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Friday end of day

Well this was a workout that I wasn´t sure would be happening. It was late Friday, there was a group of colleagues wanting to kick off the weekend, I wanted to get home and chill, it was again one of the tools in place that "saved the day" - earlier that day I had went to lunch with my previous team to farewell one of the members who is leaving. It wasn´t a perfect meal - by fitness standards - but it still had a decent portion of lean protein (chicken), white rice and a small portion of salad. OK, the chicken came dipped in a bowl of sauce, the rice was fried boiled, I had an eggplant starter with yogurt sauce and bread nan. But the key take away: you don´t throw out a good chance to improve a little bit more just because every single thing isn´t perfect. I felt like skipping the workout, since I hadn´t entirely stuck to the food part of it, but for my own accountability / demise / good, my training partner was at the very restaurant we entered to have our meal!

So we talked briefly, when I wasn´t too keen on training later in the afternoon, James did what a good training partner will do: he called me on my sh#t. I tried to get an easy way out for the late afternoon, he put a face on that immediately signaled to me "What are your goals with fitness for the year?". I later realized he was right doing that, and I thanked him for it.

Just because all the starts aren´t aligned like you´d want them to, doesn´t mean you should dump all of your fitness plan for the day, out the window! These little habits creep up on me every now and then, I am no different than the next person. This is what Life is called, dealing with every day practicalities and not letting yourself stand down at the sight of something that doesn´t seem immediately confortable. This takes me to a broader topic, which is goal setting.

You see, I am approached quite a few times with questions regarding training / fitness and I´ve had the chance to learn that the emphasis of the majority of questions usually relies on what´s a good "whatever-goes-here". Hey Simão, can you please advise me on what´s a good gym to go workout around here?  What´s a good exercise for X body part? What´s a good food to lose / gain weight? Train with weights or bodyweight? In the professional realm and due to me being a graphic designer, that switches over to "what´s a good color / font / effect to put here". How do I make this blink the most in Photoshop? I say the question is based on a false principle. Or at least relative to where you are in the continuum of your own process.

The current state of affairs in the World has us all swirling around these trains of thoughts that implicate quick answers, an ever increasingly faster solution, pills for this, powders for that, save your life gadgets, an un-endable list of things, tricks, tips and licks. It´s usually a setup to think you can counteract your own action that was compunded over a period of time, with one quick turn. It´s a flawed starting point, from which you will have slim to none probabilities to overcome. What I´ve come to realize on various levels of existence, is that everything I´ve achieved took its amount of time and dedication to prove worthy having aquired. Or perfect it, when it comes to a skillset.

OK, let´s not get too caught up in philosophical theories and tie this right in with our main point for today: set yourself a goal for the day, you´ll likely last a week, month, whatever a midnight New Years Resolution takes to wear off. But tie your goal with what, who and how you are, you will get a direction for life. There are no substitutes for accountability, there are no coaches who will keep you more truthful than yourself. Give yourself a strong compelling huge WHY, and you can be sure of this: the HOW will find its way into manifestation. Give yourself a goal that resonates with what you are here to accomplish as a person, make it a part of your life, let it be you. Your results will show up. In our case, I was nicely "coherced" into looking at my goals again. In the end, it wasn´t James who kicked my butt into the gym. It was my having a purpose, it was me who went and trained, it was me who put in the sweat.

When you are setting goals properly, use whatever means you have at your disposal. Your goals success greatly depend on the people, environment, social and professional context you gravitate in, as well as your inherent habits and personality. When setting goals and objectives, make sure you throubleshoot yourself - James came as a very handy tool last Friday, like so many times before I was able to be of the same use to him. Had I not decided to train with him, I would be without a safety net on days like last Friday. This is the 2nd time I will say James is a story for another day, we´ll get there.

Nutrition is another tool that will maximize my half hours to 40 mins in the gym, outside of it! Know when to train, laziness does not equal fatigue, learn to discern one from the other. Strategize: we are currently back to training rythm, after all the breaks and travelling (I´m Portuguese, James is English), we both went back to our Natal countries and took a break out of the training / nutrition schedule. Next, we are starting to measure. Implement principles of progression, every 2-3 weeks. 1 week / 1 cycle around the body (complete routine for all body parts) at maximum effort, 1 more week to let yourself catch up. So on, so forth.

Have your strategy figured out, have your timeline layed down, know when you are making these goals happen. What it takes from you on a daily level, what does that translate into time wise, how are you fitting it into your day? Know the tools at your disposal, get used to them in real time, don´t wait forever. Immediate action is better than delayed perfection. If you give yourself the chance to fail 7-8 times out of a hundred, you´re still 93% better than you were!!! Now, you set a no-tolerance policy in whatever goal you set, set yourself up for failure with a 100% comply philosophy and you´ll be headed into a frustration mode because you couldn´t keep up with the strict rules you caged yourself into. A great plan is only as good as your ability to commit and execute it.

