you are not wrong there sir. Damn
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Trained my coworker again yesterday. Because I was still eating when he arrived, I had him watch World’s Strongest Man with me to pregame. Once we were done with his session, I did my own work.
Incline dumbbell press
80s x 10, 12, 10, 12
Super-set with lying dumbbell rows
80s x 12, 12, 12, 12
Lateral raises
35s x 10, 10
Super-set with Kelso shrugs
80s x 10, 10
Alternating side curls
50s x 20, 20
35s x 20, 20
On the dumbbell press, I intended to use a high incline to make the 80 pounders more challenging, but on the second set, I had lowered the angle for the rows and forgot to set it back. Ended up alternating the angle for the next 2 sets to be consistent.
Low back was feeling very fatigued so I did several feel-good yoga poses before bed. One came from Dr. Stuart McGill while another came from my cat. I noticed after his play session that he was laying on his belly with his lower body on the couch and upper body hanging off, arms stretched out in front of him, so I went next to him and did the same, which felt awesome and decompressive.
The shrimp I ate from Google upset my guts. Starting to wonder if I’m developing a shrimp intolerance, as I recall feeling bloated after eating shrimp from Trader Joe’s recently, or it’s this particular batch. Nothing debilitating, just bloat and stomach gurgles. Haven’t noticed any issues from crab and lobster so it’s not shellfish in general.
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Thanksgiving workout:
Landmine RDLs
5 plates x 10
6 plates x 10, 10
Super-set with reverse hypers: 200 x 3 x 10
Belt squats
9 plates x 3 x 10
Standing ab wheel: 5 slow reps
Had a massive feast at my sister’s. As siblings we’ve never gotten together like this for Thanksgiving by ourselves. The last time we did something like this was 2008 at my aunt’s house, and my brother wasn’t there. So definitely a special night.
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Overhead press
155 x 3
175 x 3
200 x 1
Against bands:
115 x 10
105 x 10, 10, 10, 10
Super-set with pull-ups: 5 x 10
Barbell skullcrushers
105 x 10, 10
115 x 10
Super-set with upright rows + shrugs
105 x 10
115 x 10
Axle curls
40 x 50
The rep of 200 was the closest I’ve ever come to passing out on this lift. Could feel consciousness rapidly slipping away as I locked out, but somehow still felt confident enough that I could hold on.
I recently watched a Brian Alsruhe vid about keeping your breath in the belly the entire walkout for the press. I used to do this intuitively and for some reason started breathing out and then taking another breath before pressing the first rep. I can definitely lift more weight holding my breath before the first rep.
I’ve had great results pressing against bands in the past so I was excited to bring these back in. I could tell I wouldn’t be able to get 115 for 5 sets; going to 105 was the right move.
The bar skullcrushers were fun. I’m at the age where I legitimately get nostalgic for certain exercises; used to do these a lot in 2008. I definitely had 135 x 10 in me like the old days.
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Holding that initial breath is just magic. You’ll never have a better brace.
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Neglected to mention that I got sick the day after Thanksgiving, and trained through that on Saturday for the press workout. Got set-up to do squats yesterday, went up to 290, and called it off based on how rundown I felt. Practiced some boxing in the living room instead.
Will see how I feel today after work. Throat is no longer sore, but am still sniffly. If heavy barbell squats still feel crummy, I’m thinking belt squats as the main work again.
Boxing will be only two days this week again. Class slots fill up incredibly fast. I need to register as soon as class selection becomes available (Saturdays at 4pm) so I can get in more days. I actually opened up the link early this weekend but hesitated because I felt sick and wasn’t sure if I wanted to register for Monday. By the time I came back, a bunch of classes were full, including sparring.
I’ll be well prepared for sparring next time, though. For Black Friday, I bought new headgear and a groin guard from Phenom. I originally had my sights set on headgear from Winning, but what was around $350 in 2019 (when I logged about it) is now well over $600.
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Felt sick and rundown, so last night I worked up to squatting 405x5 with the Yukon bar and called it there. Every rep felt awful, but equally so - the 5th was just as hard as the 1st and I could have kept cranking out reps, but knowing I haven’t been sleeping great and with 2 days of boxing ahead of me, 5 was just the right amount.
Why back to the curved bar? Low bar squatting has been starting to hurt. My elbows are no longer feeling the strain, but lately I’ve been feeling discomfort on pressing exercises that feel like accumulative punishment from squats. Rotating different bars and bar placements is needed.
I am also going to bring back scheduled deloads. There have been countless times running 5/3/1 where I came back after a deload and marveled at how much better and stronger I felt.
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Suddenly tweaked my back twice today at the office! The first time was at my desk when I leaned forward and felt a small twinge. The second was at lunch when I bent further down, clearly not having learnt my lesson the first time, and felt a sharper pain that’s now lingering with me. I went for a slow incline walk on the warehouse treadmill afterwards and lay down for 15 minutes for the remainder of my break, dozing off slightly.
