WildEndurance: 100km through the Blue Mountains in one weekend 2-3 May 2009

Posted by Duncan Cassidy on Tuesday, February 03, 2009. Visit Duncan Cassidy's BodyDaemon Journal.

Proper training starts today, as I am still acclimatising back into the Australian summer from the European winter I will not be not pushing myself to 100%. That starts next week.

To further explain what I am doing I have taken the following from the WildEndurance website.

WildEndurance: the new standard. 100km through the Blue Mountains in one
weekend, raising funds to save the planet.

WildEndurance is a unique trekking challenge for teams of 4-6 people.
Experience the stunning beauty of the Blue Mountains World Heritage
area - while raising funds to protect our wonderful wild places.

This will be a no holds barred account of how my training progressed. Currently I feel fat and out of shape, funnily enough, I look fat and out of shape also. Over a month of no training and eating excessively (closer to two months if I'm completely honest) has left me worse than I have ever felt or looked before.

Today I start again, let it begin.

Monday, January 19, 2009

Posted by lizwinfrey on Tuesday, January 20, 2009. Visit lizwinfrey's BodyDaemon Journal.

I'm still feeling pretty crappy today, sore throat, tiredness, headaches etc.  Recovering from a cold pretty much sucks.  I weighed myself this morning at 10 and was 206.6.

I polished off the last of the chocolate cake today.  It had to go and right now, it did wonders to help cheer me up.  Now that it's gone, no more cheating on my proper nutrition (I hate calling it a diet, since I want to try to eat healthy every day for the rest of my life).

My hand / wrist RSI problem - update

Posted by jim on Saturday, January 10, 2009. Visit jim's BodyDaemon Journal.

Found out a little more about what's going on with my hand.

Apparently I have mid-carpal instability. When I was younger I broke my arm and since this was during adolescence, apparently the growth plates hadn't fused and the bone healed 'flat' (it should be curved).

As a result my wrist subluxes all the time which is stressing out the ligaments and leading to instability.

Up until now this hadn't caused me pain, but now it seems to be. This is likely a result of some/all of the following:

• I haven't been lifting due to my shoulder injury thus have lost a significant amount of forearm muscle and strength.
  
  
• Due to the shoulder injury (right) I've been using my left hand more
  
  
• I've been doing an awful lot of keyboard work over the last 18 months, more than usual
  
  
• Chronic build-up of inflammation
  

I was advised that at some point in the future I'll probably need corrective surgery, but this doesn't have to happen for a while, certainly not in the next year or two.

Here's a link with some more information about mid carpal instability (warning: Graphic images of surgery are there, don't look if you are squeamish)

Fortunately it does't feel as bad at the moment, and using a Microsoft Ergonomic Keyboard really seems to be helping:

General update

Posted by jim on Wednesday, January 07, 2009. Visit jim's BodyDaemon Journal.

I've not written anything for a while so thought I'd update with how things are going.

Knee[s]
No real change, but I am attacking the plan I formed with my physiotherapist which is comprised of:

• Medial glute work
• Massage of the lateral retinaculum
• General glute activation work (eg: bridges)
• Quad exercises with an emphasis on the VMO

My knee feels the same, but my medial glutes are definately getting stronger. I'm going to see my physio in about 10 days and get him to observe the changes in my pelvic tilt and posture. Hopefully I'm dropping my hip less.

Shoulder
Not much has happened. I had my MRI Arthrogram today and will see the consultant to review the results next Wednesday - so until then I won't know anything else. Until I know what's happening with it I am not doing any shoulder exercises as I don't want to make things worse.

Hand
I had a bit of a scare with RSI in my hand. It was so bad I thought I'd broken my wrist! Fortunately it feels a lot better now. I've got a Microsoft ergonomic keyboard and it's helping a lot.

