Sunday, March 31, 2013

Underlying Pop-Political Issues

...because there's nothing more fun than getting into politics.

Well, I'm actually not going to use this time to try and convince anyone of my political standings. Instead, I'm going to use this post to talk (although relatively briefly) about the underlying issues of touchy subjects like abortion rights and same-sex marriage.

I'm going straight for the touchy subjects because they're the ones that, as a spectator, either leave me fascinated by the way people handle these topics, or leave me keen to drown out the noise of what people have to say. What I really want to cut down to is the heart of these issues, and why they are issues in the first place.

There's so much screaming on all sides of the fence, generally to the effect of: "I'm right, you're wrong, and you're a horrible human being because I'm right and you're wrong." In reality there's a big grey area in the middle, but airtime gets diverted to those who make the loudest sounds.

Why is there such heated argumentation (and, on occasion, intelligent debate) over these issues? Why are they such hot topics? The reason, I suspect, is because in some way both sides are (at least to an extent) right.

Let's look at abortion. The two major camps are "pro-life" and "pro-choice." The pro-choice camp stand up for a woman's right to have control over her body. The pro-life camp stand up for an unborn human's right to life. The struggle here is that both the woman and the growing child have needs and (perceived) rights. (I say perceived because rights are not something innately present, they are a social value.) If we take a step away from the heat of the argument, we'll probably see that it's unreasonable to go in with the attitude of: "I'm right, you're wrong, and you're a horrible human being because I'm right and you're wrong." Rather, we have a conflict of interests here: the interests of the woman and the interests of the child. At opposing ends of the argument, there are people who would have you believe that only the woman matters, or that only the child matters. In the grey area in between, you might instead encounter people who acknowledge the complexity of the issue.

With same-sex marriage, the major camps are those who support the rights to same-sex marriage, and those who oppose those rights. I'm not aware of any neat titles for each camp, unlike the pro-life and pro-choice camps when it comes to abortion rights. Anyway, to those who are for same-sex marriage, the opposition are typically called "homophobic," "intolerant" and "bigoted." Those who oppose it often have varied reasons for it, with reasons of spirit and tradition often being up the top of the list. And yes, some people do oppose same-sex marriage out of fear, hate or ruthless judgement. Now, why are same-sex marriage rights such a big deal? Because, like abortion, there's a conflict of interests here, with multiple hands in the marriage pie. Is marriage a religious issue? If so, the government and society have no say in it. Is marriage a state issue? If so, the churches have no say in it. Is marriage a human rights issue? If so, neither the government nor the churches have a say in it. The problem is, marriage is a state issue, a religious issue, and a human rights issue. Same-sex couples want the right to be married, and to call it marriage (depending on where you live, you may have all the same functional rights to marriage, but under a different title, like civil union). Churches want the right to do marriage their way, and to save the world from what they regard to be sin. The state wants...well, I don't know what the state wants other than to get paid. Nonetheless, we have at least three major parties that have something deeply invested in this issue.

So, what's the real solution? Stuffed if I know. I could tell you where my worldview and morals point me, but so long as I support a democracy, at a political level I have to regard my stance on these issues as an answer, not the answer. I could give the old adage: "Can't we all just get along?" but the answer is no, no we can't. Of course we have the theoretical capacity to get along, but the very fact that these touchy political issues cause such epic skubala is evidence that we (in general) would rather be right than happy, and are "open-minded" so long as the topic is something we would have gone for anyway.

On that note, goodnight.

Saturday, March 30, 2013

Hundreds of Workouts Without Thinking About It

Back when I worked in a commercial gym, I'd often catch my colleagues sitting down for half an hour planning their next client's workout. As a general rule, taking the time to think about what your client needs and how you can structure that is a good thing. But when there's nothing special about your client (no health issues that require specific programming, no injuries, the client's goals revolve around general fitness and looking better naked), do you really need to spend that much time on each client's next workout?

For the average client with average goals and no special circumstances, here's a simple template you can follow for each workout:

1. Legs
2. Push
3. Hinge
4. Pull
5. Abs or Loaded Carry

Now, let's pick a few different exercises you can do for each of those 5 categories of exercise:

1. Legs: back squats, goblet squats, leg press, step ups
2. Push: bench press, overhead press, push ups, dips
3. Hinge: deadlift, RDL, hyperextension, bridge
4. Pull: pull ups, lat pull downs, rows, upright row
5. Abs/Loaded Carry: sit ups, planks, side bridge, farmer's walk

So, that's 5 movement types, and 4 exercises per movement type. That's hardly an exhaustive list, mind you. I could quite easily list off at least a couple different variations of each exercise on that list, still without really thinking about it. And there are plenty more movement types you could consider. Very often, when trainers early on in their careers spend so much time thinking about the next workout when there's nothing that they need to specifically worry about other than keeping things balanced, it's because they believe that they need to use a lot of different exercises each session in order to keep the clients coming. Depending on the clients, this may be true, although that isn't an absolute statement. Nonetheless, with 5 movement types and 4 exercises per movement type, you've got literally hundreds of different workouts that you could potentially give your clients.

