Try looking on craigslist. You never know what you’ll find. I’ve seen some really good deals on gym equipment.
Also for sciatic problems, stretching exercises are very effective when done daily.
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Craigslist will be an option too. But probably for the smaller stuff I want to get. The other two/three things I want to drop some good money on for quality. Because I’m gonna be mad if this stuff starts to break down quickly.
LOG # 107
Max effort squat
Work up: 135lbsx1 225lbsx1, 315lbsx 1, 345x1, 355lbsx1, 365lbsx1(new PR, yay!)
Secondary:
SLDL: 200lbs 3x3
Arch back goodmornings: 135lbs 3x5
Compound rows: 160lbs 3x5
Seal rows: 135lbs 3x6
Leg press: 225lbs 2x10 (wide stance to open up hips)
Hanging leg raises: 3x10
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Congrats on the squat PR. That’s some serious weight on your back. 405 in no time
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My max video won’t load for some reason on YouTube 
But I’ll fix it another time.
Here’s a video of me doing 315 for a triple (is that what you call it?) better than nothing.
I dropped my phone at the end, so don’t be alarmed at the sudden garble of colors lol.
Felt good the entire time. Didn’t pee this time either lol. Knees felt weird but they don’t hurt. Need to remember to bring my wraps which I never do.
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Thanks man!
Damn get it girl! Nice job
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Thank youuuuuuuu! 
So I was totally ready to tell you that you aren’t hitting depth, because, you know, I’m a dude and my max 1RM was 290, and, you totally hit depth, congrats!
Nice job and congrats on the PR!
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General notes:
All three of my lifts have gone up which I REALLY REALLY enjoy. My last deadlift max was 305? I think? I feel as though I can test my med out one more time to really see what it is. I’m really shooting for 315 again or maybe even 320 (wishful thinking).
My bench is steadily climbing and I pin point in my training what’s causing that. It’s a mixture of whatever scheme of speed bench/assistance work I’m doing at the moment. The 10x1-5 movements with 60%, my body seems to respond well to the most though. Pull ups and dips are something I’m going to start adding into my assistance work as well.
For squat I’ve noticed it’s a bit different. The speed day, is what solely triggers the most strength gains. However I’ve tweaked it to where the training doesn’t stay only at 50-60% of my max though, but climbs up maybe two weeks at a time in 15-25lb increments. Sometimes my max isn’t as high as I wish but the increased intensity on speed days is what does the trick, even if the latter is lacking. Because I hadn’t tested my squat max in a while, but kept on top of my assistance work and managed to hit a new PR. So that’s that.
For deads however I’m still trying to figure out the sweet spot for me. Resting too long makes me stagnant, rotating deads earlier too often and strength breaks down. My deadlift is so damn temperamental. Some days I feel like crap and pull a ton, sometimes I feel great and can’t even get passed 275. Conventional is something I can use as assistance work, but I don’t think I use enough of it so I’m going to start incorporating that more, coupled with sumo. Rack pulls are great for me, so that’s something that needs to be thrown in there. Assistance work kind of doesn’t help my deads, but helps my bench in terms of strengthening up the lats. But I think it’s the kind of assistance work I’m doing that isn’t helping. Either that or it needs to progress to more heavier weights, and upping the reps slowly. That lower back injury did not serve me justice either because that also plays a big role as to why my deads suck ass right now. Recovery is very good, and I feel no pain from day to day, but I think I’m afraid of hurting myself again, and probably am not putting forth full effort, so I’ll have to fix that as well. I’ve also noticed the work up on my deads is different from any of the two other lifts. My bench increments I usually do 1-2 reps and then increase. For squat I did 1 rep across the board and felt great. For deads sometimes I’ll do 3-4 reps of the same weight before going up, and by then I’m already tired. I think if I bump it down to 1-2 reps on the lighter weight through and through I won’t tire out as quickly.
