So, yesterday I actually felt worse, so I decided to split the difference and put my calories at 2500 for a couple of days.  Maintenance, in theory, is still around 3000 calories, so I decided it was a decent compromise between the 2000 I had planned.  It was really pretty hard to do as I was slightly sick to my stomach.  I feel marginally better this morning, but we’ll see how the day progresses.  I spent the day yesterday playing with AutoCad and vegging on the couch.  Today I need to work on Math (test Tuesday) and do some research for my Communications project.

So I’m off to weigh myself and then have breakfast.  I will pop back on later with my update for the week.

Food for Saturday:

Total: 2506 (25% fat, 42% carbs, 26% protein, 3% alcohol)

Breakfast: scrambled eggs, zucchini bread, jam, clementines (470)
AM Snack: chocolate zucchini bread (156)
Lunch: turkey spaetzle soup, cracked wheat oatmeal bread, apple, ruffles chips (605)
PM Snack: fruit salad, hummus, flatbread (241)
Dinner: chili with cheese, multigrain tostidos, salad w/dressing (681)
Late Snack: protein shake, hot toddy (353)

Well, I just ran out of time today.  I think I just wasted too much of it this weekend.  By the time I got to the point where I should have done some kind of exercise I realized that I still had Math homework to do.  I did put on my shoes though and played with the chin-up bar for a while.  I think I’m comfortable enough with it that negative chins will go into my strength training workouts this week.

Oh, and I made bread this afternoon.  Not  my most successful attempt at higher protein bread.  I tried revamping the cracked wheat oat bread, but it really didn’t rise very well.  I’ll have to take another look at the honey oatmeal bread to see what changes I can make next time.  Oh well, at least it’s higher in protein, and it should probably toast well.

So the plan for this week, workout-wise:

Mon (rest day)
Tues (cardio, hopefully outside) in the afternoon, before my test
Wed (lifting) in the morning, before my evening test
Thurs (cardio) in the mrning, before school
Fri (rest day)
Sat (rest day)
Sun (lifting) - back to Sun/Tues/Thurs lifting

Food for the day:

Total: 2001 (28% fat, 33% carbs, 35% protein)

Breakfast: egg/egg white omelet with cheese, chocolate pecan bread, jam, clementines (509)
AM Snack: blueberry bran snack cake (103)
Lunch: whole wheat tortilla, bbq pork, cheese, potato chips, apple (540)
PM Snack: cracked wheat oatmeal bread, butter (123)
Dinner: sirloin steak, corn, butter, salad w/dressing (609)
Late Snack: fruit salad (127)

I started off with 3 mins cardio (walking/jogging on the spot), the prescribed warm-ups, and then did:

Power Training - Strength Training (weeks 4-6)
Workout A3 (5 of 10)

1: Clean High Pull - 85t/3, 85t/3, 85t/3, 90t/3
2: Clean-grip Deadlift - 140t/6, 140t/4, 140t/3, 145t/2
3: Single-leg Romanian Deadlift - 55t/6, 55t/4, 55t/3, 55t/2
4: Push-ups (incline) - 6, 4, 3, 2
5: Bent-over Dumbbell Alternating Row - 45e/6, 45e/4, 47.5e/3, 50e/2
6: Push Press - 80t/6, 80t/4, 80t/3, 85t/2
7: Chin-ups (assisted) - 6, 4, 3, 2 (see explanation)
8: Windshield Wipers - 8, 8, 8, 8
9: Four-point Plank - 40sec, 45sec, 45sec, 45sec

Total time: 70 mins
HR monitor: 425 cals, Max: 151(85%), Avg: 121 (68%)

Okay, not a bad workout… except for the chin-ups. I was using a band that provides approx. 150 pounds of resistance (or assistance I suppose). This still would mean I have to pull a little over 100-lbs of myself strait up. This was not as easy as you would think. Okay, I’m sure most of you figured it wouldn’t be easy. And yes, even I figured I wouldn’t be able to do it the first time.

I didn’t have much of a problem getting my right foot in (or out) the loop. The only issue I had was after the first set my leg felt ‘odd’, kind of wobbly. I’m guessing this has to do with the pressure on my straightened leg. I thought perhaps to change feet for the next set but for whatever reason I didn’t have enough balance to get the left foot through the loop (without me falling off the stool and cracking my head on the water heater that is). So I just did them all with my right foot in the loop.

I did get further up than I did without the band (duh) but I think next time I’m going to try with a knee through the band. I’ve seen a couple of videos done that way and it might be easier, or not.

