fitness

A little each day

/ hsoi / 2 Comments

Which is better? Practicing something for 1 day once a year? Or practicing something for 1 hour once a month? Or practicing 10 minutes each day?

Granted, this depends what we’re practicing, but for many things we do better if we do a little bit of it on a regular basis.

What makes some things tough for folks is thinking they have to do a lot of it often. Granted, if you’re totally in love with the thing you’re doing, if you are driven to some higher level (e.g. to be a world champion), that’s a different context. But for most of us regular schmoes, we just want to not suck at our chosen thing.

Yeah, you have those gym rats that spend 2 hours twice a day at the gym. It’s probably their social thing and that’s fine as far as it goes, but then their goal is probably social and not performance. I have appreciated the basics of Wendler 5/3/1 because it’s gotten me stronger than I’ve ever been, and it’s about doing more with less, e.g. the most basic template, Boring But Big, has you doing just 2 exercises (tho 1 is done in 2 different ways, so I suppose you could say 3 exercises) in a simple scheme, and you ought to be in and out of the gym in under an hour.

Champion pistol shooter, Ben Stoeger, promotes a dry fire practice routine around the notion of “15 minutes a day”. I recently started doing his 15 minute sessions, and some actually take less than 15 minutes. But you see the point that it’s about manageable chunks, not some massive session that you’ll dread and thus opt to never do. But it also needs a “per day” in order to progress. One 15 minute session once a year isn’t going to cut it.

PoliceOne even talks about how police officers can practice the skills of their trade in just 10 minutes a day. This could be things like dry fire practice, handcuffing skills, or even watching the news and visualizing your own response to reported situations.

The P1 article made a good point:

Do 10 minutes of training a day, every day you work the job.

Doesn’t sound like a lot, but it is.

Assuming you work a four-day week, and you do 10 minutes of training each day you work, you will have done 40 minutes of training per week. Easy math, right?

Assuming you have four weeks off (vacations, holidays, etc.), leaving you with 48 work weeks in a year, and you do the prescribed 10 daily minutes, you will have done 1,920 minutes of training annually.

That’s 32 hours of training.

Every year.

For FREE.

I hadn’t thought about that. I hadn’t looked at the math.

There are schools out there that you attend for a week. You take a week off work (taking the hit to your vacation time and paycheck). You spend thousands of dollars for tuition, travel, food, accommodations, whatever. You get a week of good training. It’s fun. I won’t discount the value of such things. But the above shows you can get a whole lot out of a little each day.

Tom Givens makes a point that you do far better with a little practice more often. That is, better to practice 15 minutes 2-3 times a week than to practice for 1-2 hours once a month. When skills are perishable (and most are, if you want to operate at any level above rudimentary), when skills are ones that must be called upon at any unexpected time, you do better when those skills are more fresh in your mind and body. If the last time you practiced was 3 days ago, that’s less “rot time” compared to 30 days ago; things will be fresher, you’ll perform better.

I’m not perfect about this, but it is something I strive for. And seeing the above math? That really hits it home. A little each day, and it really adds up.

2013-09-06 training log

/ hsoi

That’s what I’m talking about.

Wendler 5/3/1 program, cycle 23, week 2

  • Work Set – Bench Press (working max: 220#)
    • 2x5x45 (warmup)
    • 1x5x95
    • 1x5x110
    • 1x3x135
    • 1x3x155 (work)
    • 1x3x180
    • 1x7x200
  • Assistance – DB Incline Press
    • 5 x 10/10/10/7/7 x 55
  • Assistance – Pull-ups (superset between each pressing set)
    • 11 x 4 x BW (band-assisted)
  • Assistance – DB Rows
    • 3 x 10/10/13 x 55

This was a good session. Worked out quite well. I was happy to crank out 7 reps with 200. I kept things really tight, with the pull-ups working me, and even my incline presses pushing me to my limits. So all was good. Felt focused, driven.

One thing I did differently was instead of benching on the normal bench, I moved a flat bench into the squat “rack”. It’s not a true power rack, more like one of those racks with the inclined rack of pegs and then one large flat “catch” somewhere well below where most people would be at depth. I wanted to see how I would fare and how it would work out. One set of pegs was just out of reach… I could do it if I shrugged my shoulders forward to get the bar out, but that won’t happen nor be good for setup with heavier weights. The peg I have to use is kinda low, but oh well… it will serve as a good peg to fall into if I can’t get lockout, which is kinda the point. And if I get stapled well… the catch rails are 2-3″ below me so I will be rolling the bar on my body, but by the time I get to my legs I can get it onto the rail and well… this isn’t ideal, but it’l be better than the free-standing bench.

