[Chumbaniya]

I'm a bit busy for proper exercise today, but I did 10.5km on my bike at a reasonable speed just getting around, which is a nice bonus. As I was in town and close to the gym I contemplated going in for a bit of upper body work as the last couple of days have just been cycling, but it isn't really worth it - I'm hardly missing out on it, and I'll just undo any benefit if I leave myself without enough time to recover for my next session if I get a chance to do one tomorrow.

[Chumbaniya]

I was over in Rugby yesterday and went for to the gym with a friend who wanted some advice on lifting as he'd recently started a membership and didn't really know what he was doing in terms of weights. We managed to do some decent work on squats and bench, but unfortunately the gym didn't have bumper plates (which is odd, because most gyms tend to never have any plates which are pure metal but in this case all of them were) so we couldn't do any deadlifting. Obviously I wasn't too focused on my own lifts, but I did get some decent triples done.

Squat
(some stuff)
90 x5
(belt on)
110 x3

The triple was pretty easy. As the rack there had the safety bars a little higher than I'm used (and I'm really short) I couldn't squat to the depth I normally like so I reverted to a wider stance style and squatted to just below parallel. I'm confident I got the depth, but it wasn't substantially below like I'm used to. Apparently my friend overhead some guys talking about how it was nice to see someone squatting properly for a change - a statement then backed up by the fact that a guy came in, put 4 plates on each side, and proceeded to perform squats where the bar travelled a distance of about 6 inches in the entire movement.

Bench
(some stuff)
60 x5
70 x3
72.5 x3

Last rep on both of the triples was a bit of a struggle, but definitely allowed me to illustrate the point I'd made to my friend about tightness in the back giving a stable platform to push from when it gets heavy - the bar was moving smoothly throughout. I'd certainly be capable of more if I was in practice benching more heavily, but it's something I'm usually pretty conservative with.

Barbell Rows
55 x8, x8, x8

Then a little pissing about overhead pressing that I don't really remember.

EDIT: Forgot to mention the bars at this gym (LA Fitness) which were really odd. The bar we were squatting with was full size (or thereabouts - maybe a little thinner) but with plastic ends, and it felt like it must have been 10kg (the squats above are assuming this). Then the bar on the bench was a pretty ordinary 20kg olympic bar, which made me annoyed when I realised because we could have squatted with it. Then the bar we used for rows and overhead pressing was a short bar, but with metal ends, which I estimated was 15kg - this was short enough that it only just managed to fit onto the squat rack for the pressing. It was pretty weird. Why they didn't just have a bunch of 20kg olympic bars I don't know - they certainly don't have any need for 15kg women's olympic bars because they have fixed weight barbells that light and nobody could do any olympic lifting there due to the lack of bumper plates and platforms.

EDIT 2: Another friend I was training with and getting into some pretty ordinary 3x5 strength training a while back now wants to train with me again - after we stopped training together, he got a hernia while squatting, which I'm really hoping wasn't anything to do with my instruction (I was pretty happy with his technique on the big lifts) - I think he just went for more than he could manage as he got very keen pretty quickly and wanted to up his lifts as fast as possible. So hopefully we can start training together again as he's pretty much fixed now, and I can make sure he doesn't get ahead of himself and takes his time working back up to where he was.

[Chumbaniya]

Some days you just aren't in the mood for a proper session, so you derp around instead. Thus:

Power Cleans
20 x some (hang cleans)
40 x5
50 x3
60 x3, x3
20 x some (hang cleans)

These weren't too bad, I suppose. 50 felt easy but I shouldn't have upped it to 60 because I really need to work on my technique a lot. After the main sets I practised regular cleans as opposed to power cleans, because I'm really lousy at getting under the bar for a proper clean.

Push Press
20 x some
40 x5
45 x5, x5

These hurt my shoulders and wrists and were terrible. I could probably have just overhead pressed the same sets and reps. But it's ok because today was set aside as a derp day! More derping follows:

Incline Bench
20 x10
40 x10, x10, x10

When unloading the bar before these I put down a 15kg plate sloppily and it smashed my finger into the corner of the metal upright on the bench. I was pleasantly surprised it wasn't broken.