Never much of a post on a Monday night.  I have to be up 8 hours from… now.  Once again I seem to have become the ‘go to’ person for math (and AutoCAD today, which is scary).  We were early in the lecture hall today for Math and I ended up working out a couple of problems for people (including one at the board so I could add a diagram).  So that’s about all I have to say.  Just adding the food.

Food for the day:

Total: 1997 (25% fat, 34% carbs, 37% protein)

Breakfast: protein shake with oatmeal and frozen berries (331)
AM Snack: none (0)
Lunch: whole wheat tortillas, sirloin steak, mustard, apple, chocolate zucchini cake (494)
PM Snack: carrots, hummus, soy nuts (312)
Dinner: szechwan stir-fry, salad w/dressing (585)
Late Snack: fruit salad, protein shake (276)

Our grades are up from last night’s test.  Yay for hated bubble tests (at least the marking is fast).

I’m medium happy about my mark (36/45 = 80%) although I know I was hoping for 85%+.  However, because of the way these results are posted I can judge my performance against the class(es).  Between the two groups:

120 people wrote
20 people did not (I don’t get this for a 1st test)

The highest mark was 40/45 = 89%  /  Only 7 people did better than I did.

So, now I feel marginally better about my grade.  

So, a couple of things floating around my head today…

1) I’m still not sure that I’m well. I feel better, but I’m still congested and have a touch of a nagging cough. It’s not chest congestion, but post-nasal drip collecting and irritating. It leaves me unsure of what my plans are for the coming week. I had planned to go back to usual on Sunday or Monday, but I think I want to see what two days of rest and (ick) homework brings. I also can’t get a feel for how my weight has been affected by the maintenance week as I really feel that only my Sat/Sun weights have been valid since going back to school.

2) People are idiots in general. Someone I know from the boards is working towards a new career in personal training. I don’t know enough about what classes she’s taking, but here’s a comment about her teacher.

The teacher said, “If you have a fat person come in and you overwork them their first workout they will go home and say forget that was too hard. I’m just gonna go back to sitting on my sofa eating bon bons like I always do”.

The woman taking the class is about 5′10″ and currently about 240 pounds. She was 510 pounds and I’m so impressed with how far she’s come. And here’s some idiot throwing out generalizations about fat people. She thought perhaps quietly filling the teacher in on her background might stop the ‘fat people’ generalizations… not!

3) Eating more this week has made me hungry. It may be the fact that these last few days I’ve let my protein levels go down a bit, but I’m 30-40 mins away from dinner, and I’m freakin’ hungry.

4) I think I finally see some changes when I look in the mirror. Not subtle changes, but finally kind of recognizing that I’ve lost weight. I know that sounds stupid really. However, I put away the too big pants and have been wearing the probably slightly too tight ‘loose fit leggings’ and tossed an oversized top on the other day… and actually thought it didn’t look too bad in the mirror. This is a definite improvement. 

Busy isn’t the issue this morning.  I’ve had to admit finally that I’m not well.  The head cold/throat tickle has migrated into my chest.  This is probably why I couldn’t motivate myself to multi-task yesterday.  So today I have to do the ‘must dos’ and make sure I can fight it off.  I’m probably a little gun shy as this is (three years ago) what started the decline that ended with me in the hospital.  Quick recap on that - chest cold in April eventually ended with a large amount of fluid in the pleural space around one lung by June.  Yes, it was probably 5 weeks later.  I was doing 5 days a weeks of high HR cardio, working a job I was on my feet all day, and eating under 1500 cals.  Oh yes, and I ignored the early symptoms and the fact that each day was becoming harder to get through.

So this time I’m listening to my body and will give the exercise a rest until I’m feeling well.  I’m wavering between going to rest/maintenance now (was planning it in two weeks) or just going to rest day calories.  For today I’ve adjusted to rest day calories and will do that for a few days.  If I’m on the road to recovery at that point I won’t worry about it.  If I’m not feeling any better in a few days then I’ll bump it up to rest/maintenance levels.

I don’t plan to watch it, but last night was the premiere of The Biggest Loser. I’m thinking that these people are single-handedly making pretty much everyone trying to lose weight feel like a failure. I mean, if they don’t step on that scale and lose 10+ pounds a week, just watch the tears flow. It’s a fiasco one week when someone loses only a pound.

Anyway, that’s not why I got on the kick about it today. I was flipping the time shift channels last night and caught a few minutes of it. It must have been during the BodyBugg plug part of the show. They were reminding people to download their information and enter their food. So the guy at the computer has burned about 3500 calories, and his food entries total 250 or something close. Jillian leans over his shoulder and points out that he only needs to burn a few hundred more calories to lose that first pound.

