Lets try this again....

[Rufio]

I'm currently doing the second semester of a masters in Grenoble, France. I'm here until the end of April and since arriving I've done a whole lot of nothing, gone for one run and other then the daily walks around town i've been living a highly unhealthy lifestyle.
Too much drinking and a diet consisting largely of premade white pasta with sauce with the odd bit of chicken stir fry and steak thrown in.

So this will be about my third or fourth attempt to become a gym going regular. My last gym session was about three months ago, workload in college got very heavy and as i didn't manage my time very well, the gym got the boot. Prior to that I had been doing the starting strength program and making good gains from it.
My max lifts were still pretty underwhelming but I was happy with the progress I had been making.
Max squat was 72kg (body weight at the time) Bench was 60kg and Deadlift was 85kg. I was doing one arm db rows with max 5 rep set using a 28kg db. Standing dumbell shoulder press was done with 14kg db's. I could never do more then one pull up, so had just begun working on body rows in the hope of improving that.

I would describe myself as a lanky 5ft 10. I have skinny arms, skinny legs and a nice little beer belly going for myself. Although I don't have a weighing scales here, my weight always seems to fluctuate a few kg either side of 72kg.

Aim: 12 weeks of stronglifts 5x5 program. See stronglifts.com for more info.
So it will be three days a week with two days of cardio on non lifting days.

I'm going up to join the gym now and should do my first session later this evening.

I think my main problem is going to be my diet; looking like it will be something like this:
Breakfast: 3 egg omelette with onion, peppers or Mellors Oat pancakes. Glass of multivitiman juice and some green tea.

Lunch, cold wholegrain pasta with chicken.

Dinner: Chicken/ Steak, boiled vegetables (mixed veg that you find in freezer section of supermarket).

Snacks: nuts etc.

I don't tend to eat a lot of bread, but I am finding myself eating a lot more croissants over here then usual, not sure just how bad these are.

Any advice or hints tips would be most appreciated.

Also any links to good meals which can be prepared frozen and then microwaved for later would be amazing.

[Charlie Harper]

goodluck wit this..

if ur looken to build urself up ud b better of stayen away from the cardio and just concentrate on doin weights,cardio will only burn muscle.

as for the dinner ur better off steaming the veg, all the goodness off the veg goes ibto the water when u boil them so steam wud b better

goodluck

[Rufio]

goodluck wit this..

if ur looken to build urself up ud b better of stayen away from the cardio and just concentrate on doin weights,cardio will only burn muscle.

as for the dinner ur better off steaming the veg, all the goodness off the veg goes ibto the water when u boil them so steam wud b better

goodluck

Thanks for the advice, I still want to stay fit, I play rugby in Ireland so don't want to come home and be bigger but really unfit.

I don't mind sacrificing gains for the sake of being fit.

[Emmet]

Any medium/long term goals?

Reach a certain bodyweight/Body fat Percentage?
Lift a certain weight?
Run a distance in a certain time?

Things like these will really really help you stick at it.

Are you planning on building muscle? If so, I'd put on the weight first, and then cut back the inevitable fat gain afterwards.

[Lurker23]

Goals are important as Emmet said. Agree with regards to bulk then cut. Doing a bit of cardio on off days won't hinder muscle building potential.

I'd help you out with diet but mine consists of eating everything in sight for 46 weeks and cutting the other six. I'll leave it to the healthy eaters!

What I will say is that if you do go on a cut after a bulk, concentrate more on the tape measure than your actual weight as you could still be gaining muscle on a cut.

Best of luck.

[Mellor]

Best of luck, I found a log really helped me stick to it.
Make sure you log everything, them you'll feel bad if you start missing weeks etc.
Any questions or anything like that fire them out and somebody will give tips

[Trippie]

Saw the thread title and was thinking ffs they're not starting that book club shit again are they. Glad to see not so a irrelevant thanks goes your way luke

[Rufio]

So first session was today.

