Sol's Training Log - Getting back up!

Training
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So after having a pretty bad year of training, I’m re-focusing, not letting myself get down and finding my motivation again.

I competed in a meet in March, weighing 175lb with:
Squat - 200
Bench - 115
Deadlift - 240

Since then I’ve lost about 20 pounds, and am trying to get down another 10 or so. I’ll put a link to a post I made with some before and afters at the bottom of this post.

Presently my training consists of 2 Max Effort days / week (Upper & Lower), and 2 Volume days (same). I’m trying to will myself into doing a little more light cardio (just walking), which shouldn’t be hard since I work at a gym, but I’ve been too lazy. Time to get on it.

I’ve deadlifted with a sumo stance since I started lifting, but recently it’s been really disappointing - as in I couldn’t lift 215 a couple weeks ago. On a whim one day I tried conventional and got myself up to 225! My upper back rounded quite a bit, I think, so I got nervous and didn’t go up anymore even though I felt like I could. So I’ll be sticking with conventional for now, which I’ve never done more than a handful of times before! The other day I squatted 205 at a questionable depth, but I’ll take it. My bench isn’t doing too hot, I did 125lb x 2 a few months ago, and yesterday couldn’t even get it for 1. But keeping at it!

Today’s Training:

Volume Lower

  1. Speed Squat: 8x2x105
  2. Deadlift: 5x5x185
    3a) Front Squat: 4x8x75lb
    3b) KB Swing: 4x15x44lb
    4a) High Bar Prowler Push: 250lb x 40ft x 2
    4b) Farmer’s Walk: 50lb x 80ft x 4

My success with the conventional deadlift and the new squat PR have me motivated and excited - trying to keep the momentum up! I’m always open to advice and criticism on programming.

Link to before & afters: Making Sense of Modern Fitness: Fat Loss, Minus the Cardio: Month 6 - Far from the end

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IN!

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Congrats on the weight loss! Don’t get too bummed out if your numbers go down a bit. You have to remember that, to a certain extent, mass moves mass. You just lost 20 pounds in less than a year. You’ll get the strength back.

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Cool! I was actually going to say the exact same thing that was just said above ^

You have actually done very well keeping your strength levels that close to your old maxes at 20 pounds lighter! But yea, normally people can only do one at a time. Get your weight someplace where you’re happy with it, and then see how strong you can get!

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[quote]TheTexican wrote:
IN![/quote]

You have no idea how much I love that picture!

[quote]
Congrats on the weight loss! Don’t get too bummed out if your numbers go down a bit. You have to remember that, to a certain extent, mass moves mass. You just lost 20 pounds in less than a year. You’ll get the strength back. [/quote]

Thank you! I’m hoping that this is the case - I have female clients (I’m a personal trainer) who are stronger than me, I need to catch up with them!

[quote] Cool! I was actually going to say the exact same thing that was just said above ^

You have actually done very well keeping your strength levels that close to your old maxes at 20 pounds lighter! But yea, normally people can only do one at a time. Get your weight someplace where you’re happy with it, and then see how strong you can get! [/quote]

That’s what I keep trying to tell myself, to not worry so much about the numbers until I’m done losing weight. On the plus side, I have been able to do a bodyweight chin-up for the first time EVER since losing the weight, so that was a pretty awesome moment.

My lower back is SO SORE from those deadlifts yesterday. I knew that conventional style was more back-intense than sumo, but dang. It’s a good sore though! Taking a rest day today, Volume Upper on Sunday.

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Glad to see you logging again. Now kick some ass! :slight_smile:

Congrats on the chinup, btw!

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Great transformation.

I remember you from some previous posts.

Good to have you here.

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Glad to have you here!
Cheers

_Mel

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Thank you for all of the welcomes! I forgot how great of a community PW is.

