Fat Loss II - A6

I started with 5-mins cardio outside, most of the warm-up. Then I did:

A1: Front Squat - 90t/8, 90t/8, 90t/8
A2: Bent-over Row - 90t/8, 90t/8, 90t/8
B1: Supine Hip Extension with Leg Curl - 8, 8, 8
B2: Barbell Push Press - 70t/8, 70t/8, 70t/8
C1: Dynamic Lunge - 30e/8, 30e/8, 30e/8
C2: Upper Body Russian Twist - 8, 8, 8

Then I did 5-min warm up, 4 sets of intervals (1m high/2 min med) and a five minute cool down.

50 mins, 393 cals, Max HR: 175 (99%), Avg HR: 136 (77%)

It was a pretty good workout. I suppose it should be with yesterday’s excess calories. I found the 90lbs a lot to get into position for the front squats, but the squats themselves weren’t too bad. I finally managed to raise the weight on the push press. So this was my last Fat Loss II A workout, the B one will be on Sunday.

This was actually written on the 2nd…

In the interest of full disclosure yesterday wasn’t a good day, at least as far as compliance goes. Some of it was my own fault (a skipped morning snack while in the kitchen baking). So it started with a few dried cherries, a few sunflower seeds. I’m usually pretty good at not picking when I’m cooking (the exception might be tasting a sauce for spices). It moved on to a piece of cheese, a couple of biscuits. All in all by bed time it was only maybe 300 calories over. Not a huge deal, but annoying all the same.

Then at 3am, still not asleep it became a lost cause, with some type of fuck it all attitude that seems to come over me when I’m off planned eating. Definitely wasn’t pretty, and shows that I can easily overeat on nutritious items (whole grain tortillas, reduced fat cheese blends, etc.). I think I captured what most of it was, understanding that there was little weighing/measuring going on, and ended up about 1400 cals above where I should have been. Yikes.

So today is day 1 of compliance, and I’m thinking that this week’s weigh-in will not be pretty either (we’ll see). I still think a maintenance break is needed. Mentally I’m having a tough time with continuous dieting. I need to think of something to do when I come off that maintenance week. I have the basics down well enough that I could probably do set meals/snacks except for dinner. I’ve done that before with some success. It tends to make me feel a little more normal, however, there’s a chance with all the lovely fresh fruit that will be coming in the next few months that I’ll just overeat on that stuff.

We’ll see how it goes, and what comes next. Today I’m making chili (but staying out of the kitchen) and waiting for the pool guy to show up. We’re about to find out if the repairs the pool needs are minor or major. If they’re major we think we’re willing to live with a bypassed return system for a while. Now, since it’s about the right time, I’m off for my morning snack!

I wouldn’t have said I was tired until I started yawning a few minutes ago.  So I think I’ll head to bed, hoping that it’s dry in the morning.  The plan at the moment is to bake snack cakes for the freezer (probably just chocolate zucchini) and make chili, as we used up the last of the chili tonight for dinner.  If I get ambitious (probably not) I might make some pizza crusts (again, for the freezer) as I’ve been in a pizza mood lately.  I suspect the pizza won’t get made until the next rainy day.  That should be Thurs, or Fri. 

Food for the day:

Total: 2276 calories (24% fat, 30% protein, 46% carbs)

Breakfast: egg white omelet with salsa, citrus bread, jam, orange (265)
AM Snack: beef jerky (108)
Lunch: multi-grain tortilla, smoked turkey, lettuce, mustard, nectarine, cherries (438)
PWO Snack: protein shake with cherry concentrate (269)
PM Snack: hummus, flatbread (231)
Dinner: chili with cheese, multi-grain tostidos, salad w/dressing (704)

Evening Snack: fruit salad, chocolate zucchini cake (174)

Fat Loss II - B5

I did a 5-min cardio warm-up outside, followed by a few inside warm-ups, then did:

A1: Snatch-grip Deadlift - 85t/8, 85t/8, 85t/8
A2: Push-ups (regular, not T) - 8, 8, 8
B1: Bulgarian Split Squat with Overhead Press - 5e/8, 5e/8, 5e/8
B2: Assisted Chin-up - 8, 8, 8
C1: Romanian Deadlift / Bent-over Row - 85t/8, 85t/8, 85t/8
C2: Lower Body Russian Twist - 8, 8, 8

Then warm-up, 4 rounds intervals (1m high, 2m moderate) and cool-down.

52 mins, 407 cals, Max HR: 172 (97%), Avg HR: 133 (75%)

The weather is still sucky. Kind of raining off and on, and even a little cool when it’s overcast. I managed to get my walk in this morning with only a couple of drops of rain. I even managed to get some shopping done (and unloaded) before it rained buckets. Yet when I started to do my workout it was clear enough that I could do the cardio outside, which was good.

I’m so not going to miss that overhead press with the Split Squat. I see in Fat Loss III you still do a split squat, but thankfully not with the press. Although I’ll probably whine about it even then. :p

Well, did some work in the garden in the morning (after my morning walk), and luckily got a swim in before lunch. Since at that point it pretty much thundered and rained off and on. I caught up on a few things inside, although tomorrow I really should do some cooking and/or baking if the weather forecast is correct.

Food for the day:

Total: 2002 calories (31% fat, 30% protein, 39% carbs)

Breakfast: breakfast bake, citrus bread, jam, orange (367)
AM Snack: beef jerky (108)
Lunch: multi-grain tortilla, sirloin steak, lettuce, mustard, peach, sweet cherries (468)
PM Snack: hummus, flatbread (231)
Dinner: chicken & sausage gumbo, baked brown rice, salad w/dressing (552)
Evening Snack: fruit salad, protein shake (276)

Yes, sweet cherries. They finally have the Washington state cherries around here, so it’s officially fruit season! They’ll overlap with out local cherries, followed by plums, peaches, etc. I’m not so sure that I’ll be hitting my 30% protein levels, but I did manage to hold it to 4oz of cherries and a small peach (that wasn’t worth it).

