Week of 05/20/2019

5/21/2019 Tuesday

11:20 – Pushups x 48; narrow hands, great form, total failure at bottom of 48. Everything just gave out and I collapsed.

I walked down 7 floors, did the pushups then walked back up 5 floors. I feel sketchy as hell right now. Checked my blood sugar and it’s fine. Maybe it was the preworkout?

Yeah, that must have been it. I just realized I took a whole scoop when I normally would take half, plus I haven’t taken it in a while so I’m sure it was the Taurine.

5/22/2019 Wednesday

8:30 – Neck Mobility Drills

10:20 – Vitamin B cocktail shot

Preworkout, but no protein powder. I dropped the container this morning and it broke. I did take 2 servings of Collagen Protein earlier though (around 9:15)

11:15 – Up/Down Dog x 5

  • Superman x 15 -> superman Isometric hold x 15 seconds
  • Yoga Pushups x 100; could have done more, but I am on display in the “Phone Room”, and my manager is interviewing replacement for the guy that got walked out last Monday (I did mention that didn’t I?)
  • Up/Down Dog x 10

11:50 – Seated Torso Twist x 75

5/23/2019 Thursday

  • Reverse lunges x 25/side, non alternating
  • Squats x 25; no rest between exercises

11:30 – back therapy

Have a Great Day!

Lubimûr

Trying To Gain Traction

I have so completely lost my focus, my discipline, and my motivation. I still have the desire, that never goes away, but I am seriously struggling to push myself to actually push hard, to challenge myself. I’m tired, I’m hungry, whatever, it is sooo hard to actually dig and push when I’m hungry. I feel like such a wuss. When I was at the last facility, pushing myself when I was hungry drove me to push harder. Now every muscle in my body feels weak and tired, and mentally, … just forget about it. I suppose I could try doing light workouts to gain some momentum and then build on that success. But at the same time, when I do that it doesn’t give me the drive to keep going the next day. I think it was the feeling of progress that kept driving me forward. Now I don’t even know what to do beyond squats and pushups, my creativity has left along with my motivation.

Not only that but I am sitting more and more too. The chairs at this new facility aren’t nearly as uncomfortable as the previous ones, so I don’t have the pain and discomfort from sitting for extended periods that I did too remind me – and encourage me – to get up and move more regularly. Because of this my back is taking a turn for the worse. I’m sure not being able to get my back worked on is part of the problem as well, but I think even if I were getting my back therapy, it would still be deteriorating from the extended sitting.

I think the point I’m making is the point I’m always making: Never stop. It gets harder and harder to start, and at this age you just lose your progress so quickly. Because you do lose it so quickly, you are much more susceptible to injury when you start back up.

5/14/2019 Tuesday

Just tried pushing myself a little harder, and I did, but man my left elbow didn’t like it. I didn’t even do regular pushups. I have no choice but to start slow, it’s like starting over again. Starting at the very beginning. This sucks!

12:35 – Torso Twists, standing & on all fours;

  • Superman x 35 seconds;
  • Knee Pushups x 15; lousy form, elbow really bothering me
  • Chair Dips x 50; very short ROM, just figured out how to raise the arm height tho!

I think my approach is going to be to focus on building up the smaller muscles and strengthening the joints before pushing with the bigger muscles.

12:45 – Lunch – Hot Link and broccoli/carrots/onions

5/16/2019 Thursday

I did do a tiny bit of stuff yesterday, mobility drills mostly, did 6 stories on the stairs once, did a couple of sets of Chair dips. It’s even hard to motivate myself to document the training I am doing. I don’t know if it’s because I’m just not feeling it or because I am doing so little that it feels like what’s the point? I’m pretty sure that some if has to do with my coworkers being so close and the environment being so open, that I don’t want them to hear me tapping away at the keyboard. I really need to keep in mind however that it is important to do it, because my results aren’t from doing anything spectacular, merely doing something with obsessive consistency – even if it is just a tiny something.

So I have my Preworkout in hand, and I am gearing up to take an actual 15 minute break and move.

Yesterday one of the guys sent out the text that it is time to start thinking about our fall backpacking trip and to get something on the books. I think I am going to do some more targeted training to get this done. Not sure exactly what just yet, but rest assured I’ll come up with something. I’m thinking lunges, stairs, jumping… I don’t have the stamina of the other guys, and I’m not that strong, I’m a sprinter. I have to figure out how to work that to my advantage. Maybe I need to adjust my approach on the trail as well. Rather than trying to keep pace, fall behind and catch up. Maybe take the lead and then slow down or stop and rest. IDK, I’ll think on it.

So I think my next two research topics are going to be training for backpack hiking and how to handle distances as a sprinter type athlete.

11:00 – Stairs, down 7 Floors

  • Pushups x 40; Narrow Hands, Excellent form, made it to 30 nonstop before having to catch my breath, had to push on 30 – 40; probably would have failed at 45l;
  • Ramp in Parking garage; walked up and down the ramp between levels many times, ran up a couple of times, ran down a couple of times, power walked up most of the times, walked up and down backwards once’
  • Pushups x 40; Wide grip, Excellent form, may have failed before 45 if I could breathe enough to keep going,
  • Stairs, up 5 Floors

These were all done back to back with no rest, and I didn’t listen to any pump me up music or motivational before starting!

