Month: November 2012

fitnessgroanLeave a comment

As I’ve written in the past, creatine supplementation can be very useful for many kinds of athletes and exercisers. Read this post for an excellent, thoughtfully researched examination.

jennovafoodblog

Hey all!

Continuing to trudge through my semester- final stretch before exams, cannot wait until christmas!! Still loving my job and have found a new love with kale chips :p lol. I’ve been a little unmotivated with training over the past month but after not being able to compete this past weekend (work :() I’ve gotten a little inspiration and am back full force :). Did a pretty good workout today, I’m sure my shoulders will be wrecked tomorrow :p.

Also just trying to figure out the pictures on wordpress, if this works heres a pic of me climbing at the Red! 🙂

So on a related topic, and something I’ve been pretty interested in because I’m both a vegan and do a sport where power is important; todays post will be on creatine! Be warned, its a long one lol.

Vegetarians have been shown to have better or equal cardiorespiratory…

View original post 843 more words

Advertisement

Updating the Message to Get Americans Moving – NYTimes.com

fitnessgroan2 Comments

So sad. And so obviously true. Read the article, then comment on why YOU continue to exercise with intensity. Answer the question about what is motivating you; where is your pleasure response to exercise achieved?

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/19/updating-the-message-to-get-americans-moving/

“ Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see. ” – Arthur Schopenhauer

My workouts…

fitnessgroanLeave a comment

So the first week of my new regimen went like this: Chest & Back

CHEST

  1. Olympic flat bench press Set 1: 95lbs x 15 reps (warm up) 60 second rest Set 2: 135 x12 reps (deeper warm up) 60 second rest Set 3: 185 x 3 (heavy warm up) 90 second rest Set 4: 185 x 7 reps ( near muscular failure) 90 seconds rest Set 5: 185 x 6 reps (near muscular failure) 90 seconds rest Set 6: 185 x 3 reps (momentary muscular failure) 90 seconds rest 
  2. Dumbbell incline press 45lbs x 12 reps 60 seconds rest, 55 x 10 reps 60 seconds rest, 65 x 6 reps (momentary muscular failure) 90 seconds rest
  3. Standing Cable Fly (free motion machine on 4th floor): 70 lb. x 15, 80 lb. x 11, 90 lb. x 8 (momentary muscular failure) all sets had a 90 second rest between them

BACK

  1. Pull Ups Set 1: body weight (164 lb.) x 3 reps.  Ended the exercise due to a severe twinge in my left biceps tendon (where the biceps muscle inserts into the crux of the elbow)
  2. Lat Pull down: 90 lb. x 15 reps (testing the arm) 60 second rest, 110 lb. x 10 reps 60 second rest, 120 lb. x 8 reps 90 second rest, 140 lb. x 2 reps (the twinge again; decided to switch the movement pattern from downward pull to inward pull)
  3. One Arm Cable Bent forward rows (using cable cross machine, bottom pulley): 100 lb. x 12 reps (performed with each arm before rest) 60 sec rest, 130 lb. x 8 reps 90 sec rest, 150 x 4 reps (momentary muscular failure achieved on each arm; no twinge issue)

Workout ended.  

There were no residual issues with my left arm afterward.  I did not perform lower body workout due to lack of motivation, and decided to skip the shoulder and arm day until I’m sure the left biceps issue has been resolved.  I did repeat the chest/back routine, with the exact same results including the biceps twinge.  I plan on truing to get thru the whole weeks worth of workouts again starting tonight.

Body Building: beyond aesthetics

fitnessgroanLeave a comment

I’ve been lost with my workouts lately.  I haven’t had a clear-cut goal, instead basing my workouts on  general health, some notion of (obsolete) athletic needs, and boredom.  Without some competitive outlet, I find my workouts to be aimless and somewhat pointless.  General health and fitness is so uninspiring to me.  None of these has kept me training at the level of consistency and intensity I ought to be maintaining for both optimal physical fitness and professional reasons.

Since I really don’t pursue any specific athletic avocations at this point in my life, training athletically is not only pointless, but also counter productive considering the physical impairments I keep exacerbating: sciatica, arthritic pain in my ankle and left hand digits, shoulder pain from years of over-use and abuse, to name a few.

The level of exercise I need to accomplish to maintain general health is likewise so easy for me to achieve I don’t feel like I’m accomplishing anything.

And boredom leads to demotivation and general lack of interest in my own personal fitness.

To remedy this I’m going to begin a good, old school, body building routine.  Nothing fancy.

Nothing overly athletic or complex.  Just basic body building and strength training, done with gradually increasing intensity over a period of weeks.  I’ll target different parts of my body on different days, using a three-day split routine.  The same exercises every week till I reach a strength and development plateau, and then I’ll redesign the routine to reach a new plateau, and so on.  The goal is simple: get specifically strong in certain exercises, and to generally strengthen every skeletal muscle as much as possible.  In addition to my other posts, I will log these workouts here, and post them, so that all my readers can see what I’ll be doing, and the challenges that I either overcome or succumb to, just like everyone else in the exercise community.

My split will be as follows:

  1. Chest & Back Monday and Thursday (DB bench press, Incline DB press, cable fly’s, Pull-ups, cable rows/long pull, cable high row)
  2. Lower Extremities Tuesday and Friday (squats, dead lifts, jump step ups, leg extension, prone leg curl)
  3. Shoulder, Arms, cardio Saturday (standing military press, db lateral raise, Standing e-z bar biceps curl, db incline biceps curl, dips, cable triceps pulldown, spin 30-45 minutes)

Light to moderate cardio will also be done on chest and back days, depending on energy levels, and on any other day energy, motivation, and time permit.  Abdominal and core work will be done at the end of every workout, depending on soreness.

Hopefully, you will find this log of my own workouts to be motivating, and heartening to see that we all face similar challenges, regardless of which direction we come from in this exercise community of ours.