The chronicles of Luke the Rotund.

[lukepeter]

Wednesday weigh day is upon us.

104.0kg - and so we continue.

I did another posed photo for comparison purposes, my fat storage genetics are poverty, my love handles are so damned resilient.

This morning, vs April 7th.



Front single bi douchey.JPG

[JSim83]

That's some real nice progress right there!

[Sarumyan]

Amazing progress, very inspirational, especially considering engineering job and family life. Good stuff!

[lukepeter]

Not much to report from the weekend... Halloween festivities on saturday with the family and a gentle Sunday(I built 5m of garage storage shelves - I ate to compensate for the labour ), both around maintenance. I didn't run or walk at all in order to give my body a little recovery time. I have been feeling... worn... of late, and the downtime coupled with a relaxation of eating restrictions has done wonders for my energy and aches and pains.

Back under the bar today, a new chest day best, 107x10, 117x10, 67x20. Thats bodyweight +14kg for 10 reps - I am more than pleased.

[lukepeter]

I am going into a shutdown for the next week, so my TDEE is going to spike for a bit...

Leg day yesterday was good, squats are feeling really comfortable at 80kg, and I have let the deadlifts creep back up to 117kg for 10x3. The current conundrum is this: do I leave myself in this "comfort zone" wherein I finish the routine in my allotted half an hour comfortably, or do I continue to stretch... It's been a recurring theme for me - how strong is strong enough?

[lukepeter]

Decent week thus far, workouts performed despite shutdown, adjusted intake by about 400kcal to compensate for increased TDEE.

103.5kg this week, I have been hovering around 104-105 for the last 3 weeks, so its nice to see a bit of a dip. I am feeling pretty disciplined, so hopefully I can get to a new low shortly.

As an aside, my garage is so much more functional after building the shelves Its great being able to just walk in, and turn on the machine I need to use without moving a hundred items and working in awkward positions. (not remotely related to my body transformation, but a health step forward w.r.t. my mood )

garage.jpg

[cherrygarcia80]

Wednesday weigh day is upon us.

104.0kg - and so we continue.

I did another posed photo for comparison purposes, my fat storage genetics are poverty, my love handles are so damned resilient.

This morning, vs April 7th.



Attachment 8777491

OMG dude! You look fantastic!!! I haven't been here for ages and only now trying to catchup on the various logs....you've completely transformed, you're wife and kids must be ecstatic, all the best as you continue to get back to good health and as you journey on

[Imp81318]

Hey Luke, just stopping in to see how your progress has been. Garage looks great, btw! Want to come organize mine for me next? haha

[lukepeter]

So, shutdown completed, and a week away from home at training in one of the other sappi mills about 800km from my hearth.

I wish I could say that I was a disciplined weight loss and lifting soldier and have emerged from the time period showing good progress, but alas, the opposite is true.

Shutdown had so many very late nights towards the end - 22-26 hour days - and following that, I missed my usual workout routine as a result of being away from home. The wheels came off a little

When I weighed myself on Saturday on my return I was 112kg - thats a gain of 8.5 kg in 2 weeks... A testament to my increased carb and sodium intake, that is back to 105.5 today (which is probably reasonable considering the food I ate and the beer I drank whilst away with the "lads"). The wheels are back on, and the slog to claw back 2 weeks worth of good progress has begun anew. Sometimes this happens, its disappointing, however, that I chose to express my freedom of responsibility with such reckless abandon - may it be a lesson to me.

[Imp81318]

Glad to hear that your shutdown is over and you're back on the proverbial horse. In the grand scheme of things, 2 kg gained over 2 weeks away with the boys is really not all that terrible. I'm sure you'll be back down to your pre-shutdown weight in no time.

[AlexSays]

Hi Luke,

Have been following your log for a while but have just dropped back in after a couple of months away, progress is incredible!!! nice job, keep on slogging

do you mind if I ask what a 'shutdown' is?