11:40 – Lunch: Piece of beef jerky, 2 cherries, a hunk of smoked pork shoulder. I didn’t come prepared to be so motivated today. I was even thinking about fasting this morning before work.

I am going to start being more diligent about logging my food intake. This has been a big part of my journey. The little 2 minute and 15 minute movements aren’t the prime reason I am in good shape, my food choices are.

12:50 – walk outside (90° outside, ozone alert day, I think the hole in the ozone layer is directly above us), about 2000 steps

5/17/2019 Friday

Lat night for dinner I had ham and shredded purple cabbage cooked in tallow with onions, garlic, mushrooms and black pepper; and 2 bourbon and cokes

12:15 – Yoga Pushups x 100; great form, wide hands, a little lower down my body than normal, last 10 were slow, feel super pumped

  • Chair Dips x 10; Arm rests at highest position, triceps are wasted.

Have a Great Day!

Lubimûr

Moved To A New Facility

Week of 4/29/2019

This one is supposed to be a minimum security facility once you make it past the 90 probation period. This place is an open office space design, so there is far less privacy. I sit at what is basically a long table in the middle of a large, open space with 7 other people, 4 per side. Thankfully before I got here they put frosted glass between each of the stations. You can still see the person sitting directly in front of you from the nose up, and the people next to you are in full view. The president of the company sits behind me diagonally to the left in a glass office.

This means that the cubicle workouts I was doing are no longer an option. That’s a drag, but it does force me to refocus on the original intent when I came up with the cubicle prison workout: to figure out a way to stay active and improve fitness levels despite being shackled to the grind. There are “phone rooms” where we can go for privacy when we need to make a phone call, so I have been going in there to do quick sets, but nothing challenging or extreme. I also still do my mobility drills seated at my desk. I’m still learning the job, and learning the routine and personalities, so I’m not comfortable enough to really start pushing myself workout-wise yet, plus I’ve allowed myself to slack off so I am having trouble pushing myself mentally. Since it is an open space it’s risky watching any motivating workout videos.

This seems to be a much more laid back environment, definitely more dynamic and upbeat. This isn’t a publicly traded company (although it is owned by a Canadian company that is publicly traded), and they seem to be more employee friendly. The free coffee is pretty decent too. There are far fewer obese people, and fewer merely overweight people. And the people that are overweight aren’t nearly as overweight as they were at the last place.

4/29/2019 Monday

This is my 4th week on the job. Today is the first day I feel like I am able to start refocusing on mobility. I started doing some mobility drills sporadically last week, so far today I am on track. I have done shoulder and neck mobility, some scapular dips, and I am drinking my pre-workout now. Last week I found some unoccupied offices on the second floor and started gong there on my lunch break to do some serious stretching. I did it Wednesday through Friday, and I plan to continue it today. I am going to have to figure out how to get better exercise, but for now I will keep doing the short cubicle prison workouts in the phone rooms. Maybe I can get in the habit of stretching at home so I can workout on my lunch breaks before eating.

12:00 – Pre-workout Drink

12:35 – Pushups x 40; excellent form, narrow hands, damn near failure. Maybe had 2 more in me. Seriously sucking wind.

I don’t recall if I mentioned this or not, but last weekend (10 days ago) I jacked up my shoulder(?) somehow. I woke up with a pain that was the same type of pain I had when I tore my rotator cuff. This pain was either in the tendon that connects my right pec to my humerus, or the tendon that connects my bicep to the humerus, or something in the crease between my front and medial delt. That is the main reason I have done almost nothing with my upper body this past week. But I actually haven’t done hardly anything for basically 3 weeks, and look how much it has affected my progress. I’m sure I couldn’t have done 45 pushups today.

12:55 – I’m about to do some more pushups, probably not narrow though, and I am noticing that I really feel a pump in my biceps. Weird.

  • Pushups x 31; wide grip, not fail but challenging, I had to stop for 2 reasons: 1 I just couldn’t catch my breath, I started to feel a tiny bit light headed; 2 I couldn’t focus hard enough to dig deeper.

I say it’s lunch time.

4/30/2019 Tuesday

10:30 – Isometric Chair x 40 seconds; basically hold the bottom squat position just past 90°.

  • Third world squat about 2 minutes

11:30 – Squats x 40; Medium stance, not failure, definitely winded me.

No preworkout today.

12:00 – Hamstring stretching, 1 leg at a time. About 5 minutes per leg.

About 3:00 my back/hip area just started screaming in pain from sitting. I went outside and took about a 15 minute walk, and helped immensely.

5/02/2019 Thursday

Didn’t do much of anything yesterday, I was dead tired. I took a nap in my car at lunch. On the drive home I drove with my head pressed firmly into the headrest with my back barely touching the seat.

