Come Back Crying (P4C5A1D)

UD2 kicks my ass. I just do not have the balls for it.

So I’m going back to the lofty realm of cheesecake and BBQ ribs that is LeanGains. Also less volume work. Today was my last day of volume work. It’s fun, but, I really have no use for the pump.

Heh.

So I went back to my old A1B1 routine, starting with A1 today. Chest/tricep day. Monday. Fuck that worked out horribly.

Not really. I came in early. I finished the heavy portion of this day looong before the benchbros. came to town. I finished up entirely around the same time that Ken11 did. I don’t know if I’ve talked about Ken before or not (I know I’ve cited him as one of the strongest people in my gym) but today we’re christening him because I accurately determined his bodyfat percentage. Woot.

Workout for July 12, 2010

Bench Press

1. 45lbs x 5
2. 60 x 3
3. 80 x 2
4. 100 x 3 ~ increase
5. 90 x 6 ~ increase

This felt really good, honestly. I’m flirting with the idea of increasing the top set by ten pounds instead of five next workout.

Incline Bench

1. 55lbs x 3
2. 70 x 2
3. 90 x 6 ~ increase

This I’ll probably still only bump by five. Too much shoulders, though I found out I can use my legs to help me get to the low pins (failed my seventh rep…)

Horizontal Press, Hammer Grip

1. 65lbs x 3
2. 85 x 2
3. 110 x 1 ~ Actually failed the first attempt but refused to mark down a zero…

I’m ditching these. The machine’s starting to hurt my wrists because of the awkward angle of them to the grips. I could probably fix this. And I am, by switching to close-grip benching.

Pushdown

1. 42.5lbs. x 3
2. 47.5 x 2
3. 52.5 x 5 ~ INCREASE!

Gosh. I almost didn’t EXCITED over this because of the Ryan Reynoldsalike Douchebag who spit LORDLY GOBS OF PHELGM into the water fountain. I wanted to see him fail his 315lbs bench. I didn’t see it from here.

In retrospect: FUCK YEAH! That much closer to lifting the whole stack, HAHAHAHA!

Asschin ~ bodyweight 171.5

1. 51.5lbs x 5
2. 76.5 x 3
3. 101.5 x 2
4. 126.5 x 4 ~ Increase.
5. 61.5 x 6 (misread my log and set the pins to the weight I intended to lift rather than the proper offset, I’m not counting either drop set today)
6. 96.5 x 6

I’ve basically decided that, for top sets, 3-5 will be the rep range of increase. If I get at least three reps at a given weight, I’ll increase it next workout.

Cable Twists

1. 30lbs x 5
2. 40 x 3
3. 60 x 2
4. 80 x 5

Not doing drop sets on core work of any kind.

Weight (preworkout): 169.5
Body Fat %: 17.1%

This is bad. I haven’t been able to properly keep a lid on my appetite following the refeed. I’m going back to UD2, with cardio on off-days to help with the deficit I’m behaviorally incapable of properly achieving through diet.

Start: 10:20AM
Finish: 11:48AM

I took about a half hour break to rest and reflect on my approach (yes, again, another post on planning coming up. Sorry I suck at adhering.) before returning to the floor to do volume-centric work. I cut out some sets based upon the above workout as well. This was from my INTENDED UD2 depletion workout, and I only managed to get one round in before I checked time and blood to decided to do some cardio. Here we go.

Superset: Leg Extension / Leg Curl: 3 x 15 @ 30lbs / 25lbs

Cable Rows: 3 x 15 @ 45lbs

Superset: Lateral Raise / Calf Raise: 3 x 15 @ 30lbs / 45lbs

Dumbbell Curls: 2 x 15 @ 8lbs (no rest, alternating arms)

Pushdown: 2 x 15 @ 27.5lbs (probably should have just skipped these, but I had planned to do the ENTIRE depletion workout, and I cut the extra sets from the back-end.)

Cable Twist: 3 x 15 @ 30lbs (I almost just skipped them because somebody had the pulleys, but he was all “Nah man! I only have one more set on each one!” so I hung out.)

For the single-exercise portions I just waited 2 minutes straight between sets. On the supersets, I did the first exercise, started my timer, walked over and did the second exercise, walked back, and waited for the timer to hit 2 minutes before I did the next set of the first exercise. Seemed to be the least-bothersome way of organizing the rest periods, to me.

