Good training today. Felt strong on all lifts today. I worked up to 341 for an easy triple on the bench, worked with 80’s on db inclines, and used 80 pounds on dips today for 8 reps.

Keeping this short and sweet. Worked up to an easy triple with 330, pausing the last rep. Overall a good workout. Hit 8 reps with 70 lb.. on dips, no shoulder pain. Pushing Courtney harder than he wants to work, he keeps using every excuse in the world not to increase his work load, and sometimes we have had to ridicule him into the work. He still has not finished a workout with us. Timbo is not really pushing himself either, and since they have been training together, it’s easy to see why they struggled at the end of their training cycle for the nationals. You have to push yourself so that body can adapt and overcome. Every injury they have been complaining about I have had as well. Rotator Cuff, elbow, kidney stone, hell, I have even pulled my hamstring twice in the last 12 weeks, but kept it to myself and kept plugging away at it. Add in the track work that has been keeping my legs fatigued all week. In order to get back to where I was, I have to get back to what I was doing to be successful, and we are still not at the total workload we used to handle.

Back up to 319 x 5 reps today. Easy, but I was aching more than usual in the left elbow and shoulder, plus for some reason hurting at the insertion point of the upper right bicep. Might be the weighted dips stretching that area. Since I love dips so much, rather than cut them out I just cut out the extra weight this week. Bodyweight holding at 214. No drastic drop in weight. Skipped running yesterday, but we’ll be back at it tomorrow morning.

Wow! Long time no update, huh? Well, things haven’t been too bad. Feeling strong on everything and my cardio is getting better as well. On the bench press I hit an easy 319 for 5 reps friday before last, then backed it down last week to 297 to recycle. Still doing rack squats, hitting 407 for 5 2 weeks in a row, then dropping down last week to do some full range Hatfield squats.

We are still hitting the track for 2 miles on Monday, Thursday, and Saturday. However yesterday I went to the gym instead and hit 30 minutes on the treadmill and then 30 minutes on the bike. My bodyweight has been fluctuating between 215 and 219, so that has been a sticking point for me, but this past 7 days or so I have been dropping again, and I’m refocused on hitting 200.

Deadlifts are up tomorrow. I’ll see about putting some videos back up this week, at least of my deads and bench.

Haven’t missed a beat this past week. Last Friday I recycled on the bench, took it back down to 286 for 5 reps. I’ll continue to do these mini-cycles to stay fresh and not max out too soon. This week I’ll go back up to 296, then next week 308, then the week after back down to 296.

Sunday’s square were still in the rack, and will be for quite a while. 363 for 3 sets of 3 reps, easy weight.

On deadlifts last week I went up to 386 for 3 reps. Today I did stiff-leg deads without a belt and hit 325 for an easy 3 reps. I will alternate deads this way to keep my back in shape.

I haven’t skipped out my cardio, either. Monday, Thursday, and Saturday we hit the track at Erickson Field.

The diet was going pretty well for the most part, but it took a hit this week. Nothing bad for me, just to much of a good thing

Ok, a little lax on the updates, right? Well, I have been very consistent in my training, but not my blogging, and very inconsistent on my eating habits. A little catch up:
Because of the pain in my IT bands, I have switched to heavy rack squats…I have started doing much light deep box squats on my deadlift day, just as a way to warm p for deads. Just doing heavy rack squats feels good, getting heavier weight on my back is a mental boost. I trained for the Nationals in Baton Rouge for an entire training cycle by doing no full squats, just racks, and didn’t even put gear on until 2-3 weeks out from the meet.
Deadlifts are going well. This is the first time in years that I have actually trained the deadlift, so any deadlifting is a plus for me. I should be back over 400 for reps in the next couple of weeks.
The Bench Press is my baby, and it’s coming along nicely. Slight shoulder pain, but not so much that I can’t ignore it. This week I hit an easy 297 for 5 reps (paused the last one), and then dropped down to 231 for 20 reps. One indication that my shoulder is close to normal is that I can do dips again, this week hitting 2 sets of 15. 5 weeks ago is was all I could do to even hold myself up on the bars, the shoulder didn’t want to support me. I modified how I was doing them so that I could some kind of range of motion, and now can do regular dips.

I finally got into the cardio part of my training. This past tuesday I hit 2 miles on the treadmill (quick walk at an incline), and this morning I went to the track and ran/walked …the running part had me hurting.

Ciao.

