I'm a little late to write up the last report, because as soon as I finished the challenge, I fell into a deep slumber and woke up many years later to find out my hair had all turned white and King George no longer ruled the American colonies. Actually, I just got extremely lazy for a few days and put off even the smallest amount of work. There's nothing wrong with being lazy :)
Here's what I did for the last three days of the 30 day workout blitz...
Saturday:
Squats, 130 lbs times 10 reps times 5 sets.
Leg press, 115 lbs times 17 reps times 4 sets.
Sunday:
Treadmill, 60 minute run (with a bathroom break at 30 minutes). Plus 6 minutes cooldown. I ran a total of 6.59 miles, with a max speed of 7.5mph at the end. At the 20 minute mark I added a .5 incline (no idea what units that is, though). The total vertical distance I ran was "114" (no idea what units).
Monday:
I did a partial "benchpress to exhaustion". In the full version, you start with as much weight as you can lift, do as many reps as possible, then lower the weight slightly and repeat, until you're down to the naked bar. Instead of going all the way down to the naked bar, I only went down to 75 lbs, so I'd have some strength left for other stuff...
Bench press: 120 lbs, 8 reps
115 lbs, 10 reps
105 lbs, 10 reps
95 lbs, 10 reps
85 lbs, 15 reps
75 lbs, 20 reps
After doing that, my arms felt like they were dying :) And that wasn't even a full benchpress to exhaustion. When I do it all the way down to the naked bar, my arms get so exhausted I can barely raise them. It's awesome. But I didn't do that because I wanted to do the next exercises as well...
Rows: 115 lbs, 15 reps, 3 sets.
Dumbbell bench: 45 lbs per hand, 11 reps; followed by 9 reps. I was aiming for 2 sets of 11 reps each, to progressively train the previous 2 sets of 10 reps each, but on the 2nd set, my arms totally failed when I tried for the 10th lift.
Pulldowns: 95 lbs, 15 reps, 2 sets.
I'm very glad I did this challenge, though I'm not ready to push it and go, say, 60 days. Many people would say that I shouldn't even have gone 30 days, that the body needs rest days between training days; that's true to a certain extent, but doesn't really apply in my case because the weights I'm lifting are relatively light. If I were benching 200 lbs and/or squatting 300 lbs, I would definitely not be able to do more than a couple bodybuilding sessions a week. But those weights are still a long way away for me, which is what allowed me to get away with 30 straight days. It's still pretty tiring, though, and I've enjoyed relaxing the past couple days!!
Whenever I do any prolonged self-improvement quest of this kind, I find I go through periods of high motivation (including the beginning, when I'm all gung ho) and periods of very low motivation. The latter are where the real test of self-discipline come. When I feel like I just want to crawl back into bed, and I have zero natural motivation, I have to muster up the sheer determination to push my rear into gear. On the plus side, once I actually get to work, I inevitably feel 100 times better. With the workout challenge, once I'm actually on the treadmill and my feet are moving, hidden motivation bubbles back up to the surface.
This fitness adventure has also helped me zero in on how best to write about these types of things. When I did my 30 day French Revolution language challenge, I wrote an entry every single day, but I feel like that was very suboptimal: some days I just wasn't very motivated to write, and some of the individual writeups are a little boring. In the end, that project ended up more like a personal journal than a useful public contribution. This time, on the other hand, after the initial few days, I made the writeups cover larger intervals of time, and I think that's somewhat of an improvement over the French challenge. I'm still learning though, and next time I liveblog one of these flings, I'll have better experience with the necessary presentation style.
I'm happy with the physical results of the last month; so is my girlfriend ;) The photographic evidence speaks for itself; you can compare it with the photos posted on day 1. I really love my body, and I love looking in the mirror and seeing a healthy good-looking guy reflected.
FURTHER READING
My Time in Air Force Boot Camp
My Time in the Seduction Community
Autodidact: Be A Self-Teacher
Skills and Metaskills
Here's what I did for the last three days of the 30 day workout blitz...
