I pretty much like all his stuff when I’m totally “in;” it’s too hard when it’s not the only thing I’m doing.
Speaking of which, I’m totally failing sticking to the program right now. Last night I played basketball. I didn’t play particularly well, but it wasn’t lack of conditioning or even being able to move for a change. I was super passive and indecisive. I don’t know why; it was like I was 12 in my brain. Oh well. Amusingly, it being 9/11 came up. Only like 2 of my teammates were alive on the original, and they were babies. I was like “I was already in the army…”. Obviously I had to add, “so if your mom lived anywhere near the upstate NY area…”
This morning I went to a CrossFit kind of class (it’s got its own brand name at the gym). It was a lot of front squats and presses and sled pushes and stuff. Everything was on a clock. I was pouring sweat in the first 5 minutes. My foot hurts a lot the days after I play basketball, then it loosens up as I move; the first few rounds were pretty uncomfortable but then it got ok.
Continuing to fail both the program and at updating here… That’s my game! Our last basketball game is Sunday (because I think we’re mathematically out of the playoffs), so we’ll see what I feel like doing after that. Hopefully I can find some more opportunities to play.
This week I’ve been sticking with those classes. Yesterday I took the dog on a pretty long walkies - she loves them. The old dog was slowing her down, I think, so now she can really push it. We went far enough to get a little lost, which was kind of fun.
My daughter has made $13 on her sticker business so far! I’m honestly really impressed. She’s even got sales reps that go out and move stickers when she can’t be there because of practice or whatever. It’s pretty entertaining.
Today’s group class was a bunch of circuits again. I worked up to 315 x 10 on box squats and 185 x 10 on incline press, so not too bad for the format. It’s much more of a cardio burden than muscular, I will say, which is kind of cool for now but won’t be the thing for me. I am enjoying the volume reduction. I like the kid coaching it, but there were definitely a couple cues I didn’t enjoy - he wanted me to touch the bar low on my nipple line on incline and press in a “J” back toward my face. I think he was confusing some tips he’d seen on bench, and I didn’t like that for my shoulder, but that stuff’s ok so long as he doesn’t get too dogmatic about the one way for everyone.
Today I’ll be able to get back in there this evening and I’ll probably screw around a little with some accessory stuff. My shoulders and elbows still hurt and I’m hoping some pump work would help.
You know me so damn well. Just finished doing 15 minutes of biceps and then did the dude’s class again - way harder the second time!
This has been a fun diversion, but I’m ready to get back to what I’m good at. I do need to figure out how to still play some basketball without destroying myself because it really makes me happy.
Alright heroes - back on plan. My little deload is over, and I needed it, so I just restarted week 4 today. I wanted to get it in yesterday, but we had chauffeuring emergencies that got in the way.
My shoulders and elbows absolutely could not take straight bar squatting anymore, which was way killing my mojo, so I finally just bought an SSB to leave in the gym. Very happy with it!
I did legs today, which will impact my basketball game tomorrow, but such is life.
Legs!
Lying Leg Curls
40/15
65/10
95/10 x 4 + 15p on the last set
SSB Box Squat
I just count the bar as 45, but if anyone is getting the Titan SSB I think it’s actually ~60.
Chains for all sets
45/6
135/6
225/6
315/3 - crapped out fast!
Leg Press
2pps/10
4pps/10
6pps/10
7pps/10
DB Walking Lunges
20/10 x 4
SSB GM
45/10
95/10 x 2
I definitely don’t have the hang of this movement.
Then I took the dog on her walk, but sans ruck today to hopefully not double down on tomorrow’s soreness. Now it’s off to volleyball!
Today went so much better it’s incredible, and I really think the SSB is to “blame.” I think wrecking my elbows on squats has been having me think about how much they hurt for my entire chest days, rather than focusing on my gnarly pumps bros and gals. Anyway, that was not an issue today.
Banded Hammer Press
Black bands
Did a bunch of warmup sets this time
1.1pps/4 x 8 w/ 60s breaks
DB Bench
50/8
65/8
80/6
90/6
100/6
105/5
Still not quite @davemccright, but I had great control over every rep. When I’m chasing weight, I tend to speed through; not this time.
Floor Press
45/8
135/5
185/3
205/3
225/3
Grip4orce Pressdown
50/12 x 5 w/ 75s breaks
Triceps felt great
Close-grip Pushups
~40 (forgot to count) in 90s
EZ Grip4orce Skullcrushers
50/10 x 4
Felt good today
Off to dog walkies, volleyball, football watching and basketball!