That's not taking into account coaching, the many different options for progression (increasing weight, increasing reps, increasing sets, increasing ROM, decreasing rest, etc), "advanced" techniques, exercise arrangement (3x10 sets across, supersets, circuits, targeting reps, targeting time, etc) and the many other variables that you can play with.

It's my opinion that a fair amount of forethought should be given early on, but if you're spending a lot of time planning every single session when there isn't a clear need for it, then perhaps you should be focusing that attention on more pressing matters. If you understand exercise programming and have a well-reasoned system sorted out, then (for the most part) less time should be spent thinking about what to do next, and more time should be focused on how to use what's coming next.

Training -- Sat 30/03/2013

Squats

10xBW
10x20kg
5x40kg
3x60kg
1x80kg
1x100kg
1x115kg
3x4x125kg -- Booyah! This felt better than last week's 3x5 at 118kg, but then this week I have my knee sleeves and belt.
5x118kg
8x103kg

RDL

8x60kg
3x8x90kg

GHR

3x8xD.Blue

Calf Raise/Decline Sit Ups

3x15x300lb/8xBW

And of course I did a boatload of rehab work throughout the session.

Friday, March 29, 2013

Training -- Fri 29/03/2013

Bench Press

10x20kg
5x35kg
3x50kg
1x65kg
3x4x80kg -- First and last rep of each set were a little off, but the middle reps felt really smooth and solid. Very last rep, my spotter moved to get the weight, so I had to race against him and protect the bar from his hands.
10x65kg -- Light touch of assistance from spotter on final rep.

Press

3x5x39kg -- I love micro-loading.

Pull Ups

3x8xBW

Seated Row

5x12x40kg

Incline DBBP

2x8x12.5kg

Apparently it's Good Friday today. I'll be doing a public reading of the crucifixion from Luke's gospel tonight, and eating lamb. I assume that I won't be doing both simultaneously, but I haven't been given a schedule, so only one way to find out.

My Thoughts on Wendler's 5/3/1

Intro

Jim Wendler is one of the powerlifting greats who has walked the walk and now writes to help other aspiring lifters along the way. Wendler is one of the few people who has squatted 1,000lb, so he might have some experience we can learn from. In this article we'll look at the program itself (briefly) and then my thoughts on it.

The Program

His program 5/3/1 is a fairly simple 4-week cycle, that looks something like this (other variations of the program exist, so this isn't the only version of it out there):

Wk 1: 5x65%, 5x75%, 5+ x85%
Wk 2: 3x70%, 3x80%, 3+ x90%
Wk 3: 5x75%, 3x85%, 1+ x95%
Wk 4: Deload

You'd start the program with ~90% 1RM as your training max, so all of the above %'s are based on that 90% figure (ie 5+ x85% = 5 or more reps at 85% of 90% 1RM), and then in each training cycle add a tiny bit of weight onto your training max.

You would train 4 days a week (ideally), with each day dedicated to a different lift (the vanilla lifts of the program are squat, bench press, deadlift, and overhead press), followed by a pile of assistance work. There are various assistance work protocols covered in the original 5/3/1 for raw strength manual, and I assume there are many more assistance work protocols covered in the 5/3/1 for powerlifters and 5/3/1 for bodybuilders manuals. One of the most common assistance work protocols is BBB: Boring But Big. This protocol is to simply take two exercises (one of them being the main lift) and do them for 5x10. Wendler recommends starting out light with the assistance work, so this 5x10 might only be at about 50% training max when you begin the program.

So, with a 1RM of 200kg (training max of 180kg), a squat day in the first week with BBB might look something like this:

Squats: Warm up; 5x117.5kg, 5x135kg, 5+ x152.5kg.
BBB: Squats 5x10x90kg; GHR 5x10.

As I said before, after each cycle, you would increase you training max slightly with each cycle of the program. You'd be looking at about a 2.5kg increase on the upper body lifts and a 5kg increase on the lower body lifts each month, which doesn't sound like much, but adds up to 30kg/60kg over the course of a year (on paper, at least).

