with 45lb. bar. 95/95/95/115/95
Pull-ups: 5/5/5/5/5

WOD:
As many rounds in 15 minutes of:

7 Med ball cleans (25lb.)
7 burpees
run around the block
finished 6 rounds

Food:

6am oatmeal/flax/glutamine/protein
9am trail mix
2pm half of a chicken sandwich from subway
4pm trail mix
8pm tuna steak, asparagus

So I saw this "Gibbon Slackline in a magazine and it looks like a lot of fun.   I am hoping to pick one up before summer for something to play around with outside at a park or something.  It would be fun to bring into the gym too and wrap it around the big posts and try some balancing core stuff with it.  Anyways....here is a video.

I haven't been doing much photography lately, mostly because the weather has been so bad and I like to do most of my shooting in natural light. I am going to be shooting a friend of mine and a couple friends next week doing yoga up in Seattle. It will be a nice jump back into it and will be something a little different then I am used to. Should be fun! Hopefully we can come up with a good area to do the shoot at and the weather cooperates.

It felt great to get back into the gym today. I wasn't expecting such a hard work out though. Anytime I see burpees or running I know that I won't be setting any land speed records. So I accepted that before even starting the work out and really tried to have good form on everything. It was one of the tougher work outs I have done in quite awhile. It felt good to finish it.

Work out:
Warm up-
3 rounds:

10 around the body
10 halo
10 goblet squat
100 jump rope
Row for 20 calories

WOD:

10 burpees
15 db snatches each side (35#)
20 med ball slams (20#)
25 2-hand swings (24k)
1 Bear crawl length
1 lap around the building

5 rounds 32.29

At home - Rowed 2000 meters

Food-
6:30 oatmeal/flax/glutamine/protein
9am trail mix
12:30 Turkey sandwich
7:00 5 oz chicken, 1/2 cup brown rice, 1 cup of broccoli and cheese

I am back from Chicago now and looking forward to getting back into the gym tomorrow.  I did mange to get in a work out Tuesday morning, just did a lot of body weight exercises and leg circuits.  I didn't eat really good while I was gone, since I was at the mercy of where ever the people that were driving too me for food. 

Ok folks after completing my goal of lifting double my body weight I am in need of my next goal.  I have some small goals I have been working on that are more long term, but I want something I can achieve in the next month or two to keep pushing along.  So here is my dilemma....I am thinking I don't necessarily want it to be a "strength" style goal because I tend to go a little nuts and could end up injuring myself.  I am thinking or something that might be more endurance/strength.  Here is where I struggle the most....

Ok, so I couldn't resist the temptation.  I was thinking about it all morning and decided I was going to attempt lifting double my body weight (430).    I decided to see how I felt and Nathan talked me into trying 415 which is 10 pounds more then my PR from last week.  I figured if I felt good I could do an extra set to get my goal of 430.  So on my 4th set, I did 395 and as soon as I lifted it I figured I could not go any heavier.  It was frickin heavy!!!  So then I put on 415 and it took me forever to get my mind right...I just couldn't get psyched enough to lift it.  Then it happened!!!!!  The little push I needed and as soon as it happened I knew I was going to lift it.  It was all thanks to Tina...she went over to her music and put on "Eye of the Tiger"!!  Ok,  you may laugh but to any guy my age.....you know that song gets you psyched!  hahaha  (I can't believe I am admitting that.) Anyways, I pulled the 415 and it went up easier then the 395 and felt better then my 405 last week.  So as soon as I put it down, I said....I am going for the 430.  Tina was even kind enough to loop "eye of the tiger" But this time I wasn't so psyched, I couldn't stop thinking about how much weight 430 was and almost decided not to lift it, but I heard a little voice in my head telling me that I could do it and I had to try and give it everything I had.  So when I lifted it......it was slow....it was ugly....it was even kinda funny....but I got it up and down and I am going to count it!  :)

Felt great to be in the gym today and do a lot of kettle-bell work.  For strength today we did a double kettle-bell push press.  We did 5 sets of 3 paired with jackknives and spidermans.  I made it to the 80 pound kettle-bells and was able to push press them ok....bringing them back down to the rack position was a little more difficult.  Nathan gave me some good advice to try and absorb the kettle-bells on the way down instead of staying so rigid.  I will give that a try next time we do those. 

“You cannot control what happens to you, but you can control your attitude toward what happens to you, and in that, you will be mastering change rather than allowing it to master you." ~Brian Tracey

I was forced to give the people at one of my branches some bad news today and it was pretty hard to go through the day with a good attitude. I thought about what I wrote last week about how people are effected by the way I carry myself and my attitude. So all day I tried to stay upbeat and keep smiling and it really helped I think. I was able to think clearer and because of that I came up with an idea to help create more of a positive spin on the news rather then it just being all bad. The news was still bad to them but it could have been a lot worse. They will never know that....but I do and I feel good about helping them out, even if they don't know it.

Work out

Swam last night then did 4 rounds of:

Mini leg circuit
10 burpees
20 sit ups.

Food:

8am smoothie
10am trail mix
noon bbq chicken (no skin) corn bread and slaw
3pm food supliment shake
9 pm CPK Salad

Ok, so if you remember last week I talked about not getting on the scale for a week and just eat good and stay active. Well I ate just about as good as could be expected last week in my opinion and when I got on the scale on Sunday I lost 1 pound. Now at first I was thinking...1 pound? WTF!! I felt like I lost 5 pounds after having such a great week. I have to admit, I was a little discouraged but after thinking about it for awhile I remembered what an amazing week I had in the gym and how strong I felt. (Until Saturday...that is a whole other topic.) So really the way I ate and felt last week probably had a lot to do with how good I ate. It is hard for me, but I have to stop worrying about the scale, my fitness is what is more important to me right now then what number is on the scale. If I keep eating like this and keep having weeks in the gym like I did last week, that should be enough to keep me going.
I am traveling a lot the next 3 weeks so my work out schedule and eating will be put to the test. But I am staying POSITIVE!!! I will do good! : )

So at the beginning of the Dead-Lift cycle we are doing at the gym. I had a goal of lifting 400 lbs. by the end of the cycle. After the week I have been having and how good I felt I decided to give it a try today and see if I could do it. On my final set I was able to lift 405 for 1 rep. It was not easy and was not pretty but I am so glad I got it and now I can go into the final week of it not having to worry about reaching my goal.

Other then that, last night I went up boarding with David and had some great runs, I am feeling more and more comfortable at higher speeds on the board. It did get very cold and windy up there though but other then that it was a lot of fun.

Work out:

All I did was pretty much Dead-lift

3-3-3-1-1-1

I think it went 225/275/315/375/395/405

Food:

7 am otameal
9:30 am trail mix
noon turkey sandwich
3pm meal replacement drink
8 pm burrito from laughing planet