531PL Cycle 3, Press 1

Press: 45, 75
97.5x5
110x3
122.5x4
110x5
Felt weaker today. Let the last 110 rep down a bit funny and may have done bad things to my shoulder. Oh dear.

Left early due to the room closing for circuit training and my having stuff I needed to do afterwards.

Updates to Diet and Program

The 5/3/1 components of the program aren't changing. What's changing is that from now on I'm training 7 days per week with the spare 3 functioning as rehab days with:

Banded GMs (which I may add back into my regular warmup) to stretch out hamstrings
Shoulder warmup, but done with more reps (currently I do; I'm thinking up it to 5) and for 3 sets. Also possibly longer holds.
Light barbell rows to work on form and scapular stabilization (both overhand and underhand grips)
Light lat pullsdown for sets of 10, focusing on form (we're talking like 60lbs here)
Face pulls, supersetted with scap push-ups
Competition lifts done with light weights (45lb bench, 95-135lb squat, 135-185lb deadlift) focusing on form, ideally to the tune of 100 good reps per workout. These will be with low rest.
Stomach vacuum for many sets and reps

Ideally I'll figure out a way to cut all of that down into a single hour of training.

For dietary changes...there actually aren't any hugely significant ones, but I'm branching out with the types of stew I can make so hopefully I'll have something new in the near future. The basic outline stays the same - low-carb, high-fat, high-protein, high-fiber until training and high-carb, low-fat, high-protein, low-fiber afterwards. I may start adding an actual breakfast in; I want to try the hazelnut roast + coconut oil + heavy cream idea first though.

A Brief Discussion on Nutrition

This should remain brief partly by design and partly because I doubt I have that much content I can put in it. That aside, here goes:

People who've gone to the earlier reaches of this log will find some references to Jamie Lewis's predator diet and to my dietary history in general. I've tried various (fairly faddy) approaches, and at this point resigned myself to a few relatively simple things:

1) Whatever the current model of obesity predicts would be effective for weight loss is probably the best evidence-based method of losing weight. Currently that appears to be limiting palatability of your food to reduce overconsumption, because it seems fairly laid-in-stone nowadays that the actual amount of weight lost or gained depends primarily on caloric deficit/surplus (respectively).

Fortunately, palatability on the level that's (presumably) caused the recent dramatic increase in American calorie intake is fairly easy to avoid by simply cooking the vast majority of your food yourself. This is where it gets stickier, because making decisions past that point requires some kind of framework that will probably be health-based, and there are numerous conflicting positions on what constitutes a healthy diet.

That being said, there are a few things that seem fairly universal:

1) Refined sugar and anything containing it is generally bad.

2) Hydrogenated oils and anything containing them are bad.

More controversially:

1) Fructose (and by extension sucrose) is problematic because it can't be stored as muscle glycogen (or, as far as I'm aware, even removed from the blood by muscle cells) and should be limited due to the liver's small glycogen capacity (~100g, apparently). This doesn't mean avoid all fruit, but it does suggest that avoiding large quantities of fruit and sucrose will be beneficial, and that starches should be prioritized over fruits for any method of carbohydrate loading.

2) Omega-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids should generally be avoided in the context of Western diets, as a bias of w-6 over w-3 appears to lead to chronic inflammation and generally damage health. w-3 biased over w-6 is also a problem, but it's a lot harder to reach that stage because Western diets tend to be very high in w-6 as a result of our animal feedstocks and habit of using seed oils in most of our foods. Saturated and monounsaturated cooking fats are probably best, and grassfed/pastured meats may be preferable for this reason.

More selectively and controversially:

1) Glutenous grains (N.B. - the family of celiac-associated plant proteins is quite large and does not, as far as I know, actually feature a specific protein named "gluten") may be contraindicated for a large percentage of the population due to various levels of intolerance and allergy. Avoiding these goes (somewhat) hand-in-hand with reducing omega-6 intake, since the two seem to be found together quite frequently.

I'm currently experimenting with carb backloading (as with my APD experience, this is more for convenience than anything else - the APD didn't really work out, though it did at least teach me a few things about how effectively I can eat some things). That said, I'm taking a modified approach based on what I've said above, partly for health reasons and partly because while some of the science has merit (primarily his notes about post-exercise changes in muscular utilization of glucose), a lot of it appears to be bullshit (of the traditional "doesn't say what he says it says" variety). This basically turns it into "

Currently unsure of how I'm going to handle breakfast; Keifer presents some argument for coffee with fat and very little protein or carb (I suspect that if I go this route it'll be hazelnut roast with cream and coconut oil).

Later in the day (a few hours before training), I'm thinking a fairly conservative meat and greens meal; half-rack of ribs, steak, pork chops, etc.. There are plenty of good protein and fat meals and easy vegetable sides.

For non-training days, that'll get followed by something larger (or multiples thereof), say a full rack of ribs or a whole roast chicken. I may allow myself some wiggle room with respect to carb content in the evenings, but ideally these will essentially be "keto" days.

On training days, post-workout meals will consist of some manner of protein (ideally with lower fat content) with a fairly large amount of starch, generally from rice or potatoes. Braised meat with rice, curry, Shephard's Pie, etc. (and cheat meals) go here.

531PL Cycle 3, Bench 5

Didn't warm my shoulders up

For some reason this warrants mention

Bench: 45, 95
120x5
137.5x5
157.5x5
Second two sets were very strong. I suspect this was because there was a cute girl on the next rack who actually knew what she was doing. The fact that this may have made a difference horrifies me.

DB Bench:
45s - 5x10
Upping to 50s next week. I've been here too long.

DB Row:
45x - 4x10, 1x29
Also upping to 50.

531PL Cycle 3, Squat 5

Squat - 45, 95, 135
200x5
230x5
260x5
Surprisingly unpleasant, but I've been feeling fairly shitty all week so it's not too surprising. Expecting a positive change next week.

Pistol:
5x6ea
The side-to-side imbalance is really coming out here. I've been starting with the right but I think I may try starting left next time to see if it gets any better. Sticking with six until I can do both sides with good balance - right now I can actually hit them continuously on the right, and that seems like a fairly good milestone.

GHR:
5x10
Hands by sides.
Stretching and massaging left calf to help loosen it up.

And today's experiment was...

A roast chicken that I'd left to air-dry in the oven overnight.

I'm going to do this with every bird I eat from now on. The skin was amazing.

Put the onions and celery in the oven with some duck fat and butter as well; in future I'll probably wait a while before doing that, or just not toss them around at all so the onions never contact the sides of the pan and burn.

531PL Cycle 3, Press 5

Press - 45, 65
85x5
95x5
110x5
Easy enough. Keep forgetting the bloody microplates, though.

Blast Strap Push-Ups:
10, 8, 7, 6, 6
Trying to keep my shoulder healthy while doing these. Got a PT referral; going to set up an MRI for the near future.

Barbell Row:
100lbs - 5x10
Upping to 105lbs next week. I'm thinking I'll up this twice per cycle for a bit until it starts to get vaguely hard.

Meat - Braised Short Ribs in Chocolate Sauce

Yes, you read that correctly. Incidentally, this is the dish that made me take braising seriously again after 5 years of weekly pot roasts. This doesn't taste "chocolatey" - it's just very, very, scarily good.

Credit to foodwishes for the recipe, though I anticipate adjusting this further. (My other meal for today will be pan-grilled short ribs and asparagus; I'll probably cook the "fat" side of the ribs for an extra minute or so but they should be identical otherwise).

Ingredients:
3lbs beef short ribs, trimmed
3oz bacon (I use uncured; not sure if it makes much difference)
1 cup dry Sherry (~$10 bottle)
1 quart beef broth (I haven't tried this with homemade yet; will report)
1 onion
2 cloves garlic
5 sprigs thyme
2 tbsp white rice flour (regular flour ok if you're glutenous)
2 bay leaves
2 oz bittersweet chocolate (I use expensive dark chocolate from the local pretentious grocer)
1 stick cinnamon
Salt and Pepper to taste
(5QT DUTCH OVEN)

Prep:
Dry ribs, cut into ~4-in pieces, salt generously (min. 1hr in advance). We add pepper later.
Cut ribs into ~4-in pieces; salt and pepper generously
Dry and dice bacon
Finely dice onion
Finely dice/paste garlic
Mix the rice flour with 2tbsp water until it forms an even slurry (skip for regular flour)*
Tie the thyme sprigs into a bundle
Cut chocolate into small pieces

*I'm considering some roux-related experiments here. Stay tuned.

Cooking:
1) Lightly fry bacon for ~5 minutes on medium-low heat to render out the fat
2) Remove bacon with a spoon and reserve off to the side
3) Brown short ribs in bacon fat, all four sides (six if they're very thick). I've found it's best to do this 4 pieces at a time; any more than that and water can't evaporate, so you get an ugly thick mess at the bottom of the pan. This is also why it's important to trim the fat down.
4) Remove ribs and reserve off to the side.
5) Add onions, add a pinch of salt, and cook on medium or low heat for ~5 minutes until soft. We're sweating them here, not browning - no color change.
6) Add garlic and sautee for ~30 seconds (err on the side of shorter)
7) Add rice flour slurry and cook for 2 minutes
8) Add sherry and deglaze the bottom of the oven. Bring to a simmer.
9) Return bacon and short ribs to the pan (bone side up if applicable); add broth, bay leaves, and thyme
10) Bring back to simmer and cook covered for 90 minutes
11) Add chocolate and cinnamon. wash around to make sure chocolate dissolves
12) Cook for 30 minutes

At this point it's edible, but for optimal results:
13) Let cool and put in fridge overnight (VERY IMPORTANT)
14) Remove fat from the top if applicable
15) Return to heat and reduce sauce as desired

This works very, very well.

Link to foodwishes post:
http://foodwishes.blogspot.com/2007/02/braised-beef-short-ribs-with-chocolate.html

531PL Cycle 3, Dead 5

Getting the shoulder looked at tomorrow afternoon.

Deadlift - 135, 185

225x5

250x5

275x5

I think my general technique here is getting better. My grip, on the other hand, is not - had to use a mixed grip and reset between reps for 275. This may be because of all the random chins I've been doing at home, not that I consider that a valid reason to stop.

Deadlift Negative:

145x5x10

These are getting harder somewhat disproportionately to the rate at which the weight is going up. Hopefully that's for grip-related reasons.

Incidentally, I may need to get some baby powder - the friction on my thighs is actually becoming a problem for my grip here.

Good Morning:

145x5x10

Nothing to report, these are still easy as shit.

Cooking - 12/2/2012

Breakfast - 2 Toulouse Sausages

Dried, poached*, then pan-fried in grassfed butter.
Suspect I left both steps for a bit too long and that the poaching was at too high of a temperature

*Brought water to a very light boil, then reduced heat to ~5 o'clock. Left for 20-30 minutes.

