I’ll have to admit I am not familiar with the Training Maximally template so in regards to the specifics of your main movement I can’t comment. I do like how you have laid out your assistance. Personally, this appears to be close to the volume of assistance that I have been using for months and has allowed me to really focus on my main lifts and push it a bit harder knowing I don’t have 45mins of assistance following my main lifts.
1 Like
I’m so impressed with your progress since the last time I looked at your log!!! Seeing the recent video of you lifting is crazy and the way you look is a huge difference for sure. Always motivating!
1 Like
@T3hPwnisher I should have specified, it’s Training Maximally so I work up to my TM for a single or PR set, then jokers if I feel good.
Cool, well thanks everyone, good to know it’s not just me. That’s training July to October sorted then. I’ll probably have my TMs starting at something like 462 lbs for squat, 264 lbs for bench and 506 lbs for DL. That way I’ll never have to even wonder if I can hit them on a bad day and have plenty of room for jokers beyond.
1 Like
Bingo. I’m doing the opposite now, which is serving it’s purpose, but no way I’d do that when focusing on heavy singles daily.
1 Like
Started setting out the July to October training on my spreadsheet. So much quicker to do than what I’m doing currently. What I like about doing it this far out is that by the time July rolls around I’ll have made damn sure it’s all as it should be.
I’m excited now, that’s most of this year planned. Training Maximally will be a nice change from my usual quite rigid approach - which works, so I’m not complaining. The excitement is also very good because that’s generally a sign I’ve set things out right. Two more cycles of death by volume, two cycles of PR sets and then six weeks of peaking to go.
Plus, I figure that by July I’ll have ‘earned’ the right to do proper grown-up training where I have to use a lot of autoregulation. If it turns it I’m not ready, well, no time spent learning is time wasted.
3 Likes
More boredom, so more rambling. This is what afternoon and weekend shifts do. Woke up looking good still, third line of abs are starting to peek out. Still a bunch of flab to come off my midsection though, interested to see what I’ll look like come July or so.
Looking forward to some pressing tomorrow - I’ll do bench as assistance on Monday during deloads for the moment. I’m doing my 531 week loads for press, maybe joker sets if I feel really good. That way I can keep decent track of where my press is going while I focus on bench. I’m already starting to feel energy building back up so cycle two is shaping up to be good.
I often wonder why my mind works the way it does. Caught myself coming out of the locker room at work a couple of days ago and for about a second I had no idea where I was - everything looked completely foreign and unfamiliar. This kind of thing isn’t new to me. Doesn’t happen often, but enough that it doesn’t completely throw me. Besides, it beats waking up and not knowing who you are. That’s happened to me twice, and even though it only lasts for one or two seconds it FUCKS with your mental equilibrium for a few hours. Waking up not knowing where you are is peanuts in comparison (which has happened a few times, usually when I’m at home and running on too little sleep).
I have done that driving, and it scared the fuck out of me everytime it’s ever happened. It’s only a second, but seems longer.
1 Like
Haven’t had that driving. I’ve momentarily forgotten where I was going, but that’s different.
Thank you. I spend even more time posing/checking myself out than before. Who said narcissism was a bad thing?
1 Like
I’m always looking over my own shoulder. A lot of the time that’s because there’s a gap between me in my head and me actually doing stuff - like driving a car. I’m doing and saying things but it sometimes feels like someone else is actually doing the talking/moving (NEVER happens when I’m lifting stuff. EVER). Overall I think that’s a positive, because quis custodiet ipsos custodes and all that. It also means I review what I say and do a fair bit.
Anyway, context. I feel kind of bad about my last rant, because while I stand by the points it was pretty much about one person and because they’re a friend I feel vaguely responsible for pointing out that they’re being an idiot and doing themselves a disservice. I have absolutely no fucking idea how to go about it though, because I know the dude does not take any form of criticism well. As far as I know no-one in his circle ever pulls him up, and a bunch blow a steady stream of smoke up his arse. My best idea so far is to stay quiet until his next meet and see how he goes. If he underperforms and gets shitty and blames the judges and meet organisers, I should probably say something quietly to him because it’ll be two years that he hasn’t had a meet without missing targets. It’s not a lack of ability, the guy has fucking bags of potential but just doesn’t seem to train or eat anywhere near optimally, has a massive chip on his shoulder combined with an inflated ego and despite having a basically good heart is way too ready to tear others down. I swear if he started using 5th Set or 531 or Juggernaut and took his diet seriously his total would go up by 100 lbs in half a year.
