Lo/Rez Training

[LoRez]

[quote]Apoklyps wrote:

[quote]LoRez wrote:
“this rep isn’t going to be 100% crisp, clean, explosive, so I’ll stop”.
[/quote]

Ah, okay. Thanks for the clarification. There’s still one thing I don’t like about this approach though. Completing reps is very much a psychological game. It builds confidence in your ability to handle heavy weights. Trust me, this makes a huge difference. For example, I had a huge mental barrier trying to deadlift 200kg for the first time. I kept failing 200kg and it took me about 6 months to go from a 195kg max to a 200kg max. After I hit 200kg though, it only took about 6 weeks to get my max up to an easy 220kg.

The lesson here is that, in reality, I had the strength to lift 200kg for a long time, but I couldn’t because of a psychological barrier. A lot of this game is psychology. Don’t create barriers to your success needlessly.[/quote]

It’s interesting you say that, and it’s something I’ve kept in mind. It took some “heavy” walkouts to get me past the 200lb barrier on the 20-rep squats.

There’s a school of thought that says “don’t miss, it will teach you to miss”, and another that says “always work to a miss, to get comfortable under the weights and always push yourself”.

Yeah, I don’t really buy it either.

At least in the past three weeks, the combination of that + heavy pin squats has helped. I went from being “scared” of 315 on my back at my highest pin setting to handling 315 fine at the lowest pin setting over 3 weeks. Overloads definitely help with the psychological part of things.

However, I’ll be taking the overloads out in the next couple weeks, going to just use the to-the-letter “Nick Horton Squat Nemesis” program. I’ll get to see how the misses affect me then.

Entirely valid point though. I’m actually in agreement with you, but I’m just going to give the other approach a chance. Both approaches can be rationalized and work with some people; I want to find out which works best for me.

As far as the food and sleep consistency goes, TBH, I think the importance of that is overrated on the internet. I have ADHD (I’ve found meds to be very helpful, but they are not a magic bullet and kill my appetite) as well, and I’m also in a fairly demanding schooling program (I’m in my last, read: busiest, year before hopefully entering one of the more competitive med schools in Canada). I’ve got a young son too. So you can imagine that my life is probably in shambles most of the time as far as consistency goes LOL.

Yeah, good luck with that. That sounds… busy. No sarcasm.

You don’t necessarily have to eat ridiculous amounts to make gains either. Yes, weight moves weight. However, most people get way too hung up on scale weight. I did too for a long time. My approach to bulking has since changed. I’ve been eating fairly close to maintenance for the past while. Haven’t gained a pound in the past 3 weeks. In that time, though, my arms have increased in size, my waist has decreased, and I’ve hit PRs. So I would consider that bulking in a successful way.

I agree.

I was stuck at high 140s for a long time, and actually did a lot of “recomping” at that weight just as you described. (It’s all relative sure, but I got a lot “thicker” compared to before) But I also knew that I didn’t want to stay there and needed to find a way to push things up.

What I was doing wasn’t working [for that]. I’m not sure how long I’ll stick to this very very limited food choice selection, but I finally got the scale moving a bit in the right direction.

Current goal is hit 160 eating relatively “clean” and hold it. There’s an article or three by Dr. Lonnie Lowery on here about that approach. Again, I don’t exactly buy it, but I want to find out for sure.

–

Just to have it documented though.

Week of Jan 26: (150.4 avg) 151.6 150.1 149.0 150.1 150.5 150.8
Week of Feb 03: (149.5 avg) 149.3 149.5 150.0 147.9 148.2 151.2 150.6
Week of Feb 10: (151.0 avg) 152.6 148.2 148.3 152.9 151.0 152.0 151.9
Week of Feb 17: (152.7 avg) 151.8 152.0 153.0 153.3 153.6 152.5

It’s moving in the right direction. Maybe a little too fast, but 160 is the hard stopping point to hold at for a few months.

Chobbs would be proud, lol.

[ishinator]

[quote]LoRez wrote:
Underestimated how much time I’d need to do this over lunch.

Squats

255 x 0 – just fell into the hole with no hope

[/quote]

Dear lord do I know this feel.

[ishinator]

I’m interested in seeing how Nemesis works for you. I’m currently doing the JTS program (currently in 5s) with an additional front squat day.
I’ve been considering Horton’s stuff after I’m done with this.

