Hardmatch's blog

Last week I started a blog detailing my reasons for beginning a fitness regimen. How did I do in the week that followed?

I have never been a fitness buff. I hated gym class when I was in school and I’ve never taken up team sports or enrolled in regular fitness classes. I have started exercise routines before, only to see them fall away. Just getting me down to a gym, even one that is free and in my own building, was a major undertaking.

I have been to my building’s gym before but the only machines I’d ever used were the ones for cardio; elliptical, treadmill, stationary bike. The Nautilus machine may well have been designed by aliens for all I knew. I hoped someone would come down the first few days to use the Nautilus so that I could spy on them and see what they did. No such luck! Fortunately my partner has gone to the gym regularly over the years so he gave me some pointers, even though he was never much for actual weight training. Of course, I’ve heard from a few guys since then that aren’t all that enamoured with the Nautilus machine and recommend I focus more on free weights instead.

I am proud to say that I went to the gym each weekday last week. I did my usual cardio stuff but I also slowly increased the amount of weight training that I did. One of my extremely fit friends kindly sent me his training routine. I would love to say that I followed it religiously but the first week was a bit of a hybrid and I made a lot of stuff up on the fly. Maybe this coming week will see me follow it a bit more closely.

After posting my first blog, I received a number of encouraging messages. Thanks to those guys! I did, however, worry that I may have inadvertently offended some guys. If any guys with similar or larger builds read the blog and thought I was criticizing them for not looking more buff, I do apologize. I’m not terribly out of shape and I don’t think most guys would say I was fat. I’m my own worst critic and felt I needed to hit the gym to deal with my own insecurities about my body image. I also wanted to address shortcomings I noticed on my recent UK wrestling trip in regards to upper body strength and cardio. While I’m 56, I still have a desire to be competitive or wrestle hard. If I can’t beat guys, I want them to at least say I was in good shape and made them work up a sweat!

I want to remind people that I started this blog for purely selfish reasons. I figured that I would be more successful at staying the course if I made my intentions public.

Monday, January 15:
Weight: 176.5 lbs
Body Fat %: 31.5%