So I’ve started trialing the workouts, did the deadlift main today with reduced volume and no AMRAPs, plan is still to fully start in about 2 weeks.
DL: 135 x 5, 225 x 5, 315 x 2, 365 x 1, 415 x 1, 315 3 x 5
Pull-ups neutral: 3 x 8
Close grip: 135 x 10, 225 x 5, 275 x 2, 205 3 x 7
Superset
Straight arm pulldown: 60 3 x 12
Rope curls: 60 3 x 12
Start with the appetite and mental health stuff. I’m taking adderall, among other things, that suppresses my appetite significantly but the plan is to not take it on the weekend. So I’m essentially going to be cutting hard for 5 days a week and trying to maintain or be close to a surplus the other 2, will see how it goes. New medication regime seems to be working though, feeling more motivated and positive than I have in a really long time.
Deadlifts felt terrible until 365, which felt fine, 415 was terrible, brace broke, tweaked my lower back. Decided it wasn’t too bad and went on, all 315 sets felt great. Because my HIPS STARTED MUCH HIGHER THAN I THOUGHT THEY SHOULD (seriously, I forget this every time I deadlift). 415 was the wrong call anyway, I’m only supposed to hit around 90% and my max is set to 405, just dumb but lesson learned. Pressing felt good, had minimal rest here.
I think I’ll be drained when I hit one more regular set and one AMRAP but I’m confident I can grow into this work.
Had some friends over last night, had a few too many drinks but nothing too bad and watched cocaine bear, a hilarious movie.
OHP main
kB swings: 4 x 25, 1 x 30
OHP: 95 x 5, 135 x 5, 165 x 2, 185 x 1, 165 3 x 5
Beltless back squat: 135, 185, 225 x 5, 245 x 3, 275 x 2, 295 x 2
Pull-ups (wide): 2 x 5
Lateral raises: 3 x 8
Was dragging a bit but made it through most of what I wanted to. My lower back tweak is a little bit more tweaked than I thought and that impacted my press a bit, harder to feel stable in the movement. Was worried the beltless squats would hurt so I took it easy but those moved way better than expected. I think I last hit back squats for a meaningful amount of work in July or August, so moving into them slowly and I rely heavily on my belt, so I’m happy these felt good.
Lots of walking the rest of the day and maybe some abs.
Squat main
KB swings: 2 x 20
Back squat: 135 x 5, 225 x 5, 275 x 3, 315 x 2, 355 x 2, 275 3 x 5
Slingshot bench: 245 3 x 7
RDL: 245 3 x 7
Split squat: 30 2 x 8, 60 x 8
Thought about doing another accessory but called it there. This was all done fasted and I was starting to drag a bit, which is expected but not good news when I have 3 more regular sets and 3 amrap sets incoming. Think I’ll buy a Kind bar or something next time and eat that before I go in. Finished this work in about 55 min, kept pace pretty good so I suspect the full workout will be ~80 minutes which means I need to be in by 7:30 or so, which shouldn’t be too difficult on most weekdays.
Squats felt good again, my shoulder was giving me some grief, need to bring bands in as the gym as them located far away and all of their light ones have disappeared. Elbows are a bit cranky too but not surprised there, glad tomorrow is off. Last point of pain was my upper back, I’ve neglected back squats for so long that the bar resting on it is causing pain again lol
Not sure how much longer I’ll keep the weekly swings in but I’ll finish off this week, at least.
After some slow loss last week things really picked up this week. Came in at 274.2, for a drop of 3.8lbs. I always say to myself, “if I lose 30lbs I’ll be where I want to be”. I said that at 289 (start point this year) and I am saying it at 274 lol. Work to do but things are going exceptionally well.
Down 11.2 over 6 weeks and 14.8 since the beginning of the year. Starting a different program in just over a week (still waffling on exact start date) which will increase volume and frequency of my lifts, almost certainly creating a greater recovery burden. But to take from Dan John (via @T3hPwnisher) the goal is to keep the goal the goal. That goal is to get leaner, secondarily to maintain strength. So if this program is crushing me or putting weight on, I’ll call an audible.
Knocked out 25 swings this morning, will do a kettlebell-centric conditioning workout this afternoon when I have a minute.
Knocked out some swings before my forever and half long working session/meeting
5 min AMSAP
30kb swings @24kg
Got 6 rounds done and had probably 10-15 seconds on the clock when the dog went out the door with a yak cheese. Had to go grab her because her favorite thing is to bury these damn things, wait for them to half ferment, then unbury them, bring their soggy corpses into the house and devour them. Which naturally makes her feel awful and have GI symptoms.
Knocked out 20 more swings to get to 200 after having a talk with the dog lol
Lower back gave me grief and made sleep worse last night, will take it easy or not hit the gym tomorrow and do conditioning instead.
Glad you caught your pup before she could make poor choices - ours absolutely loves finding cat poop on walks and snarfing it down before I can react. Or furtively consuming appendages from his stuffed toys. Because the “Will he throw it up, poop it out, or have a stomach blockage? Guessing Game” is always loads of fun.
It seems like Dr. Jones and Winnie are kindred spirits lol
We got Winnie some hard rubber toy that looked like a double-ended dildo when she was like 8 months old, naturally she chewed through the middle of it and swallowed some pieces, gf thought she was obstructed so took her in a got her ultrasounded, luckily she wasn’t but it’s a constant fear! She is also something of a fecal fiend, super disturbing.