Bodydaemon
Real life is busy for the next few days but I'll be back to adding new features very soon. Next things to be done are going to be:

• A few new reports (I want a 'time spent doing cardio' report, and 'distance travelled in cardio'
  
  
• Lots more exercises videos
  
  
• Tidying up of the exercise libary
  
  
• A more flexible way of recording exercises - so you'll be able to record as much information as you want in terms of distance, time, resistance etc. This came about when recording farmers walks - I got to thinking that some cardio exercises may involve resistance, and some resistance exercises may involve duration / distance. So once this is done, you guys can record exactly which information you want to. Exercises will have defaults (eg: by default 'running' will show distance and duration, but won't show resistance or reps!) - but you can tweak these

Hope you are all well. Not sure anyone is reading this, but still :-)

one last push

Posted by Dimebag on Monday, January 05, 2009. Visit Dimebag's BodyDaemon Journal.

Going to make one final push to cut again, this time I really want it.

I've got a good healthy diet sorted out and I'm going to be doing a mixture of weights and CV. The key is clearly consistency and I've got to stop pissing around being dissapointed that I dont get anywhere in a week and watch what I'm putting into my face.

Starting off well, 2 good workouts in 2 days, i'll see how I feel at the end of the week as to how sustainable it is.

I want to be lean! I will be lean.

PS - Thanks for new gloves Ad, it doesnt half make grip more difficult though putting a fairly thick barried inbetween you and the bar...

MRI SCAN DELAYED - sigh

Posted by jim on Friday, December 19, 2008. Visit jim's BodyDaemon Journal.

Grrrrrrrrr.

I wasn't happy about having to have another MRI Arthrogram on my shoulder because, to be frank, they're not very pleasant. Having lots of needles rammed in my shoulder isn't my idea of fun.

Still, it needs (re)doing - even though I only had one 6 weeks ago - before the surgeon can tell me what's wrong, since the quality of the last scan was so poor (so a day of my life wasted there).

It was meant to be happening on the 24th of December.

I just got phoned and now it can't be done until Mid January.

Which means it's going to be at least 3 weeks extra before I know what's wrong with my shoulder..

Great!

Swaying

Posted by Dimebag on Thursday, December 18, 2008. Visit Dimebag's BodyDaemon Journal.

I keep swaying back and forth between wanting to cut and wanting to get bigger, knowing full well the whole time the only way i'll improve on either is really down to diet and consistency. The latter I lack.

I saw a couple of older pictures of me when I was at a really lean 12 odd stone and I want to get back to that sort of definition. For that reason I am subbing my morning and lunch time meals for protein shakes and eating one healthy meal in the evening of lean meat and some lean carbs if I feel like it. Oh and lots of water. Lots.

I'm going to keep this up over the christmas period, it should be workable because I'm not too bothered about eating Christmas lunch etc, this isn't designed to make my life a misery. I'll be keeping up as much as possible at the gym going the days I can until the new year and we'll see if 3 weeks of subbing protein shakes in for meals will make a noticeable difference. Evidently I know it will take longer to achieve what I want but I want to see if its sustainable and worth it.

Flu!

Posted by SERAPH on Wednesday, December 17, 2008. Visit SERAPH's BodyDaemon Journal.

Oh noooooo....

Monday

Posted by jim on Tuesday, December 16, 2008. Visit jim's BodyDaemon Journal.

My MRI arthrogram is booked for my shoulder on 24th December, so not much is going to happen between now and then.

Left knee feels OK.

Right knee is very, very clunky and keeps subluxing. Its not too painful its just popping a *lot* at the moment.

Sunday

Posted by jim on Sunday, December 14, 2008. Visit jim's BodyDaemon Journal.

No knee or shoulder news today. (right) knee is very clicky. I've been on my feet a lot this week so I'm taking it easy.

Did a lot of cool stuff on BodyDaemon today, including the 'Photos & Videos' tab, which is new.

Today

Posted by jim on Saturday, December 13, 2008. Visit jim's BodyDaemon Journal.

Personal situation

Not much happening today knee or shoulder-wise. I'm not going to do anything shoulder-exercise-wise until I've had the MRI scan done.

