Week 4 - Cruise Control

Day 1 - 23/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: High
Sleep: 3hrs 10min

Recovery
Feeling like king awesome as usual this morning despite the fucktarded sleep totals overnight. The thing is that even though I’ve only had 3hrs 10min sleep last night, I was so ridiculously fucked up over the weekend from excess drinking which had given me the biggest fucking hangover of my entire life that I was pretty much in bed from 5:30AM Saturday morning until 9:30AM Sunday, yes: 28 hours straight. I mean I got up every now and then to drink water, give Maxximus some food, drink, love and attention, etc etc but 99% of that time was just laying in bed.

Routine - AM
Fasted (IF): 8hrs 30min
Routine: Analogue stationary bike 20min (9min hill climb @ 3min intervals)
Duration: 20min

Notes - AM
Kicked this morning’s MIIT session up a notch. Not by force, but because I felt more awesomesauce than usual.

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 11hrs
Routine: Back
Duration: 1hr 40min

• 5min SBike LISS warm up
• Wide grip pull up: 21xBW 6xBW+10kg 3xBW+25kg 3xBW+20kg 10xBW 4xBW+10kg 8xBW 8xBW 8xBW 5xBW
• Dumbbell row: 6x25kg 6x35kg 6x45kg 6x60kg 12x60kg 6x60kg 6x60kg 6x60kg 6x42.5kg 6x42.5kg (PB-R)
• Barbell shrug: 10x70kg 8x70kg 6x120kg 6x170kg 3x200kg 2x220kg 4x200kg 6x170kg 10x120kg 10x120kg

Notes - PM
Interesting session. Now onto my 3rd week of trials, that means my primary routines get a switch. The wide grip pull ups suffered considering I feel like awesomely super energized today. Although is it perhaps because I haven’t done them in 6 weeks, and prior to that I was doing them regularly on a weekly basis? Perhaps this is good news. 6 weeks may be too long for me to park a particular body weight routine on the sidelines. But with my new trials the longest they get parked is no longer than 2 weeks. The body weight only repetitions fall short from a previous PB of 25 to 21. And a weight based rep fell from a previous PB of 5xBW+25kg down to 3xBW+25kg. The dumbbell rows however were different. I’m amazed how much cleaner the 60kg ones are compared to my form a couple of months ago. A repetition based PB here with 60kg dumbbells being the max weight dumbbell at the gym. Barbell shrugs also felt nice and solid, although quite dirty on 200kg - 220kg, that’s the point of it, dirty the clean, pick another dirty number, clean that up, rinse and fucking repeat.

Nutrition
Total: 3,600 calories
Protein: 380g
Fat: 110g
Carbohydrates: 250g
Meals: N/A

Notes
Fucking LULZ @ this morning’s weight-in. From Friday’s Week 3 end-of-week weight-in, the scales indicate that I am a solid 2.1kg heavier. Abso-fucking-lutely hilarious! I’ve obviously overloaded on calories over the weekend. Without counting the fucktarded amounts of alcohol on Friday night, I downed fucking 15 sausage and egg mcmuffins from McDonalds in an attempt to prevent a hangover. See, there’s this place called “Chicken Gourmet” who sell nasty deep fried chicken items. My secret to have always feeling like a champion after massive social drinking sessions is to grab maybe a large bag of chips and 10 piece of chicken deep fried in lard. The morning comes and fuck I feel like super awesome level 100. Even 15 sausage and egg mcmuffins (that’s 5,055 calories) didn’t do the job. Lesson learnt: don’t leave it to the last minute so that you can still catch the place open and get that majik hangover cure. So as you can imagine, the beach camping mermaid adventures that I had planned starting Saturday morning did not eventuate, lesson learnt. My friend rocked up at 6AM, I sleep-walked/stumbled to my door, opened it, and proceeded to pass out right in front of him. Up to this day his vagina is still crying tears of sadness because he could not bask in the awesomeness of my presence (camping site was a meet up with other peeps). I’m sure his vagina has limited amount of tears and he will stop crying soon.

I see this unexpected weight-in as an blessing in disguise. I don’t look too bad plus, apart from feeling extremely fucking bloated right now it’s a great thing that I’ve consumed a shit load of calories over the weekend, even though the sleep patterns weren’t stable, I got a crap load of it. The level of intensity and increased in strength training over the past two weeks compliments my slow/sensible mass/strength gain intentions.

No changes will be made to nutrition this week apart from all of my heavy lifting sessions will be crammed for three days in a row starting today right up through to Wednesday, Day 3 of this week. That means my nutritional templates will all be high for three days straight and all high carb, no heavy tension vs metabolic non-heavy tension cycling will occur. Reason: I am joining a friend of mine to celebrate his Birthday in an extended manner starting from Wednesday evening through to Friday night in Sydney, as well as spend the Saturday and part of Sunday up there as well. “ HALP HALP!” I hear my liver cry. I will be maintaining some sort of training/activities while I’m up there but I’m sure you sick fucks would like to hear about that. And no I will not be logging it.

One more observation: New trousers needed. My testicularZ feel like they’re in a tight place, can barely fit my iPhone in my front trouser pocket, all while my waist size is roughly unchanged, albeit a little tighter (from the water weight I would assume) but unchanged.

Damage Control

• N/A

Notes
Absolutely fucking no stretches were maintained with minor tricep tendon reloading conducted yesterday. Soreness is only evident on my quads which today marks it’s 4th day. Glute soreness dissipated yesterday evening. The other thing is that my core/abs are sore. And no, I did not do any standing crunches (aka. vomiting) over the weekend. Maybe I should have, but despite the biggest hangover of my life I didn’t.