I want to do this so if I start pushing my benches with things like Joker sets or other 1RM testing, I can handle possible failure. I’d rather not miss the rep, but shit happens. I’ll work this setup for a while and see how it goes.

2013-09-04 training log

/ hsoi

Only 2. 2 good ones, but still…. only 2.

Wendler 5/3/1 program, cycle 23, week 2

  • Work Set – Squat (working max: 300#)
    • 2x5x45 (warmup)
    • 1x5x120
    • 1x5x150
    • 1x3x180
    • 1x3x215 (work)
    • 1x3x245
    • 1x2x275
  • Assistance – Front Squat
    • 5 x 8 x 95
  • Assistance – Crunches
    • 3 x 15/15/10 x BW
  • Foam Rolling

If I’m diagnosing things correctly, it’s my legs that suck. My back is strong(er) by comparison, so it’s easy for my body to want to keep the bar where it is, let the hips shoot up (and the back/hip angle closes), then basically “good morning” the weight up… ratchet it up. I can do that to move the weights, but that doesn’t make me stronger.

So my squats, I’m really trying to keep upright, press back, and drive drive drive with the legs.

On the 245 set, it was tough. I knew the 275 would be tough, even with the belt on. It was. Maybe I mentally set myself up for it (failure). I know that when the weight gets heavy, I want to ensure I get back up, so I’ll cut depth. No no no, that’s unacceptable. I would rather get 1 awesome rep than 3 shitty reps. I will go all the way down. And I did. Rep 1 went down, and it was hard coming up. Rep 2 went down, and mid-way up I stopped… I just couldn’t go any more. My body wanted to lean forward to let my hips shoot up and then good morning the weight up, but no no no, fought it because that’s not the point. Push with the legs. I just refused to dump the bar. I knew I was on the cusp of dumping it but figured if I was going to then let my body fail and dump, meantime keep fighting it until then. And I managed to get it up there, keeping as upright as I could, pushing as much as I could with my legs. I racked it after 2. I thought about resting 30-60 seconds and going for 1 more rep, but why? What purpose would that really serve? I left it alone.

I am not happy with only getting 2 and missing prescribed reps, but that I didn’t miss depth and that I fought through on form? I’ll take it. But still… we’ll see what next session brings. And this probably means next cycle I’ll keep the weight the same and go for more reps.

Front squats. Oye. I dropped the weight down because I want to ensure I’m getting form right. Feet are just a little inside of shoulder-width, toes mostly forward. Using the bodybuilder-style cross arm setup (anything else really hurts my elbows). Fight to keep upright. Slight pause at the bottom… not of any noticable count, but enough to avoid the stretch reflex. Push back as I go up… almost like I’m trying to lauch myself backwards in an arc. And holy crap…. my quads were killing me. Pumped like hell, and well, that’s what I’m after. 5×8 was good, the last few reps of the last few sets were hard. So it doesn’t feel all that impressive, but it sure knocked it out of me. 🙂 If this helps me out, great.

Someday, the 300# barrier will be broken. I struggled a lot at 230 and broke through that plateau, I’ll get through this one.

Burnout

/ hsoi / 5 Comments

I’m trying to emerge from one of the worst burnouts that I can remember.

It happens. It’s the nature of the business I’m in… and I think it’s also the nature of me.

I try to live a balanced life, but by the time I figure out how to balance things, there’s something new in the mix that imbalances everything. And I have enough drive and dedication to things that sometimes I push too much, and it’s… well… too much.

I think to some extent I just have to accept that this is me and how I run. It does better sometimes to go with the flow instead of fighting the current.

It finally came to a head a couple weeks ago. I just cracked. Was really short-fused and couldn’t focus on anything. No motivation for work or other stuff. I made a long Labor Day weekend, taking 5 days to do nothing. And while I did some stuff, the main focus was on sleeping and eating. I slept a lot. Heck, I woke up on Sunday after about 9 hours of sleep, ate breakfast, then went back to bed for another 2 hours. I then took another nap later in the day. Yes, everything was shot. In fact, I think if I could take another week off of “life” I’d come out in really good shape.

