Q&A – 36

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“Come on you apes! You wanna live forever?”

PR Friday

As usual, post your training updates and PRs. Mingle with the crowd. Talk about the Olympics.

Weekly Challenge

Last week’s challenge aimed at getting you to create a food log for three days (2 weekdays, 1 from the weekend). How many of you actually did this? This is the standard type of food log that a coach or trainer will ask from a client. It is a pretty good representation of how they eat (by looking at both week and weekend days), yet it isn’t more invasive than a few days. I’d suggest estimating your macro count for each meal and the day and see if you can improve it given what you want and need.

Next Week’s Challenge: Curl 40kg or 90 pounds for as many reps as possible at the end of one of your training sessions next week. And watch the Olympics. Post your reps to next week’s Q&A comments.

Week In Review

Monday there was a nerd-jizz-worthy post on hyperlordosis. Tuesday focused on helping powerlifters, CrossFitters, or strength trainees to transition into Olympic weightlifting. Wednesday talked about how much of an asshole Andrei Aramnau (won gold in 105kg class in Beijing) won’t be attending the 2012 Olympics, but it’s okay because he’s an asshole. Thursday was a “deep thoughts” moment from Dr. Kilgore. There were also posts on the live streams for the NAPF Powerlifting Championships (going on right now and throughout the weekend) as well as the Olympics (the opening ceremony is tonight).

Q&A

Justin,

A little context first I’m 32 and have a 13 year old brother, dad was active after he and mom split. So to the question at hand, I have a basic garage gym set up, rogue squat rack and bar w/some bumpers a pull up bar the basic crossfit set up. I’ve been doing “crossfit” for about 5 years now. My 13 year old brother is going to be starting football this year and wants to start working out. My old man not knowing any better almost bought him one of the cheap academy/sports place “home gym” things. I luckily advised him against this. But now he wants me to show the kid how to work out and set him up with some work outs. Stephen is 13 just started puberty and hit a growth spurt he is know about 5’8” and all skin and bones. I personally know how to do the lifts but would by no means call myself a coach or an expert. Would it be wise for me to teach him how to bench and squat correctly to knowledge and set him up with a squat rack and bench and pull up bar, or just run him through body weight movements and the like? I’ve tried finding some past q&a on the subject in your website because I know I’ve seen it before but just can’t seem to find it now. Any help pointing me in the right direction would be appreciated.

Thanks

Mike

PS- doing the goruck in Austin in dec after reading your write up. Thanks for the extra push to get me to actually sign up for it.

Dear Mike,

The GoRuck will be a good time. I’ll be doing a post soon on preparing for one, so keep an eye out. In the mean time, I’d suggest walking around with about 30 pounds in a pack for about an hour once a week and add some calisthenics after you lift.

As for your little brov, the thing that will help him the most is to get stronger. That doesn’t mean you’ll ignore spatial awareness or body weight stuff, but, yes, it’ll be worth your (and his) time to learn how to squat and bench. This could be fun or frustrating for you, but with kids it’s best to be patient. As long as you have him a) squatting down all the way with b) his chest up, and c) his knees out, he’ll be fine. Remember, any weight room coaches he has will probably know less than you. As for bench, just get a little bit of pinching the shoulder blades together and work on keeping his elbows from flaring. If you need to, use a bit more of a narrow grip than you’d expect to help the elbows stay under control. Don’t progress him if they flare. This will build his triceps, which is important for any football position.

Basic agility work wouldn’t hurt him. You could teach him the “athletic position”. It’s easier than it sounds: the athlete is on the balls of their feet (which is the base of the toes), stance shoulder width, knees and hips slightly bent. It allows quick change of direction. You could have him do the standard “chop the feet” and do whatever. Side shuffle, back pedaling, up-downs, or whatever. 30 seconds to 60 seconds of whatever you think of with half that time in rest. Do this to finish his workouts off. Total training time could be less than an hour. Make sure he’s having fun and be encouraging on his progress. Teach him that this stuff will make him better at football. If he believes it, then he’ll be a better player automatically. Give him confidence and teach respect, and he’ll do well in football.

@70sBig Justin love your site. Question: tweaked my knee front squatting. Back of knee swelling but no bruising. Normal or am I a pussy?

