Good luck with it mate, most families have these sort of ‘undesirable types’ as part of them somewhere. Great suggestion above, vent at the gym, I find while lifting I am in the zone and nothing bothers me.
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Had a great father’s day anyway.
Don’t like benching without having a spotter so I just did a substitute upper body day
WPU’s
Warmup BW 2x10
+25x10
+45x8
Super wide grip neutral bodyweight x10
Superset with
Straight arm rope pulldowns x12
X4
Cable Rows x 10
Superset with
Kroc Rows 80x20
X3
DB incline
60, 70, 80 x8, 90x4
Cable Crossovers superset with pushups
You’re both right- just went hard in the gym and had a wonderful father’s day at a friends house, now home, put the kids to bed, and can have some alone time with the wife. Can’t go wrong with that.
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Benching without a spotter is my motivation. During the eccentric phase I tell myself “There’s no one here to save you so you better get it.”
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I am not worthy
bows deeply
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Did power clean+press, and muscle snatches yesterday, along with some arm work and core stuff, while my wife did bench.
Today: Deadlift
Worked up to 275 with the B.B. and just felt like my hip and SI joint were too tight, so I switched to the trap bar and started over.
265x5
290x3
315x7
RDLs
135, 155, 185, 185, 155x10
Single leg hamstring curls, back extensions, lots of calf work/
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DELOAD WEEK
I’m definitely feeling these several months back in the gym. Never took more than one total rest day a week and I feel like it was definitely useful to back off a bit. I may switch up the routine, or try a CT routine after this week. We’ll see.
OHP
105, 115, 125x5
Seated Smith Shoulder Press
95, 115, 135, 155, 95x10
Muscle Snatch
95x3, 105x3, 115x3, 135x1 drop Set to 95x8
The 135 was super shaky.
Face pulls, lateral raises, rear delt Flyes, band pullaparts
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Squat
95x10, 135x5, 185x3
195x5
210x5
225x5
135 3x20
Leg Press Burnout - Keep doing 10 reps and adding a plate a side until I can’t hit 10, then dropset all the way back down to 1 plate
Calf stuff
Man, I will never get the “load 324789328732947 pounds onto the standing calf raise and bounce repeatedly over a 2 inch ROM” mentality. My calves are a good size and have a serious “W” shape, and I do like…100-140 pounds. 3 second eccentric, 2 second stretch, 1 second concentric, 15 rep sets, superset with seated calf raises with a plate or maybe a plate and a 25, same 3-2-1 15 rep set. Usually do it 3 times and finish with max BW. Once I’m unable to hit the absolute peak of my tiptoes, I’ll only do 1 or 2 more reps after that. I’ll honestly bet these people couldn’t do 1 genuine rep at the weight they’re doing. It’s not like I haven’t seen it all my life in gyms, but it never gets less annoying. Unless they tear their achilles tendon in front of me. Hasn’t ever happened, but I bet it would make it less annoying.
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Did some arms and shoulders today, while wife did conditioning.
DB Curls superset with cg pushups
30s, 35, 40, 40
Seated shoulder press, pause on collarbone
95 4x10
Superset with 21s with 55
Snatches
95, 115, 115, 95 x8
Superset with clean + pressx10
Same weight as snatches obviously
Giant Set of
Rope Pulldowns
Rope curls
Lateral plate raises
Just wanted to make arms and shoulders burns and gas myself for a bit, it worked. Good Sunday. Had sushi for dinner, 6 piece spicy tuna roll, 6 piece California roll, 10 piece assorted sushi, box of white rice, pork gyoza.
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So I switched up the routine and tried the Built for Battle routine.
I was okay doing 5/3/1 for longer, but I was getting antsy after 2-2.5 months on it, and my wife was eager to do more of a conditioning-like program. Plus it just looks fun. So I made the modifications I talked about in the thread on CT’s forum, and it was fun.
Couple thoughts:
Definitely start light, and our 3rm lifts always looked like we had 1-2 more in the tank. Would be easy to have a tired or sore day and mess something up with this volume and frequency of compound lifts.
I’ve been enjoying deadlifts, but I just don’t feel…safe with them. I can pull 315 without much of a problem but once I get above 225 my SI joint never feels totally stable. Trap bar deads just feel completely comfortable. Also, front squats aggravate my SI joints, so back squats it is.
We took the trap bar to a regular squat rack, and I would do deads while she did OHP and squat, then we would load for each other and switch. Didn’t take long for OHP to hit the 3rm so then it was just deads and squats and went quickly.
Then she grabbed cable row while I grabbed a bench and we jumped back and forth.
Was definitely fun, got the heart rate up without gassing us, had both the lifting and complex/circuit feel. I’m gonna run it. Also, not that this is related to the program review as a whole, but my squats felt disgustingly weak today. Lower back was tight going in and we didn’t have as much time as I wanted so I minimized my warmup in return for the full workout which was fucking stupid, and I’m lucky I didn’t injure something.
