Woke up at 430am, tried to get back to sleep, the baby had other ideas, got baby back to sleep and was awake, so drank 3 coffees and read super squats start to finish, what a class book that is.
Also slightly disappointed that I can’t just start the program and bulking right now! Knew that would be the case but I’ve got my plan and I’m going to stick with it and in doing so hopefully avoid injury and get hyooge and slay me a tarrasque.
Though the circumstances were unfortunate, your post gave me such delight. I know the EXACT situation you describe after reading Super Squats. Strossen gets his hooks in you. I had ZERO intention of running the program before reading the book: I was just reading it academically. Once I was done, I was already planning my next Super Squat workout, haha. The healing will be good for you though.
There really is something special about these old school training books that just male you wanna put on your old holey training t shirt and get busy. Can’t wait to follow you along when you do start this.
Absolutely, it really does make me keen to start.
But this needs to come first, as much as I just want to run straight into super squats, getting my back comfortable again and then running BtM will be perfect to acclimatise to the madness to follow. I really am excited about the prospect, whether I’ll be as excited when it comes to actually hitting the work remains to be seen, but head down, do the hard work get the results!
Absolutely, super squats is really just a sales pitch for hard work and eating big, with a stupidly simple program. I love it, looking forward to reading it a few more times before I run it.
10/04/25 - 195.25
Weight isn’t moving, a little bit of up and down fluctuation but I was 195, 3 weeks ago. I’ve got a social event this Friday, which involves food, so that will bump the scales temporarily.
I walked a lot yesterday (daily walk plus a family afternoon out at garden with a big old walk) and have been strict with diet, but I’m getting hungrier and eating bigger portions.
I’m getting to the “end” I don’t particularly want to do this and the results are currently a diminishing return, but I have a plan and there’s only 6 weeks left. I want to look as lean as possible for this cruise even if that makes me feel small (yup in that headspace now).
I’m keeping the goal the goal and getting this done, so one final experiment before giving in and tracking. More frequent meals, I can keep them significantly smaller and deal with hunger knowing that I’ll eat again soon. Two meals down so far - oats, greek yogurt, whey and blueberries, jacket potato and beans.
Training shortly and I’ll probably eat meal 1 again after that. Trying this for a week, then other tools might come out to play - cardio (more than just the daily walking), then tracking.
You will find, on your cruise, that you will be one of the leaner guests on the ship. If you are cruising the sun routes, be sure to get up and get deck chairs. They go fast. The last cruise I was lucky enough to take, I watched a lot of passengers start throwing back the booze. The more they drank, the more they forgot their sun screen. That makes for a miserable trip. Most of all enjoy yourselves!
Love that you’re keeping the goal the goal. Ignoring that siren’s call is key.
On that note
You may not be like me in this regard, but this was a total trap for me. The hypothesis is sound, but here is the null hypothesis: BECAUSE you are hungry and BECAUSE the meals come more frequently, you end up obsessing over when the NEXT meal is coming, because you (falsely) believe that THIS meal will give you relief from the hunger. It ends up not really doing it: it just marks time until the NEXT meal. So rather than the small, frequent meals taking your mind off the hunger because you’re always satisfying it, you end up focusing even MORE on food and hunger because you just can’t wait for that next meal to come.
I’ve gone the opposite with my Maximum Definition Diet: LONG stretches of time between eating, but BIG meals when I do eat. After the meal is done, I don’t think about food for quite a while, because I know the next meal isn’t coming for a while. Robert Sikes, the “Keto Savage” employs a strategy like this when prepping for bodybuilding shows, frequently eating just one meal a day. Far less bandwidth used up on food: you eat your 1 meal and then you go live your life until that next meal comes. And since he’s deep in prep, that one meal is like 1800 calories, which isn’t much for a whole day of eating, but IS pretty big for one meal.
If nothing else, you may have TWO more experiments before giving in and tracking.
10/04/25 - PM
Deadlifts: 60, 100, 120, 140kg x 5, 160, 180kg 1, 190 X f - wasn’t a serious attempt.
160kg:
180kg:
Seated OHP: 40, 60kg x 5, 80kg x 1, 90kg x f, 60kg x 15
A1) wide grip pull-ups: bw, 5, 10, 15kg x 5 - burn out: 8/5/3/1.5*
A2) dips: bw, 5, 10, 15kg x - bw x 20/10/6
A3) sandbag over shoulder: 75kg x 1 x 4 sets - 50kg x 10
Set 4:
I was in 2 minds whether to bother with the 190kg deadlift, so when it didn’t move easily I shut it down. Probably not a great idea going for a PR, on a cut, a month after a back injury - I’ve never been accused of being overly cautious!