Solid workout today! Easy 5 reps with 275 and finished off with 220 for 15 reps! I still need the right shoulder to be tight, not loose like it feels now. It kind of feels like it’s not completely attached, but the pain is almost 100% gone, so that makes it easier to concentrate on the weight. The rest of the workout was good as well…We kept up a good pace and I increased the weight on each accessory exercise, and increased the reps wen possible, just to fatigue the muscle as much as I could.

Another decent day in the comeback…benches were super easy, as the videos show…only thing is, on the two heavier sets, 220 and 242, I don’t feel like I’m pushing with the right shoulder, the one that’s injured. They were super easy, but the shoulder just feels like it’s detached or something. It looks eve on the video, but it feels off. I’m a lifter who has always been exact on balance, perfect on technique, and these feel way off, even if they don’t look it.

220 x 8:

242 x 5:

So, you can see that the benches are easy, I’m just getting to the edge of greedy, and really am fighting the urge to make bigger jumps each week. I might stay at 242 next week, for 2 sets of 5.

The rest of the workout was identical to lat Friday’s workout, so you can refer back to that day for the details. Bodyweight down to 213, that was still in my jeans, so I’m happy with that. I’ll be hitting some cardio and a long stretching session tomorrow, then squats on Sunday. I’ll be going for a bigger drop in weight by the end of next week, increasing cardio each day, increasing the water intake. The caloric intake has been steady at about 1200-1500 per day, mostly due to the big dinners…eating light at breakfast and then a protein drink for lunch.

Well, I finally felt good enough to workout again, having been sick with a head and eventually chest cold for a week now. Still have a lot of congestion I’m hacking up, but everything else is all good. We worked out the Patriot Fitness Center yesterday. For the past couple of weeks we have been revamping the center to be a more effective training center, emphasis on training. It’s turning out well, a few more pieces of the puzzle will be added next week, such as more cardio equipment, but the main areas are set.

I took a little leap based on last weeks workout. Instead of the normal 5 pound jumps we were making, I went from 198 last week to 220 this week. It was still extremely easy, but I felt it more in the rotator this time. Actually, the right shoulder almost felt detached at that weight. Just for variety, we added incline and decline presses on the Icarian machines. The inclines really put a strain on my shoulder, but in the end it felt good to grind it out.

Bench Press: 99 x 15, 143 x 12, 176 x 8, 220 x 8 (I should have added another set, but wasn’t thinking)
Incline machine 140, 180, 200 x 8
Decline Machine 140, 180, 200 x 12
Shoulder press mach 70, 80, 90 x 12
Front and lateral raises 3 x 12
Tricep Pushdowns 4 x 10
Lying 1 arm tri extensions 4 x 8
cable kickbacks 2 x 12
Nautilus tri ext 1 x 25 (burnout)

My bodyweight is down to 214, more than likely due to not eating very much while being sick, but we’ve also been busting our humps moving equipment in here, so I’m sure that had something to do with it. Either way, I’ve lost 4 pounds this week. We’ll be squatting Sunday, and then right after that I will be leaving for Cleveland again for a couple of days, so I won’t be training again until Wednesday’s deadlifts. I’ll try to get in some cardio at the hotel on Monday and Tuesday.

Friday was Bench day. Shoulder is getting there…went up to 198 for 8 today, and finally figured out that if I don’t concentrate so much on that first rep, the pain isn’t nearly as bad. The first rep is always the worst, then I rep ou the next 7 reps with little to no pain. So, on the set with 198, I just dropped the weight down fast, concentrating more on speed than thinking of the shoulder, ad it worked fine. Still didn’t rush it, of course 198 is extremely easy, but I’ll stick with 11 pound jumps each week for awhile (maybe a little more next week). I’ll video next week so you can see what I’m talking about.
The rest of the workout was quick:

Flat Db flyes 3×12
Front raises 3×12
Lateral raises 3×12
Tri Pushdowns 4×12
Lying 1 arm Db Tri ext 4×10
1 arm reverse pushdowns 2×12
purple band pushdowns 1 set of burnout (around 25 reps)

Lost 2 pounds since Tuesday, back down to 117…diet has been on the mark this week, good increase on protein and cut back on the carbs, fat, and empty calories, while increasing my water consumption. By the way, if you want to read a good article why you should drink water, and how to get into the habit read this article.  I also hit the treadmill on Wednesday, and have hit abs in the morning each day. Much better on the workload compared to last week.