The Sideshow Freaks Fitness Thread

[Snake Plissken]

I actually really liked lifting when I did it before and it was one of those things that felt really good to get back into, upon going to the gym again. It's kind of funny because, maybe it's growing up the fat kid, but I always dreamed of being the dude with the 6 pack; yet, in my mind, it was always somebody else looking back at me in the mirror; like I was stepping into somebody else's shoes, but, for the first time in my life, I look on the mirror and I feel like that could be me; I can see that being me. I realize getting to that level with such a low percentage of body fat takes a lot of time, effort, and dedication, but I just feel like, for once in my life, I would like to tap into whatever potential there is and just, like, use every ounce of it.

Calorie counting is one of those things that I feel like you get good at over time. I have My Fitness Pal and stuff like that on my phone, and there are some weeks where I'll be logging every meal religiously and others where I can eyeball it and tell pretty accurately if I've had enough. I'm 6', so, my goal is to get down to 190 and then build myself back up to about 200.

6 packs are overrated. Sure they are nice to have, but focus on one step at a time. Once you get down to a good bodyfat percentage, they're easy to have poke through. You can hammer the **** out of them multiple times a week to have a washboard stomach. At least in my experience that is. I'm more focused on losing fat right now than working on my abs. I only train them once a week. I used to do it three with a total of say 400 crunches (different variations throughout)

I'd give an arm for the gains you'll get when you start seriously weightlifting. After awhile, it becomes an agonizing slow process. Doing it right, you could gain 10lbs of muscle in a year when you're starting out.

I like how people say "oh it's hard not eating." Try eating ALL THE TIME. Although when your metabolism kicks in, it's easy to do. I'm starving every hour and a half nowadays.

 

[Snake Plissken]

After taking a break from working out for 6 months!(!), I finally resumed my workout routine after I was out of breath shipping out a statue, mortified that I could carry much heavier stuff all the way to the post office last year with ease.

The worst part was never the sore muscles or difficulty sleeping, it's maintaining the routine while balancing work. Here's hoping I'll finally commit!

It's good you're back at it, you just gotta stay on top of it. Even just a few times a week will keep you balanced and you'll have more stamina. I've gotten lazy over the last year or so since my knee issues are pretty demoralizing, but I've been going ham at it for about 2 months now.

 

[Jameson Rook]

It's good you're back at it, you just gotta stay on top of it. Even just a few times a week will keep you balanced and you'll have more stamina. I've gotten lazy over the last year or so since my knee issues are pretty demoralizing, but I've been going ham at it for about 2 months now.

Yeah, I won't make any excuses on why I left because honestly, nothing is better for your overall well being than working out and you feel like **** if you don't. You feel better, you look better, your brain works better and you get compliments. I implore anyone who's procrastinating to just go for it.

 

[Snake Plissken]

Yeah, I won't make any excuses on why I left because honestly, nothing is better for your overall well being than working out and you feel like **** if you don't. You feel better, you look better, your brain works better and you get compliments. I implore anyone who's procrastinating to just go for it.

I wish I got into it 10 years earlier than I did. Spent half my life 50lbs overweight.

 

[Bgnyc007]

It's been a week on my meal prep and cardio after work, weights during the day. No weight loss but I see a difference in my core and abs showing up more. I actually feel like I have more energy. I've always been a fit dude but the definition is showing up more.

 

[Snake Plissken]

Yeah, scales lie to you. You'd have to use one of those water tanks to get a true answer as to your bodyfat. As long as you see results, keep at it.

 

[FriendlySamurai]

It really does. I'm not totally sugar free, but one of the best decisions of my life was cutting out regular pop. The Diet stuff gives me a fix when I need it, though I realize it's probably ****ing up my liver, but there are periods where I'll drink nothing but water and you just feel so much better. I realize there are other things about soda that are terrible for you, but the sugar was always just a massive weight, and, if I'm being honest, that was probably the biggest contributor to my weight over the years.

Awesome man, yeah i love water. I actually lucked out in that department. Back in high school my family was broke so i got $10 a week for lunches. I lived off the dollar menus and figured out I could order twice the food if I just drank water. I love it. People say it has no taste and they add the flavor stuff bleh... crazy. Only time I ever drink coke is occasionally with pizza. Otherwise dont even like the stuff.

Soda really is a nice racket. All that sugar hides the salt they add to it, combined with the caffiene (a diuretic) you have great little repeat customer business going. *******s Not to mention all the rest of the sludge in it. For instance the sodium benzoate, by itself not too bad but forms benzene when mixed with vitamin c... nice!

Im just so sick of the crap the industry is pulling with our food. Ive been trying to overhall my diet and what I eat. Now that Im paying attention everywhere I turn around theyre screwing with it. Went to the store the other day wanted to get sweet potato fries cuz Im lazy making them and sweet potato is better than regular potatoes. I check out the label, 7 grams of sugar per serving... whuh?! At the top of the ingredient list- cane sugar. What did they do, puree it and add sugar to it in a vat then mold it back into a fry?? wth? My uncle told me the other day he got some peanut butter and at the top of the ingredient list was vegetable oil! So they robbed the peanut oil to sell on the side lol. My only advice for stuff that says diet is just go for the real thing in moderation. What they do to it to make it diet will probably kill you lol. I joke, but in all reality it did cause the current heart disease epidemic. (low fat, high sugar and carbs, no fiber). They say the avg American has 20-40 tsp of sugar daily and up to 1/4 their daily calories come from sugar. Its pretty nuts.

