Hello everyone! I’m Moonflower. I’ve never made a training log before and I’ve always wanted to try it out, so here we are. I’m currently chasing a 315 bench and aim to keep this updated until then–after that, we’ll see what happens.
Currently 25, 5’6", and averaging 160–I’ve been training for about five years, starting with calisthenics for a while, moving into weighted calisthenics for long time, and then getting into lifting almost a year ago when I decided to spring for a home gym setup. My current training style is probably best described as conjugate with high intensity principles. I typically program two sets across 5-6 exercises per workout with very frequent exercise variation, which tends to keep me very happy as a 2A neurotype. My split is currently PPL, averaging about four days a week at the moment although I just try to stay consistent and train when I can in the midst of life. Let’s get some gains!!
Flat Bench - 275 x 1, 225 x 8, 225 x 8
Seated Overhead Press +38 chain - 65 x 7, 65 x 5
Weighted Decline Push Up - 70 x 12, 70 x 11
Incline Cable Pushdowns - 75 x 9, 75 x 8
Barbell Skull Crushers -75 x 9, 75 x 9
Started out with a bench max and set a new PR with 275 for a single, which I was really stoked about. The last time I rotated in flat bench was in late October, so the increase in weight was quite nice. I’ve been rotating bench variations every workout so I can keep maxing out then run my backdown sets at around 80% of my max, which I’ve found works well.
Weighted Neutral Grip Pull Ups - 80 x 8, 80 x 8.
Small Mag Grip Ghetto Pulldown - 145 x 12, 145 x 12
Small Mag Grip Cable Inverted Row - 175 x 12, 175 x 10
EZ Bar Preacher Curl - 52.5 x 12, 52.5 x 9
Unilateral Behind the Back Cable Curls - 20 x 9, 20 x 7
Decided to do the small mag grip for my rows and pulldowns since I just got it over Christmas and I’ve been dying to try it out lol. I also just got a cable tower which has been amazing but I still like doing pulldowns and cable rows on the ghetto-style setup, a single pulley at the top of my rack and bracing my feet on the front uprights. Pretty much everything else I do at the cable tower now instead of the ghetto-style high/low pulley setup.
Belt Squats - 265 x 20, 265 x 20
Barbell Good Mornings - 115 x 10, 115 x 10
Unilateral Calf Raises - 70 x 15, 70 x 15
Unilateral Ghetto Hamstring Curls - 30 x 19, 30 x 19
One Arm Cable Pushdown - 25 x 11, 25 x 11
Leg day usually involves legs/posterior chain/etc. for me, and I like ending with an arm exercise since I want more frequency and volume on my arms right now and it helps motivate myself to train legs. XD
I love belt squats and I’m better at them than any barbell variation, I think it’s because of better stability and keeping the load closer to the floor and not suspended on my back. It also was nice to run calf raises with the same setup after elevating my heel a bit.
Cambered Swiss Bar Bench +38 chain - 240 x 1, 195 x 6, 195 x 8
Seated Overhead Press +38 chain - 65 x 7, 65 x 6
Low to High Cable Flies - 15 x 12, 15 x 12
Incline One Arm Pushdown - 35 x 9, 35 x 6
JM Press - 85 x 13, 85 x 13
Decided on a bench variation that makes the bottom harder thanks to the camber on the bar but also emphasized the top with the chains at the same time. After pushing myself pretty hard last push day on bench I wanted to try something where I could get more out of less weight with a lower absolute load that emphasized the top and bottom to build strength at both ends of the movement, and this definitely did the trick. Absolutely brutal on the rep work, I wasn’t dialed in on the first backdown set and it showed. With my max I was locking out 278 at the top on a cambered bar, which I was pretty happy about. I love how this bar feels on my shoulders and the stretch in the bottom is brutal.
Also tried the low to high cable flies today for the first time, I liked that one. Finished out with an incline pushdown to hammer the lockout in my arms since that’s a weak point and some JM Press, which I’ve gotten into a bunch recently. Been rotating both of these in my workouts a lot in the past few months.
Weighted Chin Up - 80 x 9, 80 x 8
Wide Mag Grip Ghetto Lat Pulldown - 150 x 11, 150 x 9
Cable Inverted Row - 175 x 12, 175 x 12
Barbell Curl - 70 x 12, 70 x 12
Cable Hammer Curl - 50 x 12, 50 x 12
Incline Cable Curl - 25 x 6, 15 x 11
Decided on the spur of the moment to add another isolation exercise tonight, I haven’t tried incline cable curls yet and I really wanted to so I threw on a couple sets at the end to really drive it home since I had a bit more time tonight. Ended up starting out a bit heavier that I wanted to so I dropped the weight down a bit, I think next time I’ll start with 20 lbs. per side.
