Quote:
Originally Posted by loco
Sounds like the cure for you is the TCprotocol. 68 sets of upperbody and only 12 sets of lowerbody. That's the goodlife.
Yeah. Workin on it.
TLDR UPDATE POST:
So anyway, I've missed a workout or two. The last one was intentional as I transition to a 4-day program beginning tomorrow. I made excellent bench gains (while losing 2.5kg no less) on the Sheiko template, but that's all I made. It's hard to blame it for my lack of squat gains considering my ongoing knee issue. However, there's no excuse for the fact that my deadlift didn't go up at all, in fact it went down substantially over the course of the program. I couldn't even get my sumo up to what I was doing over 18 months ago at 61kg bodyweight.
So basically the Sheiko template taught me that I need to do way more pressing and way less deadlifting. My results of the bbm template corroborate somewhat, as my bench went up hardly at all (went down in fact). I made some deadlift gains on that program, but had very inconsistent sessions which even makes me think that two heavy pulling sessions per week was too much. I think i'm better off with 1x or 1x heavy / 1x light. I made stupendous squat gains on that program though which featured 2 heavy squat days and one light squat day.
TLDR - sheiko says to bench a zillion times a week, bbm says to squat 2.5 and pull 1.5 times a week
So I'm gonna run a 4-day program of my own design that attempts to address what I learned from both of my previous programs. Four days because life stuff has ramped up and I just don't have time to make it there 5 days per week anymore. Here's week 1:
Will be an 8-week meso with some movement changes after week 4. Volume will undulate week to week with low stress in weeks 1 and 5. Instead of separate GPP I'm just gonna continue the trend of doing GPP sets between pressing sets. The fourth day has some GPP tacked on the end since it's the easiest day otherwise. Squat RPEs will be taken with a truckload of salt in the first few weeks as I see what my knee can recover from (top sets will be 80kg tomorrow, lol). Deadlift I'll push hard from the start.
Speaking of my knee. Symptoms slowly improve, at least those related to standing for extended periods. The general pain around my patella is constant when my knee is fully flexed and has been there for years at this point. It's never going away. I did some reading on orthopedics and the more I read the more I think it's pointless to see one. They basically perform surgery or inject joints with corticosteroids or lubricants. None of which I am interested in given the lack of severity of my symptoms. If I see a physiotherapist, it is likely that I'll get prescribed total bunk treatment, and if I'm lucky I'll get some good ideas for stretches or rehab exercises. Again, a poor outlook for something I can't afford anyway. So I've decided to not see a professional at this time.
What I will do is manage load the best that I can and do some GPP to stretch and strengthen the muscles around my knee, including some *gasp* calf training and unilateral work. I'm also going to experiment with squatting with a band around my knees to see if that cues a more knee-stable bottom position in the squat. In the meantime I need to get excited about training again or it's gonna be harder and harder to get out of bed and go.
Last edited by Renton555; 03-18-2019 at 08:16 AM.