I have not been able to film any tutorials. I filmed an about me that this blog post is mostly about regarding my weight loss and training. It’s about 25 mins long. I’m taking other clips and photos I’ve done and adding those so it’s not so ‘blah.’ I need to really script what I’m doing more. I usually do two runs all the way through and the final is the version I use then if there’s something in the other two I can use I’ll pop that in as a cutaway.
I spent this week intermittent fasting and getting back to 16:8 or better on my fasts. I did very well with one day going to 21 hours. Intermittent fasting is super easy for me. I went shopping today and designed my eating for the week. I got in some basic workouts and designed my workout routines from this point on. I feel really good and I feel really good about my food and workout plan.
Basic summary: On Memorial Day 2018 I weighed 331 pounds and was willing to try anything. I went on “the potato diet” that Penn Jillette wrote about in his book Presto! and later Kevin Smith would go on. It was created by a man named Ray Cronise. You can watch his videos on YouTube including a TedTalk he did in 2010. The basics of the potato diet are: eat only potatoes any kind you want. Eat as many potatoes as you want through the day. You may not add nor take away anything from the potato. So you have to eat the peel and cannot add salt or butter, etc. You may eat them raw, baked, pan cooked, mashed, whatever. You do that for 2 weeks. After the first week you can add a little pepper. All you drink during this time is water. I did that.
I lost around 20-30 pounds the first 2 weeks and continued on eating better. I plateaued at 297ish and then would do this again for a month and dropped to 270 range. Eventually hitting 269. I then do what I do when I have stress and eat. Not but a few months ago I weighed 269. Then I stress ate and am back up to 292 right now. Yeah. That’s what I said too.
Food: I’m ok with eating the same thing over and over again. My wife is not. This time around I’m not going to eat just potatoes. I have a plan to eat mostly spinach, broccoli, cauliflower, and baby carrots (which are just regular sized carrots cut to look like they’re baby carrots). I can eat as many of those as I want during the my non-fast period. I’m going to stick any carb-rich foods at the front of the day. IF I need energy I have three options: oatmeal with some vegan protein and fiber, rice with diced tomatoes and chilis and black beans and spinach, or potatoes with diced tomatoes, chilis and black beans and spinach. Those are only if I need energy. When I hit a very low calorie diet (VLCD) I do very well. At one point, in 2018, I was eating about 300 calories a day and felt fantastic. I also have a lot of fat reserves since I’m 31% body fat and my BMI is 43 (I think). If I am going to eat any of the energy options those would come at the beginning of the day. I did some checking of all of the oatmeals on the market at the place I shop and they all had 24-27g of carbs so I chose Maple & Brown Sugar which has 4g sugar in it. I do have some egg whites so I can add protein if I want it. So…. that’s all for food.
Workouts: I am in a calorie deficit. If I ate one serving of everything I would still only have 858 calories during the day. I’m also going to be doing light workouts as I’ve done all week. That means I’m not going to go hardcore into TRX or weights like I have before. I’m going to do some TRX and weights, just not very heavy, for now.
I start my day with 20 min meditation. Followed by 15-20 mins of stretching (it’s not really yoga, as my yoga instructor wife will tell you. Stretching includes the basic calisthenic stretches: wrist rotation, knee rotation, hip rotation, shoulder circles, shoulder shrugs, neck rotation, wrist rotation, finger spreads, some carpal tunnel exercises, straight leg seated, figure 4 seated, standing touch-your-toes, frog stands. Frog stands aren’t really stretches they’re just a nice way to transition into wrist strengthening.
Wrist strengthening is next. As I said Frog stands, planche practice where I start with my hands in a planche position with fingers facing out leaning in a pushup then I rock back and forth and side-to-side to build up some wrist strength. I move my hands from under my shoulders down towards my hips to make it harder. Both in preparation for eventually trying the planche itself… you know when I weigh less and can pick up my fat ass and tree trunk legs.
I move on to parallettes where I sit stiff arm with my feet on the ground and hold for as long as I can. I then sit on the floor and push my body up, feet still on the floor. Then I unsuccessfully attempt tuck front levers and L-sits with curled legs.
