Technically, this is gym day #10, but it’s actually #9, because I just posted on that day, so I haven’t been to the gym since day #8 which was the 13th, 4 days ago.

in 165.2
out 165.6 (water)

Yes, I already took Brian’s advice and I’m not concerned with my actual weight at this point. I’m still going to mark it down for archival purposes.

I still had zero motivation after four days out of the gym, but I felt like going today to see what would happen. It was too cold to go to the real gym, so I went to the bogus gym and got what I paid for.

Of course, there were a bunch of people there, so I ended up waiting around for a couple of the machines, and it was impossible to find a couple of sets of dumbbells I wanted to use, because there’s only one or at the most TWO sets of each, and people take them with them to the ends of #&$*(#& creation to do sets and then don’t bring them back to the racks. :/

I had decided that the only thing I was really interested in today was working towards getting my dips/pull-ups back in order on the weight-assist machine, but without using the weights. The problem with this particular machine in the bogus gym is that there’s no function to change the width of the dip bars. Since I’m a slimmer person, that means that as I’m doing dips, my arms aren’t where they’re supposed to be, at my sides. Instead, my arms are kind of out to the sides as if I’m about to draw two guns in a western movie. :/

Obviously, this means that I’m using more sets of muscles than I’m supposed to, and I’m not getting to isolate my triceps & chest properly during the dips.

The wide-grip pull-ups weren’t that bad, but the close-grip COMPLETELY SUCKS, AND is also too wide for my frame, so I end up holding my arms like a referee right after someone kicks a good field goal. :/

1. Super-Sets (no weight assist) dips 10, wgpu 5, dips 7, cgpu 4, dips 5. I was aiming at 10 of each. Eventually, I’ll be up to that and then I can start doing dips with added weight instead of having the machine subtract the weight, but that won’t be on this bogus machine, because there’s no way I’ll be able to support extra plates with the wide placement of the bars.
2. Super-Sets (40 lb weight assist) dips 10, wgpu 10, dips 8+2 (rest), cgpu 6+4 (rest), dips 10. The other thing that’s stupid about this dumb machine is that the numbers on the weights don’t take counterbalancing the weight of the apparatus into account. This means that if you pull the pin from the weights, the platform goes down immediately. The only way to stop that from happening is to put the pin in several plates below “zero”. It would have been SMARTER for them to make the machine calibrated so that you could get a good idea how much weight you’re actually offsetting.
3. Flies 100, 70, 40. This is the same dumb machine that doesn’t allow you to do flies with your elbows, but insists that you have your hands and forearms involved in the exercise. Unfortunately, the weights don’t match up to the weights on the same machine in the real gym, so it was just guesswork and messing around. Also, the only reason I was *DOING* flies is that someone wanted to use the weight-assist machine, so I was actually just killing time and doing some minor chest work in the process.
4. Shrugs (two dumbbells) 65×10, 90×6, 90×4 (grip issues), 50×10. It’s always good to do shrugs. I went with the 65s to warm up, then could NOT find two 85s or ANY 80s :/ So I went with 90 lb dumbbells for the heavy section. I knew it was heavier than I wanted to go, but…… So… By the second set with those, I was losing grip on the right side, so I went for a light set to close it out.
5. Super-Sets (60 lb weight assist) dips 10, wgpu 10, dips 10, cgpu 10, dips 10.
6. Shrugs (two dumbbells) 65×7

Overall, it was a better workout, but it wasn’t. :) It was more fun, but I got less done. I’m going to end up going to the real gym more, just because I like hanging out there. I definitely would have stayed twice as long. Also, with the wide-grip machine I had no choice but to use, I really couldn’t press the way I wanted/needed to, so it ended up being partially a chore, even though I got a good idea where I stand as far as starting a workout with dips.

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Reader Brian, from Hervey Bay, Queensland, Australia left me some GREAT comments that I just read on “Gym, Day 08″.

Let me first say that THIS is the benefit of self-expression on the (literally) world-wide-web. I can’t explain to you how amazing and incredible it feels to have people reading and responding to my posts, LITERALLY from around the entire world. :D
I can’t explain it because I couldn’t have explained it to myself before I got involved. It really expands your mind and your “vision” beyond localities and territories.

It’s really fantastic that Brian a) read my post, and b) commented. It’s icing on the cake that what he had to say was on-point, thought-provoking and useful. I wanted to be sure to respond in a post instead of just in my comment section.

