Johnny Kuo's Training Log

The $50 home gym

2011-01-12T20:30:00.003-05:00

I recently read a post on Gimundo about building a $50 home gym, which I found to be.... well, utter crap. I guess the suggestions are ok for someone looking to just start moving, but I personally can't imagine anyone achieving anything beyond mediocre fitness with a suggestion of exercise videos, balance ball, and 3 lb hand weights (really, 3lbs?!? Are we so weak that we shoot for weights lighter than some of my textbooks?). Here's what I suggest for a $50 home gym.

Bodyweight (absolutely free!) - You can do plenty of resistance training, running, calisthenics, yoga, etc. with just your own bodyweight. Pushups, pullups, situps, dips, inverted rows, hand walkouts, planks, side planks, lunges, squats, burpees, etc. are all easily done with no gear or just stuff around the house. If you get serious about getting strong, start getting exotic with handstand pushups, pistol squats, planches, and variety of lever static holds.

Jump Rope ($5-$15) - If you've never skipped rope, you don't know just how bad your cardio conditioning really is. A basic speed rope (and a good pair of padded shoes if you're jumping on a hard surface like concrete) is all you need for one awesome cardio workout that hits most muscles of your body. Of course, it might take a couple of weeks of practice to get the rhythm and coordination. Add a few months if you want to learn fancy rope turning tricks.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MD3uicAYtdw

Furniture Sliders ($10 for a 4-pack) - If you've got carpet, you can do a ton of bodyweight exercises with these bad boys. If you've got hardwood or linoleum, go even cheaper and use towels as your sliders.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XzhrM_vPI5I

Exercise Bands ($15-$30) - You wouldn't think that big rubber bands would give you a good workout, but you would be oh so wrong in your assessment. You won't need too many to start with. The heavy duty bands can give a lot of resistance (like 200+ lbs of resistance). Ebay a set of basic bands. It'll open up a lot of resistance and conditioning exercises that you can do during your workouts.

Foam Roller (~$20) - Most of us have crap soft tissue quality. Loosen up your upper back, glutes, IT band, etc. with a foam roller. Your IT band will probably hurt like hell the first time you roll, but you'll feel better in the long run. Look at it as a poor man's massage. If you're super-cheap (and masochistic), just use a tennis ball or lacrosse ball and skip the foam roller.

Start a love-hate relationship with your roller.

There you go. You could theoretically get everything for under $50 if you shop smart. Drop the exercise bands, and you can definitely stay under $50. Skip the workout videos suggested in the Gimundo post. You can learn to use your cheap home gym effectively with youtube videos and save the cash for something else.

Jump rope notes: Buddy Lee replacement cords and cable rope

2010-05-30T23:26:00.002-04:00

Replacing my Buddy Lee rope cord

I finally managed to snap the cord on my Buddy Lee rope. It took me about three years, but I finally wore through the cord. All things considered, that's not too bad. I chew through the cheap ropes when I get in a jump rope conditioning phase, though I guess I mostly break those ropes at the handles.

The snapped Buddy Lee cord

I was just going to buy a new cord. An attractive feature of my Aero Speed rope is that the cord is replaceable. And it's reasonably priced at $5. That's when I got the sticker shock of the shipping and handling charges. $15 for shipping and handling is a bit excessive. How expensive can it be to stuff a cord into an envelope and drop it in the mail? Just on principle, I refuse to buy something where the shipping and handling is three times the cost of the product, especially when that said product is a plastic cord. That's $20 for a new cord. For that price, I'm most of the way to buying a whole new jump rope (the Rope Master is $28).

Being the stingy bast... errr... I mean, frugal person that I am, I decided that there must be a Home Depot solution for my problem. I remember reading that someone had made their own jump rope from PVC pipe and laundry line. I checked out the laundry line, and lo and behold the inner diameter of the laundry line was close enough to the original cord to be workable.

Laundry line = jump rope replacement cord

The tough part about using the laundry line as a replacement cord is that the laundry line has wire running through the middle of the vinyl sheath. It takes a bit of jiggering, but you can get the screw tip of the jump rope handle swivel bearings to insert into the vinyl sheath just off center from the wire. After a bit of turning, you can attach the laundry line to the Aero Speed handles just like the original cord. Getting the cord attached to the swivel bearings is a bit of a hassle, but it's totally doable. You just make sure to measure the cord to the right length. I cut the cord too long and had to repeat the process of screwing the cord to the swivel bearings several times as I adjusted the cord length.

Replaced Aero Speed cord... now it's green!

How does it work? Actually, surprisingly well. I can get similar speed as I was getting with the original cord. It's a bit more tiring to turn the cord since it's a little heavier with the wire running down the center, but I consider that a bonus. The added mass also means I'm just as careful about wearing shoes with this cord. I do sometimes miss and catch the rope on the feet. The extra heft of the rope means those misses sting more now. The clothes line cord holds its shape a little better, so I seem to recover better when I occasionally miss slightly and snag the rope on my heel. The flip side to that is that the rope is a little less flexible than the original cord. You have to be a little more precise in your timing of crossing the rope since it's not quite as responsive as the original rope. Again, I consider this a bonus. My technique has to be a little cleaner when I cross the rope, so I'm paying more attention to my jump rope workouts.

Replacement cord test
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQpn8plFp64

Note on cable cord jump rope

I tried my buddy Kevin's cable speed rope this weekend. While I don't regret getting my Aero Speed, if I had to do it over again, I'd probably seriously consider a cable rope instead. I can actually get the cable rope turning faster, which provides a better cardio and foot speed workout. I nearly got a triple under with the cable rope, and I could still do all the rope crossing steps. The only downside to the cable rope is that it's a thin wire that moves really fast. If you miss, you're going to have red welts (so you learn quickly not to miss... :).

Weight training and bone density

2010-03-12T09:26:00.004-05:00

Conventional wisdom tells us that weight training increases bone density (ex. here and here). The force of your muscles moving a load stresses the bones slightly and causes them to grow back stronger. That's a decidedly good thing, at least assuming that you don't do anything really (excuse the pun) bone-headed like lift weights you're not ready for or do exercises with terrible technique. Imagine my surprise when I catch this bit of news: "Weight-bearing exercise does not prevent increased bone turnover."

My response to that headline was bafflement. I thought there was going to be some crap study on how weight bearing exercise didn't do anything for your bone health. Turns out that it's a study about how jogging and walking don't mitigate the increased bone turnover that occurs during weight loss. Apparently, you have increased bone remodeling when you drop a lot of weight. This makes inherent sense: less weight = less load on the bones = less stimulation for bone growth. The thing that bothers me with the study is how "load-bearing" exercises are defined. I guess getting my ass up and walking around is technically putting a load on my bones. But it's as much of a load bearing exercise for a normal healthy person as is picking up a remote to change the channel on the idiot box. I'm not sure when "walking" and "light jogging" became considered "load-bearing" exercises. Have we became that sedentary that everyday activities have become tough exercise?

Home Gym Essentials

2010-02-27T16:37:00.002-05:00

Reading through a fitness mag (ok, I admit it, I flipped through my wife's issue of Shape), I came across an article about equipping a home gym. As expected, I found half the suggestions to be ludicrous. I was quite amused that the bigger budget home gyms had a treadmill and elliptical trainer--two pieces of equipment I think are completely unnecessary for a home gym. I was likewise amused at the suggestion of the perfect pushup device; rotating handles for pushups are overrated and not worth $30. But the article, as silly as it was, did get me thinking about what equipment I would put in my home gym.

I actually do go to the gym since it's free for me (one of the perks of being married to an academic), and I often workout outdoors. I do however recognize that it's still useful to have some equipment at home for working out. Here's what I came up with:

Essentials

Jump rope - a $5 speed rope is sufficient for a fabulous cardio workout that will work your legs, core, and arms. If you want to splurge, you can get a $40 Buddy Lee Aero Speed.
Gymnastics rings or suspension trainer - I'm a big fan of bodyweight resistance training. A TRX trainer is a pretty versatile piece of training equipment that you can use to hit basically every part of your body. You can also go the DIY route if you don't want to spring the cash to buy the commercial product. Gymnastics rings (like Elite Rings or Xtreme Rings) are similarly fantastic total upper body workout.
Resistance bands or tubing - Elastic bands and tubing are really versatile and just as challenging as weights once you get bands/tubes thick enough. I have trouble even opening my 2.25" inch band. As an added bonus, they take up far less space than regular weights.
Pull up bar - You could technically get by with just some rings or a suspension trainer, but if you opt not to get one of those, you need at least something to pull yourself up on. There are plenty of DIY solutions for this, though commercial products are certainly a viable option.
Foam roller - Keeping your soft tissue healthy is an important part of your training! Tennis balls, lacrosse balls, rolling pins, wood dowels are also acceptable substitutes and complements to the foam roller for maintaining your soft tissue health.

Nice to have

Dumbbells - Weights with handles. They're basic, can be used in many exercises, and can usually be picked up used for pretty cheap. If you want to go fancy, you can even get adjustable weight dumbbells.
Kettlebells - Once you know what you're doing, kettlebells are a great training tool for strength and conditioning. I wouldn't prioritize getting bells like some of the kettlebell fanboys, but they are admittedly versatile and worthy of adding to your fitness gear collection.
Medicine balls - Do twists, slams, throws, or just use them as a weight.
Sledgehammer - Just go the hardware store and pick up a sledgehammer. Find an old tire. Swing at the tire for rounds and intervals until tired. You'll be thoroughly de-stressed and be building a physique with explosive power. Pair the sledgehammer swings (anterior chain) with kettlebell swings (posterior chain), and you have a pretty complete strength and conditioning workout.
Swiss ball (or stability/physio/body/fitness ball) - This isn't a strictly necessary piece of equipment, but it's cheap enough and versatile enough to make it worthwhile. Sometimes you just need to make an exercise slightly unstable to improve your strength levels.
Sandbags, Bulgarian bag (or other odd object weight) - You can easily make these yourself. The non-rigid nature of the bags adds a stability challenge and makes for an effective workout.

Only if you have room and/or discretionary funds

Erg / Rowing machine - Rowing is a great cardio workout that hits the upper and lower body. The machines can be a bit pricey, but can be worth it if you're dead set on working out primarily at home.
Barbell with weights - Again, weights and a handle are pretty basic, but simplicity trumps fancy training in my opinion. I prioritize dumbbells over the barbell since I think dumbbells are more versatile overall.
Power/Squat Rack - If you want to be seriously strong, you'll need to train your legs and squat. You'll probably want some measure of safety when holding heavy weights on your shoulders. As an added bonus, you normally get a pull up bar in a rack. Personally, I prefer going to the gym for the squat racks.
Bench - I like a padded elevated surface for certain exercises. Dragon flags with my shoulders on a hard surface are no fun.
Heavy Bag - Getting my heart rate up while training full body mechanics and hitting something is incredibly fun. I'm always in a better mood after yelling obscenities and pounding the bag. Ok, scratch the yelling obscenities part, but I do feel better from hitting the bag.

I realize my list is highly biased to my own training. I'm partial to bodyweight training, resistance strength training, and interval cardio training. I also really like exercises which I believe have good functional carryover to other activities, which means my equipment choices favor compound and stabilization movements.

I intentionally left the typical cardio machines off the list (treadmill, elliptical, bike), because I think they just aren't necessary. The treadmill and elliptical in particular I don't like. They're expensive to buy decent ones, and have serious shortcomings that preclude them from being regular training tools in my view. Treadmills move your foot back for you and basically give your hamstrings and glutes a free pass during your running. This leads to an imbalance between the quads and hamstrings/glutes. That's a recipe for future knee pain if you do the treadmill all the time. Elliptical trainers tend to put the pelvis in posterior tilt, which is not a postural habit you want ingrained. Modern sedentary life (i.e. sitting desk jobs, sitting in cars, couch lounging, etc) already puts a lot of us in posterior pelvic tilt. Reinforcing that posture during your regular cardio workout is not doing your spine a favor.

I also left off the typical "universal" weight machine you see in a lot of home gyms. They are far too expensive and generally provide sucky versions of all the exercises at each of the stations. Quite frankly, you're better off with either dumbbells and a bench, or a pull up bar and just open floor space.

Anyhow, that's my take on equipping a home gym. I'm sure I left some things off the list, but I think the list is a good launching point.

Making progress with the old man

2009-12-26T10:32:00.004-05:00

My dad was never a big fan of my avid interest in physical fitness and physical activities. His attempts to turn me into a nerdy bookworm were only half successful. I did turn out to become a nerd, but he fortunately never succeeded in making me forgo all physical activity to study more. In fact, his constant badgering about me not studying enough probably caused me to rebel and become even more interested in physical fitness. But last night, he didn't poo-poo my fitness expertise like he usually does. Finally, after decades of criticizing me for wasting my time training too much, he finally listened to my advice about exercising.

What happened? Well, my dad retired. You have a lot of free time to fill when you go from college professor to retiree. He took up repairing the house, and like everything else he tackles, he took it up with single-minded vigor. But he neglected to consider that he doesn't have the body of a 20 year old any more, and years of professing while not exercising had taken quite a toll on his physical conditioning. He gave himself tendonitis from gripping and using his tools for too long without sufficient rest.

Then he starts exercising, doing mostly pushups and modified squats. That would be ok, except my dad ignored my advice on correcting his pushup form. He managed to overdo the pushups and strained his shoulder. I suspect (from my attempt to play PT) that he wasn't using his upper back and lats enough to stabilize his shoulders, so he overused his rotator cuff muscles to compensate (guessing he strained his supraspinatus? gotta ask my PT friends to be sure).

After two bouts with injuries, he finally listened to me as I instructed him to do band pull aparts and scapular wall slides to restore proper shoulder mobility and muscle activation patterns. I may try getting him to do a scapula push up and some lat pull down variation, but I don't want to push my luck quite yet. From past experience, my dad doesn't always take too well to having to listen to his son instead of barking out the orders. But I'm pleased I've made this much progress with him. Maybe in another few years, I'll also be able to correct his hip movement dysfunctions.

2009/12/16: Back on the rings, medicine ball core work

2009-12-17T00:24:00.003-05:00

Hopped back on the rings yesterday afternoon after a few weeks off. It's been a little cold, so hanging the rings outside hasn't been happening. At some point, my Floridian senses take over and tell me that freezing temperatures and stiff winds are not good for an outdoor rings workout.

wide supports: 3 x 15s

iso hold false grip pull ups: 2 rounds

archer dips: 2 x 4-6 reps

We also attracted some unwanted attention in the gym for this workout. Hanging the rings seems to always bring people over. Sometimes you meet interesting folks who are curious, and sometimes you run into the people that don't like you doing things that they're not used to seeing. Today was the latter. Fortunately, we weren't being unruly and I can't be kicked out of the campus gym for merely working out. Whew! Saved by the campus ID.

After the main rings workout, we did some core work on the medicine balls. I planned on doing Swiss ball step offs, but we ended up playing around with different medicine ball variations. That ended up being more fun than the step offs.

Freak warm December day = Outdoor Leg Workout

2009-12-14T08:33:00.006-05:00

It had been unseasonable warm through November here in PA, then it turned cold. But we still had one last warm-ish day in December. We broke out the weight vests and took advantage of the cinder blocks and tires outside for an outdoor leg workout:

Lunges:
- 20 x bodyweight
- 20 x 20lb vest
- 20 x vest+cinder block
- 20 x vest+2 cinder blocks

Side lunges: 2 x 20 x vest

Tire Pushes: 2 rounds pushing 40 yds (or failure)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pePWzyLVHAg&feature=player_embedded

Our legs were pretty wobbly after the tire pushes. I don't know why I thought tire pushes as a finisher was a good idea. I had trouble walking for the next 20 minutes. Next time, I'll also keep in mind not to do this exercise after a rain. Slipping while pushing really sucks. You lose pushing power and the tire can come to a grinding halt. Then you have to expend extra effort to start the tire moving again.

I've been enjoying the outdoor workouts I've been doing from the summer and fall. Of course, it's getting quite a bit colder now, so we're moving indoors for our workouts soon. I'm already scheming on what fun exercises can be done inside.

Random notes

2009-10-11T19:48:00.001-04:00

Deadlifted 205 lbs again. It's been a while since I went past 185 lbs since I've been working on my technique. Technique felt pretty clean this time around, but my grip is still weak. My grip failed long before everything else.
On that note, I watch other people do deadlifts in the gym. I cringe at the sight of many rounded backs. It must be good to be young and not feel any pain from poor lifting form.
You'd think that college athletes would all be fantastically fit and strong. You'd be wrong in that thought. I've never witnessed such terrible plank form than during a team strength training session. I saw butts up in the air, holding on to benches, bracing against the wall, and apparent trouble holding even half-assed planks for a minute.
Eating well is important in our household. So, we prepare a lot of our own food. That in itself takes a lot of planning and food prep which I don't enjoy. Add in the fact that I'm vegetarian and it adds even more planning and food prep. Then I have to be a physically active vegetarian who needs to eat constantly, which makes for yet more planning and prep. Finally, I have to prepare food for my wife who's still junior faculty and who is also vegetarian and physically active, doesn't eat dairy, and who wants low carb, low fat meals. I spend entirely too much time doing food preparation. I'm beginning to detest all the chopping and cooking. Some days, I wish I could call the pizza place down the road and get something delivered.
Burpee pull ups... royally... suck. Yet, I keep doing them.
Burpee squat jumps across a football field... also... really... suck. And yet, I keep doing them.
If I'm ever mad or annoyed for some reason, a session of pounding the #$%$*(!@ out of a tire with a sledgehammer makes me feel a lot better.
Getting closer to holding a real handstand. I'm close enough that I can actually see myself crossing out that goal sometime in the near future.
I've grown increasingly disenchanted with most gyms, especially blatantly commercial gyms. Why the hell would you buy 8 foot, 100+ lb heavy bags and only allow weak women in a kickboxing class to punch them with bad striking mechanics? "Kicking" the bags is strictly out of the question.
I'm still amused at the fact that the regular "fitness center" on campus only has dumbbells up to 50 lbs. I don't often lift weights, but the fact that I can run the rack and clear a lot of the weight stacks means that Gen and I work out in different gyms. The athletes gym may smell, but at least I don't get frustrated by being surrounded by inadequate equipment.
Finally, there's a policy at the campus gym about "sleeveless shirts." You can't enter the gym with them because it's unsanitary; you might drip sweat. Apparently, an extra few inches of cloth over your shoulders magically makes you stop dripping sweat. My faith in common sense gets eroded more and more every year.