Start: 12:35PM
Finish: 1:30PM

I didn’t check time as to when I did the cardio. I think it was around 1:40PM after I called my dad to secure a ride home (I would otherwise be stuck until 7PM, and as I’ve typed this my mom called to tell me she was running late besides… but this was why I figured I’d have time to do the entire depletion routine.) Once sure, I hit the bike for 5 miles in 14 minutes. If I keep biking, I’ll work on speed and try to get to 7.5 miles in 15 minutes, before I work on duration.

Realistically, though, I don’t give a shit about my cardio performance. I’ll probably drop the intensity and go for calories in the future.

I got out of the gym at 2:55PM, after showering/shaving etc.

Popularity: 80% [?]

Happy Princess (P1C2B2)

Went to the gym yesterday morning, finally having a dollar for the soda machine.

Fucker was shut off. Logic’d my way into walking across the parking structure under the assumption that, hey, they probably have these for fuckers heading to work. Bam. There it is.

Dollar was too crinkly. I smooth it several times before hoping I have a dollar in my wallet. I try THAT dollar, twice, before the machine lolquits at me (the dollar-accepting thing turns off if you try too many times to prevent sodahax.)

Top floor of parking structure is the one that leads to my gym. I give up my sodaquest and take this loop-way of getting to the gym. There’s one soda machine on this leg of the journey, and it too is shut down.

I make my way in, put my bag on a chair, and dig out my keys (login badge thing is on it) front desk lady is ALWAYS unfailingly nice to me. She asks me how I’m doing and I lie blatantly. She says she’s doing good too.

In the locker room. I’m already wearing gym clothes so I simply deposit my bag. I get some nail clippers out, clipping nails at a counter. I finish, I hear my phone, I go back to the locker. Check messages, okay whatever, back to the counter…

WHEN SUDDENLY, A DOUCHE APPEARS:

D- “Are you going to pick those up?”
Me- “…Why, do you need a snack?”
D- “That’s disgusting.”
Me- “Don’t judge me by what YOU put in YOUR mouth.”
Another guy comes into the locker room, puts a shaker-bottle thing on the counter, goes to his locker.
D- “Don’t use that counter, this kid put his nails all over it.”
Me- “Nevermind that bro, this old fart leaves cocks in his mouth and forgets to swallow.” I sweep the nails into a trash bin that’s put under the counter FOR THIS REASON “Are we happy, princess?”

I got shitty looks from him for the next hour or two I was in the gym.

Day was significantly improved.

Workout B2 for Wednesday, June 16, 2010

Romanian Deadlift

1. 45lbs x 5
2. 70 x 3
3. 90 x 2
4. 115 x 3
5. 110 x 3
6. 105 x 3

5% drops from top set because I didn’t want to increase reps from set to set. Took a note that I was stepping forward to rack the weight with my left foot.

Pulldown

1. 40lbs x 5
2. 55 x 3
3. 75 x 2
4. 95 x 4
5. 85 x 5
6. 75 x 6

10% drops, since this exercise is a 4-6 rep range anyway.

Lateral Raise Machine

1. 30lbs x 5
2. 45 x 3
3. 60 x 2
4. 75 x 4
5. 65 x 5
6. 55 x 6

10% drops, which are HUGE here since I round up. It’s supposed to be a back-off day.

Torso Rotation Machine

1. 30lbs x 5
2. 45 x 3
3. 60 x 2
4. 75 x 4
5. 65 x 7
6. 55 x 10

I actually had this load setup for doing weighted crunches, but I felt myself in a twisty mood. My obliques haven’t been worked lately and I was surprised that I just-as-barely got through them without altering the weights. 15% drops are harder to manage with such low weights. I piled on reps which, in retrospect, is an ass-backwards way of tackling that problem.

Cardio: 20 minutes, 3 incline/ 3.3mph; Heart Rate @ 135bpm @ finish. The ceiling is 150bpm so I can keep increasing the speed… whenever I manage 40 minutes.

Weight: 162lbs.

I was going to test body composition by the personal trainer dwarf snatched up the handzapper. So I’m going to save that for Monday.

