I had my first Chinese class at a university today. I'm working only part time and studying it full time now. I took the placement test and completely failed the lowest level writing and reading test, then turned around and took the speaking test and was in the second best level. The examiners were kind of amazed and put me in the intermediate class. I could only read about 30% of the ppts used in class today and could write about 2 or 3 of the characters. There is no pinyin and no English in my class. All of my classmates are Koreans (lots of very attractive korean women, but I'm spoken for and they're all too young for me now anyway), 2 Japanese, 1 Laos, and 1 uberfat Russian girl. They've all done formal lessons at a university for about a year and this was literally my first formal class.

All of my classmates can basically write the characters perfectly, but my speaking is among the best in the class. I have so much catching up to do now and no idea how I'm going to learn how to write all the words I already know how to say/understand orally in the span of like 2 weeks so I can actually take notes in characters and write my homework.

Still overall I feel great about having something to work toward instead of just messing around and having fun but not really moving forward in life like I was the first 2 years. I'm definitely not opposed to a career in the health and fitness industry in China as I'm basically IFBB pro size here and salaries are so much higher. But obv need pretty damn good language skills for that to happen. It's more probable I stay another year and go work at a higher paying more elite school for a year in a new city armed with 3 years of language skills, then continue my plan of doing phd and becoming a probably mediocre academic in China but skating by on looking cool for rich MBA students.


...Damn I have been doing a good job of only posting lifting related stuff, but alas I suppose all the other stuff brought all the readers. Probably going to keep it narrowly related to lifting, just feels weird oversharing on the internet.

Back

Deadlift: 170x5x3 much smoother and easier than last time, shorter rests around 3 minutes and 5 minutes.
Rows: 85kgx10x2, 85kgx5+f too hard, 70kgx10x2
Inverted rows: bwx10x5
Pulldowns: light weightx10x4 not too much discomfort in elbow, but a small amount

Curls: 30kgx15, 10, 7, 5, barx12.

Rows were absolutely brutal. Couldn't do it. Morning bw is not budging, but my mid day bw is the lowest it's ever been at 94.4kg. My morning bw seems to almost be rising.

Oh I did a chest+tri workout and literally forgot to log it because it was so unimpactful.

Cable crossovers: 5 sets of 12 various weights
Incline DB: 26kgsx10x4
Pushups (not close grip) bwx12x4
V pushdowns: somethingx20x4
Single arm pushdowns: 4 sets of 15 each side

Elbow felt okay doing this.


Today
HBBS: 105kgx10x5

Stopped right away after that. Just feeling mentally+physically tired. I have to be up early 7 days a week at this point and mid-day naps are unpredictably impossible due to loud construction noises. The squats themselves weren't heard muscularly nor cardiovascularly even with ultra low motivation.

Did some yoga with PT afterword. No Holliday. Tspine and shoulder mobility is never bad.

TLDR Lifting plans for immediate future:

Next week deload. I feel like I could definitely go hard another week or 2 as weights aren't causing a lot of systematic stress, but I'm still coming off a lower back strain and a knee injury, so I figure I should take a deload even if I feel okay to give those time to heal/prepare for actually rigorous training.

I have my training planned on a spreadsheet. I'm doing something essentially juggernaut method styled, but only testing AMRAPs at the end of the 8s phase and the end of the 3s phase. So instead of weightx10x4+amrap week 1, weightx10x2+amrap week 2, weightxamrap, it will instead be just as simple as 3 weeks of wieghtx10x5, deload, 2 weeks of weightx8x5, next week amrap, use AMRAP to calibrate for my starting weight in 5s phase and just do 5x6 for 3 weeks adding weight each week. Basically simpler juggernaut method with less amrapping.


I decided I do want to do incline barbell. I think I can do it without this time whereas I couldn't last time for 3 reasons: 1.) Not doing pullups to failure twice a week stressing my pec/bicep tendon. 2.) Not taking incline sets to failure. 3.) My shoulder mobility and scapular retration have drastically improved over the last 4 months. Week to week adding weight will be variable, but probably 10lbs on squats, 5lb-10lbs on incline, and 2.5-5lbs on ohp.

On deadlift I'm not using any periodization and plan on doing 3 sets of 5 3 weeks on 1 week deload all the way through hoping to add 5kg each time. Harder to do it right when doing high volume and I've got a history of poor DL form, which wasn't a problem before, but while coming back from a lower back injury, even one not from dling, is still a concern.