Tai Cheese: A Case Study

2009-09-18T00:30:00.002-04:00

What do tai chi and dairy farming have to do with each other? Normally nothing, but in the case of Rob Taverner, tai chi helps keep him and his dairy cows happy. I applaud Rob Taverner for his organic dairy farming and his dabbling with tai chi to soothe his cows. I however can't say that his movements (as far as I can tell from the still photo) adhere to tai chi principles.

Tai Cheese?

While Mr. Taverner may achieve a degree of relaxation and calmness, he does not appear to have the same relaxed physical grace associated with tai chi practice. Why is that? If we do some postural analysis, we can see where his movements do not match tai chi principles and why the picture does not look like an example of relaxed body movement. Mr. Taverner is going to serve as our subject for a case study in body mechanics, balance, and relaxation.

The first thing to notice is that the body weight is not dropping through the structure to the center of the feet. The knees are pushed well past the toes. The positioning of the knees that far in front of the toes results in the knee joints bearing more load than necessary (i.e. bearing weight that should be passing through the joint down to the lower leg and feet). The quads are firing like mad to compensate for the knees being at a suboptimal load bearing angle. Also because the knees are too far forward, the heels are lifting off the ground so that the body weight is falling to the balls of the feet. The muscles of the lower legs and the feet are engaging just to maintain weight support on the forefoot.

We can also see that Mr. Taverner has a distinct forward lean in his stance. With the balance skewed forward, the back muscles will fire in an attempt to pull the body back and prevent falling forward. Likely, most of the posterior chain muscles (neck, upper and lower back, glutes, and hamstrings) are engaging to counteract the forward leaning posture. With so many muscles engaged just to remain standing, we can safely conclude that Mr. Taverner is not rockin' the relaxation.

Examining the arms and torso, we can observe another departure from tai chi principles. Harmonizing the yin and yang in terms of the body can be roughly understood as coordinating the flexors and extensors to balance the structure of the body. For the torso, this translates to harmonizing the muscles on the front (yin) and the back (yang) of the arms and body. Ideally, the front of the body should be slightly closed, and the back expanding open. To borrow a common tai chi phrase, Mr. Taverner needs to "hollow the chest and pull the [lower] back." Or, to put it in I-Liq Chuan terms, there's no suction at the dantian and sternum, and the mingmen (acupuncture point in the middle of the lower back) is not expanding open. What we see in the picture above is an overemphasis of the yang: the wrists are overextended (too dorsiflexed), the elbows are nearly locked out, and the chest is opening and floating up.

As a farmer, Mr. Taverner is likely significantly stronger than the average bloke. That may be why he doesn't notice the amount of muscular effort needed to maintain an off-centered stance. Fixing the misalignments of his structure would bring physical relaxation in addition to the mental relaxation.

My apologies to Mr. Taverner for being chosen as a case study for my body mechanics analysis.

Rocking the Relaxation

2009-08-28T10:37:00.001-04:00

"Relax!" It's a phrase you're bound to hear if you study an internal martial art, especially any of the tai chi variants. But what exactly does it mean to relax? According to the dictionary definitions,

relax (verb) is
to make less tense, rigid, or firm; make lax
to diminish the force of
to slacken or abate, as effort, attention, etc.
to reduce or stop work, effort, application, etc., especially for the sake of rest and recreation.

None of those definitions sound congruent with studying a martial art. A key to effectiveness in any martial art is generating power. The ability to generate force is highly desirable from a martial perspective. So then what gives with all the emphasis on relaxing and diminishing force?

Not the type of relaxation we're discussing.

To answer this question, we can examine the first exercise from the I-Liq Chuan (ILC) 15 basic exercises: rocking. The rocking exercise illustrates the first three points of the six physical points in ILC:

6 Physical Points
Relaxation
Center of gravity
Alignment
Center of mass
Spheres of offense and defense
Spinning force of coordination

As the balance is rocked forwards and backwards between the toes and heel of the feet, the tension felt on the body changes. Gravity pulls the body differently as we rock back and forth, causing the muscles to activate differently as the balance shifts to the different parts of the foot. As the weight shifts towards the toes and the balls of the feet, tension rises up from the front of the ankles to the shins, quads, abdomen, and chest. Likewise, when the weight shifts back towards the heel, tension is experienced on the body starting from the back of the ankles and rising up the calves, hamstrings, glutes, lower back, and upper back. The further off balance you go, the more the muscles must fire to compensate and the higher the felt tension rises in the body.

As the weight shifts towards the center of the feet--i.e. the center of gravity--the tension felt by the body reaches a minimum. At this balance/center point, the body's weight is being pulled straight down to the feet through the structure of the body. The structure of the body is stacked up such that the bones, ligaments, and tendons bear the brunt of the gravitational force pulling the body. When the structure of the body stacks into alignment at the center of the feet, the body is minimally tensed and maximally relaxed.

It is important to note that this state of relaxation is achieved by understanding the center of gravity and the alignment of the body's structure to drop the weight to the center of the feet. This simple rocking exercise contains and illustrates the first three principles of the six physical points. Without alignment (stacking of the body structure), you cannot achieve the center of gravity; gravity will pull the misaligned body structure such that the weight does not fall on the balance point in the center of the feet and some joints will bear disproportionately more weight. Without the center of gravity (body structure stacked over the center of the feet), gravity will pull in the body in the off-balanced direction. To keep the body standing upright, muscles will need to activate more (i.e. the body becomes tensed) to compensate for the off-centered balance.

Returning to the original question, what's so important about understanding relaxation? What is meant by relaxation is indeed the lack of tension or the lessening of force and effort. But the lessening of tension is relative to the muscular effort needed to maintain and move the body structure. If the center of gravity is achieved, the muscles can relax more as the body structure bears more of the weight. The relaxed muscles result in more potential force being available to move the body. With an off-balanced structure, the muscles are already engaged in compensating for the balance; the amount of potential muscular force available for body movement is diminished by the muscular effort necessary just to keep the body upright. The more off-balance you go, the more tensed the muscles become and the more pronounced your reduction in movement power will be.

Relaxation from the training perspective is the ability to use as little muscular effort as necessary to maintain the body, such that maximum muscular force is available for use. When dealing with either just gravitational force or the force of an opponent, misalignment of the body results in tenser muscles and less usable muscular force. Proper alignment allows the relaxation of the muscles. With relaxed muscles, it is far easier to move the body and generate power.

Training Gear Update: ladder, rope, belt, hammer, oh my

2009-08-26T23:06:00.002-04:00

It's been a while since I've made any notes about my training gear. In fact, the last time I've discussed training gear was my post on my cheesy pull up bar solution. So, here is my long overdue training gear post.

Buddy Lee Aero Speed jump rope

It's been nearly two years since I bought my Aero Speed rope. I really liked the rope when I first bought it, and I still really like it. I've read some people complain about the cord snapping or the rings on the swivel bearings breaking. I haven't experienced that sort of equipment failure, but I've only used my rope indoors on either rubber mats or sprung wood floors. I'd be pretty annoyed if my $40 jump rope broke on me under those conditions.

That being said, the rope cord has thinned in the middle. I thought I'd never wear out the cord, but apparently two people (my wife and I) doing numerous speed skipping sessions has taken its inevitable toll on the rope cord. Replacement cords are reasonbly priced ($4-5ish + shipping), but I'm cheap. I decided there's got to be a hardware store solution to this. After wandering into the plumbing aisle, I found it: 1/4" polyethylene tubing.

At $0.11 per foot, it's a very affordable way to put a sleeve over the rope cord and extend it's useful life. Just cut lengthwise down the middle of the tube, and wrap it around the rope.

Another issue I had with the rope was that you're not supposed to kink the rope if you want to turn it quickly. That rules out hanging the rope on a hook or just cramming the rope into my gym bag. Again, my years of experience as a poor engineering grad student came to my aid. My solution: a cardboard cutout holder. Just cut four notches into an ~8" square piece of cardboard, wrap the rope around it, and toss into gym bag. Easy, cheap, and functional.

Homemade Agility Ladder

For a period of time, I was recovering from one of my bouts of wrist tendonitis. Jumping rope wasn't exactly speeding up my wrist recovery, so I had to do an alternate exercise for my plyo/interval training cardio. So, thus began my adventures with the agility ladder. This is one case where I probably would have been better off just buying a commercial ladder, but I decided to save the cash and spend too much time building and debugging the homemade version. With some 1/2" PVC pipe and some nylon rope, I concocted my very own agility ladder:

I was proud of myself, and I was pretty sure nobody was going to steal it because of its pink rope and ghetto PVC rungs. I quickly discovered one major problem with my ladder though. Stuffing it in a backpack to transport to and from my workout locations ran the serious risk of creating a holy tangled mess. By the third untangling session, I decided to copy something from the commercial versions. A threaded rod rammed through drilled holes in the middle of each rung would keep the whole mess together without becoming tangled. A wing nut at the bottom keep the rungs from sliding off.

Now, I can look totally cool as I saunter into the gym with my pink corded agility ladder and makeshift carrying handle.

Ironmind Dip Belt

Gen gave me a dip belt last Christmas, and I've loved the belt. I'd be using it more often if doing weighted dips and pulls didn't flare up my wrists. It's rated for some absurd amount of weight (1000 lbs?), which I'm not even close to doing. I only got up to 65-70lbs.

Undoing the webbing from the buckle to change weights works ok. I prefer the carabiner and loading pin solution myself since it's more convenient. But I didn't want to buy the loading pin, so I just searched the internet until I found someone's suggestion of two carabiners and a chain. Works for me.

Sledgehammer

The sledgehammer is my latest toy (is it bad that I consider workout equipment "toys"?). I didn't think 8lbs could be so tough. I can't yet do the sledgehammer walking finger strength drills, and I'm definitely not going to attempt any sledge levering exercises which bring the sledge anywhere near my face (at least not for a while). I could swing the bad boy at a tire, and that was hella fun. If I had any stress aggression before my workout, it was gone by the time I finished my sledge swing workout.

I've heard talk from one of my buddies about a 20 lb sledge. I don't think I'm ready to jump much beyond a 10-12 lb sledge (and then only for swings, forget levering). It seems like such a puny jump going from 8 lbs to 10-12 lbs. But then again, a weight on the end of a stick makes things a lot more interesting, and 2-4 lbs more weight is still a 25-50% increase. I think I'll be sticking with my 8 pounder for a while.

New killer exercises

2009-07-24T16:30:00.003-04:00

I've added two new exercises to my repertoire. They were much harder than I originally anticipated. I guess everything looks easy. The reality was that the exercises were far from easy.

Offset barbell side bends (or lateral flexion as this vid calls it):

I actually held the barbell closer to the end. Three sets of six (each side) destroyed my obliques. I'm still feeling it two days later. Add the fact that I did deadlifts just before this exercise, and my entire midsection is sore.

Burpee pull-ups:

I don't know why I thought this exercise wouldn't be too bad. I could only do 20 reps my first set before getting gassed. Subsequent sets were down in the 10-15 rep range, and I was definitely breathing hard at that point.

back to deadlifts

2009-07-09T18:30:00.003-04:00

After taking about two months off from deadlifts to give my wrists a rest, I tried them again today. I'm not back to where I was, but I'm also not that far off from my prior progress. I got up to a solid 4x5 at 165lbs. My grip still gets pretty tired from deadlifts, which is to be expected. I felt like I could have gone up to 185 without too much trouble. I'll stay at 165 for another week or two and then start slowly ramping up.

1.5 minutes to nausea

2009-06-23T08:53:00.002-04:00

Over the past month or so, I've managed to pick up some new workout toys. They're nothing fancy, but they sure are effective. What did I get? A stopwatch and a round/interval timer. I've been keeping track of my rest/work periods during my workouts to do a little energy system training during my strength training. I though I'd go a little conservative with 1.5 minutes of rest between sets of pull ups and dips. Oof. That was tougher than I expected. By the time the 4th set rolls around, I'm not feeling so great. Fortunately, I'm pretty good about not actually working out hard enough to hurl, but boy do I feel queasy by the end of the workout.

As an added bonus to training my anaerobic capacity, timing my rest periods has made my workouts significantly shorter. That's a decidedly good thing since I only have access to a gym which closes at 6:45-7:00ish (damn summer schedule, there's one downside to going to a college gym). We may only roll into the gym a little before 6. That doesn't leave a whole lot of time for an extended workout. So, it's a quick 20 minutes of cardio, and a timed 15 minute strength workout. Even with just 30 or so minutes for my complete workout, I feel like I've had a good session and my muscles certainly feel mildly sore/tired the next day.

Crunches suck

2009-06-10T22:17:00.004-04:00

Not only are they completely boring, but they also apparently aren't good for your back either. All that flexing puts unnecessary strain on the back. People usually do crunches to tone their abs and get closer to the six-pack stomach, but ironically lots of crunches don't accomplish that. Nutrition and total body exercise (i.e. dropping your body fat percentage) play a bigger role in the ab aesthetic than tons of crunches. Plus, overdoing crunches just overdevelops the rectus abdominus relative to the other ab muscles. The result of a rectus abdominus being a lot stronger than the transverse and obliques would be? Right. Poochy belly. If the other abs are too weak to hold the hypertrophied rectus abdominus in place, you may get that great looking six-pack from the front, but from any other angle you'll have the distended gut.

I stopped doing crunches ages ago mostly because I got bored with them. The last thing I want to do at the end of a workout is 100+ crunches. Now, having my workout partner throw a medicine ball at me while I'm on a situp bench and then proceeding to swear to high heaven while throwing the medicine ball back... that sounds a lot more fun to me. It hits my abs harder and takes a whole lot less time than crunches. Swiss ball planks, leaping push ups, dragon flags, L-seat chin ups, L-seat dips, front levers, etc. are all better choices for hitting the abs. There are plenty of other core exercises which are more effective, efficient, and just plain more fun.

Injuries Galore

2009-06-01T21:18:00.002-04:00

Well, my wrists feel a little better after basically a month off. Granted, I did cheat on my "no gripping exercises" policy just a little. Not much though. Just the occasional set of pull ups and dragon flags. I started doing the agility ladder to offset my lack of time on the jump rope. The ladder was a heck of a lot more of a workout than I was expecting. I also started doing medicine ball throwing exercises. Three rounds of varying exercises using of 30s effort and 30s rest pushes me to the edge of feeling queasy.

On the down side, I've been having on and off pain in my left foot. It's sharp pain for a few days, which then disappears. But it's recurred twice, which is not a good sign. After a bit of reading, I think I have a sprained ligament in my foot. My foot only hurts when weighted and in certain types of motion. There's also the fact that I've been doing more unfamiliar plyometric type exercises, which is probably stressing my feet in new ways. All I have to say is "bleh." Walking around gimpy puts a real damper on my conditioning. But oddly enough, it doesn't prevent me from teaching my I-Liq Chuan classes. I can still demonstrate applications while gimpy.

bleh, wrist tendonitis

2009-05-01T23:25:00.002-04:00

My wrists have been hurting for the past week. After some research and consultation with friends, I'm guessing I have inflamed tendons. I have to lay off for a week or two from exercises involving my grip. That really sucks. What exercises do I usually do for my upper body that don't involve my hands? Not many. I'm going to have to be pretty creative for the next several workouts.

woot! 75 lb weighted dips

2009-04-26T21:01:00.002-04:00

We didn't make it to our regular gym today, so we had to go to the campus gym today. I'm not a huge fan of the campus gym. It looks nice, but it's not exactly a gym set up for people with above average training goals. Anyhow, I lugged along my dip belt and 3/4" rope to the gym in an attempt to get a decent workout. Folding over the rope two times gave me 4 strands to imitate a 3" rope for rope pullups. Oof! That was a serious grip killer. I barely got 8 reps before my forearms were telling me to let go.

Then it was on to weighted dips. I banged out 50lbs with no trouble, so I thought I'd try 75lbs. Surprisingly, those weren't as hard as I thought they would be. I managed one set of 4 and one set of 5. I guess the muscle up and iron cross training on the rings has been helping my dip strength since I haven't done any weighted dips in over a month.

Finally, I have decided to take grip training more seriously since my wrists are starting to bother me again and my grip is starting to become my limiting factor in doing deadlifts. The rope pull ups will be a regular part of my training for the next month. Today, I tried pinching 5 lb plates together. That sounds easy, but I could only pinch 3 plates together (for an 18s hold). I didn't make it to 4 plates. My attempt at 4 plates embarassingly clanged to the floor.

Squats hurt

2009-04-06T22:08:00.002-04:00

They really do. I just started getting up into the 115-135 lb range on my front squats. I know that doesn't sound like much (and it probably isn't), but I am doing them pretty deep. I squat down until the tops of my thighs go about 15-20 degrees below horizontal. Anyhow, I'm finding that the first night my quads are really tired, and then my glutes and hamstrings are sore for the next two days. Sore and tired legs make stance training a lot more interesting. I'm really aware of my legs for a couple of days because doing things off alignment means I have to work harder with my already tired legs. It's a good incentive to make sure I pay attention so I don't wobble and fall over.

On the plus side, I think the squats and deadlifts are finally paying dividends for my weight. I'm up to 145 lbs now. That was my original weight gain goal. I think I'll shoot for another 3-5 lbs before I start leaning down again.

Biceps on fire

2009-03-13T22:35:00.002-04:00

I dropped the weighted dips and pull ups this month in favor of muscle ups on the rings. Happily, I'm still able to bang them out, though I'm still not quite up to a solid set of 10 muscle ups yet. I realize now that my abs and core aren't quite strong enough for me to make it through 10. I was strong enough to force myself through a 7th rep using mostly my arms. I paid for it later though. My biceps have been sore ever since that muscle up workout a couple of days ago.

And today I went on with my iron cross practice as usual (what could be more fun on a Friday night?). My biceps are burning even more now. Why exactly do I do this to myself?

February wrap up

2009-03-01T17:23:00.003-05:00

February wasn't my best month for keeping my training goals. But that's ok. It was a short month, and I was in NY for 4 days. Traveling tends to screw with my daily routine, and it takes me a day or two to get back into my groove.

I didn't practice my handstands nearly enough, though I did make an important discovery. Since I've been training on the parallelettes, I've been gripping the bars so that the bars rest on the base of my palm. I adjusted my grip a little bit so that the weight was resting closer to the center of my palm, and all of a sudden the balancing got easier. The adjusted grip was closer to where I would bear weight if my hands were just on the ground. That little change gave me some more wriggle room at the wrists for balance adjustment. That was a smack the head discovery moment.

