Rugby last night. Only touch. Played well. Had some great touches.
Tonight:
Squat 140kg 2x10
Pull ups 4 sets of 7
Bench 82.5kg 2x10.
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I’m still getting a lot of likes on this log while putting very little back into the community. I would like to say right now - thank you.
I’m typically a “be the change you want to see in the world” sort of guy. So I like to try and encourage people where I can. But right now I’m a “fuck it i can not be arsed” sort of guy. So I’m not.
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I’m here to learn new words.
I’m glad to educate if I can lol.
Yesterday I did the “Paul Whitehouse”.
Minus the last 5 pull ups. Managed it in 12 mins. This is reasonable. 10mins in my bench mark for “good”. Comments are;
Front squats were done as 10,5,5.
Back squats where smooth. No re rack and only minor stops to gather my breath.
Deadlifts where trap bar high handle.
I had to spend time fluffing about with the log after this. Lost time there. And I was all over the place with the log. The first 4 reps took longer than the last 6.
But I expect to do this again next week and I’ll get 11:30 or quicker.
Today I played touch rugby. So I’m now very, very tired.
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A day off turned into two. Not sure why.
Weights
Trap bar deadlift. Swapped to this after a day or two of lower back pain last week.
130kg 2x10. Easy enough. Some quad burn. Burn but nothing to mad.
Seated press 62.5kg 2x10.
Log clean and press; 55kg
20 reps in 2:25
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Easy night tonight. Which is good as it was heavier than a long time
Squat 145kgx10. 1 set as I ripped my shorts during the warm up.
4 sets of 8 pull ups.
2x10 bench. 87.5kg.
Not really heavy yet. But I might drop that a bit to re set as this was hard.
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Damn quad gainzzzz
Ha - no ass gains. But the guy with the biggest ass is the strongest.
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Hey man, had a look back through some of your training videos and plans and thought I would give my two cents (In case you are wondering, my current job is in rehab, and strength and conditioning)
This next bit is a little bit of harsh truth, I am sorry. If you were my client I would tell you that you need to ease off on a lot of what you are doing. Considering your chosen sports, the weight room stuff needs to be considered to be bang for your buck. It should be kept relatively short with a lower risk of injury and some concentration on prehabilitation. Especially considering your age, no offence. I am in my 30s and find I struggle to adequately recover when I try out things I use to do 10 years ago.
Looking at your videos you are struggling to get to an acceptable depth on many squatting exercises including showing ‘butt wink’ on your squats.In your recent hell on earth video you can see that you are favouring you are shiting toward your right hip and you are unable to maintain a level pelvis around your low lumber joint. On many of your hip squat stye movements you aren’t reaching full hip extension which means you are aren’t fully engaging those glutes. If you rewatch your video about 140kg squats in 10 mins you can see the bar path is significantly deviating forward and backward instead of achieving that good up and down bar
For the Log press, I would break it down into a series of separate movements. 1) pull the log from a relatively straight DL position 2) Once the log is at mi thigh you can then “lap the log” by squatting your legs under the log and using your thighs as a shelf 3) Use the thighs as a stable position to flex your upper back and keep it tight 4) clean/roll the log up to the upper position 5) Use your hips and knees to providedrive to push the weight from there to overhead.
Here is a video from the legend that is Brian Shaw: on this
General question, why do log press with a reset to the floor each time? As a rugby player, this adds very little to your training that doing the press alone (with the leg drive) would give. High rep log press cleans without good form is a way to through your back out unnecessarily. If you must do a higher rep C+P style movements from the floor use a barbell (though personally I don’tthink it is worth the risk/reward to program that)
I could go on but I don’t think that would be helpful for either of us. Instead, my advice is to learn to leave the ego at the door. A good workout doesn’t mean you are exhausted afterwards (that is a trick used by relatively inexperienced trainers as a way to make it ‘feel’ like you had a good workout.
What would be a great option for you is to to look at Dan John’s Easy Strength. He wrote an excellent book on it with the legendary Pavel Tsatsouline. These guys are truly legit when it come to understanding how to many human’s function better, one is highly experienced college coach who has produced olympians, the other used to train Spretznaz and is the father of rusian kettlebell training outside his motherland.
Here is a link tova powerpoint Dan wrote about it and why it works http://www.danjohn.net/wp-content/uploads/New-Easy-Strength.pdf but definitely but the book. It contains more real world training wisdom than any book I have ever read.
