Another solid Saturday session this weekend. Both the deadlift and the squat are progressing along nicely right now, so that’s good news. The conventional DL is now back up into the 3x Bodyweight realm of things on my Saturday session. This past weekend I worked up to a top set of 470lbs x 8 reps. After that I was too beat to to do any more work at that weight so I stopped deadlifting. In the future, I’ll probably drop 20-30lbs or so after the top set and get in another set or 2.
Anyway, after that I moved onto pause squats.as I was warming uptime idea to bit a heavy single before my work sets and I ended up working up to a pretty easy 420 with a short pause. This is a pretty good place for my squat to be currently, seeing as how I left 10-20lbs in the tank, was already gassed from pulling, and paused for a second in the bottom. I’m excited to see where my squat goes when I shift focus back into it.
After that single I dropped to 370 and did sets of 5,5,3,3,3,3,3 for 25 total reps.
As a whole, I was happy with the session. Next Saturday, I attempt to pull 480 for a set of 7.
I put in some pretty solid work yesterday, alternating between the bench press and power cleans.
First I ramped up the bench to a heavy single by going
225x3, 245x3, 255x2, 265x1, 270x1.
Then I cranked out 6x3 at 250 on the bench.
Between these sets I did 7 power clean doubles with 220lbs.
I finished with 4x4 @ 240lbs on the bench.
So I ended up,doing 10 work sets on the bench after the ramp up, along with 7 sets of power clean doubles.
It was a pretty good bit of work, it all felt solid though.
From Saturday, I pulled 490 for a set of 5. After that I squatted 390 for 5 sets of 5.
Next week I’m hoping to pull 500 for a set of 5, but that might be a little bit tough lol. We’ll see though.
I also put in some decent work yesterday on the bench/power cleans.
I benched up to 270 for a single, followed by 5 doubles at 255 and 5 triples at 245. In between these sets I power cleaned 185x2, 195x2, 205x2, 215x2, 195x3, 200x3, 205x3, 210x3, 215x3, 220x3.
I warmed up with some broad jumps. Best I hit today was 9’7", which to be honest isn’t too bad. My best ever is 10’4", but that was from last summer and this is only my 2nd broad jump session since then. I’m going to keep using them as a warm up/primer for deadlifts and try to get back up over the 10 foot mark.
Then I moved onto the deadlift where I succeeded in my goal of pulling 500 for 5 conventional. After this I pulled 460 for a set of 6.
Then I finished with back squats. I squatted 400lbs for 5,4,4,4,4. I’ll keep using 400 this week and move to 405 next week. As long as I can hit a set of 5 I’ll keep going up 5lbs each week.
Anyway, I was happy with the session as whole. My next conventional deadlift goal is to work up to 530 for a triple, and then 565 for a single. After that I’ll switch it back to sumo and finally go for the big 6 hundred at the end of the summer.
Today was day one of transitioning back into sumo pulls. I started off pretty light with 455lbs, but I pulled it for a solid 15 reps which is a rep PR with that weight. The plan now is to keep adding 10 lbs each week and try to peak with a 600lb deadlift. I’m still going to be pulling conventional once a week. But I think at this point I’ve got enough new back strength to take my sumo pull up to the next level. After deadlift I squatted 410 for a set of 5 and then 4 sets of 4. All in all it was a solid day.
Haven’t posted in a few weeks. Training is coming along decently though. I pulled a solid 530lb conventional deadlift a couple weeks ago, after pulling 495 for a set of 4. I think I had 550 in me if I was fresh. Yesterday I hit a 395lb front squat, which is the most I’ve done since I put front squats in my routine in place of back squats. That’s only about 20lb below my all time best and I’ve only been doing them for a couple weeks now.
Front squats really help drive up my deadlift so I’m going to try to work this lift up to PR levels. I also did a 285lb box jerk yesterday, which isn’t too bad considering I haven’t done a jerk since last summer. My form was a little unpolished but I’d like to add them back into my routine consistently now and finally hit a 150kg (330lb) jerk.
Did some deads and squats today. Pulled a grindyyyyy but solid 540lb deadlift, conventional. After that I worked up to a 365lb beltless front squat, then hit 375 and 385 with the belt, and finished up with a 350lb triple. Overall it was a solid session. I was hoping to pull 550 but my back was still pretty sore and I think that affected me somewhat. When I deload the deadlift though, I think that thing is going to skyrocket…
I’ve been hitting some pretty big front squats in the last couple weeks or so. I hit 420lbs at the beginning of this week, which is a 2.5lb all time PR. I still have the goal of front squatting 200kg (440lbs), but today I decided to hit a back squat session since it had been a while.
I ended up working up to 465lbs for a single. Then I hit 418 for a set of 8. My current best back squat is 495lbs, so that’s not a bad place for my squat to be. The set of 8 is also a rep PR with that weight. I think if I were to switch the focus over right now I could possibly get the squat up to over 500. The deadlift isn’t quite going as well as I’d hoped either so it is tempting.
