The wisdom of @T3hPwnisher mixed with the eclectic ramblings of @LoRez make this log really fun to read.
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W15D2 - [Much] Higher Stress - DL
Warmup
Foam roller angel things. No weight, just let my arms stretch.
Main Work
17" Axle Rack Pulls (88%): 405# x 3 x 5 ← 405 is a PR
Press (69%): 90# x 7 x 5
17" Axle Rack Pulls: 405# x 5, 5, 4
Accessory Work
Constant Tension Press: 65# x 3 x 18
Supplemental Core Work
Roman Column: 8# x 6
H2H KB Swings: 90# x 32 (16 each hand)
Notes:
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biggest training day yet. 13 work sets, 14,895 pounds. Second biggest was 12,755. So a bit more.
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notable deadlift PR. First time lifting 405, from any height. And then did 29 reps…
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this is the first time a high volume day happened on the top intensity day of the cycle.
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last two sets started wearing me down, believe it or not. Decided to skip the last rep after a rough start.
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almost skipped the swings, but I’m glad I didn’t. Was a nice tonic after everything. (I confess I skipped them last session.)
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interspersed this all with gardening and yard work. Lots to get done before vacation.
These constant tension presses seem to be ok aesthetically too.
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I’ve noticed this before.
Personally I cant just drop into or out of the headspace required for a good lift.
Something like pushups or pullups, sure, but heavy pulling or overhead work is not something I can do casually.
Dan John talks about tension and arousal for performing different lifts and I find it true for me.
If it works for you obviously I’m not arguing against it.
To cut to the chase: that mostly comes down to lots practice and mental/emotional control.
There’s a couple things at play.
The first is a matter of logistics. It takes time for the body to recover between heavier sets. I don’t know the mechanics, except that it’s a mix of replenishing glycogen, clearing metabolites and neural effects. The heavier the set, the longer the rest needs to be to perform well.
The better you’re able to perform per set, the more benefit you’ll get out it. Many top coaches and athletes recommend longer rest times, if you can afford it.
That said, shorter rest times can help build work capacity, but at the expense of performance. Work capacity can be built in other ways. Sort of like how you can split deadlifting into: deadlift with straps + grip work, instead of letting your grip affect things.
For me, when I’m lifting something above 85%, I’ve started targeting a rest time of at least 7 minutes. That takes awhile, and I’m otherwise sitting around or idle, so I just intersperse it with other things.
With a home gym, and a home office, and, well, home maintenance stuff, it works out.
The second part is the “arousal” bit.
This is where it comes down to practice and experience.
At a hyped up level emotional arousal, I can lift more, but I don’t have as much control. Reps become sloppier and fall out of any groove. More practice in a relaxed state builds consistent motor patterns, so that they fall into place when in a more aroused state.
I played and performed piano throughout my childhood and high-school years. (Was good enough to take my life path in that direction, but chose computers.) Performances were always nerve wracking. A lot of drilling the most technically difficult parts prevented my mind/emotions from getting the best of me. Same idea.
There’s some training precedents too.
Long long ago, I used some Bulgarian-ish training ideas. One of the most essential elements is the “everyday max”. An unaroused max that you should be capable of hitting any day. Some days you’re feeling better and that number is higher, some days it’s lower, but the mental and emotional effort is minimal. It becomes a reflection of the physical performance only.
Any extra arousal does a few “bad” things. One is that it taxes your recovery capacity both physically and mental/emotionally. If both of those aren’t available by the next set – or next session – your performance becomes really inconsistent.
Another is that it can keep you from developing technical proficiency, because your body shifts more toward gross motor skills and away from finer level of control. Each set is different from the last, your setup is inconsistent, etc.
Training-wise, I also have spent a lot of time running Pavel’s Power to the People. I did the same lifts 5-7 days a week, so it just became work rather than making it an event. And he doesn’t recommend warm up sets. You go straight into the work set. So lots of practice just going straight to the work.
I think there’s a final element to this, which is that I’m doing 5s. Singles, doubles, and triples can be more demanding. On the opposite end of the spectrum, high-rep sets are demanding in a different way. 5s are just sort of a baseline level of work.
So, when I have 13 work sets that I get through while doing other things, there’s not a lot of arousal involved. Strap/wrap up, get into a good starting position, and lift. Then go back to whatever else I was doing.
I think I expounded that enough, but just wanted to point this out, because it’s notably different.
Before Saturday, I’d never lifted 405 for even a single. The first time I lifted 405 was for 6 sets of 5. (Well, 5x5 then a set of 4.)
I also did it without any warmup sets. ← this is probably the strangest thing for most people
I did a couple bird dogs, but that was it.
I said this in the broscience thread, but I’m not really sure warmups are necessary if you’re training the lift with high enough frequency. Even if the weight is heavy. I think 405x5@146 is heavy enough to validate the idea. I don’t think it’s just a matter of being lucky.
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It’s a mighty impressive factor 405/146 = 2.8. Dang!
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I’m on vacation until after the 4th. Was hoping to get another day of lifting in before we left, but too much stuff to do.
Food has been good so far.
