Monday begins my commitment to training and diet.
I will show progress pics, I will show routine and my weight whenever I feel like it.
It will be a pull, push, legs.
6 days a week minimum. I will rest if I feel overworked.
I will hit failure on every last set minimum unless I feel overworked.
50 years old.
175cm
90.3 kg consistently over the last 2 weeks. Minimal training, mainly just to find weight ranges for lifts.
Rather consistent weight gain from 86.6kg over the last few weeks.
Weighed first thing when I wake up.
I would say 40 percent body fat, but that is an unqualified guess, I have no idea how to measure accurately and don’t care atm. I will just monitor scales and composition.
Absolutely rubbish workout.
From 2nd set of my first exercise, I was fucked. No energy.
1 hour after I started my workout I’m at home desperately trying to stay awake and not vomit.
All I could physically manage was
2 exercises for back. 3 working sets for each following two lighter activation sets.
2 exercises for biceps 3 sets each and 1 set of forearm curls.
I was going to vomit and mentally I was destroyed so I went home.
Off to a bad start.
Pre workout for tomorrows push day.
Every day can’t be perfect. Just gotta shake it off and get back at it.
Are you training first thing in the morning or fasted? How is sleep?
Are just starting to train after a break? You may want to look at a 4-day a week program to start until you get into a routine and then ramp it up once your body is ready. Doing too much too fast is a good way to get discouraged.
Can you post your training program?
I’m definitely lowering my training days.
I haven’t trained regularly for approximately 6 months. I’m feeling DOMS that I haven’t felt in years. Still can’t straighten my arms.
Sleep is decent, could be better.
7-9 hours.
I train at varying times at the moment.
I think I overdid the calories on the morning of training. I’m not sure really. I had a 1500 calorie shake, but didn’t train until around 3 hours later.
Program will be in next message.
All exercises are 3x8-12
Currently weight selection has me managing under 12 reps in last set.
This is program wide
Day 1
Seated cable pull downs
Seated chest supported rows
Seated cable rows
Reverse machine flyes
Face pulls. ( upper chest height for me personally)
Seated incline curls
B’bell curls
Cable curls
Wrist curls
Reverse wrist curls.
On this day it is the minimum I aim to achieve as far as sets and reps.
But it varies
Eg
If I lose a pump in biceps, quite often I do, I will only do 2 exercises for biceps and do reverse grip b’bell curls for brachial workout instead.
I do this because I feel like I’m wasting energy on biceps.
Eg 2
If I’m feeling strong and connected I will do a 4th set on any given exercise.
Day2
Flat BP
Seated shoulder press machine
Cable flyes
D’bell lateral raises
Pec dec flyes
Close grip flat BP
Cable pull downs
Overhead cable extensions
Variations
If I’m feeling strong I will do my Flat bench as a low rep max. Being very weak on bench I have a goal to reach.
If I’m feeling a rare chest pump I will add another chest exercise.
Day 3
Leg Press/ Hack Squat( swap each leg day)
Seated leg curls
Seated leg extensions
1 set seated calf raises.
(Although small, they grow much better than upper chicken kegs)
I love military press, hurts my shoulders 10/10 pain level. So they are out.
Bent over rows, should pain. So they are out.
D’bell lat rows, shoulder pain, out.
Squats, weak knees, minor pain, major stability deficiency, scary, so they are out.
Deads, I love to hate and hate to love. They make me vomit every time and want to go home. So they are out.
Upper/lower split works well with 4 day ???
This above program I used with great enjoyment and got me to my best physical condition ever.
Still was small but saw some gains.
I might post pics if I’m not too embarrassed.
My unqualified thoughts on the fatigue could be diet, or rather body weight.
In recent months I’ve gone from 86-88kg up to around 92kegs.
Prior to that, most of my 40,s I averaged around 76-78 kegs.
But I have no real idea.
keep on fighting
IMO your doing too much especially since you plan on training 6 days. This is what I would recommend.
Push1
3 chest
2 tricep
1 shoulder
Pull1
3 lat-pulldown movements
3 Bicep
Legs
3 quad
2 ham
1 calf
Push2
3 chest
2 tricep
1 shoulder
Pull2
3 row movements
3 bicep
I have had great results with this formula. I can send you a spreadsheet of all the workouts if you like. You can sub whatever you movements don’t agree with you.
What does a typical day of eating look like for you? 1500cal shake is a lot. I would try yo eat more smaller meals(5-6) throughout the day with 30-40g protien at each meal.
More than happy to help if you have any questions.
