To borrow from The Eagles… take it easy.

Squats

• 2x5x45
• 1x5x85
• 1x3x135
• 1x2x185
• 3x5x185

As you can see, I really dropped my weight on the work set. I’m overworked on squats. I needed a deload.

Sad thing is, that 185 was hard. Not as hard as the 220 was on Monday, but still hard. I attribute this to mental exhaustion, on squatting.  *sigh*  But, it’s telling. More below.

An interesting thing tho. While doing the warmup sets I noticed that when I was in the hole my right calf started that ache. Hrm… as my thigh contacted my shin, the ache started. Hey… am I going too deep? going below parallel? I had someone watch me. Sure enough, I’m going a little too deep! That explains a lot, including why the weights were feeling even heavier the past couple weeks. I’m trying so hard to ensure I’m at least parallel that I’m overdoing it. This plays into my decision (more below), with how “more reps under the bar”, working my central nervous system (CNS), etc. is the way to go.

Bench Press

• 2x5x45
• 1x5x85
• 1x3x115
• 1x2x150
• 3x5x170

This felt good. Strong. I did notice I wasn’t putting my legs into it as much. As I think about it, it was the calf ache, I wasn’t putting my feet far enough back because that amplified the ache, and so I didn’t get as much leg into it. I still was using it, especially on the 3rd set I really put my whole body into it. I just wasn’t as consistent as I should have been.

Deadlift

• 2x5x95
• 1x3x140
• 1x2x200
• 1x5x240

This just felt good. Felt very strong here. Felt like I could have done another 3 reps (at least) with the 240, or gone up another 15-20# for another set of 5.

Metcon

Forgot to jump rope at the gym, so hustled home and jumped there. Usual thing, a Tabata set (20 sec jump, 10 sec rest; 8x), just simple double hop stuff. On the last set I tried doing faster single hops but didn’t get far. I did do a better job at jumping here. My first 20 second round is always good so I’m trying to pay attention to my form during that set to help mitigate problems… like the positioning of my hands and rope/handle angle and how that affects the rope as it passes under my feet so I don’t get tangled up, keeping my head up and eyes focused on something “eye level”. That helped me do a better job and get further, but I’m still getting tangled. I’ll get there.

Commentary

Feeling this strong on deadlifts and on bench press vs. how I feel on squats? My interpretation of it is overwork on my squats and my body saying “no mas”. I need a break.

I think I’m burned. I’m not sure if the intensity of the workouts is getting to me, or if it’s other things in my life getting to the workouts, or a little of both. Likely both, but I think the workouts are actually more the culprit. So, I need a break.

It was intentional to not do a full squat workout today. Just do something with a light enough load to keep the body working, but treat it like a “deload”. I picked the weights based upon Monday’s workout, but then bumped just slightly to make plate changing a no-brainer. 🙂  Why complicate this?

I am also going to take this coming Friday off. Give my body a little more time to recover (especially since my time off work is ending and I’m back to work on Monday).

When I resume on Monday, yes… I’m going to switch to the Wendler 5/3/1 program. I want to be in this for the long haul, that’s a program for the long haul. I’m not a 18-25 year old, I need to stretch out recovery; this program is better for recovery. I’m looking to bump my metabolism up so I can shed the fat I gained over the past 2 months (plus more!), and I can set up the assistance work in this program to be slightly lighter weights with less rest between sets (everything isn’t geared towards heavy 5 rep sets going for maximum strength). All signs point to this being a route for me to go. I figure I have to stick with it at least for one cycle (6 weeks in my case, since I’m going to do it 3x week) before I really evaluate and consider any changes, be it tweaking the program or changing to another program.

I’m still debating on exactly what I want to do for assistance work: “triumvirate” or “boring but big”. Granted I could do my own assistance work, but I think at first it’s wise to go with an existing program and only customize once I know more of what I want. Part of me thinks I should do “triumvirate” because, if nothing else, it gets me using more equipment in the gym and folks might like me not hogging the squat rack. 😉  But then again, I think only 3-4 other guys at the gym use the rack so, I may get a better less-interrupted workout if I stay there.

One advantage to BBB would be more reps in the same motion. That is, more CNS training towards really getting movements right and down. That will really help form refine and improve. My only fear with BBB is it will be, like it says, boring. I think part of my desire to switch off the current program is I’m a little bored with doing squats 3x week… but that is likely more due to overload than boredom. I do like squatting, but I think it’s just taking a toll and I need to scale back the approach. Besides, Wendler’s book says of the triumvirate:

This is very similar to Boring But Big, but you don’t have to do the same exercise over and over again, and you don’t have to do 5 sets. Just do the 3 exercises you’ve found to be the most effective for your training.

It’s about doing what you have found to be more effective for your training. Really, I don’t know what that is yet. It may do me well to start with BBB and see how that goes, then eventually “find my Kroc Row” (to use his phrase).

Just thinking aloud… don’t mind me.

Assessment

I’ve spent 8 weeks on this “Practical Programming Novice” program. A novice, constant linear progression program.

Here’s how things went:

Squat: — 105# to 230#. 230 was the most I did before I reset and found myself getting burned. Even if we take my reset weight (215), I still put over 100# on my squat.

Bench Press: — 115# to 170#. 55# increase.

Press: — 65# to 107.5#. 42.5# increase

Deadlift: — 135# to 240#. 105# increase.

Chin-ups/Pull-ups: — well, these were always “inverted rows”. But going from only being able to do low-single digit values to breaking into the double-digit range? That’s improvement. I’ll take it. Looking forward to doing full/real chin-ups and pull-ups. I’ll get there.

Those aren’t maxes: those are 3 sets of 5 reps at that weight. My actual 1RM? who knows. I haven’t tested it, and even calculations aren’t going to be accurate since 1. they’re just mathematical estimates, 2. they would require something like a 5RM, not 3 sets of 5 reps where I felt like I could still squeeze out more.

But it doesn’t matter what my actual 1RM is. The bottom line is I’m a lot stronger today than I was 8 weeks ago. I’m cool with that. The program did was it was designed to do: get you stronger. If I look at the “strength standards tables“, I’m not quite at the “novice” level, but that assumes 3-9 months of training: I’ve only had 2. I think I’m progressing just fine.

The reality is, it’s a very intense program. You need to eat a lot, you need to rest a lot, and you need to do little else in life than just lift… nothing else to really tax your system be it other physical activities or things like stress from work and life. If I was a younger man, I’m sure I could stick with this program a bit longer. But I’m not. Still, I’m quite happy with having discovered it and performed the program. I think it has set a good foundation for me to build upon in many regards: hypertrophy, strength, movements, fitness, CNS, discipline, humility, etc.. You name it, it’s really been helpful to me in some way in that area.

If I knew 20-25 years ago what I know now, I would have started lifting in a much different way. I think if anyone is going to start using weights to improve their life, some sort of “Starting Strength” type of program (be it the pure SS program or say one of the PP variants) is the way to go. You want to get strong? it works. You want to get big? it works. You want to be a bodybuilder? it’ll lay the foundation. You just want better strength for life and health, it’ll work. It’s a simple program, it works fundamentals, it lays a good foundation. There’s no bullshit, so long as you don’t overthink it. Just shut up, lift, eat, sleep. 🙂

See? The journey is really what it’s all about.