The idea behind the Easy Strength system is to strip back your training and do just 5 main moves. For each of those moves, you do 10 reps over the course of the workout (pick a rep scheme like 2 sests of 5, or 5,3,2). Repeat this 5 days a way. The idea is make easy rep perfect and feel easy. You slowly add weight through the 40 weeks. You will find that weights at that would have been an issue are first as now easy. Also, your form with have improved dramatically immenselent. A significant limiting factor for more people when strength training is your nervous system inhibiting the maximum strength you can recruit as a protractive mechanism. This program helps yuoi ease up the weight you are able to use. It will also help pille on some muscles and lose weight. Looking at your videos the weight your bory is hold your weight (mainly as as abdominal adipose) is really going to pull you off balance.
And Example weak:
Upper Push (Icnline BP)
Pull (Dan John Batwings)
Hing: Romanian Deadlifttl)
Squat (Zeger style)
Carry or Similar
Vary weird and distance with each workout. Example inclides fatmer’s walker,overhead carries one hanged carries, Zercher carries, odd lifts and sled/prowler work. Weighted high marches are a good option too - especially for you as you are your left hip seems to go lower than your tight in some videos. Weighted marches are good for getting your lateral hip and quadratum lumborum (the thinagle muscle you can feel at the best base of your back) to fire corrected and have enough endurance). Aim for sets of 15-20. You can also try adding the hip hike exercise off a step into your daily life. There are many, many causes for this so listen to your body and get checked out by a professional.
Additional items
with this I would ensure a proper warm up:
Personally, I do this: Walk to the gym (30 mins) then do dynamic stretching and joint rotation including the Yoga pose cat/cow and concentrate on feeling those spinal segments more. Also ass in some spinal twists, both facing up and facing down. Finally some rocking (as in Anderson’s Starting Strenght)
Next I do some specific activation work. The McGill big 3, Lock Should 3, some hollow body position holds and work, finally some wrestler’s bridge and other spinal bend work. The last parts of this may not be applicable to you, but at least the McGill and Lock protocol should be done. Learning how to keep your core tight is an essential part of lifting heavy weight and working on improving the posterior should musculature helps you pack your shoulder properly and stabilize those overhead movements.
Before you start do 20 goblet squat with a KB (really explore that bottom position and open the hips) and do 50-75 KB swings broken up into 3 sets. Makes sure they are crisp and perfect swing with a lot of snap to the hip. Over time this will really help push your power through the roof.
The Workout itself is short. Remember the aim is not to use really heavy weight weights, but ones that you can move with easy and good form. Then slowly and methodically add weight. The idea is you should NEVER fail a rep. After all you are coming back tomorrow to do more! Also, keep to 10 reps, Dan John has aid he find this is about the maximum total number of reps for a movement someone can recover from (especially as your weights increase). Do this workout 40 times (i.e. for 8 weeks at 5 times per week) and looks at what happens to your number on those life - it is really shocking considering how “easy” the protocol feels. IF you are struggling with maintaining your interest you can swap the exercises every 2 weeks. However the exercises you swap must be very similar movement patterns. Don’t mess with the program too much! For example you could swap bench press to incline bench press, or deadlift to trap bar dead lift.
Also if you are really looking into body recomposition add in much more LISS (low-intensity steado f state) cardio and do it as often as you can. In fact studies should it is better to go for 3 20 minute walk-s than one 60-minute walk. Thefore, add in as many of those as possible. Since the pandemic, this has been the single more effective change I have implemented in multiple people. Stategies we had found that help are: cancelling newspaper delivery (assuming shop is close by) Only buying smaller milks (causing you to have to walk to the shop move often, implementing a daily “commute” where you go for a walk at the beginning and end of work (this has helped a few couples I know as the other half then knowns, once the walk has occurred heir partner should be considered as being away being out the house, Tou could also try ‘rucking’ using a ll fitting backpack, ex-military packs work well, as adding a small amount (say 20 lbs) can help burn more calories. The amount of weight added need to be kept relatively low to avoid interfering with recovery. An added bonus of the weight is that is can help reduce lower back pack (Stuart McGill has written on why this can help LBP, worth googling). Almost all exercise protocols could use more walking to help with keeping lean, as it has minimum impact on your next lifting session, infact it may help as a form of active recovery.