As it is, I feel a lot better. And one thing that is most significant that I didn’t realize was an issue? I don’t feel stiff and creeky. I figured it was just being beat up from the weights. I do think it was that, but it was… silly. Trying to just kneel down then get back up? It was a chore. OK so squatting 295×2 isn’t huge numbers, but if I can squat more than my bodyweight, why is it difficult to kneel down and get back up? I guess because I was so shot. After all this time resting, I don’t feel stiff and creeky any more. I can just squat down, kneel down, get up, and it’s no problem.

Crazy.

But it taught me a lot, and gave me a lot of signs to look for in the future. Catch it before it gets bad, because a lot of these signs are new signs.

Sleep is key. I need more of it.

But food is another.

Trying to diet down, seeing how it hurt me, running counter to my true goals. I also believe the restriction on food contributed to things because I didn’t have what I needed to build myself back up. I’ve learned over the years to listen to my body. Sometimes I’ll get a massive craving for something, like fruit. Listen to it. Eat until body says that’s enough. and it’s never really a want to pig out and gorge. There’s a limit and eventually the body says it’s good.

As much as I hate to keep the belly flab, I think I need to just keep eating more. It makes sense. But I do think along with listening to my body more, I can do things to be cleaner and, if I stick to things more long-term, it should work out alright for me. I’ll get there, but it will take time.. perhaps a lot of time.

I’m going to eat well, 250g of protein a day I think is minimal, don’t sweat the fat (tho don’t be stupid about it), and moderate the carbs. For example, if I have a piece of whole fruit with breakfast, fine. But that’s probably all I need. If I can have a carbless lunch, great. Then if Wife makes something for dinner that has some carbs in it (e.g. rice), just roll with it. If I have a scoop of ice cream before bed, fine, just don’t do it every night. I think all the “artificial” program following I’ve done has been good because it’s taught me a lot and shown me a lot; learned a lot about my body. I’m finding my groove, and right now, it’s a shit-ton of protein and moderate everything else… where my body is nourished to the level it needs, and it will tell me.

So, to anyone I’ve ignored or snapped at in the past some weeks (or months), I apologize. I let a lot fall by the wayside because I was burned out but had to keep chugging on key things (e.g. day job). I was tapped out and didn’t see the signs, because a lot of them are new ones. There are no excuses, just asking your forgiveness and thanking you for your patience.

 

One at a time

/ hsoi

Here’s something I learned from lifting that I’m working to apply to shooting.

When lifting, we look at sets and reps. We think of 3 sets of 10 reps, or 5 sets of 5 reps,. When we perform them, we count. When we count, we think about the string we’re performing, and we’ll often think about them in a relative way, like instead of “7, 8, 9, 10” we might think “3 more, 2 more, 1 more, done”. Whatever we’re doing, we’re doing a couple things:

  1. We think about the reps in a series
  2. We think about the reps.

Somewhere in all the reading I do about lifting, someone said to think about each rep as a single rep. So instead of thinking about doing 1 set of 5 reps, think about doing 5 sets of 1 rep, consecutively. The difference? You don’t think about the reps. You don’t count the reps. You don’t allow any part of your lifting to be focused on not-lifting, so all your energy can be focused on performing the lift itself. Yeah, if you’re lifting the 5# dumbbells it probably doesn’t matter, but when you’re truly pushing your limits, every ounce of energy and focus matters. Furthermore, when we lift with counting, we will start that first rep all tight and ready, then things degrade. If you always think about it being “1 rep, first rep”, you take a moment to reset every time, to ensure this rep is a “first rep” in every and all regards. It increases the quality of the reps.

But for me, it’s often about the mental distraction. I get too focused on where I am in the rep scheme and where that is relative to my goal reps. That loss of focus is bad and something I continue to work on.

And so, it comes to shooting.

When we shoot, we will shoot in a “set and rep” scheme. Look at the “3 Seconds or Less” drill. We’re going to lift (shoot) 20 reps (rounds) total. We’ll start with 1 set (string) of 3 reps (shots), then a 2nd set of 2 reps, and you see where I’m going? it’s the same sort of setup and scheme here, and it allows us to fall into the same sort of counting and mental distraction.

