The weight loss and physique transformation journey of a Christian pastor in his garage gym. Documenting the training and cardio for weight loss and muscle development on the 50+ male body.
Hello garage warriors. This installment, July 30, 2018, we're carrying on with the arm development. This time we are focusing on triceps development in the Iron Paradise. I am still keeping on track of focusing on arms only for a while. My cardio is five days a week. I do it early in the morning and row 5k-10k on my concept 2 rower which is 250-500 cal burned. I am still using fasted cardio. My goal is to shave off as much fat as possible. Meanwhile, I am working to add arms. I am only lifting 2-3 days a week in the afternoon. I hit the arms hard (separate biceps and triceps workouts) and then leave them alone to grow.
The Triceps Workout
The triceps workout I incorporated is by Darrell Moore of Strength Team on YouTube.
Darrell Moore has some really good no nonsense training videos on his channel. My training log with this workout is here.
Triceps Workout Journal
Workout
1. Close Grip Bench Press
3 sets 8-12 reps
Last set drop set 6,8, 8-10
2. EZ Curl Bar Extensions
3 sets 8-12 reps
3. Seated DB Extension
3 sets 8-12 reps
Last set drop set 6,8, 8-F
4. DB Kickbacks
3 sets 8-12 reps
Last set drop set 6,8, 8-F
5. Bench Dips
3 sets 10 reps
Garage Warrior Hacks
I have been dealing with an injury in my right shoulder.The shoulder tends to click or be painful when I work arms and shoulders. I discovered that when I didn't use my bench and pulled it out of the squat rack, I could bench press off the floor of the rack with minimal pain. Benching from the floor gave my shoulder the support it needed to get through some intense workouts. Here is what my squat rack setup looks like for close grip benching dumbbells and the olympic bar off the garage floor. I lay on a strip of my gym floor foam tiles. For close grip dumbbell I use dumbbell hooks and hang them off the olympic bar for initial lift off.
Squat Rack Setup for DB Close Grip Bench off the Floor
This setup seems to allow me to hit the triceps hard with close grip bench or Moore's DB presses.
That's it for now. Keep working out and keep chasing the dream!
It's the July 16th entry of the goings on of an over 50 Christian powerlifting madman. So here's what's going on in the paradise today. On our last recap, the body weight dipped down into the 230s (Friday, July 6). On Sunday, July 8, the Mrs. and I stopped off at the Olive Garden to sit out a large California grass fire that shut down the local freeway. We took shelter in place at the closest Olive Garden. I did pretty well, I ordered Chicken breasts and zucchini plate. But afterward, I decided to order their signature dessert, the black-tie chocolate mouse cake (aka diabetes black-tie insulin avalanche cake).
The Diabetes Cake
Yes, sir-ree. I devoured it! The insulin rush sent my weight sky rocketing out of the 239 zone up to 242, and the weight lingered there for about 4 days. Just to give you a rough idea of what this stuff will do to an 50+ years old digestive system. I probably did about 1000-1500 calorie deficit in cardio during those days before the weight came back down.
Look at that body spike from the diabetes cake!
My house is also on the market and we have had a couple of open homes. Usually, get kicked out around dinner when a real estate agent wants to show the casa to clients, so I don't have a lot of control lately over all my meals (i.e. eating out a lot). However, I am back down at the 240.0 pounds line, even while not eating what I should be eating. The cardio, (I do 500 cal burns of cardio in the AM on a fasted stomach or fasted cardio). This has kept me at the 240 pounds plateau. I need to reimplement the diet and macronutrients to keep pressing down on my journey of weight loss.
Gun Smithing
My knees both currently have no cartilage and have injections for pain management. I am about a month into this treatment and it seems to work. I am not in a place where I want to start lifting utilizing the legs. I will most likely employee a Mike Mentzer, powerlifting approach to the legs, where I hit them once every two weeks and then leave them alone. Most likely use the leg press for this. I don't trust my knees with squats anymore. The Mike Mentzer approach I used in the past for powerlifting competition training. Deadlifts and heavy squats saw the most gains using this. But you have to push hard so when you're done it does take two weeks to recover. Hit them hard and get out of there. I think this will be the best approach for training legs with bad knees.
So while I hammer out a blueprint for the legs, I want to press on with the arms. I decided to focus on the biceps and triceps, for this season, just to get something going. I needed to hunt down a program that was pretty much dumbbell only, since that is pretty much all I have, dumbbells, olympic bar, and an ez curl bar. Ok, I hear the meatheads out there, Olympic bar bro! I agree, but I am back to the knees. I want to be able to lay off the legs, our at least not strain them while I curl the 135-pound bar. The goal in this life science experiment it so put on size, wisely, and effectively, and minimize any type injury.
