Day23

Triple cardio today.
This wasnt on purpose but I had to ride my bike to the bike shop and back at lunch time.
consentrated on my ABS this evening and think i should be doing much more of this. I can feel more muscle developing in this area and I know that as the fat goes i will start to show something of a six pack. It might not be much of one but this will be its first ever outing so I will be happy when it arrives.

One thing im very pleased with my self for is having made two lunches to take to work every day. I have done this without fail since I started and it has made a massive differance to not snacking on bad foods. each meal consists of either tuna chicken or turkay and a salad.

Day 3 of oats for breakfast is suiting me fine. I am having a far smaller portion of this but am not getting hungry before my 11am meal.

All is looking positive. I will be weighing in and measuring my body fat on Friday. I will publish the results Friday night.

Take it easy, not too easy...

day23 pics below.

Day22

Time is absolutely flying past at the moment.
It really doesnt feel like 22 days in. Its a good job there are a whole
load more days to go because I want to see some big changes and that is
going to take some time.
A good day today for cardio weights and nutrition. One thing I have
changed this week is my breakfast, I have swaped from kellogs bran
flakes to oats. This seems ok and means that i have a warm breakfast
before getting out on my bike.

My shoulder is on the mend and I did three sets of 12 dips tonight.

Last week I went off the rails one night and ate a load of chocolate. I obviously dont want this
to happen again and so on a few occasions I have had a few handfulls of cerial just to get me past the hunger. this has worked well and it is better to have a few extra cals of cerial rather than
hundreds of calories of chocolate.

Below are day22 photos.
Take it easy, not too easy...

Day21

I feel great.
Good nutrition, good cardio, good lifting.

Yesterday I saw a change in my photos for the first time. Also I can feel a differance in my own body fat. This is not a scientific 
measurable but you know when you can feel the differance.

I was able to use a 60kg barbell for 15 minutes today so I made good use and did three sets of 12 reps. My legs went wobley but it was great. I hope to be able to increase the weight in the near future.

My shoulder is still painfull but although I should rest it further, I dont want to loose my routine. I will continue to take it easy on this shoulder.

21 days into my diet and im still putting on weight. is this right???

Day 21 pics below.
Take it easy, not too easy.

Day20

Positive, Positive, Positive.

Rest day and also cheat meal day combined, Its been good and although ive taken the pics i dont expect to see any change. As much as I would like to think I was ready for this, its obviouse to me that I am still learning all the way through. Slight changes here and there so that I dont become to comfortable with my diet and fitness at any point.

My photos dont seem to be showing the change in weight that im able to see for my self in the mirror. I think that the camera flash means that the changes arent visable. Perhaps I will experiment with either photoshop levels or put the camera in a differant place.

Take care.

Day19

Today has been an all vegetable soup day with no protein, It doesnt feel to bad but I couldnt lift as much weight tonight. Im looking forward to my breakfast in the morning.

I feel that after a bit of a binge one night last week, im back into my diet and getting on ok. I need to step up my cardio but it seems to have been raining here for the last 3 weeks non stop.

The food recepies are getting a bit tiresome so I think ill change them about a bit.

Day 19 pics below

Take care.

Day18

Its Friday night so just some pics below.

Day17

I didnt get any cardio in today as i needed to take the car to work and tomorrow looks like downpours all day. 
I am going to have to think about this seriously and what I can do to remedy it. 
Getting to a gym will be very difficult but I think it may turn out to be my only option. 
I will investigate further tomorrow.
I guess I will have to take Michaels lead and start getting up really early and get to the gym 
on the way to work.

My shoulder is still playing me up and so ive concentrated on legs and abs again today. Nutrition was far better than yesterday and I resisted the biscuits in the office.

Day 17 photos below. One day you will be able to see a difference.

Take care.

Day16

I am full of chocolate... I know  I know.

A bit of a day off today. Can you believe this? I have been dieting hard for 2 weeks now and I have gained weight. This sounds awful but Ive dropped from 20% to 15.9% body fat, and that is a good thing.

My weight training has become a bit difficult. This is because I have a very limited gym which consists of two 20kg dumbells and a big inflatable ball. I have now maxed out on most exercises and can do loads of reps. What I need to be able to do is up the weights now and bring my reps back down and my weights back up. This is going to take some thought. Ive managed 1 hour of cardio each day this week but tomorrow I have to take the car to work. Hopefully Friday I will be back on my bike.

Think Strong..

Day 16 photos below.

Day15

Im really struggling at the moment not to lift up the dumbbells. My shoulder is loads better but i really need to leave it for a few more days. Still did good cardio today and an ab workout.

Riding through town today on my way home, all I could smell was the curry houses and fast food restaurants. It really did smell good but I had to keep going.

Im looking forward to a cheat meal at the weekend. I hope my measurements go well on Friday.

Below are day 15 pics.
Think strong.

Stu.

Day14

Extra cardio and a big workout on legs and ABS tonight. The clock is clicking and I hope I have just raised the bar a little. I need to be inching it up daily in order to achieve my goal. I used my dinner time to get out on my bike but the weather is awful at the moment so im less than inspired. I will keep at it and use the time to my advantage.