If I get sick during any point, I will repeat the entire previous 3 training weeks and then proceed as normal.

Start date will be Sept 25. Starting weights for squat, 110kgx10x5, DL 175kx5x3, OHP and incline bb press ???? but probably 50kgx10x5 and 70kgx10x5 respectively.

Lastly, one big thing I'm going to focus on for squatting and incline bench especially is SLOWING THE **** DOWN AND NOT BOUNCING LIKE A MANIAC. I reviewed some incline bench videos and even though I don't bounce hard or anything, I think I lower the weight way too quickly in a manner that is probably contributing to bicep tendon pain and I am almost sure slowing down will help me stay healthy and make more consistent week to week progress.

Oh... and I will continue cutting fairly hard until Oct 8-9. I don't think actively trying to gain weight/bulk is a good idea for somebody who's built like me, but I'll just relax on the strictness of my eating and probably end up around 100-102kg by Jan/Feb.

Have you looked into James heisig's books for writing Chinese? I used his books for Japanese and they worked really well

Evo,

Looks good man; I'll be following!

Weasel,

You speak Japanese?

Monte,

No, but I'm trying to teach myself Japanese. I can read and write (poorly) in hiragana and katakana slowly but I know what . Don't know any kanji really. and barely know how to speak or listen. I have pimsleur and some text books im using to try and learn. Probably been studying for like 2 or 3 months

9/22
cramming all deload sets into one day!
HBBS: 80kgx5, 100kgx10, 110kgx10, 120kgx5
incline bp: 60kgx8x3
bb rows: 80kgx8x2

lmao, gassed. capacity to lose fitness over short periods of time still astounding. I got a little sick this week. It was very strange, that feeling of lung scratchiness that I normally get before a big bacterial infection hit on Monday, but then the other symptoms never really fully took hold other than a fever and ache. Friday now and no symptoms at all, but I felt a little crappy Mo Tu We Thu. Immune system finally managed to fight something off and prevented crippling 14 day+ illness where I lose 2 months of strength!


Anyway, knee feeling great. My right elbow is still fiecked.

I had an epiphany on bb incline bench though. Maybe part of the reason I've had repetitive pec/bicep tendon problems is because I overextend my elbow at the top of presses and lose back tightness and put my delts in a bad position where I strain that area. I just noticed that Kevin Oak and Larry Wheels just barely fully extend at the elbow and tried locking out to that degree. Hard to say since it's light weights, but I'll try it later.

Elbow still fiecked though so I honestly don't know if I'll be able to do a real incline bench workout on Tuesday, might have to do some fluffy machine crap.

9/25

DL: 175x5, too easy, 180x5x2 just right, except last set I royally fiecked my setup and made it hard

Rows: 75kgx10x5 even with more reasonable starting weight this is just hard. Lower rest times and tighter form. Only taking 2.5kg jumps on this.

CG pulldowns: 61kgx10x5
Inverted rows: bwx10x5

Barbell curl: 30kgx20, 8, 6, 20kgx12, 10 Will move this up when I can get 25-30 on the first set

IDK what to do about these rows. Might be a lift where adding weight week to week consistently is only possible with lower reps. I'll try the next two weeks with the baby jumps, if it doesn't work out then I'll go back to doing 6x4.


I think some big DL numbers could be coming up if I can stay healthy and not get sick or injured. The former can be extremely hard during our rainy season. Vitamin d and immune system and all that. So far haven't seen the sun in 6 days. Even though life is going swimmingly I still feel mentally crappy. Maybe I can make this log about SAD UV lights and powdered vegetable juice beverages, both of which I plan to invest in.

9/26

Chest and triceps
Incline bb: 60-72.5kgx10x5
flat db: 20kgx15x3
Machine press: 3 sets failure
Pushdowns: 5 sets failure

I'm going to try something different for incline BB. I'm going to remain at very light baby weights and focus very facking hard on keep scaps retracted. Even at unchallenging weights such as these, I can feel the right side peeling off after I get passed about the 6th or 7th rep.

Basically treat it like I was advising somebody learning sn/cj: count ugly or imperfect reps as misses, use baby weights and do it 100% right, move down if you are incapable of doing it right even if it's a very low % of max. If you can't do it right with 60%, you're going to do it more wrong at 70%. At least some of this issue is muscular and not technique based too, so I need to stay consistent with getting my horizontal pulling stronger and Dr. Locke's drills.