Umm, excuse me. He’s eaten 250 calories for the day and you’re not going to point out that this could be dangerous? No, lets go out and exercise more. There was little to no chance I was going to watch it this season anyway, however, that’s the moment I changed the channel.

I heard from someone else that’s decided to turn it off this season that the prize is now called the Jello $250,000 prize. I know some people find the show inspirational but I’m beginning to find it repulsive.

I don’t know why I didn’t post it yesterday, but here’s the post I started, and hit save instead of publish!

Kind of a lazy day after the walking this morning. I did do a little work outside, but definitely a low key day. Touched base with a friend tonight and I’ll go have dinner with her on Tuesday night. I realized how anti-social I’ve been this summer as I haven’t talked to her since before I got my college acceptance. She knew I had applied, but not what the result was.

From the HR monitor:

Food for the day:

Total: 2407 (26% fat, 36% carbs, 33% protein)

Breakfast: protein pancakes, jam, peach (345)
AM Snack: blueberry bran muffins (198)
Lunch: whole wheat tortillas, turkey meatloaf, salsa, cheese, nectarine (511)
PM Snack: cheese ball, flatbread, jack daniels & lemonade (276)
Dinner: sirloin steak, corn, butter, salad w/dressing (882)
Late Snack: protein shake, peach (195)

I warmed up with a 5-min walk outside. Then I did:

A: Barbell Romanian Deadlift/Bent-over Row - 120t/4, 120t/4, 120t/4, 125t/4
B1: Partial Single-leg Squat - 4, 4, 4, 4
B2: Wide-grip Lat Pulldown (Pullover) - 42e/4, 42e/4, 42e/4, 45e/4
C1: Back Extension (Good Mornings) - 55t/4, 55t/4, 55t/4, 55t/4
C2: YTWL - 15e/4, 15e/4, 15e/4, 17.5e/4
D1: Swiss Ball Crunch (Long-arm) - 4, 4, 4, 4
D2: Prone Jackknife - 4, 4, 4, 4
D3: Lateral Flexion (Hannah side 3) - 4, 4, 4, 4
E: Prone Cobra - 120sec, 120sec, 120sec, 120sec

And then I did the HIIT. Finished up with a total session of 100 mins.

HRM: 446 cals, Max: 171 (96%), Avg: 102 (57%)

I went outside for the D exercises, the Prone Cobras and the HIIT portion so that the silly cats could come with me and do their usual lurking around.

I’m so glad we’re past these exercises. During the rest periods of the prone cobras I’m going down to a resting rate (saw 57 at one point). I feel like I could nod off during that part of the routine. However, I know that if the earlier part was harder that I wouldn’t have anything left for the HIIT. I did back off on the weights for the good mornings though as my shoulder killed last week. It’s not the lifting the weight up, but getting it behind my head. Until I have a squat rack (and that may be a while) I’m not going to try lifting heavy over my head.

So, this is where I started in Stage 3 compared to where I ended in Stage 5.

First, the A set:

A: One-armed Dumbbell Snatch - from 20e to 45e
B1: Dumbbell Single-leg Romanian Deadlift - from 20e to 35e
B2: Barbell Bent-over Row - from 75t to 125t
C1: Dumbbell Single-arm Overhead Squat - from 10&5 to 45&22
C2: Dumbbell Incline Bench Press - from 20e to 40e
D1: Plank - 90sec (45-degree) to 120sec (45-degree)
D2: Reverse Wood Chop (on floor) - from 25t to 45t

The planks I started with a 45-degree (done badly) and then switch to 20/30 sec floor planks (also done badly) so at some point I decided to go back to 45-degree and work on form. So, little to no improvement is obvious, but I do feel the difference when doing them.

Then, the B set:

A: Barbell Romanian Deadlift/Bent-over Row - from 80t to 125t
B1: Partial Single-leg Squat - N/A
B2: Wide-grip Lat Pulldown (Pullover) - from 27.5e to 45e
C1: Back Extension (good mornings) - from 25t to 80t
C2: YTWL - from 5e to 17.5e

On the good mornings I didn’t start them until #2B in Stage 3, and I actually did 25/45/50 pounds on that first day. I also backed off on them today back down to 55lbs as I’m having troubles getting the bar over my head into the starting position. I decided not to risk really screwing up the shoulder just to push the weight up.

Well, that’s it for Stage 5. I’ll be moving on to Stage 7, probably Friday as I usually do for new Stages (that way I can be in pain all weekend and not worry about it).