Brian: “Throw your scales in the river. They are demotivating and often very misleading. Water retention/loss will mask any short term changes.”

That’s what I was noticing, and the reason I started marking in AND out weights. The reason I was paying attention to weight at all is that I stay at a base weight unless I really make a big deal out of consuming extra food (and formerly weight gain formulae and protein drinks). Back in the day, when I would TRY to gain weight, I had to pretty much stand perfectly still not to lose it all back, haha. This was fine down the line, when I wanted to ‘cut up’, but it was a drag for the overall prospect of gaining weight.

This time, I walked in the gym on day 01 @ 162, which was heavier than I had ever been when I was TRYING to gain weight, which is why I was skeptical that I would get any heavier. Ultimately, at this point, weight makes no difference. I’m not a pro fighter, so I don’t have to worry about “weight classes”. Also, I put on size without actually gaining weight. So, yes, this is a good idea… stopping using the scale as some form of judgment as far as progress is concerned.

“Use a tape measure or the notches on your belt. That will give you a far more honest progress report.”

hahaha I had COMPLETELY forgotten about stuff like that, measurements. :) Now that Brian’s brought it up, I can remember actually using a tape measure to judge progress. Of specific interest was biceps/triceps, because there were three areas that basically made up the circumference (front, back, outside, to be non-technical about it), and depending on the exercises you did and how you did them, you could improve on one of the three and see gains on the tape.

I definitely WOULD do that in lieu of using scales, except I’m not aiming at any particular size, so I don’t really need to know that information. I’m aiming at satisfaction, which I’ve already achieved to a degree. A few of my female friends have seen the results and gassed my head up with compliments even more, so that’s not helping me want to get in the gym EITHER! ;)

“And maybe remind yourself that it is all about lifestyle which is a complex interactive system of relationships, work and leisure interests.

The main inputs are exercise and quality food. Your work and leisure interests also count. It counts if you swing a pick all day at work. So does a love of something like mountain biking. It sounds like you don’t really enjoy the gym – like about 98% of the population!”

More excellent points. First of all, I’m working off of “muscle memory”, so I’m just refilling what I had already built, similar to re-inflating a balloon that you already blew up. Second, my daily routine is devoid of manual labor (such as digging ditches and swinging picks!!! :D ), so working out / attacking the bag are pretty much my athletic endeavors. Riding used to be a workout as well, but that’s when I was a lot more aggressive and preparing for trackdays, at the time that I had decided that I wanted to take my riding to that level.

I also used to play a lot of roller hockey. Great for fun, using your mind on the fly and endurance/cardio/stamina.

The reason I don’t “enjoy the gym”… well.. Like I said in a different post, I enjoy the gym for hanging out and the women that show up, but actually lifting, no. I don’t enjoy lifting at this point, because there’s no reason. Nobody starts fistfights anymore, so you don’t have to be prepared for that. Girls these days don’t even KNOW any guys that are in shape, so there’s no physical competition for their attentions. I’m not playing football or rugby or any sport that requires me to have any particular useful strength. So the only reason left to actually work out is so that I get a positive instead of a negative reaction from the chicas when I take my shirt off, and that’s currently a non-issue. ;)

“The mediating process is your total lifestyle and how you give food and exercise a natural place in the flow of your day, including what you enjoy and what you have time for. Experiment with anything that increases your exercise and/or enhances the quality of your diet. It helps a lot if you enjoy the activity for its own sake.

The outcome may be weight loss, but it may not. It takes a lot of exercise and a lot less food to shift those scales.”

More great advice, and you’ve made me aware that I’m working from an ancient understanding of the way my system works… I’m going to take your advice and SEE if I can lose any weight AT. ALL. hahaha :D Now, THAT would be interesting… going directly to ‘cutting’ instead of building first. I still need to re-inflate traps & lats, but other than that, I might go for several weight-assisted supersets (dips/pull-ups), which is really good as an overall body workout and an enjoyable challenge for me as I strive to work out with less and less weight assistance and eventually get to the point where I can do all of my exercises without using the weights at all. hmmmm Yes… that would be fun. I can see if I can get back to doing dips with an *EXTRA* 45 lb plate attached to a weight belt instead of trying to REDUCE MY OWN WEIGHT by 40 lbs haha.