Thoughts

5/3/1 is very neat and tidy, with clear progression built in, recovery, and auto-regulation (by seeing how many more reps you can achieve after the first 5, 3 or 1 in the top set). Progression, recovery and auto-regulation are good things. There also tends to be a lot of volume in the assistance work (although that depends on just what you do for assistance), which also has its benefits. There's definitely a lot of praise I can give for to this program.

However, it's been my personal experience that 1 set demonstrates strength, and additional sets build strength. While everything you do in the gym has its contributions, there's a very clear single set in each session which really counts, and that's the heaviest set of the main lift. The only lift of mine that's challenged this notion is my deadlift, but at the same time that 1 heavy set of deads was allowing me to improve on them next week, I was doing roughly 10 heavy sets of squats throughout the week, plus a lot of pull ups. But whenever I've worked with programs that have used 1 heavy set for everything, nothing has improved. 2-3 work sets, on the other hand, has been a formula for success with me.

Running in that same vein, I have done 5/3/1 before, and would you like to guess where I did make improvements? My assistance work! The top end of my strength plateaued throughout the program, but my mid-range strength increased each week. And of course, it's in the mid-rang that I was doing lots of sets.

One of the aspects of the program that's both a big pro and a big con is that you get to decide what to do for assistance work. On the bright side, this results in a very personalised program. On the down side, if you aren't firmly grounded in how to balance out a program in a way that is conducive to your goals and that prevents injuries, you don't have much place in choosing assistance work you'll do.

It should go without saying, but what works for me won't necessarily work for you, and vice versa. So don't take my experience as proof that you shouldn't try the program -- many people have and in doing so have had great results.

Wednesday, March 27, 2013

Training -- Tue 26 and Wed 28/03/2013

TUESDAY

Bench Press

10x20kg
5x35kg
3x50kg
1x62.5kg
3x5x75kg
7x65kg
9x55kg

I warmed up with a bunch of rehab exercises. No bicep pain while benching. I wasn't even sure if I would bench, so I did the first set with the empty bar prepared to stop immediately if it caused problems. It didn't, which made me a happy camper. Shoulder still isn't 100%, but it's definitely showing signs of improvement.

Pull Ups

4x6xBW -- None too strenuous.

Press

3x10x20kg -- Seemed like a reasonable idea, considering these were pain-free on Friday. My shoulder did not complain.

Seated Row

3x10x40kg
12x30kg
15x20kg


WEDNESDAY

Front Squats

10xBW
10x20kg
5x40kg
3x60kg
3x72.5kg
2x3x85kg

Paused Squats

6x85kg
6x95kg
5x102.5kg
2x5x110kg -- Not easy at all. I feel these a lot in my glutes, which makes me feel happy. I did various shoulder rehab exercises between sets, which kept my shoulders happy while squatting (my shoulder wasn't keen on the very first set, which reminded me to do my fiddly stuff).

Deadlifts

10x60kg
5x80kg
3x100kg
1x120kg
1x135kg
5x2x150kg -- I went in today wanting to do 3x3, but with each rep being a grinder, it became clear to me in the first set that going for a third rep wasn't going to end well. So, with some motivation from Nick and Benji, I made up for it by doing an extra 2 sets.

GHR/Shrugs

3x6xD.Blue/15x79kg

Calf Raise/Decline Sit Ups

3x15x300lb/8xBW

Saturday, March 23, 2013

Training -- Sat 23/03/2013

I saw the physio at 8:30 this morning. Looking at what I had been experiencing, she agreed with my analysis that it's probably a nerve doing something wrong in my shoulder, and even narrowed down which nerve it's likely to be (addressing two nerves that would cause my symptoms). She gave me some mobility exercises, some strengthening exercises and some stretches to do for my shoulder and my neck, and said that if the problem's still there in 2 weeks, come back for a second appointment.

Squats

I forgot my gym bag, somehow, which had my belt and knee sleeves in it. My knees didn't like training without sleeves very much. Fortunately, I had no competition for the gym's communal belt (as is usually the case -- those of us who use belts usually use our own belts, with few exceptions), so I was still able to do the target weights for this session.

10xBW
10x20kg
5x40kg
3x60kg
1x80kg
1x100kg
3x5x118kg
5x110kg
8x95kg
15x88kg

RDL

8x60kg
3x8x85kg

GHR

3x6xD.Blue

Calf Raise

3x8x340lb

Decline Sit Ups

3x8

In the middle of the session, and again towards the end, I did several of the rehab exercises given to me. My left shoulder's feeling pretty good right now, but still not as solid as my right shoulder.

