BBM LFT Block 1. Cycle 4. Session B.

sRPE @7

BW - 203

Bench - 

195X2 @7

165X4, 4, 4, 4, 4 @~5

Pause Squat -

245X6 @7

225X4, 4, 4 @4

DB Bench - 

60sX10, 8 @7.5/7

55sX8 @7

210 Tempo Bench Dips - BWX15, 13, 12 @~7

Traps and right wrist bothering me a bit.  Traps sometimes get cranky from a lot of pressing, so hopefully they will acclimate to this training.  Wrist may have gotten a bit aggravated on curls the day before.

Conditioning. Week 2. Upper Body

BW - 205

Cuff Work - Lots

CG Bench -
BarX20, 15
95X5
135X4
155X3
165X3, 3, 3

BB Rows -
BarX25
95X10
155X12, 10, 10, 10

Chins - BWX10, 5, 5, 5 (25 total)

Decline Sit-Ups - BWX10, 10, 10, 5, 5 (40 total)

Don't know if the shoulder's getting better or not.  The cuff pain has subsided somewhat, and I can bench...somewhat, but there's  a new issue right around where the outside of my left trap meets the point of my left collar-bone.  My Acromion?  Impingement?  I'm probably a few weeks away from looking for a Physical Therapist.

The bench started to feel strong as I went through the warm-ups, but the 165X3 sets did not.  I dunno.

Rows felt okay, though.

Chins and sit-ups were fine.  Upped the volume on both over last week.

LRB 365: Strong-15. Christmas Vacation

12/20
BW - 205

Chins -
BWX8, 6, 5, 5, 5

T-Bars -
45X10
70X10, 10, 10

Shrugs -
135X20
225X20
315X20, 20

BB Curls -
BarX10
65X5
BarX40,10

12/23
Squats -
BarX10
95X5
125X5
145X4
165X3
185X2
195X1
215X1
225X1

Pause Squats -
175X5, 5

Deadlift -
135X5
165X4
195X4
225X3
265X2
275X1
285X1
295X1
235X3, 3

Leg Curls - 4 sets of 20, 1 set of 26

12/24
Bench -
BarX10
85X5
95X4
115X3
125X2
135X1
145X1
155X1
125X16

Inclines -
105X10, 10
95X10, 10, 10

DB Flyes - 3 sets of 20

Rope Pushdowns - 4 sets of 20

Squats felt much better now that I'm not sick.  Faster, but also combined explosiveness with better control so that I didn't lose lower back tightness at lockout.  Good Session.

Deadlifts all felt pretty fast.  Traps are getting sore from these now when they weren't under higher weight/reps on 5/3/1.  Interesting.

Bench felt pretty good.  Trying to focus on initiating the concentric with my legs.  Really burned myself out on the AMAP back-off set, and had to drop my weight mid-way through my incline set as a result.  Chest and shoulders were sore as hell the next day.

5/3/1 Full-Body: Cycle 3. Week 1. Squat

LRB Diet - Day 26

BW - ?189?

Squats -
BarX10
95X7
135, 150X5
170X3
195X8

BB Rows -
BarX15
95X8
135X8
115X15

High-Pulls -
115, 135, 145, 155, 155, 155X5

Dips - BWX8, 12, 16, 4, 6

I was pressed for time getting ready to go out of town for the weekend, and had to settle for going to the L@Fitness (formerly B@llys) near my home.  189 seemed like such a drastic drop-off from my last weigh-in that I'm suspicious of the scale.  However, when I set it down to Zero pounds, it counter-balanced correctly so who knows.

I need to be better about putting my head down and doing work when I'm in a strange gym; I always feel wound tight and get a little off my game wanting to get in and get out as fast as possible.  For this session that was manifested by skipping mobility warm-ups and all my core work.  I'll have to make up for all of that in spades next time I'm in the gym.

Nevertheless everything went pretty well.  Squats felt solid, and the results are in-line with steady progress after I reset my form.

I couldnt' really do Pendlays here because I didn't have access to bumper plates at this gym.  So BB Rows trying go keep my low-back parallel to the ground and using a brief dead hang at the bottom of each rep to try and simulate a dead-stop row as much as possible.  The results were predictably slightly off from previous sessions.

For the 2nd month of LRB Dieting, I'm adding in some additional shoulder/trap work inspired by a CNP article.  One of the reasons for choosing now to take my first ever stab at strict dieting, is because I'm going to a sort of weekend camping reunion of college friends at the end of September.  While I'm trying to trim up, I thought I'd also take a stab at building some "movie star" shoulders.  Kind of silly, but also fun.  So for this day, I'm adding in High-Pulls, a movement I've never done, but always wanted to try.  These are done incredibly NOT as a textbook version of the Olympic accessory, but more as an explosive, cheating upright row.  One cool bit of synergy here, is that it seemed to work out very well to use the weight from the back-off set of bent rows as the warm-up weight for the high-pulls.  I worked up to 155, where I was having to really use explosiveness and much face-scrunching to get the 5th rep, and knocked out 3 of those sets.  I used straps on this movement as well.  I really liked this movement, and my delts felt really sore the next day.

