Coming Back From the Dead

Training Over 35 Lifter
481

All work and no play makes Dude a dull boy, or something like that . . . drop by anytime!

Hi, Techno!

Lower body. Trainer introduced me to intern Zack, who will be working through the summer. Zack is training me today, and probably through next week too, since trainer is heading for meet in Baton Rouge.

Warm up: sled. Up and down block with 3 plates, another trip with 4 plates, another with 5.

Monolift. Slightly thick bar, standard plates, nothing fancy. Start with empty bar, go up with triples. He points out I have bar high up, should move down. I said I used to do that, but was told to move it up. Everyone gets all innocent - who told me that??? We finally decide to blame trainer who isn’t there anymore. Get up to 180 lbs, starting to put effort into it, go down to doubles. One more double, he calls it quits.

Deadlift. 135 lbs, 5 reps. 185, a few reps. 235, was supposed to be a double, but he stopped me when he saw the effort I put into it. Two more singles. On the last one, I think I got my feet a bit closer to the bar and it whizzed up, sort of.

Reverse hyper. Not quite 100 lbs, 12 reps. Three sets.

Leg curls, couple of sets.

Kettlebell swings. Trainer tells Zack I suck at explosive movement, so we keep weight down to 35 lbs and 30 secs. On first set, body clutches up near the end. They tell me don’t squat so much, just put some hip into it. Excuse me? Last time I did this, they told me get down and put lots of leg into it. Naturally, they disavow any knowledge of this. Are these people gaslighting me?

Zack thinks that’s plenty of work for me. Trainer disagrees, since I worked back, need to do abs. I grab a 25 lb plate and plop onto the decline bench. 15 reps before it gets tough. Wait, then next set. 10 reps.

Trainer says I’m getting stronger. Not sure I can see much difference, but I won’t argue.

482

Nice work Cav. Remember, it’s a marathon, not a sprint. Keep on keepin’ on.

483

[quote]hawkcapt1912 wrote:
Nice work Cav. Remember, it’s a marathon, not a sprint. Keep on keepin’ on.
[/quote]

Hawkman, it’s a sprint for other people, who make better gains in a year or two of training than I have in over 30.

Bad training day.

I tell trainer body’s getting really stressed, am I needing deload? He says no, we keep going.

Doing upper body. Warmup with pulldowns & DB presses.

Working sets: more DB presses. 35 lbs. Incline bench for one minute, regular bench one min, decline for one min. Get on incline, watch clock, set DBs, and . . . we’re off. Pacing myself to make the whole minute. Get to 30 secs, and - they stop dead. Straining, won’t go up.

Regular bench is a little better, more or less make it the whole minute. Decline is no problem.

Pulldown for one minute, then other pulldown machine for a min. Can’t see clock, so just keep going. Pretty tough.

Face pulls with thick rope.

Tri extensions with a twist. Go outside with sled. Two plates. Take ropes in hands overhead. Do extension and drag sled forward. Step ahead until arms drawn back. Extend again. Repeat. Goal: go down block and return. I move ahead - hmm, not as hard as I thought. Get about 30 feet, getting hard. A few more steps - bam. Nothing moving. Arms refuse to extend. I strain and strain. Trainer screaming at me to keep going. I rest a moment, try again. Extend once, move forward, halt again. Trainer helps pull on rope. More or less, I make it down the block.

He takes off a plate and tells me to return. I make a few more steps, then bam - nothing. Drop rope, gasping, try again. I am sobbing like a baby, it’s so stressful. Struggle - won’t move - rest shaking - struggle - move a bit - rest shaking.

Finally make it back, but am just pulverized by stress. Like I’m drowning in cortisol. I just walk by trainer and sit down with water bottle.

Trainer has me do some band stretching. Pretty weak. Arm curls with 15 lb DBs. Whatever.

I am feeling so godawful I just sit there staring at the floor. Trainer tries to cheer me up: “Yeah, it’s tough . . . you’re getting stronger” Well, I don’t feel stronger. I feel like shit.

Is this doing me any goddamn good?

484

Talked with trainer about stress levels. I wasn’t sore from Sunday’s workout, but body felt burnt out. He says psychological is main cause. To that end, I stay focused during today’s workout. Nothing earthshaking, so it doesn’t feel threatening.

Warmup: sled. 3 plates, then 4 plates, another 4 plates.

