Motley Health's Fitness and Weight Loss Community

This entry is entitled, Here - The Starting Point, but I'm not altogether sure where Here is. I can look back and see where I've been; the trail is littered with diets (lots) and fitness campaigns (not so many).

Physically, right now. I'm lying on my bed flat on my back with the lap top balanced against my knees which are raised to offer a tressle. It's very comfortable here, exercising my fingers and my brain. Actually, anything more than that is really out of my comfort zone and that's a fundamental problem.

I'm fifty three. I like life a lot. I enjoy working and am very fulfilled. I don't want my life to end too soon but my choices don't reflect that desire. I'm overweight, fairly unfit and getting more so as the years pass. I have high blood pressure kept under some control with medication and am probably insulin resistant. All of this is some of Here.

I would like to go There, only I don't know where There is either. I'm a bit anxious about identifying where There is because, as soon as I do, I feel Failure starting to rub her hands together with glee as she savours the prospect of me falling flat on my face once again.

So, I'm going to stay Here a little longer and ponder where There might be. I'm not in any hurry to identify where exactly There might be, I'm just going to explore a little more of how I got Here on the basis of knowing that those who forget their past are condemned to repeat it.

i have just started jogging
can someone suggest me some good procedures for effective jogging.
food and liquid diet which i have to take.
please advice me

This evening I decided that it was time to start weight training again. I cannot remember the last time I did some weight training - according to this journal it was in April, just over 8 months ago. A shockingly long rest period!

Anyway, I headed off to the garage about an hour ago, and spent the first half hour attempting to make some room for training. Where as before my garage was kept clear of junk, over the last 8 months anything and everything seems to have been tipped in there. Boxes, dining chairs, garden chairs, an old kettle, carpet, carpet underlay, an old CRT monitor, some boxed of old toys, and even the box that the kitchen sink came in. I kid you not. The old sink was fortunately taken to the tip in the summer!

Once I had tidied, I prepared to get to work. That is when disaster struck. I had forgotten how much weight the bar could hold before tipping over. I removed 20kg from the right side, placed it on the floor, and then watched as the 7 foot bar tipped up, and the left end slide along before crashing through a shelf and breaking about 4 old Stella glasses (kept for parties) in the process. I did not inspect the damage any further for fear of what else I would find.

Also tonight, I realized that I have gotten weak. I am no longer at all strong. I am an utter wimp. I just want to make that clear before posting my workout, so that you do not have to!

After reading the various celeb workouts over on the main part of this website, I decided to try to follow one. However, me being me, I could not decide, so I did my usual routine. I was going to do the Bond workout, then I decided that the Batman workout would be better, but in the end I opted for a random assortment of exercises, and even made a couple up! I'll come to that in a moment.

My workout this evening:

Seated Shoulder Press:
20*10kg warmup
10*20kg
8*30kg
6*30kg

OK, so how am I doing? Once again I have hit some stumbling blocks. I managed to catch another bad cold, and that stopped me doing my new circuit training. I also spent a long weekend stuffing my face with chicken soup and chocolate to make myself better. The chocolate was purely to aid mental recovery!

I am still walking home from the railway station everyday as part of my Credit Crunch Fitness Plan. Total savings are about £200 each month (no bus, no morning coffee, cheaper breakfast, cheaper lunches, no kung-fu, less petrol). All adds up.

But there is good news! Yesterday I hopped on the scales after my wife decided to weigh herself, and I was surprised - actually shocked - to see that I had lost more weight. Not sure what the cause is though. I weighed myself again today, to make sure that last night was not just a freaky glitch, and I still weigh 95.2kg.

I think that the reason maybe a combination of diet and walking. As said, I am still walking about 45 minutes everyday working day. But also, I am on a wheat free diet. I spoke to a doc the other week, and he thinks that I have a wheat intolerance, so advised me to give up wheat to SIX MONTHS!!! I happen to think that that is a bit excessive. This means no bread, no pizza, no doughnuts, no cakes, no biscuits. Practically nothing. So my new daily eating regime is more or less:

Breakfast - porridge with raisins and honey / maple syrup
Lunch - jacket potato with some sort of chicken/meat stew on top
Supper - soup
Snacks - lots of chocolate "energy bars".

Last night I continued my exercises. Having done 5 press ups and 25 sits up two nights previous, I aimed to double that this time. To start, I managed my 5 press ups, and then only did 20 sit ups. After a 15 minute break, I attempted the 5 press ups again but fell one short, but reached my target of 20 further sit up. I would have gone for a third set, but it was time to cook and eat!

Watch out Mr Motley, once I introduce squats and/or star jumps into my routine, I'll be beating your 300!

Or another false start? Only time will tell.....

