Progress: Keeping up with my daily routine, I was able to shed off another 12 pounds, which places me at 176 pounds from 212. I consistently ate a maximum of 1,600 calories a day and successfully started to eat in healthy proportions, with all the veggies that my mom always wanted me to eat. To this day, I still consistently run for 20 minutes at the gym and slowly ease into my workout. With this, I established a five day workout regiment, in which the weekend is used as my rest days for my muscles to recuperate and relax. Typically Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays are focused upon the upper body, which included core, biceps, triceps, back, and chest. This leaves Thursdays for leg day, crucial to maintaining a balanced body. Yet Fridays are my worse days, since it mostly consisted of cardio training, and knowing me, I wouldn't last a minute running for anything(except food).
Reflection: Starting this journey, I was considered morbidly obese for my weight and size, and it is the most demoralizing thing that your doctor can ever tell you. The fact that you have total control over the portions you eat and still managing to exceed such limits takes a toll on one's self esteem. Additionally, the journey has also taught me numerous things about the vast majority of muscle groups inside the human body, and how I must incorporate each exercise to maximize my workout. I never really have gone through such a transformation in a matter of months due to a lack of motivation, so I am extremely grateful to embark on such a journey. Although my journey of boxing had ended, I still managed to continue it on a different path, one that involved helping me achieve a different physique. Here is my final transformation photos, and I am finally embracing my body instead of constantly shaming it.
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Progress: Continuing my consistent diet and running each day, I have dropped a staggering 24 pounds (212 to 188) from when I started this journey. Although it was great to see numbers that I never would have imagined on a scale, the workouts were getting repetitive and frankly not engaging all of the muscles on my body. Then my friend David mentioned pull ups, a workout that I never had ever incorporated into my workout simply due to the fact that I was physically unable to do them. For the first few days at the gym, I dangled from the pull up bar, struggling my every last effort to pull my body weight up, yet the task seemed impossible. There was no way my arms were going to pull 188 pounds. On the third or fourth day of the gym, I was finally able to at least pull my chin over the bar, and I have never been so proud that I did a singular rep of an exercise in my life because this exercise always had seemed impossible for me. After allowing my shoulders to rest, I surprisingly managed to execute three clean pull ups on the fifth day, which I did twice in order to get the video clip. Reflection: I have always been considered fat, and the widespread belief of fat people doing pull ups is that they can't do any. Due to that fact, I gave up before even attempting them. Looking at a pull up bar had already discouraged me. Yet today, I proved that superstition wrong, as I achieved what I never thought I would do in my entire life: perform a pull up. Even though this is a minor achievement, it was still one thing that I personally felt that I would never be able to do. In retrospect, pull-ups can be compared to any aspiration that I feel that I could never achieve and with that mindset, there is no obstacle nor challenge that will restrain me. Progress: After the discussion with my parents concerning if I should be allowed to spar with another, the final verdict was that I was not allowed to under any circumstances. Since I based the majority of this journey on losing weight and increases my overall physical fitness, I have decided to shift towards a more exercising oriented journey to end it off. To start off, I tried the exercise of squats with added weights, an exercise that my father had always prohibited me from doing, due to the myth that it might shorten one's height. The recommended technique for a squat is to keep one's back completely straight and squat said weight to as one's bottom is close to the floor. In addition, the weight must be evenly distributed upon the shoulders, not the neck, as placing it upon the neck will result in severe pain in that location in preceding days. Failure to meet these requirements could result in back pain, in which I experienced after the first few weeks when attempting the squat with 115 pounds. (Squat instruction video) I was able to record my maximum squat to date, in which I was able to squat with 190 pounds on my back for 5 sets of 5. The pain was simply intolerable because the moment I return home, my legs gave up, and this feeling lingered on for a few days, preventing me from running at the gym. But I remembered that at this point, I can finally demonstrate that I haven't given up on my fitness just yet, and finally return to the gym. Reflection: Although disappointed at the fact that I was prohibited from boxing any longer from my parents, I decided to orient my journey to lowering my body fat by introducing myself to new exercises. Throughout my life, the superstition was that squats would stunt one's growth, and through a few searches on Google, that is apparently not the case unless a person is willing to squat 3 times their weight. This just highlights how oblivious I am to the outside world and constantly accepting notions simply due to them being widespread. Moreover upon the physical aspect of this blog, it was insane to learn how much your legs hurt when you really push your limits, and the lingering effect was ever so gruesome. However, despite the pain, I still manage to pull myself out of bed each morning to continue going to the gym, which has taught me an essential life lesson: I must persevere through all adversities thrown upon me to truly achieve my dreams. Despite the fact that this is a minor situation, it is definitely applicable to life in general.