Other than that, I think I’m going to run a program on this site once I hit a few more PRs. I’m shooting for a 405 squat, 225 bench, and a 335 dead, and then I’ll cut down. I’m back and forth between 208-212lbs. 208 being the weight upon waking, and 212 being the weight throughout a day of eating, drinking fluids, etc. a good half of the weight gain is muscle apparently, with the other half being fat. I’m not upset because I’m getting damn strong which means I’m doing things correctly, but for aesthetic reasons I also want to parade around in shorts, and tight shirts that show off my gains because I want to. At the rate I’m going I’ll hit Bench probably before anything else, hopefully by August, squat somewhere after that, and dead probably a bit later maybe by Christmas hopefully. However if my weight is getting too heavy I’ll go ahead and cut down to 190 and see how I fair after that. I’ve noticed I’m not meant to cut below anything under 160-170lbs. 1) because my body has kind of programmed itself to just get rid of everything and go into panic mode after a while thanks to my destructive eating patterns in the past, and 2) my genetics just call for me to be at that weight with lots of muscle and lean percentages of fat. 3) because I realize I can only lose so much weight without strength being sacrificed. So I’ll settle for being appreciably lean but not as lean as I could be while still being strong.
If I can recomp anything remotely decent, I’ll be hella happy. So we will see.
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Yay!!! YAY!!! YAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYY! You don’t understand how much that made my night!!! Thank you!!!
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The first rep could’ve been slightly deeper though.
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Here’s the thing: you can’t serve two masters. Either you want to get stronger; or you want to get leaner. Both are worthy pursuits. They are also pretty incompatible. Trying to to a bit of both will yield mediocre results for both goals.
Broadly:
- Point 2 is not true. You can absolutely manipulate your body composition to be whatever you like. You might not look as good super lean as someone else and it may be harder for you to get there, but you can definitely get to that level of leanness.
- same applies to point 1. If you make the right changes, consistently, over time your body will re-program itself. We’re talking years, not weeks or months. It depends on how much effort you’re prepared to make and how much time you’re prepared to spend. On the plus side, the younger you are the better chance you have of being able to effect such a reset over a relatively shorter period and with relatively less effort.
- point 3 is kind a of a ‘no shit’ point. If you lean out, your strength will go down for a bit. Then it’ll come back, and probably increase
- further to point 3, right now you’re a SHW. In that class, you’re not weak but you’re not strong either. If you drop to 170 lbs, which I think would be a good weight for you, you’d be doing pretty well even with a temporary drop in strength (with an emphasis on temporary).
- lastly, it’s going to be a hell of a lot easier to lean out now. Make the effort to learn how to get and stay lean, and you’ll be able to spend the rest of your lifting career getting stronger and more muscular as opposed to suddenly realising you need to shed some weight years down the track when it’ll be much, much harder both mentally and physically. Think about it: right now you squat 365 lbs, so leaning out might see you drop to 320 lbs; if you wait, you’ll probably be squatting 450+ lbs, but leaning out might see you back down to 350 lbs or so. Which would you rather?
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I gotta say, you being almost 3.5lbs/inch of bodyweight is damn impressive
Kind of funny that I just wrote that 3.5lbs/inch is a good goal for guys to shoot on a diet, I’d probably better change that to Dante’s recommendation of 4lbs/inch
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I probably should’ve worded that differently. Now that you mention it. I haven’t the slightest idea what I could switch for what I mean to say. I guess it’s not really genetics so much as it is, that comfy place, I’m put myself in since recovery.
I do realize it takes time. Took me a while to recover (still doing so), took me some time to get to this far (also still doing so), and losing fat will probably be longer than expected but I’m prepared. I suppose it’s a mental thing I need to work on. I’ve honestly been putting off losing some fat out of fear. Honestly. Relates back to the above section.
And yea the redundancy probably could’ve been spared, but I don’t mind the repitition for myself. Reminders I guess lol.
And I agree. I was telling myself this earlier. The longer I wait the more frustrated I’ll be. And the former would be the best bet. I wasn’t intending on going past this winter without even attempting to cut down though. Heck I could probably just start now like I was psyching myself up for yesterday.
Which is probably what I’m going to opt to do.
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Does the “/” symbol mean “per”? lol I’m kind of confused
And thanks But it is about time I went ahead and cut down.
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Yeah
Trust me, you are not the only one I’ve confused lately
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The more lingo stuff I learn the better lol. But can you elaborate on that? Does that mean height wise? Or like fat to lean mass wise? Or a combo of both? Sorry if this question is stupid lol
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I’ll be glad to elaborate
So we have your height (a tad over 5’2" if I remember correctly)
When we convert that to inches we obtain the information that you are 62 inches tall.
Now we just simply divide your total bodyweight (average of 210lbs) by your height (62 inches) and we get 3.32
So for each inch of height you have approximately 3.32 pounds of bodyweight
If you were 5’4 you’d need to weight around 216-217 to be relatively the same size, so, as you see, pounds per inch is a great (and simple) tool if you want to compare people of different heights mass - wise
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