Well, I should have known today wasn’t going to be a strong day. No wonder, when I checked my log my last full recorded session was almost a month ago. With all the bullshit in between and this odd week it’s no wonder I wasn’t on my game. At least I got some meaningful work in and I’ll be in a better position to drop back a wave or two and start over next week. (Trying to stay optimistic.)
medium grip bench (MGBP, pinkies touching rings): 45×5, 95×3, 135×2, 185×2, 225×1, 275×1, 295×1, 305×5,5,5 The last recorded workout I got 5,5,7 here so I thought I would be fine repeating those weights for this wave, maybe even getting 8-10. I was wrong. These were tough and I barely got 5 on my last set.
close grip bench press (CGBP, pinkies 1/2″ inside rings) I took one rep with 235. It felt horrible so I stopped, which I’ve never done before. I should have been good for 3-5×10 here.
conventional stance deadlift: 315×1, 365×1, 405 x 1 (switched from double over to mixed grip), 455×0 (added belt) This is where things got really cruddy. I didn’t feel right on any of my warm-ups and to make matters worse I left my good Inzer belt at home so I was using the shitty loner belts at the gym. (Sidenote: why do those things even exist? Who designed those things and what are they good for? They’re a single ply of leather softer than my normal dress belt and they’re about 1 1/2 inches wide in the front and 4 in the back. It’s like an uncomfortable and stupid looking variant to not wearing a belt at all.)
At any rate, I went to pull 455, broke it off the ground and got about 6″ off the deck when I just said fuck it and set it down. I could tell it wasn’t right and if I had pushed the issue that day I would have hurt myself. The only thing more demoralizing than having to miss a deadlift is missing a deadlift with a weight you should be getting 10 times. I had to just turn my music up a little, avert my eyes a little more to avoid talking to/contacting anyone and just tried to go about the rest of my workout. At least I’m proud I didn’t just give up and leave or cut my planned ancillary work short. One of my goals is to do what my old partner Scoops would make me: do what’s on the paper and if it really doesn’t work or feel right, change it for next time.
2/1 concentric/eccentric cable row: 45 x 2 x 10 L-R These are something I’m playing with. I use a single handle on the cable row and use both hands for the concentric and then lower with one hand, doing all the whole side for one side then switching. This was also confirmation I did the right thing backing off the deadlift because my back gave me some twinges just setting up for this.
I supersetted these with 1-leg hip extensions off the bench for the cable rows. bw x 2 x 10 L-R. These felt pretty good and I got a pretty decent glute pump so I don’t feel like I accomplished nothing for my pulling muscles. Next week I’m going to do 1-2 sets of pullups before I get to these.
I finished with some ab and lower back work.
back extension on the 45° bench. bw x 2 x10 At the top of each movement I do essentially a reverse fly with my arms in a neutral 45° adducted position. I squeeze the top as hard as I can, trying to get my mid and lower traps. (I call these “Titanics” in my log, like the I’m King of The World Pose.) At the same time I squeeze my glutes even harder so as to counter the natural lordosis that comes with the upper back extension.
supersetted these with weighted prestretcher crunches 75 x 2 x10 I used to do these with a rolled up yoga mat but I didn’t have anything like that and I don’t know if I want to buy one just for this movement. A half foam roll would work great but they don’t have one and I don’t want to mutilate my good one. I tried an “Ab Mat” which sucked and I tried a whole foam roll which was better but a little too aggressive. I could take the sleeping mat that I was issued, (which has been unrolled once since I hit the fleet) but I would look like a dork carrying that in and besides it’s big and unwieldy. I’ll have to raid the linen closet and see if I have a big not-so-nice towel I can steal.
Conor Attack! 