Dodgin’ Dadbods: Fortitude Training

Yeah, sometimes I’ll bust out chins faster when I’m doing them for my back, but on arm day, no lower body movement at all, and constantly using band curls to get the mind muscle connection going. Plus your arms pump up huge in the mirror and let’s be honest, it’s fuckin sweet.

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Quads day, ugh

Leg ext
110x20
150x20
180x20

Smith Front Squats, heels elevated
135x10
165x10
185x10
205x8
AMRAP with high bar feet forward smith squats, doing 1.5 reps
135x14 yeah, not happening

Bulgarian split squats
Holding 35s 3x15

Backwards Sled Drags
+90
+135
+180

Honestly I am so miserable on quad day, and I do it every Monday. It’s an hour after the workout and I want to throw up still. Like the weights aren’t particularly heavy at all, I’m just going so fuckin slowly and through such an exaggerated ROM that it’s so much more painful. Definitely already noticing some extra size/definition though. Oh well. Got a week before I do that bullshit again. My wife chickened out of it today so now she has to do it tomorrow.

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Tuesday: chest
Crossovers 3x20 pre-exhaust
Incline DB (30 degrees)
40x10
55x5
70x3
85x3
95x3
100x8 I think this might be a PR…and I had a huge ROM for them. Felt great
50x10x2 1.5 reps (all the way down, halfway up, back down, all the way up stopping just short of lockout)

Smith machine high incline 45 degrees
135x20
155x20
185x8 dropset 135x10, 95x16

High to low cable flies 3x20
Superset with pushups 3x15

Calves donkey calf raise, seated calf, standing calf, etc

Wednesday: conditioning

Warmup 10 mins bike
100 lunges, 100 crunches, 50 leg raises, 50 KB clean and press, 50 push-ups, 30 pull-ups, 50 lateral raises. No rhyme or reason, just little to no rest and a ton of sweat. Wrote it out, did it, loved it, hated it, good conditioning day.

Thursday: rest day. Been at least a couple weeks without a trip to the gym. Slept a while before work. Tomorrow is back day, and then I’m going with my wife to a huge cabin in the mountains with 8 friends for the whole weekend WITHOUT OUR KIDS. America.

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Been lackin on the trackin here for a bit, so I’ll update everyone on what’s going on.

Last Friday, the day of our vacation, I did back, but only had 30 minutes to do it since we were packing, and tried a workout that I saw in another thread.

Smith machine rack pulls, 6 reps EMOM for 10 minutes.
4 pullups, 15 seconds rest, 4 pullups, 15 seconds rest, repeat until fail.
Then 4 supinated chins, 15 seconds rest, repeat until fail.
Then 4 neutral grip chins, 15 seconds rest, repeat until fail.
Then hammer strength plate loaded row for 4 sets of 15-20, then straight arm pulldowns for 4 sets of 15. Honestly, I haven’t had a back pump like that…ever, I think.

Then I went on my vacation. A weekend in the mountains, no kids, lots of beer, all good company, ruined my diet but TOTALLY worth the relaxation.

Got back into it Monday evening with shoulders/hams.
DB Shoulder Press 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s x10 ← this might have been a PR
DB Lateral Raise 4x10
Upright rows 3x10
Face Pulls 3x15
Seated Ham Curl 4x10
BB SLDL 185, 205, 225, 225 x 8
Single Leg Ham Curl 3x20

Tuesday was arms
CGBP 185, 205, 225, 185x8
Weighted Chins superset with Rope curls
+25, +45, +70, +10 x8, 4x15
Rope tri ext 3x12
DB kickbacks 3x20
Hammer curl 3x12
Single arm cable preachers 3x20

Yesterday was the dreaded quads day
3x20 pre exhaust leg extension
185 4x10 heels elevated front squats
2 minutes of leg press (a la @JMaier31…ouch)
100 BW lunges

Had to rest today since the car had a broken transmission line that took all morning to fix. No worries, went on a walk with my kids and had a nice morning. Tomorrow is chesticles and calves.

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Did you have to do it rest-pause style or did you do it unbroken? Either way I find myself begging for the timer to beep.

