To answer my opening question in my previous post, yes, it is possible to become more awesome than you already are. This mystical transformation from regular awesome to more awesome happened to me today in my kitchen as I was making the best brownies to ever be made since the start of time.

This is what awesome is made of.

Nothing much to report today other than the usual gym atrocity. Someone decided to take up the stupidity a notch today and instead of being a spotter to spot his fellow gym buddy if he needed help, he decided that he would help him out on EVERY. SINGLE. rep. I don't know if it was a pushing exercise for the bench guy or a pulling exercise for the spotter.

I think khakis guy's fashion is starting to catch on because someone was working out in complete casual clothes; I'm talking jeans, a polo (with the collar up of course) and casual shoes. I mean I can completely understand that; he was so serious about working out today that he had no time to waste in the changing room changing into his gym clothes, so for the sake of fitness and strength gains, he would jump right into the workout no matter WHAT he was wearing.

Squat - 280 2x5
Bench - 192.5 3x5

Back extensions and chin ups

I made BBQ pizza for dinner. I knew it was good before it was done because one of my dogs was standing by the oven the entire time.

Is It Possible...

...to be more awesome than you already are? I will let my taste buds answer that question. (I realize I make lots of cocky statements/jokes, but they're all for fun).

I decided to change things up today and make pancakes rather than the usual eggs and oatmeal/bread for breakfast. Given that I've never made pancakes from scratch before, I'd say these turned out pretty AMAZING. That boxed crap is complete garbage. I added chocolate chips and some chopped up white chocolate just to add more flavour.

One of them was particularly good, it had all the right flavours and looked the best, so of course, I dubbed it 'The Chosen One'.

Be jealous. Go on, be.

Gym Atrocity/Food/Music

I never know how to begin these posts, so I'll just get right into it.

I'm working out in the wrong gym. Plain and simple. But I guess I shouldn't complain, at least it's a gym. I usually see the same people every Monday, and either they are getting more and more devoid of any sense of actual physical exercise, or I am becoming more awesome, you decide.

Maybe I didn't get the memo, but was today 'take off your shirt in the gym day?'. I had the misfortune of seeing at least three people lift up their shirts and flex in between sets. They weren't even working on their 'core' or abs, I don't know maybe it was to check if their barely visible two pack had spontaneously vanished. It's funny how it's always the guys with huge upper bodies and barely-there legs.

Some guy was working out in khakis. Enough said.

Apparently iPods are now too small to be carried around in the gym, and the new thing to do is bring your iPad. Either this guy was trying to make a statement, or simply trying to start a new fashion trend. Hell next time I'm bringing my entire laptop and speakers. Forget you, iPod. I'll just connect my headphones to it, wear a back pack and keep it in there. I bet I'll look pretty cool.

Enough making fun. What did I do today? I took the weight down a bit to work on my form. I was getting to a point where form started breaking down, so I did the smart thing and dropped the weight to train my spectacular muscles the right way so they can actually handle heavier weights without injury.

Squats - 350 8x3 - Not so bad, although by the 6th set I was trashed.
Press - 140 5x5 - Easier than I thought. I see a reset pretty soon.
Deadlift - 350 1x5 - Felt a bit heavy. I'll get it videoed next time to see what it looks like.

I decided I was in the mood for chicken today and took it upon myself to make oven fried chicken. I wanted to get a little creative so when I found out I didn't have enough breadcrumbs I found a bag of lime flavoured Tostitos lying around and with the help of my dog I did a combination of rolling and stepping on the bag to crush the chips and use them as a substitute. I also added garlic powder, paprika, thyme, salt and pepper and then dipped them in an egg/mayo mixture. Needless to say they turned out phenomenal and the best part is you can always use a different flavour of chips to see what you like the most.

This is how we do dinner, hata'.

This was my weapon of choice today. Enjoy, they are very good at what they do.

Music

Here are two songs that have constantly been on repeat lately. Without good music I have a feeling I wouldn't be able to get through a gym session properly. There's something about getting mentally prepared for a work out that plays a big part in how well you'll lift.





Ok three..

Gorillas and Lasagna

My favourite thing about going to the gym on Friday is that it's always empty in the morning. So I make the most of this and try to be as loud and reckless as possible, throwing weights across the room, javelin-launching the bars for fun and making gorilla noises while pushing through the last reps.

As explained in my last post, Friday is all about getting new PRs. With that said, these were today's:

Squat 385 1x5, will need to drop the weight a bit or the rep/set setup cos I wasn't happy with these.

Bench - 260, was meant to do a 1 rep max, but ended up doing 3. BOOYAH!

Clean - 135 5x3, dropped the weight a bit to work on technique and it helped, A LOT!

