Tag: workout plan

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Workout Plan 7

I suppose it’s worth discussing A) why I do any of this B) why I do what I do specifically and C) why anyone would care.

A) Weight lifting is an extremely simple empowering activity. There is little or no complexity. I know when I’m done.

As a physicist/engineer by education and trade, most of my problems are complicated. There’s not a whole lot of simplicity, and you can’t think harder when confronted by difficult math. The usual way to overcome difficult math is think easier, think from different angles, run down a hundred possible solutions and do so lightly so frustration doesn’t set in. There’s none of that in weight lifting. You just pick the bar up, run the miles, do the stretch. You know when you’re done because you’ve finished the schedule or you can’t lift/move/bend anymore. It’s over. It’s done. The task is completed, and there is nothing left but resting and recharging.

B) No particular reason. I used to run a lot, and I’ve gotten out of that. Now I like hiking and even aggressive hiking like the Incline is simpler than old running. But the weights are just complicated enough to do a little math and a little planning. They’re also close. Getting up to the hills, even from Denver, takes a little time, planning, good weather, and gas. The gym’s a few miles from my apartment.

I suppose there’s a physical sense of accomplishment and pleasant fatigue. I don’t notice that much, but I do like being able to carry boxes from my apartment to car easily.

C) These posts are more writing exercise than anything else. If you’re interested in what I spend my time on, this struck me as more interesting than counting uses of ‘said’ and chasing down dialogue tags. Do I always hyphenate this phrase like so? I cannot imagine anyone would like to read about that. I don’t want to do it, but it’s important.

Week reset for Bench Day!

Warmups: See before. I threw in some side lunges where I squat, stick a leg sideways, slide over, and stand up from there, going back and forth ten/twenty times. Those help the soreness from real squatting. As always, the purpose is just an elevated heartrate, so I’m not too picky.

Bench:

3×70%
10 Jump squats with 18# medicine ball
3×80%
10 Jump squats with 18# medicine ball
3+x90%
10 Jump squats with 18# medicine ball

Heavy weight:

1×95%
Pullups
1×95%
PU
1×95%
PU

Assistance: I didn’t do any math on these numbers. I just put round numbers of plates on bars. DL was with a hex bar.

5×65%
5x DL 40%
5×65%
5x DL 40%
5×65%
5x DL 40%
5×65%
5x DL 40%
5×65%
5x DL 40%

Hit a wall on the last set of bench and my spotter basically pulled the bar off me at rep 4 or 5. I was done. Closer to acclimatization, but not there yet.

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Workout Plan 6

I took yesterday off and did some walking, little else. I came back around 80% today and was able to get some work done.

Squat day! I use a safety bar, the big yoke-looking thing with the long arms and pad, due to an old elbow injury. It works for me, so there’s no sense in changing. It doesn’t work my upper back and chest quite as much as a barbell, but that can be compensated for in other ways.

Warmups: Same as typical. See before.

Work: Objective is improve leg strength, burn calories, and prepare myself for vigorous outdoor leg-work in the form of hiking.

Assistance work was sledgehammer/tire work or pushups.

5×65%
SH
5×75%
SH
5+x85% (saw spots)
SH

Heavy weight:

Did some heavy weight here. It was rough. NB: the 100% below (and all other percentages) refers to my training max, which is below a true max. This difference gives me a margin of safety so I can push harder with less risk. I started years ago by calculating 90% of my 1rep max and using that as a training max, and all calculations and training modifications adjust this number. Having done this cycle for a while, my training max has climbed from the 90% of true max, and I’m not sure where the numbers are in relation to each other any more.

1×100%
Pushups
1×100%
Pushups
1×100%
Pushups

Assistance work:

Objective was support the squatting. Someone else was using the trap bar, and I usually use that for assistance. No matter. I was almost out of gas anyway.

