Slightly less flabby. I did calipers a week ago at the two week mark and went down a bit. I’ll caliper again in a couple weeks.
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Absolute dog crap workout today. Not sure exactly why but probably from a variety of things. I think I’m not fully recovered from being dehydrated a couple days ago.
And, I took this THC garbage two nights ago to try to sleep and it has completely f’ed me up for almost two days. It’s my own fault - I took 100(!) mg instead of 10 mg by mistake. I woke up at 3am and almost went to the ER. I couldn’t even stand up and my brain wasn’t working at all. I slept almost the entire next day. I still feel some brain fog today and it’s been 40+ hours.
I’ve never ingested any THC until several months ago to try to sleep better and haven’t taken it in almost two months. It makes me feel terrible. And then taking ten times what I should have obviously not a smart thing. I think I’m done with THC lol.
I had the crazy blackout nonsense again today with front squats. I had three episodes and had to give up after only two sets at 300 lb. I backed off to 225 lb and felt fine.
I felt pretty crappy today so I went a bit rogue on my program today and just did some random things. My left shoulder is barking again so I didn’t do any pressing today.
My estrogen was high on my last blood test two weeks ago and it’s probably still running high. This might be contributing to feeling tired the last several days. I’m going to start backing off the anabolics over the next week to get back to my normal amount. I’ve been running high going into week four now and that’s about the limit on what I wanted to do.
I took the last four days completely off and did absolutely nothing. I drove from Florida to the northeast. I definitely needed the rest. I was feeling like major crapola end of last week.
I felt pretty good today and was able to do everything I wanted. Took forever, but I was fairly slow between sets - I walk a lot between sets to get in steps - and I uncharacteristically was more chatty with others than normal. Hey, if a good looking woman wants to talk, I’m talking. The deadlifts can wait lol.
I’m at one month since starting the targeted fat mobilization. I’ll take some measurements tomorrow and write up my progress. I’ll decide tomorrow if I continue with this or not.
I started Sermorelin last night to see if it helps with sleep. I now pumping so much crap into myself on a daily basis, I’m a pin cushion.
I’m likely going to start tapering my T and nandrolone starting this week to get back to my normal cruise dosages. I’ll probably go to zero on the nandrolone for a bit soon since I’ve been running that continuously for a long time.
I stopped the oxandrolone five days ago as I ran out and was only planning to run it high about four weeks anyway. I’m planning to take at least a month off, probably more.
I was going to decide to bail or not on the fat mobilization thing this week, but I haven’t had time to do a full analysis of everything. So I’m sticking with it for now.
Workout today was good. I cut the volume slightly for chest as my left shoulder is screaming bloody murder again. I had to switch to flat DB bench from incline. The incline puts my shoulder in more external rotation and when it gets cranky, it does not like this position (that’s what she said).
I have a pro tip - don’t injure yourself so badly that it requires surgery. The joint will never work right ever again. Subscribe to my newsletter for more groundbreaking observations such as this.
Big bonus for today was I had zero blackout feeling like I have recently while doing fairly heavy for me front squats (90% intensity). Actually felt as good as I’ve felt doing them in a long time. I’m sure it will all go to hell again during the next front squat session.
I started backing off the nandrolone yesterday down to 150 mg per week from 250 mg. Apparently the pharmacy I buy from is out of stock of nandrolone, so I’m going to use this as a reason to go off nandrolone for awhile once this almost empty bottle is done since my heart is probably the size of a basketball lol.
Felt as good today as I have in a long time. Trap bar deadlifts at 480 lbs were “easy”. Total volume is dropping a lot for the progression I’m on as I ramp towards higher intensity and my body seems to be reacting well from it. The premise of the progression is I will be able to do 3 reps of my 1 rep max (530 lb) that I had at the start of the progression.
I didn’t do the targeted fat mobilization today. I’m losing my mojo on it a bit and I’m not sure it’s really doing much for me. I still need to fully analyze my last month’s progress before making a judgment.
Felt pretty good again today. No blackouts during front squats. I’m on a roll.
I decided to keep doing the targeted fat mobilization thing, but I’m going to mix it up. I got bored with the hip thrusts/aerodyne and since fat loss is about inefficiency, I figured changing the exercises might be beneficial.
I’m going to do 30 kettlebell swings paired with 1 minute farmer’s walks. I chose kettlebell swings as it still hits my fat ass pretty good and will be helpful in ramping to the Dan John 10,000 kettlebell swing thing I’m likely doing as my next training block.
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Finished block 7 of 10 today. About 8 days per block and still feeling pretty good almost two months into the profession. Trap bar deadlifts at 3x3 for 480 lbs again felt “easy”. Next block I jump to 505 lbs for 3x2. I’m getting chubbed up just thinking about 5 plates on the trap bar this coming Saturday.
I had to laugh today seeing the trap bar filled to the ends with plates and thinking where I was two years ago after letting myself turn into a pile of crap.
RDLs are getting up to a marginally respectable weight at 235 lb. But still fairly pathetic. Just slowly grinding my way up so I don’t pop a hamstring or tweak my glass-like lower back.
