PaulG's Training Log

[PaulG]

Workout Log 3/4

 

Going in: not a ton of sleep, but plenty of energy, been eating well.

 

Normal Warmup/Prehab

 

L-Sit (Tucked): 12s^c-x

L-Sit (1-Leg): 10s/10s^b-x

 

Box Pistols

7/7^b-x, 8/8^b-x, 8/8^a-x
- No knee pain, so I brought it up a rep for the next two sets. Awesome.

- Slight knee wobble on set 2.

 

Headstand Push-Up (stack of boxes/books: 1 green box, 1 book)

4^b-x, 4^a-x, 2+1^b-y

- Crapped out early on the last set, but I at least managed to get a good 5-second negative out of my last rep.

- Feeling really good about these actually. No pain, decent form, stomach to wall, and the limited ROM wasn't all that limited -- I was only 5 inches from the floor in the bottom.

 

C2B Pull-Ups

3^bbc-y, 3^bbc-y, 2^bc-y

- Finally feeling my pull-ups in the perfect part of my back: lower traps, scapular retractors. Of course, means I can't do a ton.

 

Leg-Assisted Deep Step-Ups

5/5^b-x, 5/5^a-x, 5/5^a-y

- I can feel less assistance in the back leg than last time, so no added reps today.

 

BW Rows

9^a-e, 9^b-x, 6^a-y

- Unexpected failure in the last set.

 

Cooldown/Prehab

 

Grip: 100x5x2 right / x1 left

 

 

- Took today off pushups, shoulder was a little sore off and on today. Now that I've hit 10 pushups per set, I'm looking for the next progression. Steven Low would recommend rings pushups, but I'm a little nervous to jump back into ring work right away. Think I'll go through a cycle of decline pushups -- will probably run myself up to 10 on those within a couple weeks -- and then reassess.

 

- In my cooldown, ran through a circuit of my shoulder prehab exercises since my shoulder's been a tiny bit fiddly.

 

- Think I need some programming help. I'm not sure how to work dips and headstand push-ups into my workout. They're both vertical pushes, and I don't want to throw in too much in a full-body workout. But I don't want to give up horizontal pushes either.

 

Right now I'm considering switching off between the two -- stick with HeSPUs for six or eight weeks, then switch to dips when I'm ready to do more serious muscle-up work. Anyone got some tips?

[PaulG]

Parkour Share Wednesday!

 

Or something. Anyway, enjoy. Lots of freerunning from the highly skilled/insane guys at Storm.

 

[PaulG]

Cutcutcut

Interesting tidbit of news: I'm back up to 175.8 lb. I expected weight gain once I started exercising, but not this much. But I've weighed every day for the past 3-4 days, and these are the numbers I'm getting when I'm not incredibly dehydrated.

My waist has stayed the same -- actually gone down (29.5) -- so I know I'm not gaining back fat. That would be impossible anyway, eating at an ~800kcal/week deficit. I can only assume this is water weight.

What's really odd is that at my current weight, my BF% has actually dropped -- to about 14.77%. Water weight has no effect on body composition, so they say... but when your two inputs for bodyfat are waist (which measures fat) and weight (which measures everything), water weight is going to come down on the lean mass side of the equation. Ah well, guess I shouldn't be complaining. It's free goal progress.

Sidenote: I'm going to try to make my workout logs shorter. The info is nice, but they're getting bloated now that I'm doing more exercises.

[PaulG]

Let's talk a sec about cutting.

 

It's a mindfuck.

 

Take today for example. I mosey down to the scale, clock in at 174.4. With all my weight spikes and whooshes lately, I wonder to myself, what could my waist measurement be?

 

28-3/8 inches.

 

No, I am not shitting you.

 

I have no idea what happened over the last two days. (Back then I was 29.5".) Part of it may be user error, but I measured a dozen times with two different tapes (one brand-new) and got roughly the same measurement. To even get it close to 29, I had to take a breath and barely pull the tape at all, neither of which I was doing last time I measured. What's even weirder is that my relaxed waist has barely gone down, it's now at 32.25".

 

Long story short, my bodyfat is now already 5.27%. Before, I was correcting upward by 7 points... this means I've practically met my original goal of 12% bodyfat.

