5/1/2020
Workout 20 of 10,000 KB swing challenge
DONE!!!
swings only: 500 swings in 20:54.
Very happy with the time improvement, just above half of my very first time.
Obvious grip strength and endurance improvement, conditioning improvement.
So much of life has changed during this challenge, unrelated to the exercise, that causal links aren’t clear; but I feel strong and athletic, and my wife says I look bigger and more muscular than ever before. I can see about the same amount of abs as right before my beach trip at end of February despite eating everything in sight every day.
What’s next?
5/2
100 50lb goblet squats in 9:35, done as 10x10 EMOM.
5/3 Sunday.
Off day, yard work.
Incredibly sore from yesterday’s goblet squats, that wasn’t supposed to happen!
I’ll need to do more of those.
5/4
I want a baseline number for my pushups and pullups, so I started with this:
Max pullups 16
2 min rest
Half of max pullups 8
2 min rest
Max pushups 46
2 min rest
Half of max pushups 23*
2 min rest
*had to break that set with 10 seconds rest after number 15. Could barely go on. Wiped me out!
Next: 110 50lb goblet squats, 10 emom.
This completely wiped me out, I was sucking air the whole time!
Later: 10x10 kb high pulls. Distributed around breakfast and household chores.
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5/5 Tuesday
Warmup: 25 kb swings
Work: 120 goblet squats in 11:28, doing 10 EMOM.
3x20 flexion rows (same 50lb kb).
Neck stuff.
Amazingly the goblet squats were easier today than the 2 previous sessions of 100 and 110! Despite the fact that my legs are still sore. I’ll take tomorrow off and hit em again in a couple days, may try for more minutes or more per set.
The flexion rows are goofy, but it really burned in my erectors, which is the point.
Neck stuff: didn’t feel effective. Was lying with my head off the end of the couch doing nods at various angles.
Pecs and lats sore from yesterday. I’ll get back to them soon. Goal for the next few days is to improve pushups and pullups, using the same technique I’ve been doing with goblets.
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Great job dude! Looks like a killer workout
Thanks. TBH I was inspired to go this direction when I looked at your log and realized a single murph would explode my elbows and heart. I’ll bring pushups, pullups and squat volume up before attempting one.
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5/6 Wednesday
Easy day to let my legs recover.
50 pullups: 5 EMOMx10.
106 pushups: 10 EMOMx10, upped it to 12 on the last 3 sets because it was too easy.
Short run with the dog.
5/7 Thursday
Serious workout today. Planned to do 13 rounds of EMOM goblet squats, ended up doing 15 rounds. That’s a real improvement from last Sunday, when i was sucking air doing just 10 rounds.
So:
2x25 swings to warm up
150 Goblet squats (50lb) in 14:28, 15 rounds of 10 EMOM.
5x5 ab wheel from knees
5x5 pullups
5x3 (each arm) kb press
5x10 KB high pulls
5/8 Friday
Progressed the goblet squat workout further by increasing reps per set.
Warmup: swings, 2x25
120 goblet squats: 10 sets of 12 EMOM
Pullups: 6 sets of 5 EMOM
Pike Pushups: 3x10
Pushups: 3x20 (ow! Serious burn in the chest at the end)
Flexion rows with KB: 3x20
5/9/2020
Split squats, 50lb, 5x10 each side
Pushups, 4x20
Pullups, 7 sets of 5 EMOM
I’ll take tomorrow off from legs, then progress the split squats. Many possible directions to progress it: reduced rest (could go EMOM), more reps or sets, or RFE. Probably going to use RFE, then progress from there.
Once the pullups hit 8x5 I’ll go to more reps per set.
14 hours post-workout and I already feel the DOMS setting in in my glutes.
5/10 Sunday
5x5 bodyweight split squats just to work out the soreness
3 rounds of: superman 60 seconds, 10 hollow-rocks.
5x20 pushups
8x5 pullups EMOM, supinated grip
The pushups felt easier, getting to 20 each time was faster than before. I’ll continue adding sets, then at some point I’ll go to 25 reps/set.
The pullups were fine as always, but I started to feel my elbows get cranky. I’ll take tomorrow off from these and do rows instead. When I come back to pullups I’ll move to sets of 6.
Tomorrow will involve 50lb split squats, 50lb rows, 50lb press, pike pushups.
5/11 Monday
10x10 50lb split squats, 10 EMOM. Brutal but kinda cool.
5x10 50lb rows, feet on floor, off-hand on couch.
5x5 single-arm KB press, stabilizing/assisting with off-hand.
3x10 pike pushups.
