Author: hsoi

Sometimes what you avoid matters more

/ hsoi

An acquaintance is planning a trip to Austin. She has never been to Austin before, but remembered I lived in Austin, so she asked me for input as to places to stay, things to do, restaurants to check out.

She’s just starting to make her plans, so I gave her some general suggestions. However there are so many options it was tough to provide her with specifics; she’s just starting to plan so she’s not quite sure yet what she wants to do. As we continued to speak, the conversation started to gravitate to what NOT to do, where NOT to go.

For example, the (in)famous 6th Street is OK, but after 10 PM I’d avoid it because drunk young people isn’t a recipe for quiet and well-reasoned behavior. Same for the University of Texas area. Then a couple other places, like I-35 and East Riverside, the I-35/US-183/Rundberg area as worth avoiding.

This is where tools like SpotCrime and specifically in Austin, krimelabb, are useful. You can find the hotspots worth avoiding.

No where is 100% safe, but small steps to manage your safety and security add up. Following Farnam’s Law – avoiding stupid people, avoiding stupid places, avoiding doing stupid things (with stupid people, in stupid places), and generally being in bed by 10 PM – does a lot of good, and is truly a first step towards effective self-defense.

2016-12-13 training log

/ hsoi

I’ll chalk up today as a 78% day — what it should be, with only a dash of pain.

Yes, my shoulder/arm pain was minimal today, which is great news! A little bit of ache happened, but it’s no where like it has been. I’ve been working on massage, stretching, posture, and I’d like to think it’s been helping.

And so today I was able to crank out 7 reps at 240 lb. which was great! That’s where progress should be. I’m still taking the 5/4/3/2/1 rep approach (tho I clicked into habits and did 3 with 185). But really, I’m happy.

Assistance work continues to be oriented towards me thinking more about the muscle, moving via muscular contraction not the body working in concert to get the weight moved through space. It’s such a different approach.

But anyways, I’m happy. Looking forward to my testing next week. I’m going to strive to be conservative and get what I get. Even if I don’t PR, so long as I can perform well and not have the pain get in the way, I’ll be happy.

5/3/1-based program

  • Bench Press
    • bar x whatever
    • 105 x 5
    • 130 x 4
    • 160 x 3
    • 185 x 3 (whoops, should have been 2 but whatever)
    • 210 x 1
    • 240 x 7 (7RM PR)
  • Incline DB Press
    • 50e x 10
    • 50e x 10
    • 50e x 10
    • 50e x 10
    • 50e x 10
  • Cable Rows
    • 135 x 12
    • 135 x 12
    • 135 x 12
    • 135 x 9
  • Shrugs
    • 215 x 13
    • 215 x 13
    • 215 x 12
  • Pressdowns
    • 65 x 12
    • 65 x 12
    • 65 x 9
  • BB Curls
    • 65 x 12
    • 65 x 10
    • 65 x 7

2016-12-12 training log

/ hsoi

That went better than expected.

I was away over the weekend for my grandmother’s funeral, so it was airplanes, less than ideal food choices and consumption, lots of running around, little sleep. But tho a sad reason for gathering, overall it was a good time to see family, reminisce, laugh, and make more memories. So don’t get me wrong, it was overall a good weekend, but little sleep and too many carbs (hey… Korean food is going to have rice, y’know?).

So going into the session today I wasn’t sure what to expect. The crazy part is seeing the work-up going to 300 just messed with my head. There’s no reason it should because 300 isn’t a problem weight, but it’s still this number and did mess with me some. Given all the things going into the session, I told myself I have to get 3 since that’s prescribed reps, but I ought to be able to get 5. Well, I wound up getting 6. Everything felt good, so I just kept going. After 6 I could have gotten another but not sure what would have been sacrificed to get there because I was just starting to have a little form breakdown during 5 and 6. So, rack it. Really, 6 at 300 is good for the trajectory I’m on.

