@dchris Appreciate the breakdown and the kudos. And hey, I do have SOME formal training…it’s just 20 years old, haha. The Sprawl shorts I’m wearing are older than the competitors in the 18+ brackets. You definitely nailed it on the assessment of the dudes I went against. And I appreciate that tip on why the Americana wasn’t working. He was breaking my brain there, but I’m glad I could force the choke through sheer brutality.
Haha, you vastly overestimate the amount of fight I have in me. I am willing to pin my opponent with my my legs and one elbow if he has a dirty diaper and I need to access it through clothes, but other than that my enemies get the MOM FACE and perhaps a lecture that makes them want to file a plastic toy into something they can cut their own ears off with. I think these are probably more effective than grappling them, and doesn’t mess my hair up!
Breakfast was 16oz of meatballs, made with 8oz of venison and 8oz of 73% lean beef, alongside some beef liver, a Don Lee farms chicken breast patty, 3 whole eggs and 5 whites.
Dinner was the usual assortment of eggs, and then I made pork chops for the family. I had 3, and the scraps left from the rest of the family. Air fried until internal temp was cooked, then reverse seared in cast iron in ghee, then butter basted.
@BethB It works great for a family dinner night. I’d prefer to use the smoker, but this worked in a pinch. The Valkyrie absolutely does NOT like pink in the pork, so this allows me to put a good sear on them without burning them.
@DJoftheJungle1 Very much appreciate those kind words! Yeah, the 31 squats weren’t smart, but sometimes it’s easy to be hard and hard to be smart.
Finally back to the program. Hand was healed up enough.
1 minute rests on SSB squats for sets of 12 continues to just absolutely suck. Following it up with lever belt squats also sucks. For the press, I took 1 minute rest until the final set, which was 2 minutes. DB incline was 60-90-90 for rest, and dips was 1 minute.
Knee felt ok. First set of squats sucked, but after that it got with the program.
I didn’t even think about my pec on the first set of incline bench, and then thought “oh hey, I guess it’s healed”, but the dips showed me that it still isn’t 100%. No pain: just pulling. Playing it safe, but still getting in some solid training. In general, this was a solid workout. Specificity is marketed as pump and fluff, but when you cram it with compound lifts, it’s brutal.
Weighed in at 85.8 yesterday and 84.8 this morning. Yesterday, it was like my body was shedding all of it’s water all day: weird post competition effect. Also got a 1:28 hang: new PR.
Tang Soo Do tonight. It’s one steps, so low activity. On that note, my general activity has dropped, since I no longer get in my lunch time walk. I have to get home and let the puppy out during that time, as the Valkyrie is no longer in a WFH situation. Just lends to this being a good time for gaining.
Breakfast was the same as yesterday. Dinner was leftovers night. 6 scrambled eggs, filet mignon, chuck steak, a pork chop, kalua pig, and some lamb breast plate.
We had something like 50mph wind gusts all night. Shook the entire house. Made it hard to sleep. Second rough night of sleep in a row: I was nodding off at my kid’s choir performance last night. I legit tried to Tetris my schedule as hard as I could to NOT do this workout, but couldn’t figure out a way, so just sucked it up.
It’s not on camera, but I actually tried to do a set of the mat pulls at work weight and couldn’t break the plates off the mats. Just bent the bar. Wondering if I have a small injury, as usually that will limit my power off the floor. I took a minute rest, sacked up and made it happen, and hit a ridiculous rep PR compared to the previous cycle, so I still got some good in me. 17 reps was a lot, but not my absolute limit: I’m trying to stop shy of failure to allow for some growth.
1 minute rest for the rows, GHRs and abs. Curls went 60-90-90.
Wore a knee sleeve to Tang Soo Do last night and it was an absolute and total game changer. Zero knee pain, far more mobility and flexibility, to the point that my head instructor called me out at how much better my kicks were looking that day. He had no idea I had the support on: just thought I had turned a corner. Definitely making this a way forward. We also earned another set of stripes on our belt, so that was cool. Class tonight and tomorrow.
Pec is a little tender after those dips and push ups in class. I may 86 the dips and stick with band pushdowns for the remainder of Specificity, or do some slingshot push ups.