Barbecue last night. Brisket, pulled pork, and a “texas twinkie”: jalapeño stuffed with cheese and brisket, then wrapped in bacon.
Leftover bbq and whole milk for breakfast. Shrimp mala soup for lunch. That was spicy. You know the Thai restaurant that everyone knows for being the spiciest? Take their hottest “Thai spicy” heat level… and double it. Took my time with that one.
Then Peking duck, lobster, and pea tips for dinner.
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@T3hPwnisher’s egg and octopus meal reminded me of the best octopus I ever had.
It was in Porto, Portugal, and it was sold as either a half or whole octopus. Cooked in a wine broth with vegetables. Incredibly tender and flavorful.
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Welfare check. You doin’ ok dude?
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@T3hPwnisher @throwawayfitness
Yeah, I’m all right. Back from vacation, but pretty busy with life stuff. Quick update while I’m in a meeting involving stuff I don’t understand.
School is out so summer break/camps for one kid, with the respective new-environment, new-people stress. Also readjusting to post-vacation life. Lots of volatility at home: hair trigger tantrums. We’re working on that. Some difficult parenting.
At work, I was moved to a new team (again) while I was on vacation. I’m the tech lead for the newly-formed team (which is cool), but I don’t know the technology and nobody on the team does, so just trying to sort a bunch of stuff out. Lots of onboarding and learning.
Outside of that, I’m trying out some new productivity tools and process stuff. I feel like I’m starting to get some aspects of my life more under control. I’ve been kind of just floating along for awhile. A good change.
It also means I’m doing all these small checklist items I’ve been neglecting for awhile.
So pretty time constrained, but maybe a bit mentally clearer than I’ve been for awhile.
Training. I’m going to be super-minimalist for a bit with single lift training. Press, and only the press. Probably stick with what I was doing with the Russian influenced linear progression cycles. Just drop the deadlift and all accessory work.
Maintenance is the best I actually expect from that.
I’m also going to put some time toward the baguazhang coursework. This is woo-woo, but this particular take/school is focused more on the self-mastery and mental/spiritual/esoteric side, rather than performance or fighting. Not that those can’t extend from it; it’s the same art, just a different focus.
Anyway, that will require daily work, but I probably won’t put much more than 20 minutes a day toward it for awhile.
I guess final note on diet stuff. I’m back to eating “normally” so that’s an ok mental shift. Was a little concerned about getting stuck in that hyperfocused measure/track/review cycle, but I’m past that.
When I get a chance, I’m going to look through the Jamie Lewis “stewroids” recipes and see what I want to try out. There was a huge breadth of content in that book, but these recipes are one of the most actionable takeaways.
(That was not an AI generated post, but the way it hit the main points kind of felt like it.)
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W20D1 - Lower Stress
Press (65%?) - 85# x 5 x 6
Notes:
- That’s basically the gist of my workouts for the next bit. One lift.
- I’m weaker, as expected.
- 65% is based off a 130# 1RM
- My fastest rep in all these sets put me at a 110# 1RM right now.
- Most of my joints felt pretty good after the layoff. Was still having some issues with the left elbow, and some minor issues with the right knee (noticeable on subway stairs, especially.)
- Left low back was starting to feel weird by set 3. Something to watch out for.
This is the upcoming plan. Cycle may be cut early, since this is all based off that estimated 130# 1RM.
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Still alive. Still excessively busy. Just checking in.
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Still this I assume?
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Let’s hope!
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Still that.
So I’m not actually “back”, but I am doing some lifting-ish stuff at the moment. Pullups.
My vacation coincided with a bunch of work flux, which later continued into marriage/kids flux, but now things have been settled for a bit.
My daughter is doing much better. She has a good teacher this year, who’s figured out how to work with her, and I added martial arts in as a “therapy” method. (It’s a “Shaolin Kempo” school, which I’m skeptical of. But the guy who runs it is very very good with her and that’s the reason we’re there.)
Her school-school was documenting major incidents: it went from one every 4-5 calendar days, to now 20 days without issue. Most of the conflict at home is reduced too. Several changes to make things happen, but all for the better.
I carved out some time for personal interests. Things I saw and reflected on during my vacation led me to re-evaluate some things in my life. That’s probably the biggest statement here, and yet I’m not sure how to elaborate on that well.
Perhaps the simplest summary: I decided to take a more active role in the way my life unfolds. (Which led to some conflict, as expected.)
Otherwise, learned some new things.
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Ancient Chinese crossbows were insane. 350 pound draw-length armor-piercing crossbows were standard issue 2500 years ago. The arsenals had more crossbows than anything else. E.g., 500,000 crossbows to 75,000 regular bows. The trigger mechanisms were mass manufactured with interchangeable parts, and are actually pretty fascinating pieces of machinery on their own. Simple, reliable, self-balancing.
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Lamellar armor is pretty cool (so is polycarbonate), at least against arrows.
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Nephrite jade is an amazing material. The toughest stone. (It can be scratched by diamond, but diamonds will shatter long before nephrite will). No wonder it was revered in ancient times. I mean they made axes and anvils out of jade. “Real” jade, not the green transparent jadeite jade most people know.
