Fat, Bald, and D@%n Near 50

Training Over 35 Lifter
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[quote]j_willy3 wrote:
Tuesday morning workout:

Snatch grip Dead lifts: 135x5, 185x5, 185x5, 205x5
Leg Curl: 3x85x10
Leg ext: 3x35x12
Dumb bell rows: 3x65x10
Treadmill: 15 minutes

Little to report this morning. My work spouse joined me this morning. It’s a foggy, steamy start to a hot eastern NC day up here. Couldn’t ask for a better day. Nothing is better than heat and humidity!

Off to deal with the problems of running a stressed business in a depressed industry. It’s sure hard to keep the intensity up for that, just like the workouts. I like the 4 day workout schedule. I think I need to re-arrange it to keep the intensity levels up…DAMN I hate having to use my limited mental capacity!!![/quote]

LOL - Let us know what you come up with! I’m getting more interested in a 4 day plan as well.

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Tuesday night de-stressing workout.

Bench press 135x3 “hel320 warm-ups” 225x5, 225x5, 245x3, 245x3, 275x1.75
Close Grip Bench Press: 3x135x10
The fancy ass Pec Machine thingy: 3x75x12
Power Snatch 3xBarx5

Had quite a day at work. A big customer had an issue we thought was settled a year ago, and now has brought it back up to the tune of 15G’s. Not a good day in the swamp!

Wife had a meeting and kind of got pissed about me going to the gym in spite of the meeting. So I started out in “trouble”. C’est la Vie! Or as we say in eastern NC; WTF!

I needed help on to finish the second 275# rep. Still, it was nice to know the last bench day wasn’t a fluke. The pec machine in the corner has called my name the last few weeks, so I gave in to its seduction. It was fun and I may add it in for shits and grins.

Power Snatch, what can I say. They are fun. I only pulled the bar, I was trying to remember the form. I’m going to add some weight and try some pulls again.

Oh and Cappy, if you read this, I remembered why I returned to the gym. It goes back to my first post. Control of my life. I have no real influence on the controlling factors of my business. I have very minimal influence on my wife and daughter. The only thing I can control is what I do in the gym. And while at times I have no real direction in my workouts, I can fumble around in the dark looking for the right answers. I can control the rate I re-learn about me, AND I can control the stress level in my life.

Today, call me Jim Hunter or Don Larson. I have pitched a perfect game on controlling the stress of life.

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[quote]j_willy3 wrote:
Oh and Cappy, if you read this, I remembered why I returned to the gym. It goes back to my first post. Control of my life. I have no real influence on the controlling factors of my business. I have very minimal influence on my wife and daughter. The only thing I can control is what I do in the gym. And while at times I have no real direction in my workouts, I can fumble around in the dark looking for the right answers. I can control the rate I re-learn about me, AND I can control the stress level in my life.

Today, call me Jim Hunter or Don Larson. I have pitched a perfect game on controlling the stress of life. [/quote]

Mr. Hunter:

Read it, get it!

Just be careful. Control is a funny critter. Some days you ride the beast, other days the beast rides you. :wink:

Cappy

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Cappy,

That’s why Jimmy Hunter marveled at every homer hit off him. He was as proud of them at times as the hitter was.

Thanks for the input, always!

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[quote]j_willy3 wrote:

Oh and Cappy, if you read this, I remembered why I returned to the gym. It goes back to my first post. Control of my life. I have no real influence on the controlling factors of my business. I have very minimal influence on my wife and daughter. The only thing I can control is what I do in the gym. And while at times I have no real direction in my workouts, I can fumble around in the dark looking for the right answers. I can control the rate I re-learn about me, AND I can control the stress level in my life.

Today, call me Jim Hunter or Don Larson. I have pitched a perfect game on controlling the stress of life. [/quote]

Its good to take time, control stress, re-learn about yourself.

Nothing better some times.

326

Treadmill 40 minutes.

Yep, I’m whining and complaining about cardio work. I’ll be 90 and bitching still. The only good thing about the treadmill is the reflective time it allows. I mean I get to see the Weather Channel and ESPN is interesting without the sound. But aside from the heart healthy aspect, I’m not coordinated enough to read on the treadmill.

So I think, I plan, and today I realized I just may put the power snatch in my weight routine. My upper back has a nice DOMS feeling I had forgotten about.

