Words of wisdom from Elliot Hulse

Yesterday I posted an entry about the Hodge Twins and essentially to treat what they preach as semantics for a well formed and well balanced lifestyle or body building programme, instead of treating their advices as schematics.  There are no such "schematics" for producing good results.  Yes, if you are new to this, then pretty much just about anything will work in the early phases of your development.  But as you progress, it gets harder.  You must contest your own body's flaws, limitations and barriers, that will be unique to you.  It is at this point you will struggle to find results in what served you for so long.  You will be craving something to produce those short term results you once saw.  A blueprint of some kind that you can follow to the letter and build muscle fast, get strong fast or get conditioned fast.  Unfortunately, although some may lead you to believe, there is no such thing.  The only things that will help you achieve your goals are:

• Commitment
• You must stay committed to your programme.
• Patience
• Lack of patience will have you questioning your goals and your programme.  You won't notice change overnight.  When experimenting with something new, give it a few months.  Be patient!
• Experience
• You need to try things for yourself.  Don't take someone's word for it that a given exercise will or will not work.  Create your own programme to experiment with it.  Prove or disprove if it works for you or not.  But least of all, don't consider that someone is wrong if it doesn't work in your favour; what works for you, may not work for them and vice versa.

Shortly after posting, I was trawling through my YouTube subscriptions and came across a video from Elliot Hulse; someone who I deem to be a valued professional, given he reads real material, and also someone who practices what they preach.  Whilst we both share very different goals, our approach is very similar...

Hodge Twins - A.K.A. Twin Muscle Workout

I came across these guys quite some time ago now and shared their YouTube channel with a few friends, who found them equally entertaining.  Until now, I don't think I have ever mentioned them on this blog, so perhaps it's a good time to share.  They have a few channels now, but the channel I primarily focus on is their body building channel.  Whilst I don't agree with everything they preach, I do like the fact they are honest about what they say being their opinion based on their own life experiences.  I can relate to this and often find myself in a position whereby people question my motives, regime or diet, trying to apply what works for me to their own lifestyle.  This will not work.  Not only am I genetically unique compared to anyone else I know, my daily routine and habits also differ, meaning I have a completely different resting metabolic rate.  Take my dad for example.  Genetically we are the same or at least extremely similar.  But we both have jobs at different ends of the spectrum.  I am desk bound for 70% of my day, doing my full time occupation.  But for 20% of it, I am pushing myself hard to keep up with those that can cruise throughout the day at a constant consistent pace.  The other 10% is spent running at a moderate pace, being a father and husband.  My dad on the other hand, is on his feet 80% of his day, doing a very manual job.  The extra physical exertion he experiences from day to day would mean, anything I find works for me may not work for him.  I also have no idea what his sleeping patterns are.  Energy levels fluctuate throughout the day, with most peoples optimal energy output being between 4pm and 6pm.  However, I am not most people and since I wake at 5am every morning and commute 60 miles to work, my 4pm actually arrives a lot sooner at around 12pm.  So between 12pm and 2pm, I am energetically at my optimum; the best time to smash the gym!  Everybody leads a different lifestyle, be it hobby or habit.  You can question what I do, when I do it and how I go about it, but don't think you can contest it.  I am content with my approach and I find my approach works for me.  If you have something that works too, great!  That means you have found something that works for you.  But you haven't found a secret formula, nor a magical blueprint as you might lead yourself to believe.  You have simply discovered the unique formula and blueprint that was made to work for you and you alone, and one that easily fits your lifestyle.

With this in mind, watch and enjoy the Hodge Twins, but don't take what they say as the definitive.  They are merely two very funny and very talented individuals who are sharing their experiences through their body building journey.  Of course, experiment and try some, if not all of the techniques they are sharing.  But don't allow yourself to be consumed by their success with the belief that your own success can follow, if you mimic everything they do.

This is one of my favourites, but if you can, find the link to their channel and find yourself your own favourite...