I do need to continue working at keeping my elbows back, because as the set wears on I do lose some tightness up there. But for sure this is helping my situation because there was zero shoulder and arm pain today. Huzzah!

On RDLs, I’m continuing to work on technique. I’m trying to get it so the movement is from the hip thrusting, not the back raising. That it’s my hams and glutes contracting, not my erectors, that raise things up. I think I had a bit of a breakthrough today because more reps than not felt like they were coming form there. And that I was feeling the tired/sore hitting my glutes more than my lower back I think is a fair sign too.

What hit me is 1RM testing is next week! Gah…it’s upon me. So I started thinking about my attempts. I’ll probably do something like:

  • 135×5
  • 165×5
  • 205×3

to warm up

then singles like:

  • 245
  • 275
  • 305
  • 325

And 325 will tie my PR, and I’ll judge from there where to go. 325 may tap me out. Maybe all I can do is 330. If I could get 345 I’d be totally cool with that. But who knows: I may be feeling awesome and go for 350 or 355. We shall see. I don’t need to set the world on fire, I just want to progress and set things up well for the next 6 months.

What this also tells me is I need to put a premium this week on preparing. That’s sleep, eating, massage, anything I can do to help with recovery. Be strong and ready to kick ass next week.

5/3/1-based program

  • Squats
    • bar x whatever
    • 135 x 5
    • 165 x 5
    • 200 x 3
    • 235 x 3
    • 270 x 3
    • 300 x 6
  • Romanian Deadlift
    • 165 x 10
    • 165 x 10
    • 165 x 10
    • 165 x 10
    • 165 x 10
  • Hyperextensions
    • BW x 13
    • BW x 13
    • BW x 12
  • Crunches
    • BW x 15
    • BW x 15
    • BW x 13
  • Standing Calf Raises
    • 85 x 12
    • 85 x 12
    • 85 x 10

Sunday Metal – The Dead Daisies

/ hsoi / 1 Comment

I liked John Corabi back when he was in “The Scream”, and I think the album he did with Mötley is probably their best, musically speaking.

So here’s his new project, The Dead Daisies, with “Long Way To Go”

 

2016-12-08 training log

/ hsoi

Modified day.

With my grandmother’s funeral this weekend, I had to make some adjustments so I could get some work in. Opted to just deadlift and press today. That gets the basic work in. Not ideal, but neither are circumstances. No big deal tho, you just do what you can and over the long run it all works out.

That said, it wasn’t the greatest day either. 🙂 I should have been able to get more pressing reps but it just didn’t happen: the 5th rep was a tough one. And with deadlifts, I should have been able to crank out to 10, but I got to 8, felt “good enough” and just stopped. I was not in the groove at all, and not sure what exactly to attribute it to but I do know my brain is elsewhere (all the planning and running around I have to do to prep for the trip). It’s what it was tho. In the end I got the basic work, and that’s the main thing.

  • Press
    • bar x whatever
    • 75 x 5
    • 90 x 5
    • 110 x 3
    • 120 x 5
    • 140 x 5
    • 155 x 5
  • Deadlift
    • 155 x 5
    • 195 x 5
    • 235 x 3
    • 255 x 5
    • 290 x 5
    • 330 x 8

Goodbye, Grandma

/ hsoi / 8 Comments

Last night my maternal grandmother, SHIN Joung Nam, passed away. She was 91.

To me, she was always 할머니 – “Halmoni”, Korean for “grandma”.

There’s so many memories.

Watching her squatting down on the floor making kimchi.

Always offering me corn tea to drink.

Spending summers at the Pine Park Apartments in Omaha (which they managed), with her, my uncle, aunts, cousins. Such a silly time.

“Ha-mi, go be-bo” – which was “Halmoni, take me to the basement”. Apparently when I was a small child, it’s something I always said to her and wanted to do with her.

Of course, when I was small enough, she would carry me on her back, piggy-back. “Ah-bu-bah”.