 

Supposedly, anyway. I can't make myself believe that I'm actually at 12% bodyfat right now. Dropping 2.5% almost overnight just does not happen. So I've decided to adjust my goal slightly. As of now, I am correcting upwards by 8 points, which means my working bodyfat is now 13.27%. I'm not there yet, but this means I'm in the home stretch.

 

Sidenote: food math

 

I crunched some numbers after my measurement confusion, and I think I have at least a partial explanation for this weirdness. My cut has been in full swing for the last 13 days, and during that time my goal has been 2100kcal/day. However... when I actually average it out, I've only eaten about 1800kcal/day. So: this means I'm eating below my BMR. After doing even more number-crunching to find roughly how my scale weight shows on the measuring tape (1/8" lost = 0.4 lb), I can estimate that I've lost about 2.8 lb per week.

 

Which means my TDEE is currently... drumroll... ~3200kcal/day. Before exercise. As I write it, this seems insane.

 

Oh well. I may never figure out what the hell happened here. There's two big takeaways I can bet on, though:

 

1. What I'm doing is working, and

 

2. I'm losing weight a bit too fast for my liking. I considered adding back in some calories to about 2350/day, but if this math is actually right (anyone's guess), I'll hit my goal around Thursday of next week.

 

New plan: keep steady, and add in a few extra calories to get closer to 2100/day. There's too little time to start adjusting my intake goals willy-nilly. I'll just have to keep hitting my protein goal and training enough that I can be reasonably sure I'm not losing muscle.

 

Anyway....

 

 

Workout Log 3/6

 

Going in: still not bunches of sleep, but getting better. Rather low energy. Right shoulder feels tight.

 

Normal Warmup/Prehab

 

L-Sit (Tucked): 14s

L-Sit (1-Leg): 10s/10s^b-x,10s/10s^b-x

 

Box Pistols

9/9^b-x, 8/8^a-x, 8/8^a-x
- Tried to go easy on pistols, since I knew NHCs would murder my legs.

- Think it's time on Saturday to try real honest-to-god pistols, no assistance.

 

C2B Pull-Ups

3^bbc-y, 2^bd-y, 3^bdd-y

- 'd' means I didn't even touch the bar to my chest. Doh.

 

Ring Support Holds (Leg-Assisted)

15s^c-x,15s^b-x, 10s^b-x

Dips

4^b-e, 5^b-e

- With my weird shoulder, I wasn't feeling up to headstand pushups again. So I scaled back to just do some support hold work, concentrating on form. But then I felt great and hit a few dips on the assisted pull-up machine. I used the pull-up bars for dips, got a lot of weird looks because of how high I was.

- Even leg-assisted, goddamn it is tough not to round my shoulders in the support hold. I'm going to stick with these until my motor control/trap strength issues are better.

- Didn't want to stress my shoulder so I took it super easy on the dips.

 

 

Assisted Natural Hamstring Curls

5^c-x, 5^c-x, 5^c-y

- Big-time cramping after every set.

- Need to bring my scale next time so I can track my level of hand assist.

 

BW Rows

9^a-x, 9.75^c-x, 8^b-y

- Tried for a tenth rep in the second set, made it most of the way, but my form curled up and died.

 

Decline Pushups

6^c-x, 5^b-x, 4^b-x

 

Cooldown/Prehab:

Shoulder Prehab Circuit

Grip: 100x5x2 right / x3x1 left

 

 

- Shoulder feels weird the next day, like a strained muscle somewhere between my collarbone and my upper trap. I've tried stretching both my neck scalenes and my upper trap and it goes away temporarily, but then it's back. OTOH, I've run quick impingement tests and they're coming up negative. So I think I've got a strained muscle of some kind. It's annoying enough that I'll have to back off for tomorrow's workout, but not enough to sound the alarm just yet.

 

- Shorter?! Nope... better luck next time.

[PaulG]

Quick notes, as I sit here eating breakfast pre-workout:

 

• Shoulder issue is definitely some mild impingement. I'll have to be a little nicer to it for a while. My mistake over the past two weeks was attempting to hit my workouts like I'd never stopped. But I did stop, due to illness. I've only really restarted my workouts since 2/22 and I'm already blowing past my previous strength -- I have to keep in perspective that I'm actually doing really well. So for the foreseeable future, I'm scaling back my workouts and taking it easy on my shoulder, and taking some time to really concentrate on form.