[LoRez]

Squats

Ramp
45, 95, 135, 155, 175, 185, 205, 215, 225, 235, 245 x 2 (last rep was a little sketchy)
255 x 1

Work Sets (clusters)
230 x 2, 3
225 x 2, 1

These were supposed to be 4-6 rep clusters at 90%. I’ve had a lot of trouble with these… I can do 90% clusters with bench and high pulls, but apparently not with squatting. Anyway, I got the minimum 8 reps in. Became more “density work” than clusters.

The workout made me stiff again. Hip flexors and IT band today. I kind of expected something though with two extra workouts in the past couple days. I’m pretty sure if it weren’t for this exercise-onset stiffness I’d be able to have done more.

CT gave me a plan for a deload week:
3x3 @ 80%
5x3 @ 70%
off
upper body
3x2 @ 85%
off/upper
off
test max

I’ll give that a shot. Then I’ll switch to Nemesis for squats, and probably for bench 2-3x a week.

[LoRez]

[quote]ishinator wrote:
I’m interested in seeing how Nemesis works for you. I’m currently doing the JTS program (currently in 5s) with an additional front squat day.
I’ve been considering Horton’s stuff after I’m done with this.[/quote]

I’m pretty interested too. He’s certainly hyped it up, but I haven’t seen much for logs.

I’m not familiar with the JTS program. How is it set up?

[LoRez]

Week 1 Daily 1RMs: 255, 250, 250, 225, 245
Week 2 Daily 1RMs: 267, 245, 245, 245, 235
Week 3 Daily 1RMs: 265, 255, 245, 245, 255

Week 1 Max: 255
Week 2 Max: 267
Week 3 Max: 265

Week 1 Average: 245
Week 2 Average: 247.4
Week 3 Average: 253

Pin squats went way up. Like, 265->315 at the lowest pin.

We’ll see what this deload week does for me. Nervous system / endocrine system definitely needs it.

Based purely on these weekly averages, 8lbs in 3 weeks is a little weak.

–

Also, my right knee injury is gone.

[ishinator]

[quote]LoRez wrote:

[quote]ishinator wrote:
I’m interested in seeing how Nemesis works for you. I’m currently doing the JTS program (currently in 5s) with an additional front squat day.
I’ve been considering Horton’s stuff after I’m done with this.[/quote]

I’m pretty interested too. He’s certainly hyped it up, but I haven’t seen much for logs.

I’m not familiar with the JTS program. How is it set up?[/quote]

It’s kind of like a convoluted 531. You have a month of 10s, 8s, 5s, 3s with percentages based on your training max.

So 5x10 first week, 3x10 second, max set of 10 third, deload 4th. The rest of the months essentially follows that pattern.

The 5x10 is death.

[mutantcolors]

I couldn’t tell you why, but I had a years-long battle to hit 160. Once I did though, I’ve never dipped below that mark, even with months away from lifting and eating half the calories it took to get there.

[magick]

I find it confusing that people are saying that you shouldn’t be doing 6x a week training while no one says anything negative to me.

Tbh, I expected people to be all “your numbers suck because your training sucks”.

[LoRez]

Final day of the original 3 week plan.

Ramp to 80%
45, 95, 135, 155, 175, 195, 205, 215 x 2.

Depth was great on these. I’ve been going a little higher than true ATG for most everything… below parallel but above ATG. These were all ATG, focusing on speed.

Set everything up to bench again. I’ll do that later.

[LoRez]

I’m pretty amused at all the “controversy” about what I’m doing.

I took a program from an article on this very site, an autoregulation-based peaking program that CT himself did to improve his high pulls, and applied it to squats instead of high pulls.

I just did it to get my squats moving in the right direction again.

It’s not even my program.

Now it happens to be based in some of the more extreme ideas out of the weightlifting world, which I learned about while doing it, and talked about here…

But all I actually did was follow the program, eat a lot, and use some peri-workout nutrition. I.e., following the program.

There’s a lesson in there, somewhere.

Something about trusting what you’re doing, ignoring naysayers, buckling down and doing the hard work.

Lol.

[LoRez]

Nemesis Bench – high pins (4), moderate incline

Ramp to 3,2,1
95, 105, 115, 125, 135, 145 x 3
150, 155, 165 x 2
170, 175 x 1 (5lb PR)

Reset to 70% - volume
125, 127.5, 130, 132.5, 135, 137.5, 140, 142.5, 145, 147.5, 150, 152.5, 155, 157.5, 160, 162.5 x 3
165 x 2,0

Reset to 50% - speed
87.5 x 2 x 5 (two sets of 5)

I started out at pin 3, but it was affecting my shoulders; upper arms were going below parallel. Brought it up to 4.

It’s interesting during the volume part that I hit well above my original 3 ramp. The ramp was dead stop, volume was tng. That might have been why.