Seated DB Curlz
17.5 x5

Let this be a lesson to anyone neglecting curls. Don't assume that, having hurt your shoulders earlier in the session, you can curl what seems like an eminently reasonable weight given your other lifts. These were hilarious and terrible. Clearly I'm going to need to sub all of the squats for curls in my sessions over the next few weeks to address this imbalance. Girls like leg guns better than arm guns anyway. Right? Right???

[PinkMobilePhone]

You're hurting your shoulders, you're hurting your wrists, and you're half smashing-in your finger bones!

Be careful dude!!

[Chumbaniya]

(Original post by PinkMobilePhone)
You're hurting your shoulders, you're hurting your wrists, and you're half smashing-in your finger bones!

Be careful dude!!

My shoulders felt like absolute crap the next day, and in trying to stretch them out I really screwed over my right shoulder for quite a while.

Only had one session since then (Sunday 10th) which I forgot to record:

Squat
40 x5
70 x5
90 x5, x5

Before the 3rd work set I lay down on the floor and my lower back felt sketchy. It's probably just a natural consequences of squatting then stretching my spine out like that, but I decided not to go for it.

Incline Bench
20 x8
40 x6
45 x6, x6, x6

Lat Pulldowns
35 x8
50 x8, x8, x8

DB Shrugs - mainly as a grip exercise.
35 x10, x10

Heading to the gym in a few minutes as well.

[Chumbaniya]

Today:

Squat
40 x5
(belt on)
80 x5
100 x5, x5, x5

These were really good. Solid, probably the deepest working sets I've ever done, with a good bounce at the bottom. I overhead a guy saying to his friend "Now that's a squat!" in the middle of one of my sets, which was nice.

Overhead Press
20 x6
35 x5
45 x5
40 x5, x5

The set at 45 was fine, but my shoulder didn't feel perfect and I don't want to aggravate it, so I dropped down for easier sets at 40.

Pull Ups
x4, x4

I AM SO BAD AT DOING PULL UPS

EZ Bar Curlz
bar+12.5 x10, x10, x10

I am really bad at curls. These were really difficult. Woe is me.

[Chumbaniya]

Today:

Squat (high bar)
20 x8
60 x5
(belt on)
85 x5
102.5 x5, x5,x5

They'd moved the squat rack, and it's now in front of a mirror that only allows you to see yourself at the top of the squat. I actually like this, because I can see where the bar is for the set up, but without a visual cue for depth I just decided to go pretty much ATG every rep, and without the feeling of needing to stop myself a couple of inches below parallel I was able to be snappy on the descent and get a good bounce. I really enjoyed these.

Bench
20 x5
40 x5
50 x3
60 x5, x5, x5

These were pretty easy but I didn't feel confident doing more without a spotter because unracking the bar was a little awkward and made me lose my set up a little.

Chin ups
x5

I had to jump to reach the bar, which I'm used to, but for some reason this time it really pulled my lats quite painfully and I didn't want to cause any damage, so I left it there. A little disappointing really.

[McHumpy92]

Good squatting. You should get full strength back fairly quick.

[Chumbaniya]

(Original post by McHumpy92)
Good squatting. You should get full strength back fairly quick.

Now that I'm starting to feel comfortable in the squats again (last 2 sessions felt really good) I think I can pretty consistently add weight for a while. It'll be a bit different to before, though, as it used to be all low bar, powerlifting style squats. Though I've always been pretty quad dominant, so I don't think a high bar squat of a given weight is noticeably more difficult than a low bar squat of the same weight for me. I was able to front squat 120 when I could low bar back squat 145.

[Chumbaniya]

Why am I so lazy?

Today's session:

Lat pulldowns
30 x8
55 x8, x8, x8

I wanted to start with squats but the rack was in use. I asked the guy how long he'd be and he said he'd just started - he then proceeded to do a bunch of curls with the empty bar. He seemed nice enough and let me know when he was done, but the rest of his session consisted of two types of wrist curls and some really low weight tricep pushdowns - I felt a little sorry for him really.

Squat (high bar ATG)
20 x8
60 x5
(belt on)
90 x5
105 x5, x5, x5

Same as last time - really bombed the depth on these and it felt great. My upper back actually felt a little more taxed than usual, but that's to be expected as I've normally done no back work before I squat. Once again I got compliments on my squatting - the guy asked if it hurt my knees squatting that deep, so I suspect he's used to half squatting without breaking at the hips properly.

