Awesome. Wish I could just build sh*t.

a) Plenty of beginners have taught themselves how to dead and squat with no coach

b) What do your volume and/or HIT programs involve if there are no squats or deads...

a) True but having a coach makes it easier
b) Variation of traditional deads and squats, romanians, stifflegged etc

Was gonna post about workout #3 but nah, I NEED to get a couple of BigMacs first.

9 months? What the...

19.11.2011

SS-workout #3

Warm-up:
10 mins of random basketball-stuff

SQ:

2 x 5 x 20
1 x 5 x 25
1 x 3 x 30
1 x 2 x 35
1 x 1 x 37,5
3 x 5 x 40kg/88lb

BP:

2 x 5 x 20
1 x 5 x 25
1 x 3 x 30
1 x 2 x 40
3 x 5 x 42,5kg/94lb

DL:

1 x 3 x 60
1 x 2 x 65
1 x 5 x 70kg/155lb

Cool-off:
10 mins of random basketball-stuff

Easily the best workout so far, prolly simply cos no biking/office before lifting. I did record some videos, gonna open a Youtube account and upload them later tonite or tomorrow.

Hehe, building one of those was actually fairly easy, anyone can do it if I can.

I'm gonna up my cals whenever I feel like I need to. Eating is easy, just make a cal goal for the day, and eat accordingly, simple as that.
Regarding cardio and recovery - I've already considerably slowed down the pedaling, I basically just cruised last few days.
But yeah, if it starts to look like it interferes with recovery too badly, then I'll start biking every other day or drop it altogether. I'm not biking for cardio's sake, it's just a preferred way to commute for me. No need to pollute the planet if there's no real need to. Also, biking to/from work takes less time than driving my car there. It just feels so lol-silly to sit in a traffic jam every morning/afternoon, too.
One more thing - winter is slowly crawling in here in Finland and I'm not gonna bike on days there's more than 20cm of snow on roads I use or if the temperature gets below -20C/-4F, so I'm gonna bike less often when weights get heavier anyways.

Hmm, I guess I'll take my chances and go on with SS.

I dunno, but thanks anyways.

19.11.2011

Food:

~2700 kcals / 185g of protein

****, after spending like half an hour trying to pixelate my face in my DL-video with Pinnacle Studio, I give up, too difficult and time-consuming ****.
I guess I have to try something else to save ppl from seeing my ugly face, maybe I'll just wear a hoodie or ski-mask or something during the sets I video whilst my next workout.

20.11.2011

Food:

2700 kcals / 195 g of protein

Prettay good amount(s) seeing that the only thing even remotely resembling physical activity was the button-clicking necessary to receive donations from always so glorious Sunday donks.

21.11.2011

Food:

2500 kcals / 190g of protein

22.11.2011

SS-workout #4

SQ:

2 x 5 x 20
1 x 5 x 25
1 x 3 x 35
1 x 2 x 40
3 x 5 x 42,5kg/94lb

OHP:

2 x 5 x 20
1 x 5 x 22,5
1 x 3 x 25
1 x 2 x 27,5
3 x 5 x 30kg/66lb

DL:

1 x 4 x 60
1 x 3 x 65
1 x 2 x 70
1 x 5 x 75kg/166lb

Squatting felt good.
Maybe I coulda added weight in OHP - it felt a bit light but whatever.
Felt like DL is already getting pretty heavy for me, need to start alternating with PC's soon.
I did record some vids but too lazy to post them yet, will ul/post em tomorrow.

Food:

3000 kcals / 220 g of protein

Given your relatively small size it's just fine to bump DL by 2.5 kg each workout too. Gives you a better opportunity to work on form as well, which is hard to do with near-max weights as a beginner.

^
Yeah, I guess I'll add 2,5kg to DL in next two workouts and really, really focus on correct form.
Starting next week I'll incorporate PC's and therefore do DL every other workout and then prolly get back to adding 5kgs to DL between workouts.