Nick Horton recommends only adding 2-3% each successive set for the volume portion; 2% of 125 is 2.5lbs, so yeah. First time really using my fractional plates.

Speed sets should have been slow down, fast up… I did it fast both ways. I’ll do it right next time.

[AnytimeJake]

Speaken of that other ‘‘gear’’ looks like you found it lately as well, atacking those squats !

[LoRez]

Squats - 3x3 at 80%

45, 95, 135, 155, 175 x 2
185, 195, 205 x 1

215 x 3 x 3

DB Overhead Press
oly handles x 30, 30, 20, 20 (8.something pounds each, for some reason)

After seeing chobbs talking about Paul Carter’s program, and doing a bit of reading between squat sets, I figure I might as well try this out. My rotator cuff tendons were feeling awful from yesterday and affected my sleep last night.

In the “squat every day” book, it was suggested that loaded movements across a joint can heal the joint faster, since it actually pumps more blood to the tendon for healing purposes. Otherwise, I guess the muscles get all the blood, but not the tendons… which is why they heal so slowly. And then seeing how my knee went from a potentially major injury (stabbing pain behind the kneecap) to healed in 3 days. And knowing that high-rep sets of light overhead extensions help my elbow when it acts up. And then seeing Paul talking about high-rep sets for the same reason, I tried it.

And yeah, shoulders are feeling great right now.

Maybe this will be a regular thing.

–

And, of course, more TRX face pull rows. Remember when I said I’d be doing these, I just wouldn’t be recording it? Just a reminder.

Actually, I rebuilt my whole over-door apparatus using 1" nylon webbing/strapping instead of rope. But that’s the only change. Maybe I’ll put up a photo one of these days.

[chobbs]

I’m not an expert by any means, but if you have any questions I’ll try and answer them or at least look them up in the book lol

[LoRez]

Squats - 5 x 3 @ 70%

45, 95, 135 x 3
155, 175 x 1

185 x 5 x 3

This sucked, for totally different reasons. 70% feels like I did absolutely nothing and wasted my time in the gym.

Celebrated with Chipotle though. 1240 calories, 69g protein. As much as I love this place, I almost never go.

This is the 2nd awesome “cheat” meal I’ve had since I started my pasta/rice/beef/milk diet. The first was a 1/2 lb (cooked) elk burger, with cheddar and bacon and two fried eggs on it. With sweet potato waffle fries. With a pint of cream of broccoli soup. Amazing.

If you’re ever in Indy, Bub’s Burgers in Carmel is worth a stop.

[LoRez]

I’ve got the basic outline for the next 4 weeks of training bouncing around in my head.

Goals:

1. improve back squat and bench
2. learn how to front squat (never done them before, but too many good recommendations to be ignoring them)
3. start doing some rows for the lats; bb focus
4. get my shoulders back to par to eventually overhead press again
5. monitor how my deadlift improves from just the squats

Weekly Layout:
M: back squats + bench + db overhead press
T: front squats + row + curls
W: back squats + bench + db overhead press
R: front squats + row + curls
F: back squats + bench + db overhead press
S: deadlift + curls
S: off

First three weeks heavy, fourth week light.

Heavy = ramp + volume + speed
Light = ramp

For Bench, Squats and Deadlifts I’ll be using the “classical” Nemesis layout:

1. Ramp to 3RM, to 2RM, to 1RM.
2. Ramp triples starting at 70%. Add 2-3% per set (so, 2.5 for bench, 5 for squats).
3. Speed sets, slow down, fast up. 2 sets of 5 at 50%.

Rows will be about volume. 4x8-12 or something else. DB overheads are 100 rep sets. Curls are pump work only, possibly 100 reps. 30-50+ TRX facepull rows daily. This is mostly about shoulder and elbow health.

If I’ll be gone for the weekend or something, Friday becomes Deadlift day.

Obviously subject to change. Just the basic outline I’m thinking right now.

[chobbs]

Qdoba>

[LoRez]

[quote]chobbs wrote:
Qdoba>[/quote]

Meh.

It’s been years since I’ve had Qdoba – pretty much ever since I had access to a Chipotle. But I’ll give it a shot again. Suggestions?

[chobbs]

[quote]LoRez wrote:

[quote]chobbs wrote:
Qdoba>[/quote]

Meh.

It’s been years since I’ve had Qdoba – pretty much ever since I had access to a Chipotle. But I’ll give it a shot again. Suggestions?[/quote]
I always get the naked burrito, double chicken, whatever toppings you want, and chips and queso.