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I had to put my hands on my knees twice. Legs were shaking. My wife was so absent minded about the timer, she kept letting the screen go dark and wouldn’t tell me how much time I have. Like when she’s doing it I’m giving her encouragement, I’m telling her at 15 second intervals, I’m counting down, I’m using all the tricks to get her through it. She made it so much harder for me hahahah she also got scared when I locked my legs out cause of that video where some guys leg hyperextends in the leg press, and I’m like “it’s a 90 lb leg press…I couldn’t make this hurt me if I tried”. It definitely broke my spirit a bit, man. I was not ready for how hard that was.

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It’s definitely lactic threshold training and it sucks. It gets better though!

You could also try Tabata squats. 8 rounds of 20 sec on, 10 sec off. You never rack the bar. Start with an empty bar. You’ll thank me later.

It doesn’t hurt the quads as bad though since you can get your hams and glutes involved but it’s still murder.

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Is it fucked up that my first instinct is to be excited for the excruciating pain that awaits me when I try this? I’m sure any relief the quads get is offset by your entire lower body (and shoulders) screaming at you.

It takes 3:50 total. I used to get around 13-15 reps on each round. On the final round you go beast mode and ignore the pain and go for max reps. If you hit 15 or more reps then you add a little weight the next time you do it. I don’t think I ever used more than 85 lbs. I also did it after every training session for awhile which was four times a week. Awful. Just awful.

Yesterday: chest

Crossovers 3x20
Inc DB 90s 4x8
High inc Smith 2 plates 3x10
Pushups 3x20
Crossovers from different angles 4x12

Today: back
New routine, new diet, new everything: I’ll explain on Monday when I start for real but I was due for a back day and took it from this routine anyway. Brutal.

Reverse grip Pulldowns 5x8 13 on the stack
Straight arm push downs 4x15 6 on the stack
BB rows 5x8 185
One arm DB rows prone on incline bench 4x10 with a 50 - real light but super slow
Smith machine rack pulls 5x10 2 plates

Fuckin brutal. Didn’t seem like a lot but now all my working sets are at the same weight and I don’t get any of the relief of ramping up or down in sets, it’s just all pain, and took a long time.

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Also the other night my wife spent like $120 on Amazon on workout pants and shirts and I told her, she’s super picky about how things fit and look, so this is a bad idea, and lo and behold, she gets everything and hates all of it and wants to send it back, so we’ll lose money on the shipping costs for delivery and return. The good news is, I had her order me rogue wrist wraps during her rampage and at least they came and feel great.

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Sunday: delts and tris

Lat raise 4x8 30s
Lateral raise prone on incline bench 4x15 15s
Shoulder Press 5x8 50s
BB smith shrugs behind back 5x10 185
Rope ext 4x15 6 on the stack
2 DB skulls 5x8 20s
Camber bar pressdowns 3x15

Yesterday: Legs
Single leg curl 4x8 60lbs
Leg Ext 4x15 130lbs
DB RDLs 5x10 55s
Back Squats, high bar, heels on 2.5s, 5x10 185 ouch.
Leg ext 5x15 3 plates a side
Seated calf raise 1 plate 6x15

Very sore…today Chest

Incline BB press 5x8 155
Cable crossovers 4x12 10 on the stack
Incline cable flys on bench (low incline) 4x15 6 on the stack
Flat DB bench 5x8 65s
3 sets of Pushups, AMAP - 20, 14, 11
Supposed to do calves but didn’t have time, will have to do them at work later :confused: plenty of heavy stuff and surfaces for one legged weighted calf raises.

Diet is locked in.

Breakfast:
1 cup egg whites, 2 whole eggs
1/2 cup oats
1 banana

PWO shake:
2 scoops protein in water, 1/2 cup almonds

Lunch:
8 oz chicken breast
1 cup rice
Lots of broccoli

Mid-afternoon:
Turkey spinach mustard on sugar free whole wheat bread

1 cup cottage cheese, 1/4 cup granola

Dinner:
8 oz ground beef, 1/2-3/4 sweet potato chopped and baked

Diet changes just a bit from day to day - some days have no bananas, some have raisins instead of granola, some have avocado with dinner and one has peanut butter (natural) with breakfast.

