9/2, Weds, Workout A

Given I haven't worked out in a couple weeks, decided to just do my #s from last time, though I ended up bumping up DLs 5 lbs.

Squat	Bench	Deadlift
45x5x2	45x5x2	89x5x2
75x5	70x5	140x3
105x3	95x3	200x2
145x2	125x2	235x5
185x5x3	140x5x3

Squats - went OK. left hamstring is still bothering me and made the worksets fairly difficult. I'll keep an eye on it. If it's still a problem in the next couple of workouts I may have to rehab it with lighter sets/more reps.

Bench - didn't love my form but it was pretty easy. Bar got slow on the final rep of the last 2 sets.

Deadlifts - pretty easy but I was a little slower between reps than usual. Just out of shape I guess.

Didn't do anything else.

Food today was meh because I haven't gone shopping. Breakfast burrito with chorizo, potatoes, and cheese this morning. Good salad w/ tuna lunch. Footlong turkey sub with swiss and veggies on wheat from subway for dinner. Milk, whey, blueberries shake PWO. Banana and some cashews at some point in the day.

I bought some creatine. If I do 5gs a day, how much is that in terms of a teaspoon? IS that too much, too little? Read that Peele article but I'm dumb about this stuff.

If I'm trying to lose weight is creatine completely counterproductive? What about just maintaining 2 bills?

are you trying to lose weight or fat, b/c creatine, as I understand it, has zero impact of fat loss/gain

welcome back yo

fat, but I'm no expert on all of this. I'm 2 bills now. I'd like to be a strong and athletic somewhere in the 175-185 lb range.

Also, met a guy at the gym today in the "strongman room". Said a bunch of strong men dudes come in and train on saturdays and I should come check it out. I'm guessing mornings because I've been there in the late afternoon and I've never seen 'em. Something I might check out in a few weeks.

Also, goals I posted in the LC thread:

I did order MM and I/O. They were having a 30% off sale. I know you can find it through other channels for free but I only steal music.

all i've read (and experienced) is that you might gain weight because creatine keeps your muscles more saturated with water.

yeah that's what I was thinking too. hm. I'll have to think on it.

And seriously you should all be buying that axe it's SICK.

9/4, Fri, Workout B (kinda)

Squat	Press	Power Clean
45x5x2	45x5x2	butnahhhhh
85x5	60x5
115x3	75x3
150x8x3	90x3
	105x5x3

Weird workout today. First, I got out of work a little later than normal, and then my sister called and I had to talk to her. Then I had errands, so I didn't get to the gym until after 8:30 and it closes at 10.

Also, my left hammy still hurts. Feels like a hammy/groin pull type of thing. Feeling better, but I didn't want to push it. So I ended up stopping at 150 instead of doing 190 like I was planning, since it was hurting there but felt good enough that I wasn't really compensating for it on my right side. So I decided to just do sets of 8 to get in a little more workload and work the muscle a little without killing it. These were quite tiring, actually. I could really feel it in my core on the 7th and 8th reps.

Presses actually went pretty good, though I planned for 110 and I'm just a bonehead and forgot to throw the 2.5lb'ers on the end, so I did 105 for my first workset, so I just stuck with it. I was pretty beat today. Just one of those days where I didn't have it, but I got all my reps up here. Form felt better than usual. I think I did a nice job staying tight. I got loose on one rep (3rd or 4th) in the 2nd set and I could really feel the difference, so I tightened up for the final rep and nailed it with relative ease.

Decided to skip power cleans because I was exhausted, my hamstring hurt, and it was 9:40 and I'm too slow to get my warmups and worksets in by closing time. I did some 12kg KB swings instead to target the hamstring a little more without killing it. Did 20x2 one arm swings, switching arms halfway through.

I met another cool guy today, who seems pretty beastly. He says he's a track athlete (hammer toss, shot put, maybe discus). ex-body builder ex-power lifter. Says he trains with a really reputable oly lifter and his training schedule sounds nuts. Squats heavy 2x a day 7 days a week! He said my squat form was pretty solid, so that was nice. He might be coaching me a little on power cleans on sunday, assuming we both show up. Sweet. I could use it.

my plan is to do M/W/F, but the gym is closed on Monday so I'm coming in Sunday. Might stick with W/F/Su or just take a 2 day rest next weekend. We'll see.

a+ table usage/butnahhhhh combo

ty ty

and wtf did they stop selling chucks in the half sizes? I've been to two stores and nothing but 9s and 10s. Where's my 9.5s? I'll have to order them. God damn it.

