"Fitness Club" Thread

GWC Community GWC Fitness Club
#101

Thanks for the B-Day wishes Darth!

Great workout this morning, despite waking up an hour early at 4:00am. Oh well, leveled my pally until 5:00 - no horde to gank me in Outland at that time in the morning :slight_smile:

In honor of DawnAZ and Darth, I swapped out the first 20 min of elliptical with some treadmill (much <3 to the GWC runners).

BTW, if anyone wants help with designing a program, either in the gym or for at home, send me a PM! I always try and work in some calisthenics which are quick, and don’t take any expensive machines. I’m happy to share my experiences and thoughts and lend a hand to anyone out there.

Cardio
20 min treadmill (increasing speed & incline throughout to max incline for the last minute)
25 min elliptical

Core & Pushup-centric Calisthenics (takes 11.6 min start to finish)
3 sets of the following, 35 sec per exercise with a 35 sec rest period between sets:
Pushups
Mountain Climbers
Divebombers/Hindu-pushups
Spiderman pushups
Pleasant Valleys (bicycle kick crunches while “picking cherries”)
Dumbbell scorpion pushups

Bicep/Deltoid weight training
Dumbbell curls - “21s” (7 curls coming to mid point, 7 from mid-point to apex, 7 full extension)
Super set with
Delt dumbbell flyes (bent arm)

Dumbbell flyes (straight arm to “iron cross”)
HTS Hammer Curl Machine
Preacher Curl Machine
Dumbbell Shrugs (cause I wanted to, didn’t fit with the set)

Final core/combined set
x12 Dips (parallel bar style)
x15 hanging leg lifts (straight leg)

Total time: 1.5 hrs

#102

I’d be up for helping design one, though all I have at home is a treadmill, dumbells, pull up bar, and push up bars so we’d have to keep it pretty simple!

didn’t get to work out tonight due to getting home and having to shovel snow and throw salt down, tomorrow is another run day…think I’m going to keep it at 8.5 miles but up the incline one point, then at some point I want to up the speed .1 or .2 ph while maintaining the distance

good news… for the diet at least…no grandma’s b’day party saturday, there’s suppose to be a big snow storm and she didn’t want everyone making the long drive in during it so I guess I don’t have to worry about all that fattening family get together food

last night was my cheat night, had an Arby’s market fresh sandwhich and some home made tater tots, my new theory anyway is to have the cheat day during the week since I had noticed when I have my cheat days on the weekends it tends to be an all day gorging process, with having to work during the week and not wanting to look like a pig at lunch I think overall it will lighten the damage done on the cheat day

that’s the theory anyway guess we’ll see how it goes!

one nagging problem I’m having which is why I decided to make last night my cheat night…I think I might have strained my left bicep muscle near where my elbow bends, it hurts to full straighten my arm…so I don’t want to do any weights to make it worse which leaves me in another pickle since I don’t want to run everyday since I’d burn out my legs bad then too

was thinking maybe do that P90X yoga and some ab routines in the meantime for the workouts on my ‘lift days’

any thoughts or suggestions?

#103

hmm appears I spoke too soon…literally as I woke up today I have no pain…was kind of odd for it to be hanging around since monday all the way through Thursday feeling worse than ever then suddenly going away

#104

Awesome Darth! Glad to hear that you’re pain-free. Always good to take it easy to not aggravate something, and giving the legs a chance to recharge between long runs is probably a good idea if you’re legs are feeling tired (Disclaimer, I haven’t trained for distance running since the mid 90s when I did triathlon).

Hey Omra - how’s it going? DawnAZ, still training?? BishopMontana, how you doing with the goals? Frakkintalos, you too!

Great workout this morning. TLDR version: 45min cardio (elliptical intervals), 45min weights (tricepts & lats) super-setted with core, squats and lunges (lunges with dumbbells and Bulgarian Split Squats FTW!) Looking forward to a rest-day (yoga with my wife) tomorrow!

#105

Jeez, you guys are makin me feel like a slacker. Maybe I should get up and ride in the morning.

#106

I hears ya. I gained 20 lbs and nothing fits. These folks are giving me inspiration. Thanx y’all.

#107

going to run in an hour and a half…we’re getting 14+ inches of snow this afternoon…and I’ve given up trying to get that dang snowblower going for the day…so it looks like round 2 work out will be shoveling snow all afternoon :open_mouth:

#108

I want to share this because I think it is so awesome. I and some friends are going to to the Ohio Dash. I only started working on getting into shape in September. I walked my 1st 5K in December and plan to run in a Tin Man 5K in April, but the Warrior dash looks like it will be both fun and a challenge so I am up for it. They are being held all over the US (and Austrailia) so there is probably one in your area too.

Warrior Dash

http://www.warriordash.com/

#109

wow that looks awesomely fun!!!

and there’s going to be one in Wisconsin!!! next September hmmm will have to see if I can get some people to go with me!

also today with the weekend effect, 5 hour energy, and being pumped up from reading the fitness club thread before going, not only did I up the incline .5 but I also upped the distance to 9 miles today, RAWR!!!

