LOG # 227
Squat
255lbs
5x3
225lbs AMRAP, got 27 reps. Lats were burned out, and my back was getting irritated.
Hamstring curls: 100lbs 5x3
Leg press: 410 3x15
Lat pulldowns: 100lbs 3x7 (having to strengthen my lats up more because they strain under pressure during squatting.
Back extensions: super light, 100lbs AMRAP
Kneeling crunches, or whatever they’re called: 4x20
Mobility stuff:
Bunch of foam rolling
Is this post beers? Those can be good for a few pounds of water weight.
It might be time to bite the bullet and do a true cut. I really dont think your strength or muscle mass will take a hit…
But I really dont recommend this…ever. Eat a protein shake or piece of chicken.
Personally I have found much better results with PM cardio and cutting afternoon carbs. (fasted cardio even while enhanced just felt like it forced more fat to be more stubborn.)
Getting all of my carbs pre workout and then only veggies and lean meat the rest of the day was like a blow torch to butter.
You still get your energy around your workouts that matter and then the PM cardio burns off a bit of extra calories and the lack of carbs forces your body to burn the fat stores.
and STAY STRONG!!!
It actually went down after beer night. I kept looking at 199-200 for a few days, before I recorded this most recent weight. I think it might’ve gone towards some needed carbs, because I hadn’t really had any that day. [quote=“BOTSLAYER, post:1106, topic:220550”]
It might be time to bite the bullet and do a true cut. I really dont think your strength or muscle mass will take a hit…
planetcybertron:
[/quote]
I’ve been properly cutting down for about 7-8 weeks now. But I could be just in need of more water. I only drink about 4-5 glasses a day.
I was just testing it out, but I’m not seeing much of a difference. So I’ll agree. I don’t think I’m lean enough for that to be something I use anyways.
I’ve been doing most of the cardio on off days, like around 2-3 in the afternoon. On training days beforehand I follow that same guideline, and drop carbs. I was just experimenting with fasted cardio, but it probably isn’t going to do much, if it doesn’t do the opposite of what I wanted.
I follow that guideline, with a few adjustments. After 5-6 in the afternoon I just keep veggies. I don’t really need as many calories as I thought I did. I’ve been keeping protein at 140-150. And carbs cap out at 100, on training days. On non training days it’s usually half that.
I’ll give it a go, doing cardio around 7-8, instead of early afternoons. Few hours after the sun goes down over here.
Just so impressed with your strength. Wow.
And nice work with your ongoing cut.
Sorry, I haven’t kept up with following logs for a long time.
About all the progress on your Bench this fall, congratulations! I know you felt like your upper body lifts were always lagging your Squat and DL. What did you do in terms of programming? I just looked back a few days and see a BP/Triceps Pushdown accessory, then OHP and DB rows. Is that a typical training day, you’re following an upper body split these days?
Edit: Looks like you like to split legs into Squat-Centric or DL-Centric days. I often train legs like that. Posterior chain/DL Then Squat/Quads.
Edit 2: Wait a minute. I see Full Body training and a lot of cardio/ walking. You’re switching things up while you cut, and mabye not following a strength program right now. Anyway, Yeah. Would like to know what you did in terms of programming to move your Bench. Freaking amazing progress on that, BTW.
First off, thank you very very much for such a sweet compliment. I really do appreciate it.
Before the cut I was following a 5/3/1 variation for offseason powerlifting. The accessory movements concerning that variation aren’t set in stone. Most of what you see me doing concerning accessory stuff is to help build up my bench press, so they’re subject to change depending on how I’m feeling, and depending on what I pinpoint that is lagging. So, I wouldn’t say those movements are typical, but I do rotate them with other upper body work to help me. I wouldn’t really say what I’m doing is a split because it’s more or less one bench session followed by mix and matched accessory work as I see fit, even now during my cutting phase.