Not sure about boxing today. My instinct is to call it off, but it’s a technical day and the easiest day of the week. Might be able to pull it off with my Cerberus soft belt for support. Will evaluate how I’m moving the remainder of my work day and go from there. It costs $15 to cancel a class if it’s less than 24 hour notice, which is my only annoyance about this gym. Will definitely cancel tomorrow’s class, though, which typically has a lot of conditioning.
EDIT: Going to boxing today. Can still punch pain-free, it’s just bobbing and weaving that I’ll have to go easy on. Will let the coach know.
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Very glad I ended up going to boxing yesterday. Usually I get home from work, spend 10 minutes lying down watching boxing videos on YouTube, and then I get up to prepare and leave. I started thinking about not going as I lay down in pain yesterday, comfortable with the cat sitting on my chest while watching a video about Sugar Ray Leonard, so I gave myself a minute of feeling like I didn’t want to get up before I stopped thinking and simply did it. Made sure to grab my Cerberus soft belt on the way out.
Skipping rope was the hardest part, but not too bad. I made a point to raise my legs more gingerly and land a little more softly than usual so I felt slightly more tired than normal.
After 3 rounds of shadowboxing, we partnered up to trade various combos that we had to parry and block, eventually moving on to one of us getting mitts. Partner understood my back woes so I bobbed and ducked slower than normal. Finished with bagwork. Unfortunately I left my Cerberus belt there.
I did cancel today’s class in advance, which typically has more ballistic conditioning workouts and ab exercises.
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Swiss bar bench press
225 x 10, 10, 8, 8
Super-set with pull-ups
4 x 12
37-second chin-up
Wanted something dead simple and fast I could hit while sick. Was surprised at how light 225 was given that I got under 135 and noted that it felt oddly heavy.
Wanted to do a 1-min chin-up, but I was feeling pretty weak at this point - and I HAVE gained almost 10 pounds in total during this mass gain phase. Settled on 40, but my elbow started to hurt on the eccentric phase so I let myself drop down. Going up didn’t produce any pain, though.
Back is still in pain with limited function, but not nearly as bad as previous injuries. I can put on socks, get in and out of bed, and was able to load work equipment this morning without trouble.
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No training yesterday. Made myself rest. Will do belt squats today and possibly repetition effort goblet squats with the 50 lb kettlebell if my back agrees with that.
Back is the same: injured, but not too bad. Can do life stuff fine, just can’t load the spine too much right now. Sleeping doesn’t hurt like with some nastier back injuries.
Not feeling too bad from illness anymore but cough has become quite bad, especially at night. Have been going to bed early to account for coughing time. Last night I’d find myself drifting off to sleep only to wake myself back up with a cough. Eventually fell asleep right at the mark where I’d get 8 hours, so I timed that well.
Being cozy makes me want to train. I’ll be chilling in bed feeling sick with tea and the cat on me before my intrusive thoughts instruct me to ruin the moment and go sprint some hills. I’m glad I have that fire and it served me well on Tuesday when I didn’t want to go to boxing at first.
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Saw a documentary about lions recently and thought no cat is going to beat my boy. Dragging a 2.5 lb weight + chain. We’re training to move up to 5 lbs.
If anyone’s wondering, he’s been dragging weights since kittenhood and runs over when I bring the vest out because he knows he gets to go outside.
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Strongest Panther I’ve ever seen.
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Bench press
225 x 5
275 x 3
310 x 3
Incline Swiss bar bench press
175 x 10
190 x 8
205 x 6
175 x 11 → Drop-down to 155 x 5
Super-set with lying dumbbell rows
115s x 4 x 8
Banded tricep pressdowns
10, 12
Super-set with seated hammer curls
50s x 8
35s x 10, 10
Feeling more recovered. Just have lingering congestion and the cough. The bench press top set came very smooth. Intentionally shorted myself of 315 by going with 310 to ensure success, but turns out I had more in me.
The rep scheme for the incline bench is a suggestion from Eric Bach: 10, 8, 6, and ending with 15 using the weight that was done with 10. 175 was too heavy for 15 reps at that point in the workout, but that’s a cool sub quest to try and reach. The rep variety was very fun after doing 4 and 5 straight sets of 10 lately, which can get boring.
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Squats
410 x 7
315 x 20
Reverse-hyper single leg curls
200 x 20
On Friday, I got set-up for belt squats a bit too deep in the hole and with my foot placement off. Straining to break the weight off the ground made my right hip angry. I was able to belt squat fine after an adjustment, but I’ve been feeling the hip pain a little since then. Squatting was a little uncomfortable so I stood a little more narrow than normal and kept a couple of reps left in the tank. Very happy my back is feeling better from last week and that it held out fine.