[lukepeter]

Hi Luke,

Have been following your log for a while but have just dropped back in after a couple of months away, progress is incredible!!! nice job, keep on slogging

do you mind if I ask what a 'shutdown' is?

Hi Alex.

Thanks, I shall continue on what seems to be a perpetual uphill slog...

I am a mechanical engineer responsible for asset reliability in a pulp drying machine (for all intents and purposes a machine that takes low consistency water born wood pulp and dries it into a sheet like cardboard). The plant produces around 700 tons a day, and runs 24/7. There are two periods in the year when we suspend production and shut the plant down to allow for maintenance, these outages typically last around a week each, and require a significant amount of work to be completed in a relatively short window. It always ends up interfering with my men and my sleep

[lukepeter]

104.7kg this weigh day.

It's been a messy three months from a weight loss perspective, been up and down between 103 and 105 for the most part. Its a comfortable weight for me, I am perfectly functional now, but not yet happy with my ability to control my body, or, ultimately, how I look. My training still continues as per usual, and I have managed to get 45 mins of squash in once a week on top of the usual lifting - maintaining the work rate through my upcoming 4 weeks of leave is going to be challenging, so is eating according to my goals when I am spending the majority of my time at home.

Sigh. through general lack of discipline I have made this process far longer than it needed to be. I am still around, however, and still on the proverbial horse.

Luke

[lukepeter]

Greetings readers.

I have been absent the forum, and the gym, for the past 4 weeks during my leave. I must admit to experiencing a modicum of shame at this fact, but it has been a very welcome break. Alas, in my typical fashion, a breach in my routine corresponded well with a breach in my diet - especially over the christmas period. While I have yet to climb on a scale and officially document the damage, it will be significant (I have had to back off a belt loop ).

I did manage to get through a smattering of runs and pretty regular squash games, along with various internally rewarding projects at home, so the time period was not spent rotting.

The OCR organizers have published the race day for my province, it is in early July... This leaves me with six months to become a competent runner and mover of my body, having something concrete to aim at has always served me well, so here's to becoming a runner . My target is not, I feel, unreasonable. I aim to be comfortably completing a 10km run in 60mins - not a stretch at all for people blessed with normal bio-mechanics (sadly I do not count myself among them). With that in mind, I will be stretching my distance by roughly 10% a week, initially aiming at 3 runs a week on to of my usual lifting routine.

My wife an I are hopping across the pond to Australia late June, so it will be good to have the impending horror of a 16km, 30 obstacle course to keep me in line

Blessings on all your houses, and may the insincere resolutioners not plague your lifting sessions (sincere ones are more than welcome).

[lukepeter]

Weigh day has arrived.

108.9kg - a gain of 4.2kg over the last 5 weeks. (secretly hoping returning to a reasonable carb intake will yield further losses by the end of the week).

Training has been back to usual so far, I am tremendously stiff - every group I have worked is screaming in agony. No loss of strength, which is a pleasant surprise - however, I have not been in a deficit for the untrained period so that makes sense.

It's good to be back in my usual routine (from a training and diet perspective, its unfortunate that I also need to return to work), I am considering a 16 day stint of PSMF, but not yet sold on the idea - it goes against my typically moderate approach, and I need to be running a fair amount also in order to improve my fitness for the race later this year... Loss aversion has me chomping at the bit to re-lose the inch I have gained on my waist.

[Imp81318]

I was giving you until the end of this week before asking for an update. Glad to hear you're back at it, and even better that you have not done significant damage during your hiatus. Those DOMs are really horrible and are almost enough motivation to keep with the program all by themselves, aren't they? Fortunately for me, my severe DOMs/stiffness only persisted for the first week and I'm now into a realm of discomfort and stiffness that can be managed without medication. Hoping that your recovery/re-adjustment of your body to lifting heavy objects repeatedly is similarly smooth and swift.

[lukepeter]

Thanks for stopping by Steve. Your responses are always so eloquent, and the consistent support helps (though I would appreciate some harsh arse kicking for non adherence also).