Also Monday: I will be deciding how I’m going to progress with this diet. It’s been two cycles, so roughly four weeks. Typically I see folks have their diet phases lasting anywhere from 4-8 weeks unless they’re horrifyingly fatassed. I’m going to fast tomorrow and do some carb-depletion stuff over the weekend to try and dry-out before measuring on Monday.

Body Fat Percentage Results

• 13%+: I’m just going to continue the diet for another cycle. No-prob-bro.
• 11 – 13%: Diet break for one training cycle, then continue the diet and training as I have been.
• <11%: Diet break for one training cycle, then I’m going change everything around to resemble Ultimate Diet 2.

I’ll probably round the results down if I have a convincing decimal or something, but that’s generally where my mind’s at.

Popularity: 5% [?]

Progress Excites Me (P1C2WA1)

I just realized I started my second workout cycle yesterday. Awwriiight~

It was a highly unexpected result, my measures, as I still feel like I’m vastly overeating. I’m still recording on paper when and how much of whatever I’m eating, but I’m not tracking the calories on The Daily Plate.

I’m not as anal about how much I’m eating as I used to be. Granted, it has to be less than enough, but what I’m doing now can be best-described as eating until I’m full once a day. If I mysteriously put on weight, I can easily backtrack into my records and tabulate the calories. If the numbers make sense, then I know I ate too much and I’ll have to back off. If they don’t quite, or there’s a lot of carbs in there, well! Water weight.

I’m slowly introducing a little more cardio, here-and-there. I don’t really have a set plan with it. I’m tentatively looking at days that I do yohimbine (fasted-cardio style), or post-workout. Something about fat being released into the bloodstream from the Y or the high-intensity activity, that makes me want to include cardio at those times. More on this in another post. I haven’t been as tenacious in my physiological studies as I used to be.

Saturday Cardio

1. 6:45AM: 15mg Yohimbine HCL + 200mg Caffeine (since I haven’t been posting on this as much, in the future this will be referred to as YC much like the ephedrine+caffeine stack is referred to as EC.)
2. 7:23AM: Slow warm-up. Easy-walking for about 12 minutes.
3. 7:35AM: Speed walking. Just walking quickly enough for it to be uncomfortable, for about 40 minutes.
4. 8:15AM: I didn’t plan my route, so when time was up I had to walk back home. Another 12 minutes.

Something I noted was that I had a really high blood sugar. I should have tested much, much earlier (on the order of around midnight, I’d say) but since I had only just realized it a couple of minutes after taking my YC, I just tested right then, at 380mg/dL. Insulin counteracts the effects of yohimbine, so I just went and did my cardio anyway.

A few minutes after I got home (around 8:30AM) I tested again at 292mg/dL. Still really high, but an 88-point drop is pretty significant. I don’t know if that would have worked from 188 to 100 (I don’t know why it wouldn’t but I’m not going to make that claim), but I think doing cardio with an untested threshold made the higher level of sugar a decent “safety net” though I wouldn’t ordinarily like to be anywhere near that high.

Workout for Sunday, June 6, 2010

Before leaving for the gym: EC1 @ 9:45AM

Bench Press

1. 45lbs. x 5
2. 50 x 3
3. 70 x 2
4. 90 x 7 (felt 50/50 on making the 8th rep; I decided not to risk it.)
5. 85 x 9

I’m going to increase this next workout.

Incline Press Machine

1. 45lbs. x 5
2. 75 x 3
3. 90 x 2
4. 120 x 4

Okay. Screw this machine. I can’t find a suitable place to set the lever (it’s either too-high to be useful or too low to not be damaging to my shoulders) so I’ll be moving back to the free-weight version.

Hammer-grip Horizontal Press Machine

1. 55lbs. x 3
2. 70 x 2
3. 90 x 8

Shoulders are bugging me now.

Pushdown

1. 32.5lbs. x 5
2. 37.5 x 2
3. 42.5 x 9

I cheated a tenth rep so I’m not counting it, making this fall below my desired range for increase. Next workout I’m dropping the first warm-up set to 3 reps, but keeping everything else. If I make 10 reps on A2 then I can increase the weight.