Wasn't 100% sure where to start given how long its been, I definitely didn't want to start with empty bars on the three lifts, but did keep it light enough.

Squats (weight X reps X sets)
Warm up
Bar x 5 x 2
32 x 5 x 1
42 x 5 x 5

Was light enough but definitely could feel the build up in my begs come the last set, gonna have some serious doms tomorrow me thinks, but all in all was happy with the form etc. In the gym there is a mirror in front and behind you, so it's good for looking at form etc.

Bench
Bar x 5 x 2
32 x 5 x 5
This felt very light, but none the less the bar wasn't as steady as it should be, my bench press has never been that strong but think i'll ask someone to check out my form next time I do it as i'm not sure how great it is.

Bent over rows.

Bar x 5 x 2
32 x 5 x 5

It's the first time for me doing bent over barbell rows, having previously done one armed dumbell rows. Have watched plenty of youtube videos and fel my form was pretty good, definitely can add a good few kg's onto this one I think.

I finished off the session with press ups (x8) supersetted with knee raises (x)15 on one of these
I did three rounds of this.

Was pretty wrecked after it, so much so that when showering I put shampoo in my hair before wetting my hair....

Diet for today has been

Breakfast
Omelette (4 small eggs)

Snack
Bounty bar
Banana

Lunch
Supermarket bought bolognese ravioli

Have some fish which i'll probably eat later.

Also received my order from myprotein.fr so had a pre-workout protein shake and a post workout recovery xs shake.

According to my food tracker I've consumed 1725 calories so far today, 105 g of protein.

Next workout will be on sunday morning, unless I go snowboarding in which case it will be monday. If it is monday, i'll go monday, wednesday, friday which suits better in any case.

[Rufio]

Well three days after the first session and I have some serious DOMS going on, I really shouldn't have gone snowboarding yesterday

Hopefully things will feel better by later on so I can do my second session.

[Rufio]

So after a poor start, I have gotten into the swing of things.

Still nowhere near where I left off at the summer, but I'm making positive gains and feeling good about it.

However, yesterday while squatting, I got given some pretty brutal advice by a guy who was squatting on a smith machine, unfortunately as I am not fluent in French I just kind of smiled, nodded and went along with what he said, then waited till he left to finish my sets. Basically he was advocating that your hips never below your knees, and as such not to do a full range of movement. I think he was saying this because one of my reps was pretty sloppy and it saw my back hunch a little bit. None the less it was a bit annoying....
In general i'm happy though, diet is good (mostly boiled fish and steamed veg with some fried potato bits), starting to do some cardio in between etc.

I know I still got to limit the alcohol intake, the beers are the killer.

My girlfriend is coming over for a week on Saturday, hopefully she wont mind too much when I sneak off to the gym for a few hours....

[Rufio]

Also, a friend of mine sent me this recipe which I have used as a pre-gym snack and they work out pretty good.

Makes 5 Bars

Ingredients

- 4 scoops chocolate protein powder (I used the cookies and cream myprotein flavour and it worked out nicely)

- half cup oatmeal/porridge oats

- lotsa peanut butter. i use nearly half a jar. (try use the organic one as there are no saturated fats)

- 2 tbsp honey

- 1/2 cup milk

- crushed peanuts/hazelnuts/cashew nuts

Directions
(first u will need extra milk to thin the peanut butter - put the peanut butter in a cup and add a few drops of milk and heat it up gently. then stir it up so that it the consistency is not solid - ie make runny peanut butter)
1. Mix together the protein powder, oatmeal, thinned out peanut butter, honey and milk.

2. Form into a flat cake shape and then roll in the crushed peanuts to finish (u can mix the nuts in with the mix or just use as a topping i use cahsews and hazelnuts).

