DanH - Becoming a Machine

[dan_ho]

Name:

Dan

Brief overview of goals:

1. Complete 4 sets (8 reps) of the bear. Undecided on the weight, probably going to go light, having never tried it before.

2. Get more interval training done (slightly hampered by cold NJ weather currently, but we'll see).

3. Be able to complete 50+ push-ups in one set.

4. Increase handstand push-up set to 10. (I believe I'm currently at 6, should be fun to work on both push-up goals =P )

5. Keep a cleaner room until I move south.

6. Practice piano MUCH more often! (I've been really slacking over the past few months)

I'll stop at 6 for this round..

Eating Habits:

Low carb with an eye towards paleo. I'm at 100g or less of carbs per day right now

Any other piece of information you think would be useful for team creation:

My long-term goal is to become a machine..lots of free weight exercises, body weight exercises, and interval training so that all of my muscles become more efficient.

If you want to be part of a team or if you want to work alone:

Team me up, Scotty!

[spezzy]

what bear complex are you doing? the one i usually do is 5 sets of 7 reps.

just wondering if its the same one

and 6 HSPU is awesome, I'm still working to get ONE!

[dan_ho]

clean => squat => press => back squat => press

I've never done one, so I'm not sure how much I trust myself to be able to do all that much

thanks, i've got my work cut out for me!

[Ruggerone]

I went for the hundred push up challenge last year, made a huge difference. I started with 15 to 20 decent, i actually never finished but I was topping out at around 70 to 75 flat out with good form.

Handstand push ups look and sound cool I may try some of those too.

cheers,

[spezzy]

yeah, handstand pushups are hard. dan, how did you go about getting TO one? i dont have one yet, but i'm close...

as for the bear, thats the same one i do. i can now make it through without crying, but barely.

always surprises me that its the press from behind my head that truly brings me down.

[dan_ho]

to be honest spezzy, i'm not completely sure. i was just doing a handstand one day and was wondering if i could do pushups like that, so i grabbed a wall and found out that i could. wish i could be more of a help there!

[dan_ho]

Gonna be double posting my workouts here and the battle logs for records:

Short circuit training, no time for the gym: (3/3)

14 Push Ups

20 Jumpsteps

14 Push Ups

14 Pistol Squats (7 each leg)

10 Push Ups

20 BW Squats

10 Push Ups

20 Walking Lunge

9 Push Ups (Fail!)

41s Plank

10 Push Ups

20 Box Jumps

[dan_ho]

3/5 Quick circuit:

(Prefaced by 5 handstand push ups)

14 Push Ups

20 Jump Steps

16 Push Ups

16 Pistol Squats

12 Push Ups

20 BW Squats

12 Push Ups

20 Walking Lunge

15 Push Ups (Success!)

1 Min Plank

23 Box Jumps

Minimal increase on some of the exercises, feels good to be working the push up and handstand push up goal at the same time. Goal for next circuit round is to make this circuit a little smaller, and do it 2x.

Monday, we fight a bear!

[dan_ho]

3/8 (Weight is all in lbs)

First round VS the bear. Not too shabby, but you were right about the press from behind the head, surprising! Even more tiring than I anticipated!

50 x 7

50 x 5

50 x 5

50 x 5

Deadlift: (note: check max and increase it!)

70 x 12

70 x 12

70 x 15

Crunches (+20lbs):

25

25

25

35

45 Rollouts + Pikes (3 sets of 15 each)

Medicine Ball:

05 minutes passing around 25lb medicine ball

15 minutes passing around 18lb medicine ball (lowering to waist after each catch)

1.5 hours of basketball, ending with suicides in intervals (jog 2 suicides, sprint 2, jog 1, sprint 1, repeat)

[dan_ho]

3/10

Off day. A little sore from bear-ing it (especially in my traps).

Tomorrow - Circuit training + light workout at the gym (if it fits in after next tattoo session).

[HawkAndRoll]

DanH - Becoming a Machine

Name:

Dan

Brief overview of goals:

1. Complete 4 sets (8 reps) of the bear.

So, I've never heard of the bear before. How does it work?

[dan_ho]

It's a lifting exercise that is a series of steps, the one spezzy and I do consists of:

Clean, front squat, OH press, back squat, OH press, down (that's 1 rep). the trick is, you don't rest the weight on the ground at any point during the set, you just touch the weight to the ground. if you're going to rest, you have to rest while you're holding the weight.

spezzy, the first time you did the bear, was your trapezius really sore? or was your back already in good enough shape for that not to happen?