 

• I was ravenously hungry yesterday, and as I've found, I'm not eating as many calories as I'd like. Even meals didn't really make me feel full for more than half an hour. I'm considering a refeed, although it seems like a ridiculous thing to do with just 1-2 weeks left to go before I hit my goals.

 

• Cereal is delicious.

 

Took some progress photos this morning, then wolfed a bowl of cereal and decided not to weigh. Last night's measurement is good enough for me. I'll post the photos later today, with my workout log.

[Prairie]

I know pretty much nothing about cutting, but if you're well on your way to meeting your goals, and a refeed would help you get through the last couple of weeks, why wouldn't you do it? 

 

Good luck with the shoulder, hope that a bit of scaling back is all it needs. 

[PaulG]

I know pretty much nothing about cutting, but if you're well on your way to meeting your goals, and a refeed would help you get through the last couple of weeks, why wouldn't you do it? 

 

Good luck with the shoulder, hope that a bit of scaling back is all it needs. 

 

Hmm... good point. Mainly, because of fear that I wouldn't do it right... which probably means I should.

 

Okay, you've convinced me. Today is refeed day. I'm going to post my workout log in a sec, along with progress photos, and then I'm going to do a 5-hour refeed. Let's get our carb on.

[PaulG]

Progress photo time!

 

Relaxed

 

Flexed

 

I did not take these photos believing I would be showing visible progress. More of a "what the hell, it's been two months, I should snap a shot for the record" type thing. But I'm pleasantly surprised (if I do say so myself, muahaha).

 

- Abs are back! Vanity goal: acquired. they still only show when flexed, but when relaxed there are at least suggestive bumps. Nice to know I'm not insanely far from unflexed ab territory (unless all my math is waaayyy off).

 

- I am currently wearing the same jeans from my Jan photo, but the belt is a notch tighter than it was back then.

 

- Extra protein in my diet appears to have gone mostly to growing a manly beard (rawr).

 

 

Workout Log 3/8

 

Going in: slept crappy last night. I actually went to bed early, around 10:40 PM, but accidentally passed out while reading a book with the lights on. Had to get up at 3 AM and get in bed properly, then got woken up two more times by cats and the girlfriend... all in all not that great a night.

 

Normal Warmup/Prehab

 

L-Sit (Tucked): 12s, 16s

 

Pistols

5/5^b-e, 5/5^b-x, 6/6^b-x/y
- Real pistols, bitches! Ass to heel and back up again. Surprised myself with how many I could do.

- Usually I do one leg, then the other, but to test myself and make sure I was going to failure, I switched between legs each rep for the last set. Little tip I picked up from Waldo's blog. My right leg crapped out in the hole on rep 7, but my left leg still felt fine. Definitely still have a slight strength imbalance there.

 

Diamond Push-Up

8^a-e, ^9a-e, 12^a-y

- Really pushed myself in that last set just to see how many I could do. I'm bored with diamond pushups, but it's the hardest variation that doesn't irritate my shoulder.

 

BW Rows

9^a-x, 8^a-x, 7^b-y

- Unexpected failure in the last set.

 

BW Rows

9^a-e, 9^b-x, 6^a-y

- Definite lack of progress in these over the last week. I've been adding in other things that have stressed my upper back, though -- particularly pull-ups and L-sits. I wouldn't be surprised if these bounce back in the next workout.

- Did some ring support hold practice between sets.

 

Assisted Deep Step-Ups

5/5^a-x, 5/5^c-y, 5/5^b-y

- Balance issues in the second set. Assistance is lessening by the workout, which is encouraging.

 

 

Cooldown/Prehab:

 

Shoulder (P)rehab Circuit

Wrist Curls/Extensions

Grip: 100x5x2 right / x3x1 left

Stretchin' of shoulders, hips, hamstrings

[PaulG]

Refeed: over. 445 grams of carbs imbibed in five hours. 11 grams of fat.

That is all.

