All Aboard the Pork Chop X-press!!

[Pork Chop]

Thanks, good luck to you too.

Mon 3/2
he|| week got started off pretty good.
Was up around 5:45 to work out at Gold's.

Did 30 min on the elliptical.
first 10 minutes was a motivated warm up
Then I did 3 rounds of "sprints" - not true sprints, but 3 minutes of hard as I could go with 1 minute rests.
Finished out the end at a medium-high pace.

moved over to T-Bar row
70lbs on the bar x 20, 90 x 15, 115 x 10, 135 x 8

Went to work and felt totally energized till around 1 or 2 in the afternoon; started getting sleepy.

After work, went to the mma gym.
Lots of calisthenics
2 rounds of shadow
3 rounds of jump rope
then held pads for the last 30 min or so.

cruised on over to the muay thai gym for jump rope followed by calisthenics & shadow boxing with the weight vest before class got started.
class went pretty well, too many people to do sparring, but at least got some technique work & some good pad work in.

slept okay

Tuesday 3/3 - am
Woke up before my alarm this morning, before 5:30.
headed over to gold's.
Turned in a 45 minute cardio session from he||.
Calorie counts on those things don't carry much weight with most people, so i'll quantify it by saying my shirt was soaked, I was out of breath, my fingers were numb & stayed numb until I'd completed 3 laps walking around the gym. Called it a workout after that. Was considering kettlebells, but 45 min just takes too much out of me. Think I'll stick to 20 ~ 30 on weight days.

Not feeling quite as energetic today after the morning workout - feeling kinda achey.
Started coughing up interesting stuff yesterday - wondering if it's new parts of my lungs that have finally healed from the damage I've caused.

[Pork Chop]

Tuesday 3/3 pm

After work I headed to the mma gym.
Did a lot of stretching, a good amount of shadow, and a lot of bag work (mainly burnout stations and some double end).

got to the muay thai gym by 6:15
the highlights of the workout were lots of rounds of focus mitts & thai pads with defenses mixed in.
I was pretty burnt afterwards.

Tuesday wasn't calisthenic heavy - skipped my pushup-crunch-bicycle-leg lift-jump squat complex in both evening workouts (not exactly intentional) and I didn't do any lifting in the morning workout. This might turn out to have been a good thing. While I slept in this morning (wednesday) instead of a 6am workout, because I needed sleep, I don't feel quite as dead as I was expecting. It's still early in the week though and I have a lot of workouts left to survive, not even half way.

EDIT: the weight was down at 226.8 last night before dinner and down even further at 226.6 this morning on waking up, for a new pr.

[Pork Chop]

Wed 3/4
Having a hard time getting to bed so I'm gonna blog.
Made it through the half way point.
One minor casualty though; get to that in a sec.

Gold's at lunch
30 min on the elliptical crosstrainer
kept alternating every 2 minutes between high resistance + med speed and med resistance + high speed. Good workout.

Was a bit burnt when i got to kettlebells.
2 supersets of:
10 swings right, 10 clean & press right, 10 swings left, 10 clean & press left, 20 swing both
On the second one, transitioning from the right to the left, i felt something tweak in my lower back. Was going to do a 3rd superset, but the pain was getting worse and I called it a day.

after work I went to the muay thai gym.
sparring, pad work, the works.
Did shadow in the vest, but not much more in order to take it easy on my back - the weight vest puts a lot of strain on my back.

Right now the pain is enough to be annoying and to keep me from being able to sleep, but I wouldn't call it "agony" - probably thanks to the 2 Alieve I popped. Wish I could sleep though.

[Pork Chop]

Thursday 3/5
One of the weirdest effing days of my life.
The strangest part might be that I'm actually grateful.

Came in to work and found out 2 of my buddies were getting laid off - they'd been having some issues for a while, so while it's sad, it wasn't completely unexpected.
One of them's been my main training partner since last fall; so I really hope things work out for him.

Tried to go to the gym at lunch, but got in a car accident.
It was the other guy's fault and my car's not too bad, so it wasn't the end of the world.
What almost gave me a heart attack was the fact that I hadn't printed off my new insurance cards and my wallet was still back at work.
Luckily the cop was nice to me.
Felt bad for the other guy, he was just coming from his send-off luncheon after getting laid off.
Nice guy though, hope he's able to find something better.

