Tell us, how do you train, Steel Nation. Height, weight, age, diet, years training, style of training, before and after pics, anything ya got.
Hell of a physique. Tell us more indeed!
Myron Gains!
The man helped me out when I was working on breaking 5 in the squat. Gains are rightfully mired.
x10 
Total beast.
Ridiculous - amazing physique!
Definitely interested in this thread. Steel is a Beast!
Jeez, that new profile pic is scary. Didn’t know he was such an impressive individual. Please drop knowledge.
Thanks for makin this thread Spidey. I was seriously about to make it at the same exact time lol. I’d known SN was a monster for some time, but after than new avi pic he put up I was just like “WTF IS THIS”. Looking forward to an answer.
sub’d
[quote]csulli wrote:
Thanks for makin this thread Spidey. I was seriously about to make it at the same exact time lol. I’d known SN was a monster for some time, but after than new avi pic he put up I was just like “WTF IS THIS”. Looking forward to an answer.[/quote]
LOL I remember one of the first ‘check in update’ thread things he posted his pic, and I was super impressed, because his avi was just the Steelers logo for some time. And I feel like every update thread, he would post, ppl would give him props and ask for a thread on him, and inevitably it wouldn’t happen.
Figured it’s time for this gentleman to get his shine. lol. Hopefully he stops by soon.
Thanks for the kind words everyone. I’m flattered, seriously.
Height: 5’-9"
Weight: 212 at the moment
Age: 31
Lifetime PRs: Bench 405, Deadlift 605 (in a suit due to hip), Squat 575 (w/wraps), Military Press 225x5
Current training split:
Sunday - Bench Press, chest/delt accessory
Monday - AM treadmill 50 min, PM Back touch-up (depending on recovery)
Tuesday - Arms
Wednesday - Legs and Abs (only train legs “hard” every other week or so)
Thursday - AM treadmill 50 min, PM Military Press, delts
Friday - Back
Saturday - Prowler
Current diet:
Calorie/carb cycling with low days on Monday and Thursday, moderate on Sunday, Tuesday, Friday, high on Wednesday, and refeed on Saturday. I’m losing about a lb of fat a week on this. I track this by weighing myself every Friday morning, since that will be my lowest weight of the week. On other days it can fluctuate by 5-7 lbs.
Low day - 50g C, 350 P, 100 F = 2500 kcal
Med day - 180 C, 300 P, 100 F = 2820 kcal
High day - 300 C, 260 P, 100 F = 3140 kcal
refeed - 800 C, 260 P, 50 F = 3690 kcal
Training philosophy - Power building? I guess that’s what you can call it. I train for strength gains on the big lifts, which for me are just bench and military press. Oh, I guess I’ll get that part out of the way now…
OK, so in 2008 I had a very bad skiing accident that resulted in a dislocated right hip. My femur was out of the socket for around 6 hours before I could get to a hospital and have it put back in. Had it scoped three months later to clean up torn ligaments and other debris. By that time the joint capsule had healed in such a way that it drastically altered my hip flexion ROM. I could no longer pick anything up off the ground with my feet narrower than a sumo stance, so no more conventional deadlifting. I also can’t cross my right leg over my left, which makes tying shoes a pain in the ass.
So I recovered from the initial injury, and did my first full powerlifting meet a year later. I totaled 1713 in single-ply gear with a 650 squat, 501 bench, and 562 deadlift. I was a 242 here, hence the fat face.
About 7 months after that meet I found out that I had osteonecrosis in my right femoral head. When I was injured the blood supply to the bone was cut off, and the bone was now starting to die. So in November 09 I had a vascularized fibular graft inserted into my femur to restore blood flow. This involved removing a 12" section from the fibula in my right leg and implanting it in my femur. I was on crutches for 6 months after that, and didn’t get back to squatting and deadlifting until 2011.
In the summer of 2011, I resumed squatting and deadlifting, and did my first raw meet that fall, getting a 1530 total in knee wraps. Over the next year I did two more raw meets, but after the last one (November 2012) my hip was so bad that I could barely walk for a month. Now it’s gotten to the point where sitting in the wrong position is painful, and it hurts to walk the majority of the time. So no more squatting and deadlifting for now. I’m looking into getting a total hip replacement for a few reasons.
First, my ROM is limited in such a way that I fear I’m going to start to have lumbar spine issues down the road. That is much worse, IMO, than having a bad hip. Second, if this is really osteoarthritis, then it’s only going to get worse. I don’t want to sit around waiting to see how bad it will get; I want to get better, not worse. Finally, it impacts me in every day life, not even including training. It affects my sleep, I can’t pick shit up off the ground, can’t chase my daughter around, etc.
But I can’t make any decisions until I see my ortho in a few weeks. I’d like to get it done in November if possible. We’ll see what happens.