This program is brutal and the diet feels great. I didn’t pull all of this out of my ass, I decided to shell out the money for a program and diet design from an online bodybuilding coach (a prominent one on this site, though I’ll refrain from tagging him until I have some results that he would appreciate his name being associated with). No alcohol, no sugar besides what’s in the fruit, and lots of water throughout the day. The plan is to attempt to compete in a bodybuilding show next year, or possibly even early 2020, if I’m being realistic.

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Holy shit my chest has the DOMS like I just came back after a long hiatus…keeping working sets at the same weight combined with doing like 16 sets before I get to 5 sets of flat DB press is murdering me, and I love it.

Gonna go do calves, conditioning, and abs. Had 3/4 cup egg whites, 2 whole eggs, and a scoop of protein with 1/2 cup of oats in water.

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Warmup 10 min stairmaster

Standing Calf Raise 100 6x15
Seated Calf Raise 2 plates 5x12
Machine donkey calf raise 150 4x10

6x25m prowler sprints

3 max sets of hanging leg raises 6, 5, 5
Honestly, I’ve been doing these wrong forever, and saw a video of Al Kavadlo doing them perfectly and decided to try - arms locked out but shoulders still down and back, and never losing posterior pelvic tilt, i.e. the legs never come down all the way and the core never relaxes. Tried to do them super slow and the eccentric was worse than the concentric. 6, 5, and 5 reps is pathetic but they were slow and perfect reps, and I know if I do it twice a week they’ll fly up.
3 max sets of crunches 85, 50, 30
3 max planks: 1:22, 0:48, 0:40.

Thazit. Back day tomorrow.

Protein with almonds after the workout, chicken broccoli and rice at work, and a spinach/turkey salad, forgoing the wheat bread so instead of eating ground beef for the 3rd night in a row I can make burgers and use wheat buns when I get home from work. Still kind of hungry and all I have is a cup of fat free cottage cheese and another 1/4 cup of almonds. I wouldn’t be this hungry except I had to lift 60 separate 44-lb boxes of copper up stairs in work boots, and load them all into baskets and then put the baskets in a nickel-plating tank. Fuckin sucked. I’m covered in sweat and my arms got diluted acid solution all over them so they’re itchy as shit.

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Thanks for this. I’ll work on this form too…

I struggle just hanging on at my new fat ass bw

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This was the article that made me rethink my form. I’m not sure if I want you to do them though because if your lifting progress is any indication you’ll be doing more than me at a heavier bodyweight in no time haha

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Thurs: Back Day
CG Pulldowns: 5x8 14 on the stack
Straight arm pulldowns: 4x15 7 on the stack
Back was sore today, didn’t do BB rows, did chest supported row instead with 2 plates for 5x8
One arm DB rows prone on incline: 4x10 with a 55
Smith machine rack pulls 5x10 2 plates and a 5

I ended up taking friday, saturday, and sunday off. I haven’t taken 3 days off in FOREVER. I needed it desperately. Training to be supervisor at work requires me to work in several different departments and carry heavy shit EVERYWHERE in this production plant all the time, and I just started to feel weak after training for weeks nonstop with my only rest days being for conditioning. Hopped back on it yesterday with delts and tris.

Lat raise 4x8 30s
Lat raise prone on incline bench 4x15 with 20s
Shoulder Press 5x8 55, 55, 55, 55, 40
BB smith shrugs behind back 5x10 195
Rope ext 4x15 8 on the stack
2 DB skulls 5x8 20s
Camber bar pressdowns 3x15

Today was legs

Leg Curl 4x8 90lbs
Leg Ext 4x15 140lbs
DB RDLs 5x10 65s
Back Squats, high bar close stance heels elevated 5x10 185 didn’t up the weight from last time, just added pauses and slower eccentrics
Leg Press 5x15
Seated calf raise 6x15

Friday and Saturday: took o

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Have you tried the Tabata squats yet? I haven’t seen them in your log.

Nope, I kind of forgot about them this time. Last time I did legs I did remember and I chickened out after doing 5x10 squats. I’ll do them next leg day instead of the 5x10 squats, I still have 5 sets of 15 leg presses afterwards.

Consider it a Metcon finisher. When I first started doing them (and did them frequently) it was during a program where I did 5 x 5 on squats, rear foot elevated split squats, and squat & press. I suggest doing them last. I can’t imagine trying to do anything productive afterwards.