Day 2 - 24/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: High
Sleep: 6hrs+

Recovery
No issues/challenges, this however has a lot of room for improvement in terms of rest duration.

Routine - AM
Fasted (IF): 9hrs 20min
Routine: Analogue stationary bike 20min (9min hill climb @ 3min intervals)
Duration: 20min

Notes - AM
Fucking awesomesauce.

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 14hrs
Routine: Chest/Shoulders
Duration: 1hr 30min

• 5min SBike LISS warm up
• Dip: 35xBW 6xBW+25kg 6xBW+25kg 3xBW+50kg 3xBW+50kg 2xBW+50kg 25xBW 6xBW+25kg 1xBW+50kg 15xBW 10xBW 10xBW
• Seated dumbbell military press: 8x30kg 8x30kg 6x45kg 6x45kg 6x32kg 6x40kg 5x40kg 6x30kg
• Bench dip: 20xBW 20xBW 8xBW+25kg 8xBW+50kg 5xBW+75kg 20xBW+25kg 25xBW 20xBW (PB-W)
• Cable crunch: 50x60kg

Notes - PM
A pretty sensational session, I’ll explain why. Firstly, I have not done dips/weighted dips since 26/10/2011, that’s 12 fucking weeks ago. I was 3 repetitions short on the body weight repetition from 38xBW to 35xBW and down one repetition on the weighted version from 4xBW+50kg to 3xBW+50kg, BUT, I did pull more BW+50kg repetitions/sets today than any other day. So in considering the dormant period and numbers completed, I’m happy with probably what I would call my favourite chest/tri routine. Secondly, the seated dumbbell military presses,not impressive on paper. But that’s not the point. I last did these on 20/04/2011, 9 fucking MONTHS ago. Reason for the long break: I kept flagging this particular routine as something that kept bothering my right tricep tendon injury, which mind you is still not 100% healed today. And even though I was 10kg short of my PB (5kg extra each arm), the major cause for celebration is that the healing right tricep tendon was not bothered at all! BOOM! The bench dips were for shits and giggles. Funny though as my abs cramped up during the BW+75kg set. Then this prompted me to do some cable crunch, for shits and giggles once again.

There’s one other thing I will note however: the dips and seated military presses are no good together for me. Not when I’m doing 12 sets of the dips. Left shoulder was really fatigued after the dips (not really surprising at that volume) and I could feel them during the military presses. If I pushed real hard I would have definitely caused some sort of injury. So it was good that I did not go any harder on them, which was sensible. And that’s another thing I need to consider, to continue being sensible.

Nutrition
Total: 3,600 calories
Protein: 380g
Fat: 110g
Carbohydrates: 250g
Meals: N/A

Notes
Weight-in indicates an immediate 1kg drop overnight from the ridiculously stupid amounts of overflowing that occurred over the weekend. That’s 45% (I say this instead of 50% because I believe at least a minor proportion of that weight gained, realistically should be muscle) done and fucking dusted.

Damage Control

• N/A

Notes
Daily loading on injured right tricep tendon maintained. Back and pectoral stretches maintained. Forearms and lats are sore at moderate levels. Biceps and upper back/traps are sore at high levels.

Day 3 - 25/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: Low/Medium
Sleep: 4hrs 30min

Recovery
Distracted. Eventful. Unproductive. That pretty much summarises my night. Sleep was pretty rough also even though the room temp was at 22’ish degrees. I remember waking up a couple of times all hot and sweaty.

Routine - AM
Fasted (IF): 9hrs 30min
Routine: Analogue stationary bike 20min (9min hill climb @ 3min intervals)
Duration: 20min

Notes - AM
Morning pre-workout workout went awesomesauce but was mildly a struggle due to morning energy levels.

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 14hrs
Routine: Waist down
Duration: 1hr 30min

• 5min Treadmill incline LISS warm up
• Barbell deadlift: 5x70kg 5x70kg 5x110kg 5x110kg 5x150kg 5x150kg 2x180kg 1x180kg 20x110kg 10x110kg 3x150kg 10x110kg 10x110kg 5x110kg
• Machine leg extension: 10x50kg 15x50kg 6x80kg 6x80kg 20x40kg

Notes - PM
I tried to replicate what I’ve been doing with squats over the past two weeks today with deadlifts and I realised (for now) that deadlifts cannot be approached this way. What I mean by replicate is going through a moderate to heavy approach with ridiculous amounts of volume. Squats at 20 to 30 sets, doable. Deadlifts, probably but then again, probably not a very smart thing to do. By the 9th set of today’s deadlifts I could anticipate back pumps coming. When the first signs of fatigue surface certain parts/movements that may be insignificant to most start becoming lazy. This laziness becomes the weakest part, a bottleneck through the movement and in effect, it has a domino effect and it affects the entire movement. It becomes inefficient and at times downright dangerous. In my anticipation I started to drop my weight whilst trying to maintain volume. All in all however, a pretty solid grinding deadlift-fest considering my energy levels thanks to a very responsible [/sarcasm] evening. The machine leg extensions were just for shits and giggles, nothing overly serious.

I was approached by an athlete today requesting to assist one or two staff members in edumacating them on how to do a proper Turkish Get Up. See, I come across staff members from time to time who are somewhat new to the lifestyle and are having a go. When I see someone doing a particular movement incorrectly which isn’t uncommon, I NEVER jump in. Not even for the purpose of vaginas. Gym is sirius biznes. More importantly, I am not qualified. But today I helped, especially at a request of an athlete. So that was a nice moment there.

