Didn’t sleep well again, but I didn’t let it stop me this time
Warm Ups
5 min treadmill
Pull Apparts/Disconnects
Press
40X5
50X5
60X3
70X3
80X3
90X3
Depending on how the 5/3/1 set goes next week I may stay on this weight for my next cycle. I’m meeting the minimums, but my shoulders are a weak point and I think another cycle at this weight would be benificial.
Bench Press
105X10
105X10
105X10
105X10
105X10
Increase weight next set
Had a business trip early the week of the 19th and didn’t make the gym. Got home and went to the gym on Friday the 23rd, but it was lackluster and rushed.
Didn’t make Sunday BJJ. I volunteered Saturday and Sunday at a booth at a local Harry Potter fair that benefited an organization that recovers and rehabilitates trafficked women. Great cause. This was there first event like this and we raised ~$5000 over both days. This was a phenomenal achievement since the average price point for the items we were selling was ~$6.00. I was on my feet all day, both days. Saw some old friends and a couple of team mates from BJJ. All in all, it was a good time for a great organization.
Since Friday’s workout sucked and I was off a workout I decided to redo the press workout and get back on cycle. Nice to see the weights go up from last time. I know this program is working, but it was a good little reinforcement.
5 min treadmill
Pull Apparts/Disconnects
Press
40X5
50X5
60X3
70X3
80X3
90X4
Bench Press
110X10
110X10
110X10
110X7
110X6
Dumbbell Row
50X10
50X10
50X10
50X10
50X10
Increase weight next set
Our main Kids coach was out, so our head coach took over. reviewed the Upa and moved on to the first half of the knee-elbow escape, getting to half guard
Older Kids
Worked with one of our advanced kids helping him get ready for this Jr Grey belt test. He did pretty well. He’s got to work on his self defense techniques and cleaning up his movements, but not bad
Adults Advanced
Really small class. only 4 people. I worked with one of our female 4 stripe white belts to help her get ready for he blue belt test in November. She knows the material, but she’s really got to sharpen up her technique and not be so floppy. Rolled with coach and got some good pointers on escaping back control. We got in a bit of a punch choke showdown and I managed to get him to blink first. Didn’t help overall, but I did delay the inevitable a little bit longer.
Our main Kids coach was out again, so our head coach took over. built on the first half of the knee-elbow escape, getting to half guard that we covered on Tuesday and then completing the move with the “out the back door” back take. Pretty complicated for the age group, but they all did really well.
Older Kids
This was the last day of mount month, so we did a recap of the escapes and did a little positional sparing. I got paired up with the largest kid in class, and our other female blue belt assistant coach got paired up with a new kid who was at his second class. Coach’s instructions were “bottom guy escape, top guy don’t let him”. My kid didn’t get out, but after we finished up i looked over at the new kid and he looks totally exhausted, makes the sign of the cross and stumbles off mat. the Blue Belt looks at me, shrugs, and says “I was just doing what coach said” she did take it easy on the kid, he has a wild sense of humor and was playing it up. Really funny. I told the Blue Belt “You made that boy see Jesus”
Adults Class - All Levels
Good class. Had about 10 people on the mats, so not too small but it could have been larger. Wrapped up mount month with basically the same material. We had a new guy show up for his second trial class. i took him and worked basic bottom mount protection and posture. Also showed him the Upa. He signed his contract after class, which is awesome.
Rolled really well tonight. I felt good and worked on being more offensive and aggressive. worked on my standup and takedowns with a couple of partners. Finally hit a Tani Otoshi in sparing. My OP had a collar and sleeve grip, so I pinned the sleeve grip hand to his waist and then overwrapped the colar grip to get my own grip on the back of his jacket. As I moved to the side to set the tripping leg he switched his hips to go for an Ogoshi, which fell right into my plan. Rolled with our white belt wrestler and had issues, as usual. He’s so good at getting past my legs and into side control to high mount. I need to work with him more. I used to tap him on the regular, but he’s a VERY quick study and progressing very well. Hit a bread cutter choke and a pretty nice bow and arrow. Also gave up my back several times to work the escape that Coach showed me on Tuesday. Did pretty well, but I missed controlling the top leg a couple times, so one of our Blue Belts managed to advance into Mount. Just more to work on.
Had an early morning appointment today so time was limited. I got my main lift in and an accessory.
Warmups
5 min treadmill
Agile 8
Deadlift
80X5
100X5
120X3
160X3
170X3
180X6
SB Squat
100X10
100X10
100X10
100X10
100x10
Going up next cycle
Next week i start the 5/3/1/ rep set and the final two weeks of this cycle. So far, i’m really stoked with the results. I’m thinking the next one i do will be the Busy guy template from the Beyond article here with the dips and curls, then come back to this one after that. That will get me another ~12ish weeks of programming before i look to change things up again. I can see this template being an anchor program for me going forward.
It was just me and my main training partner for Sunday Coffee and Chokes. His therapist released him to roll after his leg break, so we caught a few rounds NoGi. We went 50/50 with him catching me in a weird ankle lock thingy and an americana, and i got him with an americana from side and a rear naked choke. Good rounds. Then we recorded the latest podcast (to go up Wednesday) and cleaned the gym.
Also worked my grippers. Hit 3 per side on the trainer. should be moving to the .5 soon!
Had a long night at the barn Monday, ate really late and went to sleep on a full stomach. Didn’t sleep for shit. Ended up sleeping thru my Tuesday gym slot. Also had to skip BJJ due to work over runs. Just a general shitty day.
