Witty Title No.69

Training Logs
21

[quote]tredaway wrote:
Is the 8x3 for assistance in the Wendler books or is it something that you’ve come up with yourself as I don’t remember reading that in the books ?[/quote]

It’s definitely not something Wendler recommends, although I guess it falls within the rule of 50. Back in the day, I used to do one day a week of 5/3/1 sets with assistance and another day of working up to a 3RM, which was a weight that was heavy but not so heavy I risked failing since I train without spotters or catcher bars or whatever. This turned into 8 x 3 after reading the Waterbury Method and it stuck. I’ve had success with it in the past so I’m hoping to do the same again.

22

[quote]ActivitiesGuy wrote:

[quote]dagill2 wrote:
So a quick summary of my current training and goals:

Goals:
Lifts:
500/400/300 powerlifts by 30
1000lbs total by 29 (early September)

Physique:
200lbs by 30
15% bodyfat by 30 (by my, extremely, inaccurate bodyfat scales)
[/quote]

Might I venture to ask:

  1. Where you stand now relative to these goals? I can infer that with your powerlifts, I suppose, but the BW/BF…are you:

a) heavier and fatter
b) lighter and fatter
c) heavier and…wait, never mind, I assume it’s A or B

  1. A brief training history. Just curious. I am a believer in some degree of muscle memory with the big lifts, and expect that someone like me (an ex-FB player with a bit of PL history) getting back into lifting would have an easier time pushing towards the round numbers you’ve outlined than someone who has less of that history.[/quote]

I’m looking to simply add weight in the short term. It’s been several weeks since I weighed myself for whatever reason but last I checked I was around the 186lb mark. I am also marginally fatter than my fairly modest 15% goal. My big goal short term is the strength though, as you’ll see below, strength on the powerlifts has always been something I’ve been lacking so that’s priority numero uno.

My training history is very patchy. I started climbing from a young age but never played any other (real) sports to a competitive level (cricket doesn’t count). At my climbing peak I weighed about 140lbs and would easily climb even the smallest campus boards with 100lb belay bags attached to me and knock out 30 pull ups without batting an eyelid. Because of this, I had abs of steal and popeye fore arms but the rest of me looked like a famine victim so I started going to the gym to try and counteract this.

Being a teenage boy I forget I had legs and started doing a crazy volume curls and chest press “routine”, which never the less gave me some pretty good results. I worked up to about 175lbs of muscle and moved some ok weight on the machines I was using.

Then drinking uni happened and I suddenly woke up at ~24 and realised I had a 40" waist and was so weak I could barely do a pull-up or squat the bar 10 times. I slowly lost the weight and started lifting following progressively more sensible approaches until we get here. It’s been a long, long road back and even longer before I reach any kind of decent levels of strength or size.

23

[quote]dagill2 wrote:

[quote]tredaway wrote:
Is the 8x3 for assistance in the Wendler books or is it something that you’ve come up with yourself as I don’t remember reading that in the books ?[/quote]

It’s definitely not something Wendler recommends, although I guess it falls within the rule of 50. Back in the day, I used to do one day a week of 5/3/1 sets with assistance and another day of working up to a 3RM, which was a weight that was heavy but not so heavy I risked failing since I train without spotters or catcher bars or whatever. This turned into 8 x 3 after reading the Waterbury Method and it stuck. I’ve had success with it in the past so I’m hoping to do the same again.[/quote]

That sounds interesting…does that mean you would train each lift twice a week… what was the basic template ?

24

[quote]tredaway wrote:

[quote]dagill2 wrote:

[quote]tredaway wrote:
Is the 8x3 for assistance in the Wendler books or is it something that you’ve come up with yourself as I don’t remember reading that in the books ?[/quote]

It’s definitely not something Wendler recommends, although I guess it falls within the rule of 50. Back in the day, I used to do one day a week of 5/3/1 sets with assistance and another day of working up to a 3RM, which was a weight that was heavy but not so heavy I risked failing since I train without spotters or catcher bars or whatever. This turned into 8 x 3 after reading the Waterbury Method and it stuck. I’ve had success with it in the past so I’m hoping to do the same again.[/quote]

That sounds interesting…does that mean you would train each lift twice a week… what was the basic template ?
[/quote]

This is just something I’ve tried for bench, I’ve never tried it for anything else. My recipe for bench pre-injury was:

5/3/1 sets once a week, plus some higher volume work after which I’d make up on the fly, often 5 x 10. Then on another day, usually OHP day, I’d do 8 x 3 at ~80%. This was good to get my 5/3/1 TM up to 110kg, estimated max was about 120 from memory. While this is far from an impressive number, I’ll be very happy to get back there so I can start pushing for some real numbers.

25

Just to make sure I’ve got it correct you would do 8x3 with around 80% on OHP day rather than work up to a 3 rep max ?

