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You can say that again! Apparently Mother Nature didn’t get the memo that spring started yesterday!!!</p>
<p>I guess I shouldn’t complain about our current 52 and heading towards 75, eh? But it is a little overcast. </p>
<p>I hate squats. Hate, hate, hate them. I can’t think of another of the exercises that I dislike more, and I don’t really know why. Compared to my wussy arms, my legs are strong. So, of course, variants on squats is what the trainer is having me do. </p>
<p>Used a small resistance band for side steps Friday, and I’m still feeling it a bit today. Trainer says that my adductors are way stronger than my abductors, and that’s leading to movement problems. </p>
<p>Today’s a walking day – though I’m staying on the relatively flat and giving the achilles a bit of a break.</p>
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<p>72 and climbing here…</p>
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<p>Yeah, I’d imagine that could lead to some problems. Almost always are your abductors stronger than your adductors. Your abductors (especially glute max) are MUCH bigger!</p>
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<p>I just got back from my workout. </p>
<p>–Bench Press 4 sets of 5 reps each @135#
–Bulgarian Split Squats 4 sets of 5 reps each leg @25# DB per hand
–Incline DB Bench Press 4 sets of 10 reps each @25#
–Lat Pulldown 4 sets of 10 reps each @80#
–BOSU lunges 2 sets of 10 reps per leg</p>
<p>Now time for a nice sub sandwich :)</p>
<p>Felt pretty crappy for most of the day and then went for a run. 3.75 miles - felt pretty tired afterwards and did a bit of free weights. I ran in the new shorts (five inches with the zip pocket in the back). The zip pocket is the size of an iPod Nano (fifth generation). Basically the plug for the headset winds up on the outside of the pocket as there is no room for it.</p>
<p>The shorts are extremely light and it’s nice not to have all of the extra fabric for the front pockets and extra length. Very nice to run in and I even forgot about the iPod. When running with the iPod in the front pockets, they banged around so I always know that the iPod is there.</p>
<p>I just got back from a run. It’s still about 65 degrees outside this evening so I decided to do some running. Ended up running just shy of 5 miles. Took me 55 minutes. Probably will be sore tomorrow…</p>
<p>No workout for me today. I hate skipping Monday workout, but I was up ‘til 2 am bleaching kitchen cabinets, sore in every bone in my body, and no gas in the tank. Painters, carpenters, and tile guys all over the house. I’m scramblin’ to stay one step ahead of them, with only one small guest bedroom not in the firing zone.</p>
<p>I’ve got one more major room to finish clearing out – my home office. What a nightmare. I’ve got cardboard boxes and plastic storage bins all lined up and labeled and filling up at a rapid clip.</p>
<p>My new “skinny” thermometer pants arrived. $14.95 each for Docker Soft Khaki. I bought three of the four closeout colors (passed on the barn red). The blue and the green are both **really **nice colors. Fit perfectly:</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.sears.com/shc/s/p_10153_12605_041L0370000P?ci_sku=041L0370000P&ci_src=14110944&i_cntr=1300765833174&sid=IDx20070921x00003a[/url]”>http://www.sears.com/shc/s/p_10153_12605_041L0370000P?ci_sku=041L0370000P&ci_src=14110944&i_cntr=1300765833174&sid=IDx20070921x00003a</a></p>
<p>idad, it sounds like you are in the middle of a major remodel! Remodel and construction, even if done by someone else, are physically and emotionaly draining!</p>
<p>I ran my 4 miles. Moved the treadmill incline a bit up or down to add some variety to my run. My leg muscles were a bit sore from the Saturday run, but I managed to do OK.</p>
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<p>Paint, carpet, replacing kitchen tile floor, two major carpentry projects – replace front door and new sheet ceiling in master bedroom. Basically, the entire house is torn up at the same time.</p>
<p>Idad – Good luck on the remodel. Maybe this is a chance to get rid of some of the “fat guy” clothes if you still have any sitting around.</p>
<p>But why are you bleach washing the insides of your cabinets?</p>
<p>I finished the Gary Taubes book, and based on that and the Stanford lecture, I’ve decided to really go for a very low carb diet and give it a full month of completely strict compliance. I’m going to have to work on a take it with me quick meal and some other breakfasts, though – I get tired of eggs, and I have yet to find a protein bar, much less a low carb protein bar, that has a taste I can tolerate. I’m not a fan of artificial sweeteners, all of which taste just nasty to me. But I found Taubes’ summary of the research and evidence really compelling – the picture of the diabetic who had always injected the insulin into the same part of the fronts of her thighs was particularly compelling. Two huge boob-like objects where you don’t expect to find them, and right where she’d been injecting the insulin over all those years. D also thought it sounded logical, and is trying to follow a lower-carb diet at school, which for her means eliminating grains and starchv vegetables and limiting fruit. She’d like to lose a few pounds she’s put on in college, not that she’s gained a lot.</p>