Pulldown

1. 45lbs. x 5
2. 70 x 3
3. 90 x 2
4. 115 x 6

I very nearly almost skipped doing these. I was hearing all sorts of excuses in my head during the tricep exercises. I switched on autopilot and let the excuses fly, hammering out possibly the best-form round of pulldowns I’ve ever done in my life. FUCK YEAH. Increasing the weight next workout.

Weighted Crunch Machine

1. 30lbs. x 5
2. 45 x 3
3. 60 x 2
4. 75 x 5

This isn’t, probably, going to be a regular exercise, but I thought in an effort to combat staleness in my routine I’d stick in a ‘reward’ exercise at the end. I chose crunches over calf raises because I’ve got something nasty happening on my left big toe joint and I’d like to establish that it’s not an infection before I harass it much more than I have.

Body Weight: 160.5lbs

Body Fat Percentage: 13.7% ~ I totally didn’t believe a lick of this, though before I saw it I mistook my BMI for my bodyfat percentage and had a mini-heart attack (23.7!?) I redid this reading multiple times and 13.7 was the first one to show up three times so I took it down. It was also the second-highest in the range (13.8 beat it) so it panders to my inner-pessimist.

Condition: B. ~ I very BARELY made it to the gym today. Had to roll off the couch and run down the parking lot in my underwear to make the ride to the gym, but I DID. So, yeah. I’m probably disproportionately proud of myself for having done that. Screw it.

Time in: 10AM
Time out: 12:35PM

I finished the workout at 12:20 but I sat in the locker room debating cardio for 15 minutes before I decided to leave and, if I started to regret it later… just do it later!

So I Regretted It and Came Back and This Is Treadmill

1. 1:42PM: EC2
2. 2:23PM: back in the gym. Warm-Up: 10 minutes at 2 incline/2mph. Heart Rate 102bpm
3. 2:35PM: HIIT: 5.5 minutes. Started and stopped with jog @ 4.5mph for 1.5min; run @ 6mph for 30sec. Incline set to 3 for both. Heart Rate 178bpm
4. 2:41PM: Rest. Talked to DJ in the locker room about cutting. He’s bulking, but cut for beach season.
5. 2:53PM: Steady State: 40 minutes at 3 incline/3mph. Heart Rate 135bpm
6. 3:35PM: Done.

I cut the HIIT short because I just am not fit enough for it. I was sweating and wheezing and my legs felt like they were going to fail out on me at any moment. (I wanted to total 10 minutes.)

So, then, while doing the steady state stuff I kept trying to convince myself to stop. But there weren’t any physical signs of needing to stop early, and any excuse I could come up with was quite easily squashed with “you’re not going to be burning any more fat than you are right now.”

But man, when 40 hit the clock I was off.

Popularity: 5% [?]

No Excuse (P1C1WA2)

Week got off to a bit of a crap start.

Sometime over the weekend I had a seizure at my grandmother’s house. Banged up my right elbow, left hand, and both feet (more on the left foot, the right foot just has a cracked nail on the big toe.) It happened the day after training deadlifts, which summed itself as a fried CNS. Limping around, wincing… butthurt doesn’t even begin to cover it.

I wasn’t very motivated to lift on Tuesday, but I had the seizure and the binge working against my morale. So I used those things as encouragement. The unwillingness to let myself be put down by something I have only a limited amount of control over, coupled with the guilt over having let myself gorge so atrociously, lead me into the gym that morning.

Workout A2, June 1, 2010

Incline Bench

1. 45lbs x 3
2. 60 x 2
3. 75 x 8
4. 75 x 8 (too much shoulders)

I kind of forgot that I was supposed to deload on the second work set. Oops. I guess I can be confident in my increase for next workout!

Wide-Grip Horizontal Press

1. 35lbs x 5
2. 50 x 3
3. 65 x 2
4. 85 x 8

Hammer-Grip Horizontal Press

1. 40lbs x 3
2. 50 x 2
3. 65 x 8

Pushdown

1. 27.5lbs x 5
2. 32.5 x 2
3. 37.5 x 12

At this point, I was feeling really fucking accomplished. My chest was the only part of me that WASN’T sore, so getting that little extra from my triceps made me pretty happy overall.

Pulldown

1. 45lbs x 5
2. 65 x 3
3. 85 x 2
4. 110 x 6

I lost a rep. Not cool.