#110

Kick Ass Darth!!! Way to blow past the 8.5 mark, AND increase the incline! You’re making me want to hit the treadmill again tomorrow!

I was also pumped up from the thread this morning. Actually got up, pushed the alarm forward an hour, lay there for a bit and thought - nope, gotta do this! I checked the body fat composition on Friday and was sitting at 7.8%, but with the work xmas party being buffet style this year, it was a bit too hard to reign it in.

Awesome workout this morning though! And I had extra motivation. In Sept my wife got me a photo shoot via groupon to celebrate having lost all my weight. Actually had it today over my lunch our - it felt great, and I didn’t even have to force a cheezy smile :slight_smile:

Memyself - that’s so OSSIM! We’ve got a bunch of runners now posting to the Fitness Club thread. Getting into running is a great commitment, and having a coal like the Warrior Dash is a great motivation!!

No kidding Talos :slight_smile: Thanks everyone too!!! Let’s keep this up right through the holidays. In no time we’ll be sleek-geeks for the meetup :slight_smile:

BTW, I just saw on Twitter that Nightwing just started heading back to the Gym!!! Way to go Nightwing!!!

BTW v1.1, if you’re a Twitter user, there are some great fitness tweet-ers out there if you’re looking for periodic fitness tweets and motivation. I follow:
@FitnessbyBarb
@CommittedTrain
@Sharefitness
@MsFitBC
@mercedesfitness

If anyone else follows someone inspirational or with great fitness advice, feel free to post it! (Also, I keep meaning to post my favorite iPhone fitness and diet apps… maybe tomorrow:D )

#111

I think I need to try something new for lifting, the P90X vids are just not inspiring me anymore, I know them all by heart already and am already having trouble finding motivation for lifting

am looking for some alternative strength training ideas, anyone have some?

Wednesday or Thursday (opposite of whichever I make my cheat day) I think I’m going to do a workout that always use to kick my butt

it’s essentially a constant workout, you take no breaks at all which is what does you in

10 push ups standard width
10 sit ups (forget where I got this from but the original instructions were to do crunches here, however I have back issues when I try to do crunches and I actually find full sit ups to be easier with anchoring my feet under my couch)

10 wide fly push ups
10 sit-ups
10 military style pushups
10 sit-ups
10 decline pushups
10 sit-ups

you keep going, once you get tired enough you switch to 5 and 5

you’re done when your arms are so tired you can’t do anymore pushups

you pretty much ‘rest’ your arms by doing sit-ups

now when I did this originally I was in MUCH better shape than I am now (in terms of strength training at that point I could crank out 120 pushups at once with it being nothing and now I’m usually burning around somewhere between 30 and 40)

so we’ll see how it goes next go round!

and if anyone is interested, I never attempted this but the same place I got that work out from there’s another variant, believe it was called the ‘Spartan Run’ or something similar, you essentially do one round of that, run half a mile, repeat, until you’ve run 2 miles

am looking forward to trying some new strength training routines, I need something new to get my interest back I think!

only did half of the P90X chest and back today, ended up quitting not because I was really all that tired but bored :confused:

#112

Your mentioning of Spartan made me remember something… This looks promising!:slight_smile:

http://www.menshealth.com/fitness/muscle-building-11

#113

Heya Darth, if you’re looking for push-up variants, here are some great ones for strength training that I’m really a fan of:

Spider-man push-ups Video Link
Scorpion push-ups Video Link
Hand-stand push-ups Video Link
Hindu Pushups (also called judo pushups or dive-bombers) Video Link
Renegade Row w/ Pushup Video Link

I sometimes do a similar workout to yours, with abs in between pushup sets, but if I’m really feeling sadistic, I’ll work in 1 min of jump rope between pushup sets, then superset ab exercises with jump rope.

After cardio this morning, I took my plank to a new level by doing elevated planks (feet on a 1 ft rise), and then adding a 25lb weight on my back. The set looked like:
60 sec elevated/weighted plank
60 sec right elevated side plank with dumbbell
60 sec left elevated side plank with dumbell
30 sec of whimpering… rinse & repeat for a total of 3 sets

After that, a great lats & chest day with seated rows, wide grip pull-ups (still hate pull-ups), dumbell rows, pec deck, dumbbell bench, lat pull downs, incline bench, ‘low’ seated rows and some swiss-ball crunchies super setted in here and there for good measure. :slight_smile: I think I’m feelingd a legs and tricep day tomorrow!

#114

Are any of you on DailyMile? I would love to add all of you to my feed so we can encourage each other ‘n’ stuff. I am Abby D. over there.

Then again I guess that is the point of this thread. I’m so silly. I really love dailymile though. Something about getting training reports at the end of the week keeps me motivated.