I’ve had a raging case of tennis elbow that has subsided quite a bit with reducing volume/load on my elbow - and I’m assuming the BPC-157 I’ve been injecting has also helped.
Maybe it’s a coincidence, but I felt faster healing on my elbow when I changed to injecting 50 mcg EOD vs 25 mcg daily. But maybe it was just a timing thing and my elbow was ready to turn a corner anyway.
I started Sermorelin a week ago to help with improving sleep and have been having crazy vivid dreams nightly for the last week. I also switched to taking 10-20 mg DHEA to nighttime at the same time so maybe that is doing it. Who knows.
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Started a new block today. 95% intensity for 3x2 on the main lifts. Felt good on 330 lb front squats. No blacking out, so that’s two squat session a row I haven’t had that. Maybe I’m out of the woods. I still have no idea what caused it.
I’ve maxed out the gym dumbbells for bench. Only have up to 105. I typically do incline, but my shoulder has been grumpy lately with incline so I went back to flat. I only do single arm at a time to make them harder and no dumbbell in the non-working arm makes it even harder to prevent rotation, but 105s are fairly easy with a X01 tempo. So I slowed them down to a X04 tempo and a 1-2 second pause in the stretch position. Still not super hard though.
I refuse to do barbell bench. Too high of an injury risk for my crappy shoulders. I’m hoping my left shoulder stops screaming so I can go back to incline soon.
I didn’t do any targeted fat mobilization today. Instead as a finisher I asked an attractive woman working out near me how many push ups she thought I could do in 5 minutes. She said “75.” I said “uh oh that was a mistake asking.”
I did 30 in the first 60 seconds and was thinking I’d crush 75. Then I completely died at about 45. I could only muster 67. 
She said that was “pretty good.” Ego crushed lol
.
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That’s gotta feel really good, seeing that kind of tangible progress. Especially when the thing is filled out to the ends haha
And that’s gotta fee pretty bad haha.
For real though this is a great “test” to show you how going to failure early in a workout can has you for the rest of it (or even a work out week). Something to think about…
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It was satisfying to see five plates on the trap bar today. Did 3x2 at 505 lbs and it wasn’t super difficult. I took a picture of the bar so I can remember this day in the future when I’m a lazy slob again.
The trap bar at my gym can only hold a max of 585. My goal is to hit this max by the end of the year. My ultimate goal is to hit 3x bodyweight which is about 650 lbs. I’ll have to stuff some plates in my shorts to get there.
I love snatch grip high pulls. Thanks to CT for introducing those to me. I did a sad 155 lbs today but I’ve been focusing on moving the weight as fast as possible and feeling like I own it. As opposed to just flinging it up with more weight but not feeling it in the right places.
I increased the total kettlebell swings to 120 today and paired with farmers walks for the fat mobilization circuit. I have no idea how I’m going to do 500 swings per workout when I attempt the 10,000 swing fiasco. My hands were shredded with just 120. The handle isn’t wide enough for both my hands to fit comfortably.
At some point I have to do an analysis on the targeted fat mobilization thing to see how useful it has been. I’ve been lazy about taking the time to do it.
Someone came up to me at the gym and gave me a nice compliment on what I was doing. In the past I’d blow that stuff off in my head and pretend to be the tough guy that didn’t need any recognition. But I now accept those types of things as meaningful and it made me feel pretty good. So thanks to that random guy today who made me smile.
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I actually have the exact same goal lol. Something about a fully-loaded trap bar just feels badass. Great work you’re doing in here btw
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I bookmarked your training log. No going back on that goal statement.
Do I get some sort of weight handicap for having 30 years on you? Lol
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I only get to use a trap bar like twice a year (my regular gym doesn’t have one), so we’ll just say that makes it even lol.
545 was my max the last time I tried it. And under 300 the time before that, because I was like 15 and 110 Lbs
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Worked out yesterday but didn’t have time to post.
Another blackout free front squat session so I’m hoping that has passed. Still have no clue exactly what was causing it.
This was my second front squat workout at 95% intensity. The next block bumps to 100% (350lbs) for 3x2. I’ve never actually front squatted that much before. 350 1RM was calculated based on my 3RM. So I’m looking forward to that.
The final block will be 100% intensity for 3x3. The premise with the progression (CT’s power look programming) is to do 3 reps at the end of what you could do 1 rep at the beginning. So far I’ve hit every progression for each block. Hitting 350 lb will be more of a mental thing I think than physical.
I’ve been bumping the kettlebell swing volume up slowly to prep for the 10,000 swing deal. Hamstrings today are feeling a little tight but not too bad. I only did 140 swings and the thought of doing 500 in one workout makes me want to vomit. But I’m doing the swings now after already being completely gassed so I’m hoping when the swings are the focus, it will be tolerable.
Had my ego stroked the other day. Someone thought I was 35. They asked me how I look so young and I said genetics and steroids lol. No magic here.
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Yesterday’s workout.
Felt good finishing up block 8 of 10 of the progression. 3x2 with 505 lb in trap bar deadlift wasn’t all that difficult. I probably had 4 RM in me, maybe 5 if I was willing to pop a few blood vessels.