Today is very much potentially my last day of training for the week. And if I do anything more throughout my interstate trip until my return this Sunday then it certainly isn’t going to get logged. I’ve also made a very close observation on the idea of doing three heavy days in a row, in training and in nutrition, which is also different depending on what kind of day it will be. At this point I have some speculation in my head about several things from treating a weekly training calendar this way but I will not at this point make any conclusions. If I were to, I would need to do it all over again a fair few times so I can identify some sort of trend/pattern.

Nutrition
Total: 3,600 calories
Protein: 380g
Fat: 110g
Carbohydrates: 250g
Meals: N/A

Notes
This total is rough only. My first (out of 2 total for the day) meal is a sure 2,000 calories. I’ll be out of town straight after work so there’s no telling what my totals will be. After my first meal, the counting stops until Monday.

The pic I’ve attached roughly shows my current composition. As I said I’m feeling pretty fucking swole so far but at the cost of looking a little softer. I think my mild bulk has sped up recently, too quickly actually so starting next week I’m entering a mild cut. I’ve been getting a push towards getting a photoshoot since late last year but have never really gotten off my arse about it until now so I’m starting to take self pics solo (and soon with female partners) to get ideas, some self research if you will. I’ve got access to a small network of young aspiring female models and I’ve got a photographer or a small network of to also work with. I’d like to get at least one shoot down before the weather gets cooler and what a perfect time to get some sort of life snapshot done, because I turn 32 in a couple of weeks. It’s something I can look back to and say “Hey, that’s how I looked like at age 32”, amongst other things.

Damage Control

• N/A

Notes
Every fucking thing waist and up are sore from mild to moderate. Pecs, arms, lats, back, fuck me dead. I’ve never felt so swole in my life. Weight-in indicates that I’ve settled on 75.7kg today and there’s no telling what the next 5 days will do as they will be pretty relaxed on all fronts. Pectoral and back stretches were all maintained overnight as well as the daily loading I do for my injured/healing right tricep tendon. I will not be able to maintain these starting from tonight but I’ll try and squeeze them in every now and then.

Weekend Outlook going Into Week 5

Training
The usual Saturday conditioning will be skipped but I will be moving around and doing things while I’m away of town from today through to Sunday. No logging will occur but my accommodation (or accommodations ;) I should say) has gym/pool facilities.

Nutrition
No logging/counting will be done in the nutrition front either. As with training, nutrition will be flexible over the next 5 days. Plus, my general approach: when alcomaholz is in the equation, all logging stops. And there will be alcohol consumption every fucking day I assure you.

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Week 3 - Cruise Control

Day 1 - 16/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: High
Sleep: 7hrs 10min

Recovery
Not alcohol free over the weekend but was extremely responsible, the first for this year. Timing was perfect considering how fucked (and still are) my legs are after Fridays routine, sleep was plentiful and nutrition was more than sufficient.

Routine - AM
Fasted (IF): 12hrs
Routine: Analogue stationary bike 20min (9min hill climb @ 3min intervals)
Duration: 20min

Notes - AM
Breakfast, awesomesauce MIIT as usual.

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 16hrs
Routine: Back
Duration: 1hr 30min

• 5min Treadmill LISS warm up, incline
• Cable row: 8x50kg 8x50kg 6x75kg 6x75kg 6x100kg 7x130kg 6x130kg 6x130kg 6x100kg 6x100kg (PB-RS)
• Cable wide grip lat pull down: 8x30kg 8x30kg 6x60kg 6x60kg 6x100kg 5x100kg 4x100kg 6x80kg 6x80kg 6x80kg (PB-S)
• Barbell shrug: 8x70kg 8x70kg 6x120kg 6x170kg 6x200kg 6x170kg 6x170kg 10x120kg 10x120kg 15x120kg

Notes - PM
So far so good. Strength is slowly on the rise and the numbers are synchronized with my current weight-in status. I am purposely holding back on PBs because I don’t want to fatigue myself out but I am ensuring I have significant increases in numbers in either repetition and/or set counts. Every routine here saw a minor improvement from last week. Including cleanliness on the working sets.

It was also interesting to note that upon chatting to Coach J, she said “I took your advise over the weekend” (I didn’t give her advice but we usually talk about our approaches etc), and took a relax approach to nutrition. The end result: she feels like a fucking champion today, with strength on the high. And, she doesn’t look like she put anything on over the weekend. BOOOYAAAH to fucking flexibility.

This now marks the second week of my trials. Next week will be interesting because there’s a public holiday up, but the intention regardless is now to still go out and replace key routines that I’ve done the past fortnight and give them a ninja-style deload without actually going through a deloading phase.

Nutrition
Total: 3,600 calories
Protein: 380g
Fat: 110g
Carbohydrates: 250g
Meals: N/A

Notes
This is the third week since I made adjustments to my nutrition and I’m very happy with the direction of where everything is heading. This also marks my second week in a row where weight-in is in it’s high 75s, this mornings number was 75.7kg. I find that the strength will catch up once the new baseline weight (mass volume) has been established for several weeks.

Damage Control

• N/A

Notes
Right injured/healing tricep tendon loading, back and pec stretches were only maintained half the time over the weekend. Quads and glutes are the only ones sore, still at fuck-me-dead levels, 4th day since training them last week. They were pretty fucked up throughout the weekend. I had a funny moment on Friday afternoon. Straight from work, I drive into my driveway, get out of the car and I was literally grounded/stuck for a good few minutes. Both my quads, the teardrop shape thingois cramped up and I absolutely could not move. I couldn’t stop laughing because it was so painful. The routine I did on Friday, that’s a fucking keeper. My quads and glutes have never been worked out like this before, that session itself has had the greatest impact (from feel) and I didn’t hold back on eating like a king and a half and sleeping like a baby over the weekend to complete the formula.