3. Place in the fridge for about 30-45 mins or until solid

4. u can then cut the flat cake shape into four strips and each strip will contain approx:

Nutritional Facts

(Per Serving – 1 Bar)

Calories: 452

Protein: 50g

Carbohydrates: 36g

Fat: 12g

[Mellor]

I got given some pretty brutal advice by a guy who was squatting on a smith machine, unfortunately as I am not fluent in French I just kind of smiled, nodded and went along with what he said, then waited till he left to finish my sets. Basically he was advocating that your hips never below your knees, and as such not to do a full range of movement

The fact that he is doing squats in the smith machines basically means he doesn't have a clue what he is talking about.
You should always try to swat to parallel



That recipie looks pretty good. Esp if you are trying to bulk. Prob too many cals for me at the moment.
But just on the peanut butter. Ignore that bit about organic and sat fat. Peanuts naturally have sat fat, organic or otherwise. But sat fat isn't actually bad, just got a bad rep years ago. (Trans fat is the bad one)
In terms of getting good quality peanut butter, get one with 100% peanuts (ie the only thing on the ingredient list). As often poor quality oils, sugars and various additives are added, even with organic ones.

[Emmet]

hope this helps...

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IkyiekPIrg[/ame]

[Jackyback]

I might try make a batch. Getting that many calories in whilst running or on the bike would be ideal for me.

[Rufio]

So once again I failed miserably at sorting out a gym routine.

I do find it hard to motivate myself, but thankfully a friend of mine said he will be my gym partner for the summer. Hopefully that will sort things out.

Also thinking of putting together some sort of prop bet to act as an incentive. I'm not really sure how to do it though. It would be a three month thing, maybe June to end of August. Goals are to get stronger so maybe have it reach certain lifting goals within those months.
I'm still a relatively poor student so I don't have the funds to be putting up for any serious prop bet, and I don't really care for money that much that a few hundred euro would act as a big incentive for me.
Any suggestions on this would be great.
I'm going to head to the gym now in a minute for the first time since March 21st. And will report back with how I do.

[Rufio]

Yup, I'm weak as shit!

Struggled with squats. 3 x 5 @ 52kg (after warm up sets etc)

Bench 3 x 5 @ 42kg

Then did some db rows, shoulder presses and finished with some planks, situps and press ups.
Going to give a PT a call to schedule a meeting for next week to ensure that I've perfect form etc. A few of my friends know the guys who work at the edge in clontarf and have said they know their stuff, so will give them a buzz.

Powerful weak...

[Opr]

I have been making something similar to your friends recipe that I found over on boards. They are a god send in terms of convenience for a protein hit. Best thing is they are also fucking delicious and I actually think of them as a treat!

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055992322

Opr

[Lurker23]

A few of my friends know the guys who work at the edge in clontarf and have said they know their stuff, so will give them a buzz.

Yes, they're awesome. I did my strongman sessions with them. I've done a few sessions with James when he was in Westwood Clontarf too.

Be prepared for a world of pain

[Rufio]

I have those at the freezing stage OPR, looking forward to tasting them. Cheers for the link.

Did a session yesterday with my mate who's going to be my regular gym partner over the summer. An improvement on the first session back, but still nowhere near what I was before I left.

Squat was 60kg 3 x 5 and also did 45 x 10, x 8, x 6, at the end of the squatting part as it's something my friend wanted to do. It was a killer for me.

Deadlifted three sets of 80 x 3. Felt I had a bit more to give, but i'm still a bit unsure about how good my form is on these, especially when putting the bar down as opposed to picking it up.

Tried getting through to the edge but no answer, going to knock down to them later if I can't get through.

[Rufio]

I joined a gym at the start of the month on a three month contract (not sure where i'll be in september so didn't want to get a longer one)

So I've been working out pretty steadily 4 times a week, two strength days and two conditioning days and the diet is getting there but I think still needs a bit of improvement. (Just looked at moneymakers thread and seem to be lacking in greens).

I've been making decent gains, but it's still very early and i'm still very week. So here's what I did today.