OK, back to training style. Like I was saying, I train the bench and military press for strength. I’ve used 5/3/1, Juggernaut, and my own progression “system”, which is basically just linear weight/volume progression, in a 3 steps forward, 1 step back kinda way. Right now, I’m using some stuff from Wendler’s new Beyond 5/3/1 book. Lots of sweet-looking templates in there.
For everything else, I’ve been using John Meadows’ stuff. High volume, high “intensiveness,” working for a huge pump every session. This has really been a godsend for me, especially for back and delts. For legs, all I can really do is leg curls and hack squats. I do these for several sets of 15-20 reps each, with a drop set every once in a while if I don’t feel like walking for the rest of the day. This is basically the least fun thing ever. I used to love squatting and pulling; I miss it a lot. But my legs have always been my best body part by a long shot, so I’m just trying to maintain what I have until I know what’s going to happen with my hip. If I get the OK from my doc to get a hip replacement, I will make sure to come back extremely slow. Wouldn’t plan to load any lower body stuff for at least a year post-op, and I’d just focus on mobility and bodyweight stuff until then.
For now I’m just focused on getting as lean as possible. I’ve been doing this every summer for 5 years now, and each year I get a little better at it. It’s not quite contest prep but it’s getting pretty close to it.
I will go over my training history in the next post. Let me know if I missed anything.
Talk about fighting through adversity!
Awesome numbers, awesome physique, IRON will.
Congrats man.
That’s a damn lean 212 there. Good stuff. I like your training style. Good luck in the future with the hip, amazing you’ve been able to overcome it and hit some of the lifts you have.
[quote]Steel Nation wrote:
Monday - AM treadmill 50 min
Thursday - AM treadmill 50 min
Saturday - Prowler
[/quote]
Can you expand on your conditioning a bit?
For your 50 mins. of treadmilling, is that brisk walking or jogging or what?
On the prowler, do you do sprints or longer pushes or walks with heavy weight?
Thanks!
[quote]csulli wrote:
[quote]Steel Nation wrote:
Monday - AM treadmill 50 min
Thursday - AM treadmill 50 min
Saturday - Prowler
[/quote]
Can you expand on your conditioning a bit?
For your 50 mins. of treadmilling, is that brisk walking or jogging or what?
On the prowler, do you do sprints or longer pushes or walks with heavy weight?
Thanks![/quote]
Agree, I’d like to hear more about the conditioning especially since so many advocate little or no “road” work.
[quote]csulli wrote:
[quote]Steel Nation wrote:
Monday - AM treadmill 50 min
Thursday - AM treadmill 50 min
Saturday - Prowler
[/quote]
Can you expand on your conditioning a bit?
For your 50 mins. of treadmilling, is that brisk walking or jogging or what?
On the prowler, do you do sprints or longer pushes or walks with heavy weight?
Thanks![/quote]
The treadmill is pretty pathetic, walking at 2.6 mph with a 15% incline. The point is to just burn some calories on my low carb days without tiring myself out too much. The calorie counter on the machine says I burn 700 calories in that time, but I don’t really believe it. This is honestly the fist time I’ve ever done long slow cardio like this. I hate doing it but I always feel great after I’ve done it.
Prowler will be either 90 lbs for 16-20 x 40 yds or 140 lbs for 10-12 x 40 yds. I usually try to get one trip per minute. These are all done just walking and pushing the uprights. I used to sprint and use the low handles but my hip can’t handle it any more. It is getting pretty dodgy just walking with it now.
I used to do hill sprints and kettlebell stuff as well for conditioning but haven’t been able to do it this year.
A few questions from me if you don’t mind:
Do you do anything in particular with respect to peri-workout nutrition? Any intra-workout intake? Also, do you handle/time your carbs in a particular way (ie, mainly in the morning, or in the evening, etc)?
It looks like you train delts twice a week–on Chest day, and then again on Military Press day. What do you do for delts on these days (besides the MP of course)?
[quote]EyeDentist wrote:
A few questions from me if you don’t mind:
Do you do anything in particular with respect to peri-workout nutrition? Any intra-workout intake? Also, do you handle/time your carbs in a particular way (ie, mainly in the morning, or in the evening, etc)?
It looks like you train delts twice a week–on Chest day, and then again on Military Press day. What do you do for delts on these days (besides the MP of course)?[/quote]
Pre workout meal (2 hrs prior):
35-70g C from cream of rice
1 tbsp natty pb
35g whey
8 oz egg whites
Peri drink (start drinking 30 min prior):
3 scoops Mag10
1 scoop gatorade
Post meal: same as pre meal or sub Pop Tarts or a candy bar for cream of rice if I’m craving junk
On the bench day I will hit rear delts hard with chest supported swings a la Meadows, then do lighter laterals for higher reps (like 20+). On military day I will do heavy side partials and higher reps on the reverse pec deck.
