Synergy93 - Fill Us In

[John_Schlecht]

[quote]synergy93 wrote:
Thought I’d throw up a vid of how I’ve been doing one of the heavier curl movements, in my routine lately…

Rest/Pause Seated DB hammer curls
90 lb DB’s

I prefer the seated version, to minimize body help

[quote]synergy93 wrote:
Thanks guy for all the sincere appreciation and kind words. I truly enjoy sharing my experiences, because I love to “talk training” and hope that others can learn a bit from me in the process.

I won’t lie, I’m tired as hell right now, but here’s what I assaulted myself with today…

Today’s focus:

Primary = Upper Body Power Complex…emphasizing, you guessed it…density
Secondary = Isolation work for chest and shoulders-post AM workout

AM Workout
Technique: Press complex
Rest…seemed like absolutely none…as little as possible…my work capacity is about as high as it’s been right now, so I’m able to keep up a torrent pace
Reps: 3-5 on strength movements…as many explosive reps (was usually around 10 or so) on explosive push ups and heavy medicine ball chest passes
Sets: As many as I could tolerate
**got through 7 rounds of this today…6 last week in the same amount of time (45 minutes)…only 5 the week before in 60 minutes…so huge improvement there
Load: Moderate…not going to give poundages…added weight when I could

A1 Top 1/2 press from pins
A2 Decline BB press
A3 Military Press…no leg drive
A4 Plyometric pushups…set up two benches parallel to each other, and then elevated feet on a box
A5 Explosive Med Ball chest pass into wall…made sure to reset between each rep, so I could literally throw with 100% effort

Made it through 7 times in a little less than 45 minutes, as mentioned above

Chest Isolation circuit
Rounds: made it through 3, before I fell out of the zone and ran out of gas
Rest between movements: minimal
Reps: aimed for about 10 reps on first movement, max reps after that. I tried my hardest to not even count reps, but very old habits die hard

B1 DB floor fly plus rotation at top
B2 Decline Bench Cable flies
B3 bench power flies (arms bent at a 90 degree angle, and stopped upward movement about 3/4 of the way up, as tension lessened)

Shoulder Isolation Circuit
Rounds: only got through 2…wiped
Rest: minimal
Reps: Aimed for 6-8 on first movement, max reps per movement after that

C1 Seated Deadstart lateral raises
C2 Standing lateral raises
Rest about 15 seconds
C3 Seated Deadstart DB front raises
C4 Standing front raises
C5 TRX rear delt external rotations

PM workout
Focus: Upper Body eccentric-less sled work
Distance: 50 meters total (25 each way)
Technique: Antogonist muscle pairings
**did a press muscle movement the first 25 meters, then did a pull muscle movement on the way back for 25 meters
**I worked back last night, so I wanted to help speed recovery a bit, since I plan on hitting it again on Sunday…plus, my back muscles were “tight” so the I could really zero in on the pulling muscles on the sled

Time: As long as I could tolerate tonight, which ended up being 70 straight minutes of sled work…I hardly rested…another advantage of pairing up opposite muscle groups…no as much accumulated fatigue in the target muscle group
This ended up being (6) 25 meter trips for each muscle group…or 24 total sets of 50 meters…a lot
**I should note that I implemented a huge peri-workout nutrition intake this morning, as the complexes are tiring as hell…it was 2 FINiBARs, 2 scoops Surge Workout Fuel, 2 scoops ANACONDA and 2 scoops MAG-10
For the evening sled work…I used: 1 scoop ANACONDA, 1 scoop MAG-10 and 1 scoop Power Drive

S1 Shoulder Front Raise
S2 High pull

S3 Chest Flies
S4 Rear Flies

S5 tricep extensions…performed these like a DB kick back with a palms up (pronated) grip…the contraction of the tricep was super intense…however, you cover about 2 feet of floor space with every rep, so it takes forever to cover 25 meters and my tricpes were screaming…had to stop a couple times due to this, and rest a few seconds before continuing on…love it, will be doing it again!
S6 Bicep curls

S7 Chest Press
S8 Rows

Like I said, the above took 70 minutes…this mornings total workout time was about 90 minutes with set up, mobility and activation work, etc

All in all, I logged about 2 hours and 40 minutes of total workout time today.

As I also mentioned in the past, this is my strategy for the last 8 weeks or so…multiple workouts per day, splitting up the time

In fact, I may go to 3 workouts per day for a couple weeks at around the 6 week mark, if I feel I need it.

This is by far a better strategy, then cutting calories again, and doing boring ass, traditional cardio…I only do that 1 mile run test on the treadmill once per week, other than that it’s all weights and sled work

Nutrition is about the same as it’s been the last 5 days…not much food
Also, no cheat meals from this point on, which is 58 days! I’m already obsessing over food…not cool, but part of the deal, happens every time. I’ll adjust my intake as needed, but I don’t anticipate getting much lower than I currently am, if anything I’d increase intake, if it’s needed

That’s it…now my brain is out of gas, like my body
Just kidding…I’m not that worked over…just being dramatic!
[/quote]
[/quote]

[BiP]

Thanks for the video Synergy. I’ll give that a try next week and see how it feels.

