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.

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!

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.

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.

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!