—@NicMcCool

Dear @NicMcCool,

This type of injury is related to toe angle and squatting (see first and second posts). Most people see that we eventually should have the toes pointed relatively forward, yet forget that toe angle is dependent on mobility.

Last December I had a similar injury. I did 72 clean and jerks, 31 of them with 300 pounds, for the Movember fundraiser (I don’t recommend this). My knees were crusty after this Thursday night session at my buddy Adam’s Panhandle CrossFit. Saturday I did an hour long ruck, and then Monday I was trying to warm-up to do some light or medium squats. I was squatting the bar, and tweaked the rear of my knee, just like Nic did above.

The reason is torsion. If you’ve been paying attention, you know that we want torsion, AKA torque AKA rotational force, at the hip because it helps to actively engage more musculature and more efficiently distributes the force of squatting or deadlifting across the thigh and hip. However, if a lifter doesn’t have the mobility — or their mobility has artificially been reduced due to structural stress (as in my case with the 72 clean and jerks and rucking) — then torsion can actually be an injurious act.

In this case, I think it’s a straining of the popliteus, a small muscle on the back of the knee (see image to the left). See how it attaches medially below the knee and laterally above the knee? When the toes are more forward, the tibia will face relatively forward. Then when the knees are shoved out, the femur (thigh) will angle outwards. See how this would tug on the poplitues if the upper attachment was pulled out while the lower attachment was kept in?

 

The popliteus normally aids in un-locking the knee from terminal knee extension. When the knee is flexed, as is the case in the bottom of a squat, it is contracted. My reasoning is that the muscle is shortened (contracted) at the bottom of the squat, and then the attachment sites are pulled apart (described in the preceding paragraph), resulting in a strain. For me, I know that the rucking also “worked” or “fatigued” the poplitues since each step applies more than body weight on the structure (it inevitably distributes force during walking, yet adding 50 pounds more than body weight to an already tired structure (from the CJs) will weaken and damage it even more). When I went to do the squatting movement a couple of days later, my popliteus was “crusty”, which means it was damaged, inflamed, and tender. Then I contracted it with knee flexion and then shoved my knees out which applied tension on a shortened muscle belly, and voila, it was “yanked” AKA strained.

I see this as a potential problem for people attempting “forward toe angle” style squatting when they lack the mobility in their hips, knees, and ankles to accommodate it. That’s why my suggestion has always been to make small, gradual changes to anything, whether it be mechanics or programming. At the same time, you have to take into account the other things that are going on in your training or life, because a lack of recovery can open a trainee up to small injuries like my popliteal strain. This is why when I climbed a 9,712 ft mountain last Saturday, I rested for three total days before snatching and CJing up to my month’s goals (more on this in a later post).

As for your injury, Nic, I suggest icing it as much as you can for the first several days. Mob the upper calf area with compression tack and stretch (you can do this above the knee as well) or joint capsule work with a rolled up towel tucked inside the back of the knee while in knee flexion (kind of like this vid). Ease back into squatting with light, medium, and then heavy days.

for some background, i’m 20, 5’8″ 195lbs with 15%bf. ive been lifting since high school, and it was always for football performance, so it was mostly the power lifts and just power cleans, with football conditioning. after high school i started learning the oly lifts. i’ve been doing them for about a year now, still not the best mechanics and deffinately not with a lot of weight, but i really want to focus on them because i like them so much. ive checked out the pendlay outline for a beginner template and i made my own up. could you tell me how dumb or smart it is?
mon- snatch 5×3@80% 1rm, high pulls and hang cleans 5×2 (not with significant weight, just to reinforce mechanics) high bar squat 3×5. (recently switched from low bar about a month ago when i decided to focus on oly lifts) pull ups
tues- clean and jerk 5×3@80% 1rm. high snatch pulls and hang snatches 5×2, rdls 3×8, sprints
wed-bench 3×5, bent over bb rows 3×5, db bench 3×5, db rows 3×5, push ups, lower back and ab complex
thurs- snatch 2,2,1 @90% 1rm. high bar squat 3×5, high pulls and hang snatches, press 3×5 (was doing 3×3 with ascending sets, but neglecting presses for a while has left me weak on them and im gonna just do an LP with them till i hit a wall) chins, if i have time ill do a bb complex
fri- c and j 2,2,1 @90% 1rm, high snatch pull and hang snatches, deads 1×5, dips, sled pullslooking at it, it seems like a lot. maybe it is. i havent been able to actually do this program for longer than two weeks uninterrupted due to travel and vacation, but it hasnt been too much to handle for the time ive been able to do it. i feel like i can do this template, but if it seems like im gonna drive my dick into the ground just let me know.

