Today was great!

Going into today I was a little nervous. There’s the arm pain – which is diminishing, but still present. It’s heaviest weight I’ve benched in a long time, and the crazy thing is that any time I’ve been working with this weight, there’s always been arm pain present and it’s always gotten in the way. So I really wasn’t sure how things would go. In fact, I was so unsure how this would go that I asked for a spot for all 5 of my working sets; normally I go without a spotter, but I just wasn’t sure how today would go and didn’t want to kill myself.

And I didn’t kill myself; in fact, I exceeded my expectations!

I told myself that if things got so bad that all I could do was a single, then so be it. I wanted to do well, but I am not out to kill myself or make things worse. I was just going to get under the bar and take each rep as it came. I added a single at 225 as a warm-up so it wasn’t as huge a jump from 185 to 240.

But then I started on my work sets, and the reps just kept coming.

I think part of it is setup. I focused more on setup on these sets than I probably ever have. To get really tight, really place myself. To “slide” the bar out of the hooks to minimize disturbance to the shoulders. Take a moment to reset the shoulders, and even take another deep breath. Everything I could think of to really ensure I was tight tight tight. I also did my new thing of pinkies on the rings (instead of ring finger). I shouldn’t be surprised, but it did influence my bar path — my body wanted the bar to touch higher, but that slight adjustment made things want to touch a bit lower. It was an interesting “fight” but I just went with it as best I could.

I will say, the first rep descent on each work set was the most worrisome as that’s where I felt more instability; but once that hit, every subsequent rep was great. I want to work more on my descent, having that tight “controlled drop”, like I’ve been doing with squat. And I’m going to need to find that new groove and bar path with the new hand position. But all in all, not a bad deal. That will come.

I only stopped at 7 on the first set because I was playing it conservative! Even on the later sets, my spotter was like “you had more in you”, and I did but again I was trying to play it conservative. So I’m really really happy with how things went.

And the arm pain was present, but not bad. Very manageable.

Oh, I should note that I do have my elbow sleeves and also added wrist wraps on the work sets. Is that helping? Probably. If that’s what I need, then so be it.

Anyways, very very happy with how things went.

Then on inclines, I was to do straight sets with 85’s, but I opted to drop down to not beat myself up too much. It gave me an idea tho. For next cycle I was contemplating dropping DB pressing but I think I’ll keep it — just change it. I’ll keep the DB’s at 45º to my body, then lower the weights and go paused on every rep. Sink the weight deep, get the stretch, pause, and only allow pec/delt contraction to move out of the hole. I think that will be good for me in a number of ways. The pausing (just like why pause squats are good), and it should be a little more friendly and productive for my shoulders.

Everything else was support work. While I do want to do this RP template one more time, I am looking forward to my own programming again because I want to address more of the things I need vs. what a template tells me. I want a little more pulling work, a little more shoulder and upper back work. Things to help me long-term manage and stay healthy.

But I’m happy for today. Very happy.

RP Powerlifting, Strength Cycle, week 4

• Competition Grip Bench (with pause)
  • bar x 10
  • 135 x 5
  • 185 x 5
  • 225 x 1
  • 240 x 7
  • 240 x 5
  • 240 x 5
  • 240 x 4
  • 240 x 3
• Incline DB Press
  • 60e x 10
  • 70e x 10
  • 80e x 8
  • 80e x 8
• Barbell Bent Rows
  • bar x 10
  • 135 x 5
  • 195 x 8
  • 195 x 7
  • 195 x 7
• Barbell Upright Row
  • bar x 10
  • 115 x 8
  • 115 x 8
  • 115 x 7
• Reverse Curls
  • 20 x 10
  • 65 x 9
  • 65 x 9
  • 65 x 8