Rebirth of the Juggernaut: Brute Force and Ignorance (Part 1)

Training Training Logs
4229

PM WORKOUT

Buffalo Bar Squats
5xBar
5x140
3x230
1x320
1x370

REST PAUSE (12 deep breaths between sets)
7x410
4x410
2x410
1x410
9x320
5x320
3x320
2x320
1x320

SUPERSETS (shrug-hyper)

Deadlift Stance Barbell shrugs
12x405
10x475
6x525
6x525

Reverse hyper 360
4x15

Notes: 2:00 between giant sets. The instant I got under the bar for the topset of squats, I had the thought of “why do I ever stop doing this?” This protocol ALWAYS works for me. Most likely I stop doing it because it sucks, but it always works, and it works FAST. It was weird, as my traps and upper back were absolutely killing me from the 55 reper I did on the trap bar, but my legs were still fresh, so it’d take all my energy to unrack the bar and then I’d just shoot like a rocket out of the bottom of the lift.

I know Denver squats are when they’re mile high, so I’m gonna call these Detroit squats, because they were dirty, rock-bottom, and there was no bail out.

I still wanna make this a 2 a day to get some more work in, but today was a decent proof of concept. Shrugs are a great humbler to me, because I may be able to rep 600 on deads, but you put me in a partial pull like that and I’m a complete wimp. I’d start the sets off strict and switch to power shrugs once I ran out of reps, and the last 2 sets were ugly. I also bent the holy hell out of my cheap barbell, so now I have TWO cambered bars, but this one is gonna stay exclusively a shrug bar. I might switch to an axle in the future to keep this from happening.

Significantly dropped the weight on the hypers because my back was blown up from squats. That said, my recovery is absolutely on point, as that squat workout used to floor me for about a half hour, and now I just loaded up all my weights for everything else and then laid on my back for 4 minutes with my legs up.

I’m feeling like I fixed my squat programming issue for now. I think, fundamentally, I didn’t like having a program where I wasn’t able to unplug if I needed to. The ramping giant sets were effective, they worked, but I was basically locked in to that workout once it started. If I got interrupted in the middle of it and had to stop, it was basically wasted time, as I hadn’t built up to my top weight. With this program broken into parts, I can divide it as needed.

6 Likes
4230

killing it as always mate. Good way to kick off 2020.

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4231

Thanks dude, although that was technically on 31 Dec, haha.

4232

ha ha yer but for me it would have been Jan 1 !!

1 Like
4233

Reading your log is often nauseating…good work.

4234

@jpmason1985 Hopefully like this

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image604×659 117 KB

Haha

AM WORKOUT

Swiss bar incline bench 260
1x10
1x9
1x7

Axle bench press 281
1x10
1x6
1x5

Axle close grip bench 241
1x10
1x8
1x7

Dips
1x31
2x23

Standing ab wheel between sets of benching
5x8, 3x7

Notes: 2:05 between benching, 2:00 between dips. Hardest part about this workout was putting on my elbow sleeves: my elbows were screaming. Most likely a result of training 4 days in a row. Otherwise, happy with how much my strength held on with the shorter rest periods. Next week I can really let it out.

Swiss bar felt better than last week. Think I had the set-up better configured. I was dying by the time I got to the flat bench though. Happy to have held on.

3 Likes
4235

Hey @T3hPwnisher I am about to hop on monolith tomorrow or Monday. Would you care to share your results, experience,tips, etc.

4236

@T3hPwnisher appreciate your latest post.

4237

@tlgains If you google “mythical strength building the monolith” you will find a full write-up. I gained 4.6lbs in 6 weeks from what I recall.

@dagill2 Thanks man. It’d definitely be a fun subject to continue to explore, although I lack the real scientific background to do it. And I don’t care enough, haha.

YESTERDAY’S TRAINING

PM WORKOUT

Keg clean
3x150
2x175
1x185
1x200
1x225
0x235
0x225

Notes: Was feeling pretty fatigued coming in to this. Been working early shifts this week, and this was a late PM workout. The first 225 flew straight up with zero struggle: technique was dialed in well. Went to grab 235 and it rolled away from me on the pick up. Somehow, that 10lb difference was massive. The 225 afterwards was just a technique issue, and at that point I figured it wasn’t worth trying more.

Once again: happy to have problems, because now I can work on solutions. I got 3 months to add 25lbs to my keg clean. One of the big things I need to do is get my body used to handling the weight. 225 feels absolutely fine, 235 feels insurmountable in my hands. My strategy is to do keg carries with at least 250lbs so that my body gets conditioned to feeling that weight in my hands, making it feel less alien when I approach it for the press. I’m also considering doing some daily cleans to keep technique sharp, and possibly bringing back the 10 minute EMOM keg clean strategy I’ve used in the past.