Day 2 - 17/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: High
Sleep: 6hrs 40min

Recovery
Consistently getting 8hrs of sleep under my belt every night is posing to be a challenge recently. My schedule seems to be getting busier and busier and at times I get home later than expected that I find myself chowing down on whatever calories I need to cram in at 11PM. I wouldn’t mind sleeping immediately after some calorie chowing but it’s not that easy. Next week will be more challenging as I’m looking at once again, for social reasons, heading out of town starting from Wednesday with a Saturday/Sunday return. My liver loves me.

Routine - AM
Fasted (IF): 9hrs 30min
Routine: Analogue stationary bike 20min (9min hill climb @ 3min intervals)
Duration: 20min

Notes - AM
Solid as usual. Highly anticipating this afternoon’s simple but butt-fucking session. I wonder if I will superset some standing crunches again.

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 14hrs
Routine: Random Shit - Metabolic
Duration: 40min

• 5min jogging/skipping warm up, 2x around the track
• 4x Field length sprints @ 75% 15 seconds - 16 seconds range sprint duration + 60s walk (from one edge of field to the other)
• 5x FF (Fat Fuck - 10x2 on the last stretches) tyre flips SUPERSET 20x push up, entire field length and a half+: Totals: 80 flips + 300 push up

Notes - PM
FUCK ME FUCK ME FUCK ME FUCK ME! Well that summarises it. I love training (nothing new there) and this session provided an even higher and all sorts of levels of awesomesauce. Every time I needed a breather/in between sets, I was either walking or dancing to some Tinie Tempah (been getting into some of his tunes lately). This session was adjusted slightly. One, I reduced the sprint run count from 5 to 4 only to cut down on time but it seems I didn’t need to because I finished this session in less time when compared to the last weeks routine. In saying that, I did 50% more flips compared to last week, which automatically means more push ups since I superset’ed both. Last session saw me totalling 55 flips and 200 push ups. Today saw 80 flips and 300 push ups, flipping the fat fuck tyre an entire field length and a half. Massive fucking sweat fest and it is evident that by not unintentionally doing any standing crunches (vomiting) like I did last week on a lighter routine, that my fitness levels continue to improve.

Nutrition
Total: 2,400
Protein: 262g
Fat: 120
Carbohydrates: 31g
Meals: 1

Notes
No change, just the usual non-heavy template. Two things though I’d like to put up. I’m going through nearly 1.4kg of peanut butter a week. And an update for my weekend dessert mash ups: 200g peanut butter, 4x scoops of choc whey, 5 tablespoons of Milo, a crap load of milk. Mixed that all up into a thick sludge then dumped 2 180g bags of Milkybar buttons in there and mixed them up again. Fuck I miss white chocolate.

Damage Control

• N/A

Notes
Mid and upper back are sore at moderate levels, beauty! Glutes are clear! Quads are still sore, it rapidly reduced overnight from fuck-me-dead levels to mild-caressing levels, now onto day 5 of soreness (this is why I do legs on Fridays). I’ve been good with the usual daily recovery loading of my right tricep, back and pec stretches. My ankle tenderness from front squats I mentioned last year is also nearly cleared. Right elbow lateral epicondylitis is also undergoing a significant improvement. And the past three weeks of sprinting also has not aggravated the mild abdominal wall issue which I’m convinced is now gone. Things are clearing up, good fucking shit I say.

Day 3 - 18/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: High
Sleep: 7hrs+

Recovery
Slept like a baby, top stuff! Tiredness finally kicked in last night and I was forced to hit bed at a decent time. I’m not sure why, despite cycling 16hrs to 24hrs of fasting periods, I’m still finding it a challenge to go to bed at a decent time. I’ve been limited to two coffees a day max, sometimes just one.

Routine - AM
Fasted (IF): 10hrs
Routine: Analogue stationary bike 20min (9min hill climb @ 3min intervals)
Duration: 20min

Notes - AM
Early morning MIIT breakfast pre-workout workout for today’s lunchtime heavy workout, awesomesauce as always.

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 15hrs
Routine: Chest/Shoulders
Duration: 1hr 40min

• 5min Treadmill incline LISS warm up
• Incline dumbbell press (45 degrees): 10x30kg 10x30kg 6x40kg 6x50kg 8x70kg 5x70kg 6x50kg 6x50kg 6x50kg 6x50kg (PB-R)
• Seated barbell military press: 6xBar 6xBar 7x40kg 6x40kg 6x40kg 5x40kg 5x40kg 8xBar (PB-RS)
• Dumbbell isolated side lateral raise: 6x15kg 6x25kg 6x30kg 10x37.5kg 6x25kg 6x25kg 6x25kg 6x25kg (PB-R)
• Dumbbell reverse flye: 6x30kg 6x40kg 7x70kg 6x45kg 6x45kg 6x45kg 6x30kg 6x30kg (PB-R)

Notes - PM
Top session with minor improvements on all routines. Whether it’d be repetition or set count based, improvements are evident. Incline dumbbell presses are very close to hitting two solid sets of 8 repetitions at 70kg, next increment will be 75kg. But this marks the second week of my trials so an ‘sneaky’ deload for my incline dumbbell presses starts next week to be replaced by another pectoral primary: dips (body weight and weighted). Seated barbell military presses also went great and now hit a 7 repetition based set. An extra set was added as I fatigued early on this one. Isolated lateral (supported on non-working arm) also went great. The left arm is noticeably dirtier during the working set of 37.5kg, a minor improvement nonetheless. The reverse flyes also saw a minor improvement.