“However, the other outputs are a bit easier to achieve. If you improve your diet/exercise to even a small extent, you will more than likely feel better mentally and shortly after you may even look better as your body tones up a little. These changes can be achieved way before any weight loss.

So how about a quick walk down to the park and be proud of yourself. Do you own a dog?

Good luck,”

Yes. I’m going to get on this, immediately. I’m going to make it FUN instead of a WORKout. I’m going to figure out who wants to go to the gym and when and make hangouts out of it instead of something I’m just doing to prepare for the warm weather.

Thanks again, Brian. Great points, and perfectly timely, as I had reached saturation with going to the gym for the sake of preparation.

Cheers! :D
~Bill

Related Posts

• Gym, Day 10
• Gym, Day 08
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in 164.6 (electronic)
out 165.0 (water during workout)

Complete and Utter lack of motivation.

I opted out of the real gym yesterday (part of my lack of motivation is now lack of motivation to BLOG about my lack of motivation! :D ) and went slummin’ in the convenient gym. I was totally and completely disinterested in going, but I know that if I don’t, it’s eventually going to get to warm weather and I’m going to wish that I HAD gone, so I went.

My recovery system’s down to < 24 hours and will eventually be < 12 hours. I decided that I was going to work on sections I needed to work on rather than concentrating on a routine or overall plan.

The electronic scale said 164.6 lbs. Admittedly, it's a slight rush to be ~3 lbs heavier just by getting on a different scale, haha. It takes weight to push weight, so for some reason, I just felt better, even though, mentally, I knew there wasn't any difference and that if I went back to the metal scale, I'd be back down to 161.

I decided I wanted to try curls first, since I had done a set or two last time with the EZ-Curl bar and plates on the ends. I had been wondering at the time whether that bar was 25, 35 or 45, but now I’m clear that it was 25, because the EZ-Curl bar I used yesterday was way heavier. I did a test set with the bar and then put a couple of light plates on the ends.
 
1. Barbell Curls 45 (bar only) 65 70 then multiple dumbbell sets with 20 lbs

After I tested the weights on curls, I felt like the only thing I really wanted to do was shrugs. As I said the other day, ‘Traps’ are tough for a lot of guys to build, so working on those is an easy way to “look better” without necessarily being stronger or lifting more weight.

I started out with 75 lb dumbbells, which was much easier to get off the ground than the other day, but I was having grip issues, so I went down to 60, but that was too light. I could have done those forever… So I went back up to 75 and started doing sets of dumbbell curls with 25 lbs in between my sets of shrugs.

2. Shrugs 75 60 (too light) back to 75, add curls between sets of shrugs

Next was the seated dip emulator machine. It’s basically like doing weight-assisted dips, but you’re seated and pressing down on the bars instead of raising your own body weight over the bars. I started with 100, then went to 80 then to 60. I was going more for burn & failure than pushing heavy weights. Decent triceps workout, ok lower chest workout.

3. Pressdown Dip Machine 100 80 60
4. Weight-Assisted super-sets – 60 lbs offset (dips, pull-ups, dips, close-grip pull-ups, dips)

I’m pretty sure I did two sets of those. I wasn’t paying much attention, haha.
I went back for more shrugs with the 75s before I left.

I’m doing decently up front. I need to focus more on heavy bent rows & shrugs for back development as well as light biceps/triceps work and flies for shaping and kick-starting muscle memory.

This is an interesting process for me, being that I’m used to starting out at a way lower weight and building up to the low 160s. Being that I walked in the door on day 01 @ 162 (according to the same scale that currently weighed me @ 165) I’m in the odd situation where I could actually look better faster by eating less. I’ve always wondered how that was, for guys that actually get fat if they don’t work out… It seems like it’s easier to get in shape, because “all you have to do” is cut weight, instead of how I used to have to consume calories all day every day and make sure I never rode my bike or ran anywhere.

Anyway… I’m going to try to go again today, haha but I just don’t care. :D

Related Posts

• Gym, Day 10
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in: 161.5
out: 162.25

I knew this morning that something was “wrong”. I was actually fully recuperated yesterday, and could have gone to the gym then, but I decided to hold off until today, just to see the difference. Today, I was completely ready to roll, but I had a hard time getting to the gym.

