JohnnyIrish's Diet/Workout Log

[JohnnyIrish]

I normally do this on Friday but my brother was around so we hung out.

Today:

Barbell Bench press: 3x5 PR
bar x 10
75 x 6
105 x 1
140 x 6
140 x 5
140 x 5

/\ Gained a rep.. but I was mostly worried about/concentrating on form. It was MUCH more controlled this time.

Incline Dumbbell bench press: 4 x 8 PR
90 x 9
90 x 9
90 x 9
90 x 9

/\ Added 4 reps.

Dumbbell shoulder press: 3 x 8 PR
60 x 8
60 x 8
60 x 8

/\ Raised the weight, felt good.

Skill crushers: 3 x 10 PR
60 x 8
60 x 7
60 x 6

/\ Tough! I upped the weight.. probably could have waited until next time to do so. No biggie though.. Next time I should get close to 10 reps each.

Decline weighted situps 3x10: PR
50 x 10
50 x 9
50 x 9

/\ I held a barbell to my chest for the weight. This is always tough.

Stretches:
supermans: 1x10 reps, each rep held for 3 seconds
squat stretches: 2 reps, each held for 25 seconds at the bottom
Hamstring stretches (good morning stretches): 3 reps each held for 30 seconds

 

[Quagmire911]

Remember and be explosive on the positive, even whilst doing it under control.

The anabolic diet: I think Mehdi (stronglifts) mentions that it is harder to gain muscle on, however it does work for some. He says in one of his posts that calories have to be higher than nomral. Fat calories are easy to get in though- double cream for the win. If you are tolerable of carbs a TCD (timed carb diet) will work faster.

Fat loss whilst gaining muscle is very possible, and is what you have been doing. There is a thread in the vault by WBA on it.

Keep it up.

 

[I-tallionStallion]

Yeah i've been doing the WBA way of losing fat and gaining muscle. It takes a lot of dedication, I mean who wants to wake up everyday to walk for 45 minutes?

Good workout. So when you do situps you hold a bar? how does that work for you? Cause I'm stuck on 60 lb dumbbells cause thats all my gym has.

 

[JohnnyIrish]

Quagmire:
Thanks mate. I'll work on explosiveness next bench day. This time however I made progress on form as last time I had bench day it sucked as the bar was all over the place.

As for fat loss and gaining muscle yeah your right. I was doing that all along. Now I'm making a slight adjustment to my diet.. which honestly isn't that much of a change as I wasn't taking in many carbs anyway. I'll give this diet a fair shake and see how I perform on it.

At the moment I'm feeling lethargic/out of it.. but thats to be expected as I haven't taken in more then 30-50g carbs each day for the past 3-4 days (yep I upped fats).

So the main cavat in terms of gaining with the anabolic diet is being able to get past the 'I'm full' feeling that eating fat provides so you can down more calories. Time will tell but I think I'll be ok in that regard.. as it is now even 45min after I eat I feel I could eat again.. its crazy (and annoying).

Itallionstallion:
Yeah I hear ya.. I'll be honest I have 3 cardio days/week and 3 lifting days. I can't do more cardio then that because well.. hell if I'm getting up that early. I'm tired enough as it is. lol

My gym is an LA fitness so they have tons of machines and free weights. I think the dumbbells go up to 150lbs.. which is way more then I'll EVER need.

I just grab a 50lb dumbbell and hold it to my chest (the weights at my gym are coated with rubber so I can get a decent grip and hold them to my chest fairly easy). Each hand holds one of the plates perpendicular to one of my pecs. This seems to have worked the best so far.

As for your dilemma, Hmm.. haven't tried this but how awkward is it if you hold say a 35lb dumbbell in each hand and held to your chest? Maybe you could cross your arms with them (might be easier)?

 

[I-tallionStallion]

Thanks Johnny i'll try it. Not bad thinking. Once i tried a couple of 25 lb plates and i could do it but it was extremely awkward. I don't recommend that.

 

[JohnnyIrish]

As I'm at work at the moment and feeling exhausted (still in the grips of the conversion so my metabolism/energy levels are screwed and likely will be fore the better part of this week) I'm thinking I'm going to make this week a deload week. When originally I saw that a deload was 'recomended' for the first week in the AD book itself.. I thought I could push through it but I'm barely staying awake at work. lol

What would you recomend for a deload with my current exercise?

I'm thinking perhaps similar to what I did prior on efforts 'where to start'. That is do one of the big three each on M,W and F of this week doing 1 set of 5reps doing as much weight as I possibly can.

That sound about right?

