Josh here, long time no see! Hope you’ve all been well. I’m back in the fitness game and have been for a few months, so I thought maybe I’d dust off the ol’ Tumblr.
So, let’s get started! First things first, I’m not driving myself crazy this time. I’m just making incremental changes, eating at a deficit, working out (3 days of freeweights and 2 days of cardio). Taking it as it goes. There will be ups, there will be downs. There is a calorie tracker on my phone, but I don’t track calories. Tracking calories drives me nuts. I use the calorie tracking app to help me make better choices in a pinch or spot check random days.
Let’s talk about the elephant in the room. I hadn’t stepped on a scale in a few years, hadn’t jogged, or done any real exercise in sometime. In June, I thought self, it’s time to get out of the funk.
June 9th I stepped on the scale and saw 293.0. A new lifetime high. I knew it would be bad honestly, but that slapped me in the face. So I started eating at a calorie deficit.
The following weekend I cleaned out the garage, mounted an old TV in front of the treadmill, I was set. Walked for 30 minutes. 2 days later I jumped on the trusty treadmill, went for a bit, a loud pop happened and a fuse blew. The treadmill was dead, fried motor control board. L O L
I scoured craigslist, found a nice used Precor elliptical. Exchanged emails, went and looked at it the following weekend, and picked it up. Set it up in the garage, and went to use it. Uh, the weight input on this bad boy goes to 250. Checked the owners manual, yep 250 is the max weight. Well, now we’ve got one of a few, target goal weights.
While I was looking for ellipticals, I also happened upon a used Precor treadmill. Price was pretty good, so I checked and it was still available. Setup a time to look at it, and it had clearly been in a garage wich was pretty dirty. I was going to pass, but the guy wanted to deal. He offered it for $50, I took it for a quick jog, tested the incline motor, it all worked so I took it home. Spent hours cleaning it up. It’s pretty freaking nice!
I also thought that since I was going to be cutting for a substantial period of time, I’d also like to lift. I know for how little free time I have the only way that would be done was with a home gym. So I bought a squat cage, built a lifting platform, and picked up a free weight set. I started watching form videos and began doing a weightlifting routine from Reddit. In my YouTube form video watching I got hooked on Alan Thrall and Barbell Medicine. For the last 6 weeks I’ve been following the beginner prescription https://www.barbellmedicine.com/blog/the-beginner-prescription/
Lifting 3 days a week. 2 days of light cardio a week.
So where am I at now? 270.6, and a lot stronger! Almost 23 pounds down since June, all my lifts heavier. Woo hoo, this stuff works!
For tonight I’ll leave you with a picture of my nifty home gym and a snapshot of tonight’s workout. Hope to see you around!