Friday was classic lifts workout A in the ultra-boring but ultra-effective Five by Five program:
5x5 back squat @ 180# (sweaty)
5x5 bench press @ 95# (easy)
5x3 deadlift @ 235# (easy)
This took an hour and a half, including all the warmup and mobility work. Warming up for the squats in particular takes me about 5 sets at increasing weight all on its own. And no matter how much I warm up, right now the fifth set of squats at the full working weight is always much better than the first. I move better.
There’s a meet in San Jose in October that I think I’m gonna aim for. This time I won’t injure my shoulder the day after I pay the entry fee. Really this time for sure.
Monday: minor rollback on weights after last week’s rest.
5x5 back squat @ 170#
5x5 bench press @ 90#
5x3 deadlift @ 225#
Today:
5x5 back squat @ 175#
5x5 OHP @ 65#
5x3 power cleans @ 100#
Squats easy as far as leg strength goes. The challenges are with endurance (making it through that fifth rep with good form) and upper back strength. Also, my shoulders are really starting to feel abused. Definite calluses and I was thinking this morning during that fifth set that they feel bruised.
OHP is easy at 65lbs, impossible at 75. Such a massive cliff for me.
My sleep and diet have been utterly horrible in the past week & a half. I’m commuting into San Francisco by train for a new job and my schedule is still disrupted. I’m lifting at 6 in the morning, for instance, which means I go to bed at 9:30pm which is hard. It’s like moving two time zones eastward, only my husband is still on west coast time.
Monday’s workout:
5x5 back squat @ 190#, success!
3 rounds of:
12 hamstring curls in the wussy machine, 50 units
20 lunges, alternating legs
12 hack squats @ 90# + whatever the sled weighs
12 95# stiff-legged deadlift
Wednesday’s workout:
3 rounds of:
bench press lockouts, top half, @ 100, 3-5 reps
dumbbell chest press, 30# each, 5-8 reps
plyometric (aka explosive) pushups against a bar, 8-12 reps
shove a medicine ball straight up while lying on my back, 15 reps
Tricep-riffic!
3 rounds of:
rack pulls @ 315#, 3-5 reps
barbell hip thrusts (shoulders on bench) @ 135#, 5-8 reps
deadlifts @ 135#, 8-12 reps
supine hip bridges, unweighted, 12-15 reps
Hamstring-riffic! Dripping with sweat by the end.
After that I got on a train and rode up to San Francisco to my new job. Worst thing about it: not being able to eat properly immediately afterward. Can’t eat on the train.
5x5 back squat @ 185#
5x5 OHP @ 75# fail
5x3 power cleans @ 115# didn’t even try
My left shoulder started acting up in the second set of overhead presses. My upper trap started cramping up. Very painful. So I bailed on the lift and did some stretching and low-trap activation work, trying to get the shoulder to let go of itself. This is lingering fallout from my pec minor injury back in January: the trapezius is compensating for weakness elsewhere and really wants to overwork itself. I have to consciously keep it from activating on a lot of lifts. Today, man, I failed. Or something. Sometimes I just accidentally sleep on my left shoulder and wake up with it a mess all day.
These are the days when I am aware that I’m closer to 50 than I am to 40 now.
Anyway, the back squats were awesome. I blasted through the sets. Excellent depth, excellent drive upward. Felt great. The wild thing is that my previous measured single rep max is 200#. I am so going to blow that away! And with a much higher quality squat, too.
Friday:
5x5 back squat @ 180#, failed at 4th rep of 2nd set, got at most 3 reps from the next sets
5x5 OHP @ 75#, failed in the third set
5x3 power clean @ 110#, bailed early from exhaustion.
A weak workout overall. I was tired going into it because my Thursday had been exhausting for unusual reasons.
Today:
5x5 back squat @ 180# crushed, last set was the best set
5x5 bench press @ 95# solid
5x3 deadlift @ 225# easy
And that with a hangover from two margaritas last night while watching one of the stupidest movies I have ever seen, Underworld. Yes, I am a lightweight. But it does highlight the importance of rest & recovery time.
5x5 back squat @ 175#
5x5 bench press @ 90#
5x3 deadlift @ 225#
In the books. The deadlift is still a boring weight. The squat leaves me sweating and breathing hard. It’s all about mental toughness.
5x5 back squats @ 170# in the books
5x5 overhead press @ 75# not in the books, oh man, total failure from the 2nd set on
5x3 power cleans @ 105# in the books
Tinkering with my breathing on the squats. Trying to release a little breath at the bottom of the squat immediately before driving up. I dunno about that. Might have to practice it on the warmup sets.
I don’t drop those cleans on the floor afterwards, by the way. 105 is still light enough to be caught easily and placed down. I guess I have a thing about not dropping weights if I am at all capable of putting them back down under control.
5x5 back squat @ 160#
5x5 overhead press @ 70
5x3 power clean @ 105
Strong on the squats! Good depth, good acceleration on the way up. So satisfying. They leave me dripping with sweat at this weight, though. Man, I notice it.