 

[JohnnyIrish]

Alright.. so it turns out I haven't hit the gym this week. Thats because my energy level has been in the crapper for most of the week (still isn't great.. but its better then earlier in the week.) Its also my birthday week so I'm being a bit more lenient with myself (more like giving myself permission to not be pist at myself for missing the gym lol).

So far its been about 7 days strict with the carbs on this diet and 2 days prior to that I was still taking in low carbs but more then the 30g the AD allows. My fats and protein levels look on par too.

The main issue I've ran into with this diet are all the damn hidden carbs lol. Even my meals I premade for the previous week contained small amounts of trace carbs (carrots, greenbeans, onions, soysauce.. etc). Turns out counting those miniscule amounts will drive me nuts.. so my recent batch of beef cooking yesterday I dropped all the carbs and tweaked the beef recipe.

Thought I'd share one of my recipies that exparimenting has paid off with..

1) Take .5lbs beef and mix in an egg, thyme, garlic (I love garlic so i put in a lot), parsley, sea salt.
2) Once its mushy and thourghly mixed break it into 4 equal size chunks.
3) Mush the chunks flat.. real flat. So they are bigger then your hand.
4) Take 2 slices of american cheese or a few chunks of chedar cheese (I've tried both.. yumm!) and put them in the middle of each othe flat beef paddies.
5) Try to roll up the american chese into a tube.. if it breaks apart its ok.. now roll the meat around the cheese and close it up so the cheese is in the center of the meat.
6) roll the meat around to make it even.
7) Put all 4 of them (assumign you have a big pan..) in the pan. I cooked them until all the sides were browned.

(the above makes 4 beef meals, lessen the ingredents accordingly if you wanted to just make say.. 1 meal)


Oh and of note.. I went out with friends this week for my bday and well I found vodka has no carbs!

 

[Quagmire911]

Have you done a carb up?

Happy birthday.

 

[I-tallionStallion]

Nice recipe...I'll second the happy birthday. Mine was on April 25 and i only allowed that day as a break haha my mom was so mad i wasn't eating that much cake.

Keep working hard dood.

 

[JohnnyIrish]

Have you done a carb up?

Happy birthday.

Thanks quagmire. Not yet, tomorrow starts the 2 day carb up. Its been awhile since I've done significant carb eating so I did some digging and I plan the majority of my diet to contain lots of whole grain pastas, breads and fruits and veggies. Man its been a long time since I've had a big pasta dish.

Nice recipe...I'll second the happy birthday. Mine was on April 25 and i only allowed that day as a break haha my mom was so mad i wasn't eating that much cake.

Keep working hard dood.

Thanks buddy. Hey in that case happy belated B-day to you!
My carb up coincides with the day I'm celebrating with my family so.. cake? yep.. It can be eaten guilt free!

Btw- I'll be hitting the gym Monday come hell or high water.. Hopefully the carb up will 'recharge' my battery so to speak.

 

[EFFORT]

Really hit the 2 day carb up hard, you don't have to be super clean with the eating. The 2 carb up days are really important for gains, make sure to get as many calories as you possibly can.

 

[JohnnyIrish]

Really hit the 2 day carb up hard, you don't have to be super clean with the eating. The 2 carb up days are really important for gains, make sure to get as many calories as you possibly can.

Normally I don't eat until I feel full but after your advice.. well I did today.

I ate (not in any particular order):
2 pieces toast
apple
half pound of linguine with fettucine alfredo
5 stack of pinapple coconut pancakes + syrup
2 pieces bacon
2 pieces sausage
some special Chinese bread
2 beef shiska-bobs in peanut butter sauce
big fried rice dish with shrimp, ginger, onions, mushrooms

I felt like I ate like a pig today. God it was tasty! If this is how this diet works and it really does help me loose fat + increase muscle mass I think I'll be in heaven. At the moment I feel kinda fat.. or rather bloated but from what I read thats normal.

PS- I got to say. Many people talk about feeling almost comatose after eating their carb meals on the weekend (or the first weekend) with this diet. For me that didn't happen at all.. at most I felt only slightly sleepy about an hour after I ate my big pancake meal at lunch. Is that weird?

 

[JohnnyIrish]

Sunday and Monday (early morn Monday) my food intake was less then optimal. I should have eaten a lot more Sunday and Monday morn I should have eaten more. However Monday I compensated by eating more often the rest of the day. I have a bad habit of loosing track of time and not caring about much else when women come over my place and get nekid.

Anywho all in all I thought my workout today would have sucked more.. but looking at the numbers it wasn't too bad. I definitely don't feel as energized as I should but I definitely have more energy then last week. I just have to be patient. From what I read, it may take 3-4 weeks before my body fully adjusts to this diet and energy levels peak.