Did some backside today - you missed your chance to observe.
This has become the most boring, grinding day in the world for me. I’m just not currently turned on by feeling my lat work perfectly or any of that. I just go in there and kind of tug away (settle down) and then go eat some eggs. I’m so bored I don’t even want to jot it down - ha! Just trust me that there were some rows and hypers in there. I’m not as miserable and depressed as that paragraph sounds; just nothing exciting about today’s session. Probably because I just want to play with the SSB every day. Maybe I’ll figure that out…
In other news, my daughter’s volleyball team has started running into some really impressive competition this season. I think it’s a good wake up call for them. They’re starting to get frustrated and yell at each other on the floor, which shows they care. Now we’ll see if they put the extra work in or if they give in. I will say, they play every single “down” (I don’t know what it’s called in volleyball - a point?), so I think they’ll bounce back.
My kids were sick and I couldn’t make basketball the other night - and they won without me! I’m devastated; I need them to need me out there! Eventually they’re going to realize maybe this old man is not a key difference maker (most of them were not born by 9/11, which was an amusing conversation a couple weeks ago). I’ll get my shot right this week and go Steph Curry on Sunday - that will show them!
I’ve picked up an additional ~6 weeks of travel rolling into the holidays. It will be a little tiring, but it’s honestly a good thing: the business is healthy, I’m in a trusted position to drive some things, and I’m getting to go at least one bucket list place I’ve never been before. No complaints, but I’ll definitely use it as an excuse to do whatever I want in the gym - basically I want to jump high and have jacked arms (at 41 with multiple back and knee surgeries and working out in hotels): anyone got that program handy? I’m pretty sure it’s a Rippetoe plan.
Nice update mate even if t was a little low of the training details. Sounds like you should be marketing your program to all the old ballers out here who want giant peaks. Jumping and Jacked has a nice ring to it,
I didn’t want a repeat of my crappy back day, so I put off speed bench yesterday and just practiced a bunch of volleyball with my daughter.
I want to squat tomorrow (I need to string some workouts together because I’ve got a quick turnaround trip middle of next week), and speed bench and arm day are both easy, so I just combined them this morning. I skipped abs and calves, because that’s what heroes do, but I’ll throw them in tomorrow.
Let’s just call it an overall accessory day:
Speed Bench
Warm ups, then:
155 + red bands/ 3 x 8 w/ 60s breaks
DB Rear Delt
I put my forehead on an incline bench this time; that was helpful.
Pronated grip
25/15 x 4 w/ 90s breaks
Face Pull
Orange band wrapped across a pole
4 x 15 w/ 90s breaks
When I write it this way, sets come first; when I write a weight in there, reps come first. Go figure
DB Incline
70s x max reps in 90s. I got 40
Now some guns:
Grip4orce BB Curl
5 x 8 - weights were between 55 - 65 every set, adjusting up and down
Grip4orce DB Curl
One arm at a time, palm up
20/8 x 4
Grip4orce Pressdown
6 x 12
Bench Dip
2 45s in lap/ 12 or so x 2
2p/12 + 1p/12 + BW/10
Kicking sticks this morning! I’m going to have to be sub-optimal, which means the universe will cease to exist, the next however many months and stack my workouts over the weekends without rest days because it’s hard for me to get anything reliable in during some of the short trips.
Everything listed is after a bunch of warmups; we know how long it takes my knees to move.
Lying Leg Curls
100/10 x 4 + 15 partials on the last set
DE Box SSB Squat
Loving the SSB!
175 + chains/ 3 x 8 w/ 60s breaks
Leg Press
3pps/10
5pps/10
7pps/10
DB Walking Lunges
One leg down, the other leg back
25/10
30/10 x 2
Adding just 5 lbs. was awful. I really struggle with these. My knees and hips don’t like to unlock at the same time.
SSB GM
I still wanted to do more SSB since it’s a new toy for me, so these are replacing RDLs this block. I got a better hang of it today. I used chains because I wanted to be able to stretch at the bottom but not be scared, so i liked them unloading, but mostly because there was another big there and I was too dehydrated to pee on his stuff so I needed the noise to demonstrate my dominance.
95 + chains/ 12 x 3
That’s it! I “forgot” to do abs and calves again, but there’s some minor possibility I’ll knock those out with the kiddos after school.
Got my workout knocked out early before volleyball. I had to line judge. Our own team’s moms booed one of my calls! I tried to have the ref throw them out, but he wouldn’t.
Push
Banded Hammer Press
Black bands
Warmups
1.1pps/3 x 8 w/ 50s rests
