DE bench on Tuesday

I was feeling lonely with the family being in Idaho, so I went for a short DE bench workout tuesday night.

DE bench bar with unknown amount of weight in chains:

10 sets x 3

Tricep cable press downs:

4 sets whole stack.

Shoulder press machine:

4 sets of known weight ( I can still feel the bruise with overhead pressing, but thankfully only with overhead pressing. )

Speed deadlifts on Monday

I haven't really every done DE deadlifts, but I felt like it was the thing to do.  The deadlifts went as follows:

warmup:

135 x 8

135 x 8

225 x 5

315 x 5

I put the bands on, mini bands basically wrapped around twice, ie 4 bands thick.  Russ was trying to figure out how he usually wraps the bands around the platform, but couldn't remember.  He said that he does green bands, but when wrapped how we wrapped the mini's it was way too much.  Anyway, 135 with the bands as we did them felt like about 365 to me at lockout.

I did 6 sets x 3, here's a video clip.

I then did dumbell rows

100 x 8

120 x 7

120 x 7

100 x 8

Pull throughs:

5 sets I don't remember the weight.

Overall not a bad workout given that I've been tired lately.

Skiing with Eric on Sunday

There wasn't any new snow, and it warmed up considerably since Friday, almost all of the powder was gone, but the skiing was still pretty good. I met up with Eric and Jen. It was nice to ski with somebody. I had a good time.

Crappy ME bench session

For some reason (Becky), I haven't been sleeping very much lately. That and the skiing on friday made it so my body was completely not ready to lift saturday morning. I did two sets with my shirt and realized that there was not point in lifting, so I talked to Stump for a while and left to take a nap.

Powder skiing Friday

Lots of new powder. The canyon was closed until 10:30, but I was the second car up the road. It was worth waiting for, there was tons of new snow. Lots of deep untracked to track up.

ME Squats

It's hard squatting the day after skiing, but I had to get it done.

Squats:

Bar x 8

135 x 6

225 x 5

315 x 3

405 x 1

455 x 1

Rack pulls:

315 x 8

405 x 5

455 x 1

3 sets on the leg curl machine

Time to eat lunch.

Powder Tuesday

Snowbird got 15" of snow Monday night, so I took vacation time to enjoy the powder.  It's getting really good up there.

Deadlift PR

I deadlifted 500 pounds tonight...

I tried 515 and almost got it.  I tried it again and could barely get it off the ground.  OK, I'm done deadlifting.

Dumbell rows 

100x8

120x6

140x5

100x8

5 sets of Pull throughs.  I haven't done these before so I was just getting the feel of them.

Seated cable rows with the 2" handle.

80x8

90x6

100x5

Skiing sunday

No new powder, but decided to go up anyway.  I skied Pruvian gulch for the first time since the brusing, I had been hanging out in Gad Valley since then.  Skiing was good though, lots of people with NY accents on the lift.  Hopefully I saved enough energy for my deadlift training tomorrow.

PR during Max Effort bench session

We did reverse band flat bench press for our max effort exercise.  I did 495, which is a 20 pound PR.  Below is the video.

We then did some benching with chains, and I did some accessory work.  Below was my last set with chains only, kind of getting tired....

POWDER FRIDAY

Man, snowbird just keeps getting better and better.  I wasn't planning to go up on friday, but when the snow came I couldn't resist.  I got up there at 2:45 and skied until 4:30, and actually got a lot of skiing in.  When Gadzoom closed at 4:00, I went over to Wilbere and skied for another half hour.  I don't usually ski on Wilbere but it was awesome.  Powder, Powder everywhere!

Squat workout Thursday.

Monday's workout didn't really count for anything, so I squatted Thursday.  I did DE box squats working up to 315 with purple bands x 2.

I then did 3 sets on the leg curl machine, and some lat pulldowns and barbell rows.

I felt relatively strong, and it was a good workout.