Today:

Squat (BOX) 2x5:
bar x 10
85 x 6
115 x 6
165 x 1
195 x 5
195 x 5

/\ I lowered 1 black raiser (lowers the box, now only 4 high). The whole thing was pretty darn hard.

Pullthroughs 3 x 10: PR
57.5 x 11
57.5 x 11
57.5 x 12

/\ Actually made some gains here. Didn't see that coming.

Chest supported Row 4 x 6:
bar x 8
25 x 4
50x 1
75 x 6
75 x 6
75 x 6
75 x 5

/\ Hard.. but I didn't do as badly as I thought.

Hammer curls 3 x 8
30 x 8
30 x 7
30 x 6

/\ Bis sucked today. I lowered the weight 5lbs and still couldn't get 3 sets of 8.

Calf Raises 3 x 15:
70 x 10
110 x 6
150 x 1
170 x 12
170 x 12
170 x 12

/\ Tough but I didn't loose much from my week off.

Stretches:
Hamstring stretches (good morning stretches): 2 reps each held for 30 seconds
squat stretches: 1 reps, each held for 25 seconds at the bottom

 

[JohnnyIrish]

Tuesday after my workout I felt exhausted however on Friday when I got off of work all of a sudden my energy level was up and I suddenly felt aggressive. I felt pretty good (and I hadn't changed anything in my diet). I hit the gym and for not working out my chest in 2 weeks I had an impressive workout. Also after the workout I didn't feel exhausted like I did Tuesday!

I'm thinking what happened is that my metabolism finally made the switch to fat burning. Hmm.. I hope it stays switched through my weekend carb up.. I guess I'll see Monday.


Friday 9th:

Barbell Bench press: 3x5
bar x 10
75 x 6
105 x 1
145 x 5
145 x 5
145 x 6

/\ Ok.. Its been almost 2 weeks since I worked bench and I lost no weight or reps. Sweet. :woo:

Incline Dumbbell bench press: 4 x 8
90 x 8
90 x 8
90 x 8
90 x 8

/\ These were darn hard. (only lost 4 reps)

Dumbbell shoulder press: 3 x 8
60 x 7
60 x 6
60 x 6

/\ Tough as I thought. (lost 5 reps here)

Skill crushers: 3 x 10
50 x 10
50 x 10
50 x 11

/\ I lowered the weight here which puts me a week or two behind on this exercise but I'll catch back up.

Decline weighted situps 3x10:
50 x 10
50 x 8
50 x 8

/\ I held a barbell to my chest for the weight. (only lost 2 reps here)

Stretches:
supermans: 1x10 reps, each rep held for 3 seconds
squat stretches: 2 reps, each held for 25 seconds at the bottom
Hamstring stretches (good morning stretches): 3 reps each held for 30 seconds

 

[Quagmire911]

When are you next deadlifting .

 

[JohnnyIrish]

That'd be today Quagmire.

Today:
Deadlift: 2x5 PR
bar x 10
85 x 6
115 x 2
155 x 1
205 x 1
235 x 5
245 x 5

/\ Hard as hell. Lifted my last two work sets in my socks. I think my form could have been better as I beat the hell out of my shins from pulling the bar so close to them as I was raising it.. I think I'm going to have to not raise the weight so fast as apparently my form suffers.

Leg press: 2x10 PR
270 x 12
285 x 12

/\ I was going slightly below parallel and this was a bit tough. Weight thing that never happened to me before is the last rep out of no where I got a bad headache and a throbbing/pounding in the back of my skull.. wth is that about? (I'll post a thread about this)

Chins:4 sets
4
3
3
3

/\ Lost a rep here.

Hammer curls: 3 x 8
30x9
30x9
30x7

/\ I gained 4 reps here since last Tuesday.

Calf Raises:
50 x 10
90 x 6
130 x 2
170 x 13
170 x 13
150 x 13

/\ Weird.. I my calves were done after the second set. I had to either do less weight or less reps.

Stretches:
squat stretches: 1 reps, each held for 25 seconds at the bottom
Hamstring stretches (good morning stretches): 2 reps each held for 30 seconds

 

[I-tallionStallion]

Good workout dude...nice on the DL's

 

[Quagmire911]

Good workout dude...nice on the DL's

Yah

 

[ProDJ26]

Scraping of the shins is normal...

Try and see them as your battle scars....

 

[JohnnyIrish]

Thanks guys.

Today:
Fasted Cardio treadmill, 45min, incline 4, spd 3

Stretches:
squat stretches: 1 reps, each held for 25 seconds at the bottom
Hamstring stretches (good morning stretches): 2 reps each held for 30 seconds