Dinner - Roast Duck

Cut off neck fat and the fat around the cavity. Discarded giblets, because I don't have the courage to start actually using them yet. Costco seem to have these in fairly steady supply, though, so I'll probably manage it over break. Saved neck for stock. Accidentally cut very close to the butt; removed for symmetry.

Did the usual thing of snipping the achilles. Tied the legs together - couldn't truss fully because I'd removed the butt. I'm not entirely sure if it's worth trussing a duck, actually - the meat's all dark, so it may cook evenly regardless.

Scored the skin on the breast and a bit on the leg. Tucked wings under the body.

Seasoned generously with salt and pepper. Put a halved garlic clove, some thyme sprigs, and some bay leaves in the cavity, and sprinkled some thyme leaves on the breast.

Roasted at 450 for 90 minutes.

This was definitely overdone. Some portions were nearly burned and the meat was quite dry. I'm very glad nobody came over to eat with me, because I'd've been embarrassed serving this to other people.

531PL Cycle 3, Bench 3

Went fairly well, albeit not as well as I'd've liked.

Bench - 45, 95
130x3
150x3
165x7
185x1, 1, 1
Need to work on pausing.
I've been getting an unpleasant sensation in my left shoulder when I'm trying to let the bar settle.

DB Bench:
45lbs - 5x10

DB Row:
45lbs - 4x10, 28

531PL Cycle 3, Squat 3

This went better than expected.

Squat - 45, 95, 135, 185
215lbs - 3
245lbs - 3
275lbs - 8
315lbs - 1, 1, 1
Stopped at 8 because doing more felt gratuitous. Guess the bar's set high for next cycle.
Form felt somewhat off; need to take videos and work on figuring out what's wrong. I'm fairly sure this has been happening a lot recently.

GHR, arms at sides and medium stance -
5x10
Not sure if I should work back to close stance on these or stick with a more squat-related stance. Need to get my feet straight either way, but I explicitly remember closer being harder than wider.
Stretched calves very aggressively between sets. Actually fixed the "pulling" sensation in the back of my knee, which was nice.

531PL Cycle 3, Press 3

Started working on getting another ortho appointment to get my shoulder checked out (+re-script for PT).

Press - 45, 65

90x3

105x3

117.5x7

105x5

Found my microplates in the car. Handy.

Blast Strap Pushup:

8, 7, 8, 6, 7

Working on proper upper body position with these - important consider the shoulder situation.

Barbell Row:

100lbs - 5x10

May take the weight up a bit faster on these. That's pretty tentative for now thanks to the shoulder, but the probability will go up a fair bit once the shoulder's better.

Oh, right, the shoulder - I had a mildly torn labrum a year ago. It responded well to physical therapy but I've reinjured it, probably with a combination of too much studying and pool in recent months and not enough prehab. I may start doing band face pulls on my off days (...and possibly on days) to help combat this, particularly once it's better.

Meat - Miscellaneous

I'm probably going to just get a journal of some sort (and a recipe binder, perhaps) to start doing this more formally and scientifically, but for now:

EDIT: New Note:
Chicken dishes should also be rested. Everything should rest for a few minutes, basically.

Entrees
Grilled English-cut short ribs are excellent. Lightly salt and pepper (I think the salt amount can increase in proportion with time until they go on the grill - I may try salting mine an hour or more in advance in future), then medium heat for about 2 minutes per side on all sides. This seems to get them to around medium/medium-rare. The meat itself is very flavorful and tender if you cut it across the grain (pain in the ass otherwise). I'm still getting the hang of the "across the grain" part, which is really rather sad considering how simple it probably is.

Short Ribs Specifically:

0) Dry in at least 1-2 layers of thick paper towels for a few minutes
1) Salt lightly 2-3 hours before cooking. Do all four sides. Rest fat-side down on paper towels.
2) Heat grill pan to medium-high for about 10 minutes (for my current stove this is about 7 oclock on the largest burner)
3) Grill, starting on fat side. 3 minutes for the fat side, 2 each for the remainder.
4) Tent in foil and rest for 10 minutes.
5) Cut across the grain and serve.


Grilled asparagus is nice.

Desserts
Strawberries and plain goat milk kefir tastes awesome (noticeably better than strawberries and cream, presumably because the kefir actually has some complexity of flavor) and is VERY easy to make photogenic. I don't currently have a nice bowl, a camera, a decent photography background, or immediate access to people who do, but I got something pretty photogenic by filling the bottom of a bowl with a fairly thin layer of kefir, then arranging halved strawberries in the bottom. Put a whole one in the middle for good measure, though I think I'll do it as two halves next time for symmetry.
(Fun note: You preserve strawberry mass if you cut them in half and THEN cut out the green. My lack of experience is showing)

---

Future ideas -
Berkeley Bowl stock beef ribs at $3/lb; not ideal but doable, particularly since they're grass-fed.
Really want to roast a chicken.
Really want to do a leg of lamb, though unfortunately the result of this is large enough that I'd need to throw some kind of dinner party to make it worthwhile.

Meat - Curries

This one's a work in progress because I really, really suck at making curry without the aid of pastes (e.g. Patak's). Thus far, major notes:

1) Onions should be finely diced and very, very thoroughly sweated.

2) Don't overcook the garlic. Pasted/finely diced garlic should be cooked for ~30 seconds (definitely no more than 2-3 minutes) to get the flavor out; longer will impart an unpleasant bitterness to the sauce.

Meat - Roast Chicken

I prefer to roast my chicken Thomas Keller-style and suspended on a bed of coarsely-sliced mirepoix (onions, celery, carrots). Today I omitted the carrots and put some butter off to the side of the chicken to give the vegetables some extra fat; the overall result was good. I assume the extra fat content was very important for this.

I also sauteed the vegetables after I removed the chicken to rest. This softened the celery more and gave the onions some extra caramelization, ultimately making an orgasmic side to the breasts. Legs are amazing as-is, though this time was dramatically better than most (see below).

Further notes:
1) Celery on the bottom, then onions. Haven't figured out where the carrots should go if I'm doing specific layering (probably next to the celery if they're included at all). The onions will cook nicely regardless of where they are, and the celery seems to benefit more from being on the bottom. Sauteeing everything afterward should caramelize the onions enough without much risk of burning (definite problem with them this time).

2) Use more salt than you think you need. This run was dramatically better than usual, and a huge part of that was that I dried the skin with paper towels for longer than usual (left it sitting with the towels on while I trained) and accidentally used a fair bit more salt. The skin crisped out much more than usual and was significantly more delicious.
I also put a few sprigs of thyme in the cavity. I think these helped a bit too, but not with the skin texture.

3) Cut the tendons at the ends of the drumsticks. I go all the way around to remove the skin as well, but the tendons are the really important part.

4) Truss...at least for now. I may try not trussing one soon to see what happens (Heston Blumenthal seems opposed to it, but his way of roasting chickens mirrors my way of doing sous vide steaks - if we're not concerned about the time commitment I guess his may have some advantages. I'll actually try this tomorrow).

5) Remove the wishbone. It makes presentable carving easier (in this case taking it from "Beyond Jon's meager abilities" to "Viable for three of the four quarters"*).

*I'm very good at removing the right breast, terrible at the left. Getting better, though - after sufficient resting you can almost pull the breast off straight up.

6) Consider doing the mirepoix while the chicken itself rests (and ideally suspend the chicken above the bottom of the pan). The vegetables (probably) give off a fairly large amount of steam and negatively impact the quality of the chicken itself (e.g. as far as I can tell, Keller himself keeps everything separate). Celery and onions can be sauteed in the fat leavings (plus any butter or duck fat) afterwards.

I cooked this one at 450 for 50 minutes; the legs were suspiciously juicy (and some of the flesh looked a tad rare), so I may bump this up a bit. The chicken itself was a 4lb regular chicken from Trader Joe's; I'd like to cook the Poulet Rouge and Cornish birds that Riverdog Farm sell at the Berkeley Farmer's Market, but...well, this one ran me something like $1.50/lb, and those are up at $5/lb and $4.50/lb respectively (I'm more interesting the Cornish Hens, personally, but either way).

I finished it one sitting, which is a pretty good sign considering how bad my appetite has been. As noted, the (truncated) mirepoix worked VERY well as a means of making the breasts more edible.

531PL Cycle 3, Dead 3

I've decided I'm going to consolidate the cooking and lifting segments onto this one and keep Hallowed for more intellectual stuff (...so in other words, update this one with everything important and that one twice a century). The food side may wind up falling a bit once I get a recipe binder (...or a tablet), though*.

*In case of tablet, I'll probably back everything up here, though.

Thanksgiving was fairly good; lots of rest and some decent food. Next year I'm cooking it.

Also I got stronger. Like, dramatically stronger.

Deadlift - 135, 185

225x3

260x3

295x7

330x1, 1, 1

Definitely took a bit longer between reps on these than I have in the past (extra breaths between setting my feet and setting the rest up), but the improved performance is pretty nice regardless.

Borrowed some chalk for the singles. Also stuck to a strict 2 minute rest for everything but the 295 set, which I gave more of the 3-4 range.

My weight's still falling forward a bit on these; I'm not sure if I actually had my upper back rounded forward properly for most of them. Working on it.

Deadlift Negative -

145lbs - 5x10

Still having grip issues.

Good Morning:

145lbs - 5x10

Nothing to report.

Had two donuts and a tub of strawberry icecream post-workout. I question the nutritional wisdom of this decision and intend to push more towards the rice/potatoes side of things in future.

531PL Cycle 2, Bench Deload

Bench - 45
70x5
90x5
110x5
Considering that I've trained four days straight (with no sleep between the first two) I'd say this actually went pretty damn well. Nice and fast.

DB Bench:
45s - 5x10

DB Row:
45s - 5x10ea
No Kroc set this week. Deloading.

531PL Cycle 2, Squat Deload

Squat - 45, 95
120x5
150x5
180x5
Ridiculously easy. Which makes sense, since it's a deload.

GHR (arms at sides):
5x10
Need to work on keeping my calves loose. Probably do another cycle of 5x10 and then graduate to the Vampire style.

Pistol:
5x5ea
Moving to 5x6ea or something for next cycle.

531PL Cycle 2, Press Deload

I actually haven't slept since the Dead deload.

Press:
50x5
60x5
75x5
The worrying part is that my shoulder didn't seem entirely on board with this idea.

Barbell Row:
95lbs - 5x10

Blast Strap Pushup:
9, 6, 5, 5, 5

531PL Cycle 2, Dead Deload

Deadlift -
135x5
155x5
195x5
Easy. Mild shoulder complaints; should probably get back into PT.

