Novice LP. Session 15

BW - 224

Squat - 325X3X5

Bench - 185X3X5

Chin-ups -
 - BWX4, 2
 - Negatives (0/0/3)X4, 4, 4, 4

Squats went really well.  This is my heaviest set of 5 since February of this year, and my heaviest 3X5 since January of 2016.  3rd set shown in video.

Bench also went pretty well.

Switching Deadlift to once a week.  I'll be doing chins 2X a week and using Niki Sims progression.  The negative chins were much harder than I expected, although I was jumping up to the bar instead of stepping off of a bench or somesuch.

Conditioning. Week 5. Tempo Run

Tempo Run - 1.25 miles @ 15:00

Nice light pace.

Novice LP. Session 14

BW - 228

Squat - 320X3X5

Press - 122.5X3X5

Chin-Ups - BW
 - V-Grip - X3, 2, 2, 2
 - Supinated - X3, 2, 1

Pull-Downs - X10

Low back has been feeling achy, but Squats went great.  Either the Light Day is already helping, or am overcoming the issue with strength and technique.  If it's the latter, I will need to tread carefully.

Press felt MUCH better today that last week.  Again, the Light Day effect?

Still playing around with alternating grips on chins to extend the number of quality sets.

Conditioning. Week 5. Intervals

Intervals - 5X1/4 mile; 11:50 (2:22/interval)

My wife had friends in town, and was unavailable to run.  Pushed the pace back up into target range.  Felt good.  Not sure what she'll want to do next week.  Likely repeat the 4 interval day.

Novice LP. Session 13. Light Day

BW - 225

Squat - 250X3X5

Bench - 145X3X5

Deadlift - 320X5

First light day of the "advanced" novice LP.  Light Squats and Bench all felt great.

Had heavy DL today, as I'm alternating chins and DL.  I hoped they would feel a little bit better with the intensity being lower on the other lifts.  My low back is feeling a bit tweaked afterwards.  Trying not to worry about it too much, and we'll see what happens with heavy squats this week.  If the pulling 3 times in 2 weeks starts to seem too much, I'll scale back to once a week.

Novice LP. Session 12

BW - 224

Squat - 315X3X5

Press - 120X3X5

Chin-Ups - BW (15 total reps)
 - Overhand - X3, 2, 1
 - Underhand - X3, 2, 2, 1
 - Neutral Grip - X2, 1

Pull-Downs - X4, 7 (drop-set)

Squats went really well.

For the Press, I really had to buckle down.  I have no idea why this is so challenging and yet so far off of 137.5 which is my best 3X5.

I was just going to do overhand on chins today (I've been mixing the grip up randomly), but it was clear I just wasn't going to get enough reps and sets, so I did more sets with different grips.  Fun.

This is the last day of the regular Novice LP.  Starting this weekend, I will move into the "Advanced" Novice program by adding in a session at 80% intensity every 2nd day.  I will continue to alternate Chins and Deads every other day, adding 5 lbs. every Deadlift day.  That keeps the DL in line with Squat all the way down the line.

Eventually, I expect to move back into 531, but I want to ratchet down the periodization as gradually as possible.  I don't see the point of jumping from daily periodization to monthly.  So I will ratchet down from 3X/week increases, to 2X with the Advanced Novice.

If that starts to get un-doable, depending on how it is feeling, I will either reset and then run up to triples and doubles, reset and switch to 80% every other day (1.5X week increases), or switch to TM with 3X5 on volume day (5X5 just ran me into the ground last time).  Ideally, I would do all of the above in that order, and then switch to 531.

Conditioning. Week 4. Tempo Run

Tempo Run - 1 mile @ 11:38

Ended up pushing a little too hard, and matched the pace from the interval runs.  Need to pull back a little bit.

Novice LP. Session 11

BW - 224

Squats - 310X3X5

Bench - 180X3X5

Deadlift - 310X3X5

Had a hectic weekend with irregular sleep, so I wasn't sure how this day would go.  Squats ended up feeling quite good.

First set of bench felt terrible after unracking it myself.  I got a liftoff for the next two sets, and it felt much stronger.