Dear Alphinitis,

You’ve been reading the site and commenting for a long time, so this is why I’m dealing with your long-ass, messy question. By the way, someone made fun of you for posting your BF%, but I think that is relevant information, so ignore that person.

I’m not going to dissect your program fully. But I’ll give you some of my personal philosophy with programming Olympic weightlifting. I don’t typically like partial movements for beginners. This means pulls, lifts from the hang, or from boxes. I agree with Pendlay that the positions are incredibly important, and these partial lifts may develop those, but I think it over complicates things for a beginner. Not to mention, in my opinion, they just need time to do the full lifts over and over with at least okay positioning (this would grade them out at a “B”). Instead, you are getting reps with tons of partial movements that may or may not be correct to begin with. I’d rather you just do the full lifts.

I don’t like to think in terms of percentages until the mid to late stage intermediate programming of anything. Modern society wants to be told exactly what to do, but programming is more organic than that. Doing whatever for a percentage may be the optimal stress in a given week, but who is to say that it will be several weeks from now? Or the first several weeks of a program? That’s why I indicated a steady progression in the program earlier this week.

You also have a day in which you bench, and then the next day you are snatching. I don’t know if you’ve ever benched heavy and then snatched heavy (I’ve done this in a session), but it’s not good. Not good at all.

By my count, you’re aiming to train five days a week. You already know I’m not a fan of that, especially for someone in your position that is transitioning into weightlifting. Rest is important to recover and get stronger from compound movements that impart a systemic stress. You are young, but I’d rather you learn this lesson now instead of doing it the hard way.

Lastly, I see a bunch of random shit tacked on the end of the training sessions. Dumbbell work and what not. Focus your efforts, mate. You already know why, but Ron Swanson will help:

78 thoughts on “Q&A – 36”

  1. Oops, accidentally posted this on yesterday’s update earlier:

    Longtime reader, sometimes poster. Hate to spam the page, but given Justin’s previous military-related posts and the military-friendly nature of this page I thought it wouldn’t be too obtrusive.

    I’m interning with Bullets2Bandages.org and we’re sponsoring Albie Masland as he runs across the US to raise money for the Travis Manion Foundation, a charity founded by the parents of a USNA classmate of mine who was killed in Iraq in 2007. Albie started near San Diego in mid-March and is now in Zanesville, Ohio, due to finish in Washington DC on August 18.

    You can follow his progress here: http://operationamerithon.com/ or on Twitter at @OpAmerithon.
    We’d appreciate any kind of support from anyone in the community–obviously financial support for the charity is great, but after 2,500+ miles of solo running Albie is happy just to have someone give him a high-five along the way, join him for a few miles, or have dinner with him when he stops for the night. Also, if you’ve got any contacts in the media who would be willing to do a story on him, please let me know.

    Thanks for reading this far, and if you’ve got any questions about Amerithon, the TMF, or B2B feel free to send them my way.
    eric(dot)montgomery(at)bullets2bandages(dot)org

    Oh, and as for PR Friday…
    Gym PR: High-bar squat 315×7 on my 3+ week of 5/3/1
    Life PR: Got engaged

  2. hai gaise

    haven’t DL’d in over 6 months due to switching to oly from strongman. previous best was 275kg, clean deadlifted 265 kg yesterday without too much trouble, feeeeels good man

      • I am camera shy.

        No really, I started the sport ~7 months ago coming over from strongman, gonna start posting videos when I get back of jerks and snatches

        I’m a 94 and my best training total so far is 110/145. I basically lack the mobility to do a full snatch consistently, the 110 was a power snatch. I also need a coach.

  3. After a week sitting on a bus in a developing country earlier this month I ended up with some weird sciatic pain. All week mob’d my hammies every day and I feel like a million bucks.

    No new PRs, but after weeks back on an LP to come back from an injury-followed-by-a-month-of-inconsistent-training I’ve layed the foundation to get back into making gains. This week I trained consistently in the morning and avoided the temptation to head straight to my desk every morning to sit here all day.