Slow DL Negative:
140lbs - 5x10
Very taxing on grip.

Dead Stance GM:
140lbs - 5x10
Working on keeping my knees close to locked out and following the various squat-style cues to recruit different parts of my hamstrings.

531PL Bench 1

Cut this one short; forgot the blast straps and helped some guys out with deadlift form. Don't feel particularly bad. About this. Rearranging training to reflect some new discoveries (mainly that benching the day after deads probably isn't a good idea).

Bench: 45, 95

135x5

150x3

170x3

180x1, 1

Much weaker off the chest.

Using the benches in the annex now; I've figured out the rack settings that let me perform properly.

Still need to figure out the actual dimensions of the bars at the RSF.

New Schedule (somewhat tentative pending conditioning schedule):

Sunday - Deadlift

Monday - Press

Wednesday - Squat

Thursday - Bench

I plan to add in some conditioning work after a few cycles, at which point the actual day order will probably reverse. For now I'm good, though.

Not sure if I'm keeping the heavy front squat holds; may remove them in favor of glute-hams, since I need to be fucking doing those.

531PL Cycle 2, Deadlift 1

Forcing myself to get back into it.

Working on putting together a meal plan; the rest of this month will be a bit odd because I'm already out of money. I don't know how this happened but I intend to find out and ensure it never does again, partly by developing a meal plan that puts me sufficiently in the green that I can start actually saving again.

Also got the rumble roller back, which was...surprising.

Deadlift - 135, 185
235x5
265x3
300x5
315x1, 1
Did my best to switch up the overhand grips between sets. 300 was fairly easy. I'm not entirely sure why my numbers went up after three weeks of no training and a bad (i.e. anemic) diet but I'm not complaining.

DL Negative:
140lbs - 4x10
The looks I get doing these are interesting.
Grip was giving out during the last few sets.

DL Stance Good Morning:
140lbs - 4x10
But not quite as good as the ones I get doing these.
I may start explaining the movement to people once I'm back to squatting 4 plates.

531PL Cycle 2, Press 1

I've been very bad about actually recording numbers here for the last few months; the first half because I wasn't "in the mood" to update and the second because the root cause of that got so bad that I stopped training. Back now, though, and hoping to maintain some accountability. I will be training alone late at night, as I used to - seems that if I can't train in a team, I will train in isolation (...or as close to it as I can manage).

No rolling or real warmup today - strapped for time and I left the rumble roller at the gym and haven't been able to reclaim it yet.

Press: 45x5, 70x5
95x5 (4c)
105x3 (2c)
120x5 (3c)
105x5 (2c)

DB Bench:
45lbs - 5x10
Some extra chins in here

DB Row:
45lbs - 4x10, 27

For now I'm going to handle the chins situation by doing extras on two of my off-days. I'll probably start doing conditioning on those days as well.

Meat - Sprouts

Brussels Sprouts recipes:
Prelude -
1) Cut off the base of the sprout and cut it in half to get rid of the outer leaves. You can soak and/or blanch them for a bit to handle the outer leaves, but we're going to be halving them either way and the base doesn't seem to add much.*
*Will conduct further testing

Actual Stuff:
A) Oven-Roasted
Oven heated to 375 bake.
Toss halved sprouts in a ~neutral, high-smoke point fat (e.g. Macadamia Oil or melted lard) with salt and pepper. Arrange face-down in a skillet, casserole, or other container. Bake 30 minutes. Remove from oven and lightly "dust" with strong grated cheese. Return to oven for 5-10 minutes to allow cheese to melt. Let cool for a few minutes before eating.

B) Pan-Seared
Pan preheated with oil; have only tried with bacon fat thus far.
Toss halved sprouts with the same fat used in the pan (e.g. melted bacon fat) - no salt and pepper. Put face-down in skillet, casserole, or other container. Cook at high heat until browned (2-5 minutes). Turn heat off.
Cover pan with foil, then (using appropriate heat shielding) turn upside down (i.e. sprouts now rest on the foil and are covered by the hot pan). Leave for 5-10 minutes.** Remove and briefly toss with a small amount of salt and pepper.

**This softens them up without requiring you to flip them over. You can probably leave them for longer, actually.

Log - 8/6/2012

Great day

Warmup - As usual

OHS - 45, 65. Tried 85, failed immediately.

Squat - 95, 135, 185, 225
275lbs - 5x5
Got Deng and Pete to cue me on these. Excellent results ensued. Hitting 315. It looks like I'll actually have it the day before my birthday. Sweet.

Bench - 45, 95; 135
167.5lbs - I don't remember. Something like 5, 4, 4, 5, 2
These are getting progressively less paused. That said, it seems like a lot of people are finding that TnG carries over fairly well to paused but not as much in the other direction, so maybe I should be less anal about this. Whatever.

Chins
Today's chins are brought to you by the numbers "4." 58 total, would have been 60 but I did a couple of triples. Had a weird pull in the front of my neck; deal with it by angling my eyes up a bit higher during later sets. For some reason this helped despite a total lack of conscious changes in head position.

FatGripz Rack Pull:
132.5lbs - 5x5
Volume day. Wednesday is 2x5 at 110, Friday will be working up to 1x5 at 147.5.

Front Squat Hold:
315lbs - 5x15ct
Ok, these are challenging now.
320 next time.

Log - 7/31/2012

Deadlifted two days ago; got 1 set of 5 at 320 and then 2 sets of 3+2, then called it a day. Low back is still sore. I credit this to not eating enough on Saturday and don't plan to repeat that mistake. I'm also going to see if I can continue losing weight with three high-carb days per week; this time I'm just experimenting because I have to wake up early tomorrow and don't have time to cook (forgot to put ribs in before I left for the gym), but if I'm still weighing in lower I'll switch over now rather than in a few weeks. Also worth noting that with that level of carb intake I can reasonably do some conditioning on my off-days. Probably switching training to Sat-Mon-Wed so I can avoid the "late training, early PT" thing. Also going to email Allen about extra PT for my leg and some maintenance on my neck, since the ulnar nerve thing is acting up.

Warmup - Abbreviated. Wrist hurts on overhead squats (lateral pain on right side). Weird that it's 1-sided. Will investigate.

Squat - 95, 135, 185, 225
270lbs - 5x5
Did more of a breathing squats approach here; very methodical, as I've previously tried to be with good results. Some sets ended questionably, but the last one was pretty good. Getting a heavier GM effect here; have to keep reminding myself about all the tight back cues.

Bench - 45, 95; 135
165lbs - 5, 5, 5, 5, 4 (5F)
One of the earlier sets (I think #3) had me hit the foam roller on the first rep. I won't credit that with the final failure but it certainly didn't help. 4 on the last set is enough to go up, though, so whatever.

Chins -
Didn't tally up the chins from today but most of the sets were 3 so I assume I hit at least 45 total.

FG Rack Pulls:
130lbs - 5x5
Reasonable holds here. I called it a day after the terrible deads on Sunday so this is a little out of whack, but I can probably fix it (particularly with the schedule change).

Front Squat Holds:
305lbs - 5x15ct
Easy as fuck.

Log - 7/26/2012

Trained with Eric today and wound up teaching some people to bench, so this took way longer than it should have. Kept a good rate on the squats, though.

Warmup - As usual

Overhead Squat - 45, 65
Just working on these as part of the warmup. Not sure if I'll note them again, but I figure they're a decent alternative to the lower-weight squat warmups (same motion but less forgiving, especially given that 45 feels like air).

Squat - 95, 135, 185, 225
265lbs - 5x5
My hip was acting up today but didn't complain much over these.
My IT band/quad, on the other hand, was still pretty bad. I'm going to schedule an appointment with Roghair to get it looked at in detail. Taking a slightly closer stance seemed to help.

Bench - 45, 95; 135
162.5lbs - 5x5
Longer rests. Harder, but fuck it, I don't plan to squat 315x5x5 by pussying out when it gets hard and the same applies here.
Need to work on keeping my ass down; wide stance. It's funny how my technique always runs back to that one thing (among lots of others, but I remember that one specifically from past meets etc.).

Chins - A few, with some during the squats and bench

FG Rack Pulls:
45, 80, 100, 120, 140 x5
I'm thinking I'll do the rack pulls exclusively with the TM and not the holds. See how it goes week to week.

Front Squat Holds:
295lbs - 3x15ct
Working back up from here

EDIT: Weight loss update
I'm currently sitting steadily at about 170. I dropped down closer to 165 last week but have gained back up from there, and intend to reverse that.
Major changes right now are that I'm probably going back to a more APD-style approach and eating a small lunch and a huge dinner rather than a huge breakfast and a small lunch. I'm probably going to reduce the meal sizes slightly as well.
The other big thing is that I'm no longer allowing myself gelato as a post-training meal.
We'll see how far those two get me. Failing all else, I may wind up adding sled work back in on the weekends and adjusting my training schedule to facilitate that.

Log - 7/24/2012

Training alone, late in the evening, on at most 1500 calories, after two days with less than 8 hours of sleep each. Funny the circumstances under which you can hit PRs without seriously aggravating week-old injuries.

Warmup - The usual. Removed the hamstring stretch (stretching at home) and started doing some active release-esque stuff on the lower IT band (see the IT Band Hell episode of MWOD).

Deadlift - 135, 185, 225, 275
315lbs - 5x5
Easy as shit.
Well, the last set may have had some slow moments, but still. It's funny that this style of programming seems to work insanely well for my deadlift, though I guess we'll have to monitor my meet performance before drawing any really strong conclusions. Still, 365 for 5x5 looks very doable and predicts an all-time deadlift PR (grip allowing).

Press - 45, 80
115lbs - 5, 5, 5, 5, 4 (5F)
Probably could have had a full 5x5 but I got a bit carried away going into the 5th set and fucked it up. Still advancing.
Haven't decided if I'll do 117.5 or 120 next time. I'm guessing 117.5, given my past success with microloading.

Chins - 4, 4, 3, 2, 2
...I didn't do any of these throughout the rest of the workout. I'll start that up again on Thursday.

FG Rack Pull Holds:
5x10s - 100lbs
Just realized I was only supposed to do 2 of these. Oh dear.

Pilates:
5x5ea for 5ct

Log - 7/17/2012

Warmup - As usual, plus overhead squat at 65lbs

Squat - 45, 95, 135, 185, 225
260lbs - 5x3
IT Band pain is back again in full force. Also strained something in my left hip on the final rep of the final set; I'm guessing I'm favoring one side over the other and the forward lean is killing things. Driving my knees out on deads may also be contributing to this. Rest, ice, the whole party. Also need to talk to Allen about an extra PT session each week to address these sorts of things.

