Andie's blog

Over the last few weeks I have been toying with the idea of competing again.



I have spent the summer hitting the gym hard and getting back in to shape. Most say but you didn’t need to lose weight. When I tell them I haven’t lost any weight they look confused. In fact I have gone down a dress size, so to those who don’t train and or don’t realise muscle weighs more than fat I look like I’ve lost weight.

All this training and simply being in the gym daily has given me the bug to compete again. I don’t think the bug really went away, just got buried a little deeper under work commitments and lack of access to a gym. So as the summer drew to a close and the commitments of work was upon me, I armed myself with a set of dumbbells (thanks to a new friend) and took to working out a home routine. To maintain and develop the body I sculpted over the summer.

I worked each body part first thing in the morning and ran cross country 3 times a week. Now I know it’s the wrong way round. I should be running in the morning and doing weights in the evening. However here at work I run a cross country running club in the evenings so I train weights before work. The buzz I have on my way to work is great. Weight training really sets me up for the day. The good positive feeling from training is with me all day. So at the moment, it’s working for me.



Now I’m seeing more of my abs and greater definition in my muscles. I am more motivated than ever to get back to competing. So a bit of research and science later and I now have my new routine for diet and exercise.

The science for the diet.



I worked out my BMR – Basal Metabolic Rate, then factored in the exercise and worked out how many calories I can consume without gaining weight.



I measured my body fat.



I measured my weight.



Currently I’m around 22% body fat and I weigh 154 lbs.



My aim is to be about 14% body fat for the competition. That means I have 8% body fat to lose. That is about 12 lbs of body fat.



Now 1l lbs of body fat equals about 3500 calories. So that’s 41,000 calories I need to burn.



So my daily BMR including exercise is about 2300 calories daily. That’s 16,100 calories a week.



Now to lose 12 lbs of fat, I need to create a calorie deficit to burn the body fat.



I want to burn the 12 lbs of fat in 8 weeks. That means that I need to burn 5,125 calories a week.



So 16,100 calories (Maximum weekly consumption to prevent weight gain) – 5,125 (calories of fat I need to burn) = 10,975 calories (Maximum weekly consumption to lose 12lbs of fat in 8 weeks)



Now that means a daily consumption of 1,567 calories. However if I stick to consuming this each day my metabolic rate will slow down and therefore I’ll store that fat I want to lose.



So, this is what I’m going to do.



Mon – Wed, Fri and Sat – My maximum daily consumption will be 1495 calories



Thurs and Sun – My maximum daily consumption will be 2000 calories.



This means I will keep within the maximum weekly consumption and prevent my metabolic rate from slowing down.



In the hope I’ll gain maximum fat burning.



Next time I’ll let you know what I’m eating to stay within these limits..... see you soon.....x

The word diet congers up many different thoughts but generally it leads us to think that when a person states they are on a diet that they intend to lose weight. But the first thing we should all realise is we are all on a diet of some sort or another. Some of us are eating to get fit, some to gain muscle mass, some to lose fat, and others are simply eating. What we eat is our diet. What we should be aiming for is a ‘Healthy Diet’, one that enables us to reach our goals.

I thought I ate pretty well, I thought I had a reasonably healthy diet, that was until I recorded what I ate. I did this for about 2 weeks; it was a real eye opener. It’s amazing the calories I was consuming without even realising. I was rewarding myself not every day but about twice a week with sugary treats for going to the gym and training hard. When I worked out the calories I had consumed and the calories burned over the week, I was still consuming more than I had burned, I was storing calories, which in the long term means gaining body fat. So what did I do.......?

I began by cutting out the rubbish from my diet. By rubbish, I mean all the things that have no nutritional value and generally have a negative impact on or in your body.

I was eating breakfast if I had time, prepared food from my work place, lots of fruit and eating a meal at home in the evening and a couple of snacks. So the first thing I did was to replace the variety of snacks with just fruit. So no more sandwiches, crisps or cakes at break. I also forced myself to have breakfast. As missing breakfast meant I ate more at break time, which meant I ate more at lunch and so on. So for the first three weeks I just cut out the junk, no fast food, no crisps, no chocolate. This was a challenge as I worked many hours and generally grabbed food to go.

After three weeks of no junk I began to change the content of my 3 main meals. I began to eat my evening meal before 6pm, as calories not burnt before sleep, get stored! I then began to increase the protein content of my meals and reduce the carbohydrates. I also began to introduce protein shakes as a snack. I kept this going for about 6 months, during this time I didn’t lose a single pound let alone a kilo. I stayed 12 stone 2lbs.

