Everything felt pretty good on this day. No pain issues with quads or low back.
Squats actually seemed to get easier as I went on. If I was auto-regulating volume, I would have done another set. I'm getting plenty of warm-up reps with: BWX10, 45X10, 135X8, 185X5, 205X3, but I may need to that if the work sets continue to feel easier as they progress. Could try reducing reps on the last couple of sets, or conversely shifting some reps from the lighter sets to heavier sets. Could also give longer breaks between the last couple of warm-up sets.
Tempo work all felt about right. My ego would obviously like these weights to be heavier, and after the first sets I often think I should go up, but experience has told me that my strength falls off a cliff on upper-body movements, and by the time I get to the 2nd and 3rd sets, the weight turns out to be about right.
I've tried to go back through my old logs and look for places where the comp lifts seemed to make a lot of progress, and note down how I was training them at that time. I'm going to try sprinkling them in here and there, a block at a time. This Squat session is the result of one of those. There was a point where I was doing LRB training, and the squat training was a low bar set of 10 followed by three triples of high bar at the same weight.
Because I haven't squatted much the last few weeks, I had pretty good DOMS going into this session, and it made stuff a bit more difficult. The weights I landed on seem ok. Hopefully, I'll get more acclimated over the next cycle or two and can dial this in a bit tighter. All in all, felt fine.
Bench was all over the place. It's been a bit like this recently where the expected weight ends up being way over on RPE, and nailing down the right intensity is a bit of a ride. We'll see how this progresses. Possibly BW drop has something to do with it?
Was really nervous about DL after 2.5 week back injury, but these felt good. I did fatigue quickly and got to @7 on set 2, when I'd planned 3 sets, but we'll see how that goes next time. I made some changes to my set-up and inter-rep patterns. Used to, I would take my breath before I dropped my knees, and then I'd lock my knees to take a breath between reps. I think that got me in trouble with these low intensity DLs last time, and caused the bar to be moving around a bit much, and that may have contributed to the back tweak. This whole session and cycle have really been about recommitting to focus. Taking time to do things right even when the intensity is relatively low.
And also not freaking out about how much lighter all these weights are than what I used to use.
Low back pain seems all but gone, and gave me no issues on day 1 of this block.
While this is conceived as an accumulation block, I'm starting off with good 'ol 3 sets across. As I've been struggling with injuries for so long, and had so many pivot blocks, I want to make sure I easy myself back into both volume and intensity on the big movements.
Squat felt better than it has in a long time as neither my back, nor my quads gave me any issues here. Focus was on very controlled reps.
Tempo incline topped out at a lower weight than I would have expected, but I've never done these before. I took a moderate grip, but nevertheless triceps began fatiguing very quickly. I originally conceived everything in this cycle to be 3X8, but it became clear on the warm-ups on these that the tempo was hitting me hard and fast, and so I called an audible to do these for 3X5 so that I could keep relative intensity a bit higher.
Rows paused at the top are also fairly new to me, and the weight was hilariously low. I'm only doing a 2-day cycle this time around, and I'm a bit nervous this movement could be too light in relative intensity for a DL accessory. However, coming of a 2.5 week low-back strain, I wanted to kick off with something that would put low intensity tension on the low back to "test" it. Hmmmm. We'll see.
Haven't done rear-foot elevated split squats since Jan '15. So awkward.
A brief exchange with Mike Tuchsherer led me to decide to go into another brief pivot while my low back heals up. 2-day pivot cycle. Hopefully just doing one and then jumping into another dev block on Monday.
Low back has been not great the last few days despite taking Friday through the weekend off from lifting. Started popping NSAIDs on Sunday, and felt okay to go to the gym on this Monday. Decided ahead of time not to Deadlift. Perhaps won't deadlift again the rest of this block or at least a week after the low back feels good.
Went with the same weight as last time on tempo squats. RPE came in lower which was good, but I didn't want to adjust the weight upwards as I started to "feel" the low back injury a bit. I did throw in an extra set just looking to get @6+. Decided to play it safe, but was enthused that these felt better.
Worked up to last week's Close-Grip working weight of 127.5 and it was @5 at the most, and so warranted a jump to 135. Same number of sets to get to @7. Low back gave me a little trouble getting set up, but not too bad.
Decided to continue last week's new adventures with pull-up variations with straps. Early days with these, but...my forearms strangely feel like they're getting more work? Like, burning after the set like you get with high rep isolation work. It seems counter-intuitive to think the forearms (i.e. "grip muscles") would be getting more work with straps. Not sure exactly how to test that.
Still avoiding HIIT conditioning till the back feels better. No video today.