Bench - 45, 95; 135
155lbs - 5x3
Easy. I think the break did me good.
Now aiming for 185x5x5 rather than 225, since that'll still have me tying and possibly beating my meet PR but at 30-35lbs lower bodyweight. 225x5x5 sounds like more of a spring thing.

FatGripz Rack Pull Holds:
125lbs - 5x10s
Meh.

Log - 7/15/2012

Warmup - Usual

Deadlift - 135, 185, 225, 275 (2x double overhand, then 3x mixed)
310lbs - 5x5
Working on lat tightness. I'd like to get video here to see if my back is too horizontal at the start of the first rep - I'm not sure if I'm setting up properly.
Pulled a muscle in my back. Brian says it's probably my teres minor. Argh.

Press - 45, 80
115lbs - 5, 5, 5, 4, 4 (5F)
I think I could have had a 5th on the 4th set if some dick hadn't come over and started doing chins in the middle of the set. Whatever, I'm probably just rationalizing. I'll get it next time.
Not doing chins here helped; I may make that the standard policy and just do my chins outside of the main workouts. Two-a-days, anyone?

Chins - Total of like 25. This wasn't a good day.

FG Rack Pulls -
5x 135, 145, 155, 150, 150
Seems 150 is my 5RM. Texas Method approach starts next week, albeit with holds (based on 145) instead of these. Or maybe I'll do the 5-rep for all of it at the start and see how it goes.

Log - 7/13/2012

Warmup - Usual

The GHRs are getting a lot easier. Might have to start adding weight, or doing them as an accessory again.

Squat - 45, 95, 135, 185; 225 (4)

260lbs - 5x5

Started cuing myself based on a recent Jason Pegg video - thinking of the set as a series of singles and doubles rather than a continuous block of 5. Concretely shifting over to this seems to help.

My knees are coming in more. This disturbs me. I'm also falling forward a lot more, though past experience tells me this is a cuing issue.

Floor Press - 45, 95

120lbs - 5x5

Working on keeping my right shoulder blade locked down for these. This actually seems to suffer with the "Push yourself away from the bar" trick; not sure why.

I pause these for a three count, if anyone's wondering why the weights are so low. I mean, I also started low and suck at benching right now, but this is probably lower than most would expect.

Chins

Totaled to 50 again, though this time I only got to 45 with the main workout. Got 6 going into the first set of squats. I'll be picking up one of those magical "doesn't screw in but still stays in place" bars from Brian soon so I can do these at home. Ideally I'd like to hit 50 per day.

Pilates

5 sets of 5 reps each side with 5 count

We'll just call this 5x5x5s

Thinking I'll start doing these on deadlift days and do both these and the heavy supports. I figure I need more ab work.

Log - 7/11/2012

Warmup

Deadlift - 135, 185, 225; 275 (had to split this up a bit)
305lbs - 5x5
Keeping my lats very actively engaged makes a huge difference here for both bar path (and therefore the ease of the movement) and how my shoulders feel at lockout. I need to emphasize this.

Press - 45, 80
115lbs - 5, 5, 4, 4, 3
Not what I would have liked, but at least I don't appear to have regressed. I'll get this next time. May consider going up in 5lb increments in future, given how long it takes me to get the full reps anyway.

Chins: Totaled to 48 with the normal method, then did two extra at the end just so I could hit 50.

Rack Pulls: 135, 225
10s - 275, 295, 315, 335, 315
Calling 335 my ten-second max. Let's see if the FatGripz actually do drive this up.

Log - 7/8/2012

Warmup

Squat - 45, 95, 135, 185; 225
255lbs - 5x5
The thigh pain only comes up when my knees cave; this time I focused harder on preventing that from happening, and it worked out rather well.

Floor Press - 45, 95
115lbs - 5x5
Low and slow.

Chins - Totaled somewhere in the 40 zone for the entire workout
Pilates - Going back to these because it felt like core strength was limiting my squats. Turns out I lost the effect.

I'm switching my carb intake to backloading (i.e. high-carb days only become high-carb AFTER training; prior to that it's the usual drill). I'm sticking with two high-carb days per week rather than 3 for the time being, though.
Considering adding an evening meal.

Log - 7/3/2012

Today, on the other hand, was fucking awesome.

Light warmup

Deadlift - 135, 185, 225; 275; 335
300lbs - 5x5
Know that I've had a decent lesson in strap use, these were a lot easier. I'm still not convinced I'm holding a good back position, but I'm not too worried. I also started working on the same "footwork" I use in a squat - rotate outwards, spread the floor, and knees out. This made a huge difference and let me keep the bar closer to my body, and as an added bonus scraped off all of my deadlifting scabs on both thighs. Had some issues with my right shoulder feeling like it was being tractioned out slightly, but I doubt that was actually what was going on (i.e. fairly sure it's an issue of muscular weakness/tightness/whatever).
Hit 18 chins here.

Press: 45, 80
115 - 5, 5, 5, 3, 4
Lost my mental focus on set 4. Sort of regained it on the 5th, but wound up deciding to cut the set short because "I'm repeating the weight anyway."
Not as many chins here; I think it was 13.

Chins: 2, 2, 2
Shrugs: 45, 135, 225, 275 all for 5
High Rack Pulls: 315, 335 (holds)
Strapped Shrugs: 1x5 with 335, then a couple of reps with 335

Log - 7/1/2012

Well, that was unsuccessful.

Warmup. Switched to single-side glute bridges.

Squat - 45, 95, 135, 185; 225; 280
250lbs - 5x5
Got through the first set fine, but the later ones had the IT pain come back. I "solved" this by reracking the bar when it got too worrying and rolling out the lower end of my thigh, then unracking to finish the set. I think I had to put it back twice for the last one (I believe it went 1+2+2). I was extremely pissed for the last two reps and, strangely enough, went through both without any pain at all.

Bench: 45, 95; 135; 180
160lbs - 1x5
Had to do TnG.

Dips: 3x5

Floor Press: 1x5x135lbs

Torn between TnG bench and Floor Press.

Logs and Updates

6/21/2012

Warmup

Squat - 45, 95, 135, 185; 225; 280

250lbs - 5, 5, 1

Shooting pain at the bottom of my right IT band. Nothing on first set, last few reps on second set, from the start on the third set. We'll see where this goes.

Bench - 45, 95; 135; 175

155lbs - 5x5

Having a spot helped a lot. The longer rest probably also made a difference (Saarni was responsible for both of these, though I could have prevented the second if I'd wanted to).

6/28/2012

Warmup

Deadlift - 135, 185, 225; 275; 330

295lbs - 5x5

Straps are sliding on the bar; I probably need to work on the technique for setting them up. Brian came along and offered some advice for them.

Press - 45, 75

112.5lbs - 5x5

I'm guessing rests and a training partner helped with this, but the difference between these sets and the ones I was doing before was phenomenal.

I think most of the difference came from a slower and more methodical pace. Solid rests between reps and somehow not running out of air seems to help a lot.

---

Updates:

Twelve-hour workdays across two jobs (very, very voluntary - i.e. it actually sort of goes against both bosses' advice, albeit not against their wishes as long as I can stay productive) mean I'm training either early in the morning or late at night. I've gone for the mornings and moved my food intake to reflect that. Current plan (still needs a bit of refining):

Sunday - Carb breakfast; Train; Carb brunch; cheat window; carb "snacks" (i.e. PSMF but with rice)

Monday - Small breakfast; medium brunch; protein-sparing modified fast (chicken breast)

Tuesday - Small breakfast; train; large brunch; PSMF

Wednesday - Small breakfast, medium brunch; PSMF

Thursday - Carb breakfast; Train; carb brunch; PSMF

Friday - Small breakfast; large brunch; PSMF

Saturday - Small breakfast; Small brunch; PSMF

I should be fine maintaining/losing with this, and can adjust variables as needed. Large meals will probably be ribs, small will probably be chicken wings. I'm not sure on the mediums yet; steak and sausages both probably work.

I'm skipping my scheduled deload for this cycle because I've trained about 3 times in the last two weeks, and have thus already effectively deloaded. Yay.

I may restart creatine fairly soon; haven't decided.

Log - 6/19/2012

Mild upper back injury. The pain's already almost entirely gone, though some of that may be because I rubbed Capzasin across the area yesterday evening. That shit is powerful. And fun.

Warmup

Deadlift - 135, 185, 225; 275; 325
290lbs - 5x5
Decided that from now on, the singles will be set at roughly 10% over the work weight (specifically, WW/0.9 - i.e. the work sets are 90% of the singles). In the interest of facilitating recovery, I'm going to apply this to Squats and Bench as well, though squat singles with 315 aren't that challenging right now.

Press: 45, 80
112.5lbs - 5, 5, 4, 4, 3 (4F)
Tweaked my back on the failed rep. I fell back into my hold habit of shifting left for harder reps and something sort of...well, died. Went home immediately after this.

I made it to 31 chins between those sets, though, with the opening set being a full 5 reps with strict posture. I credit this improvement to my habit of doing chins whenever I'm bored, and will look into getting some manner of chin-up bar in Berkeley (though it will probably have to be a screw-free model that can fit in the front door - oh dear).

Rest period changes: Just realized that I'm edging in on relatively high weights. I've decided I'll increase the rest periods by 1 minute for every 8% off of the final goal (so 3 minutes as of about 75%, 4 no earlier than 85%, and 5 no earlier than 92% but hopefully closer to 95%).
Weights for this:
Squat: 3 minutes whenever; 4 starting no sooner than 270, and 5 no earlier than the 290-300 range
Bench: 3 minutes starting at 165; 4 no sooner than 185; 5 starting no sooner than 205-210
Deadlift: 3 minutes starting now; 4 no sooner than 310-315; 5 no sooner than 335-345
Press: 3 minutes starting now; 4 no sooner than 115; 5 no sooner than 125

I'm fairly sure I've hit somewhere in the 30-50 range for chins on off-days, too. Speaking of which, off to do more, then roll out my upper back.

Log - 6/14/2012

Warmup

Squat - 45, 95, 135, 185; 225; 275, 315
245lbs - 5x5
It's funny how easy these get if I just start insulting myself between sets. Apparently calling yourself a pussy is a great way to stop being one.
That said, I forgot to pause 315, and may have cut my depth somewhat. I'm sure they're still legal, but I don't like knowing that I'm being (mildly) inconsistent.

Bench - 45, 95; 135, 185
150lbs - 5x5
Failed the final rep; Zerchered it back into the rack and redid it. I suspect this is happening because my grip's closer and I'm forced to do my own unracks; doing a quarter-tricep extension to get it out of the rack shouldn't make a HUGE difference, but I can see it causing some fatigue.

