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Friday 27 April 2012


So in terms of lifting, everything is going well, I feel as I am getting more powerful and stronger. I am gaining weight, my arms, back, chest, shoulders are looking much bigger, I am still fitting into my old pants, which means my waist has stayed the same around, which means I am gaining muscle primarily. I feel like I am starting to get that "I look like I lift look". I havent weighed myself in a few weeks now, but last time I checked, gym weight was around 173-174, which is decent. I'd like to be up at 180 before the summer ends.

I am eating around 200-250 g of protein each day, with whatever carbs and fats, although I try to keep those within boundaries, obviously I am not gonna be eating large fries everyday, but I am starting to throw in some carbs during each meal now. It is hard to stay energized and focused when I am eating low carbs, and because I am doing so much physical activity, I feel like the carbs will really help my performance. Drinking a lot of milk, atleast 1L a day, I feel like this has helped me a lot, its a good way of getting calories in, and it has decent amounts of protein. I would recommend milk as one of the top mass gainers to be honest.

I am current playing basketball on a rep team outside of school. I can almost dunk a basketball, on days where I feel good I am getting 4-5 inches above a 10 foot rim, which is very good, especially since I have gained 10-15 lbs in the last 4~ months. I am very happy about that. In school, I am playing on the varsity rugby team, I am starting so far, which is good since this is my first year playing. The team is good, so far we are 1-0 with our second game this Monday. My conditioning is still good, im starting to do some higher rep squats just to keep pushing my conditioning levels.

Aside from lifting or whatever, I've been pretty busy, I have lots and lots of school work. I havent been sleeping as much as I would like to these days, all my extra curricular events and school are keeping me really busy, I havent been updating as frequently either. Its a good thing to stay busy, my youtube channel is doing well as well, although I havent been pushing it as much, as soon as the school year ends though, I will be making a lot more videos and may even invest in a HD camcorder rather than using my familys digital camera.

Thanks for those who check in regularly, I appreciate the support guys

Here is a recent training video that I uploaded recently:

Saturday 21 April 2012

Last Few Workouts (12,13,14)


4/17/2012

front squat - 253 for 3/3/2, 231 for 5
bench - 190 for 3/3/4!, 165 for 6, 154 for 8
pull ups - +75 for 5/3/3

4/19/2012

B squats - 130kg (286) for 3x3, 115kg (253) for 7
press - 121 for 3, 121 for 2/2, 100x8, 100x8 weird pressing day, did them in my squat shoes, tipped over a buncha times
row - 190 for 3x5, 154x20 (rest paused) pretty easy
core work

4/21/2012

f squats - 255 for 3x3!, 225 for 2x3 paused
bench - 195 for 3/3/4!, 165x8
pull ups - 10, 35x8, 60x8, 60x6, 60x5, 10
dips - 10, 20, +25x10
core work

good fucking workout.

Friday 20 April 2012

Red lights

Fucking red lights everywhere this week.

Anyways this week was kinda shitty, not too shitty, some things went well but kinda shitty. So I really got to get on top of my studying, I am getting somewhat distracted by facebook and other shit, but I can fix that. My youtube is going well, I am at 17 k + hits, and almost all my more recent videos are hitting 1 k + views within a week or so.

I'm losing some motivation with things like school and shit, I feel like I am studying real hard for nothing, I know for a fact that I am most likely not going into sciences yet grade 12 chemistry is one of those courses that I work the most hard in. Also shit like physics is so unnecessary, yes its nice for me to have some common knowledge on how the earth works or whatever but I put so much time into studying to do well, when I can learn other shit like economics and marketing, or simply putting more time into things I enjoy like my youtube or blog.

My diet has been shitty since my week has been shitty, I've been so busy also. I had rugby practice in the morning 3x this week, a basketball practice and game, as well as a full week of classes. I have to wake up before 6:00 A.M. some days, and I am sleeping at 12-1 every night. I'm not complaining, but I always feel so fucking lethargic during the middle of the day at times, I wish I was always so pumped up and hype so that I can always be 100%.

Training has been alright, things are getting much heavier and I am starting to feel it, its good though, here is where I really make the progression. I think its a good thing maybe that my diet is a little shitty, I mean I am really able to get the calories in, I am trying to reach a goal weight of 180 without getting slower or less "athletic". At the weight I will be real good for rugby and I will start to look like I actually lift weights.