Back was feeling better today*, and so I was optimistic about the training session.
Bench felt fine, but still got to @7 after only 3 sets again this week. Interesting.
HBS to a low box were super solid. Still trying to keep rest times to ~2 minutes, but I ran into one of the strongest guys in the gym who I don't see that often anymore, and we inevitably got to talking training between sets. With the longer rests, the RPE just wasn't going up very much on these, so I cut it off after 6 sets. Will still probably expect a higher intensity next week.
*Tried doing mat pulls, but felt my low-back twinge just a bit after 2 reps with 225, so I shut that down. We'll try again with pulls from the floor on Friday.
I'd done chin-ups instead of DL on Monday, so today I decided to do pull-ups. I already had my straps out for mat pulls, and I was stuck using my least favorite pull-up station, so I decided to try them with straps for the first time. Wow. I really didn't expect them to make as much of a difference as they did. These were only sets of 3, but for pronated pull-ups which I haven't done in some time, these felt much stronger than I would have expected. These were very strict with a swinging, straight-arm hang at the bottom and chest to the bar at the top. It never occurred to me that grip strength might be limiting my chin strength this much.
Bench went from 6 to 7 pretty fast. Not sure what that was about.
High-Bar Box Squats and Elevated Deads both went fine.
Day 2 felt solid overall.
Not so much Day 3. Tweaked my back on the 2nd rep of the 4th set of Deads. Video of 3rd and 4th sets below. Probably just getting in too much of a hurry because the low intensity is kind of boring, and makes the higher rep sets seem to take forever. Feels about 80% back to normal 3 days later, and didn't prevent me completely from finishing the training session.
I have to take the tempo squat weights with a grain of salt because of the back injury. If the low back is fine this week we'll see how they do. Generally would expect these to have been heavier.
CG Bench was a shit show getting to my work weight. It took me 4 sets to find this weight, at which point I was already fairly fatigued. Theoretically that should mean this will be a conservative number come the next session.
Hope the low back continues to heal quickly. Was very happy to be starting a new cycle, and would hate to get derailed in the first week.
First day of the new cycle! Very happy to be revving things up.
Quads felt fine during Squats. I have "normal" DOMS less than 24 hours later, and we'll see how that trends over the next 24. Otherwise, these felt great. Estimated target weight for the day was 252.5, and happy to have ended up in that ballpark. Mostly happy to just be squatting for volume (and reps) pain free, but am hopeful that I can see a robust increase in intensity through this block since this weight is about 100 lbs. under my best set of 7.
Over 3 years since I did DB flat bench, so I had no target. First set with the 55s was really awkward, and I thought I might have overshot, but the 2nd set was @6 tops, and then I sailed through until I hit a conservative @7 on the sixth set. Depending on fatigue and recovery for the first week, I would expect these weights to be higher next week. Didn't grab any video of these.
I've never used a trap bar. Ever. It was fun! If a little strange feeling. I decided to use the high handles for this cycle as they seem to involve less legs, and therefore more back? The range of motion feels very strange, but it was all good.
Last session of the pivot block. Mind is definitely ready for more, and I think my body is healed up a bit.
Close-Grips are the only "big" movement I've done higher-rep RPE work on. Not sure if it's normal to have a drop off in rep strength @RPE like that at higher reps.
Squats were again supposed to be 3-3-0. I just suck at counting seconds under load, I guess.
Squats felt pretty solid. Quad discomfort maybe has flared up a bit over the past 12 hours since the session, but nothing crazy.
Moved grip in a smidge on wide-grip press and it started to feel more natural. Some shoulder discomfort, so I'm glad I've decided not to use this in my next training block.
Despite the shoulder discomfort on the press movement, full depth dips felt solid.
Sunday is my #1 least favorite day to train. Fatigue kicked in pretty quickly across the board at this mid-day session.
Grip was by far the limiting factor on Deadlift.
Box Squats felt very solid. Shank is nice and vertical; really pushing the lift into the posterior-chain. No quad pain during set at all. No increase in quad discomfort outside of the gym within 24 hours following session.
Ran out of gas quick on the DB Inclines.
Looking forward to switching back to full training.
Pushed Bench and Rows a bit harder than I was supposed to on this day. Meathead mentality, I guess. Trying to do more than last time, instead of sticking to the plan 100%.
Bench set-up felt off the whole time. I couldn't seem to "naturally" get settled into the movement. Start position and leg drive were both inconsistent, etc. Could be the relatively light intensity making it easier for my mind to wander. I thought moving competition movements to first in the session order would generally improve them, but that was not the case this session. Still, it's a wash-out block, so nbd.
