Month: September 2019

WED WKOT

Followed same routine as MON WKOT, added a bit of weight where I could, added reps where I couldn’t. According to my somewhat arbitrary accounting, Wednesday’s workout increased total workout volume by 5.86% over Monday. Pretty good. Making progress. Total time was about 110 minutes, very little dilly-dallying but I did try to get 2.5-3 minutes rest between sets.

My overall goal is to keep increasing *weekly* volume indefinitely because that is a somewhat arbitrary measure of overall progress but easily quantifiable.

Felt a weird twinge in the lower right ab/groin area doing Zercher squats. Not painful but something felt off. Gonna have to pay attention to this. Also didn’t really fully extend the Overhead Presses so need to pay more attention next time. Otherwise everything went rather well if I do say so myself.

Felt pretty good all day after Monday’s workout, started feeling increasingly sore Tuesday, felt better this morning before working out, so the DOMS were rather limited. We’ll see how I feel tomorrow.

MON WKOT

Did first proper workout with new weight set. Switched things around a bit, did 4 sets each major exercise. Did Zercher Squats instead of Front Squat, put on some more weight for these, definitely felt it. Felt pretty good overall right after the session, definitely have that post-workout “flavor” in my body, not really a feeling of fatigue but that buzzy, spicy, electric feeling that comes with proper exertion. Total session time was almost two hours though maybe 10 minutes was helping change out a furnace filter. Or rather “supervising” the effort by which I mean standing around doing nothing.

Now just gotta wait until Wednesday. And eat food. And rest.

Back on the bandwagon

Image stolen from the Dick’s Sporting Goods website, used for illustrative purposes.

Got a 300# “Fitness Gear” brand Olypmic barbell set from Dick’s Sporting Goods the other day, total cost $225.69. Pretty happy with it. Wanted to get a new barbell set for a long time now and realized I’m not getting any younger, etc. so now’s the best time to get started.

Did the first workout with it yesterday. Pretty light workout, mostly to get reacquainted with barbell work after a couple-few years of calisthenics. The workout consisted of a warmup set and 3 sets each of the following:

  • Overhead Press
  • Front Squat
  • Bent Over Row
  • Deadlift
  • Pushups
  • Farmer’s Carry

Normally one might suggest a different order to the lifts but there is a method to this madness: The OHP is first so I’m not too tired to lift the bar above my head, Front Squat second so I’m not too tired to clean the bar to the starting position, Rows next, again so I’m not too tired to get the bar to the starting position. Deadlifts come before Pushups because I want to have enough strength for them and my Pushup strength is already pretty developed compared to the other exercises so I try for failure here since the likelihood of serious injury from this exercise is minimal. The Farmer’s Carry is just to polish off the forearms and really make them burn.

I intend to continue this routine at a relatively light weight 3x/week for the next 4 weeks to improve form and build up connective tissue strength. At that point I suspect my connective tissue will be strong enough to switch to a different program to focus more on heavier weights. Also, at that point I plan on acquiring a rack and bench.