Zen and the Art of Being Epic (Sheiko for Strongman experiment starting at pg 11)

Elliptical?20 minutes trying to stay moderate

DL
235 x 5
275 x 3
1 + 1 x 315 This was supposed to be 235, 265, 295, but I was feeling very strong and have not a good DL session in a while. I probably had another 315 rep (with good form) in me but I didn?t wreck myself so I checked myself.
3 x 8-10 @ 185

Bent over rows, underhand grip
5 x 5 135 haven?t done these in a loooong time

on to deload week…lame. I’m thinking about skipping it because I am traveling the following week. I’m going to flip DL and squat days so I will DL/OHP on Sundays, and Squat on Thursdays. I think my DL will benefit from being totally fresh. I want to break 400lbs before 2014, and really haven’t progressed.

Cycle 4 week 3.2?Ill deload when I?m dead, or traveling next week
20 minutes on the elliptical?epic headphone failure
DL
5 x 235
3 x 265
1 x 300
1 x 300
1 x 300 I like this 95% single group, taxing but survivable
3 x 10 x 185
OHP
5 X 80
3 X 95
1 X 105
1 X 105
1 X 105
5 X 10 X 65
New funny gym guy?He wears USMC everything hoodie (a 95 degree day) tan USMC t-shirt, navy blue USMC shorts and government issue high and tight. I grew up around military people, I have lots of respect for them but this guy was way to serious. I think he was training in prep for bootcamp. He did mobility work for ½ hour before getting busy (respectably). He had the 1.5 ft stride and marched around the gym eyes ablaze with intensity between supersets of squats and pushups until he started failing. There?s another guy who I am pretty sure just got back from somewhere hot and ugly who has the real stare this guy was trying to have. Good luck kid.

I am sure I am someone elses funny gym guy. “Fat guy changed from squatting on Sundays to DL, supersets farts and sweating on equipment. His headphones are broken so he had to acknowledge other humans.”

15 minutes on the bike?super strict low carb phase, AKA I felt like a sack of hammered shit. Keiffer (Carb Back loading) insists that there is no performance lull from carb deficit. I strongly disagree.

Bench
5 x 185
3 x 205
1+2 x 225
10 x 185
7 x 185
5 x 185

?seated dips? on the machine
10 x 170
10 x 200
7 x 200
Cable curls
10 x 100
8 x 100
7 x 100
5 x 100

Funny gym guy, huge mutha only doing cable and machine exercises wearing a stripped red and white shirt and jet black beard?a live action Bluto from Popeye.

[quote]TheKraken wrote:
I am sure I am someone elses funny gym guy. “Fat guy changed from squatting on Sundays to DL, supersets farts and sweating on equipment. His headphones are broken so he had to acknowledge other humans.”

[/quote]

Oh man, that’s funny.

10 minutes on the elliptical?not sure why I felt so drained?other than zero carbs
Squat
5 x 235
3 x 265
1 x 315?should have been 300, but I haven?t done 315 in a long time. The only thing I don?t like about 531 is that there is no opportunity to move true 95% percentages. He 95% is really 95% of 90% of the max. I plan to do more heavy singles from time to time because I find them beneficial and not doing so makes close to PR # feel really heavy.

8 x 185
10 x 185
8 x 185
5 x 185
Good mornings
4 x 10 x 135?tha?fuck! These suck, I?d rather deadlift?but I can feel my entire posterior chain from the back of my knees to the back of my head this morning so I think this might be a necessity for a while.

Funny gym person?a group effort on Thursday. Three 2nd gen Vietnamese (my guess) 2 boys one gal, probably 18-22, who probably have a combined weight total of one Kraken (me) leg pressing 90lbs, next to me. The girl is beautiful, and really distracting (yoga pants, camel toe) to have her leg pressing, wide stance, (open camel toe) right under my nose with little grunts and growns just auditable over my Metallica in one headphone (ongoing technical issue).

Cycle 5, week 1

…and I’m back. BTW, it is not always sunny in Philadelphia. Cloudy, day 1, rainy day 2, mostly cloudy, some rain day 3, and so on.

20 minutes on elliptical
DL
5 X 205
3 X 245
1 X 275 I realized I had the wrong rep pattern after I unloaded 275. When someone says, “it’s idiot proof” I say, “oh yeah?”
3 x 10 x 185 conventional style. Hips are tighter than a _______ in a __________ ________!
OHP
5 X 70
5 X 80
5 X 95
3 X 10 X 70

Major diet change. My feet have been aching and I have not lost any weight, in fact I have gained a few pounds. CBL started great but I am doing something wrong…and when I stopped eating large amounts of animal protein my feet stopped aching. Gout? I hope not cause I normally am much happier on a low carb diet, but I also hate veggies so this could really suck.

So how do you figure 90% or 95% or whatever of max if you don’t do max?

[quote]cavalier wrote:
So how do you figure 90% or 95% or whatever of max if you don’t do max?
[/quote]

I have been following the 531 recommendation of +10 lbs per cycle on DL, squat, and +5-10 lbs on presses, but I have adding those to the 90% number I calculate everything on. So, my new DL 90% max is 320, which translates into 352 LBS at 100%.