Concerning those two movements, the accessory work becomes even more fluid, but the actual squat and deadlift I do have to break up into their own days. Reason one being that I have to work around an injury, and reason two concerning accessory stuff, is that most movements I pick that work the best, help build both my squat and deadlift so you’ll see me doing back extensions, hamstring extensions, and hanging leg raises for both the squat and deadlift quite frequently. When I first started training I was able to train all the movements back to back until I was done with my session, but as the weights grew heavier, and after I injured myself I really have no choice but to split them up like that, or else I’ll come a banged up, trembling mess.
With the full body stuff, to paint a picture, whenever I post a full body routine, it’s in my garage, with dumbells. And the reps are pretty much sky high, and I use that mostly for some sort of weighted conditioning. For the cardio part, I’m not the leanest whatsoever, so I’m a bit able to implement a decent amount of cardio. I also don’t work at the moment, so I have ample time to sleep, and recover. Botslayer mentioned ditching fasted cardio, so that’s a no-go for now.
I’d say I’m still running a strength program. Most of the poundages you see are roughly 60-75% of my max, coupled with a can of ass whoopin volume sets, so I’m still moving decent weight during this cut. This cut is also rather aggressive at the moment, so I’m rather pleased To be maintaining even this amount of strength.
Glad you asked, because I can remember rather specifically what I did.
I’ll have to rewind a bit backwards though. When I managed to switch to actual free weight benching, I made it a point to always be able to press 135 at the very very least. I started with 25s on each side of the smith machine, and hammered 5x5 consistently until I moved all the way up to 165 for 3x3, or 3x5. When I finally got my hands on some free weights all I could do was bench singles, maybe a double here and there.At that point I just started shoving food in my mouth. Although you don’t have to do what I did at all. Just up calories as you see fit.
I also dabbled in DoggCrapp training for about some month. Not sure if you’re familiar with that but it is a rest pause style training, that you work up in weight on, coupled with weighted stretches, that are split up into 5-7 training days I believe. I didn’t give myself enough time with that program to get it down pact, but I understand the majority of it. @danteism can give you more info on it, if you’ve got more questions.
After that I hopped on a conjugate style of training (Westside) and it had me training bench twice a week, and sometimes three if I rearranged deadlift and squat for whatever reason. Either a new PR, or a 1-3rm, or speed work was what I was doing. And that’s where I finally saw a 210 Bench. For me, if I’m not training bench frequently I’m not going to see progress, so I enjoyed running that type of training. I was also eating like a mad man so that helped a bunch too.
The accessory movements that were prescribed kind of mimicked the ones 5/3/1 implement. Triceps, chest, floor presses, row variations, bench with boards( have yet to get boards so I haven’t done those yet), cambered presses. I’ll
also note that on the days it said to shoot for a 1rm or a PR, it didn’t have to be strictly bench press. You could max out a cambered press, floor press, lockouts, banded presses, incline presses, DBs for reps that were heavy enough, etc. it also had you rotate whatever you decided to max out on, if you did more than one movement to max out on ME days.i just kept it mainly bench press because I’m still limited on the equipment I have.
Speed work is what it sounds like. Backing off the percentage a bit, and working on a controlled decent, and a quicker controlled concentric portion of the bench. And higher volume for accessory work which also mimick the accessory work for ME days (max effort), and DB, tricep, chest, traps, etc. I was to pick two- four accessory movements for that training session, and rotate them until I landed back on the first batch I started with, and then repeat. I kept the accessory mildly heavy for 3x5, 5x5, and then finish it off with lighter volume for anywhere between 10 reps on up to 20 or so.
I ran this program for what, maybe 4-6 months? So I received very decent results from it.
But that’s mostly everything in a nutshell though. Hope I was detailed enough.
Hey, thanks so much. I have never trained Conjugate, but I’m considering a strength program. Thanks for taking the time to detail that. Sincerely, that was awesome.