Videos from yesterdays SS-workout #4:

Squat (42,5kg/94lb):

workset1 -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVIKY4j0JyA
workset2 ->http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrSP30CrHec
workset3 -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0XITvCRoxM

OHP (30kg/66lb):

workset2 -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0brTk3KczQE

DL (75kg/166lb):

workset1 -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ww6FF73B7_Q

Any critique/advice truly appreciated!

Press looks good. Make sure you are staying tight and flexing glutes/quads if you aren't. That helps me, anyway.

Looks like you lose extension when your start the DL reps.

and I'm banned from critiquing squats around here.

Kool. My initial thought when watching the vid was that I might be exaggerating a bit with my forward torso movement.
But yeah, I'll try to remember to stay as tight as possbible next time.

Yeah, looks like I tilt forward as soon as the weight leaves the ground. Any specific idea how to prevent that from happening?

Just curious, why is that?

Squats:
- Bar should be lower for SS-style low bar squats
- HUUUUUGE breath before each rep, tighten the motherloving **** out of your lower back and abs (no, more than that), then squat
- Reach back with your ass, don't go down (you can see your knees moving way forwards)
- Filming directly from behind is useful to see knee cave/placement of your feet

Gotcha. I should prolly take a bit wider grip and raise my elbows a tiny bit more to achieve that?

I thought I already took a huge breath before every rep but I guess there's a big difference between huge and HUUUUUUGE and will do the latter next time.
FWIW my vids seem to have audio out of sync (I blame the MTS->FLV-converter) and thus it may sound like I take a breathe while descending.

Yes, they end up way forwards and it also looks like my heels rise a bit when in bottom position. I guess having bar lower on my back would help a bit with that but I'll also concentrate on sitting back instead of down next time.

I'll try to vid one of the worksets from behind next time. But, it may turn out to be impossible because of the limited space in my one-man-gym.

Oh, also, thx a lot for the comments, both of ya.

Wider grip if necessary, yes. Raising your elbows a bit more is also good.

You can try to raise your toes next time, at least for the warm-up sets - that should teach you how to stay on your heels.

Rip's DL setup is good to follow. And cross-post in the form check thread to get max exposure.

^All righty, will try picking up my toes next time and check out the link.
I already did x-post the vids in form check-thread, but thx for reminding.

23.11.2011

Food:

~2950 kcals / 180g of protein

All right, I think it's time for me to give some thought to nutrition or more specifically decide how to feed myself.

I weighed myself today - 64 kg / 141 lb

I have no idea really, but my initial thought is that ~ 80kg / 177lb might be a reasonable body weight goal for a shortie (5'9") like me.

I also think that a reasonable rate to up my bodyweight is right in the neighborhood of 0,5kg / 1lb per week.
Acquiring weight at that rate would mean that I need to eat a ~3500 kcals surplus per week or on avg a 500 kcals surplus per day.
At that rate it'd take ~32 weeks or 7,5 months to get to 80kg / 177lb.

According to my calculations my calories out average ~2500 kcals per day, so that in mind from now on I'm gonna target ~3000 kcals in per day.

Obviously as my bw increases I need to up my calories gradually to keep getting in that daily ~500 kcals surplus but for now I'm gonna use that 3000 kcals per day as a starting point and see what happens.

I don't think that getting in enough protein will be a problem at all for me - I just naturally happen to like to eat protein-rich stuff.

Other stuff:
Without paying attention to anything else but overall cals and protein my macros seem to land on 30/40/30 (p/c/f)
I try to get in ~30 grams of fiber every day and that is easily achieved seeing that I eat a ****load of whole-grain-rye-bread every day.
I try to get in 500 grams of fruit and veggies every day
I try to favor polyunsaturated/monounsaturated fats but not gonna go crazy about it
AFAIK eating-freq doesn't mean ****, only overall cals do, but I eat every 2-3 hours just cos I like to eat often.

Supplements:

Multivitamin - I take one tab every morning with my breakfast
Fish Oil - I take two caps every morning with my breakfast and two caps every night with my before-bed-meal
PWO-shake - protein from whey-powder and carbs from maltodextrin-powder