Friday, March 22, 2013

Training -- Fri 22/03/2013

I considered not going to the gym today, and that would have been a wise decision. Then when I approached the gym on my trip home, instead of bypassing it I merged left and decided to see what I could do.

Incline Bench Press

10x20kg -- Not nearly as bad as benching on Tuesday, but I could feel undue tension in my left bicep, which was the first sign of trouble earlier in the week. So I concluded that continuing wasn't as good an idea as trying something else.

Press

10x20kg -- I had my suspicions that this exercise would feel good, and my suspicions proved to be correct. So I started loading up the bar.
5x25kg
3x30kg
1x35kg
5x5x38kg

Fat Gripz Row

3x12x52.5kg

Wide Grip Seated Row

3x12x40kg

And then I proceeded to do some external rotations, tricep pushdowns and curls with a light resistance band. No pull ups; I'm paranoid of them right now.

Physio tomorrow, hopefully they can sort out my shoulder and won't give me terrible news like "no lifting for 6 weeks."

In other news, I got the results of my blood test back yesterday. Like the last blood test I took, the diagnosis is that I'm very, very boring. Whoop-whoop-whoop!

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

Training -- Wed 20/03/2013

Front Squat

10xBW
10x20kg
5x40kg
3x60kg
3x72.5kg
2x3x82.5kg -- So far so good as far as my left shoulder goes.

Pause Squat

6x82.5kg
6x95kg
3x6x102.5kg -- Alas, now my left shoulder was being unfriendly, and it caused problems for my whole left arm.

Deadlift

10x60kg
5x80kg
3x100kg
1x120kg
1x135kg
3x3x145kg -- Last rep of each set felt like it mustn't have been pretty to watch, however this did (surprisingly) make my left shoulder/arm feel better.

GHR

3x6xD.Blue

Tuesday, March 19, 2013

Training -- Tue 19/03/2013

This wasn't an off day. This was a day where something was wrong. From the first set of bench press, my left arm was giving me all sorts of grief. It felt like my bicep was in trouble, but I'm 99.999% sure that the issue was my left shoulder.

Pull Ups

10xBW

Bench Press

10x20kg
5x35kg
3x50kg
3x60kg
3x70kg
0x80kg -- This should have been an easy triple, but with my left arm/shoulder doing its thing, the bar didn't come off my chest even once.
10x60kg
9x60kg

Seated Row

3x10x40kg -- Narrow grip.
3x10x40kg -- Wide grip.

Biceps Triset/Resistance Band Triceps Pushdown

10-10-10x5kg/15
2x10-10-10x5kg/20

Band Pull Apart

4x20

Saturday, March 16, 2013

Training -- Sat 16/03/2013

Squats

10xBW
10x20kg
5x40kg
3x60kg
1x80kg
1x100kg
1x112.5kg
3x5x122.5kg -- Booyah! More weight and more sets than last week! Not the 5x5x125kg I'd been aiming for in this week when I started 5x5 a month ago, but still a firm PB.
2x3x100kg -- Pause Squats. Whether you want to call this 2x3 or 1x6 is fairly arbitrary. I reracked the bar after 3 reps so that I could adjust my belt as it was digging into my side in a painful manner, and then got straight back into it; probably 10-20 sec with the bar racked between triples.
5x100kg -- Pause Squats.

RDL

10x60kg
3x8x80kg -- Fairly easy.

GHR/Calf Raise

3x7xD.Blue/16x220lb

Decline Sit Ups

4x10

I also did some unco skipping, and some rack pulls, deadlifts and sumo deadlifts for demonstration purposes.

Friday, March 15, 2013

Training -- Fri 15/03/2013

Bench Press

10x20kg
5x35kg
3x50kg
1x65kg
1x75kg
1x85kg -- Harder on the eccentric than the concentric, funnily enough. Dat der control and tightness. I was safe for 2-3 reps, which I'll likely be going for on Tuesday before backing off and doing 3x5.

Incline Bench Press

3x6x55kg -- Going straight from flat bench to incline without warming up on incline at all made the first set a bit unco, but second and third sets were better technique (except for the very last rep, which had final-rep elegance to the fullest).

Press

3x5x37.5kg -- Again, straight into the work sets. I was pleasantly surprised to find that apparently I didn't need any warm-up sets to do the work sets properly.