Progress: Having discussed this project with my parents previously, they were always skeptical at the fact that I had to physically participate in an facilitated fight, and since my quarter goal was to spar another for 3 rounds, I had to bring up the subject once more. Unfortunately, they refused to for me to partake in a physical fight, since it goes against our morals of inflicting pain upon others for no apparent reason. Anger was all I felt, as I had finally found a passion I was willing to chase after, yet a simple words could end all of it. After contemplating to go against my parent's wishes, I figured a solution for the time being, and it was to beat my mile time by a full minute, making that mile time a solid 8:30, something that I hadn't been able to achieve ever in my life. Beginning from this week, I start going to the gym each day in order to achieve such a score Yet the second the timer struck 8, I was on the home stretch and I had never been in such a rush, I finished exactly 8:27 which was incredible. I couldn't believe it. All this time, I had always ostracized due to my weight, yet I was finally making progress. Reflection: Although I didn't get to spar someone and gain such an experience, I learned a valuable lesson from this: life doesn't always go your way, and it is your responsibility to take charge of it. Instead, I took the alternative of challenging myself by running at 8:30 mile, the thought itself had already seemed impossible, yet if I gave up before even issuing the challenge, can I institute change in anything? The second the timer struck 8:27, a surge of happiness and accomplishment had taken course in my body. There is no exaggeration when I say that I could not believe the numbers on my timer. And to my amazement, when I checked the scale, I was at 175 lbs, the lowest I have ever been since I last checked my weight personally. Personally, I never knew that I could achieve my goals to this extent. Progress: To truly immerse myself in the pain that a boxer traditionally has to go through, I asked my friend to punch me at my core muscle to strengthen my endurance in a fight. I have never been in a fight, so having my friend punch my stomach region repeatedly was excruciating and painful. As I was trying to hold in the pain, William continue pummel my stomach in, yet I knew inside, he was doing this for the better. Finally, after 30 seconds of enduring countless punches, it stopped and I realized that my breathing had a certain rhythm to it. But after a couple of minutes, my core began to be in a world of pain, and for a moment, I thought I had the worse stomach ache of my entire life Reflection: Never in my life, have I experienced pain to this extent, yet today has changed my perception of any physical contact sport entirely. Going through such a process, has given me insight of what its going to be like when I box in tournaments. I expected to be fazed by this sudden news, however I am leaning towards anticipating my first punch to the face; it might knock me out or not, but nonetheless, it would be a learning experience. To be frank, I am excited to participate in my first ever spar for my quarterly goal. Progress: To this point, I have focused all upon my punches, yet I had forgotten where my power is derived from and that would be the hips. To do so, I must focus more on my footwork when I am engaged within the ring to maximize both my power and agility. Due to be self-taught, I decided to go to my master, You tube for some instructional video in order to become lighter on my feet; turns out, there are multiple exercises to keep myself light on my feet. ?That isn't the only advantage in learning footwork drills, as I learned that it creates different angles that one can attack from and thus controlling the fight in general. I attempted the first two exercises in the video provided below, which I set up a box and pivoted my feet to change direction. Changing directions allows me open new opportunities to strike and ultimately play the more aggressive role in the fight. The drills were certain not at all difficult, although I did sprain my ankle on the last few due to my weaken Achilles tendon. Reflection: I am currently at the 3rd checkpoint out of 4 in my journey of boxing, yet I finally discovered what footwork was and that was very surprising to me. Fortunately for me, I was able to apply the same mechanics that I had learned in taekwondo to boxing, as in taekwondo, it was very footwork oriented. Another thing that I had discovered was that although boxing is a sport that involves much of one's arms, the footwork is crucial in one's survival in the ring as it offers several forms of maneuverability. This goes to show that I really don't know much about this sport, despite investing half a year into it already, and not only that, this can be applied to the fundamentals of life. If I barely know anything about boxing after dedicating my time into it, wouldn't the same principle be that I don't know anything about life even after spending 16 years in this world. Progress: Although my goal was to spar 5 rounds before I move towards challenging another in a head to head bout, I was nowhere close to be fit enough to even last a single round in the arena. The reason why I haven't been focused on exercising is due to the fact that I have been cramming for each and every of my classes; there is a certain balance between the two. To improve my physical fitness, I integrated running for at least 20 minutes at the gym, followed up with cardio that I learned about by researching about. The specific exercise that I was introduced towards was H.I.T (High Intensity Training), in which one performs a certain exercises for a short interval and exerting all their energy in each activities In doing so, I was able to improve my mile time in general. Due to certain time constraints with tennis and schooling, I was completely exhausted after leaving the gym where I did the H.I.T workout, and going home to a couple hours of gruesome studying and homework had demoralized my motivation to continue this journey. Despite these challenges, I persevered through it all and actually dropped a staggering 8 pounds during my journey(below are my below and after).
