Ian_Montrose

Hi all

Apologies in advance if this post turns out to be quite long but you seem like a really helpful and friendly bunch so I'm going to provide as much information as I think is relevent and see what I get back.

I'm 41 yrs old, male, 6'3" and was 245lb when I last weighed myself 4 weeks ago. I was fit and active till my early thirties but since then I have steadily declined to an abysmally unhealthy life. Just enough exercise to stop me seizing up altogether, never ate breakfast but stuffed myself with huge portions of unhealthy food for lunch and dinner. Drank about 8 cups of coffee and 4 or 5 bottles of beer every day.

My aim is to get myself into very good shape but it's important that I do this not as a quick fix but by adopting a lifestyle I can stick with for the long term. I also want to concentrate on developing all-over strength and power rather than sheer muscle mass - I need to greatly increase my stamina and strength-to-weight ratio to enable me to pursue a couple of activities I'm interested in (rock climbing and sea kayaking).

So far, I've switched over to wholemeal rice, pasta and oats for most of my staple carbs and have pretty much ditched bread and potatoes altogether. I'm eating more fresh veg and fruit, protein comes primarily from fish and chicken and I try to keep my fats as healthy as possible. I'm also spreading my intake over 5 or 6 smaller meals per day rather than the 2 binges I used to enjoy. The coffee has been replaced with green tea (no milk/sugar) and the beer has gone. A typical day:

8:00am - bowl of porridge (no milk,salt or sugar) plus a glass of grapefruit juice;

10:30am - a pickled egg with oatcakes or mixed nuts and dried apricots;

1:00pm - pasta with chicken or fish (smoked mackerel/herring, salmon, tuna), small fruit smoothie and an apple/orange;

5:30pm - fish or chicken with either rice, pasta or veg (broccoli/cauli/green beens mix usually);

9:00pm - Either a couple of scrambled eggs or some fish or chicken.


I'm getting on well with this and enjoying my food more than I probably did before. The only thing that I miss is the beer but it's an acceptable price to pay and I'll allow myself the odd off day once I've made some decent improvements to my body.

Exercise is fairly unstructured at the moment. It's not practical for me to go to a gym so I'm stuck with what I can do at home. I've also been taking it fairly easy up till now to get my muscles used to the idea they're going to have to start working again.

I'm not sure of your terminology but I rotate through chest/back/shoulders/arms/legs working one area each night across the week (is that what you call a 5 day split?) I don't have abs in there as I don't know enough exercises for them to fill a session so I do sit ups and leg raises every 3rd or 4th morning. All I've got to work with at the moment is a set of dumbells so I've been doing:

Chest - flyes & bench press;
Back - Dead lifts & pullovers;
Shoulders - side lateral raises & shoulder press;
Arms - Curls & tricep extensions & wrist curls;
Legs - Squats & lunges & calf raises;

For each exercise I do a light weight warm-up of 20 reps followed by 3 sets of 10 and 1 set of 6 using the heaviest weight I'm comfortable with for that number of reps without losing form. If I cope with the set of 6 easily I up the weight and repeat that set until I fail to complete.

I also go indoor climbing 1 day a week and pulling my bulk up and down a wall for 2 hours is proving to be a pretty effective all-over workout.

Having done this for a few weeks I feel I'm ready to start expanding my routine and I've got a bench and bar with 200kg of plates going into the garage next week. I've got about £200 left in my equipment budget for the moment and was thinking of spending that on a VKR/Chin/Dip station.

So, what tips, advice or criticisms can you offer?

Forgot to mention I do 3 or 4 sessions (45 mins) on an exercise bike each week, before breakfast if possible.

Robsta

The best advice is to stick around on the board mate, and you'll learn no end of advice/tips to help you achieve your goals. Remember, we all started somewhere and consistency is the key....
All the best, and I'm sure you'll achieve what you aim for. You'vve made the hardest step by changing your lifestyle, it's all downhill from here, hard work but down hill nonetheless

__________________


Robsta

first4muscle

As Robsta says mate everyone has a beginning and its once you begin that is when the progress starts.

budgie

enjoyed your report,sorry i cant help with much as im new to this myself but great info on here, all i can say is dont be afraid to ask anything great bunch. sounds like your determined to do well.
after ive trained, and i log on here, after reading for a while it makes me want to train again
thanks budgie