26

Deadlift day, 5/3/1 week, last workout before deload.

warm up set: I did some
plus set: 147.5kg x 8

Decided, since it’s the last workout before I take a week off (everythings starting to click and ache) so I’d hit deadlifts hard.

150kg x 1
160kg x 1
160kg x 3 (aiming to equal Kleinhound from his log)

then 130kg x 3 EMOM for 10mins.

5mins of floor push aways. I’m really not fit.

27

[quote]tredaway wrote:
Just to make sure I’ve got it correct you would do 8x3 with around 80% on OHP day rather than work up to a 3 rep max ?[/quote]

You could do either, I’ve had success with both.

28

I’m not looking to change anything on my current program but it’s definitely something I might try out in the future…thanks for the tip :slight_smile:

29

Good luck with your current program it looks like it’s going well.

30

Thanks man, always good for the support.

31

Start of an easy week to give my joints a rest and to throw some ideas around for my next 6 week cycle. Lower back is still pretty DOMS-ey (that’s a real word, right?) from stupid volume of deadlifts on Saturday so I ditched the complex I had planned and took a leaf from Activities Guy.

~1km walk with 20kg dB overhead. Broken down into 10lap (~200m) sections, last lap was 5laps and 5 laps for symmetry reasons. My left shoulder is already noticeably weaker than my right and I don’t want to make it worse.

then: 5 laps with each shoulder of “viking salute walks” with 20kg. My new favourite exercise.

Lastly: one set of 50 20kg dB snatches with each hand. No reason for this, other than waiting for a pan to boil.

Also trialing a high frequency push-up program similar to the NASA push-up program detailed in Beyond Bodybuilding to see realistic it is to fit into my life. So far the biggest challenge will be keeping track of the number of sets I’ve done. Potentially a counter app on my phone will help with this.

32

Quick calisthenics day today:
1-2-3-4-5 pull-up ladders supersetted with:
5-10-15-20-25 press ups and sit ups.

ie. 1 pull up then 5 press ups then 5 sit ups, 2 pull ups etc.

5 rounds

Starting to get some ideas for my next training block. The major focus will be on the big 3 since this will be my last training block before I turn 29 and the last push for my 1,000lb target. Since my current estimated maxes are still 45kg short of this total, I am aware that I’m likely to need something magical over the next 6 weeks.

Anyway, these are my thoughts:

Squats:
My squat sucks serious donkey balls so that needs to be the biggest focus. My plan is:
5/3/1 squat with FSL
Anderson squats with 130kg, 25 reps in as few sets as possible, starting from lower than my last cycle.
ABS. Todays workout has shown me that my abs are weaker than I thought so I need to actually start doing some. Twice a week on lower body days, probably ab wheel one day and “something else” on another.
Front Squats: It feels like tightness is my big issue in the squat, rather than leg strength so heavy front squats should help fix this. Plus, I avoid these because they suck which is usually a good sign I should be doing them. 25 reps, trying to decrease the number of sets.

Bench:
My bench approach has been detailed above. Assistance will be mostly based around shoulder health, plus a higher rep set of clap pushups.

Deadlift:
I’m fairly happy with my deadlift progress, but I need all the help I can get so I think I’ll continue with 5/3/1 without pushing the plus sets then follow it with ROM progression sets at 5 x 3 at 160kg since it worked so well last time.

33

What this looks like:

Squat day:
5/3/1 FSL
Anderson squats
Loaded carry of some sort
Abs

Bench Press:
5/3/1
8 x 3 bench
single dB Clean and Press, 25 reps
lots of pull-ups (1-2-3-4-5 ladders)

Deadlift:
5/3/1, no plus sets
ROM progression
Farmers walks
ab wheel work

OHP day:
5/3/1 OHP FSL
Bench 8 x 3
BTN press 25 reps
shoulder bodybuilder work
weighted pull-ups, 25 reps

cardio:
2 x per week.

34

Looks like you have a pretty sound plan for your 5/3/1 setup. Just speaking from my own experience with 5/3/1 and Squat struggles (post hip injury), Spinal Tap from Beyond 5/3/1 has been a pretty big help in terms of Bench Press and Squats. Because you are doing an entire cycle of 5/3/1 in one workout and increasing your Training Max every week you get plenty of volume with heavier weights. I was doing FSL with Back Squats and Front Squats and didn’t feel like I was getting anything out of it as far as getting my Squat stronger. I got better at Front Squatting but with long legs at 6’4" the Low Bar Back Squat isn’t very fun but it’s better than it was since I’m getting the extra volume at heavier weights. I have also enjoyed doing Spinal Tap with OH Press and Deadlifts but I feel as if I’ve seen the biggest improvements in my Squat and Bench Press which are two lifts I struggle with the most.