There was a nice HUGE lasagna waiting for me when I got home, at which point I was so hungry I didn't question what was in it. I just scooped up half and dumped it in my plate.

The Texas Method and Beef Stroganoff

Today felt...productive. It's a nice feeling to sit back and think you're squatting 275 pounds on a 'light' day. What do I mean by this? Well let me explain.

Like I said in a previous post, I'm working on a Texas Method template. The basic structure of the program is split up into three days: a volume day (Monday), a light/recovery day (Wednesday) and an intensity day (Friday).

Volume? What the hell is volume? Volume is the final number after you multiply the sets by the reps by the weight. For example, if I did 5 sets of 5 reps of 100 pounds, the volume would be 5 x 5 x 100 = 2500 pounds. A typical Monday of volume for me would be 22,000 pounds, but after you consider all the warm up sets and reps, it's not that hard to get to that number.

The point if volume is basically to overload the system and prepare for Friday. Recovery coming off of volume is very important. I'm usually in the most pain on Tuesdays, but with proper food and rest it's gone by Thursday morning.

Wednesday is just a light day, the point is to still keep the motor patterns working, but not to the point where they affect recovery and interfere with Friday's workout.

Friday is the day when new PRs are set. (PR = Personal Record). New weights are lifted and records are made. The volume is the least on this day, but the intensity is the highest, hence the name. So squats for example are done for 1 set of 5 reps, so low volume, but high weight.

Presses are alternated every other week. So one week would focus on shoulder presses on volume day, and on Friday, a 1, 2 or 3 rep max is done. On Wednesday of that week bench presses would be done, and vice-versa if bench presses had been done on Monday.

So that's the TM in brief.

Today:

Squat 275 2x5
Press 140 3x5
Back extensions 5x10
Pull ups 3 x Failure (I got to 16, 10, 7).

This recipe was made tonight, and ended up looking like this:

It tasted so good I needed a moment of silence to take it all in.

Monday In The Jim

New PRs for yesterday

Squats 345 8x3 - I changed these up from a 5x5 scheme to basically make them a little easier since 5x5 is a recipe for disaster at higher weights, but overall volume would not change much. For anyone that passed grade 2 math yes, it ends up as 24 reps as opposed to 25, but the benefit of the ability to actually finish the workout outweighs the loss of one rep.

Bench 215 5x5 - Not as bad as I thought, although had a bit of muscle pain in my left elbow area but G.I. Joe'd my way through it.

Deadlift - 385 1x5. Damn. Straight.

I've always been much better at pulling, so it's no surprise that my deadlifts are my best exercise.

I think I'll make tacos tonight. If I do you'll have the pleasure of hearing my own reviews, and I might post up a picture, depends how they turn out.

"I don't need to train legs, I run"

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

There aren't enough words in the English language to describe the atrocity of this statement. It can usually be heard coming from a member of the Biceps Boys, as he chugs away at those curls while checking his hair in the mirror.

http://30.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_l5mu3qLqpw1qzmowao1_500.jpg

I realize I make lots of hair comments, and just to clear things up, no, it's not because I'm bald (ish) and wish I had hair.

Sometimes I just need to rant, so bear with me.

Playing sports or just running to 'train' your legs is not the same as squatting 400 pounds. They work your legs in very very different ways. A basketball player who wants to be stronger, faster and jump higher would benefit from squatting.

I've had people ask me many times what they should be doing in the gym and as soon as I tell them they need to squat more, they tell me they don't need to because they play sports. At this point I stand up and walk away without saying anything. Ok I don't, but I tell them that it's not the same. No it's not okay to be working on 52 different upper-body exercises only to end with a light cardio session on the treadmill or elliptical for your 'lower body' as it's referred to way too often.

Running doesn't make the legs go through the full range of motion that squatting does, there's only partial extension and contraction of the leg muscles. I'm pretty sure I can say with confidence that people ignore the legs as part of their routine because it's not what mainstream fitness and media has you thinking looks good. Look at any cover model and notice what you see. It's always a shot of their upper body, and I'm not saying magazines covers should have a big picture of only someone's legs on there, but we're constantly bombarded with pictures of people with abzzz and gunzzz to the point that young people getting into weightlifting for the first time believe that's all that matters.

The legs and back are some of, if not the biggest muscles in the body, and training them releases the most testosterone which is extremely important for muscle growth, fat loss and many other things.

Rant over. Now go do your squats.

Casa De Robby

One of the things I do best is eat too much. I have a bad habit of not stopping until there's no more food in front of me. Needless to say, given that this weekend was spent partly with señor Hobby Bobby, we did nothing but eat like cavemen.