Keep at it. You’ll get back to where you were in no time.
Check out the T-ransformation challenge if you have not already. It’s a great way to give/get motivation.
Here is my log if you wanna see what I do for training/diet.
Absolute gentleman.
I’ll check your log.
I appreciate the meal example. Great little cheat sheet for myself.
If you were to ask, I’d say my diet is dialled, but it’s not.
High calorie breaky shake
50g rice flour
2scoops wpc
50g almonds
Banana
150g frozen blue berries
70g full milk powder
3-5 g Creatine
TB spoon Manuka honey. ) I’m sure this is hurting my cholesterol also.
Taken with 2000mg fish oil
D3 4000 and k2 100
0.2 T/E 250 2 x per week (3rd week)
Next 2 meals
200g cooked rice
200g beef mince 80/20 roughly( will be changing to chicken breast. Cholesterol is too high)
Then last meal is family dinner, macros go off here, sometimes I weigh, but rarely do.
3 serves Metamucil a day
I usually end up around 3500 calories most days.
These calories are a battle every day tbh.
I’m going to take your advice as far as program goes and give a crack for a few months.
I’ll probably run it through my mini blast once Doc has my levels dialled in.
Like it or not, at age 50 recovery IS an issue. Why are you doing so much volume and training 6 days a week? Growth occurs when you recover. Biceps get alot of work with pull exercises; is it necessary to do 2-3 sets of biceps if you’re working your back? Are deadlifts necessary or will RDL’s do the same? Lighten up on the volume, especially if you’re just getting back to working out. As your intensity increases, that amount of volume will leave you wiped out. Just some food for thought
I would def cut this back. Do you like shakes for 1st meal? You’d be better served breaking this into 2 meals and keep the sugar way down. Watch the fats as well if you taking in a bunch of carbs.
This is good but go to 90/10beef or chicken thighs. About the same macros. Chicken thighs have a couple extra grams fat over the 90/10. 80/20 is too much fat.
If this is the sticking point cut down on the shake cals to try to offset this. What are the typical meals with Fam? A trick you can do is take a 1/2 serving of the food the fam eats and make a big salad with super low cal dressing of hot sauce to fill you up. Is hunger the issue or do you just like good food?
This is a great tool to keep digestion on track. I take 15-30g/daily
Cut that shake down to 500cals. Drop the honey and get the fruit way down. 1/2 banana and 20g-30g fruit is good.
Let me know if you want the spreadsheet I created.
Where in your day do you typically train?
The only real reason is because it change my body last time I work with that intensity.
TBH there was atleast 4 times over a 6 month period that my body told me it was too much.
On each occasions I could not sleep during the night, I felt electrify shooting through my body and had cramps. WEL the cramps were more like involuntary stretching lol.
The stretches that feel awesome, just I had no control over them.
Strange feelings I can tell you that lol.
But I knew it was my body telling me I’m doing to much. I just got addicted to the training.
I’m lowering the volume and I’ll see how that goes for a few months.
I’ll probably stay at the lower volume for 6 months. Then I’ll have a look at something else. Or if it’s working I’ll keep it going until it doesn’t.
Thanks for your reply.
This is a good plan. Make sure you are getting in some cardio as well. I like 15-20min post WO year round and then ramp it up a little when needed during a diet phase.
That’s a definite yes for the spreadsheet please mate.
I’ll be training midday as I’m off work for a few months and the gym is quiet. No waiting for equipment.
Once I’m back to work it will be early mornings for workouts, more than likely fasted as I struggle with food in the morning. Even worse at 4 am.
I actually prefer to train after work, but I hate crowds, so I go later in the evening, that has a big impact on my sleep for recovery, especially if I take a pre workout, obviously.
Yes the shake is a preference, only because i struggle to eat in the mornings. I’ll drop the calories.
Family feast is usually a spag bol, honey mustard chicken and pasta or some chicken and veggies.
I appreciate your advice.
You efforts aren’t wasted I can assure you.
Hunger is rarely an issue. I force feed for the calories.
FWIW, I concocted a 1,000+ calorie shake and drank it over the course of an hour. I spent the next four hours in bed/vomiting.
This goes back to your first post-training reply.
EDIT: if you’re force-feeding, removing excess calories should be a cinch. The only trick is to be removing the correct extra calories.
The plan was to down the shake and head straight to the gym.
I was sat on my arse trying not to move for a an hour or two. I attempted to train 3 hours later, but as stated previously, I was fatigue before completing my first or second set.
Lesson learnt.
Most definitely the lower calories will be fantastic.
Just need to grow