I find descriptions of Conjugate style programs a little confusing, partly because they are flexible within the basic idea. I need to read and watch some videos of someone coaching a typical training day or two. I don’t love training in low rep ranges, so doing a lot of 1-3 Rep work is a huge shift. Erg… I like the 8-12 Rep Range. I think my Bench has moved, but I’ve been gradually inching up the weight with sets of 8-12. Ha! Not yet putting anything really heavy on the bar. To give you an idea, I presssed 105lbs x12, and 115 lbs x7 last week at a BW of 115, so 52 KG class. Any advice appreciated.
I’ve been coming back from a shoulder injury and am finally comfortably pressing again. Feeling really happy to see that I’ve maintained my strength pretty well pressing DBs and doing Cables. I’m thinking of doing a PLing meet next spring. I’ve been training with a very talented female newbie PLer, and she’s making awesome progress. It’s motivated me to work on strength again. We may do one together with a couple of other people at my gym in the spring. I will let you know if I start running conjugate. Please tag me here if you decide to do a competition. Would love to see that!
Best,
Puff
They are at first. I attacked Mark with a crap ton of questions and was still confused but kept doing until it looked like a well put together plan. Even now, I still try to separate Westside and conjugate, but they’re on in the same lol.
If you want I can post a simple guide I’ve used from another site I post on. I’ll include the guys name, to give credit, For copyright stuff. That way you can read it and look it over to get a better grasp of it. With Conjugate style training, you’re very free to add in some things and take away things as well. The most important aspects to remember are your speed days/dynamic effort days, and your max effort days. Dynamic effort could viewed as something that helps supplement your max effort days, or your main lifts. At least in my opinion.
Low rep ranges with higher intensity give you an ego boost sometimes. I will say they do tax the CNS a hell of a lot though, so keep mobility and recovery as a top priority. And since you have a banged up shoulder, be watchful of your upper body. If it’s hurting, there’s no shame in easing up on the work load you have. If you do get some irritation in your shoulder, I find a rotation of an ice bath with a hot bath works really well. It works with ice packs and heating pads, but there’s something about fully submerging yourself in water I find works a bit better.
I’d say you’re doing great. To be honest, espeacially with a shoulder injury. Advice wise, I’m not the most experienced, or even the best, but I’d definitely encourage you to start dabbling in the low rep, higher intensity stuff, because I bet you’ll see the likes of 135lbs, and even higher. You’re very well versed in aspects of diet, and all that, so it’ll probably be a breeze for you to start progressing once you’ve got a good plan down.
Let me know how things go for you. I’d be great to have another female to talk to about powerlifting stuff, and if you need any help I’ll do my best to help you, if you decide to stick with it. Plus side: Powerlifting Butt. 
I’m not sure what your physique looks like at the moment, or your height or anything like that, but I will say, that it’s okay if you gain a bit of fat switching to this style of training, and start chasing strength. You’re probably way leaner than I am, so you probably won’t even have to worry about it, but if it does happen please don’t panic, it’s normal. I’ve had a few chicks ask me questions about that, and most shy away from delving into powerlifting for that reason.
And I’m planning next year to compete sometime in June or the early fall. I’ve never done a proper peaking cycle, so I’m going to run a few practice rounds during the spring time.
If the doctor gives me the go ahead, and I don’t need any type of surgery, after this cut I’m going to start playing around and keeping certain training styles that I can tailor uniquely for the bench, squat, and deadlift. I’ve been thinking about running Smolov for squats, while melding aspects of Westside for bench just to see. I may or may not have success with this idea, but I do want to try at least. Have to look around and see what I can tailor for deadlift to suit my needs. I may or not eventually just switch to a different pulling variation for my back altogether.
Yes, if it’s not too much trouble. I’d like to take a look. The small group of PLers I sometimes lift with are doing a variation of Westside, I believe. I know they are basing programing off of Prelepin’s Chart, so I believe it’s a Conjugate program, or something very similar. I’m thinking of jumping in with them, just to keep things simple. They’re finishing a cycle at Christmas, so that would work well to jump in for the New Year.
