Solid leg day. I initially was nervous going into this plan because I’m a stickler for a thorough plan, but aside from the heavy/light thing and sticking with a few key lifts, I’m keeping things loose and it feels pretty good.
GREAT session. Bench wasn’t as strong as I wanted, but everything else hit ALL the marks I wanted out of a solid push day. Finally got wrist wraps working for me on bench, too.
Fuck me, ring dips are freaking hard after not doing them for a couple years. Kicked my ass.
My tricep bar finally arrived after a few delays. Love it for CG bench; the neutral grip is really comfortable, and the tricep bar adds a level of wrist instability I wasn’t expecting.
Heavy upright rows officially get my middle delts fired up. Focused on trying to pull the bar apart with my elbow, not my hands, and INSTANTLY felt the shoulders get to work.
Minus the rack pulls and poor performance on chins, FANTASTIC session. Widening the grip — not quite snatch grip — hammered my upper back, but it’s still a bit too light. Plus, unfortunately, I can’t pull that heavy on my bar anymore. All my bars are standard size, not Olympic, and the bar is starting to bend a little. I’m trying to find and save for an Olympic bar and plates, but the markup on equipment right now is INSANE. I’ll swap back to power cleans for my heavy back movement, and keep squats as the only barbell movement pushing the weight capacity for my bar.
My chinning numbers are garbage, so I’m gonna keep them as a staple strength movement.
Thanks for the inspiration on those landmine stripsets, @T3hPwnisher. Lit up my entire back. Definitely keeping those. The stripset just adds a whole new level to them.
Concentrating on a hard squeeze at the top of both curl movements was a game changer. I think curls have given poor returns for me because I’ve focused more on the movement, as opposed to the muscle. Squeezing the crap out of my biceps at the top worked to change that.
Start time: 0705
Garage temp: 4C after heating. Chilly today.
Squat
190x10 (no lockout)
220x10 (no lockout)
3x10 @ 250
Superset
landmine squat, 3x20 @ 150; 1310 tempo
prone band leg curls, 3x20; 1013 tempo
Band leg extensions
100 total reps (lots of pauses. Ow.)
60 sec quad stretch (THE. BURN. GEEZ.)
Notes:
The squats this session made me realize I haven’t been pushing hard for a long time. That was 3 sets at 85% of last session’s 5RM. I haven’t done that many reps at that percentage in… maybe never. What the hell have I been doing this whole time? Clearly not enough.
@robstein, tell your coach he’s a sadist and I hate him. I used that 3x20 SS with the 3-count pause on the landmine squats and leg curls, and I hated my life after. Brutal. I’m keeping it.
After the 100-rep leg extensions and the following stretch, my quads burned SO much and were SO shaky I had trouble standing. Just got over the DOMS from my last leg day, and I’m just gonna start it all over again. Sobbing uncontrollably
Decided it was time to add an extra leg to the runs. Had my dog with me last night and I could tell he wanted to keep going, and my lungs hit the point where they were like, “We’re good, let’s keep going”, so I did.
My legs, however, wanted to kill me; my quads are pretty fricken sore from my last leg day. I got through about 1/4 of the run and thought, “Wow, my quads feel pretty good. Guess this is active recovery.” Then at the halfway point… they cramped up hard. No fun. Kept going and they eventually just went numb.
Haven’t done planks in a loooong time, and it showed. I was shaky and had to take little breaks every now and then. Something I clearly need to work on.
Start time: 1245
Garage temp: -2C, 4C after heating
Bench, no lockout or pausing
135x10
150x10
3x10 @ 170
Superset, 3 sets
flat bench band flye, 2013 tempo: 20, 20, 18
band tricep pressdowns, 2013 tempo: 20, 18, 15
Incline tricep bar bench (AKA neutral CGBP), 3/50 method
22, 18, 10 @ 65
60 sec triceps stretch
Upright row
100 total reps @ 25
Notes:
Bench sets felt much easier at 85% than the squat sets did.
Those supersets SMOKED my chest and tris. I thought I’d move the SS to after the incline press next time, but I enjoy the press and the SS is just so painful, so putting the press after gives me incentive.
I think I’m gonna swap the flat tricep bar bench to incline on the heavy week too. I like the movement better, and it’s gives an even distribution between chest and triceps, instead of being mostly triceps. Also need to bump the weight up next “light” week for the 3/50 method.
I definitely feel upright rows more than regular lateral raises for my middle delts. Need to up the weight next time for this one too.
Tricep bar hammer curls, 1013 tempo @ 35: 16, 15, 14.5
60 sec lat stretch
EZ bar curls, 3/50 method
20, 15, 12 @ 45
60 sec biceps stretch
Rear delt swings
100 total reps @ 5 (yes, 5 lbs)
Notes:
Fuck me. I was spent after this. Partially because it was first thing this morning, but also because these supersets are BRUTAL. It would be one thing if there was no 3-count pause at peak contraction and no constant tension, but the added factors are painful. The hammer curls were the first time I whimpered while working out.
I have no idea if using a band will help my chins, but it let me get good reps in without flailing around.
I might switch to a wider grip on bar curls, and a close grip supinated grip for chins. The close grip supinated position feels better on my elbows, and if I’m already working my biceps in a close grip position, I don’t want to double up on it by using the same grip on curls.