I had cut out the refined sugar and rubbish food from my diet and trained hard, I became fanatical, and I didn’t cheat. I knew my clothes felt looser but didn’t know by how much, I was becoming demotivated by the lack of weight loss. I would whinge to my friends, they would say how good I was looking but I just didn’t believe them. I suffered and still do sometimes from always seeing a fat girl in the mirror no matter what size I am. So I bit the bullet and went for a body fat test, I was surprised to find out it was 21%.

I began to read more and study the effects of diet and training, I learnt that, I had lost fat but gained muscle mass at a similar rate. Muscle is 4 times denser than fat, so although I weighed the same my body had got smaller, 2 dress sizes smaller. This is the reason you should record your waist, hip, thigh, chest, calf, neck and arm circumference as well as your height and mass.

About six months out from the competition, when I realised that the competition was becoming a reality, the diet changed again, but that’s another story for later......

Before we all start a ‘healthy diet’ we should realise what we are already eating. Just as I said in part 2, record everything. This means your diet too, what are you eating today? So before you even start to cut things out, write down everything you eat, and I mean everything down to the last snack and each drink. This is your foundation, this will help you to work out what to add, change or cut from your diet. So before you do as I did, record everything that goes in your mouth for at least a week, then you’ll be ready to make changes that will enable you to reach your goal.

If you need any advice, just ask...... you can post a question here and I’ll do my best to answer it. I promise if I don’t know the answer I’ll find out for you.....

1st Training Plan – please remember this is a primitive plan and there are more sophisticated plans to come.... but essentially they all follow the same method of a single body part a day.....until that is i met a special someone who could see the gains i had made and helped me balance my appearance.....but more about later......

Legs

Warm up - 10mins on free runner. Aim burn 100 calories in 10 mins.

Leg Press – warm up set of 20kgs followed by 3 x 10 (60kgs a side – 120kgs total)

Quads (thigh extension) – warm up set of 20kg followed by 3 x 10 (40kgs)

Hamstrings (Seated curl) – warm up set of 20kgs followed by 3 x 10 (50kgs)

Calves (Standing Calf Raise) – warm up set of 20kgs followed 3 x 10 (50kgs)

Warm down – 10min on bike.

Back

Warm up 10mins on rowing machine.

Stiff legged dead lift – warm up set of bar only on smith machine followed by 3 x 10 (10kgs a side 20kgs plus bar in total)

Rower – Weight resistance machine – warm up set of 17.5kgs followed by 3 x 10 (35kgs)

Upright row – EZ bar – warm up set of 5kgs a side followed by 3 x 10 (7.5kgs aside plus bar)

Single arm row – Dumb bells on inclined bench flat back – warm up set of 10kgs followed by 3 x 10 (17.5kgs).

Warm down – 10min on cross trainer (including arms)

Chest

Warm up 10mins on cross trainer (including arms)

Fly’s – dumb bells - warm up set of 2kg followed by 3 x 10 (5kgs)

Chest press – smith machine – warm up set of bar only followed by 3 x 10 (5kgs a side)

Seated chest press – weight resistance machine (upright) – warm up set of 10kgs followed by 3 x 10 (20kg).

Fly’s - Cable cross – warm up set of (1plate a side) followed by 3 x 10 (2 plates a side)

Warm down – 10 mins on treadmill at 6km at level 15.

Shoulders

Warm up – Rower – 10 mins

Shoulder press (Arnold press) – dumb bells – warm up set of 5kgs followed 3 x 10 (7.5kgs)

Reverse fly’s (dumb bells - rear delts – standing – slight bend from waist) – warm up set of 1.5kgs followed by 3 x 10 (2.5kgs)

Shoulder press (smith machine) warm up set bar only followed by 3 x 10 (5kgs a side plus bar)

Upright row (smith machine) warm up set bar only followed by 3 x 10 bar only.

Warm down - Treadmill set at 15 (highest incline) 10 mins 6kmph.

Arms

Warm up – Rower – 10 mins

Bicep curl (isolated – single arm) – warm up set 2.5kgs followed by 3 x 10 (5kgs) alternate arms after each set

Tricep extension (isolated – single arm – standing) – warm up set 2.5kgs followed by 3 x 10 (5kgs) alternate arms after each set

Bicep curl (weight resistance machine – standing) – warm up set 10kgs followed by 3 x 10 (15 kgs)

Tricep push down (weight resistance machine – standing) – warm up set 15kgs followed by 3 x 10 (20kgs)

Hammer curl (isolated - single arm – seated incline bench) – warm up 2.5kgs followed by 3 x 10 (5kgs)

Skull crushers (EZ bar – flat bench) warm up bar only followed by 3 x 10 (2.5kgs a side)

Warm down - Treadmill set at 15 (highest incline) 10 mins 6kmph.

Abs and cardio

Warm up – cross trainer 10 mins

Cardio – 4 x 10mins on 4 different machines (Rower, treadmill, free runner, and bike)
Hyper extensions 3 x 10

Crunches using ab max 3 x 30 (1x 30 Legs in middle, 1 x 30 legs to right, 1 x 30 legs to left)

Incline bench crunches 3 x 10.