First time doing tempo squats, I think. These were fine. They were supposed to be 3-3-0, but they were probably closer to 2-2-0.
GHR felt a little better grooved today.
Pushing the DB rows into @8+ is probably not that big of a deal, it's just old "body-building" habits kicking in when DBs are involved.
Quad pain was barely a tickle during squats, even if it's still causing me distraction outside of the gym, and Squats generally felt the best they have in a while. I had an e-mail consult with one of the rehab specialists from BBM, and they recommended staying this course for another week or so, but dropping leg press and belt squat. My plan for an accumulation block following this with sets of 6-8 and RPE 6/7 was agreed with. Caution was to just keep an eye on tonnage, to make sure there's not a huge jump in the next 4 weeks or so.
Bench-Grip Press didn't feel quite as natural on this day for some reason. Had more trouble finding the best grip so that the bar path felt smooth.
Per BBM, I'm going to discontinue the leg press in this block. Frankly, my left medial hip/adductor area that was hurt for so long earlier this year hasn't been loving the single-leg press, and I'd been considering dropping it for that reason anyway.
Dips felt good with more reps while depth stays good.
DOH BG DL (lol) went pretty well got up to @7.5 on grip strength, which is fine. Doing DOH for a reason.
I think the only other time I've done box squats was when I worked out with Matt Wenning a couple of years back. These felt very solid. I kind of thought the weight would be higher, but novelty, plus the lingering quad strain plus [waves hands].
Did DB Inclines for the 4th time in 4 years, haha. These also felt fine
Moving "comp" lift to first in the session order. Bench ended up coming in about 7 lb.s under target weight, but I'm also being conservative.
When I used to do close-grip bench, my offset was about 80%. I dropped 80% off my bench work weight, but upped RPE to 8. I didn't do the math ahead of time, but 12 reps is right on target for that 155/(195/78.6%)=62.5%=12@8.
Ended up getting more reps at my target weight than expected. I believe that's wholly a function of a still-very-novel movement. However I need to watch this on squat movements through this block as I'm trying to let my quad strain heal up and higher-rep sets are probably not the best idea, as it pushes the total volume back up. Need to really hone in on that 2X4-5 @7. I should have stopped the first set of 130 and upped the weight.
Haven't done GHR in forever. Medial hamstrings at the knee weren't loving this, but hopefully a little SRA will help with that.
Belted up for the DB Rows as I've had issues here and there with these in the past, and it's also been forever since I did them.
Quads are finally starting to feel a bit better. Seems like time and/or these pivot workouts are allowing the issue to dissipate. Still trouble enough to limit my squatting and leg pressing today (left hip didn't love the single-leg press), but felt MUCH better than the past several weeks.
Bench-Grip press again today to slot it into the "regular" OHP slot I had planned for this pivot block. Felt good. Getting the unrack and starting position more dialed-in.
I wanted to make sure I got good depth on Dips, and so did not push reps at all in order to protect my shoulder. My best is 22. This was X9 at a very conservative @7. Just "dipping" my toe back in the water.
Bench-Grip Press (dead-stop on chest) - 95X5, 5 @8
Bench-Grip Deadlift -
245X8, 8 @~7.5
255X7 @8.5
Rope Cable Curls - X9, 8 (straight-weight)
More improved pivot work. Broke a little further out of the mold on this day by using no comp. movements. Also didn't bother getting video of anything but the BGDL. Wish I'd gotten video of the BG Press, though. Those felt good.
Squatting still difficult because of quad pain. A little better on belt squat, but obviously much lower intensity.
I used to do a fair amount of PBN, but I tried doing these as dead stops on my traps, and they felt like crap. May try them again in the future with a floating rack above the shoulders.
A year or so ago, one of the strongest guys in the gym had mentioned that he got more carryover from the press to his bench if he moved the grip out and allowed the bar to sit fully on his chest. I've had that in the back of my mind ever since. I rolled it out today, and once I found a good grip position they felt great. Feels very stable, especially with a belt on. The lift kind of starts with the hips pushed forward already to allow the bar to sit on the chest. This makes it virtually impossible to use hip drive, and thus makes the movement much "stricter."
Decided to do a wider grip DL and only use double-overhand. SGDL has always made me a bit nervous as far as technique breakdown under fatigue, but bench-grip has always felt comfortable to me. Decided to do this of high single-digit reps. The capped it with some rando-curls.
DB Rolling Triceps 3-3-0: 35sX8, 8 @8, 9
finish with tucked elbow DB Bench X10@8
3" Mat Pulls -
285X6 @6
315X6, 6 @8, 9
DB Rear Delt Flyes - 30sX10, 14, 12 @8, 9, 10
finish with DB Rear Delt Rows X10@9
I was so mentally and physically ready to move on to something different, I just decided to call an audible and start the pivot block early. Everything here was improved, and with out much of a plan. I decided to do a couple of work sets of each of the compound barbell movements that were originally slated, and then move on to single-limb movements
Safety Squats were hard and weak due to the continuing quad pain. Interestingly, the quad pain was still very present in the single leg extensions, but in general feels much better today.
For Bench, the 230X2 felt very solid. I decided to do a higher rep back-off of 7-9 @8.
The way I've always done DB rolling triceps is as an overloaded eccentric movement. That is, the eccentric keeps the humerus perpendicular to the ground through flexion, but then drops down to the ribs so that the concentric is a full press movement. I decided for no reason to turn that up to 11 by adding a tempo protocol of a 3 second eccentric, and a 3 second flexed hold at the bottom. Then finished the last set with a bro-tastic burnout set of tucked elbow DB bench. I'm sure by this evening, the triceps DOMS will be real.
Mat pulls actually progressed to 9 very quickly. Not sure if that was fatigue due to the shorter rest periods used prior in the session, or more general fatigue from feeling beat up by prior sessions. Had intended to just do 2 sets @~8.
Similar to the rolling triceps, I finished rear delt raises with a rear delt row burnout set.
Solid session, thought it did run a bit long. That's a combination of this fully auto-regulated approach (initially) yielding a higher volume of work sets than I've been doing, and a bit more socializing with some of the die hards in an otherwise empty Friday gym.
SSB had 250 as the estimated weight for the day. Took 225 for my test set, and that suggested 250+, and when I took 250 it ended for being X6@7, so I made another jump. I meant to shoot for X6 on the work-sets, but I'm so conditioned to do 5s that I cut the first set a rep short. Whatever. Just happy to have been over the target intensity for decent volume.
As always with Press, I hope today will be the day it feels strong, but it never is. Nevertheless, 140X1@8 was the target, and was squarely hit. Volume sets got heavy kind of fast, and I overshot a touch with a 4th. No big, I don't think.
Deadlift was very solid. I might have done a 3rd rep with 350 to try and hit @8, but I'm more concerned with the back-off sets at this time. The weight felt just right on those, and rewarded me with sets of 6. It did get to @9 somewhat faster than I would have liked, but it was the end of the session, and already more volume than I've done pulling from the floor in...over 2 years according to my logs.
Since I'm dieting and have been having these weird quad pain issues, I decided to just open it up and go sort of full auto-regulation on my programming. Gonna try and stop worrying about the specific weight on the bar, the specific reps/sets, and just try to hone my ability to hit RPEs. I've missed enough reps anyway.
Generally, I know what movements I'm going to do that day (although I may need to change the order to make the "main" movement first), and I'll have a target rep range for each movement. Sets of 1-3, 2-4, 4-6, etc. And on the main movements, a top set range and then back-offs. The straight-sets and back-off sets will all be RPE Stop sets. For "light" movements like Pause Squats, I will shoot to keep rest times ~2 minutes to limit total number of sets. "Medium" movements, ~2-3 minutes. Main or "heavy" movements will have ~2 minutes between test /final warm-up set and top set, 2-3 minutes between top set and first volume / back-off set, and then ~2 minutes between volume sets.
So for Low Bar Pause Squats, I was targeting 4-6 reps around 275. Test set/last warm-up of 245X5@6 pointed me right at 275, and that worked well. My intent is to go for @9 RPE Stops, but I've only been doing 3 sets on this day, and figured a week to pivot into higher volume might not be terrible, especially since I'm still dealing with quad issues. So I hit a 4th set @ 8.5 and called that good enough for this week.
Bench was a little all over the place. Was looking for a top set of 2-4 reps in the 235 range. Went for a test set with 210 (90% of target) and felt like it was almost @8 after 2 reps. So I added 2.5% and tried again, but this time got X3@7. So either I wasn't fully warmed up for 210, or my technique was off. Anyway, this ended up being more predictive. Took the 5% jump to 225 and it was just a hair over @8 for 3 reps. Back-off sets ended up getting to @9 pretty quickly. This is why I might need to move the main movement to the beginning of the training session. Just in case adding additional volume to the initial movement of the day may negatively impact ability to do volume on the primary movement.
Block-Pulls went okay although I overshot the first work-set, and ended up with a top set and back-offs (not the plan, but whatevs. AUTO-REGULATED). 305 is heavier than the test sets I've been doing, but this felt @6 and this movement has been moving really well the last couple of weeks. But 335 was definitely not a weight I was going to pull for sets across. Backed down to 317.5, and that felt like a weight I was going to pull all day, but with the 2-3 minute rests, I got to the end fairly quickly, which is how I planned for this to work. So yay me. Tried to get video of all top sets and final volume sets, but missed the Bench top set.