Monolift. Ordinary bar. 95 lbs total. Eight sets of triples, box squats. Oh dear, he forgot to mention . . . he took the box height way down. Almost kept going straight to the floor on first rep. Got through them OK . . . weight no big deal . . . he say flexibility is main thing. Got some odd behaviour from heart, seemed to react more than I thought it should, like I was out of breath. Did the sled wear me out that much?

Deadlift. Eight sets of singles. 135 bar with bands. Yay - never did banded deads before. A little weird, but no problem. Could have done doubles or triples, to be honest.

Leg curls, 3 sets of 10.

Abs, 2 sets crunches w 25 lb plate. First set, heart started going, had to stop halfway. A little rest, then crank out the rest.

All things considered, feeling pretty good.

485

At this point I think you know when you need a deload Cav. We can’t afford injuries. I am just stopping by though I would say hey.

486

Hey Dude, thanks for stopping by! Trainer letting me get in some recovery time. Sat on my butt for the past 3 days, feel better.

Today’s workout: Operation Grease Monkey.

Since trainer was at meet, Matt (Wenning) only one around for training. Lot of people in gym (very popular weekend mornings), figured it would be hard to get his attention. Didn’t realize how hard. He had his motorcycle in the place and was working on it. Very nice looking. He had me do warmup of incline DB benches and pulldowns.

He told me to bench 45 lb DBs to failure and report. I struggled with them and did 10. Had to wait until he crawled out from under the cycle. He told me to do 3 more sets of 10, wait 3 mins between. Concentrated . . . tough part getting the weights into position . . . successful.

Went back to Matt who was still at his cycle. He told me to do tri pressdowns, one arm holding Grenade (plastic ball), to failure. At least, that’s what I think he said. It’s hard to talk with a screwdriver in mouth.

First set - 22 reps. Second - 15. Third - 11. Tris are pumped. He was pleased and told me to do lat raises, 8 lbs, one minute each for 3 sets. Concentrated . . . got it up . . . boy, my delts are BURNING.

Back to Matt. Wrist curls, but not like any I’ve seen before. He had another guy show me. (You didn’t think he’d leave his cycle, did you?) OK. Wrap band around top of power rack. Stand with back to rack. Arm bent, hand near shoulder. Grab band, flex. Not as easy as it sounds. Kept going and going, eventually got 75 reps each hand. He says that’s plenty.

Rear delts: lat pulldowns to eyebrows. Three sets of 20.

Good workout - I think the time off helped.

487

Birthday. Had din-dins at Golden Corral. Their steak is getting smaller and tougher, but BBQ chicken good. Will stop by ice cream place tomorrow - awesome stuff.

Tutoring schedule finally set at school, will have to work gym time around it.

Got nice birthday present from boss - two classes guaranteed for autumn semester.

488

Happy Birthday Cav. and congratulations on Fall semester news.

489

Happy belated birthday.

Your log should be sponsored by Golden Corral!

490

Dave, thanks. Visit anytime.

Brett, please. Don’t we have enough ads on the internet as it is? (And Johnson Ice Cream. Can’t even touch the desert bar at GC, Johnson’s has spoiled me so much.)

Trainer back from meet. I asked him how it went. All he said was “Strict. Not a place to lift big weights.” So I’m guessing it didn’t go well.

Yesterday (birthday) was gorgeous. Sunny. Mid 70’s temp (Fahrenheit). Slight breeze. Couldn’t get enough. Today dismal, raining. Trainer checked it wasn’t raining at the moment, had me pull sled for warmup. OK, I’m really rested and recovered, feel great, but sled was weird - damn heavy. Got up to 4 plates, should have been no problem, but felt like pulling a Mack truck. Almost collapsing from the effort. Confidence taking a beating. Trainer says when sidewalk is damp, sled is waaaaaay harder to pull. Really? Well, something was up.

Good mornings - first time in months. Monolift, safety bar (60 lbs? 70 lbs?). Triples. Start at bottom, bar held in chain. Empty bar - easy. Add 10 to each side. Still easy. Work up to 40 each side. Some effort, but snapping them up. Add a 5. Tough, but got all of them. Add another 5 - grrrrrrnnnnnnnnccccccchhhhhhhh. No go. Anyway, a definite ******* PR ******** for Good Mornings. Yay me!

OK, lower back is fried. Wasted. Totaled. Kaput. So what do we do next? Of course not. Don’t be silly. We do deadlifts.

175 lbs. Normal bar. Three sets of 5. Double overhand. First set unusually hard (duh). Rest. Next set better. Rest. Not too bad.

Leg curls. Three sets to failure. These just don’t seem to be getting easier.

Leg extensions, one set to failure. A little harder than expected - well, was pretty wasted.

