226.1 – Down 7.5. Glute soreness

So back to the best, and now ready to break through! I was good yesterday with the diet. Basically said ‘this is what I am going to eat today’. Today will be a repeat of that. It’s more like a 400 calorie meal every 3-4 hours. A current sample of a day:

• 7:00 AM – Eggs, Feta, Coffee with Kitu Creamer – 335 calories
• 10:30-11:00 AM – Serving of chili with a little peanut butter – 425 calories
• 2:00 PM – Protein shake 330 calories – 1.5 servings of Optimum Nutrition and berry medley with Fairlife or Almond milk
• 5:00-6:00 PM – Green ground chicken curry – 500 calories (can be subbed for chicken and veggies, or other things)
• 7:30 PM – Oikos with berries and some granola – 400 calories

Works out to 2000 calories and 190 grams of protein. Lots of veggies with chili and curry dishes. Zucchini, carrots, onions, peppers, mushrooms, celery, tomatoes. Those meals are equal veggie and meat. The protein with the Oikos, or protein shake are filled with either fresh or frozen berries. Carbs yesterday were 125 calories. I actually probably made this up with a few dates that I snacked on. Sometimes I add in a banana pre-workout. That’s basically the diet. Have options of swapping the chili for the green curry at any point. Sometimes I can swap a salad for either as well , or just chicken breast (even fried). I also swap a Tuna salad in there every few days.

At some point I would like to make an air fryer salmon and see if I can get that right. Once a week. Cheat once a week with ice cream or cookies and what not. This diet got me down to 203 before. Removing 90% of the carbs got me down to 196.

I attempted to workout yesterday, but my upper body was kind of sore, so I pulled back and will do it today. Swapping out the circuits, it will take a little longer this go around, figuring out how to do the circuits.

My glutes are sore after yesterday’s work with the PT. This is a good sign. Perhaps my glutes are not nearly as involved in certain movements as I think they are.

PT again

I want to write a quick post covering some exercises while it’s still fresh. Just bullets right now

• Hip Flexor stretch with rear foot externally rotated. Turn left hip towards right, make sure foot doesn’t cave in. Different stretch than what you’ve been doing.
• Hip side raise , move the leg further back to get more glute involvement. Move back , move slow (everything move slow). So a change here
• Thoracic rotation. Rotate through with golf club behind you, keeping your butt on the wall.
• There were a couple thoracic on the floor movements, that you will have trouble repeating, but will hopefully get a video of.
• Hip bridge/glute raise. Push knees forward, exaggerate this. Raise one leg on a yoga block, and do it one at time. Feel it in the glutes and hamstrings more.
• Working deadlift with butt against the wall, and taking a breath at the bottom, and then getting deeper. You can actually start adding this to one of your lift days and actually work your hips without pain.
• Single leg deadlift type movement. Length, slow and steady. You’ll need to hold on to something until you are able to grease this some.

So changing things up a bit:

Circuit 1 – Birddogs, Pullups, Lateral Hip Raise (more back), Incline Situp

Circuit 2 – Glute Bridge w/block, Pushups, Single Leg thing, Back Extension

Circuit 3 – Chins, Thoracic golf rotations, Dips (cut it a couple short), Deadlift wall movement.

I can appear to weight deadlifts by using the wall now, and get a little bit more depth!

227.7 – Slightly up over the weekend

I am up a little over the long weekend, but now to tighten things up over the next few days and see if we can get things down a bit more. You are down ~6 lbs from the high and this is good. It’s going to be a little tough as I have a couple days on site this coming week. The 225 goal would really need to be closer to end of this week. 222 for end of school year. 220 last year was a good weight for me. I think if I can get there without running that would be a pretty big success.

HRV and RHR have been improving. HRV last night was 27ms which is on the ‘good end’. 51 bpm resting is good too. It’s not running level, that would be low to mid-30s, and below 50 bpm for resting on the good end. It’s better though. A bit of cardio and some weight loss it should be back where I need to be.

Today I visit my PT to get a look at the hip. Lets see if he can give me an idea on what to do moving forward. May just have some swap out of some exercises for any new rehab stuff after today. Will see what happens.

I tried the rower. It was a no go yesterday. Press was fine. Elbow is fine once warm. I am through the first 6 weeks of CCCD. I need to change the name of this as I have really made it my own. Whatever it is, it’s working for me now. It will be interesting to see how it does extending in to an anchor. I will take a couple extra days of rest this week… probably start lift again on Saturday with a full 2-3 of just walking.

The only thing I’d like to add is perhaps a bit of cardio after the weight session (thinking like a 20-30 incline walk or light row). The mobility stuff is helping, but hard to tell. Just gotta keep going with it.