The 180 was easy and I’m really happy the form didn’t revert to previous hitching 2 part deadlift monstrosity. The deadlift now feels like a completely different movement, my glutes and hammies get lit up, even just warming up, lower back feels solid the whole way through. I see deadlift PRs falling like dominoes at the back end of this year!
OHP wise that 90kg felt light in hand but was absolutely glued in place haha, seriously why am I trying to set PRs right now - I mean mainly because it’s fun and honestly mentally easier than repping stuff, but still stupid. The 15 reps were hard, shoulders are fried now.
The assistance work just worked up giant set style, the final pull ups I went with wide grip, dropped into chin up, dropped into neutral grip, into angled neutral. Then took a breather before rest pausing the dips and just going ham on the lighter sandbag. Killer way to finish what was ultimately a pretty lazy session.
I agree with all of this, for what it’s worth. When i’m losing weight, i definitely do better with eating fewer meals. Less opportunity to fuck up and eat too much, for a start.
Huh, didn’t even think about that, but that’s an excellent point. Rounding errors get compounded with increased frequency, kinda like what they were going for in “Office Space”.
Of course, I can also see the one big meal turning into a one BINGE meal, or the one big meal becoming part of multiple meals in the day (“I already had my one meal, but then I got invited out to dinner” sorta thing), but I suppose it goes to show the multiple pitfalls.
This actually has me thinking about something else: the notion that willpower is a finite resource. Maybe it’s easier to avoid the temptation to overeat at the one big meal since you only have to do it one time, vs having to fight that gremlin at the multiple meals.
Horses for courses. Some people LIKE counting and tracking to avoid all this, haha.
For me, i dislike counting but it serves as a decent substitute when my willpower is lacking.
@T3hPwnisher I’ve mixed it up over the last 3 months and gone for 2 meals for a reasonable stretch (with greek yogurt and whey mixed together as a 1 or 2 a day snack, usually bed times and if needed bridge for lunch and dinner). I think I’ve reached the point where my metabolism has dropped and my ability to overeat even healthy foods is now undermining my efforts. This could be rectified with some fairly sensible portion control, or tracking.
I’m still at the point of doing this for an experience and experiment, trying to do it instinctively rather than by measuring.
I feel like the two meal solution might be better suited to carnivore/keto, I’m thinking my high(er) carb intake leads me to greater feelings of hunger more rapidly and then I get to the meals and eat very large portions.
I’m not going low carb in this experiment, but might do in future runs (I’ve always done badly on it in the past, but my recent nutritional changes have me suspecting I can do it and do it significantly better) - so my current thinking is to try this approach as it’s one I’ve not tried on a cut before and see how it goes.
Definitely, and actually the more I think about it the more I think I’ll not give in to counting - for the simple fact that I could just stop eating quite such large portions and still get the results so why not just exercise some self control.
As a side note I think the large portion have been an attempt by me to ensure I don’t lose muscle, which is fine, and has worked well this far, but the goals the goal here and I do want another 5-7lbs before the end of May. Be interesting to see how this experiment impacts.
What’s your sweet spot for number of meals and what’s your go to macro emphasis carbs or fats?
I heard something about this not too long ago, that this is true, but only if you believe it to be so. I realise that sentence sounds a little matrix-esk but it was on a podcast with some sort of expert and they phrased it much better. (It’s a vague memory unfortunately, but the principle stuck).
What works for me, in terms of sustainability and ease is either 2 meals a day or 1 meal and protein shakes, depending on how early in the day i have to do difficult things. I’d rather not do protein shakes, but I always end up defaulting to it for ease.
In terms of macros, i aim for roughly 180g protein as a minimum, and 70g fat as a minimum (i would like more, but find it more difficult) but those are both very much eyeballed from using basically the same diet on and off for years.
I don’t think my diet is even close to optimal, but i do know that it works for me, with my lifestyle, indefinitely.
This is definitely a Dan John thought, and one of the reasons i use the diet above, its minimising the willpower i need to use.
11/04/25 - 193
A downward fluctuation, but not getting ahead of myself here, social event tonight, it’ll be make your own wood fired pizzas so it’ll almost certainly bump back up tomorrow.
I could not eat at the event, but honestly I’m not aiming for stage ready, as @Friedrich said - I’ll already be one of the leanest people on the cruise (thanks for the other tips!) and I’m quite happy that I can do these sort of things that add to a joyful life, and lose fat, even if not as fast as humanly possible.
Picking stuff up:
Bulgarians: BW, 10, 20, 30, 40kg x 4 (DBs per hand)
Stole the idea from @simo74’s log with the foot rest:
Worked a treat, BSS suck big time and that’s going to cost me some serious DOMs tomorrow, even BW felt bad enough.
Sandbag over bar: 75kg x 11 reps
(Muted because YouTube rules about faintly hearing some low quality sounding offspring for more than 60 seconds is simply outrageous and unacceptable - soon everybody will be listening to my clip instead of buying records and the whole industry will collapse!)
