This is praise from Caesar; it genuinely means a lot to me. Thank you.
You’re 100% right. I need to do a better job digging into these than I do. Some are so popular that I’m always playing catch-up and missing half the context - like watching Marvel movies.
How was freaking shoulder day nearly as bad as leg day?? Lots of nauseating metabolite accumulation on this one.
HFS
I did this as a circuit today - not particularly sprinting between stations, maybe 30 - 45s between, so a couple minutes or so between sets of the same exercise. I much preferred this approach.
Foundation
Structural
This was rough! I wasn’t good at any of these.
So yesterday I went in and got on the bike to loosen my knee up - the frequent squatting has it relatively cranky. I did that for 20 minutes or so and was just not feeling it getting into my workout. I don’t really stress or force that issue anymore (that’s a lie, I often do, but not this time).
The gym was starting up their knockoff version of a CrossFit class while I was tooling around, so I just jumped into that. It was a lot of press and lunge type pairings where you’d get all your reps in and have whatever time was left on the clock to rest before the next round. It was ok. I was somewhat pleased that my conditioning was decent - not a limiting factor at all. I haven’t had a real plan around that, obviously, just doing something every day. More evidence that acting like a teenager tends to work.
Your body and I say, Thank You!! lol
Catching up yesterday’s!
We have our first club-level volleyball tournament this weekend, and it’s a ton. They played 4 full games yesterday; took the whole day.
I squeezed in a workout while she was warming up and getting the brief and all that before the first game. Different environment and all that, so I was off my game, so of course I did whatever I wanted. I saw CT changed his workout already, though, so it’s ok - it just makes me greater.
I did my jumps and all that, then I did chest and a little triceps.
DB Bench
3 or 4 warmups working up, then
80/8
90/8
95/9
100/8
Smith Incline
155/10 + 6
185/8 + 5
205/6 + 2
Dips BW+25/8 x 3
Cable Flyes
3 x 8
EZ Skullcrusher
Some warmups
70/8 x 3
Rope Pressdown
3 x 8 or so
I am feeling pretty good. Maybe it’s going to be a period of whatever I want right now. “Open world gaming” maybe if I were trying to somewhat fit @T3hPwnisher’s recent blog series. It, by the way, my friend, is fantastic. I have enjoyed it immensely. I think you should write whatever is exciting you at the moment, because it’s a great skill, but I would love to see you play out that analogy as far as you want even across periodization schemes and training.
I really appreciate that dude! Definitely gives me some inspiration to keep going. The metaphor just works too well! Haha.
Just dropping in to say happy birthday old geezer! I can say that since we’re basically the same age. Hope it’s a great one!
Thanks Dani! I think it’s my T-Nation “anniversary,” because my birthday is a few weeks out yet. Everything else was accurate - I’m old!
The girls played, I thought, really well at their volleyball tournament yesterday. Unfortunately, not as well as their opponents; they were bounced early and tears abounded - we’re still learning that we’re at a new level and winning is going to take more. After, we all went to an arcade and they ate a late lunch/ early dinner and played games so it was ok.
I had my first basketball game of the “season” last night. Some of my teammates were talking about their high school game the week before, so I am old enough to be their father. My conditioning has improved, so that wasn’t a factor at all - win. My defense was ok and I made some good passes, but I missed everything. At the end, we were up a ton, and they all made an effort to feed me the ball until I scored. Nice of them, but devastatingly embarrassing. I clearly need to put some work in there.
I will say: my knees feel pretty good today! The curcumin is doing its job!
Now my daughter is laying on me and watching WWE, which is her favorite thing lately. It’s kind of funny.
Oh I didn’t know that’s how that worked! Well, happy T Nation anniversary then! And congrats on the basketball game win AND having adorable kiddos.
It’ll be sweep if you can Throw Down a thunderous alley-oop next game.
It would be sweet if I could hit a layup without kids having to take pity on me!
Alright, gents, as expected: I did whatever today.
The part of the plan that has stayed the plan is the “explosiveness add-on;” I’m doing my jumps prior to all my lifts.
Then today was legs. I felt good enough to do it today, and this was as far from basketball on the other end as possible, so this worked.
I’m also thinking 4 weekly lift days is max for me right now (like basically everyone, go figure). It does leave room for a little more pick-up, which is both what I want to do and better for my chances of living to 50 anyway - so pros and cons.
No dog walks for the last couple days because it’s been so cold; that’s disappointing. I might have to buy her some little shoes if this stretch doesn’t break!
Jumps first
Seated Leg Curls
55/20
70/20
85/4
100/4
115/4
130/8 + 100/6 + 10 partials
SSB Squat
45/10
135/6
185/6
225/10
245/10
Leg Press
2pps/4
4pps/4
6pps/10 + 8 + 6
RDL
45/5
135/4
185/4
225/10
BSS
Different kind of drop set of death today. 3s eccentric on each rep, then the 8s hold as normal, but only two drops. My glutes were absolutely spasming - the eccentrics added a level of awful!
40/8 + 8s + 20/8 + 8s + BW/8 + 8s
Standing Calves
2 x 20
2 x 10 + 10 partials + 10s stretch
Tibia raises in between
The side quest continues! Chest and shoulders today
Slight Decline DB Bench
30/20
50/10
70/6
90/5
105/6
95/8 + 75/8-10 (don’t remember)
Slight Decline Smith
45/6
135/6
185/6
225/8
245/5
Cable Crossover
1 double rest pause set
Dips
3 x 8-10
Machine Rear Delt
3 x 20
DB Side Lateral Partial
30/20 x 3
DB Y Raise
10/15 x 2
Cable Crunches
4 sets
Kinda awesome and kinda boring all at the same time
how do you like these ? Back on the day I always used smith for inc bench but never decline.
It was ok. I don’t think I have a good enough feel for it to really say. I used to really like decline and felt like I got a lot out of it, so thought I’d try this. I think I like the hammer strength machine better though
How wide is your grip, I always preferred a wider grip on smith than normal bench
Hmm. I kept it pretty normal relative to my bench, so maybe it would feel better if I widened up a bit. Good call!
I loved the Smith slight decline Press a lot during High Evolutionary! Might’ve been my favorite pressing movement during the program. I felt like I could go so heavy on it and just explode the weight off my chest
You press everything heavy!
@davemccright really does press Fkn heavy and what scares me the most is he has years of this to go yet. Damn