JoeG's Log

[joeG]

An introduction:

I'm a 22 year old Canadian. All through highschool I played video games and ate poorly. I often found myself feeling shaky, weak and tired. I was very clumsy and never had a lot of energy. I assumed it was the awkwardness you go through when you're a teenager. I couldn't catch a ball or anything. I never understood how come I was so awkward and never had the energy everyone else did... I assumed it was genetics.

When I was 19 I went through a slew of personal life issues which only worsened this. I stopped taking care of myself. Ontop of this, When I went in to have my wisdom teeth removed, they refused to do the surgery. A doctor told me I had an irregular heart beat and said I had to get checked out before I go through any type of surgery. They put me through a slew of tests, because they was concerned someone so young would have an irregular heartbeat. Eventually he said it was benign, but this scared me into doing cardio 3 times a week, and eating a bit better. I still always felt tired and my marks were suffering in college. I still had the same awkwardness and lack of energy. The cardio just didn't make me feel better.

The cardio continued until last summer, when I went bouldering with some friends. Bouldering is a style of rock climbing which tends to focuses more on short bursts of strength instead of endurance. It's usually made up of problems that are shorter and more difficult.
The embarassment hit when I couldn't even do one pull up. Here I was - a 21 year old with poor posture, a belly and noodle arms who couldn't do a pull up.

I continued to rock climb (up to 3 times a week), and started going to the gym more often and doing a lot more weight lifting. After a month I could do a pull-up, after a few more weeks I could do 4 in a set. The sense of accomplishment when I could finally do my first pull-up was amazing.

The stronger I got, the better I felt during the day. I don't know if it was increased testosterone but I began to do better in school, in my social life and at work. I started feeling good all the time, and my posture improved. I was better at everything I did, at every sport I played and even in the bedroom. Testosterone is definitely nature's viagra.

My cardio vascular performance also improved. I was weightlifting more and running less, but my performance in running/rowing/cycling was increasing faster then when I just did cardio.

Originally I was weightlifting to get better at rock climbing, but it improved my life so much that now I weightlift for weightlifting, and only climb once a month.

I've always done the isolated routines (Day 1, Back and Biceps, 2, Chest and triceps, 3 legs, 4 shoulders and forearms). They're ok but I find my gains have become sub-par lately.
It may be consistancy. I try for 4-5 times a week but often I am very busy and only make it two or three times in a week because I'm busy. This means if I slip up and only go a couple times a week during a busy month, I only end up working every muscle twice a month!

I've also found that lately my muscles are getting bigger but I am not getting any stronger...

A friend of mine recommended doing a 5x5 a long time ago but I never gave it much thought until now. I recently decided I needed to do a new routine, and after some research I've set my sights on the 5x5.

Starting tomorrow, I begin the 5x5 Beginner's program.

[joeG]

I made a lot of small grammer/spelling mistakes writing this, but I don't seem to be able to edit the post? Guess I'll just deal.