Close-grip bench press:
70 x 12 reps, 105 x 4 reps, 102.5 x 4 reps, 105 x 3 reps
Press:
10 sets x 40 x 3 reps (= speed, 1 minute pause @ 55% current 1RM)
Hanging straight leg raise:
BW x 9 reps
Crunch machine:
1 superset descending weight 21 reps total
On the whole a good day, even if greed got the best of me and I knocked up the weight on the close-grips a week too soon, cut it back in the second set in recognition of the error of my ways, and then went on and it again on the final set, which fell off the low end of the desired rep range. Well, I pledge to stay at 105 for the next two weeks as I had planned.
The barbell seemed to be flying up today on the press speed sets. I did notice, however, that I need to take care with this relatively lower weight to press vertically over my head and not out in front.
Close-grip bench press:
70 x 12 reps, 105 x 4 reps, 102.5 x 4 reps, 105 x 3 reps
Press:
10 sets x 40 x 3 reps (= speed, 1 minute pause @ 55% current 1RM)
Hanging straight leg raise:
BW x 9 reps
Crunch machine:
1 superset descending weight 21 reps total
On the whole a good day, even if greed got the best of me and I knocked up the weight on the close-grips a week too soon, cut it back in the second set in recognition of the error of my ways, and then went on and it again on the final set, which fell off the low end of the desired rep range. Well, I pledge to stay at 105 for the next two weeks as I had planned.
The barbell seemed to be flying up today on the press speed sets. I did notice, however, that I need to take care with this relatively lower weight to press vertically over my head and not out in front.[/quote]
Hey Geech - I though the bench press is supposed to go up over your chest and not over your face. I’m pretty much a beginner and want to move into barbell bench presses when I stall on the dumbbell bench presses and would like to know the proper method.
The barbell seemed to be flying up today on the press speed sets. I did notice, however, that I need to take care with this relatively lower weight to press vertically over my head and not out in front.
Hey Geech - I though the bench press is supposed to go up over your chest and not over your face. I’m pretty much a beginner and want to move into barbell bench presses when I stall on the dumbbell bench presses and would like to know the proper method.
[/quote]
You are absolutely right, Soldog, you don’t want to bench press over your face in a loopy movement (something I had to break myself of, and still sometimes creeps in, to which end close-grips have been a big help, since they more immediately demand with my build a lower torso centeredness for the bar). There is so much to bench pressing method that I would suggest the book Starting Strength, 2nd ed., to which so much reference is justly made on this site. It has chapters dedicated to bench press, squat, deadlift, press, and power clean, as well as assistance exercises. I wish I had read it when I was younger, as it would have aided me in avoiding some other bad habits in all of these lifts. It is really so well conceived that it can be read again and new perspectives found on things one might have considered well in hand.
But you don’t need to be in a hurry to leave the DBs: They represent in many respects a better exercise, since you have to work and stabilize the limbs independently, and in a potentially greater range of movement – and you have to work even to get them in place at the start!
Here I mean by the shorthand ‘press’ standing two-hand overhead press and more specifically military press – no leg, hip or back movement to help get the weight moving.
[quote]1Geech wrote:
Here I mean by the shorthand ‘press’ standing two-hand overhead press and more specifically military press – no leg, hip or back movement to help get the weight moving. [/quote]
I wondered if you were referring to an OH press since that made more sense with your comment on keeping it overhead. But I got confused because you hadn’t written about any OH presses for this workout and I overlooked the “press” section. Sorry for the confusion.
I’ll look for that book and no worries about my moving off of DB presses anytime soon. I seem to be still making steady progress there and I think they may be easier on my shoulder since the movement is less constrained.
geech do you bench around twice your body weight? 56% of 100=178 amd you weigh 90 kg…thats impressive.
Also, are you done with this blog after the 9 weeks?
[quote]ecogenx wrote:
geech do you bench around twice your body weight? 56% of 100=178 amd you weigh 90 kg…thats impressive.
Also, are you done with this blog after the 9 weeks?[/quote]
I wish, ecogenx, I wish. That will be a long time coming, if ever. That is an embarrassing error in my log for 6 May that I shall fix.
It is a paltry 70 kgs that is the 56% of my last tested max in March, hence, 125 kgs, itself, then, only 1.39 times my bodyweight. Right now my goal is to get to a 300-pound (just over 136 kgs) bench – what I think you are doing as a warm-up!
I intended to blog only for the nine weeks to document this training cycle, and because after that I have a three-week family vacation back in the States where I will have to train differently. But the interaction with everyone in this forum (and one or two others) has been so enjoyable and worthwhile that I would like to keep it up if possible.
Squat:
10 sets x 70 x 2 reps (= speed, 1 minute pause @ 54% current 1 RM)
Lying leg curl:
80 x 6 reps, 80 x 5 reps
Weighted chin-up:
BW + 17.5 x 6 reps, BW + 17.5 x 5 reps
In and out pretty fast today. Nothing remarkable to note, got one more rep on the first set of the leg curls over against last week.
I tried to keep better hand and elbow position in the squats, but clearly need more work to get it ‘down’; I have been squatting with bent wrists and elbows forward for too long – only now in advanced age have I realized that with proper positioning my upper back can and should be much tighter in the lift.