I have been pretty good about doing my solo I-Liq Chuan practice. I haven't made my daily minimum every day, but I've done it almost every day. I'm starting to feel a little more coordinated with my butterfly form, and after the workshop, spiral force started making more conceptual sense to me. Of course, I have to now deconstruct the form yet again to try to incorporate my refined understanding. It's a rewarding process to feel that improvements are happening, but at the same it's also frustrating to realize that I've spent a lot of time practicing without certain pieces of understanding. Oh well. I guess that's just part of the training process. If it were easy, I'd already be grand-ultimate-sigong master.

Back on the rings

2009-02-26T15:00:00.003-05:00

Well, after two months of training, I think I'm just about ready to get back to the rings. Weighted dips and pull ups have improved my strength, but I feel like I'm losing a little core strength. That could be an unwarranted misgiving since my dragon flags actually feel better now and I had no trouble holding a support on the rings with my hands turned out and my arms 45 degrees out to the sides (getting closer to that iron cross, yeah!). It might just be that I'm itching for a change and want to see if I can finally hold a decent back lever and bang out a legitimate 25-30 (over a few sets) muscle ups. So, I think it's back to the rings for a few weeks. I'll keep up the deadlifts and squats though since I'm not doing much else for lower body strength conditioning.

Back from training in NY

2009-02-18T00:14:00.002-05:00

After my 4th I-Liq Chuan intensive, my brain still feels oversaturated after 3.5 days of training. This time I at least made it to mid Sunday before my brain felt overwhelmed with information. Now I just need to find a way to get in the necessary practice to physically manifest the concepts I learned.

On another note, I returned to my strength conditioning routine today with weighted pull ups and dips. All I can say is that my lats and upper back must be tired from the workshop because my pull ups totally sucked today. Even though I made it up to 70lbs, I was already feeling it on the warmup 45lbs set. But surprisingly, my dips felt a lot better today. I managed to get a full 5x5 set at 70 lbs on the dips. That's some encouraging progress.

Strong abs???

2009-01-26T13:18:00.003-05:00

So, I read a T-nation article today about ab strength. I was all excited that there might be some new exercises which I've never seen before. I tried their ab strength assessment and passed the hardest level without much effort. I won't say it was cake, but it wasn't that hard. Maybe they should have added another level and made the test subject do a front lever, dragon flag, or a crank on the rings.

Training thus far

2009-01-20T22:31:00.002-05:00

We're just about 3 weeks into the New Year. My training has been going ok. I've been consistent with my goal for this month of getting in at least 5 minutes of I-Liq Chuan solo drills training a day; most days, I've been getting up to 15+ minutes a day. Sounds pretty measly right now, but I'm developing the daily habit. And believe it or not, 15 minutes of concentrated training actually takes real effort. I'd much prefer that I get those few minutes of attentive mindful training in rather than hours of mindless, rote training. Add in the 10-30 minutes of meditation I've been trying to get in every day, and I'm slowly getting back to a respectable practice regimen. All I need now is to find consistent training partners for the partner work.

My strength conditioning has been going well. I can almost hold a front lever now; my butt still drops a little and I can't hold it much longer than a second or two. But hey, it's a start. I finally realized that I wasn't clamping down on my lats (and rest of the posterior chain) hard enough, which was making the front lever harder to hold. I can almost hold a handstand on the parallelettes for 5-6s.

My deadlift and squat form is improving. I realized that I was underutilizing my glutes (especially on the left side), which was throwing my form off a little bit. After two weeks of correcting that, my deadlifts feel much better. I blasted through 165lbs. I'm still at measly 65lbs on full R.O.M. front squats for the time being until I can correct a movement imbalance. I can feel my hips tilting just a little because my left hip/glute is not activating right. Once I correct that, I think my squat numbers will jump pretty quickly.

I'm also really enjoying the Ironmind dip belt that Gen gave me for Christmahanukwanzikah. I'm still stuck at 70 lbs max on the weighted pulls (60 lbs for my 5x5 sets), but I've upped my dip weight to 60 lbs. Those 60lbs on the dips were easy today, which means I'll need to torture myself by upping the weight next week. I think I'm struggling a bit with the weighted pulls because I just do so many pull up type exercises, and I do weighted pull ups the day after deadlifts. My posterior chain is probably still tired from that workout when I get to the weighted pull ups. It's hard to do them on any other day though since I need to get in my iron cross practice on the rings, and I like to have two days off from weighted pull ups and dips training the iron cross. The iron cross is a little tough on the elbows, especially after doing weighted dips and pull ups. Gen wisely suggested that we sit down and rejigger our workout schedule. I need to figure out how to space out deadlifts, weighted pull ups/dips, and the iron cross training, all while trying to minimize our workout time because Gen is now teaching a heavier load this semester.

The Gift of Strength

2009-01-02T22:53:00.003-05:00

So Santa/Hannukah Harry brought me a pleasant surprise this year. Ok, maybe it wasn't a huge surprise since I did write a letter specifically requesting this gift. Anyhow, though Santa may not be in great shape, he sure does deliver on the fitness gear. I'm now the proud owner of an IronMind dipping belt. Rated for up to 1,000 lbs, I (nor any other mere human) should ever be able to break it without a chainsaw, blowtorch, and similar device of destruction. Considering that I'm struggling with a piddly little 70lbs weighted pulls/dips, it'll be a while before I'm even within an order of magnitude of straining the straps.

I've started my January logs. I know I've said it several times, but I still can't believe I've been keeping relatively complete logs of my diet and exercise for this long. I've also got my fitness goals for the year planned. I'll be getting around to writing them up at some point, but probably not tonight. I may be a little ambitious, but I think I can pull off all of my fitness goals. More later.

Stretching and Instability

2008-12-27T11:40:00.002-05:00

Who knew you could get sore stretching? It's a new experience for me. I've done 2 hours worth of yoga so far over my vacation. While I am more relaxed and loose now, I'm also sore. This is either a reflection of my tightening up since I haven't been very diligent about stretching over the last few months or maybe I just always go overboard trying to hold advanced versions of the asanas. Either way my hammies have been definitely feeling it over the past two days.

On another note, I've learned that I rock quite a bit doing fast pull ups. The pull up bar in my mom's gym doesn't have a very wide base and isn't bolted to the floor like it's supposed to be. I started rocking the entire structure while I was banging out a set of pull ups. I had to slow down my pull ups so I wouldn't tilt the entire bar structure over. I suppose I'm just too used to accelerating up since I'm usually trying to do muscle ups.

The holidays and winding down the year

2008-12-02T22:16:00.003-05:00

Well, it's already December, and I'm still just a bit short of my training goals for the year. I can't hold a dragon flag for much more than 9 seconds, which quite a bit away from my goal of 20 seconds. That's directly correlated with my inability to hold a full front lever. I probably won't be upping my static hold times by the end of the year, so those goals are going to have to carry over. My handstand goal I'm going to say is completed since I can actually hold a handstand for a few seconds, even if I can only do it somewhat inconsistently. Next year I'm going to have to up my handstand time to a solid 10s. I'm also going to call my goal of "progressing to a planche" complete since I can hold an advanced tucked planche on the parallelettes.

I'm actually looking forward to a new year of training goals. My next new goal will be an iron cross on the rings. That's probably going to be a little tough. I'll have to limit my goals next year to: 1. iron cross, 2. more planche progress, 3. 10s handstand, 4. 20s dragon flag, 10s front lever. I may add a double bodyweight dip/pullup, but that'll be an intermediate goal on the way to my other goals. I'll have to re-evaluate closer to January and determine what's feasible.

I've already posted my December Google Doc training log. I'm rather pleased that I managed to keep up my log through the Thanksgiving holiday. I'm guessing I'll be able to keep it going through the end of the year without a problem. I actually like logging my training, so I'm going to try keeping it up next year, too.

News on the gym front

2008-11-18T23:41:00.003-05:00

Recently, Gen and I have been going to the campus gym, which I find... well, let's just say less than stellar. It's not actually bad or crappy or anything. It's pretty nice, but it just doesn't suit the needs of someone who's a little more serious about fitness and strength conditioning. I can easily clear the entire weight stack on the cable machine, and the dumbbells top out at 50lbs. Granted I usually don't train with the weights, but sometimes I like doing Turkish get ups; if I can already do the 50lb weights, I can foresee those weights becoming too light down the road.

Anyhow, I've managed to find one acceptable bodyweight exercise (actually progression of exercises) I can do in the gym. I start on the pull up bar, invert and hold a back lever, drop into skin the cat, roll back up and hold a front lever (or at least the 1-leg lever), drop into a dead hang, do a clapping pull up, readjust my hands into a false grip and do a muscle up. I tried adding a 180 degree release and turn, but I can't seem to grip the wide cross bar on the cable machine when I'm attempting that skill. I'm digging this dynamic strength series that I made up. Gen suggested I try it on the rings, but I fear that. Not only are my rings not rated for swings/catch-release moves, but I'm don't actually know if I'm strong enough (or even coordinated enough) to release and catch my rings.

Pulling too much, but ignoring the dips?

2008-11-13T23:22:00.003-05:00

Ok, for the first time in my life I can do more pull ups than dips. I think having a pull up bar in my home and no corresponding dip equivalent has really biased my training to stuff I can do while hanging. And I guess doing the rings (mostly hanging or straight arm support-type skills) is also biasing the type of strength I'm developing. I did weighted pull ups and dips again yesterday. I can do 70lb weighted pull ups, but I don't think I can do 70lb weighted dips. Plus, my lats and back still feel pretty fresh whereas my pecs are a little sore this morning.

I find it amusing that most people who strength train are too pec-centered in their training. Just look at all the meatheads in the gym doing way too much bench press. I used to overemphasize benching, too. Then I got a shoulder injury and listened to my PT about balancing out the strength in all my muscle groups. I don't think it's possible for me to develop a strength imbalance with all these pulling exercises, but I'll need to check to make sure.

Sort of back into weight training

2008-11-06T00:43:00.002-05:00

I've forgone weight lifting for nearly two years now, and amazingly, I've actually gotten significantly stronger. That's not to say I think weight training is crap, but I do think now that I was taking the wrong approach to it before. If only I'd started subscribing to the "train smarter, not just harder" mantra earlier, maybe I'd be a beast by now.

I've started supplementing my bodyweight gymnastics-style strength training with some weight training again. Since clapping pull ups have become easy for me now, and I've been able to do 45lb weighted pull ups and dips, I've decided to make weighted pull ups and dips part of my regular workout.

I had a big ego boost in the gym today. I put on the dip belt and hooked up a 45lb and 25lb plate for some pull ups. I wouldn't say they were easy, but I did bang out a solid 3 reps and 1 wobbly 4th rep. Pull ups with an extra 70lbs isn't too shabby. In total, that's pulling 150% bodyweight. And it's great for my vanity. It looks more impressive doing pull ups with plates strapped to you than doing pull downs on a machine.

October gains

2008-11-01T22:46:00.003-04:00

Despite working really long hours and not getting nearly enough training and workout time in, I've managed to make strength gains this past month. I went to the gym and banged out 10 clapping pull ups with ease. I was shocked that they were that easy, so I strapped on the dip belt with a 45lb plate. I did 3 sets of 5 weighted pull ups and dips. That's definitely stronger than I've been in the past. I used to only be able to do just 1 set of 5 (followed by another weak set of 4).

My handstands are getting better. I still can't do them away from the wall, but I'm getting less reliant on the wall. I tried handstand pushups on my parallelettes though. That was big ego deflater. Just when I was getting stoked over my improvements, I found out that I can't do full range of motion handstand pushups on the parallelettes. Those bad boys are tough. I guess I'm going to have to up my shoulder strength.

I went on a trip to NY last month and also had my parents visit me, so my October logs are a little incomplete for a few days. I had to guess some things when I was logging my food and workouts a few days after the fact. Oh well. My November log is now started, so I'm still keeping up my daily log. Only two more months until I've done a full year of logging.

Unexpected results

2008-10-17T22:21:00.002-04:00

It's been a long time since I've done weight-lifting strength training. The vast majority of my strength training has been bodyweight exercises over the past 2 years. I have done the occasional squat or deadlift, and dabbled with weighted dips and pull ups, but that's about the extent of the actual "weight" lifting I've done in the past couple of years. I'll probably start ramping up the squats and deadlifts at some point since I find it a little difficult to find similarly challenging bodyweight equivalent for those exercises.

Anyhow, what has all this bodyweight training gotten me? Well, it's given me a good amount of strength gains. I can actually do certain weighted exercises better (like weighted dips and pull ups) just because doing the rings has given me a lot of strength gains. I've also gained a good bit of functional strength so that I can do some exercises that give would make the regular gym goer wimper in pain. Dragon flags are a good example of such an exercise. Even most dedicated weight lifters simply don't have the core strength and neuromuscular control to pull off that exercise. And now, I can flaunt in the gym with clapping pullups. After banging out 40 pull ups in a day without a problem, I wondered if I had enough explosive power to clear my hands above the bar to clap. To my surprise, I could. Lots of hanging exercises are the reason I have enough strength (and acceleration) for clapping pull ups.

My least expected and most welcome result from the ring training and other gymnastic skills training has been the increase in my bicep size. I know it's a vanity muscle that meatheads in the gym work way too much, but I think I've earned the right to revel in my vanity a little. I read that straight arm gymnastic skills required strong biceps to stabilize the elbows. I didn't actually expect to develop noticeable guns though. My biceps never looked this good from dumbbell curls. I should have started the rings earlier.

Grippy rings

2008-10-12T23:06:00.002-04:00

So, I taped my rings with climbing tape and tried muscle ups tonight. I can now say that the grip on my rings is not holding me back anymore. My hands didn't even come close to slipping out of position. In fact, the glue from the climbing tape started seeping through from the adhesive side to the grippy cloth side, making for a truly sticky hold. The first set of muscle ups felt really awesome. But then the 15 minutes of hard jump roping for my cardio warmup and the weekend pull up fest on my new home pull up bar caught up with me. The next few sets really sucked, and my anterior serratus(?) and abs didn't have enough left to keep my shoulders from floating, which made the transition of rolling my shoulders over my hands really hard. At least that's the story I tell myself as to why my muscle ups started sucking even after taking the grip factor out of the equation.

Raising the bar

2008-10-11T17:12:00.003-04:00

With my abundance of free time, what do I do on the weekends? Why, I build myself a pull-up bar so I can bang out some pull ups at home. I don't always make it to the gym since my boss seems to think it necessary to keep me working until past 8 p.m. Not a great way to get workouts in when the gym closes at 9. Anyhow, here's what less than $20 worth of parts gets you:

That's $7 for the 36"x0.75" steel pipe, $6 for the rug pad to provide scratch protection and prevent sliding on the door frame, and $4 for the climbing tape to provide some grip on the bar. The wood is scrap that I had lying around, so it's free. The rug pad and cloth tape (climbing tape in this case) really added up, but those are actually reusable for other projects. I'm going to use the tape on my rings since I'm starting to find that sweaty hands are making my grip slip and limiting the number of muscle ups I can do. The rug pad has already been used as a makeshift solution for keeping some speaker wire and telephone cord firmly on the carpet and not wrapping around our ankles as we walk in and out of my home office. At any rate, $17 sure beats $40+shipping I'd have to spend on one of those fancy cantilever door pull up bars, which I'd have to put up and take down all the time anyhow.

So, I know you're wondering (or maybe you're not): does it work. Of course it works! I've already done over 50 pull-ups on the bar so far this weekend.

Handstand and planches

2008-10-06T23:38:00.002-04:00

I'm mostly recovered from my weeklong cold and started getting back into my gymnastic skills training. Mostly, I'm back into the handstand and planche practice because I have no other choice with my crazy work hours. I can do those two exercises at home on my parallelettes. Anyhow, I did manage to hold a handstand for nearly 5s. As usual, my technique needs improvement. I need to keep my core tighter and get my leg and shoulder alignment better. I can also hold the arched handstand a little easier than the fully straight version for some weird reason. I got myself into an advanced tucked planche relatively easily today, and I was all excited until I realized my arms weren't straight. Oof. Straightening the arms made that exercise a whole hell of lot harder.

Getting over cold

2008-10-04T08:59:00.003-04:00

Well, this past week was a wash. I managed to get a cold, so that's taken me out of commission for the past 5 days. The plus side to all this has been that I've had some more time to focus on my meditation training and to do a little research. I came across this fabulous site about DIY home bodyweight workout setups. I particularly dig the doorway chinup bar, wall mounted multi-purpose rack, and the pipe rowing station. I don't have the time (and quite possibly spousal approval) to make any of those things, but it did inspire me to look around the apartment for places to put a pullup bar. I was about to spend the money one of those cantilevered door gyms, but that I decided that I could just put a dowel or pipe over the door frames between the bedroom and bathroom in our hallway. A 0.75" to 1" diameter dowel or pipe about 34"-35" and some padding/gripping material will make a cheap and simple way for me to add more pull ups into my daily routine.

My October logs are now up. I still can't believe I've been keeping logs this long.

Damn work interferes with workouts

2008-10-01T09:04:00.000-04:00

Well, I've really been slacking on keeping my training blog up to date. As the title implies, my long hours at work have been slowing down both my training and my blogging. I have been managing to keep up some semblance of training. I started logging my training since the beginning of the year, and oddly enough, I'm still at it. I've been very tempted to stop logging all the food I eat and my training regimen. In fact, I have forgotton to log a couple of days these past few weeks. Oops. But even as nuts as I am for logging everything, I'm glad to know that there are other people out there at least as nuts (and probably crazier) than I am. I just read this article on T-nation about a guy who has 4 years worth of logs. I haven't even made the year mark yet.

Anyhow, it's now October, and I'm beginning to think I may not achieve some of the fitness goals I had set out to accomplish for this year. I've done the muscle up thing, and I can easily jump rope for 10+ minutes at a pretty heart racing pace. The handstand is coming very slowly. I can only hold a dragon flag for 7s at best, which is still pretty far from the 20s goal I had set. The front lever is really hard. I can only do a 1-leg version of it at the moment. To be fair, I did originally state "progress towards a planche" and not a full planche as a goal, so I've made pretty good progress on that one. I can almost hold an advanced tucked planche on the parallelettes, but it may be a while before I can hold a full planche.