If you listen to some of the older lifters on youtube, they are actually recommending going lighter for adding to your biceps. They recommend time under tension and the mind-muscle connection. This is the recipe for growth. But at the same time, you need to create some good fiber tears for growth. There are three channels I enjoy for lifting on youtube, my favorite is Strength Team right now with Darrell. That guy seems like he would be a hoot to work out with. He has some really good advice on stressing the biceps for GAINZZZ!!!
SuperHuman You is another great no-nonsense YouTube channel on lifting. Lots of solid lifting and dieting info on this channel.
MountainDog1 is a straightforward no BS powerlifter in his 50s. Not selling anything, just giving us old dogs advice on how to keep making gains. Very down to earth channel and great old school lifting advice.
So as I forge my guns I will utilize the information on those youtube channels. For Sunday's arm's race, I followed a workout by SuperHuman You, 3 Ways to Get Bigger Arms While Loosing Body Fat. A really good intensity workout to stimulate muscle tears for growth using lighter range dumbbells, 15# and 25#. So it was a good starting place for my journey. Again, muscle gains, DRUG-FREE, take up to a year or longer for sizeable GAINZZZ! I set my goals with realistic expectations. Always allow for the mind to visualize where you will be down the road on this journey. There will be lots of twists and turns to the final destination.
The July 15 2018 Biceps (intensity) Workout
Workout Journal from the Iron Paradise Sunday July 15 2018
Workout:
1. Alt DB Biceps Curls
3 sets x 12 reps
2. DB "EZ Curl Style" Curls superset with plate wrist curls
3 sets x 12
3. FST 7s (spider curls)
7 sets x 12 reps - total mind-muscle connection, time under tension
4. Biceps blaster DB curls
4 sets x 12 reps
Note: I will train triceps on another day. Possibly with Chest.
That was it for the biceps workout. I may possibly even switch it up with biceps and triceps.
Spiritual Guidance for this Journey
I always find that lifting is the best time to pray. Cardio is even better. But lifting lends itself well to praying and connecting with God. Just get your mind into a conversation with Jesus. I pray about anything. But if you're not liking the reflection you're seeing in the mirror, pray for perseverance for all the training that will come to pass! Yes, stay motivated, stay in Jesus, and focus the anger of your self-hatred into forging a new you. Change does come. I have been there and I am still on that road of transformation both in the physique and mentally. Change comes through time. Dream the dream and chase it. It's attainable. Most of all have fun on this journey. Take every victory through every change and keep forging on!
The biggest key to weight loss is having an overall vision and a project management mindset to achieve that vision. As I stated in my previous blog entry, every day is a battle to be one pound lighter. It may take one day to get that pound, or it may take a week. Each and every one of these little daily and weekly battles have an objective and a target in mind. I track my progress daily on the scale with the exception of Sunday or another day of the week I don't workout. That doesn't give me a day off in my goals or my work to get there, it just gives my body and mind a break from the physical training. This week, on Tuesday July 3, 2018, I reached a major milestone when my body weight finally broke out of the 240 weight range and dipped into the 230s. I weighed in at 238.8 pounds! The happy dance broke out!
My Fitness Pal screen capture of the 238.8 lb weigh in.
Caloric Deficit
The progress I make on a weekly basis is based on caloric deficit. For starters, I don't eat any sugar in my diet. I am not stringent on this, if I am at a family party, which are infrequent. Sure, I will sample some dessert, such as I did today. It's the 4th of July, it was a family BBQ get together. I ate some great food containing sugar, but I did so in moderation. I didn't eat where I over stuffed myself and had to come home and sit on my couch and undo the top buttons of my jeans, like Al Bundy. I had some grilled chicken, BBQ ribs, ate one cookie, tried some delicious sugar free home made chocolate peanut butter cups, and had a slice of chocolate cheese cake. Washed it down with unsweetened ice tea. That was it for the caloric consumption. A lot of food for me, but didn't come home feeling like a stuffed Hawaiian Luau pig.