Alternating: Forearm Curl / Reverse Forearm Curl

1. 3lbs / 3lbs x 8
2. 5 / 5 x 8
3. 8 / 8 x 8
4. 12 / 12 x 8
5. 15 x 8 / 15 x 3
6. 20 / 12 x 8 (though I got the reps, 20lbs just felt like too much)
7. 15 / 12 x 8

I’ve just been looking in the mirror and getting sick of the ‘funnel’ look of my growing upper arms and my ain’t-shit forearms. Fixing that with a little volume work, as I don’t want to fail them with high-intensity stuff. I need the grip stamina for pulls.

Cardio: I did 20 minutes at level 2 on a recumbent bike just to… I dunno. Burn something or other. I was thinking carbs when I decided to do it, but after intense lifting I have no idea if there were some free-floating fatty acids to be used, floating about, or what.

Condition: C.

Didn’t get enough sleep, felt bloated. Pretty standard. Feeling sorry for myself counterbalanced by FUCK IT.

Popularity: 5% [?]

Moving the Blood Around

I haven’t been feeling so well lately, though I haven’t missed workouts because of it, it’s been making me feel obligated to eat a bit more, and this is bothersome.

Especially combined with constipation.

I have this mental habit of not allowing myself to vomit. I used to eat competitively (derp) and it’s just reflexive. Like those girls who deepthroat for a living get over their gag reflex, I can put a lot down my throat for the win.

So I’m just going to post up two workouts and leave it at that.

Workout for Thursday, March 4, 2010

This is a sequel workout to the one from “Show Prep.” I designed a full body workout for myself of moderate intensity for those days I’m just not feeling it. Those days I can’t lift heavy as a bitch nor have the stamina for a legitimate depletion workout.

After lifting poorly on Tuesday my deadlift muscles (lol, mostly lower back) were killing me and I decided to do some cardio at the end as well. So I skipped direct leg or ab work, aside from calf raises. I figured maybe getting the blood moving would relieve some soreness and make me feel okay about having more carbs that night.

Which I did.

• Calf Raise: [Warm-up: 2x5@15; 3@20; 2@45] 4×12 @ 60lbs. (increase) ~ left foot hurt like crazy afterward, but went away ten minutes later

• Chest Press: [Warm-up: 3@20; 2@25] 2×12 @ 30lbs. (increase)

• Pulldown: [Warm-up: 3@15; 2@25] 2×12 @ 40lbs. (really easy but felt GREAT; increase)

• Incline Chest Press: 2×12 @ 30lbs. (I didn’t make a note of difficulty, I’m going to increase it though)

• DB Curl: 2×12 @ 8lbs. (pretty easy until the last four reps; increasing)

• Cable Extension: 2×12 @ 7.5lbs/arm (significant effort on the last reps; not sure I want to increase it, given the exhaustion from pressing. I’m going to, though.)

Cardio: Bike, level 3, 25 minutes. Ending heart rate was about 123. I forgot to write down kcals or distance, but it actually started feeling like I was riding a bike. I’m going to go for increased time at the same level, next workout.

My body weight was 165lbs. Jesus. I need to poop.

I didn’t bother checking my body fat percentage.

The workout in total took just over an hour.

Workout for Tuesday, March 2, 2010

I felt absolutely horrible on Monday, and Tuesday was only just enough better to convince myself that I have no excuses to be missing workouts.

I paid for that.

Deadlift

1. 70lbs. x 5; hook-grip hang
2. 70lbs. x 5; h-gh
3. 105lbs. x 3; h-gh
4. 150lbs. x 2; from floor, hook-grip. Grip slipped though and became barely-overhand. Should have taken this as a sign. Thought nothing of it at the time.
5. 185lbs. x 1 (goal was five); fml right hand under

This coolbro doing squats next to me chatted about leg power with me. He was half-squatting 405lbs. for reps (I asked, and he said it felt like a house, which is absolutely true) so I didn’t really, you know, argue with him. I was also dying. Apparently he felt the same way, but we shitgrinningly optimistic’d through it and shook hands and introduced ourselves.

His name is Keen, and he’s apparently been seeing me come in consistently for a while. Good for him! I’ve never seen him before.

