Turbulence Training 5th Transformation Challenge – end of week 4

Well, it’s now been four weeks since I started the Turbulence Training 5th Transformation Challenge. I have just finished a 4-week TT exercise programme for the first time ever (despite having started a few in the past). Here are my details for this week:

Exercise:

I did all three TT weights and intervals workouts from TT Strength for Women, did yoga for 30 minutes and played badminton with hubby.

I have now finished phase 1 of this workout. Mostly the gains were minor, and in the case of Ys & Ts, non-existent. The only major progress I saw was for pushups, which went from (10,11,12) in my first workout to (23,22,20) in my sixth. Even I’m impressed! I’m looking forward to phase 2 of the TT Strength for Women.

As I have written in other posts this week, the biggest fitness gains have been in my aerobic capacity where I have seen really noticeable improvements over the four weeks which have spilled over into daily life.

Nutrition:

Av cals: 1618
Av deficit: 660 (range ~400 to ~1100)
27% Fat, 23% Protein, 50% carbs, 1% alcohol
Nutrients: >100% RDA on everything except vit E (again) (50%), iron (again) (56%), pantothenic acid (76%) magnesium (82%) and vit A (97%)

The reason my nutrition has been a bit off this week has been a sore throat earlier in the week when I lived off soup (and not home made) for a couple of days. So it wasn’t so much that I was eating the wrong foods, but simply not enough foods – check out that deficit range! – hence carbs up, fat and protein down, and not getting a good range of nutrients. At least not from food. I do take a multivitamin and mineral anyway. But being a bit short on vitamin E and iron was a bit of a recurring theme during month 1, so I will work on increasing these in my diet over the coming weeks.

4 week overview

This is what my stats look like for the first four weeks, courtesy of FitDay.

As you can see, nutrition pretty good overall, maybe a bit low on protein (the yellow segment), which I will work on – in particular trying to get more protein in my snacks rather than mainly at meals. Also over the four weeks I maintained an average calorie deficit of around 550 calories, without trying too hard or being too strict, and you can see the results top right – a nice steady downward trend on my weight graph. Here are the rest of my stats:

Body:

I’ll give you these results for the four weeks, rather than this week only:

• Weight down 4.8 pounds
• BF down 1.9%
• Thigh down 3.5 cm
• Knee down 3 cm
• Calf down 1 cm
• Bicep down 1 cm
• No change in waist or hips

Hubby took some pics but I haven’t had a look at them yet. If there’s anything to see compared with the ones we took at the start, I will put them up some time over the next few days. Anyway, overall some nice concrete gains, and some even nicer emotional and psychological ones. I am making slow and steady progress but am doing it without being restrictive and just adopting a healthier lifestyle – one I can maintain. Despite yo-yo dieting for over 20 years, and getting progressively fatter and fatter, I truly believe this is the last time I will have to lose this weight.

Specific goals for week 5:

1. Go to bed earlier – aim for no later than midnight at least 3 days this week (it’s a start)
2. Get 100% RDA vit E and iron from food
3. Do bonus cardio on two days
4. Get 5 servings of fibrous veg at least four days (only managed twice this week)