Despite that ridiculous feast last night, I was .1kg lighter today, at 84.7. On the subject of food, I’m kicking around an idea for my January phase of training where, on non-lifting days, I fast through breakfast, having either coffee or coffee mixed with protein powder and just settle on the evening meal. This would shake out to 2 days a week, minimum, with possibly a third on weekends. The Valkyrie likes to make us breakfast on weekend mornings, and I’m not one to turn that down, but she enjoys a break every once in a while, so there’s room for a third there. Considering my breakfast tends to be about 1400 calories, this would mean eliminating 2800 calories in the span of a week, assuming I don’t try to overcompensate on the evening meal. Biggest concern would be inadequate protein intake for the day, but given how much I eat in general I feel like that’s really a non-issue. Food for thought, pun deliciously intended.
Hey I was just trying to send you a dm but realized that the forum here doesn’t have direct messaging enabled. Do you have any platforms or handles where you accept unsolicited messages? Lol
Breakfast was a repeat of yesterday. Dinner was 3 Costco grassfed burger patties topped with 3 whole eggs and some Primal Kitchen avocado mayo, alongside 5 whites and 1 slider burger patties. Used my silicone egg rings to make the eggs. They worked…ok. Not amazing, but good enough.
We got to bed late last night, and my plan was to take up with the Valkyrie’s alarm went off. She ended up not setting it, so we naturally got up at 0525. Chaos is, of course, the plan, and it worked out that my kiddo had a late start with school, so I did the usual breakfast routine and had a little extra time before I had to leave, so I squeezed in the hardest part of the workout, with a plan to follow up the rest when I get home from work.
Because of the tight timeline, rests were kept to a strict 1 minute, which made this fantastically ridiculous. I DID take video, which I’ll cluge together when I do the rest of the workout, but sets of 12 with the SSB with 1 minute rest is just never a good time, especially when it’s 20lbs heavier than the last time. My belt was wondrously tight from eating before training, but let’s also applaud my ability to eat over 1lb of meat and 8 eggs with butter and liver and then go smash a bunch of squats.
Knee is feeling good, given the circumstances. Wore the sleeve again at TSD and it’s a real gamechanger. On that note, final class of the week tonight. Still not very active, but getting some technique work in.
Woke up at 84.3kg. Been a consistent decline all week. Also got in a 1:20 deadhang off the fat gripz. Been seeing my trend on this ticking up.
Everything felt strong. I’m sure a combination of having that meal in me and 2 cups of coffee through the day helped, but was really driving hard on the press.
Felt my pecs in the incline, to include the buggy one, and got a real solid pump as well.
1 minute rest for first 3 press sets, then 2 minutes. 60-90-90 for DB bench. 1 minute for dips.
Breakfast was a repeat of yesterday. For dinner, we did a venison ring bologna as a family, but for my sides I did 3 whole eggs and 5 whites scrambled topped with Amish butter, 2 leftover sliders and the rest of the leftover kalua pork.
I am sore as hell. First week of specificity does that. Training motivation was low, as a result, but knowing this was going to be an easier workout and that getting it done bought me a ticket to my weekend got me through.
Chins felt great. No pec pain, major upper body pump. I really need to train them like this more often, vs just sneaking in volume through the workout.
Went with an extra set of rows because I used the wrong weight last session and this would have been a repeat otherwise.
Tang Soo Do had us doing a lot of breakfalls last night. Fairly active.
Weighed in at 84.4kg this morning. Doing a date night with the Valkyrie: got a 16oz ribeye in my future. Need to finish out this year eating big.
Breakfast was 3 1/3lb Costco grassfed beef patties, a Don Lee Farms chicken breast patty, 3 whole eggs, 5 whites and some liver.
Stock photo of the meal from the restaurant. 16oz ribeye, cooked rare, topped with compound butter and a loaded baked potato. Loaded with sour cream, bacon and butter. I asked for extra butter on the side and ate everything but the potato itself. Clutch.
Idk why I’m so excited to learn that you use this word lol.
Secondly, I noticed you mentioned specificity brings about that dreaded soreness, which I concur. I’m slowing putting in more conditioning that has me getting better at moving my own body weight around.
How long do you think yours is gonna last? I’m on day two. I know it’s probably gonna different for different people. Height, weight, age, all that.