[Prairie]

Ha, I really had to twist your rubber arm, didn't I? Hope it helps!

[PaulG]

Me too! I'm pretty happy with things. In fact, I really don't think it could have gone better. I'm definitely having far fewer issues with hunger between meals, and with my all-out binge last night, I actually am just about meeting my calorie goal. So I doubt my progress will slow at all.

For those who like numbers, here's my calorie readout for the week:

[PaulG]

Oh so happy with my refeed. Even though it was only a 5-hour affair (bodybuilders will refeed for up to a couple days), it's given my energy a nice jump and I'm noticeably less vulnerable to hunger. Before, I was starting to get into gnaw-off-my-arm hunger where snacks didn't help and meals satisfied for only half an hour. Now, I'm able to get through the workday with nary a snack. I don't expect it to last forever, but this will last me through the last few pounds of cutting.

 

 

Workout Log 3/11

 

Going in: bad sleep, good food. Stress has been up due to some rough relationship stuff.

 

Normal Warmup/Prehab

 

L-Sit (Tucked): 8s, 10s

 

Pistols

6/6^c-x, 6/6^b-x, 5/5^b-x
-  Forgot my switchoff on last set, volume suffered for it but I'll live.

 

C2B Pull-Up

4^cbcd-y, 3^bcd-y

- Only 2 sets, going easy on le shoulder.

 

Decline Push-Up

7^b-e, 7^a-x, 7^a-y

- Whaddaya know, really pulling in those lower traps makes push-ups harder.

 

BW Rows

9^b-x, 8^a-y, 8^a-y

- Surprised myself in that last set, maybe I'm starting to progress again.

 

Assisted Deep Step-Ups

5/5^a-e, 5/5^a-x, 5/5^b-y

 

Cooldown/Prehab:

 

Shoulder (P)rehab Circuit

Wrist Curls/Extensions (20lb dumbbell)

Grip: 100x5x2 right / x3x1 left

Stretchin' of shoulders, hips, hamstrings

[PaulG]

Cut continues, as cuts do. Waist has slipped down to 28-3/16". Also measured 1 inch below my navel for the first time, this is new data, and got 29.25". I'm curious to see if that moves faster than my natural waistline. Weighed in at 174.6 -- it's odd, my waist has continued to slip downward while my weight bounces around the 174-5 range. Guess that means glycogen is still fluctuating.

 

So a quick note to mark the date for myself, and also just because I need a space to vent a bit: on Monday my girlfriend of 3 years and I broke up. We both saw it coming a while back, we weren't happy together, but that didn't make it much easier. We live together and she has small children, which makes it yet tougher. So it's been a stress-fest. I've already been immersing myself in a job hunt, and now I'm going to have to get a roommate within the next couple of weeks, as she plans to move out in April.

 

I've wondered a couple times if I should freeze my cut for a while just to make things easier on myself. But honestly, I like being able to focus on my training and diet at tough times in my life. It's something I can control when there are a lot of things that I have no control over (my job, my relationship, my living situation). When I put it that way, it sounds an awful lot like anorexia or some other eating disorder -- but I'm not starving myself or harming my health. Hell; I guess this is why I see a therapist once every few weeks. All I can really do is keep tabs on myself, make sure my health is good, and not let myself get distracted from dealing with my new living situation challenges.

[Shortgorilla]

I don't really know why all your sets and reps are algebra problems, but you seem pretty awesome at stuff.  Sorry to hear about your girlfriend, man.  But you're right, keep focusing on the awesome progress you're making.  You're a smart guy and you have a weatlh of support in this community.  Keep it up bud.

[Prairie]

Sorry to hear it, sounds like a rough time. Take care of yourself.

[PaulG]

Thanks guys.

Workout is today, and it's natural hamstring curl day. Going to generate some serious algebra.

[PaulG]

Today was my worst day for protein in a while. Got too busy at work to eat my breakfast, and ran out of lunchmeat when I was making my sandwich for lunch. Finally just ate a sandwich with cheese, pickles and mustard (gross), and wolfed the cottage cheese. Also snacked on a couple cookies hanging around the office, which I haven't done in a while.

 

Logging them reminded why I stopped eating cookies. 270 calories for a couple bites of Keebler? Let's not make that a habit.