My goals are similar to yours in getting the 300/400/500 mark with Bench, Squat and Deadlift. I’m close to the 300 with bench and 500 with deadlift but since I started back squatting again several weeks ago I am behind a good bit on squats and about 20 pounds from the 225 OH Press. Good luck to you and will be following along.

35

How are you looking at set/rep/progression with the Anderson squats and deadlift ROM progression?

EDIT: nevermind. I suck at reading.

But why those weights for the Anderson squats and deadlift ROM stuff?

36

As someone who avoided ab work for years, the best thing I did was put them in the middle of my routine or superset them with other movements.

When you put abs at the end of a hard training day, they have a tendency to magically vanish from the program. You finish up a ballbuster set of squats and say “I’ll skip abs today, I’m short on time and that probably hit them hard.”

Putting them in the middle of the program is like forcing a kid to eat their veggies before dessert. You’ll get it over with to get to the good stuff, and no matter how short you’re running on time, you NEVER skip dessert.

It’s also something of a governor on heavy training by going into heavy work with a fatigued core. You’ll still be able to blast your legs, but you won’t be able to use stupid heavy weight.

37

Hola,

I was wondering the same thing as LoRez, as I’m looking to program heavy partials in a later cycle but find that I tend to overdo things if they’re not planned properly. Are you using or did you start with certain percentages of your training max?

38

Just saw your post in my log. Didn’t want to overstep in my initial comment regarding ab work, but with your solicitation I’ll give you my perspective.

RE bench: I feel like you’re doing too much actual pressing in this correct workout and not enough assistance work. You’re doing 6 (what I assume to be) full ROM pressing movements in 1 week between 2 days, with minimal angle change (it’s either completely horizontal or completely vertical). For me, I’d fry out on that pretty quick (and I have done so in the past when I tried).

I would consider either eliminating the 8x3 bench on bench day, utilizing FSL if you want more volume, and spending some time on that day doing some tricep and bicep assistance work. You might also make the dumbbell work a push press rather than a strict press, in order to give your shoulder a slight break from pressing a dead weight so often. OR, instead, on OHP day you could switch out the 8x3 bench with some incline work, cut out the BTN press and make that a very much “bodybuilder” day with shoulders, triceps and biceps.

Also, on one of your upperbody days, I’d de-emphasize pull ups and put in some sort of row.

And, of course, my recommendation to chase everything with a set of band pull aparts. If that’s no viable, I like to do them at the end of the day before bed (100-200 reps).

RE Squat: I think your decision to train your abs is good. I’d also recommend doing some direct lower back training as well, to get the “whole core”. It made a huge difference in my life once I started training my lowerback. A reverse hyper is worth it’s weight in gold, but I realize most folks don’t have access to one. Do you have a normal hyperextension bench? That’s at least something. I’d probably remove one of the loaded carries and swap it out with direct lower back work.

On a personal note as well, I do much better doing my AMRAP sets at the very end of my workout, so that might be something to consider with the squat day for the FSL. Really allows you to give it your all.

I’ll give it a little more of a look over to see if there is anything I’d change otherwise.

39

[quote]LoRez wrote:
How are you looking at set/rep/progression with the Anderson squats and deadlift ROM progression?

EDIT: nevermind. I suck at reading.

But why those weights for the Anderson squats and deadlift ROM stuff?[/quote]

For Anderson squats, I literally just added 100lbs to my TM at the time and rounded slightly to make it easy to set up.

For deadlift, I chose that weight because it’s about my 3RM and that’s the approach that worked for me last time I ran the progression earlier this year.

I wish there was more complicated or smart reasons for this but there just isn’t.

40

[quote]jblues85 wrote:
Looks like you have a pretty sound plan for your 5/3/1 setup. Just speaking from my own experience with 5/3/1 and Squat struggles (post hip injury), Spinal Tap from Beyond 5/3/1 has been a pretty big help in terms of Bench Press and Squats. Because you are doing an entire cycle of 5/3/1 in one workout and increasing your Training Max every week you get plenty of volume with heavier weights. I was doing FSL with Back Squats and Front Squats and didn’t feel like I was getting anything out of it as far as getting my Squat stronger. I got better at Front Squatting but with long legs at 6’4" the Low Bar Back Squat isn’t very fun but it’s better than it was since I’m getting the extra volume at heavier weights. I have also enjoyed doing Spinal Tap with OH Press and Deadlifts but I feel as if I’ve seen the biggest improvements in my Squat and Bench Press which are two lifts I struggle with the most.

My goals are similar to yours in getting the 300/400/500 mark with Bench, Squat and Deadlift. I’m close to the 300 with bench and 500 with deadlift but since I started back squatting again several weeks ago I am behind a good bit on squats and about 20 pounds from the 225 OH Press. Good luck to you and will be following along. [/quote]

Thanks man, I’ll have a look at the Spinal tap training.