I guess some of the goals will likely carry over into the next year. I've determined that next year's feat of strength should be an iron cross. It feels like it'll be pretty hard, and I'm sure it will be difficult training for it. Did you know that an iron cross is only a "B" level gymnastics skill. The skill levels go up to E, I believe. That means my big feat of strength aspiration is something that's easy for the average gymast. Boy does that make me feel weak.

Back in action

2008-09-01T21:37:00.002-04:00

It's been a rough few weeks with work, moving, and getting married all at the same time. But Genevieve and I have returned to a semi-normal workout schedule. I realize that my wife is now just as much of a gym rat as I am. I suppose that's good since we can partially combine our workouts and time together, which is nice considering that we both work long hours. My plan for the next three months is to get Gen doing a full unassisted pull up. [Bodyweight] Pull ups are one exercise where women are supposed to have near parity with men. A fit woman should be able to do something like 70% of the pull up reps as a man. If I can bang out 20 pulls fresh, that means Gen should be able to do at least a few.

I didn't make a lot of gains in August since I've been super busy. My martial arts training has definitely taken a hit since my work hours have increased. Fortunately, I haven't lost much strength or cardio conditioning. I can hold a support position on the rings with my hands turned out for nearly 40s now, my back lever is getting better, and my muscle ups feel pretty good. I just need to up my endurance with the muscle ups. I'm pretty worn out after 15-18 reps (over 3+ sets). I can hold a 1-leg dragon flag for 25s, but the full flag still sucks major donkey since I can only hold it for just over 7s. On the plus side, I have made gains on the tucked parallelette planche. I can finally hold it cleanly, if only for 5s.

My September log is now posted. Hopefully, I'll convince my boss that working 12 straight hours is not productive (it really isn't). Maybe I'll be able to grease the groove a little and get some more handstand and planche improvements in my breaks.

Sore.

2008-08-04T22:11:00.002-04:00

Oof. It's been a while since I've been this sore. I had 2 hours of sparring practice and 20 minutes of handstand practice yesterday. Today, I decide to give the bag a beatdown as a warmup since I didn't have my sneakers with me to warm up with the rope. In case you ever wondered, punching the bag for a solid minute as fast and hard as you can is really tiring. I can just barely make 50 seconds on that drill right now.

Stupidly, I decided to do a rings workout today. I'm happy that my muscle ups are getting better. With a few technique refinements and some more strength gains, I should be banging out 5x5 in no time. I don't know what possessed me to do extra Bulgarian dips and false grip pull ups though. I was already tired from yesterday's training. Now everything is just sore.

Another challenge bites the dust

2008-07-31T22:01:00.003-04:00

Ok, maybe the 30s double under challenge wasn't as hard as I thought it was going to be. I just did it today. I will say it really got my heart rate up, but it only took me 3 attempts over maybe a week to complete the challenge. Probably having a $40 jump rope with smooth turning swivel bearings helps me out a lot. I can imagine it being harder with a standard leather or PVC speed rope simply because it takes a little more arm strength to keep the rope turning at a high speed. I guess I'll have to shoot for 45s to 1min as part of my interval training scheme and maybe retry the challenge with a different rope.

The Double Under Challenge

2008-07-28T09:52:00.002-04:00

Oof. I did the killer anaerobic rope workout yesterday. 2 minute warm up, then 5 rounds of 3 minutes at a 180-200 turns/min pace, and then a 3 minute cool down. I gave myself 1 minute rest between rounds. It's been a long time since I've felt [mildly] nauseous during a workout. I also tried the 30 second double under challenge during my workout. I can only make it to 15-20s before I start getting tired and my form falls apart.

I tried doing full ROM front squats afterwards. I only made it through 2 sets with just the bar before I felt my hamstrings start to tighten up. Fortunately, I was smart enough not to try more sets with more weight. I stretched, went home, and managed not to cramp up. Who knew that all out jump roping would tire out my hammies?

Woot! New rope trick

2008-07-25T22:54:00.002-04:00

It only took like 6 months, but I can finally do the double-under crossover trick while skipping rope. Just in case you're wondering what I'm talking about and you can't see the rope in the above videos, that's crossing and uncrossing the rope in a single jump. So far, my attempts look no where near as good as the two linked examples. But it's coming along. I haven't seriously attempted them in over 4 months, so I'm pleased that I managed to get it. I think my next set of rope challenges will be 30s of double unders, multiple double-under crosses, and more turning tricks. I'd try the crossing behind the back or passing the rope under my legs, but I feel like I waste so much time getting the coordination right when I'm pressed for time trying to get my maximal cardio workout in.

update during the madness

2008-07-21T22:34:00.003-04:00

It appears I haven't made any updates to my training blog in a while. Rest assured that I am actually still training. I've kept my daily log of MA training, strength/cardio conditioning and nutrition up to date even though there are many days where I'm loathe to sit down and log everything. Anyhow, on to the updates.

Muscle ups: I can do 6 in a row now and 15-20 total depending on how fresh I am. My technique has gotten much better, and I think my strength is improving now that I can bang out more reps.

Handstands: I can hand balance on parallettes for 4-5s become yelling "timber!" I had the "duh!" moment when I realized I wasn't positioning my shoulders correctly to align myself.

Dragon flags: Still stuck at 7 seconds for the full flag. A 1-leg half tucked flag I can hold for almost 30 seconds.

Front lever: I still can't hold a full front lever, though I'm slowly getting into double digits for the 1-leg half tucked lever. If I can hold my hands closer to my hips and remember to keep my shoulder blades engaged, I do better at the static hold. I started training cranks on the rings to build more strength for the front lever. I have to pike more than the guy in the video. Dear Lord, that exercise hurts. I can only do 3-4.

Back lever: Not one of my original strength goals for the year, but one I picked up while messing around. I can hold the full back lever, but I can only hold it for at most 10s on a bar and maybe 5s on the rings.

Planche: I'm still stuck at like 10 seconds with a tucked planche on the parallettes. I need to ramp up my practice of this skill, but it's the one that is the hardest to find time for.

Jump rope: I can turn the rope around 200 turns per minute for 3-5 minute rounds for up to 15 minutes. I'm trying to ramp up my HIIT training and build up my anaerobic capacity since staying in the aerobic range on the rope is now pretty easy for me.

Martial arts wise, I've been slacking since I've been pretty busy lately. I have been ramping up my work on the punching bag since I've discovered that I have a hard time maintaining proper body mechanics when under pressure with a dynamic, non-cooperative, and bigger partner. Not a particularly shocking revelation. I read on a gymnastics forum that competitive gymnasts need to practice skills for at least 1000 hours for competition level proficiency. That's mildly depressing since that means I have a lot more practice to put in to achieve proficiency with certain skills. But on the other hand, I'm not worried about being competition level, so hopefully I'll be somewhat decent in a shorter period of time. Anyhow, the point of that was that I'm trying to put a beatdown on the bag more often so that I'm better able to keep my frame and deliver effective power. I may still fall apart under pressure, but maybe it'll be less so after more practice.

yet more muscle up madness

2008-07-03T07:23:00.001-04:00

A few nights ago, I had a strange dream that I was doing muscle ups on a pull up bar. That probably means that I'm a gym rat if I dream about exercising. At any rate, I actually attempted some bar muscle ups last night. I have to kip up into them, but I can actually bang out a really ugly looking muscle up on a bar. That was pretty exciting.

In other news, my 1-leg squats are getting better. I have better balance on my left leg now, though I get a little bit of crackling and popping when I do pistol squats on my left leg. I'll have to ask a PT about that. It does hurt a little, but I wonder if it's because there's scar tissue in there constricting my motion.

Finally, my training logs for July are now created and linked. I hope this month it contains more entries about successful handstand attempts.

more muscle ups

2008-07-02T10:21:00.002-04:00

After a week off, I came back to the rings for another tough workout. I still can't get more than 3 muscle ups in a row, but I at least managed to get 4 sets of 3 reps. I'm really close to being able to do more consecutive muscle ups if I can keep my form more strict and my grip more solidly on the rings. I also managed to do a total of 18 muscle ups on the rings yesterday, so I'm pleased with my progress there.

After slacking so much at the gym, I've put on some weight. I'm up to 142lbs right now, which I don't think is all muscle gain considering that my diet and exercise habits degrade slightly while I'm traveling. Oh well. A few weeks of HIIT with the rope should trim me down again.

Weighted chins and dips suck

2008-06-21T22:18:00.003-04:00

What the hell was I thinking? Who came up with the evil idea of strapping weight to your body while doing chin ups and dips? Oof, I put the weight belt today with a 45lb plate to do my pull ups/chin ups and dips. I managed to get 4 pull ups in one set and 5 dips. That was about what I was expecting. All in all, I barely eked out 10-12 reps over several sets for both the pull and push exercises. I guess this means I'll be doing more low volume, high load workouts for the next couple of weeks in an attempt to pack some more muscle mass on my lean frame.

Went back to handstand practice after several weeks off. I definitely feel the time off, but it's starting to come back. I definitely see why strong hands and forearms make a difference with handstands. Digging my fingers into the ground like I'd grip the ground with my toes allows me to hold an ugly looking handstand for roughly 4 seconds before I ungraciously lose my balance.

In other notes, my I-Liq Chuan training has been a little slack lately. Busy with life. But I have still been keeping up the teaching, so I'm getting some training at least.

3 muscle ups

2008-06-18T23:00:00.001-04:00

Woot, got 3 mucle ups in a row on the rings today! Actually, I accomplished the feat twice. If I can keep my grip on the rings and my body under control, I should be able to up that number pretty quickly.

muscling up, other notes

2008-06-09T22:47:00.003-04:00

Woot! I managed 3 muscle ups today out of 5 attempts. It really is all in the technique. After watching a few Crossfit gymnastics video, I picked up some pointers that helped me more consistently get the muscle up. The tip about reaching forward with your nose at the top of the pull... that tip is completely worthless for me. What did help was keeping more tension in my core and legs. That keeps my body from being a floppy object that's harder to control and manuever. The second tip that really helped was keeping my hands close to the body and also keeping my elbows in front of my body. That was definitely a "doh! why didn't I think of that before?!?" moment for me. With my elbows in front of my body, I can pull behind the rings easier (rather than pulling my chest up to the rings). At the top of the pull, my elbows swing back, my shoulders naturally roll over my hands, and my hands drop right into position for the dip half of the muscle up. It's really not that hard. Of course, now I've got to work on being able to do two or more in a row now.

I also did more dips and false grip pulls today than I have in the past. I attribute the improvement to my two weeks off the rings when I was doing mostly painful 1 minute duration single reps on the chin ups and dips. That probably improved my pull and dip strength while stabilizing my body control more.

Martial arts wise, I seem to be slowing down a bit. I think life is just getting busier. I've decided to mostly focus on stepping and keeping the 13 points and unified structure in mind while stepping. I think it's been very informative for me. It certainly takes a good deal of concentration to feel the integrated body structure while moving.

The bag strikes back

2008-06-08T23:12:00.002-04:00

Dear Lord, I didn't realize how much wrist and forearm strength punching a bag requires. It felt good while I was hitting the bag, but 2 hours later, my forearms were completely dead. My left wrist is also sore again. I may have to take yet another week off of my full rings workout after yesterdays forearm killing session on the bag. Maybe I'll be able to at least get my muscle up practice in (keeping fingers crossed).

Getting back into the swing of things

2008-06-07T07:17:00.004-04:00

Oops, I haven't posted into my training blog in a while. But I have been keeping my training logs up to date (as you can check on the Google Doc log link in the right column). My two weeks of resting my wrist are nearly over, and my wrists do feel a lot better. I guess the 6 months of being out of commission last time I got wrist tendonitis made me much more wary of overtraining.

In my two weeks off of the rings, I've been doing the slow negative rep chin ups and dips. I can now do 1 min slow single rep, followed by 10 regular reps, and then another 35s slow single rep (1 min rest between sets) on both chins and dips now. My arms are usually pretty tired afterwards, but I'm pleased that I can do it. I also discovered that I can finally hold a full dragon flag with nearly perfect form (body and legs in a straight line and parallel to the ground), though I can only hold it for 2 seconds or so. Not too shabby. I'll need to work on getting my front lever up to snuff next and up my static hold times.

My weight seems to be stabilizing right around 140lbs, after disturbingly dropping to 138lbs briefly. I'm still on my vanity goal of getting the 6-pack I never had before. Sadly, that means probably dropping at least another 1% body fat. I'm pretty sure I'm sub-10% now since my abs are peeking through. T-nation claims you need to be 9.8% body fat for the abs to show up, but then they had to crush me by mentioning that the exact percentage needed for ripped abs is genetically dependent and could be as low as 6-7%. I'm not entirely sure I have the discipline to drop my body fat that low.

My I-Liq Chuan solo training was going pretty well for a few weeks. I had been upping my practice time to 45 minutes a day, but I seem to have fallen off the wagon this week. Motivation seems to be lacking after a day or two of having too many things to do and neglecting my practice. On the plus side, I have managed to give the punching bag in the Y and regular beatdown lately. They still haven't filled the base with enough sand though. I don't think someone my size should be able to tip the base up two inches with a low kick.

Resting Up

2008-05-22T21:26:00.002-04:00

Well, currently both of my wrists are a little sore, which is probably a sign that I should take a break and do light workouts for the next week. I started doing skin the cats on the rings again, did some airborne pushups (not sure what they're called, but both my hands and feet leave the ground), went a little nuts on practicing the muscle up transition on the rings, and gave the new punching bag in the gym a beatdown. That combined with learning the kip pull up and training my grip is probably just a bit too much for my wrists. Thus the need for a break.

I also tried Turkish get ups with the 25lb kettlebell the other day. Overall, it's pretty easy, but my arms start getting tired long before my body. I think gripping on so tightly to the weight and constantly holding it up tires out my arms. It's certainly not tiring out the rest of my body though. I may have to try again with a heavier dumbbell since I've apparently maxed out the kettlebells at the Y. But again, I've got to give my wrists some rest. Maybe in 2 weeks time I'll give a heavier Turkish get up a try.

Lifting heavy things

2008-05-16T16:04:00.002-04:00

I usually don't lift weights, but last night I made a minor change from my body weight routine for some variety (and to stroke my ego). I did weighted pull ups and dips again with 35lbs strapped on a belt. I did slightly better than I thought I would. I'm still not up to a clean 5x5 workout with the weight belt yet, but I'm pretty close. Next time, I may try strapping a 45lb plate on just to see if I can do it.

I wasted most of today watching exercise demo videos on the Crossfit website. There's actually a lot of good stuff on there. I already knew Crossfit usually had good workouts, but I didn't know there was such a wealth of video material there. Anyhow, with new insight, I'm going to try getting a kipped pull up at my next workout (as a prelude to getting a muscle up on the bar instead of the rings). I also picked up a handy tip about driving my nose and shoulders forward for the ring muscle ups. I'll have to try that to see if my muscle up technique gets better (thus sparing my triceps from bearing so much weight on the pull to push transition).

I also picked up lots of other good tips including working up to handstands, forward rolls out of handstands, Turkish getups, etc. I'm definitely going to have to incorporate some new stuff into my workouts over the next few weeks.

Muscling up slowly

2008-05-12T22:24:00.002-04:00

Now that my technique is getting a bit cleaner, I'm more consistently getting the muscle up on the rings. I can still only do single reps, and maybe a grand total of 2-3 muscles ups when I'm fresh. But hey, it's a start. I'm still pretty terrible at the transition of rolling my shoulders over my hands, so I've been using box-assist (feet on box) muscle ups to try to clean up my technique.

My support on the rings is getting significantly better. I can turn my hands out nearly 30 degrees and hold that support position for 50s. Not quite the minute I'm shooting for. I think my anterior serratus muscle gives out on me around 50s. I'm pretty ready to drop by the 50s mark. I tried skin the cat on the rings again today to mix up my routine a little bit. Oof, I forgot how much those challenge the core muscles. Granted, I did the piked (not tucked like I used to), so they're a bit harder than when I last tried them.

I did the slow negative chin up and dip workout again last week. It still really hurts, and I'm still stuck at 50s for my ultra slow rep. Maybe I'll try again next week. I think later this week is time to return to weighted chins and dips and maybe some more deadlifts.

Been training with a boxing guy for the past three weeks. My timing and distance judgment is getting a little better, but they're still pretty sub par. As usual, I'm training with someone taller and heavier than me. Oh well, I guess that makes me better in the end, but it sure does suck having to deal with someone with a significantly longer reach than me. I do try to keep the I-Liq Chuan principles in mind when I'm training. It's kind of neat seeing things I've learned from ILC help me in another art. I'm also sure my training partner must think it strange that I do things a little differently than the usual boxer.

It's technique, stupid

2008-05-06T10:08:00.002-04:00

After reading two sources, I determined that my inability to do a muscle up was probably a failing in my technique. So, I tried again last night, and wouldn't you know it, I can do a muscle up again. Apparently, I haven't been keeping the rings close enough to my body, which just makes the transition from the pull up to dip a hell of a lot harder. I'm not nearly strong enough to have my hands away from my body. I also modified my false grip to hold the rings a little more laterally rather than on the bottom of the rings. That allowed me to more easily keep the rings closer to my body while transitioning from pull to push. I did a few practice sets with my feet on a box to get my technique down, and then proceeded to get two successful muscle ups. It still doesn't look pretty (I feel like I flail my way through the transition point), which I attribute to my inability to cleanly "roll" my shoulders over my hands.

On another note, my one of my training partners was showing me boxing ducking and weaving drills (which I am completely incapable of doing at full speed). I noticed that the only way I could successfully do the motion was to maintain the absorption at my kua and the dantian. If I lost awareness of my hip joints, my ducking would feel really disconnected and awkward and would leave me out of position for a counter attack.

Jumping into the music thing

2008-05-03T23:28:00.003-04:00

Music is such a great exercise motivator. I finally managed to put my jump rope music mix on my mp3 player and had some great tunes to keep me going during my jump rope workout today. I had originally only intended to do 10 or so minutes on the rope, but instead, I went for 20 minutes (not including warm up and cool down rounds). Oops. This could be a mixed blessing. I may end up doing more jump rope than I intend to just because I'm digging the tunes and want to keep going.

