10-31-16 HY: Body Beast - Bulk: Chest + 10 Minute Trainer - Abs + Splits + TCF.

10-31-16 HY: Body Beast - Bulk: Chest + 10 Minute Trainer - Abs + Splits + TCF.


Today was an off day for me from work because Sunday, I had to work by attending the school festival.  It is the big event of the second semester and all the students were there manning their respective booths and such.  So I went to show support.  Thanks to that, I have today off! So, in the morning, I went to see the new movie Star Trek: Beyond with my tennis playing partner, who also like science fiction movies.  I'm not going to say anything about the movie except that I LOVED IT!!!!  The best movie I have seen in a long time.  Definitely worth another see, and buying the BluRay.  INDULGENCE DAY!!!  Today is the 31st.  So that means ice cream at Baskin Robbins is 31% off.  I have ice cream only on this day, so I went and had a double scoop of the seasonal ice cream.  It was delicious!  Motivated me to workout when I got home. 

Today, I restarted the Bulk phase again. This will be my third time around.  Also, this officially fills my worksheet dates. so today's workout weights are designated by a black dot.  The last time I went through this routine, I reduced my weights.  I stuck with those weights and I was able to really focus on my form and using the target muscles, my chest.  I really had to think about activating my pecs to get them to flex up the weights.  My reps were also a bit slower than Segi.  When I went fast, I found that I was not activating my pecs as effectively.  At the end of the routine, my chest was feeling really pumped, and even now, three hours after the workout, I'm still feeling the tension.  But I am getting ahead of myself.  On the first Super Set, Incline Fly and Incline Press, I used to use almost double that weight I used today, but I wasn't feeling my chest at all.  With a much lower weight and much more control, I feel the tension on the chest muscles. On the Press,  I'm still feeling a lot of tension in my inner shoulders than my chest, but at the top of the press, I am able to flex the chest muscles.  I like being in better control. The Force Set was really tough.  I can press more, but 17kgs is perfect for this particular set.  I really struggled to get the weights up on the last set.  Got a great burn.  Still a little too much on my shoulders, but it's getting better.  Progressive Set,  Almost failed on the increasing heavy weight, but had a better time with them coming down.  But the last set was brutal, but I got through it straight, no breaks.  I kept the weights also on the Combo Set.  I love this move because bringing the weight down, I really can flex my chest.  Great feeling when I'm working the chest.  On the Multi Set, I almost failed on each of the Decline Push-Up sets.  I was able to increase the reps on both of the other moves by a couple reps.  I again added the Band Uppercuts at the end.  This time, each rep had a static hold at the end.  Really finished off that awesome pump.  I did up the band tensions though by one level up.  Plus, I used my other set of bands on the middle tension.  That static hold at the top of each rep really gave me the pump I wanted.  Great routine!

I was thinking of going to Ab Ripper X, but I have plenty of time to get to that level, so this week, I decided to go with 10 Minute Trainer - Abs.  Now that I have worked on my form with Brett and Chalene, I wanted to increase the intensity on this nice routine and see if I could push the burn even more.  NAILED IT!!! Huge burn.  But huge burn on the shoulders as well with all those plank/ab moves in the middle of the routine.  Tony transitions so fast here, and I need time to re-position my mat so I won't kick stuff in my room.  The routine ended up being 18 minutes.  But the burn was real.

The Splits and Flow were right on point.  Getting low and deep little by little.

In the end, I torched an awesome 1123kcals.  Great burn for a resistance day.  With all the tennis I'm doing on my cardio days, I'm sort of wondering when I'll get to finish Combat.  I still have about 3 weeks left to complete the Warrior schedule.  But it will get done.

10-30-16 HY: Tennis + Splits + TCF.

10-30-16 HY: Tennis + Splits + TCF.

Today ended up being a tennis day because my wife wanted to play. YEAH!!! So, we went and played tennis.  As before, I got a good workout, not from running all over the place, but from maintaining longer rallies.  My wife has improved a lot and our rallies have become much longer.  It is my job to keep the ball in play and return everything I can.  My wife is working on her strokes and placement.  So, yes, once in a while I have to run for a shot, but for the most part, we kept the ball in play.  I don't go for kill shots, but I try to place my shots where she can practice her strokes and footwork.  This time, we brought our basket of balls and I drilled her a bit on down the line and cross-court shot placement.  She was just swinging without purpose before, but now she has some understanding of how to place and direct shots.  Great time with my wife exercising together at something we really enjoy.

