Your 2012 Review :)

Morba

Morba

Morba

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So we are almost at the end of the year, how have you done? Have you achieved what you wanted or has something else happened?

Want to keep this out of the gym rats thread so that it's more open to all Sports Arena people :)
 
not a lot :D ...managed to recover from about 10 injuries..and back on it finally :) I guess its progress!
 
My 2012:

First 6 months were pointless, normal lifting with no real goals.
2nd half has been chock full of goal orientated lifting and strongman fun :D

2 competitions, 3rd and 4th place respectively has been a good start to my novice SM life, allowing me to set some realistic goals for 2013 :) :)
 
Well I began cycling early on this year and completed a 300 mile coast to coast in September, which I'm pretty happy with.

For about a month after this I lost motivation a bit, so signed up for a sprint tri in April 2013, which I've been training for for the last 2 months. I'm improving pretty well in all three disciplines, I'm the fittest I've even been and feel generally awesome. :)
 
My 2012

Jan - March - Working on my goals i had set and bringing up weak bodyparts. Aim was to add size and not worry about definition.

March - May - Changed goals and did a stupid, get hench in 36 days, and put on 1000lbs utterly pointless and messed up my metabolism. However in this time i managed to bring up a weak bodypart my chest to one of my strongest :D

June - Dec - Exciting months, landed a sponsorship deal with a supplement company and involved a number of shoots. One that will appear across 6 pages in the offical British Army magazine in Feb 2013

2013 is going to be insane i have 5 months of diet prepration all set out infront of me looking to achieve "ripped to shreds" for Bodypower with the Sponsor and looking to enter POTW
 
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Jan-May bulk and improve lifts
Set my PB's as follows bench/squat/Deadlift at 80.2kg BW
100/150/150

May-sept
Cut and drop weight, target 70kg, achieved 71kg

Sept-current cleaner bulk and improve form and lifts
Current weight 73.5kg
Current lifts as follows 95/150/170
Bench I haven neglected, squat I am very pleased as much improved form, and deadlifts I am super pleased with as I had very mixed feelings about them, hopefully things are coming together nicely
All in all I am happy with 2012 and hope for some real solid progress with lift totals in 2013
 
I've not been anywhere as committed as I would have liked to be, other priorities have been more important to me. I do feel, however, that I've learned a lot from reading on here and putting it in to practice when I've had the chance/inclination. I'm looking forward to sorting my routine out next month when things settle down for an extended period of time - I won't be travelling around anymore.

January: I was in the Falklands and doing SL 5x5, saw about 8 weeks progress which was great, however I didn't really know what I was doing and the facilities were dreadful! Benchpress using some dodgy bit of kit where where you wanted to grip was where the bar was being held by the stands, squatting by doing a steinborn lift in an ISO container with a low ceiling, and OHP hitting the ceiling every rep.

Febuary - present: Utterly all over the place, I can't remember when I was really bothering or when I wasn't. Still on the SL 5x5 format but not following the progression properly at all, just staying the same as gym visits were so inconsistent. I've been better recently, but still letting my shift patterns/travelling up to see family/girlfriend get in the way.

The problem? No realistic goals and no realistic way of making it happen with the other priorities making it easy to make excuses for myself.
 
2012 has been a funny year. Started off on the right track, only to put my back out and have to stop training for a month.

This followed with a couple of months of no deadlifting or squats, had to do split squats (which even hurt my back at the time) Slowly nursed my back to some kind of healthy state although it still hurts day to day.

Sorted out my diet for once with help from some forum members, put on far too much fat over the end of last year by a shoddy diet, got my diet down and did a successful cut, now on a nice slow bulk which I'm happy about.

The best part of 2012 however is finally sorting my shizzle out and managing to lift a decent weight (again, with help from various forum members) on my main two lifts, squats and deadlifts. Deadlifts I am most pleased about, squats are coming along and can only get better :)

Needless to say, I love this place, and without it I doubt I'd be where I am now.
 
Getting stronger and working towards competing, I'm very happy with how things have gone.
 
Waste of a year for me. It's totally flew by though. I feel like christmas was only a few months ago.

2013 will be my year. Not just in the gym but in all aspects of life.
 
I bought a (second hand) road bike, cycled over 1000 miles in half a year and lost a stone. I'm very pleased and can't wait to get cycling again when work calms down and it brightens up and warms up.

I set some goals for 2013 in the cycling thread a while back:

  • 3000 miles in the year
  • 100,000 feet in the year
  • At least one period of 28 days where I've climbed over 10,000 feet
  • At least one ride of at least 100km
 
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Can't honestly complain with 2012 to be honest, hit the 12 stone lost mark and my life back again!

Same effort for 2013, see what happens...

Edit - Should say my 2013 goals really!

