“What day is it?" "It's deadlift day," squeaked Piglet. "My favorite day," said Pooh.

That it is. Ever since I discovered deadlifts they have been my favourite lift (followed very, very closely by squats) and I am slowly working my way further and further up, both in weight and in reps. Here's a cute video of me with an easy 65kgs at the end of a workout:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jw9LVJrjjWM

My current PR is 92.5kgs (204lbs) and I am looking to get to get to 100kgs (220lbs) by the end of the year. I don't lift with a belt, I rely on my core and back strength at the moment, but thinking I should get a belt to get heavier. The only problem is standard belts don't fit me... not many heavy lifters have waists like mine.

My training schedule is pretty full already, but I'm going to adjust it a little in the next couple of weeks to focus on my problem areas.  I work out 7 days a week and most days I will do a session at lunchtime and a session in the evening, hence why there are mixtures of body parts on the same day. I hate going a day without training and will usually use an arms or core training day as a "rest day" and won't go so heavy. My training week usually looks a little like this:

Monday - Core, Arms, whatever I can be bothered training
Tuesday - Chest
Wednesday - SQUATS, legs, glutes
Thursday - chest, back, lats
Friday - Shoulders
Saturday - DEADLIFTS, back, core
Sunday - SQUATS, legs, glutes

I have a mixture of volume and weight, and change it up depending on the day. I usually do my heaviest lifting on the weekends when I have plenty of time to spend in the gym.

After finding my arms really are my problem area, I'm going to add a bit more of that, and some more deadlifts into my weeks. I'm thinking my new week will look something closer to this:

Monday:
Lunch- Shoulders
Evening- Biceps, Triceps, Core

Tuesday:
Lunch - Core
Evening- DEADLIFTS

Wednesday:
Lunch- Biceps, Triceps
Evening - SQUATS, glutes, legs

Thursday:
Lunch - chest
Evening - lats, rows

Friday:
Lunch- Arms
Evening -Shoulders

Saturday
-DEADLIFTS, lower back, core

Sunday
-SQUATS, glutes, legs

Of course I'll be messing around with this to see what's working and what's not, but I really do need to add a much more comprehensive arm workout to really target that area. You'll notice I don't really have set cardio days... Cardio and I have a complicated relationship, I used to enjoy it, now not so much.

So for now I'll stick with my ever so sporadic cardio regime, unless the Boss tells me otherwise!

Starting from the beginning...

AJ here...

Me, I love lifting. Mainly bench, deadlifts, squats and shoulder press. You will be hard pressed to find me doing much more than that (and straying very far from Level 4 at Extreme). I guess now, things are going to change.

Way, way back, three days ago, fate made the decision that I was going to go from lifting to actually training for something. So here it is, I'm going to get Shredded by September 2014, for the Wellington regional IFBB show.

I thought it would be a good idea to make this public, so I actually go through with it and make it happen. It can be so easy to tell yourself you're going to do something then cop out when it gets too hard. I figure the more people know about this, the more motivation I'll have to actually get up there and show everyone what I've accomplished.

So I first shared this news with my Fito Fam (Hi guys!!) and pretty soon the idea came about that I should blog about the next 12 months. So here we are, and posting is under way.

Tuesday night was an intense and awesome experience, meeting with my trainer, guide and mentor through all this. Until I tell him I'm blogging about this, I'll just refer to him as the Boss, if he let's me, I'll tell you all about how awesome he is later on. My husband and training partner D and I went in and had our fat tests and measurements done. I came in at a whopping (compared to where I thought I was) 56kgs (123lbs), 24% bodyfat, 42kgs (92lbs) of lean muscle mass. This is me at this point:

Apologies for the dark dungeon gym photo

Most of the fat is sitting around my arms, which admittedly I knew were my problem area, so shouldn't have been as big of a surprise as it was. The Boss seemed mildly impressed with my quads though, so I have to be slightly smug with all those squats paying off!

The scariest part is the Boss wants to see me put another 8kgs (17lbs) of lean muscle by September 2014.... WOW. That's a lot for me to even think about. Mainly because (like a lot of girls) putting on weight automatically makes me think I'm putting on fat. and while I've put on 6kgs (13lbs) since I started weight training ( and I've never looked this good before) it's still going to be hard to fight the thought that weight = bad and think weight = awesome.

The next step is embarking on the diet plan the Boss is putting together for us. I have always known that was my real weak area. I like to say I get big by osmosis, because I have a) little appetite and b) little self control when it comes to food. My philosophy is definitely less is more, I skip meals and generally behave badly... looking something like this:

AJ's diet – (Aka sorry trying to be honest...)

7.30am – some days ¼ cup oats with handful of blueberries,

8.30am - can of v

10.30am – coffee maybe cake if someone at the office has brought some

12 pm – muesli bar, maybe some steak, tuna or chicken if I remember to bring it to work. Usually not though, I tend to skip lunch...

3pm – chocolate bar sometimes, coffee or milo, more cake if there are leftovers from morning tea

6pm – steak or chicken or tuna with kumara or brown rice

After gym – protein shake


Oops. As you can see, not exactly good muscle building fuel. So I will definitely be looking forward to seeing what the Boss has in store for turning my diet around. I have actually been trying to eat three meals a day since Tuesday, and I am finding it a lot harder than normal. This will definitely be the area I will have to work hardest in.

I've had a few good trainings since Tuesday, I did light back and lats that night, did squats, lunges and hip thrusts on Wednesday and arms Thursday. I'll probably just be giving brief summaries and comments on workouts on here, if you want my full workouts you can check out my Fitocracy profile (you'll have to be a member to see!) at: 

https://www.fitocracy.com/profile/xoxAJVxox/?feed

Warning, it's pretty boring, I only ever talk about workouts and the gym on there.

It's off the the supplement shop tonight for more protein and to see what else there is on offer. I get all my supplements from the awesome guys at Gymeez Health and Fitness Wellington on the corner of Willis St and Manners St, so I'll let you know when I find good stuff they've got there :)

 That's all from me for now. I'm pretty excited (and a tad nervous!) but I'm looking forward to the next 12 months!