Since May, I have achieved a level of fasted cardio where I can burn 500 calories in the morning. Again, I stressed I achieved this level of cardio. If you're not doing cardio don't start here and expect miracles. Your body will crash from the exorbitant amount of cardio. You will become sleepy during the day, and your body will try to compensate by over consuming calories to make up for the shock. This is the same reason many people who run for fat loss actually gain weight. You jumped the gun and put your body into a situation it wasn't acclimated to cope with. I mentioned in my previous blog entry, you have to slowly work your way up in cardio and condition your body for fat loss.I also mentioned that fat loss is a mental prison sentence. You must serve your time and do your do diligence. It took you some time to over indulge and build the bulge. Now you need to fight the battle of the bulge from behind your prison walls of body fat. This is all about reconditioning the body and mind into being a different physique than what it currently is. Re-programming the body!
Cardio section of the Iron Paradise - Cycle and Rower
It takes a month or longer to work an unconditioned body up to this level of cardio. The first month of training is conditioning the body to handle the cardio that is required for weight loss. I am doing 4-5 sessions of fasted morning cardio of 500 calories each week. This gives me a deficit of 2000 - 2500 calories per week.
Over Coming Strongholds
As I mentioned I am a counselor, author, and pastor. I work with people who survived severe childhood trauma. Counseling a person out of a stronghold is lot easier than dealing with your own. When I started to aggressively attack my stronghold I was in a place where I was disgusted with my physical appearance and my health condition. I couldn't stand to see a picture of myself, nor did I like seeing myself in the mirror. It was gut wrenching painful. Furthermore, I was working out in the iron paradise for years with no results whatsoever. There were no returns on my efforts. My right shoulder was injured, I could no longer bench press heavy poundage, nor shoulder press anything about 135 pounds without excruciating pain or clicking of the shoulder. Cartilage in my knees were nearly all gone and I was living in phase of my life of pain management. The nights of my shoulder and bench work were excruciatingly painful. I couldn't sleep on my right side. If I woke up laying on my right side I was like a beached sea turtle. I couldn't flip myself over with out experiencing horrible pain.
Big Mike at 270 pounds from a street ministry picture
Because I work in spiritual warfare, I work with people on intense cases of the occult. In December, I had a circumstance in dealing a dabbler in the occult who was irritated by a post I made about voodoo and spiritual house cleansing. I was called an intolerant Christian and on top of that they sent something my way. I knew through discernment what happened. I could feel from their post they weren't satisfied with a discussion and they released something (talk about being intolerant). Within two days of that intolerant comment exchange my digestive system was filled with gangrenous infection. I didn't know the infection was in me. One day I had a sharp pain in my side, my intestines were literally encrusted and rock hard from the infection. Through a 2 1/2 hour laparoscopic surgery, appendectomy, and my internals were literally power washed. This happened to me six days before Christmas. It was severe that I was suppose to spend Christmas in the hospital. Jesus did some amazing healing, and I was released in two days. The doctors were even baffled. They weren't certain if I was even going to walk away from the surgery. So my guts were power washed and my internals hurt like hell. Jesus told me that I was clear to go home, I literally had to demand the nurses to give me the tests they needed to assure them I was good to go home. They resisted and ignored me, then finally appeased me with the blood and fluid tests required to checkout. They were dumbfounded! I was released that afternoon. Supernaturally attacked and supernaturally healed (Still praying for the hospital bill to be supernaturally paid). I was still dealing with internal healing. But I was home for Christmas, external tubes and all. I felt like Wolverine and the Weapon X program with this stuff hanging out of me.
Something in me died on the operating table that night. I don't know what happened. When I woke up I had a different attitude. A fighting and angry attitude. I knew what happened to me spiritually and where the attack came from. But I knew I could no longer allow myself to be in this sad physical and mental condition any longer. Whoever the old me was, died. Too many attacks were coming my way. If you ever dealt with the occult in ministry, and I am not talking about deliverance ministry, I am talking about Mark 9:29 hard core warfare, you know the level of mind games the enemy throws at you. For me, not any more, I was leaving with a new me and a new attitude. I was done with hating myself, I was grabbing my life by the reigns and fighting back. I believe Jesus was shaping a new me for the depth of warfare to come. This involved both mental and physical re-alignment of myself.
My original post operation plan was to lose 60 pounds between January 1st and July. I had to nurse my injured body back to health first. I think in the second week of January (4 weeks post op), I tried spin cycling, for 300 calories (Mondays). Only one day a week. My guts were still a great deal on the tender and raw side. So I played it careful. Around six weeks post op, I started using a kettlebell (on Tues - Fri) for early am fasted cardio (I started intermittent fasting on Jan 1st, since it was something I could try without injuring my guts). The kettlebell exercises I used were from Chandler Marchman's your tube channel, 12 Minute Kettlebell Workout for Faster Fat Loss. I used a 20 pound kettlebell, and with a post surgery recovering body, these were realistic and doable exercises. But listen to your body, I was couch ridden for six weeks, before I slowly moved into this. If your (post op) body says NO! - don't push it!