No weigh in – big meal

I am not bothering weighing in today. I know I’m up. Yesterday was the big meal of salmon and potatoes. I would typically do this every couple of weeks as a treat, and know you’ve gone over. Today and the rest of the week will be really clean. I have meals prepped, and options if I don’t feel like those meals. Pretty awesome to have 6 lbs of cooked meat + probably another 6 lbs of veggies ready to eat at any moment. Makes things super easy. I am experimenting with a new dish of ground chicken and green curry. It’s good, but not great. Not enough spice. Will eventually figure that out like the chili. Hard to say whether it’s actually good for me with the saturated fat from even the light coconut milk. Probably could do it a little healthier. Something is definitely working though right now.

I hit a few golf balls yesterday, and then maybe did too much on the TENS, and my hip is a mess this morning. It just feels off, not necessarily that bad. My elbow is also a bit of a mess. It’s fine once warmed up, but still nagging and annoying. Tens machine on that too seems to help. Wrapped during workout helps some with the shoulder sleeves. I want zero pain.

I did 10 pullups the other day. But the other sets suffered a bit (I think 7,8), and pushups, were 25, 22, 20 (I think). I’ll double check , but small performance improvements which I’ll take at 46. 10 at this weight is really really good. An extra rep here or there, slight improvements over time. Whatever I have been doing has been working well. Looking at some prior number from last year when I tested, I pulled out 12 reps July of last year at 220.8 lbs, so I am back in line close to that. Who knows how clean those were, the 10 reps were really clean.

I may try a few on the rower today after I’m thoroughly warmed up. See if that’s terrible or doable. Thinking of adding cardio after weights some days. The weight workouts are so short, I can probably handle 20 on the rower if the hip is not irritated.

Next week, I should start getting an idea on where bench and press are at. Next week will be a 185+ set. I bet I get that to 10-12 reps. Goal for this round would be to do 210 x 10 at the end of the block. That’s an estimated 1rm of 280, which is .5 better PB estimated. That’s probably pretty unlikely, because I haven’t been lifting heavy at all. Everything has been easy set after easy set. So we will see. 210 at 7 or 8 reps is probably more like it.

228.3 – Down 5, up 1.7

So the inevitable mean reversion happened. As long as the mean is dropping your in good shape. Instead of continuing to capitalize on your success you got lazy with the diet.

I got plenty of protein yesterday but went several (maybe 300) calories over your goal. Tons of grabbing a little bit of this and that added up and here you went. The 4 main meals were okay, but got too much extra.

The Tens machine is working well, and able to target specific areas. It’s still taking trial and error to figure out proper placement, but there is this weird spot that I found yesterday that really got some work. Will do another couple sessions today, starting this morning. It is

226.9, up .8, down 6.7 total

Kind of expected. I didn’t keep the diet as lean as I would like, and I didn’t track as well as I usually do. This is what often happens after a couple weeks of dieting, a little bit of this and that starts sneaking in and effecting things. It’s small enough at first that I ignore it, but in the long run I know it causes issues.

Got the tens machine, and wow. It’s really strong compared to what I had before. I think I will go through pads a bit quicker, then didn’t feel as solid as the old unit, but those are cheap 10 bucks for a 20 pack. I still haven’t figured out the exact right placement, but I noticed a marked improvement this morning in the hip after one 20 minute session yesterday. Could be placebo, or that I’m just continuing to do all the right recovery things, but something felt good about really being able to target the hip with the tens unit. I am still getting some of the weirdness in the my leg that I’ve had in the past, a little lower down on the quad with a bit of pins and needles. I think it’s some very mild sciatica, that seems to be getting better in the current routine. I’ll probably do 2 tens sessions today, but I’ll do some test and retest after wards .

I end up just testing my hip a lot but thrusting the right hip forward, which will usually bring on some very mild pain. No pain this morning with that, just a small bit of tightness. There is hope!!!

Today is either a rest day, a bench and mobility day, or just a mobility day. I am leaning towards doing a just mobility thing. There is a 60 minute that could be good for me. Feeling a bit of general soreness this morning through my upper body. However, HRV is trending well. Game time decision mid-afternoon (which probably means bench press)

226.1 – Down 7.5 lbs.

There’s hope after a couple days streak of weight loss. The trend is down, and I’m optimistic. 7.5 lb is no fluke. Gotta keep it up, go a full 4 weeks of this, with the last 3-4 days really cutting the carbs.

Revising the short term goals (again). I think I can make 225 by the end of the week, Sunday. And I think 220 as a super stretch goal by 4 weeks is doable. Yes this is only 10 days in, but I believe in my willpower again. No fuckups until you really feel good about yourself, health, weight and appearance again.

I expect that I will be a slight bit higher tomorrow, as this one was a bit of a radical couple of days losing 3.6 lbs over those two. It’s never straight down, but a general trend until you plateau, and then break through the plateau. That’s how it goes for me.

