PVC pipe to the IT bands, it could have hurt more. Did about 20 passes per leg. Some residual soreness, external rotation with toes forward in the bottom position squat feels a bit better.
Training has kinda sucked, I benched 285lbs x 1 and could not grind the second rep out. I squat 415lbs x 3, 2, 2 and DLed 430lbs for three singles, did some weighted GHRs which seemed to have made my hamstrings sore. The only cool thing I did this week was power clean 265lbs for a +5lbs PR.
lampchop writes:
man talk more about lifting
[spoiler effect=”simple” show=”Shit no one cares about because I total less than 1500lbs.”]I’ve got a PL meet in less than two weeks and then another oly meet exactly one week after that. My PL total could have increased by more since I last competed. Assuming I take conservative attempts, which I’ll prob end up having to do, I’ll PR by like 15-20lbs and most of that is gonna come from the bench. I don’t expect to PR my dead or even match my best, I think I have a reasonable chance to match my PR squat except this time it’ll be high-bar. I should total just over 1200lbs. My best total is 1194lbs @ 180lbs bw. I went 462/275/457. I’ll be a little sad if I don’t beat that at 158lbs.
I guess I shouldn’t expect anything terribly cool. I would like to make some significant PRs at raw nationals this year, and more importantly get my fucking DL closer to 500lbs.
If I had to say what’s helped my bench the most (which is currently the lift I’ve improved the most with), it’d be mobbing. Not having to deal with my fucking shoulders or elbows hurting makes grinding out reps a lot fucking easier, and it’s given me a lot more force off the chest since I’m not creeping into position with inflamed shoulders. I feel real solid taking the bar out of the rack, and me starting from a solid position makes the rest of the lift feel a lot better. Check the comments on the 365/365 episode of mobilitywod. It’s a bunch of people thanking Kelly for changing their fucking lives. I’ve plugged mwod a bajillion times but I can’t plug it enough. Do you think you could be a better athlete? Mwod is a good place to start.
One of the things that’s always made my DL suck are my hamstrings. For a long while they’ve felt uncomfortably tight off the floor and to the knees, and it was making me skittish when I started pulling heavy again a few weeks ago – the sensation reminded me of when I strained my hamstring in August. Tacked-and-stretched whatever hurt in the hamstrings and a bunch of things got better, it was easier to squeeze into position and that scary “your hamstring is about to fucking pop bro” sensation isn’t a factor anymore, meaning I can psychologically say, all right fuck it, pull on this motherfucker until it goes.
As far as programming, I’m gonna start thinking about focusing on singles for the deadlift on a weekly basis. I’ve typically preferred 5rms and 3rms for the deadlift, which seems to have resulted in me having a 5rm that’s like 15-20lbs off from my best single (in addition to my deadlift not moving for a real long time). My 1rm doesn’t appear to increase when my 5rm or more goes up.
There was a thread a while back on the mainsite where Nolan and some other guys were talking about singles being the most productive thing for the deads, and Saul’s been pushing this training philosophy for a while as well. I’ll prob rotate heavy singles with RDLs and good mornings and try to get in some GHR shit 1-2x a week.
My squat protocol isn’t gonna change, i.e. high-bar for motherfucking life. I could start doing some more volume though. [/spoiler]
Some fucking guy writes:
You didn’t tell us the story where you crashed and burned while hitting on chicks in your gym.
There’s only one chick that I hit on at the gym (that I can remember in recent memory) but there are two stories I want to tell you guys.
I was squatting sets of 10 last spring with my roommate and they were pretty taxing, I worked up to 375lbs x 10 low-bar and my glutes could not have hurt more post-set. Anyways on this particular night I was lifting with my roommate so I was being sociable with him (nowadays when I’m training on my own I just twiddle my thumbs and listen to Radiohead’s Creep off my phone and when Thom Yorke starts screaming
SHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE’S
RUNNING OUT
THE DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOR
SHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE’S
RUNNING OUT,
SHE RUNS,
RUNS,
RUNS,
RUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUNS
RUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUNS
I sink to unfathomable fucking depths and go take my workset) but anyways I was there with my roommate, I finish up a set of 10 with probably 355lbs and I rack the bar and turn out of the rack to make an exaggerated, high-pitched moan, the kind of moan you would probably make after having someone’s hand shoved into your anal cavity without lube. I happened to do this in some Asian chick’s face as she was walking past the squat rack and she like flinched away and made a disgusted face but didn’t stop walking to the dumbbell rack. I never said, “Hey man, I didn’t mean to moan in your face and I’m not really weird like that I was just being funny for my friend,” and she never joked about it with me, “That’s a funny noise to make,” so we can only assume she thought I was being a real fucking dickhead.