  4. Squat 455 x 2
    Did speed deadlits for the first time, seemed sort of easy during the set, felt a little more fatigued than usual the following day. Did a food log, plan to keep it up as I try and lose some weight.

  5. Don’t post here much, but I’ve been reading it every day for about a year so I figure I’ll start posting.

    5’11 230lbs

    3+ on 5-3-1 this week:

    Press: 4 @ 192.5 (lots of back bend on rep 4)
    Deadlift: 3 @ 440
    Bench: 7 @ 220
    Squat: 4 @ 380

  6. I did keep a food log for the whole week. I’m actually reducing my calories a bit right now in anticipation of being photographed about a thousand times at my wedding in five weeks, so I was doing this anwyay. Nothing crazy, I’ve just cut out some of the extra/tastey items I like to eat. I’ll happily do curls this week. I’m finally back in the gym this week after four weeks of only being able to train once or twice a week. I’ve been doing 3×5 squats and dealing with soreness as I get back in the swing of things. I can’t exaggerate how pumped I am to deadlift tomorrow.

    My favorite post this week was Kilgore’s “Cautionary Tale.” I chose the name Maslow for my training log and this site because I see weight training/exercise as one of the essential elements needed to take an ordinary person to self-actualization. As another wise man in Texas once put it, we don’t do these things to prevent problems, we do these things because otherwise there will always be problems. Just as in psychology we shouldn’t aim to simply prevent nerosis, we should aim to be the most competent, successful, intelligent, fun people we can be, otherwise we’ll just be a bunch of douches.

    +1 and a hat tip to Mike above for teaching his little brother to lift. Sounds like you’re the older brother I always wish I had! I taught my younger brother the lifts when he was 16 (I’m six years older). He hasn’t been consistent enough with lifting but when he strung together a few months of training he was able to get his squat up at about the same rate I was able to when I started lifting at age 22.

    Also, someone on here wrote about also being a home brewer. I’ve decided that I’m going to add 500 grams of creatine to my next 5-gallon batch of beer. I’ll probably throw in some horny goat weed just for good measure. Two birds with one stone type of thing. I’ll let you know how it goes.

    • I am the homebrewer you speak of & that’s an awesome idea with the creatine (a previous post about BrewDog’s new release served as inspiration, no doubt) – I have a bunch of the unflavored powder and may just have to sacrifice some for my next batch as well. If my calculations are correct, that means you’ll get a li’l over 9 grams per 12 ounces, plus it’ll be interesting to see what sort of bitterness/aroma dynamic the goat weed will add as well. Definitely keep me posted!

      I’m almost ready to keg an Irish Red ale entirely brewed with Citra and Fuggles hops from my own vines that I dried and froze last year…

  8. I keep a food log on MyFitnessPal off and on, more of a check to see where I’m at than an attempt to count & measure. This week I was fairly on target, though my target might need to be adjusted.

    No PRs this week – reset all lifts on the GSLP recently. Hit a HBBS of 245 for 10 which is a rep PR. Squats are feeling good and I’m expecting to keep moving up.

    Great post on Oly Lifting earlier this week – that’s my next step…

  9. No food log for me, going unweighted/unmeasured paleo for awhile after logging 95% of my food for 2.5+ years. Working great so far. Gonna curl the shit out of some 95’s tomorrow bro.

    I have finally once and for GOOD fixed my squat depth issues with some clever and unorthodox belt placement. I have also been bugging the shit out of AC all week trying to unfuck my deadlift (props to him for putting up with me). I am having trouble getting into a position that keeps lumbar/thoracic extension.

  10. Finished Jim Steel’s “6 Weeks to a Bigger Squat” program and took my squat from 445 to 465. Closing in on 500 this year goddammit.

    • That is a fun one to chase. I don’t remember being as excited for 300 or 400, they sort of just happened. I failed at 500 earlier this year and can taste it but don’t plan to max again until this fall. Good luck to you sir.

  11. Pingback: Hip…Hiphop…Hiphopanonymous | ManMade Fitness

  12. No PRs this week; I train at a university gym but it was closed due to holiday so I took it off and decided to work on mobility. Did the foot drills everyday and I hope they help with my shin splits. They are harder than I thought!

    Starting TM on Monday. I’m pretty excited. One question! My last SS workout was 3×5 290lb on the squat; stalled at 295lb. I was thinking on starting volume day with 235lb 5×5 since I took a week off. Does that sound like enough or should I go higher?