Also, bodyweight gain needs to continue. Right now, I’m trying to move weight that is more than me, and my body feels the difference in the attempt. If I bridge the gap, it will seem less significant. Surpassing the gap would be dandy, but that ain’t happening.

Plan for that is even greater carbs pre/post training. I’m staying lean enough with this strategy. My post training meals are getting epic, but I’m also not struggling to consume them. I may look into weight gainer, but right now I’m still finding conventional avenues.

2 Likes
4238

Do you have multiple kegs or one of these ingenious loadable kegs?

4239

Finding a scientific reason for a problem you’ve already solved seems kinda pointless.

4240

The protocol is working up to a top set of about your 7-8RM, rest pausing til you get a single, and then repeat that at ~80% of your top set? Did I extrapolate that right?

1 Like
4241

Not trying to be dick or anything, but it’s not really pointless. You could find the reason why it works, then work on improving the solution based on what you learn as to why it works. It may already be solved, but maybe we can solve it better next time

2 Likes
4242

In general I agree and I’ll concede your point. In this context though, once you find a way of eating that achieves your goals, why confuse things by figuring out why?

3 Likes
4243

Ah crap, thought you were referring to something else. My bad!

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4244

@Koestrizer Got the loadable keg from Mike Bartos. It’s a great space saver for a home gym. My only real gripe is that the loading pin is noticeably tilted on it, and it makes set up a bit of a pain because the locking mechanism has to be settled in JUST right. Can’t quite do the quick changes I’d like to do. I’m also worried that one day it will bend too far, but I’ll cross that bridge when I get there. For the time being, it’s been great to have.

@Voxel Pretty close. The topset will be about 1 rep shy of failure, as I’ve found going to real failure on it prevents me from getting any more reps on the workout. Then, each following set will be half (rounded up) of the previous set, until I eventually get to 1. I refer to this protocol as “Xeno Squats” based of Xeno of Elas’ argument against motion where he postulated that, for an arrow to reach it’s end point from it’s origin, it would first have to travel half the distance between them, and to do that it would first have to travel half the distance between those two points, etc etc. Just a little cheeky philosophy humor.

Once I get to 1 rep with the weight from the topset, I strip off 90lbs and then try to hit 2 reps HIGHER than what I did on the initial set of the whole thing. You’ll note how it was 7 with 410 and then 9 with 320. Then it’s more rest pausing and half as many reps until I get to 1.

Depending on how I’m feeling after that’s all done, I’ll either terminate from there or strip off 90lbs and go for an AMRAP finisher.

Then, the next week, I aim to push the top set by just 1 rep. Because everything is based off that topset, it has a cascading effect on the rest of the workout.

Typically, once I get to about 8 to 10 reps on the topset weight, I’ll start matching reps with the 90lb back off set rather than shooting for 2 more, so if I got 10 at 410, I’ll start with 10 at 320. Just found that more sustainable.

And with the whole program, I like to use Dan John’s “plates and quarters” approach, where I only use 45s and 25s. I find the time to make the jump to the next weight is when I can get the topset to around 12-14 reps at the start. It tends to become a monstrous workout at that point, and then I start looking forward to the low reps with high weight, haha.

@whang and @dagill2 Great discussion dudes. It’s honestly a fair point on both sides. There’s times when “don’t fix what ain’t broke” is the right way forward, and there’s times where “it could be better” is right. The biggest issue I observe is the misapplication of those two concepts, and, perhaps with bias, I tend to observe the latter as being more frequently committed than the former. I postulate it’s due to the fact that, even at our best, the results of training take time to observe, and no one likes that, haha.

3 Likes
4245

Potentially we are better at measuring end results than the progress towards them.

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4246

So, here’s the problem for weaker people like myself. I’d be down to about one plate per side after the first round and that could result in me being able to do way too many reps. I guess for those of us with less than three plates on the bar could/should just strip off 25s before doing round two.

4247

The drop sets I used before christmas for press did exactly this. I loaded the bar up with 4 x 5kg plates per side deliberately so i could strip them off one at a time I also deliberately used the crap rack with the weight plate holders on the inside so I could make the change quicker. I’m sure i looked like a bellend, but it worked.

1 Like
4248

Yup. Exactly what I would suggest, and I have done before. The 90lbs is more a necessity thing as the weight climbs.

2 Likes