A Fitness Journey

So in the next few weeks my amateur football season is finished, meaning that I won't be playing anywhere near as much football as I have been over the past six months. I currently play twice a week in 11 a-side matches and twice in a sixes league, which is combined almost 300 minutes of intense cardio per week.

This I believe is the main reason for my somewhat inability to put on any mass. So I'm hoping will be a big boost to my muscle gain mission. Having to eat almost 4000 calories on a football day isn't the easiest task, so will be nice to get myself back to the 3100 that I've set myself in order to gain around 1lb per week.

Does anyone else do a shed load of cardio and feel like it might be limiting their mass gain goal?

Would be interesting to hear how others get on with their cardio or how they keep the balance between too much and too little.

So as you know, I have been suffering from an injured forearm for the past little while, but I'm beginning to think that it's becoming more psychological than physical. My forearm is giving me pangs of pain every so often, but it's only really aggravated by doing anything bicep related.

Today when doing my chest workout, I struggled to remain focussed and was barely able to lift weights that I normally manage no problem. I'm beginning to worry that I've begun mentally preparing myself to fail and my wrist to give out, giving me no confidence in my lifts.

Even with my pre-workout supplement to help me remain focussed, I lagged completely and my workout was pretty poor and I hate to say it, but it was a complete bore. This is nothing like I normally am, as I really enjoy working my chest.

All I can say really is, I hope Thursday comes around quick and I can get this sorted out and get back onto lifting again.

Since I haven't posted anything to do with nutrition this week, I thought I would share a protein shake idea with you all. This one isn't anything too exciting or different, but it's a start.

This weeks smoothie is a Chocolate, Peanut butter and Banana smoothie.



I luckily have one of those Magic Bullet blenders, which are fantastic for these sort of things. If you don't have one then I would suggest buying one or something similar.

Let me know what you think, or perhaps any suggestions of other ingredients to add to the list.

After 4 days of weight training again, it would appear that my forearm is sore again. It's the same problem as last week too. When I go to train my arms, my left forearm starts to hurt like hell and almost buckles under the weights, so I have to stop before I do myself any more damage. 

So today I went back to the community gym for the first time in a few months and there were a few familiar faces from when I was last there and quite a few new ones. I was over at the free weights doing my shoulder warm up when I noticed this group of three guys, maybe late teens, doing some dumbbell work.

Now I know I have only been at this gym stuff for around 7 months, so I am by no means an expert on any of this stuff, but I can't help noticing that so many people don't do their exercises through a full range of motion. Is this to target weaker parts of a muscle? Is it due to their lack of experience? I'm not entirely sure, if it's me that's lacking experience and not knowing that what they are doing is actually beneficial for what they are trying to achieve or am I the one that's been taught all wrong. It's all a learning curve for me too.

This leaves me the question of "When, if ever, is it ok to correct someones form?", because unless you know entirely everything there is to know about lifting weights, could you be the one that is wrong?

There are times that I feel that the way someone is working out is going to injure themselves, but due to my inexperience, I feel that perhaps I'm just not as clued up as them and they may be doing something perfectly fine. So I don't say anything and I just let them get on with it.

I don't want to be a gym bro, that tries to know what I'm talking about, when I could be completely wrong. So I don't say anything, I just go home to learn as much as I can.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on this, so please leave comments below.

Today I had a fish supper (haddock and chips) for the first time in a long time. In fact it's the first time I've had anything from a chip shop in a long time.

My diet normally consists of quite healthy home cooked foods, with minimal take away foods, that at most normally consist of a chicken breast kebab with salad. Not the worst of foods you could choose to have from a takeaway.

Anyways, I now feel really sluggish and don't feel at all as energetic as I normally would. Football tonight was a nightmare and I could barely move. Be that due to the junk that I ate, or the fact I'm still not fully recovered from my bout of man flu, who knows. One thing I do know is that I won't be eating that sort of rubbish again for a long time. Even as a treat, because there is nothing enjoyable about how I feel now.

Since it's "hump day" I have decided that I will post up some midweek motivation for anyone struggling to get through the week. Found this picture on my trawls of the internet and thought it was very appropriate to myself and perhaps others looking to achieve the best body that they can.

Last week I managed to somehow injure my forearm and my calf on the same day, whilst also contracting a cold/man flu the day after. It gave my arm and leg time to recover, but left me with absolutely no energy at all. So bed rest was my only remedy (along with many cold/flu tablets).

During the time I found it very hard to eat without feeling quite sick, but I knew I had to keep my calories up to minimise the chance of any muscle loss. I tried to do this by eating soup and drinking protein shakes. I was still hitting roughly 2600 calories per day, whilst getting plenty of sleep to help aid my recovery.

Three days later and I'm feeling a lot better, so decided it was time to hit the gym. I was a bit skeptical about how well I would be able to lift, but thought I would go anyway.

Chest is what I always hit first during my workout week.

My workout consisted of the following with 30-50 seconds between sets.

Olympic Bar weight approx 22kg unloaded.

3 sets of 25 reps of Olympic Barbell chest press (flat bench) with no weight as a warm up.

Flat bench
1 set of 16 reps Chest press with 10kg on the olympic bar.
1 set of 10 reps Chest press with 30kg on the olympic bar.
1 set of  6 reps Chest press with 40kg on the olympic bar.

Incline bench

1 set of 12 reps Chest press with 10kg on the olympic bar.
1 set of 8 reps Chest press with 30kg on the olympic bar.
1 set of 6 reps Chest press with 40kg on the olympic bar.

Although I have had this blog for only a day, I have actually been working out for almost seven months now. My weight has remained pretty much unchanged throughout this time, although I don't really listen to the scales. The mirror is definitely more my friend when it comes to monitoring my progress.

I would recommend to anyone who is just starting out on their weight loss/muscle gain journey, to take a picture of your starting physique, because seeing yourself every day you will not notice a difference without it. This can be one of the biggest problems with most people who are just starting out and having sweat blood and tears for a month don't seem to notice any difference.  Having a comparison point to start with is the best thing you can do.

If you look at my "Welcome" post then you can see a picture of my starting body and below is a picture of my current (excuse the unsightly sunburn).

• The mirror is your friend - Don't weigh yourself every day. 
• Take a beginning picture to compare yourself to.

Hi folks,

Let me start by introducing myself. My name is Peter, I am 25 years old and I have started this blog in order to track my progress in my goal of getting into shape.

A bit of background about me before I begin though. I have always had an active lifestyle. My teenage years were spent being part of football teams, swimming clubs and Skating. I wasn't chubby and I wasn't muscular. I was what is referred to as skinny-fat.

A physique, while not overweight (and possibly underweight), lacks any visible lean, striated tissue.