But that is enough for now, thanks for reading my rant.

I am uploading a 3 part series in regards to stretching and mobilizing the lower body for those interested.

I will also post up my training from the past week in a bit. Thanks for reading guys,


Good night! :)

Wednesday 18 April 2012

Warming Up Properly




This is a video I did regarding the importance of warm ups, and how to properly warm up before doing any sort of barbell or resistance exercises. What you guys need to remember is that any sort of sudden intense physical activity will make you more susceptible to injuries. Also, proper warm ups will reduce the likelihood of injuries and just get you into the mentality or mind state of hitting PR's and really killing your working sets.

In the video, I am doing front squats, a lot of what I say pertains more to front squats itself, and the movement. I really try to work on sitting back, and exploding out of the hole, the same thing can be said for bench press, really try talking your elbows in and engaging your lats and back into the movement.

As you can see, the warm ups don't actually take that long. Although I did speed some stuff up, the warm ups took me around 10 minutes at most. The key to warming up specifically if you are doing strength specific training, so aiming to hit weight or rep PR's is to keep the volume of the warm ups low, while having the repititions decently high. What I mean is it would be better to do multiple sets of 3-5 for warm ups rather than a large set of 10. As you can see my warm up goes like this:

barx5
barx3
50 kg x 5
70 kg x 3
90 kg x 2
105 kg x 1

And then I did my working sets. It works a lot better than doing say 60 kg for 10, 90 kg for 10 and then doing your working sets or whatever.

Anyways, thanks for watching, remember to do your warm ups properly.

Sunday 15 April 2012

Conditioning (1)


4/15/2012

did a conditioning circuit today

50 med ball slams/50 burpees/ 50 push ups/ 50 russian twists
30 med ball slams/30 burpees/ 30 push ups/ 30 russian twists
10 med ball slams/10 burpees/ 10 push ups/ 10 russian twists'

been pretty tired lately, gonna eat more and resttttttttttttt.....

Basic Protocol

Couple guys at school have been asking me how to workout, what they should do in terms of getting more aesthetic and stronger.

So honestly it comes down to what your goals are, do you want to get bigger? Lose bodyfat? Get stronger? Become more "aesthetic"?

And after you ask yourself this question, you need to ask yourself how much are you willing to change, if you want to change a physical aspect of yourself, you need to be willing to give up your time, and other things such as certain foods. If you know you don't want to change completely, don't count on reaching that goal or standard you set for yourself.

Anyhow, onto actually working out.

Most people want to do 2 basic things: get stronger and attain aesthetics.

As beginners there are a few basic routines I would recommend:

IA's SPBR, and Mark Rippetoe's SS.

SPBR can be found: http://www.ironaddicts.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8050
SS can be found: http://startingstrength.wikia.com/wiki/The_Starting_Strength_Novice/Beginner_Programs

Any version of each is fine, and will work. Each workout will take between 45 minutes to 90 minutes, depending on what stage you are at. Each routine has a focus of adding weight to the bar while maintaining good form, this means squatting to depth, touching chest on bench, and touching your chest on rows and keeping a straight back during deadlifts. Good form is meant to prevent injury and increase efficiency during the lifts. The main idea of adding weight to the bar is a good indicator for improvement, for most beginners this will be an easy and simple process and won't require too much effort, however after a few months of training, it will begin to get harder, and you will either progress slower or there will be something you need to change (diet, rest, etc.). Remember, if you to change something, your habits need to change.

So lastly, actually working out. So if you look at the prescribed routines, you will notice an exercise and then a rep/set scheme. So for starting strength, you have 3 sets of 5 for most of the exercises. This means 3 sets of 5 "working" sets, not warm up sets. Before you hit your working sets, you should always be warming up. Personally I always start with an empty bar, just to make sure my form is alright, and there is nothing wrong with my body. So, for example, if you are squatting 275 for 3x5 as your working sets you would do your warm ups as:

bar for 2 sets of 5
135x5
175x3
215x2
245x1

You could make bigger jumps or smaller jump accordingly. And see how the reps start to decrease as the weight becomes closer and closer to your working sets? This is to reduce fatigue before your working sets, so you can add weight properly. Doing something like:

barx10
135x10
185x5
225x5

As a warm up this would work, but by the time you hit your working sets your legs will be quite sore and pumped already. With smaller jumps, you also become more accustomed to the weight, and you aren't surprised by a big load or whatever. So during the working sets you need to maintain good form. As for the programs, if you don't like a certain exercise, or you can't do a certain exercise, try your best not to tweak it, these programs are meant for newbs and beginner trainees and have worked - there is a reason why I recommend them.