Sunday did some upper body volume -

  1. Bench Press: 3 x 10 x 95lb (felt like I could have gone for 11 or 12! Next time maybe.)
    2a) Bent-Over DB Row: 4 x 10 x 40lb
    2b) Push-Up: 4 x 5
  2. Overhead Press: 3 x 5 x 55lb
  3. Farmer’s Walk: 8 x ~55-60lb x ~100ft

Push-Ups and overhead press are definitely weak for me. Push ups have been getting a lot easier, especially since I try to do them randomly throughout the day. Never been great at overhead press though - my intention was to do 8 reps at 55 but that was unfortunately too tough. I know that converting reps at a certain weight to a 1RM isn’t accurate, but I just feel like if I can do 3x10x95 on bench, I should be able to do 1x135!

Today was Lower body strength -

  1. Rack Pull: 45x5, 95x5, 135x5, 155x5, 185x3, 205x2, 225x2
  2. Good Morning: 3x8x95lb
    3a) 1-Leg Kettlebell Deadlift: 3 x 8 x 72lb (this was HARD!)
    3b) Hanging Leg Raise: 3 x 8

I tried for 240lb on the Rack pull but couldn’t get it off the pins. I also noticed that my grip felt like a big limiting factor on these, even though when I pull from the ground it’s not? Not sure why that would be. If I could use chalk where I work it would help. The good mornings felt awesome though.

Short day today, but I have 8 hours of training clients tomorrow in a row, and 3 more later in the day. Yikes!

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Upper body Max today:

  1. Fat Grip Bench: 45x5, 65x5, 75x5, 95x5, 105x3,
    2x5x95
  2. Chin-Up: 3 x 1
  3. Incline DB Bench: 3 x 8 x 30lb
    4a) Face Pull: 3 x 12 x 65
    4b) TRX Bicep Curl: 3 x 8
  4. Ball Slam: 3 x 10 x 30lb , 1 x 4 x 30lb

With the Ball slam, I wanted to do 5 x 10, but I busted the ball on my 4th set. Whoops!

The Fat Grips on the bench press were almost so fat I couldn’t grip it at all! A lot harder than I thought. Maybe I just have small hands…?! The Chin Ups felt great though! First time doing 3 sets.

My hamstrings are so sore from the other day, I can’t straighten my leg out or sit down properly! Maybe I’ll goad the boyfriend into a massage.

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Lower Body volume today -

  1. Speed Deadlift: 10 x 2 x 135
  2. Narrow-stance ATG high bar Squat: 3 x 10 x 95lb
    3a) Goblet Squat: 4 x 10 x 60lb
    3b) KB Swing: 4 x 15 x 44lb
    4a) TRX Ab Rollout: 5 x 10
    4b) TRX 1-Leg Squat: 5 x 8 each side

I was very dead after the goblet squats, 1-leg squats were killer! Hamstrings held up though. Need more ankle flexibility for the narrow-stance squats though.

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This is great stuff! I have a question for you… So I’m about 175lb currently and 5’8", new to lifting relatively. Just started back in January and my lifts are almost the exact same as your’s from March as you said? How did you lose 20lbs? I’ve tried all kind of carb cycling and other attempts but I’m still sitting at 175. I’m getting stronger but not really losing the fat I want. What did you do?

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So every October at work we do a challenge for our clients called the Decathlon where basically they enter this contest and compete against each other in 10 different events - a 1500m Row, Wall Sit, Prowler Push, Farmer Walk, etc etc. This year they’re making the trainers compete in some of the events as well, so Friday I got some scores for a few events:

  1. Slosh Pipe Hold - 3:30 (basically a ~30lb PVC pipe with water in it that we have to balance above our heads. Was harder than I thought it’d be.)

  2. Farmer’s Walk - 10 x ~70ft lengths w/ 40lb db’s. Disappointed in this one, but perhaps for an optimal score I shouldn’t do it right after the slosh pipe.