Maybe cardio time isn’t all that bad.

327

Willy,

Great post on the whole “control” aspect of weight lifting. For me, lifting gave me the confidence to confront some very difficult issues in my life that I was choosing to ignore. It gave me the inner stength to trust myself and allowed me to move forward.

My first tattoo was the chinese symbol for strength. It really meant more inner stength rather than physical strength but it captured my newfound control that I was experiencing lifting weights.

Great work on the increased bench numbers. I think there was a little bit of “sandbagging” going on before I threw down the challenge of 250 for 3 reps…

328

[quote]mday wrote:
Great work on the increased bench numbers. I think there was a little bit of “sandbagging” going on before I threw down the challenge of 250 for 3 reps…[/quote]

Thanks mday, Seriously, the only sandbagging I do is when a hurricane is coming. It was all about the confidence of having a spotter around.

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Thursday morning workout

Bench Press: 135WU, 2x205x5, 4x225x5
Incline Bench Press: 135x8, 3x155x5
Seated Row: 100x10, 125x10, 135x10
Smith Machine Shrug: 135x10, 205x10, 205x8

Weights were damn heavy this morning. Probably the letdown form a decent stress relieving workout from the other day. So while not a spectacular workout a decent one.

I’m attempting to implement the advice of skid, cappy, Ironman and others. trying to give my workout a more structure and purpose. As I say over and over, the thinking part ain’t my strong suite.

Speaking of thinking, I realized this morning, I had stopped listening to the radio in my truck. Now I have AM/FM, a CD player, XM, Sirius; the whole gamut. I drive 35 rural minutes to work, behind school buses, farm machinery, logging equipment, retired farmers looking at the corn grow and little old ladies barely able to see over the steering wheel in their Dodge Dart or Crown Vic. I cross a bridge that is 6 miles long, counting the crab pots in the water. I see deer, turkeys, sea gulls, bear, horses, and an occasional eagle on the way.

So I haven’t listened to the radio in a month. I’d rather listen to the dash rattle, the tires rumble (I have one with a twisted belt) or the wind whistling thru the bad door gaskets. Now I don’t know how to take all that, I mean I have no desire to listen to Marshall Tucker, Bruce Springsteen, Purple Harem, Traffic, or Coldplay. I’m really getting old. I’m driving in silence like my granddad. Maybe its genetics.

And leaddog worried about his rambling…

330

Good benching, Jwilly – you are making your own music with those numbers going up.

331

I don’t listen to the radio in my truck unless I’m driving my son or wife somwhere. Haven’t for more than 20 years.

Sometimes there’s just so much going on inside the head that you want some quiet outside of it…

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You mean you don’t talk to the voices in your head? I mean everyone has them, right? Right?
I guess everyone loves the part of the country their in but ain’t nothing like drivin through the backwoods on an early morning.

333

[quote]hel320 wrote:
You mean you don’t talk to the voices in your head? I mean everyone has them, right? Right?
[/quote]

Riiiiiggggght.
whispers to the side “You got the trank?”

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Dips: BWX10, BW+25x8, BW+25x8
Close Grip Press:135x12, 185x8, 185x2, 115x20
Tricep pull downs: 3x80x12
Tate Press: 3x40x10

The wifey and child were away, so Willy went and played at the gym. I had the bright idea to work the triceps today. It was fun, not to strenuous until the second set of the close grips. The dips got the best of me, ha-ha.

No worries, just a nice evening at the gym.

335

My wife has told me it’s all right to listen to the voices in your head as long as you don’t answer them back.

336

[quote]hel320 wrote:
You mean you don’t talk to the voices in your head? I mean everyone has them, right? Right?
[/quote]

Never hear voices, just hear ringing…Can’t decide if that means no one is home, or it’s the echo of the wind swirling around the empty space between my ears…

337

Nice bench willy.I don’t listen to the radio in the truck either.Need the time to reflect and rest.On the getting old,we are getting stronger and its a trade off!!!LOL

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Friday Morning Workout

Squats in the Smith Machine: 3x135x10
Leg Curl: 3x85x10
Leg Ext. 3x45x10
Power Snatch: 65x10, 85x10
Treadmill: 15 Minutes

What can I say, squatting in a Smith Machine sucks. Toying with the power snatch. It’s a fun lift.

