Atlas13 Burning the Boats

Training Logs
121

Work for today:

Bench: 205x5, 215x5, 225x5, 210x5, 210x5

Inc DB bench: 70x10, 70x8, 70x6

HS bench: 90x12, 90x11, 90x9, 90x8

BB curl: 80x5, 90x5, 100x3+2 cheating like a mofo, 90x5

Cable curl: 37.5x10, 37.5x10, 37.5x11

Reverse cable curl: 22.5x12, 22.5x12, 22.5x12

Notes:

Good workout today, felt in the zone the whole time. Moved my grip in a tad on bench, makes it feel a bit better on my still somewhat fragile pec. Never timed my rest periods before. I’m realizing that if I don’t watch the clock, I tend to rest about a minute max in between sets. I think slowing down and giving some more recovery time between sets may do me good. Also, never done heavy low rep barbell curls before. Kind of like it, biceps are always boring to train but moving something somewhat heavy makes it more interesting

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122

Weight: 249.6
Work for today:

Squats: 135x5, 185x3, 225x3, 265x2, 305x5, 305x5, 305x4

RDL: 135x5, 225x8, 225x8, 225x8

Hack squat: 110x10, 110x10, 110x10, 110x10

Dumbell RDL: 45x12, 45x12, 50x12

Notes:

  1. Squats felt… meh. Okay, but not great. I’m really losing a lot of tightness when I get low, about right at parallel I get butt wink pretty bad and just feel no power. Cutting it a little higher helps, still trying out to figure out the line between ATG and squatting too high. Learning to cut at parallel is a work in progress.

  2. Gym was crazy, crazy busy, so hack squats replaced the planned leg press, and dumbbell RDL replaced hamstring curls. Not ideal but working with what I could get to.

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123

Work for Today:

Seated overhead Press: 45x20, 95x6, 135x5, 145x5, 145x5, 155x4

Lateral raise: 20x12, 20x12, 25x10, 25x9

Lat raise machine: 60x15, 60x15, 60x13

Rear delt cable row: 70x15, 70x12, 70x11

Dips: 5, 5, 5

V bar pushdown: 70x12, 77.5x12, 77.5x12

Rope overhead extension: 40x15, 40x15, 40x12

Notes:

  1. First time ever doing seated overhead. Love hate relationship there. I feel it much more in my delts than with standing, and it doesn’t allow me to lean back as much as I tend to standing. However, on the platform we have for it, it is just plan difficult to take the bar out to start the set. Rack positions are too far forward in front, and too far behind in back. I settled with unracking the bar standing, then sitting down, and then starting my set. Kind of throws off the start of the set, still toying with finding a better way. Still, I like the movement overall.

  2. Lat raise machine is new. I like it, can really isolate my delts.

  3. Dips suck at 250, and I could definitely feel the Christmas ham from yesterday… still all in all felt good

124

At 230lbs and weak, I feel your pain. I just can’t find a comfortable position where it doesn’t feel like my shoulders are about to blow out.

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125

Work for today:

Lat pulldown: 50x10, 100x5, 139x3, 165x8, 180x8, 195x7, 165x9

Barbell row: 165x6, 165x6, 165x6, 165x6

Hs row: 200x12, 200x12, 200x12

One arm cable row: 30x15, 30x15, 40x15, 40x15

Notes:

  1. Lat pulldowns felt good, going to switch these out with pull-ups as body weight drops

  2. Barbell row felt awful like all barbell rows do. Going to continue banging my head against the wall with this movement until it feels good

  3. One arm cable row actually felt amazing, could get a very intense contraction in my lat. not really a heavy weight type of movement, but I figure the contraction at the end of the workout has to be good for me

126

Work for Today:

Bench: 205x5, 220x5, 225x5, 215x5, 215x5

Inc DB bench: 70x10, 70x9, 70x6

Fly machine: 80x12, 80x12, 80x12, 70x12

Barbell curl: 90x5, 90x5, 90x5, 90x5

Cable curl: 40x10, 40x10, 40x12

Reverse cable curl: 25x12, 25x12, 25x12

Notes:

  1. Bench is finally starting to feel good again, feeling like I can push myself without having my pec give out

  2. Really digging low rep barbell curls, seems like the move for building bicep strength

  3. Cable curls remain the best all around biceps move I have ever tried

127

Pics for the start of the new year. Well, guess there’s only room for progress

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2 Likes
128

This is a really good place to be starting. You look like you have a decent amount of muscle underneath that fluff. Now its time to focus on cleaning up the diet and being consistent and you will do great in 6 months.

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129

We’re in the same fatness ballpark, excited to see your progress for the transformation.