After getting home, and before my shower, I did my splits.  Felt good.  I was able to push more.  I added a couple more minutes to my routine to stretch out my inner thigh because I'm still too tight there.  But I'm definitely getting looser.  The Flow was also right on point.

In the end, I torched 920+kcals.  My favorite way to exercise is with family and sports!  Today was awesome!

10-29-16 HY: Body Beast - Bulk: Shoulders + ChaLEAN Extreme - I've Got Abs! + Splits + TCF.

10-29-16 HY: Body Beast - Bulk: Shoulders + ChaLEAN Extreme - I've Got Abs! + Splits + TCF.

I wanted to workout on Friday.  I had a half-day off and got home around 1pm.  I was feeling really tired though when I got home so I relaxed for a spell.  Then, my wife asked me to drive her around town to complete some of her errands.  I agreed.  But when she saw how tired I was, she started to insist that she could go alone.  So I insisted back and so we went.  It ended up being very productive, fun and some nice together time.  We got back too late for me to start a workout so Friday ended up being my off day. 

Saturday night Bulk!  That is the name of the game.  After church I took a short nap, only about an hour, and when I woke up, I was not feeling in the mood to do anything strenuous.  But I knew I had to get it done, I got to it.  Luckily, Bulk Shoulders is a short workout.  This was another routine that would require me to be brutally honest with my strength level.  So I reduced the weight on a few moves by an average of 2.5kgs.  The first move on the beginning Super Set, Lateral Raise, I kept it at that level.  That move has always been tough for me.  Also, whenever I tried heavier weights, my right shoulder would start to click, and I would feel some pain, sort of like cracking my knuckles to hard.  So, I kept it at the same level.  But the second move, Arnold Press, I was always going too heavy and needing a lot of cheats to get the heavier weights up.  So I went down... way down.  Set 1: 13.25kgs to 10kgs, Set 2: 14.5kgs to 12kgs, Drop Set: 17kgs/15.75kgs to 14.5kgs/13.25kgs.  That was a huge drop, but I was finally able to get the heavy weights up without cheating, but it was still really tough. I almost hit failure.  I have always been pretty good with the Upright Row, so on the Progressive Set, I kept the same weights.  It wasn't too heavy, but my stamina, or lack of stamina showed.  I was able to finish, but not without some short mid-set breaks on the declining round.  The next Super Set of Alt. Front Raise and Plate Twist-Twist, remained the same, but with the Alt. Front Raise I felt I could probably go up a little on the light and medium sets, but the heavy set was just under failure level. The Progressive set with the Reverse Fly was somewhat a question. I've always had trouble with the reverse fly, especially with the heavy weights.  So, I decided that in order to keep form, I would reduce the weights a bit.  So, I went back to the first weight levels I used way back in February and March.  So on the ascending: 5kgs/6.25kgs/7.5kgs to 4kgs/5kgs/6.25kgs.  Descending followed suit in reverse, heavy first.  The ascending heavy weight was heavy, and my range of motion suffered.  But on the descending, after the short break, I was able to keep form on the heavy weight.  It fell apart a little on the last few reps of the medium weight, but the light weight was okay, but I got a huge burn which necessitated a couple quick mid-set breaks.  But range of motion didn't suffer.  On the final Super Set, the Superman Stretch was fine, and I increased my reps on both sets of the Plank Twist-Twist by 2reps over the last time, 38/40.  Shoulders were feeling so pumped.  I was happy to get it done.

Today is the end of the week, but the beginning of my workout week.  So I was wondering if I should go up to the next level of Abs or not.  I decided to stick with Chalene for one more day and them move up to Tony for my next round of Abs.  I felt better with my abs today.  Some of the more intense moves saw better form, and slightly wider range of motion.  Push Ups were choice, and the weighted moves seemed better, but I still got a huge burn by the 5 minute mark.  I feel ready to move on next time.  Maybe I'll go to Ab Ripper X.

Post-Off-Day Splits have always been more painful than regular days, but today, the pain didn't last as long, and I was able to hit my mark a lot sooner, So I was very happy.  I increased the hold times and the rep count on the inner thigh stretches so I'm pushing harder to open up my hips more.  I'm "millimetering" lower and lower. Just over two months to go.  Flow was good. Just one hiccup one the second round.  Accidentally went the wrong direction on the second move, but I just went and started over.  Perfect from there.

In the end, I torched 873kcals.  Pretty much what I expected from Bulk Shoulder.  Not using a lot of big muscle groups, so I'm happy with the burn.  Nice way to start my week.

10-27-16 HY: Body Beast - Bulk: Arms + ChaLEAN Extreme - I've Got Abs + Splits + TCF.