5×70%
SH
5×70%
SH
5×70%
SH

Kroc rows

I was a little dizzy and lightheaded leaving, so I went home, drank a ton of water, ate a big meal, and rested.

Tomorrow I can start the cycle over and bench, in which case I’ll rest Wednesday and do DL Thurs, or rest tomorrow and do Bench/DL Wed/Thurs respectively. Sledgehammer work is a hell of a core exercise. I don’t get to do it very often because it takes up a lot of gym real estate, but it’s a good time when I can. That kind of stability work is invaluable for hiking with a pack, as it strengthens the load bearing muscles and the spine sandwich. Nothing sucks more than being ten miles from my car with a pack I thought I could handle.

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Workout Plan 5

So today was pushpress day, and I was struggling.

Warmups: usual stuff, see days 1 and 2

Primary work: Pushpress is a solid, all body exercise. I do elbows to knees pushpress, which sometimes gets called a front squat to shoulder press. The objective is total body work, with a strong focus on core and legs, and building explosive power. I try to move the bar upwards as fast as possible and lower it slowly. While in general that’s the objective of all lifts, it’s a strong focus in this one because going from a front squat to a full vertical involves so much stabilizing.

I was dying. Just getting the sets was a labor, so no assistance on primary work.

5×65% pushpress
5×75% pushpress
5+x85% pushpress

Assistance work:

Still felt terrible. Had a hard time breathing, kept burping, and never got that I’m-ready feeling. Skipped heavy weight to do assistance.

5×50% pushpress
5 pullups
5×50% PP
5 PU
5×50% PP
5 PU
5×50% PP
5 PU
5×50% PP
5 PU

Just a hard day. I’m glad it’s done.

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Workout Plan 4

Still struggling with the breathing. I can walk single flights of stairs and moderate hills but still have problems.

Objective: Continue acclimatizing.

Swam about 12 laps (I think) in a little less than 30 minutes. I wasn’t tired, but I couldn’t breathe at all. Each full lap of freestyle made the pulse beat in my temples, and I wound up doing alternating lengths of freestyle and breast stroke.

This should have been a back day, so the swimming sort of counts.

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Workout Plan 3

Yesterday was a rest day. There’s a vigorous divide over whether rest days are part of the workout, and I sit on the ‘yes’ side. I went for a leisurely hike, which would be more honestly called a walk. But it was on dirt paths, so it counts as a hike!

Distance: 1.5-2.5 miles. I didn’t clock it.

Time: 2 hours

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Workout Plan 2

Yesterday was deadlift day. Deadlifts are fantastic total body exercises, but where the joy really kicks in is for people who spend too much time sitting down with their hands in front of them, say at a computer. Sitting down like that isn’t great for the back, and the T-Rex pose, hands close together in front, can allow the chest muscles to tighten, causing back pain between the shoulder-blades. Deadlifts help all of that, support mobility, etc.

Warmups:

Again, the objective is a raised heartbeat.

3 sets:

70 jumping jacks
10 lunges
10 pushups
20-30 second stretches of whatever feels tight
5×40%, 5×50%, 5×60% of deadlift training max

Shake it out real good. Seriously, try shaking your hands or legs after warming up. You’ll feel silly but feel a bit more mobile later.

Primary Lifts

The objective is improve the deadlift! Build muscle and use it to burn fat.

Assistance work was walking pushups. I put my feet on a low box for space reasons, and did a pushup, walked my hands left, did a pushup, walked hands right, etc. 10 total pushups per set.

5×65%
Pushups
5×75%
Pushups
5+x85%
Pushups

Rest

High weight

Objective is prepare body for heavier lifting

1×95%
10 medicine ball jumpsquats
1×95%
10 medicine ball jumpsquats
1×95%
10 medicine ball jumpsquats

Work sets

Objective is use major muscle groups to burn off all the ice cream, beer, egg nog, cookies, etc. of the holidays. I used a trap bar (diamond bar) and a safety squat bar. Both of those don’t really match up to weights on the barbells, so I just went fairly heavy with the weights at the gym stations and tried not to get in anyone’s way. Weight was heavy enough I could only get a few reps in.