I also feel quite silly putting this in my log, because it isn’t strictly training related and I know this last fortnight I’ve pretty much kept talking and talking.
2 Likes
@stronkfak interesting question. I’m not a fan of cutting if I can avoid it, and even if I’m sitting at 190 lbs in July I’m not sure how well my body would react to a rapid cut to 181 lbs and then going back to 190 lbs within 24 hours. It just doesn’t seem like a good idea. If I end up around 187 lbs by July, different story.
HA… true story!! It’s working really good for you.
Tell him now.
He will either ignore it, bomb but remember it and reevaluate (finally) OR he will pretend to ignore it and use it as motivation to prove you wrong.
Either way you helped him even though he will probably be mad at you in both scenario’s. If he has been doing the same routine for 2 years you need to plant the seed ASAP.
I have a friend like that and I tell him all the time and he ignores me all the time, but once he repeated what I said verbatim so at least the seed has been planted.
2 Likes
No, I am talking total glitch in the Matrix type thing. A break in the space time continuum. Like my brain hit the reset button, and reboots, all within a matter of seconds.
2 Likes
Just popping in here, a few stray thoughts of my own…I also am a training “minimalist” and don’t really consider things a “PR” other than major 1RM breakthroughs, but I do think tracking things like rep PR’s and/or PR’s on selected variations (a la conjugate) gives a way to track progress, and also indicate if you’re building up your weaknesses, etc.
For example, I have just started training some in a new facility that gives me the ability to do a lot more deadlift variants - mat pulls, adding chains, etc. I don’t intend to consider lifts on those true PR’s but I will be mentally keeping some tabs on how I progress on a 4" mat pull, or a pull with some extra chains, knowing that progress on those variants is likely to correlate well with making progress on the deadlift.
2 Likes
I’m with you now. Good description, that was what happened at work the other day. I would NOT like that to happen while driving.
1 Like
You’re right. Damn. Well, I better do that then. I’ll be as nice as possible.
1 Like
Hey now, this is the shit that keeps people coming to and commenting on your log. Not that I don’t love seeing people record their # of facepulls, but these thought provoking threads are what keep me scrolling through the forums more than Facebook.
Don’t you dare take that away from me.
9 Likes
Same here man. I guess that’s why I don’t really have any female training buddies, or friends in general due to that simple fact in those points. Not only that, but principles that you mentioned here leak over into everyday life too, and waaaaay too many people are lacking in those areas, or they’ve over-complicated EVERYTHING. Most of the time now, when I head out to the gym, and people see me stacking three plates up to squat, I get asked so many questions, and I literally sound like a “bro”, trying to explain my training and dieting, and I try my best not to, but the two or three sentences I give to people either isn’t enough, or they overcomplicate it entirely. I remember having three people I used to train with, right when I joined this site (one female and two males), and they burned out within the first two months. They weren’t even training the same as I was, and I never told them to race, or make it a competition, or anything, and lo’ and behold, I’d call them up, ask where they were, ask if they needed a ride with me to the gym, and they slowly would make up excuses, or just ignore my calls altogether. And i have the same issue with training with others. It kind of festered due to the prior experiences with those three folks I mentioned earlier. I cant even begin to explain how something being hard shouldn’t even equate to it being something that induces feelings of inadequacy, or anxiety, or frustration, sadness, etc. (This is speaking solely on training. I do understand some things in life are ridiculously hard, and sometimes are better left alone to begin with anyways, and sometimes it just means to stay steadfast and keep pressing), but training shouldn’t be grouped in situations that fit that category. Shoot, me having to re-learn squatting was “hard”, me having to try and take a step back from some new training i REALLY wanted to start was “hard”. But having that opportunity for the feelings of “if only” to creep into my head are even harder to live with.
So i agree with you 100% on this.
2 Likes