Full-body supersets

Supersets are Andy's favourite new manoeuvre, which he inflicted to 'get me back up to speed'.
They hurt. A lot. Though caning my biceps the day before probably didn't help.

Exercise	Warmup	Set 1	Set 2	Set 3
Dumbbell Bench Press Dumbbell Bent-over Row	12×8kg	12×14kg	10×20kg	8×24kg
Push-up†		8
Dumbbell Arnold Press	12×6kg	12×10kg	10×12kg	8×14kg(+16.7%)
Cable Twist‡ Cable Kneeling Crunch	15×20kg 30×20kg	12×25kg 24×30kg	10×30kg 20×40kg	8×35kg 16×50kg
Push-up		10	8
Kneeling Push-up				10

†: Balancing exercise, with hands on a 3kg medicine ball.
‡: Holding a cable attachment with both hands, arms straight out in front of chest (as opposed to the lever illustrated).

Supersets are market with a khaki-coloured bar to their left.

Return: Biceps & Back

Exercise	Warmup	Set 1	Set 2	Set 3
EZ Barbell Curl	12×15kg	12×20kg	10×25kg	8×27.5kg(-8.9%)
Cable Underhand Pulldown	12×49kg	12×56kg	10×61kg	8×63kg(+12.5%)
Dumbbell Hammer Curl		12×7.5kg	10×10kg	8×12.5kg(+4.2%)
Dumbbell Lateral Raise		12×7.5kg	10×10kg	8×12.5kg(+39%)
Sled Seated Calf Press	12×79kg	12×115kg	10×124kg	8×133kg(+7.3%)

Not too bad after a break. Slight improvements on everything except the barbell curl, which might be ascribed to my lack of cardio warm-up.

With my weight and BF, things look less positive. Andy's mentioned that scales that attempt to measure it via electrical impedance are notoriously inaccurate, and also that whether you measure before or after a workout can make a difference. With that in mind, I measured both:

Measurement	Before Workout	After Workout
Weight	74.1kg	74.4kg
FFM	60.8kg	60.3kg
BF	18.0%	18.9%
FFM Change	+0.9kg	+0.4kg
Fat Mass Change	-0.1kg	+0.7kg

Since I normally measure after a workout, and an increase of muscle mass with a decrease in body fat seems utterly implausible, let alone when I'm not working out, I'm going to assume the latter figures are more accurate. Which means that, roughly, I was over-consuming an average of about 300 calories a day during the trip.

On the North American diet

I returned back to England on Monday afternoon have been regretting it ever since. Canada, and the little I saw of upper state New York (Niagara Falls State Park) are utterly, breathtakingly, terrifyingly beautiful.

Now, as the cliché goes; everything's bigger in North America. I can confirm this is certainly true of their sea-like great lakes, massively ugly cars (one could easily get the - incorrect - impression that most people run haulage operations on the side; or the - correct - impression that they drive everywhere - even though everywhere in central Toronto is walkable), and most of all of their food.
You can buy a Double Big Mac for about $6. You can also buy some of the best raspberries you'll ever eat for $3 a punnet, or some of the best salmon for just over $10 a pound.
Living there would make eating healthily much easier and cheaper than here. However, eating unhealthily and excessively would be easier still.

I'm afraid I did a bit of both.

The weather in Toronto was also unexpectedly hot - it was 31 degrees when we arrived, with hardly a cloud in the sky. So, I took to drinking a local staple, Tim Hortons Ice Cappuccino.

Somewhat sneakily, Tim Hortons' own nutrition guide only gives you the calories for 10oz (medium) beverages. The only data I could find their exact beverage sizes was from a self-professed employee's blog comment. Cross referencing the two; if an ice cappuccino is 250 calories - made with cream, unless you specifically ask for it to be made with milk - and thus a large, 14oz ice cap is 350 calories.

That's more than my intended meal allowance in one shot.

In addition, I'd often order some solid food to go with my coffee, in the form of a cream cheese bagel - which their FAQ specifically recommends for a low fat diet. My first such order met with a bewildering paradox of choice - did I want plain; onion; flax, poppy or sesame seed; 12 grain; cinnamon raisin; blueberry; sun dried tomato; or the so-called everything bagel, presumably intended to allow indecisive virgins such as myself to opt out of a potentially line stalling decision. The cream cheese also came in four varieties; plain, light, herb and garlic and strawberry (!). Total calories for an everything with herb and garlic: 421 calories, for a total of 771 calories for what was intended to be a light snack.

In future, I'll think twice before criticising Americans for having an obesity problem.

Break: Canada

I've been somewhat lax at updating this blog (hence the sudden appearance of a backlog of entries). This is because tomorrow I fly out for an eighteen day trip to Canada, and I've been busy preparing.
Hopefully I won't pork out too much on the (apparently superb) local sushi, and will at least get some exercise (hiking, perhaps?) while I'm out there.
As a precaution, my weight stands at 73.3kg, 18.3% BF (59.9kg FFM). I'll compare when I come back.

Chest and triceps

Another training session with Andy, and another set of impressive gains:

Exercise	Warmup	Set 1	Set 2	Set 3
Dumbbell Bench Press†	12×12kg	12×18kg	10×20kg	8×26kg(+30%)
Barbell Military Press	12×15kg	12×25kg	10×30kg	4×35kg
Dumbbell One Arm Triceps Extension	12×3kg	12×6kg	12×8kg	8×10kg
Triceps Dip	15×-25kg	12	10	8
Medicine Ball Incline Crunch‡		30×3kg	35×3kg	40×3kg

†: On a Bosu Ball, rather than a bench.
‡: Throwing the medicine ball and catching it between crunches.

After utterly caning our triceps with the presses and extensions, I have no idea how I managed 3 sets of dips. I practically fell off the bars at the end, my arms were so close to failure. We can push ourselves much harder than we often think.
In the last set of medicine ball crunches, I felt tired after fifteen, knackered after twenty, and ready to give up at twenty-five. At thirty, adrenalin took over, and I hammered out the last ten reps with even more energy than I started.

Back and biceps

It was far too sunny and pleasant a day on Saturday to spend two hours of mid-afternoon in the gym, so I missed this week's Wu Shu Kwan class. I made up for it on Sunday, though, by really hammering the weights:

Exercise	Warmup	Set 1	Set 2	Set 3
EZ Barbell Curl	12×10kg	12×20kg	10×25kg	8×30kg
Barbell Bent-over Row	12×25kg	12×35kg	10×40kg	8×45kg
Cable Straight Backed Seated Row	12×40kg	12×70kg	10×90kg	8×102.5kg
Cable Underhand Pulldown	12×28kg	12×42kg	10×49kg	8×56kg(+33%)
Dumbbell Hammer Curl	12×6kg	12×9kg	10×10kg	8×12kg
Sled Seated Calf Press	12×79kg	12×106kg	10×115kg	8×124kg(+27%)

I'm particularly pleased with being able to pull the entire stack, plus a 7.5kg topper on the seated cable row. It does mean I should drop that exercise, though, and go back to dumbbell rows. No pain, no gain.

I also had another go at caning my calves. I reckon they can cope with being trained twice a week; it's been a while since I've ended up hobbling around for three days after overtraining them.