 

Workout Log 3/13

 

Going in: Good sleep! Bad food.

 

Normal Warmup/Prehab

 

L-Sit (Tucked): 3 sets, didn't track this time cuz I was lazy.

 

Pistols

6/6^b-x, 6/6^c-y, 7/7^b-y

- Did the switchoff on my last set and reaped the benefits. 7 pistols per leg! I felt like a badass.

 

C2B Pull-Ups

3^bbd-y, 3^abc-y

- Wanted to add a third set but my shoulder was feeling a little sore after the warmup, so I decided to put this workout in a holding pattern. No added volume for now. On the bright side, Did one more good rep than last workout.

 

Decline Pushups

8^a-e, 8^a-e, 11^a-y

- Switchin' it up next workout I guess, the declines are just too easy now. It's time to either bust out some ring pushups or start working toward one-arm pushups.

 

BW Rows

9^a-x, 9^b-x, 7^a-y

- Reps are going nowhere, but form is improving and I'm slowing myself down. I noticed myself going a little too fast and sloppy in my second set, I've probably been doing that for a few workouts now. Gotta treat my shoulder nicer than that and do my reps right.

 

Assisted Natural Hamstring Curls

18lb assist: 5^c-y, 5^c-y

25lb assist: 4^b-y

- Holy balls.

- Brought the bathroom scale to track my assist, and after two sets I realized that with only 18lbs of support from my hands, I could probably straighten my torso significantly. Holy hell. The last set was only 25lb of assist, still had a definite kink at the hips, but I completely failed my 5th rep.

 

 

Cooldown/Prehab:

Shoulder Prehab Circuit

Wrist curls/extensions, 20lb dumbbell

Grip: Forgot today. Oops!

[PaulG]

Quick addition of Cutting News: Thinking I'll raise my calories by 250 starting Saturday. My last two estimates have given me a TDEE of about 3100, and I've been eating at a 1000-calorie deficit; so close to my goal, it's just not necessary. Gonna scale back. Maybe my weight will normalize a little, it started to swing around wildly when my waist hit the 28-29" range.

 

For Shortgorilla and anyone else newly reading, here's a quick repost explaining my workout notations:

 

Legend

Since my training is primarily bodyweight, I use a notation that allows me to log a lot of variables. I log weight (if used), sets, reps, my rate of perceived exertion, and my form quality.

Form:

a: high-quality form maintained throughout the set. No issues or very minor issues

b: one form flaw, which I was able to notice and correct during the set.

c: one or more form flaws which I noticed but was not able to correct during the set.

d: crappity crap. Ended the set because form broke beyond margin of safety or my quality standards.

I have certain form standards for each exercise I do. It's not always "perfect" form, it's a matter of what I know I need to work on or what I consider a minimum for safety. I'll try to note them down for posterity.

RPE (Rate of Perceived Exertion):

I shamelessly stole Waldo's system for grading his RPEs, which he outlined in his blog post. For that matter, my form quality notation is also based on his.
Waldo being something of a pioneer of bodyweight training on these boards, I've also borrowed a few other aspects of his notation:

/: denotes left/right reps in a set of a single-limb exercise. For example, 5/3 reps on a pistol squat means 5 reps on my left leg, 3 reps on my right.

(): used for my eccentric exercises where I need to note both reps and time under tension. For example, a set of pull-up negatives shown as 3(6s) is 3 reps of 6 seconds each.

[PaulG]

Holy balls guys.

 

I did it.

 

Estimated fat loss: 17 lbs or roughly 9 bodyfat percentage points.

 

I am now 12% bodyfat, or incredibly close to it.

 

For a closer look, let's turn to the dashboard.