Physically, I’m doing fine. Mentally, I’ve hit a stage that I had forgotten about, which is “lack of motivation”. I’m basically already satisfied with how I look, which is the purpose of working out if you don’t play a particular sport. It’s like when Fonzie goes to the mirror and tries to comb his hair, but before he touches himself, he’s like “AAAAAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY :D ” and just walks away, hahaha. So I knew I needed to go to the gym today, I knew I could have gone yesterday but chose not to, and still, I just didn’t feel like going, haha. :D

I got a little cardio in, I guess, by walking to the gym. I weighed in @ 161.5 lbs, but like I said, I don’t necessarily trust that scale as far as calibration. Either way, it’s clear that my weight isn’t going anywhere, as my system starts snarfing reserves from wherever to replace the destroyed muscle tissue.

The problem today was that lack of motivation is very debilitating when it comes to pushing heavy weights. I just can’t convince myself that it’s important. I was listening to Gimme Shelter today, imagining being in some war, where everything was SO IMPORTANT, and I still couldn’t motivate myself to lift heavy. For that reason, I decided to do pyramids, or basically, as soon as I felt fatigued at one weight, I selected a lower weight and kept going. My goal was to fatigue on each machine and not go back around like I did a couple of days ago. It’s A LOT easier to lift lighter weights for more reps than it is to lift heavier weights for fewer reps. That seems obvious, but I mean mentally easier, not physically easier.

1. Close-Grip Pulldowns 150, dropping 20 or 30 each time I approached failure. Once I got to the point that the exercise was approaching cardio, I started sweating, immediately. The point being that that’s historically been my body’s typical reaction to carrying excess material (weight).
2. Bent Rows 50 35 25
3. Shrugs 80 70 60 35 – once I got to 35 lbs, I was doing sets of 25 reps each
4. Flies 120, dropping on failure. The way that machine is set up, so stupid :/ is that you’re holding the grips in your hands instead of having pads that sit right where your elbows are. This causes you to have to maintain your arm positioning WHILE you’re trying to pull the grips towards the center. For this reason, my biceps were failing even before my delts (shoulders) were failing, which was WAY before my chest was failing, which is the ENTIRE POINT OF THE EXERCISE!!! :/ I’m going to have to find a location that has the machine I need.
5. Pressdowns – Light work. I totally wasn’t motivated to go heavy on those, as I mentioned before.
6. Curls (Barbell) – I was going to go light, but I decided to step up from the “herb” pre-fab weights to the ez-curl bar with plates on it. I did a few reps with 25 on each side, so depending on the weight of the bar itself, I was either curling 75, 85 or 95, but I’ll assume 75.
7. Weight-Assisted Super-Sets 12 16 16 – Between lack of motivation and pushing towards fatigue on the actual exercises, I was pretty much done by the time I got to the super-sets. Since this is basically cardio, more sweat for me.

I’m thinking I’ll stick to starting heavy and doing most of my workouts light at this point. Obviously, I don’t know what I’m actually going to do until the day & time that I’m ready to go work out. All I know is that without some new form of mental motivation, going heavier is going to be impossible for me.

Another thing is that my recovery time has decreased to < 24 hours. It’s time to push my workout schedule to daily, and eventually twice a day. There’s a crossover between your body saying “I don’t want any more of this” and “I didn’t get enough of this… gimme more!”. Once you get to “gimme more”, waiting longer than your recovery period is only wasting time in achieving the outcome you’re aiming for. There’s the possibility of overtraining, which isn’t a good thing, but that becomes obvious when nothing’s really changing about your workouts, strength or look, and you can make adjustments accordingly.

Related Posts

• Gym, Day 10
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in: 160.5
out: 160.5

I’m not concerned about the .5 lb difference between today and three days ago. That could be any number of factors, including some 300 lb dude getting on the scale and stressing it out before I got on it.

It does look like my system’s planning to balance out in the low 160s, so I can kiss 170 goodbye! :D

I realized this morning that I had played myself last time by starting out with pyramids. You really want your first exercise to be heavy, so I overdid it, trying to find my limit. I found it, but in order to do that, I did a lot more reps than I should have, and pretty much jacked the rest of my workout. By the time I got to weight-assisted supersets, I was pretty much kaput.

This time, I decided to keep it heavy up front and save the light for the supersets at the end. I made some pretty good guesses, so I have a good template to start from next time I head back to the gym.