Really great workout, the pump was great and back/biceps were feeling it afterword.
Belt Squats - 265 x 20, 265 x 20
Seated Good Mornings - 95 x 12, 95 x 12
Unilateral Calf Raises - 75 x 14, 75 x 14
Unilateral Cable Hamstring Curls - 40 x 15, 40 x 13
EZ Bar Flat Bench Preacher Curls - 50 x 13, 50 x 13
Cable Overhead Extensions (Straight Bar) - 50 x 12, 50 x 12
I’m not sure if I was more tired for this workout or if I jumped up the weight too fast for belt squats but the form wasn’t great and I definitely could have gone a bit deeper. I might keep it at the same weight again next time to keep working on better form and then probably switch exercises.
I also tried seated good mornings, I definitely felt it in my lower back and I think it’s a great variation to rotate in so I don’t overuse the regular version. Belt squats/seated good morning felt really good afterward on the lower back, nice and stretched out. Feels almost like I gained an inch in height even though that’s probably not true in reality. XD I also moved my hamstring curls away from the ghetto pulley setup and tried them in the same style on my cable tower–lying on my back with an ankle strap connected to the cable. Maybe not a normal way to do it but it works pretty well for now.
Decided to try two arm movements today because I had time and it was really the only way to motivate me to train legs today in all honesty. XD Tried a preacher curl but with my arms flat on a bench instead of my preacher curl pad, it really makes the movement different. I don’t think I set it up correctly because it was hard to keep my elbows on the bench and my arms fully locked out at the bottom. I’ll probably try to work on the setup next time and this will probably go down in weight when I figure it out, but I liked it. Ended with overhead extensions with a cable. I really like doing extensions with a barbell or EZ bar but the cable variation just hits different. The tension on the negative is just different from a bar, it feels like it’s pulling back so much more and it makes the negative harder. The last few reps on both sets were absolute grinders and I loved the pump I got from it.
Larson Press +38 chain - 225 x 1, 185 x 9, 185 x 8
Low to High Cable Flies - 17.5 x 13, 17.5 x 12
Rope Pushdown - 50 x 11, 50 x 11
JM Press - 90 x 12, 90 x 12
Bit of a rushed session tonight, I was also really tired from working overnight last night and it shows. I had hoped for a bit more out of the Larson pressing (especially trying this out with chains for the first time) but it is what it is. I also decided to deload my shoulders today since they’ve been a bit fatigued for a few workouts now–I think adding chains to my OHP work was a bit more taxing than I originally thought, so I dropped it for this one and I’ll switch variations next time. On the plus side the JM press felt really good and I probably could have gotten another rep had I really pushed it.
Cable Face Pulls (Rope Attachment) - 40 x 12, 40 x 12
Straight Bar Cable Curl - 60 x 10, 60 x 10
EZ Bar Spider Curls - 65 x 7, 55 x 10
Loved the cable curls tonight, my arms were feeling it! I love barbell and EZ bar curls but I like cable work too, the tension feels different and it really hit the spot tonight. Also tried spider curls for the first time too and that felt great, I started out a bit heavy but the second set felt good. I measured my arms cold last night and realized I’ve put on half an inch since September when I really started trying a lot of new things and started going hard on arms when I overhauled my training. Considering that and my still-new cable tower and all the new things I can do with it, I think 2025 is going to be my best year yet for arms. Anyway–great workout tonight…nothing fancy, just some basics and high intensity getting the job done.
(yeah, I know I skipped a leg day…I’ve been pretty busy with work this week (~60 hours) and it’s been pretty uninspiring to even think about training legs the past few days. Sundays are my worst days for recovery, since I work super late Saturday night and I didn’t want to bench on Sunday and not be 100% fresh starting a push session (seeing as how that’s my biggest goal right now), so I tossed aside legs this time and went to a push workout for Saturday instead. Anyway…that’s life sometimes–adapt and overcome.)
Reverse Grip Bench - 265 x 1, 215 x 10, 215 x 9
AD Press - 95 x 11, 95 x 11
Low-To-High Cable Flies - 20 x 12, 20 x 12
Straight Bar Pushdowns +19 lb. Chains - 70 x 10, 70 x 9
JM Press - 95 x 12, 95 x 12
I was pretty pleased with how bench turned out, I was expecting around 245 for the max but decided to up it by 20 more pounds and see what happened since I felt good about it during warmups. Failed 265 but then tried again after resting for a few minutes and it went up quite smoothly. Last time I rotated in this variation my reverse grip bench was about 20 pounds lighter than my flat bench, which makes me wonder now if I could get up 285 on flat. I went for a tenth rep on my second set and failed it, it stopped about 2/3 of the way up which tells me my triceps are still a weak link on bench–although the reverse grip does bias triceps a bit more, so that’s worth taking into account too. Overall, great session and I’m seeing improvement which is always good.
