Ditto. Sometimes I’d be racking up 5-6 mins just standing there trying to rest up, now I’ve shortened it to roughly 2-3 mins. Even with heavier stuff. Only exception I make for myself is if it’s max out Day. Those last two sets I’ll take up as much time as I need for the second and last attempts.
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I used to time my entire workout because they started getting really long. I was getting distracted. I’d do a couple of good sets, go get a drink, and apparently get lost on the way back to whatever I was doing. Next thing I know it’s been 7 minutes between sets.
My main goal has always been adding muscle so I’ve stuck with 1 minute rests. I started timing my rest to get myself in and out of the gym in a reasonable amount of time. Now it’s just natural. I set the timer and by the time 1 minute passes I’m ready to go except on heavy squats or deadlifts. I’ve started taking 2 minutes rest for those when needed.
In 2007 I did a workout that was 5x5 on at least four exercises per day. My rest was 3 minutes between sets. Those workouts took FOREVER. Luckily my job was to be in the weight room and my boss let me train on the clock. I was doing two-a-days to get all the work done.
What’s the coolest Return to Action song?
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Talk about non sequiturs (unless I’m missing something @FlatsFarmer)…
Not sure. I’ll get back to you.
Woke at 206.4 lbs, looking decent. Holiday softness seems to be slowly dissipating
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Oh, sorry man. Back home, in your gym, and back on the routine.
15 second rest between sets of squats and 2 minute long sets sounds like the opposite of a vacation.
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Ah, right. I’m obtuse at times.
The 15 second breaks were ok. The two minute set was really very unpleasant.
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Shitty sleep in that I from 2330 to 0330 I woke up on the half hour every hour. Feel asleep each time just fine though
Today’s training
20 push-ups, 6 pull-ups
A buddy had left his Rogue Ohio power bar out so I used that. Very nice.
Bench press
5xbar
5xplate
3x176 lbs
4x2x198 lbs, all under 6 RPE in seven minutes
14x198 lbs, 9-10 RPE - shocked but really pleased. I went in wanting 10 but kept going. Heels to traps is a great cue.
All up work sets took 11 minutes
https://www.instagram.com/p/BeQ3gZph3FC/
Wide grip bench press (pointer finger on ring)
3x8x148 lbs
DB flys
2x25x25 lbs
DB military press
4x10x45 lbs
Dips
4x10 at bodyweight
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I know there is variation from bar to bar but that’s usually my normal hand position lol
There shouldn’t be if you use a bar with PL markings…
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Yes, but you’re much taller than @MarkKO, hence, different anthropometry.
I just like saying anthropometry - it makes me sound like a douche.
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Lately I’ve been all over the place with my training. The bars at the work gym are mostly donated from garage gyms. The one I used yesterday barely had rings at all and they were wide, even for me.
At my favorite hangout they have unmarked bars, two American Barbell Power Elite bars, and recently bought two Hammer Strength 20 kg bars. Everything in the gym is in lbs so someone wasn’t paying attention when they bought those.
That was the point of my comment!
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For wide grips I put pinkys on rings and hands are outside of them. Just between the rings and the rack.
I know. That’s why I said I just wanted to sound like a douche.
@Frank_C, you are very concrete, and that’s a good thing.
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I’m having a hard time picturing this. Maybe I’m missing something @losthog
@Frank_C if you place your pointer finger on the ring, but the inter-ring distance changes from bar to bar, how does this affect your setup? My grip width is set because it’s where my wrist is stacked directly above my elbow on my chest.
@MarkKO. I was totally beat up yesterday when I wrote that from my workout. Index finger on the rings not the pinkys.
Unless I decide to go reverse grip which I have done occasionally but I like reverse grip better with dumbells not the Bb.
Never tried pinkys outside the rings reverse.
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I try to stack my wrist over my elbow too. Luckily I’ve benched long enough to go by feel. I also make minor adjustments during my warm-up sets.
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Woke at 206.4 lbs again. Lookinf decent too. Definitely seeing the holiday softness recede more.
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Was going to swim today but opted for a bit more sleep. Good decision. I’m going to see how going back to four days a week training works now - I think it’ll be different now I’m following a much better designed program.
A few notes in no particular order, because I’ve had time to think about all this. A lot relates to what I found during the mass phase and now what I’m finding training with Greg Panora’s system:
- people generally rest too long during training. This is something that often goes overlooked these days, I think. There’s no reason you need to spend that long training, even when you’ve got a fair bit to do. All you need is the work capacity to get through the sets faster, and you build that by resting less. Hell, even Dave Tate talks about getting through some ME sessions in an hour or so. Yes, of course the more you’re moving the longer it’ll take, and same goes if you’re beat up or using full gear. Still, though, I see people spend way too long between sets and just wasting time in other ways. I used to be one of them;
- a lot of people train too damn heavy. Again, until recently I was one of them. Even when I cut the weights for my mass phase I could have gone a fair bit lighter and still gotten bigger and stonger.;
- I’m beginning to think you don’t need to squat and DL more than once a week BUT to do that you probably need to do a fair bit of each when you do - and one way of being able to do that is not using too much weight. The other way is working hard with the weights you do use: shorter rests, more sets, higher reps where applicable, etc;
- assistance work is probably the only ‘secret ingredient’ apart from consistent hard work and I’m starting to think it also probably takes a hell of a lot longer to figure out how to implement it to its best effect than how to train the main lift;
- you can probably get stronger (and bigger) without increasing how much weight you use that much: that certainly seems to be one of Greg’s principles because your working max stays the same until you next compete.
- learning how to feel muscles working is invaluable no matter what your goals.
Now I also want to (kind of) have a rant about 5/3/1. Not a rant, really. Just put some thoughts out there.
- it’s effective, but I think mostly because once you get into it and look a bit deeper it pushes discipline and consistency. As an actual program it isn’t that great;
- it’ll get you a fair bit stronger but not as well as something more focused on what you need to get stronger;
- it treats all the lifts (basically) the same. Sure, you can use one template for one and another for another, but the overall approach is identical. This isn’t ideal at all;
- it has a pretty shitty approach to assistance: it treats it as something you don’t need to think about, and the options Jim suggests leave out a TON of exercises that would most probably make a big difference;
- I’ve said this before, but I’ll repeat it: 5/3/1 seems to be based on throwing a bunch of volume at each lift, throwing varying degrees of assistance at each lift and hoping like hell some of it sticks;
- 5/3/1 seems to be about making you better than you were - but quite possibly at the expense of being the best you could be at one or another thing. It’s a one size fits all strength and conditioning system (and in fairness to Jim he pretty much says that)
- none of this applies to the first edition. That’s still a damn fine option, especially BBB and (now I think about it) the Periodisation Bible.
- Training Maximally is also good, provided you aren’t wanting to do anything in particular than maintain and slowly build some strength and size;
- 5/3/1 has its place but also definitely has its limitations, and IMO you don’t need anything other than the first edition.
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I’ve been resting 60 seconds by timer for years.
This has always been a hangup of mine with the program. For me it’s more about staying balanced. If you only care about three or four exercises then you inevitably will become unbalanced. This applies to visual symmetry, muscle imbalances, and overall training (strength, endurance, athleticism, etc). I think the program lacks certain phases of training that could address these while maintaining strength on the four primary lifts.
And this is why I don’t run any templates as written.
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