Efforts of an Aging Ectomorph (lifting)

02/08/2007:
Warmup: Rowing machine for 10 minutes @ resistance 4 @ c. 25 strokes/minute

Deadlift: 135x14, 235x8, 235x6 (regrip), 235x1, fail on attempt at 8th rep. Tore a chunck of callous off, too. Crap.

Pullups: 5, 4

High Pull: 95x8 (got a bit light-headed), 95x7 (felt like my shoulders were the weak link here)

BB Bent-over row: 90x9, 90x8

Straight-Backed, Straight-Leg Deadlift: 90x5

Incline Twist Situps (@2): 21

Straight-Backed, Straight-Leg Deadlift: 70x10 (looks like 80 might be the proper starting weight for this one :))

Incline Twist Situps (@2): 18

Total Lift time: 60 minutes
Cool down: Arc Trainer for 20 minutes at 20 resistance at 130 strides/minute
Bodyweight: 200

Notes:
Swapped out stiff-legged DL's for SBSLDL's, and rearranged the order of the assistance exercies to put the isolation exercise at the end of the line where it belongs. My hamstrings are feeling appropriately beaten this morning, though my lower back isn't as stiff as it usually is after a deadlift day. Sigh. The search for the perfect set of assistance lifts continues....

Today's gym oddity: a guy doing pullups with a spotter. Odder yet was said spotter jumping in to help for a couple of forced reps at the end of the set. To each his own and all, but man, that looked just wrong.
 
Stonebreaker said:
Tore a chunk of callous off, too. Crap.
Click to expand...

That's just great, isn't it? :icon_chee

Luckily, I've only done that once, but it sucked there for a whole month with every pulling move.
 
Eh. It was just a little bitty chunk of callous, I just had a stinging spot on my hand for the rest of the workout. I think that Lusst currently holds the S&P record for biggest hunk of skin ripped off during a lift.
 
02/09/2007
Recumbent bike: 5 minute warmup, 3:1 HIIT for all of 16 minutes, 10 minute cool down.

Still trying to find the right resistence for this, I think. After those 16 minutes, my legs were burning like hellfire, but I wasn't all that out of breath. I'll keep fiddling with the resistence until I find the spot where I can put some serious strain on my heart and lungs without just burning out my legs.
 
02/10/2007:
Warmup: Arc trainer for 10 minutes @ resistance 20 @ c. 130 strides/minute

Bench Press: 85x14, 155x8, 155x8

Standing Overhead Press: 70x9, 70x8

Incline Bench Press: 115x7, 115x8

Dips: 6, 4

DB Lateral Raise: 15'sx8, 15'sx7

Wrist Roller (Extension): 10x1

Wrist Roller (Flexion): 15x1

Wrist Roller (Extension): 10x1 (not as good as first "set", but still okay)

Wrist Roller (Flexion): 15x0 3/4's if you're feeling generous. Ascent was painful, descent burned like crazy. My forearms and shoulders decided more or less at the same time to give up. Eh.

Total Lift time: 61 minutes
Cool down: Arc trainer for 20 minutes at 25 resistance at c. 120 strides/minute
Bodyweight: 202

Notes:
I tried keeping my elbows "tucked" for the warmup and first set on the flat bench today. It felt odd, like I my arms weren't really directly under the bar, but that probably means that I just need to rewatch and reread until I get the change in form right. The bar kept drifting "upwards" on the last few reps, and I did the second set with the usual "elbows flared" form. Didn't feel any easier or harder, really, just different. The consensus seems to be that keeping the elbows tucked takes some strain off of the shoulders; I've never had any real shoulder trouble, but I'd kind of like to keep it that way, too. Will keep tinkering with it and see how it goes.

Don't normally lift on Saturdays, but I wanted to try to make up for not making it to the gym on Tuesday. Don't normally lift on back-to-back days, either, but today's workout went fine, really. The real question will be how squatting will go tomorrow morning.
 
02/11/2007:
Warmup: Arc Trainer: 10 minutes @ resistance 20 @ c. 130 strides/minute

Full Squat: 80x14; 150x6 , 150x6 (got to be a real struggle for the last two reps, but my form held up relatively well. I have "Hell Yeah!" written in the margin of my notebook, so I will repeat it here. :))

OH Squat: 95x8; 95x3 (fall on ass ), 95x2 (fall on ass again, done).

DB Lunges: 35'sx8 , 35'sx7 (I knew on the first rep of the second set that I wasn't going to make it to 8. I'm pretty happy with hitting seven at that point).

