Pretty chilly out first thing this morning; may need to start adding layers soon, although as this program progresses I do more running vs walking so that might help keep me warmer anyway.
Felt a little out of sorts on the first interval, but after that things seemed OK. No major pain/aches to report. Got caught out by the train this time and had to double-back a little way until it had passed so ended up covering a tad more distance than under previous intervals arrangement.
OHP felt OK, but the very first rep of 45 felt heavy and then it slowed right down by 3rd rep so I just called it there. I’ll just use 40 for my starting TM and go from there.
Accessories felt fine - SLDLs took much longer to get through than the squats, so I had to move quickly to get the weights changed in the remaining time available each round. Added the shrug at the top of each rep as recommended by Wendler, which seemed fine but once I finished the workout and got back indoors I felt tightness on the right side of my neck so I need to be careful with these.
Generally felt a bit stiffer today- got into a bit of a groove with the running but never really felt truly comfortable. By the end my left leg, specifically the ankle/calf and hip were achey and once I stopped there was a bit of pain running down the inside of my shin, from knee to ankle.
Testing it out a bit afterwards once it calmed down, it seems like it might come from might foot rolling inwards a bit, putting pressure down that inside. This adds up as a I did inherit fairly flat feet from my dad, so I need to be mindful of this on my next run and/or look at getting new running shoes that actively help with that (my current shoes are fairly old, and are more general trainers than ‘proper’ running shoes).
Not a great session here - pretty disappointed with deadlift result, but I think this was a large part with being too tentative because I was still concerned about my knee from yesterday (which felt OK, but still a bit sore and just generally very aware of it and don’t want to make it worse). Probably doesn’t help that I’ve not deadlifted in quite a while either so I think my technique needs to be dialled in again. In any case, looks like I’ll only be using 100 as my TM for this
Thinking I might be better off going with one of the Limited Time templates from 5/3/1 Forever, rather than this Krypteia setup. It would mean each session is more focussed (either on strength/main movements, assistance, or conditioning) and I think it would spread the recovery demands over the week.
It would mean I’m doing less conditioning than this current plan but with the issues I’ve just hit with running I’m thinking that building that up more slowly might be more sensible anyway. The assistance day would be done circuit-style, similar to the early morning breaking in sessions I did, so I feel like that would still have a conditioning element to it anyway.
Logging this a few days later so don’t really remember how it went to be honest. Left knee has been a bit dodgy over the weekend and into the start of the week so it’s not really getting better but also not worse?
I did go into town and tried on some new running shoes but didn’t like any of them so sticking with my old pair for now…
Weighed in @ 13st 10.2lbs on Sunday morning. At this point I’m not surprised - I need to decide if actually want to put in the effort to lose weight (and make necessary changes) or do something else (and make necessary changes). In a sort of bodyweight purgatory at the moment…
Queen’s funeral today, so no work, but still got up early and hit this as usual to see how the timing will work out on a work day. Got through everything in good time, about half an hour in total including the rows and transition time etc. The times above for the front squats and OHP include warmup sets, but I’ve only logged the working sets here (the 5/3/1 % sets).
Front squats felt pretty smooth. Felt a little niggle in my right glute but nothing major. OHP felt fine - stopped the AMRAP set at 10 as that’s the point it slowed down prior to lockout. I probably had another rep, maybe 2, if I’d been willing to grind them out (which I want to avoid doing).
Rows were tough - think I’ll stick at a given weight until I can get up to about 30 reps per arm and then bump it up.
Completed 5 rounds in 14:41. First few rounds were pretty quick - got the work done in under 2 mins each time. Then the rows and pushups had to be broken up on rounds 4 and 5 so that slowed things right down. Happy to have completed it all in under 15 mins though as I was targeting 20 mins.
Didn’t push too hard as the I’m still finding my feet with this program setup, but think I can go heavier/increase reps in the future.
Run felt pretty good today - tried to focus on keeping my head and chest up and being a bit lighter on my feet, as I feel like I was bent over and looking down on my last few runs and ending up quite heavy-footed. Seemed to work fairly well.
The 3 minute runs were tougher than expected, but not horrible. I think the issue there is partly the general lack of fitness/running ability that I’m building up and partly that I set a decent pace for the early (shorter) runs and am now trying to maintain that rhythm on the longer runs which is tricky.
Z-Press - 5 @ 22.5, 26.25, 5 x 5 @ 30
(took about 10.5 mins)
Deadlift - 5 @ 65, 75, 12 @ 85
(took about 8 mins; belt on from 75+)
Kroc rows (L/R) - 18/18 @ 28
(1m rest)
As before, only working weights logged above. Got the whole lot done in about half an hour.
Z-press felt harder than expected, but got into the groove during the 5 x 5s. Really hits the core hard.
Deadlifts felt pretty good. Put the belt on a tad earlier than normal as I knew I wanted it on for the top set so I wanted to get the feel of it before that. Reps on top set were done ‘continuously’ to mean only a split-second pause at the bottom of each rep to take a quick breath and make sure I was locked in. Stopped at 12 as that’s the point the bar slowed right down.
Kroc rows were tough after deadlifts, as expected. Think I’ll just track the two days separately (as I expect post-deadlift to always be the tougher one) and change weights as needed based on the reps achieved.
Cheers Sven! Even working out every morning I don’t think I’m keeping up with your workload…
At this stage I think if I were to stop or change program again (not exactly unlikely given my history) then I wouldn’t really have achieved much by way of new ‘fitness’, so I’ll leave it there for now.