Fat Loss II - A5

I started with 5-mins cardio outside, most of the warm-up. Then I did:

A1: Front Squat - 85t/8, 85t/8, 85t/8
A2: Bent-over Row - 85t/8, 85t/8, 85t/8
B1: Supine Hip Extension with Leg Curl - 8, 8, 8
B2: Barbell Push Press - 65t/8, 65t/8, 65t/8
C1: Dynamic Lunge - 30e/8, 30e/8, 30e/8
C2: Upper Body Russian Twist - 8, 8, 8

Then I did 5-min warm up, 4 sets of intervals (1m high/2 min med) and a five minute cool down.

50 mins, 379 cals, Max HR: 173 (98%), Avg HR: 134 (76%)

It wasn’t a bad workout today. I’m still struggling with the barbell push press, so I was happy it dropped to 3×8 today. The 30sec rest times were a struggle and I’m not sure that I managed to keep them all under 30 seconds.

- - - - -

The weather is really flaky around here today.  The rain held off long enough that we got a swim, and had dinner outside.  Although when we were outside having dinner there were times I questioned if eating outside was a good idea.  Looking at the forecast tomorrow I should get my walk done in the morning before it starts raining again.

Food for the day:

Total: 2290 calories (28% fat, 42% protein, 30% carbs)

Breakfast: scrambled eggs, orange (316)
AM Snack: beef jerky (108)
Lunch: multi-grain tortilla, eye of round, lettuce, mustard, apple (438)
PWO Snack: protein shake with cherry concentrate (269)
PM Snack: hummus, flatbread (231)
Dinner: sirloin steak, corn, butter, salad w/dressing (652)
Evening Snack: fruit salad, protein shake (276)

This morning’s weigh-in was 239.0, which is 0.4 pounds down from last week. This week has been really weird weight-wise. If it hadn’t been for the weird mid-week readings I’d have assumed that maybe this was a bit of a slow-down. I knew mid week that I was likely retaining water, so stepped on the scale to find I was 3 pounds up from Sunday. Thursday was worse as I was up about 4 pounds. I’m actually a little surprised that I ended up down at all. Since I haven’t changed food, exercise, water intake, etc. I’m assuming it was the heat that did it. Anyway the 9-week loss is 20.4lbs (2.27/week) which is usually the ‘number’ I look at to see how things are going overall. The other little compulsive number I look at is how many days I’ve been ‘on plan’ primarily with food. I still consider a maintenance week ‘on plan’ since I accomplished what I wanted to. So this is day 61 on plan with food.

The next couple of weeks will show high losses per week as I drop the spike off the graph. In a way they should be ignored as much as the gain weeks. With that thinking it will be about 2 weeks before all is back to normal. I did briefly see 233.6 at the end of March, so seriously, no congratulations until then!

Next week’s plan is:

Continue Fat Loss II phase of New Rules of Lifting, 3 days a week. 30-45 min walks 5 days a week (with my mother), aiming for 45 mins on non-lifting days. For July I’ll likely continue at the same food levels - 2000 on non-workout days and 2250-2300 on lifting days and see how that goes. I may take a maintenance week for week 9 of NROL. That would be after next Sunday. It’s supposed to be a full rest week (no weights, no intervals). I’ll likely keep up the morning walks though.

And the 9-week graph…

It was a quiet day here today. I vacuumed and backwashed the pool this morning. That’s unusual, since usually the pool cleaner keeps it pretty clean. I may have mentioned it here, but we were losing a lot of water in the spring. We eventually broke down and called the pool guy, who came by and gave us a temporary fix (admitting he wouldn’t be back for a month probably). He basically bypassed the returns in the pool, which did the trick. I’ve just noticed though that the pool doesn’t keep as clean (so now it gets the occasional manual vacuum). The weather here was gorgeous today. Warm without the oppressive humidity of the last couple of days. The forecast doesn’t look promising though for the next few days (cooler and rain possibly). I was hoping for lots of sun as we have a few boysenberries showing colour and a few red currants as well. I think the boysenberries will be at least a week from this point (but we’ll see).

So that’s it for the rest day… a couple of swims, a small amount of watering, dinner on the patio, and lots of doing nothing.

Food for the day:

Total: 1994 calories (24% fat, 35% protein, 41% carbs)

Breakfast: breakfast bake, citrus bread, jam, orange (367)
AM Snack: beef jerky (108)
Lunch: multi-grain tortilla, smoked pork, lettuce, mustard, apple (457)
PM Snack: hummus, flatbread, pisco sour (321)
Dinner: pork tenderloin w/jerk seasonings, salsa, green beans, butter, salad w/dressing (465)
Evening Snack: fruit salad, protein shake (276)

Nothing really exciting around here today.  I trimmed back a few of the trees and the grapevine, but that was about it.  Nothing needed watering, so just wandered around the house and the garden a bit.  The weather was decent enough for a lovely swim and dinner on the patio, so all in all a good day.

Food for the day:

Total: 2008 calories (23% fat, 30% protein, 47% carbs)

Breakfast: breakfast bake, citrus bread, jam, orange (367)
AM Snack: beef jerky (108)
Lunch: multi-grain tortilla, smoked turkey, lettuce, mustard, apple (424)
PM Snack: hummus, flatbread (231)
Dinner: meat sauce, whole wheat pasta, parmesan cheese, salad w/dressing (642)
Evening Snack: fruit salad, protein shake (236)