Inspired by Mr Motley himself, Jon, and his new circuit training routines, the competitive edge came out in myself. That edge has been laying dormant for a number of years, and only recently been awaken (see below). And with no more party food scheduled until Christmas, now is the ideal time to get into some form of shape.

So, what have I been doing in the year since my last blog entry? Not an awful lot, it has to be said. I am playing five-a-side football a lot more reguarly now, approximately once every two to three weeks. That's where the edge was rediscovered. Generally, the games I play are kick-arounds with work colleagues. There is running involved, obviously, but the game is played at a nice slow pace.

We entered into the company tournament in May. Seven teams, six games, top four through to semi-finals. After four games, we had won one and lost three. We were dead and buried. But two wins in our last two games gave us fourth place. We were tired, but had to play a semi final. We won that 1-0 against a team that really should have beaten us. They were getting really serious and started turning on each other. That's when I found the edge. That desire to win and be the best. And win we did. Somehow we managed to find the extra energy for the final, and came away 2-1 winners. To say I was shattered was an understatement. I finished that last game on will-power alone.

So, back to the present day. I've got three games of football lined up over the next month. No need to do any more there. But this circuit training looks a doddle, I'll give that a go....

It has been over a week since I did my first 300 workout circuit, as I managed to get another cold during the week that lasted until today. I was still feeling a bit run down today, but felt I had to do something.

I decided on a different approach tonight, to do 400 exercises in total, adding star jumps (jumping jacks) to the press ups, squats and sit ups. Also, I decided to do sets of 10 reps, with each circuit more intensive that last time, but with longer rest periods.

I did the first two circuits (80 exercises) of star jumps, squats, press ups and sit-ups and a relatively gentle pace. For the next circuits I started increasing the intensity, by adding jumps to the squats, and attempting claps on the press ups (all I actually managed was to get my hands a few cm off the floor).

I did 9 sets like this, and then on the 10th, as I was still feeling like I had some energy, I decided to work harder and to failure on the last set. So for the last set I completed, in quick succession, 70 star jumps, 50 squats (without jumps) 15 press ups and 25 sit-ups.

In total I managed to do 520 exercises, a massive 120 over the objective for the night! Well done me.

Although I am not actually trying to build my biceps, they have responded a little from the press ups (although surely mostly triceps?), which is why have have added a pic. Maybe I will add some curls into the workout later. There is a dummbell sitting under the bed unused.....

I plan to do the same again next time, hopefully in a couple of days. Maybe I will aim for 600!

Tonight I decided that it was time I took a new approach to my attempts at getting fit. As I have stopped kung-fu for now, I need to increase my body weight training. I walk a few miles every day during the week, and cannot run on my dodgy ankle at the moment, so some home circuit training is the answer.

This evening I decided that rather than just simply do 100 press ups, I would do an equal number of squats and sit-ups too.

It was a very tiring workout, but I split it up into bite size chunks, and updated my Facebook status as I went, which provided some encouragement, of sorts, from friends that were online. Actually the most common comments were along the lines of "don't think you stand a cat in hell's chance of doing the 300 haha" and, after doing my first 100; "You would have been 2/3 of the way there if you didn't stop to tell us all your progress!".

I started at 10.15pm, with 25 press ups, and finished at 11.08pm, with an impressive 15 press ups. I obviously took a lot of rests in between sets. The squats were relatively easy, the sit ups harder, and the press ups a killer near the end. But I did better than usual on the press ups. If anything, giving myself more time to recover, by doing sit ups and squats, must have helped.

But I got there in the end. And the workout is attached for all to marvel at!

My fitness plan went pear shaped, again. Last week my dodgy ankle flared up again, and that has put an end to my running home from the station. However, I am still walking everyday - 2.7 miles, or 45-50 minutes. The walk is tiring, and by time I get home I am all sweaty and my legs feel pretty tired too. Anyway, to supplement my walking, and also to try to make up for the fact that I am not going kung-fu, I have started my daily 100 press up challenge again.

I did this challenge last year, I think, or it could have been the end of 2006 thinking about it. Anyway, I did 100 yesterday, but admit only managed 30 today. My 100 involved doing 1 set of 20, followed by 6 sets of 10, and then as many as I could before failing each time, until I got to 100. The 100th was a single press up, as I failed on 99. It was tough, but enjoyable!

Also, I promised my wife that I would do some sun salutations with her too. And September is apparently "Yoga Month", so I really should give it a go. Never done a sun salutation, but they look like a good way to exercise. My wife "does 100's" every Sunday in her Ashtanga yoga class. She says that it is the hardest yoga that she has ever done - so it must be good!

Here is a bit more about the Sun Salutation, plus a YouTube Yoga clip