Dips were a bit wonky because this gym has a weird, trapezoidal dip apparatus.  Again, getting past this sort of thing is something I need to be able to do.  It's dumb to only be able to have good workouts in my regular gym.  Regardless, my target was to ladder up to, and back down from 16 reps.  I got that top set, but the back off sets were completely crap.

UB: Strong Week 4. Bench

Defranco Shoulder Mobility

Machine Neck Extension - 25X20X2, 30X20

Bench -
BarX30
95X5
115X5
135X5
145X5
165X5

DB Incline - 60sX9, 4

Dips - Gym BW 207+25X8, 5

Hanging Leg Raise (Feet to Bar) - BWX5, 3, 4, 3

10 minutes on treadmill

5th week of neck work in the bag.  I've been growing a beard since October, and I'm shaving it off this weekend.  Wondering if my neck will look drastically different once it's exposed.  I originally started addidng in extensions here, because I thought it might help with upper back tightness in the deadlift.  Paul Carter poo-poo'd that idea, however looking at the deadlift on exrx it mentions the levator being a stabilizer along with the traps.  The levator gets worked in lateral neck flexion, so maybe it would be better to start doing those instead.  2 weeks to go, might as well mix it up a little.

So 165 is right around my projected 5RM.  I did a lot of reps with just the bar to make sure to get a lot of blood flowing into the muscles and get the mechanics locked in.  I took progressively longer rests between sets as I progressed through the 5X5.  On the top 2 sets, I let my focus come away from mechanics and move towards power, or "intent."  Top set felt pretty good.  Hard, but not a grinder.  Next week the weight on the lower sets come up, but the top set remains the same, so everything should be good, and setting the stage for a PR the following week.

UB: Strong Week 3. Bench

Defranco Shoulder Mobility

Machine Neck Extension - 15X20, 20X20, 25X20

Bench -
BarX10
95X5
105X5
125X5
135X5
155X5

DB Incline - 55sX12, 7

Dips - Gym BW 204+5lb.X12, 4

Defranco-style Core Circuit X2

20 minute, brisk walk home

Back of my neck felt a little sore coming into the gym, so I backed off the weight on the extensions.  I'm pretty sure it was just my traps from heavy shrugging the day before, but no point in killing myself on neck extensions anyway.

Bench felt a little better today.  I've been focused so much on tinkering with my set-up, that everything had just felt hard.  Today I tried to just make sure and do the things I KNOW have been good, and not worry as much about other stuff.  That meant setting up high on the bench so that my shoulders end up just below the uprights, and getting into this position by setting my feet then sliding down the bench and then back up onto my upper-back.  The thing I had trouble with today was tucking-and-flaring my elbows through the movement, and pulling the bar apart.  Otherwise, I gave myself decent rests between the top sets, and things mostly felt good.  Next week the top set is my projected 5RM.

UB: Strong Week 2. Bench

Defranco Shoulder Mobility

Machine Neck Extension - 20X20, 30X20X2

Bench -
BarX10
85X5
105X5
115X5
125X5
145X5

DB Incline Press - 55sX11, 5

Dips - Gym BW 200+10X10, 4

10 minute trot on the treadmill

Switched over to extensions on the neck machine.  I figure this will have more carry-over to the Deadlift and Squat than flexions were going to have to anything else.  However, before I decide to do them for both upper-body days I want to see how the muscles feel tomorrow.  If my neck is sore and achy, I may not want to do them on Press day, and then have them sore on Deadlift day.  OR maybe I should and make my body adapt.  Dunno.

Still hate benching.  I'm still monkeying with my set-up, and taking minimal breaks between sets while the weights are this "light."  I've done 145 for 10 reps before, but those 5 felt pretty heavy today.  Hope that's not a bad sign.

UB: Strong Week 1. Bench

Defranco Shoulder Mobility

Neck Machine - 3X20

Bench -
85X5
95X5
105X5
115X5
135X5

Incline DB Press - 55sX10, 5

Dips - Gym BW198+10lb.X11, 4

10 min. lope on the treadmill

I hate the bench.  I keep trying to dial my form in better, but sometimes that seems to make everything feel heavier.  Lately I've been focusing first on driving my upper-back into the pad.  Then I break the bar out of the rack.  Make sure my hands are straight so that the bar is above my wrists.  Look at where the bar is "at" on the ceiling to make sure it comes back to that same point every rep.  Squeeze hard, pull the bar apart, tuck elbows on the way down.  I'm having trouble the last couple of times remembering to flare the elbows while hitting my "target" on the ceiling.  Anyway this session sucked as all this shit makes it a pain in the ass.  Additionally, I was making sure to get a full touch at the bottom, and then drive that shit up.  This made sure the muscles got worked hard with relatively light weight.  However, all this shit in combination, plus only enough rest between sets to reload the bar, meant I was mentally and physically pretty taxed afterwards.