I myself am guilty of letting this happen in some areas of my life. I am setting up a business, so all too often I catch myself doing this very thing. I adopt an all or nothing posture, which works well within the first 4-5 times you are trying to implement a habit. I let me determine what me will do this for x amount of time, without properly realizing all learnings need its time, place and don´t go as you envisioned all the time. Let yourself learn at your own pace, be kind to yourself.

This is what I am saying: have a goal, have tools to assist you in reaching your goal. Do not take the easy way out, you will congratulate yourself after you didn´t. Know your outcomes, what is it that you want to have happen. Use strategies and learn to personalize your solution. Have fun in the process.

Me and James went in for an arms training session. We used 3 supersets to combine antagonistic muscle groups, such as the biceps and triceps, in reverse order. As per goals set, I did some more abs work at the end. The whole time in the gym did not exceed 45 mins.

Superset 1:

Bench closed grip triceps press + EZ bar presses (10-12 reps)

(45sec - 1 min rest)

Superset 2:

Press down rope triceps + closed grip EZ bar 2x7 partial reps+7 full reps

(45sec - 1 min rest)

James pumping blood into those bis

Superset 3:

Over head rope cable extensions (15-20 reps) + lying hammer rope curls

(45sec - 1 min rest)

Project Abs made sure I included 3x15 reps of ball crunches with elastic bands.

Could you find flaws in this system? Of course! My nutrition for that day was not perfect, James hadn´t eaten the regular 5 meals up to that point in the day. We didn´t record results and measure them against previous. Some days the will to do it is not entirely there, Life is still happening in the background.

BUT - here´s the most important thing: WE WENT IN AND TRAINED, despite everything we still did more than the version of me that skipped training that day due to Friday party, or because the feeling wasn´t there. We still did more and faster than 90% of the people in the gym. How? Well, that´s smart training... Keep checking back to see what you can apply in your routines to avoid the general misconceptions that you need to train longer to achieve better results.

Until then, go set some goals!

Shoulders day, 3rd of Project Abs

Day 3 of Project Abs happened yesterday, quick run out of the office to go in for a workout with James at lunch time. Do not use lack of time for an excuse, if you really want it, you will find a way to do it. James poked me to come in and get a workout (See one of the tools I told you about 2 posts ago? Here it is in action). 3x15 crunches to finish a 25 min intense workout, we took care of shoulders.
The plan: 3 sets of military press (10 reps) supersetted with dumb bell side raises, on to dumb bell front raises + bent over dumb bell flies also superset and also within 12 reps and to celebrate old times sake (when I used to train with an Argentinian coach), we did a coordination / strength / balancing movement. Standing up paralel to the cable, hold a dumb bell with the inside hand hand, the one closer to the cable. With your free hand, which should be the outside one, grab the cable and drag it in front of you to full stretch all the way across your body. It should go like this: start to squat laterally, raising both arms up. The arm holding the cable willbe slightly lower, opened and in line with your torso. The dumb bell should be all the way up, inside arm stretched.

I will come back with a video for this one, as it apparently is harder to perform than one might initially think (try describing it with words). I went and included a set of abs at the end of each superset or exercise. So I end up doing exercise one, exercise 2 (if supersetting) and then exercise 3 (the abs exercise) in a non rest in between mode. This way, you keep your muscle fully pumped with blood, you work more to perform the exercises as you are getting increasignly tired, accelerate your hear rate thus adding to the fat burn, get your abs in the circuit and you save time off your total time in the gym.
Which totalled 40 mins, not bad. How many of the regular gym going guys can tell you they perform a session, do some cardio and still get ab work in? I´ll tell you... Not that many;)

Project Abs underway

Hey there!

By the time these are posted, they´ll be yesterdays news :) Here´s today´s workout, back was the main focus of our session, starting it off with medium barbell rows 10 reps (pronated grip) + 10 reps (supinated grip) superset fashion, on to some cross cable overhead lat pull down to vary the angle on the muscle fibers being hit, on to one hand medium cable row + bent over overhead cable bar extensions (10-12 reps). We finished things off with some shrugs. At the end, I cramped my abs up with 3 sets of 15 reps on the medicine ball, holding the cable bar up and crunching it in.

Have a great day!

Project Abs

Here´s 2013, this will be as big as the courage to create it!
Kicking off Project Abs! This is one of my goals for the coming year, result of many peaks and valleys in that area, I´ve decided to dedicate one year to making them look good - permanently. Never dedicated too much atention to that specific boy part, as I´ve pretty much kept active all my life, daily activities usually tend to keep them decent. It also reflects my choices in food when I don´t eat with care in mind, I´m also using this as another way of eating responsibly. So 2013 will be a year to prove what atention, dedication and consistency can do for my stomach region.

I´ll be asking for homework often, feel free to drop me a comment and assign an exercise for the day. My commitment in this process is, to not leave the gym every time I enter for a session, without adding something on top of my regular workout schedule. Something abs related, that is. If you have an exercise, a question, doubt, you have something to interact in this project. Many times I am approached and asked about fitness / nutrition / training, so here´s a way of explaining what I do with my training and what works for me. I´m not claiming to be a God in this subject, but I do have considerable experience, considered expertise by definition and a will to help all who come for advise. A video / photograph will be added (almost) every day, it´s one of the tools I am using currently for accountability. My partner is another tool :) James and I started training a year ago, crossing paths and coming together on the gym. But this will be another post.