  13. ‘realization week’ of my 10’s wave of Juggernaut. enjoying it so far, especially the quality moderate weight, higher volume deadlifting. and find that as long as i limit my squatting to my coach’s oly programming (this is a hybrid sort of thing), it is manageable from a mix n’ match perspective.

    Press – 130# x 15 reps
    Bench – 212# x 15 reps
    DL – 305# x 19 reps

  16. No PR’s this week just upped the volume a little bit. I did the food log and honestly I thought I was eating more than I really am. Easy fix though I’m just going to making larger portions.

  17. Hello fellow 70sbigers, I’ve had sort of a shitty training week. I was gardening and helping people move all week, lots of heavy and awkward things to carry. Its also been over a hundred all week here in virginny. Not a winning combo. I have couple prs (not sute how) 440×3 deadlift. It was messy and bad but its been that sort of week. Also to cap it off I got back from the doc and I apparently have a partially torn labr

    • Hey welyn. I’m pretty sure this happened to me last year. Can’t say for sure because I never got a diagnosis. (Shitty grad student health care.) I was squatting on chronically impinged hips, I felt the impingement, I kept squatting like an idiot, and then one day something deep in my hip felt scary loose at the bottom of a squat. I couldn’t squat anything over 95 pounds for several months. Yay!

      One bright spot was that it didn’t affect my deadlift at all, so my deadlift blew up during that time because I was never fatigued from squatting. It took me several months of rest/light work for me to get back to squatting pain-free. That sucked. But it did give me the chance to figure out what I was doing wrong and essentially re-build my squat, which turned out to be a very good thing. When I was able to squat again, I shifted to high-bar and front squatting. For me, the more vertical torso resulted in a less acute hip angle, less impingement, and no pain. Working hard on shoving my knees out also helped. But perhaps more than anything, this mob saved my hips:
      http://www.mobilitywod.com/2010/11/episode-789-un-impinge-yourself-from.html

      I now do this the night before every squat session (at least). If I don’t do it, I feel impinged. If I do it, I feel like Klokov. I recently shifted back to a lower bar position, about one year from the initial injury, and I’m setting PRs again. Hopefully it won’t take you that long — you have a doctor!

      Rest up now. Squat big later.

      • Oh man, that’s rough. I squat high bar right now and I’ve got a weirdly shaped femur so that’s why it’s impinging my left hip. I’m probs getting surgery for it to get the funky part of my bone cut off. I don’t want to make it worse and I don’t think I can deadlift with it because it causes my left lower back to tuck because the femur won’t fit in the hip socket properly. I think I can rack pull though because that doesn’t have your hips at or near 90 degrees. Ty for the insights and the video link

  19. Didn’t keep a written log, but I count my calories in my head every day so that I fall into a specific range. I really only check the macros on my protein and just let the fat and carbs fill in the rest until I hit my calorie goals, although I should start regulating those more based on off/on days. Luckily I eat the same basic foods all the time, so counting calories takes almost no effort since I have most of them internalized already (meat/milk/eggs/rice/quinoa/veggies/cheese).

    Squatted 365×5 on tuesday.

    About to go to the gym in an hour and try for 370×5.

    I want that 405 so damn bad. I’m sure I could max it right now, but I want to hit it for reps the first time I do it.

    Has anyone had experience with loading the bar up heavier than your work sets (squats), unracking it and sitting under it for a few seconds before racking, switching to your work weights and doing that set. I’ve heard positives about it, but I always bitch out of trying it, but I feel like it could help the psychological feeling of the weight during the work sets.

    • I’ve toyed around with it. It was cool the first session or two, but then the overload eventually took its toll and messed up my progress. I hear ya though, sometimes you just got to unrack that goal weight and feel it.

      • How much heavier were you doing? and did you actually walk the bar out or just lift it off the pins for a bit.

        I’ve just noticed that when I do work sets that if I do any drop sets, even if its only 40lbs lighter, my form tightens up a lot and the reps are incredibly smooth.

        • I’d put 405 lbs on the bar, walk it out, and if I was feeling good I’d dip into a 1/4 squat to really feel it, rack it, then do my work sets. What was a heavy work set would feel a bit lighter and crisper, but the overload of the 405 was way too much (80 lbs more than my max at the time), and would burn me out after 4-6 weeks.