Chins
I believe today totaled to 25.

Front Squat Holds:
305lbs - 3x15ct
Had to leave prematurely because the gym closed. I'm going in the mornings from now on.

Log - 6/12/2012

Warmup - As usual

Deadlift - 135, 185, 225; 275, 315
285lbs - 5x5
Nothing really to note here, except that straps are annoying and I really want hooks.

Press - 45, 75
110lbs - 5x5
These were something of a fight.

Chins - No idea. "A few."

FGRP Holds:
147.5lbs - 5x10s

Log - 6/7/2012

Warmup - Added Reverse Hypers, because I could. 20 reps with a single 45lb plate. This was not enough weight and I shall use more next time. I'll probably also do some extra sets at the end of each workout.

Squat - 45, 95, 135, 185; 225, 275, 315
240lbs - 5x5
2-minute rests prevented this from being fun. Good music helped to counter that.
I'm thinking I'll push up to 3-minute breaks once I'm up around 250.

Bench - 45, 95; 135, 185
145lbs - 5x5
Intermission here for a brief rant.
There aren't a whole lot of things a barbell needs to do to feel "complete" in life - it needs to be long enough to hold the plates it's supposed to support, sturdy enough that it doesn't bend under the weight of those plates, and "sharp" enough that people can get a good grip on it. As with a lot of other gyms I've been to, World Gym has an excellent selection of barbells (SSB, 8ft Squat Bar, Deadlift Bar, Cambered Bar...), but outside of the specialty ones almost none of them have a significant knurl or competition ring spacing. Say what you will about the Cal RSF, but the bars there are at least grippable. And competition standard (as far as I can tell), which is also important. The last set of these was actually a 2+3 because getting my grip set was such a pain in the ass that my forearms gave out.
Rant over.
I started off using one of the regular benches, but since nobody was there to spot and I had an excellent cage ten feet away I moved back to the rack and pressed in there.

Chins:
4, 1, 3, 2, 2
3, 2, 2, 1, 1
2, 2, 2, 2, 2
32 total.
Some of this is probably due to excessive rest around the bench setup (took about half an hour before I started the work sets), but yay. I also may have "accidentally" yanked my shoulder in a weirdly therapeutic fashion on one of these.
Doing these is actually kind of odd for me - World's uses straight bars whereas the RSF has the middle set at an angle, and my chins have gotten a LOT better very quickly now that I'm using the former rather than the latter. Maybe I'll start doing these off of a barbell or something when I get back to Cal.

Front Squat Holds:
295lbs - 5x15
Fair bit harder than last time. I'll hit 305 next time; no need to rush to 315.

Log - 6/5/2012

Deadlift deload day. First time training at World Gym in San Diego; I like some stuff about it, dislike others. Overall I'd rather have my own stuff, but whatever.

Deadlift - 135, 185, 225
280lbs - 5x3
I spent most of these paying almost no attention to my back position, and paid for it with some unpleasant aches over the following day. Warming up seems to help.

Press - 45, 75
110lbs - 5x3
No real trouble here.

Chins:
3, 2, 2, 2, 1
2, 2, 2, 2, 2
2, 2, 2, 1, 1
Total of 28

FatGripz Rack Pulls:
145lbs - 5x10s
The bars are World are a bit thinner than the ones at the RSF, so this was a lot easier than it would have been back home.

Log - 6/2/2012

First deload since I switched back to LP. This gave me a chance to notice some nagging flaws in my technique.

Warmup

Squat - 45, 95, 135, 185

235lbs - 5x3

Still working on my unrack here, mostly. The unrack makes the rep, so flaws in the walkout are a very significant problem.

Bench - 45, 95

140lbs - 5x3

Somewhat better here, though still not where I'd like it to be. I suspect a lot of the problem is the upper back complaints I've been getting since I increased my chinning volume (see below).

Chins: 2, 1, 1, 1, 2 (I think)

I totaled somewhere between 25 and 30 for the entire workout; I got something like 3, 2, 1, 2, 2 during the squats, and that's where most of the increase is from.

I'm not changing the progression, though; the goal is still one extra rep per workout starting Thursday. My minimum for next time is 27, not today+1. I may change that if I'm consistently going up by more (which isn't all that improbable given that I'm dropping weight and doing a LOT of chins), but for now I'm not looking for too much. Maintaining +3/week gets me over fifty by the end of the summer, and that point I can probably start working on consolidating them into 5x8 or something. THEN adding weight (and probably subbing out the Dead day chins for dumbbell rows).

Front Squat Holds:

275lbs - 5x15ct

Weight's going up next time. I've done these before at 295 but wasn't sure what to expect this time; clearly the pilates got my abs stronger, though, because this was even less difficult than it was when I weighed 20lbs more.

Face Pulls:

15lbs - 5x10

With 3ct holds.

The increase in chinning volume seems to have caused one of the upper back/shoulder muscles on my right side to tighten up very significantly. As a result, after I finish a set, the back of my shoulder feels like it's tearing apart. I'm confident that this is a muscular problem and not further labral tearing because rolling some musculature in that area (I suspect it's the rear delt, but I'm not sure) for a minute or so alleviates it and keeps it from coming back. Unfortunately, the amount of pressure required in the rolling is pretty extreme, so actually doing it is a pain in the ass. From the looks of things, the solution to all of my problems is massage (hardly unusual).

Log - 5/31/2012

Warmup

Deadlift: 135, 185, 225; 275, 315, [365 - Again, didn't budge. Not retrying]
275lbs - 5x5
That was fun.
Unfortunately, my right side isn't activating properly, so some of these were fairly unpleasant.

Press: 45, 75
110lbs - 5, 5, 4, 4, 5
Funny how this happens right before I start adding in scheduled deloads.

Chins:
2, 2, 2, 2, 1
Total of 25 today. 3 before the first deadlift work set, then singles and doubles before the others. The "trick" here is to keep tension in the lats and not go to a dead hang after each rep - most of the doubles would have been singles on Tuesday.

FatGripz Rack Pull:
145lbs - 10ct, 10ct, 10ct, 10ct, 7ct
These are now exclusively for Deadlift days. Ab work will go in their place on Squat days for the time being (I'm tempted to do shrugs instead, but neglecting core strength seems foolish); I'm going to start just using Front Squat Holds again.

Pilates - Random crap for the first two runs

Face Pulls:
20lbs - 10
15lbs - 2x10 with 3ct hold
Turns out you can stop the 20lb and 10lb bricks from sticking to each other by slamming the weights back into the stack. Who knew?

Deload on the next two training sessions.

Log - 5/29/2012

Warmup (including Overhead Squat)

Squat - 45, 95, 135, 185; 225, 275, 315

5x5 - 235

My quads completely locked up after doing these, for some reason. Strange.

Bench - 45, 45, 95; 135, 185

5x5 - 140

Chins:

2, 2, 2, 2, 2

My shoulder tells me that the last few couple of doubles were a bad idea.

Also did 2 before the first squat work set and one before the rest (i.e. went up by 2 rather than 1 over last time).

FatGripz Rack Pulls:

5x10ct - 140lbs

Moving up, slowly but surely.

Plate External Rotations:

10x 5s, 10s, 10s

Shoulder started complaining somewhere during these.

Band Dislocates:

1x10 (Orange)

Log - 5/24/2012

In Maui.

Deadlift - 135, 185, 225; 275, 315
5x5 - 270
Attempted 365 for the warmup but it didn't break the ground. I intend to rectify this on Thursday.

Press - 45, 85
5x5 - 107.5
Nice and easy. This may have something to do with my facing a mirror for the entire set, though.
(More likely it's because I took most of a week off, obviously).

Power Shrug: 45, 135, 225, 275, 315, 365, 405
5x5 - 315
1x20 - 315
Damn these are awesome.
My traps were sore for about 4 days afterwards.

Also got a copy of The Strongest Shall Survive from the front desk of the gym (Valley Isle Fitness). Pretty decent place, all in all.

Log - 5/19/2012

Squatting with Saarni. That was fun.

Warmup - Experimenting with very close foot placement on GHRs. The effect is very noticeable.

Squat - 45, 95, 135, 185; 225, 275, 315
5x5 - 230lbs
315 was a grinder, probably because of the five second pause at the bottom. I'm guessing that I'll stop increasing the single weight after I move it to 365, but I don't really know yet.
I'm gradually refining my form and re-learning my unrack. Today's insight is that initiating the rep by pushing my hips back is fucking stupid and I should never do it ever again.*
*It results in my hips shooting up out of the hole and forcing me into a GM, even with the relatively vertical torso position.

Bench: 45, 95; 135, 185
5x5 - 135lbs
The 185 single was terrible, but everything else was fairly good. I suspect the problem is a combination of having forgotten how to bench 185 and not getting a liftoff (meaning an atrocious self-unrack), but whatever.

Chins: 1 before every work set and after squats, and then
2, 2, 2, 2, 1
Yeeeeeup.

FatGripz Rack Pull:
10ct - 135, 145, 145, 135, 135
These are a lot harder than the old-fashioned towel deads.

Log - 5/18/2012

Went in with very little time and very little food. Fucked shit up. Life is good.

Warmup

Deadlift - 135, 185, 225; 275, 335
5x5 - 265lbs
Strapped work sets. Still getting used to setting the straps up; I may get some Haulin' Hooks at some point just to cut down on the time required compared to setting my grip normally. 335 was slower than usual (possibly because I rested for a total of maybe two minutes between starting 135 and finishing the entire warmup sequence).

Press: 45, 75
5x5 - 105lbs
This is starting to take some effort; funny how that comes up on the final weight before I start using the microplates again.

Chins: 1 rep before every work set of Dead and Press
2, 2, 2, 1, 1
Total of 19 reps. Next time, we add one.

Towel Rack Pulls:
5x10ct - 205lbs
Forgot the Fatgripz again.

Rollouts:
3x5
Still getting too much tension in my shoulders from these. I'm still trying to figure out what I'll use here.

Log - 5/13/12 and 5/15/12

5/13:
Had to cut this short due to unforeseen time constraints.

Warmup

Deadlift - 135, 185, 225; 275, 315x1.5
5x5 - 260lbs
Started using chalk today. Things improved slightly, but not so much that I'll keep going completely bare on my work sets. I need to learn to use straps (or possibly buy some hooks).

5/15:
Starting to feel like the Texas Method, possibly because it was a long work day and I haven't been sleeping as much as I should.

Warmup
Squat - 45, 95, 135, 185; 225, 265, 305
5x5 - 225lbs
Fun milestone. The "Texas Method" feeling comes from the sets sucking despite being very doable and taking all of 30 seconds to recover from - this probably has something to do with the 2-minute rest periods. I plan to maintain those for a while, because fuck you.