Found a makeup slot for my workout yesterday… at 5am, but the rent had to be paid.
Had a great workout. Everything felt light and I got a wicked forarm pump of all things. Had a couple extra minutes, so i added some kettlebell wrist rollups.
also changed up the playlist today. I went with all Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge from My Chemical Romance (except The Ghost of You, that one just puts my dick in the dirt)
Bench
55X5
70X5
85X3
105X5
115X3
130X5
Press
55x10
55x10
55x10
55x10
55x10
Going up next cycle
Chins
2
1
1
1
1
Good reps on the first 3 sets. felt strong at the top, which is where i usually feel weak
Little Kids - Head coach and little kids coach were out today, so older kids coach and I backed them up. Started working punch block series with the littles. Got thru PB2 before their attention span ran out.
Big Kids - Started teaching sweeps. First we did the monkey flip/Balloon Sweep and then started the scissors Sweep. I’m always amazed that the Scissor is the first sweep (in general) that gets taught in BJJ. It’s a pretty technical sweep with a lot of moving parts. Once you get it the technique feeds a lot of other sweeps, but damn is it hard to learn at first
Adults - All Belt Levels - One of our purples taught today. We’re starting guard month, so he covered the basics of guard retention. This guy’s guard is ridiculous and his retention is so annoying, so the class was great. My retention is pretty good, but I learned a lot. Skipped rolling to work with one of the white belts on her blue belt test.
SLDLs
115x10
115x10
115x10
115x10
115x10
Going up next workout
Front Squat
105x10
150x10
105x10
105x9
105x6
Side Bends
20x12
20x12
20x12
20x12
20x12
Program called for hanging knee raises, but my abs were still torched from Rollouts on Wednesday and guard work last night, so I subed out Side Bends. I’ll get the HKRs next week.
Well, the lazies and excuses got me. Between work travel, the loss of a pet, and down right laziness I haven’t had a meaningful workout in two weeks besides BJJ. A couple of friends got me reset and I’m back on track.
Did a two mile ruck today. Tomorrow will be back to weights and BJJ.
BJJ has been good these past two weeks. Lots of concept stuff about guard, passing, maintaining, and breaking. Lots to think about and work on. I also got picked by one of our female whitebelt’s to be her Uki in her upcomming blue belt test.
Got to the gym and the door wouldn’t unlock. Tried a couple of times and rebooted the app to no avail. Texted teh owner and it looks like the internet was out in the building and the door couldn’t receive the unlock signal. I booked a makeup slot for tomorrow morning.
Good news is I’m getting closer on my CofC grippers to move on to the .5. I’m getting 5-6 good reps on the right side, and 3-4 good reps on the left. the 5th rep on the left is a little spotty, but i should be moving up to the .5 in another week or so.
On the road for work. My hotel had a pretty legit gym. Dumbbells that went up to 70lbs, Kettlebells up to 30, and a Procore FTS Glide double cable tower. I had to get a little creative, but I good approximate workout in.
Treadmill 5 min
Pull aparts and disconnects
Press - So the Precore Glide had a bar attachment that could be connected to both pulleys, so i used that and split the total load between the two towers. THis worked pretty well. i had to do rounded numbers, so i defaulted to the higher value
40X5
50X5
60X3
80X5
90X3
100X8
Bench Press - had to substitute Dumbbell press
45X10
45X10
45X10
45X6
45X6
The Hotel workout was technically the last workout in this cycle. I had considered repeating that workout once I got home, but running the updated numbers my press weights aren’t going to change till the NEXT cycle, so I’m going to move onto the next 6 week cycle. Here are my goods and bads from this cycle
Goods
1.) I made it thru the entire cycle. This is a good thing in my mind. I worked thru some issues and setbacks, and I kept showing up
2.) I can tell I’m getting stronger. The gains from this cycle are probably just resurrection of lost strength but I am happy with my progress
3.) This cycle is much easier on my joints, especially my shoulders. This could be due to a focus on form, but i don’t feel like i’m bombing out my joints
4.) I had a great time. I found this workout to be very enjoyable, even when it got hard
Bads
1.) it took a LOT longer than 6 weeks to finish this cycle. some of it was exigent (getting the C again, tweaking my back, some buisness travel) but some of it was just me being lazy and unfocused.
so, more goods than bads.
I’m going to restart with the busy guy program from the Reloaded article, which includes dips and curls (LOL), starting Monday. After that i’ll probably come back to this template. After that, I’m going to see if i can go to a 3 a week standard 5/3/1.
my Focus for this next cycle will be to keep working the program and do better on my consistency. I want to get thru the whole cycle in 6 weeks, as prescribed.
After my last November post I had a lot of stuff go on. I traveled for work most of December and January, so i wasn’t home for either BJJ or to train 5/3/1. In Jan my wife got caught in a downsize, so i ended up canceling my weight training gym membership to save funds. During that time i switched to the full body dumbell workouts that Cotes posted a while ago because I could do them at home with what I had.
Then in March things started to come back together, work let up a little and i started going back to BJJ. One night i felt a little full of myself and I tried to throw a guy who weighs ~270 and dropped him right on my knee, blowing out my ACL. Had surgery in July, finishing up rehab now, and waiting till March/April before i get back to the mats.
I started the Cotes workouts again now that my new knee is getting stronger. It’s not 5/3/1 so i haven’t been posting here. But they are going pretty well.
Looking to add a half rack to the garage so i can get back to 5/3/1.
I’m going to close this thread after about a week. Thanks to everyone who engaged. I’ll start another log once i get back to full action.