I also loved the pushdowns with chains, it gave me an absolutely massive tricep pump.
Weighted Chin Ups - 80 x 9, 80 x 9
Seated Cable Row - 110 x 15, 110 x 15
Weighted Behind the Neck Pull Ups - 45 x 6, 45 x 6
Barbell Curls - 75 x 10, 75 x 10
Unilateral Behind the Back Cable Curl - 20 x 10, 20 x 10
Didn’t have a lot of time for this one which was a shame, because I really felt like I could have pushed harder on pretty much everything tonight. I was pretty happy to see progress on the chins and the barbell curls, been patiently working on those for a while now.
Belt Squats - 265 x 20, 265 x 20
Seated Good Mornings - 100 x 12, 100 x 12
Weighted Pendulum Sissy Squat- 45 x 8, 25 x 11
Unilateral Cable Hamstring Curls - 45 x 14, 45 x 14
EZ Bar Flat Bench Preacher Curl - 50 x 16, 50 x 16
Very tired and drained for this one thanks to work yesterday and today and almost no sleep last night, so I honestly didn’t push too hard tonight in all fairness. The pendulum sissy squats I started out much too heavy on so I bumped the weight down after the first set left a lot to be desired in terms of quality. I also tried flat bench preacher curls again and they went pretty good although I didn’t really feel it as much in the muscle so I ended the workout by doing a set of standard EZ bar curls with the same weight to failure.
Board Press (1 board) - 265 x 1, 210 x 11, 210 x 11
AD Press - 95 x 11, 95 x 11
Low-To-High Cable Flies - 25 x 11, 25 x 11
One Arm Cable Pushdown - 35 x 11, 35 x 11
Barbell Overhead Extension - 75 x 10, 75 x 10
Finally got another session in last night, been really tired and finishing a week at work that included a lot of overtime. I was really happy with how the board press went, I felt like I still had a bit more left in me. While I realize nothing is strictly linear, at the current rate of progress I think it might be possible to hit 315 this spring, which would be cool.
Little update, since I’ve been offline for a little while now.
Nine days ago I started feeling pretty sick, so I weathered down and started enduring one of the worst flu experiences I’ve had in a long time. One of the hard things about it was that all food tasted very bad and was repulsive to me, so in addition to being pretty sick this means that I ate almost nothing for 4-5 days straight. After the flu I narrowly avoided the hospital at the end of last week as I was diagnosed with pneumonia, which is a whole different animal. The first day I got tired and winded just going out to check my mail.
With this being said, I haven’t lifted at all in the nine days since I first became sick and do not expect to start back for a while yet, as I regain my strength and go back to work, among other things. I lost a bunch of weight last week (to the point where family members can just look at my face and tell I’ve lost a bunch of weight) and my strength is not up where it was anymore. Whenever I have enough energy to get back in the gym, I fully anticipate having to rebuild a significant amount of my strength and physique. Until then I’ll be resting and regaining what energy I can. What I was doing before flu/pneumonia was working really well and I have no reason to believe it won’t work again to rebuild and go beyond.
On the bright side I now have a pretty killer before picture that could do quite well as a late entry into the T-ransformation challenge or something lol.
More in the next 1-3 weeks or so when I get back into the gym. I miss lifting.
Barbell Curl - 75 x 10, 75 x 10
Cable Rope Pushdown - 40 x 11, 40 x 11
EZ Bar Preacher Curl - 52.5 x 12, 52.5 x 12
Incline Cable Pushdowns - 75 x 10, 75 x 9
Cable Hammer Curl (Rope Attachment) - 50 x 12, 50 x 12
One Arm Cable Pushdown - 25 x 10, 25 x 10
Unilateral Behind the Back Cable Curls - 20 x 10, 20 x 10
Overhead Barbell Extensions - 75 x 8, 75 x 8
Ok so I might have been feeling decently good today and I really wanted to hit something less neurologically taxing, plus it’s a perfectly good Friday night, so…today we train arms. XD
I’m still recovering from pneumonia so a lot of these reps were of lesser quality and the form wasn’t as good for some sets as I wanted, but training again after a full two weeks off was great. Plus, switching things up and training just arms today was actually pretty fun. This wasn’t easy to get through but it went well enough that I’m thinking of maybe hitting a pull workout this weekend if I’m feeling recovered enough, we’ll see.
Weighted Neutral Grip Pull Ups - 80 x 6, 80 x 5
Wide Mag Grip Ghetto Lat Pulldowns - 150 x 10, 150 x 8
Small Mag Grip Cable Inverted Rows - 175 x 9, 175 x 7
EZ Bar Curls - 75 x 11, 75 x 9
Straight Bar Cable Curls - 55 x 7, 55 x 7
First regular workout in over two weeks, thanks to flu and pneumonia. The pneumonia recovery has still left me a bit weaker than normal, and I’ll have to build back to where I was. It looks like I lost about threeish reps on all my sets compared to before, and I did increase all the rest times to help with fatigue. Other than the strength loss, it was a decent session, overall it just feels good to be back and starting to rebuild.