    _________                           ___________                              /   _____/__ ________   ___________  \_   _____/____    ____   ____ ___.__.   \_____  \|  |  \____ \_/ __ \_  __ \  |    __) \__  \  /    \_/ ___<   |  |   /        \  |  /  |_> >  ___/|  | \/  |     \   / __ \|   |  \  \___\___  |  /_______  /____/|   __/ \___  >__|     \___  /  (____  /___|  /\___  > ____|          \/      |__|        \/             \/        \/     \/     \/\/                     _________         __    __  .__                                \_   ___ \ __ ___/  |__/  |_|__| ____    ____                  /    \  \/|  |  \   __\   __\  |/    \  / ___\                 \     \___|  |  /|  |  |  | |  |   |  \/ /_/  >                 \______  /____/ |__|  |__| |__|___|  /\___  /                         \/                          \//_____/          ________                .__   ___.                          .___        \______ \ _____    _____|  |__\_ |__   _________ _______  __| _/         |    |  \\__  \  /  ___/  |  \| __ \ /  _ \__  \\_  __ \/ __ |          |    `   \/ __ \_\___ \|   Y  \ \_\ (  <_> ) __ \|  | \/ /_/ |         /_______  (____  /____  >___|  /___  /\____(____  /__|  \____ |                 \/     \/     \/     \/    \/           \/           \/ 

Date:         1/7          ->          1/26            ->          3/14

 

Weight:   182.12       ->         176.8           ->          169.8

 

Fat:          38.06        ->          30.05           ->          20.41

 

LBM:       144.06       ->         146.75         ->         149.39

 

Waist*:    32.38"        ->          30.5"          ->          27.75"

 

BF%:       13.9%        ->         9.99%         ->         4.02%

 

AdjBF**:  20.9%        ->        16.99%        ->        12.02%

 

 

 

* Based on Waldo's method of waist measurement: flexing your abs as hard as possible by pulling as tightly as possible on the tape. Though it gives a totally inaccurate reading of your actual bodyfat percentage, it seems to show progress more consistently with one's actual fat loss.

 

** My own estimate of my BF%. (I run my waist and weight through the Modified YMCA Formula, then add 7% 8%. Why 8%? I have no reason other than photos and observation.) It's a shot in the dark, but hey, so is any bodyfat formula.

 

 

 

And that's about all there is to it.

 

Analysis

I lost quite a bit of fat no matter how you slice it, but added a LOT of lean weight -- almost entirely glycogen/water as I resumed my strength training. Now that I'm well into training, I've packed on nearly eight pounds of the stuff. A lot of my plummeting bodyfat percentage has come from the extra glycogen, which gives me the slight nagging feeling that I cheated. (Though I know that's ridiculous.)

 

My cut was extremely steep -- about 2 lb/week loss, give or take -- but I appear to have preserved my muscle mass through it. Was a little worried when I first started, but it appears that between a helluva lotta protein and dedicated training, lean mass can be preserved even when lean and cutting hard.

 

My only slight concern is the amount of water weight I seem to be holding. If I up my calories some of it may disappear, which will effectively raise my bodyfat again.

 

Overall, my cut lasted 6.5 weeks, once you take out the weeks in the middle I spent sick.

 

Where to next?

I've been thinking about this for a couple days, though I didn't expect to be implementing my Phase 2 plan so soon.

 

Up until this point my intention was to bump up my calories to 2,350kcal/day and hold there for a week. For now, I'll stick with that goal. If I am retaining water, I should shed some of it, and I'll still be in a good deficit so I can keep shaving another couple pounds off my fat stores. That should get me to a "real" 12% bodyfat.

 

Once I've been there at least a week and I know I've met my goal, I plan to jump straight to maintenance and hold there for another week or two, take a diet break, and let my body do its hormonal coming-out-of-a-cut thing. (Bodies do that, right? Because I don't know for sure.)

 

After that, I plan to eat a very modest calorie surplus, maybe +100 over maintenance, and keep training. With the extra food literally under my belt, my workouts should start moving forward at a much better pace. My eventual goal is to start an eight-week bulking cycle, a la Lyle McD's muscle gain advice... my eventual goal, physique-wise, is 190 pounds at 10% bodyfat. I've never been a physique-focused guy, but that would be rad.

 

So bro, are you ripped or what?

 

HAHAHA no.

 

But I may as well commemorate this (tentative) milestone with a progress photo. Yeah, a week later. Deal with it.

 

Relaxed

 

Flexed

[PaulG]

Weighed in today and got a little shock. I was half-expecting to shed some water weight, but not this much.