Seated Calf Raise: 165x6, 160x7

Leg Extensions: 100x7, 100x7

Hanging Leg-Hip Raise: 7, 5

Total lift time: 59 minutes
Cool-down: Skipped.
Bodyweight: 201

Notes:
Annoyed that my OHS sets are still getting broken up by losing my balance at the bottom, but practice, I suppose, will get me closer to perfection. My workout was cut short by having to attend a friends' baby shower that afternoon, but the lack of a cool-down fortunately hasn't left me a DOMS-crippled wreck today. Benching and squatting on back-to-back days worked okay, it seems, though on Sunday night the only part of me that wasn't sore or too tired to move was a medium-sized section of my upper back. I don't think I'll be doing it again soon, but it's good to know that I can use Saturday as a makeup day in my regular schedule if I have to.
 
02/13/2007:
Today's regularly-scheduled bench pressing day was cancelled on account of snow. Sound like a lame excuse? I agree: it was the damned gym that didn't like the weather and closed up. I was so happy for a moment when I got there and saw that there were only a couple of cars in the parking lot... oh well.

Replacement exercise was shovel drivewayx1 and spread de-icer on drivewayx1. Looks like I'll be doing the Saturday/Sunday Bench/Squat thing again this week.
 
Zerocrew1984 said:
235x8, 235x6??? whoa nice weight bud!
Click to expand...

*scratches head*

Is that sarcasm, or did you not notice that those are deadlift numbers?

Edit: Just checked your deadlift numbers in your log and Strongest Man entry, Zerocrew. Your DL PR is only a little shy of mine, and the only lift I'm leading you on. I won't try to sell you on the efficacy of the high-rep to low-rep scheme I'm using because I don't know for myself how effective it really is, but that 2x235x8 is almost certainly something you can do. It was my grip that crapped out on me there, not my legs or back.
 
no sarcasm. i've seen your DL max and i thought that was alot of weight to be repping on. that would be a tough workout for me! my max is 315(DL)
 
02/15/2007:
Warmup: Rowing machine for 10 minutes @ resistance 10 @ c. 25 strokes/minute

Deadlift: 135x14, 255x6, 255x6 (1st rep of 2nd set sucked, I struggled getting it up off the ground. Think I might have started with my hips too low. Also scraped a patch of skin off of my shin).

Pullups: 5, 5

High Pull: 95x8 (got light-headed again, this might just come with the territory on these), 105x7 (again feeling weakest in the shoulders, particularly the right one)

BB Bent-over row: 90x9, 90x9

Straight-Backed, Straight-Leg Deadlift: 80x7, 80x7

Incline Twist Situps (@2): 24

45-degree plate-loaded calf-raise*: 320x9

Incline Twist Situps (@2): 18

Total Lift time: 70 minutes
Cool down: TB Eliptical for 20 minutes at resistance 5 at 115 strides/minute
Bodyweight: 202

Notes:
Today went pretty well, I think. I hit most of my rep goals, and it looks like it's time to increase weight on some of the assistance exercises. I'm going to be cutting about 200 calories/day out of my diet: my weight has been slowly but steadily increasing, but it's looking like too much of it is going towards by little Liddell-belly. If I'm steadily putting on fat, I'm thinking that my muscles are getting what they need, and I can probably trim back a bit without inhibiting whatever muscle growth I might be earning here.

*This isn't a machine that I'd used before, but today was one of the rare weekdays when my wife and I were working out at the same time. She had 320 on the machine and cranked out a set of 12. I tried it, and managed 9. She then loaded the little thing with as much as it would hold (450) and did a set of 8. I told her that she's going to have to find a different machine to work with. :)

I also hereby acknowledge that my wife's calves are significantly stronger than my own, both on a pound-for-pound and absolute basis. I strongly suspect that holds true for her legs in general, but I won't know that for sure until I get her into a squat rack.

MMA Notes: Today's workout was partially fueled by annoyance that A) Yves Edwards had a fight that I wasn't able to watch "live" and B) he dropped a decision to a man he could (should?) have beaten. This does not make me happy. I don't know what has to be more frustrating for the man: the fact that he's lost four of his last five, or the fact that a man that he's edged out twice is getting a shot at the UFC LW belt and he's not even really in the picture any more. Either way, WAR EDWARDS. You fight, I'll cheer. Simple as that.
 
02/16/2007:
Cardio on the recumbent bike again: 5 minute warmup, 21 minutes at 2:1 high-intensity intervals, 10 minute cool down.

Reading up what I can in the conditioning forum. The running-based conditioning article linked in their sticky seems almost too easy/good to be true. Will wait for confirmation from someone who's been doing it before I accept that less than ten minutes of sprinting and jogging, twice a week, is going to have a noticable effect on my body-fat percentage.
 