I was seeing results, but the fat was coming off EXTREMELY SLOW! I came to the rationalization that I wasn't going to lose 60 pounds by July. My body was reacting differently to exercises. The physique transformation blueprint from my 40s was too much for my 50 something body to handle. The 53 year old male body was temperamental. It wanted to do things it's way or the highway. This was at first a set back. But I never lost my desire to lose weight and do the physique transformation. I just had to re-engineer and re-learn what it takes for the 50 something body to get into shape.
To overcome the fat stronghold image I hated, I now visualized what my body would look like in the mirror. This helped me over come the self hatred of my reflective image. The weight loss was extremely slow, but it was coming off, which helped me re-imagine what my design goals were. The body was now an artistic palette, the nutrition and exercise a super soldier science program for a 50+ year old male. I re-imagined myself and went after it with the realization that this is an extremely long term project - magnitude of years. As the weight slowly came off, I noticed my heart burn started diminishing. Another plus. Good bye to my old friend heartburn! Heartburn was a daily occurrence at lunch and dinner. My esophagus would close up and my chest would burn. Not anymore! I no longer really monitor my type 2 diabetes. The dangerous diabetic narcoleptic involuntary reflex naps no longer are an issue with me. I started seeing a lot of health gains that baffled my doctors (i.e., no prescriptions!).
Slowly the stronghold of the mind comes unraveled with your diligence and persistence. Channel your anger and self hatred through prayer for break through. Turn your tears up to heaven and forge your pain into a new body in the gym. This is a long term prison sentence. If something isn't working for you, don't use it. By this I mean, trying something for over a month and there is no return at the weigh in on the scale. I had an old mindset of how I lost weight in my 40s which was useless to me and my gains in my 50s. Yet I tried to push myself through a brick wall, for years with no return on investment. Something stops working or doesn't work, drop it from your program! I literally remodeled my garage gym in the last couple of months to reflect the equipment I need for a physique transformation at age 50. The lat pull-down machine is GONE! The Body Masters leg extension and leg curl machines are GONE (no cartilage in the knees). I added a pull up bar and bands in place of the lat pull-down machine. Sure I could lat pull 250 pounds, but I couldn't do a pull-up because of my weight. I want a body that can do reps of pull-ups! Right now as the weight comes off I use the bands and do assisted pull-ups. The cheapest and most effective form of an assisted pull-up machine.
So this is where I am at now, on July 4th 2018. I did have an interesting week this week. When you're 270 pounds, you're invisible (see my old picture of me above). You can walk into a store and just get in and out unnoticed except with the conversation with the cashier at the checkout. This week on several occasions, I had women clerks in the store look at me and smile and talk to me. It was puzzling at first, because I never experienced this. I had one middle aged woman, last week, in my bank check me out. I glanced over at her and wondered why the heck she was looking at me. She quickly looked away non-nonchalantly. I was like, what the heck, this old fart just got checked out like I was a piece of meat! Ok, ladies I now know how it feels. Well, I laughed it off inside. I am happily married (for 28 years), so I didn't need this attention. Even though I don't care, it is a weird reassurance that hard work is paying off. Perseverance! Stick with it. Each little piece of the journey there is some reassurance you are to stay on track with your dreams and your goals.
And most of all, begin to develop a new relationship with food. It is to fuel your exercise, it is not a means for weight loss, avoid fad diets. If you're friend is on a fad diet, let them be on it. Don't let them talk you into it too. They're going to jump the next bandwagon when the current fad diet fails!
Welcome to the Iron Paradise! The blog where the frustrations of 50-something physique transformation are hammered and forged into a new body and a new hope. Behold, the ramblings and insight of a Christian garage gym warrior!