  3. Prowler Push (High Bar) - (each of these weights 1 x 40ft) 400lb, 450, 505, 560, 600

The 600 took me a while and tore up the tread on my shoes, but it was pretty fun! Going to try and beat one of the male trainer’s scores (635) sometime this week maybe…

Sunday (10/14) - Upper Body Volume

  1. Bench Press: 3 x 10 x 95
    2a) Dips: 5 x 5
    2b) Inverted TRX Row: 5x10
  2. OHP: 4x8x45lb
  3. Face Pull: 4 x 12 x 80lb

The bench press was really really hard, but I guess there are always good and bad days! My OHP really really needs some dedicated work.

Monday (10/15) - Lower Body ME

  1. Deficit Sumo Pulls: 135x5, 155x3, 185x2, 205x1
  2. 1-L Deadlift: 3 x 8 x 72lb
    3a) Hyperextension: 3 x 8 x 35lb
    3b) Laying Leg Raise: 3 x 10

Wanted to do deficit conventional pulls, but my back was really hurting. Stupid old back injuries. The 205 was tough - almost didn’t make it. I was at my sticking point for like 5 seconds.

[quote]CamBam wrote:
This is great stuff! I have a question for you… So I’m about 175lb currently and 5’8", new to lifting relatively. Just started back in January and my lifts are almost the exact same as your’s from March as you said? How did you lose 20lbs? I’ve tried all kind of carb cycling and other attempts but I’m still sitting at 175. I’m getting stronger but not really losing the fat I want. What did you do? [/quote]

I’m 5’6.5, so I am a little shorter than you, however not by too much.

The thing that really had to happen for me was really boiling down to counting my calories. On days I don’t work out I usually go for ~1200-1400 depending, and on workout days 1500-1700. I’m kind of maintaining atm since there are so many events going on this time of year, but when I was losing weight that was what really did it for me. I always saw the best results when I was very strict and did NO SNACKING - my worst enemy to my diet was grazing on nuts and chocolate while I was cooking food for dinner haha.

As well, intermittent fasting really helped me to still feel full even while dieting, and also to eat some straight up crap every once in a while.

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10/18

  1. Overhead Press: 45 x 5, 55x5, 65x2, 70x1 - fail , 2 x 3 x 60
  2. Floor Press: 3 x 5 x 90
  3. DB Incline Press: 3 x 8 x 30lb
    4a) Face Pull: 3 x 12 x 65
    4b) TRX Bicep Curl
  4. Rower: 10 resistance, 5 intervals of 30s : 1 min rest

My OHP seriously needs workkkkk

10/20

  1. Speed Deadlift: 10 x 2 x 135
  2. Narrow-Stance ATG Squat: 3 x 10 x 100lb
    3a) Good Morning: 4 x 10 x 85
    3b) KB Swing: 4 x 20 x 44
    4a) Front Squat hold (15 seconds): 5 x 135
    4b) Lunges: 5 x 10 reps each side x 20lb

That front squat hold felt so heavy, I guess I really need to work those too, it was only 135, I couldn’t even fathom trying to ACTUALLY squat that!

10/23

  1. Conventional Deadlift: 135 x 5, 165x3, 185x1, 205x1, 215x1, 235x1, 245 x 1 - fail
  2. Good Morning: 3 x 5 x 105
    3a) 1-Leg DL: 3 x 8 x 72
    3b) Hanging Leg Raise: 3 x 10
    4a) Physioball 1-Leg HS Curl: 3 x 8 each leg
    4b) Plank: 3 x 45s

I was SO happy about the 235, it’s the first time I’ve done it since my meet in March and the most I’ve ever lifted at my new weight. I was so pumped, it went up really fast so I was CERTAIN I was going to get a new PR with 245. So I was really dismayed when I failed on it - I gave it 2 attempts. The first one I just set up poorly, second try I couldn’t even get it off the floor. I was pretty sad about that. Trying to focus on making the 235 though. Maybe I should have just tried 240.

Also at one point in between all those workouts, I tried to push a prowler with 650 lbs on it for 40 feet - I was 2 steps away from making it when the sole of my shoes rubbed off and I slipped. I finished the push after, but I think I hyperextended my left elbow, as it hurts quite a bit when I press or when I try to push the prowler again. Boo.