At the A-Zone Range, Karl has a steel “hostage” target (not sure if this is the exact model, but it’s close enough for discussion purposes). The target is set up on “the small range”, and depending where we put the firing line, it’s generally a 25 yard shot. Karl says the flapper is 6″ diameter with probably 75% exposed. So it’s a small target, but hittable. I’ve long had a goal of being able to step up to the line with my carry gun (M&P 9), shoot a full magazine of ammo at the flapper (16+1 rounds), and have 100% hits on the flapper.

I have yet to do this.

25 yards is a humbler for me, and something I’ve long needed to work on. Alas, there’s always something more important to work on, so it always gets bumped down the priority ladder.

The other day I started shooting this and realized what I was doing. I was going along, making hits, doing well. Then I got too mentally excited about things and thinking “hey, I might actually do it this time…. nope… damnit!”  I was distracted. I was thinking too much about my count… hey, I got through 6 without a miss, 7 without… 8!!  9… nope. I could see myself getting closer to the finish line, then falling because I was thinking more about the end goal than doing the work required to get there.

I was not in the present moment. I was distracted by a potential future, one that wouldn’t happen if I didn’t live in the present moment and do what the present required of me.

And I thought to myself, this is just like heavy squats. I shouldn’t be trying to do 1 string of 17 shots, I should be doing 17 single shots.

I also thought I should be more progressive and work up to it. You know, start light (huzzah, Jim Wendler). So I moved up to 15 yards and 10 rounds. I did that. Great! It was getting too hot so I called it an afternoon, but there’s where I will resume: 15 yards, full magazine, one shot at a time. When I can clean that on-demand, I’ll back up to 20 yards, and go for 5 rounds, and “work up” (there’s a lifting term again).

Crazy how world’s overlap, eh?

2013-09-02 training log

/ hsoi / 2 Comments

My neck… ugh.

Wendler 5/3/1 program, cycle 23, week 1

  • Work Set – Press (working max: 155#)
    • 2x5x45 (warmup)
    • 1x5x65
    • 1x5x80
    • 1x3x95
    • 1x5x100 (work)
    • 1x5x120
    • 1x6x135
  • Assistance – Press
    • 5 x 10/10/10/8/7 x 95
  • Assistance – Seated Rows (superset with all pressing)
    • 11 x 10 (last set, 20) x 70
  • Assistance – Lat Pulldowns
    • 4 x 12/12/10/8 x 110/110/110/100
  • Foam Rolling

For the past couple weeks there’s been some pain in my neck, truly a pain, not metaphoric. 🙂 Pinched nerve? I don’t know. Swallowing can hurt, and can cause the pain to radiate down the top edge of my left trap. Probably would be remedied with a trip to the chiropractor for a quick neck movement, but I think ultimately it’s due to a lot of muscle tightness which then pulls my neck into funky positions and causes this. I think it’s why my left-hand grip isn’t so good (it’s been slipping on deadlifts), and it really got in the way of things today. But still, press on (pun intended).

I do like supersetting the rowing in here. Went way too light today, but better to start too light than too heavy. Affords me the ability to go strict, letting shoulders pull forward, then pinch the shoulder blades together at the top of the movement. Focus on pulling from the elbows, with the pinkies. This is not a max effort movement, this is a bodybuilding movement. Still, I will go heavier. I do think running my supersets with a movement in the perpendicular plane is keeping my shoulders happier.

I opted to drop power cleans. They just aren’t what I’m looking to do right now, not consistent with the goals I have.

2013-08-30 training log

/ hsoi

Feeling better, more directed.

Wendler 5/3/1 program, cycle 23, week 1

  • Work Set – Deadlift (working max: 380#)
    • 1x5x155 (warmup)
    • 1x5x190
    • 1x3x230
    • 1x5x250 (work)
    • 1x5x290
    • 1x6x325
  • Assistance – Speed/Dynamic Deadlifts
    • 5 x 3/3/3/2/2 x 265
  • Foam Rolling… a lot

I felt a lot better today. Cleared the air at the day job, took yesterday and today off work, so I felt no pressure nor rush to do anything. Got to the gym a little later, took my time a little more with things. Felt a lot better.

When I pulled 325, I made every effort to ensure my upper body was straight, that I broke the weight off the ground with my legs and pushed that first third or so strictly with my legs. It was a struggle, but I did it and it felt good. That’s really where I need my focus. I opted to do a sixth rep however it worked out, merely because I didn’t want to stop at just the prescribed reps.