<p>If I were Jewish I’d just tell everyone I’m cleaning out the pantry for Passover.</p>
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<p>Got rid of a lot. The rest are organized on long closet rods installed in cellar, bundled by size, each bundle covered in a large green trash bag. So there are 42 pants, and a bundle of 40 pants, and a bundle of 38 pants. And a bundle of XL golf shirts. And so forth. It’s all ready to go to the homeless shelter. I’ll probably keep the 34s and 36s. All XL shirts will go.</p>
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<p>We are painting cabinets white and I wanted to do a major clean of the insides of the cabinets beforehand. I’m not using bleach bleach, but a spray bleach cleaner. By doing it now, I can spray the heck out of the cabinets and then sponge all the excess out on to the counters or down on the floor and not worry about a mess in a freshly painted and tiled kitchen.</p>
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<p>I don’t think most of us have to go crazy early-stage Atkins level carbs. I never did. I always had fruit. One carb dinner (pasta or pizza) a week. The occasional sandwich or hamburger bun. I think that if you can get to the sort of moderately low maintenance level carbs of the Stanford study, most of us would lose weight. To be honest, I think getting bread, rice, pasta, potatoes, and sugar out of the daily diet would be enough for most of us to lose weight.</p>
<p>I’m not much of a breakfast eater, so I don’t have great suggestions. Canadian bacon is a good option, though. Probably cheese omelets would be one of my favs. When I feel like it, bacon and eggs are my standard breakfast since I’ve been dieting.</p>
<p>Here’s what I have planned for my workout tonight. We’ll see what alterations are made once I get to the gym. I’m a little sore from yesterday and really did not want to get out of bed this morning, but am ready to rock and roll now. I sent this to my partner and she showed it to one of our CrossFit trainers. He approved ;)</p>
<p>Warm Up
–10 minutes of cardio
–Monster Walks 4 trips</p>
<p>Skill/Strength
–Overhead Squats 4x8</p>
<p>WOD
–100 sit ups/crunches
–80 Single Arm Snatch (40 per arm)
–60 Kettlebell Swings
–40 Burpees
–20 Dips</p>
<p>Quarter mile run (fast)</p>
<p>Cool down.</p>
<p>Now we just have to wait to see if we get yelled at again tonight. Last Tuesday we got yelled at because we were still in the gym after it closed. The janitor didn’t like that too much, but apparently we’ve gotten the all-clear to stay to workout after work…</p>
<p>What’s a Monster Walk, hops?</p>
<p>Did a bunch of new exercises at the gym – chest press with 15 lb dumbbells in each hand, which were real work, small squats on the wobble board, and calf raises on the wobble board, both of which proved that my left outer leg and hip are enormously less strong than the right – they were really feeling both of these exercises. I think I’m going to feel each of those tomorrow. I was shaking by the time I was done. Particularly with the weights, having the trainer there makes a big difference in doing the exercise the right way vs. getting off-position. She’s also maniac about me keeping my feet pointed straight since I have the tendency to plant them with the toes out. We moved up to heavier weights on some of the exercises I’d done a week or two ago, and I managed (barely) to get through the sets. I am finding that the environment makes a difference – the gym is a small, very basic gym – only machines are several nice cable cross machines and a Smith rack, free weights, some rings dangling from the ceiling, medicine balls, bands, swiss balls and wobble boards, but it is very quiet. Typically only two or three of us there when I’m there, and most folks working with a trainer. One of the nice things is that I’m seeing how much I could do at home if I wanted – she is not at all a fan of the various fixed machines at most of the health clubs, and that’s pretty clearly where my regular health club has put its money. This marks five weeks into working with her, and I’m starting to see some nice changes. Her ability to quickly figure out alternatives when something hurts in a not-good way is essential.</p>
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<p>Using a miniband (think large rubber band), you put it around your knees. Then you move laterally. It’s meant to be a slow movement all the way around. It really gets the heart rate racing…</p>
<p>Got it!! My trainer has me do something similar–I have a rubber band thingie that I put around my ankles. You’re right–it’s not easy.</p>
<p>arabrab:</p>
<p>Your gym sounds fantastic. </p>