Nice guy though. I saw him leaning on the stick I use for shoulder dislocations and told him that “if you can’t walk on your own, man, you’re pressing too much!” (He had moved o nto doing bropressive amounts on that machine.) He laughed it off and proved he was okay.

Incline Bench

1. 45lbs. x 5
2. 45lbs. x 5
3. 45lbs. x 5
4. 60lbs. x 3
5. 80lbs. x 2 – started to feel ‘wrong’
6. 90lbs. x 1

I definitely got the weight up, but I didn’t feel right about the form I was using. I might not have been entirely wrong, or it could have been right, but I had my suspicions and I wasn’t about to make a bad thing worse. I proved to myself that my maximal strength is there, felt uneasy, and I stopped.

I think if I had done less warm-ups on my incline and rested a little longer I could have gotten all four of the reps I set up for myself today.

I did not fiddle with my loading to account for feeling unwell, I just loaded as usual and… essentially: if the way I’m feeling is just in my head, well, it’s infecting my confidence under the bar, too.

Hi-Lo Twists

1. 20lbs. x 5
2. 20lbs. x 5
3. 30lbs. x 4 ~ ugh, someone snags the other pulley. I like to check form in the mirror!
4. 40lbs. x 3
5. 50lbs. x 5 (excellence; increase)

I did more warm-up reps than I should have, but I was determined to get at least one of my exercises right today.

Which I totally did. Rawksome.

Cardio: Bike, level 2, 30 minutes, 5.12miles, 145kcal, average HR 120-125, even easier than the previous workout.

Weight: 160lbs.; 19.3% body fat (full of shit)

Workout took about an hour and a half of my life.

Popularity: 3% [?]

Ignoring The Stopwatch

I did something yesterday while I was working out that I have never done since I started training five years ago. Rather, I didn’t do something.

I didn’t time my rest periods.

In the past I’ve certainly NOT RECORDED my rest periods, or been NOT ANAL about them (oh my god, I’ve rested thirty seconds over two minutes, WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO WRITE DOWN!?) but I’ve never been totally unaware of generally how long it was since my last set.

When my dad got me started with lifting when I was fourteen, he didn’t lord over me on the machines. He was right next to me working antagonist groups, but he never said: GO NOW. DO THE SET RIGHT NOW. END OF THE WORLD IN FIVE MINUTES AND YOU STILL HAVE THREE SETS.

Nope. Just “when you’re done with your set, look at the clock. After two minutes, do your next set.” So I did.

Sometimes a set would take longer than another because I recently bumped weight, or whatever. He had his own workout going on and would peek over from time to time to make sure I was using my biceps and not my ass when I did curls, but he didn’t count my reps for me. He didn’t count my rest periods for me. He kept it simple and chimed in if I was doing something horribly wrong.

In all my recent efforts to reduce complexity in my program, I’ve just found that I’m still programming my rest periods as though they really mean something. So I decided to leave the watch in the locker and just go whenever I’m ready.

Just as I thought I would, I recovered from warm-up sets quickly (in many cases, significantly less than the two minutes I prescribe myself on my workout tearsheets) and needed an undetermined longer amount of time to recover from the top sets on down.

What was once pushing three hours to do got knocked out in about an hour-and-a-quarter. Accounting for the additional 30 minutes of steady cardio I tacked on as part of a “moar srs” fat loss effort and it’s still roughly an hour of time saved.

I’m certainly feeling the after-effects of the workout now, more than I did when I took those extra minutes, but I LIKE that. It’s not a debilitating level of soreness, just “hey man, take it easy.” Which is what I want to feel on my rest days!

Speaking of rest days: I’m reconsidering my approach to frequency as well, meaning the number of times per week I work out. I can get by on one or two workouts a week, and it really isn’t a broken or horribly rigid scheme to begin with.

But MAYBE I could do more, and I’d like to allow myself the opportunities to try, should they present themselves.

Simply, my approach to rest intervals, both between sets and between workouts, is this:

“Wait until you’re comfortable, without getting RELAXED, and go again.”

That was my subvocalization yesterday, talking to myself so I wouldn’t feel obligated to check the clock.

Workout for Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Popularity: 3% [?]

Butthurt Workout

Seriously? It was one more set of deadlifts than usual, and my glutes are WAY too sore.