 

For reference, between yesterday evening and this morning I went from 173.6 -> 169.8. Yeah, four pounds. Just for giggles I re-measured my waist and that went up slightly, to 27.75. Incredibly weird. Last night I must have been... extra squishy?

 

Anyway, it actually doesn't affect my bodyfat percentage much, I'm still 12.02% by my own calculations. (Last night I was technically 11.45%, but didn't believe it and was waiting to see what happened this morning.) However, I updated my dashboard in my previous post, so you can see my actual stats up there.

 

So, hallelujah! No last-minute plan changes, it's time to diet back up to maintenance. (He says, sipping a large glass of chocolate milk.)

 

Let's talk workouts. Yesterday I realized that my scale was... off a little with the assist in those natural hamstring curls on Thursday. After fiddling with the batteries a little I failed to realize that it had reset to kilograms rather than pounds. Oops! So I was giving myself quite a bit more assistance than I thought. I'll update my numbers in that log shortly, so you'll see my actual assistance numbers. (39.7 and 55.1 lbs, respectively.)

 

Workout Log 3/15

 

Going in: 9 hours of sleep, excellent, and an unusually high calorie load from yesterday since I bumped my intake up a little. Feeling good.

 

Normal Warmup/Prehab (+ 2 sets german hangs)

 

L-Sit (Tucked): 3 sets, not tracked

 

Pistols

7/7^c-y, 7/7^b-x, 7/7^b-x

 

C2B Pull-Up

4^bbcd-y, 3^bbd-y, 3^bdd-y

- Cranked it up a set, my shoulder has been feeling pretty bulletproof the last few days.

 

Rings Wide Push-Up

3^c-y, 2^b-y, 3.5^b-y

- New pushup variation. Harder than declines, more chest emphasis, and I feel it right in the front of my shoulder where I've been having troubles (but not in a bad way). I think this might be a good conditioning exercise to bulletproof the front of my shoulder a bit. Plus, it's incredibly difficult, that counts for something.

- In the last set, crapped out halfway up from the 4th rep. Oh well. If my shoulder feels good tomorrow, I may add a 4th set for this exercise going forward.

 

BW Rows

9^a-x, 9^a-x, 9^a-y

- FUCK YEAH. 9's across the board. Looks like my little stall is over, I did every rep slowly and they felt much easier than last time. Suspect my improvement is because of my higher calorie count since Friday.

 

Deep Step-Ups (unassisted)

BW: 9/9^b-e

+24lbs: 5/5^a-x, 5/5^a-y

- Corrected my form based on Waldo's recent recommendation. Turns out I've been doing them wrong this whole time! What I've been doing up to now is actually closest to a skater squat with a huge deficit (about 8 inches' worth, that means I was performing them on an 8-inch platform). I was using incredibly bad form on them though. These are much better now. Felt them in exactly the right places, the butt and hams.

 

Cooldown/Prehab:

 

Shoulder (P)rehab Circuit

Wrist Curl/Extension Pushups

Grip: 100x5x2 right / x3x1 left

Stretchin' of shoulders, hips, hamstrings

 

Notes:

 

On my injuries

- This workout was particularly tough on my shoulders. I keep feeling that it's a little tight and sore, and my impingement tests keep coming back negative. I've been doing some reading through Waldo's old material, and it looks like he had a very similar issue back when he was at my level of strength. Bit eerie, but our programming is quite similar. We also both work desk jobs which means similar mobility/stability problems. Anyway, his view of his own old issues were a lack of strength in the back of his shoulder, which was putting stress on the tendons at the front of his shoulder during the tougher exercises. If my issues are the same, this means the Rx is actually quite different than impingement. In impingement you have to stop all aggravating movement, but with tendonitis the best thing is normal ice and NSAIDs paired with just enough stress to keep the area healing. That and exercises to fix any strength deficiencies.

 

It boils down to: keep doing my shoulder prehab, rows and pullups, but don't worry so much about a little twinge here and there. I'm going to keep adding volume slowly, I don't want to blow my shoulder out completely, but I seem to be moving at a good pace. Current plan is to add a fourth set of pullups next workout, then start adding in dips, and more german hangs and ring support holds into my warmup. That will probably take about two more weeks. I may be able to add volume faster as my calories rise.