Trap bar shrugs with 2 second pause: 68, 108, 128kg x 6, 148kg x 8 - no pauses and body English.
Chest supported rows: 30kg x 10, 15/7/5 - Rest pause
Done.
I’ve done a fair amount of pressing recently, and didn’t want to push too much harder on anything lower back, so went for quad focus with low loading, clearly sandbags aren’t taxing on the lower back…ok just wanted to do something heavyish and “explosive” didn’t know what I had in mind so just kept going until it felt like a good place to stop.
Shrugs, because I don’t have a particularly well developed back, full stop, but traps, always need more traps.
Rows - is there ever enough rows?!
This was a slow moving session it’s hot, I didn’t really need to train so just an odds and sods session, no purpose but just to train something (as per my current protocol of just doing stuff - which is a nice mental break from programming, I have nothing I “have” to hit just doing stuff that I want to, yes even the Bulgarians).
This has been the goal of my most recent fat loss as well. Lose the fat: don’t lose humanity. Being able to still feast with the family on weekends while leaning out is winning.
(Muted because YouTube rules about faintly hearing some low quality sounding offspring for more than 60 seconds is simply outrageous and unacceptable - soon everybody will be listening to my clip instead of buying records and the whole industry will collapse!)
This is, no joke, why I started training to 8-bit video game soundtracks for a long time. And my youtube audience loved it! Haha.
Regarding the willpower discussion, it’s definitely an interesting turn of events. IF willpower is a finite resource, we still have to acknowledge that some folks simply have MORE of it than others. David Goggins running some 100 mile race has GOTTA be using more total willpower than Debbie from accounting who made it a whole day without eating a donut. Begs the question of if our reserves can be built up.
I find that, often, habits replace willpower. Eventually, you develop the habit of turning down the donut so much that eating one just “feels” off. Not in a guilty sense, but in an “out of sorts” sense. “Being that which does”: I am the one who does not eat the donut.
Awesome work Alex, they were solid reps at 40KG. The look on your face at the end was Quality.
i like your thinking
Because you are on the verge of becoming a real man, that’s why.
Morning weight - 194.5
Yup, the only pressure I have to lose fat is a cruise, which if we’re honest I’ll probably be in the top 5% if not 1-2% of leanest patrons. If I were going today I’d be happy with the results, I’ve got 5 weeks left to polish off the last little bit, I can definitely relax when something worthwhile comes up.
This is where the long term slow cut shines, that and truly changing habits. I’m like you in the lamb/dog kibble department for all of my meals, I can’t say I’ve had a single meal which felt like a chore, or just eating to fuel.
The only “deprivation” I’ve noticed is basically just having to be an adult when it comes to cheese and I’m definitely looking forward to gaining again - cheese will help that 1.5lbs of beef mince go down a treat! Habit wise, I no longer crave sugar, could I eat it sure, I ate a little bit at my social event (a quick Google reveals 12g for a premade meringue nest - which was topped with strawberries and cream - Eton mess), but it just doesn’t hold the same call anymore.
One of my food joys is my new pudding - a scoop of chocolate whey and half a pot of greek yogurt, with blueberries, this is something I really look forward to and get to the end of wanting more - so much so that I’ve now started my day with porridge and this added to it, which is also awesome (in my current eating smaller more frequent experiment I end up eating this twice because it’s a quick easy go to, and I feel like a hobbit - second breakfast, which for the Tolkien purists out there is actually heretical because it’s more like elevenses, but then can you even call it elevenses if you didn’t have second breakfast?).
Haha I love the soundtrack on yours, not sure I could cope with training to it personally, although the C&C soundtrack is probably PR material!
Which is exactly where this longer slower cut has brought me. To the point where I’m thinking of bulking and my thoughts aren’t of binging crazy foods, but just adding some more cheese and not holding back on the portions - and I’m really looking forward to it!
Haha, a picture paints a thousand words, Bulgarians are legit, they’re one of those exercises that you just instinctively feel are going to be awesome for you. Thanks for the inspiration, they’ll definitely be a regular with that set up, made it so much more manageable.
I’m still at the point where I don’t feel I have “weak points” just all of me is weak - but no one ever said their back was too big or too strong, and I definitely want a massive back.
Haha feels like I need to start a thread - you’re not a real man until you can put 2 plates overhead (strictly).
Strong stuff, mate! Seems like the back is doing well again or well enough at least, haha.
One thing about Super Squats: Make sure your back is 100 % before going at it.
Yea I think that’s where it’s at, not 100% recovered, but functionally fine.
Yup for sure - I’m about 13 weeks away from starting it, and will have first taken on building the monolith, so 20 reps squats once a week, so hopefully that will mean I’m fully recovered and acclimated to higher rep squats.