I feel like these Day 3s (chest and shoulders) can be tweaked some more. I feel I’m still doing too much. I will have to remove a routine here and squeeze it in elsewhere. Another option is to dedicate another day for shoulders and concentrate on chest (triceps as secondary) on another day but then again, that’s too much lifting for me since I’m already three days of heavies during the 7 day week, make that four since my tricep conditional and broxperimentals can be considered heavies which I do on Saturdays. The balance might be broken in regards to heavy, non-heavies, and rest days. Investimagation towards tweaking and possible options in my head in progress.

Nutrition
Total: 3,600 calories
Protein: 380g
Fat: 110g
Carbohydrates: 250g
Meals: N/A

Notes
Bob’s your fucking uncle. All is well. Looking soft, but abs are visible, strength is up and I’m still a 32” waist. Leaning up as usual as I progress through the week and numbers dipped below 75kg today in their high 74s this morning. All good on all fronts. I’ve got approval at work to take Wednesday off until the rest of the week next week which will give me a 4.5 day weekend. Possibly watching Soundgarden in Sydney, drinking pretty much every day throughout except for Sunday. That means calories would probably be out of whack, most likely over maintenance with the wrong macro-nutrients, more importantly, not enough protein. I’ll play it by ear, I haven’t been able to source a babysitter so far to look after Maxximus (my 6+ year old 55kg Alaskan Malamute) and the house.

Damage Control

• N/A

Notes
Everything maintained. 1hr of injury loading on right tricep tendon, back and pectoral stretches, all completed with no issues. Mid and upper back are still fucked, feeling awesomesauce. Everything waist and below are now clear. Sprints, flips, and other body weight stuff yesterday, all non-heavies, do a brilliant job with recovery.

Day 4 - 19/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: High
Sleep: 6hrs 30min

Recovery
Bed-to-KO was a little challenging due to the heat/humidity but I eventually got there. The fact that a fan was directed at my balls made me sleep like a baby though, a tip for you hot blooded mangs out there, OK mang?

Routine - AM
Fasted (IF): 10hrs 30min
Routine: Analogue stationary bike 20min (9min hill climb @ 3min intervals)
Duration: 20min

Notes - AM
Fanfuckingtastic.

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 15hrs
Routine: Metabolic/Non-heavy/Randoms
Duration: 40min

• 5min jogging/skipping warm up, 2x around the track
• 5x Field length sprints @ 75% 15/16 seconds range sprint duration + 60s walk (from one edge of field to the other)
• 5x FF (Fat Fuck - 10x2 on the last stretches) tyre flips SUPERSET 20x push up, 2x field lengths!!!!: Totals: 110 flips + 400 push ups

Notes - PM
Mind over body. That’s what fucking happened. What a milestone. Continuous improvement: fucking evident. What a session, the feeling is abso-fucking-lutely incredible. I planned on merely repeating this weeks Day 2 routine by going through the same flip/push up protocol of 1.5 field length with 80 flips and 100 push up totals. I didn’t want to get carried away. As soon as I was done, the first words I could hear inside me said “Well done. Great work. Mishun akomplisht!”. Then I heard another one (fuck me dead I must be going crazy. Seriously though this is just my thoughts being voiced inside my head....) say “You know, if you were to do 2x field lengths that would be a nice improvement. I mean, you’ve essentially just done 75% already, just fucking do it”. I looked at the time and said to myself: “Why the fuck not. Let’s rock!”. BOOM! Done and fucking dusted! I’m very surprised that my chest held up, considering yesterday was a chest (and shoulder day), I was still able to pull 400 push ups. Form was kept clean throughout the flips (thanks to Mr. Track and Field athlete/coach’s observation not long ago when he trained with me) and the sprints did not aggravate the mild abdominal strain, which at some point this week I was so convinced was gone, but it’s all good no stress. Both the ring and middle fingers on both my left and right hands are burnt from doing the push ups. There were the occasional breeze (relieving and beautiful) but it is a fucking hot day. And those synthetic grass radiates the heat nicely. The standing crunches were a bonus one for shits and giggles... just kidding. I vomited again 25% of the way through the flipping bonanza.

Nutrition
Total: 2,400
Protein: 262g
Fat: 120
Carbohydrates: 31g
Meals: 1

Notes
The usual non-heavy single meal day applies today. When I got out of bed this morning I said to myself “Hrmmm, I feel leaner (and look it too - water drop) and lighter. I must have dropped 1.5kg compared the start of this weeks weight in, Day 1 @ 75.7kg. The actual weight in however indicates my weight-in from yesterday was bumped up and I’m smack bang on 75kg. Things are going great. My body is going through a slow but progressive change as intended and the consistency, despite it’s variation of its rate (depending on certain situations), indicates that a slow mass gain cycle is still under way.

Damage Control

• Push up (400 total) on hot synthetic grass (superset with fat fuck tyre flips) - 4 burnt fingers (2 on each hand, ring and middle fingers on each hand)

Notes
Mid and upper back soreness have been reduced to mild levels. Chest soreness are at mild levels. Daily recovery loading on injured right tricep maintained as well as back and chest stretches lasting one hour. I felt some mild abdominal strain this morning by accident while doing my tricep loading lying on my back on a bench and also conducted some physiotherapy prescribed exercises. The strain however did not affect my sprints this afternoon.