Pull Ups

10xBW
3x3x17.5kg

Fat Gripz Row

3x15x52.5kg
15x40kg
20x30kg

Thursday, March 14, 2013

I Had a General Check-Up Today

This would be the first time since I started remembering stuff that I've had one of those. Typical guy behaviour, I guess. Girls get general check ups every three months, guys every three decades.


Tests taken

- Blood pressure + "resting" heart rate:

My BP came in at 121/57. I'm quite happy with this. I've had an interesting history with my BP. The tendency has been for systolic to be high (135-145mmHG being the most common readings, and I've seen it get into the 160's back when I was a gym employee) and diastolic to be low (60-75mmHG being common for me, although when I got my systolic up to 160, my diastolic crept into the 90's).

A healthy BP is about 120/80. If it's particularly low, there is more than one explanation for that, but it could be a sign that there's not much blood in the arteries to put any pressure against the vessel walls. If it's particularly high, it can be a sign of all sorts of problems, such as hardening of the arterial walls. This can be a  snowballing issue, because the higher the BP, the more likely the arterial walls are to become inflamed, which will in turn promote higher BP...bad cycle. So naturally I like not being in on that cycle.

My "resting" HR was something like 75BPM (I can't remember exactly what it was...maybe 174 or 176). Most people want their RHR to be around 60-80BPM. Higher than that is probably bad news. Lower than that in a sedentary or only lightly active person is probably bad news (you may not be circulating enough blood), but for an endurance athlete a lower RHR can be a sign of good cardiovascular conditioning.

- Something involving a stethoscope and my lungs:

I don't know what exactly doctors are listening for when they tell you to lift up your shirt and put their stethoscope here, there and everywhere. Obviously, something related to the thoracic cavity. There are some mildly important body-parts in there. Whatever the case, the doctor said all was good.

- Something involving my stomach:

Again, I don't know exactly what things the doctors are looking out for here, but all was good, apparently.

- Height/weight/BMI:

I weighed in at 71.5kg. This was after breakfast and with stuff like my phone and my wallet in my pocket. On an empty stomach, standing on the scales whilst naked after having thoroughly alleviated my bowels, I'd be about 2kg lighter than that (my last home weigh-in, on the 11th, was 69.2kg). My height was 172.5cm, which means I'm 1cm taller than I thought. Either there's been some errors in measuring, or my posture's improving (only thing that would make someone my age taller other than surgery).

That gave me a BMI of 24. Good news, I'm getting closer to being technically overweight. I look forward to one day being technically overweight, but with visible abs.

Training -- Wed 13/03/2013

Front Squats

10xBW
10x20kg
5x35kg
3x50kg
1x65kg
2x3x80kg -- This was less difficult than I expected. I like it when that happens.

Pause Squats

10x80kg

Deadlift

10x60kg
5x80kg
3x100kg
1x120kg
2x5x140kg -- Prior to this day, the heaviest I'd ever done for 5 reps was 137.5kg, which was just 1 set and mixed grip. Getting 140kg for 2 sets with hook grip made me quite happy.
3x140kg

GHR/Shrug/Calf Raise

3x6xDk Blue/15x76.5kg/15x300lb

Decline Sit Ups

4x10

Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Training -- Tue 12/03/2013

Let's just get this out in the open: Today's session sucked. My body was all like: "Well, I could lift heavy, but ain't nobody got time for that!"

Bench Press

10x20kg
5x35kg
3x50kg
1x65kg
4x77.5kg
5x77.5kg
3x77.5kg
2x5x70kg -- 5x5x77.5kg did not exactly happen.

CGBP

2x10x40kg

Pull Ups

2x10xBW
2x8xBW

Seated Row

3x10x62.5kg
30x30kg

And then I finished off with some resistance band exercises.

Sunday, March 10, 2013

Some Weight Loss Tips

The first thing to know about tips is that they might work for you, they might not. These are absolutely not rules on how to lose weight, just some pointers that may make the process easier to manage.

1) Exercise before eating. What I don't mean (necessarily) is get up first thing in the morning and train while fasted. I mean, at any time of the day, know when you're going to eat, and schedule your exercise to come before that.

Why?

When you exercise, you tend to undergo a state of appetite suppression. That's all well and good, but after exercise, your appetite will come back, and often with a vengeance. Anecdotally, a lot of people get really hungry about an hour after training. This can lead to over-eating in the context of a 24-hour period, thus countering the amount of calories burned. You can battle this by timing your workouts so that your peak appetite after training occurs at a time when you'd normally have a meal anyway. If you were going to eat it anyway, then it's not going to upset your weight loss plans.