I wanted to do some kind of extra work so I could offset some of those extraneous carbs I’d been eating. I probably put on a legitimate pound or two of fat recently. Not going to know for sure until after I drop all this water weight.

Which I’ll have to do in short order for this modeling audition I have on Saturday. This Sunday, however, marks 15 weeks until my goal date is reached. I have to look my best by this date. For two reasons: it’s the first major event in my town, and it marks the beginning of summer.

I am NOT wasting another summer dieting. Fuck that. I don’t care how awful I think I look on the day: May 30, I stop dieting, and get a loaded fucking hotdog at the flea market.

If I’m still 156lbs. @ 16.8% bodyfat, and all the weight I lose is fat (unlikely, but it’s the numbers I have to work with): I could lose one pound a week and get down to 146lbs. @ 11%BF or so in ten weeks.

If I get to 12% or so, that’s roughly 7-8lbs. lost. That puts me about 5lbs. away from 9% and five weeks to do it.

THE BEST ASSUMPTION: I don’t know where the hell I’m at, but I’m going to diet in a moderate way for ten weeks, then five weeks out from goal I’ll go completely batshit intense and lose as hard as I can.

• February 14 – April 25: 10 weeks of moderate dieting. 10-20% caloric deficit or somesuch; twice weekly workouts.
• April 25 – May 30: 5 weeks of severe dieting. Up to 30% caloric deficit; workouts x5/wk. The same workout setup, but likely to have more cardio involved.

I really highly doubt I’m going to get to single digit before summer hits. Oh well. I think I’ll have to live with getting to 12% and living with it for a while.

Click for the workout!- ~ Wednesday, February 10, 2010-

Popularity: 3% [?]

Raisin Bran Bench

I ate so much Raisin Bran and other carby shit yesterday that I completely negated the fast I did on Wednesday. I’m really pissed with myself. I let boredom and nerves get to me, control me, and overfeed me considerably. Today’s fast it to 5AM Saturday. I wanted to fast throughout Saturday since I’m not really there, mentally, to soldier through another day of no food so early on.

But it’s the last day of the week, so whatever. Doing it.

Here is yesterday’s workout:

Bench Press

1. 100lbs. x 2 (my right middle finger was infected when I worked out, I think my lack of right hand grip and just losing focus cost me the third rep)
2. 90lbs. x 3
3. 80lbs. x 4

Incline Bench

1. 65lbs. x 8
2. 55lbs. x 9
3. 45lbs. x 10 (how fortunate I am that my bottom set is the empty bar, haha!)

I had a much more difficult time with these sets than I was anticipating.

Incline Fly, 3 x 5 @ 15lbs.

Cardio: 30 minutes of 90s walk / 30s jog on the treadmill. 2 and 4 mph, respectively.

I really didn’t feel like doing cardio, but I was already in the gym, already sweaty, and figured I less didn’t-want-to-do-it-now that I would…n’t… want to… in the future. “Do it now so less need be done at a later date,” I felt.

I’m going lay out my workout for next week so I’m not in a rush to figure it out before I leave the house in the morning.

Bench Press

1. 100lbs. x 3-5
2. 90lbs. x +1 previous set
3. 80lbs. x +1 previous set

Incline Bench

1. 70lbs. x 5-8
2. 60lbs. x +1 previous set
3. 55lbs. x +1 previous set

Incline Fly

3 x 5 @ 20lbs. dumbbells

Gym Radio Tracks I enjoyed: “Hip to be Square” (Huey Lewis and the News); “Working My Way Back to You” (The Spinners); “The One I Love” (R.E.M.); “Just Can’t Get Enough” (The Saturdays)

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Flying, Rep Ranges, and the Inverse Pyramid

So Thursday was Chest Day.

I’m really thinking about doing a chest/back split and not having a “leg day.” The most leg work I’m going to do are deadlifts on back day and the obligatory cardio work. I have to figure out how to work my squats in, or perhaps I’ll just… abandon it for a while… ugh. Any time I drop squats entirely from my plan is the time I know I’m going to fuck myself. I have to do more thinking/reading on the issue, but for now I just need to log my workout.

It’s pretty low-volume, relative to what I’m used to seeing in local programs, but at the same time relative to my own conditioning this was quite a lot of work outside of my normal rep range. It’s been a while since I last benched, so I decided to work for an additional rep rather than adding weight to the bar. This turned out to work out beautifully.