Overhead press
20 x5
35 x5
45 x5, x5, x3

These didn't click for me today. I don't think the failure in the last set was a strength issue as much as it was me not quite finding a comfortable position. I think I was still worrying a little about my shoulder, although it didn't cause me any trouble today.

EZ bar curlz
bar+12.5 x10, x10,x10

Tricep rope pushdowns
32 x10, x10, x10

Just thought I'd do a little accessory stuff. I'll often poke fun at curls, but I do have genuinely weak biceps and it would be a bit dim to ignore that because I wan't to avoid looking like just another bench'n'curler.

[Chumbaniya]

Pretty shoddy session today.

Deadlift
60 x5
80 x5
100 x5, x5

I'm just bad at deadlifting at the moment. Form was terrible. These weren't hard, obviously, but they just felt sloppy. I think I need to try putting light deadlifts into more sessions just to get my form right.

Rows (with the bar attached to a pivot on the floor - still don't know what these are called)
+15 x8
+25 x8
+30 x8
+35 x8
+40 x8

Don't ask why I used variable weights - I don't know either.

Bench
20 x8
40 x5
60 x5, x5, x5, x5

Not sure why I had the 4th set. I suppose these were just too easy but I already knew I was having a bed session and didn't have much confidence.

[Chumbaniya]

Decent session today. Pretty low on energy, but I managed to get some decent squats out before I got shaky on the other exercises.

Squat (high bar)
20 x8
70 x5
(belt on)
90 x5
110 x5, x5, x5

I didn't feel like I had that much energy, but with squats I usually seem to be able to pull out a bit extra even if I'm not at my best. These were tough and left me pretty drained, but at the same time I never felt like I was in the slightest danger of not completing any of the reps, and I was happy with how they went. Afterwards things weren't too solid, but I just dropped the weights down and got on with it:

Overhead Press
20 x6
30 x5
40 x5, x5, x5

DB Row
25 x10, x10

I found 4 pints of milk for 48p in the reduced section at Sainsbury's, so I've got that to chug through tonight. Yum yum yum.

[Chumbaniya]

I forgot to record yesterday's session. So here it is:

Bench
20 x8
40 x5
55 x5
65 x5, x5, x5

This was pretty easy, but again I didn't have as much confidence as I could due to the less than perfect set-up I get without having a spotter. Still, I'm sure I could quite easily do 70kg even without changing this.

Front Squat
50 x4
70 x3, x3, x3

Deadlift
(regular)
60 x5, x5
(sumo)
60 x5, 90 x5

This was all technique stuff. Nothing hard, obviously.

Lat pulldown
45 x10, x10, x10

[Chumbaniya]

Today:

Incline Bench
30 x8
40 x8
50 x8, x8, x8

Pretty damn easy actually.

Pull ups
5, 4

I AM SO TERRIBLE AT PULL UPS.

Squats
60 x5
(belt on)
92.5 x5
110 x5, x5, x5

I would have upped this from last time but I didn't feel confident because I'd barely eaten anything before the session and didn't trust my energy levels. It turned out these were good, and the last set was quite easy, so I could have done 112.5kg.

Barbell Rows
20 x8
55 x8
50 x8, x8

After the aforementioned lack of food, I decided to make up for it by eating 3 dinners tonight. It was awesome.

[Chumbaniya]

Forgot to log my session yesterday. I missed a session on Thursday and took it fairly easy yesterday as I'm not completely well (just swollen glands in the neck, no biggie) and I was a tad hungover. Went for higher rep stuff as I didn't fancy the big weights.

Squats
20 x8
50 x10
70 x20

Not too difficult actually. On a good day I think I'd manage 20 at 80kg.

Barbell Rows
20 x8
50 x8
55 x8, x8, x8

Tricep rope pushdowns
36 x10, x10, x10

Only did these before benching because the bench was busy.

Bench
20 x8
50 x8, x8, x8

[Chumbaniya]

Forgot to log yesterday's session too. I need to be more diligent. Still not feeling perfect, so pretty soft again.

Lat pulldowns
40 x8
60 x8, x8, x8

Overhead press
20 x8
40 x8, x8, x8

+ a few cleans at 40kg

Sumo deadlift
60 x5
80 x5
90 x5

I think I'll be ready to actually go heavy next time I'm in the gym (probably Saturday).