May 15

Conditioning, done as a circuit with Tabata intervals
Push-ups: 10x8
jumping pull-ups: ~5x8
bent over rows, 50kg: ~8x6, 6x2
knees to elbows: ~6x8

numbers are approximate, some sets I didn't make my target reps but no time for tracking all this...

May 16

clean doubles: 100, 110, 112.5, 115, 110, 112.5
bench press: 70x5

May 30

not real happy with how my body's been acting over the last while, I've lost a fair bit of flexibility in the last year in particular my quads and shoulders seem stiff.  For a bit of a change of pace, I'm going to be doing Eric Cressey's Show & Go program to get some good programming with proper warm-up and cool down, and mobility work thrown in between sets for good measure.

doing the 3 day a week program, MWF and my plan is to do Snatches on Tues and C&J on Sat.  Will do it as a substitute for conditioning, so the plan is to lift every minute on the minute for 15 minutes, probably snatch doubles and C&J singles, will see how it goes this week...



Week 1, Phase 1 - Monday

Foam roller series
Mobility warm-ups

Front squat: 112x3, 120x3, 115x3x2

Speed deadlift: 110x2x5

Reverse db lunges from deficit: 15x8x3
feet elevated push-ups: 10x3

bent over rows: 60x10x3

cool down stretching


Also, bought a used dumbell set off kijiji, sight unseen (my father-in-law is going to pick them up) I think it was a steal of a deal, but won't know till this weekend.

Tuesday

Mobility warm-ups

Heidens 4x5/side
20m falling sprint 6x1/side


Wednesday - drinking with some friends who were up from Chile they dropped by unannounced.


Thursday

Foam roller series
Mobility warm-ups

Close grip bench: 80x3, 82x3, 82x3, 75x3
Pull-ups BW+10x3x4

Walking db lunges: 15x6/side x3
Pendlay rows: 60x10x3

Ab roll-outs: 8x3

cool down stretching

Saturday

Went for about a 6km hike with some friends, carrying the kid in his backpack

Foam roller series
Mobility warm-ups

Deadlifts: 145x5x4

Bench Press: 80x5, 85x5x2
Glute-ham raises: 6x3

pull-ups: 5x3

mobility work & cool down stretching

bench press felt surprisingly strong.  I think I could've beaten my previous record of 1 rep in the military bench for reps.

bench press felt surprisingly strong.  I think I could've beaten my previous record of 1 rep in the military bench for reps.

Tongue in cheek aside (had a good laugh!), I think you've touched on one of the main reasons why not many people do the reps event. "Repping out" with bodyweight is just not a meaningful proposition for many virtualmeeters. But hey, if you can now get 2-3, I guess you're now 200-300% stronger!

Tongue in cheek aside (had a good laugh!), I think you've touched on one of the main reasons why not many people do the reps event. "Repping out" with bodyweight is just not a meaningful proposition for many virtualmeeters. But hey, if you can now get 2-3, I guess you're now 200-300% stronger!

Well, the truth is that I'm just not setup for benching so I never do it.  My squat stand is too high to reach on the bench, and it's been on my wish list for about 2 years now to get a piece welded on the back to make it low enough.  I'm improvising at the moment, I've got my bench up on a couple plates to make it high enough.  It's pretty iffy.  But hey, with a 200-300% improvement without training, why bench?

Monday - Phase 1, week 2

Foam roller series
Mobility warm-ups

Front squat: 125x3, 127x3, 125x3

Speed deadlift (done more like clean pulls): 115x2x5

Reverse db lunges from deficit: 15x8x3
feet elevated push-ups: 10x3

bent over rows: 60x10x3
side iso ab holds: 3x3x10sec/side

cool down stretching

Decided with only 3 sets that I shouldn't be a wimp on the squats this week.  The speed deadlifts were done as clean pulls, they felt nice and fast at the top.

Tuesday

Snatch: worked up to 95x1 and a couple misses at 97.5
C&J: worked up to 120

Was supposed to be a light day but the weight was moving well...

Thursday

Virtualmeet day, weather outside was beautiful!  Moving the plates back into the house after lifting was challenging for the ol' grip strength.

Found a steal of a deal on kijiji (Canadian classifieds website) on some dumbbells. A mix from 5-100lbs with about 14 pairs, weighted heavily to the bigger end.  About 1500lbs of steel for only $300.

Unfortunately they're in lbs, so any dumbbell work is going to be written in lbs just to make my log more confusing.