POWDER Tuesday

I was able to take vacation time this tuesday as well, just in time to enjoy some of the best powder skiing in a long time.  I got up there at about 9:15 and it was snowing harder than I've ever seen it snow up there, seriously.   Before I left the house the snowcam was showing about 5" of new snow, but by the time I was on top of Gadzoom there was at least a foot, and by the time I was on top of Gad II, it was over my knees on the main runs.  Oh yeah, I was the second person up Gad II and was able to ski 3 runs tracking up knee deep powder down the main runs before it was tracked up enough to need to head for the trees to find untracked.  It was an amazing powder day at The Bird.

Monday Squats

I went to Ripped Fitness to squat monday night.  When I got there it was very clear that I've been over doing it, probably mostly caused by skiing.  I did maybe 5 sets of 225 and decided that I should just go home and rest, which is what I did.

Powder skiing at Snowbird today

Today was by far the best day so far this season.  There was 13" of new since friday night, and it's really opened up a lot more terrain on the mountain.  I skied some of the most technical terrain so far this year, like through the black forest, which is much harder skiing early season than it was last spring.

There was an avalanche on Mt Baldy today around 12:30.  Apparently somebody was life flighted out at 1:30 or so in critical condition.  Kind of scary, that's in the ski area and under snowbird's avalanche control.   Last year I skied over there all the time but haven't yet this year because I didn't think there was enough snow, but apparently there is if there's enough to slide.  Scary stuff, I could have been over there.

Mock Meet yesterday

Saturday we had a mock meet at Ripped Fitness.  CJ, Mike and I lifted, and Stump, Lance, Jacob Gunter judged/spotted/loaded weights.

I was happy with my performance, especially since I haven't been sleeping all that much lately.   My lifts were the following...

Squat:

315 ( good lift )

385 ( good lift )

445 ( Lance said I didn't get depth, from the video it was as deep as other good APF/AAPF lifts I've seen online, so IMHO I'm counting it especially since if I knew I needed to go lower, I easily could have, ie I thought I was low enough.  )

Bench:

285 (good lift)

315 (good lift, actually went up *really* easy )

330 (got the bar to about 6" off my chest and couldn't lock it out.  I'm kicking myself now, I don't think I strained with 100% of what I had )

Dead:

445 ( easy weight, but Lance wanted me to bend backward at the top, OK )

455 ( good lift )

500 ( URG!  SO dang close, but didn't get it.  I think I'll get this on my next ME deadlift session though. )

The mock meet was a great learning experience.  I really appreciate everybody's time/help/advice/encouragement.  

I think once I get used to the squat suit, 600 pounds could be possible by Feb.  Once my brain decided to let me keep my hips down a little longer pulling, I think 575-ish will be easily possibly by Feb.  I should have gotten that 330 bench, if I had another attempt at it I think I would have.

Strongman training with AF strongman group

I met with the AF strongman group to do some strongman training after work, they meet right down the street from my office, go figure!  I've never done any strongman stuff before so I wasn't sure what to expect.  I guess the whole group wasn't there tonight, so we only did tire flipping and some deadlifting.   They gave me a little tutorial about how to flip the tire and asked if I wanted to try, well of course!  But I quickly found out that being tall means different technique.  For example they said to keep my chest on the tire, which put me at an angle where I was pushing down into the tire and not across.  Anyway, after forgetting what they said and just figuring out what felt right for me, I could flip the 800 pound tire pretty easily.  I can see that the strong man event of flipping it until it travels 60 feet would be more endurance than strength, at least that how it felt for me.  After a flip I was winded but felt like I had plenty of strength to do it again, ie being winded would be my limiting factor.

After that we did some deads, which I wasn't really prepared to do, I was wearing my boots and I deadlifted a couple of days ago.  Anyway, I worked up to 495 which I pulled off the ground but didn't get, URG.  that extra inch with my boots makes a big difference.  But the guys told me I had good form, I guess my working form is paying off.  But they pulled different than powerlifters though,  they use straps, and hitching is allowed, and they start with the bar out farther in front, and they really arch backward at the top.  I'm not sure what to think about that.

Anyway, it was alot of fun, and I look forward to meeting with them again, and/or flipping tires and stuff with Russ at Ripped Fitness.

Powder Tuesday

Snowbird got about 10" of new snow monday evening, and the skies were clear as a bell tuesday morning, so I took the day off and went skiing.  It must have been windy when the snow fell, but still lots of fun. To the left is the photo of the day from snowbird's site. 