Shoulder warmup
Bench: 135 x 10, 225 x 5, 275 3 x 5
FS: 135 x 5, 185 3 x 7
Push press: 135 x 5, 165 3 x 7
DB Row (forearm on knee): 90 3 x 10
Super set facepulls/Tri pushdown: 70 2 x 10
Felt a little better energy wise today, just had a handful of almonds (and more food last night) but I was flying through this, got done in 45 minutes. I’m really just going to have to suck it up and get in early if I want these workouts to be productive. Weights are pretty much what week 1 will be except front squats, i went 185 instead of 220 because I was worried about the low back, turned out to not bother it at all. Slept much better last night too.
Got in 3 chicken thighs, a tortilla, half a zucchini, and 1.3 mounds of hummus for “breakfast” after the lift, figure that should sustain me pretty well
Owe some swings and abs, probably going to take it pretty easy on the lifting until next week when the trial phase ends and I start paying for these workout.
5 x 40 swings, minimal rest
1 mile walk
2 x 40 swings
Weekly swings: 900/900
Decided I needed to have my annual step average get up to 9500 by the end of the month, for no particular reason so I will end up with about 14k steps today, an improvement over recent efforts.
Think I’ll continue the swings for one more week, starting tomorrow instead of Sunday and shoot for 1000. Starting next Saturday I’ll begin Stronger By Science Reps To Failure. Plan on Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Wednesday where Saturday and Sunday are the longer days. Woot. Signed a promotion letter earlier this week, shouldn’t actually change what I do too much, might have to tell more people what to do (and therefore listen to more people) but I don’t mind that, comes with a nice chunk of change.
KB swings: 4 x 20
BS: 135 2 x 5, 225 x 5, 275 x 3, 315 x 3, 365 2 x 1, 385 x 2
Pull-ups: 2 x 7
Push press: 135 2 x 5, 185 x 3, 225 x 3, 165 x 14
Split squats: 50 3 x 8
Trying to not accumulate too much wear and tear while also preparing myself. That being said, push press was way too hard, 14 is my rep target for week one and I was gassed at the end of the set. Doing that same work after way more volume is probably not going to happen. I’ve already been thinking about it but this is making me make the call, I’m going to drop all auxiliary maxes by 20lbs, if I grow into the work they will go up if I don’t then I know I made the better decision.
KB swings: 4 x 25
DL: 135 x 5, 225 x 5, 315 x 5, 365 3 x 3
Pull-ups: 8,5,5
CGBP: 135 x 10, 225 x 5, 275 x 5, 195 x 20
Db rows (arm on knee): 85 x 10, 95 2 x 10
Db curls (no rest): 20,25,30,35 x 6
Hammer curls: 20 x 15
Lower back still isn’t 100% but my deadlifts feel completely fine, the higher hip position actually allows me to drive aggressively. Should be in a good position to grow I to these. Owe some more swings and abs tonight.
Was absolutely starving yesterday and ate a ton, some good, some bad but I think most of it necessary, my body needed it to perform at all. Part of the hunger also came from getting 30k steps across the last few days. Today will be a moderate eating day, followed by the weekday cut which needs to improve in quality of food (i.e., more protein), im thinking about getting shakes but I really don’t like them so holding off for now. Made 4.5lbs of chicken thighs on the grill yesterday, will use that as a base.
KB swings: 2 x 30
Bench: 135 2 x 5, 225 x 5, 275 x 5, 295 x 8
Front squats: 135 2x 5, 185 x 5, 205 x 15
Dips: -30 x 15, bw 2 x 12
Owe more swings and abs.
Bench felt a little rough, stopped a few reps before failure but the push press and close grip the days before definitely impacted this. Going to have to get used to increased frequency. I dropped my bench max 10lbs but have all of my other mains the same.
Rest felt good, front rack wasn’t perfect on the squats but they moved well, breathing was the hardest part. Felt 93% asleep through this lift but hopefully my body gets used to it.
Weight update:
Came in at 272.4 this morning, for a drop of 1.8lbs. 260s in the next week or two and maybe even the 250s by the time this T-ransformation is over. I still don’t know what weight I want to end up at but I think I could probably be pretty lean at 240, guess we’ll see as we go.
The 1.8lbs drop is encouraging because I ate an absolute ton on Saturday and probably 2000 calories of it were absolute junk. Will try to do something similar this weekend but instead of Maple Creme cookies and tater tots I’ll try to get in things like dark chocolate, protein pancakes, and sweet potatoes.
Shoulder warmup (brought my own band)
KB Swings: 2 x 25
OHP: 95 x 8, 135 x 8, 155 x 6, 185 x 4
Pullups: 3 x 6
Beltless squat: 135 x 5, 185 x 5, 185 x 15
superset:
Lateral cable raises: 25 3 x 8
Facepulls: 90 3 x 10
Right shoulder was a bit sticky to start but ended up feeling pretty decent, I’ve been noticing I’m getting lightheaded a lot more as my cut deepens, probably need to salt things. Might schedule some bloodwork with the doctor since I’m taking a shit ton of meds that could be messing with things, too. Felt a bit better this morning session overall though, which is encouraging.
Owe some abs, might just finish the swings this afternoon but also have like 5-6 hours of meetings today, so we’ll see.