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130

Back from vacation, work for today:

DB overhead press: 60x9, 60x9, 60x9

Lat raise: 15x12, 15x12, 20x12, 25x10, 20x13

Plate front to overhead raise: 25x12, 25x12, 35x8

Rear delt fly: 10x12, 10x12, 10x15

Notes:

  1. Sick as hell, could hardly breath through the workout. Wife’s family had some little kids around for the holidays, and I swear they carry the plague

  2. Limited equipment due to lifting on ship, but made it work

131

So, yesterday I returned from a 5 month deployment. First deployment, spent most of it in 5th fleet getting harassed by Iranians. (We made the news, that was cool).

During those 5 months, the gym onboard our ship was closed for 4 of them. No pull-up bar, no weights, no nothing. I could run, and do body weight movements (no pull up bar) and that was about the summary of my working out for the past 4 months. Nutrition was a joke, but I did what I could with protein powder.

All in all, starting from a pretty rough spot. I feel weaker and fatter then when I left, although idk if my weight has really changed much. Working on finding a new gym out in San Diego while covid restrictions are still in place, and really trying to hit the ground running on my fitness ASAP.

132

Welcome back. Sucks not to train but glad your deployment went OK. Time to get back into a gym and kick ass.

133

Went to a new gym today. Very serious powerlifting gym out in San Diego. Technically a “lifting club” rather than a gym, I guess it’s all run as a non-profit. Met the guys, the want me to lift their for a week or so, then there’s an interview process and the members take a vote. The exclusivity of it excites me honestly, everyone seems really close, looks like a great group to work with.

So, that being said, took today to establish new baselines. First time in 5 months I’ve done anything besides pushups, sit-ups, lunges, air squats. 5 months of crap nutrition and not enough sleep, no weights, not as much mobility as I should of done. Was curious to see how far back I dropped, but damn was it disheartening to see. None of these were true maxes, went to the point where I couldn’t get any heavier without form breakdown, and called it there.

Squat: 135x5, 185x3, 225x2, 265x1, 295x1, 315x1

Bench: 135x5, 185x3, 205x1, 225x1, 235x1

Dead: 135x5, 225x3, 275x2, 315x1, 365x1, 385x1

Hit some light lat pulldowns and got the hell out.

Not at all happy with my strength, my deadlift seems to have taken the worst hit of all, which I wasn’t expecting. This gym is pretty hard core, and I am freaking fired up to work, so I fully intend to get these numbers moving ASAP.

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134

Work for today:

Bench: 135x5, 185x5, 195x5, 205x4, 165x8, 135x9

Superset:
Lat pulldown: 90x15, 140x9, 140x7
Db overhead Press: 35x15, 50x6, 50x7

Db row: 80x10, 80x10, 80x9

Lat raise: 15x15, 20x12, 20x12

Ez curl: 45x15, 55x12, 65x8

Notes:

First real workout back. Did not feel good. Conditioning is trash, weights moved slow. Need to get back into my routine

135

This is to be expected. Give it a few weeks of consistency and you’ll be smashing it.

136

Buckle Up: long post ahead.

My last post marks my last time hitting the gym prior to today. Lots of factors went into that, none that I am happy about. I started this log in the beginning of 2020, and holy hell did the year not go as planned. Let’s break it down:

  • I was supposed to leave for a 5-6 week underway in the beginning of 2020, and besides that had about another month at sea planned in the schedule for 2020. It is now March 2021, and since I left mid January 2020, I have spent a grand total of 7 non-consecutive weeks on land. Was out for about 5.5 months, and ever since it’s been 6-10 weeks gone, few days home, repeat. Deployments, extensions, trainings, you name it. Everything that could go wrong with the schedule did, with the result being me spending over a year at sea since Jan 2020.

  • Now, being at sea is rough by itself. Not terrible, but it ain’t easy in the best of times. With COVID? Absolute shitshow. The limited gym onboard the ship was closed by mid-February 2020, and has yet to re-open. Which means for the vast majority of my last year, I have been on a ship with no gym. On top of that, due to COVID precautions, we have gone through multiple months where PT was actually not allowed, with the reasoning being it would increase our chance of spreading COVID. (We’ve had several bad outbreaks). So limited body weight work has been happening, but that’s pretty much the extent of my last year.

  • Recovery (if you can call it that without working out) and Nutrition have been garbage. When at sea, I average about 4-5 hours of sleep a day, with 3 hour days not being uncommon. Not uninterrupted sleep, generally broken into 2 2ish hour naps. Couple that with nothing but ship food which is carb and fried food heavy. Not exactly the perfect mix for health.

  • Stress has been high. To be honest, it’s been a rough year, and I’ve struggled. Some normal for my line of work. Being away from home for so long, high stress job, very toxic command climate, family getting COVID while I was overseas, lots of things that just add up. Tough, but part of the job.