02/17/2007:
Warmup: Arc trainer for 10 minutes @ resistance 20 @ c. 130 strides/minute

Bench Press: 85x14 (elbows tucked, back arched), 165x6 (tucked/arched), 165x6 (flared/flat, 1 sec. pause at the bottom)

Standing Overhead Press: 80x7, 80x6

Dips: 7, 5

Incline Bench Press: 115x6, 115x6 (very nearly seven: I couldn't lock it out, but managed to wrestle the bar back up onto the rack)

DB Lateral Raise: 15'sx9, 15'sx8

Wrist Roller (Extension): 10x1

Wrist Roller (Flexion): 15x1

Wrist Roller (Extension): 10x1 (slow but okay)

Wrist Roller (Flexion): 15x1

Total Lift time: 62 minutes
Cool down: Arc trainer for 20 minutes at 20 resistance at c. 120 strides/minute
Bodyweight: 201

Notes:
Not much going on; missed benching on Tuesday on account of snow, and squeezed in a "make up" day today.

The last time I weighed in at less than 200 pounds was more than two weeks ago, and I'm removing "scrawny" from my signature line accordingly. I wish I was a bit happier about reaching one of my goals, but I think that knowing that my body-fat percentage is higher than I'm willing to acccept long-term is detracting from it. I don't think it's that much of a belly, but it's what's putting me up over the 200-pound mark, and once I trim back down, I'll still make Kendall Grove look like Mark Kerr. Bah. If I cut the fat and drop below 200 as a result, maybe I'll put "scrawny" back on there. We shall see.
 
02/18/2007:
Warmup: Arc Trainer: 10 minutes @ resistance 20 @ c. 120 strides/minute

Full Squat: 80x14; 140x6, 205x1 (10lb PR), 215x0, 215x0

PL Squat (surely, I thought, I can do a little more weight with a PL squat than I can going ass-to-ankles. Wrong.): 45 (bar) x 10, 215x0, 215x0

OH Squat: 95x8; 125x0, 125x0, 125x0 (couldn't press the bar into position overhead) (incredibly tired at this point, legs are done; no more compound lifts for today)

Seated Calf Raise: 165x7, 165x5

Leg Extensions: 100x5

Hanging Leg-Hip Raise: 7

Leg Extensions: 100x6

Hanging Leg-Hip Raise: 4 (started swinging a lot all of a sudden; need to stay controlled & slow on descent)

Total lift time: 76 minutes
Cool-down: Skipped.
Bodyweight: 199

Notes:
Okay, this week marks a planned deviation from The Plan as it was originally written. On my first run through the two-month cycle, I found that the second (low-rep) half seemed way too easy: I was going well over the target reps/weights I'd plotted out at the beginning, and wound up adding weight more or less at random to try to keep the number of reps where they should have been. Two possible explanations occured to me: either I had gained some measurable strength in the first month of the program, leaving the weight plotted at the beginning a little lighter than it should be, or that the program's weight/rep recomendations are a bit off. To try to test these theories, I've added a "Week 4.5" to retest my 1RM's and will adjust my targets for weeks 5-8 accordingly to see how that goes.

That said, today sucked.

My full-squat is keeping pace with my growing bodyweight, and that's the only good news I found. I might well have been able to do a bit more weight with the PL squat, but I think I was hampered by the fact that I don't use that from very often, and that I'd already beaten the hell out of my legs by the time I tried them. Trying to max out on my OH squat also failed, as I couldn't manage to press the damn bar up overhead.

I've decided that the worst thing about a failed squat is that there doesn't seem to be a good way to reset for another attempt. The bar is sitting on the pins in the power rack, and I've just proven that I'm incapable of getting it back up on to the hooks on my own. Nothing like following up failure with the tedium of taking the weights off, putting the bar back up on the hooks, and then putting the weights back on to crush any vestige of joy I might once have had in my heart.

Can't wait to see how the rest of this week goes....
 
02/20/2007:
Warmup: Arc trainer for 10 minutes @ resistance 20 @ c. 130 strides/minute

Bench Press: 85x14 (back arched, elbows tucked), 155x6 (arched/tucked), 215x0 (a/t), 215x0 (back flat, elbows flared), 215x0 (flat/flared)

Standing Overhead Press: 90x6, 115x1, 125x0

Dips: 8, 5

Incline Bench Press: 115x7, 115x5

DB Lateral Raise: 15'sx9, 15'sx8

Wrist Roller (Extension): 12.5x1 (slow)

Wrist Roller (Flexion): 15x1

Wrist Roller (Extension): 12.5x.25 (got it about halfway up before my forearms crapped out. Not good)

Wrist Roller (Flexion): 15x1 (poor descent due to shot extensors, but otherwise okay)

Total Lift time: 68 minutes
Cool down: Row machine for 15 minutes at 10 resistance at c. 22 strokes/minute
Bodyweight: 201

Notes:
The word for the day is "disappointment."

I really thought I'd be hitting a bench PR today. Of the three main lifts, it had been the bench where the goal weight/rep combinations had seemed too easy. The last couple of weeks I'd been adding weight above my original projected goals simply because the original projections were going up too easily. I'd hoped that meant that my max bench had increased, but the answer, today at least, appears to be "no." Looks like I'll be sticking to my original projections and seeing if the low-rep/high-weight portion of the cycle evens things out any. I'll use the time to concentrate on getting the arched/flared form down (Monger sold me on it back in the S&P forum proper) and just go from there. Damn it.

The only bit of a bright spot was finding that my SOHP 1RM was higher than I thought it would be. In retrospect, I'd based my expectations on an 8RM that presupposed that I'd already tired out my arms and shoulders on the bench and thus had probably expected too little from myself, but I'll take what silver lining I can from today's cloud.
 
02/21/2007:
Recumbent bike cardio: 5 minute warmup, 15:60 HIIT x6, 10 minute cooldown.

New cardio plan is the 'interval running' scheme from the sticky over in the Conditioning forum. It will take some tinkering to get the resistance on an antiquated recumbent bike to mimic the effort of a sprint on a track, heck, I don't know if this program CAN be adapted to a bike, but I'll see what I can do. In the end, there are two nights a week that I can consistently get some cardio in, and that recumbent bike is essentially all I have available to me on those nights. We make do with what we have.
 
02/22/2007:
Warmup: Arc trainer for 10 minutes @ resistance 20 @ c. 120 strides/minute

Deadlift: 135x14, 235x6, 355x1 (+20 PR), 375x0 (didn't even budge it), 375x0 (don't know why I thought I'd have more luck that time, but it still didn't move. I turned a neat shade of red, though).

Pullups: 5, 3 (a longer rest interval would have been a good idea here)

High Pull: 125x.9 (got it to about collar-bone height), 125x.85 (not quite so high, decided to quit trying for a 1RM), 100x8 (still feeling it most in the shoulders, still getting a bit lightheaded)

BB Bent-over row: 100x7, 100x6

Straight-Backed, Straight-Leg Deadlift: 80x7

Incline Twist Situps (@2): 20

SBSLDL: 80x6

Incline Twist Situps (@2): 16

Total Lift time: 55 minutes
Cool down: TB Eliptical for 20 minutes at resistance 7 at 115 strides/minute
Bodyweight: 202

Notes:
Any day with a new PR in it can't be that bad, can it? It wasn't great (I thought I could have done a bit more when I first pulled 335), but it's still the heaviest thing I've ever lifted. The "Week 4.5" experiment is halfway done; I'll adjust my goals for the next month for the newly established 1RM's and see how it goes.
 
i have yet to finish the couch to 5k program(listed in the stickies(conditioning) but thats my fault and not the program and i suck at running but that program is the best ive ever done and i'm going to start it again soon! it actually made me feel good about my running "abilities"
 
02/23/2007:
Recumbent bike: 5 minute warmup, six reps of 15:60 "sprint":"jog", 10 minute cool down.

Monkeying with the resistence on the bike as well as my foot speed to best replicate a real sprint. I've got the time to get it right if it can be done at all....
 
02/25/2007:
Warmup: Arc Trainer: 10 minutes @ resistance 20 @ c. 130 strides/minute

Full Squat: 85x14; 165x5 (sloppy form and a bent waist on the last rep), 165x4 (failed on 5)

OH Squat: 115x3 (fail on 4), 95x8

DB Lunges: 35'sx8, 35'sx7 (still need to smooth out my form here, too. I'm getting a bit wobbly as my legs wear out)

Seated Calf Raise: 165x8, 165x6

Leg Extensions: 100x6

Hanging Leg-Hip Raise: 5

Leg Extensions: 100x9 (had a longer than usual rest interval before this, I think)

Hanging Leg-Hip Raise: 6

Total lift time: 61 minutes
Cool-down: Arc trainer for 20 minutes at 20 resistence at c.110 strides/minute
Stretch: 10 minutes
Bodyweight: 200

Notes:
SmashiusClay said:
Quit cryin, start lifting. The cure for the poor squat blues is to go squat more.
Click to expand...

What the hell do you think I've been doing every damned Sunday? The squat is improving, but I have a decade of worrying about my knees and neglecting my legs to catch up on, here. Grumble grumble grumble....

The workout wasn't bad, but I'm really irked at missing the last rep on the squats. It's the main lift, damn it, that's what I was there to do today. Bah.

Tried upping the weight on the OH squat, reasoning that it wasn't my legs holding me back on these, it's questionable balance and concentration. Turns out that I was only partially correct: my shoulders and wrists were not especially happy with the sudden jump to 115. I guess I'll continue slowing increasing the weight after all.

MMA Notes: I wasn't originally going to watch Pride 33 live, and I am now very, very happy that I did. I posted all of my thoughts over in S&P's thread on the subject. Great fights make me a happy man.
 
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