Hmm, well that is encouraging if you think my back is at enough of an angle on the 300 when I start the actual pull. I think on the 5th my back rounded a bit, but probably was my mid/upper back. I'm def a far cry from what used to happen.

Thanks for checking things out....it's kind of funny but at this point it's hard to objectively look at my lifts - I either see every little thing and think it's crap, or I look at just the most important things and think I'm a machine, lol.

Your low back looks good on the 5th rep. Maybe your shoulders came out forward a bit - that's fine and actually necessary to get the maximum out of your DL.

Andy Bolton purposely lets his shoulders come out and his upper back rounds a bit - this is fine. It basically lengthens your arms and shortens the distance the weight has to travel. I do that too when the weight gets heavy. Just dont let the low back round and you'll be fine.

Sounds good - seems like I could have pushed it for a 6th rep....something I didn't mention is we moved a very heavy piano the day before and my low back was sore afterwards. So, especially since this was the heavy week, I wasn't super eager to push things too much on DL - 5 is plenty in the grand scheme of things, .

But next cycle I think I'm really going to go after it....although every lift seems to be tougher since I think I'm still very very slowly losing weight or maintaining weight. I think I'm 187/188 now (down from a relative high of 195). I still don't really seem all that low body fat, lol. Meh, fatties gonna fatty amirite?

The plan was to go down to 185 and then go back up to 190, rinse, repeat. But I dno, maybe I should be a bit more aggressive, get down to 180, then I'll have more room to grow aggressively. I'd like to be in a valley (rather than peak) weight-wise for my wedding next May, but we'll see I guess.

10/29 log

Bench week 3, cycle 6 (180 target, cont. from cycle 3)

123.75x5
141.25x3
157.5x6 PR (190 est.) - felt good, 6th went up pretty smoothly - still only a small PR, but any pressing PR is a big deal to me imo. I really think I'm "getting it" in some ways with bench. For some reason the last couple times I went to Cha's watching him bench made more sense to me than it has in the past....also I'm banging out more reps with my first breath (3-5) which I think helps a bunch. Let's keep this train going!

Incline BP 95x5, 108.75x5, 123.75x5

Chinups 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 6

DB rows 65x8x5
Ripplebro tri ext. 85x6x5

Got two things out of that DL vid that cha didn't cover:

1) Your gf talks too much during a set
2) fat-as-****-cutcutcut.jpg


Nice work on progressing on the presses

Lol, I've instructed her to really keep talking to me....I think it helps my heavy lifts. I really would prefer her screaming at me (which she already feels like she's doing - the gym we go to is pretty quiet), if she talks in a normal voice I basically don't hear anything. I also can't count for myself on really heavy sets. Like, after that set I had no idea how many I did....so I kind of need someone to tell me to keep going or my form sucks or whatever.

Fat as **** from the video - seems I'm wearing too many clothes to tell? Or like, I should go with the plan to get much lower bf% b/c you are all about guys going for dem abz?

Yes, getting razor abz is all that matters in the world.

Guess we'll allow the talkative gf then.

Also, she's my fiancee now btwtyvmimo.

NBA STARTS TODAY!

Looking forward to everything

I think my Kangz are projected to be the worst team in the league but I'm gonna hold out hope that they run good, they def have potential.

I think your Wolves did pretty good job in the off season, should be a pretty solid NBA team, for being so white anyways.

Wolves gonna be legit this year finally. Buuuut, this isn't *the* year, if that makes sense. That will be next year or probably the year or two after that I guess.

I dno, I think if they keep these guys together and Rubio isn't perma-injured, then they will be a perennial strong playoff team. We'll see about actual contender.

Btw, I'm going as Ricky Rubio for Halloween. Got a sweet jersey to wear (god they are so expensive) and will bandage my left knee and be on crutches. Also planning to not shave my neck so my beard is closer to his. Too bad I got my hair cut short last time, it was pretty shaggy earlier this summer, woulda been dead ringer for Rubio with enough of that hair in my face.

I think POR & PHO will probably be worse than the Kings, and probably several eastern conference teams will be too.

I cant wait to see the Wolves play - even without Love & Rubio. This is not even remotely close to the team we had at the end of last season. We have a soft schedule while Love is out, so I think we'll have a winning record when he returns.


PEK smells fear from his hapless opponents

10/30 log

Shot around for 45 mins with my friend. Outside after sunset, let's just say there were a lot of ugly shots.

10/31 log

Played 1v1 at gym vs. this guy David. He actually plays defense now! Good for him, bad for me. I won all 3 games but in all of them I had to slow it down, back him down, and really go for the highest % shots. Somehow his 3 point shot (all he used to have) sucks now all of a sudden, but he plays D and drives right by me sometimes (he has this ugly dribble that bates me into reaching out while he goes by me....gotta stop biting).

We did two 3 point contests (first to hit 25 3s from various spots) and he wont the first sesh and I won the 2nd sesh somehow. Yeah budddddddddday!

Also, say hello to my Halloween costume and fiancee's costume (the crutches I plan to wear aren't present, maybe only Cha will know who I am though, ):

Nice, that's nice.

11/2 log

LBBS week 3, cycle 6

Let's just say this did not go well.

210x5
235x3
265x1 - 2nd failed, not really sure why tbh. I think I should be strong enough for 3-5 here tbh but I just don't know how to push when it gets tough anymore.