Grear will be happy to know that I did buy some sweat pants that fit, though.

Yea they only make them in whole sizes. Just got some for my friends wedding.

looks like you can still get 'em online. And google doesn't reveal anything like they'll eventually be discontinued. I'd be very upset if they eventually did. 9.5's are like a glove for me.

9/6, Sun, Workout A (kinda)

Squat	Bench	Deadlift
45x5x2	45x5x2	94x5
85x5	70x5	145x3
115x3	100x3	205x2
135x10x3	130x2	245x5x3
	145x5
	145x4x2

Left hamstring still sore, tweak it every now and then just doing normal things, like getting out of bed this morning. It's more towards the groin. Anyway, decided to keep going with lighter weight with more reps to get some blood flowing there without killing it, sorta like what the Starr rehab says. It felt like jello after the final workset.

Benching sucks. It actually felt pretty easy. I only did 4 on the final two sets because I'm a pussy and didn't have a spotter and I felt a little iffy going for the last rep. I wasn't in the power rack as usual, because there were a lot of people there today, probably due to the short holiday hours.

Deadlifting was pretty easy. Harder than it should be, I think, but that's probably somewhat related to the hamstring. I might be involving my lower back a little too much. I should record soon.

Also, dude I met last time was there and showed me a good bar drill for learning the power cleans. Get into the jump position, bar around mid thigh. Lightly swing the bar out in front of you and back, so that it taps your thigh. Once you get a rhythm going, thrust your hips to meet the bar just before it touches to initiate the 2nd pull and rack the bar. I found this pretty helpful. Whenever I try to hang power clean just by going from hang to jump to pull, my timing sucks. He also had a great pointer for the catch. He said I'm catching the bar too upright, which A) makes it harder to pull bigger weights, because the bar has to travel farther, and B) will jack up your spine and lower back at the heavy weights anyway. He said to really focus on dropping down and getting your ass out and catching it in a crouch, somewhere between parallel and a quarter squat. Tried that a few times and it felt a lot better.

9/9, Wed, Workout B (kinda)

Squat	Press	Power Clean
	45x5x2	bunch of 45lb hangs
	60x5	55x5
	75x3	70x3
	90x2	89x3x5
	110x5
	110x4

The squatting I did last time did more harm than good last time, so I just kept it really light today. Did a bunch with the bar, then did 2 sets of 15 with 65. It is starting to feel better. Hopefully in a week I can moderate weight with it. This is getting annoying, but there's no reason to rush.

Press went fine. I didn't even attempt that last rep because I ****ed up on the rep before and let my breath out up top, let myself go completely loose, and just blew it. I knew there was no chance so I said meh f it. I'll do 115 next time.

Power cleans went OK. All warm up sets I just did using that hang drill. I felt that getting my ass out and catching lower helped, but I still need to improve my shrug.

9/11, Fri, Workout A (kinda)

Squat	Bench	Deadlift
45x5x2	45x5x2	104x5x2
85x10x3	75x5	150x3
	105x3	215x2
	135x2	255x5
	150x2
	150x3
	150x2

Squatting light again. Hamstring is almost there I feel. Hopefully after mobility work and stretching and resting this weekend, I'll be able to do some moderate weight on Monday.

Bench is just fail. I'm somewhat suspect the bar was a little heavier than 45. The bars in there vary a little in length/width. This was slightly wider. None are marked. I've always been confused by this. But anyway, I hate benching. I have a very difficult time keeping my shoulders and lats pulled back and down. Maybe I just need to find a spotter to get a hand off. Still, I shouldn't fail this bad. I'll read up on it some more this weekend. Oh, I should note I didn't fail any reps. It was very clear to me after the good rep that the next one wasn't happening each time.

Deadlifts, on the other hand, rule. I was excited about them all day, even though my lower left back has been a little sore lately (maybe related to the hammy). After the 215 warmup, I was a little concerned. It was kinda hard. So I turned my ipod back on, put on some Deadguy, got mad at the bar, and pulled that **** with relative ease. Dug into my shins fairly good, scraped some skin off through my sweatpants. Overall, it felt pretty good, though I was tired afterward. 10 more lbs next time.

The nice thing about rehabbing the hamstring is the workouts go by fast

I got MM and I/O in the mail yesterday, so I'll watch those and work on mobility drills this weekend.