The Iron Paradise
I am not getting any younger, and time is not on my side. I am in my early 50s and a former powerlifter enthusiast, and long distance cyclist. From those days of glory, I have a damaged shoulder, and yet have adamantium bones, and knees with no cartilage (how did that combination happen?). My lifestyle in my 50s shifted from physically active to pain management. I lost the physique I developed in my 40s and ballooned up from 215 solid pounds to 270 fat pounds in weight and probably had 35% body fat (diabetic type 2 and high blood pressure). I am a Christian counselor and ordained minister and I work with people who deal with severe cases in spiritual warfare and inner healing. When I looked into the bathroom mirror I was dealing with my own stronghold of self-hatred. A stronghold is a spiritual battle taking place in the mind. I couldn't stand to see my reflection in the mirror. My body was always in pain and my exercise was inhibited. Which in turn, added to the weight gain problem. In the old days of weight lifting, we had the motto, "No pain- no gain!". Which would resonate through my head, and I would counter with my new motto, "I need gains through the pain!" Little did I know I was prepping myself to say, "to hell with the pain, if I am going to live like this I am going to at least have a nice body again." Little did I know that's what I needed to persuade myself to get back on track and get the weight off me. Welcome to my science project - me! I used to compete in physique transformation challenges since I put on weight in my 40s for gym powerlifting competitions. The drug free power lifter had the big gut, and the steroid jerk who competed drug free had ripped abs. After the competition season was over, I would do a physique transformation and in 16 weeks have an athletic body. Again, that was in my 40s and I was long distance cycling too. I was no stranger to physique transformation. This should have been a no-brainer, I would just push through the shoulder and knee pain, but lift stricter and with the wisdom of previous accomplishments. Not so! After too many frustrating months of intense spinning sessions and workouts, the magic in the iron paradise, my garage gym, wasn't happening at all. What the heck???
Rule Number One - Perseverance
I started learning valuable lessons from my 50-year-old body. What worked in my 40s as sure thing strategies did not work at all in my 50s. Furthermore, some of my Bodymasters machines in my garage were now useless because of my injuries. Some of the leg machines had to go because I couldn't use them with my bad knees. And the scale still wasn't budging at all. I had an aggressive mindset of knocking off 5 pounds a week. To my dismay, I wasn't seeing any pounds drop and sometimes the scale would agonizingly move in the undesired direction. Rule number one of over 50 physique transformation, is perseverance! No matter how overweight you are, you have to get the weight off. You have to want this off you - more than you want to breathe, but still keep a sane mind about yourself and your goals. I constructively channeled my own self-hatred of my reflection in the bathroom mirror to push me where I wanted to be. The battle to victory starts in your own mind. I started visualizing on myself the body I wanted to see in the mirror. Then I started to believe I could do it. But I also had the understanding of the long battle ahead of me in this journey. I dropped the expectations of losing 5 pounds a week, I was going after 1 pound a week. Most physique people recommend weighing only once a week. I weighed every day. I wanted to know what the cost was for the food I put into my body. This helped me learn a lot about foods and their effects on my body long before I started tracking macronutrients.
Rule Number Two - Workout Intensity
Rule number 2 is workout intensity. You're not 40 anymore! As I build my physique I joke that 50 is the new 30. My goal right now is building a physique that would blow away my 30-year-old self. But the fact of the matter is my body has gone through some changes. In my 40s I got a vasectomy, I reached my quota in child production. All was good. However, I noticed that year after the operation, my lifts in bench and squats were adversely affected. Something happened with the natural testosterone production in my body. I spoke with a friend, who was my former powerlifting coach, and he shared he noticed the same thing after his vasectomy. Testosterone is necessary in muscle development and fat loss.The point here is, something happens to the male body where the testosterone production or availability is severely hindered in a male in his 50s. There is also the issue of estrogen in processed foods. Hence, the 50-year-old male that has a big gut and the man boobs (moobs)! The 50-year-old lifter needs more recovery time than he did in his 40s. I still bang out heavy sets. But the body is incapable of recovering from volumes of sets exercise. You won't be working out 5-6 days a week like in your days of glory. You will be pushing your body to the limits and pushing yourself into heavier weights. And then you will wait 2-3 days to recover. And move along. You will also adapt to how your body is functioning in your 50s. I still bench press with an old injured shoulder. I just bench off the flat floor now with dumbells so my should is completely supported for the lift. I had to break down and buy a plate loaded bent-over-row machine, in order to remove strain and pressure on my knees with normal barbell bent-over-rows. The days of no pain no gain are over. It's the days of gain through the pain. The pain will dictate if you do an exercise or not. You will need to start listening to your body and what you need to do. Modify your exercise program accordingly.