Back and biceps routine

This is the routine I have been following for the past eight or nine weeks.  It is time to change it, so before I do, I thought I'd log this one.  Details of weights / sets are in the video description.  I finished with some roll outs, which I have been working on intermittently for the past few months.  My last video to include this exercise shows that I was not getting my body close enough to the floor.  Now I am happy with the proximity to the floor and just need to focus on extension of my arms, trying to avoid bending them at the elbow.

Obscure lifting injury

For the past nine weeks or so, I have had to put up with an unconventional injury I acquired whilst lifting.  It's not the conventional injury you'd associate with lifting, which would typically be some sort of strain, torn ligament or muscle.  This is in fact oral and was the result of biting my lip!  Typically, you'd get an ulcer, it would heal and that would be that.  But in my case, it healed but then came back and persisted as such, repeatedly healing and coming back.  I have now since been to a consultant who specialises in such things and has diagnosed it as a Mucocele.  Typically these things will heal themselves, but when they have persisted beyond three weeks or so, surgery is inevitably required to remove the gland.

Here is an article on Mucoceles: http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/1076717-overview

Hopefully I will get an appointment to have the faulty gland removed and that will be that.  There are some risks associated with the removal, but really, I am not that worried given how annoying this thing is and how painful it gets when swollen.  My advice is to avoid biting your lip when you lift and of course when eating.  If you are struggling not to, it might be worth investing in a mouth guard and wearing it to stop you from lip biting.

Might I add that this is generally only an issue when lifting heavy, since it's the strain associated with lifting heavy that can make you do irrational things, such as biting your lip!

If all that wasn't enough to put you off your tea, here is a photo of my Mucocele.

Update: 8th Sept

Have been using the jump rope as a warm-up / cool-down routine for the past two years now. I only spend between 10 and 15 minutes a day, excluding weekends, practising different techniques. For the past four or five months, I have been able to incorporate side swings (see them here if interested, I won't embed this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Q5d_RlfNxw ). However, I have been eluded by double-under to running in place to double-under transitions for a while now, so these are my next skills to acquire on the rope. A few days ago, I managed a rather scruffy looking set of transitions, so it's a start. Definitely need to panic less when making the switch, then I think I will maintain a smoother rhythm. Skip to around the 2 minute mark to see where I got a good set of transitions in.

I haven't done a video of my usual training programme for a while, so I made a small montage of Weds leg workout. I failed on the 200kg deadlift at the end after hitting 190kg, so maybe next time! I have put the info for weight, sets and reps in the video description if you are interested. Oh, it's probably worth mentioning that it is a strength building programme that incorporates body building protocols, if you are wondering why the rep range is so high.

BBC News: Reducing salt 'would cut cancer'

BBC News: Reducing salt 'would cut cancer'

I do my best to avoid consuming salt, for other reasons than those highlighted here, but if you are a consumer of heavily processed food, then you are fighting an ever losing battle.  Retailers are the least consistent when it comes to labelling of food, sometimes labelling quantities per 35g serving, other times per 100g.  Interestingly, they also often have diluted ideas about what constitutes a portion size, so often you will buy something that looks to be low in salt, because you bought it on the presumption that it would be consumed as one serving, but in actual fact, the retailer has labelled the serving size to be a quarter of the contents, and thus there is actually four times the amount of salt than you first thought.

My advice, steer away from processed foods entirely.  It's okay to eat processed food occasionally, like a pizza once a month, but don't make it a weekly habit to consume salty food, especially Monday to Friday.  You should treat the working week as a time to abstinence from luxury foods and alcohol.  Doing this alone, cuts the amount you consume in a year when you think about how many weeks there are in a year.  As much as you might feel that this is a restraint on your liberty, actually the opposite is in effect.  Retailers lead you to believe that it is your desire and an expression your liberty and free will to consume junk food, when in actual fact, you are playing into their hands making them millions in profits through sales of cheap, easy to produce, crap.

Athletic greens

You can buy it in the powdered form, but this is fresh. A while bag of spinach, 2 kiwi fruit, milk, basil and a dash of lemon.