 

[BuffyGirl]

Since I'll be in LA in Sept - forever, I have been hitting up some places in TX I've been wanting to see before being gone. One of those places is Destination Dallas. I loved every bit of it.

First pic is me about to put the bar back on the rack after lowering the J-cups. Cause I'm short, they always need to be lowered. Loving the definition.


Next one is just me, showing bar placement to my trainee. that's a lie. Well, I was and then my ADD brain got distracted by something out of the window. Building leg muscle is HARD when you're a woman. The muscle is there so just have to continue the cut to really expose them. But this picture really shows me that my hard work in building them, is there. Good feeling.



Last is me showing depth. When weight is low enough, ATG is easier.



For me, personally, I only want to put on about 2 more pounds of muscle or so. I'm not looking to be crazy muscular. Just enough so I can keep eating more food. I want to cut to 18-19%% body fat and then back to bulking for about 6 months and then cut 1 more time, then maintain for life.

 

[Aliaz]

It's time to get cracking again and getting control of my calories. Been training 3 times a week this year but slowly started to eat to much again. It pretty much crept up on me since My wife has been forced to eat like crazy since she has been losing weight ever since she gave birth. Might not sound like a problem but she went down to 148 pounds before she turned it around and that is way to low for her since she is 6 feet tall. And without knowing it I've been eating to much, and like always all the weight goes to my gut.

Time to use the vacation for training

 

[batfan08]

Well, I'm here now.



Eventually after a long time spent logging food and weighing and measuring, you'll be able to see food amounts without having to do all of that. And you'll return to a normal way of eating. It took me about 2 years of proper tracking but I no longer track. And I'm still losing fat without issue.

As for weight, muscle and 6 pack abs...just remember being that lean is actually not maintainable long term unless your genetics are just THAT good. Keeping a low body fat % means low calories (all the time) unless you are extremely muscular. I mean big! And even then, muscle only burns 6 cals/lb vs. the 2 that fat burns. So you never really get to eat 'that' much more food, even building more muscle.

SO first you need to build the muscle, which you can only do slightly in your noob phase, in a deficit. But once you surpass that noob phase, you'll need to start eating more calories to build actual muscle. Which means more food and proper progressive overload = new muscle. And then you have to diet down to reveal those abs. It's not fun, and basically everyone will tell you how crappy it is working so hard for so little. Again, you see those guys with 6 pack abs all of the time, most of them have damned good genes, or they are usually still in their bulk and cut cycles. So they don't reallllly have them all of the time.

My recommendation is don't fret over abs, and just keep doing your thing. Eventually you'll see your hard work pay off. Your abs will pop during training but any normal time of day, they will be asleep.

6 packs are overrated. Sure they are nice to have, but focus on one step at a time. Once you get down to a good bodyfat percentage, they're easy to have poke through. You can hammer the **** out of them multiple times a week to have a washboard stomach. At least in my experience that is. I'm more focused on losing fat right now than working on my abs. I only train them once a week. I used to do it three with a total of say 400 crunches (different variations throughout)

I'd give an arm for the gains you'll get when you start seriously weightlifting. After awhile, it becomes an agonizing slow process. Doing it right, you could gain 10lbs of muscle in a year when you're starting out.

I like how people say "oh it's hard not eating." Try eating ALL THE TIME. Although when your metabolism kicks in, it's easy to do. I'm starving every hour and a half nowadays.

For me, it's kind of a long term ideal to strive towards. I know for most people it's not sustainable, and, frankly speaking, I like food too damn much to be able to maintain such a low body fat percentage, but I figure keep pushing, see how close I can get to the "best shape of my life," and see how long I can make it last, if I even can.

 

[Snake Plissken]

Weighed myself just now, I lost a pound this week. That makes six so far.

 

[Shawpaw]

Awesome, Snake! Get way to get after it.

 

[Snake Plissken]

Thanks! I was thinking that I should lower my calories further since one week it went up half a pound strangely, but if it ain't broken don't fix it.

I've been trying to do a conservative cut by not limiting calories too much. I only want to lose maybe five more pounds by the end of August.

 

[Thainitty]

Right on snake! Keep at it

 

[Mr. Green]

Lost 4 lbs from marathon kayaking. Had to let go 5 short fluke but got a nice 22 & 3/4 inch fluke. Happy eating!

 

[Snake Plissken]

Be careful if you order Optimum Nutrition powder from Amazon. I got one the other day and checked it last night and there was no plastic seal under the lid.

 

[Thainitty]

What's up fellow fit freaks! How's everyone's fitness coming along? I've gotten my weight down to 216 in the last month (from 228).

 

[Shawpaw]

I worked out for the first time in 17 months today. Just had too much going on over the past year with terrible work hours. I did two exercises for chest shoulder and tricep. My power is still good, but stamina is ****. Did 15 military presses at 80lbs then did 5, 3, 3,...

I know I have a ways to go to get back but I'm super excited and it felt amazing having the pump again. Tomorrow will feel crippling

 

[Mr. Green]

Fishing sucks, due to over fishing. Will have to hit the weights and thread mill again. He's not going to gain those weights back, for sure.

 

[Thainitty]

Right on shaw paw!! I did shoulders today which is my most painful workout but I still killed it I think. Mr green!!! I love reading your posts....go hit those weights!! And treadmill even though cardio is no fun