I will also have to make sure I don't sing too obviously when there are other people around. I tend to attract some attention with my rope skipping because I do it somewhat fast and use some fancier moves than most people are used to seeing. I might start looking really vain if I'm singing along to Petey Pablo "Show Me the Money." I can just see it now: I'll probably be doing some side swing, cross combos while singing "show off that body you got, you got that dance floor so hot, you workin' that, you twerkin' that, you checkin' that..."

Oh yeah, and in case you haven't noticed it already, my actual training logs are linked on the sidebar. I'm actually somewhat impressed that I've managed to keep a fairly detailed log of my training for nearly 4.5 months. Keeping myself accountable has also been a great motivator for my training, though I think only my mom actually reads my log regularly. I can't imagine anyone actually slogging through my daily log unless they're trying to imitate my training regimen or looking for proof to verify that I'm a nut.

Training notes 04/30/08

2008-04-30T14:18:00.002-04:00

Well, I'm finally starting to feel a little worn out from my training regimen. I often complain about my entire body feeling tired and sore, but these past few days, it's been more noticeable. Not a bad sort of sore, but that sort of I ache all over and wouldn't mind soaking in a hot tub and having a massage type of sore. I think it may be time for a few days break from the strength conditioning.

I did dead lifts again yesterday and made it through 30 reps at 135 lbs (over 4 sets). Not too shabby. My form probably wasn't as clean as usual since I was already tired from doing the rings the day before. Anyhow, my back is only a little sore today, so I think I've made some posterior chain strength gains.

I've been slowly upping my ILC solo training sessions to 40-45 minutes. I think I can start getting it up to an hour, but it starts getting tough getting much beyond that since I usually have an hour long workout after my martial arts training. I spent a lot of time during yesterday's training session trying to understand the frontal plane. The frontal plane is slowly getting better for me, but can't say that I fully understand the body mechanics behind it. Generating real power in the frontal plane still eludes me.

Body weight, where hast thou gone?

2008-04-28T22:20:00.002-04:00

It figures that when I'm trying to up my body weight, I keep dropping weight. I can't say that I'm complaining with the way I look, since I am definitely getting trimmer and leaner. Once I lose a little more body fat, I'll probably have a bona fide 6-pack instead of the pseudo 4-pack I'm sporting now. On the flip side, I'd really like to pack on some more muscle mass to offset this drop in body weight. I may have to resort to buying some supplements like branched chain amino acids and whey powder if I drop much more weight. I actually don't like being this light when I have to train martial arts. It's already bad enough that everyone I train with is taller than me. The weight differential just exacerbates the size difference.

On another note, my fitness level has definitely gone up. I'm starting to jump rope for 10-15 minutes at a pretty fast clip as my pre-workout warm up. A rope workout that would have wiped me out 2-3 months ago feels like child's play now. My dips on the rings and false grip pull ups are slowly getting better, though I'm not quite where I'd hoped to be. I still can't do 10 straight ring dips or 10 straight false grip pull ups, but that may be because I always do them after jumping rope and because I've been concentrating on proper form.

My front lever feels better. I can hold the 1-leg tucked variant (knee pulled in close to body) for a solid 15s. Half-tucking my leg (knee nearly perpendicular to body) drops my static hold time to 5s. It's surprising how huge a difference that leg position makes. Same thing with the dragon flags. One leg tucked variants, I can hold for 20s when fresh, but with the full flag, my time drops to a measly 5-6s. Oh well. I need to strengthen those grinding muscles.

training habits, deadlifting

2008-04-23T22:46:00.002-04:00

Well, I've been upping my personal training time to 30+ minutes a session, which is what I was originally shooting for like 2 months ago. Unfortunately, that personal training time doesn't happen everyday. It's a little tough to work in on certain days, particularly if I have a class/lesson to teach. But, hey, it's a start. Now if I could only revive my daily meditation goals.

I did deadlifts again yesterday. I really like them, but they sometimes bother my left wrist (the wrist that previously had tendonitis) and often make my whole back sore. But today, there was no back soreness or stiffness at all. I hope it's from my posterior chain getting stronger, but it might also be from the fact that I didn't jump rope for 20 minutes before doing the deadlifts. Anyhow, next week I may have to attempt upping the reps or weight. I've been able to get 3 sets of 10 at 135lbs pretty easily. I should be able to do significantly more than that, but I've been loathe to stress my wrist too much or make myself too sore.

4/17/08 training notes

2008-04-18T10:02:00.003-04:00

Oof. Man, my muscle ups really suck. After being able to do them last month, I just can't do them this month. I think my pull and dip strength is good enough, but I just cannot for the life of me transition between the pull phase to the dip phase. I've started putting my feet on an elevated box to help me push through that troublesome transition point. It's no problem on the box. I'm not sure whether my grinding strength isn't good enough to get me over the rings or if my triceps just aren't strong enough at the lower end of the dip position. Anyhow, time to revisit Beast Skills to get some technique insight.

That being said, I tried full range of motion dips on the rings again. I feel weak. I used to be up in the 8-10 dip range on the rings. I'm back to 5, but maybe it's because my grip is now wider and I'm really focusing on the full range of motion. I go down far enough for my wrists to nearly touch my front shoulders/upper pecs. I can't say my form is great. My hands keep turning in rather than staying parallel. Anyhow, that'll be a definite strength exercise focus on the rings for the next several weeks.

slowing down for gains

2008-04-15T09:55:00.003-04:00

I was a little annoyed yesterday at the gym since some fool was on the cables lollygagging. Honestly, taking 5 minute rests between sets is not necessary, and then sitting down smack in the middle of the cable machine just shows that you're too lazy to do a real workout. Anyhow, rant over.

I had intended to do weighted pull ups and dips yesterday, but the cable machine (and consequently the lower 7 foot pull up bar) was occupied and I didn't feel like jumping up to an 8-9 foot bar on the power rack with 35lbs strapped to me. So, I switched to the slow single rep pull ups and dips. I made it to 50s on the pull up and dip for the first rep. Then I got 25s for the second pull up and 22s for the second dip. That's a solid 10s improvement over my attempts 2 weeks ago. Now if only the strength gains would translate into me losing less weight...

Oh yeah, I also managed to jump rope for nearly 23 minutes straight yesterday: 17 minutes, 1 minute jog in place while twirling the rope, and then another 5 minutes. I had a plan on attempting 30 straight minutes, but I quite honestly think I would get bored of the rope by then and quite possibly get one of those post-workout exhaustion headaches.

checking in

2008-04-09T11:05:00.002-04:00

Well, I tried a dragon flag, and Gen clocked me at a 6 second hold. Form wasn't as pretty as it could have been, but a 6 second hold ain't half bad. I only have to hold it for 14 more seconds to reach my goal. I think I'll be shooting for 10s and improved form in the near term. If I half tuck 1 leg, I can hold it for 25s, so I guess my core strength has improved somewhat. I'm getting closer to the front lever, too. The 1-leg tucked front lever looks pretty good form-wise, and I can hold it for 15s or so (with me counting, no official Gen timer for that number). The full front lever eludes me. I can just barely get into position, but I can't hold it.

Got 1-leg squats on the bosu ball down. Woot!

Handstand progress is still frustratingly slow. I think my forearm strength is getting up to par, but I cannot balance on my hands. Wall handstand press ups: no problem. Wall static handstand for over a minute: no problem. Feet leave the wall: Geronimo! My planche progressions also still suck. I can just barely stick out one leg before toppling over. I know I'm not actually weak, but that exercise makes me feel weak.

My last weigh in was 142 lbs. For once in my life, I don't want to lose anymore weight, and it keeps dropping. All I have to say is that it had better all be fat loss. I may have to start protein supplementing to gain some weight back. I don't think I'm losing muscle mass since some of my strength exercises are improving, but I'll probably up my protein intake just to be sure.

New format, and slow exercises of pain

2008-04-01T14:41:00.003-04:00

Well, I'm pretty sure no one actually reads this blog since it's mostly a journal to keep myself accountable for my fitness, training, and nutrition goals. So, I'm going to try something different to keep my blog fresh and looking less cluttered. I'm going to track my progress monthly via publicly viewable Google documents from now on and just note cool milestones in my training. I'll still be accountable to anyone caring to read my training blog, but all those daily details won't have to clutter up the blog. So, here's my training log from March 31st to April 30th, 2008.

I managed to do a modified version of this T-nation workout. Basically, it centers around doing a really slow single rep, doing one set of a similar exercise at regular speed, and one more really slow negative. I will attest that it's quite challenging doing a really slow chin up or dip over 30 seconds. I definitely fall in the category of not being able to do a full minute like the original workout called for, but then again, the author of article notes that he had a lot of people dropout of the workout with the 1 minute slow reps.

I actually made it up to a 40s chin up, and I'm quite proud of that. I will actually probably continue this workout past the suggested 10 days, but maybe at a reduced frequency. Once I hit 1 minute for my slow reps, I'll move on to something else to stimulate some more muscle growth and strength development. I definitely need more pull and ab strength to get the muscle up more consistently and to hold the front lever/dragon flag longer.

Week 13: 03/24/08 to 03/30/08

2008-03-25T22:50:00.003-04:00

03/24/08:
morning warm ups

food:

breakfast: 3 cornbread muffins with PB and honey
snack: cashews, almonds, raisins
lunch: lasagna
snack: mung bean soup
post workout: cup of soy milk
dinner: half quesadilla and handful of corn chips with guacamole and salsa, flatbread with vegannaise, bowl of mung bean soup, salad with walnuts and raisins
piece of ginger chocolate

training: 45' form practice: 7x 21-form, 7x butterfly

workout:

jump rope: 2', 7', 3', 2'
1-leg tucked front lever: 10s, 8s, 8s
back lever attempt (easy to do, but couldn't check form)
side to side pull ups: 10
pull-up to horiz push out: 7
ultra slow chin ups: 2 reps over 45s
chin ups: 7
ultra slow chin up: 20s
side to side dips: 10
slow dips: 2 reps over 40s
side to side dips: 5.5
slow dip: 20s

03/25/08:
morning warm ups

food:

breakfast: soba noodles with peanuts and fried onions
snack: cashews, almonds, raisins
breakfast 2: small plate of fruit, half bagel with cream cheese, small danish
lunch: lasagna
snack: mung bean soup
pre-gym snack: 3 corn bread muffins with PB and honey
dinner: half bowl of Southwest stew, flatbread, 4 Morningstar nuggets, 1 cup of soy milk

training: 35' form training, 7x 21-form, 6x butterfly

workout:

1-leg bosu stand, round side: 2' each leg
jump rope: 2', 8', 3', 2'
airborne push-ups: 15
jackknife push-ups: 14
pull ups: 6

03/26/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: corn chips with guacamole
breakfast 2: 2 cornbread muffins with PB and honey
snack: cashews, almonds, raisins
lunch: lasagna
snack: banana
dinner: quesadilla and corn chips with guacamole, salad with walnuts and raisins, bowl of red bean soup
1 piece of ginger chocolate

training:

6x21-form, 3x butterfly
1.5h lesson

03/27/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast 1: soba noodles with fried onion and peanuts
breakfast 2: corn bread muffins with PB and honey
snack: peanuts, almonds, raisins
lunch: lasagna
post workout snack: banana and 2 spoons of peanut butter
dinner: bowl of veggie soup, 2 egg rolls, bowl of red bean soup
1 piece of ginger chocolate

training:

form practice: 30', 4x 21-form, 7x butterfly
1h class

workout:

side to side running man pull ups: 10
30s slow chin ups: 1, 1
pull up to horiz push out: 6
side to side dips: 10
30s dip: 1
side to side dips: 6
30s dip: 1

03/28/08 to 03/30/08:
in NC for ILC workshop

Week 12: 3/17/08 to 3/23/08

2008-03-24T00:35:00.000-04:00

03/17/08:
morning warm ups

food:

breakfast: 4 small quinoa-chickpea flour muffins with PB and honey
snack: 2 handfuls of cashews, almonds and raisins
1st lunch: half container of brown rice with tofu Thai curry and spinach paneer
2nd lunch: rest of rice and curry
snack: apple
post-workout protein shake
dinner: brown rice with dahl and cashews, 1 bowl of red bean soup, half an oatmeal cranberry cookie, 1 piece of candied ginger

training:

5' standing
35' form training: 5x 21-form, 7x butterfly

workout:

jump rope: 2', 4'
rings:

support, hands turned out: 40s
L-sit: 30s
muscle up: 3 attempts
false grip pull ups, 5 count negatives: 6, 5, 4, 2
slow dips: 5, 5, 3, 3

03/18/08:
morning stretching

food:

3 quinoa chickpea muffins with PB and honey
snack: cashews, almonds, raisins
lunch: brown rice with leftover Chinese food (mixed veggies, 2 pieces of sesame tofu)
post-workout: 1 cup OJ
dinner: 4 small pieces of spanakopita, 6 grape leaves, small bowl of brown rice with dahl and spinach tofu paneer
3 apple slices

training:

5' standing
35' form practice: 5x 21-form, 7x butterfly

workout:

jump rope: 2', 3' (5x), 2', speed and double under focus
bosu squats: 10
bosu overhead squats: 2 sets 45lbsx10
bosu 1-leg squats: 4 each leg

03/19/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: 1 quinoa chickpea muffin, 3 slices of whole wheat bread with PB and honey
snack: cashews, almonds, raisins
lunch: brown rice with dahl and tofu paneer
snack: banana, oatmeal cookie
multivitamin
post gym protein shake
dinner: brown rice with tofu thai curry
ginger candy piece

training:

35' form practice: 5x 21-form, 7x butterfly
1.5h lesson

workout: 4' 1-leg bosu balance

03/20/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: 2 Eng muffins with PB and honey
snack: cashews, almonds, raisins
lunch: brown rice with tofu Thai curry
dinner: brown rice with dahl, 4 Morningstar nuggets
1 piece of chocolate

training:

50' form training: 5x 21-form, 10x butterfly

workout:

jump rope: 2', 3', 3', 4', 2' focus on speed, double unders, crossing skills
1-leg tucked front lever: 14s, 15s
pull-up, grip release and switch: 6
front lever: 3 attempts (can get into position, can't hold it)
towel pull-ups, 5s negative: 6, 5
chin-ups, 5s negative: 5, 4, 4
1-leg bosu squats: 5 each leg
Swiss-bosu ball pushups: 20 (2x)

03/21/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: 3 slices of whole wheat bread with PB + honey
snack: cashews and almonds
lunch: buckwheat noodles with tofu Thai curry and peanuts
snack: apple
snack: Clif Z-bar
dinner: 1 bowl lentil veggie soup, 3 eggrolls, 1 bowl Tunisian tomato stew
2 pieces of ginger chocolate
1 mug of mint hot cocoa

training:

5' standing
45' form training: 7x 21-form, 7x butterfly form
1.5h lesson

workout:

jump rope: 2', 3' (5x), 1'

03/22/08:
morning stretching and qigong

food:

breakfast: 1.5 bowls of oatmeal with frozen fruit, protein powder, flax, walnuts and maple syrup
snack: 1 bowl of Tunisian tomato stew and a handful of corn chips
lunch: 1 refried bean-veggie quesadilla and corn chips (3 handfuls) with guacamole and salsa
dinner: buckwheat noodles with tofu Thai curry, 1 bowl of red bean soup

training: 35' form practice: 5x 21-form, 5x butterfly

workout:

basketball: 30'
jump rope: 2', 3', 6'
1-leg bosu ball squats: 5, 3 reps (each leg)
tucked planche: 6s, 15s
planche plank progression, feet elevated: 35s (2x)

03/23/08:
morning stretching, qigong

food:

breakfast: oatmeal with frozen berries, raisins, walnuts, cinnamon, flax, protein powder, and maple syrup
snack: bowl of Tunisian tomato stew
lunch: red leaf lettuce salad with walnuts and raisins, 1 bowl of Tunisian stew, 2 pieces of flatbread with vegannaise
1 piece of ginger chocolate
snack: 1 bowl of red bean soup
snack: half a cornbread muffin, half an apple
dinner: 1 bowl Southwest stew (quinoa, black beans, cumin, onions, etc), 1.5 cornbread muffins
2 pieces of candied ginger

no training / workout today. did 1 hour of self myofascial release massage.

MA training, life and working out

2008-03-22T22:19:00.004-04:00

I've been working lately on keeping my body unified with the 13 body requirements laid out in the I-Liq Chuan system during my martial arts training, particularly when it comes to form training. It sounds like a simple thing to do. How hard can it be to keep your crown suspended, perineum pointed down, ribs tucked, mingmen open, dantian absorbing, weight on the center of the hips dropping to the center of the feet, etc.? Apparently pretty difficult. The more I practice, the more lapses I notice in my attention to the 13 points. Once you get past the basic mechanics and choreography, the mindfulness training takes center stage. It's pretty tough maintaining high levels of mental attention to keep my body unified through a dynamic choreographed set, but ultimately, the improved awareness and deepening of understanding are thoroughly satisfying.

As I advance in my training, the ILC principles start spilling over into other aspects of my life. I didn't initially start ILC for the mindfulness aspects of the art, but now I can't get enough of it. Mindfulness becomes a perpetual guiding life principle. It's funny how an ostensibly violent and physical training brings me a mental calm a sense of inner peace.

The ILC principles have even started pervading my non-martial arts workouts. I've been favoring exercises that require whole body coordination over the past year, and I'm pretty sure studying ILC factored into that workout decision. I really like the rings (and other gymnastics exercises) because they requires a lot of core stability and mental focus on maintaining proper form to do the exercises correctly. Similarly, I like doing exercises on unstable devices like the bosu ball for similar reasons. Jumping rope requires a lot of total body fitness and coordination. Multi-joint exercises like 1-leg squats and dead lifts require a good deal of body awareness to perform the exercises with proper technique.

Not only do these exercises require mental focus, but they actually work well with the 13 body requirements. Having the shoulders over the hips, front of the body slightly closed, and ribs tucked translates directly into maintaining stability in your core muscles. Paying attention to the weight dropping through the center of the hips to the center of the feet and keeping the knees aligned to the toes while maintaining absorption to the dantian and expansion of the mingmen makes executing a mechanically and technically correct deep squat easier. I've even found that paying attention to absorption to the dantian (particularly at the hip joint), tucking the ribs, expanding the mingmen, and wrapping the elbows to the ground makes my basketball shooting form more consistent and improves my shooting accuracy. The only thing I haven't found to translate directly is the nine solid, one empty concept. That idea allows me to more readily manifest spiral energy and can help me maintain my balance on a rocky train ride, but doesn't actually translate into my workouts. But 12 out of 13 ain't too shabby. The fact that I've translated the much of my MA training into other aspects of my life seems a sure indicator that I'm a gong fu nerd. Oh well, at least I'm becoming a mindful nerd.