Do you usually do this as a finisher (since it’s rest/pause so you can really push your limits) or in the middle of the workout (leaving a bit in the tank for later exercises)?

B.

[John_Schlecht]

I almost always do the heaviest movement first…to attack the heavy weights when fresh, and to activate the neural drive for that particular movement pattern (elbow flexion).

I find that this allows me to capitalize on bicep activation on the later exercises, which are more fatigue/higher rep/super set focused.

I try not to “leave anything in the tank” for any exercise, as I feel it limits your moment to moment experience. I let auto regulation take care of all that.

No reason to limit yourself on a set, just to have a little extra later. Besides, that “little extra” may not even be there when you expect it to OR you may have more than expected.

Each moment of a workout is more of an internal experience, than one you can put on a piece of paper or try to predict…set to set.

If you have your workout guidelines, load selection, exercise selection, etc properly planned, there should be no reason to assume or save anything.

It can be difficult not to quantify things…I’m going to do 4 sets of these or I’m going to do 8 reps this set. It’s a habit we’ve all learned when first starting out our training.

Once you can learn to effectively listen to your body, not get to ahead of yourself and take each workout, moment to moment, you’ll almost always hit that sweet spot of not doing too much or doing too little.

I will say that MAXIMUM EFFORT in all phases of a workout is necessary for this to work. Otherwise, you will be limiting yourself (or going too hard), without even knowing it.

I like to call it “Patient Violence.” Be patient with your approach, but violent as hell, set to set

**I think on this particular day when I shot this video, I only did one set of these, because I could tell that I just didn’t have the big weights in me that day, so I stopped after one such set. I’ve done up to 3-4 of those sets on other days, when it felt good. Usually, if the heavier movements don’t feel good, I’ll do more of the other bicep work I had planned, which is less taxing, in terms of intensity

[quote]BiP wrote:
Thanks for the video Synergy. I’ll give that a try next week and see how it feels.

Do you usually do this as a finisher (since it’s rest/pause so you can really push your limits) or in the middle of the workout (leaving a bit in the tank for later exercises)?

B.[/quote]

[BiP]

I know what you mean about starting with the heavy stuff and autoregulation. I’ve been autoregulating more and more recently and my progress seems to be accelerating! I’ve completely stopped counting sets and I adjust load reps on a set-to-set basis.

My “heavy workouts” (upper press/pull and lower) have (for the most part) the same general structure every time (order and selection of main exercises, some idea about assistance work) but whether I will do just a couple of sets of 5 or keep ramping all the way until heavy singles depends entirely on how I’m feeling from set to set.

My lats and biceps work is even less structured. Well, I do pretty much the same stuff for lats every week, plus or minus an exercise, but, again, I have only have a very rough idea how many sets I’ve done. I do as many as I feel I can and need on the particular day.

As for biceps - I almost always start with a “main” exercise (often chosen on the spot) and then keep working until I’ve done “enough”. One day I might follow the first exercise by a heavy circuit, then another “regular” exercise and finally a drop set, another I might just do two exercises on top of it. Earlier today I’ve tried two exercises I’ve never done before, one of which I thought of five seconds before starting it.

The best thing is, not only is my progress better, I also feel much better throughout the day. Last thursday I woke up feeling great and ended up doing two workouts, probably just short of 3 hours in total. Not only did I perform better during the second one, when I came back home I was feeling extremely energetic and focused.

Ok, time to stop hijacking your thread. Keep up the good work!

B.

[ryanbCXG]

I have a question for synergy and any one else who autoregulates.

How long did it take you to develop this? Did you slowly work into it? Like start autoregulating one exercise then 2 and finally working up to autoregulating whole workouts or did you just jump right in and autoregulate everything. Thank you for your help.

[coolusername]

Synergy, man, your hamstrings give a whole new meaning to ‘the biceps of the legs’. literally looks like an upside down arm when you’re sitting down haha.

i have a question for you… I just tried BB hang snatches for the first time yesterday at the start of my deadlift focused day. today i’m feeling a tightness (good kind) in my side delts. The wierd thing is that i have never been able to do this with any side lateral raise or upright row. I think it may be because my form was obviously less than perfect being my first time doing the exercise i was likely ‘muscling’ it up more than i should. Anyways i just wanted to hear your thoughts on using that exercise as a means for delt growth or do you see it mostly as a hip exercise/activation tool? i figure since it’s easier in terms of eccentric stress i could probably perform it more often. maybe as an activation exercise at the start of my leg and upper pressing days. Just not sure if the volume would be sufficient for growth. anyways i guess i’m just spilling my thoughts and keep the vids coming syn!

[therajraj]

I really liked the video… descriptions are great and all but I think a lot gets lost.

