Squat
bar 3x135 3x185 3x225 1x275
1x295
2, 1 x275
2x4x265
No wrist problems, but low back soreness like last Friday - limited performance.
Bench
bar 3x135 3x185
3x205
2, 2, 1 x215
2x205
Good despite wrist pain.
Pull-ups (palms out)
3xBW 3x+25
3x+35
2, 1 x+45
3x2x+35
Palms out instead of usual neutral grip. Less of a beating on the wrist.
OHP (wide grip)
bar 3x95
3x115
1x125
3, 2, 4 x115
My usual closer grip was too much on my wrist, even with just the bar. Got away with benching but by now it was serious. Wide grip let me put the bar pressure on a different part of the wrist if that makes sense - was completely painless.
Taking the weekend off, it looks like going just MWF kind of deal is best for making progress with this setup.
Wrist is still an issue. Bench is as usual but OHP will stay wide grip until it gets better. Don’t know why one is OK and the other isn’t. Maybe I can go back to normal grip for OHP too.
Had to take some steps out of the 1-3 rep range. Picking the right weight to start is a little tricky, and I can’t promise this “mistake” won’t happen again. I’d rather start the day with a rep PR than a missed single though.
Squat
bar 3x135 3x185 3x225 1x275
3, 1x295
3x3x285
Bench
bar 3x135 3x185
2x215
4x2x205
Pull-up
3xBW 3x+25
2, 1 x+55
3x2x+45
WG OHP
bar 3x95
1x135
2x125
5, 4, 2x115
Squat performance seems to drop regularly on Friday; the low back stress from squatting heavy def adds up over the week.
Bench was down, may be because the bench here is higher and softer than the one at the gym back home.
Pull-ups - PR. They don’t have a dip belt here so I just put a DB between my feet.
WG OHP - Up to now I could take it out of a rack because the gym at home is always near empty. But I have to clean the bar off the ground for this now since the squat racks are usually full of people squatting/benching.
As for when I’m going to bboy again, I’ll start easing it in tomorrow. Will have to eat even more to keep fueled up. Just with training 3x/week, I’ve been eating 1000g carbs between each workout to continue getting stronger - and my weight has been staying constant at 185 (with food baby weight of 190). Training is the easy part. But if my schedule doesn’t allow this much time to eat, I can bring it back to doing each main lift (squat dead bench OHP) once per week. I’ll know I’m doing too much if I start missing PRs since this 3x/week lifting setup, by itself, has been hugely effective for leaving me with at least one PR every day.
1990s - Best was <1-1/2
Rollback stalls - one forearm, usual stuff
Swipes - still easy
Inverts - first time, ugly
First practice in a while, was not bad for how long it’s been.
I’m thinking of going back to lifting 4x/week, only doing one of the main lifts in each session (squat bench dead press). Looking back that has proven itself as a good way to build lifting strength while also leaving me enough energy to bboy well (and every day), AND leave a little time and energy for isolation work. No injuries, either.
Think about it: If I wanted to boost my bench, would I do handhops three times per week? Then why would I bench three times per week to improve my handhop count? Or squat 3x/week, for that matter? Especially if said lifting gets in the way of practicing more relevant (to me, at least) skills?
However, this current setup has given me solid (faster) strength gains too, and last night’s practice (along with past experience in general) has showed me that drilling the skill over and over won’t help much without some raw strength to back it up.
Then, that’s an empty statement, because both lifting schedules provided significant strength gains in a matter of weeks.
I think the smartest step for now is to go back to the 4x/week thing, hitting each core lift once per week. That method has proven itself for performance improvement in both lifting and bboying. I can objectively say it would be stupid to try something new when I already have a system that I know to work from experience.
Bench
bar 3x135 3x185
2, 1x215
2, 3, 2x205
PR for total work since coming to college
Pull-up
3xBW 3x+25
1x+55
2, 1 x+45
2, 1 x+35
Forgot to bring chalk, this may be the reason for the performance drop
WG OHP
bar 3x95 1x115
6, 4, 1 x125 (PR)
5, 4x115
Wait, let me explain.
I said it would be prudent to go back to hitting squat/bench/dead/press 1x/week each and filling the rest with bboying. The thing is there are arguments for both options, and while I can’t pinpoint a hard scientific reason for why I chose full body training today, I’m happy I did because I walked out with three PRs.
1990s - best: 1-3/4
Reverse 90s: Few good ones.
Barrel mills - Best was singles - was getting tired by now.
Bests of the day were pretty good but there were plenty of crashes.
Reverse 90s
Barrel mills - all singles, blah
Was tired by now, shifted gears to just some footwork then went home.
Objectively speaking with 90s and reverse 90s I generally get a few OK ones with most of them crashes/lame performance. One thing that helped in the past is focusing the time spent on a move to 20 minutes max. Also, can’t lie - I was hitting my best 90s while doing 5/3/1 - the lifting volume was simply low enough that I could put as much focus as possible onto practice.
For right now I’m going to keep lifting heavy, practicing on off days, and mainly getting stronger. If I see a battle that isn’t a 300 mile drive with a $15 entrance fee, I’ll step down lifting to the old setup with each core lift hit 1x/week, and put the focus back on more bboying.
Wrists are getting sore, likely from all the heavy pressing plus now the bboying - something will need to be dialed back. Maybe take Saturday off.
First off today was really bad. Squats were even worse than usual for a Friday, pull-ups and OHP took a dump and even though I was hitting 215 for sets on bench, it was much less total work than days prior.
