Bradley Cooper went from a skinny dude to a thicker dude. He wasn’t huge or ripped, but he was carrying about 20 lbs more for the role (my guestimate).
a) how this plan works for you and if it generates the results that it claims
and b) how long you stick with it
I just glanced at the article and he doesn’t mention a set number of weeks. How long do you think you’ll run it?
For what it’s worth, I think this can be a viable approach for you. I ran into a high school classmate of mine at the gym. Didn’t know it was him. I seriously saw him and thought “That looks like a jacked version of Greg”. It turns out that it’s actually Greg. He does the shorter distance cardio things like 5Ks, biking stuff, and I think even the shorter triathlons. Greg’s legs aren’t huge, but they’re not small. His upper body is jacked. I don’t think he’s overall huge, but the way he carries his mass is impressive. It kills me because for one, I think he looks better than me, and secondly, he was a string bean in high school and didn’t play any sports.
I think triathlon training and a pursuit of a jacked upper body can work out just fine.
Honestly, I want to give it an honest run for 3 months. I’ve had my criticisms of Paul but he taught me how to achieve lat activation better than I had ever known. Same thing with his scap retraction stuff. I think it’s the way he presents the knowledge that irks me, but it hasn’t been wrong yet.
Some of his presentation is perfectly fine, but that’s only when it’s him putting out content instead of debating. I can’t read his stuff without hearing his voice in a condescending tone now. It’s irritating.
I learned from him. I even agree with him. But his behavior on here is/was off putting and I’m struggling to get past that.
That program looks like crazy low volume for you. It’s interesting to see you choosing that path because my own split and volume isn’t so different. I’m going to run with a push/pull split but I’m not going to kill my shoulder with a bunch of pressing. That pretty much leaves cable fly’s and lateral raises for my pressing days. And that’s all I’m going to do. I have like four movements per workout and that’s it. It looks like nothing, but I honestly can’t think of anything else to do and I don’t think doing more exercises is going to be better. I’ll just be sure to wear myself out on the few things I do.
Im also following it and finished my first week today. Also did a few bastardised versions of the upper workouts the weeks before. So far I like it a lot.
Also looking forward to following along. I did CT’s Superhero/Hollywood Muscle program last year and picked up some new favorite bodybuilding exercises and some modest body comp gains in the process. PC’s program sounds like an interesting variation on the theme.
If you feel the urge to change things up now that we’ve figured out that PC intended for this to be a five day routine, then you could do what I’m doing and just make it a push/pull. Split the leg exercises accordingly and then you hit everything three times in two weeks with your same three day plan.
I personally would not put a set 3 4 5 or 6 days on it. Go by recovery and beating the log book, it’s going to be a personal thing. If your not beating the reps doing it 2 times a week give yourself more recovery time. Even certain body parts may take more or less recovery time, and can vary depending on other factors.
Go by feel, your experienced enough to figure it out what you need.
Luckily the Y has a wider neutral grip handle that puts my hands in the same spot. The trick will be hogging the pull down and a cable station in a commercial gym. They’re like 50 ft apart.
A thought: Paul starts the program on chest day with smith incline, and after a shoulder superset you ramp up to one set of either seated DB, seated smith OHP, or seated BB OHP. I love the pre exhaust, and I chose BB OHP because it was the only free weight movement, but I’m honestly considering making it a smith OHP and changing the smith incline to a regular BB incline. My progress was going great, this would set me up to hit 225x8 on incline BB, it’d let me hit the big strength movement first, etc. My BB OHP isn’t going to progress much after incline, upper chest crossovers, and a superset of shoulder exercises, so I may as well use the smith OHP where I can go 100% to failure afterwards. Just a thought. Might be a safer bet and continue my progress.
I’m going to regret this, but I’m signing up for a half ironman swim-run in May. I don’t really mind long runs or swims, but I genuinely don’t enjoy long bike rides. My last 52 mile ride was just miserable for me, I wish I could say I got something out of it, but besides my ass hurting and my entire groin being kind of numb, which is a really unsettling feeling, I don’t think I felt anything besides rage after 3 hours in the saddle.
SO - I’m going to give myself the benefit of the doubt that a 1.2 mile swim followed immediately by a 13.1 mile half marathon is not a cop-out. Plus, if I ever commit a felony near a body of water ~1 mile from another piece of land, I’ll be tough to catch.
It took a full 24 hours to regain feeling. I was terrified, and then I did the one thing you should never do - research your symptoms on the internet - and found that long distance bikers having erectile dysfunction problems is a common problem. It was a scary day. Fortunately (or unfortunately for my wife) my hyperactive sex drive is a-ok.
The program called for 1 set of leg extensions. I balked and added a widow maker 20 rep set. Even for Paul, that’s 3 sets of quad work a week. The lunges are quads too, sure, but 100 bodyweight lunges ain’t shit, so MAYBE that’s 4 sets a week. I have absolutely no problem adding one more set of leg extensions.
I remember hearing about an increased cancer risk in distance bikers. There’s something not so good about a bike seat. The seat just smashes the nerves in that region.
Yeah, I found a wider split saddle that doesn’t compress the perineum. That’ll stop the problem, though my ass bones will hurt more, but in a sprint I’m on the bike for like 30 min so I don’t care, lol.