Well, I’m now at the half-way point for my Wichita Highland Games training. Â Lemmie say this – I’m still not ready for it. Â Hopefully, after the next 7 weeks, I’ll feel I’m ready for it, but I have my doubts 🙂
Workouts sucked this week. Â Tonight, for instance, on pull downs, I grabbed the bar and started to finish the set (50-40-30-20-10-20-30-40-50), and felt a stabbing sensation in my right shoulder (the one I injured weeks back, which hasn’t really healed). Â OK, time to be done for the night – there’s never a reason to push myself to injury (I keep saying this, because I have to remind myself.) Â Two days before, I aborted my workout way early – something wasn’t “right”. Â I’m not sure what it was, but something was way off feeling – it may have been staying up until 4:30 AM (because of a drunk in the neighborhood causing the dogs to go off from time to time) and sleeping in really late, or something else. Â It’s hard to tell. Â But, if it feels seriously off, it’s time to stop – that’s another time when injuries can happen.
I can’t say it’s been super-easy to stay motivated, but at the same time it hasn’t really been that hard, either. Â I decided to do something ultra-random, and have the camera snag a shot of me mid-workout. Â I have two mirrors setup to help me keep form (another injury cause during workouts is bad form – I’m bad about hurting my back, so I literally watch my form during workouts.) Â I took a shot, because seeing myself working out has become it’s own form of motivation.
That guy in the picture there? Â That’s not who he used to be. Â I’m bigger and stronger than I used to be. Â I’m still fat around the center – and even if I lost weight down to the 7% body fat range, I’d probably look overweight. Â I’m just no longer built for a flat stomach, I think (however, I’m gonna give it a shot after the Highland Games. Â We’ll see what happens 😉 ) And, while I’m sure most people don’t see it, I do. Â And it makes it a lot easier for me to stay motivated, seeing those changes. Â Looking at the other pictures, there’s changes in there, too – some of them “little things” like the veins popping out in my arms, or the flattening of my pecks when flexed up. Â Again, most people wouldn’t see it – heck, probably not even with side-by-side pictures, unless they’re really looking for them. Â But, for me, it’s all there. Â And it’s fun.
I was going to change things up a bit for week 7, and it never happened. Â I think I’m going to try and make it happen for week 8. Â Plus, time to see about breaking the workouts into slightly different schedules, because a full workout is getting ridiculously long.