Now indulge me. If y’all don’t want to read this crap just move on.

I had an employee named Sherman. Sherman was a night watchman and a boiler tender. Sherman was… well…less sharp than the dullest tool in the shed. But Sherman was Sherman, and we knew his limitations.

One Saturday I was upside down hanging in a machine by my toes helping my maintainance manager remove a bearing. It was humid and hot, much like the days we have been having here in the South of late. We were covered in sweat, sawdust, saw lube, and dirt. We were contorted in ways normal human beings should not be contorted. It was obvious the engineers had designed this piece of machinery to be built, not maintained. (no knock intended to the engineers that post on this board)

Sherman walks up sticks his head in the opening, blocking the only whisper of a breeze and says,
“Mr Willy, last Saturday these men were walking thru the limber(lumber) shed and looking around. I told them they had to leave but they wouldn’t leave.”

Now I’m in no position to hear this and I say, “What?”

Sherman repeats “Last Saturday these men were walking thru the limber(lumber) shed and looking around. I told them they had to leave but they wouldn’t leave.”

This goes on for 2 more exchanges and by the 4th one I’m just about pissed. So I reply "Goddammit Sherman,I have seen you 5 times this week, why in the f**k are you telling me now?

Sherman had a puzzled look on his face and replied, “Well I didn’t think about it till I thought about it”

I was speechless.

Sherman died of a stomach aneurysm. He was a good guy. He provided me with a bunch of stories that I may add here if the mood strikes me. Believe it or not I miss the guy.

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[quote]j_willy3 wrote:
"Goddammit Sherman,i have seen you 5 times this week, why in the f**k are you telling me now?

Sherman had a puzzled look on his face and replied, “Well I didn’t think about it till I thought about it”[/quote]

OMG! Perfect answer! Priceless!!!

Awwww. Poor Sherman.

Stories are good. If we only talked about lifting we’d be a dull group indeed. One of the things that separates us from the rest of the crowd is knowing there’s more to life than just lifting weights. :wink:

Cappy

340

[quote]j_willy3 wrote:
I figured I better start my own thread, since I jump in and comment on so many others.

By hel320’s category I’m a has been, wanna be again, former bodybuilder, turned oly lifter, turned bouncer, that matured and got a real job in the family business after college. After a 20 + year hiatus I have returned to the gym, fatter, balder, and damn near 50.

My journey was restarted after a sales trip to Vietnam. My colleagues gave me hell, deservedly so, about my health. I was topping out at 284lbs on blood pressure pills, cholesterol meds, a diabetes pill and a nightly sleeping pill.

I’m a physical mess, the kind folks right obesity articles in the Wall Street Journal. I am the guy that causes health insurance premiums to skyrocket.

So after 7 days of brow beating in Ho Chi Minh City (or Saigon as I remember on the CBS Evening News) coupled with an impassioned speech I heard from a Dr. Martin Blacker I joined a gym again. 28 years after joining my first gym in Boone, NC.

27 years after I wanted to be a college football player, 27 years after I figured out I would never make the team, and 26 years after I found out being strong as hell gets you a job at a college bar and that is a helluva good place to meet girls.

Of course it was 23 years after lifting my last bar bell. Life, careers, marriage, and fatherhood took a front seat to my health. I learned to cook and cook well.

I ate and drank myself to relieve the stress of earning a living in an industry I have no control over profit margins, markets or real control over operations. I needed a different avenue; I am fat, bald, damn near 50 and dying by leaps and bounds. I had to change.

The transformation has begun. I am 34 lbs lighter due to diet and exercise. I am in the gym 6 or 7 times a week. I have a whole body big muscle group weight plan I am working on. My cholesterol is down to 189 from 220. I am arguing with my Doc over testosterone levels and my wife about working out.

I get pissed when I have a bad day at the gym. I’m stronger and feel better than I can remember. I have something I can control.

So this is the beginning of my story. I will be ranting and raving, self criticizing and seeking it from the rest of the crowd. I’m an over 35 weightlifter (sorta) Damn that feels good again!

Oh and had a shitty work out in the soccer mom gym today. But more about that later, as well as the routines that are not logs, but more documentation of my progress.
[/quote]

Cool