elzools journal and request for kicks in the bum

[elzool]

Morning folks,

Since all the other kids are doing it and I couldn’t find any other appropriate place to start a journal, I figured I’d do it here.

I’m not a girl, but I’ll post a pic anyway if I can find some.

I’ve reposted this paragraph from another post of mine to sum it up:
Last year at this time I was 249lbs and started the south beach diet. I lost 40lbs on that over 5 months and started eating better than I ever had before. Felt better but knew I could do more. I started off working out in January after being quite sedentary the last ten years. Went to LA Fitness and signed up for a year with a trainer. At that point I was still a Male and 5'11" but I weighed 204 and had 25%bf.

At this point I’m down to 18%b/f. and weigh in at 188.

I’m eating approx. 2400 calories a day at a 40/40/20 ratio.
I drink about 2 gallons of water a day on workout days and maybe 1.25 gal a day on the three days I don’t workout. After each workout I have an ON Choc drink(23g protein).

I’m looking to gain strength, but not bulk up too much, mainly get a little bigger arms and that’s it. Just so they are a bit more proportional to my legs.

Working off a new routine from dbflgirl I’m doing the following:

Monday - Chest and Triceps
Bench press
Incline press alt. with decline press
Flys or cable cross-over
Dips
Skullcrushers

Tuesday - Legs
Squats
Leg press
Extensions
Curls

Wednesday - Off

Thursday - Back and Biceps
Deadlifts
Pull-Ups
Barbell rows
Barbell curls
Hammer curls

Friday - Shoulders
Military Press
Lateral raises
Front raises
Rear raises

That said, here are a few pictures and next up I’ll post my workouts from yesterday, today & some questions.

-elz

[elzool]

Thursday June 30, 2005
Legs still hurt from doing them Tuesday
Did 5 minutes of warmup on a treadmill @ 4.5mph/incline 3

Back & Bicep
lb/rep
Deadlifts 70/15, 70/15, 70/15
Pull-Ups, Assisted 88/12, 94/10, 94/8
Barbell rows 50/15, 50/15, 50/15
Barbell curls 50/12, 50/12, 50/9
Hammer curls 20/15, 20/15, 20/15

Ate 2460 calories

[elzool]

Friday July 1, 2005
Woke feeling off today, but hit the gym anyway.
Did 5 minutes of warmup on a treadmill @ 3mph/incline 3

Shoulders
lb/rep
Military Press 50/12, 50/10, 50/7
Lateral raises 10/15, 10/12, 10/10
Front raises 15/15, 15/12, 15/10
Rear raises 10/12, 10/10, 10/8

Came home, bad tummy problems.
Had protein shake(23g)
Had white beans (14g protein)
Nothing but water for the last 4 hours as my stomach is just too rumbly tumbly and not doing too well.

[elzool]

Questions:
About barbells… does it matter if I use a straight or ez bar?

Does wrapping an mp3 player around my upper arm constrict it too much when doing upper body?

[kimsquit]

At that point I was still a Male and 5'11" but I weighed 204 and had 25%bf.

um...so you're no longer male? (not that there's anything wrong with that)

From the photos it sure looks like you've made fantastic progress - congratulations!

I've been told that curling with the straight bar places more emphasis on the outer head of the bicep, while the EZ curl bar offers a more even distribution.

For myself, I find that curling heavier weights with the straight bar places too much strain on my forearms and wrists.

Again, congratulations!

[jaguarr]

Looks like the beginnings of a great journal, and you seem to have made quite a transformation since last year, already. Congrats and keep up the hard work! That being said, you've got some freaky-ass eyes, man!

jag

[mom24boys]

wow looks like some good progress..and hey you must just be a little related to the black circle gang hehehe...yea i see a little resemblemnse just in the eyes though *grin*

[elzool]

Thanks for all the kind words folks. It's certainly a great motivator.

As far as the bar goes, I guess I'll alternate between the two and see what happens.

[GameDayDog]

hahaha... These guys don't notyce the little thyngs...

Hahahaha.... You're a funny dude... In the gym picture with the baby on the balance beam... he also put little black circles over not just the babies feet... (thys forum has one helluva foot fetish) ... but also over the faces of the pictures in the background.. hahaha.. Now that's funny... and great attention to detail...

Peace..~G

[elzool]

hahaha... These guys don't notyce the little thyngs...

Hahahaha.... You're a funny dude... In the gym picture with the baby on the balance beam... he also put little black circles over not just the babies feet... (thys forum has one helluva foot fetish) ... but also over the faces of the pictures in the background.. hahaha.. Now that's funny... and great attention to detail...

