Hey dude, what size fridge do you use to store your beef? I’ve got half a cow coming my way this fall ~400lbs of beef and I’ll need to pick up a chest freezer.
I have a chest freezer and it’s full when I put my 1/3 beef in it. Our kitchen refrigerator is the French door style with the freezer drawer on the bottom. It’s not very big.
If you have a normal-ish sized kitchen unit then you might be able to fit everything in that and a chest freezer. My chest freezer is about 2.5 feet wide, 2 ft deep, and maybe 3 ft tall.
1 Like
9.8.20 - Rest
I might be committed to an actual plan to purchase this…
Low cables. High cables. Adjustable cables on the outside. A Smith rack. And it accommodates a regular barbell like a squat rack. It’s my home gym dream. And it’s $4699 plus tax, delivery, and setup.
2 Likes
Thanks for the info dude, will definitely keep it in mind. Do you get to choose your cuts from the butcher as well? I haven’t been as excited about something in what feels like a long time haha.
That’s a hefty purchase, managed to convince the Mrs yet?
Does it fit in your basement?
Very similar to what my neighbour added to the home gym. I don’t really use it for anything other than cable rows. For me it wouldn’t be worth the coin.
1 Like
Definitely a nice-looking piece of equipment. However, we have no idea what’s going to happen in the country or around the world with the plan-demic and upcoming election. That might sound paranoid, but I’d think hard about the best use for that much money. And maybe having an awesome home gym set-up IS the best use.
There are standard cuts for parts of it, but you should get to choose your roast, cube steak, and ground beef. I told them to turn my swiss steak into ground beef. I can do the same with the roasts. The swiss steak isn’t worth the hassle for me. You can cook it in a way to make it tender, but I always fail. I go through four to five pounds of hamburgers a week so more ground beef is better for me.
Yes, but I’m not an impulsive jerk about it. I ask permission and she seems to be okay with it as long as I’m reasonable about the timing.
Yes. I have about 87 inches from floor to ceiling and that beast is about 85 and it can be adjusted up or down a few inches.
Cable rows, pull downs, fly’s, reverse fly’s, all deltoid isolation, presses to failure with drop sets (on the Smith), all curls, all triceps, pull ups, cable presses, abs.
I could use it for a few things.
$5-6k for mental health? I’d keep it for life and pass it on to my kids or grandkids if they wanted it. Would you spend $1000 per year on a membership or equipment? Everyone is different.
Keep in mind, I spent $3500 on guns, ammo, and accessories about six weeks ago. 
I’m also working extra “part times”. I make an extra $380 per week right now and don’t pay any taxes on it. I figured it up and it’s about $1285 per month minus 10% for tithes. In five to six months, I could have enough saved to buy that bad boy. It’s also out of stock until at least December. Lastly, I’m on the list of buyers in the event that a used one comes back to the store. I guess people occasionally move and just call the store to come get it and sell it for them instead of packing it up and moving it.
It’s a six to 12 month plan. A set of cable columns would cost $1500-2000 used. I could get just cables only for about half of the cost of the rack, but that’s only for the wide cables - no close grip pull downs or seated rows with that option. I could make it work with some different attachments, but I’m not going to spend $2500 “to make it work”. I could sell my rack, have the same footprint in my basement, and have my dream for $5-6k. I think I can get the machine closer to $4k with a discount, but I’m rounding up from retail to account for taxes, delivery, and set up. Delivery and set up aren’t necessary, but it might be worth it.
4 Likes
9.9.20 C1 W3 D3 - Deadlift
Warm Up
PULL UPS
BW x 10, 8
AB WHEEL
10, 10
SQUAT
bar x 5
135 x 5
205 x 5 x 2 sets
HANG POWER CLEAN
135 x 3
185 x 5 x 2 sets
DEADLIFT
275 x 3
365 x 1
435 x 5 singles
465 x 1
495 x 4 inches
CLEAN PULL
315 x 5 singles
RFESS
BW x 15 ea x 2
super set with
AB WHEEL
10, 10
Incoming rant:
Once again, I felt like garbage on deadlift day. I don’t know what the issue is… under-recovered from weekend workouts? It’s getting old. This whole workout sucked a big fat one which is why I did 465 and tried for 495. I need something positive, but nope. I’m considering eliminating this day altogether and just doing squats, deads, and cleans on Fridays or Saturdays. That would only leave upper body workouts during the week.
On the other hand, that probably goes against my training goals… or does it? I know I wrote them down, and yet I find myself still being pulled in multiple directions. I hate squat but I think it’s because I suck at them. If I was stronger then they might not be so bad. It’s not the act of doing a squat workout. I hate that I’m struggling with light loads. I also don’t want to gain unnecessary weight just to add weight to the bar. I want to get stronger without getting fatter.
I’m really not happy with power cleans. That lift used to be something that made me proud, but it’s gone. I used to move 275 like I move 225 now. The pop is gone.