<p>15 lb dumbbells on the chest press is getting into serious weight territory. Bumping up is challenge because the next size DB is usually a pretty hefty increase percentagewise. iPod nazi, Alwyn Cosgrove, and Boyle all progess to an alternating DB press where you lift just one, then the other – either using just one DB (really, really hard) or pushing them both up and then alternating one then the other while always keepng one up.</p>
<p>I had a major leg imbalance on the squats, too. I think most people do. Alwyn Cosgrove recommends always starting each set with the “weaker” leg. I even started doing 4 reps on the weak leg and 3 reps on the strong leg. Now, I’m pretty much eliminated the difference.</p>
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<p>I was all set to workout this evening and then I fell asleep instead. So I got up and carried about a dozen heavy boxes down two flights of stairs to the cellar with I was doing a pork roast out on the grill. I’ll call it “Heavy Box Farmer’s Walks”. I’m burning calories, just not doing any fun workouts.</p>
<p>My kitchen is down to a plywood floor and empty cupboards. All of my utensils and spices are in plastic bins and boxes stacked on the dining room table, which is actually in the den, covered by a tarp! Microwave and coffee maker are in the laundry room. Sheesh.</p>
<p>I should be able to get back on track with a workout workout tomorrow. They sheet rocked the master bedroom today, and the plastering is scheduled for Thursday, so I’ve got a day to clear out the remaining odds and ends from the closet and bath in preparation for painting all that.</p>
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<p>What are the “moderately low carb levels” of the Stanford study? I haven’t read Atkins but I remember reading something about Atkins, and the really, really low carb first step is pretty much no carbs at all (if I remember correctly).</p>
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<p>Breakfast is hard because neither H nor I is a morning person OR likes to cook, so omlets are not happening in this house on a regular basis unless we hire a cook. Since we have been working at low carb, I have usually had high-fiber oatmeal for breakfast. It is not really low carb but with the 10 g of fiber, the nets carbs are not terrible. I would love to find another low carb, easy breakfast, as well as some easy to fix and transport lunches.</p>
<p>The Stanford study compared Atkins (low carb), Traditional (basically the US Dept of Health /Heart Association diet), Ornish (very low fat, mostly vegetarian), and Zone (fixed ration carbs/fat/protein). The people assigned to a given diet were given the book for that diet and told to use it as a bible – and given eight (six?) weekly classes led by a dietician teaching it step by step, and any follow-up questions on the diet that they wanted to ask during the first six months, all answered based on what was in the book.</p>
<p>Atkins looks for 20 grams a day of “net carbs” in the initial (“Induction”) phase, though it would seem to come to closer to 25 if you followed the food suggestions in the book. </p>
<p>Taubes’ book suggests that people who have been overweight longer may have bodies that are more sensitive to carbs than people who haven’t been overweight as long, and that those people might need to be stricter with carbs to start with (and perhaps stricter as time goes on.)</p>
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<p>The group taught the Atkins book in the Stanford study lost the most weight, had the biggest blood pressure reductions, the biggest reduction in triglyerides, and the biggest gain in “good” cholesterol. This group couldn’t stay on hard-core Atkins levels of carbs. By six months, they had settled into an average:</p>
<p>30% of calories from carbs
23% of calories from protein
47% of calories from fat</p>
<p>I vary quite a bit, but that’s pretty much been my breakdown during my weight loss and still today. Somewhere in the 100 to 150 grams of carbs per day for me. I mostly keep it low by skipping the bread, pasta, potato, rice, and cereals. I will get a loaf of thin sliced rye bread every few weeks and have some turkey or tuna sandwiches, but I try to make that an occasional treat. Lately, I’ve been carb-festing on tangerines.</p>
<p>Since reading the Taubes book, I’ve probably been a little more strict in avoiding carbs. For example, I didn’t have the baked potato that I usually roast with the pork on the grill. I do not limit carbs from veggies at all – brocolli, carrots, lima beans, peas, even kernal corn.</p>
<p>I think the real insidious part of the healthy eating recommendations is the way the low-fat, whole grain jihad turns a carb-fest diet into something that is perceived as healthy eating. My wife eats every low-fat, whole grain food in the book – from waffles to bread to cereals to wraps to tortillas. She believes that eating this stuff is the key to maintaining her weight. And, since it’s so “healthy”, she can eat it morning, noon, and night. Meanwhile, I’m cooking with butter, eating bacon, grillng steaks, and losing weight. I wouldn’t eat “whole grain/low fat” anything, even if you put a gun to my head. I hate the stuff. It’s still waffles, cereal, and bread.</p>