Reflection: The moment I embarked on this journey, I believed that the physical aspect was going to be the most challenging part, yet through this week, I discovered that balancing school and this project was extremely difficult. This seemed as a side project, yet now, it simply felt like a burden to complete and there was no end to it. Oddly enough, I still managed to find time to complete such a challenge with my studies piling up, and finally, the concept of time management had been exposed to me with such importance. I was proud of myself to muster up the strength to continue to pursue this dream of boxing because it has been my passion since I was a child. Overall, I believe that this journey has not only strengthened me physically, but instead, it has allowed me to realize that if things get difficult and I quit the second they do, where would I even be in life? Progress - After setting a intense workout routine and a specific diet, I have successfully fulfilled my quarter 2 goals, as I could do 50 push ups without dropping my knees or elbows, although I did assume the downward dog position to rest numerously. Yet, I did not succeed in the mile time for I missed the mark by 11 seconds. More in depth, this week has entirely been based on achieving those goals, and in order to complete it, I challenged myself to the 100 push ups a day challenge. This allowed me to grow stronger each day, until I could 50 push ups in a row, since I only did 20 on my first attempt. Day 1 was the most gruesome, as my shoulders ached for hours on end, and it is really a hassle to massage your shoulders while attempting to read the AMSCO book for AP U.S. History. Proceeding to day 2 to 3, I read articles on how to do more push ups, and it said performing concentrated curl ups creates more bicep resistance, while doing hammer heads develops one triceps muscle. Finally on the fourth day, I thought I did 50 push ups, but my dad told me that I barely scratched 40. The disappointment in myself overwhelmed me, and now I was determined to get the big five and O. To get me through this, the motivation that I held key to mind was that if I gave up on this simple challenge, what really could I do in life then? The last day of the week, day five, I woke up and told myself that I had to do this because there is no stalling in becoming hokage(fit warrior). Immediately, I hit the ground, pushing up and down, as if it is natural human motion. I hear my bones cracking and my heart rate shooting up, yet I closed my eyes and continued to endure the pain. When I counted 50, my body immediately dropped to the floor, in desperation of water and air. Reflection - Looking back at the first semester of my junior year, it feels as if I am a different person than I was during sophomore year, since i have a regulated diet and working schedule to balance out work, school, and the gym. Not only that, but my goal of running under a 9 minute mile has extended over the course of 4 years and the 50 push ups without dropping never even crossed my mind before. Starting at an 11 minute mile and to a 9:11 mile at the end of second semester was incredibly accomplishing for me, but I still felt that I disappointed myself as I set the goal for myself, no one else did. This is not just an achievement for this boxing journey, but instead it is a huge milestone in the journey of life itself. Progress- In the past few weeks, I have physically and mentally readied myself for boxing, yet I did not focus so much on the form and technique, as I previously could not even sustain myself after a few punches. There are many things to take into consideration when one is boxing, such as stance, breathing patterns and many more. Since it seemed like the easiest concept to grasp, I attempted to learn breathing patterns. Many might simply ask, "Isn't breathing a natural process?." Well in this case, there is a way to breathe "correctly," which differs from each and every individual and for in particular, I breathe in through the nose and out through the mouth. Each exhale follows the secession of each punch, making a "hiss" sound at the end. Doing so, allows me to control my breathing throughout a sparring match without under or over exerting my breathe, which is crucial for me to sustain. Additionally as a self-taught boxer, I had to understand what style of a boxer I was: "swarmer," slugger, "out-boxer," or "boxer-puncher." Each style had its own advantages and drawbacks, and it was difficult making a choice between slugger and out-boxer because usually I end a boxing match in one good punch, but at the same time I have the ability to maneuver the ring, pulling in numerous advantages. After a day of analyzing infamous boxer, such as George Foreman(Slugger) and Muhammad Ali(out-boxer), I came to conclusion that I am no where as fast as Muhammad Ali on his feet, so I accepted my role as a slugger. People say that it is "style that defines a boxing fight," and that is entirely true, as there are different positions for slugger for they must hide their ultimate weapon to end off the opponent. A pattern that seems to be prominent among Slugger styled boxers is that they all roll their shoulders to guard their dominant hand, and eventually when the opponent makes a mistake, that is when the knock-out comes in. As seen in the photo, this is when I attempted my supposedly "slugger technique" of keeping my stronger right arm hidden and protecting it with my left shoulder and arm. This allows me to explode with my right arm as I torque my entire body into one predictable, yet deadly shot. Not seen in the image, is that my leftThis is known as the south-paw position, and after reviewing many slugger fighters, this seems to be their main stance instead of the orthodox stance with alternative leg and hands in the front. It may seem very amateur, but that is the basis of a slugger boxer. The infamous boxer, Manny Pacquiao is not a slugger, but he uses the southpaw position to push his advantage for his left hand to explode and I was attempting to recreate that with my right arm.