I find the stiffness lasts for exactly 4 days, so my pecs and tri's are cleared up now, but the rest are still tapering...

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I have been heavily restricting intake as I suggested I would, around 1300kcal a day (150gP, 50gC, 60gF), training is measurably more difficult, but otherwise no horribleness has presented its self. Weight down to 107.3 today (from 108.9 on wednesday) the plan is to stick with this for a period of 16 days, then ramp back up to reasonable restriction - we will see.

[PhantomEater]

Still going at it and glad to see you back on it after the festive period, I have followed similar paths and let go of the reins but as always I look towards you for some motivation in hope that one day I can write of my journey in the way that you do! Happy New year wishing you many blessings and good health for the coming year

[lukepeter]

day 7 on this... rediculous... restriction. I had a 3000kcal day on saturday (there was a wedding involved).

It is spectacularly ****. It may be that leg day requires extra intake, or that I am feeling the restriction after a week of this, but my RHR has dropped to 42, I am far shorter of temper than usual, and my vision is occasionally blurry I am going to weigh in tomorrow morning as usual and see what the progress has been - if the weight loss has been too drastic I will up calories by a suitable amount.

Strength is still really good, my major loaded compounds have seen no reduction (I am back up to the weights I was using before christmas break), but the final isolation exercises per muscle group tend to flag heavily (less reps performed comfortably than usual) That is to be expected though.

ugh.

[lukepeter]

So - virulent hunger and general fatigue aside, the experiment is working.

Weight 106.0kg this morning, 2.9kg down week on week. It is likely that that is bolstered by a carb washout in this period, I reckon there is about 1.9-2.0 kg of fat loss. It is faster than I intended, but since it was week 1 I am going to leave energy intake where it is and see (I suspect the loss will taper off significantly now that water weight is shed)

[lukepeter]

So. 14 days into my little experiment.

104.5kg today - a total loss of 4.4kg in the last 2 weeks. I am back to pre-holiday debauchery form. I am going to hang on at current energy levels for a while longer (averaging around 1700 a day) because the results are hard to ignore.

I do find I am more fatigued than usual, but my strength is still unchanged, and I am managing to get through my day reasonably easily. Running remains only just bearable, I feel the energy deficit the most on the road...

[lukepeter]

Back onto 2100kcal a day now, it feel so much better.

I carbed up this weekend, running felt so much better, lifting still to be determined. Weight at 105kg today after 250g of carbs on Saturday.

I really need to start pushing my distance out for the runs - I am still only doing 3km, and yesterday was the first time I finished "strong" since october (as opposed to wheezing my way over the threshold and collapsing in a sweaty heap). July seems a long way off - but at only two runs a week I am worried I will not make the distance target comfortably by then, time to push myself a little more.

[AmelieTaylor81]

I used to be a lifter like you, but then I took an arrow to the knee...

Marriage and child wrangling altered my life significantly, I traded exercise for family time, and ultimately couch time. Luke the Rotund emerged as I donned the sweatpants of +3 ice cream consumption, the loose tops of strength of digestion, and the comfy slippers of the neverrunner.

At 19 I was pretty, and in good shape. At 28 I am neither - basically a NPC in the fitness world that I used to love.

Herein shall I chronicle my quest, my agonizing climb back up the slopes of inadequacy to the not-so-lofty peaks of acceptability, perhaps even further to the mystic realm of ripped Adonis (unlikely).\

Our tale begins with the intrepid hero getting a message via email... It is an offer from the photographers that captured his image as he hauled his over buoyant carcass from the water following an open water mile swim, asking if he would like to purchase prints or the digital copies of these images. Our hero feels a surge of pride remembering the completion of the event, and thinks a reminder of such an achievement my not go amiss. He clicks on the link...

Little did he know that the horrors he was about to witness would strip his pride and shrink his ego - leaving him reeling in a quagmire of self loathing. He takes a large bite out of a chocolate slab to steady his nerves and puts on his glasses to make sure what he is seeing is accurate. It is. Seemingly instantly, the mists clouding his perception have cleared, he has become... Luke the Rotund.