To give you a visual example of what I'm talking about, this was breakfast today at Casa De Robby:

Scrambled eggs with veggies and garlic sauce.
Bacon
Guacamole made from scratch. That's right.
Robby's Blackberry
Bread
Coffee
Awesomeness

You know you want some.

Some people have a natural ability to understand ratios of flavours and quantities. And Mr Hobby Bobby, my fellow readers, is one of those people. The best part is that I get his recipes and can make them at home, although not as good.

The downside to eating so much is the after feeling of not being able to move, but unless there's a sudden zombie attack, I'm not too concerned.

Furious Friday

Furious: 1 a (1): exhibiting or goaded by anger
(2): indicative of or proceeding from anger b: giving a stormy or turbulent appearance <∼ bursts of flame> c: marked by noise, excitement, activity, or rapidity

From the Brittanica dictionary.

So there I was all happy and bubbly while warming up thinking this was going to be a good workout since the gym was practically empty and I had the entire weight room to myself. As I started looking for the plates I noticed that all of the 2.5 and 1.25 kilo plates were missing. Apparently people in the gym today decided to only lift weights in increments of 5.

I looked around for some personal trainers to see if they knew where they were, and they had no idea. I mean what do you say to that? You work in a gym and you don't know that some of the equipment is missing? I didn't know if I should have been a) surprised, b) flabbergasted, c) appalled, d) disturbed, e) offended, or f) all of the above. I decided to go with f).

This baby looks happy compared to how I felt.

Why is it that when I asked them if they knew where the plates are since they're all missing from the weight room, the first thing they go and do is check the weight room to see if they're there. As if I hadn't just finished spending 20 minutes looking around in every crack and corner.

It turns out there was some 'fitness competition' going on in another gym of the same franchise, and since they can't afford equipment they need to share the plates between gyms. Yes, professionalism at its best.

Needless to say I had a word with the manager, who was clueless by the way as to what was going on. The head office is going to get an email from me they're going to love. I wasn't as mad about not getting the right weights for the day as I was that no notice had been posted warning people that some weights would be missing. For people that go in there to actually work hard, it's frustrating.

Anyway, enough ranting, new PRs for today

Squat 375 1x5
Press 157.5 1x5
Clean 155 5x3 (Not too happy with these, I'll need to reset the weight)

I drove out to see my good friend Mr. Hobby Bobby Costa today and sitting in the car for an hour and a half was not my ideal post-work out activity, but as they (I) say, great sacrifices must be made in the pursuit of awesome-fun-times, and awesome-fun-times it is.

Since Mr. Hobby Bobby and I do nothing but eat, and while eating we talk about what the next meal will be, I can say that with 10 hours of sleep tonight and copious amounts of food headed my way, recovery will go well. Well indeed.

Sometimes you can't think of a title

Not a whole lot going on today. I made this yesterday, except it didn't look anything like the picture, and in my case should be renamed to 'The Worse Butter Chicken'.

I followed the recipe exactly, all the way to the part where I had to add chicken broth. Lesson of the day: follow the directions for quantities, and don't eyeball it. I did some mental physics and decided for some reason that holding the bottle of water over the pot for 4 seconds would release exactly 1 litre of water, which is what I needed. Except it didn't. And the worst part is I didn't drain any of the water. So my butter chicken tasted and looked more like butter chicken soup/stew/everything that it shouldn't be.

I would have taken a picture of it to post here but I was too ashamed.

For anyone who's into Buddha Bar style music, you'll like this. And if you're not, then get into it. I heard this song yesterday and decided one day I'll move to the far East and become a monk.

Kung Pao chicken. KUNG PAO. Chicken.

For reasons out of my control, I had to train in a different gym today and although it was slightly bigger, it was incredibly under-equipped. Not to my surprise, it was filled with personal trainers giving out bad advice, which confirmed my dislike hate of anything to do with the mainstream fitness industry.

The gym is not:
A coffee shop
A place to catch up with friends
A cat-walk
A place to wear t-shirts that cost over $50

Squats 270 2x5
Bench 187.5 3x5

Then I did some back extensions and good old pull ups for the guycepssss.

Last night I made Kung Pao chicken. KUNG PAO. Chicken. I think I chose the wrong path (bumness) in life, I should have considered chef school when people suggested it and I laughed it off oh so smugly. Lesson learnt; when someone tells you you're good at something, listen. It just might be your calling.

On the menu tonight at maison de Sharif is butter chicken and naan bread. Yes I'm going for an Asian theme this week in case you were wondering, it wasn't intentional, I have probably been influenced by my surroundings.