Bench: 45, 95; 135, 155
5x5 - 130lbs
Finally closing on a weight that doesn't make me feel embarrassed to sit on the bench between sets.
These didn't feel that great, though that may be because I'm both tired and playing around with my setup. Setting my grip before my arch actually does appear to be a useful strategy.

Chins:
3, 3, 3, 2, 1
I'm going to go back to the "do reps between sets of everything else" approach, starting with singles. I could get more reps if I didn't insist on strict back position, but since I do, we're stuck with low.

Rollouts:
5x5
Skeptical of these.

Log - 5/9/2012

Fairly successful, though training with friends results in increased rest times. I know you're reading this. Yes, you.

I need to figure out some better ab work; the pilates movements I'm doing right now are getting far too easy. I think I'll try rollouts again on Friday.

Squat - 45x5, 95x5, 135x5, 185x5, 225x3, 295x1 (5-second pause)
5x5 - 220lbs
Held the final rep for roughly ten seconds at the bottom. The ascent was...slow, to say the least. My position collapsed in the hole and gave me some mild low lumbar complaints, but that should be easily preventable in future.

Press: 45x5
5x5 - 100lbs
Side-to-side imbalances on these, probably because I've spent a great deal of time over the last few days writing and did a lot of scapular stabilization work at PT this morning. These were made harder still by the many sets of push-ups I did Monday night and early yesterday morning; I'm fairly sure that I shouldn't read into the difficulty I had in actually doing the reps.

BS Chin Holds:
5x10ct
Again, slipping from the top. I'll see how these go on Friday; if they don't display noticeable signs of improvement I'll start doing reps on the straight bar.

"Fat Bar" Rack Pull Holds:
10ct - 185, 185, 195, 195, 205
Wrapped a towel around the bar. Bolton's article on the subject suggests that this should be harder than the fatgripz, but I'm guessing he was wrapping more towels. Certainly harder, though.

Pilates:
5x5ea
As noted above, I need to find some new stuff for this.

Log - 5/5/2012

I think it's time to start chalking my deadlifts.

Warmup - As usual. My hamstring flexibility is improving - I can almost force myself into an straight-leg deadlift stance without losing lumbar position now.

Deadlift - 135x5, 185x5, 225x3, 275x1, 315x1.5, 335x1
5x5 - 255lbs
Grip is becoming a limiting factor on these. The reps themselves are very easy, though, so I guess it's time to bring out the chalk.
I'll try a 315 single with the chalk and see how it goes; if it works out, we'll keep doing those, otherwise I'll just switch to mixed grip and take the weight higher.

I'm going to start integrating Fatgripz Partials into the end-of-day circuit. I'm not sure if I'll do this exclusively on deadlift days.

Bench - 45x5, 95x5, 155x1
5x5 - 125lbs
This was bizarrely tiring.
The single was very easy, though. I'm going to take it up roughly in time with the work sets.

Blast Strap Chin Holds
5x10s
These had me in various stages of failure, though; the first hold was at the top, but the others had me gradually sliding down.

Pilates:
5x5 - "The Complete"
Marching, but with thoracic flexion and some oblique recruitment, followed by a transversus abdominis maneuver that gets more raised eyebrows than supine bridges ever have. Since I can do these 5x5 now, it's probably time to start doing them on a roller.

Overtraining and Other Bullshit

Disclaimer: I am not an accomplished lifter, a coach, or anyone else that you should actually listen to under any circumstances or for any reason.
---
People talking about beginner programs (and odds are that if you're still reading blogs and taking other peoples' unpaid advice on your training, you are indeed still a beginner) love to talk about how you should only train a certain number of times per week, should only increase at a certain rate, shouldn't deadlift too frequently, and all other kinds of annoying crap that far too many people listen to. Rippetoe seems particularly guilty of this (always justifying his statements with "Because we found that less wasn't enough than more was too much," which while sound in principle is annoying as hell given that people were producing amazing results with 5x5 BEFORE he showed up and said that five sets was too much), which is part of the reason that I think he's a pussy.

Here's the deal: If you feel recovered and want to train, go train. If you prefer sticking to a schedule (which I do, to some extent), cool, but if you're a beginner and wake up the morning after a PR thinking "I could totally do more today...and I really wanna go to the gym," go do more. If you wake up the next morning thinking "...that was a bad idea," then either don't do it again or try an alternate rep scheme, or don't increase (or, further still, straight up reduce) the weight, or play around with another movement. Experiment with this shit - don't let some guy with a book dictate everything about your training to you, especially if that guy is just some random idiot on a forum.

"B-b-b-b-b-but I might overtrain," I hear you think - and I call bullshit. "Overtraining" gets bandied around as this insatiable boogeyman who's just outside, hiding in the shadows and waiting for you to train ever-so-slightly-too-hard so he can jump out and steal your nervous system, and this is absolute crap. The whole "There's no such thing as overtraining, just undereating and undersleeping" mantra is just as stupid in many ways, but for beginners, it's a hell of a lot more relevant - you are just starting out, your brain is only just now realizing that it can do things like synchronize signals to motor units to make muscles contract harder, and you are recovering so quickly that "1-rep max"-based programs are completely irrelevant because your max increases fast enough that the percentages change completely after every session. Very few people will ever reach a state of actual overtraining even ten years after they start lifting seriously, and overreaching (essentially overtraining-"lite") is relatively rare among those who "listen" to their bodies and back off when they have to.

The most important benefit of getting in the habit of trying extra sessions per week - even if you don't increase the weight in line with whatever linear progression you're following, if that is your situation - is that, if you pay attention, you should get plenty of information with which to figure out what works, what doesn't, and where your limits are. Just assuming that your program is "good enough" will get you a reasonable distance, but if you ever want to become actually strong, you're going to need to get a little crazier than that. Starting early and getting in the habit of experimenting can't realistically hurt you (given that you can progress so fast that one poor choice will set you back by at most about two or three days), and will do you a lot more good in the long run than just sitting around talking about "recovery." You're a newbie. Recovery isn't something you need to worry about. Shut the fuck up and lift.

Log - 5/2/2012

Trained with Saarni today. Need to make a point of lining this up more in the future (easy enough).

Warmup - As usual, including Overhead Squats

Squat: 45x5, 95x5, 135x5, 185x5; 235x1, 285x1 (long pause in hole)
5x5 - 215lbs
Paused the final rep of the final set for 5 seconds. I was tempted to go for ten, but got bored.
These were largely effortless, which is always nice.

Press: 45x5, 95x1
5x5 - 95lbs
Forgot that I'm not doing singles on these anymore.

BS Chin Holds:
10s, 10s, 5s, 8s, 8s

Pilates:
Assorted. Doing the oblique/upper/march component as a single movement for 5 each leg (ideally), then doing the TVA movement for 5. Probably switching to doing these on the roller after next time. Alternated these with the chin holds.

Mild Diet Revision

One thing I didn't realize about intermittent fasting is that after a while, you simply stop feeling hungry. The 4-hour window dictated by the Warrior Diet might sound like a terrible limitation, but I can say from my experience yesterday that after not eating for an extended period of time - especially overnight - you (or at least, I) basically have one low-carb meal and I'm done. Yesterday was this week's lower-calorie day - I got through my probably-larger-than-it-should-have-been "lunch" (T-Bone steak and roughly a pound of lamb sirloin) and was then essentially unable to eat anything until I went to sleep. Duly noted - limiting myself to a pound of meat for that lunch. Possibly less, if it's on the fattier side.

However, in light of the discovery that I can realistically eat nothing for 36 hours and then only manage one low-carb meal, I'm going to attempt an alternative arrangement:

Sunday - Medium Dinner
Monday - Small "lunch" and massive dinner. (8-hour window) (TRAIN)
Tuesday - Massive dinner
Wednesday - Small "lunch" and massive dinner. (8-hour window) (TRAIN)
Thursday - Massive dinner
Friday - Full-day fast
Saturday -  Textbook Rampage day (TRAIN)

The inconvenience of Friday will (in theory) be offset by my eating carbs fairly constantly on Saturday. I'll give the current setup another week and limit myself with Monday's lunch, but...yeah.

Also, Rampage Day will be shifted forward next week - apparently boyfriends are included in Mother's Day celebrations, so I get to go to an extremely fancy buffet, at which I will gorge as I have never gorged before (...or, rather, in recent memory. I'm sure I've gorged more heavily at some point in the past, but that remains to be seen).

Log - 4/30/2012

Time constraints.

Deadlift - 135x5, 185x5, 225x1, 275x1, 315x1.5 (double overhand to knees, down, mixed to lockout)
5x5 - 250lbs
Having to reset for the last two reps now.

Bench - 45x5, 95x1, 145x1
5x5 - 120lbs
Most of these were fairly bad, but the last was actually well-executed. This is all technique-wise, of course. Weight-wise it was a walk in the park ("Yeah, no shit?").

Chin Holds:
5s, 10s, 5s, 5s, 10s
No blast straps today

Full-day fast yesterday went fairly well, though I think I'll need to include a small meal at the end. I also need to be more moderate with my "lunch" on Mondays; I ate enough a few hours ago that I don't have any urge to eat right now, which is a problem.

2012-03-27 Deload Deadlift

Deadlift - 135, 175, 215, 255 (for 5)
Then 3 singles at 305. First one was done relaxed; meh speed, meh difficulty. Second one was still hook-gripped but done harder; decent speed and fairly easy. Third was full competition setup. Easy and fast.

Also did a 135 Press single before the deads, then a much easier one right afterward. It's funny how I forgot how much of a problem it is if you set up "relaxed."

Log - 4/25/2012

I'm pretty sure my switch back to "3 per week" rather than "Every other day" will pay off now. Not deloading for about another two weeks, though.

Warmup

Deadlift: 135x5, 185x5, 225x1, 275x1, 315x1 (mixed)

5x5 - 245lbs

I actually had to stop and reset for the last few of these. My grip is giving out (this is a recovery issue and not a strength one; I was hitting easy sets of 10 at 225 as an accessory about a month ago).

Bench: 45x5, 95x1, 145x1

5x5 - 115lbs

I'm losing the abdominal bracing from pilates. I'm blaming fatigue for this one too, though I suspect I could be doing more to regain it.

Chin Up Holds:

7s, 5s, 3s, 3s, 3s

Blast straps; easier on the joints, harder on the movement.

I have progress pics now, but they're on my girlfriend's camera and I don't know how to get them off.

Dietary Update

Well, that didn't take long.

I'm currently sitting (or, rather, sliding) around 180lbs with pretty respectable sustained weight loss. However, due to a variety of factors, I'm switching from the straight up Apex Predator approach as Jamie writes it into the "actually fasting" equivalent.