Then I think I did:

225 or 235x3x2
205x5x5

I actually think FS have completely F'd our LBBS. Not b/c it's making us lose strength or anything, I think it's because we do too few squat reps each week (especially at hardish weights) and we both (fiancee and I) feel lost at the bottom and it's not like our form sucks, it's just like we can't really push properly. So I think I may either switch us from FS -> box squats, or find a way to do more back squats some other way from now on.

RDL 165x5, 190x5, 215x5
Ab wheel - 70lbs x 15 sec x 5


11/3 log

Bball at gym. Played against this guy who has a really quick release mini-step back 3 point jumper. I won 1/3 games playing to 15 by 1s and 2s. I may decide to only play him with 2s and 3s b/c it was so frustrating, lol.

I think I scored 10 points in a row at one point b/c his defense is not the greatest, but I still barely won that game. I just cannot jump fast/high enough to actually block his 3pt shot and I mean, if I crowd him, he can then run right by me, no one can recover that fast. I barely lost those two games.....but seriously, I think he was shooting like 70% from 3 (with me trying to hang all over him). At one point he hit 4 in a row, 1 step back, 2 from NBA 3 (one from a step behind NBA 3).

11/4 log

DL/OHP deload. Some pullups, some curlz, some pendlay rows.

back squats - you'll get it back soon enough if you keep doing them.

Thoughts on switching FS to box squats? Or trying to add in light box squats as an accessory lift, maybe something like 50% 1rm x10x5?

So leg days would look like:

5/3/1 LBBS
5/3/1 simple strength RDL
box squats

5/3/1 DL
5/3/1 simple strength FS
box squats

yeah, that looks good to me

Finished Forge of Darkness. Was very good, although like most of Erickson's books you could have cut out a lot of the philosphizing, and it would have been a lot shorter and easier to read.

Book did a good job of explaining how the Tiste people split into Liosan and Andii (no mention of Edur yet), and how Mother Dark got her powers, and her relationship with Draconus, etc. Pretty much all of the Andii that are in the Book of the Fallen series are in this book too, although the only POV characters are Spinnock Durav and Orfantal (with Orfantal it sucks a little bit cause he is main character in this book and likeable, but you know how and when he is going to die in Book of the Fallen)

A little disappointing that neither Draconus, Anomander Rake or Silchas Ruin are POV characters, but I guess they are not in the Book of the Fallen series either so he is consistent that way.

All in all a good read though, and looking forward to the next one, which hopefully should not be no more than a year, as he is a pretty damn fast writer. I looked, and counting the novellas Erickson has written 16 Malazan books since 1999.

11/6 log

Bench deload + cardio. Did the "fitness test" on an elliptical machine. After ~30 minutes it finally started getting somewhat challenging and immediately stopped, saying my HR was too high and gave me "medium fitness". Not sure how I'd ever get to elite fitness during that fit test. But I guess it was just supposed to be a test.

11/7 log

Cardio at gym on a machine. Haven't done that in a while. 40 mins or so, HR ~140 for most of it. Finished listening to an audiobook.

Hmm, yeah. The books are simply too long. I don't think it's due to actual philosophizing though, more just due to extraneous and superfluous thoughts from characters that don't really do anything. Although that's almost surely what you mean. But I've come to the conclusion that they don't often enrich the character or anything really, just make the books longer. In some ways this is kinda good (nice, long book to read that I will like). But I am quite burned out on the Malazan world in general and I'm sure it's because there simply was too much stuff presented that didn't end up having anything to do with anything.

Yeah, but possibly less disappointing than reading something from the POV of one of them and it being lame. It's tough to really write from the POV of a "god-like" character or someone who is just a huge force of nature. For example, in Scott Bakker's Prince of Nothing trilogy when transitioning to the next trilogy, he stopped writing from the main characters POV b/c I think he realized it was simply untenable given how godlike the character had become.

Yeah, the guy is a huge, huge beast. Needs to give more weight to his editor though, or be more selective in descriptions/history type stuff. Although it does help provide fur the huge epicness of the stories....

I started the Mongoliad Book 1. Seems ok. Jumps around between a group on a journey and a war camp of Mongols. Let me know if you start it and what you think. I'll probably finish through Book 2 within a week or so.

DT - just ok? Doesn't it involve like ninja warrior monks and ****?

I have two books sitting at home before I get another. Warbreaker by Brandon Sanderson, and book 3 of the Acacian trilogy by David Anthony Durham. I'm not reading as much as I was, so those could take a month or two....I've been listening through a 6 book fantasy series by Jim Butcher that I really like. And b/c I listen to that a bunch, reading books becomes secondary it seems.

Been a while since I've read your log (or any other logs really). Why not just use standard squats as assistance on DL day to get more volume? Courtesy of kc.

Currently reading Dance of Dragoons, about 1/4 through. Not super excited but it's pretty decent.

Yeah, this is what I meant. Plus it is real annoying when he spends so much time going through the inner thought ramblings of a character, only to kill that character off right after.

For example, from the Book of the Fallen series I was really annoyed at how much he went into the thoughts of Tattersail in the first book, only to kill her off (although I guess a part of her is still alive in Silverfox, and could pop up again in a forthcoming Assail book)

Do you like the Acacia series? I read the first book, was pretty underwhelmed, and never went back. I guess I just found too many of the characters uninteresting, and the ones that were interesting mostly died, so felt no compulsion to go back.