Amen. I’m backing off of anything that causes pain.
Will do. Thank you.
I’m almost 5’2". I’ve mostly lifted for aesthetics, and just because I love it. Yes, petite but much smaller framed I think. You know when you see strength like yours, you have the bone structure to support it. Hard Work plus some good genes there. Nice you realized that strength training was your thing! Genes are real. Ha!
It’s true about women being unwilling to see their weight go up. I often trained OLY with a woman who is very, very small boned, tall and thin. She’s often asked me for advice about hypertrophy. Ask me to help her train shoulders and back, but I think that she’s not really willing to eat for it so she’ll continue to look more like a willowy dancer instead of someone who looks like they lift weights. Agree. It’s a quick way to get nowhere fast, if you’re unwilling to see the scale come up a bit. I’m hoping to see myself get more efficient at the BB lifts, without going up to the next weight class. I’m older now, and happy with my physique so… Not planning to seriously bulk. This will be a bit of an experiment in seeing if I can learn to be more efficient, better MMC in the BB lifts. Not very exciting, I know!
Cool. I will stop in and see. Thanks for letting me threadjack your log a bit. It was really helpful. Nice to chat with you, and best of luck!
You’re more than welcome to hijack my log. It gets boring me just posting stuff and rambling.
My phone is being weird, so I’ll just have to write it down and type it out here. I’ll get it up here later this afternoon.
Here’s a sample of what a conjugate style of training would look like. This is a rough template of Westside. There are others but this is the one I used.
Monday: Max effort for squat and deadlift
pick a movement from below, work up to a 1rm. Do not perform Same movements two weeks in a row
•zercher squats
•SSB squats
•Good mornings
• deadlift, or a 1-2inch deficit dead
•SLDL
•pin lockouts/rack pulls
• low bar/high bar squat
• sumo deadlifts
Assistance movements: lower back, keep reps in the 3-5, or 6-10 rep ranges
• leg curls
•biceps
•triceps
• SLD
• glute work( optional)
•pull throughs
• hypers/ reverse hypers
•abs
Wednesday: Max effort day for bench
work up to a 1rm for bench, pick a movement from below, do not repeat more than two weeks in a row
•board press
• camber bar presses
•decline bench
• bench press
• floor press
•banded presses
•lockouts/ dead benches
•heavy DBs for reps
• CGBP
Assistance movements:
•triceps (3-7 rep range)
•upper back movements (rows, pull ups, dips, etc. 6-10 reps range)
•biceps
•Kroc rows
•seal rows
•abs
Friday: speed day for squat
6-10 sets of 2-3 reps with 50-60% of 1rm. Rest should be for 1 min
•box squats
•pause squats
•high/low bar squats
Assistance movements: 6-10 rep range or 10-15 rep range
•leg curls
•glute work
• any lower back movements from Monday’s sessions
•shrugs
•abs (biceps are optional)
Sunday: speed work for bench
8-10 sets of 2-3 reps, using 50% of 1rm
•CGBP
•Front presses
•Floor presses
• bench press
Assistance work:
•front presses (3x5, or 5x5)
•triceps movement (10-15 reps)
•DB work (extensions, rows, presses,etc) 10-15 reps
The rest of these movements can be in the 6-10 reps range:
• JM presses
• skull crushers
• pull downs
•cable rows
•biceps
•abs
I added in a few movements that I find useful. I simplified this as much as I could. It’s preferred that you rotate A good chunk of the movements used, but due to equipment restrictions I’d usually stick with 2-3 different movements for the max effort days.
The site I got this from is called Intense Muscle. The guy who made this post, his name is “Liftin’ Heavy”. Think he works out at Hercules Gym in Syracuse. Idk. Pretty strong dude.