Squat
Bar (22kg) x 10
42 x 5
52 x 5
62 x 5 x 3
42 x 1 x 3
- Really been working on my form over the two weeks, trying to keep my elbows pointed down and my chest and shoulders up, pretty sure I have it spot on so should be seeing more gains hopefully.

Bench
Bar (20) x 10
40 x 5
50 x 5
55 x 4 x 3 (Gym was absolutely empty and didn't have a spotter today, so stopped on four as I felt I was struggling a bit)
- feel good about the bench, three weeks ago I was struggling on 45.

Standing shoulder press (20kg bar)
Bar x 8
30kg x 5 x 3
Supersetted with straight leg deadlift
60 x 5 x 2
Felt there was still more to give so moved to 70 kg for the last set

Stir the pot See youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3EuMtm2MzRA
suppersetted with plank
Stir the pot = 10 circles and plank = 30 seconds
three rounds of this

Preacher calls to finish off
10kg + ez curl bar x 10 x 1
x 8 x 1
As it was supposed to be 5 sets of 12 reps, I decided to drop down

7.5kg + bar
12 x 3 (definitely a good idea to drop as really felt a decent arm pump after this)

All in all I was very happy with the session, my regular gym partner had a pain in his vagina so was on my own for the first time, but it was highly enjoyable.

Food today was as follows
Breakfast - 1 whole egg + 3 egg whites w onion ommellete and two slices of multigrain bread
Cup of delicious coffee

Before gym had one of these moist protein flapjacks, absolutely delicious.

After gym myprotein recovery xs shake and another flapjack when I got home (probably should have been eating something more substantial but had plans for dinner with the girlfriend)

Dinner 3 x tesco finest sausages and a load of mash potatoes (this is a bit of a once off, for the past week I've mainly been eating stir frys or steak and sweet potato mash)

Will have another protein shake before bed and next gym day will be a conditioning day on saturday.

[Mellor]

Was the squat with a different bar (22kg)? Bench, press etc appear to be a normal 20kg bar

[Rufio]

Yep, was a different rack and different bar, the bar with the squats had a noticeably wider collar but the same width bar, was told that its 22kg and all others are 20...

[Emmet]

Drop the wholegrain bread and eat all the egg, separation unnecessary IMO. Wholegrain bread is probably not even 20% less bad for you as it's White cousin. Just kick bread to the kerb imo

[Rufio]

Drop the wholegrain bread and eat all the egg, separation unnecessary IMO. Wholegrain bread is probably not even 20% less bad for you as it's White cousin. Just kick bread to the kerb imo

Cheers for that, should I be replacing bread with something else?

[Emmet]

Meat.

Bread is pretty much just a sheet of high calorie high carb mass. I don't know what you'd why you'd want either really unless you were trying to bulk up /get fat?

[Keane]

Saw a tip on the boards nuitrition section once that if your just a sandwichy type of person to use a shell of iceberg lettuce instead of bread the way you'd eat a meat sung in a chinese.

[Rufio]

So yesterday instead of a conditioning session we decided to head down to an open session of a new mma gym that's opened in Glasnevin.

Ended up doing the whole bjj session and found it a lot of fun and absolutely excruciatingly tiring. None the less, learned the basics of side control and really found it a great work out.
Strongly considering signing up, the only problem is the timing of the beginners sessions clash with training when the rugby season gets back into full swing.

Few ouchies today, two sore knees, and what feels like a sprained finger on my right hand and a sprained big toe as well as a sore rib, nothing a few difene wont fix. And hopefully will get along to the gym later.

Also had a serious cheat day yesterday, home made deep fried spicy chicken wings, big ass burgers, home made deep fried onion rings, deep fried cod, deep fried chips and even a deep fried banana.
Was tasty and a lot of fun, my heart is finding it a little harder to pump blood today.

[Lurker23]

Saw a tip on the boards nuitrition section once that if your just a sandwichy type of person to use a shell of iceberg lettuce instead of bread the way you'd eat a meat sung in a chinese.