Part of me really has it my head to take this somewhere new in leanness. See if you can get absurdly lean and stay there for a long time. For that, we are 20 lbs and a sh*t load of work away. 200 lbs, and 20 pullups. At 9 pullups now, and taking off 20 lbs, could see it with a ton of work.

Yesterday’s workout felt blah. I think the weight loss kicked was working, and I haven’t figured out yet how to turn my body over to burning my own fat just leaving me flat. Or more likely… it was just a low energy workout and I was a bit dehydrated.

Today is just a walk and mobility day. Lots of mobility. I’d like to total up the walking to 1:15 today if I can find the time.

The TENS machine arrives today… almost 5 days ahead of schedule. Can’t wait to see if I can get some change in this leg with an additional tool.

227.8 – Down again – Total 5.8 lbs

Back down again. Prepare yourself for a higher number tomorrow, but down is down. Almost back to that 6 lb loss. Lets keep this going. Apparently, I couldn’t do math yesterday morning, and made my total down 2.9 lbs instead of 3.9. Psychologically that mistake seemed to extra motivate me yesterday after being a little down on myself.

That short term goal of 225 is in range. 220 by June 14th is going to be too hard a push, unless weight miraculously starts shedding off. 3 weeks to go on that one, and would have to lose 2.6 per week. That’s on the high side. I am motivated though… Part of me wants to take this ‘back to 6 pack’. Will need the hip to get better for that one though….

Today is circuit day. I keep modifying slightly, and it now looks like this one:

Circuit 1 – 3 Rounds

• Birddogs
• Side band hip walk – 20 reps
• Pullups
• Incline Sit-ups ~10-15 reps

Circuit 2 – 3 Rounds

• Single leg step downs
• Pushups – 20-25 reps
• Calf Raise – 15 reps
• Back Extension – 15 reps

Circuit 3 – 2 to 3 rounds

• Lateral Hip Raise
• Chins
• Rollouts
• Band pull aparts

Occasionally. I will throw in hip thrusts on previous circuit, and if the energy level is high I might throw in some sets of

• Dips
• Walking hip raises or band raises
• Hangs

Usually it’s 45 minutes of moving if you get through all 9 rounds non-interrupted. Rest time is typically between 30-60 seconds, 36 sets. So about 10 minutes of actual work time, but your moving most all the time. Rest is pretty active.

Pain in the elbow seems to be pretty good. Not eating crap seems to help. Hip pain is pretty light this morning. Look forward to getting the tens unit . Amazon says next week, usps says Thursday, hoping for the later.

229.7 – up 2.1 lbs, down 3.9 total

An uptick way higher that I would have anticipated. Perhaps I did not measure my meals well enough. Maybe it was too much olive oil, maybe some water weight got sucked back in. At the end of the day, the straight down trend was broken.

The good news… I ate clean. I walked over an hour yesterday.

Perhaps too much oil on the air fryer. Perhaps too large a portion of my chicken curry. Not enough detail in weighing. Just another up and down fluke. I need ‘real’ cardio to keep the caloric deficit going.

Going to try a TEMs machine for the leg. It’s 40 bucks and figure worth it. A little disappointed I have to wait a week with shipping delays.

The mobility work seems to be going well. I feel a little bit better with all that stuff. I feel like small progress in ‘lack of pain’ and further movement in certain areas. Less stiffness, and inflammation. I definitely focus on the hips, but the shoulders are also improving. I think it’s a combo of the stretching and the band pull apart my shoulders have been better than they have been in years. No upper back pain at all! Lower back pain is also really good. I haven’t had any of the issues that have plagued me and been ignored for as long as I can remember. The elbow seems to be getting better as well, just staying off the cell phone seems to help with that. Gotta keep it all going.

Today is press and mobility day. Press tops out at 120×5. Reps are at 95. This seems like I finally might start challenging myself over the next 2 weeks after a slow build up. Really looking forward to some push sets in the anchor.

The leg work today I’m gonna be super careful on. Last time I attempted even light kettlebell deadlifts I had some pain. Any hint of pain, I’ll back way off. So it may be a really quick one today.

228.1 – down 4.5

A slight .5 lb uptick today. You always hate when moves any the wrong direction, but it’s normal. Small increments. It happens in fits.

Typically what you’ve seen in the past is a long period of losing about a 1-2lbs a week once you get over the first few lbs. I am hoping that part doesn’t start until I hit at least 225. As you get closer to target it tends to be closer to 1lb unless you do a drastic no carb thing.

I am trying some new recipes. Yesterday I did a ground chicken hash with veggies and some olive oil on the wok. I added some red curry sauce, and made two portions. This was around a 500 calories meal with 44g protein. Pretty darn good.

Today I started with the air fryer, and did boneless skinless chicken thighs with olive oil and veggies in olive oil. I am concerned the drenching of olive oil may have overdid it some and I am not counting enough calories there.