Run a 10k
London 2 Brighton Bike Ride
Keep lifting
 
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It's been a fairly good 2012 for me.

The only goal i set for myself was to gain enough BritishCycling points to move up to category3, which i managed to do. Not much hope of moving up to Cat2 for at least another year yet tho.
Other highlights include finishing in the top half of a 24hour MTB race and a 2nd place in a road race.
My weight loss plans havnt gone so well. I'm lighter now than i was at the start of the year but not as much as i could have been. Over the summer was good, but i need to keep it up in the darker/colder months.

My goals for 2013 are:
-Continue with weight loss, and trying to be a bit more focused on it.
-Do as many road races as possible
-Break 22:30 for a 10 mile time trial
 
Cycling wise I hope in 2013 I can fit riding in and around my work commitments better than the last few months. I want to build a really solid base with the aim of TTing/racing in the future but I need to ride more regularly to achieve that.

Edit: just realised that's not really a review. :p My 2012 saw me the fittest I've ever been (in summer) but also the least active I've ever been (now). My new job has made it difficult to cycle to work regularly and I'm away a lot which again is difficult. My regularly weekly commute was 100 miles plus whatever I did on the weekend, recently I've been riding 50 miles a week at best plus an occasional long ride. While my longer rides have still been good I've missed the daily rides, and since they were my transport to work there was no excuse to miss them.

It's been too easy recently to do nothing on the weekend because I'm tired, but I'm tired because I'm less active. Vicious cycle, if you excuse the pun. I rode into work yesterday and I had so much more energy in the evening and my mood was massively lifted. The mental benefits of exercise are hugely underrated, I feel a lot better about myself when I'm riding regularly. I find myself feeling very sorry for myself when I miss it and I start developing unhealthy attitudes to food since I feel like I'm not doing enough to justify my caloric intake.
 
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While nothing notable has happened for me due to pulling out of my show in July, I've made decent gains across a number of areas I wanted too.

Next year will be the big year in terms of my competing
 
I started training back in September 2011, but only had a couple of weeks' discovering the wonders of barbells until a big car accident put me out of the gym for three months (from November).

So my 2012 started on 13th February, when I was signed off by my physio and started a proper training programme.

Since then, I've gone from 82-ish kg to 94kg, beating my dad to our initial challenge total of 90kg (him to lose 8kg, me to gain 8kg) in four months.

I then focussed a huge amount on Olympic lifting technique and my overall lifts have not increased as they probably should, but have been pushing brute strength hard since September with the aim of doubling my lifts in a year, and have noticed significant improvements in overall power output.

Whilst I'm not goign to get to my lol-tastic Christmas targets for the three canon, lifts, I'm sitting at hte following:

- Bench: 100kg (110kg target);
- Deadlift: 170kg (180kg target);
- Squat: 135kg (150kg target... but will finalise this actual tomorrow when I do my last day of back squatting before the recess! :D )

Olympic lifts have also benefitted from the aforementioned technique and strength work:

- Hang snatch: 70kg
- Hang clean: 90kg
- Jerk: 80kg

Yes, I've had bigger numbers up, but the form was all over the shop (borderline silly) and so didn't count.

So, overall, I'm very happy. I've only had one gym-related injury (torn adductor), and only had around two months off training during the 10 months from February, so the next year should be awesome.
 
I began the year saying i wanted to lose weight and stop smoking (ive said this many times over the years)

but this year ive actually managed to do both,lost over a stone after buying a mountain bike and doing roughtly 40 to 80 miles a week depending on the weather and im hoping to maybe lose another stone next year

I quit smoking in stoptober and did really well but one night a few weeks back after drinking quite a few beers i really wanted a smoke , so borrowed one and sparked it up, took one drag and nearly puked ,so threw it, i take it thats a good sign ?

well chuffed tbh :D
 
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Started off a little lost, just doing same old lifts with no direction.

Started to hit mobility, and address sticking points and issues as well as add far more dynamic sort of training to start improving my power/explosive and functional strength. Improving stability work, single leg and core movements and heading much more down gymnast-type strength rather than anything else.

Started to make some serious progress, in terms of fitness, explosive power, functional strength (i.e. not using machines as they add no benefit unless you're a bodybuilder - where in life do you sit down in a machine to lift something up?!). As such my core and strength has improved dramatically, although my main lifts haven't gone up yet, I'm laying the foundations down for some improvements.

Towards the end of the year, now my mobility, flexibility, and raw strength is back up to where it should be, core and gymnastic ability as well has improved - single leg and stability as well. I'm not following a hybrid powerlifting/strength programme which is suiting my needs well. Although not up to my 600kg, I'm not doing too badly at around 540kg - within 6 months I hope to match my previous maxes and go beyond. At a lighter body weight.
 
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