2) Love food. That probably sounds like it would be counter-productive, but I genuinely believe the opposite to be true. The trick here is that when I say "love food," I mean love lots of different kinds of foods, not love a select food pyramid that has McDonald's at the bottom, other fast food chains up the sides, and desserts as the top third. It's easier to go without chocolate, for example, when there are a dozen other wholesome foods that you want just as dearly.

3) Get back on the horse. You will fall off the horse. As surely as the sun will set today and rise again tomorrow, you will lapse from your plan. It's going to happen. Accept that fact, and pick yourself back up when it does.

A lot of people approach weight loss goals with an all or nothing mentality. So, when the inevitable happens and they fall off their horse, not only do they fall off it, but they then roll around in its feces and play dead cocky with their arms in the air, because they aren't perfectly on the horse, so they may as well give up altogether.

Now, imagine if you were driving down to the store, but you had to stop at a red light. The sensible thing to do would be to wait for the light to turn green and continue driving. But instead, you unbuckle your seat belt, open the door, step out of the car and stomp back home. Because you couldn't get to the shops in one go, so why go at all?

You're going to reach red lights, and you're going to fall off your horse. Get over it. So you ate a cookie today -- your weight loss journey isn't over, and downing another 12 of them isn't going to do you any good. So you missed today's workout. Big deal. Make up for it. You will have setbacks. Get over it. Get back on the horse.

4) "If it's worth doing, it's worth doing poorly." You don't need a perfect plan to make a change, much less a plan that goes perfectly. You need to do something. There are many right ways to do this, and many wrong ways to do this. If it sounds like it's going to be bad for your health, it probably is. If it sounds sensible, it probably is. Make gradual changes and learn as you go. Some things will work, others won't, some things will work better than others. Doesn't matter. If you're doing 100 things that are outright bad for you today and 0 things that are good for you, and tomorrow you do 99 things that are outright bad for you and 1 thing that's good for you, that's a step in the right direction. Take it. Don't let perfect be the enemy of good, and don't let good be the enemy of okay.

Saturday, March 9, 2013

Some Calorie Maths

Back when I was working in a commercial gym, I got asked by a potential client (who then didn't hire me after hearing my answer) how to lose 10kg in 3 weeks for a wedding. She insisted that this was a realistic goal. I gave a rough breakdown of what it would take to lose 10kg of fat in that time. I don't know if she got disheartened and gave up on her plan, or if she decided to take her business elsewhere, all I know is that I didn't hear from here again.

Now, let's pretend that you're her and you want to lose 10kg in 3 weeks. In reality, you can get somewhat of a boost on that amount through water loss, but I've never been in the business of getting pseudo-results for clients. So let's go with an actual 10kg of fat.

According to one of my textbooks, 1g of fat contains roughly 9.4kcal. That puts 1kg of fat at 9,400kcal, and 10kg of fat at 94,000kcal.

According to the back of my cereal boxes, the average adult's daily intake is something like 2,400kcal. Let's assume that that's accurate, and that the adult in question is maintaining weight at that level.

You've got 21 days to work with, so 94,000 / 21 ~ 4,475kcal. That's the daily calorie deficit we're after. Let's assume (unwisely) that the person's metabolic rate doesn't shift at all in the process. To simplify things, here are a couple ways that our client could hypothetically achieve that calorie deficit:

1) Burn 4,475kcal/day through additional physical activity while maintaining current diet.
2) Consume 0kcal/day, and burn 2,075kcal/day through additional physical activity (4,475 - 2,400 = 2,075).
3) Consume a diet of -2,075kcal/day by eating things that can only be identified through theoretical physics.

Let's assess the viablity of these three options.

The third option, involving no additional exercise (yay for laziness) but eating a solid diet of anti-matter is about as close to impossible as can be. We can rule that out right off the bat.

As for the other two options, lets look at where exercise will lead us.

According to Lyle McDonald, the average person can, at a maintainable pace, burn roughly 5-10kcal/min, which clocks up 300-600kcal/hr (average 450kcal/hr). 4,475 / 450 ~ 9.9. So, we'd be looking at roughly 10 hours of exercise per day in the first option to lose 10kg of fat over 3 weeks. 2,075 / 450 ~ 4.6. So in the second option, we're looking at a little over 4hr30min of exercise in order to lose that weight. That probably sounds less awful than 10 hours, but remember you're doing this on a thoroughly empty stomach -- three weeks without a single calorie entering your body.