Ab crunches, 25 lb plate, 3 sets.

Side bends - first time in a year or two. 50 lb DB. OK, I’ve had weird problems with these, probably due to the scoliosis. One side’s always been stronger, or stronger leverage, than the other. Not sure what will happen this time. Got up to 25 reps both sides, one side slowing down by the end. other side still going. Surprised, though, how well it went.

Hmm . . . GMs and side bends did great, others didn’t. Conclusion: only work out once every 6 months. Wait . . .

491

[quote]DBasler wrote:
Happy Birthday Cav. and congratulations on Fall semester news. [/quote]

x2

I’ve had to sacrifice a couple of virgins here to get some sunshine.

Congrats on the PR too, I always like good mornings, working that space between my butt and my back.

492

Hi, Techno. Yeah, really lucked out on the weather. Too bad about the virgins . . . you really couldn’t think of anything better to do with them? GMs have been really tough for me in the past, but strangely I felt really in control this time.

OK, something was odd today. Upper body, warmup with pulldowns and DB presses. Pulldowns felt kinda easy. The DBs were snapping up very nicely. Best I’ve done so far with 20 lb DBs.

Then I remembered I was using 25 lbs.

Bench. Plain, vanilla bland bench. Empty bar. Something’s wrong . . . is this a broomstick? It’s flying up. 65 lbs. Singles. Flies up. 85 lbs. Almost lost tightness, seemed so easy. 105. Zoom. 135. Put a little pressure on it. 155. Wait a minute - this is getting my max. Is OK, down and up. 175. Don’t add the weights in my head - too late. Never did this before. Don’t think. Grab bar. Arch. Tense. Out. Down. And UPPPPP . . . . it’s slow . . . barely moving . . . I want it so badly . . . don’t let trainer grab it . . . it’s up.

                      • PR * * * * * * * * * * *

Trainer tells me I’m moving elbows around too much, should just snap arms open like doing a tri extension. After a few minutes, we try 180. It comes down too high on chest, I try popping open arms, but no go. He takes it. I don’t care - got a PR.

Close grip bench. 95 lbs. He yells at me, I get 13 reps.

One arm pulls, 75 lb DB. Much more than I’ve done before. Only get about 3 reps per arm. He tells me keep at until get 10 reps total.

Then tri extensions . . . on sled. (Love this nice weather) Two plates on sled. Take rope, extend. Step forward, extend again. And again. A little easier than last time. Get about 2/3 down the block, straining but arms kaput. He takes off one plate and puts on 25 lb. I keep going. Turn around, come back, and croak again. He takes off the 25, leaving one plate. I keep grinding. Holy *$%&@! the burning is awful. Rest, move, rest, move . . . I make it.

Trust me, regular tri extensions can’t hold a candle to this.

A set of arm curls and I’m done.

493

Found out the school is hosting a national level strongman contest Saturday. Of course, I’ll drop by and watch.

Appropriately, trainer put me through a strongman program today.

Warmup: sled pulls. 3 plates, easy. 4 plates, no problem. 5 plates, a little challenging.

Tire flips - the big one. Think it’s about 400 lbs. 5 flips down the sidewalk, then 5 back. Struggling, pulling, pushing. Trainer is telling me “Don’t lift it, push it! Run forward!” Easy for him to say, he’s got twice the muscle I do.

Farmer’s walk. 50 lb kettlebells. I take them down the sidewalk, then back without dropping. Piece of cake. So trainer ups them to 60 lb bells. Tougher, had to drop couple of times. He tells me to chalk hands. I do, but didn’t help much, they still started slipping.

When I catch my breath, trainer tells me 5 more flips with tire. I grab the thing, yank, and . . . nothing happens. It’s bolted to the ground. Try several times, no go. Trainer realizes I’m out of gas. (petrol for you Brits)

Finish up with 3 sets leg curls and 3 sets ab crunchs. I’m using 25 lb plate for the crunches & getting over a dozen reps, getting stronger.

494

[quote]cavalier wrote:
Found out the school is hosting a national level strongman contest Saturday. Of course, I’ll drop by and watch.

[/quote]

WATCH?..WATCH?

Compete you fool!

Pretend you’re a Wildcard entry from Scandinavia. You just need a Nordic sounding name, how about Ikea Herringsson?

Good luck.

495

Keep up the good work Cav. And ignore FB, he’s one of those guys who mixes his lbs with his degrees Celsius.