[kingbeef323]

[quote]synergy93 wrote:

[quote]synergy93 wrote:
Thought I’d throw up a vid of how I’ve been doing one of the heavier curl movements, in my routine lately…

Rest/Pause Seated DB hammer curls
90 lb DB’s

I prefer the seated version, to minimize body help

[quote]synergy93 wrote:
Thanks guy for all the sincere appreciation and kind words. I truly enjoy sharing my experiences, because I love to “talk training” and hope that others can learn a bit from me in the process.

I won’t lie, I’m tired as hell right now, but here’s what I assaulted myself with today…

Today’s focus:

Primary = Upper Body Power Complex…emphasizing, you guessed it…density
Secondary = Isolation work for chest and shoulders-post AM workout

AM Workout
Technique: Press complex
Rest…seemed like absolutely none…as little as possible…my work capacity is about as high as it’s been right now, so I’m able to keep up a torrent pace
Reps: 3-5 on strength movements…as many explosive reps (was usually around 10 or so) on explosive push ups and heavy medicine ball chest passes
Sets: As many as I could tolerate
**got through 7 rounds of this today…6 last week in the same amount of time (45 minutes)…only 5 the week before in 60 minutes…so huge improvement there
Load: Moderate…not going to give poundages…added weight when I could

A1 Top 1/2 press from pins
A2 Decline BB press
A3 Military Press…no leg drive
A4 Plyometric pushups…set up two benches parallel to each other, and then elevated feet on a box
A5 Explosive Med Ball chest pass into wall…made sure to reset between each rep, so I could literally throw with 100% effort

Made it through 7 times in a little less than 45 minutes, as mentioned above

Chest Isolation circuit
Rounds: made it through 3, before I fell out of the zone and ran out of gas
Rest between movements: minimal
Reps: aimed for about 10 reps on first movement, max reps after that. I tried my hardest to not even count reps, but very old habits die hard

B1 DB floor fly plus rotation at top
B2 Decline Bench Cable flies
B3 bench power flies (arms bent at a 90 degree angle, and stopped upward movement about 3/4 of the way up, as tension lessened)

Shoulder Isolation Circuit
Rounds: only got through 2…wiped
Rest: minimal
Reps: Aimed for 6-8 on first movement, max reps per movement after that

C1 Seated Deadstart lateral raises
C2 Standing lateral raises
Rest about 15 seconds
C3 Seated Deadstart DB front raises
C4 Standing front raises
C5 TRX rear delt external rotations

PM workout
Focus: Upper Body eccentric-less sled work
Distance: 50 meters total (25 each way)
Technique: Antogonist muscle pairings
**did a press muscle movement the first 25 meters, then did a pull muscle movement on the way back for 25 meters
**I worked back last night, so I wanted to help speed recovery a bit, since I plan on hitting it again on Sunday…plus, my back muscles were “tight” so the I could really zero in on the pulling muscles on the sled

Time: As long as I could tolerate tonight, which ended up being 70 straight minutes of sled work…I hardly rested…another advantage of pairing up opposite muscle groups…no as much accumulated fatigue in the target muscle group
This ended up being (6) 25 meter trips for each muscle group…or 24 total sets of 50 meters…a lot
**I should note that I implemented a huge peri-workout nutrition intake this morning, as the complexes are tiring as hell…it was 2 FINiBARs, 2 scoops Surge Workout Fuel, 2 scoops ANACONDA and 2 scoops MAG-10
For the evening sled work…I used: 1 scoop ANACONDA, 1 scoop MAG-10 and 1 scoop Power Drive

S1 Shoulder Front Raise
S2 High pull

S3 Chest Flies
S4 Rear Flies

S5 tricep extensions…performed these like a DB kick back with a palms up (pronated) grip…the contraction of the tricep was super intense…however, you cover about 2 feet of floor space with every rep, so it takes forever to cover 25 meters and my tricpes were screaming…had to stop a couple times due to this, and rest a few seconds before continuing on…love it, will be doing it again!
S6 Bicep curls

S7 Chest Press
S8 Rows

Like I said, the above took 70 minutes…this mornings total workout time was about 90 minutes with set up, mobility and activation work, etc

All in all, I logged about 2 hours and 40 minutes of total workout time today.

As I also mentioned in the past, this is my strategy for the last 8 weeks or so…multiple workouts per day, splitting up the time

In fact, I may go to 3 workouts per day for a couple weeks at around the 6 week mark, if I feel I need it.

This is by far a better strategy, then cutting calories again, and doing boring ass, traditional cardio…I only do that 1 mile run test on the treadmill once per week, other than that it’s all weights and sled work

Nutrition is about the same as it’s been the last 5 days…not much food
Also, no cheat meals from this point on, which is 58 days! I’m already obsessing over food…not cool, but part of the deal, happens every time. I’ll adjust my intake as needed, but I don’t anticipate getting much lower than I currently am, if anything I’d increase intake, if it’s needed

That’s it…now my brain is out of gas, like my body
Just kidding…I’m not that worked over…just being dramatic!
[/quote]
[/quote]
[/quote]

Watching that video just made me feel so… small…

[Liv92]

Synergy… God bless your parents and all the hard work you’ve put in. hulk!