I'll do another post on diet some other time, but in terms of working out this is it.

If you follow the program, eat/rest properly and stay consistent, you will get strong and aesthetic, and people will be jealous.


16 Year Old Heavy Back Squats



Video from my previous training session, enjoy!

Saturday 14 April 2012

Past couple workouts.. (9,10,11)


4/10/2012

back squat - 275 for 3x3, 242x9
press - 115x3x3x6!!, 99x6, 88x5 (paused)
row - 180 for 3x5, 143x20
static holds, tricep work

- was real busy yesterday, didnt have time, uploading video right now

4/12/2012

squatted in oly shoes for the first time

fs - 253x3x2x2 damn, 220x5x5
bench - 185x3x3x6!!154x9
pull ups - bwx10, +35x8, +70x5x5x4, bwx10
dips - x15x15, +35x8

no vid today lol

4/14/2012

good training sesh today

bsquat - 280 for 3x3! 245x10!
press - 120 for 3x3, 100 for 2x6
row - 185 for 3x5, 165x10
static holdz
curlz and tri extensionz

video uploading

Hmmmmmmmm

Hm.

I had a out of the ordinary basketball practice yesterday. I felt like I could go forever, it was a conditioning based workout, so we basically did sprints and burpees and shit for an hour, with a couple of water breaks between. Although I had a long day at school, I felt fine, I wasn't tired until after. The morning after, this morning, I was dead, my lungs were huring - it was hard for me to take a deep breath. I felt fine yesterday though.

I think its the creatine to be honest. Its been working, I am pretty happy that it is, for such a low price, its definitely worth it. I've been stretching and doing mobility work lately, I am going to do a video just to demonstrate what kind of stretching/foam rolling and massage work I do, and how you can do it as well.

I am going to train in half an hour, I am squatting/pressing/rowing. I am going for a all time PR of 280x3x3 for squats, this is going to be interesting. Will have me camera, and I will also show these new squat shoes that I received. The heel on them is raised, which allows me to sit back more effectively, preventing the minor heel lifts that I've had. I am still pretty tired though, so yeah.

In terms of diet, I have been eating a lot of everything lately, I've ditched the low carb diet thing, and am mainly concerned with just getting my protein numbers in and then eating whatever until I am full. I am hoping to bulk until 180ish, and reevaluate then to see what my goals are.

Anyways, I will post in a bit

Also, here's a vid I made from one of my previous training sessions:

Thursday 12 April 2012

My training routine

Some of you guys have asked what exactly am I doing during my training.

So, here it is:

I don't schedule my cardio or speed or plyo work, I do those when I don't have sport practices or whatever and feel that I can recover enough to do them. In terms of practices, I have like 2-3 days of rugby and about 2-3 basketball practices combined with a game. Pretty busy, but its not too much work and because of my decent diet I can recover from them.

In terms of lifting, I do a combination of Greyskull LP and Starting Strength.

So in terms of exercise selection and workout days I do this:

Day 1
Front squat
Bench press
Pull ups
Dips

Day 2
Back squat
Press
BB row (deadlift)
grip work

So typically on day 1 I will superset dips and pull ups, I add weight to both of them. On day 2, every 6-8 weeks I will have one deadlift session, besides that I will be doing rows, in terms of grip work, I mainly do some static holds.

So rep set scheme looks like this:

For the squats and pressing, I go by a rep set scheme of 3x3, but on the last set I will go for as many reps as I can, saving maybe one rep in the tank for the next workout, obviously I don't want to be training until absolute failure each set as that would not benefit me, although from time to time I will fail a rep. Once I fail a lift, which is simply failing to do 3 sets of 3, I will attempt it between 3-4 times more, simply due to the fact that I may just need more chances at the weight or I may not be feeling well or whatever that certain day. If I still fail to hit the reps, I reset the weight by about 5-10% and start again.

The thing I really enjoy about this program, is that once I reset, its not a really bad thing since the last set I try to hit max reps, this allows me to hit new PRs and I don't view this resetting thing as such a bad thing but as a good thing. For example, just two weeks ago I hit a bench of 185x5, recently my bench stalled at 192 and due to how I was feeling, I reset the weight without giving it another try, just today I hit 185 for an easy 6 reps, which allowed me to see the progress I made. Bench has always been a shitty lift for me so yeah. It is nice hitting these PRs.