Every year, receiving our blessing on New Years Day. And a little gift of money. I remember that first time I went from $20 to $50: it meant I was finally getting older and not really a child any more. 🙂 Oh, and the ox tail “new years” soup that she would make each year.

Of course, always sneaking me gifts and other things.  Especially food and treats.

Being at her house, and always smiling at the propane heater and how she always kept a tea pot on top of it.

When I was getting ready to go off to college, she took me to the Korean market and bought me a little 4-cup rice cooker to ensure I had rice to eat in my dorm room. 🙂

Her coming to my wedding, and the first time she met my “soon-to-be-bride” my older sister introducing them and encouraging my bride to “go on…say it..” and the laughter shared at my bride speaking her first Korean words to my grandmother.

And even tho her English was broken and my Korean horrible, there was always one clear thing that came through:

“John-a, I love you.”

I can hear her voice right now, saying that to me. She said it so much, how can I not hear it?

Seeing her smile. Hearing her laugh. I will always treasure.

I love you 할머니

2016-12-06 training log

/ hsoi

Today was pretty good, with modifications.

I was most interested in how today would go with regards to the arm/shoulder pain, as bench pressing seems to be the worst for it. I also opted to modify my approach, taking a cue from Paul Carter’s rep approach: 5,4,3,2,1,AMRAP (vs. the 5/3/1 5,5,3,5,5,5+). It dovetails pretty nicely. It would be a little less volume during the work-up, to hopefully avoid aggravating the issue. Save it all for the top set.

All in all, it worked well to do this. I did start to feel some pain, but not as much. The pain was mostly focused in my lower biceps, brachialis, brachioradialis. But there was some pain in my upper back/rotator area. Is it from the work done last Friday? Is it from the reduced volume? Hard to tell, but probably a little of both.

That said, things didn’t feel great; good, but not great. I felt a little stiff, a little shakey/unstable — for sure, my shoulder is at the root of all of this. My feeling at this point is to continue this abridged approach, preserve myself as much as possible, and try for the 1RM workup conservatively. If I don’t set a PR, then I don’t. Just do the best I can, take what I can, and go from there. The worst that it means is I have a longer road ahead (fine), and when I reset and recalculate my percentages I’d be working at a lighter weight, which will probably do me good anyways. So, it’ll be what it’ll be.

Otherwise, things felt good today. DB inclines didn’t give me trouble, and the pain reduced as the sets went along. I am trying to focus on all assistance work, having it be “the muscle moving” instead of anything else contributing to the movement. So reps are dropping, and I may drop the weight some too. But for now, I really want to get myself into that bodybuilding mindset.

5/3/1-based program

  • Bench Press
    • bar x whatever
    • 105 x 5
    • 130 x 4
    • 160 x 3
    • 170 x 2
    • 200 x 1
    • 225 x 10
  • Incline DB Press
    • 50e x 10
    • 50e x 10
    • 50e x 10
    • 50e x 10
    • 50e x 10
  • Cable Rows
    • 135 x 12
    • 135 x 12
    • 135 x 12
    • 135 x 8
  • Shrugs
    • 215 x 12
    • 215 x 12
    • 215 x 9
  • Rope-handle Pressdowns
    • 65 x 12
    • 65 x 12
    • 65 x 9
  • BB Curls
    • 65 x 12
    • 65 x 10
    • 65 x 8

2016-12-05 training log

/ hsoi

Despite forgetting my belt, today was excellent.

First, update on my shoulder/arm pain. I feel MUCH better. Had my first session on Friday and still today everything feels good and loose. I’m working to find ways to keep my pectoralis minor stretched, as that’s for sure the main culprit. Continuing to evolve my warm-up accordingly.