When I went back to my truck at lunch time, this little car had parked next to my truck leaving only a couple inches on the driver side of my truck.  URG!  At first I didn't see the guy was still there and I was seriously thinking about trying to deadlift the back end of the car and move it over a bit.  Then I saw that the driver was still there, so I walked around and asked him how I was supposed to get into my truck.  He said something like "oh I expected a little guy like me".  I loved the look on his face as I moved a little closer and said something like "well I'm not a little guy like you".  ( I wasn't trying to be a jerk, but he clearly shouldn't have parked there given there wasn't enough room.   Does it make me a jerk that I liked intimidating him a little with my size? )   He promptly moved his car.  I love being 6'8" 312 pounds, LOL.

I'm looking forward to meeting the the AF strongman people tonight.   

Light squats and deads

I decided to squat and pull today, but stayed relatively light...

Squats:

bar x 8

bar x 8

135 x 8

225 x 5

315 x 3

405 x 1

Deads:

225 x 5

315 x 3

315 x 3

405 x 1

405 x 1

URG, with the 315 I felt like I was keeping my hips down a little better, but not with 405.

3 sets of leg curls and 3 sets of leg extensions.

Today's the last powerlifting training session before saturday.  But I'm going to ski tomorrow morning, and then meet the AFSTRONGMAN people on wednesday.  

Saturday and Sunday

Saturday ME benching at Ripped Fitness

Kyle came, very cool. 

Benching ( from my imperfect memory )...

bar x 10

bar x 10

135 x 8

225 x 5

Stump presses ( ie weight hanging off the bar on straps )

135 x 8

185 x 8

225 x 5

225 x 5 

Stump presses definitely add another dimension to benching.  I think my slow style actually helps with these, although they were still REALLY hard.

Put on Stump's old shirt for the first time

Flat Board presses

135 x 8 with 5 boards (?)

225 x 5 with 3 boards (?)

275 ( don't really remember the # of boards or reps )

315 x 1 2 boards

315 x 1 2 boards

315 x 1 1 board

315 x 1 1 board

Hmmm, the shirt is interesting.  I didn't feel like it helped at all until maybe the last two presses.  On the last one I think I understand, maybe.  Definitely different than the denim that I tried a while ago.  Maybe at some point I'll try the denim again, but this seemed alot easier to get used to.  I think it's slightly big on me, but I'm still want to gain some weight.

3 sets of Chain presses with Russ, Tom, Scott, Brad...

After that I did various sets/reps of the following

tricep push downs

grip roller ( don't really know what to call this, but I *love* doing them )

a strongman one arm deadlift thingy with a 2" handle that rotates.  ( Cool, very cool, I've got to start working things like this )

Crap, I'm loosing weight, 307 pounds.  I guess I didn't eat enough for breakfast.

Sunday...  Skiing!

Whoo hoo.  The skiing was decent, Snowbird needs more snow, but it was sunny so that's a bonus.  My added weight is making skiing weird.  On the things that I have always skied well ( powder and off the main runs ), I still ski them really well, but on the things that I always have skied kind of crappy ( ie groomed runs ), man now I really suck.  Maybe it's just that I skied on the skis that I've been skiing on until June last season and they're pretty edge-less and in need of more of a tuning that I can do myself, but I can really feel how my added mass just causes me to skid on the groomed.  I LOVE the added mass in the powder though.  We need more powder!  And I *love* the added mass in general.

The *interesting* thing is that last year I would have skied until I was completely dead tired on a day like today, but today, while on the lift I was thinking about squatting tomorrow and to a lesser extent the little meet next weekend, so I came home early and I was completely satisfied with the amount of skiing that i did.  Very weird, lol.   I know I have horrible leverages for powerlifting, but I'm really finding myself loving it.

Pulling at Ripped

Deads ( sumo ):

135 x 10

225 x 7

315 x 4

365 x 3

(put squat suit on)

405 x 3

455 x 1

455 x 1

475 x 1

475 x 1

495 x 1

475 x 1

Dumbell rows

90 x 8

100 x 8

100 x 8

What a great workout, it was awesome getting everybody's help/suggestions.  It's very much appreciated.