3rm’s:
Trap Deads: 335
OHP: 155
Squats: 245
Bench: 225
Cable Row: whatever 14 is on the stack
Wife’s 3rm’s
Trap Deads: 135
OHP: 60
Squats: 95
Bench: 75
Row: 8
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I’ll enjoy watching you do this! It’ll give me a chance to learn how to make it work in a commercial gym workout having to experience the growing pains.
As long as you don’t mind doing BB rows and conventional deads I really think it’d be easy to do it all in one set. But man- conventional deads, bent rows and front squats sounds like murder on the hips. Day one feels great but 5 days a week is gonna suck eventually lol
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I think the lighter days might actually help with recovery. I’d do back squats and some sort of barbell type rows. Pendlay rows aren’t terrible on the back because you can set the weight down between reps if fatigue gets to you.
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Guys. It happened.
My sister came to visit me and asked if I was on steroids.
My arms have blown up, plus I’ve cut body fat like crazy in the past 5 months so they do look pretty big but after asking her if she was serious, I just said thanks and have spent the rest of the night feeling flattered.
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Honestly that’s the best compliment
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Have had family visiting for the past 3 days, haven’t been able to do day 2 of B4B yet, my sister is really into fitness but doesn’t do much conventional lifting, and wanted to workout with us. It took 2 months of 5/3/1 to get my wife comfortable with the main lifts, performing them once a week, so I wasn’t about to try to teach my sister to DL, OHP, squat, and bench in one day while trying to maintain a circuit with 3 different 3RMs. Did some fun stuff instead.
1 push-up, 1 pull-up, 2 push-ups, 2 pull-ups, etc. up to 10. Wife and sister used the assisted PU machine, I did up to 6 with +25 for the pull-ups but failed after 2 reps on the 7 set.
Prowler sprints: 25 meters with high grip on poles, +50 for me, +20 for the girls, turn around and do 25 meters back with the low handles (6inches off the floor, essentially in a bear crawl, and it fuckin sucks). 4 rounds, decided not to do 5 because…
Battle Ropes:
20 second sets, 10 seconds alternating waves and 10 seconds simultaneous waves, always as large waves as possible, holding just above a parallel squat, just going 100%. 4 sets.
Went home trying not to puke and die. Felt great an hour afterwards and spent the rest of the day at a lake with my family and wife and kids swimming and laughing.
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Back at it with Built for Battle
5, 4, 3, 2, 1 with 80, 85, 90, 95, and 100% of 3RM
Deads 265, 285, 305, 320, 335
OHP 105, 115, 130, 145, 155
Squat 185, 205, 220, 235, 245
Bench 165, 180, 195, 205, 225
Row 10, 11, 12, 13, 14
Tomorrow is lighter percentages with an assistance circuit afterwards. Since I’m doing it with my wife, rest is only as long as it takes to load. So I’m at 30-60 seconds rest give or take. Definitely sweaty as shit and feeling strong.
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5/4/3/2/1 with 72.5% 77.5% 82.5% 87.5% and 92.5% of 3RM
Deads 265, 280, 295, 305, 315
OHP 115, 125, 130, 140, 145
Squat 185, 195, 205, 215, 225
Bench 155, 165, 175, 195, 215
Row 9, 10, 11, 12, 13
With assistance circuit 1
Giant Set
Incline DB 60, 70, 80x10, 8, 6
DB Row 50, 60, 70x10, 8, 6
Bulgarian Split Squat 20s, 25s, 30s x 10, 8, 6
Dropped RDLs from the circuit and did calves
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Built For Battle Heavy Day
90%, 95%, 100%, 105%, and 110% of 3RM.
Deads: 300, 320, 335, 350, 365
OHP: 140, 150, 160, 165, 170
Squat: 220, 235, 250, 260, 270
Bench: 200, 215, 225, 235, 245
Row: 11, 12, 13, 14, 15
The bench was shaky. I had to do Deads OHP and Squat in a circuit then hit bench and row for the next and I was so gassed, it was like a 6-7 second concentric. Also…I might switch out the cable row. It just doesn’t feel right doing 1RM’s on the cable row. It’s the only exercise I don’t get a good feeling from, and high rep cable rows always did a ton more for me. I think next week I’m gonna do weighted pullups instead of rows. I’d do BB rows but I really don’t wanna add in another lower-back heavy exercise.
STILL - all in all, lifting those weights in circuit fashion is no fuckin joke and I left so fuckin pumped I was exploding out of a shirt that was borderline baggy on me when I arrived. The strength gains feel real, and the conditioning aspect of it is there too. Fantastic program so far. Wife deadlifted 155 today without much of a problem. I’d put her actual 1RM around 185 right now, and that’s with a surgically repaired ankle and atrophied calf muscle. She’s a boss.
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Deadlift and squat weights looking good!
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Thanks man. Getting back up to where I want to be. Just gimme that 405 already so I can start working on 500. All time PR for squat is 365 and in my experience my squat goes up much more slowly than my dead so I’ve got some time on my hands.
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