20-Week Rebuild Block

1. Resting heart rate (optional). Before getting out of bed, lie still for a minute. Put two fingers on the inside of your wrist, below the thumb. Count the beats for 30 seconds on your phone's stopwatch and double it. If you wear a watch that tracks it, use its resting heart rate figure instead.
2. Body weight. After the toilet, before eating or drinking, in underwear. Scales on a hard floor, not carpet. Enter it as stones then pounds with a space, so 14 st 6 lb goes in as 14 6.
3. Waist. Stand relaxed and breathe out normally. Wrap the tape round your middle at the level of your belly button, level all the way round, snug but not pressing in. Read it at the end of the out-breath. Do it twice and use the average.

1. Warm-up, 8 minutes. 5 minutes easy on the bike, 10 bodyweight squats, 10 slow two-leg calf raises. No stretching.
2. Single-leg sit-to-stand. Use a bench where your thighs are about level when sitting. Sit near the front edge with arms crossed on your chest. Put the test foot flat on the floor, just under the knee. Lift the other foot off the floor and hold that leg out in front. Stand up fully on the one leg, then sit back down slowly until your backside just touches the bench. That's one rep. No rocking, bouncing or dropping down. Stop when the other foot touches the floor, you have to use your arms, you drop onto the bench, or you can't stand. Rest 2 minutes, then the other leg.
3. Calf raise, knee straight. Barefoot or in flat trainers, on the flat floor. Face a wall with your fingertips on it for balance only, no pushing. Stand on the test leg with the other foot lifted behind you. Keep the knee straight. Rise as high as you can, then lower the heel back to the floor. One second up, one second down, no pauses. On the first rep, note where your eyes line up on the wall. Stop when you can't get back to that line, the knee bends, you stop to rest, or anything hurts. Start with the leg that wasn't injured. Rest 2 minutes, then the other leg.
4. Calf raise, knee bent. Rest 2 minutes after the straight-knee test, then the same set-up and counting. Bend the test knee slightly, about as far as you would to start sitting down, and keep it bent that much the whole time. Your eye line will be lower, so note it again on the first rep. Both legs, 2 minutes' rest between.
5. Push-ups. Hands a little wider than your shoulders, body in a straight line from head to heels. Put a rolled-up towel under your chest and lower until your chest touches it, then push back to straight arms. Count until your hips sag or you can't reach the towel. If full push-ups are too hard, do them from your knees and write "k" after the number. Use the same version every time.
6. Plank. Forearms on the floor, elbows under the shoulders, up on your toes, body straight. Start the stopwatch. Stop when your hips sag or lift noticeably, or you can't hold any longer. Write down the seconds.
7. Rower, 2,000m. Rest 5 minutes first. Set the damper lever to 4 or 5. Strap your feet in so the strap goes over the widest part of the foot. On the monitor, choose a 2,000m distance piece (on most gym rowers: Select Workout, then Standard List, then 2000m). Each stroke: push with the legs, lean back slightly, then pull the handle to your lower ribs. Return in reverse order: arms, body, then legs. Start comfortably hard, hold that pace, and empty the tank over the last 500m. Write down the final time, for example 8:45.
8. Cool down. 5 minutes easy on the bike, then enter everything in the table above.

If something hurts during a test, stop, write down the reps you managed, and keep going with the other tests if they don't hurt. If the gym has no rower, tell Claude and the test will be swapped for a bike test.

• Legs: quads (leg press, split squat, step-down, leg extension, step-up), hamstrings (Romanian deadlift, hamstring curl), glutes (hip thrust, step-up), calves (three calf exercises twice a week), shins (tibialis raise), inner thigh (Copenhagen plank), outer hip (side-lying leg raise at home).
• Back: lats (pulldowns), mid-back (rows), traps (shrugs, farmer's carry), lower back (back extension, Romanian deadlift), rear shoulders (face pull).
• Chest and shoulders: chest (bench press), upper chest (incline press), front shoulders (shoulder press), side shoulders (lateral raise).
• Arms: biceps (curl), outer arm and forearm (hammer curl), triceps (pushdown, overhead extension), grip (farmer's carry).
• Core: abs and hip flexors (hanging knee raise, cable kneeling crunch, plank), obliques (side plank, cable woodchop, Pallof press).

• Effort: weeks 1–3, finish each set with 2–3 reps in the tank while you learn the movements. From week 5, 1–2 reps in the tank, and the last set of upper-body exercises can go to failure.
• Intervals mean hard: the hard parts of bike, rower and swim intervals should leave you unable to talk. That is where the fitness comes from.
• What stays controlled: calf loading, hopping and running distance. They follow the plan exactly, however good you feel. Pushing those early is how the last five years of injuries happened.
• Add weight when you reach the top of the rep range on every set with good control. Go up by the smallest jump available.
• Tempo on calf raises: about 2 seconds up, a 1-second pause at the top, 3 seconds down. No bouncing.
• Morning-after check: if a calf or knee is sorer or stiffer the next morning, repeat last week's weights and skip any hopping that day.
• During a set: mild discomfort (up to about 3 out of 10) is fine if it settles. Anything sharper, stop that exercise for the day.
• Weeks 4, 11 and 16 are lighter: same exercises, one fewer set on each, same weights. These are planned recovery weeks that keep the strength building.
• Missed days: if you can only manage some sessions in a week, do Tuesday and Friday first. They carry the calf and knee work.
• Never stretch the calf hard before or after the heavy calf days. Gentle mobility is fine.

A lighter (deload) week every ~6 weeks, and a retest checkpoint each quarter.

• First two weeks: shorter games or fewer minutes, and one game a week.
• Keep one lower-body session a week with the calf exercises in it. For good.
• Warm up before every game with pogo hops (2 × 20s) and 4 strides building up in pace.
• Any break of two weeks or more: do one or two runs with strides and accelerations before the next game.
• Don't start a new stretching or strength routine in the week before a game.

• Protein at every meal: eggs, Greek yogurt, chicken, fish, lean mince, beans or lentils. Roughly a palm-sized portion or more. It keeps you full and protects muscle while you lose weight.
• Half the plate vegetables or salad at lunch and dinner.
• Cut the extras before the meals: alcohol, biscuits, crisps, sugary drinks and grazing in the evening are where the easy calories are.
• Go steady: around 1 lb a week is enough. Losing faster tends to cost strength, which is the opposite of what this block is for.
• Christmas: aim to hold your weight over weeks 8–9 rather than lose. Pick up again in January.
• Weigh in once a week, same day and time. Judge the trend over a month, not single readings.