Optimum Anabolics - Day 55/I <3 Craigslist

Ever since my heel issue showed up during Week 2, I've been spending increasing amounts of time on the bike rather than running and jumping rope for cardio purposes. Slowly but surely my foot was getting better. In fact, I hardly had any discernible discomfort yesterday at all. I was extremely encouraged by this improvement.

My attitude changed quickly, however, when I felt the pain again later this morning post workout. When I stood up from my desk at the office it grabbed me. Stinks. Actually, it sucked and I was pissed. Something had to change. Enough was enough.

It was time to get that stationary bike I had been seriously contemplating getting since Week 2 and lightly considering since, well, I don't know when. Probably since doing a fat-loss cardio interval on my bike in the snow 2 springs ago. Good fun. :-)

The thought came to mind to hop on the net and check out Craigslist. If you're not familiar, Craigslist is like an on line garage sale, want ad forum, and "services available" listing for your area. Nearly all the equipment in my home gym was purchased from the site. We have also had luck with selling a couple of items and even finding tenants for our rental properties. Bottom line...try this site out!

After clicking into the sporting goods for sale section, I immediately came upon what turned out to be my next piece of fitness equipment. The Edge 491r Programmable Recumbant Bike.

I contacted the seller, asked a bunch of questions and set up a time to meet. Christina's mom was kind enough to loan us her SUV for transport purposes and the bike fit (almost too) perfectly. Once home, with the reluctant help of my wife (thanks, hon!), we wrangled it down the steps and into the home gym.

Tomorrow's cardio workout should be pain free and my foot will get the rest time it clearly needs.

Sweet!

WORKOUT - CARDIO (HIGH INTENSITY INTERVAL TRAINING)

My lungs and breathing were quite good today.

The Flying Romans are coming along nicely. Looking at last week's times, I improved a little. That's a good thing!

I walked at a steadily increasing pace for 5 minutes or so prior to hopping on the bike for the first interval.

Here are today's intervals:

• Bike, Intensity 1 (warm up), 5:15
  
• Jumping Jacks, Intensity 2, 3:00 ± (160 jumps)
• Jog, Intensity 2, 4:30 ±
• Flying Romans, Intensity 3, 35 seconds (15 each leg)
  
• Jog, Intensity 2, 3:10 ±
  
• Bike, Intensity 2, 4:45 ±
  
• Jumping Jacks, Intensity 2, 3:00 ± (about 170 jumps)
• Flying Romans, Intensity 3, 35 seconds (15 each leg)
  
• Jog/Walk (cool down), Intensity 1, 5:41 (jogged 4:20, walked 1:21)
  

Total Time => 30:01

Comments:

Arms and shoulders are fairly sore again this week. The muscles that lift my arms above my head (like doing the wave at a ball game) seemed to have been worked the hardest.

Not as sore in my chest as I'd like to be, although it feels like I worked harder in this area this time around.

Left heel was just so-so today. Progress is slow and I'm still favoring it some.

Calves and feet got stretched for 2 minutes per side today rather than the usual 1 minute per side.

DIET - PROTEIN DEPRIVATION

For breakfast I tried out a new recipe...raw (mostly, I think...) blueberry cereal. I bummed this recipe from Kardena's Kitchen and was admittedly skeptical. I had been wanting some cereal however and was avoiding buying processed, boxed up junk. This did the trick!

Check it out...















The recipe went into the "keeper" file for sure.

1/3 Cup Sunflower seeds (soaked or raw) 2/3 cup

1/2 Tbsp Shredded Coconut

½ Tbsp Flaxseed (soaked or raw) 1 Tbsp

1/2 Cup Blueberries (fresh or frozen)

12 gr Protein Powder (Rice/hemp)

Dash Mineral Salt (Sea Salt or Himalayan)

Dash Cinnamon

1 Tbsp Raisins ¼ cup

¼ tsp Vanila extract (optional)

Sweetener (Agave Nectar/Stevia/Raw Honey)

Female Calories: 337 Protein: 23 g Carbs: 35 g Fat: 13 g

Mens Calories: 489 Protein: 31 g Carbs: 59 g Fat: 18 g

The ingredients that are bolded to the right of the ingredient is the different portion for men. The rest of the ingredients are the same.

Instructions:

If you’ve soaked your sunflower seeds, drain enough water to scoop out 1/3 cup (or more, depending on desired serving) of seeds. If not check out this video on how to soak sunflower seeds. Place any extra sunflower seeds in water and store in the refrigerator. Place all ingredients in your bowl including salt, cinnamon and raisins to taste. Add sweetener to taste (your choice—feel free to experiment). Add however much water you want to mix the dry ingredients and seeds together.

I made a few adjustments, of course...

• Added 1/4 C almond milk
• I do not understand "dash" of cinnamon. I measure it by the pound. :~)
• Added about 3 TBS of Trader Joes semi-sweet chocolate chips
• No sweetener of any kind was added (unless you count the chocolate chips)
• I left out the protein powder as well since I'm in the middle of the Protein Deprivation cycle

Mid-morning, I knocked out 2 apples and raw almonds, cashews, walnuts, and brazils.

Lunch was a repeat of Day 53...raw tortilla soup with 3 tostadas. I'll be buying the farmers out of peppers and tomatoes this weekend to make this again next week. (~:

Lemony hummus and half of a Hugh Jass red pepper went down the hatch for a snack this afternoon.

Dinner before heading out to pick up my "new" bike was a repeat of Day 52...non-dairy, gluten-free, raw alfredo sauce with spiralized zucchini "pasta". The recipe comes from Gena at Choosing Raw.

Anyone know where I can buy stock in raw cashews? (~: