RTS Block 8. Week 1. Day 2.

sRPE @6.5

BW - 225

SBS -

-    220X8 @6.5

-    185X8, 8 @5

Spoto Bench -

-    175X3 @7

-    182.5X3 @8

-    190X3 @8.5

Dips - BWX8, 7, 5 @~9

Cable Flexion Rows - X15, 12, 11, 10 @9/10

RG Pulldowns - X12, 10, 9, 10 @9/10

Leg Extensions - X14, 11 @~5

Stationary Bike - SIT; 10 minutes

Nice, low stress session.  Everything moved well.

RTS Block 8. Week 1. Day 1.

sRPE @ 8

BW - 226

Pause Squat - 295X2 @7.5

Squats - 277.5X5, 5, 5 @~6

Larsen Bench - 

-    140X10 @6.5

-    145X10 @8

-    147.5X10 @10

-    140X10 @10

TnG DL - 325X6, 6, 6 @7/9

GHR - BWX12, 9, 9 @7/8

Leg Extensions - X13, 11 @5.5/6.5

Stationary Bike - SIT; 10 minutes

Training was pretty crap the last couple of weeks across illness, travel, and just general disruptions.  Also dealing with some tendinopathy in my right knee.  Hoping I'll get a solid 4 week run of training in this block.

RTS Pivot Block 4. Week 1. Day 1.

sRPE @8.5

BW - 229

High Bar Squat - 

-    230X10(PR) @6

-    245X10(PR) @7.5

530 HBS - 245X5, 5, 5 @8/9

20 minute circuit - 

-    BSS - BWX16, 14, 10, 10 @8.5/10

-    Pendlay Row - 135X11, 10, 8 @10

-    Press - 90X7, 7, 7 @9/10

Stationary Bike - SIT; 0:20/1:40; 10 minutes

Add knee sleeves and get a 40 lb. HBS 10 rep PR.

I will say my knees actually didn't feel great after the tempo squats, and were pretty creaky on the BSS.

Texas Method - Week 6 - Volume Day

BW - 230

Squats -
BarX5
135X4
205X3
245X2
285X5, 5, 5, 5, 5

Bench -
BarX5
95X3
125X2
155X1
180X5, 5, 5, 5, 5

Deadlift -
135X3
225X2
315X1
350X1, 1

 Feeling kind of beat-up.  Starting to look forward more towards after the meet than the meet itself.  My right shoulder (my "good" shoulder) hurts, but I can't tell how much is the pain from chins, dropping the bar on my collar-bone in the clean, and general DOMS.  Knees and hips are achy.  Knees in particular make it hard to get comfortable trying to go to sleep.

Didn't have coaching today.  Pretty sure I was supposed to start singles this week, so I worked up to a single on Deadlift.  Then I wasn't sure if it was one single or multiple, so I did one more and called it.  They were both hard.

Hoping I bounce back a bit both mentally and physically for the meet.

Novice LP - Session 10

BW - 220

Squats -
BarX5
120X4
175X3
215X2
255X1
290X5, 5, 5

Bench -
BarX5
100X4
125X3
150X2
170X1
190X5, 5, 4

Deadlift -
135X5
195X3
235X2
275X1
310X5

290X5 is a Rep PR on squats.  Happy about that.  Not so happy about the knee maybe-tendonitis I'm getting on off-days.

Missed my last rep on bench.  No big deal.

Final work set of Deadlift actually felt better than my last couple of sessions.

Legs and Back, and low-back rehab

BW - 213

Slow Rack-Pulls at the knee - 135X5 for a few sets

GHR - BWX5, 5, 5 (using a stick to maintain spinal alignment)

Hack Squats -
100X8
knees felt weird and tight, so I jumped over and did
Leg Extensions - lightweightX35
jumped back over to Hacks and the knees felt fine and so I continued with
100X5
120X10
140X10
150X8
170X8
190X8

Chin-Ups -
BWX5
+25X3, 3
+45X1
BWX10

Chest-Supported Rows -
45X8
70X5
95X5

Started off with the rehab rack pulls.  Need to talk to my P.T. about these.  There's no pain, so that's good, but I'm also supposed to be re-drilling form to make sure I don't round my lower back.  I'll get one or two more session in before I meet with him again, and we'll see what's up.  Wondering if I need to be filming these or something.

GHRs using a broomstick to maintain a neutral spine were much harder today for some reason.  Could barely get 5 reps on the 3rd set.

Knees felt NOT GOOD on first set of Hacks, but after a bunch of light leg extensions, they were totally fine, and I set my 6th consecutive PR on them.

Felt like going for intensity instead of volume on chins, and so threw some weight on.  Nothing special about the results in-session.

Full Body. Week 1. Deadlift

BW - 207

Bulgarian Split-Squat - BWX12, 12, 12 (each leg)

Deadlift -
135X5, 5
185X4
225X3
275X2
315X1
295X8

BW Ladder Circuit -
Push-Ups - 5, 10, 15, 20, 15, 10, 5
Chin-Ups - 2, 4, 6, 8, 6, 4, 2
Dips -         3, 6, 9, 12, 9, 6, 3
Sit-Ups -    5, 10, 15, 20, 15, 10, 5

I'd originally planned for the squat movement on this day to be High-Bars, but with the knee issue I was dealing with for a few weeks, I thought it would be smarter to go with single-leg work instead.  I wasn't sure what I would do, but I'd been thinking about the Bulgarian Split-Squat.  Similar to the barbell complexes I'm doing on other days, this is a something I did a lot of during my first year of training, but haven't done since then.  Then I saw this video of John Meadows the other day, and realized I could do them very similarly with a little sit-up bracer they have at my gym.  The genius (and hellishness) of doing them like this with the back foot on a roller is that it's easier to keep the load on the front foot and not 'cheat' with the back leg.  I like 'em.

Waving the top-weight and back-off weight down again on Deadlifts to make sure my low-back gets some recovery and is ready for the other full-body days.  On the other hand, I'm also going to let the back-off reps get above 5 for the first time in forever.  295X8 ties my previous 8 rep max, and I easily had a couple more reps in the tank.

This body-weight ladder is modeled almost exactly on a section from Paul Carter's LRB 365 program I ran last year.  By the end of July, I'm going to test myself on some military PFT standards, and that's part of the focus here.  In addition, I'm thinking about these and the complexes I'm doing on the other days as having a 'focus' on assistance movements for the big lift from the prior session.  So the session before this was Bench, and the push-ups and dips here are reflecting that.  My next session is Squats, and the complex at the end of that has RDLs, High-Pulls, and Rows as 'Deadlift focus' to follow on this session.  Bench day follows Squat day, and so the complex on Bench day has two squat movements in it.

tl;dr this was a good session.

Full Body. Week 1. Bench

BW - 207

Pause Squat -
BarX10
95X5
135X3
185X3
225X2
255X2, 2, 2

Bench -
BarX20
95X5
115X4
135X3
155X2
185X1
155X15

BB Complex - Clean, Front Squat, Push-Press, *Front-Squat
95X2; 7 sets

Super low energy today.  I managed to hit all the Pause Squats, but really had to psych myself up for Bench and grind out the 15th rep.  The bad knee didn't display anything like pain during the squats, but I could literally feel it pumping up with blood.  Maybe that means there's already a good deal of inflammation in there?

Even though I was so low energy today, this complex seems significantly hard than the other despite having "bigger" movements in it.  Could be the accumulated fatigue from this first full week of full body and conditioning training, though.

*Getting from the push-press to the front squat and then returning the bar to the floor continues to be awkward.  On the last couple of sets, I tried switching to back squat, but that was just okay.  I contemplated Overhead-Squats, but when I was at the press lockout, it just seemed like a bad idea, so I skipped it.

Full Body. Week 1. Squat

BW - 207

Squat -
BarX10 (paused)
95X5 (paused)
115X5
135X5
155X4
185X3
225X10, 5

DB Bench - 60sX15, 12, 8, 8

BB Complex - RDL*, High-Pull, OHP, Row*
95X2; 14 sets

Knee is still bothering me.  Mostly it's achy when I wake up.  I can feel it when I'm exercising as well, but it's hard to tell if that's because of discomfort or because I'm hyper-aware of it.  Anyway, it's time to get back to work, so we'll just have to see.

225X10 is solid I believe while being scared of the knee.  14 reps is my all-time best with this weight.

I was only supposed to do 3 sets of DB Bench.  Oh, well.

Playing around with the complexes to see what feels right.  I'd originally programmed for 5 sets; increasing the reps per set every week.  But 5 sets of 2 here was just nothing, so I kept going until I felt worked and that was 14 sets.

* Strict OHP is the weak link in this chain, and I have to keep the weight down to be able to do it.  But the RDLs and Rows just felt ridiculous, and the High-Pulls weren't much harder.  After about 10 sets, I started pulling the RDL's with one-arm and switched from Rows to Cheat Curls.  I'll try this from the top next week.

Full-Body. Trial Week.

BW - 208

Pause Squats -
BarX10
95X5
135X3
185X3
225X2
255X2, 2, 2

Bench -
BarX20
95X5
135X3
155X2
185X1
155X15

Complex - 95X2, 2, 2, 2, 2
(Clean, Front Squat, Push-Press, Front Squat)

Next Day:
One-Mile Run - under 11:00

My knee was bothering me the last few days so I took time off from training.  It was still feeling wonky, but I felt like it was time to get back in the gym and see what was what.

My plan for May has been to do three days of full body training in the gym with complexes as finishers, and two-three days of starting to ramp up conditioning now that the weather's better.  I haven't done complexes in two or three years, so I wanted to take a week to try some stuff out.

My bench day programming seemed like a good place to start.  With pause squats not having a bounce at the bottom, I knew I'd feel safer on them.  Everything went well here.

On bench, I'm backing down to a lower section of my tiered programming for hitting 225, but with no back-off sets.  15 reps with 155 is actually my calculated target for 225, so that's kind of nice to have there even though I didn't quite make is to 225 in my last strength phase.

This complex had mixed results.  I have zero Oly training, so I knew the cleans would be more like reverse-grip cheat curls and I'm fine with that.  Going from front squat rack position into the press position was awkward, and getting the bar back to the floor after the 2nd front squat was REALLY awkward.  Both were kind of rough on my wrists.  I may ask one of the Oly guys at the gym for advice, or I may switch out one or both front squats for overhead squats.

The next day I did a mile run; my second of the season.  Last week, I came in about 10:45.  I was under 11:00 this time as well, but my time-keeping was off so I don't know exactly.  My knee was a bit tender at first, but after about a 1/3 mile or so, it got warm and felt good.  I'm still WAY over my best ever, sub-8:00 mile times, but this is just an acclimation period.

Higher Reps. Week 4. Squat

BW - 209

Squat -
135X5, 5 (paused)
135X5
185X4
225X3
275X2

Pause Squats - 235X3, 3, 3

High Bars - 185X10, 6, 5

Hack Machine -
100X12
120X8

Leg Extensions -
pyramid upX15, 15, 15, 15, 10 (top set heavier than last week)
back-offX24 (heavier than last week)

Lunges - BWX22, 20, 22, 22

Dragging ass heading into the gym today.  Did an extra set each out Pausers and High Bars to try to get my motor going before grinding out the bodybuilding stuff.  235X3 is a Rep PR on Pause Squats, but then the bottom fell out a little bit on High Bars and I came up 2 reps short of last week.

I think the Hack Machine may get cut out of my program.  My right knee has been bothering me, and I'm starting to suspect this machine.  Also, when the reps start to get really hard towards the end of sets, I'm losing some stability in my trunk, and that may be aggravating whatever has been going on with my low back.  What's happening is, because the feet are set against the plate, and my shoulders are set against the pads on the track, whenever there is a stability "leak" my butt kind of starts to move around against the sled.  Maybe I'll switch over to leg presses to get some comparable work in.

For similar reasons, I decided to cut out the hypers this week.  They were supposed to be a buttress against the low back issues, but I'm worried they were aggravating it as well.

LRB 365: Strong-15 Short. Week 4. Squat

BW - 203

Squat -
BarX10 (paused)
95X5 (paused)
135X5
155X3
185X3
205X2
235X1, 1
245X1

Pause Squats - 205X3, 3, 3, 3, 3

Leg Press - 3ppsX20, 16

Leg Curls - X20, 16 (heavier than last week)

Decent session.  My right knee has been feeling wonky this week.  At first it seemed like squats were making it feel worse, and then by the end of the pause squats, it seemed to feel better than when I started.  Just wait and see.  Hope it's not a side effect of the weight gain.

Cuing hard with 'chest up' and pushing through 'heels.'  245X1 was good.  The 3rd reps on the last couple of pause squat sets were a little wild card as my form tried to break down, but there was no doubt of hitting them all.

Keeping my stance close on leg press, and quads continue to burn.

Hoping the leg curls will help with the knee.

Skipped calves.

LRB 365: Conditioning. Week 6. Hills 2

Hill-Sprints - 15 Hills @ 90%

Well there's a big difference in between running these with almost a week off, and only one day off.  Much harder this session, and I went over the target time by a 1/2 second on about half my sprints.  Not crying about it, because I was still getting the hard work in.  My knees, particularly my left one, are doing a bit of crying, however.  But this was the last run, so they've got lots of time to settle down.

UB: Strong Week 2. Squat

Defranco Mobility

Standing Calf Raises - 245X15, 305X15, 345X15

Squat -
135X5
155X5
175X5
205X5
215X5

Front Squats - 125X10, 5

RDL - 135X10, 145X9

Inline Sprints - 30 yard sprints X 9 minutes

Weird day at the gym cuz there was a PL meet happening.

Moving up the stack on the raises FWIW.  I think it tops out at 405.

Squats felt pretty good.  Not sure about my depth, though.