Coming Back From the Dead

Actually, Zenon, not quite as pulverizing as I was afraid. Guess all that sled dragging kicked up my conditioning.

OK, time to kick up time under tension:

Squat
95 x 8
125 x 20

whew. not too bad. Only the last rep started to slow down a little, so I clearly could have done 130 or 135.

Bench
65 x 10
95 x 20 started slowing down on the last few, good weight
95 x 10 definitely exhausted

Bar Row
65 x 8
95 x 20

5 x 5 says do some arm work at this point. I need triceps like crazy . . . haven’t worked upper pecs in ages . . . incline press it is.

Incline DB
20 x 30
too light, will increase next time.

DOMS in upper pecs. Had to keep eating lots of protein or belly started complaining.

Squat
95 x 8
135 x 20
OK, now this was a good weight, had to push some.

Bench
65 x 8
95 x 20
a little better than last time.

Bar row
65 x 10
95 x 20
better than last, kept under tension a bit more control

Because of DOMS, decided to skip incline press. For tris, did Icarian dip machine.
80 x 25
ooh, good one.

Bar curl
40 x 22
Ouch. Holy lactic acid, Batman.

DOMS gone in upper pecs. Been eating like never before over the past few days.

OH Press
45 x 12
65 x 9 . failure
wonderful. I LOST strength since last week. was shooting for 20 reps, but just too much weight.
50 x 20 . was straining near the end, retched some, almost screamed. but got it up.

Deadlift
95 x 12
155 x 18
not bad, kept going. Nice pump in low back. Will leave 20 reps for next time.

Cybex Ab
115 x 3 or 4
forget it. This always happens. I go up a little in weight, it gets a bit tougher, I go up a bit more, finally can’t do it at all. Have to scale back and start all over again. I wonder, what would it feel like to get stronger and do more weight ? Bet it would be wonderful.
95 x 18

thats great about “eating like never before” … when lifting makes your appetite return with a fury thats a good sign your metabolism is revved up, and your body is going through an adaption phase. Have you ever checked out john paul carters blog, Lift bang run? I find it to be my favorite site for lifting information lately. Much more focused and down to earth.

Rings a bell, will check on it.

Concentrated on keeping spirits up during workout. Seems like it paid off.

Squat
95 x 8
135 x 20
good work, out of breath, but no retching.

Bench
65 x 8
100 x 20
came close to failure, otherwise whipping it up

Bar row
65 x 10
100 x 20
good!

Recovered from sore upper pecs, so:
Incline DB press
25 x 25
this went well

tempted to do some bicep work, but this kind of workout can overtrain very quickly, leave it at this.

Had to stop and be a good samaritan. Guy next to me got pinned by his bench, I pried bar off his chest. Skinny guy - only 85 lb bar. Guess I’m not the weakest guy there.

Well, waistline shrank another fraction of an inch, and strength seems improving (slowly), so had a moment of feeling good. Which of course I had to change fast. Suddenly got the thought “OMG!! In two years I’ll be 60!!”

Oh, well. Back to the gym. Crowded today, had to wait a bit on the power rack, another golden oldie was doing rack pulls. Finally my turn.

Squats
95 x 8
145 x 18
good and grueling. Could have done 20, but that would just encourage me to up the weight next time, and want to make sure I’ve mastered this one. Still some issues with leaning, nothing much, but I want perfection. Blame the scoliosis.

Bench
65 x 10
100 x 20
this went a bit better than last time, will keep for a bit more

Bar Row
75 x 10
105 x 18
very good. had to concentrate on staying strong, didn’t want to fall into “My god it’s too much”.

hadn’t done leg curl in ages. Will take weight done a tad and see what I can do.
Cybex Leg Curl
60 x 20
didn’t think I could get that many, but kept concentrating, it just kept moving up

Incline DB press
30 x 22
am I getting some kind of PR here? actually seemed kinda easy.

You must be doing something right those DB presses are good numbers.

You’re not saying that just to make me feel better Dude?

I’ve been quite hungry over the past week or two. Slugging down protein shakes on top of the meals really helps. Sure hope it does something - weight isn’t changing, hard to see a difference.

Onward with time under tension:

OH press
55 x 20
thought about warming up, but 45 is almost the same, so skipped it. This went pretty well.

Deadlift
95 x 10
considering I’m doing squats at 145, should kick up weight. Prepare to do a high rep, but it got weird:
175 x 15
pause, then 175 x 5
pause, then 175 x 5
ran out of gas on the first one, rested briefly, went back and fired off 5 fast strong ones, so did 5 more. Maybe I should do these rest pause. I don’t know, just want to pound my body, do whatever it takes to make it grow. Low back sure felt nice and pumped.

Crunch holding DB
I though 45 lbs would be right, well, sortof . . .
45 x 15
pause, then 45 x 3
pause, then 45 x 2
Didn’t want to do that, but just couldn’t breathe

Tri pressdown
40 x 25
cuz I’m tired of having thin arms.