10-27-16 HY: Body Beast - Bulk: Arms + ChaLEAN Extreme - I've Got Abs + Splits + TCF.

I've been fooling myself on the Bulk: Arms routine for a while now.  But I'll get to that in a bit.  The routine started of fine with the Progressive Set of Standing Curls.  I kept the same weights as before, and when fresh, that weight was fine.  Needed just a tiny bit of body motion to get them up on the last couple reps.  And the next Single Set of Triceps Extensions.  But I was struggling on the last few reps of the last set. By this point, my arms were feeling so pumped. But I didn't want to feel like I was dying too much so I went down on the Force Set by 1.25kgs.  It made a big difference.  I was able to finish, and almost fail with no mid-set break.  I went down more on the next Single Set of Skull Crushers.  I remember struggling too much last time, so in order to keep form, I went down 1.25 - 2.5kgs.  But this is where I had the biggest change.  On the last two Progressive Sets for the biceps and triceps.  All the times before I knew my form was terrible on the Hammer Curls.  Segi said to keep my elbow connected to my leg, but starting from the middle of the medium ascending weight, my elbow was off my leg, and on the descending round, I was basically swinging the weights up and letting them fall down.  So, no more fooling myself with weights that were too heavy, I went down to my threshold so I could keep good form.  So This is it: 6.25kgs to 5kgs on the light weight. 8.25kgs to 6.25kgs for the medium weight, and them the heavy weight was 12kgs to 7.5kgs.  This time around, I was able to keep my elbow on my leg the entire time... almost.  Just on the last few reps it came off a bit, but I didn't swing the weights up at all.  I believe I had good clean form almost the whole set.  I didn't stand either.  I was in complete control the whole time.  That goes for the Triceps Kick Backs as well.  Same weight decrease.  My form was way better.  But on the last half, my lats were burning from keeping the dumbbell up for so long.  I felt the most pumped I have felt in a long time.  Definitely more pumped than the last time around.  Doing the Body Beast style routine as compared to the P90X style routine,  I was able to lift more weights on all the single sets.  The Super Sets, Progression Sets, Force Sets is so different.  But the pump was awesome!  On the final Set of Weighted Crunches, I, again did it twice with a 12kg weight.  First, I did it with the weight on my chest.  Easy 30 reps.  Then, on the second set, I did 30 reps, but in a different count.  Ab were burning so back so I ended up doing a 10-10-5-5 progression to get the full 30reps.  In the cool down, I could really feel the pump and burn.  After Burn Effect was in full effect.  I felt the pump for over half the day.  Great to do workouts in the morning.  I fill the last space on this worksheet, so I circled today's weights so there wouldn't be and confusion.

I had not time, so I went right into Abs.  Third round of "I've Got Abs" and man was it tough.  I went back up to 10kgs on the weighted crunches and had a good struggle.  I didn't go full tilt like I did the last time.  I didn't want to burn out before the end. So I paced myself and I was still able to get a great ab BURN.  I was especially happy with the weighted Oblique crunch.  I was able to keep my legs straighter than before.

The Splits and Flow had to weight until after work.  But today, I took the time to do them before going to my night class.  So I was able to just relax after my night class.  First time for me to try that schedule, and I think I like it.  I got a little sweaty, but I wiped quickly as the beads of sweat were forming so I wiped quickly. 

In the End, after the morning session, I torched 803kcals.  Felt really great though. 

10-26-16 HY: P90X2 - Recovery and Mobility + Splits + TCF.

10-26-16 HY: P90X2 - Recovery and Mobility + Splits + TCF.

I have been sore in so many different places this past week.  Not a bad kind of sore, but the good kind.  The kind of soreness that motivates instead of hinders.  But I was really looking forward to today and the foam rolling.  The routine went well, and I was able to do all the stretches and mobility exercises.  Today, I had the time, so I more than doubled the foam rolling part of the routine.  I also did some new positions with the foam roller.  Oh, and today, I switched foam rollers from the Rumble Roller to the regular roller.  And I was still able to find a lot of hot spots.  I also hit more of the front of my legs, shins and quads.  I also spent a lot of time on my shoulders since they are the most tender today.  Felt really good afterwards.  Then is was shower shave and shine, and off to work.

Splits and Flow came at the end of the day.  Good painful session.  I'm increasing the time to give me more push time.  I'm so close to the floor, I know I'll get there eventually, but these last few inches are the toughest.  So I may need to add not only time, but morning or early stretching.  Stretch multiple times a day.  Formulating a plan.

In the end, (of the morning X2 workout) I burned a nice 320+kcals. Back to resistance tomorrow morning.