Work went weird. I didn't get the email to start working on something for Tuesday until Wednesday. Eventhough I was late, I still plugged away at it; when I did have an opportunity to just blow it off. The plugging away should've just been an exercise in following procedures but I actually found something that needed to be fixed. While fixing it is kind of a p.i.t.a. I'm glad I didn't take the lazy route for once.

After work went to the mma gym.
Started out with a lot of light cardio, footwork drills, and stretching.
It was hot & stuffy in there; eventhough outside was very comfortable.
Made it difficult to work out with intensity.
One of the guys that always hits the bags around our time wanted to jump in on our pad work, which was pretty cool - alternated rounds between him and my coworker.

As soon as we finished the workout another coworker who was going to meet me at the muay thai gym called to tell me that the coach was sick and that it's closed.
I drove over there anyway to see it for myself - took some pics with my cell phone, might post 'em.
He waited for me to show up, so we hung out and BSed for a while.

Then I took off for Gold's gym for the cardio workout I was trying to do that afternoon.
30 minutes of cardio.
Felt like I was stuck in 2nd gear - not in the sense of being sluggish, but in the sense that maintaining my normal pace & intensity felt like an all-out war.
Sweat buckets.
Was spent afterwards, so I showered up and headed out.
Saw Aaron Rosa at the front counter of the gym, while I was talking to one of the guys from muay thai. He used to work out at the muay thai gym when we had Mike Rangel's mma class there. He even got started under my muay thai coach before going mma. He was close with the guy I was talking to, don't think he remembered me too much. I'm closer with his friend Marcel (that record's not complete - he has won a few).

Went home and my wife; who normally works 1 to 2 hours overtime, was 3 hours late due to a difficult patient. Got home around 8 and by around 9:30 I was sick of waiting for her and basically delirious from hunger & exhaustion. Picked up some chicken wings & strips with fries. Not my most nutritious meal ever, but I didn't pig out on the scale that I've done in the past. It surprised me that I got really full pretty quick.

I weighed in at 225 when I got home from the gym. This morning; after the buffalo chicken strips and some seasoned fries (not a whole lot), I was back up to 227 - sodium making me retain water, not too big a deal.

I'm very grateful to have made it through yesterday, safe and sound.

[Pork Chop]

Friday 3/6
had an eye doctor's appointment in the afternoon so i went into work early.

went to gold's around 3
20 min of cardio - including 4 rounds of 3 min "sprints"
did assisted pullups to failure - 10 @ 10 plates of assist, 8 @ 9 plates, 6 @ 8 plates, 5 @ 7 plates, 3 @ 6 plates - just burnt.

Got to the muay thai gym around 6
lots of everything, except maybe sparring - finished out with clinch instead.
complete burnout session

[Pork Chop]

Saturday 3/7
finished out he|| week with a nice, vigorous workout.
Didn't completely die - worked with a newer guy on thai pads for a long time, picked up some more tips on certain things, we worked some more punching defense. Finished out with the sledgehammer stuff on the slam ball.

Hit up some Thai food after the gym and wanted to go to Gold's after but just didn't have time.
We went to a MMA event that night and didn't even get to eat dinner.
Left the mma event early coz the striking was pretty atrocious and I was so hungry I was getting woozy.
Ate some Korean food and went to bed.

[Pork Chop]

Tuesday 3/10
Got back on the horse today.
Took monday off because after a 6-day week, 1 day off wasn't gonna cut it.
Still felt a little worn out today, so even one more day wouldn't have hurt.

Gold's after work around 5
30 min of cardio - pretty low intensity
assisted pullups - 100lb assist x 20, 80lb assist x 15, 60lb x 10, 50lb x 6, 40lb x 5, 30lb x 3, 20lb x 2 (the assist got stuck so the second one was basically no assist).

Muay thai gym after that 6 to 8:45
jumped rope for 10 min
lotsa calisthenics - without the weight vest, they were almost easy.
jogging with more calisthenics
held focus mitts for about 10 min
hit focus mitts for 15 to 20 min
held thai pads 3 rounds
hit thai pads for a round and a half - had to cut it short coz it was Gabbie's birthday and we had a cake for her.
finished up with defense drills for punches, teeps, and roundkicks

pretty good workout, it was very humid and a bit hot so it took a lot out of me.
back down at 224 tonight too - even though my diet hasn't been great lately.

