Warming up and carbing down....

DATING STUFF

Well now this has become interesting. As you know I've been up on OKCupid for quite a while now, with not much success really. I had written someone last year as her profile said that she worked in the online dating industry. I recall her profile stating that she was married and was just on the site for research and such. At the time I was trying to wrap my head around the fact that there wasn't much action happening so I wrote her to get her opinion of my profile and her views on the online dating topic. She wrote back and gave me some pointers, everything pretty much positive and that was that.

Fast forward to today and things are a little different now. She's divorced. She wrote me the other day and we started chatting back and forth. She had just come back from Maui and was going to get back to me when she had come back down to reality. Yesterday we chatted for a bit and I suggested coffee (typical first date, don't judge me on originality ;) ). We met and had an amazing conversation. We're very much alike in how we think and how we communicate. We went back to her place and continued to chat for a bit. Now before you think what I think you are thinking, STOP! Get your head out of the gutter. A friend of hers was going to be stopping in in a bit so we agreed that it was time for me to go, I had things I needed to get done anyway. She walked me to the door and the goodbye kiss went on for a little longer than a goodbye kiss normally does. I'm sure if her friend wasn't standing outside the front door (which is made of glass btw) things would have heated up a bit more.

We made the best out of a slightly embarrassing situation, said our hellos and L and I agreed to get in touch soon so that we can set something up.

Looks like I'm going to have a full weekend coming up ;)

TRAINING STUFF

OK so here we go. Offseason is underway, has been for 5 weeks now. The power is starting to come back again. Bench is back to 315lb and 365lb shouldn't be that far off. I can see a 405lb bench later this year.

We are taking a little different approach after looking at last years progress.I already knew I was carb sensitive so I pulled it back last year. I still had pasta pretty much everyday but portioned out the serving. 

This year all starchy carbs are out. Nothing but fibrous carbs. Simply put, fruit. We are taking a closer look at GI and GL influence and the starchy carbs just spike the blood sugar too much where the fibrous carbs don't. It's hard to believe but a serving of shredded wheat will spike your blood sugar as effectively as a spoon of sugar! So much for whole wheat being the healthy choice. An apple even though it is sweet, because of the fibre in it does not spike your blood sugar (might I suggest Honey Crisp apples, friggin awesome). Stack the apple with a good protein and fat source and you reduce the insulin spike even further. I'm still getting around 30gm of carbs per meal but they are of a better, more valuable kind. The only time I would have a simple carb would be right after training when you want an insulin spike (insulin pushes nutrients, proteins and glycogen into the cells). For that treat I always have a small bar of dark chocolate. I'm a bit of a chocolate fiend, especially 70% Lindt dark. The cocao has other antioxidant properties to it as well so it's win win.

K that's all for now. I got a pot of chilli to put on, laundry to get up from the basement and a couch that needs sitting on.

Any questions?






(UPDATE)
Ok that was hilarious! I pulled the laundry up and was about to get the chilli on. I figured I should text L and let her know I had a great time and that we should set something up for Saturday. As I was typing my message, she messaged me! She beat me by 5 seconds! K' plans are set, dinner is at my place and the signature sesame lemongrass salmon is the surprise menu. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

Another swing at bat....

So I gotta get back in the game again. Get back up on the horse as it were and start getting more social again. It's not like I had cooled down all that much but towards the end of my preseason dieting I was starting to get pretty tired most of the time. It limits what you can do rather than what you want to do, sleep becomes a very scarce commodity and a high priority which you will grab whenever you can. There's that and of course the breakup didn't do too much for my overall motivation to get out. So I pulled back and took a bit of a rest. Enough of that, time to go and have some fun again.

As for the diet this year, my last week, when the end was so close, I ended up getting sick. I never get sick, once a year at most which is a bonus. The timing just sucked this time around really. So my diet was cut by one week, oh well no biggie I guess. It's not like I was going to drop another 10lbs in that last week or anything. I also wasn't competing this year either so there wasn't a dire need to get absolutely shredded. I decided to take the week off work and the gym and start getting carbs back in the diet again. Getting as much sleep as I could and recovering from the previous 15 weeks of hard work and bland chicken, mmmmm beef.

All in all the diet was good this year. I accomplished my goals and found out that I can go harder and deeper than I ever had gone before. I started out at 215lbs and ended up at 173lbs. Each year getting leaner and leaner while also gaining more mass, shape and overall balance. Win win no matter how you look at it.

So now I find that I am getting back to my normal self again. The off-season has already started and so far, just 3 weeks in, I am seeing the rebound kick in big time and I am so pumped about this years potential. I'm already back up to 315lbs on my bench and 405lbs on the squat! As it was last year, it's going to be a conservative off-season. Just like the pre-season diet everything gets measured so that I can keep from getting too big too fast. Putting on too much in the off-season simply makes the following pre-season all that much harder. I've learnt that you can only drop so much in a pre-season before your body pushes back and says enough! It's best to be smart about it and play the long game. Build your goal over a long time and the results will be all the more sweeter.

Another goal of mine was to take control of my finances and get myself out from under this bullshit credit card debt that I have. I've lied to myself for quite a while saying that I was working hard to pay it off but I see how full of shit I was. Low and behold the universe seems to hear these honest cries for help and provides it just when you need it most. I've heard over and over again about budgeting but I never did get into the habit of it, until now. I came across a program called YNAB which is short for You Need A Budget. It's fairly basic but powerful in that it puts you in control of your spending. It has totally changed my life and it's only been two months since I started using it. I can't begin to describe how much more empowering it feels to finally be in control and know that I won't ever be caught short again. I highly recommend checking it out.


There's more to chat about but I think I'll close this one off for now.


A.

“You must take personal responsibility. You cannot change the circumstances, the seasons, or the wind, but you can change yourself. That is something you have charge of.”—Jim Rohn

http://www.positivelypositive.com/2011/11/06/the-single-most-important-mindset-shift/