The chick I was hitting on at the gym was this hispanic chick with a little muscularity, she had broad shoulders with good thoracic extension. She did stuff like RDLs, squats, benched, push ups, pull ups, so I was all like hey this chick seems to lift kinda serious maybe I should talk to her. So I walk up to her, she’s got her earphones in so I tap her on the shoulder (I didn’t really tap her on the shoulder but if I were to film a re-enactment I would depict myself tapping this very disinterested girl on the shoulder) and I ask her if she’s training for something.
Let me just say that she couldn’t have been less interested in talking to me. If I could go back in time I’d take note of her body language, which quite frankly screamed I COULD NOT BE LESS IMPRESSED WITH WHAT I SEE and just stop mid-sentence and say “oohKAY” and turn around to go back to doing oly lifts on iron fucking plates. But she gives a bunch of three-word (or less) answers to my questions and I say “well I guess I’ll let you get back to your workout.”
So I bug her AGAIN after I’m finished with my squats or my bench or whatever, I try talking to her about what she’s doing, is she in school, what does she do for work, I mean this is all cold approach, guys, and I’ve done this like, less than three times in my entire life. I’m desperately fumbling for conversation. I’m sweating, but it’s not from the workout. She tells me she’s GOING TO SCHOOL FOR X-RAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WHICH I DO SO I AM LIKE HEY MAN I AM DOING X-RAY RIGHT NOW, I TAKE X-RAYS, WHAT DO YOU WANNA TALK ABOUT?????????????? She was ex-military which prob contributed to her distant demeanor.
So I talk with her a little bit about that and I go back to my workout. She finishes hers. Leaves without saying bye (I was going to ask if she wanted to hang out sometime before she left). Next time I see her she’s with two other friends, a guy and a girl, and she ignores me.
tiny writes:
Will you please talk about American Idol Kelly Clarkson….
How do you feel about this…
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xn676-fLq7I]
Describe the music video in nine words, followed by 7 more words about the singer.
Thank you for your contribution.
I could train to this, seems good for pressing.
I don’t know much about Kelly Clarkson.
Joe writes:
Bront,
Please keep the jams coming.
Thanks
I don’t think my taste in music is terribly interesting, but this one makes me want to be in a video montage of some difficult c+js:
The beginning would be some tough cleans and missing the jerks. I’d be wearing soffes, a headband, and long socks. Either topless or a real small tank top. Then I’d be the only one sitting in like a row of chairs at the gym. Justin would be standing in front of these chairs with a chalk board, lecturing me with diagrams about the jerk and the split and the dip and drive and shit. You couldn’t hear what he was saying, the audio would be muted out, then he’d stress something important and throw the chalk against the board and you could see his lips say something like, “Let’s get to work.” Let me add that throughout this montage, there’d be clips of me doing dance movements that typically would be expected from chicks. Like whipping my head back and forth, possibly in slow motion. See the video that dave linked in the comments for some idea of what I’m talking about. Then I would do some more tough cleans, make some better attempt at jerks, drill the jerk a little more, and start making successful attempts that progressively looked better and better and got heavier and heavier until I PRed with a legit split jerk.
Curt1s writes:
Hi Brent,
I like this group alot, seems like you might dig them too. It’s called Mux Mool. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTEgI-virsY]
GOod for warmups.
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NALoXmPL7kU]
Those are some legit fucking beats my friend. Thanks for sharing.
Welp, see ya later! writes:
Brent when you squat (meaning high bar) do you try to stay real tight on the descent and rebound back up from just below parallel or do you just dive bomb into it and sort of bounce off of your calves out of the bottom? The low bar cues about rebounding up off of tightened hamstrings don’t seem to work so well for high bar. I find that cutting it off anywhere above ATG feels arbitrary and unnatural please respond. Also depression, unrequited love, etc.
I go to what feels like end-range, though my back squat bottom position doesn’t seem to be as low as my front squat’s. I use some kind of bounce out of the bottom, I’m pretty sure I’m not bouncing off my calves though.
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