Have you seen the stuff bells of steel has? I have a arch nemesis bar and sandbags from them. They are great and have awesome customer service. Anyways, they have racks that have leg curls and seal row pads that you can put on them BUT don’t look like cheap pieces of shit
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I haven’t looked, but I will definitely check it out!
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Freedom lol
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I want to guess where you’re going for grad school…
Hmmm…
Georgetown?
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That’s the plan. I’ll probably apply to a couple of Ivies, and if I get in then that’s gonna change plans a bit, will have to talk it out with the wife if it’s worth it, but Georgetown is pretty much my default lol
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LOVE this post so much. Also didn’t realize you were so young: you’re so squared away. I’m super excited for your future. Being able to lay down roots is HUGE.
To that list, I’d add a reverse hyper, a prowler, quite possibly a yoke (can double as another rack), a log (even if you’re not a strongman, a log is an AWESOME tool for full body strength), a keg and some sandbags.
Oh yeah, and landmines. They go a LONG way for home gyms.
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I think this is like the 5th time in this log someone has made this comment haha. Idk if that means I’m doing well, or if I’m just extremely boring for my age! I’m gonna pretend it means the former, in which case I appreciate the compliment, sincerely.
The Yoke is a great idea! I was thinking about picking up another squat stand so the wife and I could workout at the same time, now I’m thinking that extra stand may be a yoke! All good suggestions here, appreciate the input!
And you get it, there’s such an excitement about being able to lay down some roots. I’ve never really had that, and it’s an exciting prospect. To make things even better, my best friend (whose wedding I met my wife at) is also going to DC with his wife (my wife’s best friend) within a month of us getting out there, so somehow the whole gang is reuniting from around the country in the same spot! Beyond excited for this. I’ve been absolutely grinding really since 2015, doing everything I can to set up the life I want, and it’s all really coming together in 2025. Amazingly satisfying to see all those plans I’ve had since 18 come to fruition
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Man, that’s fantastic. Having a ready to go social network at a new location is a real blessing. I’m so happy for you both.
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Echoing Pwn’s comment, I’m so thrilled for you both. All this stuff is wonderful to hear.
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we have one of these rack attachments at the gym that I use for chest supported rows and I love it. wont take up much room in the gym either.
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Cant second this enough. No gym is complete without sandbags. If you don’t run up and down the road carrying a huge sandbag, How else are you supposed to look alpha in front of the neighbors
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Airdyne too?
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No we are just trying to find ways to torture him. LOL
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08aug24
Bench: 200x5, 200x5, 200x5, 200x5, 200x8
Seated db press: 60x12, 60x10, 60x10
Kroc row: 105x27 (PR)
Lat pulldown: 145x12, 145x9, 130x10
Assisted dip: 120x15, 120x15, 120x15
Conditioning: 4 minutes and quit
Notes:
- realized I wrote the wrong weight last week, all those sets were 195, not 205. Went with 200 today, 205 next week. Plan is 5x5, with the last set going to/close to failure. When I can hit 8 reps, add 5 lbs
- Hit a wall today. The last week of no sleep longer than 3 hours at a time has gotten me walking half dead. Caught up with me hard today. Weights felt sluggish, energy failed halfway through the workout, had nothing in me on those pulldowns. Also noticed a sharp uptick in my temper. Not losing it or anything, but my initial reaction is rage to pretty much an inconvenience, and while I can tamper that pretty immediately, that internal flare up is normally pretty good indicator that my takes running on empty. I think I’ll be able to steal some solid sleep Saturday night, looking forward to that.
- Called it in on conditioning. Just too tired going into it, my heart was hammering with almost no exertion, juice wasnt worth the squeeze today. Will use the extra time to get ahead on some work, maybe fit in a longer session tomorrow.
Replies to follow!
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If I were building the ideal gym - it would most definitely have one of these https://www.nordictrack.com/incline-trainers/commercial-x32i
You can climb a damn mountain in the garage!