6 months will have passed since that fateful day when the sun inescapably rises on the 19th of this month. Some progress has been made.

Fantasy tale aside - I have decided to post a weekly log here as a means of getting my arse kicked for non-adherence to the plan, and occasionally for validation of results (no-one wants to admit that this is important, but it is).

Trigger pics below - weekly progress pics logged weekly in bodyspace.

Stats as follows:

Assume all lifts are weights used for 3 sets of ten reps...

Height - 6"4' (193cm)

Start:
weight 145kg
bench 60kg
squat 40kg
deadlift 80kg

Current:
Weight 125kg
Bench 110kg
squat 100kg
deadlift 120kg

Bodyfat percentage is an unknown for me at the moment...

I was eating mostly clean for the last 24 weeks - since commencing the 250k challenge I have set my macro targets at 200P, 100C, 90F - and have hit them within a few percent since Saturday.
I lift 4 times in a week - chest and tris, legs, rest, back and bis, shoulders and abs, rest, rest.
I do not cardio - not even once

I will be honest here, what I expect from those willing to contribute is a hearty "harden the **** up" if I become whiny, and a kick in the pants if my adherence slips. So come on in and help me stay accountable

Luke the Rotund

Good luck

[lukepeter]

Week in, week out - adherence has been good.

I am comfortably back to full strength, It took a little longer than I had hoped (probably as a result of the heavy deficit immediately following my holiday). I am back up to scratch on the road also, distance pushed out to 3.6km this weekend and comfortable.

My diet has been good, if not always perfect. I have been training without any pre-workout, creatine, or beta alanine for the last 3 or four months (the logic behind this was predominantly because I had no real performance goals, and the supplement money was essentially wasted). I think I am going to start using all of the above again in the hopes of pushing my running out further, faster. and at the same time getting some strength gains.

Keep on keeping on.

[lukepeter]

103.7kg today - the gradient is once again negative, this on an average intake of around 2100kcal. I will be keeping it here for the foreseeable future, time to get the last leg of this (by now, epic) tale completed. I cant describe how much I am looking forward to closing this thread and starting a training journal

[JSim83]

103.7kg today - the gradient is once again negative, this on an average intake of around 2100kcal. I will be keeping it here for the foreseeable future, time to get the last leg of this (by now, epic) tale completed. I cant describe how much I am looking forward to closing this thread and starting a training journal

How much more do you think you need to lose before you are done with losing fat? I don't remember if you have mentioned this in you log and I'm just curious...

[lukepeter]

8-10kg... Hopefully...

[Imp81318]

Hey Luke, how's the progress been?

[lukepeter]

Hey Luke, how's the progress been?

Still hovering around 104kg, but I feel leaner... I am making small progress in my lifts, pullups were good today at 12 and 10 reps for my "pulldown" loaded sets. Bench is steady and my leg days are finally showing a bit of promise again (despite the ridiculous stiffness, I think a 10% jump is in order for next weeks set).

I have been pretty consistent with my running, 2-3 times a week. Warrior race is in July in my province, so I have just enough time to be reasonably road fit before it starts.

Wife is on the bandwagon firmly, she has lost 6kg over the last 5 weeks and as before, it helps a huge amount that she is being conscious of what we cook (also, it has the added benefit of much more variety in my diet, while remaining macro conscious).

I found a brand of whey (finally) that I find very easy to drink, legitimately the first time in my life I have actually looked forward to a whey and water shake every day

Ta for checking in

[Imp81318]

What kind of whey have you found that is good in water? I almost always mix mine with almond or cashew milk to give the shake some substance. I have always found shakes made with water to taste “watered down” and kind of meh, but the same powder mixed with nut milk is delicious. And the 8oz of milk only adds 30 calories. Lately, I’ve been making simple waffles with a scoop of whey, an egg, baking powder, and a dash of cinnamon for breakfast in lieu of a shake.

Have any home projects going on lately?