With the rowing and pull ups, I still follow a 3x5 because it is working still. I started off doing starting strength and I only recently stopped the 3x5 and switched it to the 3x3ish rep/set scheme, but I kept the same thing for pull ups. I try to hit atleast 40 reps though, in the warm ups and after I get my main set. In addition, after I hit the final set, I may do sets of 5/8/10 with some lighter weight just to up the volume or just for some more form practice in case I feel I need either of the two.

My training has worked well, I've went from a front squat of 165 for 3x5 to recently 250 for 3x3. Bench went form 145 for 2x5 to 185 3x3 (6 for the last set), and I've also hit +70 for 5/5/4 chins, and a 396 lb deadlift several weeks ago. Also, at the end of most workouts I will do some aesthetics work, probably spend 15 minutes doing some curls/tricep/shoulder work.

If you have any other questions just let me know, I'd be happy to answer them.

Wednesday 11 April 2012

Lately



This is a video I made regarding macro nutrients.

I sound retarded speaking to the camera but the information is there, give it a look, and tell me what you guys think. But yeah, I give a primer on proteins/carbohydrates/fats, I know there is some information that isn't too clear and could do better, also my speaking needs some help but those aren't the issues.

Anyway, I've been quite busy again lately.

Had my physics test today, could have been better but meh, I did well for how much work I put in. I wasn't expecting anything spectacular.

Rugby has been going well lately, its been a lot of fun, and its really nice how a lot of my close friends are playing as well. It feels nice having a role on the team also, and its a good way to just hang out with my friends. Training has been going well, I picked up some creatine lately, and after doing some sprints and medicine ball throws, I feel like its starting to kick in, I feel really explosive and powerful on my sprints, and I feel like my endurance is lasting. I really enjoy the feeling of being sore and just a bit tired all the time, its a nice feeling.

Cause of my sports I've been foam rolling a lot lately, to prevent injury and increase recovery, I am too lazy to do it sometimes but I know I need to since it is really beneficial. I will do a video sometime on my stretching/rolling routine sometime for those who are interested.

But thats it for now, got rugby and training tomorrow, and some homework to do still.

Easy, thanks for reading!

Sunday 8 April 2012

Training Session 8 (4/8/2012)


4/8/2012

training:

fsquat - 250 3x3, 225x6
bench - 180x3x3x6, 155x4x4x5 (close grip)
neutral pull ups - x10,+35x8,+60x6x4x4, x15
dips - x15 x15 +25x10
curlzzz

video below:




will do a more detailed write up for my routine, thanks for watching/reading guys.

Friday 6 April 2012

Training Session 7 (4/5/2012)


4/05/2012

back squat - 270 for 3x3, 231x10
press - 110x3x3x6, 99x9, 88x10
row - 176x5x5x5x5, 154x10
static holds, tricep extensions

- had rugby practice on this day also in the morning
- was charlie horsed but was still able to hit my squat reps
- charlie horse is feeling worse today, but it'll be fine
- have a basketball tournament again tomorrow

vid from the session:

Overtraining

What is overtraining? Being sore, being tired, feeling like shit?

Personally I don't believe in overtraining.

What if I told you this: If your family was captured and you were told you needed to put 100 pounds onto your max squat within two months or your family would be executed, would you squat once per week? Something tells me that you'd start squatting every day. Other countries have this mindset. America does not.

This can apply to anything, your squat, sprinting, jumping, whatever it is.

You can train everyday, and you can train hard, your body is magical, it will adapt. Yes there will be that dark period, where you dont feel like doing anything, your sore, lethargy strikes, you dont feel like talking to anyone.

How your body feels is a lie. Yes you can have sore legs, but you can still hit a personal best squatting that day, its happened to me a shit ton. Here's a nice quote I have from John Broz the coach from the U.S.A's national weightlifting team.

If you got a job as a garbage man and had to pick up heavy cans all day long, the first day would probably be very difficult, possibly almost impossible for some to complete. So what do you do, take three days off and possibly lose your job?

No, you'd take your sore, beaten self to work the next day. You'd mope around and be fatigued, much less energetic than the previous day, but you'd make yourself get through it. Then you'd get home, soak in the tub, take aspirin, etc. The next day would be even worse.