Dude that is so awesome. Being able to buy a house in such a high cost of living area at your age is insanely impressive!!! It is easy to forget how ahead you have gotten compared to your peers and how hard you’ve worked for it. Impressive stuff man!
I’m the same age and my fiancee and I have similar income to you guys. The value of having two people in a relationship who earn money also takes off a huge burden. Despite that, I sometimes have to remind myself that even if I am feeling like I need to make more, etc., I am so lucky to be in this position and to continue working hard for the future. Not so easy to remind yourself of those things in the moment.
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11aug24
Deficit deadlift: 135x5, 225x3, 315x3, 355x3, 385x3, 415x3, 435x1
Shrugs: 225x15, 225x10+10 fast-> stripset 135x15
Close stance back squat: 140x10, 140x10, 140x10, 140x12
Single leg hamstring curl: 35x12, 35x12, 35x13
Cable crunch: 80x15, 80x15
Conditioning; 20 min zone 2 bike warmup, 1 hour spin class.
Notes:
- belt loop 15-16
- deficit deads didn’t feel the best. 2 factors there. 1, I absolutely smoked my lower back on the rack pulls over a week ago, and it’s been tender ever since. Better now, but still is tender, and back wasn’t loving the extra ROM. 2, no chalk, slick bars, and I find it hard as hell to strap in on deficit. I have to let my brace out, and kinda kick my knees out to reach the bar. I like deficit a lot more strapless, but Cest la vie.
- You know the one muscle I’ve ever really gave a damn about aesthetically? My traps. You know what muscle I’ve never really spent time hitting directly? Yeah, doesn’t make sense to me either. So, new rule. Any deadlift variation day, I’m doing some shrugs. Now, I need to learn these a bit. 225 felt good, not sure where I need to put the weight. As I have it now, I’m getting a good 4-5 inch range of motion, with a nice little pause at the top. On the dropset, I was just moving the weight, no pause. I realized I could do that for approximately 10 million reps. So not sure if I should ditch the pause and crank the weight, keep the pause and just try to up weight, or keep weight and pause and focus on the muscle. But it’s my first time touching barbell shrugs in years, so I’ll figure it out.
- Upped weight on the back squats, felt good. Doing these still feels a bit odd, I’m just not used to pushing off of my toes, but for some lights up my quads. I’ve got a cold (@jdm135 @taylortooswift the ship hack got me), so worst part about this was snot running down my throat as I was trying to lift. Still, I’ll have until 2025 where this my choice of leg machine, so I plan on getting damn strong on it.
- I’m coming around to the viewpoint that deadlifts are a good exhibit of strength, but maybe not the best builder. I just hit my deadlift PR, after months of not deadlifting. When I was making a lot of progress on deads a little over a year back, I wasn’t pushing deadlifts super heavy, I was pushing my squat and leg press, and deads just came along for the ride. I DO feel like deads build the upper back pretty well, but there are better options for that. RDLs, squats, trap bar variations, and especially good mornings seem to really build the deads. Obviously you need to deadlift if it’s in competitions, but I can see myself only doing lighter deadlifts for form and relying on other exercises to get that brute strength.
- And yes, I fully recognize this is far from an original idea, but it’s taken me a long time to believe it. Largely because I love deadlifts, so I want to believe they are the answer to making everything better. But deadlifts aren’t the answer, they are the solution haha.
- A fellow JO does the weekly spin class, and it’s actually a ton of fun. A ton of the RX sailors go to it, booked to the max every week. She does a great job, legit could be an instructor at soil cycle or something like that. New themes every week, strobe lights, great music, brutal sprints and hills, plus all the JOs are just busting one another’s chops the entire time. It’s great.