Squat:
10 sets x 70 x 2 reps (= speed, 1 minute pause @ 54% current 1 RM)
Lying leg curl:
80 x 6 reps, 80 x 5 reps
Weighted chin-up:
BW + 17.5 x 6 reps, BW + 17.5 x 5 reps
In and out pretty fast today. Nothing remarkable to note, got one more rep on the first set of the leg curls over against last week.
I tried to keep better hand and elbow position in the squats, but clearly need more work to get it ‘down’; I have been squatting with bent wrists and elbows forward for too long – only now in advanced age have I realized that with proper positioning my upper back can and should be much tighter in the lift.[/quote]
It’s made all the difference in the world for me to stop flexing my wrists. Locks that bar in tight and forces you to keep your chest up and that, in my case, makes it a done deal to get my rear out and come down properly on my free squats and box squats. Amazing that it all starts with hand position.
Any contact you have with the bar should be properly addressed, I’m learning.
Are you using bands on your speed sets? Have I asked that before?
Any tips on solving the wrist problem would be greatly appreciated, Skidmark – and everyone.
Call me a know-nothing, but I only discovered what weightlifting bands are and might be used for on starting to peruse sites like this earlier this year. (I am sure that they did not suddenly appear in the four years I was out of the gym, but I certainly never saw them before anywhere I was working out, nor was I much into further reading in this area in the 90s: to my own detriment.)
I am considering getting some bands while in the States over the summer, and then figuring out how to start using them – or deciding whether I am even ready for them, considering that I am still working at getting my 1RM over 140 kgs. – and solving the hand positioning problem and what comes with it.
For squats all that is available in my gym is a squat rack with safety bars – but thank goodness at least for that: There is a real preference here everywhere I have looked for Smith machines alone.
I stopped wrapping my thumb around the bar and put it over the bar. Took my hands out farther. I’d bring them in right to my shoulders if I could, but my shoulder flexibility won’t allow it. My hands aren’t straight on the bar either.
Bands: Their uses are myriad. It’s the most flexible exercise tool I have. Check out EliteFTS’ videos on how bands can be used.
Self-myofascial release:
Foam roll lower body and shoulders, tennis ball back / neck.
Ab wheel:
4 sets x 12 reps (from knees)
No wrist roll because my hands and forearms are still a bit tired from this week’s training.
By the way, in the same vein, I tried on Friday a BW two-hand hang after my chins to see what it might do for me, but found it very uncomfortable deep in one shoulder joint.
Full ROM is no problem for me chinning or pulling up (or for that matter pressing), but the static hang at full extension was pointedly unpleasant.
Squat:
70 x 12 reps, 100 x 8 reps, 120 x 6 reps, 122.5 x 6 reps
Walkout 145 twice, hold 10 secs.
102.5 (79% current 1RM) x 20 reps
Power clean:
50, 60, 70, 72.5, 75 x 3 reps
In a word, today was excellent – this because I moved, and understood why I moved, from high-bar to low-bar position on the squat in the course of substantially solving the matter of hand positioning by tightening my upper back and getting my chest up. In a nutshell, I grasped why the high-bar position had always been more agreeable to me: because I was not keeping my upper back tight. Grasping this to me is secondary to the better leverage that this brings with it: The entire movement of sitting back in the squat was so much smoother and of one piece than before. The 20 reps then went pretty quickly.
For the suggestion not to worry about gripping a bit wider towards achieving this end, thanks to Skidmark. I still have to work on this: my hands, on the rings, were in part rather more draped over the bar, and that width brought with it the need for more caution when racking so as not to crush them, but (my decided impression) what an improvement in the squat itself – at least I hope it keeps up.
Power cleans continued to be fine up to the final set. I may switch these to Friday and bring that day’s chins and leg curls to Monday in exchange if having the latter at the beginning of the week does not impinge on my deadlifting on Wednesday. Have to think about this. The PCs are just gravy for me now, anyway.
Bench press:
70 x 12 reps, 100 x 8 reps, 117.5 x 2 reps, 117.5 x 2 reps, 117.5 x 1 rep, 117.5 x 1 rep
Unrack 140, hold 10 secs twice
Press:
65 x 0 rep, 60 x 3 reps, 60 x 3 reps
Hanging straight leg raise:
BW x 9 reps
Crunch machine:
1 superset descending weight 22 reps total
Oh, the agony following upon the ecstasy. Today was, in three words, less than zero. Having decided to keep the bench and press speed sets, I decided to regroup the two exercises on the same day, whether heavy or light, realigning close-grip bench press and dips together on Thursday – introducing this with another heavy bench day today after the same last week … leading, perhaps only indirectly, in the afternoon’s sub-nullity, as I seemed to be benching out of a black hole.
In true French manner, the rest of my body then joined in unauthorized sympathetic strike, resulting in a very sloppily power cleaned and then wholly unpressed 65 kgs. In disgust without concentration, I reduced the weight to 60, power cleaned it twice in a moderately respectable manner, pressed thrice, did abs and departed, my consolation being that the session was so miserable I could not take it too seriously. We’ll see.
Not all days can be great. If we made every lift we tried we’d all soon be in the record books. Regroup, you’ll get it next time. The rest of your workout looked to go good.
Sometimes just doing speed work and max effort or even submax reps (doubles, triples) isn’t enough. There are times when you need to put some reps in to build the bench, particularly at the bottom end of the lift.
You might also consider doing speed bench with more weight in the range of 65-75% of current 1RM. It might help until you get the bands.