Good timing because my facking elbow still facking hurt on the presses and will need more time to heal, but no pain on the pushdowns.

I need to re-arrange training to give myself more time between back and chest day so my upper back isn't fatigued and I can optimally contract though.

Try some batwings on flat and various inclines and some isometric holds at the top of TRX row focusing on retraction

^ did some trx rows with a hold at the top today as part of warmup

9/28/17
HBBS 110kgx10x5
fs: 60x8x3
leg curls: 30lbsx12x4 unilateral each side
leg extensions: 40lbsx15x4

Appropriately easy. First squat session of this training block. 10s phase. Hoping to hit either 140 or 145kgx8x5 7 weeks from today, but we'll see how the rest of the 10s goes. If I manage to do either successfully, I should be in a position to dominate some 5s lifetime prs, albeit at a bit heavier bw.

Ended but not really ended the minicut. Not ending the "diet" though, just eating more of the same foods and allowing myself to go out for healthy food more frequently. Still doing mostly Chicken breast+sweet potatos, no refined sugars but fruit and sweet potatos are fine. Going to cut pizza from my cheats and do either all you can eat sushi+teppanyaki for a super clean cheat or do burgers, fries, steaks, etc. I just don't feel good after eating a ton of bread, dairy, and fatty processed meats. Usually feel great the next day after a sushi+salmon+teppanyaki steak gorging. #naturalcleaneating herp derp.

Knee hurts bad today. It's normal to be a bit sore after a squat workout or even from pistol box squats. Today it suckkksss though. It felt fine during the squat, I think it was actually the leg extensions that did me in.

If I'm able to continue with the 10s/8s phase, I'm going to literally only squat for a while. So just 10x5 then gtfo lmao. Add accessories as squatting volume goes down and %s go up.

I remember that I was going to shift my training schedule around, so tentatively if the knee is feeling fine, next squat session will be in 10 days. If it's still sore then, I guess I'll just jump out of the window. I will skip DLs this week.

Those leg extensions are babyweight and high reps.


Maybe, just maybe, it was the 68 reps of squats with knees traveling forward about a foot each rep.

Having said that, it makes no sense to deathblow your quads/knees and do 45 legext reps after squatting that much.

Yeah, as usual too much heart. I'm becoming an old guy now. It actually feels much better this morning, so false flag on reinjury. Still, I'm not really ready for actually hard training right now. It was a wakeup call. I should be very grateful my squat and deadlift are as strong as they've been in a long while, do some maintenance on squatting, continue rehabbing hard (ofc I fell off with the box pistols), and maybe marginally improve deadlifts between rows and rack pulls. And I still have issues on incline bench I need to fix before I start loading up.... and my elbow isn't 100% so I can't OHP. Lmao broken old dude.

Last night arms
seated DB curls: 16kgx25, 4 more sets to failure. Each side do reps to failure, then go to the other side, then back to the first side etc.
V-pushdowns: 36x5 sets failure
Pushups: bwx12x4
Hammer curls: 16kgx4 sets failure
Rope pushdown: 4 sets failure
Straight minibar curls: 17.5kgx4 sets failure

Might be a good time to learn to lbbs and maybe switch to that for 12-16 weeks.

Back

Rows: 110kgx6x4 5kg pr, pretty tough
Pulldowns: 175x11, 155x9, 135x7,8
Inverted rows: bwx11,8,6,6
Straight arm pulldowns: 2 sets

DB curls: 12kgx32 each side, 12 each side
BB curls: barx3 sets failure don't remember

I gotta stay away from the db curls. Just wanted to try different angles to see if I could get rid of the pec tendon irritation. Nope. There's so many bicep exercises and they're all pretty similar, no reason to do one that causes discomfort. I'm going to stick to barbell, ez bar, hammer, and maybe spider curls.

Meant to rack pull today, but it's a holiday where I actually don't get as many days off as I should and I want to go out and have fun today and not be exhausted from dls/rack dls.

Incline BB: 60kgx10x7 srs
Machine press: 135x11x3
Pushups bwx12x4

Actually got a decent pump from all the incline pressing. Got the hang of the retraction and staying tight by mentally drilling myself to spend as little time at the top as possible and slow down the negative. I think I was losing position often trying to rest at the top for a few seconds; this is a death sentence for scapular tightness.

Elbow sucked. Knee on the mend. Elbow pain is an odd one because it gets better as I continue lifting.

