Jumpstart Day 3

Back to work today after a long holiday weekend. Getting up this morning was not fun. Made it through the day and even got in my work out.

Breakfast
Eggs
Sausage
Orange

Lunch
Chicken
Mixed Vegetables
Apple

Afternoon Snack
Greek Yogurt
Almonds

Dinner
Italian Sausages in Sauce
Zucchini Baked with cheese
Salad

Evening Snack
Greek Yogurt
Berries and Walnuts

Todays workout, 2 circuits of each of the following.
Dumbbell Squats
Push-ups
DB Rows
DB press
DB Up rows
Triceps press with DB
Wall Sits
DB Curls

Jumpstart Day 2

Today got off to a rough start. We were having our coffee and getting ready to cook breakfast when the power went out. We waited a few minutes and then a few more minutes and still no electricity. Having an electric stove, a cooked breakfast was out. I dind't really feel up for cold-cuts for breakfast, so I just had a bowl of Kashi Cereal, with some walnuts and a protein shake. It wasn't ideal, or what I wanted, but sometimes you got to do the best you can in any given situation. As for the rest of the day.....

Lunch
Deli meat rolls with cheese
Vegetable soup
Apple

Snack
Cottage cheese
Peanut butter
Protein Powder

Dinner
Scampi Style Shrimp
Spaghetti Squash
Tossed Salad
Wine

About the snack, I know it sounds a little weird. I even made fun of Mrs D for a couple of weeks for eating it. Then I tried it. It is really good, just add a little vanila extract or such for a little flavor. Its almost like desert. I also added 3o minutes on the bike today because of what happened with breakfast. Ordinarily I would not have worried about the cereal for breakfast but being that I'm trying to do the jump-start, I did it.

Jumpstart Day1

Breakfast: Scrambled Eggs with vegetables, Bacon, an Orange, Coffee with Splenda and Half and half.

Lunch; Italian Sausages on a salad with vinegar and olive oil

Post work out, afternoon snack; Milk, Bomber Blend Protein Powder, peanut butter and banana

Dinner; Vegetable Soup, Salmon with a macadamia nut and coconut crust

Evening Snack (not pictured);Fage Greek yogurt with berries and walnuts.

Todays work out consisted of 2 circuits of the following exercises;
Deadlift
Dumbbell press
Lat Pull down
Lunges
Push-up
Dumbbell row
Wall Sit
dumbbell curl
dumbbell tricep press

I used a moderate weight for all exercises that allowed me to finish the first circuit with moderate effort, ut a challenge for the second circuit. Rest between exercises was kept to a minimum, and rest between circuits was avout 60 seconds.

Its News Years, time to lock it back down

Official Jan 1 Weigh In 203.5 lb.

My most recent recorded weight prior to today was 197 on November 18. I had been down as low as 195, but I must have not recorded it. Even so, that puts my holiday weight gain this year at 6.5 lb. It could have been worse, a lot worse. I had hoped to end the year at under 200, but I'll take a 20 lb. weight loss year on year. I spent today just eating normally and taking a short walk. Tomorrow, the seven day jump start begins. I'll be posting my eating and exercising activities for the week along with my results. After the jump start I will be sticking to my plan very closely for the month of January, by avoiding any refined sugars and junk foods, and making sure I meet my protein, fruit and vegetable requirements. Exercise wise, I going to try to hit the gym three times a week. If this gets to be unmanageable, I'll drop it to twice a week and not sweat it. Lets get read to rumble.

If this is your first time here I'd start by going to the first Average Guy Post and beginning at the beginning.

Getting Back On Track

So, the holidays are winding down, and in-spite of your best intentions, you over did it. It happened at my house, and chances are it happened at some of yours. No big deal. Really.

Plan A - Just get back into the swing of things and the weight and belly bulge will go down on its own. Go back to the Average Guys Diet and start from there. Keep doing what ever exercise you are/were doing. At least one hard weight work out and one hard interval session for cardio will do. This may take a couple of weeks or more, depending on out of control you got at the buffet table.

Plan B- Many of us, me included, like to get the holiday weight and bloat off as quickly as possible. For four to seven days, up-to about 10 max, depending on how over the top you went, Eat meat, beans, eggs, cheese, nuts, olive oil, non starchy vegetables, and fruits, and nothing else. Limit your fruits to 2 pieces a day or what ever is your minimum amount accord to the AGD . Every other day, do some type of full body workout. The "No excuses work out", Circuit training with weights, or even push ups and sit-ups combined with Interval training on a Bike. Mix and match as you wish. In one week, you should have dropped the holiday weight. Then its back to eating right, and exercising on a normal schedule. Like I said before, you got to keep doing it forever.