From there I move on to grip strength. IcyMike on Hard2Hurt has some great advice for this that I’ll cover in future blogs and vlogs. If you want to know more check out his channel on YouTube then search for ‘grip.’ He also has some great advice about back strengthening especially my lower back. Check those out while you’re giving IcyMike some love on YouTube… that sounded less nawtay in my head.
I move on to stair jumps because I don’t have a plyobox and I’ve not built one. Which is ok because I can barely jump up one step. I have a theory that as I lose weight if I added a weight vest and every pound I lose I add weight that by the time I hit 200 with box jumps I could take off the vest and jump up to my roof. It’s just a theory.
In here somewhere I have #3 10 min bike rides on my stationary bike. If I’m on a conference call or watching videos of something I ride my stationary bike even if it’s slowly. For 30 mins a day it’s on the hardest resistance on the mag trainer and I push all out. I broke this down into the 10 min rides 3x a day.
Finally, because my shoulders are so weak and have been hurt often from years of playing hockey I do some FMA/Aikido/KM moves. The FMA strikes with sticks help keep mobility in my shoulders and with small weights on the end they do build up some strength while I’m doing something fun. Aikido moves I do look more like Tai Chi while I practice moves and remember what I’m doing with them. They also give mobility and flexibility while I cool down. And finally, I have some KM work I do from the workout portion of David Kahn’s first KM book. When I punch I punch an old army duffle bag I filled with old uniforms. It weighs 33 pounds and isn’t too tough on the outside so I can punch ok. I also use it to strike with sticks.
I also have a TRX Upper, TRX Lower, and TRX Core workout that are in other blogs that I do one set once a week. So TRX Upper on Monday, TRX Lower on Wednesday, TRX Core on Friday. I don’t push super hard just hard enough that when I talk I’m slightly out of breath. These originally came from the site smartfoodandfit.com however they are no longer there. So, when I get to the point I’m going to publish all of the links I’ll include the original exercises I’ve used for years.
I mete these out through the day so I’m not spending all of the time at once. I may get up from my desk once an hour and do some parallettes or try to drop from my pull up bar (bc I can’t do a pull up) or do frog stands. However, the meditation and stretching are always first for the day and take about 40 mins or so to finish. The rest, depending on what I’m doing on each day of the week can take another hour or so. Once I get really tired, they can take an hour and a half not including the 30 min of bike riding.
Sleep: I nearly forgot to add my sleep habits. My best sleeping time is between 12-2a going to bed and getting up at about 7 am CST (though it’s Daylight Savings now so we’re really CDT). That seems to be the time I optimally sleep and wake up at 7 on my own because of the sun shining through my window. It doesn’t seem like that much sleep. However, during this last week of intermittent fasting it’s been perfect the way it has been most of my life.
Summary: These food and exercises aren’t meant to be permanent and will change as I lose weight. The exercises are more to increase my cardio, add flexibility and mobility, and gain some strength. The food is more to help lose weight while eating the best I can. All of my food for the week cost about 46 USD (61 CAD, 74 NZD, 38 GBP) which includes some items that are going to last more than a week. I think it’s more important that I get built up on workouts and get down on weight and not push too hard right now until I’m ready to add more calories and my workout-fu is up to par. I’d rather workout 75% 5-7 days a week and not have burnout than work 100% 3 days a week and be so sore I don’t want to do it again. It’s not like I’m going to eat 3000 calories and go full gymbro. I also realize that this isn’t sustainable for too long (30-60 days). It’s a short term kind of thing. As I go, I’ll up the caloric intake with more veggies and maybe even add back some meats like chicken breast or swai. We’ll see.
I also will note that I’ve not been tired at all this week. I usually hit the afternoon lull and want to nap. Don’t tell anyone; there have been times I’d just fall asleep in my work chair and wake up like 30 mins later. That didn’t happen this week. As a matter of fact, I’ve had more energy this week than many weeks before. This is why I like intermittent fasting and eating “cleaner” and drinking boatloads of water (10 8oz glasses a day most days).
My next Workout Wednesday video (hopefully edited by this next Wednesday) will be the full 25 min with intercuts of each of these exercises and links to every other video I pulled this information from.
IN MY MIND BY WINK DOUBLEGUNS 