I think I may take 7-10 days completely off, do 1-2 light weeks, then make attempt number 2 on starting a real program. Kinda sick of trying to train around injuries but probably making them worse instead of just resting. Still going to keep doing upper back/shoulder/knee prehabz during time off. But I really think I might have found a solution to pec/bicep tendon problems!

Did sum liftin

Pullups: bwx8x3
BB rows: 75kgx10x5
Inverted rows: bwx10x3
Rack DL: 160kgx8x2 below the knee
Curls: no energy

Pullups were the only thing that bothered the elbow. Everything feeling fine, but I might rack pull for a while because my knee probably couldn't handle hbbs and dl in the same week just yet, maybe just lbbs and rack pull and add back in full deadlifts a few weeks or months later.

FLAT BARBELL BENCH PRESS: 80kgx10x3
Incline bench: 65kgx10x4
close Pushups: bwx10,7,8

Superset:
Cable shoulder
Rope pushdowns
4 sets failure each

Scapular control improving greatly. Have long winded thoughts on this but busy and nobody cares. Sticking with baby weights for a pump a little while longer. Elbow pain free!!!

okay so short version I feel like I have to very actively flex my lower lat on the right side the keep the scap glued down, and even then it still pops out ever so slightly. On the left side I can have my lat barely tensed and the scap stays in place automatically. Flat benching felt weird as **** because my right lat was literally pumped all the way through but the left one only the top part of the lat has much tension.

Incline don't really use lats very much and it's much easier to keep them glued down.

Like I mentioned before, i need to be rid of the habit of trying to pause at the top, unload tension, and take breaths. Instead, I'm almost doing it like an ohp with a pause at the bottom; the bottom is like the default/reset/start position instead of the top. This greatly improved the amount of scap tightness and probably keeps more tension on the pecs anyway and if I ever powerlift obv flat bench is more important anyway.

Pullups: bwx10,10,7,7
Rack deadlift btk: 180kgx6x2
BB rows: 75kgx8x4
Inverted rows: bwx9x5
Ez curls: 20kgx5 sets fail


I want to drop the inverted rows. Just don't feel much from this exercise, too easy. I really wish we had a good chest supported row machine like the other gym. Maybe I'll do db csr, maybe unilateral cable rows for teh pump, or maybe just go back to doing 5 sets of heavy rows, 3 sets of light pullups, 3 sets of pulldowns to failure. It's more sets of vertical than horizontal pulling and there's only 1 kind of horizontal pull, but the pullups are just junk warmup volume.

Elbow still doesn't like either kinds of pulldowns so I guess the inverted rows will stay for now. Funny that I can bench/incline bench, do pullups, yet pulldowns still bothersome.

Last few log entries.... chest and back only lmao. hey I have bad arms and just okay/normal legs but very good chest+back, so let's only work on chest and back?

Incline bp: 67.5kgx10x5 0 scap winging. I think I've completely fixed my problem omg! zero bicep tendon pain or even moderate irritation for a long time now.
Flat db: 24kgx12x3
Paused close pushup: bwx13,10,8
Side raises: 5 sets failure each side

Some eccentric only right side tricep extensions for blood flow.

Almost 0 elbow pain, so good on both fronts.


Knee has been doing great lately as well. I'm remembering my rehabs exercises every day and consistently overloading via volume/reps. Next week I'll do some 60kg squats. Might try and squat 2-4x per wk with 15-25 reps each session at about an RPE 1-4 for a while. Then start hitting it hard again when I'm absolutely sure I'm capable and healthy.

Despite no pain during the workout, my elbow didn't like the last incline bench workout.

BB rows: 80kgx10, 85kgx10x3, 80kgx10
T-bar rows: 3 platesx10x5
Cable rows: 135x10x2, 115x10x3

EZ curls: 30?kgx5 sets failure

Yesterday
Did some knee rehab including 60kg lbbses. Felt okay

Incline Bench: 70kgx10x5
Machine press: 4 sets failure
Side raises: 5 sets failure each side

Elbow felt okay/better than last time. I wore an elbow sleeve. It works great. Next week I might deload presses. I seem to have "cured" my bicep/pec tendonitis. Now to deal with elbow tendonitis.

I reckon I'm 3-4 weeks out from squatting semi srs again.

Also I've been cruising the last 3.5 weeks now. Going to cruise a total of 6-8 weeks.