AI–Cat2/W1

I’ve decided to move to a weekly post to be done after my weights/measures are done on Sunday.  Sometime Monday I will publish out my journal to my blog.  Here is a sneak peak at what I am attempting to do – and yes, this will be updated fully this coming Monday.

Week one was a mixed bag of success and frustration for me.  While I gather a lot of the guys just starting out on this program have a ton of questions around the Training side of things, I found almost all of my questions were around the Nutrition side of things.

As far as nutrition, I saw the recommended 1,000 calorie/day intake and pretty much freaked out.  <sigh/>  Needless to say, after 3 days at that level my wife and I decided to up it to 1,500 calories a day.  While the consensus of the community seemed to think this was not following the program, I disagree.  Granted, I won’t get the same results as another man who is 6’2”, 225lbs and eating 1,000 calories.  I’m eating 3,500 calories more each week which should equate to 1 lb less in fat loss – everything else being equal.  I can live with that.

My wife and I took our measurements today and I plugged mine into the AGRNC.  Weight: –4 lbs, Waist: –1 inch, shoulders: +0.5 inch and AI from 1.22 to 1.26.  Not huge gains, not bad gains.  And you know me by now: graphs are in order!  This first one is a simple projection of my AI based on 2 weeks worth of measurements.  What is it they say?  2 points makes a straight  line?  Yep – the projection, for now, is a straight line.  As each week passes, the AI line should start having hills and valleys and the projection will either tilt more horizontal (less gains) or more vertical (more gains).  I am also adding my personal goals to the last entry so I can see where I am shooting.  Sorry, did not do it for this graph but it will be on next week’s graph – promise!

With my new calculation I did increase in daily intake.  I went from 1000/day to 1007/day!  Since my average for this last week was 1651/day, my goal this week is to approach 1300/day.

I am entering a “who makes the most progress” contest tomorrow and really looking forward to it.  I would love to get rid of the abs insulation and see how fast I can get to an AI of 1.4 and 1.5.  As far as the rest of my graphs, images, screenshots and such, I think I am just going to show the Endomondo screen shots.

I mainly want to see the heart rate zones and calories burned for the different workouts.  I believe this is the best info to determine the intensity of the work out.  Right now, I’ve been rating mine a 2 on a scale of 1-3.  I can probably push harder each workout and figure I will be at that 3 out 3 in another 2-3 weeks.  Just need to figure out weights for sets/reps where I am pushing myself to technical failure in the last 1-3 reps of the last set yet not pushing to physical failure.

Heart Rates for Mon, Tue, Thur & Fri.

HR Zones for Mon, Tue, Thur & Fri.

 

AI–Cat2/W1/D3

Week 1, day 3.  Ok.  Kick my ass some more!  I am finding part of the workout is within my reach while about 1/4 is beyond my current capacity.  Right on!  I will say, JeFit is not really setup to track the circuit setup of this type of workout so I just took a snapshot of my workout sheet and listed it under JeFit.

My caloric intake went higher than I wanted.  I have to remember to take a sugar substitute with me on (NFL) game nights!  We don’t have cable/dish at home so we go to Buffalo Wild Wings to watch our teams.  Last night was a double header with the Broncos at 6pm then the Seahawks at 8pm.  I drink iced tea and like it a little sweet – 4 packets of sugar per 32ozs of tea.  Live and learn!  Next time, Splenda or Stevia packets will go with me!

Calories In (MFP):

 

Calories Out (Endomondo):

 

Workout (JeFit):

AI–Cat2/W1/D2

Day 2 complete and feeling good – except for this nagging hunger.  I can feel my mood going foul and it’s only been 2 days.  <sigh/>

Tomorrow is a rest day and I’m not sure what to do (mentally) about that.  In the past, it was always welcome but now that I work from home, I may be one big mass of stiff by the end of the day. 

I think I discovered the easiest way to convey my day below.  Tell me what you think.

Calories In (MFP):

Calories Out (Endomondo):

Workout (JeFit):

 

AI–Cat2/W1/D1

 

Today is day two on this current journey.  I’m trying to come up with a format to keep things consistent, so patience as I work this out.  And thinking this through, I will be reporting on yesterday rather than today so I don’t have to feel like I need to write these right before bed.  :-)

Monday 08/25/2014

Caloric Intake

With a lot of questions, a lot of complaints, and severe trepidation I started Cat 2 today. Here are my experiences so far for W1D1:

Trepidation: How am I supposed to drop from 2200/day to 1000/day? Is it safe? Is it truly "starvation mode"?
My Answers:

• Starvation Mode - Being a former Jarhead I can speak somewhat to the military 1000/day diet. It sucks! Plain and simple. And, it does not kill you or weaken you in the short term. In the longer term you will be malnourished, burning muscle mass and start looking like you came from a death camp. Now remember, a typical military man in this situation is burning 4500 or more calories a day. Most of us will be lucky to hit 3000 in a day and we only do it for 4 days/week (not 30 days straight!) *AND* we should start seeing an increase in our caloric intake after a couple of weeks as we burn off layers (unlike a good grunt who is already in shape before facing a gauntlet).
• My 1000 calories today - I am currently just a little over 300 calories intake, consisting of a Nutrilite Cookies and Cream Whey Protein Bar, a Dr Blast XS, a Naranja Blast and a Perfect Water. My lovely wife is cooking up lunch which is a chicken stir fry and dinner tonight is salmon, steak and veggies. I'll post my MFP sheet for today, tomorrow after it is complete.

Caloric burn

Workout: I've been working out using a typical system of 3 sets of 10 reps (more or less) before I opted into the Adonis program. I tore the small vertical muscles between L3 and L5 back in April and stopped working out until last week. Picking up where I left off was a mistake as my triceps are total hamburger *before* working out today.

Today's Workout: If I understand the system correctly, each circuit has 3 exercises which are to be done back-to-back followed by a 1 minute rest. OK. I can do that. I am not *that* out of shape. Uh huh. Dream on lover boy. Here is my Endomondo capture with a heart rate monitor for today:

 

In my previous workouts I was burning about 400-500 calories and my zones were typically in Warm Up and Fat Burning. As you can see from today, I burnt over 1,000 calories and was in the next 2 higher zones; Aerobic and Anaerobic. Huge difference!

I've been using JeFit to track my workouts.  Unfortunately, for those days that are based on Circuit Training, JeFit is not the best fit.  However, after the fact I can fill in the workouts and then track reports on those days that are in the typical workout (bulking?) mode.  So, in the next post, you should be able to see day 1 & 2.

Insights

While I've been a little worried about a greatly reduced caloric intake – so far so good.

And to capture my starting point on this program, here is my first AI.