Heavy

Yesterday I went dancing. A fellow dancer and I started talking. He’d just gotten married. He was looking fit, but he was always a pretty healthy guy. He said, “you look a lot thinner.”

The interesting thing is that I’m still heavy. But yes, much of it is muscle now. Few people would guess my weight accurately. I still have a paunch, which is directly related to my beer intake.

I did measure my belly the other day however, and found some old notes. I was once 155lbs with a 40 inch waist. I’m now 178 with a 44 inch waist. My healthy waist would be about 37.5, which is about 5 lbs per inch, so a healthy weight loss would be about 33lbs. In some way this is necessary for my heart. It seems so daunting at this point.

But it was encouraging that he noticed. I do look better, and feel better than I did six years ago, when I was only ten pounds heavier and a lot weaker. I have an old passport photo that I barely recognize.

I went heavy the other day, but still lighter than where I was six weeks ago. I wanted to get out quickly, so I did some super sets. It looked like this:

Backsquats + Plyo pushups
Did two sets of three reps at 185, and then one at 205. Finished with a set of eight at 155. After each set five powerful push ups, trying to go as high as I could as fast as I could.

Deadlifts + Dumbbell presses
One set of eight at 135, and then two sets of five at 185. I then did three singles until I reached 225, before going back down to a set of 8 at 155. In between I did five sets of five thirty pound dumbbells.

I did two sets of one pull up and one set of one chin up in between these supersets.

It’s less than what I was doing before I left. They were “easy” but I didn’t want to hurt myself. I don’t have a partner, which makes me a little more wary.

But I won’t be taking any vacations for a while. I’m hoping that with slow five percent increases I may be able to get to my goals within six months.

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