The split squats felt like a big deal considering 8 days ago, 10x10 goblet squats with the same weight made me sore for days. I went for it - every minute do 10 on one leg, the next minute do 10 on the other leg, until 10x10 total - and was surprisingly not completely destroyed by it.
The rows identified a weakness - I need to do them more, I was feeling some tightness I’ve never felt with rows before – but I haven’t really done much rowing since the gyms shut down.
Then I think the shoulder stuff was a bad idea, felt like I tweaked something on the right side.
I should use my wife’s 20lb DBs and do lateral raises for a bit, I think.
5/12 Tuesday
200 pushups in about 20:00:
10x20 around E2MOM, not exactly though.
60 pullups: 10 sets of 6 EMOM*
3x10 single arm kb rows
3x20 kb high pulls.
*kids woke up before the last minute of pullups, adding some delay. Just as well because I could not have done the last set without more rest.
Subsequent exercises had tons of “rest” in between parenting activities.
Edit to add: Glutes feel like two inflamed oranges!
Thought I’d log my food for the day too.
I pretty much eat whatever I want all the time. I tend to be too skinny instead of too fat so I don’t worry about it too much, but the past few months I’ve been focusing on eating a lot more protein. This week I’m reducing my carbs a bit too, mainly by eliminating certain breakfast bread items.
So far today:
Wake up 5:15. One cup of coffee, with a spoonful of sugar, dash of cinnamon, and splash of coconut milk.
7:00: Breakfast time. Big portion of breakfast sausage, 4 scrambled eggs with a spoonful of maple syrup (makes eggs taste great BTW). Cup of tea with two spoonfuls of sugar and a spoonful of creatine.
3/4 cup of greek yogurt (the FAJE 5% kind, which has some fat but tastes like sour crap) with a spoonful of sugar.
9:30: Protein shake. 2 scoops ON whey. More to follow! Hope I can keep up for today. I have no intention of logging food regularly, it’s just more trouble than it’s worth for me personally.
Edit to add: 12:00 Lunch!
1/2 lb lean ground beef (96/4 lean); 3/4 cup of pasta-with-red-sauce. Dessert: a moderate portion of ice cream!
Afternoon: a couple more cups of tea with sugar
4:00 pm: one beer.
6:00: another half-pound of beef with 3/4 cup pasta-and-red-sauce
Bowl of cereal
7:00 Link of chicken sausage
7:30 Cake and ice cream LOL
5/13
Awoke feeling totally beat up. The glute soreness is painful while rewarding at the same time. My chest is now also tender from the pushups. No lat soreness interestingly.
But I’ve tweaked something in my lower back. Possibly because of my glutes just “giving up” all day yesterday, I noticed I was bending down incorrectly. So I’m just going to walk a mile around the neighborhood and call it an off day.
Put yesterday’s food log into Excel and did my best at gathering all the nutrition facts. There’s some margin of error, and the fat/carbohydrate/calorie numbers may be on the high side, because I estimated portions for some items. But here are my totals from yesterday, which I felt was a fairly normal day, give or take:
- Protein: 235 g
- fat: 127 g
- carbs: 275 g
- alcohol: 14 g
- Calories: 3318
At 180-185lbs, looks like I should up the protein a little bit. Calories are about right for maintenance or gain; I’ve been adding muscle mass (I believe LOL!) so I’m not too worried about that.
So it looks to me like I should choose leaner meats (instead of sausage) and eat more of that, and less sweet snacks.
5/14 Thursday
Warmup 2x25 kb swings
Legs: 10x10 split squat with 50lb KB, EMOM+ (100 reps each leg, 18:54 total time)
— Do one leg one minute, other leg the next minute; at the end, I powered through a couple sets thus the shorter time. Was absolutely devastating, but its my second time doing this so I suspect (hope) the soreness will be less severe.
Pushups: 15 EMOM for 10 minutes – 150 pushps in 9:27. This is a faster pace than last time, when I did 20 E2MOM, but less total volume. It was a true struggle to get to 15 on the last 3 sets. Chest was made from jelly at the end.
Pullups: Goal was 7 EMOM for 10 minutes. I came close:
5 sets of 7, supinated grip.
1x7, neutral grip.
1x3, pronated.
1x7, supinated.
1x4, supinated.
1x7, supinated.
63 pullups total in 9:20. Not terrible. I’ve been switching grip between pronated-only and supinated-only every workout but today I found switching them during the workout allowed me to keep going longer.
So I’m totally wiped but I feel I’m getting 2/3 of the strength portions of a Murph in roughly double the time it takes @kleinhound so I’m getting closer! Some day perhaps I’ll get there!
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