So, is it theoretically possible to lose that amount of fat in 3 weeks. Yes. Is it realistic? Only if you can make exercise a full-time job for the duration of that 3wk window whilst avoiding problems with metabolism and health.

Now let's bring this same math over to more realistic goals. Let's say you want to lose weight, and you're going to do it through exercise, without changing your eating habits to suit fat loss. Remember, 1 hour of maintainable exercise will burn an average of 450kcal, and 1kg of fat contains roughly 9,400kcal. 9,400 / 450 ~ 20.9. That means it'll take almost 21 hours of exercise to lose 1kg of fat. If you're doing the 30min/day, 5 days/wk recommended by the government, you'll have lost your first kilo after about 8-9 weeks. If you double the duration of each session to 1hr, you can halve the time required to lose 1kg down to 4 weeks. And if you do 1hr/day, every single day, you can lose 1kg through exercise alone in 3 weeks.

Yes, an hour a day, daily, will (theoretically) give you a 1kg loss in fat after 3 weeks of exercise. 3 weeks, the time in which 10kg, evidently, is not so realistic.

What shall we take away from this?

Firstly, get realistic. Weight loss is a slow process, or at least it's slower than the marketing machine would have you believe. Fortunately it doesn't take many kilos of fat loss to make a difference to most people's bodies, but still, if you're focused on the scale and you're doing things properly, you may be in for a rude wake-up call.

Secondly, the importance of nutrition. Most people don't have the desire or priorities in place to do an hour of exercise a day, every day. Most people, despite their protests to the contrary, do have the time for it, but are focused on other things, and probably see exercise as a chore, and so an hour a day is unlikely to occur. It takes an hour to burn 450kcal in the gym. It takes no time at all to not put 450kcal worth of doughnuts (which is 2xKrispy Kremes) or soft drink into your body. If you're consuming 5 meals a day, you can easily reduce your calorie consumption by 450kcal/day by reducing each meal by 75kcal. Not such a tough deal.

Training -- Sat 09/03/2013

Not the best session today, but I did have fun during it. Squats didn't go according to plan, and then I decided to do some exercises I haven't done in ages for my posterior chain, which was refreshing (not necessarily effective, but definitely refreshing).

Squats

10xBW
10x20kg
5x40kg
3x60kg
1x80kg
1x100kg
5x121kg -- PB :)
4x121kg -- I knew there was no way I was getting a 5th rep in this set. After this set, I stripped the weight back and did paused squats, which let me know how much I'd been getting out of my stretch strength reflex.
3x5x100kg -- "4 sec" pause at the bottom, although you know how relativity works, so it was probably only 2-3 sec in reality.

Goodmorning

8x30kg
5x35kg
5x40kg
5x50kg
5x60kg
5x70kg

Barbell Glute Bridge

10x20kg
3x10x30kg

Calf Raise/Decline Sit Up

2x12x320lb/8
2x10x320lb/8

Medicine Ball Slams

3x20x5kg

Friday, March 8, 2013

Training -- Fri 08/03/2013

Incline Bench Press

10x20kg
5x30kg
3x40kg
1x47.5kg
3x8x53.5kg

Press

10x20kg -- Actually, this may have been more like 14. I got to a point where I said the number of the last rep in my head, then instantly forgot whether it was "nine" or "five," (they just sound so similar) so I did 5 more just to be safe. That wasn't overly pleasant.
5x25kg
3x30kg
1x35kg
3x5x37kg

Pull Ups

10xBW
3x5x16.5kg

Fat Gripz Row

4x15x50kg

In other news I was in the Myer centre in the city this morning. Two hours later, the place got attacked by a gunman and was under lockdown by police, while I was meeting up with the QUT Christians group for the first time about 1km away. I think I may have dodged a bullet there.

Thursday, March 7, 2013

Rejoice Against Spot Reduction

Infomericals are hilarious. There are multiple infomercial stations available on free-to-air TV here in Australia, and on occasion I get my guilty pleasure out of watching them. This is my current favourite:


I mention infomercials because they are a major culprit in the "spot reduction" sensation. Most fitness experts will tell you that spot reduction doesn't work, and at this point in time I stand with the majority. But there are still a lot of people who believe in spot reduction.

When fitness experts consult with new clients who believe in spot reduction, the tendency (as far as I've observed) is to explain to these new clients the disappointing fact that spot reduction doesn't work.

And this is where I find myself puzzled.

If spot reduction doesn't work, then what does work? Losing fat everywhere, of course. The "disappointing" news is that if you want to lose fat off your stomach, you're going to have to lose fat off your hips, back, thighs and arms, too. But wait, why is that disappointing? Isn't that something to be excited about?