Cardio wise, it doesn’t specify but cardio should definitely be kept to a minimum. Maybe a brisk walk twice a week, leisurely swimming for 30 mins, bit of jump rope, etc.
You can interchange the days you train as needed. And depending on how you’re feeling you can switch up the order a bit if you need to as well.
I’m not sure what the protocol for a peaking cycle would be prior to a competition, but it’s probably using the same template, but with much less weight, and probably having ME days cut out.
LOG # 228
5 mile walk
LOG # 229
Deadlift
270lbs 5x4
Volume set: 225x15
Assistance:
Seal rows: 135 3x10
Back extensions: 115lbs AMRAP
kick backs and hip thrusts: 4x20. Thrusts= 225lbs. Kick backs 50lbs? Somewhere around there
Hamstring curls: 100lbs 5x5
Hanging leg raises: 3x20
Have you ever swam!? There’s no such thing as leisurely swimming for 30 min…at least for me. It’s more like 30 min of swim or die.
Thank you so much. I was searching around the web a bit yesterday, and lurking @Sturat’s log a bit. Stu helped give me advice when I started lifting.
At equipment, I should be OK. Great gym. No SSB, or Cambered Bars. The rest should be fine. I’ve never trained zerchers, or trained with boards or chains, or even done banded bench, although there are a few people using bands and chains at my gym that could probably help me if I want to try. Sumo DLs are of the devil. Haha.
Thank you for posting up all the detail! I’m not a good program follower. I’ve had a coach write programs for me fro OLY, but I’ve never run 5/3/1. Haha! Maybe Conjugate will suit me since it’s fairly flexible, and it will make me get more comfortable in the lower rep ranges. I don’t love that anxious feeling I get when I’m going to do a heavy single. Cautious.
Best,
Puff
@anon71262119 one way to run conjugate - and probably a decent way if you’re starting out with it - is to work up to a max triple and use variations quite similar to the main lift for your ME work and cycle them every three weeks. For DE work you’d keep your comp lifts, but pause them. The repetition work is where you work on your weak points.
For your ME work, a good way to look at it is that you’re using builder lifts to improve the main lift. These are lifts that target your weaknesses and reinforce technique. For example, if you’re weak at lockout on bench, pin presses from mid range may be a builder. Every fourth week or so (or seventh, etc) you can also use a tester lift, which tells you whether the builder lifts are working - so for bench it might be a floor press or one board press. The other very important purpose of ME work is teaching you to strain.
The repetition work adds to the builder lifts, so continuing with the bench example you would do a ton of tricep work like DB rollovers, JM presses, etc and also make sure to keep your upper and middle back strong. For your squat and DL a ton of repetition work would go to lower back and abs.
One thing with conjugate that is really important to remember is the KISS principle, especially for ME work. It isn’t a contest to find the most variations to use. Pick the ones that work. It could be as simple as moving grip on or out a few inches for bench, stance width or bar position for squats, etc.
Thanks, Markko. Yeah, I was thinking about working up to heavy triples more comfortably, instead of working up to heavy singles. At least for Bench and Squat. I don’t want to lift something that I can’t control. The harder part is for me to know which builder lifts will help. As I progress with this I may put up a formcheck thread or log so I can get specific advice.
Thank you. I hope lifting and life are going well.
Yes, that’s part of the difficulty of running conjugate. It’ll take experimenting to know what works. One thing to remember is that ME work has nothing to do with getting comfortable, it’s getting accustomed to straining and the fear that comes with maximal weights. The mental part of that is huge.
Max effort is 1! 1 is safe!
Imagine you’re in the woods. There is a deep ravine that you’re going to have to run and jump across. Its right on the limit of how far you can jump. Its gonna take “maximum effort.” It’s mildly dangerous, if you miss you could get a little banged up.
Are you going to jump across it once and move on? Or go back and forth 3 times, increasing your risk 3 fold? Which jump is most likely to end in failure, the first or the third?