Spinach works well too.

[Mellor]

So yesterday instead of a conditioning session we decided to head down to an open session of a new mma gym that's opened in Glasnevin.

Kyuzo?

[Rufio]

Kyuzo?

Yup that's the one.


Just back from the gym. Session was as follows:

Deadlift

60, 70, 80, 90 x5 and then 100 x 3 x 3
Was happy with form on it all and doing the 100's was tough going. New max and definitely will be getting higher in the next few weeks.

Bench
Bar x 10
40 x 5
50 x 5
55 x 5
57.5 x 4, 57.5 x 3 (failed trying a fourth)

So bench was still an improvement on the last day, so it's going in the right places.

Next we were to do Bulgarian squats (single leg squats) supersetted with pulldowns (this is as an alternative to pull ups as we struggle with sets of three! )

I find the bulgarian squats really difficult, even with the light weights that we are using (I used 10kg db's in each hand)
I couldn't even get one without falling over while doing it off a bench, so stacked three plates on top of each other and did it off that.
The weight doesn't really seem to be an issue, it's just the unstability. I'm finding it really hard to stay straight and often found myself falling off of the position. Might try it holding a single db in the middle of my body the next time and see if it helps.
The pulldowns went well, did three sets of ten at the 7 setting. (Not sure what the weight was, but will be putting it to eight for the next time and then see if the pullups have improved)

Pallof press SS w planks.

Did 3 x 10 pallof press at 5 which was a setting higher then the last day, the form was better and felt a lot more steady then the last day if that makes sense.

The planks were as follows
10 seconds normal then 10 seconds of the following, right arm raised, right leg raised, left arm raised, left leg raised, then back for ten seconds at standard plank.

Come the third round this was a real killer on the abs.

Finished off with 10 x 4 @ 8 kg seated db curls. Focused on doing six second reps and could really feel it come the last three reps of each set.

Solid workout I feel.

Diet today hasnt been amazing.

Started with a three egg ommlette and a slice of multigrain bread (I know it was stated that it isn't great for you, but I had some left so didn't want it to go to waste)

Had two portions of the protein flapjacks for lunch.

For dinner it was one donegal catch breaded cod, three potato waffles and a portion of baked beans (pretty terrible I know, but have been uber busy the last few days and didn't get to the shop in order to do a decent shop)

Had another flapjack half before the gym and half after combined with myprotein recovery xs shake.

Hopefully I'll get to the shop tomorrow to get some decent food into the house.

[Rufio]

Went over on my ankle playing football yesterday. Was hoping that an evening of RICEing it and a diphene would do the job, but it still hurts like hell if I don't walk on it in a specific way.

Hopefully it will be good by tomorrow otherwise I'll have to basterdise the session and do all seated exercises.

[Rufio]

Solid day in the gym yesterday, saw me doing two PB's (nothing to write home about given the puny weight of it)
Squat
Bar (22kg) x 10
42 x 5
52 x 5
62 x 5
67 x 3 x 1
72 x 3 x 1 (PB)
- All done with good form, so very happy.

Bench
Bar (20) x 10
40 x 5
50 x 5
55 x 5
60 x 3 (PB)

Standing shoulder press (20kg bar)
Bar x 8
32.5kg x 5
Supersetted with straight leg deadlift
72 x 5
- Five rounds of this, was knackered coming onto the last round, so felt good when it was completed. I find straight leg deadlifts a lot easier then standard deadlifts, seem to have a real problem on the decline motion of the deadlift, I seem to bend me knees to early and always have the bar scraping off them on the way down.
- I think this will go up to 77kg for the next day

Stir the pot See youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3EuMtm2MzRA
suppersetted with plank
Stir the pot = 10 circles and plank = 30 seconds
Four rounds of this

Preacher calls to finish off
7.5kg + ez curl bar x 12 x 5
- felt good pump on the arms after this one.

Happy with the session and continuing to make good progress.