I mean, think about it. Instead of just losing fat on your stomach, taking a couple inches off your midsection will also make you lost fat off your hips, back, thighs and arms! That's killing five birds with one stone!

This is good news!!!

I, for one, am glad that spot reduction doesn't (appear to) work -- if it did, that would make fat loss a whole lot more complicated and harder to achieve across the whole body. The possibility of spot reduction opens up the possibility of losing fat disproportionately, and ultimately looking ridiculous. Just try imagining someone with a narrow waist and 40 inch arms. Not the most charming of ideas, is it?

Wednesday, March 6, 2013

Training -- Wed 06/03/2013

Front Squat

10xBW
10x20kg -- Stretching out my legs by doing all these reps made them feel a bit better for working with. All my running around yeterday seems to have utilised my leg muscles in some manner. Don't let the bodybuilders find out.
5x35kg
3x50kg
1x65kg
3x3x77.5kg

Deadlifts

10x60kg
5x80kg
3x100kg
1x120kg
3x5x135kg -- I think I need more hamstring strength.

GHR/Trap Bar Shrug/Calf Raise

3x10xBlue/15x74kg/20x220lb

Decline Sit Ups

4x8

I also did 2 rounds of skipping towards the end of the session. I have no idea how long each round went for, but I'm confidant both rounds were more than a minute. To my surprise I didn't feel overly puffed afterwards.

Tuesday, March 5, 2013

Training --.Tue 05/03/2013

Bench Press

10x20kg
5x35kg
3x50kg
1x62.5kg
5x5x75kg -- The hardest part is getting started. Getting a spot to help lift out on the last two sets did wonders.

CGBP

2x10x55kg -- Towards the end of each set, I really felt it in my glutes and hamstrings.

Pull Ups

2x10xBW
9xBW
8xBW

Seated Cable Row

3x10x60kg

One-Arm Cable Row

5x30kg
12x10kg -- That was harder than I expected

Biceps Triset/Triceps Triset

2x12-12-12x5kg/12-12-12x5kg

Incline DB Fly/Band Pull Apart

2x20x5kg/20

I also spent a lot of time walking around uni today, plus a jog to the bus, and walked the dogs this evening. Feeling a wee bit tired now.

Saturday, March 2, 2013

Training -- Sat 02/03/2013

Squats

10xBW
10x20kg
5x40kg
3x60kg
1x80kg
1x100kg
5x5x118.5kg -- That's not a typo, I went up 3.5kg instead of 2.5kg, in the hopes of being able to make 5x5x122.5kg next week. Given that the last 2 reps of each set were bigger grinders than last week, and that I almost didin't make it out of the hole on my very last rep, I may have overestimated where I can be in a week's time. Oh well. Maybe I'll meet halfway and go up 3kg next week. Micro-plates are handy.

As an aside, I feel it worth mentioning that since I've only been doing heavy back squats on Saturdays, my concept of a week has changed. Instead of weeks being a straight line across from Monday to Sunday, my weeks are now circles. Technically, Thursday is the closest thing I've got to a weekend, in the sense that I don't have anything inherently planned for Thursdays, but they don't feel very weekendish. But Saturdays and Sundays don't feel very weekendish now, either. This isn't a complaint at all, just something I've been feeling. Saturday feels like the first day of the week, because the day in which you put your highest priority lift is the start of the week (thus why Monday is international bench day). Monday is the start of the week, because it's Monday...and because it has half my uni classes. Wednesday is the start of the week, because it has deadlifts, but deadlifts also make it the middle of the week. In conclusion, my week is a circle.

Speed Pull

5x60kg
3x5x80kg

Bulgarian Split Squat

10xBW
2x10x7.5kg

GHR/Calf Raise/Decline Sit Ups

3x8xBlue/20x220lb/8xBW
8xBlue

We had a new member in today, and some loud rockish metallish music while I was squatting, which made me happy.

Friday, March 1, 2013

Training -- Fri 01/03/2013

1/3/13 = one of those special-sounding dates.

Incline Bench Press

10x20kg
5x30kg
3x40kg
1x47.5kg
8x52.5kg
7x52.5kg
8x52.5kg

Press

10x20kg
5x25kg
1x30kg
3x5x36kg -- Micro-plates FTW.

Pull Ups

10xBW
3x5x15kg

Seated Row

15x50kg
13x50kg
2x12x50kg

Dips/Biceps Triset
8xBW/10-10-5x7.5kg
8xBW/10-10-1x7.5kg