Woke up at 215.6. Just realising now I forgot to eat my advent chocolate this morning. Terrible news.
Workout
Warmup
Flexible Five
Conditioning
Meat-Eater II from Tactical Barbell
2 mins bike, 20 KB swings, 2 mins bike, 20 bag cleans Original program calls for runs instead of bike and KB snatches instead of bag cleans. However I was doing this indoors and I don’t trust my right shoulder to snatch without dislocating. This was awful on my quads.
Diet
Pre-workout
Special K Original w/semi-skimmed milk
ok a lil touchy about the chocolates, my bad. Haha I actually saw one of those calenders the other day and debated with myself if it’s sad for me to want one since there are no kids in my house…
Woke up at 215.1. @Irishman92: I remembered today’s advent chocolate
Workout
Warmup
Flexible Five
KB swings/KB SLDL superset
Deadlift
3x100kg (no belt)
3x107.5kg
7.5x112.5kg Grip slipped on the sixth rep, so I switched to hook grip for the next two. That hurt. Definitely had more in me if grip wasn’t a factor. TBF I’ve neglected training it. May buy straps for AMRAP sets in future.
Three rounds of:
5x100kg (no belt)
Press
3x40kg
3x42.5kg
8x45kg
Three rounds of:
10x30kg Nicest press has felt in a while. Shame it doesn’t feature in my next planned cycle! Compromised between FSL and BBB with the backoff sets.
Pre-workout
Special K Original w/semi-skimmed milk
Post-workout
2 scoops Gold Standard
AM snack
Banana, raisins
Lunch
Salmon fishcake with veggies
PM snack
2 scoops Gold Standard, 50g peanuts
Dinner
Work Christmas dinner, which is oddly going to be steak & chips. Going for the cheese board in lieu of actual dessert, so it’s basically like a salad.
Woke up at an unpleasantly surprising 218.2. Ah well that’s Christmas for you. At least I’m getting stronger and fatter, not just fatter. Actually, my waistline seems about the same so not too bad. I think from mid-February onwards (AKA after Full Body, Full Boring) I’ll start seriously looking at losing fat over gaining strength.
Workout
Warmup
Flexible Five
Swings/squats superset
Squat
Three rounds of:
5x75kg (beltless)
Bench
3x55kg
3x57.5kg
10x60kg No idea what happened here lol, the 57.5kg felt heavy and I was convinced I wouldn’t get anything close to a PR here but then the 60kg moved like a dream.
Woke up fat. Did a Christmas Day on Saturday since myself the the missus will be spending actual Christmas apart. Will probably lose the bloat just in time for actual Christmas at which point it’ll all come back.
Workout
Warmup
Flexible Five
KB swings/squats supersets
Squat
5x80kg
3x85kg
7x90kg
Three rounds of:
5x80kg
Bench
Three rounds of:
5x57.5kg
Assistance
100 facepulls @20kg (4x25)
100 DB rows @27.5kg (20/18/17/15/15/15)
Diet
Preworkout
Special K Original w/whole milk
Postworkout
2 scoops Gold Standard
AM snack
Banana and raisins
Lunch
Cod and prawn fishcakes w/veggies
PM snack
2 scoops Gold Standard and 50g peanuts
Dinner
A smaller Christmas dinner because I cooked way too much on Saturday
Evening
Probably a few handfuls of popcorn as we’re seeing The Last Jedi this evening.
Woke up a little less fat. Out of curiosity took my neck and waistline measurements today. Waistline the same, neck (unsurprisingly) the same. US Navy Calc puts me at 21% BF which seems on the low side but I’ll take it. Strongur.io has me at the same. May get some calipers at some point just to have three ways to track going forward. Can’t hurt.
Workout
Conditioning
Just a quick jog around the square, interspersed with some chins on the scaffolding outside (building being painted). Nothing too intense, just getting the blood moving between the 95% workouts.
Diet
Preworkout
Special K Original w/whole milk
Postworkout
Advent chocolate
AM snack
Banana and raisins
Lunch
Chicken or fish and veggies
PM snack
2 scoops Gold Standard, 50g peanuts
Dinner
GF made a pie out of Christmas dinner leftovers, so that with veggies.
Warmup
Deadlifts - the usual KB area was totally full so I just moved about a bit then warmed up by doing deadlifts like a normal person.
Deadlifts
5x107.5kg (no belt)
3x115kg
6x120kg
1x130kg
1x140kg (PR) Decided to go for the Joker Sets as I was feeling decent and thought I might as well go for another plate milestone after last cycle’s 100kg squats.
0.4x150kg Thought this was a bit ambitious. Got it to the knees but couldn’t lock it out.
Press
5x42.5kg
3x45kg
5x47.5kg Infuriatingly inconsistent. Going to just do DB presses for volume for my next templates as these seated ones are maddening.
Assistance
50 lat pulldowns @50kg (5x10)
100 facepulls @20kg (4x25)
Yeah haha it was basically just below my knees and couldn’t quite get the hips through. Calling it 0.5 would have definitely been disingenuous. Of course it all gets rounded down anyway…
Still, pretty sure I have 150 in me on a good day.
No idea about weight today. Woke up at my parents’ house. Local gym here is different and strange.
Workout
Warmup
Not a lot.
Squat
Three rounds of:
5x80kg
Bench
5x57.5kg
3x60kg
3x65kg Super disappointing. Blame a different and slidey bench. Going to keep TM the same for next cycle and see what happens. Probably just an off day.
Three rounds of:
5x57.5kg
Assistance
DB rows - 50 reps @30kg (5x10)
Diet
Booze.
Cycle Review
So despite a disappointing end to the cycle with that bench I’m pretty happy with how my three cycles of 5/3/1 for Beginners went. In terms of projected 1RMs I’ve gone from a total of around 285kg to around 320kg since October.
Squat
Pre-injury max: 95x2
October max: 80x5
Current max: 100x3 or 90x7
Deadlift
Pre-injury max: 130x1 or 120x3
October max: unknown
Current max: 120x6 or 140x1
Bench
Not sure about this but 60x7 was a PR a couple of months ago and 60x10 was last week.
Next template
From January 1 I’ll be running Full Body, Full Boring with the following setup:
Day 1
Squat 5/3/1
Bench 3x5
Deadlift 3x3
100 lat pulldowns
50 shoulder raises
50 curls
50 tricep extensions
Day 2
Squat 3x5
Bench 5/3/1
Deadlift 3x3
100 lat pulldowns
50 shrugs
50 curls
50 situps
Day 3
Deadlift 5/3/1
Bench 5x5
Squat 3x3
100 DB rows
50 shoulder raises
50 curls
50 tricep extensions
It’s not Full Body, Full Boring as Jim wrote it because I’ve added back and arm work there, but I need to work on my tris to improve my poverty bench and I’m really pleased with how my back has been progressing and don’t want to change that. After a couple of cycles of doing that and eating a lot I’ll be ready to do less and eat less.
ok a lil touchy about the chocolates, my bad. Haha I actually saw one of those calenders the other day and debated with myself if it’s sad for me to want one since there are no kids in my house…