Flat Bench

1. 95lbs. x 5
2. 65lbs. x 6 (I wasn’t paying attention, this should have been 85lbs.)
3. 75lbs. x 7

Incline Bench – 5RM test

1. 45lbs.
2. 55lbs.
3. 65lbs.
4. 70lbs. (failed at 4 reps)

Incline Fly – 8RM test

1. 5lbs.
2. 10lbs.
3. 12lbs.
4. 15lbs.
5. 20lbs. (failed immediately, couldn’t even hold the bells out)

Here’s what it’s going to look like now that I have definite numbers to play with, next week:

Flat Bench

1. 100lbs. x 3-5
2. 90lbs. x 4-6
3. 80lbs. x 5-7

Incline Bench

1. 65lbs. x 5-8
2. 55lbs. x 6-9
3. 45lbs. x 7-10

Incline Fly

1. 20lbs. x 5-8
2. 15lbs. x 6-9
3. 10lbs. 7-10

I’m basically working strength-volume on flat bench, as it mostly functions to me as a warm up for incline benching. I would just do a max-single and move onto incline, which sounds like a fantastic idea on paper, but I’m too much of a pussy to actually attempt a single. So the volume: is for warming up more, and… balance. I don’t want to really increase the size of my lower pecs but I don’t want it to look neglected, either.

My goal with the chest workouts is firstly strength, of course, but from the standpoint of aesthetics I’m trying to also increase mass of the upper chest to achieve the ‘square pec’ look. Some evidence that I may be on the correct path is the tenderness I feel from armpit to armpit between collarbone and nipples. My lower pecs are not experiencing any soreness whatsoever. The reverse pyramid scheme allows me a set in which I can push the muscle hardest while it’s freshest, and then further volume to fully exhaust the muscle.

My only real concern is that perhaps the incline flies won’t be possible to reverse-pyramid. I don’t really know how to tell the difference between nervous and muscular failure, other than muscular failure is probably when it hurts and nervous is probably when my arms aren’t doing what I tell them to. If this is indeed the case, my failure with 20lbs. dumbbells was a nervous failure, and I may have to approach it with more simple volume than I would originally intend.

Finally, following the lifts, I spent 20 minutes on the treadmill alternating in 30s/90s jog/walk (convenient to have these labeled on the machine at 2 and 4 mph.) Though it was fairly easy, I want to do four more sessions at this intensity before I progress to doing 30/30, as I don’t want to overextend or overtrain myself through overconfidence. Slow progression is all I seek in regards to cardio.

I think next post I’ll detail some of the things I’m considering as far as diet. Right now I’m hovering around 2000 calories and doing a haphazard ephedrine/caffeine stack, which is probably only a 300 daily calorie deficit now that I briefly think about it…

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Goal Revision

I’ve been spending more time away from the gym than I ordinarily would like, but my immune system has been taking hell lately and I’d rather not take more stress than I absolutely have to. I seem to have an inverse gym-to-thinking ratio; the longer I stay away from the gym the smarter and more introspective I become. I have to fix that.

Optimal health over the long-term is the only real goal, after all.

However, I do have three major goals over the next eleven weeks:

1. 10% or lower body fat percentage.
2. Run continuously for 20 minutes.
3. Squat 300lbs.

They’re in a specific order, too. They’re in the order of effort I’m putting in, in order of likelihood to occur, in order of what I’d like to have and INVERSE order of what I would really enjoy doing.

A lot of people get mixed up. Yes I would like to HAVE sub-10% bodyfat, but I don’t really enjoy DOING WHAT IT TAKES to have it. Important distinction. Though honestly I enjoy squatting and also would enjoy having a BW-multiplied-by-whole-number PR.

And to be honest I don’t really care a whole lot about running one way or the other, so sticking it in the middle is accurate. I don’t really care about running, I don’t really think I enjoy doing it, but just having some aerobic fitness couldn’t hurt, and certainly contributes to my caloric deficit for fat loss. Family has a history of heart problems and diabetes, and I’ve already neglected the latter, so might as well take care of a problem before it can happen, you know?

Optimal health over the long-term.

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