My food’s been solid - 1200g carbs in preparation for each lifting session, along with 300g protein and 70-100g fat. The food I ate in preparation for this session was the same as the food I ate in preparation for Wednesday’s squat (1x325), bench (3x215) and pull-ups (2x+55) PRs, and Monday’s wide grip OHP PR (6x125).
I’ve been lifting heavy like this for four straight weeks so far and have broken some notable PRs while staying at just over 185 morning weight. But I can feel some pangs coming in. My knees feel stiff when I sit down and I have a little nagging pull feeling around my right lower back. And today’s performance is telling me that recovery will take more than another hour in the dining hall. Brainstorming some options:
Same exercises and frequency, with sets of 8-12 instead of 1-5 to get a good pump.
Skip the gym for a week
Same volume, reduce weight to just really light milestone weights for practice.
Focus on muscles like abs that are so necessary I can’t even train them directly because I need them to be fresh for heavy lifting the next day so my back doesn’t explode.
Nothing is certain. I’m leaning towards combining 3 and 4.
Then, maybe I’m just low on protein. 300g over 48 hours isn’t much.
Today was bboy practice - couldn’t even do decent 90s. Crashing all over the place.
I don’t need a deload week. What I need to do is stop training 7 days a week and expecting improvement across the board. It worked for a little bit but it’s not sustainable.
I’m going to spend the rest of this semester training for strength alone.
Squat
bar 3x135 3x185 3x225 1x275
5x315 (PR)
1x325
1x315
1x305
2x295
Last 2-3 sets should be lighter, say 3-5 reps. More work and practice, less low back stress.
Bench
bar 3x135 3x185
3, 2, 2, 2, 1 x215
Three options for Wednesday: 1) Go for 225, 2) 3x215 plus a lot of 205 reps, or 3) Hope I can get better by just sticking with 215.
Pull-up
3xBW 3x+25
2, 2, 1 x+55
3, 2 x+45
Wrist is feeling 93.847% so I’ll go back to neutral grip Wednesday.
WG OHP
bar 3x95 3x115
2x125
OHP
bar
3, 4, 3, 2 x135
Wide grip OHP was starting to get at my shoulders today. When I say wide grip, I mean index finger just past the bar. I noticed longer warmup time and a stiff/pulling feeling during the 2x125. Over the past few weeks I’ve learned how to get tighter at the bottom of a wide grip OHP but it looks like the shoulder stress is outweighing that.
So I went back to (painless) normal grip OHP. Felt out of practice. We’ll see.
Squat
bar 3x135 3x185 3x225 1x275
3x325 (PR)
2, 1 x315
3, 2x295
That tightness in my right low back is gone now, and my knees are fine too. Good all over.
Squat
bar 3x135 3x225
3, 2, 3, 2, 2 x 245
Did these with a strict focus on keeping my butt down and not letting it come up until the bar starts moving up, because from videos of my recent maxes I noticed that’s an issue. I figured since I normally don’t hit squat PRs on Fridays anyways I might as well take the chance to practice better form. The sets were still hard.
Bench
bar 3x135 3x185
2, 1 x225
2x215
2x3x205
More total work than Wednesday.
Squat
bar 3x135 3x185 3x225 1x275
1x325
1x315
1x305
1x295
Hold: 30s x 365
Bench
1x225
1x215
2, 2, 2 x205
Pull-up
2, 2, 1x+65
3, 3 x+55
OHP
3, 3, 2, 2, 2 x135
“Technique” practice with squats on Friday wasn’t any significant help. Going to replace last set of squats with a nice heavy iso hold. Not just shifting things around for the fun of it, I’m trying to find a way to teach myself to get tighter so my back doesn’t cave so much at the bottom. And I’m not really sure how a few sets of 8-12 on leg raises is going to cut it.
Caught something on Saturday. If you knew what I looked like/felt like Saturday night you would not have checked me off as “most likely to destroy an ME full body workout”. Feel alright now, just a lot of mucus.
Plan for Wednesday: Check those macros, get ~1000/300/80 c/p/f, sleep well, stay hydrated, stay away from dirty hookers etc.
That’s neat, I just showed that the lifts that get done first make the fastest progress. But looking at Wednesday it looks like I’m stalling. Two small rep PRs, but bench and OHP fell back. Even with yesterday’s PRs, the squat was pulled off with some serious back rounding (a trend, I’ve noticed) and the pull-up was questionable with the height. (Translation: The only two lifts I PRed on Wednesday are the ones that I can cheat the most on)
Going to wait for Friday’s session to make a judgement but it looks like it might be time to switch focus. Maybe to a setup that lets me do plenty of GMs for squat stability and puts size on my upper body.
Also, why lift heavy? If what I’m doing is preparing for bboying next spring, then shouldn’t I be focused on building muscle instead of getting better at benching? What translates better to a 1990: Shoulder muscle mass or technical OHP mastery? Just a thought. Nothing is concrete.
Edit: Did some more thinking. Going to switch to 5x/week push-pull-leg with a lot more volume in the 6-12 range, definitely with an upper body focus. Starting day 1 tomorrow.
As for lower body, I plan on one day a week for deads, squats, and GMs. Starting off with Stronglifts type programs already gave me some blocky 38" hips that I don’t feel the need to grow any more. Heavy lower body lifting because it’s fun and necessary to grow no matter what, and GMs because I’ve noticed that when I’m in shape with those I’m stable under the bar - abs, low back, and hamstrings.
If I keep trying to squat heavy 3x/week without leaving time for work like GMs, it will be like last summer when I never had time for assistance because I had to be fresh to max on deadlifts every week. Eventually I hurt myself.