Saturday:
Squats, 130 lbs times 10 reps times 5 sets.
Leg press, 115 lbs times 17 reps times 4 sets.
Sunday:
Treadmill, 60 minute run (with a bathroom break at 30 minutes). Plus 6 minutes cooldown. I ran a total of 6.59 miles, with a max speed of 7.5mph at the end. At the 20 minute mark I added a .5 incline (no idea what units that is, though). The total vertical distance I ran was "114" (no idea what units).
Monday:
I did a partial "benchpress to exhaustion". In the full version, you start with as much weight as you can lift, do as many reps as possible, then lower the weight slightly and repeat, until you're down to the naked bar. Instead of going all the way down to the naked bar, I only went down to 75 lbs, so I'd have some strength left for other stuff...
Bench press: 120 lbs, 8 reps
115 lbs, 10 reps
105 lbs, 10 reps
95 lbs, 10 reps
85 lbs, 15 reps
75 lbs, 20 reps
After doing that, my arms felt like they were dying :) And that wasn't even a full benchpress to exhaustion. When I do it all the way down to the naked bar, my arms get so exhausted I can barely raise them. It's awesome. But I didn't do that because I wanted to do the next exercises as well...
Rows: 115 lbs, 15 reps, 3 sets.
Dumbbell bench: 45 lbs per hand, 11 reps; followed by 9 reps. I was aiming for 2 sets of 11 reps each, to progressively train the previous 2 sets of 10 reps each, but on the 2nd set, my arms totally failed when I tried for the 10th lift.
Pulldowns: 95 lbs, 15 reps, 2 sets.
I'm very glad I did this challenge, though I'm not ready to push it and go, say, 60 days. Many people would say that I shouldn't even have gone 30 days, that the body needs rest days between training days; that's true to a certain extent, but doesn't really apply in my case because the weights I'm lifting are relatively light. If I were benching 200 lbs and/or squatting 300 lbs, I would definitely not be able to do more than a couple bodybuilding sessions a week. But those weights are still a long way away for me, which is what allowed me to get away with 30 straight days. It's still pretty tiring, though, and I've enjoyed relaxing the past couple days!!
Whenever I do any prolonged self-improvement quest of this kind, I find I go through periods of high motivation (including the beginning, when I'm all gung ho) and periods of very low motivation. The latter are where the real test of self-discipline come. When I feel like I just want to crawl back into bed, and I have zero natural motivation, I have to muster up the sheer determination to push my rear into gear. On the plus side, once I actually get to work, I inevitably feel 100 times better. With the workout challenge, once I'm actually on the treadmill and my feet are moving, hidden motivation bubbles back up to the surface.
This fitness adventure has also helped me zero in on how best to write about these types of things. When I did my 30 day French Revolution language challenge, I wrote an entry every single day, but I feel like that was very suboptimal: some days I just wasn't very motivated to write, and some of the individual writeups are a little boring. In the end, that project ended up more like a personal journal than a useful public contribution. This time, on the other hand, after the initial few days, I made the writeups cover larger intervals of time, and I think that's somewhat of an improvement over the French challenge. I'm still learning though, and next time I liveblog one of these flings, I'll have better experience with the necessary presentation style.I'm happy with the physical results of the last month; so is my girlfriend ;) The photographic evidence speaks for itself; you can compare it with the photos posted on day 1. I really love my body, and I love looking in the mirror and seeing a healthy good-looking guy reflected.
FURTHER READING
My Time in Air Force Boot Camp
My Time in the Seduction Community
Autodidact: Be A Self-Teacher
Skills and Metaskills
Posts
2 comments:
Good job, mate.
Good to see you make it to the end even though I new you would. I can definitely see the difference between your original photos and your latest. Personally love working out and the feeling it gives me, healthier, better well being and just feel better about myself.
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