Good luck rehabbing the hamstring. Have you heard of cissus? Rippetoe recommends it as the best supplement for rehabing injuries. The product I'm using is here:

http://store.anabolicminds.com/produ...x-90-caps.html

meh, I'll pass. It's almost there. It was just something where I tweaked it on a wet floor. Should be 100% within a few weeks I think.

edited to add: also, need to sleep more. Been getting less than 7 hours lately. Need to be asleep ~11 every night, no more of this 1 a.m. crap.

Met another power lifter at the gym today. He was ~ 5'8", 220 if I had to guess. He was doing pretty beastly box squats. Looked like 335. Pretty bad ass.

if it was wider it was probably a 55 lb bar

then i'm a ****in beast brah

9/14, Mon, Workout B

Squat	Press	Power Clean
45x5x2	45x5x2	a bunch of HPC w/ bar
65x5	60x5	55x5
85x3	80x3	70x3
135x2	95x2	80x2
165x5x3	115x4	94x3x5
	115x5x2

Back to squatting "heavy". It was pretty easy. I'll be adding 10lbs next few workouts. Hamstring felt good. The only time it bothers me now, is if I'm moving my left leg out, and I unexpectedly bump it into something. Then my groin kinda freaks out.

Press was OK. Form a little iffy. I'm excited that I botched the final rep in the first set, but came back and got all my reps up. Final rep of 2nd set was a little iffy, I had a weird jerk/push press to lock it out when I was stuck a few inches from the top. Final rep of final set I just muscled up. My shoulders were a little sore after that.

Power cleans went OK. Form still iffy, but I'll just keep practicing.

kc, the wider bars are 55lbs so it could have been that

edit: nevermind evan got it

9/16, Wed, Workout A

Squat	Bench	Deadlift
45x5x2	45x5x2	109x5x2
75x5	75x5	155x3
105x3	105x3	70x3
140x2	135x2	225x2
175x5x3	150x5x2	265x5
	150x3

Squat was fine. Maybe I'll record on Fri. 10 more lbs. Strongman dude said my form was really good, so that's nice. I doubt it is, though.

Benching still sucks, but I felt better about this workout than the last one. I busted a nut on my final rep of the first two sets. 3rd set I ****ed up from the start. My grip wasn't very centered and it threw me off balance and I just lost it. I busted out another single rep after a short rest just to kinda redeem myself. Oh.. I switched from the heavy collars to lighter alligator clips between sets 1 and 2. That probably saved me ~.5 lbs.

Deadlift was OK. Getting a little hard. Still double overhanding which is good. I think this was a PR, and I've lost a few lbs. So I guess a woot is in order. woot.

9/18, Wed, Workout B

Squat	Press	Power Clean
45x5x2	45x5x2	HPC practice w/ bar
75x5	65x5	55x5 (hpc)
1110x3	80x3	70x3 (hpc)
145x2	100x2	89x2
185x5x3	120x5x3	99x3x5

Squats felt fine. Everything might be +10 there. It was one of the thicker bars. I normally avoid them but I had to use the crappy rack out in the common area and that's all that was around.

Press: umm... I smoked these. Maybe they were trick plates or something. I barely struggled.. just a little slow on my final 2 reps. Form felt great. I did a better job staying tight and holding it the entire time. Felt great. The top of my shoulders are a little sore, though. Maybe kyleb knows what that's all about.

Power cleans were OK. They're improving I think. I found out what happens when you're slow with getting your elbows up: you hyperextend your index fingers. Ouch.

After the workout did 20 swings with a 36lb kb just to cool down a little.

the only thing I could think of that might have helped with the presses is nutrition. I've been eating consistently good for a few weeks now. Plus, last night and tonight before the workout I had ~10oz 93/7 hamburger patties for supper. I think when I eat chicken for dinner I don't eat enough and my calories are probably a little too low.

I'd say that's like a 150 calorie difference from 10oz of chicken

It's also like a 100x difference in nomnomnomminess.

fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu press, mine's pretty much stagnant at 120, cannot wait to get back on the bulkmobile.

nah I mean I probably only eat like 6-7 oz of chicken, so now it's maybe like 300c difference or whatever. I need to start cooking bigger batches.

If I were a proper cook, with a proper kitchen (I'm afraid to use my oven), I'd cook whole birds more. Them ****s delicious and can feed you for a week.

I'm gonna beat you to 130. And I bench like a vag. Just sayin'.

hmmm.. now I'm paranoid I put 110 on the bar instead of 120. ****. I put 25, 10, and 2.5 on, but maybe I f'd up and put 5s on. I didn't go with 35s because I already had 25+2.5 on the bar for 100. meh. I couldn't be that stupid. We'll see on Wednesday I guess.