Anyman Fitness – Week Three
Originally published on September 12, 2024.
Last Updated on September 15, 2024.
I’m now through week 3 of my Anyman Fitness program and things are going well! The losses continued although not nearly as great as the 1st week which was expected. My waist measurements dropped significantly and I dropped another almost 5 lbs the 2nd week by the scale. The first week was definitely a big blow off of water and waste … literally. Now that I’ve been eating clean with out a single cheat morsel for 3 weeks, I know that any weight that comes off is mostly fat. Taking measurements will confirm this for sure and I expect more losses from my wasteline when I measure again tomorrow.
Soreness
The 1st week was characterized by extreme soreness, to the point that it was waking me up at night. By the end of the 2nd week, the extreme part of the soreness was finally gone. I still had quivery, mushy legs after leg day, but not the bone deep ache that was haunting me the 1st week. I love this part as I know that my workouts are still effective because I’m driving the muscles to exhaustion but without paying for it for days. I don’t know if there is a way around this for people either starting lifting or getting back into lifting after a time off. I tried starting ‘light’ but that is a relative term and I found it really hard to pull something light when I know I was capable of doing so much more. Plus I’m not sure that light would allow me to gain much strength without wasting a bunch of weeks working up to strength again. I suspect this soreness is just something to gut out with gritted teeth and Advil.
Gaining Strength
If week 1 was characterized by soreness, the 2nd and 3rd weeks would be characterized by strength gains. I was amazing at how light the weights felt the 2nd week … and even more the 3rd week. I ended up jumping up by double plates on a couple of lifts just to feel a bit of burn. My workout notes for almost every lift in week 3 said, ‘go heavier next week.’ This is exciting … and VERY encouraging. I was shocked at how weak I had allowed myself to become when I sat down to do my 1st lift. Jason also has me doing pushups – and it has been a lot of fun to see the numbers going up each time I do a set. I’ve almost tripled the number I’m able to do on my 1st set. Again, I was shocked (and it was a blow to my manliness) to see how few pushups I could do my 1st week. Thank goodness this has come along quickly, if nothing else than for my ego. lol.
What I’m Eating = Food
Our garden harvest continues, so there is a lot of sampling. Cherry Tomatoes, Green Beans, Peas, Peppers, Corn … just to name a few. I’ve been using these as sides in my meals and they are wonderful. However for the main bulk of my calories and food, I’ve chosen simple packaged food – mostly dairy. I don’t have any intestinal issues with dairy, so Cottage Cheese and Yogurt have been real staples for me. The reason why I’ve chosen to stick with the packaged stuff is ease of calculations. When
starting out, I really had no idea how much of what macro was in any food. So food labels were essential and a source of discovery for me. Further, calories are sneaky. They seem to get into food and meals a lot easier than they should … like
Gremlins gumming up the system. lol. The other thing that makes packaged food easier is that I can often find foods that are either all of one macro (all carb or all protein) or balanced macros. This also makes calculations and meal food choices easier. I love Skyr Icelandic Yogurt as it is almost a perfect balance of protein and carbs (16 and 18) so it makes it really easy to do calculations. So I’ve stuck with labeled food to make this learning and calculating easier. As I learn, I will move back to my own homegrown food more … which will be cheaper and certainly more healthy in the long run. Just finished processing another 12 liters of pickles … with dill and garlic from our garden. These are going to be amazing! Thank goodness pickles don’t count for much in my macros.
Some Hard Numbers
Down 20 lbs on the scale
2.5″ Inches off my waist
2″ Inches off my chest
1″ off my calves!
I’m shrinking overall pretty much everywhere.
All this while eating over 200 gms of carbs per day (including bread) … hmmm, some guy named Paleo said this would make me fat. Turns out he was wrong. I wonder what else he was wrong about.