Rule Number Three - Consistency
The physique transformation will happen through consistency. Consistency in your nutrition, workouts and cardio sessions. Consistency is the key and it is also a cruel mistress. Consistency demands time, it's like a prison sentence you have to serve to get the body you desire. Consistency is the price to pay to crush the stronghold of self-hatred in the mirror. Consistency demands maturity, that no matter how long this takes you're going to finish what you started. There is no methodology here to physique transformation, you're going to need to participate in this long-term scientific clinical test of what works and what doesn't work in your own program. Collect data. I use my fitness pal and track my food and my weight. Tracking helps you understand what you're putting into your body and what works. Definitely, track food and weight on a daily basis if you can. It will help you understand why things happen whether good or bad on the scale. It will help you with strategies when you plateau in your weight loss and you will. As you can see below, I am now down 30 pounds in weight, since September of 2017.
My Fitness Pal tracking my weight from March to June 2018
For Starters
For starters, KISS, keep it simple stupid, you may not see results in the first week or couple of weeks. Your body is habitually being fat. You need to retrain that. In the meantime, there is no miracle cure for obesity, so start preparing the mind for the long haul. If you're obese like I was, at 270, your not going to have a beach bod in 6 months or even 9 months. You have to serve the time and pay the price - inside the gym and out. For week one, start a gym program if you haven't already. I recommend starting with only one day of cardio per week, burning 300 calories. Treadmill, spin cycle, or rowing machine. I prefer the Concept 2 rowing machine for cardio, its a full body workout. And its fun! During week one, download my fitness pal app for your phone and computer and start tracking the stuff you are putting into your pie hole. Also get into the habit of daily weigh-ins and track those on the app. Keep it simple! I strongly recommend getting a cardio machine in your home. Start building your own Iron Paradise. I love my Concept 2 Model D rowing machine (i set up filters on Craigslist and waited for over a month until I scored mine at $600). I also have a recumbent Schwinn bike for spinning. Having your own cardio equipment is great because there are no excuses for not being able to go to the gym. You can probably get a free treadmill from your neighbor. Ask them about their cardio equipment that in their garage that is buried in boxes. Ask the wife of the home, she'll probably give it to you just to get it out of her garage. If you have bad knees, find a spin cycle or get the rower!!!
Fasted Cardio
I recommend doing cardio early am using a technique called fasted cardio. Where you burn calories prior to having your first meal. I also recommend intermittent fasting, where I don't eat anything from 9 PM the night prior to 12:30 PM the next day. I do consume one protein shake (2 scoops) Muscletech Nitro Whey around 8:30 AM after my fasted cardio. But that's it. Nothing scientific or regimental to it. Simply don't eat when you get up in the morning until after 12:30 pm in the afternoon.
Routine for Fasted AM Cardio
Cardio week 1: 1 day per week 300 cal Cardio week 2: 2 days per week 300 cal Cardio week 3: 3 days per week 300 cal Cardo week 4: 2 days per week 400 cal Cardio week 5: 3 days per week 400 cal Cardio week 6: 4 days per week 400 cal As for my cardio, I now do 500 cal 10K rows on my concept 2 about 4 days of the week. I worked up to this using the routine provided. This alone and tracking and managing your food will show a spike in weight loss. Remember, fad diets do not fuel exercise. A diet fuels exercise! Throw out the Hollywood beach bod diets, you're about to become the rocket scientist of your own body. Your looking for optimal performance. This requires time, investment and consistency. A side note, fuel mixture ratios are what make or break diabetes. I baffled my doctors with weight loss and management of my type 2 diabetes with this simple program outlined. It will take the weight off. This should be a good start for you. It's a journey, and each and every day is a battle at the scale to fight for that one pound and keep it off. It's day by day.
Caloric Deficit
For weeks 1-3, don't worry about your diet. Just eat as you usually would, but try to eat sugar free. Clean up your current diet with the food you currently eat. Stay away from the candy machine and be very aware of curbing the late night snacks. The fasted cardio and curbing your sugar intake should give you some initial results on the scale. During this time do research about nutrition and about macronutrients. This information will start coming into play for weeks 4-6 of the fasted cardio. This is how I initially got my weight to start to drop after months of no results at all. That's it for now. I will return on more posts about working through injuries and dealing with low testosterone. Testosterone is another major factor in over 50 male weight loss. A comment on commenting. This blog is all about helping myself and others who are sick and tired of gimmicks and magic pills. Comments are for exchanging information for fellow garage warriors. I will not accept comments with posts and urls for gimmick weight loss fads. Those posts will be deleted as fast as they're posted so please don't waste your time here. This is all about doing the time and chasing the dream - and seeing results!