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Light therapy is fairly interesting. I was prescribed this (along with other meds). Unfortunately, the SAD lamps available on amazon are severely underpowered. “Technically” they work, but only at about 5-6" from your face for 30+ minutes a day. Nobody’s doing that.
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Fortunately, security/parking lot/stadium lights are fairly inexpensive on Amazon. I now have 4 massively bright flood lights functioning as a SAD lamp. By massively bright, I mean, 72,000 lumens; equivalent to 45 100W incandescent bulbs. That’s what it takes to have 10,000 lux at a bit over 36" away and 30-45 degress above my eye line.
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(There are cells that detect light and tie deep into your brain, circadian system, and neurotransmitter systems; different from the vision cells. These mostly live toward the bottom of your eye and toward the bridge of your nose. The bright light needs to hit those and not be in your direct vision.)
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There’s even more interesting research on day length and mental health and performance. They’ve done many studies across many species, and they unanimously show that for the studied birds, crustaceans and mammals, that 16 hours of daylight is far superior to 12 hours. Like it’s weirdly consistent. More dopamine, more serotonin, more GABA, more sex hormones, lower depression, higher curiosity, higher creativity. All triggered by having enough light, for long enough in the day.
Anyway.
Gym stuff.
I’m working on pullups for the first time in my life. In part because I want to fiddle around with archery stuff and it led from those ideas, but also because it’s something I’ve never focused on. For whatever reason it feels like the weakness I should focus on right now.
I’m mostly using the “russian fighter pull up routine” and just a few days in. Silly name.
Pavel’s fanboys don’t seem to realize it, but it’s really just a repackaging of a Doug Hepburn routine. Of course it works.
Outside of that, I’ve been working on body alignment stuff with Baguazhang, and constantly debate whether I’m ever going to put the work into staff/spear/sword training stuff.
Oh, I still cook too.
Thanksgiving was traditional thanksgiving food, but untraditional preparations. Confit turkey legs in herbed oil (french technique), purple sweet potatoes in sugar/soy-sauce syrup (japanese technique), garlic dry fried green beans (chinese technique), smashed [regular] potatoes (chinese technique), and some rolls (good old american rolls), basque cheescake and pumpkin pie with graham cracker crust.
Also bok choy and rice.
I cooked some of those.
(My wife made cranberry and cointreau crème brûlée a week prior, so we skipped the cranberries this year.)
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So happy to see these positive updates.
A big afficionado both of
And
And
So yeah, pretty happy to see this.
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Great to see you back, and feel like we might have had this discussion before, but love the place mats with wild and farm animals, hope you are working through them all like a menu!
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Haha, no we haven’t had that discussion, though it definitely has served as a reference for the meat they eat.
I read through the most recent page worth of Mythical Strength posts yesterday, and the whole “for what” post.
I need to work on my conditioning
For what???
To get better at conditioning.
But really, for what?
Ok, so, I’m working through this list… and I’m trying to get fast enough to catch a cheetah… so I can feed it to my family.
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I’m better at pullups (pronated) than chinups (supinated), so I’m doing chinups.
I can’t believe how sore I am from them, only a few days in. Seriously.
Anyway, I can now do 4 well controlled dead hang chinups. It’s pretty bad, but it’s up from 3.
There’s about a 100% chance I’ll add more into my lifting, and the chinups are just the gateway drug.
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Yay, the entirety of my training right now.
Chinups: 4, 3, 2, 1, 1
Exciting.
So as mentioned a few times, I have really long arms. Which is great for deadlifting, and sucks for pressing. It also sucks for chinups.
Turns out, it also sucks when shopping for a bow for “asiatic” archery. My arms are too long for 95% of the bows on the market.
(Also, “Asiatic” archery is a weird name to me. Why not just “Asian”? And really, it was pretty much everyone but the Europeans who used a thumb draw.)
Apparently a proper “war bow” was 100+ pounds of draw weight, as tested in the exams. So there’s a dumb sub-goal in all of this.
The gymnastic exercises were a test of physical strength of the candidates. One of these tests was carried out with special bows known as ‘numbered bows’.
These bows were extraordinarily large and heavy. Their standard sizes — No. 1, No. 2 and No . 3 — were 12, 10 and 8 “li” respectively (70.8 kg, 59 kg and 47.2 kg [… 156 lb, 130 lb, 104 lb]). These ‘numbered bows’ were never intended to shoot arrows.
The candidate stood before the Presiding Officer with a bow (usually the No. 1 at 70.8 kg) held at the centre in his left hand. He would extend his left arm, taking up the string in his right and bringing it full draw (grasping the string with his full fist, without an arrow). Then, he would let it down again immediately.
He had to perform this action three times, and then announce his own name and go down on one knee before the Presiding Officer.
Source: Le P. Etienne Zie (Siu) S.J. ‘Pratique des Examens Militaires en Chine’. Shanghai: Varietes Smologiques No. 9. 1896.
I’m certain I can just DIY something to train this. A couple pulleys, a loading pin, and some cordage. I’ve DIYed so many things in the gym this isn’t even a challenge.
Also, a thumb draw with an archery ring is oddly familiar…
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Man, f**k that: just persistence hunt that thing instead!
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