Typically you see recipes where they’re stuffed with rice. You can if you like but then I would use a mix of brown, red and wild rice.
My preference is to use grains and quinoa (I cook a lot with these).
Ingredients -
Pepper, top sliced off, sides sprayed with oil (coconut or avacado oils current faves)
Tesco 7 grains mix
Tesco white, black and red quinoa mix
Onion, garlic
Schwartz Moroccan spice mix (for eg, plenty of others to experiment with)
Random beg to dice eg courgette, aubergine etc’
Chick peas optional
Halouimi optional
Pine nuts optional
Basically boil enough of the grains to fill your pepper for about 10 mins, and whilst doing so chop and lightly fry the rest of your ingredients in the merest spray of oil.
Drain and add the grains to your fried veg and mix them. Spoon into pepper, put the top back on (otherwise mix at top with crisp or burn), and stick into oven for about 20 mins.
I like this with a sweet potato mash (mashed with garlic and a few herbs), and served with a salad with pomegranates a few beans (like borlotti) and a sharp lemon dressing.
Carbs aren’t the enemy, just need a bit of thought on choice and to not allow them to dominate your diet. You’ve heard me denounce the white carbs (rice, pasta, potato) as there are many better alternatives. It’s okay to eat carbs but I tend to choose to increase them when I know I’ve got a hectic day, or when I’m running or lifting. If I’m going to be driving for 4 hours, stuck in meetings and other desk work for another 10 then I try to avoid them. Better to load up on protein and good fats like nuts and avocado etc.
No, definitely not - it’s the full, TWS you’re after - this is why it’s called ass to grass!
Yes you do want to build up time in this position, and progress so you can be flat footed with your weight evenly distributed/ on your heels. Try a 30 day challenge to get to 30 mins by starting off with a minute and adding a minute each day. It’s okay if it’s uncomfortable but not okay if you experience shooting pain - that’s a problem somewhere which we can diagnose and treat and improve your TWS.
I can only get close ass to grass with my heals in the air. Physically i cannot do it flat footed and parallel even for a second. In a similar fashion I have never been able to touch my toes so I have just made myself a touch your toes o meter. Legs together I can just stretch my fingers to 125mm above the floor and hold for a second. Mrs Adpully is flexible though she once won a competition by picking up an increasingly smaller cereal packet off a table top she was stood on with her teeth. It was cut down to an inch IIRC.
Cheers fellas, of to try the pepper recepe and check out the online stuff too. In terms of carbs, I have a couple of whole meal wraps a day with soup and that’s about it. I avoid all the white stuff. Mainly desk bound in the week, but at the weekend I have an extra pita.
Still relatively high in protein in the morning and tail off toward the evening.
I might lose a pound during the week, three over the Fri to Mon morning.
Can’t touch toes and can’t squat below parallel - I suspect short hip flexors but there’s probably limited mobility in your mid back, and maybe lats too. This is usually what sitting does to us over the years.
I’m looking for a good guide to treating these areas to link for you - gimme some search time. This is worth investing some time (and emotion too as treatment isn’t painless) as it will stop this from getting any worse, and it will help you in your running too.
OK cheers, really appreciate your advice. FYI I was a draughtsman from 20 - 48 Years old - Then H&S job 80% desk bound. My 84 YO uncle was a draughtsman - His back is seriously hunched now. If I can avoid that great.
This evening was brutal, squats were proper tough. I’m very close to or at my working weights now, it’s going to be a lot harder from now on, I won’t be surprised if I need 2 days off in between sessions.
Some new fraction plates have turned up as well, lightest ones are 125g, so can add a quarter of a KG, will not be long before I’ll be using them.
For me it’s always the thought of how many reps I need to do that puts me off before I start.
I like to start with 10 reps then lower the reps as the weight increases. I go 10, 8, 5 then 3. If I can I do more and quite often when aiming for 3 I’ll get 5 or even 8 sometimes. Seems to work well.
I’m not saying you should do this or anything but it always seems more mental to me and sometimes I’ve squatted next day when my legs felt too tight, couldn’t feel anything after warm up.
Reps should be the product and not the driver. The reason why the 8-12 rep range for hypertrophy is recognised is because of the studies showing the time under tension required is about 45 -60 seconds per set. If you use good tempo then that’s how long your 8-12 should take (with a load that is typically c 80% of your 1 rep max)
The 4-6, and hence 5 rep target in 5x5 and stronglifts etc comes from working at c 90% of your 1 rep max.
Some workouts I won’t count reps at all. After all they’re just an indicator. Also we naturally start to chase reps or they mentally put us off as Pan described. I’ll use these workouts to focus on form, range of motion and tempo instead. The tempo I like to use is 2 seconds raising, 1 second flex at the top, 3-4 seconds lowering, and no pause at the bottom (except squats where at the end of a set I might pause at the start of the rep to take deep breaths and get my core tight again).
If you chase reps all the time you can easily fall into the trap of sacrificing range, form and tempo, and also saving yourself in earlier sets to try to make your target in the end set. In the end you’re only cheating yourself. Also lifting weights is meant to build mental toughness and an unwillingness to give in! Anyone who has done 10x10 sets or heavy sets of squats for 20 reps will know what I’m talking about!
I like fractional plates, once you get the reps to where you want you can then inch up very slowly the load without your body really noticing and it can take you past plateaus when on a bar the next weight jump might be 5kg (you see lots of people stall on shoulder press for this reason).
Are the 125g plates yours or the gyms? I’m after a pair - are they branded so I can find them?