25 minutes on the elliptical?moderate-intense
Bench
5 x 155
5 x 185
5+4 x 205
5 x 10 x 155
Heavily assisted dips
4 x 5
Cable curls
10 x 105
8 x 145
6 x 165
Tri pressdowns
10 x 165
8 x 175
6 x 185

Life with carbs is nice so far. I have more energy and stamina. I am tempted (I always am) to do another Sheiko cycle. I am getting bored with 531, but I?d like to see if the cardio has any effect on weight management. I don’t think I can maintain cardio and Sheiko at the same time. I think I?ll set a weight loss goal for the summer, I plan things and make goals now because I am in management, and have Sheiko as a reward in the fall.

Funny gym guy?older guy with a slicked down part sponsored by brylecream, pale, spindly (I always wanted to be spindly) does a lot of benching where his knee-high tube socks fly all over creation while he bounces the weight off his sternum. 185 sinks about 3 inches into him. He also loves close grip bench, but he manages epic elbow flair with only 4 inches between his hands and wrist angles that make the whole gym wait and listen for the ?crack.?

You don’t want to be spindly. Take my word for it.

Enjoying this log, very much. Really dig the LOBO avatar!

Eliptical blah! The available machine was available because it had no timer, resistance etc., or in other words?broken. I did an est. 7 minutes, enough to warm up, loosen the hips.

Squat
5 x 225
5 x 245
5 x 275
3 x 10 x 185 this was the first time I squatted in weeks that I did not feel ?off balance? when I unracked 250+. I think I may have been shifting backwards slightly when I give myself the ?push through the heels? reminder. I think that was the issue, I felt it slightly but I am used to it at this point.
Leg Presses?with feet high to hit the hams
10 x 315
8 x 405
5 x 495

Keep it going dude! I am enjoying it.

[quote]Umbrata Fortis wrote:
I absolutely love this log and I don’t know why, Thanks for posting man and keep the hard work going man!!![/quote]

Thanks, my other log started as more of chore, but this one has been a habit. Love the name BTW, I named myself after the rum I was craving at the time I signed on.

…and Lobo is the Main Man, so what other avatar could there be?

[quote]cavalier wrote:
You don’t want to be spindly. Take my word for it.
[/quote]

Ok, maybe not spindly but “Wile.” In my life before lifting heavy things and putting them down again became fun, I was a martial artist. I did both Kempo Karate and BJJ. In both of those, a 6ft, well over 250ish guy kicking ass is expected. A spindly/wile guy kicking ass is impressive. When I was 12 I did a textbook shoulder throw during a free sparing match with a spindly adult. I barely had hair on my nuts, but I got called a bully for tossing a guy twice or more my age because I was built like a linebacker and he was built like a scarecrow.

Never heard of “wile” before. Have heard the term “wiry”, though, for someone slender but muscular. Or “lithe”.

Anyway, I was a spindly guy all through school and early adulthood and remember the humiliation of it. I don’t have much sympathy for the big guys who manhandle the smaller ones.

[quote]cavalier wrote:
Never heard of “wile” before. Have heard the term “wiry”, though, for someone slender but muscular. Or “lithe”.

Anyway, I was a spindly guy all through school and early adulthood and remember the humiliation of it. I don’t have much sympathy for the big guys who manhandle the smaller ones.
[/quote]

^See! I’m not looking for sympathy, just a long way of saying the grass is always greener on the other side. The guys that get called “big guy” at least once a week want to be thin, trim, wiry, probably not lithe, and the wile guys want to be BIG.

For the record, I never manhandled anyone smaller than me, in fact as a bouncer “back in the day” I broke-up a lot of fights (where I was encouraged to crack a head or two, that place was like the Russian bouncer vids on youtube, punch first, punch again, kick when they’re down) by simply restraining or picking up one, or once both of the fighters and carrying them out Hoss (Bonanza) style.

Wile, like “Wile E Coyote.”

Cycle 5 week 2
13 minutes on the elliptical
DL
3 X 225
3 X 255
3 + 2 X 285 I ripped each rep off the floor like a boss, I only stopped because my form was starting to break.
2 X 10 X 225
6 X 225

OHP
3 X 75
3 X 85
3 + 2 X 100
3 X 10 X 70

Crap, forgot any sort of ab training.

20 minutes of the elliptical–the hardest 20 minutes in a while. I think the heat, and going from A/C to heat to A/C to heat to A/C is starting to get to me.

Bench
3 x 165
3 x 195
3 + 3 x 215 I think my bench form is finally “in the groove.” I feel way more confident under load than I used to. I almost enjoy benching. I think OHPing has had a huge impact on my effort here.
3 x 10 x 165
Heavily assisted dips
3 x 6 x failure
Barbell curls
3 x 8-6 x 70
Cable ab pull downs
3 x (8-10) failure x 100, 120

Keep up the good work…

Just finishing cycle 10 of my first run through 5/3/1 +BBB myself. Pretty much just been keeping my spreadsheet up to date, but considering a log here, and I’ll probably restart my 5/3/1 +BBB in a few weeks, maybe wrap up another cycle, maybe not. Reset a couple months down, I don’t think a full reset is in order… but… my + reps are starting to get really grindy to get past the min required… IE 2 at my last 5/3/1+ day.

Anyhow, great log.

From Central CT myself… Meriden.