Eating like crazy, feeling better, but am I stronger?

Squat
95 x 8
145 x 20

Bench
65 x 8
100 x 20

Bar Row
75 x 8
105 x 20

Cybex Leg Curl
65 x 15

Incline DB
35 x 15

Hey Cav. We just have to choose to keep picking up ‘relativity’ heavy shit cuz getting even less is worth less than shit crap.

I can guarantee you are way better than most approaching 60!

V impressive volume Cav. You must be doing something right and you’re definitely getting stronger. Keep up the good work!

Thanks for the kind words, everyone. Unfortunately, I didn’t feel the least bit triumphant afterwards. Got a horrible case of depression - was even suicidal for a brief moment. Could hardly sleep - actually, bad sleep has been the norm for a long time. That usually means I overtrained something awful. Just too many sets taken to the limit.

I’m going to skip tomorrow’s workout and try to recover. Got to find a way to do the work without stressing my system to the breaking point.

I recently went through this myself Cav, sans the depression thing. Essentially what it boiled down to for me was that volume doesn’t mix with age. In my case, I was slowly breaking down over time with the heavy volume. Aches and pains were steadily getting worse, lower back spasms etc. This all culminated in a tear of my IT Band which had me out for a while (hence my lifts haven’t progressed much since my last meet).

The solution for me was cutting back the volume significantly and lifting with heavier intensity (Westside).

I’ve been slowly trending in the other direction over the last few months. Something to think about at least…

[quote]late2thegame wrote:
I recently went through this myself Cav, sans the depression thing. Essentially what it boiled down to for me was that volume doesn’t mix with age. In my case, I was slowly breaking down over time with the heavy volume. Aches and pains were steadily getting worse, lower back spasms etc. This all culminated in a tear of my IT Band which had me out for a while (hence my lifts haven’t progressed much since my last meet).

The solution for me was cutting back the volume significantly and lifting with heavier intensity (Westside).

I’ve been slowly trending in the other direction over the last few months. Something to think about at least…[/quote]

I feel your pain. Also lots of sprains & aches, and my lifts have barely budged since my last meet. On the other hand, you’re lifting twice what I can, and I’d be thrilled with that.

It’s tricky trying to figure how age is hitting me, considering I was never strong. I trained when young but no results, today in best shape of life, so don’t have a feeling of losing anything. However. Have always trained intensely, brutally so, no results, so it can’t be the answer to burn myself out.

Last year was trained at Ludus Magnus by top guys, Westside-ish, but almost no gains and loads of injuries. Very intense, went to failure on damn near everything. No more.

Strange - the day after Friday’s workout, went shopping. Carrying groceries felt light as a feather. I burnt out but got stronger??

Stayed home instead of going to gym. Decided to do simple stuff.

Pushups taken to 40 secs

Arm curls with typewriter case taken to over 30 secs. (A typewriter is something you use for a bit, forget about it, then discover you can’t give it away.)

Band pullaparts for time.

Simple. Easy. I wound up with an injury, some weird sprain in my left forearm I had years ago and could never work out. Some twinging in my hips. Feet have been hurting for a while, apparently all the walking around campuses.

Good god, is it just not possible to do anything physical without breaking something?

[quote]cavalier wrote:
Good god, is it just not possible to do anything physical without breaking something?[/quote]

Not that I’m aware. Even when you’re not feeling any pain something is going wrong somewhere. I’ve backtracked so much 5x5@45lbs nearly kicked my ass and I have wicked DOMS. I wish I could say it’s using the mind-muscle connection and working the legs like a body builder so I can exhaust those body parts at light weight, but I ain’t fooling anyone, especially myself.

[quote]Crushed_Idiot wrote:

[quote]cavalier wrote:
Good god, is it just not possible to do anything physical without breaking something?[/quote]
Even when you’re not feeling any pain something is going wrong somewhere.
[/quote]
It’s funny cuz its true, or well it would be if it wasn’t so frustrating and ouchy.
Or…not sure whether to laugh or cry about it because it does seem very true.

[quote]minimaltechno wrote:

[quote]Crushed_Idiot wrote:

[quote]cavalier wrote:
Good god, is it just not possible to do anything physical without breaking something?[/quote]
Even when you’re not feeling any pain something is going wrong somewhere.
[/quote]
It’s funny cuz its true, or well it would be if it wasn’t so frustrating and ouchy.
Or…not sure whether to laugh or cry about it because it does seem very true.[/quote]

In my mind, that’s the mental aspect of lifting. When you train like we do, that’s what separates us from the rest. I’m ALWAYS in some kind of pain from lifting heavy all the time. We push through, we perservere, we NEVER give up and as a result, WE reap the rewards.

I’ll commit blasphemy of sorts and admit that I no longer focus solely on pounds on the bar as a measure of progress. I go more with form, mind-muscle connection, and how my joints feel the next day. I go backwards in weight if necessary when the other 3 are lacking.

The context, it’s important to point out, being that my sole interest is in looking good and feeling good.