[John_Schlecht]

[quote]ryanbCXG wrote:
I have a question for synergy and any one else who autoregulates.

How long did it take you to develop this? Did you slowly work into it? Like start autoregulating one exercise then 2 and finally working up to autoregulating whole workouts or did you just jump right in and autoregulate everything. Thank you for your help.[/quote]

This is a good question.

The more I thought about this, the more of an ironic answer, I came to as a conclusion.

How long it takes one to develop this ability (big surprise), again is going to be specific to the individual. Some people are just more naturally in tune with their bodies. If you’ve ever participated in athletics for a a long period of time (usually at the high school level and up), you really learn to develop this ability. I would think that, at the younger ages, you’re not really paying too much attention to how “your body feels” especially as it’s still going through a lot of changes due to age and still in the “funky” stage. It seems that once you reach a certain age and body maturity level, the signs of what your body can handle, become more evident. I guess my point is, is that if you’re 15 years old, you won’t be as in tune with your body, as when you’re 21 or older.

Here’s the ironic part:

I would venture to say that the guys who DO NOT follow a very specific plan (go into the gym each day with a paper program, predetermined number of sets and reps to complete, exercise selection, etc), COULD (but again, not necessarily), develop the ability to auto regulate at a faster rate. This would be due to the fact, that since they haven’t limited themselves (or overextended themselves by following a program too advanced for their current training abilities) on paper and just go more by feel.

Let’s say for that day, you’re going to focus on the push muscles (chest, shoulders, triceps). This is all you really “know” for that day. You proceed to do a few warm up sets on bench, then get into your workout. You do a set of X reps, add weight based on how the last set felt (not according to what’s on a piece of paper…"I’m going to increase the load 3.5% now, because the paper says so), do another set. You can feel that that particular set was tougher than the first and you did a rep or two less. You rest a bit, then add weight again, based on that last tougher set, do the set, again feel it’s tougher, the reps were less and quite a bit slower. This process continues, until you reach your max weight on that particular exercise for THAT DAY. That’s auto regulating! You went set to set, added (or subtracted weight based on performance) weight, fired through a few sets and stopped, when you weren’t performing well.

While this isn’t “true auto regulation,” it’s a good start. The two “main problems” that will occur with this approach, would most likely be:

1. Ego lifting…focusing mostly on load progression as your primary indicator of “performance”

2. Most likely chasing a top number and end up grinding reps at the end, thus “burning” yourself out a bit too much on the first movement of the day

This is how most newbies train in the beginning. I sure did. Maybe it’s “young enthusiasm” or maybe it’s just being a dumb ass, as a lot of us are at the beginning. I know I was

The ironic part, is that, if you “did your homework,” read and read and read, searched all over the internet, over-analyzed a million different programs and settled on what you thought was 'the super program for you," printed it out and brought it to the gym with you, you may have already shot yourself in the foot. Two reasons I think:

1. Chances are the program is too advanced for you, if you’re relatively new or even an intermediate lifter.
   **We all like to think we’re advanced, but most are not. I know guys who have been lifting for a decade and I’d consider them to be beginners. Mostly because they haven’t been consistent enough and haven’t learned to pay attention to what works best for their specific ability levels

2. You either do too little or too much for THAT DAY, because of what the paper program called for. Example: the programs says:
   5 sets of 5
   Set 1 : 70% of 1 RM
   Set 2: 75% of 1 RM
   Set 3: 80% of 1 RM
   etc, etc

While it’s good to have a guideline such as this, it’s impossible to predict how you’ll feel and perform that day. What if you feel like an absolute beast that day? If you follow the program exactly as written, you’ll be robbing yourself of some high quality work, you could have completed, because you felt like you could kick major ass that day OR it turns out on that particular day, you felt like shit, and even contemplated not training, due to life stress, or whatever. However, being a committed lifter, you head into the gym (fine line with this one…there will no doubt be days you “don’t feel like training” but should, because it’s necessary to establish good habits of training and just to work on getting more mentally and physically tough), get warmed up, and everything feels heavy as hell and you’re wasted and not really into it, after your first couple sets. BUT, you continue to do what the paper program says, and it turns out to be a disaster. You’re weights and reps are way down compared to earlier workouts, you’re day dreaming, eyes are glazing over, and you’re simply just not into it that day. This would be a case of “doing too much” for that day, which is the exact opposite of what your body was telling you. Not to mention, it kills your confidence for that day, and if done chronically over time, it will kill your confidence in the gym eventually…not good!

In a perfect world, you will complete as much high quality work as you can EACH workout, EACH time you enter the gym, by listening to your body and staying in the moment, set to set, workout to workout, week to week, etc.

This is almost more of an art than anything. it takes time to learn, but if you’re willing to “trust yourself” you can learn it pretty quickly, and once you do, you’ll always trust yourself in the gym and always look forward to training. We all love to do the things we’re confident in, and perform well at.