Day 5 - 20/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: High
Sleep: 6hrs 30min

Recovery
Great sleep, fan on balls, but daily average needs a major improvement. With social events and other miscellaneous things I find myself coming home later than usual, cooking later than usual, eating later than usual, and sleeping later than usual.

Routine - AM
Fasted (IF): 9hrs
Routine: Analogue stationary bike 20min (9min hill climb @ 3min intervals)
Duration: 20min

Notes - AM
Fantastic, no change. Awesome as usual. I had two swimmers on the spin next to me and since I get along well with the swimming coach we were just all there chatting and laughing about random stuff.

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 14hrs
Routine: Waist down
Duration: 1hr 30min

• 5min Treadmill incline LISS warm up
• Barbell squat to box (35cm: Parallel for 168cm vertical height): 10xBar 10xBar 5x60kg 5x60kg 5x80kg 5x80kg 5x110kg 4x110kg 3x110kg 5x100kg 5x100kg 4x100kg 10x80kg 10x80kg 5x80kg 10x80kg 4x100kg 7x80kg 5x80kg 5x80kg 12x60kg 15x60kg 10x60kg 5x60kg 5x60kg (PB-RS)
• Dip: 20xBW 20xBW

Notes - PM
Fantastic session for a Friday afternoon. I aimed to actually hit 30 sets today but see I did not want to exceed 90mins of total training time, 25 sets in total, still 5 sets better than last week. The dips in the end were “I just want to divert the pain away...”, LULZ. Total tonnage on squats: 11.5 tonnes. A coach suggested to try and measure my leg days this way so I can use this number and better it for the next routine. I got some more awesome tips from coach I and comments from another athlete and coach J such as “....great depth....” and “....looking good, depth is good....”. The grinding high volume but simplistic sessions in an attempt to break my weak squat barrier/imbalance as well as my experimentation/trails are both going great. Quote of the day in the gym goes to coach J: “You know, we all think you’re crazy right?”. What a compliment, LULZ I’m merely being my own lab rat.

Also, I confused these squats for box squats until I got edumacated by coach I, thanks champ! So correction, these are squat to box. I would go ATG for now but as mentioned not long ago, upon reviewing my ATG movement my arse curls back on the lowest part of the movement, but at this height I find (coaches and athletes believe I am getting good depth on the 35cm box) the depth to be sufficient, effective enough whilst avoiding that ass curl.

Nutrition
Total: 3,600 calories
Protein: 380g
Fat: 110g
Carbohydrates: 250g
Meals: N/A

Notes
Today’s intake is probably not going to be accurate. Estimate: more carbs, less protein (but not significant enough to affect recover from training), and a shit load of alcomaholz.

Damage Control

• N/A

Notes
Everything is clear from the past few days of training. Nothing is sore. Even post leg session, I don’t sense the two tear-drop shaped things rendering me immobilised on my own fucking driveway by entering a fucktarded matrix-style spasming mode. I’ve got an “appointment” shortly after work, so no stretches will be missed. That applies for tomorrow and most probably the entire weekend.

Weekend Outlook going Into Week 4

Training
Fucking mermaids at the beach, thanks T-Pain.

Nutrition
Flexible. Lots of drinking and zero counting. Flexibility, fucking try it. It does wonders. I’ll be out tonight and then I head off to the coast early in the morning (fucking not sure how the two are going to work) for beach camping, so naturally: BBQ, fishing, and mermaid watching.... Yes, that’s right.

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Week 2 - Cruise Control

Day 1 - 09/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: High
Sleep: 6hrs 10min

Recovery
Rest was great, total time: not sufficient. Like always, social events over the weekend has a domino effect to the first day back of the week but usually (for me) should settle by the second day.

Routine - AM
Fasted (IF): 9hrs 30min
Routine: Analogue stationary bike 20min (9min hill climb @ 3min intervals)
Duration: 20min

Notes - AM
Awesomesauce. Not too much not too little, just right. Morning pre-workout workout for my afternoon workout.

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 14hrs
Routine: Back
Duration: 1hr 30min

• 5min Treadmill LISS warm up, incline
• Cable row: 10x50kg 10x50kg 6x75kg 6x75kg 6x100kg 6x100kg 6x130kg 6x130kg 6x100kg 6x100kg 10x80kg 10x80kg (PB-S)
• Cable wide grip lat pull down: 10x30kg 10x30kg 6x60kg 6x60kg 6x80kg 6x100kg 4x100kg 6x80kg 6x80kg 6x80kg 6x60kg 6x60kg (PB-S)
• Barbell shrug: 10x70kg 10x70kg 8x120kg 6x170kg 6x200kg 6x170kg 6x170kg 6x120kg 10x120kg 10x120kg

Notes - PM
This marks the first day of my experiments/trials on my “Less is More” post which I published this morning. I feel just as fucked up post session and I feel I better utilised the time at hand with focusing it at the primary “key” routines (specifically for me, from experience and feel), limited to only one per day as opposed to doing 3-4 sets of 3 or more routines in the one session. Today’s focus were three areas, back (in general), lats, and traps (upper back). That’s it, simple. Since I have about two to three “key” routines per muscle group and a training calendar lasts 7 days, I’m looking at around 3 months worth of testing. The beauty of me being accountable as well as my attention to detail in writing these journals and also my self in-tune’ness is that I should be able to somewhat accurately predict how this will progress at the halfway mark. I am pretty consistent and yet I am not, as well nutritionally I have made adjustments that would actually benefit this experiment/trial. And, routines such as squats, deadlifts, dumbbell chest presses, shoulder presses are a given, just an example of routines I would not stop doing for an extended amount of time (outside and beyond deloading phases unless injury forces me to).