#115

I’ve never heard of DailyMile? what is it exactly?

also…I pushed myself to 9.5 miles tonight…this after my legs were already burned out from work…it’s becoming very hard now, if Christmas weren’t right around the corner this is where I’d probably say I need to just do a ‘light week’ to let myself recover…but I need to keep pushing to counter balance the upcoming holiday food!

words do not express how tired my legs are right now :eek:

I think I’m gonna hit the hay about an hour early tonight, that usually helps my legs feel better than normal the next day!

tomorrow I’m going to give what I had mentioned at shot, then Friday I’ll take a look at some of those pushups you mentioned there Amberite and give 'em a shot! do you do Diamond pushups at all? I’ve done the dive bomber pushups before in the P90X

I don’t have a jump rope at all unfortunately

at some point I’m going to drive down to my parents house on the weekend and bring up my old weight machine and bench to my house, then my exercise options will expand even further

Holidays are the toughest times for diets/sticking with our routines, we can do it all!!! :cool:

#116

It’a a place where you can track the miles that you put in on running and cycling, plus you can add other activites like yoga, weight lifting, etc. They also have challenges you can join in and and a few of them are spoansored so you can win prizes. I’ll never win one because there are folks who put in way more miles than I do but I like the challenge anyway because it keeps me motivated. You can “friend” people and send them motivation, follow each others training, share race photos, read poduct reviews, they have guest blogs from pros and regular folks and they have forums. Something about it all really motivates me to keep going. Plus at the end of the week you get a report that shows how many miles you did for the week.

http://www.dailymile.com/

I agree, my goal is to keep moving and not gain. I am keeping the sweets baking to a minimum this year and focusing more on healthy recipes. I was invited to two cookie exchange parties and decided not to participate this year. The amount of chocolate floating around is my bane though. I have to just ignore it.

#117

That workout looks awesome Omra! My oft mentioned hate of chin-ups is gonna hurt me something fierce, but I’ll give it a shot and report back.

I also like some of the routines posted here, here, here (which is my favorite!) and here by EVE Online blogger Roc Weiler. He’s a hybrid EVE fan-fiction writer and fitness buff. Check out his stuff :slight_smile:

Memyself, I’m not a runner, but it seems like a great idea. Where I can I incorporate tech into my fitness. Apps on the iPhone like LoseIt! (free), iFitness, and Timer are staples in my life. I love the idea of getting weekly status reports (the Muscle & Fitness app does that too)!! …and, I’m glad you’re getting inspiration from this thread. I know I totally do!!!

Awesome pushing yourself to 9.5 again Darth! Truly EPIC! Listen to your body though and take light day or cycle to upper body like you suggested to give the legs a break. Another idea is to do a shorter run, but do high-intensity intervals… but dude, you’ll be at 10 miles in no time :slight_smile: Way to Go!!

Yup - they can really hurt too (in a good way). I also do plank-ups (push-up position down into plank and back up) which are a good hybrid core/arm/chest exercise. I sometimes do dynamic push-ups, which is basically holding it at the bottom for a count of 5 before going back up.

Exactly. I had an impromptu business dinner to go to last night after work, so I snuck out to the gym for an hour or so before :slight_smile: Tis the Season for big meals and lots of cookies, but if we all keep encouraging each other, we may actually be more fit in the new year than now!!!

#118

Yeah, all the baking can be a killer. Fruit cake, Stollen, Shortbread, Panettone… the list is endless. Every time I’m tempted, I force myself to think of my commitment to fitness, to looking good for the meet-up, to not letting down my GWC peeps on this thread, on not wasting all the hard work in the gym, … whatever I can do. I also try and keep heathy snacks around the house. My curent fav is unroasted almonds. I can grab 6 for a quick healthy snack, and a few raisins for the sweet craving. The small fat-free yogurt cups are great too at only 35 cal. And a wedge of light “Laughing-cow” cheese is only 25 cal. The almonds, yogurt and cheese all have protein (and essential fatty acids in the almonds), so they tend to the more healthy side.

Anyone else have healthy snacks or recipe alternatives they’re big on right now?

#119

I’ve decided I’m going to take the night off, however this won’t be my ‘cheat’ day or at least not a full blown one, going to have a egg salad sandwhich and some tortilla chips and salsa for dinner so not the end of the world

that way I’ll do strength training tomorrow and run again Friday night, all in all it gives my legs an extra day than I was planning to rest

as for healthy snacks, an obvious one that I’ve been doing lately is my local supermarket sells these little ‘personal’ fruit salad packs, that have strawberries, pineapple, and kiwi all cut up in them

twice I’ve used them as deserts and once for a snack

another snack that isn’t too bad is two graham crackers and you dip them in some green tea with honey, it actually gives it a better flavor IMO

as for that dailymile.com I’ve got it bookmarked, I believe I’ll sign up on Saturday so that I have some time to explore all the features of it ect ect…

as for right now though…its some Mass Effect 2 time while relaxing after work with a bottle of water :smiley:

#120

I love this forum! Geeks do everything, even get fit!

So this November marked the end of my doctor’s recommended yearlong “slow down and steady off” period after losing, well, a veritable crapton of weight. My total end goal three years ago was X÷2. Now that I can get back on the train, I’m finding it a bit difficult.

Sitting in an office chair for eight hours is not conducive to fitness. I’ve considered picking up a few resistance bands in addition to doing a light stair workout during lunch (don’t wanna get too sweaty between meetings). Other than sitting on one of those big rubber balls, do any of you have some tips for workplace fitness? I’m pretty much flat out of ideas, and you all look like you’ve done quite a bit of research!