Peace..~G

I did that just to see if anyone would catch it.
Nice one

[jaguarr]

I did that just to see if anyone would catch it.
Nice one

I did notice it, but the one with the eyes was the one that stuck with me while I was posting. LOL! You're going to fit in just fine around here.

jag

[joed]

Welcome Elz: that's a lot of weight to lose in a year. Way to go.

[ChocoChick]

Wow - amazing transformation!

It's time to start putting on some muscle. I don't think you need to lose any more weight.

Cute baby, from what I can see. How old is she (he?)?

[GSCampbell]

Fantastic work. You should be proud!

I'm also glad to see that you have taken time out of your schedule to help members of the 5/7 club learn gymnastics (I'm sorry, I couldn't resist that one)

[joed]

Good one GSC.

[elzool]

My son is a proud member of the 5/7 club. The doc says that about 15 more years on hgh and he should see some improvement... time will tell.

What a weekend, spent most of Friday and all Sat sick with some weird bug. Ate maybe 1100 calories boths days.... if that.

Today, felt much better.

Monday, July 4th, 2005
Chest and Triceps

Warmup
Treadmill - 5 Mins @ 4mph @ 3.5 incline

Bench press
20/15, 25/15, 25/15

Incline press
25/15, 25/15, 30/8

Cable cross-over
40/14, 40/11, 40/8

Dips
88/15, 94/10, 94/7

Skullcrushers
None, no bars available

What can be done in place of these in the future?

[ChocoChick]

Skullcrushers
None, no bars available

What can be done in place of these in the future?

How about a triceps extension? http://www.exrx.net/WeightExercises/.../DBTriExt.html

Or triceps pushdown http://www.exrx.net/WeightExercises/...BPushdown.html

Your gym has no bars for skullcrushers? [scratching head]

Question: Why are you doing so many reps? If you can do 12 and still keep going, the weight is too light. Better to up the weight so that you can barely squeeze out 12, imo. And then once you can do 3 of 12, up your weight again. You might then only get 12 on the first set, 10 on the 2nd and 8 on the 3rd, but that's fine. Just work your way back to 12 and then increase again. Lather, rinse, repeat.

[elzool]

The gym had no bars out as they wee closing early for the 4th and are closed the rest of the week for refurbishing.

Those two look easy enough to replace should I ever need a substitute, thanks.

I dunno why I do so many... probably thats what I was originally taught and still haven't changed my thinking yet. Guess I'll up the weight and decrease the reps today. Who knows.. this might just work!

[ChocoChick]

Generally speaking you can expect:

strength but not much hypertrophy with reps of 1-5;
maximum hypertrophy and some strength with reps of 6-12
endurance with little strength or hypertrophy with reps of 13+

Now there are exceptions to this... periodization routines, 20 rep squats, pyramids, shocking techniques, etc., etc.

But IMHO, reps in the range of 6-12 are the place to start and the staple to return to. Within that range, you may need to experiement to see what works best for you. For instance, I was doing sets of 6 reps, and I got pretty strong but not as much growth as I wanted. So I switched to sets of 8 reps and starting getting more growth.

In case you're interested, here's an article that touches on some of the physiology behind the rep ranges: http://www.freedomfly.net/Articles/T...training29.htm

[elzool]

Generally speaking you can expect:

strength but not much hypertrophy with reps of 1-5;
maximum hypertrophy and some strength with reps of 6-12
endurance with little strength or hypertrophy with reps of 13+

In case you're interested, here's an article that touches on some of the physiology behind the rep ranges: http://www.freedomfly.net/Articles/T...training29.htm

You Rock!

Even more so once I figured out what hypertrophy was.

That explains so much more than you would think it would.
Since I'm looking mainly for strength and a little size it seems as if doing no more than 5 reps would be what I am looking for. Possibly alternating, doing 5 reps one week, then 12 reps the next week for maximum hypertrophy and repeating?

Or should I just stick with 12 like you initially suggested?

It's still a little confusing to me, but now at least it makes a little more sense.

[ChocoChick]

Gee, thanks!

The rep range really depends on your goals. Do you want to increase the size of your muscles (hypertrophy) or just get stronger? Everyone wants to be cut, but that's mainly in your diet.

I'm not sure about your every other week idea. It might work. Another way to go at it is to stay in the 6-10 rep range until you have the size you want, and then cut over to a strength-only protocol. It's not as though you can get too big -- you have a mirror and once you see that you are as big as you want to be, you can adjust. (At my gym last week, one of the trainers was asking a new guy whether he wanted to put on muscle or not and he said, "Oh, I don't want to be one of those big hulking types" and I thought, "Gee, I wish it were that easy!") Anyway (I digress!) the point is that nothing can happen unless you make it happen, so you're not going to wake up with Arnold's body one morning out of the blue.

[elzool]

oh sure, think logically

makes good sense to me, thanks!