I’ve had that bug to do dynamic work, get more explosive, see what it does for me. And after the last session (my angry bench pressing), I thought I’d give things a try today just to see about scratching the itch. The angry session wasn’t good from an anger perspective, but it did make me attack the weights more, a little more aggressive, a little more explosive. I thought it was good and useful. Well… I could tell this is not what I need right now. Yeah, it was cool, but it was quickly evident it is not what I need to contribute to overcoming my weak points. The deficit deadlifts are still what I need. So, this was a good itch scratcher and I think gets it out of my system and enables me to refocus on what I need. So all good. But that said, I also think I can take from the past 2 sessions that I could stand to be a little more explosive and have a little more mental aggression.

Watch this video from Clint Darden about speed deadlifts and attitude:

Like that. 🙂

Not that I have to get all vocal and such, but it’s a mindset thing.

Anyways, all good. I can take something home from this.

And speaking of home…. when I got home, again because I was in no great rush, I spent a long time foam rolling, rolling the lacrosse ball (finally got one), stretching stuff, and some massage (thanx, Wife!). I’m really sore, really beat up from numerous things… the worst is my left calf due to the mega-cramp I got 2 days ago. But that, my thighs, leg adductors, my neck (due to sleeping wrong), you name it… everything sucks. So I spent a good long while this morning stretching and rolling, a long hot shower… and I feel really good. Still not out of the woods, but better.

2013-08-28 training log

/ hsoi

Suck.

Wendler 5/3/1 program, cycle 23, week 1

  • Work Set – Bench Press (working max: 230#)
    • 2x5x45 (warmup)
    • 1x5x95
    • 1x5x110
    • 1x3x135
    • 1x5x145 (work)
    • 1x5x165
    • 1x8x190
  • Assistance – DB Incline Press
    • 4 x 10/10/8/5 x 55
  • Assistance – Pull-ups (superset between each pressing set)
    • 9 x 4 x BW (band-assisted)

Yesterday, after returning home from the day job office, something job-wise came down that ticked me off. It was pretty bad. I only slept about 3 hours. It’s still on my mind, bothering me greatly. Needless to say, my gym time was affected. It gave me a lot of drive… tho it was an angry drive. Some level of aggression is good, but not this sort. I did hit the weights hard, very powerful, very explosive, but I worked myself up… in the bad way. My rest periods weren’t their usual length… and then, during the 4th set of DB presses, when I used my legs/toes to “pop” the DB’s up to my shoulders, my left calf cramped up BAD. This happens to me every now and again, but this was pretty bad. Usually they fade quickly, so I kept going, but after the 5th rep it was just too painful. I threw the DB’s down and just sat there for a few minutes in pain while I tried to get my calf muscles to relax. When they finally did, I started walking around a little bit, trying to relax and stretch them out, then got dizzy and nauseous. This wasn’t good, and I just ended the session. My body is telling me to stop before I really hurt myself.

I can feel it. My shoulders do hurt because I wasn’t using any form… just powering through everything, trying to release some of my anger. My calf is still tight and sore as I type this.

So, it was what it was.

On the good side tho I can say that there’s something to take from the aggressiveness and being more explosive. Yeah, who knows… maybe part-2 of this “6 week cycle” will try adding in the more dynamic work. I guess if I can take something positive from this shit-tacular start to my day, then not all is lost.

Point, Counterpoint, but a good points

/ hsoi

I’m sure the CrossFit world is in a tizzy over Mark Rippetoe’s latest:

For casual exercisers, CrossFit-types and the like, the calculation is a bit different. The vomit I see on the internet – complete lumbar flexion, everything pressed out, everything intentionally rebounded from the floor, all done under the watchful eye of some moron saying “Nice!” – makes me of two minds.

Part of me hopes the fools hurt themselves badly (after all, orthopedic surgeons gotta eat too), and part of me hopes their incompetent, stupid-ass coaches all die in a great Job-like mass of infection (boils, abscessed hemorrhoids, lungs full of fluid, etc.).

It’s both an embarrassment to watch and a testament to the fact that apparently tens of thousands of people don’t know what the fuck they are doing, and have no apparent desire to learn.

But before you get too upset, consider Paul Carter’s recent comments. I don’t know if these are directly in response to Rip’s statements, but the timing was good:

Ok, I can’t stand the crossfit hate. I can’t. I’m so tired of seeing people bitch about it.