Week 11: 3/10/08 to 3/16/08

2008-03-16T22:46:00.000-04:00

03/10/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: three pieces of honey whole wheat bread with PB and honey
snack: cashews, almonds, raisins
multivitamin
lunch: brown sticky rice with tofu, mushrooms, and Chinese broccoli
snack: two small pieces of cornbread
post-workout protein shake
dinner: multigrain flax pasta with homemade pasta sauce, eggplant parm, and 3 morningstar nuggets
1 bite of flatbread
1 bowl of red bean soup
calcium chew

training:

5' standing
40' form practice: 5x 21-form, 6x butterfly
meditation: 10'

workout:

jump rope: 2', 7', 4', 4', 1'
rings

support, hands turned out: 30s
L-sit: 25s
muscle-ups: 3 failed attempts
false grip pull ups (3-2-1 count): 3x6 reps
dips: 7, 6, 3

03/11/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: 4 small slices of honey wheat bread with PB and honey
snack: cashews, almonds, raisins
lunch 1: multigrain flax pasta with sauce
lunch 2: rest of pasta, 1 morningstar nugget
calcium chew
multivitamin
post-workout protein shake with Barleygreen and flax
dinner: "fauxtoush" (fake fattoush salad), one bowl of mung bean soup, bowl of red bean soup
1 piece ginger candy

training:

35' form practice, 5x 21-form, 5x butterfly

workout:

1-leg bosu balance, round side: 90s each leg
assisted/supported 1-leg squats: 5 each leg
unassisted 1-leg squats: 7 each leg (multiple attempts)

03/12/08
morning stretching

food:

3 small slices of honey wheat bread with PB and honey
snack: cashews, almonds, raisins
multivitamin
snack: mixed nuts
lunch: sticky rice with tofu and stir fried Chinese broccoli
snack: banana
post-workout soy protein shake with Barleygreen and flax
dinner: 1 piece lavash with hummus, buckwheat noodles with braised tofu and Chinese broccoli
1 bowl of red bean soup

training:

40' form practice: 6x 21-form, 6x butterfly

workout:

jump rope: 2', 4', 5', 4', 2'
towel pull ups, 5s negatives: 7, 6, 5
planche plank: 30s, 35s
planche progression push ups: 10, 8, 10

03/13/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: 4 small pieces of cornbread with PB
snack: banana
snack: cashews, almonds, raisins
lunch 1: buckwheat noodles with tofu stir fry and Chinese broccoli
chocolate covered pretzel stick
lunch 2: rest of buckwheat noodles + veggies
post workout soy/yogurt protein shake with Barleygreen and flax
dinner: whole wheat Eng. muffins with baked marinated tofu, mixed spring greens, and vegannaise sandwiches
two bowls red bean soup
1 piece ginger candy

training:

form practice: 6x 21-form, 6x butterfly
1 hour class

workout:

bosu 1-leg balance: 6'
1-leg squats (each leg): 5 unweighted, 3x25lbs + 2 unweighted, 4x25lbs + 1 unweighted
walking lunges: 2 sets of 20 steps
calf raises: 20 each leg
bosu-medicine ball plank: 2'
Swiss-bosu ball plank: 70s
star side planks: 40s each side
back plank: 45s

03/14/08:

morning stretching

food:

breakfast: 4 small piece of cornbread with PB and honey
snack: almonds, cashews, raisins
1st lunch: Eng muffin with marinated tofu
2nd lunch: tofu-veggie sticky rice
post workout: 1 cup soymilk
dinner: multigrain flax pasta with tomato sauce, soy cheese, and 4 morningstar nuggets
1 bowl of red bean soup
4 chocolate almonds, 1 square of mint chocolate

training: form practice, 5x 21-form, 5x butterfly

workout:

jump rope: 2', 5', 2'
handstand practice: 3'

03/15/08:

morning stretching

food:

breakfast: large plate of multigrain-flax pasta with tomato sauce, soy cheese and 3 morningstar nuggets
snack: 1 balance bar
lunch: brown rice and mock sesame chicken (Kingdom of the Vegetarians)
dinner: salad with walnuts and raisins, flatbread with hummus, half an apple, 1 spoonful of PB
2 pieces of candied ginger

training:

lesson 1.5h
form practice: 7x 21-form, 7x butterfly

workout:

front lever ups: 8,6,3
fingertip plank: 15s, 30s
bosu ball V-set: 49s
side to side dips: 8, 8, 6

03/16/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: oatmeal with raisins; frozen blueberries, strawberries, and peaches; flax; brown rice protein powder; and cinnamon
snack: lavash with hummus
lunch: whole wheat flatbread with portabello, roasted red peppers, and goat cheese, handful of chips, and a small lettuce salad
snack: quinoa chickpea muffin with 1 cup soy milk
dinner: 1 bowl minestrone, 2 bowls red bean soup, roasted potato slices
1 piece ginger candy

training:

5x 21-form
5x butterfly

Week 10: 03/03/08 to 03/09/08

2008-03-09T22:05:00.000-04:00

03/03/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: rice porridge with veggies and tofu
multivitamin
banana
handful of cashews, almonds, raisins
1st lunch: half container of brown rice with tofu, butternut squash curry
2nd lunch: rest of rice and curry
late afternoon snack: Clif bar
post workout: protein shake
dinner: bowl of lentil soup, handful of homemade crackers with hummus, handful of corn chips with guacamole
1 mug mint hot cocoa

training:

5' standing
45' form training

6 rounds of 21 form
5 rounds of butterfly form

meditation: 12'

workout:

jump rope: 2', 11', 2'
pull-ups: 10
weighted pull-ups: 25lbs x 10, 35 lbs x 5, 35 lbs x 4
chin-ups: 10
weighted dips: 25lbs x 8, 35 lbs x 6, 45 lbs x 4.5, 0 lbs x 6
Swiss ball/bosu ball push-ups: 15

03/04/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast 4 slices of wheat/chickpea bread with PB and honey
multivitamin
snack: handful of cashews, almonds, raisins
1st lunch: half container of rice with tofu, butternut squash curry
2nd lunch: rest of rice and curry
snack: small container of quinoa, bean, corn
dinner: lentil veggie soup, tortilla chips, hummus
two chocolate almonds, 2 pieces of candied ginger

training:

5' standing
taught 1+ hour lesson
form practice: 21 form x 5, butterfly x 5
15' meditation

03/05/08:
morning stretches, qigong

food:

breakfast: 2 Eng muffins with PB and honey
snack: banana
snack: raisins, almonds, cashews
1st lunch: half container of quinoa, bean, and corn stew
2nd lunch: rest of quinoa stew
post workout protein shake with Barleygreen
snack: 2 handfuls tortilla chips with guacamole
dinner: multigrain/flax pasta with olive oil, walnuts, flax seed, soy cheese and a Boca Chik patty, two spears of broccoli
3 chocolate almonds

training:

5' standing
45' form training (5x 21 form, 5x butterfly)
10' meditation

workout:

jump rope: 2', 3' (4x), 1', 3', 1' (focus on speed)
handstand practice: 5'
turning grip switch pull ups: 10
5s negative chin ups: 5 (4x)
Swiss ball/bosu ball push ups: 15, 11, 12, 10 reps

03/06/08:
morning stretching, qigong

food:

breakfast: 2 Eng. muffins with PB and honey
snack: raisins, almonds, cashews
1st lunch: half container brown rice with tofu, butternut squash curry
2nd lunch: rest of rice and curry
calcium chew
snack: cup of yogurt with walnuts and raisins
multivitamin
dinner: multigrain pasta with tofu, butternut squash curry and cashews
2 chocolate almonds, 1 small square mint chocolate

training:

21-form (5x)
butterfly form (5x)
classes 2hrs

03/07/08:
morning stretching

food:

banana
tortelloni(?) with alfredo and veggies, 4 small pieces of bread with olive oil, 1 mint candy
cashews, almonds, raisins
2 veggie egg rolls
3 chocolate almonds
1 mug mint hot cocoa

off day today since I had 14+ hour Delaware travel day for work. Continuing my workout/training/diet regime again tomorrow.

03/08/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: bowl oatmeal with frozen fruit, raisins, walnuts, maple syrup
lunch: tofu veggie soup with noodles
snack: eggroll, 3 morningstar nuggets
calcium chew
4 chocolate almonds, 1 ginger candy
protein, Barleygreen, flax seed soy shake
half bowl of tofu veggie soup with noodles, 1 morningstar nugget
two bowls of red bean soup

training:

1.5 hour lesson
form practice: 10x 21-form, 10x butterfly form

workout:

jump rope: 2', 15', 2'

03/09/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: noodles with tofu veggie soup, soy cheese, and peanuts
snack: half bowl of red bean soup
3 chocolate almonds
lunch: small bowl of tofu mushroom sticky rice
snack: bowl of mung bean soup
post-workout soy protein shake with Barleygreen and flax
dinner:

a few bites of whole wheat flatbread
spring mix salad with raisins and walnuts
two slices of whole wheat bread with homemade vegannaise and baked marinated tofu

snack: bowl of mung bean soup
two pieces of candied ginger

training:

40 minutes of form practice: 5x 21-form, 5x butterfly

workout:

bosu 1-leg balance: 1' each leg on platform and ball sides
bosu squats: 10
overhead bosu squats: 18lbs x 10, 33 lbs x 10, 45 lbs x 10 (2x)
towel pull-ups: 10
1-leg front lever: 12s, 5s
dead lifts: 95lbs x 8, 135 lbs x 8

1-leg tucked front lever

2008-03-09T10:21:00.005-04:00

I'm not quite strong enough yet for the full front lever, which I can hold for maybe a whopping two seconds. I thought I was doing pretty well with a 1-leg tucked front lever since I can usually hold it for over 10 seconds, but apparently my form isn't all that straight. Granted, I'm no gymnast, so I'm overall pleased that I can even do this. I have to ramp up the ab and grinding strength to get up to the full front lever.

25 day challenge

2008-03-03T22:22:00.002-05:00

So Ben has challenged me to 25 days of consistent form practice. The 21-form 5 times a day and the butterfly form 5 times a day. It's definitely a challenge to find enough time to do it. It took me 45 minutes today to get through 11 form iterations (did an extra round of the 21 by accident). Even though it's a big drain on my free time, I do feel my form and concentration getting better, and ramping up my I-Liq Chuan training is after all one of my goals. Hopefully I'll finish the challenge.

The [1-leg] dragon flag

2008-03-03T22:13:00.004-05:00

I'm just barely strong enough to hold a dragon flag for 5 seconds (7s on a really good day). I was still a little sore when I had Gen take a picture of my dragon flag, so I couldn't actually hold it long enough for her to get a good snapshot. So, we have to make do with a photo of a 1-leg dragon flag which I can hold for up to 20 seconds (when rested and fresh).

I may try getting my dragon flag a little straighter, but I'm not sure just how much straighter I can make it without arching my back. Oh, and in case you're wondering: yes, it hurts, and the people in the gym think I'm nuts.

Week 9: 02/25/08 to 03/02/08

2008-03-02T22:15:00.000-05:00

02/25/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: 4 small pieces wheat/chickpea bread with PB and honey
handful of cashews, almonds, raisins
lunch: brown rice with spinach, tomato, tofu curry
Clif Z-bar
apple
protein shake
dinner: kale, potato soup, 2 small pieces of cornbread, slice of wheat/chickpea bread with nayonnaise and tofu
small bowl of mung bean soup
3 chocolate almonds

training:

5 minutes meditation
30 minutes ILC practice

10 minutes standing
10 minutes planes, focus on dantian-mingmen
10 minutes form practice

workout:

jump rope: 2', 6', 5', 4', 2', 1'
rings:

support, hands turned out: 45s
L-sit: 29s
wide grip support: 10s
muscle ups: 3 successful, 6 attempts
false grip pull ups: 8, 7
wide dips: 6, 6, 4.5

parallel grip pull ups: 12, 9
diamond push-ups: 22

02/26/08:
morning stretches, qigong

food:

breakfast: 4 small pieces wheat/chickpea bread with PB and honey
multivitamin
snack: handful of cashews, almonds and raisins
lunch 1: half container brown rice with dahl and cashews
lunch 2: rest of rice and dahl
snack: 2 small pieces cornbread
dinner: quesadilla with guacamole and salsa
3 chocolate almonds, 1 mug mint hot cocoa

training:

5 min meditation
6 minutes standing

workout: off day, recovering from Monday

02/27/08:
morning stretching, qigong

food:

breakfast: 2 Eng muffins with PB and honey
glucosamine, multivitamin
snack: 1 cup yogurt with walnuts and raisins
1st lunch: half container of brown rice, dahl, and spinach tofu curry
2nd lunch: rest of rice + curries
dinner: kale and potato soup, 2 slices of wheat/chickpea bread with 4 slices of marinated tofu
3 chocolate almonds
bowl of mung bean soup

training:

10 minutes standing
1 round butterfly practice
5 minutes concave-convex practice
3 minutes of meditation

workout:

handstand practice: 4'
hanging swing/grip switch: 30s
1-leg front lever: 3 rounds 10s
wall handstand press: 9, 7 reps
1-leg bosu balance: 1' ea leg, once on platform, once on ball side
jump rope: 2', 3' backwards, 5' backwards/turning practice, 2' speed, 2' cooldown

02/28/08:
morning stretching and qigong

food:

breakfast: 2 Eng muffins with PB and honey
glucosamine
snack: large handful of cashews, almonds, raisins
1st lunch: half container of rice with dahl and cashews
2nd lunch: rest of rice and dahl
post workout protein shake
dinner: small bowl of kale and potato soup, 2 small pieces of corn bread, 2 quesadilla wedges with guacamole and salsa
1 mug of mint hot cocoa

training:

5 minutes standing
15 minutes footwork
10 minutes butterfly form
teaching 1 hour YMCA class

workout:

bosu ball balance drills: 4'
bosu ball front squats: 18 lbs x 12, 33lbs x 10, 45lbs x 10 (2 sets)
cable assisted 1-leg squats: 40 lbs x 4, 50 lbs x 4 each leg
pylometric bench jump ups

lateral: 2 x 30s
front: 2 x 30s

ankles (cables):

dorsiflexion: 30lbs x 12
adduction and abduction: 20lbs x 15

dragon flag: 5s
1-leg dragon flag: 20s

02/29/08:
morning stretching, qigong

food:

breakfast: 1-cup yogurt with walnuts and raisins
snack: handful of cashews, almonds, raisins
snack: 2 small pieces of cornbread
1st lunch: half container brown rice with dahl + cashews
2nd lunch: rest of rice and dahl
multivitamin
calcium chew
post workout: 2 cups soy milk, handful of corn chips with guacamole
dinner: multigrain/flax pasta with veggies, marinara, 2 morningstar nuggets, and 2 slices of TJ's eggplant parm
1 square mint chocolate

training:

standing: 10'
abs/proj, condense/expand: 15'
butterfly: 10'
meditation 5'

workout: jump rope (speed training): 2', 4', 1', 3' (4x), 1'

03/01/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: pasta with veggies, 2 Morningstar nuggets, 2 slices of eggplant parm
snack: handful of cashews, almonds, raisins
glucosamine
lunch: brown rice with homestyle tofu
dinner: noodle soup with tofu, edamame, Shanghai cabbage, veggie mix, peanuts
multivitamin
mint hot cocoa

training:

2 hours teaching
11 minutes meditation

workout:

bench press: 135lbs x 10
pull ups: 10
weighted pull ups: 35lbs x 7
dead lifts: 95 lbs x 10, 135 lbs x 8, 155 lbs x 5 x 2 sets, 135 lbs x 5

03/02/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: rice porridge with mixed veggies and tofu
snack: pineapple
lunch: two servings noodles with tofu stroganoff
brownie with 1 scoop ice cream
snack: homemade herb wheat crackers with hummus
dinner: rice porridge with veggies/tofu, 2 crackers with hummus
half an apple
bowl of red bean soup

training:

11' meditation

day of rest today, no workout

Week 8: 02/18/08 to 02/24/08

2008-02-24T12:35:00.001-05:00

02/18/08:
half day of ILC training in NY, returning back to PA

02/19/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: 2 whole wheat Eng. muffins with almond butter and honey
snack: 2 handfuls of cashews, almonds, and raisins
lunch: Moroccan stew (quinoa, tomato, chickpeas, carrots, garlic, ginger)
snack: cup of yogurt with walnuts and raisins
dinner: lentil veggie soup, two slices of herb wheat bread with 4 morningstar nuggets, Nayonnaise, and ketchup
4 chocolate covered almonds

workout:

7 minutes ILC form training
1-leg bosu ball balance: 30s each leg, on platform and ball sides
jump rope: 2', 3' (3x), 2', 3', 1'
rings

support, hands turned out: 35s
muscle-up: 1 successful, 4 other attempts
false grip pull ups: 8, 6 reps
1-leg front lever lift progression: 5.5 reps

meditation: 5 mins

weigh-in today at 146.5 lbs

02/20/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: 2 English muffins with almond butter and honey
snack: handful of raisins, cashews, and almonds
snack: 2 handfuls of tortilla chips
lunch: Moroccan stew
1 piece of chocolate
dinner: egg roll, bowl of tofu veggie thai noodles
3 chocolate almonds

10 minutes standing, focus on 13 ILC points for harmonizing the body

5 minutes meditation training

02/21/08:
morning stretching and light qigong

food:

breakfast: 2 Eng. muffins with almond butter and honey
multivitamin
snack: handful of cashews, almonds and raisins
lunch: 2 egg rolls
snack: yogurt with raisins and walnuts
snack: banana
dinner: brown rice with punjab choley, masala patty, and broccoli
bowl of mung bean soup

training:

5 minutes of standing
25 minutes of form practice
class: covered N,S,E,W in relation to frontal plane exercise, covered form up to drag and shoulder

workout:

jump rope: 2', 3' (5x), 2'
hand stand practice: 5'
wall hand stand press ups: 10
deadlifts: 45lbs x 8, 95lbs x 10, 135lbs x 8 (3 sets)
towel pull ups: 14, 10

10 minutes meditation

02/22/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: 2 Eng muffins with almond butter and honey
multivitamin
snack: handful of almonds and cashews
lunch: brown rice with broccoli stir fry
snack: tofu banana pudding
snack: Clif Z-bat
dinner 1: brown rice with punjab choley and cashews
snack: 3 chocolate almonds, 1 mug of mint hot cocoa
dinner 2: Asian noodle soup, 3 morningstar nuggets
2 chocolate almonds
calcium chew

training (45 mins):

5 minutes stretching, qigong
10 minutes standing, focus on 13 points
6 minutes absorb-project
stepping practice
throwing hands practice

workout:

ankle dorsiflexion, cable machine (each foot): 20 lbsx15, 30lbsx10
ankle adduction, cables: 20lbsx10
ankle abduction, cables: 20 lbsx10
bosu+med ball plank: 2x90s
1-leg dragon flag: ~10s
dragon flag: 5s

02/23/08:
morning stretching

food:

small bowl of noodle soup, 2 morningstar nuggets
2 handfuls of cashews
bowl of veggie soup, 6 morningstar nuggets
bowl of mung bean soup
6 chocolate almonds
2 pieces of candied ginger
brown rice with eggplant and chickpea curries, cashews, broccoli
protein shake
1 mug of mint hot cocoa

training:

lesson (~2 hrs)

focus on absorb-project, hip roll, throwing hands
emphasis on attention on dantian and mingmen
partner training: flow, spin to pull, spin to push, spin to pull-push, 4 directions, intro to 6 directions

form practice: 10 minutes

workout:

jump rope: 2', 12', 1'
Swiss ball (55cm) and med ball push ups: 12, 15, 15 reps
ab throw downs: 75

02/24/08:
morning stretching, qigong

food:

oatmeal with berries, banana, walnuts
handful of cashews
black bean, onion, bell pepper, mushroom quesadillas with whole grain tortillas, salsa, and guacamole
mung bean soup
3 small pieces of cornbread
brown rice with tofu, spinach, tomato curry

10 minutes meditation practice

4 minutes standing post practice

Training checkup

2008-02-19T22:11:00.002-05:00

Well, I can cross one more goal off my list. I've managed to do a muscle up on more than one occasion. Granted, I still can't do more than one at a time before my muscles are just too tired. Still, not bad. I didn't think my false grip was actually strong enough. Now, it's an issue of pull strength and tricep strength on the dip half. The transition from the pull-up to dip is just barely doable for me right now.