[PaulG]

Sad times. I went out to a parkour class, slipped on a wall, and hyperextended my knee very slightly.

There was no pain and I don't think it was serious, but I still feel some instability in the joint. In any case, it was an immediate end to the class. It will probably mean at least a week-long break from any lower body strength training as well -- which is unfortunate, I was really enjoying my progress with pistols.

Anyway, we'll see how it feels tomorrow.

[PaulG]

Home from work today to tend to a couple things -- Job hunt, vet visit for the kitties, etc.

The knee is feeling improved, though instead of unstable it's now slightly stiff at full extension. I'm still icing and taking NSAIDS, and I managed to book myself an appointment with a doctor today, so we'll see.

Hopefully I'll be able to return to leg training starting the 25th. It would suck big-time to have to go through another major rehab period.

[PaulG]

Welp, my knee thing seems to have calmed down considerably. The joint feels a bit stiff/overstretched by turns, but I've tested myself out with some prisoner squats and the joint seems to load just fine. My guess is it'll be bulletproof again within a week.

Cutcutcut... technically it's still going, though I'm in the process of putting the breaks on. My best calculations show my BMR (daily burn not including tracked exercise) at 2871. Instead of bumping to "true" maintenance, I think I'll bump to about 100 calories over (2970) simply for the extra workout fuel, and just in case I'm underestimating.

And then... it all depends on when I start to stall. I'd like to squeeze as much out of my noob gains as possible, then start a 1lb/week bulk. All my diet and composition plans are pretty much based on Lyle McD's writings and Waldo's template: 8 months bulk, a couple weeks of steep cutting, 1 week at maintenance, rinse, repeat. So that will be my cycle for at least a little while.

Edit: just a quick note, I'm getting a ton of DOMS today in my posterior shoulder. They also feel stiffer than they have in ages. Seems to be my lats and traps, mostly.

[PaulG]

Workout Log 3/18

 

Going in: Not much sleep, saw a friend's show on St. Patty's Day and didn't get home until a little after midnight. Food was solid.

 

Normal Warmup/Prehab

 

L-Sit: 1 set tucked, 2 sets 1-leg

 

Pistols

6^b-e, 5^a-e
- Left leg only, as my right is still recovering from that hyperextension.

- Tiny bit of pain in the quad tendon doing these. Odd.

 

C2B Pull-Ups

3^bdd-y, 3^bbd-y, 3^bbd-y, 2^bd-y

- Only a total of 6 good reps tonight. Not feeling it for some reason.

 

Rings Wide Push-Ups

3^c-x, 4^b-y, 3.5^b-y

- Reps are still very low because the movement is new and particularly tough on the front of my shoulders. Gonna be nice to myself with these. I feel pretty good after them though.

 

Elevated Ring Rows

7^b-x, 7^a-x, 7^c-y

- Progressed and elevated my feet to make it a touch harder. I have a feeling I'll be moving on again next week. These felt very strong until the last rep.

 

Deep Step-Ups

+24lb: 6^b-e

- Again, left leg only.

 

Cooldown/Prehab

Shoulder (P)rehab Circuit

Wrist Curls/Extensions

 

- Got some pain in my right wrist, along my radius (the bone I broke a year ago), so I'm gonna lay off some of the grip stuff for this week and build myself back up.

[PaulG]

Aches and pains news: everything appears to be recovering well. My knee occasionally feels a tiny strain as I walk, and hanging out in an Asian squat gives a mild ache after a few minutes. I figure this will go away within a few more days; probably just some mild inflammation in the tendons/joint.

It's been a while since I mentioned my old shoulder injury. That's because it's basically nonexistent these days. Every once in a while it's slightly sore when it's stiff -- feels a lot like the tendonosis I used to have in my knee a long time back. With more strengthening of my upper back, I think it will stay a thing of the past.

I have slacked off on mobility work for a while now, so I need to get back to doing that daily. I've lost some flexibility since I resumed strength training. I'll have to change that: now that I'm strong enough to start doing dips, I'd really like to be able to get full ROM on them.

On Friday I switch back to maintenance, and my God am I ready for it. Can't wait for the extra recovery, I need it badly. 3000 calories per day, here I come.