In the end, you need to have patience, a proper perspective of what you’re really capable of in the gym, a hard working and consistent attitude, and always give the greatest effort you can workout to workout. Do those things over time and you’ll learn how to auto regulate your training rather quickly, in my opinion.

[John_Schlecht]

I’ve been MIA the last few days. This contest prep (and lack of nutrients!) is starting to take it’s toll a bit! I’ve been really tired in the evenings after a long day of work and workouts, and have been pretty fried at night. I haven’t been capable of posting anything of use to you guys, in this stage

I will say that, I’ve bumped my overall workload to 2 workouts per day, each day, for the last few days. I’ve also switched from an upper/lower split to a more “full body” approach for the bulk of my program. I couldn’t maintain doing 3 upper and 3 lower body days, any longer. Performance was starting to suffer, as well as recovery, big time!

I’m still doing a ton of work for both, but have split it up more evenly through out the day.

The morning workouts are still long and tough (but not to the point of diminishing returns), and the evening workouts are much less demanding…either isolation work for the muscles worked earlier that day or eccentric-less sled work for the muscles worked earlier that day.

I’m currently logging about 3 hours per day total…about 2 hours of main work in the mornings, and another hour or so in the evenings.

It’s working quite well so far this week, and I anticipate keeping this up for a while.

That’s all for my update. I’ll do a more detailed one at some point this week. Right now, I have to go meet with my tax guy and prepare to get bent over by Uncle Sam

[ryanbCXG]

[quote]synergy93 wrote:

[quote]ryanbCXG wrote:
I have a question for synergy and any one else who autoregulates.

How long did it take you to develop this? Did you slowly work into it? Like start autoregulating one exercise then 2 and finally working up to autoregulating whole workouts or did you just jump right in and autoregulate everything. Thank you for your help.[/quote]

This is a good question.

The more I thought about this, the more of an ironic answer, I came to as a conclusion.

How long it takes one to develop this ability (big surprise), again is going to be specific to the individual. Some people are just more naturally in tune with their bodies. If you’ve ever participated in athletics for a a long period of time (usually at the high school level and up), you really learn to develop this ability. I would think that, at the younger ages, you’re not really paying too much attention to how “your body feels” especially as it’s still going through a lot of changes due to age and still in the “funky” stage. It seems that once you reach a certain age and body maturity level, the signs of what your body can handle, become more evident. I guess my point is, is that if you’re 15 years old, you won’t be as in tune with your body, as when you’re 21 or older.

Here’s the ironic part:

I would venture to say that the guys who DO NOT follow a very specific plan (go into the gym each day with a paper program, predetermined number of sets and reps to complete, exercise selection, etc), COULD (but again, not necessarily), develop the ability to auto regulate at a faster rate. This would be due to the fact, that since they haven’t limited themselves (or overextended themselves by following a program too advanced for their current training abilities) on paper and just go more by feel.

Let’s say for that day, you’re going to focus on the push muscles (chest, shoulders, triceps). This is all you really “know” for that day. You proceed to do a few warm up sets on bench, then get into your workout. You do a set of X reps, add weight based on how the last set felt (not according to what’s on a piece of paper…"I’m going to increase the load 3.5% now, because the paper says so), do another set. You can feel that that particular set was tougher than the first and you did a rep or two less. You rest a bit, then add weight again, based on that last tougher set, do the set, again feel it’s tougher, the reps were less and quite a bit slower. This process continues, until you reach your max weight on that particular exercise for THAT DAY. That’s auto regulating! You went set to set, added (or subtracted weight based on performance) weight, fired through a few sets and stopped, when you weren’t performing well.

While this isn’t “true auto regulation,” it’s a good start. The two “main problems” that will occur with this approach, would most likely be:

1. Ego lifting…focusing mostly on load progression as your primary indicator of “performance”

2. Most likely chasing a top number and end up grinding reps at the end, thus “burning” yourself out a bit too much on the first movement of the day

This is how most newbies train in the beginning. I sure did. Maybe it’s “young enthusiasm” or maybe it’s just being a dumb ass, as a lot of us are at the beginning. I know I was

The ironic part, is that, if you “did your homework,” read and read and read, searched all over the internet, over-analyzed a million different programs and settled on what you thought was 'the super program for you," printed it out and brought it to the gym with you, you may have already shot yourself in the foot. Two reasons I think:

1. Chances are the program is too advanced for you, if you’re relatively new or even an intermediate lifter.
   **We all like to think we’re advanced, but most are not. I know guys who have been lifting for a decade and I’d consider them to be beginners. Mostly because they haven’t been consistent enough and haven’t learned to pay attention to what works best for their specific ability levels

2. You either do too little or too much for THAT DAY, because of what the paper program called for. Example: the programs says:
   5 sets of 5
   Set 1 : 70% of 1 RM
   Set 2: 75% of 1 RM
   Set 3: 80% of 1 RM
   etc, etc