But eventually you'd be running down the street tossing cans around and joking with your coworkers. How did this happen? You forced your body to adapt to the job at hand! If you can't' squat and lift heavy every day you're not overtrained, you're undertrained! Could a random person off the street come to the gym with you and do your exact workout? Probably not, because they're undertrained. Same goes with most lifters when compared to elite athletes.

– John Broz 2002

This is true, you see this with anything.

Most people dont get over the dark period, where you feel like shit, thats why most people fail and never reach that elite category of lifters. Personally I squat heavy 3x a week, whether I am sore, in pain. Unless I am injured, and physically unable, I will continue this. I play on a rep basketball team with 2 practices a week, rugby for school with 3 practices a week, lift weights, and do cardio.

What people need to realize that training is not an all or nothing thing, it is obvious that it isn't healthy to train 6-7x a week with high intensity right away, you need to build up to it. Why do you think track athletes have a base training period, or most athletes run a GPP phase? Building up conditioning and work capacity is very important in terms of injury prevention and recovery. Slowly, they up the intensity as their season progresses and peak when its contest time, these cycles are important in reaching a "high" phase and just being successful in sport.

Obviously your nutrition needs to be right, and you should be drinking enough water, getting enough sleep, stretching, foam rolling to ensure proper recovery, but if you are doing everything properly, dont be a fucking pussy and just train for whatever it is.

Tuesday 3 April 2012

Caffeine versus Coffee

Caffeine is a compound in the methyxanthine family, but what caffeine does is, essentially it will cause increased awareness, and ultimately prevents drowsiness. From a scientific perspective, what caffiene does is, it increases sensitivity of neurons to stimuli, thus making you more aware and alert.

However, caffeine can cause the leeching of calcium from the bones, which is a factor in osteporosis, studies show that although this is a problem, milk and additional supplementation of calcium will mitigate this problem. There is also studies that show the presence of hypertension (high blood pressure) among those that consume a large portion (200mg+) over caffeine. 

The half-life of caffeine is about 4 hours though, so it makes the drug less toxic and harmful. Caffeine will also raise your adenosine receptors which basically will raise your adrenaline levels, and we all have experienced an adrenaline spike in our lives. Caffeine will however, speed up metabolism, and thus can be used as a fat burner, caffeine levels will typically peak in the bloodstream 40 minutes after consumption. If used in moderate amounts, caffeine can be used to increase performance levels and is a really good thing, however an overdose can lead to serious if not fatal consequences.

Anyhow, caffeine is not the same as coffee as it is often mistaken for. We need to understand beverages like coffee and tea do contain some caffeine, however there are other substances which effects are completley separate from that of caffeine, there is a substance, a cholinomimetic compound, which when injected into animals, will cause a decrease in heart rate and blood pressure rather than a raise, this is the opposite of what caffeine does essentially.

Caffeine by itself is also much more economical, personally I bought a bottle of 100 mg caffeine pills (100) for around 10 bucks. A large coffee has around 80mg of caffeine in it and is around 1-2 dollars each, if you do the math, caffeine is actually really cheap. 

***


Anyhow, I have a good couple of days.

Had my math test today, I feel like I did well, I got the bonus question at the end too, so I can afford to make a mistake and still get perfect. I have a long weekend coming up to, and a basketball tournament along with that. Its really hard to really get into a sport especially if you are playing two at the same time, but whatever hopefully I will be able to get by.

Also, going to go pick up my creatine tomorrow, will be interesting to see how my performance turns out once I start loading, although there may be a placebo effect, I really want to be able to train harder and just take in the results, I don't expect my numbers to just fly up, but I hope that during my heavier sets I will be able to go deeper into my ATP energy system, and bust out a couple more reps.

Anyways, thanks for reading.



Training Session 6 (4/3/2012)

So, as Twolf2 has suggested, I am going to keep my workouts and actual posts separate.

So anyways, today I did a workout.

Front squat - 245x3, 245x3, 245x4, 209x10
Bench Press - 176x3, 176x3, 176x8, 154x10, 154x10
Pull ups - Bwx10, +35x8, +70x5, +70x4, +70x3, +70x2, bwx15
dips - bwx15x15x18x14
curlzzz


good workout today, hit a bunch of PRs, got a good pump at the end too
feeling goooooooooooood!