Huge gym fight about politics. I wanted to tell someone to shut up and do their work, but decided that advice would be better served by doing it myself.

5xsquats
3xtrap bar DLs
5xsquats
3xtrap bar DLs
5xsquats
3xtrap bar DLs
5xsquats
3xtrap bar DLs
5xsquats
3xtrap bar DLs

A note about weight here if you’re doing this yourself: the specifics aren’t super important. If you load up a bar at 100# and can do 4 reps in the supersets, do that. If the station doesn’t have too many plates and someone else is using them, maybe you do sets of 8. Maybe load heavier and do sets of 3. Try your best, but don’t get wrapped around the axle on numbers. In general, assistance shouldn’t go below sets of 3, and where you do go below sets of 3, like in the heavy weight sets above, don’t expect too much of those sets.

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Workout Plan 1

Monday: Bench-day

Warmups:

The objective is raise my pulse. I want to get the blood flowing to all the little muscles and tendons as well as the large ones. The methodology is low weight exercises, low speed cardio, and low intensity stretching. Low, low, low are the rules of warmups.

3 supersets:
70 jumping jacks
stretch whatever’s tight for 20-30 seconds each
10 jumpsquats or lunges (each leg)
10 pushups
5 exercise of the day (Monday is bench day, so 5 reps at a low weight. 5x 40%, 50%, 60% of training max for each of the supersets)

Exercise of the day:
5/3/1 increase in primary exercise supersetted with assistance. Yesterday I did pull-ups. The objective is maximize the amount of muscle used and hot during the primary lift to maximize muscle usage and gain. Assistance is only assistance, so weight isn’t that important.

When I say pullups, I mean getting the chin over the bar. I rotate through all grip positions I have a bar to use. Supinated, pronated, neutral, whatever is open in the gym. It’s assistance work.

5×65% bench
5x PU (or something else, say 10x jumpsquats. I do jumpsquats a lot)
5×75%
5x PU or w/e
5+x85%
Assistance if I can, but I may be dead

Rest as needed.

Max weight sets
The objective here is get the body ready for higher weight. After years of sticking to 5/3/1, I find that spending so much time at low weight leaves the nervous system unprepared for the big weight. These are assistance work sets as Wendler would describe them but critical to go heavy if you’re pushing towards PRs.

Other assistance is just more assistance. So if I was doing pullups before, I’d do deadlifts or lunges at some low weight. DL would be around 40%. The aforementioned jumpsquats would be perfect here.

1×95%
Other assistance
1×95%
Other assistance
1×95%
Other assistance

As mentioned by everyone, assistance work is assistance. I’m making my money in the main ramp up above, so if I fell like I’m about to die or fail on one of these, I drop weight immediately. They’re gravy.

Work sets:
The objective here is get some work in. The high weight sets don’t do much for building muscle mass, so 5×5 at, say, 70% is fine. I was really feeling the low air density after returning to Colorado, so I did sets of 3. Again, add supersets. I did pullups yesterday.

3×70%
5xPU
3×70%
5xPU
3×70%
5xPU
3×70%
5xPU
3×70%
5xPU

Light stuff and cooldowns:
Do things like grip work here. This is normally where I do long, slow stretches, like a 5 minute hamstring stretch. I couldn’t breathe, so I didn’t.

Point of interest on picking assistance: Remember the objective is use as much muscle mass as possible. Pullups invoke the back and biceps. Dips invoke chest, back and triceps. Why PU instead of dips? Because this is bench day, and I’m already using chest and triceps. I’m pushing them to the limit in the open sets, and working them hard everywhere else. I can add a lot of bicep and back work without hitting the limits of other muscle groups, without increasing my recovery time, and getting that added muscle mass usage.