No. 4: The One With The Resources

Just a quick post to share with you some of my favourite resources on the web:

1. CrossFit   (www.crossfit.com/www.crossfitendurance.com)
• One of the best fitness regimes around and also one of the best free resources on the web
• I wholeheartedly agree with their philosophy to exercise and nutrition
• Posts a workout every day, has forums, journal articles and great instructional videos
2. www.bodybuilding.com
• Enormous online resource for free & isn't just bodybuilding, but fitness in general
• Great workout and metric tracker and free training/nutrition article library
• Bodyspace hosts a huge online community for support and inspiration
3. www.bodyrock.tv
• Great catalogue of home workout videos with some nutrition information as well
• Has a workout video every day with people posting their scores
4. Peak Performance   (www.pponline.co.uk)
• More sports performance and sports medicine oriented and generally quite in depth and scientific, but a great resource if you're that way inclined
• Good articles and forums

Happy browsing!

No 3: The One With The Hows

I have decided that I will put overviews of everything in this blog with more detailed information about my training and how I'm progressing on bodybuilding.com.  It is a great, and free, tool for tracking your training and your body metrics, whether you are aiming to lose weight or to increase size, it can all be logged there.  And if body building isn't your thing, don't be put off by the name as there are plenty of users who aren't body builders either and there is a huge amount of information on all sorts of training.  My username is garethunderhill and you can search for me in the bodyspace section.

I will aim to keep posts more short and sweet in future, but this will remain a place for my ramblings.  As I develop my skills at this and get more into it, I will use various methods for updates.  You can post comments and questions to this blog, or to my Gmail account if you wish for more privacy, which is greu79@gmail.com.  I will put stats on bodybuilding.com as mentioned above and will update any interesting information, news and events to twitter where my username is @greu79. And, if I get really carried away with all of this, I may well start posting videos on youtube, where my username is garethunderhill.

No. 2: The One With An Excuse, An Epiphany & A Start

So,

this first update comes a bit late, correction: a lot late.  I have managed to come down with a virus and then have been suffering with "post-viral fatigue" for a month since then.  This has meant that the start of my new lifestyle hasn't quite panned out as expected, however it has given me plenty of time to contemplate and has led to some more drastic action.

As mentioned before, I have been working in an office environment for the last year and I think it's safe to say I haven't flourished in that time.  Far from it in fact, and I think it's no coincidence that it has led to this low point in my health and wellbeing.  It has led me to make some changes and as of September I will be working back in a gym as manager on a part-time basis, taking some exercise classes and trying to set up other bits of related business.  It will put me back into an environment that I love, mean that I can be more active and allow me to work much closer to home.  As with everything, this is no perfect scenario as I am taking a pretty hefty pay cut, so we are having to tighten the purse strings, but I'm positive that given time I can turn that around.  It's all about priorities as they say.....

Importantly, and potentially more relevant to the point of this blog, is the fact that I have started making small inroads into becoming more active again.  I worked out both days of the weekend last week and have just done the same this weekend.  I would have liked to complete some workouts during the week as well, but had under estimated just how out of shape I have become and paid the price in terms of pain!  What they call Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness (DOMS) almost crippled my arms, a typical man response I know!  To be honest, I'm not sure if I overdid it or if I was too slack on warming up and cooling down properly.  Pretty poor for a personal trainer, but it is a lesson learned and I'm hoping I haven't repeated the same this week.

Ramble over!  I hope to have as many people join me on my journey soon and also for them to share with me theirs.