Eating has been OK - managing to stick to food plan (low carb, lots of protein, veggies and healthy fats) with no problems. The scales say I've lost 8-10 lbs over the last 5 days though most of that is going to be water.

Haven't done today's knee rehab workout yet, I'll post it when I do.

I feel optimistic about making progress, which is the main thing.

BodyDaemon

Made some changes to the site today. I've modified the 'Reports' section to feature a new way of viewing reports. I think it's a lot better. Interested to hear what other people think...

Today's update

Posted by jim on Thursday, December 11, 2008. Visit jim's BodyDaemon Journal.

Right. I have finally finished the article I've been working on for the last few days. It's not easy to try to remember a timeline of the last 5 years.

I haven't got much to add beyond the article, since not much time has passed, but I've managed to stick to my new improved diet over the last few days and have actually lost about 5 lbs though obviously it's mostly going to be water weight from not eating as many carbs.

Went for a long walk today (it's the only form of cardio I can do), covered what I believe to be about 7 miles. It's annoying because it's not challenging on my lungs / heart / etc.. at all, but it's going to be using calories and hopefully 'waking up' the slow-twitch fibres in my legs, so it's worthwhile.

I will write more over the next few days.

Feeling a little more optimistic about things in general

Meeting with surgeon

Posted by jim on Friday, December 12, 2008. Visit jim's BodyDaemon Journal.

I had my meeting with the surgeon today.

He was great - very understanding and spoke to me at length about my options for both the right knee and shoulder.

I will do a 'part 2' article explaining these in depth, but the upshot is:

Right Knee
He thinks it's simply a case of patella maltracking. My options are basically:

• Attempt to rectify through physiotherapy;
• Have a lateral release.

I'm not keen on the lateral release idea yet, so the plan is to attack physiotherapy with every ounce of energy I have for the next 6 months, and if there's no improvement, go for the surgery.

Right Shoulder
He says the pain I'm getting does not fit the profile of arthiritis and seems to be due to a mechanical fault. He's spotted 2 things on the MRI scan that may be be causing me problems:

• What appears to be a cartilidge 'ulcer', which may require Microfracture;
  (noted as a Cystic Lesion in previous findings)
  
  
• It looks like some of the labrum has partially detatched from the glenoid.

Both of the above can be rectified surgically which is great news. However the MRI scan that led to the above findings is apparently not of the best quality, so he wants to re-do the scan. So the plan is:

1. Have the scan re-done;
2. Review the findings;
3. Make an informed decision to proceed with surgery.

Unless the refined scan paints a drastically different picture it looks like more surgery is inevitable.

Having said that, up until today I had been told my shoulder was 'as good as it's going to be' - so this is a dramatic improvement. Marcus Green has fixed my left knee before, and I have every faith he will do as much as is possible to improve things in my shoulder.

So - now I wait for the scan. I'll try to get it before Christmas.

In the meantime:

• No upper body exercise at all as it may make the damage worse;
• Lots of leg rehab workouts, doing whatever I can that doesn't hurt;
• Continue dieting to lose some of the excess weight;
• Try to remain positive.

startup

Posted by SERAPH on Monday, December 01, 2008. Visit SERAPH's BodyDaemon Journal.

Starting a new routine, after a weeks recoup. This one's a mon-thurs
movement isolation type o thingy. So eg chest, tric, wrist / lats,
bicep, hammer etc. Based on 4 major compounds, isolations and
'extensions.'

Was doing about 8 weeks of 2weekly full body workouts (2
different ones) with a standard weight for every exercise to let the
smaller'uns catch up while giving a bit of low impact strength training
for the larger groups.

Shoulder problems :-(

Posted by jim on Friday, November 14, 2008. Visit jim's BodyDaemon Journal.

I'm having a rubbish time with my shoulder.

There's a post about it in the forum - so I won't duplicate any information here.

If anyone has any words of widsom or encouragement I'd love to hear them, as I really feel like I'm fighting a losing battle.

Thanks,
Jim