Please visit regularly, if you feel these posts can somehow be of help, I´d like to know if you are taking something out of this. My experience has been that we all share one (at least) little commonality, I mean ALL of us. The breath of subjects in this blog may not all be in fitness, but it will be about creating a better___ (fill in the blank). Fitness being one of my passions, I have been sufficiently asked about it to start a recording process to give my friends, peeps or fellow humans, something back.

Enjoy.

Aqui está o início de 2013, com desejos de que seja um ano tão grande como o desejo de o criar! Arranco com o projecto Abs, terá a duração de um ano e é resultado de subidas e descidas em forma nesse local tão específico. Nunca persegui desenvolver esta parte do corpo por ser no meu caso uma questão de uso inerente. Ao fazer as actividades que normalmente fazem parte do meu dia, desporto incluido, acabam por tomar conta de sí próprios e com mais ou menos atenção, dá para manter um certo controlo de como estão regularmente.

Este ano, a par de outros projectos que tenho para atingir, vão requerer atenção, dedicação e constância. É agora uma parte do meu corpo à qual vou dar ênfase. Já o fiz com pernas (quando o direcionei para a práctica de Basketball), peitorais (flexões são o exercício mais completo para este grupo, qualquer sítio a qualquer hora) e braços com super séries. Costas desenvolveram por “simpatia”, pois a quantidade e variedade de actividades e esforços a que os grupos circundantes foram submetidos, tornou o seu crescimento como único caminho a tomar.

Portanto está aqui, um dos objectivos para este enorme 2013! Let the games begin, é um desafio a que se podem juntar quantos queiram. Cada dia vou solicitar de alguém que me dê uma “tarefa abdominal” para desempenhar. Cada dia em que entrar no ginásio, não vou sair sem ter passado algum tempo sem ter feito algo, sobre o que existe no programa. Isto quer dizer, nem que sejam 20 repetições no fim de um dia de um outro grupo muscular, será algo que tem presença marcada nas minhas sessões. Está traçado um dos objectivos! 

Um enorme 2013!

Braços (in)dobráveis

Bela descoberta do passado, este Vince Gironda. Com o entrar do novo ano e renovados objectivos, encontro-me a repensar proporção, relação, na maneira como se percepciona um físico dito equilibrado nas suas dimensões. Qual é o elemento? Quais são as metrías? Que relação altura - largura?

Toda esta ansiedade que se vive a quase todos níveis tem-nos numa rodinha de hamster, á procura do próximo modelo, de uma versão mais rápida, o patch mais recente, mais tamanho, mais tamanho, querer mais grossura, mais mais mais.... Algo de errado no pensar a que somos levados. Umas semanas para a tomada de consciência de que começa aqui, fui procurar alguma razão aos pais daquele que foi um movimento alternativo, incompreendido e de certa forma ostracizado - Vince Gironda é o nome que atravessa 20 anos de campeões, nomes, autores. Polémico como só ele, dá-me mais e mais impressão a cada dia que passa que era um ermita fechado no seu Mundo, poucas certezas lhe escapavam. Independentemente do aval das então vozes no mundo fitness.

Desde o Jon Benson que me deu tremendo gozo ser diferente dentro do ginásio. Dá a sensação de que algo está fora de lugar, no entanto os resultados consubstanciam a evidência de que ser considerado "normal" num contexto de doença é tudo menos bom. Transpondo a filosofia para fora da sala onde o aroma tão localizado e o (eventual) esforço de um ou outro, encontro novamente princípios que têm paralelismos com a "ciência da construção do corpo". É algo que me dá grande serenidade de alguma maneira, me faz sentir que uma diferença pode ser algo tão positivo como inspirador. É quase como ter um poder. Poder que neste instante se resume ao temporário incómodo, fruto de 30 anos "cá à frente" haver ainda (ou cada vez mais, não sei até que ponto não há um neo-Girondismo) uns poucos maluquinhos dispostos a mover-se de maneiras muito distintas das massas que se arrastam para dentro da próxima hora e meia de social clubbing. Porra, doiem-me os braços! Tem sido um reviver, uma viagem imaginada adaptar a mentalidade de quem desbravou mato à catanada. Lê-lo tem sido um sonho guiado, transpô-lo para a realidade uma surpresa (des)agradável no fim de cada sessão. Bom, e há uma mudança de estado, muito prontamente anunciada.

Se é, e como é, acerca de sair da zona de conforto pois aqui me tenho há dias. Para continuar a explorar, este senhor.

Ponto de partida 2012

Ombros: 1,33m
Peito / costas: 1,18m
Cintura: 1,05m
Perna: 0,61m
Braço: 0,38m

Está aí, vamos a isto.