I have a few reasons for doing this:
1) Convenience. Drinking a tasty 500mL protein shake is a hell of a lot easier than going out and actually making food, but it's considerably more annoying than not consuming anything at all, especially given that I'm somewhat limited in how often I can go to make more. This is a relatively weak reason, but it certainly played into my thought process on this.

2) Expense. In fairness, I doubt this will actually save me a whole lot of money, but protein powder - while cheap - gets a little pricier when you're buying 15lbs of it each month. I know I haven't actually hit the month mark yet, but I'm a nerd and do budget calculations in my spare time, so piss off.

3) Gas. This could be avoided if I switched back to straight Whey Protein Isolate rather than using the Concentrate that ON sells, and it's not a huge factor, but I actually get gas now. I haven't had gas in a fairly long time (pretty much since I cut out all pasteurized dairy).

4) I was planning to do it eventually anyway (partly for the above reasons and partly because I seem to have acquired a small amount of my girlfriend's dislike of casein...and partly for the below reasons, I suppose) and figure that I might as well use the period right as my classes end but shortly before my finals start to do it.

5) I recently found myself inundated in (relatively) famous and respected people jumping on board and saying it's at least decent, probably because of a recent study demonstrating that while there's no difference in mass lost between IF and Caloric Restriction protocols, the IF one actually does do a better job of preserving lean mass. These famous people then enlightened me about a metric asston of other benefits, notably including longer life, clinically-verified improvements in insulin sensitivity, and better cognition (though I should note that the last one seems somewhat conditional - John Berardi noticed that his creative thinking seemed pretty inhibited during the fasting window, at least on the daily IF protocol he tried [see Leangains, Warrior Diet]).

So, the plan is essentially the same as it was before, only now I'm nixing the protein shakes and presumably making up the difference with more meat. For those who care about specifics, the layout will probably be roughly:

Sunday - Fast. Possibly small dinner, depending on how much this day winds up sucking
Monday - Medium/Large "lunch" and massive dinner. (8-hour window) (TRAIN)
Tuesday - Massive dinner
Wednesday - Small "lunch" and massive dinner. (8-hour window) (TRAIN)
Thursday - Medium, lower-fat dinner
Friday - Small "lunch" and massive dinner (8-hour window)
Saturday -  Textbook Rampage day, but with only an 8-hour total eating window (TRAIN)

Training on Saturday will take place before the Rampage window. Once my bodyfat's down to single digits, I'll add a "Lunch" to Sunday and Tuesday. I may take all fasting-related restrictions off on Saturday, depending on how I feel.

So yeah, it's basically textbook Predator Diet, just sans all protein shakes and with more specific windows imposed for eating. The actual windows will probably wind up being more like 6 hours because I'm a busy man, but whatever.

I will provide progress pictures today.

EDIT: Oh, and carb-free liquor is allowed. I think I mentioned this previously, and the "I drink like twice a year" thing still applies, but I figure I should throw that out there.

EDIT 2: From rereading Lewis's material, I've suspect that my first Monday "lunch" may be rather on the large side. We'll see how this goes.

Log - 4/23/2012

Added Yohimbine HCl to the stack. The stimulant effects were very, very apparent.

Warmup - Added Overhead Squat (set up with BTN Push Jerk)

Squat: 45x5, 95x5, 135x5, 185x1, 225x1, 275x1
5x5 - 205lbs
Paused the 225 and 275 reps, along with a few from the main sets.
Fatigue was noticeably lower than last time, though the Yohimbine+Caffeine throughout the day may have had something to do with that.

Press: 45x5, 95x1, 135x1
5x5 - 85lbs
Yeah, I'm just going to stick to 115 for the next few singles. I'll murder 135 later.

Blast Strap Chin Holds:
15s, 12s, 10s, 10s, 10s
Got distracted teaching someone how to Deadlift; I have a hard time resisting that temptation, especially if when people actively seek my advice.
Anyway, the setup I was considering last time worked very well, and I'll be using it in the future.

Marching + Extensions:
5x5ea
Need to advance this again.

Log - 4/21/2012

Fatigue is starting to set in; I may actually take an extra rest day this week (i.e. not just go every other day the way I have been - part of that's a matter of convenience, but still).

Warmup

Deadlift - 135x5, 185x5, 225x1, 275x1, 315x0.5, 1

5x5 - 240lbs

Got 315 past my knees double-overhand, then put it back down and immediately pulled an easy single mixed.

Grip was giving out on the 240 sets too (this is part of my indication that I need to take some extra rest, honestly).

Bench: 45x5, 95x1, 145x1

5x5 - 110lbs

These are getting easier, which leads me to believe that I'm not activating my abs properly.

Some mild shoulder discomfort on a few sets; the issue appears to be related to tightness.

Chin Holds:

5s, 10s, 10s, 10s, 10s

Doing reps to get up now.

I'm going to set up the Blast Straps to do these in future; they should be ok if I set them up the way I have been but then thread them through the adjustable pull-up handles at the back of the rack. I was getting sufficient elbow and shoulder discomfort today that I think the switch will be a good idea.

I then left and ate three pounds of icecream in about ten minutes.

Log - 4/19/2012

I was unbelievably tired going into this - which is odd, because I actually caught up on sleep somewhat last night.

Warmup

Squat: 45x5, 95x5, 135x5, 185x1, 225x1, 275x1 (paused in hole)
5x5 - 200lbs
As usual, the work sets got better as they went. That said, this was a lot harder than it should have been - not even weight-wise, I was just so fucking exhausted for some reason.

Press: 45x5, 95x1
5x5 - 80lbs
Increasing the single weight next time. I'll probably do 135, just for kicks.

Chins:
5 10-second holds (getting easier)
1 pretty excellent full rep
Wanted to try doing these without a fixed wrist angle, but it the blast straps are too long to work. I'm thinking I'll make some PVC rings with short straps and hook them up to the "you set the width" rotating handles already on there.

Face Pulls:
3x10
Ropes are too short, so these aggravate my wrists somewhat. I'm guessing I'll just deal with this, or possibly switch to inverted rows.

Suped-Up Marching:
5x 4ea
Basically the same as marching, but extending at the hip and knee of one leg for each inhale and flexing back on the exhale. Dramatically harder.

Once classes finish I will probably post some analyses of some "Nuggets of Wisdom" I recently unearthed on Reddit. Foreshadowing: The first thing I look at will come up wanting. Severely, severely wanting.

Log - 4/17/2012

Diet update: Started mixing Whey and Casein together for shakes. The shakes aren't particularly palatable (though they're certainly tastier than the plain whey ones), but are "good enough," as they don't make me retch and become tolerable with salt. I doubt this will have a huge effect on my results, but the expense increase isn't anything noteworthy.

Today's training went well, especially considering that I only got 3 hours of sleep last night.

Warmup - omitted bridges and GHRs due to the risk of someone else stealing my equipment

Deadlift: 135x5, 185x5, 225x1, 275x1, 315x1 (alternated)
5x5 - 235lbs
I'm not sure that I could have taken 315 double overhand either way, but I believe that some of the bars at the RSF are getting "loose" and rotate too easily relative to the collars. I'm also fairly sure that the one I was using today was somewhat smoother than the ones in the Annex, presumably because people are scared to go in the Annex thanks to people like me (when I'm lifting heavy, at least - I can't imagine anyone being scared off by the weights I'm currently using). Most of these sets were done with about two minutes' rest; it seems I can probably continue doing this without much issue, and suspect that it will enhance my weight loss somewhat.
I'm starting to get the hang of the eccentric for touch and go - both sides now contact the floor at about the same time.

Bench: 45x5, 95x1, 135x1
5x5 - 105lbs
Hilarious.

Chin-Up Holds:
3x 5-8s
I appear to have developed a significant trigger point in my upper back.

I also need to stop neglecting my ab work and shoulder prehab.

Log - 4/15/2012

I spent today walking around in a rather annoying haze and wishing for sleep.

I need to remember to keep my caffeine intake relatively steady, and get some yohimbine.

Rolling, Bridges, Glute-Hams, Back Activation, Hamstring Stretch

Squat: 45x5, 95x5, 135x5, 185x1, 225x1, 275x1

5x5 - 195lbs

Keeping a rigid torso position makes a huge difference here.

It's funny how tightness remains the name of the game, but becomes a lot harder now that I can't just let my low back take over for everything else.

Press: 45x5, 95x1

5x5 - 75lbs

Still ridiculously easy.

Chin-Up Holds:

15s, 15s, 10s, 10s, 10s

The later sets were a little sketchy, but still tolerable.

Time constraints and helping a friend with his deadlift got in the way of ab work. Distractions are for the weak, and I do not intend to fall to them in the future.

Log - 4/13/2012

First refeed (Rampage) day today. I'm stuck on the same kind of schedule that I use...well, virtually every day, so rather than moderate-carb low-fat food (e.g. Jamie's low-carb tortillas with lean ground beef) I just went with adding 40g of maltodextrin to each of my shakes. I'm not sure how strongly that played into my brief period of drowsiness earlier this afternoon.

I'm about to go and consume outrageous quantities of food on someone else's dollar, so I'll cut the chatter there and just get right into the Iron part.

Warmup - Standard rolling, upper back warmup, bridge, GHR

Deadlift: 135x5, 185x5, 225x1, 275x1, 315x1
5x5 - 230lbs
Managed 315 with a double-overhand grip without too much trouble. The singles should take it from "Doable" to "Easy" - one thing I'm liking about this approach.
The other big thing I'm liking about it is that it makes light weights feel even lighter. 230lbs was so easy that my form probably broke down a bit. I'm getting better at touch-and-go, though, so that's a plus. I need to work on keeping my upper back rounded forward somewhat (and, as a result, setting up with the bar even closer to my shins).
I did several of these without breathing, by the way.

Bench: 45x5, 95x1, 135x1
5x5 - 100lbs
Doing strict, well-executed reps with your ribcage locked down is unbelievably tiring.

Pull-Up Holds:
5x10s

No abdominal work today; was already behind the clock for PT. Turned out I was actually VERY behind the clock and had missed my appointment, though Allen had (as usual) scheduled an extra one with someone else right afterward without telling me. The second appointment was (as usual) extremely useful - and (again, as usual) I'm going to have some more appointments with that therapist. This time it was a PT Assistant focused on getting rid of trigger points (hence the priority on seeing him again - some of them I can get myself, but there are a lot of nooks and crannies around the shoulder joint that I can't release on my own).

Log - 4/8/2012

The awesomeness has died down somewhat, but the weights are ludicrously light right now so it didn't matter. I also still managed to get more amped than usual, which is promising (someday I will write something about the placebo effect and why people need to shut up about it, but for now I'll just go with "and anyone who says that it might not be because of [badass reason here] can go fuck themselves.")