The stiff bars were all in use, so I had to use a deadlift bar for the deadlifts.  Predictably, it felt great!

Conditioning. Week 4. Intervals

Intervals - 4X1/4 mile; 11:40

Added an interval in these runs with the wife.  Still letting her dictate the pace.

Novice LP. Session 10

BW - 222

Squats - 305X3X5

Press - 117.5X3X5

Chin-Ups - BWX4, 3, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 1 (18 reps; 8 sets)

Pull-Downs - X9

Squats went well.

Press was feeling heavy, but went smoothly.

Chins may be perking up a bit.

Novice LP. Session 9

BW - 223

Squats - 300X3X5

Bench - 175X3X5

Deadlift - 300X5

Squats felt good.  Nice to be back in the 3's.

Wish bench felt a little easier, but we'll see.

Deadlifts also felt pretty solid.

Conditioning. Week 4. Tempo Run

Tempo Run - 3/4 mile @ 7:41

Reset to keep Tempo Run distance in-line with the intervals.

Novice LP. Session 8

BW - 221

Squats - 295X3X5

Press - 115X3X5

Chin-Ups - BWX4, 3, 2, 3, 2, 2, 1, 1, 1

Pull-Downs - X6

First session training by my lonesome full time after my coaches and team moved to another town.

Squats went really well.

Press was okay, but surprisingly heavy.  I may move to 2.5# jumps after this.

More chins.

Conditioning. Week 3. Intervals 2

Intervals - 3, 1/4 mile intervals

My wife decided she wanted to start running again, so we did as many quarter-mile intervals as she felt comfortable with.  I'm happy to down shift so that she can keep up.

Novice LP. Team Training. Session 7

Squat - 290X3X5

Bench - 170X3X5

Deadlift - 295X5

Last regular session working with my coach.  He and his business partner have opened up their own facility in the next town over.  Went up and trained with them on this day, but will not be continuing regular training.

All the lifts went well.

Novice LP. Team Training. Session 6

BW - 222

Squats - 282.5X3X5

Press - 110X3X5

Pull-Ups and Ring Chins - BWX3, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2

Pull-downs - X8

My coach and I mis-communicated on today's weight, and so we mis-loaded the bar.  We just decided to stay at the weight and just balance the load back out.  These went well.

Press also went well.

I tried out some pull-ups.  First time in a while.  Hard.  There's no chin bar in the room where the team trains, but someone had hung some rings.  After a few sets of pull-ups, I went back into the team room and did some ring chins.  Also hard.

This is almost certainly the last team training session.  Kratos Strength, the coaches I've been working with, are opening their own facility.  It's in a less convenient location, and will be more expensive than the current set-up.  I'm going to check it out over the weekend, but it's hard to imagine I won't be back to training on my own-some starting next week.

Conditioning. Week 3. Intervals

Intervals - 5 Intervals @ 14:51 total, ~2:58/interval

Just couldn't find the time for conditioning last week.  And it probably showed here.  2nd interval was really tough, before I started to drop in, but then I lost track of my pace and came in way over.  Need to do better next week.

Novice LP. Team Training. Session 5

BW - 221

Squat - 275X3X5

Bench - 165X3X5

Deadlift - 285X5

Everything went pretty well, but the discomfort in my low back is continuing.  If I do everything right as far as bracing hard, speed of decent, and bar path, it doesn't bother me as much.  Any technical mistake makes it flare up.  I'll probably need to make an appointment to go see my regular P.T.

Novice LP. Team Training. Session 4

BW - 221

Squat - 265X3X5

Press - 105X3X5

Chin-Ups - BW; 11 sets, 23 total reps

Pull-Downs - X7

Busy week.  Tried to find time to squeeze in conditioning, but it was either lift or run.  We'll try again this week.

On my own for this session.  Barbell lifts went well.

As long as I'm on the LP, I think I want to alternate Chins and Deadlifts.  On this day, I just kept doing AMRAP Chin-up sets until I couldn't get a single, strict rep.  Then I hit a back-off set of pull-downs.  Lats and brachialis are lit up two days later.