I’m afraid to back off on deadlifts because every time I do, I lose 50 lbs off the bar and it takes most of a year to get it back. I don’t want to lose my strength so I’m afraid to not prioritize it.
And lastly, there’s conditioning. I’m pretty happy with that at the moment, but I think it’s one of the reasons my leg days feel like crap. I’m definitely going to restructure some things, but I’m not sure what… squats or power cleans might get priority with deadlifts just getting the reps prescribed by the program.
1 Like
Then play on mate
1 Like
I know in the past, I’ve gone 4-6 months without pushing deadlift while pushing CrossFit and my squat. My deadlift actually went up. Now that’s probably newbie gains, but I’ve found the squat carries over enough for me personally.
2 Likes
I looked at Bodybuild the Upper / Athlete the Lower for guidance on how to approach my leg training in conjunction with conditioning.
That template has a squat day that’s 5/3/1 plus 5x5 FSL. The deadlift day is 5/3/1 with 10x5 FSL. It also calls for 25-50 reps of single leg work on upper body days and 50-100 reps on lower body days.
I’m thinking/planning to try combining everything into one day.
I’m currently doing this:
Squat Day
- squat 5x5, 3, or 1
- power clean 5x5, 3, or 1
- deadlift 3x5 @ 75%
- RFESS with ab wheel (sometimes)
Deadlift Day
- squat 3x5 @ 75%
- hang power clean 3x5 @ 75%
- deadlift 5x5, 3, or 1
- clean pull 5x5, 3, or 1
Throw in my conditioning of running, sprints, or CrossFit type stuff and I’m getting tired.
The new thought is one leg day.
- squat 5x5, 3, or 1
- hang clean 5x5, 3, or 1
- deadlift 5x5, 3, or 1
- clean pull 5x5, 3, or 1
- RFESS + ab wheel x 3
I will rotate the 5, 3, or 1 weeks like Alpha’s stuff.
Week 1 will be:
- squat 5x1
- hang clean 5x3
- deadlift 5x5
- clean pull 5x1
We’ll see how this goes on Saturday. With this Advanced template, it’s 5x5, 3, or 1 with optional 3x5 on the alternate lift so I’m still doing the bare minimum work plus extra pulls.
3 Likes
That look really awesome, would love to have room for something like that. Go for it!
1 Like
You already have a plan in place here, so my intent isn’t to talk you out of that, but I completely get this, and something I’m a fan of doing is approaching squats with a built in fatiguer ahead of it so I can tell myself that THAT is why the loads are so light. It’s absolutely disheartening when you set yourself up for optimal performance and then can’t move the weight you want to move, but if you set yourself up so that you’re coming into the final sets fatigued, it’s far easier to swallow.
4 Likes
I saw Dave Tate say something along those lines: “I don’t know what a good squat is after 3 other exercises” (or something like that). For him it was more about permission to not hurt himself chasing a number he didn’t have in him, but same concept.
4 Likes
So you’re saying do squats last? 
I’ve been doing deads last (or at least after squats) because I like deadlifts so I know I’ll still do them if I’m already a bit fatigued. I could definitely move stuff around. The only downside is that as I progress on everything, the squat weights will likely stay the same because I’ll *always" be fatigued.
It might be a good idea to start with cleans since they’re explosive and rely a lot on neurological efficiency. I also use the lightest loads with those overall.
Thanks for the tip! This also opens the door to those horrible drop sets of yours. If it’s the last exercise of the day and I don’t want to do it then I can talk myself into doing one horrible set and limping away. I did that on deads a while back. Didn’t want to do 3x5 so I tried to do 1x15. It was horrible! 
3 Likes
Absolutely dude! Nailed it. Putting the hard stuff at the end allows for so much more, and can really help with the psychology.
3 Likes
Definitely one of the things DC training got right, if I remember.
4 Likes
9.10.20 - C1 W3 D4 - OHP
PULL UPS
10
7+2+1
6+2+2
10 (much later in the workout)
I’ve been stretching everything out on each rep the last two days and these are much harder.
OHP
45 x 10
95 x 5
115 x 5
135 x 2
155 x 1
165 x nope
PUSH PRESS
165 x 1
175 x 1
185 x 1
195 x 1
205 x 1
OHP
145 x 4 singles
WIDE CABLE ROW
170 x 10 x 3
with
SMITH INCLINE 1.5s
115 x 10, 9, 7
Giant Set
SMITH OHP 1.5s
85 x 8, 7
DB LAT RAISE
20 x 10 x 2
CABLE REVERSE FLY
20 x 10 x 2
CABLE CURLS
drop set
130 x 12
110 x 6
90 x 6
70 x 6
50 x 10
Time: 56 minutes. Maxing on OHP and doing push press really added some time to this one. The only reason I maxed was out of curiosity. It was quite disappointing.
7 Likes