[elzool]

Tuesday, July 5th, 2005 8:20pm - 9pm
Legs
Squats
40/8, 40/8, 40/8

Leg press
120/8, 120/8, 170/8

Extensions
60/8, 75/8, 75/7

Curls
80/8, 80/8, 90/6

Went to 8 reps today based on feedback from dbflgirl. I took my last weight I did at 15 reps and increased it. Next week it will be more interesting starting at the higher weights and seeing if I can still do eight whole reps.

[elzool]

First day doing new heavier set of eight reps on upper body... that was harder than I thought.... but in a good way.

Doing heavier weights hurt my back quite a bit .... ok, so it's fine now, but having had back problems all my life, I'm always leary of putting too much pressure on it or straining too much.


July 7, 2005 Thursday 5:30am-6:30am
Back & Biceps
5 min warm-up
Treadmill 4.5mph incline 3

Deadlifts - This is where I felt the most pressure on my back... so I backed off the weight a little. Warmed up with 30/6
70/8, 70/8, 70/8

Pull Ups, Assisted - Warmed Up with 88/6
106/8, 118/8, 124/6

Barbell Rows - Again, fear of throwing my back out held me back a bit weight wise. Warmed Up with 30/6
70/8, 70/8, 70/8

Barbell Curls - By this point my lower back hurt, so I again, held back on the weight. Warmed up with 40/6
50/8, 50/8, 50/8

Hammer Curls - Warmed up with 20/5
30/5, 25/8, 25/8

Came home, had a handful of vitamins and a few new supplementals that my wife recommended and a protein shake.

As of now I'm taking a multivitamin, glucosamine/chondroitin w/ msm, chromium picolinate and l-glutamine.

It's funny, she's an nurse(LPN) and studying for her RN right now and studying up on nutrition. So now after I read about alllllll these supplements, good, bad and indifferent she'll get through studying and tell me, well, since you are lifting, using more muscles fast twitch, slow twitch,hypertrophy, eating more protein you ought to take these even though some haven't been 'proven' by the medical establishment to work. It's nice to see that in some of her textbooks in addition to stating while not scientifically proven, XyZ has had good results in the athletic community and had these benefits.

Any other little supplementation that I might be lacking in? She also mentioned Calcium as I am mid thirties but I didn't have any.

[jaguarr]

You might look into some fish oil caps. One of the best supplements around, IMHO. I also keep extra Vitamin C in my supplementation to keep my immune system boosted since heavy lifting can really impact that. It seems to work very well in conjunction with the L-Glutamine and helps speed my post workout recoveries.

Keep working your way up with those deadlifts. I hadn't done them in years, and I was having a lot of lower back soreness. When I started back into them, I thought I was going to die for a few weeks from the pain I was in, but then those muscles started growing and getting stronger and my lower back pain is completely gone. So, stick with 'em. You'll be glad you did.

jag

[elzool]

Man that's nice to hear about your back.. hopefully mine will do the same. At least it's not as bad as it was when I first started working out several months ago.

Vitamin C - Check
Fish Oil? Ok, I'll do it, does it smell at all?

[jaguarr]

Fish Oil? Ok, I'll do it, does it smell at all?

Not really. Once in awhile I'll get a little whiff of it when I open the bottle to get some caps, but it's never very strong. And, every so often I'll get a burp that has a bit of a fish oil taste to it, but not very often (not a pleasant thought to share, I know, but at least you're informed). Me and the Missus get big bottles of the stuff at Costco for cheap.

jag

[ChocoChick]

Barbell Curls - By this point my lower back hurt, so I again, held back on the weight. Warmed up with 40/6
50/8, 50/8, 50/8

Check your form on this one. Barbell curls don't involve the back unless you are swinging your upper body back and then forward to "assist" your biceps with the movement. Your traps act as stabliziers, as do your shoulders, but your back really shouldn't be involved. Your elbows should be tight to the sides of your body and your torso should not move. Keeping your knees slightly bent will take stress of your back.

Barbell curls (I don't like this video so much): http://www.exrx.net/WeightExercises/Biceps/BBCurl.html

Another look: http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/exer...e=Barbell+Curl

Not video but decent: http://www.fitstep.com/Library/Exerc...bell_curls.htm

Dumbbell incline curls (another option but I like standing bb curls better): http://www.exrx.net/WeightExercises/...clineCurl.html

[elzool]

Thanks for the pointers dbflgirl but in my case, I believe it was just residual pain built up from the deadlifts and barbell rows. I think if I were to have started with the curls first there wouldn't have been any problem at all with pain.

I've already written myself a note to start with curls next week just to check this, but I'm pretty sure it'l be pain free.

[ChocoChick]

I've already written myself a note to start with curls next week just to check this, but I'm pretty sure it'l be pain free.

Sounds like a good check. And I know you know not to make a habit of starting with curls, right?