10-25-16 HY: Body Beast - Bulk: Back + ChaLEAN Extreme - I've Got Abs + Splits + TCF + Spooky Challenge 4.

10-25-16 HY: Body Beast - Bulk: Back + ChaLEAN Extreme - I've Got Abs + Splits + TCF + Spooky Challenge 4.

I was feeling a little off all day.  Probably because I didn't get much sleep last night.  But when I got home from work, I was feeling extremely lazy and didn't feel like doing anything.  So I sat on the couch and just relaxed.  But, a thought hit me, that if I can get my workout done early, I can get to bed earlier and hopefully catch up on some sleep.  So that served as enough motivation to get me up and off my butt.  The workout got my engine running and I was feeling good.

Bulk Back is a good short, sweet and intense workout.  I didn't need to lower my weights because they were set at just the right level to almost burn me out even on the heavy end.  I didn't hit total failure on any of the moves, but the third round of Pull Ups came close.  I paused ON THE BAR at rep 9, but muscled it out.  The Progressive set was awesome.  It was good because I was able to make the plate switch quickly so I could keep pace with Segi.  Force Set was also great. Burned it up by the fourth set, and really had to push on the fifth set for both arms.  The Single Set Dead Lift, was probably the toughest move.  I was breathing really heavily because my legs were in on it.  The final Super Set was good.  The second set of Reverse Flies was brutal.  I had to bend my arms to get the weights up.  And on the final move, on the first set, I got my rep count back up to 12reps.  I was really trying to activate my back and lats, as Segi was talking about.  I could really feel them work it.

I moved quickly to abs.  I went to the limits of my range of motion on the first 2-3 moves and that just totally burned me out.  I was burning out almost midway through each move.  The killer move was the vertical ankle touch.  SCREAM!!! Man, that was tough.  Great burn and pump on the core!

I went right to the Splits, and it felt really good.  I was happy to get low again.  Then the Flow was nice, clean and smooth.  Then I remembered that today was the deadline for the 4th Group challenge, so I sucked it up and hammered out 2 rounds of the warm up, and then 3 rounds of the workout.

In the end, I torched 1077kcals.  Another great workout.

10-24-16 HY: Pickleball + Splits + TFC.

10-24-16 HY: Pickleball + Splits + TFC.

Tennis Day.... Not!

It would have been tennis day, but since I got the Pickleball Set a few weeks ago, I've been wanting to play.  So, I asked my tennis partner if he wanted to give Pickleball a try.  He said "sure".  I went early to the gym to set the net up.  I thought it would be the same configuration as the net I played with at my parent's home, but it wasn't.  So I had to take a little more time to figure out how it all went together.  I eventually got it, but it took more time that I was hoping it would.  Anyway, I got the paddles and balls out and started bouncing a ball on the paddle and the sound reminded me of what I first thought of that sound.  I thought that my playing partner would think similarly.  I took a little time to explain the basic rules that I knew and we started rallying.  Unlike tennis, we started off pretty intensely.  After just about 10 minutes or so, we decided that we should start playing a game.  Once the game started, we threw it into high gear.  The rallies were awesome.  More good shots than mishits.  This was a lot more movement than when I played in the US.  Singles and Doubles are so different.  We ended up playing four and a half games.  He took the first game, 11-15, then I came back and took the next three games, 15-10, 15-6, 15-13, and I was in the lead in the fifth game when we had to stop because of the time, 7-4.  As in the US, I burned more calories playing Pickleball than I did playing tennis.  The action just didn't stop.  Once the ball was served, whether the rally was long or short, we got it going.  It was a really intense session.  At the end, he was really excited about Pickleball, for which I was very happy.  He even said that he wanted to play next week as well.  So, it seems that we may take a little break from Tennis and play more Pickleball.  Ideally, I hope that we can alternate between Tennis and Pickleball.  One thing I forgot to mention was the fact that I was feeling a lot of muscle soreness from the Leg Day.  But I wasn't dying, and I could still move.  But I would really feel it in the evening.

The Splits and Flow came in the evening.  And boy did I ever feel the soreness come on then.  I took me a lot longer to get down to the mark, and I wasn't really able to reach it until the very end.  I felt really sore and tight tonight.  But I'll keep pushing through.  My knee didn't feel too bad, but I felt it when I was doing balistic ankle stretches on my left.  My right leg was bent and serving as the anchor and my knee was feeling that hold position.  But I eventually got a good stretch, hit my splits, and Flowed out.

In the end, after Pickleball, I torched 1100+kcals.  Very competitive and intense.  Great day!