Reflection - Looking back on how far I have gone with boxing, it is showing how invested I have been with this hobby, as I never really fought anyone with no bars held back. It just seems surprising that I was willing to learn a new style of fighting that I never have known of, instantaneously. While analyzing legends of boxing, I came across the fact that there are select few that have been self-taught, such as Julio Cesar Chavez. This goes to show that if I have enough dedication towards my boxing dream, I can one day surpass my own limits and expectations. Although it is boxing as the subject at hand, this concept applies to my life goals as well, I have been self-teaching myself how to live life; avoid the doubters and strive for your goals. As I step forward with this journey, a realization that I came upon is that there is a cycle of living life, as I am constantly baffled for the things that I have yet discovered in my lifetime and forced to learn them out of my pure ambitions. Repeating itself over and over again, I have come to the conclusion that this so-called cycle is what dictates all of our lives. Progress - All this time, I was worrying about technique and form for boxing, yet I forgot how famous boxers, such as Mike Tyson or Muhammad Ali came to be. Well in order to beat with one's opponent in boxing, an individual must be able to sustain or outlast their opponent, and to do so, it is essential to be in shape to endure such extreme requirements. Following the guidelines of the greatest legends of boxing, I discovered the key factor on why I could not sustain myself in the boxing ring when I attended classes. As a solution, I counted the calories I took and also integrated a workout routine into my daily schedule. In order for the workout to work and for me to lose weight, I had to follow the basis of weight loss: burn more than you consume. At the time, my daily caloric intake was around 2,000 - 2,500, which seemed reasonable as I didn't fill myself with carbohydrates (which are supposedly extremely bad). This meant that I had to burn over 2,250 calories a day, and at first glance, I felt as if I was going to cave in before it even started. Yet I still manage to tweak out a workout that lasted 3 gruesome hours in the gym consisting of alternations between heavy and light weight-lifting and a deadly amount of running in the gym. The specific schedule for my intense workouts are below, but the experience through each exercise really made carved a man out of me literally and figuratively. Even though I wasn't practicing my punches in the gym, it felt as if my arms were somehow lighter and stronger at the same exact time. To test this theory out, I watched the video in blog 3 and compared it to my punches now and without fast forwarding, I could see the clear results from my exercising.
Reflection - In my previous blogs, I mentioned that creating a diet for myself shows maturing within, and the same concept applies to this situation as well. After researching about exercising, I found it to be imperative in our lifestyles, as it gives one a healthy perspective on life. Also, this change has led to a more healthy lifestyle in general, and in my case is very motivating, as before this I hated how I looked. From this point, I found that working out not only helped me sustain more when I was practicing boxing, but also it felt my life had a type of "schedule" to it. Although, this forced me to ended my daily habits of video-games and binges on Netflix to a fixated routine, it allowed me to organize my life in a sense, as nothing would happen accordingly unless approve by myself. Personally, after integrating a work-out routine, everything from schooling to my weight seemed to be improving in varieties of ways that I would never imagine possible. I felt like a changed man, all grown up and ready to face the world. All this happened just because I just needed lose some weight. |
AuthorI am Goldar Luu, and I am trying one of the most dangerous sports: Boxing. Here is the story of my journey. Archives
May 2018
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