Example of a hex-bar deadlift

Haven't read the whole blog, so I might be repeating what some other's already said. However, here are my 2 cents from my own experiences and some words of advice. The summer of 2005 I was going into my jr. year of college, I dropped 40lbs in 10 weeks. (Sorry, American here, I don't know the kilogram conversion!) First week in June, until the 2nd/3rd week in Aug. The only thing I did was eliminate and switch the foods I ate. Some drastic measures (no more soda, processed foods) and some step-downs (switched to skim from 1%, reduced red meat consumption, switched to wheat bread/pasta). Then I started running and doing some weight training. Odd feeling having to buy all new clothes.

A The biggest thing is mental. I cannot stress that enough...it's all mental. A If you commit yourself mentally, set goals, and fight through and don't give up, you will achieve. Everyone here plays poker, which is a grueling discipline/game. Frankly if we all take a step back and think about it, poker is kinda dry and cash games are not "terribly exciting". As with poker and everything in life, get your head in order and everything will follow. It takes about 21 days to form new habits. Once you start forming new habits, you don't have to think about them any longer. If you're struggling with something, tough it out and fight through it. There's variance in poker and life. Make one of your goals to reach that 21-day mark.

Now, 10 years later I haven't looked back and my habits are stronger than ever. My goal is to live to 200, so I did whatever I could to make that happen. Seriously, it's going to happen. My goal is to be healthy for my life and avoid sickness and aches and pains as much as I can. I'm now 30 and my body starts to ache, my metabolism starts to decline, and my energy levels drop a bit. Now I stick to bodyweight training, MMA, and boxing.

Here are some of my recommendations for food and workouts:

-Eat clean, stay away from processed foods, soda, and sugar. I also stay away from dairy as much as I can, but if you can't, I suggest limiting it. Stick to foods that humans were intended to consume and you'll be fine. Drink water like a fish. In terms of food, it's all about quantity.

-Philosophical idea for you: we are in control of our bodies, not the other way around. It depends on us to survive and we shouldn't view ourselves as slaves to it. it doesn't do what it wants, it does what we want. If your body is overweight, tired, etc., it's telling you something is wrong.

-if you want a snack or some kind of food that is on the list to stay away from, have it and enjoy it.

-Bas Rutten MMA workouts: if you don't buy the cd's, you can find them on youtube. I'm in the best shape of my life at 30 because of these.

-Deck of cards workout: grab a deck of cards and flip them over 1-by-1. The number on the card tells you the number of reps 2-T. Jacks through Aces can also be 10, or whatever number you want. Designate the suits to be a different body group - spades (upper body), clubs (lower body), diamonds (abs), hearts (cardIo). Have at least 1-2 different workouts for each suit. Try to see how many cards in the deck you can do. Search for ideas for each suit (cardio, bodyweight training, and plyometrics).

Jon - keep up the good work. Little by little, it adds up. The struggles are worth it. It it were easy, everyone would be doing it.

One final tip (for everyone): leave the yoga pants to the hot women in the gym.

I have only done traditional deadlifts (no hex-bar at gym) so i can't compare the two lifts.
But 550lbs you should be giving us training tips.

So i feel a bit of a muppet as i got KG and lbs mixed up. Really shows my gym naivety and just how little i actually know what i am doing. One huge reason why i got it mixed up is 165KG was my standard lift in my other gym back in September so now after all this training i thought these weights in a way made sense.....i didn't think 250kg made that much sense but going close and upwards of 200KG did.....so i guess i just hung onto that hope.

Anyways we live and learn and now i just keep doing what im doing and going for it! I edited my op on the lift.

Just made an awesome homemade lamb curry. Really nice but tbh i wasn't overly keen on the lamb in a curry...just prefer chicken going forward but it included:

- Lamb
- Peppers
- Garlic
- Spices
- Rogan josh sauce
- Onions
- Chilli
- Vegetable Rice
- Mushrooms
- Mini corn

Looks good Bossman, do you make the sauce yourself or from a jar? The reason I ask dude is that they put so much hidden shit in them thats not so good for you. I have recently started making my own and they so much easier and cheaper over the long run and taste better too. Just get the spices you want , tub of creme fresh and thats pretty much it, you can use double cream too but not recommended if you on a health kick lol

#FUCKRAMSEYTRUSTSUNNY

Lamb curries are a thing of beauty.

Got a nice chicken stir fry with bok choy, beans, broccoli and a heap of other stuff for lunch. Can't wait.

Agreed, if you can't pronounce or identify the ingredients on the back put the jar down!

I mix it up. Sometimes it is out of a bottle and sometimes it is home made. Currently that was is out of a bottle and i know it contains some shit but this is a dilemma i will always have.

1. I want takeaways which are soooooo bad for me.
2. Sometimes i dont have time or want to cook.
3. a bottle is better than a takeaway but still not great for me.
4. Gotta be balanced.

Any good youtube links for good curry recipes i could try? No doubt it will be easy once i have made my first couple so 100% up for the challenge going forward

Hey jon, went through this thread real quick and you made some nice gainz
By the way do you ever cook in bulk? This works really well for me. Just make some time for cooking a lot of meals and pack them in tupperwares (think this is what they r called).

By the way (sorry if you have answered this before in a post), but do you have any certain goal of weight or some picture in your mind how you want to look like? Or just living the lifestyle and see where it will take you?

@Cookie: Sorry i didn't reply to your long post. Its funny as i thought the hardest part would be training but to me this is the easy bit. Its all down to my bad eating and drinking habits which like you say is completely a mental problem and one i need to overcome. I just simply cannot stop binging or drinking beer.......HELP

Hey there thanks for the comments. As for bulk i do not...at max i cook a meal for tonight and then one for tomorrow. Basically i am a bit weird with frozen foods or having food sat around to long so it puts me off the idea lol. Weird i know!

I used to always think 15 stone but tbh its mainly just so i don't look obese, look health and don't have moobs now lol. I guess if i could explain where i think i could get and be happy with it is like a rugby player type look or just a bigger guy who lifts type thing.

If you've got freezer space you should seriously do this.

Obviously with a family my wife cooks large batches of whatever.....pastas, curries, soups, stews...........and even if we have it one or two nights in a row there is usually something left which gets frozen for another day.

As long as it's well stored and well defrosted when you go to use it again, it will be perfectly fine...........sometimes better.

If you are going to the effort to cook anyway, I can't stress enough how much more sense it makes to increase the size of the batch and freeze some portions for another day. It takes no more time or effort on the day of preparation, but is so much more convenient down the track.

It's just like multi-tabling if you're a successful player. Banking some extra win

Yeh will look into the bulk making a little more!

Last night the diet went right out the window. Drank my body weight in beer and rum which of course led to me eating kebabs and alsorts. Going to have a really clean weekend and train super hard during it.

Thinking of putting up a weight loss target which i have been generally against recently but would be nice to say - lose a stone in 2 weeks and see if i can hit it. Thoughts?

You need a goal Jon or how will you know where you are going? I think loosing a certain %age of body fat or like you said a stone are good goals. I would allow a little longer than 2 weeks for that amount of weight loss though

How is it going Jon? And how did the 'clean' weekend go?

Your right! I am going to weight myself tomorrow and want to lose 1 stone by the end of the month. I think its better to aim to lose body fat % but i dont have a way to measure it properly on my own tbh and the trainer im with right now doesn't do that. So just gonna have a really simple weight goal. What you think?

So good! Last night i did a huge gym session which i will update shortly. I didn't have a drop of alcohol nor did i have any bad foods or well at least no takeaways!

Same plan for today.