10:40 – Preworkout; NOX, BCAA, bHIP Red, whey protein, ACV

10:50 – Superman x 15

  • Yoga Pushups x 75; wide hands
  • Hurdlers lunge x 15/side; I decided that there are 2 ways to do this. The way I was doing it at my last prison facility I will henceforth call a hurdler’s deadlift. This entails bending forward at the waste over my front leg, whereas the hurdler’s lunge doesn’t. I will remain upright.
  • Sphynx Triceps Pushups x 20; narrow hands, elbows at 90° (directly below shoulders) so not a big ROM
  • Chair Dips x 20; feet on floor, very short ROM

The entire “circuit” only took 5 minutes, and the last minute of it was at my desk so only 4 minutes away from my desk.

11:05 – Neck Mobility Drills; another 4 minutes.

  • Chair Dips x 25, <1 minute

Have a Great Day!

Lubimûr

Have a Great Day!

Lubimûr

Prison Cubicle Workouts Week of 3/21/2019

3/20/2019 Wednesday

Did nothing really to speak of the first two days of this week. I had a terrible crick in my neck Monday, and was still feeling it some yesterday. I wanted to make sure that I didn’t have any issues in my shoulder girdle after last week’s 1 RM attempt.

I have been taking B:hIP Red since last Thursday not including the weekend. I think it’s decent. It’s hard to tell if supplements are actually doing any good or not since they don’t really make you feel any different unless they are a workout specific type supplement like Taurine or Creatine. I also got some more BulletProof Collagen Protein which I’ve been adding to my coffee this week.

10:15 – NOS Blast Preworkout

10:20 – Pushups x 34; hands low on body right at bottom of rib cage; total fail on 34, made it about ½ way up. I was really pushing too. I have a sports message therapy appointment at 11:30.

10:35 – Just tried to do a planche, not even a planche pushup, …just embarrassing.

– Flat Foot (Paleo?) Squat x 5 minutes; yeah baby, 5 minutes. I think I had really good form too. Still difficult to straighten back out when I stand up, but being in the pose felt good.

3/21/2019 Thursday

11:50 – Preworkout

11:55 – Air squats x 50, 10, 20, 20, 20, 1min rest in between; great form, butt to heel, shoulder width, good glute focus

Have a Great Day!

Lubimûr

Prison Cubicle Training again

I know I’ve said this before, but it isn’t just the muscles that weaken from an extended (2 week) layoff. The motivation and drive fall off a cliff. Even though I have the desire to do something, the thought of digging down deep makes want to just “wait until I have more mental energy”. That is folly, it is never coming back. It will show up after I re-establish the habit of doing it. I don’t just mean doing the exercises and training either, I mean pushing farther than I think I am capable of. Uggggh. It’s early, it’s cold, it’s very cloudy which is depressing and completely uninspiring. In fact it’s not just uninspiring but it is anti-inspiring. I love me some Texas for many reasons, but the weather is not one of them. Winter here is depressing, it’s like living in London or Seattle. I am a child of light, I need the sun. Being overcast for weeks at a time with spots of momentary sunshine here and there is getting harder and harder for me to deal with.

2/19/2019 Tuesday

Yesterday I managed to force myself to do pushups to failure. I was able to grind out a set of 52, total failure on the concentric phase of #53. That was good, I wasn’t sure I could do more than 50 early on in the set. I took a video of myself doing them on my phone, and was surprised at how poor my form appears. I am conscious of using good form, but apparently my proprioception is off. That’s not a big deal though, it is an easy fix: raise my hips higher and they will be in line with my shoulders and ankles, and don’t look directly down at the floor, tilt my chin a bit more forward. Think kissing the floor rather than touching my nose to it.

8:40 – Windshield Wipers x 8; bent knees, my right side (problem area) is just frozen solid, so I just stayed in the bottom position to the left and focused on relaxing into the stretch. It feels a little better, but I could barely get back up off of the floor. The core muscles did not want to work with me.

– Split Squats x 10/side. My right glute feels significantly weaker, even though I think it is actually the stronger side. That is the side I leap off of when jumping over things. On this exercise (and all glute/leg exercises going forward) I focused on driving my foot into the floor and attempting to externally (laterally) rotate it. Like I was screwing something into the floor with my foot.

I wonder if hydration is part of my issue right now? I think I’ll make sure that isn’t the case, I’m going to chug back about 16 ounces of water right now.

9:45 – NOS + Protein powder + ACV

– Handstand Press x 7! New personal best! Total failure after 7.

– Yoga Pushups x 90; failure, good pump. This is my follow up from yesterday.

10:50 – Handstand x 7 seconds; this was an attempt to just do a handstand without using the wall. I did a few 1 and 2 second attempts in which I lost my balance, then I got longer one of about 7 seconds or so.

– Reverse Lunge, non-alternating x 25/side; focused on “screwing my feet into the floor” again, this really does move the focus to the glutes. I am sucking wind too, definitely out of shape after my recent downtime.

– Triceps Flex x 30 seconds; dug as deep as I could

3:30 – BCAA + NOS + ACV

– Handstand Press x 5

– Box Step ups x 5 per side; woohoo! Anything to keep moving dontcha know

Have a Great Day!

Lubimûr