While it’s good to have a guideline such as this, it’s impossible to predict how you’ll feel and perform that day. What if you feel like an absolute beast that day? If you follow the program exactly as written, you’ll be robbing yourself of some high quality work, you could have completed, because you felt like you could kick major ass that day OR it turns out on that particular day, you felt like shit, and even contemplated not training, due to life stress, or whatever. However, being a committed lifter, you head into the gym (fine line with this one…there will no doubt be days you “don’t feel like training” but should, because it’s necessary to establish good habits of training and just to work on getting more mentally and physically tough), get warmed up, and everything feels heavy as hell and you’re wasted and not really into it, after your first couple sets. BUT, you continue to do what the paper program says, and it turns out to be a disaster. You’re weights and reps are way down compared to earlier workouts, you’re day dreaming, eyes are glazing over, and you’re simply just not into it that day. This would be a case of “doing too much” for that day, which is the exact opposite of what your body was telling you. Not to mention, it kills your confidence for that day, and if done chronically over time, it will kill your confidence in the gym eventually…not good!

In a perfect world, you will complete as much high quality work as you can EACH workout, EACH time you enter the gym, by listening to your body and staying in the moment, set to set, workout to workout, week to week, etc.

This is almost more of an art than anything. it takes time to learn, but if you’re willing to “trust yourself” you can learn it pretty quickly, and once you do, you’ll always trust yourself in the gym and always look forward to training. We all love to do the things we’re confident in, and perform well at.

In the end, you need to have patience, a proper perspective of what you’re really capable of in the gym, a hard working and consistent attitude, and always give the greatest effort you can workout to workout. Do those things over time and you’ll learn how to auto regulate your training rather quickly, in my opinion.

[/quote]

Synergy, Thanks as always for the amazing detailed post. Everything you said makes sense. Everything is always different for each individual.

I am trying to learn to listen to my body and watch my progress in the mirror as well as in my log book. I go into the gym with exercises for the day but I do not go in with weights. I ramp up almost every exercise. I do look back at my log and try to beat that previous workout somehow. Maybe this is not the smartest to do because like you said there are days where you just can’t do as much work and other days where you can do a lot more. I have only been seriously training for 5months. I was in athletics from the time I was 4 (that’s when I started organized hockey). So I have been around sports and lifting but I was always sports minded and not lifting minded. I stopped sports in college so I never got to the next level, it may have been possible but I chose to attempt medical school instead.

So I am going to take my time and learn from myself and others as much as possible. Autoregulation is something that I feel you must learn to be able to truly reach your potential. Learning this will help me develop better and smarter training methods. I love training and would do more than the 1.5hrs a day I do now, but I do not know how to structure it effectively. Can’t wait to learn.

[hockey_guy]

How’s the prep been going Synergy?

[John_Schlecht]

Things have been going good this week. I haven’t had the time (or energy) to give a decent update, as I’ve been logging A TON of training hours, regular work hours, family stuff, etc.

I’ll be sure to update you guys, if you’re interested, at some point in the next day or two.

Thanks for asking.

Keep hittin’ it hard!

[quote]hockey_guy wrote:
How’s the prep been going Synergy?[/quote]

[NIguy]

[quote]synergy93 wrote:
Things have been going good this week. I haven’t had the time (or energy) to give a decent update, as I’ve been logging A TON of training hours, regular work hours, family stuff, etc.

I’ll be sure to update you guys, if you’re interested, at some point in the next day or two.

Thanks for asking.

Keep hittin’ it hard!

[quote]hockey_guy wrote:
How’s the prep been going Synergy?[/quote]
[/quote]

Always interested.

…I do several things when I log onto T-Nation, check front page for good articles, check T-cell for anything interesting, check this thread for updates.

[ryanbCXG]

[quote]NIguy wrote:

[quote]synergy93 wrote:
Things have been going good this week. I haven’t had the time (or energy) to give a decent update, as I’ve been logging A TON of training hours, regular work hours, family stuff, etc.

I’ll be sure to update you guys, if you’re interested, at some point in the next day or two.

Thanks for asking.

Keep hittin’ it hard!

[quote]hockey_guy wrote:
How’s the prep been going Synergy?[/quote]
[/quote]

Always interesting.

…I do several things when I log onto T-Nation, check front page for good articles, check T-cell for anything interesting, check this thread for updates.

[/quote]

Very true. Always excitd to see when this thread has an update. I have probably learned more in this thread than from a lot of the articles.

As always thank you Synergy. Hope the prep keeps going well.

[ryanbCXG]

[quote]NIguy wrote:

[quote]synergy93 wrote:
Things have been going good this week. I haven’t had the time (or energy) to give a decent update, as I’ve been logging A TON of training hours, regular work hours, family stuff, etc.

I’ll be sure to update you guys, if you’re interested, at some point in the next day or two.

Thanks for asking.

Keep hittin’ it hard!

[quote]hockey_guy wrote:
How’s the prep been going Synergy?[/quote]
[/quote]

Always interesting.