- Hard to gauge weight loss underway. Don’t have a scale I trust, and even then you can watch your weight go up and down as the ship rocks, So it’s not the most reliable measure. Also no good mirror to look at myself shirtless (stateroom mirror is small and at an angle where I’d need to like stand against the wall on a chair to see my torso, which I am just not going to do lol), so the eyeball method is a bit out the window. Mainly going off of 2 things. 1) belt loops on lifting belt going down 2) being freaking hungry all the time. The two combined seem like good indicators.
- I got a full nights sleep last night. With the new schedule, I’ll get one night a week where I get to sleep through the night, the rest of my days are split into 2 3ish hour naps before and after a watch. It is amazing how much better I feel after a full nights sleep, just like it’s amazing how run down I am after 6 days of that schedule. I hope I never take good sleep for granted again.
@raven78 you know, I’ve thought a lot about the air bike. I wouldn’t mind it, could use that for zone 2 and HIIT stuff, but my wife loathes it lol, so I don’t want to get something she won’t use. But honestly, idk if it’s “I hate it and won’t use it” or the natural reaction to an air bike of “I fucking hate this thing (proceeds to use it near daily)
@simo74 that attachment looks awesome! I found one that looks pretty similar designed for REP racks, I think I could rig it up with the cables to do some pretty sweet stuff with that!
@stormblessed it’s an awesome spot to be in for sure! Very fortunate with the way things have worked out. I feel you entirely about feeling like you need to do/make more. I’ve said this often before, but I’m not impressed by anything that I am able to do lol. If I can get into a school, then it doesn’t impress me. If I can make X amount or lift however much, then that is no longer impressive to me. It’s been nice, in that it always pushes me to do better, but at some point I gotta stop and smell the roses.
@quadqueen wow, that thing is impressive! Gotta say, I’m saying no expenses spared…. But maybe some expenses spared lol. That bad boy is not cheap! I do want to get a treadmill eventually, but I’d rather get some other cardio equipment first. Mainly just because, I can always run outside, but no way to really do a bike or row without a bike or rower lol
@jdm135 @T3hPwnisher I appreciate y’all’s support, this really is just working out perfectly, and I couldn’t be more pleased
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It’s an awful thing we love to hate indeed. But it makes you work so figure there’s good benefit in the end game from using it… love to loathe it indeed!
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Yup! They are good at finding what’s weak, and then from there we can fix THAT. I like deadlifting one heavy set once a week and spending the rest of the week building up everything else.
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12aug24
Db row: 110x10, 110x10, 110x10, 110x12
Lat pulldown: 145x12, 145x12, 145x11
Single arm lat pulldown: 50x10. 40x13
Seated cable row: 100x15, 100x15, 100x13
Cable curl: 90x10, 90x10, 90x8
Incline Db curl: 20x10, 20x10, 20x8+2.5alt
Hammer curl: 30x12, 30x12, 30x12
Notes:
- slight change of program. Was doing 4x a week upper lower split. Moving to a 5x weekly split. Upper/lower/pull/push/lower. Several reasons for the change.
- One, I don’t think I prioritize back enough. I hit it often, and put some effort into it, but it’s always after some other push movement, never attacking back fresh. Think I would benefit from some more direct back work.
- Two, doing this also allows a true bodybuilding style push day, which I think I’d really benefit from. My bench has always responded best to volume, and the biggest guys always tend to have the best bench. Can’t say that’s true for squat or dead, but I find you can generally spot a big bench. Size seems to matter for that.
- Three, the gym is my one time during the day when I’m just left alone, my time to decompress, and with how works been going (actually amazing for me, but terrible for the collective), I could use some me time.
- 4, I’m a vain bastard. Well not really, but I am starting to care about aesthetics a bit more with the wedding planning, and I wanna make sure I’m looking the part. May even do a legit bodybuilding routine for a few months next year.
- This day felt great tbh. Was able to really push it. Single arm pulldowns are new to me, but holy lat cramp did they smoke me. Also really let me hit biceps a bit, at which point I realized my left arm is way stronger than my right. Weird.
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