I looked through Adams day 1 to day 14 blog and was really shocked at his change in just two weeks. Im seeing why it took him a number of attempts to get his routine just how he wanted it.

Lots of things to do tonight so only a short entry.
Tonights photos below.

Be Strong.

Day13

Today ive decided its time for a change this week, There are two reasons for this, Firstly im carrying a small shoulder injury which isnt getting any better. The second reason is that ive begun to slip away from my schedule.

So what am I going to change?

To get around my shoulder injury I am going to stop all lifting of weights for 1 week and instead I will fill this gap with extra cardio and concentrate hard on my ABS. I hope that 1 week will be enough to allow my shoulder to fix its self.

The second change is with my nutrition and timing, this will be more of an experiment and may not be fixed but my thought are thus. It is said that you can burn far more fat from the body by doing cardio before breakfast. I will be having a go at getting in my thirty minute bike ride to work and then eating my tub of breakfast at work. 

There is a third change that I may try and that is to use my thirty minute dinner break to get an extra ride in. At the moment I go out walking but I dont think that this is burning enough calories. This will also be done on an before food so will show if the above theory works for me.

The day 13 pics below show that there isnt enough progress yet with 80 days to go.

Think Strong.

Day12

Not much to say tonight as its Saturday and im having the night off.

Anyway here are tonights photos.

take it easy.

Day11

Its been a good week with 5 full days of cardio which is 75 real miles of cycling.  
Today I had my weigh in which was great news. I was only down 1.4Kg but my BF was down by 3.2%. This means ive lost fat and put on muscle. This has given me a really big push and I shall be going at this with all my strength. Tonight I had a good workout which wasnt as rushed as it usually is. I very nearly managed 5 wide arm pull ups which is 4 more than i could achieve 10 days ago. It would be great to do a set of 10 of these and I will be able to do this in the next 3 weeks.

Below are todays pictures and below that are pics of my meals today.

Take care.




Breakfast is the same for me every morning.
coffee.
branflake + skimed milk



Meals 2, 4 and 5 are large salad with chicken or tuna or crab meat.
I use soya sause for the dressing and cook chicken in curry or chilli powder.



Meals 3 and 6 are protein shakes.
No pics of this.

Day10

Ive got to say that im happy to have got to day ten and im pleased with the effort ive put into this shred. I have a lot of respect for the other shredders who have been going at this for a lot longer and I can see that the dedication required to fulfill Cardio, Nutrition, Weights, Photos and Blogging is tremendous. You really have to live this shredding business to achieve great results. Well done to all of you.

As for me Ive started to wain a little but mainly because at the end of each day I dont see that ive managed to achieve a daily difference. That said I look at what ive done each day and I see 1 hour of cardio a fixed nutrition plan, and aching muscles. Perhaps im expecting too much too soon. 

My biggest stumbling block is a mental one. Because I dieted all of last year successfully I was incredibly tied up with loosing physical weight. In the last 10 days ive put on weight which is totally against my previous experience. If I think about it properly then small weight gains is perhaps what I expected and this is down to muscle gains. What I have to do is have utter faith in what i am doing and see in two or three weeks time that I have had a significant fat loss, in the region of 2 - 3 % would be great and will keep me on track for the following 70 ish days.

A real positive is the slack around my waist when i put my trousers on today.

here are todays pics.....

Be Lucky.

Day9

Back to strength today. Having a single good meal last night and a good nights sleep Has me feeling strong again. 
My cycle ride to and from work was much faster than yesterday and I felt good all day.

I did well on nutrition and got a good work out in today. Tired now so here are todays picture.

Day8

Hi all,

Its been a funny day today, I had a bit of a body crash this afternoon, Not much of one but I felt that I needed some extra calories. My symptoms were - Tiredness, Slightly low, slight headache and Inability to concentrate fully. Ive taken it easy and had a good evening meal which has made me feel loads better. Unfortunately i had to cycle home (7miles) which really took it out of me but I havent done too many weights tonight. A good nights sleep is in order.

I think that because this is the start of my second week im still trying to get my nutrition right. The last thing I want is to drag my calories too low and start burning muscle instead of the fat. Hopefully I shall have my nutrition sorted in the next couple of days.

Below is day1 - day8 pic.

Stu.

Day7

Hello everybody,

Managed to get my 1 hour cardio in again and it was great, Unfortunately Ive found a problem with my diet and that is that im not getting enough carbs earlier in the day and so by the time i get onto my bike, im finding my self without energy. I then find myself eating the rest of my daily carbs in my last meal which means that im not tapering my carbs. So as i have found this is a problem I shall be fixing it by adding a small potato to each of my early meals tomorrow.

I measured my BFI today and wow what a shock ive dropped 4% in the first week. Obviously this isnt true and although when i measured my self 1 hour later i had gone up a bit the reading was still way down on last week. 
I will try again later in the week but i think that im probably more like 18 to 19%.