          • Tried it afterall today. Threw on 415 before a work set of 370. I only unracked and held it though, I didn’t unrack it. It definitely helped.

    • Squatted 370×5. Second set I hit 4 and was iffy on my form (looks fine in my video though) so I just stopped it. Might just redo 370 on monday. We’ll see how I feel. Deadlifted 320×4. I hate how shitty my deadlift is compared to my squat. Anyone got any advice? I tried lowering my hips back in february and tweaked my lower back doing it because I can’t keep any hamstring tension, so that’s out of the question.

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8JSQ9zMoOdk

  20. Overhead Press, pyramid with an empty barbell x 10 up to 105 lbs x 2.
    Light and easy, working my way back into the movement so I don’t mess up my shoulders again.
    Going to do take the same approach with the squat, because I’m switching from low bar to high bar.
    Did blackburns for the first time. I had to use 3lb db’s; very humbling, left my upper back/scapular area sore for a couple days.

  21. Started tm today. Even though it’s Friday I did a volume day and am gonna do another one next Monday. Squatted 315x5x5 benched 205x5x5 and did some pendlay rows for a jacked back

  23. This week was a deload week for upper body lifts. Lower body TM routine keeps rolling along at a steady pace, though this week I did a widow maker in memory if Jesse Marude. My recent PR squat was 325×2, and I did 275 for 19. I thought it was 20 but my counter skipped a rep. Still though, my highest rep total at 275 ever was 12. Good times.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bikMSJ-WCY&feature=context-chv&noredirect=1
    (the last 5 seconds are the funniest part)

    • Almost forgot! I’ve been using myfitnesspal to track food and activity the past few weeks. My issues arise on the weekends, because I have a lot of free time and tend to go out. I don’t really drink, but if you’re going out the likelihood of making bad food choices increases a lot.

  24. I have a profile on fitday.com, but I haven’t used it in a while and I didn’t log any of my meals this week…for shame! Mebbe I’ll do it next week as I really am curious about my intake of late. Now for the PR’s:

    Squat PR 325×5 (got a compliment from the guy next to me doing box squats w/185lbs whilst grunting loudly)
    Bench PR 195×5
    Deadlift PR 375×3

    Managed to grind out a PR on all 3 lifts, w00t!! It felt good…REAL good. Next week, I wanna beat ’em!!

    • Oh, also forgot to mention a DOMS PR:

      My neck and face, primarily my jowls, are so damn sore from all of the straining after trying to emulate the “70’s Big Face” that I had to be all like :| today at work and everyone probably thought I was being an asshole. I think I got it down, though…

  25. 7 weeks into my beginning Olympic training. Hit up to 115 (lbs) snatching today (PR, 115 was shaky. 110 felt smooth). 185×5 FS. Last week 275×3 BS. Never did that much high bar. Ever. Or unbelted me thinks. Goal is to snatch bodyweight by end of the year. Definitely possible (165 atm)

    I’ve also gone 7 weeks without benching. Feels weird man.

    I really need to post here more often. I don’t do it enough/ever.

  26. Hey Justin, haven’t posted in a while, but just leaving a reply to let you know I still read every day–and I’m sure there are plenty of lurkers like me who read daily but post sparingly.

    No PRs this week…hurt myself on Monday attempting a PR bench triple. I lowered the first rep to my chest, and as soon as I went to press the weight (265, FWIW), I felt almost like a “snap” in my coracobrachialis. Surprisingly, I was able to finish the rep without a ton of difficulty (though with plenty of pain), racked it, and went home. That area in my arm, and even moreso my pec minor, have been hurting pretty bad since Monday, especially when I stretch my arm or put any tension on it. No bruising or anything, but I’m thinking it might be time to consider an appointment with an orthopedic surgeon.

    Anyone who has any experience or knowledge about something like this, I’d really appreciate you chiming in…

  29. Squat 5RM PR: 335#. Boom. Waiting for the day that I rep my meet PR. My precious…
    Life PR: Wore the shortest short jorts of my life at the county fair. Sky’s out, thighs out.
    Disappoint PR(?): Found out that the bacon-wrapped turkey leg was executed terribly at the fair.
    Didn’t do last week’s challenge. Fark.

    I feel that el método de Texas for my squats and deads, while resuming the GSLP for my pressing movements will suit my goals perfectly. I’m getting used to the pulling after squatting earlier in the session on intensity day. Good.

