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“Week “

• 3 reps – Press (working max: 140#)
  • 2x5x45 (warmup)
  • 1x5x55
  • 1x5x70
  • 1x3x85
  • 1x3x100 (work)
  • 1x3x115
  • 1x6x130 (PR)
• Asst. #1 – Press
  • 5 x 10 x 65
• Asst. #2 – Supine shoulder-width grip lat pulldowns
  • 5 x 10 x 120
• GPP – Sprints
  • Tabata style (20 sec. sprint, 10 sec. walk)
  • 5 “reps” (8 reps is one Tabata set)
  • walked 2 “laps” to warm up, then 2 at the end for a cooldown
• DeFranco Agile 8

Today was good. I set a PR on Press. I’ve done 130 before but got 3 reps. Today I got 6. Stronger. I should have no problem hitting 135. Confidence is high, repeat, confidence is high.

One change. Because weights are getting heavier, I’m going to wear the belt more. I’ve been wearing the belt only for my work sets on squats and deadlifts, but I’m going to start wearing it for my work sets on presses and bench press too. Why? All the torso stability from the Valsalva Maneuver. Funny thing tho… because I’m not used to wearing it during pressing, today when I wore it it did me no good: I tighten my torso, I don’t press out like Valsalva requires. Of course, the pressing out lends to much better stability, so I’m just going to have to train myself to do it. I’m going to start wearing the belt for all sets of pressing and benching (warmup, work, and BBB assistance) until I retrain myself.

On the assistance work, it was a breeze because I got a lot of rest between sets. The gym was a little chattier than usual this morning, so I was chatting a little more between sets. All good, but a little more rest than I wanted. No worries tho, it happens. Rest is good.

On sprints, I opted to not start out at 100 MPH. My problem the past few times is I start running and try to just sprint right out of the block — it’s caused me some pain in my right hamstring and even today is still a little sore. So instead, start at 0 and just accelerate quickly, ease into it. That was a lot better, I found a better groove. Did 5 reps today and will continue at 5 for the next “week” of the program. My feeling is hit 6 during the work week and stay at 6 during deload week since it’s deload week.

I also started doing the DeFranco Agile 8. The hamstring pulling motivated me — I need to improve that hip area flexibility, and this is recommended to help. Good thing. I will say, I had no idea a foam roller would hurt so much. 🙂 Not sure what that indicates but wow, my muscles went “OW!”… guess they’re that sore and in need.