Below are todays photos, I still cant see a difference in them but when im training, i can definitely see a difference in my fat levels, I cant say for sure but I think its going the right way.

See you tomorrow.

Stu.

Day6

Hello,

Another good day on nutrition today, Ive eaten all but one portion of my tasty soup and so that will be for tea tomorrow night. Two salads with chicken are prepped and in the fridge which will be meals for 2 and 4 and a protein shake in between. 

Ive also had a good workout with a cycle ride earlier in the day and I finally managed to do proper dumbbell lunges for the first time. I think i have the hang of them and the pain in my legs must be a sure sign.

Things of temptation today have been biscuits, muffins and some Christmas cake. Ive passed on all of them.

My in laws have decided that they will be going on a diet from tomorrow and were asking questions about what I was eating. I wasnt sure that I should give them the details of my current diet and exercise regime. Instead the system that I used last year of eating smaller portions of better foods and increase exercise sounded the best idea.

Below are day6 photos, Im not sure if there is alot of difference to be seen yet but Im still on the program full hartedly.

Feel the burn, its great.
Stu.

Day5

Hi all,

Its early days and im still finding out just how this cardio and weight training is effecting my body fat percentage. Having not dieted this way before means that I dont have a full referance of what should be happening. Last year I lost 45lbs but In the first week of January I had lost 7 lbs. I now Know that this would have been a fair amount of body water but I was suprised this morning to see that I hadnt lost any weight. Im not woried about this because my goal here isnt to loose weight but instead loose body fat and increase muscle, nontheless its still seems strange. I am very positive about how things are going and I feel strong. 

Today I impressed myself with two sets of 12 dipps. This is an exercise that im not fond of
but if I can start to get a good numbers in then its one that I will be working on. I still am unable to do a single wide arm pull up but I will be 
working on this over the comming weeks.

My diet today has been lots of protein and a fantastic vegatable soup which 
I knocked up last night. 
Two birdseye chillies means that no body else in the house will be eating any.

I think im going to go and get another workout in, or atleast a couple of sets of dips and some squats.

Looking forward to the days ahead.

take care.

Stu.

Day4

My arms dont hurt today,

Im just having trouble lifting them to type.

I had my first reward meal today, Mexican. It was brilliant. Although my blog suggests that im only on day4, I have actually been eating clean since 27th Dec. After Christmas I felt I needed to detox a little before getting into the fat burning routine.

One thing that im not sure about is if I have had a reward meal and dont feel hungry for the rest of the day, then should I still try to get my 6 meals in or should I let it go for the rest of the day?

Having had a good meal ment that lifting my dumbells felt much easier and I managed 12 dips straight off when I had only managed 6 previously.

All in All after 4 days im feeling good and im very glad im doing this.

Take it easy,

Stu.

Day3

My legs hurt.

but it feels good.

The muscle pain began today but wasn't to bad until this evening when I picked up the weights again. I think tomorrow will be the killer but in the scheme of things its a small price to pay.

I haven't had nearly enough protein today so ill have a shake shortly. Last year I lost 45lbs but did it through simple dieting and eating healthier foods. To be honest I wasn't bothered whether the weight that I was loosing was through LBM or fat and I think I probably lost more muscle than I needed to. Using this diet "Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle" I'm hoping to maintain as much muscle as possible. For the first time I really don't care what my weight is and simply what my body fat percentage is. I found this a difficult concept but I'm getting the hang of it now.

Take care,

Stu.

Day2

My Arms Hurt.

But it feels great.

I rode my bike to work and back today which is the first time for a couple of weeks. I was so pleased to be back on it even though the temperature was 1degC. Snow is forecast for tomorrow but I hope there isn't enough to stop me cycling. The journey is just over 7 miles each way so I get 35minutes of cardio in the morning and again in the evening.

Nutrition has been probably less calories and protein than I should have had but this isn't as a result of trying to loose weight fast but I feel like I'm eating enough not to be hungry and yet still exercise well. 

I measured my body fat this morning and was pleased to be 19.4%. This is a good position to be starting from especially after having just had Christmas.

There were two difficult things today.

1. Chocolate sweets on a desk just 3 feet from mine, (I had none).
2. The smell of the fish and chip shop as I rode my bike past, (I rode faster).

My photos took a while to do today but I will be getting the template faster each day.

Take care,

Stu.

Day1

Happy new Year.

So day one has arrived and im ready for a big reduction in body fat. I shall be posting my pictures each day so that my change in shape from 20% to 10% body fat can be seen. Today was front, side and back but in future I will be posting front only with Day1 situated next to the current days photo.

Without doubt my inspiration for this photo log and fat loss journey is Adam Waters and his fellow shredders who are also documenting there fat loss through photos. 

I really dont know where I am going to end up with this but my intention is to achive this loss within the first 100 days of 2008. I hope that the photos will give me the kind of boost that I require to keep me going. Im hoping to be able to see a week on week change within my body that will spur to the 10% mark.

Thank you to Adam and all the other dedicated shredders.

Stu.