The Three Types of Weightlifters

It's happened on more than one occasion where someone refers to my gym-going-ness as bodybuilding. To say it makes me mad to hear that would be an understatement. That's like asking Roger Federer how his ping-pong training is going. I don't think he'd be too happy. Just because they both require hitting a ball with a similar looking racket, it doesn't make them the same sport.

The exact same thing applies to weightlifting/bodybuilding. Just because they both require lifting weights, they are both pursued for very different goals. Bodybuilding is mainly done for aesthetic reasons. The bodybuilder is training to build and display muscle, and that's it. Many bodybuilders eventually compete where a panel of judges rates them on muscular definition, symmetry, body fat, etc.

They usually take a range of supplements, both legal and illegal in some cases and end up shopping at plus size shops because they're swole boi.

Weightlifting on the other hand can be, at least in my opinion, divided into three categories.

Category one, your typical gym rat who is in there everyday working on his guyceps doing curls for the girls. He is easily spotted giving his fellow gym buddies useless advice he read from a magazine, or he made it up. He is somehow convinced that there are 52 different variations of the biceps curl. He has also been known to workout in jeans, as well as wearing sunglasses in the gym and he has been spotted checking his gelled hair in the mirror while talking on the phone between sets. He usually has a V shape body, NOT upper body (which is something to admire), but his entire body starts off big at the top because it's what receives the most training, and end up with chicken legs because 'he plays basketball so there's no need to train his legs'.

http://static.divbyzero.nl/facepalm/doublefacepalm.jpg

Category two is powerlifting. These are the guys that are just really big and strong looking. How they look is the last thing on their mind, and they train only for strength, and more specifically, functional strength, the kind that comes in handy in day-to-day situations. They compete in three lifts, the squat, the bench press and the deadlift, with only their one rep max counting. These are the guys you will want when your car suddenly breaks down in the middle of the road and you need to push it to the gas station... or if zombies suddenly attack.

The third category is Olympic weightlifting. This is more dynamic and explosive weightlifting and lifters compete in two lifts, the snatch and the clean & jerk. Oly lifters are able to generate more power than the above two, but for overall strength, powerlifters come out on top. I don't know too much about Olympic lifting, and I won't pretend like I do, so I'll stop there. If anything though, it's the coolest looking of the three.

I'll admit there are people that seem to do a bit of everything. I see people in the gym sometimes go from doing 12 exercises for their arms, to squatting or deadlifting, to doing a really crappy version of a clean and jerk.

The first year or so since I started working out, I will admit I probably fell into category one, minus the gelled hair, sunglasses and jeans wearing part, but I focused mainly on the magazine-type exercises. I gradually made the shift over time to more strength training where I still did some category one exercises but learnt the importance of squatting and deadlifting. Since then I've focused only on powerlifting and am happy to say I've made the most progress ever. My lifts have gone up drastically and I've realized and appreciated the importance of training for strength and not superficial looks.

Monday's PR

It's always nice when person 1 is teaching person 2 how to do a certain exercise, and person 1 says to person 2, look, that's how you do it, while pointing at you. Yes, this happened to me today in the gym, but the sad thing is person 1 was teaching person 2 how to do a deadlift in all the wrong ways.

Anyway, enough gloating. Today's PRs

Squat 340lb (155kg) 8x3
Press 137.5lb (62.5kg) 5x5
Deadlifts 375lb (170 kg) 1x5

I now have knee pain as a result of squatting and will proceed to rest and perform intensive recovery - which is just another way of saying I'll rest some more and nag about the pain.

Everything should be made of chicken

Here's a recipe I tried today. The only thing that would taste better than this is if I had actually followed the recipe and wrapped it in bacon. Next time, playa'.

http://allrecipes.com//Recipe/spinach-stuffed-chicken-breasts/Detail.aspx

Sunday Randoms

I haven't posted in a while, not sure why, or maybe it was cos I was busy job hunting. Either way, I'll try and be a bit more consistent with this thing. I don't have anything in particular I'd like to talk about today. Maybe I'll start logging my progress in the gym, that way I'll have a reason to start writing more.

For anyone that cares, I'm working on a program called the Texas Method right now which I've been doing since last August, developed by Mark Rippetoe. It's designed to first destroy you, give you a bit of hope, then destroy you again. But I like it.

Anyway, tomorrow will be

Squats - 340 pounds
Press - 135 pounds
Deadlifts - 375 pounds (I'll be happy once I reach 400)

On a side note, I watched this last night and was disgraced to say I am a weightlifter. I don't know what made my brain hurt more, his 'squats' or the spotter wearing sunglasses indoors. They weren't cool, glasses-man, not. one. bit.

How NOT to squat:



THIS is how you squat: