DrBdan Presents: Operation Bench Press (2013)

[DrBdan]

Thurs Jan 3, 2013

sleep: 7 hours (12:30am - 7:30am)

Muay Thai

At the beginning of class everyone started skipping early so we did about 15 minutes of skipping. Then followed by the usual assortment of wacky bodyweight exercises.

combo:
- jab, right kick, cross, right knee, right uppercut elbow

We did this combo for a while, then 300 straight punches, back to the combo, 50 jab/cross/body cross/right knee, back to the combo.

Next we did some clinch work. Both partners with gloves, one with a belly pad. The partner with the pad would throw a right hook, other partner would step in and block the hook with the left forearm while grabbing the opponents head with their right hand, giving them inside bicep and head control.

From here we practiced a few things. First we would jerk their head down, shoot our hips back, and throw a straight knee. Next we added turning them and throwing a second knee. After that we practiced a couple throws. First we kneed the inside of their right leg while twisting them to their left and dumping them, second we practiced pulling them to the right by their head while lifting their other arm with the forearm that had inside bicep control while blocking their left leg with your right leg so they fall. The second one was a bit tricky because if you hook the back of their leg it is an illegal trip but if you go shin to shin (or instep to instep) it's completely legal.

For the burnout we divided into 2 groups of 7 pairs. We did 300 straight punches and 50 jab/cross/right kick then quickly switched pads and our partner did the same. Whichever group finished second had to do more burpees. Of course my slow ass was in the losing group so we had to do 55 burpees to the winning groups 50, lol.

My conditioning was weak as expected but at least I didn't feel rusty. It only took a few minutes on the pads to start feeling fairly crisp. I really paced myself but I still feel pretty sore and tired today.

 

[Kinglee]

ROFL @ zebra zombie.

 

[JauntyAngle]

You should join the race between me, ssdd and LZD to bench 100kg for 3. It's been on for maybe a year now, and since it has been on, we've all been going sideways or backward. Someone's probably going to get there maybe mid-2014. When there is a nuclear war and one/all of us are irradiated and start to develop symptoms of Giantism.

It is a pretty exclusive competition, but I reckon ssdd and LZD would allow it.

 

[DrBdan]

ROFL @ zebra zombie.

Ha yeah, I find all the identical avatars a bit confusing sometimes so I thought I'd make mine a bit different.

That sounds cool Jaunty. Is there a thread for it or anything or is it just an informal race?

 

[JauntyAngle]

That sounds cool Jaunty. Is there a thread for it or anything or is it just an informal race?

No thread- it is just a three-way agreement. It doesn't involve much except monitoring each other's benching and occasionally trolling each other when there is some bench progress.

 

[EddieLovesYou]

I recently broke through a plateau by running Smolov Jr. for bench. The recovery wasn't nearly as bad as I thought (was still able to train MMA, BJJ, and striking) and I think one of the benefits from benching so much so often was the form practice. When you're doing > 120 work reps a week you become very familiar with the lift, and you need to eek every bit of efficiency out of the movement just to get through the sets.

 

[DrBdan]

The issue for me with Smolov Jr. is that you need to lift 4 days/week and I know there's no way I would get to the gym regularly on Saturday. I also don't think my shoulders could handle 4 days of benching plus 2 days of Muay Thai. However if/when I take another break from Muay Thai I would consider something with a lot more volume. I've been thinking that I would do a Texas Method setup for bench and mix it with deadlift singles and maybe APRE + one light day for my squat however that's getting ahead of myself.

I forgot to mention that my Muay Thai gym bought some weights over the holidays. They bought a rack that you can bench in and it also has a pulldown pulley but it's not a standard power rack and I'm not sure if you can even squat in it. They only have 2x45, 2x25, 2x10 and 2x5 plates so it's not like you could do any meaningful squatting or deadlifting anyway. On the plus side it did give people a opportunity to show their bro-gym knowledge. Lots of talk about the proper way to bench and the best way to do pulldowns to work your back and bi's at the same time. Anyway...

Fri Jan 4, 2013

C2 rower + dynamic stretching

- Deadlifts
45x10
135x5
135x5
185x3
225x2
275x1
315x1
345x1
375x1
375x1
345x1
315x1

Easy. I considered going heavier but my back feels fried from MT plus I figure I'll be sore tomorrow anyway.

- Strict Press
45x8
65x6
85x5
105x3
125x1
95x5

My form is pretty sloppy on these so 105 and 125 were harder than they should have been. My plan is to do strict press every 4 weeks when I deadlift on Friday (see post 16) so it won't be really getting much work. I figure if I make good progress on my bench there will be some carryover to my press but I don't expect big things.

- Facepulls: 80 reps

 

[DrBdan]

Sun Jan 6, 2013

Hockey
First game after the holidays and I think our opponents suffered from the time off. They are the best defensive team in the league but came out flat and we jumped all over them, jumping out to a 4-0 lead in the first period. They are also the lowest scoring team in the league and only have one offensive threat so once we got a big lead they really had no chance of making the comeback.

In the third period the refs started making some weak penalty calls. At that point I think it was 8-0 for us so I think the refs wanted to give the other team a chance to score. I was given a lame penalty, I had one hand on my stick and when I went for a pokecheck my stick hit the guy's skates and I got called for hooking somehow. It didn't really matter since we had a big lead but I was annoyed because it's my first penalty of the season. I was hoping I could end the season with zero PIM. Oh well, no Lady Byng for me

I had a goal and an assist with the goal being my 50th all-time on this team, woo for me! Our leading scorer Steve had his second 5 point game of the season and is now tied for the league lead in points with 29 in 13 games. He's practically unstoppable given the skill level in our current division.

 

[DrBdan]

Mon Jan 7, 2013

C2 rower, dynamic stretching, DCSW

- DB Bench
17.5x10
25x8

- Bench
45x8
75x6
95x4
115x2
140x2
160x8 (+2 reps, add 2.5 lb)
165x6 (new 6RM)
145x3
145x3
145x3

Felt pretty good. Instead of doing one higher rep backoff set I'm going to do 3 triples with roughly 90% of my top set. This is recommended in the APRE documentation I've read and it also makes sense for my situation because I can make sure they are all good, fast reps.

Chins: 30 reps total.

 

[DrBdan]

I took yesterday off to take my cat to the vet and run a few other errands so I didn't do any conditioning. It was a pretty productive day though. Today was scheduled to be a Muay Thai day at lunch but I felt very unmotivated in the morning so I brought my lifting stuff instead.

Wed Jan 9, 2013

sleep: 7 hours (12:15-7:15)

C2 rower, dynamic stretching, DCSW

- Bench
45x10
75x6
105x4
125x2
145x6
145x6
145x6

My focus today was on keeping my upper back really tight and getting pop from my lats at the bottom of each rep. The first two sets were good but I started losing tightness toward the end of the third set. All sets were easy.

For back work I decided I'm going to run the Armstrong Pull-up program. I figure I'm in a gym 5 days/week and I mostly did rows last year so I can focus on chins/pull-ups this year. My goal will be as the program states: a set of 20 chins. Based on his comments in the PDF I think I can reach it by the end of March.

- Armstrong Chins: Week 1, Day 3
3 reps/set, made all 9 sets. Will move up to sets of 4 tomorrow.

 

[DrBdan]

Thurs Jan 10, 2013

sleep: 6 hours (11:30pm-5:30am). Had to be up early for a doctor's appointment with my wife who had to be at work early hence the early rising.

C2 rower, dynamic stretching

- Squats (5/3/1 Wave 1, Week 1)
45x8
95x5
135x3
175x2
200x5
230x5
260x5

No problem here.

- Armstrong chins: Week 1, Day 4
6 sets of 4 reps. Only made 3 reps on the 7th set so I'll stick with 4 reps for next week.

I was running really late today so I blew through the lifting. I was in the gym for about 40 minutes including changing and showering.

 

[DrBdan]

Fri Jan 11, 2013

Muay Thai

- 5 minutes of skipping: regular, one foot, crossovers, double-unders, high knees

Followed this up with some dynamic stretching.

- Thai bag: 5x3 minute rounds, did a round of punches, then kicks, then 3 rounds of both. Last round all kicks were double kicks. Mostly focused on circling the bag and putting together 3-5 strike combos.

- Heavy bag: 3x3 minute rounds of elbows and knees. I'd throw a few punches then step in with a knee or elbow, throw some knees/elbow, move out etc, occasionally clinching the bag.

Finished with 25 each of jab/cross, left hook, right kick, left kick on the Thai bag, full power.

Quick stretch to finish.

The gym was surprisingly busy, there were about 20 people total doing the class, plus a 5 or 6 people alternating between sparring and bag work, and a few people working pads together.

 

[DrBdan]

Sun Jan 13, 2013

Hockey
We were playing the first place team. The first time we played them we came out flat and they shut down our offence. One of their top players had a hat trick and they won 4-1. The second time we played them they were short players including the hat trick guy and we smashed them 8-3. This week both teams had a pretty full bench so it made for a fun, fast-paced game.

We came out of the gate hard and built up a 4-0 lead by the middle of the second period. They had some good chances but our goalie stoned them. They finally scored a couple late in the second as we slowed down a bit and we ended the period up 4-2. It was pretty even in the third period and we traded 4 goals and back and forth in a two minute stretch making it 6-4.

We made a late push amd got some good chances but their goalie kept them in the game. In our end they had some good chances but we really pulled together, played some solid team defence and got some big saves from our goalie to hang on and win 6-4.

I had a great game scoring two goals including the game winner. I was lagging a bit in the second but got a second wind in the third period and spent a lot of time shadowing their top two players and stopping them from getting any good chances. We played a great game overall and if we keep playing like this we will be hard to beat.

This brings us within 2 points of this team for first place. We play them again in the last game of the season so if we haven't passed them by then that game might be for first place.

 

[Oblivian]

Not enough bench!

 

[guilineseguy]

Sun Jan 13, 2013

Hockey
We were playing the first place team. The first time we played them we came out flat and they shut down our offence. One of their top players had a hat trick and they won 4-1. The second time we played them they were short players including the hat trick guy and we smashed them 8-3. This week both teams had a pretty full bench so it made for a fun, fast-paced game.

We came out of the gate hard and built up a 4-0 lead by the middle of the second period. They had some good chances but our goalie stoned them. They finally scored a couple late in the second as we slowed down a bit and we ended the period up 4-2. It was pretty even in the third period and we traded 4 goals and back and forth in a two minute stretch making it 6-4.

We made a late push amd got some good chances but their goalie kept them in the game. In our end they had some good chances but we really pulled together, played some solid team defence and got some big saves from our goalie to hang on and win 6-4.

I had a great game scoring two goals including the game winner. I was lagging a bit in the second but got a second wind in the third period and spent a lot of time shadowing their top two players and stopping them from getting any good chances. We played a great game overall and if we keep playing like this we will be hard to beat.

This brings us within 2 points of this team for first place. We play them again in the last game of the season so if we haven't passed them by then that game might be for first place.

Nice. I am just starting to get back into watching hockey. My Finnish buddy has been talking about it non stop and I figured why not its a cool sport. Last time I really paid attention, the Detroit Red Wigs were the shit. Hoping they are still awesome.

 

[DrBdan]

Not enough bench!

I'm trying! I'm benching two days/week right now. I might try to figure out how to add a third day.

Nice. I am just starting to get back into watching hockey. My Finnish buddy has been talking about it non stop and I figured why not its a cool sport. Last time I really paid attention, the Detroit Red Wigs were the shit. Hoping they are still awesome.

Hockey is a great sport with lots of action. I don't understand why it isn't more popular. The Wings have been a top team since the mid-90s and did a good job of bringing up prospects like Datsyuk and Zetterberg to replace guys like Yzerman and Shanahan and Nicklas Lidstrom has been a rock on the blueline for them. Lidstrom retired at the end of last season so that leaves a big hole on the blueline. They are still a solid team but I don't think they will be challenging for the Cup any time soon. I think they will have to rebuild in a few years as Datsyuk and Zetterberg get older.

 

[RedRover]

I am a little late to this party but Good Luck on your bench increase, I have a similar issue with strong DL/Sq (~420/~320)
and weak bench ~205lbs.
I have always blamed it on long arms, flat chest and so on. I must admit though it sucks to watch skinny guys who can bench # for # or greater on me(granted they suck at life for lower body strength).

I have solid empathy sir and I will watch you progress and hope to learn something good, bad, or ugly.

 

[Oblivian]

I'm trying! I'm benching two days/week right now. I might try to figure out how to add a third day.

Get on my level brah - 4 days a week.

 

[DrBdan]

I am a little late to this party but Good Luck on your bench increase, I have a similar issue with strong DL/Sq (~420/~320)
and weak bench ~205lbs.
I have always blamed it on long arms, flat chest and so on. I must admit though it sucks to watch skinny guys who can bench # for # or greater on me(granted they suck at life for lower body strength).

I have solid empathy sir and I will watch you progress and hope to learn something good, bad, or ugly.

Thanks for the support! It's a vicious circle: I'm weak so my bench sucks so I don't like benching so I don't work on benching so I stay weak...

Get on my level brah - 4 days a week.

That's a lot of benching. I'll have to drop by your log and see what you are doing.

 

[DrBdan]

Mon Jan 14, 2013

C2 rower, dynamic stretching, DCSW

- Bench
45x10
75x6
105x4
125x2
145x2
162x8 (+2 reps, add 2.5 lb)
165x6 (new 6RM)
145x3
145x3
145x3

I tried to concentrate on pushing my feet into the ground and I felt like my upper back wasn't tight enough on the work sets but 162x8 was pretty easy, I probably had a 9th rep in me. The triples at 145 I really concentrated on upper back tightness and they were better.

- Armstring Chins: Week 2, Day1
5 max effort sets: 9/7/3/3/2