I randomly thought to myself today, hey where did @carlbm go, I haven’t seen him post in awhile.
Hope you’re doing alright buddy.
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Hey - I feel off. But as the title say in it for the long run. This is not a hobby it’s a life style.
I started to train again a few weeks back. I’ve hit a few key markers for performance.
Grace with a 58.5kg (129lb) log in 2:45
100% body weight over head
I can front and back squat 130kg (287lb) for fun.
Goals are simple really. For once in my adult life get below 100kg. This really should not be as hard as I make it. But it is. The path is simple. Chicken and rice. I will low myself as much food as I like. So long as it is all chicken and rice. With the exception of breakfast. Which is eggs on toast.
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First recorded training for a while.
Front squat 130kg - 6 reps
Back squat 130kg - 20 reps
Dry quickly done reps. Done in under 120 seconds. I can add weight to this is if I try. I might how ever have an ease off and the. Re attack in a few weeks.
Plan is to do 120 kg, then 130 again before moving to 140 kg.
Eventually, I would like to get back to be able to 150 kg front squat five reps and back squat 20 reps this should be achievable before October who knows
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Welcome back mate, hope you are well.
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Good to see you back on here! Hope everything is going well.
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Hi gentlemen, thanks for the support. Everything is good. I took some time out of training to sort a few things out. I won’t lie this time last year. Probably wasn’t in a great place. However, I’ve quit my old job, now retraining, much happier able to dedicate a little bit more time and energy to looking after myself.
On that front after Saturday is leg day I played a bit of touch rugby Sunday. Not very demanding but still 60 minutes or breaking a sweat. Today/Monday is always my a bit stronger, but still CV focused workout. So with that in mind I’ve got an 80 kg log for in 75 seconds as possible. Previous best was 8 1/2 reps finishing the ninth rep about 77 seconds. Today I managed 10 reps fairly easily. So very tangible progress being made.
I’ve put the two videos of the last 20 sessions up just for record are used to video most of my workouts and record in the habit. I wanna get back into gives me a great opportunity to look back and see what I’ve achieved.
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Another basic work out.
60 reps of 60kg floor to over head.
I did this is 10 sets of 6. The attentive amongst you might realise that in set, seven I think it is I do five reps rather than six. The remedy this sets 9 and 10 with 8 reps each set. So in the end, eventually probably did more than 60 reps. I suppose if I really want to do it, I can look back over the video and count each rep but I’m really not that bothered. I worked hard. I know if get there abouts with each workout, one or two reps each way is not gonna make or break my long-term goals.
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So I saw the front squat challenge on the bigger stronger leaner section of the forum. As someone that loves the front squats, I do a cheap into this, although I haven’t been doing any sort of peak really. I have been working somewhere on the volume. I managed 140 kilograms for three reps whilst there was no chance of getting another rep out. I might have been able to do 142.5/145 kg for 3 reps. But we shall never know I’m quite pleased with this turnout, even though it is significantly below my best from a year ago I have had an extended period off. I am most definitely fitter in other regards than I was two years ago. And I feel I’m in a place where I can regain the strength was retaining my fitness,
The date ended with 140 kg back squats. One set of 10.
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Log Grace completed in 02:37.
Pretty happy with this very happy Saint second PB. Eventually me to get this below the magic 02:30 or even 02:00 Mark at some point.
Also considering that I did a good leg day yesterday. Pretty happy.
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I had Friday off as I had a rough day at work. Quite the emotional strain. And when I got home my head space was not right at all.
Yesterday was due to be a leg day. Taking it down a notch to 100/110kg front squat and back squat combo. But meal prep went wrong and I gave myself a mild case of food poisoning. I guess the chicken being a few days past its best before date. And the rancid smell it made when cooking were both tell tale signs. But honestly I just thought it was on the turn. Not totally gone. I spent most of Saturday with cramps.
Today is a new day. I’m eating well and with just 1 lost meal I feel like I can crack on with a limited leg day today.
The plan:
110kg front squat for a few sets of 10,
110kg back squats for 1 set of 20.
And then depending on how I feel MAYBE a yoke carry. I have time. I’ll go light and work it for distance. But a 140/180kg yoke for 4 x 20m (66ft) would be good.
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Sorry to hear this, did you end up retraining as a paramedic?