Also, I completely crushed the OHPs, and this after failing so badly with that same weight on Friday. It’s like my shoulders got stronger or something.
Will stay at 105 for cleans for at least another session, to continue to improve technique. I can clean that weight over and over. I just feel I do it poorly.
Yesterday:
5x5 back squat @ 155
5x5 bench press @ 85
5x3 deadlift @ 205
All lifts straightforward. The squats are making me happy. This is a high-volume program and I’m finishing every exercise strong.
It makes for a very boring exercise log, though. I can mention that I did the deadlifts barefoot again, I guess, and report that barefoot really is better than even the flattest of flat-soled shoes.
back squat @ 150#
overhead press @ 70# (failed on rep 5 of set 4, failed completely through fifth set)
power cleans @ 95#
The OHP was disappointing because I did 24 out of 25 reps on Monday, so I expected to do fine today. But my delts just quit on me.
The power cleans are getting better. I have been prepping myself mentally for the cleans by swinging The Beast(tm) kettlebell, which is the 40kg one. If I can drive that up to the level of my eyes, I’m firing the right muscles.
The squats were awesome. Because I am a jerk, I love squatting at the same time that some guy is in the other squat cage doing deep knee bends instead of actual squats. If your hips don’t go below your knees it doesn’t count, dude. Take some weight off that bar until you can get that ass to the grass. On the other hand, I am happy to see people squatting at all at this gym, which is so very much not an iron gym. It’s such a good exercise.
The one exercise to do if you’re doing only one: the squat.
5x5 squat @ 135#
5x5 bench @ 70#
5x3 deadlift @ 185#
Solid squat sets, with the last set better than the first. Bench and deads still light. I did switch to mixed grip on the deads midway through. Wanted to concentrate on perfect movement without being distracted by the pressure on my thumbs. I am told my gym has ordered a women’s bar. It’ll help because I’ll finally be able to get more finger hooked around than I can on the men’s bar right now. Though lifting with a thick bar is good for grip, so I dunno.
Also, I did the deadlifting with bare feet. Took the Merrell Gloves off because I felt they were interfering; they are hereby demoted to Very Comfortable Casual Shoes.
Bare feet are awesome. Saw a guy deadlifting at the same time I was in those running shoes with giant cushy heels with huge air bladders. They were too big for him to boot. He was practically knock-kneed. I winced watching him. Wanted to tell him to take his damn shoes off & burn them, but of course one doesn’t do that sort of thing.
Finished off with 3 sets of Tate presses, incline variation.
5x5 low-bar back squat @ 130#
5x5 overhead press @ 65#
5x3 power clean @ 80#
cable face pulls
barbell good mornings @ 80#
The squat weight is finally heavy enough that I have to work to keep my right knee doing the proper thing. The power clean weight is still a technique-tinkering weight.
Now I spend the rest of the day not eating nearly as much as I want to, because it’s time to shed some fat. Argh. Hate.
Missed Wednesday to give my shoulder some rest time.
5x5 back squats @ 125# (going great, massive depth, right knee solidified)
5x5 overhead press @ 65# (gonna fail here first)
5x3 power cleans @ 80# (elbow speed improving, but it’s hard to practice full extension at such a light weight; am always in danger of flinging the weight up over my head; okay I exaggerate slightly)
All weights still light except that OHP. My shoulders are so weak.
5x5 back squat @ 110
5x5 overhead press @ 55
5x3 power clean @ 75
sled pushes up & down the sidewalk, running, 2 plates on
much slower sled pulls, same weight
The squat weight is still in the “not exactly inconsequential, but so light that I am freely tinkering with my technique” category. My foot position is wider and my ending position is much lower than it was last time. I am concentrating on conquering once and for all that little inward twitch my right knee does. Another thing I’m doing to work on that is adductor rolling with a barbell. This is exquisitely painful, like foam rolling only, you know, with a barbell. So it’s hardcore. (Also effective.)
Sit down on the floor with the leg you’re not rolling extended and the leg you’re about to roll bent at the knee. One end of the barbell goes at your extended foot; rest the other end on your bent leg. Roll until you find the spot that makes you yelp. You can shift the point of the barbell that rests on your leg up and down to make it more or less intense. Use the junior bar if the big one is too much. ‘Cause I’m warning you, this is ouchy.
Sled pushing is a fantastic metcon. It meets all the requirements of a good metcon: low skill threshold; easily scaled in multiple dimensions; gasses you out hard; the failure mode when exhausted is directly related to exercise performance not technique; you won’t kill yourself by dropping the sled on your head. (Example of a disastrously bad choice for a metcon: the barbell snatch.)
5x5 back squat @ 95#
5x5 bench press @ 50#
5x3 deadlift @ 145#
Supplemented with dumbbell floor press (1x5@35, 2x5@30)
Everything still feels light. Deadlift calluses coming back. Am insisting on using the hook grip to rebuild grip strength as well.