Took about 15 minutes to complete this. Chinups were the sticking point (as expected), needing to be broken up from round 3 and I had to go to singles to get finish off rounds 4 and 5.
Pushups felt OK, with reps just slowing a bit on the last couple of rounds but only needing a brief pause at the top to get through them - I should note I can still feel a slight niggle in my shoulders on these so I’m babying them a bit, but it doesn’t seem to be too serious.
Tried a heavyish goblet squat for this which I think worked well - could feel my core having to do some work, though I wonder if tiring the arms a bit was impacting the chinups.
Run felt OK at the beginning, but I was really flagging on the last 3m interval. Also accidentally broke up the first 3m interval because I follow the app which tells you when to start/stop, but it comes on quite quietly compared to the music I listen to and so I thought it was telling me the 3m was up when I think it was actually saying I was only halfway through. I realised I must have misheard it and restarted running after about 10s or so, and just went a bit longer at the actual end of the interval to try and make up for it.
Session went pretty well - got everything done within about half an hour again. I don’t feel like I actually got through the squats and OHP quicker this time than last week, but maybe did 1 less warmup set (or maybe last week I included the set with just the bar, but not this time?).
Front squats felt pretty smooth. OHP felt decent as well, and managed 1 extra rep on the top set compared to last week, so that’s a great result. Got some extra reps on the kroc rows as well compared to last week, but couldn’t match the right-side performance with the left-side (not unexpected as I do think my right side is stronger).
Was away over the weekend - did a fair bit of driving and slept in a less comfortable bed than normal so I was sore all over yesterday and this morning, but thankfully it doesn’t seem to have hampered me much.
Pushups (NG handles) - 1-2-3-4-5-(X)-7-8-9-10-6
(30s rest between rounds)
Took 17:52 to get through the lot. I think having the rows and pushups that way round was the right choice as the rows are a bit harder to having those tail off is definitely better than it ramping up. Managed to get through all sets unbroken, although the last couple of pushups were tough.
As above I accidentally missed the round of 6 pushups - I think what happened is my watch was rubbing on my wrist during the swings and after trying to adjust it slightly I clocked the time and then automatically went into the 30s rest (as I usually only check the time at the end of the round). It was only towards the end of that rest period when I was thinking about where I was at/what reps I needed to do next that I realised something had gone wrong.
I carried on with where I was at and just stuck the 6 on at the end of it all, as well as doing an extra 6 rows just for the hell of it.
Run felt pretty decent, but was flagging a little towards the end. Think I need to work on my breathing a bit, but it’s been significantly chillier this week which is making things harder.
Z-Press - 5 @ 25, 27.5, 5 x 5 @ 31.25
(took about 10.5 mins)
Deadlift - 5 @ 70, 80, 12 @ 90
(took about 8 mins; belt on from 80+)
Kroc rows (L/R) - 19/20 @ 28
(1m rest)
Z-Press was OK, but I feel like I had the bar out in front of me a little at the top of some reps, rather than directly over my head/shoulders. Something to look out for. Things were smooth throughout apart from the very last rep which was a little squiggly, but I think I just took my eye of the ball there, so need to make sure I stay focussed for the entirety going forwards.
Deadlifts felt a tad heavier than expected on the way up, but top set went really well - managed to top out at 12 again, same as last week which was really positive but makes me think my work capacity might actually be the limiting factor here, rather than my strength (especially as the same thing happened with OHP).
Kroc rows were tough as hell, but squeaked out another rep or two compared to last time, so progress all the same.
10 plate GTOHs @ 25 bumper
(30s rest between rounds)
Took 15:41 in total. The first few rounds were pretty quick, taking a minute or just under to complete, but from about round 5 it started slowing down, mainly because I had to break up the chinups (mostly into 2+1, but I did just singles or round 7 or 8) and I started blowing hard after the GTOHs so probably took more like 40-45s to actually start the first chinup on a few of rounds.
Came into this one fairly tired - didn’t sleep brilliantly last night and I’ve got a slight crick in my neck which seems to be from tight traps on the right side. I was also feeling super hungry straight after waking up which hasn’t happened before on these early workouts. There have been a few signs now that I may not be recovering so well and/or losing weight (but missed last week’s weigh-in so won’t know until Sunday now), so I need to keep an eye on this.
Big step up this week in terms of total time and time spent running. Now running for more than half the total time.
I was a little apprehensive coming into this one but it actually felt way more comfortable than I expected. Last 5m was difficult but before that everything felt pretty smooth, and I feel like I managed to keep a decent pace from the off (not too fast, not too slow).
Looking at distance calculator online I covered about 5km/3.1mi total.
Felt I was generally moving a little slowly this morning, and weights were a tad heavy.
Got through the front squats OK, and felt fairly solid on the top sets. OHP felt tougher than expected - pleased to get to 10 on the top set but this did take an effort and although the bar moved smoothly I probably should have called it at 9, in keeping with the idea of not going all out on these. I wasn’t grinding them out though, so it wasn’t too bad.
Kroc rows were tough and I was using a ton of body english to get through them. I set a target in my head of 25 and then just hung on until I got there. On the left arm I just wanted to beat reps from last time out (22).
I think the issue here was I did absolutely nothing all day yesterday (aside from a long dog walk), which might be good for recovery but it means everything just kinda tightens up. I would probably be better off doing some mobility work, or just something that gets me moving a little.
Edit: forgot to mention that I weighed in on Sunday morning @ 13st 9.2lbs