Crossfit has tons and tons and eons of women that ended up with hot asses from it. That alone means it has value. Lots of value. An overwhelming amount of value. Value for days. DAT VALUE!

Ok, that’s all. I think this Monster kicked in.

🙂

Frankly, they’re both right. And I think it’s worth looking deeper at Rip’s commentary before getting too upset about it.

But the real question here is this: what do you hope to accomplish by doing high-rep snatches, done either correctly or incorrectly? And in either case, is there a better alternative, and why?

His point is one of “why are you doing what you are doing”? What are you hoping to accomplish?

If you are just trying to exercise, fine. For most people, that’s enough. Part of the reason I quit studying Kuk Sool was because it was not taking me towards what I wanted to accomplish (self-defense). But I cannot deny the camaraderie/family was wonderful, nor that it helped me really get in good shape; my physical conditioning was the best it ever was. If you want social aspects, if you want just general better health, sure this is great stuff and thus good for a number of people. But if you want to know better self-defense, try something else.

So it really comes down to what do you want. Why are you doing what you are doing.

If you want a hot ass, then by all means keep CrossFitting. 🙂

If you want to get strong, if you want to get conditioned, Rip’s point is there are better means to accomplish that end.

I follow a Facebook page called “Awkward Gym Moments“. There’s often video posted of people performing activities at the gym that just make you wonder what they are doing. Some of these people are great, because they know what they are doing and don’t care what you think. But certainly there are enough activities going on that do make you scratch your head and wonder what’s going on. It makes you wonder, what are you trying to accomplish? What is your goal, and how is this going to get you there? It doesn’t have to be obvious to the dude surreptitiously videoing you, just so long as you are actually doing something positive towards accomplishing your goals.

This isn’t to put anything nor anyone down. This is about ensuring you have a goal and are working to meet it.

2013-08-26 training log

/ hsoi

Failure isn’t bad if you learn and grow from it.

Wendler 5/3/1 program, cycle X, week X

  • Work Set – Squat (working max: 300#)
    • 2x5x45 (warmup)
    • 1x5x120
    • 1x5x150
    • 1x3x180
    • 1x5x195 (work)
    • 1x5x230
    • 1x4x260
  • Assistance – Front Squat
    • 5 x 5/5/5/6/6 x 135/135/135/115/115
  • Assistance – Crunches
    • 2 x 20/15 x BW
  • Foam Rolling

I didn’t even hit the required reps. It sucked. That last set was horrible form and I was just happy to get depth and come up. After the 4th crappy rep I racked it.

I’m not sure why. It could be because my “jack shit” deload week was truly jack shit. I rested a lot, didn’t eat well, and probably slacked too much. I needed it because I’m dealing with major burnout… mentally I’m fried, and have some physical and emotional burnout too. Just a lot of shit going on, and it all came crashing down. So the week off was certainly good for me in many ways, but I paid for it today. That’s ok… in the grand scheme of life, this is just lifting and doesn’t really mean much. Better that I work on the other aspects of my life right now.

But I think it was good because it made me realize. I had loaded the bar for pause squats and was getting ready to unrack when I stopped and called an audible. I opted to do front squats instead. I think that’s what I need. Ever since I was figuring things out about my squat weakness, both pause and front squats were on my mind. Everyone says “if you need help out of the hole, pause squats”. That’s what I need, so I did it. But I realize it isn’t quite that and doesn’t quite do what I need. Come on… my back is strong, working up to an all-time PR of 405 just over a week ago. I think what sucks are my quads. Or maybe I’ve been reading too much from Dan Green. But I do think, at this point, given what I see, how my body is working, reacting, what and where I feel the “failure” when I hit sticking points, etc…. yeah, I think front squats may be the key.

So let’s try them for a cycle (well, a 2-cycle cycle) and see what happens. Besides, nothing says I can’t pause at the bottom of them, y’know?

I had no idea what to do, so I just put 135 on the bar and aimed for 5×5. I don’t think that’s what I need because there was some lean forward. I dropped down to 115 and was able to better maintain uprightness the whole time. In the end, I don’t care what weight I use, so long as it’s done right. I’ll probably stick with 115 and aim for 5 sets of 5-8 reps. See what that does for me.

Ah well. Crappy day, but if it makes me better in the long run, fine.