Conditioning - Treadmill Sprints - 20 second sprint / 120 second walk; 7 rounds
Nagging quad pain is playing hell with my squats. W11.D3. also just seemed to be an "off" or "down" day in general. Press top-strength was underwhelming, although back-off strength was higher avg. intensity that previous. Deadlift was definitely down.
Then I went out-of-town for 3 days.
I hoped that the extra day off would help with the quads, but not really. Squat strength on W12.D1. was definitely limited by pain. Was hoping to work up to a triple @ 8, but ended up doing a single @ 8 (no video) and doing triples for the back-off. These intensities are disappointing, but at least I hit another 2-year BW low coming off a wedding trip. Anyway. I knew I wasn't going to be able to handle much volume at a decent intensity for back-off sets of 5, so I decided to use the "fatigue drop" / "RPE Stop" technique of doing volume sets until the RPE rises a certain amount. In this case, I dropped to 3's @ 8, and did them until I hit a 3 @ 9 with that weight.
The high-incline bench was taken on this day, and I hate the gym's other incline bench because it's got a curve at the top that makes it much closer to a flat bench. I was at the gym earlier in the afternoon than normal because I'd take an extra day off after our trip, so I dragged a particularly sturdy DB incline bench over to a power rack and used that instead. Actually may be my favorite incline set up I've used at this gym.
Chin-Ups and rows were fine. Rows felt a little weaker than last week, but no big.
First session in over a week and a half that felt "normal." No low back trouble, and no quad trouble.
277.5X5 is technically a PR on Pause Squats, but I haven't done low bar pause squats in a long time. This puts them right around 80% of my full squat which is fairly normal based on my history with this movement. Switched from High Bar to Low Bar for these in the hopes that raising relative intensity of my squat supplementals will help with this weird quad DOMS and/or strain I've been having. My theory is that lower relative intensity is allowing some de-training to take place between full squat days. Going to stick with SSB for my "medium" day this week. Hopefully, I can keep the relative intensity at or above this level, plus a touch more volume. Otherwise, I'm not sure I know what squat variant would fall in between full and paused low bar squats. Possibly regular High Bars or beltless Low Bar. If none of those work, I may try tempo squats. I've never used those before, though. Last set shown.
Bench is 10 lbs. off a 5 Rep PR. @8 and after a weird couple of weeks, I'm okay with that. I couldn't do full power bench last week because of my back, and the week before I did 245X1@10 and 212.5X3@8, so 220X5@8.5 seems like a bit of a bounce back. Still toying around with how to do back-off sets of 5 after a top set of 5. Basically dropping 10% here, but the RPE feedback seems off. Top set and last back-off shown.
Block pulls felt good. This is only the 2nd time at this height, and the 1st was beltless. Last set here (shown) was probably 8.5.
Low back was finally feeling good, so I took squats for a ride, and the back was fine....however the left quad is very unhappy. I'd been experiencing some nagging quad achy-ness two weeks ago, but it had seemed to be fading right before I threw my back-out. It was back with a vengeance on this day. My working theory is that all the novel movements I used to work around the back pain last week (leg press, belt squat) maybe provided novel stress on the quad issue as well while de-training the back-squat a bit, and then upping the intensity with a fully loaded low bar back squat blew it back up. Feels somewhat better the next day, but we'll see. I was limping around after this session, and having trouble with stairs. I'm going to try switching my light squat movement mid-week from paused high-bar to paused low-bar and see what effect that has. I've a feeling, in general, that I need to bring the relative intensity of my variations closer to that of the full squat. Hopefully, it helps with this as well.
So this is all to say, Squats were interesting. Managed to work up to an okay triple, but the resulting quad pain played hell with the back-offs. I videoed the top set and the first back-off, but when I had to drop to 315, I was too disgusted to want to see it back on tape.
Oh, there was also a full PL meet going on in the gym this day. Luckily, the were in the final flights of squats when I got there, and the rest of my session didn't cross-up too much with the lifters warm-ups.
High Inclines went fairly well. Looking at the video of the last couple of session, I was pretty sure general fatigue was possibly inflating the RPE a bit. I have to be careful with assuming that ahead of time, because pressing movements for me drop off a cliff very quickly rep-to-rep. Nevertheless, I was open to higher intensities being available to me on this day, and they were. 160X5 is a Rep PR at this bench angle. 3rd set was feeling dicey, so I dropped down for the 4th. Only took video of the final set of 160.
Skipped chins because my preferred chin station was a camp ground for lifters competing on this day.
Rows came in very strong today. 210X5 is a Rep PR for both deadstop and hanging rows (usually "stronger" on hanging rows). Only took video of the first set when I decided to go to 210 to make sure I wasn't kidding myself about form.
Chest-Supported T-Bar Row - 125X5, 5, 5 @ 8
super-set with
Seated Leg Curls - X10, 10, 10, 10
"Novelty Week" or "My Continued Adventures with Back Pain" continues!
Back was a little bit better on this day, but still didn't feel like I was ready to load my spine. Hoping the third session of the week will be
Tried out the belt squat for the first time. It took me 7 sets to arrive at the 165 work weight I used. It's a very different squat feeling, and took a long time to dial-in technique so that I felt like the weight was staying over mid-foot, I wasn't falling forwards or backwards (the weight being attached at the hip caused the upper body to feel a bit more out of control), and that I could apply full power to the movement. I do feel like I got some work in here.
Tried full power bench, but my back wasn't liking it. Went with feet-up. It was still painful at times (mainly getting on the bench and in position), but I got through it. These numbers are low compared to what I did with this movement when I was rehabbing my adductor, but I think low back pain just takes a bigger toll on everything. Overshot a little bit with 195 on the back-off work and couldn't sustain it for 5X5, so had to drop down to 185.
I really couldn't think of what to do in place of block pulls here. So I went with Chest-Supported rows again, but for lower reps, and superset it with leg curls to get some hamstring work in. I tried lying leg curls, but my back HATED that, so I had to switch to the stupid seated machine.
Because I wasn't doing any movements where I'm concerned about long-term proficiency, I didn't grab any video.
Threw my back out right before I left work for the gym. Lately, I've been shrugging off back spasms within a few hours. This one was really bothering me, though. Went to the gym and tried to Squat. Worked up to 185X1. I took 225 out of the rack and it hurt pretty bad so I re-racked it. Waiting a minute, and took it again. I got it for a single, but the pain was too distracting to maintain, and the intensity was too low to be useful for training.
The regular leg press was occupied, so I used this antique one in another part of the gym. I was about 3 sets in when I realized I'd forgotten the gym has a belt squat. Whatever. If my back is still giving me trouble on Wednesday, I'll try it out.
Inclines went okay, and chins were fine.
Didn't want to even try to mess around with bent row, so I used the chest-supported T-Bar.
Few weird situations going on with these two sessions. Day 2 was at an away gym with no belt. Day 3 was back at my regular gym, but I forgot my shoes and had to lift barefoot.
I went full over to RPE this last week for a few reasons:
1) Not sure how the diet is going to impact programming, and auto-regulating intensity seems like a good move.
2) Since I started the diet, I've had pretty intense DOMS going on in my quads. I'm actually concerned I wasn't getting ENOUGH intensity on my squat supplements to keep up adaptation, so I'm hoping auto-regulating intensity will help with that.
3) The beltless thing, the shoeless thing, and mysteriously crapping the bed on bench as the away gym, meant I wanted a solid framework for "guessing" what weight I needed to use.
Videos are all top sets, final top sets, or final back-off sets.
My quads are getting really achy. Kind of a DOMS way, but kind of unusual as well. They were distractingly achy during my first back-off set of squats. And I woke up to them aching this morning. For me, DOMS is usually a 24-48 hours later thing. I would think it had to do with diet, but I don't see a reason why that would be effecting my quads and not anything else. It may just be that back squat objective intensities are just the highest of any of my lifts. I'm going to try using RPE to see if it raises the objective intensity of my Squat assistance movements so that my legs get more acclimated to heavier loads. I started off this program with assistance at 80% of BACK-OFF sets on light day, and 90% on medium. I've been saying they were too light, so I think that's biting me in the ass.
Anyway, top set of Squats felt @ 9. Didn't get much sleep the night before.
Last back-off set felt @ 8. Fatigue was tempting me to rush these AND get sloppy with them. Really had to focus to be both patient and focused.
Last set of Inclines felt @ 8. Looks fast though. Again, poor sleep.
Had to use the shitty pull up station for neutral grips. They were fine. Was hoping my lighter bodyweight would make a noticeable difference, but I guess 3% isn't that big an off set, haha.
Rows were fine. No straps. Played around with hook grip a little, but finished with plain ol' DOH. Gym was crowded so no video.
Tempting to credit the first week of diet work from BBM with the weight loss here, but it was also a weekend morning session as opposed to my usual weekday afternoon. Still, that's my lowest bodyweight since April '17.
Top set of SSB felt @ 7.5, looks @ 6.5. I'm a couple weeks into documenting this "feels" RPE and "speed" RPE data, so it's time to start thinking about how I want to use it.
Top set of Press felt @9.5, looks about like that. It's so strange because the first two reps looks like I could do a set of 5, but just a little bit of bar path deviation ups the difficulty on the 3rd rep into max effort territory.
Last back-off set felt @ 7, and looks @ 6. For me, there seems to be two kinds of "feels" RPEs right now: Strength and Fatigue. This felt @ 7 because I was just getting gassed. I guess the lesson here is that I should add some conditioning in, and get my work capacity up.
2nd set of DL felt @ 7 and looks @ 6. Definitely not heavy enough, but I hope that's in part because the programming has been working.
Paused HBS were all very easy being at the beginning of a wave. @6-7, but I forgot to take notes. Last set shown.
Top set of Bench felt @ 8, looks @7.
Back-offs were very easy. Again, the beginning of a wave, but probably still too easy. I need to adjust either by % or by going off of top set RPE. Felt @ 6, looks @ 6.
Benching across from me on this day was powerlifting legend, Beau Moore. Just casually benching 455 with no lift off or spotter. Said hello, and shook his meaty, meaty hand. Friendly guy.
So I had a few back spasms this week. I used to get them more frequently, and I've often associated them with RDLs. RDLs seem to help my Deadlift, but they also seem to aggravate my spine. I thought I was toeing the water with only 2 sets a week, but here we are again. OK. To be fair, when I say that RDLs have always helped my DL, I haven't tried that many DL variations. Basically just RDL and deficit pulls off of a plate.
So I decided to try block pulls from about the same height as my RDL depth. I'm still using straps so I can focus on technique and not on grip, but I did work up to 275 double-overhand before I added the straps. I had no idea what the weight would be so I decided to work up to a set of 5 with 275, and titrate up, rating RPE as I went, and adding 5% at a time. I ended up making a double-sized jump to 345 from 315, but that ended up being about the right weight. Now I was surprised that I was able to do 345X5 @ 8 for multiple sets here (I could have done more than 2 sets, but wanted to play it safe because of all the volume leading up to this weight). In fact, this is the same weight I'm programmed to do for two sets of triples on Friday from the floor. That either means that my DL strength is lapping my programming, or this block height is NOT disadvantageous for me. Next week I will try lowering it to just the 4" block and see if that takes some weight off the bar. Still want this to be a "medium" day. The last set felt @ 8, looks @ 7.5.
*Day 1 of a new diet. I'm working with a dietitian from Barbell Medicine. BW should start to drop going forward, and training will have to be adjusted as necessary. That could go a couple of ways. The one thing I want to make sure is that I'm both keeping practice of high intensity weights in the program, but that I'm also keeping plenty of volume in. So, will continue with top sets and back-off sets, but top sets may stop majority 5s and 3s, and become something more like 1-3 heavy-ish singles before back-off work.
Top set of squats was pretty good on this day. Felt @ 9, looks @ 8.
Back-offs were all fast. Last back-off felt @ 7.5, looks @ ~7.
As the Press has continue to feel harder than "it should," I've decided to switch from the lower incline bench for my Medium pressing movement to a higher incline. To start, I just used last week's top-set weight of Press as my weight. Maybe on the light end of the correct range. Last set felt @ 8.5, looks @ 6.5. It feeling so much harder is probably a fatigue issue plus a bit of "novelty" of the movement. I may need to seek some guidance on "feels" RPE vs. "speed" RPE.
Chins were fine. They continue to not feel any stronger, but also not feel any weaker. It will be interesting to see what happens with them as I drop weight.
Rows were very easy. Likely far too easy. Last set felt @ 6, looks @ 6.
290X5 is a Rep PR on SSB. Last set "felt" @ 8.5, bar speed is @ ~7.
Press top set felt @ 10, looks @8.5. Not sure what to think about that. Doesn't seem like fatigue. The warm-up sets were harder than I would have liked as well.
Last back-off felt @7, looks @7.
Deadlift top-set felt @ 7 for overall strength, but @ 8 for grip. Bar speed looks @ ~7. Gonna drop straps for all sets of rows, and see if that's enough of a kick in the butt for grip to keep pace. I won't drap straps for heavy RDLs because they go to shit double-overhand for me.
Last set of paused HBS felt @ 7, looks @ 6. Rep PR.
255X1 is a PR on Bench. Felt @ 10. Didn't get video of last warm-up single, but it was surely faster than this. Will look to see if the top set of 3 in a couple of weeks feels @9 or less. Otherwise, could be in trouble. Last set of back-offs felt @ 8, looks @ 7.
RDL technique was a little all-over the place today, BUT the bar was solid against legs for all but 1 rep. This last set felt @ 7, and looks max @ 6.
Top set of Squat was a shit show. It looks like I let my chest drop when I hit the hole, sliding the bar forward of mid-foot, and making the concentric an RPE 10 gut punch.
I decided to take it again. I'm showing the last warm-up single and this 2nd top single to compare speed on both. The second single was a "feels" RPE @ 8, but while it was a touch higher than the last warm-up, the speed wasn't much slower, so would be a "bar speed" @ 7.
320X5X5 is a 5X5 PR. All sets were strong. I rated this last set @ 7.5, and video looks close to that.
Inclines were fairly tough at this weight. 205X3 is a Rep PR. Last set was a "feels" @ 9.5, and video was "speed" @ 8.
Chins were fine. No video. Tried to stop @ ~9.
Rows were also fine. I used straps on the last set just to make sure I could focus on the lift. Last set was "feels" @ 7, and "speed" @ 6.
Going to try tracking RPE "feels" after sets, so that I can compare them to "bar speed" RPE from the video.
Last set of SSB felt @8. Video says @ 6. Started dialing-in a new cue to "keep my triceps in my lats" on these. Felt like upper back looseness was making it difficult to keep my chest "up" coming out of the hole. I believe the lower arm position caused by this bar makes it less natural to keep the upper back muscles tight. Trying to push my triceps into my lats to open my chest up, and that seemed to help.
Top set of Press felt @9. Video says about the same. Was hoping this weight wouldn't feel so tough.
Last back-off set of Press felt @ 8.5. Video says about 7.5. These were all fairly easy, so my rating was probably due to keeping rests between back-off sets at 2 minutes or less.
For the DL, I rated both the first and third top-sets @ 7.5. Video definitely says they're at about the same speed. Not sure about RPE. May need to film my last warm-up set in order to get accurate bar speed RPE for singles. These all felt smooth, and relatively easy.
For the back-off set, it felt @ 7. Video says about 6.5.
No easily perceptible change in bar speed between the first and last reps of the last set. So probably RPE 6 at most. Going back and looking at my heaviest session with this movement from a few weeks ago, that would appear to be the same there. I probably need to up the intensity a bit to get into @7-8 range at least for the last set (shown).
Top set of Bench is interesting. Felt like at RPE 9-9.5, but bar speed between 1st and 3rd rep looks more like @7.5. Mis-grooved the 2nd rep which made it feel harder than it should have been. But technique break-down often comes with high-intensity work. As far as the discrepancy between "bar speed RPE" and "feels RPE," I would submit that my bench strength tends to drop off a cliff more-so than other lifts. Nevertheless, I will try to keep this discrepancy in mind. Back off -sets were all easy <@6. Top-set and last back-off shown.
I think I'm finally figuring out some stuff on the RDL bar path. I'm just not pushing my butt back far enough to keep the bar in contact with my legs throughout. This really felt like it started to click half-way through the last set. For me, the cue might not just be "butt back" OR "bar on legs," but rather BOTH push back so that the bar feels SOLID against the legs. The only thing is that my low back "feels" less extended this way, although it looks fine. No real difference in the bar speed between first and last reps, but it "feels" tough, so I'm gonna call the 2nd set @6. Last set shown.
Had a conflict tonight, and so got my work-out in at an "away" gym that I found in the area. The gym was mostly fine, however none of the barbells had a center knurling, and the only spare belt they had was a nylon and velcro affair.
Because of the above, I conservatively lowered my top-set weight for squats from 380 to 365. I kept the back-off weight the same, however. Top set weight was fine, however the old problem of sliding forward at parallel instead of dropping down below parallel crept back in here. Something to watch out for. Same problem was apparent on a few reps of the back-off sets. Top-set and last back-off shown.
The incline benches at this gym were standard 45 degrees, whereas the one I usually use is more horizontal. To gauge it, I worked up to a heavy-ish single, and then backed off. The back-off weight ended up being a bit too light, so I just kept rest periods down. Main floor of this gym was packed, so no video of anything but Squats.
No neutral grip chin options available, so these were all supinated. Felt fine on my wrist actually, and generally fairly strong. Still tried to keep all sets below RPE 10. Last was probably @10, but whatevs.
BB Rows, were not from the floor, but from a fairly horizontal hang position. Wasn't sure if the staff would appreciate me doing Pendlay's on their regular gym floor with iron plates even though it was a padded floor. These were fine.