Anyway, after squats I benched. I worked up to 287lbs which was a bit grindy. I had hit 285 the other day which is a 10lb PR that came out of nowhere really. Maybe now that I’ve finally broken past the barrier that I was stuck at for so long though I’ll be able to make some quick progress and finally get 3 frickin wheels on there. I finished the bench with a 5x5 at 245.
I think it’s time for me to call my deadlift program a failure. It has become incredibly stagnant so I’m just going to drop the movement for a while and let it sort itself out like it usually does. The road to 600 just got a little bit longer though.
The good news is that my squat is on point from pretty much out of nowhere. I worked up to 485lbs today and then hit a new best set of 5 with 440lbs. So I’m back up over triple bodyweight on the squat and I’m threatening to crack the 500lb barrier again. Here’s to hoping it continues this way.
Benched 290 tonight in training, which is a small 2.5lb pr, but hey I’ll take it. It felt like forever when I was grinding the lift out but I think my form held up pretty solidly, which I’m happy about. Maybe soon I can crack the 300 barrier and then 3 wheels after that! My bench is finally moving again though which is the best news of all.
Well after 369 days of stagnation, regression, and rebuilding I finally squatted 500lbs last night in training. I hit 495 last summer on August 17 and then totally plateaued and crashed. It was very frustrating fighting for a whole year just to get 5lbs, but I’m glad that I finally did it. The lift itself was actually relatively easy. I took 507 after but got pinned, probably because I was a little mentally worn out after the 500. I think I might be able to add a few more pounds to this PR in the coming weeks though.
So I posted my 5 hundo squat to Reddit and the response was like 95% positive. However, the other 5% of commenters were the depth police and they pissed me off something pretty fierce. In response, I went out to my garage and sunk a 500lb squat. Then I benched 280. Then I pulled a 585 deadlift which is a 10lb all time PR. I’m heading out of the house, but look out for the video later!
Here’s the video. Squat felt pretty good and the deadlift was smooth. I also benched 280 in between these lifts, so the training total was 1,365 which is a PR training total.
Third time using the wraps. This is the most I’ve squatted with them so far. Still 5lbs below my “raw” max, but I’m starting to get a little bit of a feel for them in regards to how to wrap them as well as how to actually use them on the squat. The next few weeks or so should be interesting, but I don’t see any reason why 550 isn’t in my relatively near future with these. Could’ve been a little bit deeper, but oh well.
Worked up to 485 yesterday. I believe this was the 5th session I’ve done with the wraps. After the 485 single I dropped down and hit 450x3, 462x2, 475x2. The 475 double could’ve been a little deeper, but I’m pretty happy with it overall.
This is from Tuesday’s training session. I don’t train the jerk consistently anymore so my technique was a little rough at first, you can kind of see that I muscle a few of them back into position. But the last set with 300lbs is actually a 15lb PR for a double even though I don’t train the lift anymore. I smoothed things out a little bit by then and that set was solid. My goal is to hit 330lbs soon for a single just because 150kg sounds pretty badass. I don’t think that’s too far off if I train the lift every now and then. My plan is to just do jerks on Tuesdays from now on since I don’t really have anything else to do that day, it’s sandwiched between 2 squat days, and it doesn’t really affect Wednesday’s training session.
Hit this squat on Saturday. It was brutal. I got a little out of posiition and goddamn I hit a wall. But I was able to hold steady and fight the bar back into position. I’m still getting used to the wraps and I want way more than this, but I’m happy for now. A year ago I would’ve folded over like an accordion on a lift like this.
I’m also going to start releasing more lifting/nutrition and fitness related content on my channel in the hopes of growing it a bit. I know I’m preaching to the choir here, but please subscribe if you haven’t already! Every like and every sub goes a long way.
New plan: going for a 600lbs deadlift at the comp. in December
I had previously set the goal of pulling 550 at the comp. This was merely because I didn’t believe I could hold 600 without straps - but I know I can deadlift It. So I said fuck that, I want to go for 600. I can’t really deadlift often thought because it fucks with my training because it takes so damn long to recover from. So my plan is to do barbell holds twice a week. I started today with 500lbs for 5 ten second bouts. I’m going to add 10lbs each week until it’s comp. time, which will put me right up around 600 by then. If I can hold my barbell loaded to 600 for ten seconds, there’s not a doubt in my mind that I’ll be able to pull 600 at the comp.
One other thing to note is, I’ll be doing the holds on a barbell that has a diameter of 31mm. A proper deadlift bar (which I’m assuming they’ll be using at the competition) should be anywhere from 2-4mm thinner than that, which will work in my favor immensely.
Anyway, I’m expecting some epic finger/forearm soreness tomorrow!