[spezzy]

heres a video of the one that i do:

you start lighter, then increase weight every round... last round is PAINFUL.

and i don't really get sore anymore, but it certainly hurt in the process. last time, though, my neck hurt because i kind of dropped the bar on it last round. oops.

for your general workouts,

how do you decide how many reps of sets to do?

[dan_ho]

haha I based mine on the same vid, haven't varied the weights yet.

generally, I want to work on muscle endurance, but I want to get to a certain strength level first. and if I can't get my desired #, I work until exhaustion.

[dan_ho]

3/11 - One more rest day - let the soreness really fade before the bear gets the best of my back. On the other hand, my diet is going well... I'm still able to eat what I want and stay under 100 carbs for the day, generally.

I might ease back on the handstand push-up increase, the push up increase + bear is already putting my shoulders through enough, maybe. (MAYbe!)

On the other goals, I've got a good start in my room, much cleaner already! And I've been busy learning a few new songs on piano, so 2 goals well in progress.

[spezzy]

haha I based mine on the same vid, haven't varied the weights yet.

generally, I want to work on muscle endurance, but I want to get to a certain strength level first. and if I can't get my desired #, I work until exhaustion.

its beyond exausting without increasing the weight each set. i worked a lot on shoulder strength before i started increasing the weight each set.

[dan_ho]

3/12:

16 Push Ups

25 Box Jumps (last 5 were 3 step jumps instead of 2 steps)

17 Push Ups

20 BW Squats

14 Push Ups

18 Pistol Squats

14 Push Ups

50 Crunches

11 Push Ups (to exhaustion) (fail!)

30s Plank (Left Side)

30s Plank (Right Side)

1 min Plank

1 min, high intensity jumping jacks (about 70)

10 Decline Push Ups (to make up for the last set)

Not sure if I'm still sore from the last workout, or just had a weak day. Still seeing increases, so it's not all that bad.

I don't usually do straight-up cardio, but next workout is going to be cardio until I can't move anymore, with some BW exercises tossed in here and there. I'm feeling pretty good about my progress towards my goals (with the exception of HSPUs).

[dan_ho]

Inspired to post this by Steve's pics from NZ. Also for a little inspiration, this is 8/2009. Close to looking like this again, hopefully this challenge will push me there!

[ATTACH=CONFIG]226[/ATTACH]

[Knightwatch]

Damn, man, 18 pistols?!? Wicked cool. Keep up the great work!

[dan_ho]

Well, 18 meaning 9 with each leg, haha. Sounds more impressive than it is, I think.

Most recent push-up exhaustion test: around 30. 29 but I believe I finished a 30th. We'll see next time.

[dan_ho]

Slow week on the workouts, but made good progress on the other goals. Spent about 4 hours in my room cleaning yesterday, as well as some quality face time with my piano.

I expect a major setback to my low-carb diet today, in the form of booze. Happy St. Patty's everyone!

[miriad]

I had never heard of the bear before. Sounds facinating and really hard. I'm going to have to research a bit more and then give it a try.

You are just ripping it up, man! Way to go!

Are you taking piano lessons or are you on your own at the moment?

[dan_ho]

Thanks! It's funny how encouraging words always make you want to work that much harder =D

I'm on my own now... I took lessons for a couple years... been playing for about 8 years now, I actually used to teach piano as a side job when I was tutoring in chem, I've just been lazy with it lately, which is no good.

[dan_ho]

New update: no pistol squats for a while, since they make this hurt more:

[ATTACH=CONFIG]235[/ATTACH]

=D

Edit: top part is a little part of a song I wrote, bottom one is Blackbird by the Beatles, at the part where the lyrics are "Take these broken eyes and learn to see."

[dan_ho]

Maybe it was the slow week, but yesterday's workout felt pretty great.

Deadlift:

135 x 5

145 x 5

155 x 5

165 x 5

185 x 1

Bear:

50 x 5 (5 times), felt like I could have done more pretty easily. Gonna go for 50 x 7 (4 times next).

Medicine Ball: (catch curl and toss)

18 x 25

90 minutes of pretty high intensity basketball.

Note: First day doing heavy(ish) deadlifting. Back is nice and sore, feels great to know a workout is working!