Weighted Dips - 115 x 7, 115 x 7
AD Press - 95 x 5, 65 x 17
Low to High Cable Fly - 25 x 9, 25 x 9
Straight Bar Pushdowns - 70 x 13, 70 x 11
Cable Overhead Extensions (Straight Bar) - 50 x 10, 50 x 9
First push workout back…decided to skip legs this time in the split order because I’m still getting back in the rotation and not feeling 100% yet after being sick–I really didn’t want to recover from a full leg day just yet if I could help it. I decided to throw in dips today instead of a bench variation to switch it up and those went slightly better than I was expecting. I really cannot figure out my AD Press right now…before pneumonia I got two sets of eleven with 95 lbs., and today I got only five grinding reps on the first set so I dropped it down to 65 lbs. and cranked out 17 reps? I have no idea how that happened lol. Maybe next push workout I’ll shoot for 75-85 lbs. and see what happens. Other than that I think the strength loss from being sick isn’t too bad for my pushing movements or I’m just closer to 100% again, maybe a bit of both. I also loved the straight bar pushdowns. They just hit in a way that feels really good.
Weighted Chin Ups - 80 x 7, 80 x 6
One Arm Cable Inverted Row - 80 x 10, 80 x 10
Unilateral Cable Face Pulls - 20 x 11, 20 x 11
EZ Bar Flat Bench Preacher Curl - 55 x 15, 55 x 15
One Arm Cable Curl - 30 x 7, 30 x 7
A day late in posting, but it was a solid pull workout last night. I matched my pre-pneumonia strength on every movement except for the chin ups, vertical pulls still feel really hard and the ~3-rep loss on my sets is still a work in progress to rebuild. It’s been really hard to work out two days in a row this past week, I’ve noticed the night after a workout the previous day I’ve been really drained, I think my recovery is still…recovering (pun intended lol). Hopefully this next week I can get back to workouts on consecutive days as my schedule allows.
I still can’t figure out the flat bench preacher curls, it seems like they should be harder than a regular preacher curls but they haven’t been for me. I felt the stretch but didn’t really feel that fatigued, I think I need to up the weight. I’m not sure why they’re easier than regular preacher curls, maybe how the bench stops the arms at 180 degrees from the floor and a regular preacher curls is about 45 degrees and how gravity affects both of those angles.
The one arm cable curls gave me a nasty pump at the end, I think those and the straight bar cable curls are two variations that I want to rotate in a lot in the near future since I really like them and they’ve been really brutal on my arms which has been perfect.
Back Squats - 185 x 10, 185 x 10
Rack Pulls - 315 x 1, 225 x 9
Weighted Pendulum Sissy Squat - 45 x 8, 25 x 11
Unilateral Cable Hamstring Curls - 45 x 14, 45 x 12
Overhead Cable Extensions - 50 x 11, 50 x 10
First leg day in…almost a full month (do not recommend but pneumonia makes that happen I guess). It’s also been a long time since I’ve done back squats, mostly because I much rather prefer belt squats. I just prefer the stability in how it’s loaded compared to barbell work. So between semi-recent pneumonia, no leg days in almost a month, and not barbell squatting for a long time, my barbell squats in all forms are lagging compared to what they should be. I want to devote a lot more to them after I achieve my big three goals right now (315 bench, 300 lb. total weighted pull up with bodyweight included, and more arm work). After that I think I might want to throw a lot more into bringing up my legs…my barbell squats are really at poverty squat levels compared to some of my upper body. Till I throw a lot more at them I’ll rotate in a lot more barbell variations in and try to embrace small, slow gains. Adding a rep to my sets, adding five or ten pounds to the bar, just really getting results that add up slowly over time.
I think that’s how I want to approach rack pulls too. I tried them on a whim instead of good mornings, just to have another hinging movement to rotate in regularly. Since I’ve never done them before I was a bit conservative and worked up to a heavy single that I’m sure is a ways below my actual 1RM and then just did one set to not completely nuke my recovery, especially since I did them right after squats. There’s a lot of potential for progress on this so I’m excited to see where it goes if I start rotating this in regularly.
The rest was pretty standard for a leg day. I’m experimenting with a few different ways to load the sissy squats, hence the different weights on both sets. I’m planning on working out next on Tuesday or Wednesday this week to put a day in between for recovery, but I think after that I should be able to go full steam ahead and not worry about spacing out workouts due to recovery unless I really feel I need it.