I also got back from the annual intensive ILC training in NY with my Sifu. While I have made progress and feel like my understanding has improved, I feel like this workshop really re-emphasized just how much work I still have ahead of me to achieve a reasonable level of martial skill. My mental attentions really need to improve. I've decided to try getting more daily training in. I'd like to get it up to 30 minutes of actual training and 30 minutes of meditation training a day, but at present, that seems unlikely with my schedule. I'm committing to at least 5 minutes of training a day. It's just enough time to get some form training or single exercise training done. If I can manage that, I should be able to gradually up my time to my desired amount.

Week 7: 02/11/08 to 02/17/08

2008-02-19T21:56:00.003-05:00

02/11/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: two slices of herbed wheat bread with almond butter and honey
snack: handful of mixed cashews, almonds and peanuts
lunch: 1 square lasagna
snack: banana pudding
dinner: kale and potato soup, 2 slices of wheat bread, 2 TJ veggie egg rolls, 4 morningstar nuggets with ketchup

evening workout:

sun salutations
light qigong
isometric pushup: 60s
parallelette L-sit: 30s
half-burpees: 30 reps
twisting side planks: 8 reps each side
bodyweight 1-leg deadlifts: 6 per leg
fingertip plank progression: 30s

02/12/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: 2 wheat Eng. muffins with almond butter + honey
snack: handful of cashews and almonds
lunch: half container of brown rice with tofu broccoli stir fry
snack: cup of yogurt with raisins and walnuts
dinner: other half container of rice with tofu stir fry, 2 slices of herbed wheat bread with baked tofu and Nayonnaise
snack: bowl of tomato soup with big handful or tortilla chips

workout

jump rope: 2', 3', 4', 5', 4', 3', 2'
parallelettes:

tucked planche progression (swinging up): 5 reps
tucked planche hold: 5s

bodyweight horiz rows: 10 reps

02/13/08:
morning stretching

food:

breakfast: banana, one spoon of almond butter
snack: handful of almonds and cashews
lunch: square of lasagna
snack: Clif Z-bar
snack: apple
dinner: bowl broccoli soup, two bowls brown rice and tofu veggie stir fry

workout:

tucked front lever-ups: 6 reps (2x)
pull-ups: 12
weighted pull up: 25lbsx5.5
hanging grip switch: 30s
handstand practice: 4'

02/14/08:
morning stretching

food:

2 whole wheat English muffins with almond butter and honey
two handfuls of mixed nuts and raisins
chili with tortilla chips
Clif builder bar

off to NY for ILC training

02/15/08 to 02/17/08:
in NY for ILC training

Week 6: 02/04/08 to 02/10/08

2008-02-10T08:00:00.000-05:00

02/04/08:
morning qigong and stretching

food:

1st breakfast: rice porridge with mixed veggies and tofu
snack: handful of cashews and almonds
2nd breakfast: two whole wheat English muffins with PB and honey
lunch: home fries with carrots and Morningstar patty
late afternoon snack: banana tofu pudding
post workout: soymilk yogurt protein shake with Barleygreen
dinner: lentil veggie soup, salad with walnut and raisins

workout:

jump rope: 2', 3' (3x), 1', 3' (2x), 2' focus on footwork and crossing skills
1-leg front lever: 14s, 8s
straddled front lever: 10s
tucked planche: 10s, 11s
towel pull-ups: 12, 10 reps
1-arm push-up attempts: 1 each arm

02/05/08:
morning stretching and qigong

ILC lesson: basic exercises up through punctured breathing, discussion of spinning force, focus on pull-push move from 21 form and importance of maintaining suction on dantian and sternum

food:

2 whole wheat English muffins with PB and honey
handful of cashews and almonds
banana
Clif protein Builder bar
mixed green salad with goat cheese and lemon vinaigrette
chili with tortilla chips
lentil veggie soup, Chinese broccoli, veggie quesadilla with guacamole and salsa

02/06/08:
morning stretching, sun salutations

workout:

jump rope: 2', 13', 3', 2'
rings:

support, hands turned out: 40s
muscle ups: 4 attempts, 2 successes
false grip pulls ups: 8, 6 reps
dips: 7, 7 reps

1-leg bosu ball balance: 1' each leg, both on platform and ball side

food:

breakfast: 2 whole wheat English muffins with PB and honey
snack: 2 handfuls of cashews and almonds
1st lunch: half container of brown rice with veggie tofu Thai curry
2nd lunch: rest of rice and curry
snack: large apple
snack: yogurt with walnuts and raisins
post-workout snack: more yogurt with walnuts and raisins
dinner: veggie chili with corn chips

02/07/08:
morning stretching

ILC class: re-emphasized open-close in context of horizontal plane, covered first three moves of 21 form, explained application of hook from whirl and hook.

workout:

squats: 95lbs x 10 reps, 135 x 10, 135 x 8
pylometric bench jumps: 4 rounds of 45s
tucked rock: 2 sets of 5

food:

breakfast: 2 wheat Eng. muffins with almond butter and honey
snack: handful of cashews and almonds
1st lunch: half container of Barilla Plus pasta with tofu veggie Thai curry
2nd lunch: rest of curry
post workout: protein shake
dinner: rice noodles, more tofu veggie curry

02/08/08:
morning stretching

no training, sick today

food:

breakfast: 2 English muffins with almond butter and honey
lunch: rice noodles with tofu veggie Thai curry
dinner: 2 bowls lentil veggie soup with corn chips

02/09/08:
morning stretching

no training, still recovering from cold

food:

breakfast: two bowls of oatmeal with blueberries, straweberries, walnuts and banana
lunch: two bowls of tomato soup, 5 Morningstar nuggest, two big handfuls of corn chips
multi-vitamin, juice with Barleygreen
6 pieces of candied ginger
5 almonds
dinner: tofu veggie noodle soup

02/10/08:
morning stretching and qigong

no training, still have cold

food:

breakfast: oatmeal with blueberries, strawberries, walnuts, and maple syrup
1st lunch: tofu veggie soup
snack: handful of chips with guacamole
2nd lunch: mixed spring green salad with raisins and walnuts
dinner: 1.5 bowls kale, potato soup, two slices of herb wheat bread with baked marinated tofu and Nayonnaise

Week 5: 01/28/08 to 02/03/08

2008-02-03T22:24:00.000-05:00

01/28/08:
morning stretching

workout:

jump rope: 2', 5' (3x), 2', 1'
rings:

support, hands turned out: 40s
1-leg front lever: 12s, 7s, 7s
1 muscle-up attempt, got stuck just before dip half of motion
false grip pull ups: 7, 6 reps
push-ups, feet on platform: 15, 12, 6, 4 reps

pull-ups: 12, 8 reps
bosu V-sit: 60s
bosu/med ball plank: 65s

food:

breakfast: 4 toasted baguette slices with almond butter and honey
lunch: brown rice with spinach, chickpea, tofu curry (pseudo-paneer) and cashews
snacks: Clif Z-bar, handful of almonds
calcium chew, 1500 mg glucosamine
post-workout: 10 oz soymilk protein shake with Barleygreen
dinner: 4 mini baguette pizzas, mixed baby greens salad with raisins and walnuts
spoonful of red bean soup

01/29/08:
morning stretching

ILC training:

discussed suspending crown
re-emphasized harmony of yin-yang, suction on dantian/sternum and expansion of mingmen
reviewed center of gravity and structure alignment using three triangles
covered first three moves of 21 form more carefully focusing a little more on previous points

food:

breakfast: two whole wheat English muffins with PB and honey
lunch: brown rice with string bean, potato dahl
snack: Clif Z-bar
multi-vitamin
dinner: refried black bean and soy cheese quesadilla with guacamole and salsa, two samosas, and a mixed spring greens salad with walnuts and raisins
one mug of soymilk mint hot cocoa

01/30/08:
morning stretching

workout:

jump rope: 2', 3' (5x), 2'

speed, double under, crossing skills practice

handstand attempts ~2'
wall handstand press: 7,6,5,4 reps
pull-ups: 8
weighted pull-ups: 25lbs x 7 reps, 2 sets 35 lbs x 5 reps
bosu ball 1-leg stand

platform side: 20s each leg
ball side: 1' each leg

bosu-medicine ball plank: 90s, 60s

food:

breakfast: 2 whole wheat English muffins with PB and honey
lunch: brown rice with string bean and potato dahl
snack: apple
multi-vitamin
snack 2: tortilla chips with guacamole and salsa
dinner: brown rice with spinach tofu "paneer", masala patty

01/31/08:
morning stretching

ILC class:

20 minutes form practice before class
covered center of gravity and absorb-project again
paying attention to body line in open-close in horizontal plane
first 2.5 moves of form

workout:

deadlifts: 95lbs x 10, 3 sets of 135 lbs x 6 reps
dragon flag: 7s, 5s

food:

breakfast: 2 wheat English muffins with PB and honey
snack: 2 handfuls of almonds+cashews
lunch: brown rice with dahl and spinach-tofu paneer curry (half)
2nd lunch: rest of lunch
postworkout: 12 oz soymilk protein shake with Barleygreen
dinner: quinoa tomato stew
multi-vitamin

02/01/08:
morning qigong and stretching

workout:

jump rope, focus on tricks and footwork: 2', 3' (5x), 5', 1'

food:

breakfast: 2 whole wheat English muffins with PB and honey
snack: handful of cashews and a banana
lunch: 2 slices of veggie pizza
snack: Clif Z-bar
post-workout: 8 oz soymilk protein shake with Barleygreen
3 pieces of candied ginger
dinner: quinoa and tomato stew, 1 Boca chik patty
still-hungry snack: some chips with guacamole

02/02/08:
morning stretching

ILC lesson: focus on yin suction on dantian, sternum. Emphasis on suction on kwa to help expand mingmen. Footwork practice.

food:

breakfast: brown rice with string bean and potato dahl
late morning snack: protein shake with Barleygreen, banana, and yogurt
lunch: Sago seeds, chickpeas and lentils, 2 Morningstar nuggest, 1 piece of garlic naan
snack: yogurt with apple, walnuts, and raisins

02/03/08:
morning warm-ups: stretching, qigong, sun salutations

40 minutes basketball

10 minutes self-myofascial release massage with tennis ball

food:

breakfast: sago seeds, chickpea-lentil curry, 2 morningstar nuggets, small piece of naan
midmorning snack: bowl of red bean soup, handful of cashews
lunch: veggie quesadillas with guacamole and salsa
dinner: lentil soup, veggie patty
multivitamin

week 4-5 in review

2008-02-01T22:50:00.000-05:00

Well, it looks like I'm making good progress to my fitness goals. I'm actually a little surprised at how much progress I'm making. I'm a bit of an over-achiever, so I want some aspects of my training to be coming along faster than they are. I'm really pleased that I can actually do several false grip pull-ups. Last year, I could barely do 1. I'm making it to 7 now. Weighted pull-ups are harder than I thought they would be. They're a total grip killer for me, but I'm still pleased I can do a weighted pull-up with a 35lb weight hanging on my feet. So, my pull strength has gotten a lot better. I'm almost to the point where I can kick myself up into a muscle up.

I still have a lot of trouble with the front lever. I can still only do it with 1-leg tucked, and even then I can only hold it for 5s. That is an extremely tough static hold for me. On the plus side, I can hold a full dragon flag for 7s. Only 13s more to go.

Just started making deadlifts more regular. All I have to say is "oof." I can see why people say it's an awesome compound exercise. I can also see why it's such a good grip exercise. My forearms are always killing me after deadlifts. I feel like I could be doing significantly more than 135lbs if my grip were stronger.

Anyhow, next week is a light week. I think I need extra time for my body to recover.

The latest weigh-in this week: 149.5 lbs. My stupid body fat meter keeps telling me I'm just shy of obese at 26.1%.

Week 4: 01/21/08 to 01/27/08

2008-01-27T22:30:00.000-05:00

01/21/08:
morning stretches and brief qigong.
It was a little cold this morning since the heat failed, so I didn't feel like inhaling too deeply for the qigong

workout:

bosu balance

2 legs: 1.5'
1 leg on platform: 1' each leg
1 leg on ball: 1' each leg

jump rope: 2', 11', 3', 2'
rings:

support, hands turned out: 35s
L-sit: 30s
Iron cross progression: wide grip support (~15 deg. angle): 8s

1-leg front lever: 10s, 5s, 5s (second two focused on getting form right)
false grip pull-ups: 8.5, 5 reps
dips: 8, 6 reps

food:

breakfast: small bowl of tofu veggie sticky rice
handful of mixed nuts
1 Clif Z-bar
lunch: brown jasmine rice with spinach and tofu curry and peanuts
apple
dinner: baked potato with chili and soy cheese, small bowl of mushroom barley soup, small handful of peanuts
1 mug soy milk mint hot cocoa
multi-vitamin

01/22/08:
quick morning stretches, still waking up late

quick round of tendon changing exercises during work break

ILC lesson, focused on concave-convex and introduced spheres of offense and defense

food:

breakfast: 2 whole wheat English muffins with PB and honey
multivitamin, 2 calcium chews, 1500 mg glucosamine
lunch: tofu and veggie sticky rice, and quinoa with kale
1 Clif Z-bar
dinner: polenta with tofu veggie chili and soy cheese

01/23/08:
quick round of stretching and qigong

food:

breakfast: two cups hot cocoa (forgot about a meeting, so missed breakfast)
lunch: polenta with chili and soy cheese
post-workout: soy milk protein shake with Barleygreen
dinner: mushroom barley soup, corn chips, handful of almonds

workout:

2-leg bosu ball balance: 1'
1-leg bosu platform balance: 2 rounds 1' each leg
1-leg bosu ball-side balance: 1' each leg
jump rope: 2', 3' (5x) bursting speed for 15s every minute, 1' cross and double under practice, 2' cooldown
wall handstand press: 8, 6, 8 reps
hand stand practice: ~2'
tucked planche: 10s (2x)
weighted pull-ups: 20lbs x 10 reps, 30lbs x 6.5 reps
L-hang chin ups: 9 reps

01/24/08:
morning qigong and stretching

food:

breakfast: 2 whole wheat English muffins with PB and honey
lunch: tofu veggie sticky rice with broccoli
afternoon snack: apple, Clif Z-bar
post-workout: soy milk protein shake with Barleygreen
dinner: mushroom barley soup, 4 Morningstar nuggets, handful of almonds and cashews

ILC training:

20 minutes of personal practice time: butteryfly and 21 form practice, some throwing hands, and footwork practice
1st class: reviewed absorb-project and open-close, drills for understanding hips and knees, reviewed first two moves of form
2nd class: worked more on absorb-project, open-close; introduced suction on dantian and expansion of mingmen; reviewed 1st two moves of 21 form again; introduced flow 2-person exercise

workout:

weighted dips: 35 lbs x 8, 45 lbs x 8 reps
L-hang chin ups: 10 reps

01/25/08:
qigong in the morning

workout:

jump rope: 2', 3' (5x), 2'
planche plank: 30s, 35s
tucked planche: 12s, 14s
regular and reverse forearm curls: 2x12 reps with 10 lbs, each hand

food:

breakfast: grits (messed up polenta) with soy cheese, 2 morningstar nuggest
midmorning snack: Clif Z-bar
multivitamin, calcium chew
lunch: tofu veggie sticky rice
2nd lunch: 2 slices veggie pizza
post-workout: soy milk protein shake with Barleygreen
snack: handful of mixed nuts (almonds, cashews, walnuts)
dinner: jalapeno refried black bean, soy cheese, onion, bell pepper, mushroom quesadillas with whole wheat tortillas and salsa, side of tortilla chips

01/26/08:
qigong and sun salutations in the morning

ILC lesson: emphasized suction on dantian and sternum and open mingmen, worked on partner exercises (flow, spin to grab, spin to push, 4 directions)

food:

breakfast: grits, boca patty
lunch: quesadillas, handful of mixed nuts
snack: Clif Mojo bar
multivitamin
dinner: veggie noodle soup with broccoli and tofu

01/27/08:
morning sun salutations

no training, rest and recovery day
self myofascial release with tennis ball

food:

breakfast: two bowls of oatmeal with berries and walnuts
lunch: eggplant parm sandwiches with marinara, soy cheese and sesame seed baguette
snacks: small bowl of tofu veggie sticky rice, red bean soup
multi-vitamin, calcium chew
dinner: chickpea, quinoa, tomato stew
more red bean soup

My cheapest equipment purchase yet

2008-01-24T23:21:00.001-05:00

The first really cheap piece of training equipment I bought was a jump rope. The jump rope was just under $3 after taxes and has done wonders to improve my cardiovascular conditioning. Just how can I beat three buckaroos? It wasn't easy, but I managed with a little inspiration from a pair of articles from Testosterone Nation: Feel Better for $10 and Soft Tissue Work for Tough Guys. Basically, the articles cover Self Myofascial Release (SMR) techniques for keeping your fascial tissue in good shape and loosening any knotted fascial tissue. Having suffered from wrist tendonitis and used similar principles to aid in my wrist recovery, I decided to give SMR a try.

