Lol! Bands are on my list besides a weight vest and sandbag. Do you have any brands you’d recommend for bands?
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I don’t have any yet.
Couldn’t go wrong with rogue or elitefts. Get whatever’s on sale, can’t imagine they’re any different.
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I’m still in the hunt for a band set. Those are the two places I’ve looked also. Texas strength systems has them too I think. I’m still looking to purchase a “cheap” set or find a 50% off sale.
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The only bands I’ve used were made by Jump Stretch. They were solid and lasted quite awhile. We mostly used the purple ones for stretching drills when I was training athletes.
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Elite Fitness Systems (elitefts. com), Dave Tate’s site, sells Jump Stretch Bands. They are having an Easter sale, and bands are 25% off this weekend.
The “Mountain Dog” band pack is like $65.
It’s got 2 “short mini” bands. I put them around my knees for Glute/leg spread action. Or hanging weights off the bamboo bar.
2 “mini bands” (regular length) which are pretty standard for pull Aparts and Pushdowns. Really useful.
2 “monster mini bands” which are like double strength mini bands. You can do harder pull Aparts/Pushdowns. I also use them for band thru belt walks. They are strong enough to start squatting/Deadlifting against also. Or dumbbell benches. Very versatile.
2 “light bands.” These are the bands JMaier mentioned for stretching. You could also do reverse band stuff, like hanging barbells out of the power rack.
Also 2 micro mini bands which are really skinny and weak. My g.f. uses these like I would use a mini band.
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Careful buying cheap bands! They fray quick!
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I definitely over paid for mine haha. I have Ethos ones which are the Dicks Sporting Goods store brand. They’re a little pricier, but I was able to just walk in and buy them which was a plus for me. Time will tell how they hold up!
So far, I’ve gotten a brutal knot in one of them and for sure thought it was going to tear when trying to pull it out and it seemed to hold up fine.
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I’m going to play around with my next two or three 531 cycles and create a bit of a Frankenstein program. Might just call it that. Rough idea of the setup here:
Press day is going to be PR sets with double rest pause and mechanical drop set. So I’ll hit my 85/90/95 strict PR sets, rest 15-20 and hit AMRAP push press, another 15-20 and AMRAP power jerk. Then I’ll hit a couple giant sets of assistance.
Squat day is going to be PR sets followed by BBB at FSL. Following again will be giant sets of assistance.
Bench day will be reverse pyramid PR sets. I’ll work up to my PR set like usual, then hit AMRAPS at the two lower percentages. Following, you guessed it, is giant sets.
The last day will be kind of a general lower body day. I’m going to hit a few heavy reps of stuff, and some lighter higher reps. Figure I can have fun with this and experiment with movements I haven’t tried before.
For my giant sets, I’m going to set a timer for 6 minutes and try to complete as many rounds as possible of my chosen exercises.
I think at the end of these couple months I should see a nice work capacity improvement.
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Sounds cool. I’ll enjoy watching this experiment unfold.
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3/30/18
Where do I set these pins?
SSB GMs: pins at 14
SSB Squats: pins at 11 or 12
Zercher GMs: pins at 8
Zercher Squats: pins at 6 or 7
Did a few reps of each lift to get a feel for where I’d like to set the pins. Finished up with some box squats to my bench for a few easy sets.
I’m slightly heartbroken you didn’t ask me 
I’ve been dealing with forearm issues for the majority of my effective lifting. Biggest helps for me were:
Warming up the forearms prior to any training. Even simple stuff like a minute hang
Reducing low bar squatting frequency
Not benching the day before or the day after low bar squatting
Reducing bench press frequency
Training forearm extensors
Thumbless back work when possible/applicable
Reducing/periodizing climbing volume
Reducing grappling volume
Rigging up a saws-all as a too powerful, hillbilly version of a massage tool
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Ah crap, sorry for the oversight man! Appreciate the tips though.
How’d you go about that?
This sounds like a Saw movie waiting to happen lol.
P.S. the Titan SSB fits pretty solid, I think once I pack on a little more shoulder mass it’ll be pretty comfy. Thanks for the info! And @Despade
Prior to planned climbing trips, I reduced any other intentional or incidental forearm work and spent more time climbing. I needed to treat climbing as a gym session in terms of training volume. Probably sounded fancier than I meant.
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Ahh gotcha. Yeah, I think once my arm clears up I’m going to have to pay more attention to how much I’m taxing my grip. I’ll be doing a good bit of light construction for the next 6 months or so too rather than just being a desk jockey. Plenty of stuff to consider.
3/31/18
Kayaking
Did about 6 easy miles on a small river today. Lots of downed trees so had to portage quite a bit but the terrain wasn’t too bad, only one tick! Didn’t grab any photos cause my phone was in my friends dry bag.
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4/2/18
Franken-5/3/1 - C1/W1/Press day 1
Warmup:
2v2 basketball and another ankle roll (not as bad)
Press:
45x10
55x5
65x5
75x5
85x13
85x6 (push press)
85x7 (power jerk)
Band rows:
Blackx5x10
Circuit 1:
SG BTN push press - 75x4
Lateral raise - 10x8
Pullaparts - redx10
5 rounds/6 minutes
Circuit 2:
Full ROM front raise - 25x6
Pushdowns - blackx10
Facepulls - blackx10
5 rounds/6 minutes
Airdyne: 5 minutes
Started the day off on the wrong foot, literally. Stepped on another guys foot and rolled my ankle again. Not as bad as last time but it put me in a pretty bad mood. Lifting went a lot better than I thought though after that.
Shut down the push press and power jerk when I couldn’t control the eccentric any longer. Band rows between sets.
Circuits were fun and brutal. I could barely get my arms over my head to put stuff away afterwards. Airdyne just to get some blood flowing back around my knees and ankle.
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I’ll roll my ankle if I step on a rock on the sidewalk.
I’ve had some doozies. In 2013 I got bumped right as I planted to jump on my left leg while driving in the lane and basically tried to jump from the side of my foot. I rolled my ankle so hard that the talus (bone that your tibia and fibula rest upon) and tibia slammed together and the talus cracked. It still hurts.
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Damn! Pretty brutal man.
I broke this ankle years ago so I guess it’s susceptible to rolls. Oddly enough, I can roll my ankle pretty dramatically while hiking and it’s totally fine, just a little one playing ball ruins me though. Luckily, I much prefer hiking haha.
4/3/18
Franken-531 - C1/W1/Squat day 1
Warmup:
Airdyne
Throws
Pullaparts
Stepups
SSB:
45x10
95x5
125x5
145x5
165x12
125x5x10
Palloff press:
5x5
Candlestick raise:
5x5
Circuit 1:
KB reverse lunge - 35x6
Fallout - 33 linksx5
Upper back extension - blackx8
4 or 5 rounds/6 minutes
Circuit 2:
Band GM - greenx10
Band crunch - purplex10
Band curl - blackx10
5 rounds/6 minutes
Airdyne: 5 mins
Was actually cold today so hopped on the Airdyne with a sweatshirt to literally get warm haha.
Palloffs between main work, candesticks with BBB. SSB = jello legs for this guy.
Looking forward to pushing the circuits a little harder next week, I was feeling pretty drained today.
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