Warm down – walking treadmill.

Coming in part 4....diet.....what diet!!!

It began with a great supportive friend....and a visit to a good gym.

I started with a weekly membership to the gym.....To ensure I got value for money I had to go to the gym at least 3 times to justify the membership....

I went to the gym after work accompanied by a great friend, though she may not realise it, her moral support is what made it easy for me to kick start my new training regime.

I began with trying everything out from the cardio machines to the weight resistance machines.....going from one machine to another armed with a small amount of knowledge.... an endorphin release must of kicked in as 24hrs later I was back doing it all again...by the end of week 1 I had been to the gym 6 times and was hooked...

I was training.....I was doing something about my self esteem and fitness....but I had no goal except to lose weight....I had little understanding of training.....

Week 2 and I bought another weekly membership and began training on Monday evening when a personal trainer in the gym offered to write me a training plan....of which I declined being too pig headed and determined to succeed by my own effort.

So I bought a number of bodybuilding magazines......now I hear you ask, why bodybuilding and not the girly fitness magazines.....well I knew I wanted to train hard I knew that I wanted to weight train and not focus on cardio....

From that evening I created a fitness plan for the next week.....it focused on a single body part a day and went something like this....it’s very primitive and lacks the finesse of an experienced trainer but I have reproduced it here to show how my understanding and fitness has evolved.

Tuesday – Legs
Wednesday – Back
Thursday – Chest
Friday – Shoulders
Saturday – Arms
Sunday - Abs

Now I started with legs as I always had strong legs and it was a good motivator......I trained so hard that day I found it difficult to walk down the stairs from the gym..... Driving home was just as much of a challenge..... but it made me laugh and I felt good....really good....I had caught the bug....

You are probably asking how can she remember this....how did she know what weights and what exercises to do. Well essentially I knew very little....it began with trial and error in the first week and reading....then keeping a journal, my plan was rather retrospective, to record what I did rather than what I planned to do.

Creating a journal.....It was one of the best pieces of advice I had read in Muscle and Fitness, I wish I had followed the rest of the advice....which I will give you here and strongly recommend you follow.

Take a picture of yourself, measure your waist, hips, thigh, chest, arm, calf and neck all at the biggest point.

Record it.....I said record it......don’t be embarrassed and pig headed like me.....don’t be ashamed of where you are right now....I was.....but soon realised I should have been proud of my results.

So record it......records it in your journal and stick your picture next to it. Next month do the same thing.....

Coming in part 3......my first training plan.......

Good day........

Where do I start.........?

Well, I guess I better introduce myself.......

My name is Andie McGarvey, I am 34 years old and I currently live in Kenya. I am a single parent and I have 1 beautiful 14 year old daughter, soon to be 15.
I am a sporty person by nature and have become increasingly interested and enthused by the fitness world over the last 10 years. I have danced since I was 8 years old. However, my mother would say I was dancing before I could walk. I am a keen rock climber and generally outdoorsy type of person. I have been involved in numerous sports, generally anything to get my adrenaline rushing. How have I come to write a blog on this fantastic website?

Well......the story so far......

I began training off and on about 10 years ago, when I took up kick boxing......I trained 4 times a week for technique and exams and fight class once a week. It took eighteen months from a complete novice to purple belt and gained 4th in the Open Nationals for Light contact and Semi contact. When I moved I couldn’t find a good kick boxing club so I took to the gym and loved every second of it. I trained for about 2 years with no particular goal. I then became very ill and had major head surgery. I moved in with a friend to recuperate. This meant a move to a beautiful part of the country but miles away from the amenities if a city.

When I was well again, I began training to become a teacher, I was living in the most beautiful part of England but couldn’t find a good gym. I lost my fitness focus, and studied almost every hour that I didn’t spend with my daughter. I started putting on weight. I was walking and climbing but not burning enough calories. I was also very unhappy as my NQT year, which was hell, came to an end; I also split up with my boyfriend of 2 years.

I had almost given up on the idea of being a teacher. That was until I went for an interview with a school and head teacher that saw the talent in me and offered me a job. I was moving again. Not too far but far enough.

About a year into my new job woke one day nearly a size 16 and diagnosed with cervical cancer. I was distraught. I was also frustrated with being fat and not fitting into the clothes I wanted to wear. So I went looking for a gym, and I found one, it only took 1 session and I was hooked again. About 18 months later and I was a size 8 competing at the Nabba Novice Finals and I came 2nd. Six months after, I was also clear of the cancer.

Coming in part 2 ......I’ll tell you how I did it....

Until then live life leaving a positive impact and a smile on the face of all those you meet.......