So, I picked up a tube of good old made in the USA Penn tennis balls. Total price somewhere around $2. I know, I was shocked too. There are indeed still products in the department stores that are actually made in the USA and not China. And they were only $0.22 more expensive than the made in China ones. It's reassuring to know that American balls haven't been completely outsourced to China.

The SMR was, as promised by the T-nation articles, quite painful. Being the macho man that I am, I gritted my teeth and kept at it. Boy am I glad I did. I felt so much looser after the self inflicted soft tissue work. It's really hard to beat $2 equipment for self-massage.

Week 3 in review

2008-01-21T23:01:00.001-05:00

Well, I have to say that the goal of jumping rope for 10 minutes didn't take nearly as long as I had anticipated. I made it to 11 minutes, though I did miss quite a bit. I say close enough. I guess I have to make that resolution a sliding target now. Next goal is to get 10 minutes more consistently then shoot for 15 minutes. I'm not a fan of just training for one goal since it's boring and doesn't fit my model of trying to keep my workouts varied. So, I'll probably be doing some interval rope work in between (rounds of 3 minutes with occasional 15 seconds of speed bursts) and skills practice.

I'm pleased to find that my grip strength is better than it was before. Not great yet, but getting there. I finally did false grip pull ups with relative ease. I used to do one and have my false grip fail. I didn't get through that many this week, but that's probably because I started with a false grip hang.

Martial arts training was a little more consistent this week, probably because I'm back into teaching mode. I'm not finding a whole lot of time for my own personal training, but I sure like to think about finding time for training. Still haven't ramped up the qigong. I really must start sleeping better so I can wake up early to get my qigong practice in.

Diet-wise, I still need to work more fresh fruits and veggies into my daily consumption. I've completely fallen out of the habit of drinking my powdered green drinks.

Week 3: 01/14/08 to 01/20/08

2008-01-20T23:20:00.000-05:00

01/14/08:
quick morning stretches (woke up late again, bleh)

evening workout:

bosu ball balance (2-leg) 2'
bosu ball balance (1-leg), 30s and 45s round each leg
jump rope: 1', 7', 2', 1.5' (oops, just met my goal for 6.5+ minutes for the week)
rings:

support, hands turned out: 40s
L-sit: 30s, 29s
1-leg front lever: 10s,9s,8s
muscle up progression

false grip, bent waist hang: 30s, 35s
false grip pull ups: 3 reps, 2 reps

archer push-ups: 8
jack knife push ups (knees): 10
jack knife archer combos (knees): 7

food:
breakfast: two whole wheat English muffins with peanut butter and honey
1 tangerine
handful of mixed nuts
lunch: brown rice with chickpea and spinach curry
1500 mg glucosamine, 1 multivitamin, 1 calcium chew
dinner: brown rice, dahl, cashews, and a side of kale and quinoa

01/15/08:
quick morning stretches

did a few rounds of tendon changing during break at work

evening training: ILC warmups, rocking, absorb-project exercise, front plane, and 5 minutes spinning with Gen

food:
breakfast: 2 English muffins with honey
handful of mixed nuts and dried fruit
apple
lunch: brown rice, dahl, cashews, chickpea and spinach curry
tangerine
multivitamin and calcium chew
1 cup yogurt with trail mix
dinner: quesadilla filled with refried black bean, onion, bell pepper, mushrooms, soy cheese and topped with guacamole and salsa.

01/16/08
morning stretches

workout:

jump rope: 2', 11', 4', 2', 1'
1-leg front lever hold: 10s, 5s
front "lever-ups" (1-leg): 6 reps
wall hand stand: 60s
wall hand stand presses: 9.5, 8 reps
wall handstand attempts/practice: 4
chin-ups: 20
L-hang chin-ups: 8
pull-ups: 6

food:
breakfast: two whole wheat English muffins with PB and honey
a few walnuts and cashews
lunch: a little brown rice, dahl, cashews, and chickpea/spinach curry
multivitamin
tangerine
calcium chew
1 cup soy milk (pre-workout)
dinner: quesadillas with guacamole and salsa

01/17/08
quick morning stretches (woke up late again)

evening:
5:30 ILC class, covered absorb-project in some more detail and taught up to brush knee and push
7:00 taught another lesson, covered center of gravity (rocking), absorb-project, and open-close
workout:

jump rope: 2', 1', 8', 2'
pull-ups: 10

food:

breakfast: 2 whole wheat Eng. muffins with PB and honey
lunch: 3 slices of pizza
2nd lunch: noodles with tofu, carrot, mushroom stir fry and broccoli
dinner

2 cups hot mint cocoa in soymilk
1 bowl of oatmeal with blueberries, strawberries, and walnuts

01/18/08
morning qigong

evening workout:

jump rope: 2', 3' (5x), 1' (3x)
planche progression

planche plank: 30s (2x)
frog: 37s
tucked planche: 14s, 11s

food:

breakfast: oatmeal with strawberries, blueberries, and some maple syrup
lunch: half container of noodles with tofu stir fry and broccoli
handful of mixed nuts
late afternoon snack: corn chips with guacamole and salsa
dinner: 3 baked veggie/tofu eggrolls, 7 Morningstar nuggets with ketchup
1 mug soy milk peppermint hot cocoa

01/19/08:
morning stretches, sun salutations

workout:

bosu platform balance, 1 and 2 leg: 3'
jump rope warmup: 2', 3'
deadlifts: 45 lbs x 10 reps, 95 lbs x 8, 135 lbs x 8 (3 sets)
cable assisted (50 lbs) 1 leg squats: 2 sets 8 reps each leg
1-leg dragon flag: 30s
full dragon flag: 5s
tucked planche practice: 3s
handstand attempts: 1'

food:

breakfast: 1.5 bowls oatmeal with blueberries, apple, walnuts, and some vanilla soymilk
lunch:

black bean, mushroom, and soy cheese quesadillas with guacamole and salsa
tortilla chips
3 candy cane Jojo's and 6 oz of soy milk

snack: handful of mixed nuts
multi-vitamin
mug of soy milk mint hot cocoa
dinner:

mushroom and barley soup
half a large baked potato with chili and soy cheese

01/20/08:
morning stretches and sun salutations

food:

breakfast: leftover quesadilla with salsa, 1 small bowl oatmeal
lunch: bowl of barley mushroom soup, 2 whole wheat English muffins with PB and honey
multivitamin, calcium chew
2 small handfuls of mixed nuts
1 mug of soy milk mint hot cocoa
1 cup yogurt with trail mix
dinner: brown jasmine rice with spinach tofu curry and peanuts
1 square Green and Black's mint chocolate

Thoughts on training so far

2008-01-14T15:22:00.000-05:00

All in all I'm pleased with my progress in my conditioning. The Buddy Lee Aero Speed jump rope (which I review here) is totally awesome. I don't miss as often because of kinks in the rope or unexpected rope turning behavior. Now my misses are almost purely due to tired legs or my form getting sloppy. Since I can now jump 5 rounds of 3 minutes with 1 minute breaks (in which I'm starting to do hand passing drills rather than resting completely), I think I'm making very good progress towards 10 straight minutes. I think I'll try to break 6.5 minutes straight in the next 2-3 weeks to get back to where I was last December.

Since my wrist tendonitis seems to have mostly passed, I've started doing more wall handstand stuff and planche progression practice. All I have to say is that holding a planche plank is really taxing on the upper body and wall handstand presses are really difficult after jumping rope for 15 minutes. I'm a little disappointed that I can only do 20 chin-ups at the moment. I was getting close to 35 before the wrist tendonitis slowed me down. On the other hand, I'm quite pleased that I can hold a 1-leg tucked dragon flag for 20 seconds. That puts my goal of holding a full dragon flag well within grasp.

I'm less than pleased with my MA practice since I haven't been able get back into the flow of things. We'll see if I can turn that around this week.

Log: Week 2 -- 01/07/2008 to 01/13/08

2008-01-13T11:30:00.000-05:00

01/07/08:
Morning: qigong and stretching
Rocking and paying attention to center of gravity/center of feet

Evening workout:

Jump rope: 1', 5' (2x), 2', 1' rounds
Rings:

Support, hands turned out: 30s

L-sit: 24s

1-foot tucked front lever: 10s (2x)

dips: 8 reps

Weighed in at 151 lbs.

I got my body fat analyzer today. This cheap piece of crap tells me I have 26.2% body fat, which is a far cry from the 11.5% I was measured at last month. Oh well, I knew ahead of time it was going to be inaccurate. I only need it to measure my change in body fat. I'll never get an accurate absolute reading out of this cheapo device.

Also did mindful raisin eating with Gen. It was a different and enjoyable approach to mindfulness training.

01/08/08:
morning qigong

focused on breathing slowly and deeply during my morning walks to and from the train

checked fat analyzer: 26.4%

I've been trying to get the tendon changing exercises my sifu taught me incorporated into my daily routine. Today, I've started trying to do them whenever I need a break or am waiting for something at work.

I'm also going to start logging what I eat. My food for today:

2 whole wheat cinnamon raisin English muffins with peanut butter and honey
a few honey roasted peanuts
1 big square vegan spinach,tvp lasagna
handful of cashews
half a large apple
1 small chocolate candy
chickpea,spinach stew
3 Morningstar nuggets
two bowls of corn chips with guacamole, and salsa
two Trader Joe's JoJos with half a mug of soy milk

01/09/08:
morning: stretching, sun salutations

wasn't very diligent this morning about controlling my breathing during my commute. Had a hard time focusing and staying present.

quick round of tendon changing exercises during late afternoon break

Evening workout:

jump rope: 2', 3', 3', 1.5', 3', 2', 1.5' rounds
12lb partner med ball toss on bosu: 5'
wall hand stand: 60s
wall hand stand press ups: 7.5
chins ups: 20 reps
pull ups: 9 reps
L-hang chin ups: 8 reps
1-leg tucked dragon flag: 20s, 22s holds

Jump rope mildly sucked. I was aiming for 5 rounds of 3'. Also a little disappointed that I didn't make at least 25 chin ups. I blame the jump rope for wearing me out.

Food consumed:

breakfast: 2 whole wheat cinnamon raisin English muffins with PB and honey
midmorning snack: 2 small handfuls of holiday nut/dried fruit mix
lunch: 1 square lasagna, big handful of cashews
post-workout: 6 oz soy protein shake
dinner: brown rice with chickpea curry, cashews, and stir-fried broccoli and carrots
1 piece Green and Black's mint chocolate
1 calcium chew, 1 multivitamin

01/10/08
woke up late, so I missed morning warmups today. Tried to stretch and do my breathing exercises at random breaks in the day.

Worked in a few rounds of tendon changing exercises during my downtime.

ILC class

came early to do some extra qigong since I missed it this morning
2 new people today, reviewed absorb-project and open-close exercises

Light evening workout:

jump rope, focusing on speed and double unders: 1', 2', 2', 1' rounds
deadlifts for technique, sets of 8 reps: 45lb, 95lb (2x), 115lb (2x)

Food for the day:

breakfast: 4 X 3" baguette slices with PB and honey
lunch

half a takeout-sized tupperware of brown rice with chickpea curry, cashews and broccoli
half an apple
a few mixed flavored nuts
multi-vitamin

afternoon second lunch:

rest of brown rice and curry
1 cup of yogurt with walnuts and raisins

post-gym 6oz protein shake with Barleygreen
dinner: tomato soup and 2 slices of herbed baguette pseudo pizza

01/11/09:
woke up late again, only got some quick stretches in

Evening workout:

Jump rope: 1', 3' (5x), 2'
planche progressions:

frog stand: 10s, 10s, 25s
tucked planche: 5s, 7s
planche plank: 30s, 40s

regular and reverse forearm curls, 10lbs, 12 reps each hand
wrist flips, 10lbs, 40 reps

food for the day:

breakfast: two slices of [fake] cheesy toast
midmorning snack: hanful of mixed nuts and dried fruit
lunch: 4 baguette slices, 6 flavored tofu slices
multivitamin, 1500 mg glucosamine
post-workout: 8 oz soy milk, yogurt, banana, protein powder, Barleygreen shake
dinner: soba noodles with tofu and mixed veggies, two candy cane JoJos with 6oz soy milk

01/12/08:
quick stretches and qigong, brief round of sun salutations in the morning

evening workout:

jump rope: 1', 3'(5x), 2' rounds

slower pace today since my legs were still tired
only 1' rest between rounds, except final cool down round
worked on crossing skills

pull-ups: 10 reps (2x), 12 reps
double bosu push-ups: 18
side-to-side push-ups: 12
front lever progressions:

tucked horizontal pull-up, 5 reps (2x)

side-to-to pull ups: 6 reps

food for the day:

breakfast: leftover clearout

small amount of rice porridge with mixed frozen veggies and a few peanuts
two bites of Gen's buckwheat noodles from last night
a banana

lunch:

two bowls of tomato soup
handful of cashews
a small potato pancake
one Masala patty
two pieces of candied ginger

shopping snack (free sample day at Whole Foods):

two bites of salad (spring mix, red onion, feta, walnuts, cranberries, and acai berries)
two tiny pieces of bread with artichoke dip and chile queso
half rice cracker with almond butter and blueberry jam
three mini bites of 3 different granola bar samples (hemp/flax, cranberry, and sunflower?)
one square piece of peppermint chocolate

two half-sized vegan mushroom crepes
cup of yogurt with raisins, walnuts, half a banana
7 almonds
dinner:

mushroom/onion/garlic spaghetti
sauteed broccoli, carrots, and bell peppers
3 Morningstar nuggets
3 candy cane JoJos, 4 oz of soy milk

multivitamin

01/13/08:
morning: a few rounds of sun salutations, 25 minute walk

food:

oatmeal with protein powder, blueberries, strawberries, walnuts, and banana
handful of almonds and cashews
two tangerines, a couple of bites of apple and grapefruit
1 multi-vitamin, 1 calcium chew
leftover mushroom pasta with 3 Morningstar nuggets
bowl of tortilla chips
6 small vegan crepes filled with chickpea and spinach curry

Log: Week 1 -- 01/03/08 to 01/05/08

2008-01-06T23:13:00.000-05:00

Between the holidays and having a cold, I've had quite a bit of time off from my regular workouts. I haven't lost too much, fortunately, despite the slacking.

Last weigh in on Thursday was 152 lbs. Not sure if it's possible that I could start the year 3 lbs lighter, but oh well. I'll stick the same scale in the YMCA locker room for consistency. When my cheapo bio-impedance fat analyzer gets here, I can start tracking changes in my body fat percentage.

01/03/08:
Qigong and stretching in the morning.

Workout:

Jump rope: rounds of 1', 2' (3x), 1.5' (2x)
1-leg tucked front lever: static holds 10s, 9s, 8s
double bosu plank: 60s

01/04/08:
Workout:

Jump rope: rounds of 1', 3' (2x), 2', 1', 1' skills practice
Wall handstand 60s
Handstand practice 30s
12 lb med ball partner toss while standing on bosu: ~8 min
forearms dumbbell curls, 8lbs: 15 and 12 reps (each hand, regular and reverse)
tucked rock (not sure what to call this): 7 reps

Doing the tucked rock, or whatever it's real name is, hurt like hell. My abs actually briefly cramped up after doing that exercise. My abs haven't cramped up in a really, really long time.

01/05/08:
Stretching and qigong in the morning

Workout:

jump rope, skills practice: 1', 2' (5x), 1'
bosu ball V-sit: 10s
planche progression: frog 10s (2x), attempted tucked planche (held maybe 1s)

01/06/08:
Qigong and sun salutation in the morning

~30 minutes of yoga in the evening

Training Goals for the New Year

2008-01-05T00:01:00.000-05:00

As I've already detailed in my main blog, my resolutions this year are to drop 1% body fat and work up to skipping 10 continuous minutes on the jump rope.

I have other fitness goals to shoot for this year. I may not achieve them this year, but that's ok because I'll have fun trying. So, in 2008, I hope to:

Improve my grip strength. I don't have a plan for measuring or tracking this, but it's more or less a requirement for several other of my fitness goals.
Progress towards a planche.
Get a muscle up.
Hold a front lever (>= 10s)
Hold a dragon flag (>=20s)
Hand stand.

Of those, I think the planche will probably be the hardest. I've already made a decent amount of progress last year towards goals 4-6. With better grip strength and improved grinding muscle strength from the front lever and dragon flags, I think the muscle up should come by the end of the year.

In terms of my martial arts (MA) training, it's an ongoing goal of keeping my I Liq Chuan (ILC, 意力拳) training consistent so I can improve. So my current MA training goals are to:

Work through the 15 basic exercises more carefully. I need to start training and analyzing them more thoroughly in blocks of 3-5 rather than just trying to get through all of them.
Gain a deeper understanding of the 21 form (二十一式). This involves my practicing the form more mindfully while keeping the 13 body requirements, 6 physical points, and 5 qualities in mind.
Improve my butterfly palm (蝴蝶掌) form. I've got the rough choreography down, but now I need to work through the form the same way I'll be breaking down the 21 form.

Welcome 2008 - Keep on training

2008-01-04T23:56:00.001-05:00

It's 2008 and I'm attempting to get into the whole blogging thing. Since I wanted to keep a log to track my training progress without cluttering up my main blog, I decided to make a separate training log blog for myself. I'll be using this blog to journal my workouts, check my progress, and discuss fitness and martial arts training topics that I find interesting.

I don't expect many people will actually read this blog, but if anyone actually does, I hope this blog inspires you, gives you ideas on improving your own training, is informative, or at least marginally interesting.