  • But I also lost a sailor this year. Good kid, was obviously struggling, and I tried everything I could think of to get him the help he needed. Filed all the proper reports, told everyone I was supposed to, tried every channel I could to get him some serious medical help, but my command just wouldn’t budge. “A sailors place is at sea” and all that crap, they thought he would get over it. Blew his brains out the week we got home from an underway. That hit me hard. I felt like I failed him as an officer, failed as a leader. The situation got big and ugly, senior officers canned, investigations, all sorts of crap that I won’t get into here. I ended up carrying around a lot of guilt, really changed me as a person. A lot of work has me in a better headspace, I’ve come to realize that I did all I could, that it’s not my fault… but it’s still hard.

This all sounds pretty rough. And yeah, it was a shit year. But it’s made me appreciate some things, so I want to take a moment to give voice to all of the good things I have going on.

  • My wife is amazing. Seriously, she is my rock. It’s been a hell of a year, and she has taken it like a champ. I uprooted her from her small Midwest town, moved her to San Diego, then promptly left her on her own throughout a freaking pandemic, and she took everything in stride. From crushing it at work, taking care of herself physically, keeping the romance alive even as we are oceans apart, to helping me work through some of my struggles this past year, she is absolutely the best part of my life. I didn’t make many good decisions as a 16 year old, but taking her on our first date was definitely one of my all time best moves.

  • Careers are going well. My wife and I bring in a good income, and managed to put a pretty substantial amount into investments last year. She is crushing her career while pursuing and MBA, and I am hitting all the markers to make me stand out on my fitrep while setting myself up well for my post-Navy career.

  • I have two big ass dogs who still freak out every time I come home.

  • I didn’t lose any family to Covid. Multiple people have gotten sick, but everyone has pulled through, and for that I’m very grateful.

So, where to go from here? Moving forward:

  • I am fat and weak. That’s just the honest truth, and there is no point sugar coating it. I’ve gotten away with carrying some extra weight at times in the past because I carry it well, and my athletic background allowed me to justify myself still being in shape. So what if I weighed 240 if I could still hit a 7min mile. But not now. I’m fat, I haven’t trained seriously in a year, I just feel weak and lethargic. Energy levels are down, stairs are hard, and belts are tight.

  • I have very limited gym access. I am not actually allowed to go to a gym period, Covid restrictions have me basically allowed to be at work or home with no where In between. My buddy has a squat rack and some basic equipment that I am going to be using when I can, but not always feasible.

  • I have a limited amount of equipment in my apartment. A 35lb and 53lb kettlebell, pull-up bar, 25lb dumbbells, some bands, and a Peleton bike.

  • I have 4 months of relative normalcy. I will be gone about 3 weeks in April, but other than that I will be home. I still have to pull 36 hour shifts every 4th day at work, but that’s still pretty good compared to what I’ve been at. My plan is to take this time to re-establish good routines. Start eating healthy again, build up a cardio base, get my body moving again and pushing some weights.

  • In 4 months, I will be moving to Charleston, SC. Wife and I are buying a house down there, and with a house comes a garage. I’ve got about 4K set aside to build an epic home gym once I get down there. Honestly, this is a dream come true. After the move will be my real return to weight training. For now, I’m just trying to recover my health.

  • Biggest thing for me is going to be establishing a healthy diet. Trying to take a page out of @T3hPwnisher playbook and go with a high fat/low carb approach. I tend to do way better on diets when I eat the same thing every day, so after a big meal prep day, this is my plan:

Breakfast : egg muffins 3
480 cal, 36 fat, 3 carb, 39protein

Lunch: chicken taco bowl
392c 10f 25c 56p

Post workout: yogurt and pb fit
170c 2f 15c 23p

Dinner: pork and beans
515 cal, 20f 19c 57p

Late night: protein shake
130 cal 2f 2c 25p

Going to stick with this plan, with 1 cheat meal a week (date night) until my move to Charleston, at which point I will re-asses my diet.

Seems to be about it for catching up. Time to get to work:

Work for Today:

Overhead Press: 45x10, 95x5, 115x3, 135x5, 135x5, 135x4, 95x8
Bench press: 45x20, 135x5, 165x5, 165x5, 165x5, 135x8
Tricep Pushdown: 80x12, 100x12, 110x12
DB lat raise: 17.5x15, 17.5x15, 17.5x15

Cardio: 20min ride on Peleton, 6.44 miles

Notes:

  1. Overhead strength seems decent. Not great, but 135lb didn’t feel terrible.

  2. Bench was crap. 165 felt pretty light, but I was feeling some pretty severe tightness in my left shoulder. Tore my rotator cuff and shattered the joint In high school, always kept it healthy with a heavy dose of pulling exercises. Without being active, a lot of stiffness has returned, and benching was definitely uncomfortable.

  3. Just did some light accessory after. Wasn’t hard, but certainly was more than I’ve done in a hot minute.

All in all, a fairly easy workout to get myself back into the swing of things. Felt like hell, but also absolutely amazing to place my hands on a barbell again.