496

Need more virgins, sun is gone here. Besides that’s really all they are good for, I’ll take experience & technique over that crap.
Tri ext on sleds sound brutal, I’m trying to get back what little definition I had before.
And just to be a brat, I 2nd that you should compete too, although its easy for me to say that.

497

Well, Brett, the way the school newsletter worded it, it sounded like a little something the athletic department threw together. I had no idea it was a national NAS meet until the day before. ( Ikea Herringsson? Nah, sounds like a furniture store.)

Punny guy, I never trust anyone who confuses kilos with fahrenheit, or uh, whatever . . .

Techno, if you really can’t think of anything else to do with virgins, I can’t help you.

As for the idea of me competing . . . that DID cross my mind. I’m watching, and blown away by the big weights. But, I started thinking maybe I could handle the low range of weights, especially with some more training.

Events:

Deadlift for reps. The used car lift bars, the plates are just behind the grips. You get a little leverage advantage, not much. The guys did 8 plates, 10 plates. Think I could handle 6 plates.

Dumbbell lift over head, one arm. No way I can do the 140 lb one. But the women were using, what? 40 lb? Must be something I have a chance at. (One guy tried a NAS record, 4 reps of 140, Masters. He did 3, and the last failed at the last moment.)

Plate hold. Straight arms out in front. Women used 25 lbs, men did 35 or 45.

Farmer’s Walk. Wooden bars. Without plates, 130 lbs EACH. I would DEFINITELY have to work grip strength. A few monster men added a extra 8 plates - 360 lbs - on top of that.

Yoke. 165 lbs empty, add a couple of plates, no problem. Two plates almost buried the women, the guys kept loading on plates.

Fun announcer. He wore a kilt and was funny all day. One guy was so fast with yoke it skidded 20 feet. “If you kill a judge, that’s a 30 second penalty!”

498

Was sore from last workout. Sore forearms, sore traps. Even my feet had a little DOMS . . . first time ever. Wow, those farmer’s walks are murder.

Upper body today. Speed bench.

Triples. 5 lb plate on each end. Easy. Snapping it up. Add another pair of 5’s. OK. Another pair. Slowing a tad. Add pair of 2.5’s. Then another. Then another. Nine, count them, nine sets. The last one was weird. I shoved hard, bar slowed, then STOPPED. Strain, got it up. It was what, 105 lbs? How the hell could that bury me? I’m pissed. Trainer tells me I had only done 8 sets of this before, 9 was supposed to be a killer. Wish he’d warn me.

Pulldowns, 5 sets. Still irked by the bench, I made these speed pulls, although trainer didn’t say anything about speed.

Two sets of thick rope pulldowns for tris. Two sets straight bar pulldowns. One set V bar pulldown.

Band pull-aparts for 30 secs, 3 sets.

DB curl. Was going to grab the 20 lbs, but he said for one minute, so I wimped out and got the 15 lbs. Made it, but barely.

I asked trainer about strongman training, he said yeah, go compete anytime. Will see if we can do anything to train for it.

499

OK, folks, this is all your fault. Really. It’s on your shoulders.

I told trainer I was interested in entering a strongman meet, so guess what he whips up for me today?

One arm deads with dumbbell, 3 reps. 60 lbs, no sweat. 70. 80. 90. 100 lbs and damn, I’m doing it.

We don’t have a yoke, so he sticks the bamboo benching bar on the power rack and hooks chains on it. It’s more or less the weight of the empty yoke. I lift it off and stumble around a bit. 20 feet down, 20 feet back. Not sure what to make of it. Second set, it keeps slipping off but Zack keeps pushing it back. Third set, my squat reflexes kick in and it stays put. I trot down and back, no problem.

Tire flipping. They wheel out the small one and have me flip for time. 45 seconds for first run. Rest, then try 60 seconds. He tells me to bend down and push into it - the exact opposite of my deadlift reflexes. No problem flipping, but nearly coughed my lungs out on the sidewalk. It’s exhausting!

Back inside for rack pulls, sets of 5 reps. 135 lbs. 185. 205. Ho hum.

Power cleans. He sticks on 10 lb plates which are as wide as regular plates. Didn’t know we had them. Fussed around, will take a bit to get the hang of it.

Trainer says he’s going bring in some stones and kegs from home. This will get interesting.

Whew - I’m worn out. Going to be sore tomorrow. But the weird thing . . . it was kinda fun.

500

Hey Cav having a good summer with a PR I see, training looks good. Stones are fun I have been lifting a few myself lately. I did manage to fit in a workout today. Though I would stop in, KOKO. Mike