…I do several things when I log onto T-Nation, check front page for good articles, check T-cell for anything interesting, check this thread for updates.

[/quote]

Very true. Always excitd to see when this thread has an update. I have probably learned more in this thread than from a lot of the articles.

As always thank you Synergy. Hope the prep keeps going well.

[John_Schlecht]

Ok, finally a little time to give an update on my prep.

Let me preface this, by stating that I’m running on fumes and if I end up not making any sense at any point during this post, don’t hold it against me!

Ok, so I’m down to the last 7 weeks, including this past week. Crunch time. Seems like a lot, but it’s not. This is when fat loss can stall out, and it can drive you nuts. However, this was probably my best week, since the first week or two (8-9 weeks ago…16 week prep), in terms of fat loss.

Here’s why!

I’ve recently switched up training splits, and have gone back to doing (4) full body workouts per week, 2 back and bicep days, and one “extras” day…still training 7 days per week.

I ran about a 4 week phase of full body power complexes last year (almost at this exact same time), and the results were excellent, which is why I decided to go back to them this year again.

However, last year, when I implemented the full body workouts, I trained different movement patterns consisting of 4 exercises (typically…an olympic/dead movement, a horizontal push, a vertical pull, and a leg press dominated movement).

While this approach yielded great results, I knew it could be better, and I couldn’t do this on consecutive days.

So, this year I took a page out of CT’s 5 star power complexes (still full body workouts, but emphasizing the same movement pattern, for each complex, while changing the strength curve…if you haven’t read the article, check it out, simply amazing, in my opinion). While I was already doing this type of approach last year, this “new” way of doing these complexes is far superior.

It allows you to train the whole body on consecutive days, and changing the neural drive of each exercise, activates the hell out of your system and allows for a very high level of performance and per workout density…always a good thing when focusing on fat loss…two things I’ve “preached” one should seek all along.

I’ve basically followed the outline of the new article, implementing small changes, that fit my ability levels, while adhering the main principles (which are basically what I came up with last year…moderately heavy weights, done explosively…terminating the set when explosiveness drops significantly, etc).

Rather than outline the actual exercises I’m doing, I’ll outline what my typical days have looked like this week.
**I’ve also started early morning “MAG-10 Fasted Cardio,” as outlined in an article by Lonnie Lowery. I’ve done this in the past, utilizing leucine powder, before MAG-10 was available.
A typical early am Mag fasted Cardio workout looks like this:
Duration: 60 minutes
Incline: 4
Speed: 3-3.5 mph
Distance: usually about 3.1-3.3 miles
beats per minute: 115’ish
I’ve done this every day this week, starting on Sunday, from 4:30-5:30 am, before my work day starts at 6 am

Sunday, April 17th
60 minutes AM Cardio

NO WEIGHT TRAINING…needed it off from the previous week…have only taken 2 “true days” off from weights in two months

4:30-6:00 PM…Bikram Yoga…if you’re not familiar with this, it’s basically the most intense form of yoga there is, done for 90 minutes in 105 degrees…sucks balls, a bit boring, but a tough challenge, so I’ll keep doing it

Total "RECOVERY"workout time for the day: 2 1/2 hours

Monday, April 18th
4:30 am: 60 minutes MAG-10 fasted cardio
11:30-1:30 pm: Day 1 of Full Body Fat Loss complexes…two frickin’ hours straight…hardly rested, of explosive circuits…they put hair on your balls, big time
**I’m focusing on upper body a little more on Mondays and Tuesdays, so I start with the upper body complexes, then do the lower body complexes

7-8 pm…evening upper body sled work…emphasizing the push muscles
Total workout time for the day: 4 hours!!

Tuesday, April 19th
The exact as Monday…different circuits, and did 80 minutes of isolation work for chest, shoulders and triceps for the evening workout…no sled
Total workout time for the day: 4 hours and 20 minutes

Wednesday, April 20th
Damn early morning cardio again…60 minutes

70 minutes of weight training…focus was on the back only, nothing else

Evening workout: biceps and abs…60 minutes
Total workout time for the day: 3 hours

Thursday, April
60 minutes of AM cardio

Weights: Same as Monday and Tuesday, except the focus in more on lower body, so I do the lower body complexes first

Evening workout: 70 minutes of lower body sled work!! Did (6) sets of 50 yards, for 4 different sled variations focusing on the lower body…only rested about 30-45 seconds between sets

Total workout time for the day: 4 hours and 10 minutes

Friday (Today)
60 minutes of AM cardio

Weights: same as yesterday…different movement patterns, started with legs again

PM: 30 minutes of upper body sled work + one lower body movement
**did a circuit of upper body press muscle movements as follows:
25 yards…sled shoulder press, no rest, turned around at the end of the turf, and came back with
25 yards…sled front shoulder raises, no rest, turned around at the end of turf, and came back with
25 yards…sled chest presses, no rest, turned around at end of turf, and came back with
25 yards…lower body sled push

I performed this circuit, only resting about 45 seconds after the lower body movement for as long as I could…which wasn’t very long today…only 30 minutes and I was done!