  30. 3rd week of GSLP, so far have missed 2 training days due to circumstances beyond my control. Today press and squat. Press PR 131×10, Squat PR 245×8. the squat suprised me today because my head (mental doubt) was getting in the way. I need to find/figure out a way to remove the doubt and just lift that shit.

  32. PR:
    Cleaned up diet. Now to get lifting back in order.
    Justin,
    Back to your hyperlordosis post for a minute..correct me if I’m wrong, but I think this condition can also be looked at as lower cross syndrome….so what would your thoughts be on reverse hypers for strengthening/correcting the appropriate muscles.

  33. My training sucked today, which is lame because I felt like I did everything right this week. Good session on Monday, lots of rest, ate lots of animal flesh and veggies, mobbed my brains out, blah blah blah.

    Benched 145 for two doubles. Was looking for a triple. Failed to squat 200 for **five attempts**, which was terrible and stupid, but I was so close. Got it out of the hole each time, but couldn’t seal the deal after the initial bounce out of the hole. Naturally, I threw my belt like an asshole and then failed to deadlift anything meaningful. I’ve been stuck at 195 for a month now. I’m going to spend some time this weekend strategizing.

    I can’t curl 90 (or can I?). I’ll make a run at 90, fail, and go AMRAP with 50 in the rack. I’ll use 2.5 lb plates while someone is waiting to squat. Will post results.

  34. Press pr: 4 reps at 70 at 89kg bw. read an article by paul carter at lift run bang about thumbless press. started using it – much easier to get the bar moving off the chest. feels like i can get my elbows much more vertical.

  35. Man … got 485# on DL … 15# shy of setting my 500# in my first year of training a few months early. Lost my 5# this month putting me on track for 200# by Nov. 198 class here I come!

  36. Squat; 165kg/363lb x 4 (PR but missed the fifth :()

    Bench: 110kg/242lb x 5 (PR! Finally hit this after three weeks of trying)

    Deadlift: 172.5kg/380lb x 5 (PR, easy)

  37. First PR in several months. I’ve gone from BW of 89kg down to 80-81, and can only lift at most 2x a week, due to other training. So, haven’t seen any PRs in ages. Then today managed to hit 3×5 on the bench @ 110. Good to finally walk out of the gym happy.
    Forgot to post it the other day, but Justin thanks for the hyperlordosis post. I’ve been mobbing it like crazy.

    Shaun

  38. One week out from USAPL Raw Nationals
    Hit my squat and bench openers (440/270) which are both technically PR’s at current bw (will be lifting in 181s)
    Pretty pumped, assuming I can make weight.
    Anyone have experience with cutting water or any short term weight loss for meets that are easily replenishable after weighing in?

  39. Just now got to read your answer. Thanks man, sorry the question was so long, but I’ll make the adjustments needed. I really appreciate the help.

  40. most bad ass manly meat eating pr ever= bought a 14 lbs brisket from walmart today and will start smoking it tonight so its ready for dinner sunday, and have pork ribs and some sausage to start in the morning so they are ready for lunch.
    had 12 days out of the gym due to family being in town…went light yesterday night with a 70k snatch and 90 c+j…snatch felt great but c+j felt terrible…decided to use it like a a.m. session/warmup for Saturday…ended up getting 115k on c+j for a 5k pr!…super happy with that even if i’m like 125k bw and some 48k chick from china just won the gold w/ a 114k c+j (and a heavier snatch too…FML)

  41. Raw nationals: Logistics: – just spectating. Have you guys been to Killeen before? Plenty of places to stay? Might stay in Dallas and drive down for Saturday 

  42. front squat PR 120kg for easy triple, (i havent done fronts for six months!) so im happy as hell with that:) mayby tomorrow i will hit some PR on 3×5 overhead press :) i try to keep on writing my food jurnal this week too..

  43. Late as always.
    Foodlog kept for 3 week days + saturday, too many unecessary sugary snacks.
    Debating whether or not to be getting up at 4am to watch the Olympic weightlifting…

  44. Justin, I have been going through the 70s big archives and noticed some posts about Gant and strength training for Judo. Just wondering what type of training program you would recomend for someone who is looking to compete in Judo. Thanks.

  45. Pingback: Q&A – 37 | 70's Big

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