In other news, I can anecdotally tell I’ve lost some fat while putting on muscle; my belt had to be brought in by 1 hole, and I had to loosen the shoulder straps on my duty vest without also needing to tightening the torso straps. The only thing I’ve changed is heavily increasing carbs in my diet, more salt, as well as adding zinc and ginseng supplements. My guess is it’s just the fact that everything I added has a de-stressing effect, so my body’s not trying to hold onto fat. If that’s even a thing.
So this marks the first time I’ve ever squatted with a belt. I squatted 315x5 before lockdowns, but that was ages ago and my strength tanked. I bought the belt from Walmart because it was inexpensive and I wanted some that I could use for landmine belt squats, and figured I’d give it a go on my top set today. Holy hell, what a difference, but the pressure built from using one is CRAZY. I thought my head and torso were going to explode. I finished the reps and realized my legs could DEFINITELY go heavier, my back didn’t feel like a weak point, but I didn’t want to push it because my core wasn’t used to using the belt. I now understand why people say to use a belt for big weights.
Running short on time so I switched the sissy squats into a superset with the good mornings, but I actually really like it. Rack the bar after the good mornings, hit some sissy squats. Gonna keep it.
Didn’t wanna fuss around with weight on the split squats, but after the back squats and sissy squats, the split squats didn’t really need weight. Just focused on lunging deep and driving the knee forward with most of my weight on the lead leg. Bodyweight sufficed.
Start time: 0730
Garage temp: 4C, 9C after heating
Bench
top set of 205x5
195x5
185x5
175x5
DB flye-press, 4010 tempo
3x6 @ 50
1x5 @ 50
60 sec chest stretch
EZ PJR pullover
80x9
80x8
80x6
60 sec triceps stretch
Incline tricep bar press, 4010 tempo
1x6 @ 115
2x5 @ 115
1x4 @ 115
Upright row, 4-1 isometric countdown
2 sets @ 80
1 set + AMRAP @ 80
Notes:
Bench felt good today, however, the velcro ripped off my wrap just before the last set. That’s what I get for buying cheap wraps, I guess.
I swapped dips out in favour of flye-presses. I just like the movement better. Should be able to milk this weight for a while too.
Big drop off on both the PJRs and the tricep bar press. Press makes sense, because I changed it to incline and did it after all the other stuff, but the PJRs is strange. I’ll chalk it up to training earlier in the day and minimal energy intake prior to training.
The AMRAP after the last set on upright rows was perfect. Gonna keep doing that.
Start time: 1315ish?
Garage temp: forgot to check. Warmer today.
Weighted chins
worked up to +25x5 (sad face)
3x5 @ BW
V-handle landmine row
2x10 @ 175
1x10 @ 175, 150, 125, 100 (stripsets)
Tricep bar hammer curl, 4012 tempo
4x6 @ 75
Wide grip barbell curls, 4011 tempo
4x6 @ 70
60 sec biceps stretch
Notes:
Brain was not in this session today. Combination of horrendous sleep last night and try to rush to get done within the remaining time of my kid’s nap meant I was unfocused.
Part of me wants to do an old school approach and just keep pyramiding up to a topset on all exercises for the heavy week, possibly with a couple down sets. Then on the light week try to complete X-number of reps in as few sets as possible. Just something stupidly simple, because I can already feel I’m starting to overcomplicate things with planning tempo progressions and whatnot.
I’m really liking the V-handle landmine row. It’s an exercise I could see myself loading up and just going ham on.
I’ve had the same thought recently. My first serious summer of training was sets of 10-8-6-4-2 on everything except isolation exercises. It’s a simple and fun rep scheme.
@Frank_C I might use that. Pyramid’s and ramping sets (specifically ramping) have always allowed me to work harder than straight sets. If I know I’m just working up to that one single all-out set, I find I push way harder because I need it to count. Straight sets start to get me bored and I drop off fast.
13/12/2020
Start time: 1205
Garage temp: 5C after heating
High bar squat
worked up to 3x10 @ 235
Landmine belt squat
50 total reps @ 190
Prone band leg curls
100 total reps
60 sec hamstring stretch
Band leg extensions
100 total reps
60 sec quad stretch
Notes:
Swapped to high bar for volume squats today. Everything was sore and achy, especially my back, so I wanted to take it easy. High bar fit the bill, and my elbows didn’t feel like garbage after either. I might just need to swap to high bar completely.
I need to get a dip belt for the belt squats. The belt I bought from Walmart… didn’t like all that weight. That aside, 50 reps of landmine squats at BW was a fun challenge.
This setup might be how I continue with light/volume weeks; getting X number of reps for me is mentally easier because, while the weight and total reps is usually the same as straight sets, just doing 50 or 100 total reps, in my mind, is just one set. One BIG set, but still one set.
Gonna do a bit more dedicated work for my arms and shoulders, since they’re weak and small.
I’m committing to not reading any training articles for at least a whole year. @Bagsy posted a great video clip of Jim Wendler talking about the woes of the internet for training. It resonated with me significantly, because I CONSTANTLY get sucked into training articles looking for the next best thing, and I hate it. It stresses me out and stalls my training.
From now on, I’m gonna lift how I want and just attack the weights. I’m gonna lift with the intensity of a fucking wolverine and FORCE my body to adapt. I’m sick of trying to find the perfect routine. It’s time to lift some fucking weights.