Total workout time for the day: 3 1/2 hours

So the total amount of workout time I’ve put in from Sunday, until this evening has been:

21 1/2 hours!!! Dear God, didn’t really realize that until I just added it all up now.

That’s just over 3.5 hours per day.

Crazy? Yes. Necessary, in my opinion, yes. I can GUARANTEE I haven’t lost an ounce of muscle at this point, due to all the mechanical work I’ve been putting in, with a large percentage of that being non-stressful, sled work, as well as, non-stress full, early morning cardio.

I will say, that I’ve been able to get down to sub-4% body fat levels in the past, doing around 12-14 hours per week, BUT I ALWAYS LOST A SIGNIFICANT AMOUNT OF LEAN MASS…EVERY TIME.

I’ve barely dropped below 250 lbs. on the scale, due to smart training (although time consuming), and I’ve no doubt gotten leaner.

I figure I have MAYBE 1.5-2% more body fat to lose over the next 6 weeks. When I’ve been at this point in the past, I would have weighed about 220 lbs (with the final weigh in around 212 at just under 4%). I’ve managed to keep the additional muscle I’ve put on in the last 1 1/2 or so, which is about 20-25 lbs of lean mass.

I should also note, that while I do feel run down (extremely run down in the evening), I feel pretty damn good overall, considering what I’ve been putting my body through. I’m pretty much a waste of space at night, but functioning well during the day, when it counts, and the workouts are NEVER pussy…always high quality and worth the invested time.

I’ve been auto regulating every session, and will shut it down, when I start to feel like shit, during a workout. Fortunately, I’ve only had to completely stop about 2 workouts over the last couple of months. Those were due to a lack of sleep, than anything else.

What else???

Oh yes, nutrition…

I’m not going to cover it in any detail, but I’ve been able to keep calories fairly high (around 3200 per day…which is all I really need to maintain my energy levels and lean body mass (I think I’m a “good absorber” and utilize everything I put into my body…this can also be mistaken for a “slow metabolism”).

Protein has been about the same each day…300-350 grams
Carbs have been cycled…haven’t had to drop below 100 (that doesn’t include trace carbs), and have reloaded them up to 500 grams per day, once in a while…which would usually consist of 150 during the day, and a monster carb heavy cheat meal, once per week
Fat: I’ve actually kept it pretty steady on most days…around 100 or so…less on the higher carb days…I’ve been using 9 capsules of FA3 and 6 capsules of Flameout per day, so that helps keep my fat intake at optimal levels, without having to consume a high amount of fats from foods…which can really help when controlling calories

Workout Nutrition has varied, but it usually consists of either:

3 scoops Surge Workout Fuel, 3 scoops ANACONDA, 3 scoops MAG-10…moderate carb days
2 scoops of Surge Workout Fuel, 2 scoops of ANACONDA, 2 scoops of MAG-10…low carb days
2 FINiBARs, 2 scoops Surge Workout Fuel, 2 scoops of ANACONDA, 2 scoops of MAG-10…high carb days
1 FINiBAR, 2 scoops Surge Workout Fuel, 2 scoops ANACONDA, 2 scoops MAG-10…more recent moderate carb days

This week, I’ve switched to:
1 FINiBAR, 1 Surge Workout Fuel, 3 ANACONDA, 2 MAG-10

I’ll drop the FINiBARs at some point, but not til the last second…those things are damn tasty, and I always look forward to them late in my dieting

Morning MAG-10 fasted cardio: 1 scoop MAG-10

Evening sled or isolation work: 1 scoop ANACONDA and 1 scoop MAG-10

Spending a shit load of money on the above supps right now, but it’s for a short time…worth it in my opinion. I’m not one to be “brainwashed” by supplements companies. I sincerely use these products, because I’m extremely in tune with my body and can truly feel the difference from their use. Besides, I don’t spend a lot of money on stuff like clothes, gadgets, or whatever. I choose to spend my money on my body…high quality foods (my grocery bill each month is ridiculous…Costco loves me), and high quality supplements.

Ok, I’m done now.

I’ll try to post some updated pics and videos soon, showing my progress.

Later guys. Enjoy the novel

[JHollywood]

Enjoyed. Incredible dedication.

Do you live close to your gym? I’m wondering what your commute time must be on top of actual training! That turf behind you in videos is makin me jealous… A goal of mine in the next few years is to build my own warehouse style gym, pretty much just so I can train whenever I want, as often as I want, with whatever equipment I want. For such a gigantic city, LA has a terrible offering of real training gyms, though “health clubs” abound.

Again, solid work. Your record-keeping is also impressive, btw! Good to hear you’re pleased with your progress, and looking forward to hearing about the end results of all this hard work

[hockey_guy]

Thanks for all the time you take logging your methods and results synergy! You are a great source of information as well as motivation for the rest of us!