Three routines, 30min each ranging from 10 to 12 sets: a total duration of 1hr 30mins. Cable rows were stronger than last week, a set based PB there @ PB-W of 130kg. Wide grip lat pull downs were also strong with an extra (but incomplete) set. I needed straps on both routines at the max weight and the dirty max weights are getting cleaner. The barbell shrugs are also the same, much cleaner and stronger than last week (maxed out at 170kg).

Nutrition
Total: 3,600 calories
Protein: 380g
Fat: 110g
Carbohydrates: 250g
Meals: N/A

Notes
Second week of new tension day calorie intake with 600 calories injected. We’ll see how this goes. Weight in is looking great, now at 75.4kg. Although this isn’t an established weight since Mondays for me are always indicate a higher weight in than the rest of the week, usually from a very flexible and social approach to the weekend, it’s a good sign. In between 3 - 4 weeks time, 75kg should be well established. I am anticipating no changes in the nutritional department any time soon and the current slow and progressive increase in conjunction in keeping a 30” - 32” waist, I’ve got no complaints. I am still holding into a little bit of water weight, but it isn’t an issue at all. This week’s dish: another yumiliciously good Asian dish: a crap load of rice, meat, some vegetables, a lot of milk, 5 scoops (in total for the day) of choc whey brotein powder, a crap load of Milo, and some orgasmic peanut butter (natural).

As a quick side note: My Suunto watch which used to be loose is now tight and I am constantly accidentally un-clipping it from my wrist. In translation: my wrists are thicker than before. No fat/water can be seen so either my skeletal structure is getting thicker then I am comfortable in saying that mass gain is now being spread out. My arms also seem to appear thicker than before. both good signs indeed.

Damage Control

• N/A

Notes
Certain “movements” (take that as you will) mildly aggravated my mild abdominal strain over the weekend, which does feel like a hip joint issue, very minor only. The right lateral epicondylitis issue has not gone away and I will give until the end of the month until taking further action (through a professional), although improvement is very slow just like my currently healing right tricep tendon. Absolutely no loading of right tricep tendon and back/pectoral stretches were maintained over the weekend, another effect of social events taking over but I’m not overly concerned so long as consistency is maintained 5 days out of the 7 of the week.

Day 2 - 10/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: Medium-High
Sleep: 5hrs

Recovery
Reading reading reading, looked at the time, I say “Oh crap...”, I goes to bed. Lost track of time. Motivation: untouched but the morning was very slow (half asleep). Cathy the cafe lady here at work makes me a “Christian” special. It’s a 6-shot long black, and this fixed me up nicely.

Routine - AM
Fasted (IF): 10hrs 30min
Routine: Analogue stationary bike 20min (9min hill climb @ 3min intervals)
Duration: 20min

Notes - AM
Felt a tad sleepy during the workout although the intensity in no way was reduced.

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 15hrs 30min
Routine: Random Shit - Metabolic
Duration: 50min

• 5min jogging/skipping warm up, 2x around the track
• 5x Field length sprints @ 75% 16s-18s range sprint duration + 60s walk (from one edge of field to the other)
• 5 Continuous rounds of: 5x FF (fat fuck) tyre flips SUPERSET 20x (10RA/10LA) 16kg kettlebell single arm snatches SUPERSET dual-wielding FS (fulisik tyres) 2x20 strides (40 total) SUPERSET 20x push ups

Notes - PM
Fan-fucking-tastic, session was fan-fucking-tastic indeed. Sprints are getting quicker and once again, for the second consecutive sprint session in a row, my mild abdominal wall strain did not surface. It was noted however by coach J after I mentioned that the sprints made my right tibialis anterior sore, that I might have been over-extending my strides during the sprints: noted. Despite sticking to approximately 75% effort, I maintained a 16s to 18s runs for the entire field length (approximately 100m - debatable, coaches cannot confirm) the entire set (5x sprints). Coach J also did 10x field sprints and she was doing low 20s. She did not join me with the tyre flips but she did have a brief attempt and I am very impressed. She flipped the FF tyres 10x and they were pretty solid. My routine was simple, it consisted of 1xFF tyre, 4xFS tyres, and one 16kg kettlebell. I enclosed the FF tyre in between a pair of FS tyres, approximately 5.5 flips room in between. The routine was basically to flip the FF tyre 5 times, do 20x (10 each arm) single arm kettlebell snatches, farmers walk a pair of FS tyres from one end to the other then do the same for the other pair and finally do 20 push ups. Rinse and repeat 5 times and the end result is an awesomesauce feeling. I was a lot more conscious (as noted by Mr. Track and Field last week) with form so I executed each FF tyre flip slower, more controlled and took more time pre-flip prep. I made sure I was starting off at full sumo, testicles to grass and both my legs just below the knee height were pretty much resting on the FF tyre.

Nutrition
Total: 2,200
Protein: 262g
Fat: 120
Carbohydrates: 31g
Meals: 1

Notes
Low carb, high protein, and high fat. The usual non-heavy tension day.

Damage Control

• N/A

Notes
Wow, I even forgot to do my usual daily right tricep loading and stretches for both back and pectorals. Will pick up on everything tonight. I should be able to get back on track tonight on everything and for the remainder of the week. I had such an effective session yesterday so catching up on as much rest as possible would be beneficial. My entire back is fucked up, I love this feeling, knowing I broke things. My energy intake is well matched, I just need to pull my finger out with sleep/rest for recovery purposes.