Saturday - Week 2, Day 2:

Foam roller series
Mobility warm-ups

Close grip bench: 80x3, 80x3, 85x3, 80x3
Pull-ups BW+ #15x3x4

Walking db lunges: #70x6/side x3
Pendlay rows: 60x10x3

Ab roll-outs: 8x3


Sunday, Week 2, day 3:

Foam roller series
Mobility warm-ups

Deadlifts: 140x5, 150x5x3

1-arm alternating db bench: #70x5x3
Glute-ham raises: 6x3

chin-ups: 5x3

mobility work & cool down stretching

Tuesday - Phase 1, week 3

Foam roller series
Mobility warm-ups

Front squat: 120x3, 125x3, 130x3, 132x3 125x3

Speed deadlift (done more like clean pulls): 125x2x5

Reverse db lunges from deficit: #50x8x3
feet elevated push-ups: 10x3

bent over rows: 60x10x3
side iso ab holds: 3x3x10sec/side

cool down stretching

I think that's a new 3 rep PR on the front squat.  It was a real grinder on the last rep.  Was planning on upping the weight on the bent over rows this week but was pretty much exhausted by the time I got to them.

Thursday - Week 3, day 2

Foam roller series
Mobility warm-ups

Close grip bench: 80x3, 80x3, 85x3x3
Pull-ups BW+ #15x3x5

Walking db lunges: #70x6/side x4
Pendlay rows: 60x10x3

Ab roll-outs: 8x3

Cool down stretching

Saturday - Week 3, day 3

Foam roller series
Mobility warm-ups

Deadlifts: 145x5, 155x5x3, 145x5

1-arm alternating db bench: #70x5x2, 70x7
Glute-ham raises: 6x3

chin-ups: 5x2, 6

mobility work & cool down stretching

Tuesday, Week 4 - deload week

Foam roller series
Mobility warm-ups

Front squat: 122x3, 127x3x2

Speed deadlift (done more like clean pulls): 130x2x3

Reverse db lunges from deficit: #50x8x2
feet elevated push-ups: 10x3

bent over rows: 65x10x3
side iso ab holds: 3x3x10sec/side

cool down stretching

I've got a bit of a cold (again, ugh), so I'm glad that this is a lighter volume week

Thursday

Foam roller series
Mobility warm-ups

Close grip bench: 80x3, 85x3, 90x3
Pull-ups BW+ #25x3, 15x3x2

Walking db lunges: #70x6/side x3
Pendlay rows: 60x10x3

Ab roll-outs: 8x3

Cool down stretching


I'm getting better at the ab roll-outs, able to get all the way down and back from my knees for a whole set.

Sunday - Week 4, day 3

Foam roller series
Mobility warm-ups

Deadlifts: 145x5, 160x5, 165x5, 150x5

1-arm alternating db bench: #70x5, 80x5, 70x6 - last rep at 80 was ugly...
Glute-ham raises: 6x3

chin-ups: 5x3

mobility work & cool down stretching


End of phase 1.  So far so good, the foam rolling is getting less painful, particularly in my calves and lats.  2 back exercises for every chest one really feels like a lot of back work.  I'm a little disappointed that I wasn't able to increase the weights for the back exercises more.  Can't really complain about progress, the numbers on the first exercise of the day seemed to continually improve.

Phase 2, I'm going to try to get some olympic lifting back on the in between days but that being said we're headed into shutdown at work so I'm going to be very busy so we'll see how it goes.  Time to go do some reading and figure out a whole new set of mobility movements for Tuesday!

Ugh, way more hours at work than I would like.  Was about 80 last week and this week is only looking a little better.

But I was inspired last night by the upcoming gathering and did my own little powerlifting meet.  (my wrist was bothering me so I couldn't snatch or C&J)  was hoping to get a 1000lb total but came up a little shy.

BW: 91kg
Squat: 145, 155, 165f
Bench: 90, 95, 100
Dead: 185, 205f. no 3rd attempt

Took too big a jump on the second dead, mis-calculated when I was taping dumbells on and going from kg's to lbs.  Bench went well, I can't remember the last time I benched 100 (maybe in 2005?) so that's a plus.

I videoed it all but it's not quite to Virtualmeet standards.  Used a website as my newspaper, forgot to roll up my shorts for the first squat attempt,  my whole bench setup is a little iffy and I taped weights on for deadlifting.  Good to video though, there's some technical issues with my squat that should be addressed.

Oh, and a couple days ago I worked up to a new front squat PR of 145.  I think that was on Sunday.