I didn’t do any ass fat mobilization. I think I’m done with that as a specific focus. Subjectively, no great shakes on results. But I’m not going to say I gave it the focus it needed to really see any results. So I really have no verdict on it at this point.
I guess I need to update the name of my log if I’m going to keep the history in one place.
I’m driving to Florida tomorrow and will be taking a few days to do it, so will take it as some recovery time. Next training block I’m hitting 100% intensity on squats and deadlifts so probably good timing.
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I changed my training log title to be my ongoing log.
I’m nearing the end of this training progression. Did 3x2 for 520 lbs trap bar deadlift. It should have been 530 to hit the intensity prescribed, but I ran out of room on the bar to get the required plates. I went less instead of more because I didn’t want to be my normal stupid self.
Of course, I did the 3x2 and was still feeling decent so I did the next increment up I could do of 545 lbs for a single anyway. Because I’m dumb like that. That’s the most I’ve ever done. Previous estimated 1RM was 530 lbs. I probably could have eeked out another rep at 545.
I did 545 somewhat “easily”, so I said what the hell and loaded the bar to the max with 585. Couldn’t pull it more than a half inch or so. I contemplated another attempt, but stopped to live to see another day.
Here’s an updated photo of me. This was after an 8 minute cold plunge at 44 degrees. Body felt crazy tight after. I’ve become addicted to cold plunges and cold showers.
I’m slightly leaner than I was from my first post in this log in mid June. Weight is about the same.
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Felt pretty good today. The last two nights I’ve gotten some decent sleep. Funny how that works. I’m back on Sermorelin the last two nights and I’m sure that is the reason. Nothing else has changed.
Main lift today was front squats. Plan was 3x2 at 345 lbs. Got a double on the first two sets and got 1.5 reps on the third set. It’s usually not my legs that fail. My upper back craps out and I can’t keep the bar racked well and then it’s game over.
Oh well, I’m now in unchartered territory for me with this much weight for front squats, so it doesn’t bother me that I didn’t get 3x2.
I’ve started to fall in love with single arm dumbbell snatches. It’s way less complex to learn than barbell snatch and I like how explosive it feels. I’ve worked my way up to 100 lb DBs for a couple reps each arm. I am absolutely gassed doing these. It’s 100% effort and I like the feel of that. And it feels like a max effort movement I can do with lower risk of injury than something like sprinting.
My work capacity overall isn’t great. I need to work on increasing density and doing work energy system work on my non-weight days. I shouldn’t be as gassed as I am like today where I did a total of only 29 reps. Granted all the reps were near 1RM intensity.
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Very low volume today.
I was supposed to do 3x3 at 530 lbs on trap bar deadlift but didn’t feel like I could handle that much volume today, so I just did a bunch of singles.
Worked my way up to 565 lbs which is the most I’ve ever done. So that felt good. It definitely toasted my nervous system so I only did one more exercise.
I rewarded myself with this sandwich.
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I’ve been lazy posting to the log the last month.
I’ve been doing heavy, low volume for over a year. I think it’s time to start doing the exact opposite type of training to stress my body in a different way. I’ve had good strength gains and decent muscle gain with heavy, low volume, but I’m for sure plateauing.
I’m calling this the George Costanza Opposite Training Phase:
I’m switching up to much higher volume for a bit to give my joints and nervous system a bit of break. I’m also going to attempt to work in some more explosive movements each workout since most of the movements I’ve been doing for months are “slow”.
I want to keep training the trap bar deadlift and front squat, the two main lifts I like best. I found a couple Ben Bruno articles I’m basing two every other day, alternating workouts around. Workout 1 is posterior focused and Workout 2 anterior focused, but both are kinda, sorta full body workouts.
I’m going super high volume for the trap bar deadlift using this Bruno article.
My work capacity is crap so this progression is going to crush me. I’m on week 3 and, yeah, it’s so much more volume than I’ve been doing it’s ridiculous.
I’m of course not following his article exactly because I’m dumb like that, so frequency is higher than once a week and I do more exercises on trap bar day than he recommends. But I modify as needed each workout and just drop overall volume if I need to any given day.
Also, as part of my trap bar DL warm up, I work up to singles that are about 90-95% of my 1RM. This keeps my body used to heavy weight and it makes the work sets feel “easy”.
Since there is so much volume on the trap bar, I’m not going nearly as crazy on front squat days. For now, I’m doing the same working up to 90-95% of my 1RM with singles for a warm-up and then doing sets of 30 second iso-holds in the bottom position using this article as inspiration.
These burn very nicely and really stress my upper back in keeping the bar racked properly, which is usually where I end up failing in front squats.
My two alternating, every other day workouts are generally the following:
For the one “set” of push-ups, I’m just doing as many push-ups as possible in 5 minutes. I use bars to allow for a greater range of motion in the stretched position and I try to really focus on full scapular retraction/protraction.
Yesterday’s workout:
335 on the TBDL is only about 60% of my 1RM, so I feel like I should be doing more weight, but I’m being conservative given the total volume is almost 10 times what I was doing my last training progression.
I do feel fairly gassed on the last couple sets as I’m trying to keep rest periods on the short side near two minutes to improve my work capacity, which is abysmal.
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