Had to modify things slightly.

“Week 3 – 5/3/1”

• 5/3/1 – Deadlift (265# working max)
  • 1x5x105 (warmup)
  • 1x5x135
  • 1x5x155 – should have been 160#, but couldn’t find the 2.5# plates. Also accidentally did 5 reps instead of 3.
  • 1x5x205 (work) – should have been 200# but again, 2.5# plates
  • 1x3x235 – should have been 230#, but again, 2.5# plates
  • 1x5x255 (PR)
• Asst. #1 – Deadlift
  • 5x10x95
• Asst. #2 – Hanging leg raises
  • 5x6xbw
• Metcon – jump rope
  • 1 Tabata set – single hop

A cool workout.

First, deadlift. The calculated/programmed weights couldn’t all happen because I couldn’t find the 2.5# plates at the gym. Well, I could find one but not the other. Meh. I just shifted the weight slightly and moved on.

Hitting 1x5x255 is a personal record. Last “heavy” deadlift I did was 1x5x240 on the PPNP program, so this is well and beyond. I also felt like I had a few more in the tank, so yeah, I’ll take that progress!

On the deadlift assistance work, I think it’s time to move that to 105# at least because I’m not really feeling it any more. But that said, I did measure my heart rate. I had recently read an article on startingstrength.com called “Death by Prowler”. There was a lot of discussion on conditioning, heart rates, and how particular target zones and interval training can lead towards better conditioning. There are many purposes for my assistance work, but one thing is to have it work at such a rate where my heart rate gets and stays up there… at least 150 bpm. It seems with 1 minute rest and a reasonable but not “heavy” weight, I get there. But, the 95# is feeling just too light and not stressing me much any more. Next “week” is the deload week so I’m not going to sweat things, but certainly next cycle I’ll bump up.

On the leg raises, I opted to try 6 this time and that was good. I’ll go for 7 next. As I thought about it today, I wondered if there might be another exercise that might better suit me until I’m stronger (e.g. like how I switched to doing the chin-up-style lat pulldowns instead, to help me build volume and strength). But I realized no, nothing else is going to get me there on this because nothing else involves as much body… like my forearms really felt good after this exercise because I had been using them so much between all the deadlifting and then the leg raises for grip! And yes, increasing grip strength is part of the equation and what else is going to attack it like this will? So, it remains… and if that means I just have to keep swinging and adding a little momentum to get me there, so be it.

On jump rope I remembered to do an important thing all the way through – breathe! But not just any breathing. Making sure to draw in through the nose, out through the mouth, and that each breath was deep and full, from the diaphragm, and took about 2 seconds in and 2 seconds out. So I sound really funny to someone standing nearby, all this fast, deep, heavy breathing. But it helps to better get oxygen into the system which really helps with energy production and lactic acid issues (either delay of creation and/or helping to remove it). I know to do this, in fact it stems back in a lot of ways to Kuk Sool ki breathing and even back to my K-12 schooling days when I played trumpet and french horn. It’s just making sure I do it. 🙂

Anyways, quite a good workout. I feel great physically since it was a good workout. I feel great mentally and emotionally because I set a great personal record. I don’t feel beat up, I don’t feel worn out. Still fine-tuning the program for myself, but that’s alright… that just takes time.