[Pork Chop]

Wed 3/11 was my LDS day.
Everything was pretty much low intensity to keep my cardio up and get my blood flowing to heal up as much as possible.

45 min of very low intensity on the elliptical - heart rate didn't get up to 130

went to the gym after that
10 min of jump rope
10 min of stretching
1 hour of shadow boxing
5 min of jumping on the tire

[Pork Chop]

Thursday 3/12
Did more than I should've today.
Got the thai pads & belly pad I ordered in today so i was stoked about that.
Turns out I might've overpaid by 10 or 20 bux, but o well.

worked out at mma gym after work
lots of light cardio, some calisthenics, stretching & technique/shadow.
supervised my coworkers through partner drills after that
total time was an hour and a half

went over to the muay thai gym
didn't even bring workout clothes
held pads for about 5 rounds

came home and got real grumpy
ticked off right now and not sure why.

[Pork Chop]

Friday 3/13
went to a coworker's going away party after work.
ended up being a late lunch - iced tea (unsweet) turned out to be a mistake.
then hit the gym hoping to kick the new pads, but the other coach wasn't there.
ended up doing a bunch of shadow and some solid clinch work.
came home, tried to rest and relax as much as i could
did some meditation
sleep didn't come easy
wife having to wake up at 5:30 didn't help
woke up hungry but nauseous
just ate a bowl of cereal, gonna try to take a nap before heading over in 4 or 5 hours.
nerves s*ck.

[Pork Chop]

Saturday 3/14
After all that training, all that nervousness, i still can't believe how it turned out.
Only one other gym showed up to our interclub event.
There wasn't really anybody to spar with.

I ended up getting paired with one of our rising stars - a young girl that can't get a fight in Texas because she's got so many knockouts. She's been doing this stuff for years and is in the process of applying for that Fight Girls show with Master Toddy.

D@mned if ya do, d@mned if you don't kinda situation.
Nobody else wanted to do it either, which says something.

She hits real hard and tries to go for the kill, any small slip and she'll make you pay for it.

I didn't pitch a shut out, but I did get complemented by a lot of people for how I walked that fine line between protecting yourself & being a bully. Had a little bit of a hard time dealing with her Superman punch - she caught me with it a couple times.

Overall, I just feel kinda disappointed and depressed.
Going to get back on the horse monday, switching up my routine a little bit to incorporate some periodization so i don't get stale the next 4 months.
Man I miss beer.

[Pork Chop]

Sunday 3/15
Fun relax day today at Gold's
Did 2 rotations of a little circuit:
Sauna - cool shower - pool - jacuzzi - cool shower
My whole left leg's been having issues and today helped it feel a bit better.

[Pork Chop]

Wed 3/18
Finally made it back to the gym yesterday after a few days of feeling very burnt out.
Good workout, not too easy, but not too crazy.
Gained like 10 pounds in the 2 days I took off.
The sweat from the workout dropped me back down to 5 over, but I really don't get it.

[sanjuro_ronin]

Get what Bro?

[Pork Chop]

Get what Bro?

oh i just don't get how my weight can fluctuate *that* much.
I was 224 Saturday morning after breakfast, with no real sweat going.
I was 233 yesterday at the beginning of the workout, 229 by the end.

My mantra thus far has been not to obsess over the weight - to just focus on being able to do crazy things in the gym, and it's done me well; but Saturday the one guy that showed up from outside our gym was 191. Couldn't go up against him coz of the 30lb weight difference. I'd like to get under 200 without any crazy dieting. I think I just gotta stay focused on getting the work done in the gym.

My usual training partner (said yesterday he's 6'3.5") weighed in at 210 on saturday and was down to 185 earlier this week. He was back up to 212 yesterday; which is kind of a relief, the idea of him fighting at 185 is scary. lol One of the other guys I work with is exactly 6 foot and weighed in at 245 yesterday, he'd probably be pretty cut at 225; he's real strong too.

The next 4 to 6 weeks will be focusing on raw strength so I imagine my weight's not going to be too cooperative.

Got another interclub May 16th and I might possibly have a spot on a local card in June, July's still my main goal.