Warmup: Foam rolling (lateral on the IT band), lacrosse balls for upper back (paused between rips). Supine bridge, GHR, banded GM stretch. Standard shoulder warmup.

Oly Squat: 45x5, 95x5, 135x5, 185x1, 225x1, 275x1
5x5 - 190lbs
Essentially no rest between warmup sets. The single was pretty easy, though technique can always get better.
The work sets (and there may have been six of them) took longer than they had to - old coworker wanted to know how I got so much smaller.

Press: 45x5, 70x5, 95x1
4x5 - 70lbs
Yeah, fucked up with the warmup. Oh well.

Chins: Holds in perfect top position
1x15s, 4x10s
Did a rep after the last hold. Was a bad idea.

Abs: "Marching"
5x2ea - 5 breaths
This is an exercise my physical therapist forces me to do. It's dramatically harder than it should be, so you can bet your ass that I'm going to keep doing it until it's easy.
For a mental image: Lie down, knees at 90 degrees, feet flat on floor. Take breath into belly, then exhale and pull navel to spine. Raise first leg to 90 degrees of hip flexion, than second leg. Breaths should be pushed "back" - if you did it standing, your shoulders wouldn't rise significantly.

And now, ribs.

Dietary Bullshit: Current Standing

I'm going to preface this entry by saying that I woke up this morning (or "this noon," since my girlfriend and I didn't get out of bed until about twelve - I blame this on her) feeling ready to murder a train. If you find this statement objectionable, feel free to tell me why, as you clearly know something I don't about both murder and trains.

The background on this is pretty simple: Since I kicked off my introductory "keto run" on Monday, I just had my first straight-up (modified) fasting day yesterday, and it sucked. Reading through Jamie's article on the early phase of the diet (particularly if you're fat, which I currently am, albeit not too visibly), I was mildly confused by his comment that your Sunday lift will be awesome - even with some extra solids, it didn't seem as though the day after a fast would be the best day to go smash some weights.

Well...that confusion has (partly) vanished now. Once I got out of bed I felt murderously awesome and was very mildly tempted to just go to the gym and squat my ridiculously light weights for the easiest 5x5 since my third week on the Texas Method. I still don't understand the mechanism behind this, but I'm a believer. That said, my scientist brain is already identifying alternative reasons - maybe it's just that I've only now hit ketosis and rebounded back into awesomeness, maybe I just slept more last night, maybe the kettlebell swings I did on a whim before I went to sleep have changed something...but what the fuck do I care (right now, at least), I feel amazing and want to go lift shit.

Dietary Bullshit: Skippable History

Since I created this blog partly because I wanted to cover this while it was still fresh in my mind (and not on the other one), I figure some context is in order. Feel free to move ahead - the next entry will be more relevant.

Back in 11th grade, when I got off my ass and finally started lifting things, I spent about six months on Mauro DiPasquale's Anabolic Diet. This was a terrible choice for a financially-restricted stick-shaped high schooler, as it resulted in my gaining a grand total of about 10lbs in a period when I probably could have packed on about 50 (I added something like 20 in the first month off), but I've missed something about that period. The general idea was that by keeping carbohydrate intake low during the week and then refeeding on the weekends, you can optimize a crapton of endocrine factors that I didn't entirely understand then and have forgotten about now, with the ultimate effect of putting your testosterone through the roof and enhancing your lifts. I didn't feel the latter one, but I DID spontaneously go through the "complete asshole" phase of puberty during that year and see a dramatic increase in my sex drive. I suspect the lack of truly immense lifting improvement had something to do with my living on about 2,000 calories per day and training like a complete pussy for most of it.

Once I got to college, I could whatever I wanted, but I was still poor and followed something approximating the "See Food" approach for most of my freshman year. Once I'd moved out of the dorms and gotten a job, that evolved into something more paleolithic, with a corresponding improvement in my mood from the lack of gluten consumption. For the last eight months, I've mixed that with (very simple) carb cycling to help manage fat gain/loss, but then I hit a small hurdle: Lab work. Working in a lab (now two labs) and actually dedicating to it isn't conducive to cooking three meals per day, and since I'm a cheap asshole with some restrictive food prohibitions, it's pretty inconvenient to eat out. I'd been introduced to Jamie Lewis a few weeks before the job picked up, and after my first "accidental fasting day" decided to just go all-in and try the Predator Diet. That was about a week ago (the actual switch started Monday). A recap/overview of basic reasons for my choice:
1) For all but one day per week, this approach has you consuming nothing but low-carb protein shakes for most of the day (pretty handy when your job sticks you in a sterile environment for 8 hours per day) and then gorging on meat in the evenings (pretty handy for a guy who, y'know, loves meat). It's technically "semi-gorging," though - after a certain point in a carb-free meal, your brain throws in the towel and you suddenly need an incredible level of willpower to take another bite.
2) The remaining day is a structured carb refeed with a 3-hour cheat window. This should sound familiar, given that with this piece in place you're basically following the Anabolic Diet with some modified fasting.
3) Jamie Lewis has been doing this for a fairly long time and is an absolute monster, which suggests that it at least CAN be executed with effective results.

Oh, and there's a decent clinical reason that alcohol won't hurt it. I'm not a big drinker, but at least with this I can get a single-malt Scotch without worrying about progress consequences. I doubt this will come up very often, though.

In the Course of Recent Events...

You may be wondering why I've decided to create a separate blog for training purposes. The short answer is "because I can." The longer one has something to do with my having a strange obsession with separating different ideas, and not wanting to bore people interested me as a lifter (yes, all two of you) with details of the rest of my life (or vice versa - again, yes, all [presumably other] two of you). It's possible that one or other of these will pick up traffic at some point, and again, I'd rather stay topical if that happens.

Since I didn't update the other blog since first touring Princeton, I'm going to assume that anyone reading the entire thing neither knows nor wants to know anything about who I am or what I've done in the last four years. This is a helpful assumption, because:
A) Nobody is going to read this
and
B) I don't want to explain any of that

I will give a few mild points, though, the first being that I'm an engineering student, and as such am used to making a lot of helpful assumptions, "momentum is conserved" chief among them. That won't be relevant here, though.

The main one for this blog is that I lift weights, and enjoy doing so. The background for everything I'm likely to say for the next six months is boring, but I'll keep it short:

I've been at this for about five years now. I've used various programs and had some success, but burned out about five months ago after a fairly productive run of a Linear Progression program (essentially the currently-in-vogue Starting Strength, but with more deadlifts and consequently more balls) followed by a murderous run of the Texas Method (essentially the one advertised in all related Rippetoe materials, but with fewer deadlifts, no benching, and consequently only half as many balls). I hit a 405x2 squat at a pretty fat 205lbs, then took about two months off  to focus on school. Then I tried 5/3/1, which started out well but didn't agree with my abnormal-labrum-afflicted-but-in-therapy right shoulder and did relatively little to build up my squat and deadlift. As a result, when I lifted in competition last week I was only able to post a 1,003lb total in the 198s (375 Squat, 225 Bench, 400 Deadlift).

Since my shoulder is recovering, I'm losing weight, my squat needs some technical work, and my deadlift sucks, I figured that continuing with 5/3/1 was probably not the best plan. Linear Progression worked last time, benefits from ridiculously low starting weights, and (done at a volume not worth spitting at) should aid in my shoulder rehab, so I figured it was a good bet. The program's pretty simple, so I won't explain it here - if you're actually reading this and don't already know what it looks like, you'll figure it out pretty quickly. If you're reading this a week from when I post it and need a hint: sled dragging and sets of 100 reps of Kettlebell Swings are called "conditioning."

Going back to the "losing weight" thing, I've been underweight for most of my life and finally got up to something respectable around the end of last summer, walking around at 5'8" and 205lbs. Thing was, I was fat. That was fun, and I look forward to being big again (not as fat, but big), but to do that, I figure I should probably get lean. Originally I was just shooting for about 180lbs, but since linear progression will take some time to ramp up, I need some other physical pursuit to follow, so I'm now shooting for 165lbs or ripped as all shit - probably the latter - and maintaining once I've hit that.

Meet Report

That was, uh...weird.
Overslept because my alarm doesn't go off on weekends
Got a speeding ticket on the way up because we were in a hurry
Got there and discovered that the weigh-ins wouldn't close for about an hour
Realized almost immediately upon arrival that I had forgotten my singlet at home
Frantically attempted to procure replacement singlet or get someone to drive mine up, wound up borrowing Saarni's for about 5 minutes until two of the heavyweights offered to let me use their XLs. Seems I fit pretty nicely into an XL, which is...silly.

They completely rearranged a lot of the organizational stuff; flights last time were all lightweights, all middleweights, all heavyweights, whereas this time it went Girls&Bench Only, all Light and Middleweight Raw men, all heavyweight and geared men. Not sure if this actually helped to even stuff out, though it did make things a bit easier for the loaders, so w/e.

Can't remember exact kilo amounts, BUT approximate poundages:
Squat: 315, 340, 375
Bench: 180, 200, 225
Dead: 365, 400, 430 (failed)

Squat and Bench attempts should have been higher. Deads have sucked for me pretty much since I stalled out at 405 for 3x5 last summer, so whatever. The Deadlift Bar is supremely awesome and if I do put together a home gym I'm almost certainly going to get one. Circular plates are amazing and I hate the RSF for getting rid of them now. Urgh.

First squat felt heavy but wound up being almost effortless. Second one I started to lose forward but didn't have much trouble GMing up. Third I very slightly lost forward but caught pretty nicely. For some reason this resulted in me grinning for the second half of the rep and cracking up after I racked it.

Bench opener was hilariously easy. Second was as well (despite my having to pause at the start of my setup to put my straps up). Third felt a lot slower but apparently it went up pretty fast. Going to stick with thumbless CG (or MG, depending on where you define things. Pinkies on rings.).

Deadlift opener wasn't as fast as I'd've liked. I was pretty psyched up for the second attempt since I'd picked it specifically to hit 1000, and couldn't move the 3rd.

Saw some pretty ridiculous squats (mostly Chris Buffington putting up 800 as a 198) and a near-miss on a 750 deadlift from a guy who vaguely resembles Dave Tate. The "Blue Whale" from the Diablo meet was there as a bench-only and failed a ~585 bench at least twice (pretty much exactly as he did at Diablo); it'd be kinda sad, but he also bitched the judges out at least once, so I'm opting for "funny" instead.

Max Aita was there as a handler for a fairly strong (and reasonably attractive) girl in the 165s. Didn't manage to get his autograph before he left, but I'll manage it next time.