I do 6 reps per set, ’cause that’s how my coach @ MIT taught us to get busy. I know Dino doesn’t read this, haha but I’m sure he’ll never forget when I was happily benching and up to reps 7 and 8 and Coach was SCREAMING AT ME at the top of his lungs, and I stopped in the middle of a rep, looked over at him and said “Who? Me?” hahahaha :D So.. Yeah… Keep it heavy. If you can do more than 6 (or, actually, if you can do a good 6 and don’t feel stressed at the end of it), increase the weight for the next set.

Here’s the list:

1. Close-Grip Pulldowns – 150 130 120
2. Bent Rows – 50 40 40 – 50 was good, but I knew I didn’t have another 6 at that weight.
3. Flies – 100 100 80 – I’ll have to find my old “flies” machine. The one they have in the gyms now are where you have your hands on the grips, NOT the ones that you push with your elbows. Taking the rest of your arm out of the exercise helps you focus way more on pecs. In this case, my shoulders were failing way before pecs, which is expected until my delts get used to working again.
4. EZ-Curl (barbell) – 65 65fN 55fN – Unfortunately starting out with Pulldowns and then Bent Rows taxes your biceps from the giddyap, so I wasn’t too effective by the time I got to curls. I went for a second set of 65, even though I probably knew I shouldn’t have. I failed on the last rep, meaning I leaned and cheated, so I did a “negative rep” (letting the weight down extremely slowly. Great exercise if you have a spotter to lift the weight back up for you so you can do more Negatives) to kind of make up for that.
5. My Pressdown/DeclineBenchPress exercise – 150 150 150 150 – I did four sets of this because using the pressdown cable with extremely heavy weight, you have to lean over it. When you do that, the cable is going to cross either your left shoulder or your right, causing one arm to do a pressdown, while the other does more of a decline bench press. I had to go right, left, right, left to get an even workout. The point of it is to get the chest involved as well as your triceps. If you do pressdowns the “right” way, you don’t lean over it and you only use your triceps to move the weight.
6. Pressdowns – 70 80 80 – I did these relatively soon after the previous exercise. My triceps were still fatigued during the first set, but I could tell that I could do more weight, so I increased it to 80 for the next two sets.
7. Shrugs (dumbbell) – 75 85 85 – Shrugs are the absolute JIZOINT for developing your traps (trapezius muscle), which basically shows up as the “connection” between your neck and your shoulders. Lots of guys don’t have traps at all, so their shoulders and their neck are at a right angle to each other (90 degrees, like an “L”). The problem with Shrugs is that you have to hold extremely heavy dumbbells for the duration of the exercise. What I used to do was wrap a small towel around each dumbbell and each wrist so that some of the pressure was relieved, AND if I wasn’t using gloves, the grips wouldn’t dig into my palms. They actually sell straps that are specifically for this purpose. I also find with Shrugs that your mind gives out before your body does, hahaha it’s really an interesting mental struggle to keep doing reps when “you’re telling yourself” nah, I can’t do any more of these! :D It has to be done though, and traps are CRITICAL if you want to look like you work out AT. ALL. :D When I get to heavier weights, I’ll have to switch to using a machine, because holding 100 lb dumbbells and doing strict reps of Shrugs is nearly impossible… well, for me, at least, being that the total of the weight I’d be carrying is way more than I actually weigh. Shrugs are REALLY more of a grip and mentality issue than anything else. Traps build fast with heavy weights and strictly performed reps.
8. Weight-Assisted Super-Sets – 12 14 16 – The weights on this machine are only listed in double-digit numbers, so you can’t tell how much weight you’re actually countering your weight with. I started out at “12″, but being that dips, pullups, dips, close-grip pullups and dips emulate just about every exercise I just finished doing with heavy (to me, right now, haha) weights, I could tell after set #1 that I wasn’t going to be able to complete another superset at that weight, so I moved it down to 14 and then 16 for the third set. This was the only situation the entire time where I started sweating, which is what I had been saying about the impossibility for me to get over 160 lbs in the past. As soon as I do ANY kind of cardio, all excess materials sweat themselves out of my body. I lost four pounds one night going out to Roseland, between the dancing and the overall heat.

Due to last session’s early pyramid shenanigans, I ended up taking two days off instead of just one. This time, I feel well worked-out, yet not “destroyed”, like I was last time. Eventually, my workouts will move to daily and then twice a day, once my recovery accelerates. Also, as you’ll notice, I haven’t worked out legs yet, because that’s an INCREDIBLE drain on resources. First things first, haha. Upper Body gets in decent shape, then leg work, then total body… eventually. :D

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