I think I'll pull sumo at meets, I'm not going super wide, but sumo now feels more natural than conventional.  I'm not sure what caused that, but I think pulling sumo makes it easier for me to keep my hips down longer, and I never scrap my shins.  I'm not sure about doing deads in the squat suit though.  I'm not sure if it helps or not.

Enjoying some birthday powder skiing up at Snowbird and thoughts about my workout routine

Today's my birthday, and like almost every birthday since I was in graduate school, I went skiing.  Even though this season started early with storm that dumped over 4 feet in early November, the storms pretty much stopped since opening weekend.  BUT, last night Snowbird got about 5" of pretty decent snow.  Definitely not epic conditions, but it was by far the best day so far this season.  The hill was basically empty, even around lunch time, I made sets of crossed tracks in the powder on the left side of big emma ( ie one of the most crowded places on the hill ) .  What a great birthday gift from the snow Gods.

I'm considering changing my current workout schedule, which currently is 4 days a week, a ME and DE bench session, and a ME squat/dead session and a DE box squat session.  I think with the skiing, I can't squat 2 times a week.  And I also think that skiing is just as good for explosiveness with squats than doing DE squats.  Also, I don't think my squats suffer from the lack of explosiveness like I have with benching.   Even with my long legs I feel that I'm a fairly fast squatter.  Also, lately I feel like I hardly ever pull, I only do a max effort deadlift session once every 4 weeks.  The other thing driving this is that I really want to be able to try some strongman training.  Russ at Ripped Fitness said I can join him and its something that I'd really like to try, but I don't want to overtrain.  Anyway, so I'm thinking of going to a 3 day split.  I've considered just getting rid of my DE squat day, but I still fell like I'm not pulling enough.   I was thinking that powerlifting is 3 lifts, and I'm considering a 3 day a week workout, why not focus on one lift per session, hitting each one once a week.  I can let my body determine if it's a DE or ME session, which probably means I won't be doing a DE bench session, which I'm willing to try to see how it goes, I can always go back to what I'm currently doing.   But it means I'll pull every week, which I think I need right now.   Anyway, lots of rambling, but I think it's decided.   My routine's going to be like this

Saturday, ME bench

Monday, squats DE or ME depending on how I feel

Thrusday, deadlifting DE or ME depending on how I feel

I think this means that maybe wednesday I can try some strongman training with Russ as Ripped or the AFSTRONGMAN people ( he emailed me back, they train on wednesdays )

DE bench work as expected

After squatting 495 last night, I wasn't expecting too much today, and my body didn't disappoint...

DE benching:

Bar x 8

Bar x 8

8 sets of 135 x 3 with basically no speed what so ever.

Overhead presses

135 x 8  ( can still feel the chest injury some, not really pain, just tight)

155 x 5 ( not quite so bad )

155 x 5 ( urg, no not ready for this yet, thankfully I don't feel it at all benching, I haven't tried pulling yet )

Standing tricep cable push downs, didn't keep track.  I've got do start doing something else instead.

Face pulls, same, ie didn't keep track.

I'm feeling really stagnant/unmotivated with my bench workouts lately.  Maybe things will change when the group is back together, or maybe I just need a break.

Snowbird's getting snow this evening/tonight and It's my birthday tomorrow ( so I have the day off ), woo hoo.

ME squats in suit at Ripped

Today was my first time squatting in my Metal IPF Squatter, at Ripped Fitness.

Back Squats:

bar x 8

bar x 8

135 x 8

225 x 6

315 x 3

365 x 2

( put the suit on )

365 x 1

405 x 1

455 x 1

495 x 1

455 x 1

Thanks Russ for the spots.

Wow, I love the suit.  The last 455 was definitely to parallel ( by how my hands hit the pins, no mirror at ripped ), and I felt like it gave me a big explosive push at the bottom.   The 495 was real close to parallel, but not 100% sure it was there.   I still think it was good to try because it'll help me get used to holding the heavier weight.  Not bad at all for the first time wearing the suit.

Leg press machine, 5 sets didn't keep track of the weight.  I did 2 more sets with bands.  Oh, definitely done for tonight.