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I love that, a year ago, I was deep into Super Squats, gunning for 315x20 as my stretch goal, and here it’s just part of your squat work—with reps in the tank, no less!
Great work!
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@SvenG Thanks for that man, it’s funny how that was a milestone and once I hit that, it didn’t take long before my recovery could handle it as accessory work. The effort is still hard-fought but it doesn’t leave me feeling dead and lying on the ground afterwards anymore, which is an interesting development.
When I arrived at boxing on Tuesday I found my Cerberus belt waiting for me in the exact same spot that I’d left it. Thankfully I didn’t need it this time, but after skipping rope I lent it to someone who was telling the coach he threw out his back bending down to his gym bag just then. He said it helped immediately.
For shadowboxing rounds, we used a plastic ring to throw a 1-2 in front of, then dip to either the left and throw a right uppercut or to the right and throw a left uppercut.
Partnered up afterwards with a fairly big guy who was dressed in pink pants, a Mike Tyson tank, and a comb embedded in his hair. I dug it, haha. Despite the loud look, he was quiet and all business, which was fine by me. Took turns throwing 1-2s, then 1-2-3s, and then did various combos on mitts and finished up with the heavy bag.
Wednesday was a total rest day because I was feeling rundown. The timing worked out because my girlfriend invited me to a holiday event at the PayPal Arena that her work got her tickets for. It dawned on me later that I’ve seen the event from the outside in years past because it’s by the Costco I used to go to and I always thought it looked neat. We walked around and looked at the decorations, which were incredibly extravagant, and I got several comments from strangers on my Abdominal Swoleman sweater.
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Axle clean once and press: 110 x 5
Close-grip neutral grip chin-ups: 5
8 rounds in 6:58
Dips
50 x 12, 12
75 x 10
Super-set with Pendlay rows
160 x 12, 12, 12
Sandbag squats
200 x 12, 12
50-second chin-up
I wasn’t looking forward to this because training without some kind of heavy top set bores the powerlifter in me, but I always end up feeling really good once I’m running the workout. Got a good upper-body pump and walk out of the gym feeling better and more energized than when I walked in.
No elbow pain on the 50-sec chin-up this time, but I’m keeping the dropdown faster than the ascension in order not to push that.
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Went to a work event Friday night: bocce ball at a place 5 minutes from my house with tons of food. Feasted on smoked sausage, prawns wrapped in bacon, meatballs, and pizza.
Rather than stay at the office after work until it was time to go to the event, I went home to feed my animals, drink some protein, and relax before heading out again, which was absolutely the right move. Before, waiting around for the group to leave from work to a Friday night dinner or event just meant doing extra email requests past 5pm, turning down drinks from the people not driving, and generally waiting around being bored and wondering why I’m still at work.
Saturday was stormy. There was a TORNADO 25 minutes away in Santa Cruz, which is insane. Lifted indoors:
Deadlifts
525 x 0, 1
RDLs
300 x 2 x 8
Barbell shrugs
300 x 2 x 10
I wanted 525x3, but was too gunshy and had difficulty mustering up the neurological confidence to blast the weight up due to recently recovering from a back tweak. When I did move the weight it shot up quick, but a second rep was definitely not happening. I’m still happy I moved it for a fast single. Back to more reps and building before going heavy again.
And the liberating thing is building my deadlift is a side quest to boxing, so I didn’t feel any frustration or stress with missing that first rep like I would have before while wondering what’s with my body just shutting down the effort like that.
Have been using my foam roller more and it’s been feeling awesome on my back and shoulders. It’s a 1st gen Viper vibrating roller that I paid way too much for only to have the vibration break down, but still functions as a firm regular roller. I should get a lacrosse ball too.
Later that evening, I did 3 rounds of 4 minutes shadowboxing with several layers on, hoodie up, and the breath restriction mask indoors to simulate the heat and suffocation from sparring in a hot gym. Went out to the store and when I got back home, went to Heart Attack Hill and did 3 hill sprints followed by a 30 minute jog. Awesome all-day mix of training and relaxation, which is my ideal weekend if I’m not going out anywhere.
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Bench press
315 x 3
Swiss bar incline bench
177.5 x 10
192.8 x 8
207.5 x 6
170 x 14
Lying dumbbell rows
115s x 3 x 8
Hammer curls
50s x 10, 10
35s x 12
Super-set with banded tricep press downs
3 x 10
Made gains on bench despite shoulders and traps feeling sore. Will use the foam roller and massage gun tonight. Over the weekend I’d been using the foam roller exclusively on my back.
I’m signed up for sparring tomorrow. At the forefront of my mind will be to relax, pick quality shots vs overdoing the volume, and sink in good body shots. My sinuses have been clearer lately; hopefully I don’t have trouble breathing through my nose this time.
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