I'm finishing my first month of 5/3/1 this week. It's the deload week. In my first month back, I went from the calculated 1RMs of:
Press: 130
Squat: 231
Bench: 203
Deadlift: 315
To a New estimated 1RM (based on liftsxreps in the program)
Press 132
Squat 233
Bench 203
Deadlift 338.5
That is actual, quantifiable progress. That excites me so much. I really forgot how much I like lifting. I have been doing 1 day of LSD a week since starting weights. One of the days I did LSD with shadow boxing and jump rope to try to remember how moving and boxing feels. It's amazing how quickly you start to feel rusty. I'm going to try to go next saturday for a NO GI class and some MMA sparring. That should be fun. Getting it once in a while will be a change of pace from having to grind every day at MT or Jits. I love them both, but feeling that I HAD to go was wearing on me, as I've mentioned.
The 'diet' is going well. Really limiting my wheat and sugars does so much for my performance and overall sense of well being. I'm still getting through wheat belly, and reading the section on lymphoma gave me chills. My mom's blood pressure has dropped 20 points and shes off her BP meds after 2.5 weeks of going paleo. I'm trying to balance paleo with sanity as I'm surrounded by a pregnant wife who I don't want to get in the way of. Some of her digestive ailments can be attributed to gluten sensitivity, and since being pregnant and cutting beer out of the mix, she has shown significant improvement in her digestive health. I think this might be the ammo I need to give full paleo/ gluten free a try with her post-pregnancy. I legitimately think it might help us both. I'll keep leveraging that angle.
I've been going pretty heavy into the crock pot cooking, since it's easy and turns out great meals. I was using www.paleopot.com and did the stuffed peppers and the kielbasa and krout recipe. Both winners.
My weight was 187 earlier last week. I don't have a recent measurement. I'm pleased with that. Under 190 and I'm good. I'm reasonably confident I can dial it in even more and get to see legit abs. I might just keep it under 190 and see the 'mono-ab' (another first for me). I feel like I have more energy when I'm above 185. It's a cool thing to have such detailed knowledge of your energy levels at different levels of food and weight. It's something that can only be had with experimentation and attention. I love this game.
In the 1/3 life crisis game: I got a tattoo. Or at least the beginning. It's a samurai meditating under a cherry blossom tree. The warrior philosopher is something that has resonated with me for a long time. Meditating on his mortality, on the battle to come, on his fallen brothers (the cherry blossoms). It's going to end up cool. Plus the art is dope.
www.memorialtattooatl.com Gary is the guy working on it. I will post photos as it becomes more complete. I have 2.5 hours in already.