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137

Great to see you back dude! You’ve been through some Hell and you survived, which means you’re stronger now. San Diego will miss you, but the future you’re heading to is going to be an amazing one for your goals. Appreciate the tag, and hope that approach works well for you.

138

Good to see you back man

139

@T3hPwnisher thanks for the kind words brother. I haven’t gotten to see nearly as much of San Diego as I was hoping, but I really like what I have seen, and my wife has totally fallen in love with the place. She really wants to move back once I’m out of the navy. She’s got some great job opportunities out here, so maybe I will see it again. Definitely been through some hell, but I feel I’m gonna end up better for it. Digging myself out of a whole for now, but I think my end point will be better than my precious baseline if that makes any sense.

@dagill2 thanks, it is definitely good to be back!

Some good news, the base gym is starting to reopening. Appointments only, little bit of a logistical hurdle, but I should be able to make it in a few times a week. On base facilities are the only things authorized right now, so this is a pretty major win. (Side note: the one base barbers are way better than people give credit for. Yeah, it’s not some $40 hair cut, but for $9, it’s pretty dang good)

Coming off an overnight on the ship, managed to hit this.

Work for today:
Lat Pulldown: 55x10, 100x10, 115x10, 115x10, 115x10
Cable row: 55x10, 115x10, 115x10, 115x10
V bar pulldown: 55x10, 115x10, 115x10, 115x10
Chest supported T-Bar Row: 50x10, 50x10, 50x10
EZ Curl: 50x10, 50x10, 50x10

Cardio: 20 min Peleton ride: 6.3 miles

Notes:

-Just a stereotypical bro style back day. Felt good, feeling a pump, really focusing on getting a good squeeze with every rep.
-I hate curls. I always have, and feel I always will. I got into weight training to help with sports, there is nothing remotely athletic feeling about curls haha
-still keeping things relatively easy. Pushing myself on the sets, but not murdering myself. Finding that I have to re-teach my body how to push itself, which is to be expected.

After my push session on Wednesday, my shoulders have been freaking killing me. Not muscle soreness, but just overwhelming stiffness. Makes crazy cracking and popping sounds whenever I move, hurts to raise the joint anywhere over 70 degrees from my body. Which just means it’s time to add band pull Aparts back into my daily routine. 100 before bed always did wonders for me, began that yesterday, hopefully will see some improvement soon.

The gym has a Theragun for people to use. I tried it out today mainly out of curiosity, and I gotta say I actually love it. Not a big mobility/recovery work guy, but it felt so good on my shoulder. By which I mean it hurt like hell, but felt good after. I think it would do wonders if I got my wife to do my rear-shoulders/upper back. Looked them up online, and holy hell are they expensive! I am not paying $400 for a little massage tool… but I am definitely curious if I can redneck engineer something out of a portable jigsaw…

On a completely unrelated note, took the navy advanced motorcycle rider course today, and had a blast. Nothing was too wild on my sportster, but I was seriously impressed by the guys killing it on big touring bikes. Very jealous of the carrying capacity of those, may have to start taking a look at upgrading the bike

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140

Work for Saturday:

Several hours of a very impromptu kickball tournament (as in a neighbor I’ve never met invited me as I was walking my dog. Had a total blast)

20 minute Peleton class

Work for Sunday:

Went on a 9.5 mile hike through the mountains wearing a 20lb pack. Did this with my best man, combat engineer who just got stationed out around here. Haven’t seen him in over a year, was so damn good to catch up, and the mountains a little north east of San Diego were gorgeous.

Also my had my chest meal for last week on Sunday. Finished the hike late morning after an early start, then we went out for breakfast food. I swear to god, nothing is more anabolic than eggs, meat, potatoes and gravy in some delicious breakfast mass of carbs fats and protein. I could eat nothing but breakfast foods until the day I die and be a very content man.

Work for today:

Another overnight day on the ship, managed to sneak in a quick workout.

5 rounds using 40lb kettlebell

15 kb Swings
25 jump ropes
10 kb goblet squats
25 jump rope
10 kb snatches (5 per arm)
25 jump rope

Notes:

-went into this with my hips and lower back feeling a bit beat up from the long hike yesterday. This definitely got some blood flowing in all the right areas, feel much better after having some it
-I have next to no experience with KBs, and this may be my second or third time ever doing a kb snatch, still feeling out the movement a lot.
-wasn’t expecting this, but wholly hell this blew up my lower back.
-actually looking at the work, pretty dumb of me not to expect it to blow up my lower back
-chalk would of been helpful, hands for sweaty quick
-overall, not a bad little workout. First round went so smooth that I was worried I had overestimated how tough this would be and thought about scaling up. Round 3 had me feeling like I was working hard, round 5 was brutal. Good.

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