In terms of getting under the bar for squatting, I’m still a ways away in terms of the mobility needed, but I am continuing to adjust my form. So elbows are back instead of down (i.e. forearms closer to parallel to the floor than perpendicular). There’s a lot of disagreement on this “in the community”, but I’m taking that Mark Rippetoe approach here because yes it means less pressure on the arms/elbows/shoulders — precisely what I need. I still have a thumbless grip, but the wrists are bent as it’s just going to take time to get to a straight-wrist position; but I will keep working towards that mobility. But either way, the main goal is to keep pressure off the arms.

But in the end? I have no pain. I experienced zero pain or aggravation during my squat sessions today. Most awesome. Tomorrow when I bench press will be interesting.

I did forget my belt today. Ugh. The gym has a belt, but it’s one of those cheap Everlast belts. It’s like 5mm thin, old, maybe 3″ wide in the back and 2″ in the front, double-prong, flimsy…. ugh. But it’s better than nothing. I wore it, but reversed it (so the buckle was on my back and the wider part of the belt across my abs).

And so, I worked up to 8 reps at 285, which surprised me. I take my approach: 1 rep at a time. I just kept going and everything felt good, so I kept going. When I finished 8 I felt like I could do 9 and it might grind a wee bit and 10 would certainly grind, so I went ahead and racked it at 8. That’s still really good given how I’ve been going, the progression of things. I’m really surprised and happy about it.

Is it because of the pain reduction? The form change? The fact I’ve been working on my sleep and getting a little bit more of it the past few weeks? That I took last week as a deload and the break did me good? That I carbed up just right this past weekend? Or it’s just solid progression? Who knows. But I’m happy.

Everything else just continues to be — it’s assistance work. But that said, RDL’s I continue to focus more on form than weight. I’ll probably stay at 165 a little longer and see about going a little deeper, getting a little more range and form. But so far so good.

Happy day.

5/3/1-based program

  • Squats
    • bar x whatever
    • 135 x 5
    • 165 x 5
    • 200 x 3
    • 220 x 5
    • 250 x 5
    • 285 x 8 (8RM PR)
  • Romanian Deadlift
    • 165 x 10
    • 165 x 10
    • 165 x 10
    • 165 x 10
    • 165 x 10
  • Hyperextensions
    • BW x 12
    • BW x 12
    • BW x 12
  • Crunches
    • BW x 15
    • BW x 15
    • BW x 15
  • Standing Calf Raises
    • 85 x 12
    • 85 x 12
    • 85 x 8

Random things

/ hsoi

Shoulder/Arm Pain Update

Had my first session yesterday with Howard Nemerov. The easiest way to describe it was that it was massage but more than massage. What I can say is it hurt. 🙂  But it was good hurt, and it really showed where I have some problems. A big one? Pectoralis minor is hugely tight. Oh lawdy lawdy that hurt to be treated, but that’s pretty indicative of problems. But after the treatment and even this morning (18-ish hours removed from the treatment) I feel much better. Range of motion is noticeably improved. Pain isn’t present, but too soon to tell as the pain can come and go.

Seriously. Even right now as I write this, making the “air squat” position with my hands, like where my hands and arms would be holding the bar on my back for squatting? I feel no pain, no stretching, no tightness. Very telling where the tension was, and how severe it was.

What will be interesting will be Monday when I squat and Tuesday when I bench. We’ll see what happens.

Howard is away next week, so I go to see him again in essentially 2 weeks. Meantime I will just continue to exercise and stretch. Given what came out of the session, I’m going to work to find stretches to target my pectoralis minor, upper traps (just a lot of head circles and deeper “rotations” and range of motion stuff can help me there), and such. I’ll also see about doing some direct work in those areas, like with a lacrosse ball.

To be totally honest, it makes me think about making massage a normal part of my routine. I know people do this, but I just hadn’t thought about how impactful it would be on my specific situation. But it sure gives me something to think about.

Gun Stuff

Next weekend, Citizens Defense Research will be in town teaching their Armed Parent class. Looking forward to it.

I was actually concerned if I could perform given all the pain I was in. But feeling how I feel now? I expect I’ll be alright. TBD.