Still An Average Guy

Oh what a lazy shit I've been these several months. Thats true at least about writing. So far however I have been doing quite well keeping my food and exercise in line which is the important part. Diet wise I have been following my own advice. The Average Guys Diet, is working and I'm down to the lowest weight I've been in about 4 years, 195. My last body fat measurement was a healthy 18%, and I've dropped several inches, and now have a 36 inch waist. I would like to get back to a 34 and a body fat less than 15%, but I see no need to push it. Slow and steady has been winning the race, so it aint broke and don't need fixing. This doesn't mean I've been perfect. Just this past Sunday, we got together with Mrs D's siblings and all their youngin's for a family picture. Afterward we all went to Ruby Tuesdays for dinner. I had the Smoke House Burger with Fries and a beer. It was wonderful, I enjoyed every bite. Didn't quite get my fruits or vege's for the day, but life goes on. Monday I was back on track.

On the exercise side, I have made a few changes. I'm back to once a week strength training plus once a week high intensity interval training. Some people do well on more frequent, less intense type workouts such as the one in my previous post, I'm just not one of them. I just feel better with more days recovery then working out. This is not to say I'm a couch potato on my off days, I'm not. I often go for a walk or bike ride after dinner, its just nothing structured or planned. The twice a week routine has also seemed to be what a couple of friends have gone back to as a default. One just hates cardio and does an A/B split strength training routine, while the others have adopted my strategy of one day a week of cardio plus one day of strength training. Not everybody loves HIIT the way I do, so they do what the prefer.

Thanksgiving and Christmas are right around the corner along with all of the dietary pitfalls associated with this time of year. There will be no baking in the Dill house this year. Holiday feasts will be one day events. I'll be keeping to the twice a week exercise plan as well. Remember, being on track 80% of the time is good this time of year. Stay strong, and hopefully it won't take me 6 moths to have something to say.

Average Guys guide to a no excuses work out

You plus one pair of dumbbells plus 15 minutes equal fitness

I was recently contemplating one of the most common excuses I hear as to why people don't exercise. Of course that exercise is lack of time, followed closely by lack of equipment. So I wondered what would be the minimum investment one could make in time and equipment. Time wise, 60 minutes a week of moderate to vigorous exercise seems to be a general, but not unanimous consensus. For equipment of course, that would be zero dollars, using nothing but body weight. For some reason however, people just seem to regard calisthenics as not worthy, and feel the need to use some type of equipment to get the job done. The most basic piece of equipment is a single pair of dumbbells. Many guys already seem to have a pair or two stashed away in a closet or in the basement, unused. I see these at yard sales and flea markets all the time for about a buck. Many of them are of very light pink type, but I also see pairs of 10 - 15lbs as well. So with one set of 10 -15lbs dumbbells in mind, I tried to figure out how to use these in a way that would meet the criteria of a fitness based workout in 15 minutes or less. During my research I came across a site, Shovelglove, that certainly offers one possibility using a sledge hammer instead of dumbbells. Much of what follows is largely the result of my adapting his concept for a sledge hammer and putting it to use with body weight and dumbbells with the idea of achieving a minimum passing score on a physical fitness test. The site itself is worth a read, particularly the part about the trap of progress, and Urban Rangering. Oddly enough, or perhaps not so, he too is a software engineer.

Off the top of my head I came up with the following list of exercises. When I began thinking about this, I had in mind a "daily dozen" that would be done on most days of the week. I ended up going for ten. The first four exercises are kind of "required" to make this work, but the rest are substitutable with what ever you may wish to do. Do this four or five days a week and get on with the rest of your busy life.

Jumping Jacks
Push -Ups
Sit Ups
Deep Knee Bends/Hindu Squats - with or with out weight
Upright rows
Over head press
lunges - with or with out weight
Curls
French Press
toe touches/Stiff leg dead lift

In starting this workout do each exercise for 10 reps, or as many as you can, which ever is less. Do each rep of each exercise at a brisk but deliberate pace, the idea is not to rush, but to keep moving. After completing an exercise, take a couple of deep breaths and move immediately to the next exercise. Once you are able to confidently do 10 reps of each exercise and move to the next after a breath or two, add 2 reps to each exercise. The last rep should be a challenge but not so hard that you might not get it. Don't add reps every work out, and don't add reps on any exercise until you can add them to all exercises. This way you only have to remember one number. Keep doing this till you are able to do each exercise for a full 50 reps. If 50 sounds like too many, start with a more modest goal, like 20 or 25. After you get there decide if thats good enough, or to go further. If when starting out you struggle to get ten or fewer push-ups, getting to 20 or 25 and hanging out there for a while is not a bad idea. For guys over 40, 30 good "Army" push ups would be sufficient to pass the push up test. A good way to get an idea of where you stand is adultfitnesstest.org. If you pass, go back and re-evalutate once a year. The key is, once you are fit, there is not a lot of benefit to pushing much further. You may just want to ride the plateau and enjoy the view.

Note - Why 50? Generally speaking, 50 is the minimum macho number for doing push ups.