Lifting – PR

Looking at how the calendar falls, my current thinking:

Let the 5-week and 3-week be as normal. Push myself as normal, get the rep PRs, but if I have to, err on being conservative. I want to save for the last week. And so the 1+ week will not be a traditional 1+ week. I will warm up, then take some larger singles, working up to a 1RM and what I hope will be a PR. It won’t be all in one day, like a mock meet. It will just be the normal days, working to 1RM, then doing some light assistance work afterwards and calling it a day.

Months ago when I started to work on rebuilding my strength, I told myself to stick with the program and just keep working, no testing. I allowed myself to test at the end of the year, which is now.

On squat, my best is 325#, which was some time ago. The Defattening Project gave my squat a big hit and has been the hardest thing to rebuild. Last cycle did 310 for 4. I expect matching 325 is do-able. I don’t need the PR to be massive, just breaking, so right now my goal is 330. If I can nail that, awesome. I may go for 335 because “plate math”, if things are feeling awesome as I work up. But really, a 5# PR is still a PR. And to be totally honest? so long as I squat 315 (3 plates), I’m happy.

On bench my best is 255#, which was also some time ago (tho squat was even further back). While I lost some upper body strength in The Defattening, it seems I didn’t lose as much as lower body (relatively speaking). Last cycle I did 245, but only for 2 reps because of the pain; but on the 3-week I did 235 for 8 reps. So I expect as long as pain isn’t in the equation, 260-265 is achievable. Part of me would love to see about 275 because “2.5 plates” would be cool. But I’m going to bench what I can bench and get a solid PR – not “plate coolness”.

On deadlift, my best is 445#. Not only does this go back to the lower-body losses during Defattening, but I have also been working to improve my deadlift technique so it does have more leg/hip drive and less back — i.e. it’s not one big stiff-leg. I actually wonder if I could meet/break my PR if I just threw all into the wind, but I’m not going to go there. That said, I’m not expecting to PR here. I just want to work up and hit whatever I can hit, breaking at least 405.

And press. Heck, I’ve already PR’d there last week with a lifetime best of 170×3. Wouldn’t 185 be cool here? But at this point I really don’t care as every lift is just gravy. 🙂

So there we go.

Lifting – Beyond

I let myself get a little too fluffy. The weight I had gained wasn’t too out of line all things considered, but since before Halloween (read: candy in the house), I’ve indulged a little too much. To combat it, right now I’m keeping the proteins and fats as usual, but restricting carbs to morning. So breakfast, lunch, etc. I eat as I have been, but after lunch I try to avoid extra carbs. I mean, if Wife makes something for supper and it’s going to be a little carby (e.g. stew) I don’t sweat it. I’m just talking extras like I don’t need to put rice on my plate, nor do I need to have ice cream afterwards.

It’s a reasonable protocol to make it easy for me to keep things in check, and I hope that by the end of the year gets me back to a more reasonable starting point.

Because yes, the plan is to have the PR-week, then take a week completely off and enjoy the holidays. After that, it’s change-up to the lifting and getting a new set of Renaissance Periodization cutting diet templates. I want to spend about 12-ish weeks on a cut and shed all that I can, 10-20#, hopefully closer to that 20.

Lifting will support that protocol. I still want to stay on the general track tho towards my goal of 3/4/5. What I am going to consider doing tho is allowing myself a longer road towards that goal. I don’t mind if I put on a little fat, but getting fluffy and flat out fat again is out of the question. What I think could work, especially as long as I’m doing 5/3/1, is have my weight reset, then spend 2-4 months with the lighter weights and cutting. Then as the weights get heavier, 2-4 months with the heavier weights and massing. Which then ought to take me right up to another reset; lather, rinse, repeat. I don’t know if this will work, or if it does what sorts of results I’ll get. My hope is that I can continue to make some level of progress in the gym, but also work to keep my weight in check because both matter to me.

Time will tell.

Whiskey

Bulleit Rye.

So damn good.