Day 3 - 11/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: High
Sleep: 6hrs 30min

Recovery
Distractions + some reading: got carried away in both but at least I’ve increased the rest period so far from a 5hr 30min average.

Routine - AM
Fasted (IF): 11hrs 30min
Routine: Analogue stationary bike 20min (9min hill climb @ 3min intervals)
Duration: 20min

Notes - AM
More intense than normal, a lot more awake than yesterday morning. My legs seem to be getting thicker too, I’m not sure if the every-off-day sprints are helping but it’s a good sign.

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 16hrs
Routine: Chest/Shoulders
Duration: 1hr 45min

• 5min Treadmill incline LISS warm up
• Incline dumbbell press (45 degrees): 10x30kg 10x30kg 6x40kg 6x50kg 6x70kg 7x70kg 6x50kg 6x50kg (PB-R)
• Dip: 31xBW 6xBW+20kg 4xBW+40kg 1xBW+50kg 20xBW
• Seated barbell military press: 6xBar 6xBar 6x40kg 6x40kg 6x40kg 6x40kg (PB-R)
• Dumbbell isolated side lateral raise: 6x15kg 6x25kg 6x30kg 9x37.5kg 6x25kg 6x25kg (PB-R)
• Cable flye: 10x20kg 8x45kg 10x45kg 8x60kg 10x50kg 15x40kg
• Dumbbell reverse flye: 6x30kg 6x40kg 6x70kg 6x45kg 6x45kg 6x45kg (PB-R)

Notes - PM
Based on my earlier post this week, I wanted to quickly test why I am moving towards more simplified heavy tension routines, hence, the unplanned and extended session duration. I feel stronger. It was clearly the case, made a PB on the very first routine, somewhat a key’ish exercise. I then move to my favourite chest routine, dips. See if I had started off with dips, I would have broken my 38xBW repetition set. Or at least equaled 4xBW+50kg weight based PB. But I didn’t. If I did, the incline dumbbell presses would have suffered. The cable flyes were just for shits and giggles.

So, the session. Fan-fucking-tastic it was. Incline dumbbell presses saw a repetition based PB and I think I’ll set 2x sets of 8 solid repetitions before increasing the weight to the next increment. Dips were a part of a little experiment. It really felt like I could hit 40xBW but clearly tits were fatigued after the incline dumbbell presses: a nice little experiment. The seated barbell military presses also saw a repetition based PB but only by one. Last week was 5, 6, 6, and 6. Today, all solid 6s on the working sets. I’d like to hit all sets at maybe 8 solid repetitions before increasing the weight. The isolated (supported) lateral raises also saw a repetition based PB. I’ll keep grinding that weight up until it starts become schmick clean. The same goes for the reverse flyes, a repetition based PB, dirty and on it’s way to getting cleaner.

Nutrition
Total: 3,600 calories
Protein: 380g
Fat: 110g
Carbohydrates: 250g
Meals: N/A

Notes
So far so good. Holding onto some water a little plus it seems with the extra 2kg’ish gain so far is mildly evident on the stubborn areas for men: lower back and lower abdominal. I’m not concerned, This is part of the plan, everything seems to be getting thicker. Plus, the creatine usage is also contributing to a softer appearance. But, strength is up and that is equally as important. Increaed numbers in lifts to me equates to muscle gained.

Damage Control

• N/A

Notes
Great development and news here. For the first time in 12 months of managing my injured right tricep tendon, a good portion of last night’s daily loading did not trigger the tinglyness that I normally feel. I love being so in-tune not only with my body in the nutritional front but also when managing injuries. We have progress, we have improvement. Pectoral and back stretches were also maintained. Upper back/traps are still fucked up to buggery and I love it. They were so pumped even a day after training them, that a senior biomechanist couldn’t help but touch and make comments about them, LULZ. It seems that this weeks Day 1 template hits the backs mid and upper section nicely. Quads are also sore from yesterday’s sprints.

Day 4 - 12/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: High
Sleep: 7hrs+

Recovery
Slept in, otherwise I’d ended up with 6hrs only. Otherwise, as always motivation and energy levels are untouched. Speaking of which, if I remember correctly, motivation levels throughout 2011 have been un-fucking-touched. It’s amazing what the mind can do.

Routine - AM
Fasted (IF): 9hrs
Routine: Analogue stationary bike 20min (9min hill climb @ 3min intervals)
Duration: 20min

Notes - AM
Breakfast, late breakfast. A morning pre-workout workout for my PM workout. Planning something simpler this afternoon and yet more brutal than before.

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 13hrs
Routine: Random Shit - Metabolic
Duration: 50min

• 5min jogging/skipping warm up, 2x track laps
• 5x Field length sprints @ 75% 15 seconds - 16 seconds range sprint duration + 60s walk (from one edge of field to the other)
• 5x FF (Fat Fuck - 10x on the last stretch) tyre flips SUPERSET 20x push up, entire field length. Totals: 55 flips + 200 push up
• Standing crunches (aka. vomiting: during the half way mark of the flip/push up superset)
• 5min jogging/skipping cool down, 2x track laps

Notes - PM
What can I say, I sound like a broken record but I don’t give a shit. Session was fucking awesome as always. The sprints are getting quicker with my maintained effort (approximate - 75%) and my mild abdominal strain isn’t being triggered nor am I sensing any injuries. The warm ups appear to be doing their job nicely. I didn’t take out my kettlebell or any extra tyres for this one today, KISS principle works and I kept it simplified by simply grinding out the flips from one side of the field to the other and doing 20 push ups every 5 flips. During the halfway mark, I ended up doing some standing crunches (vomiting) and just quietly, I was celebrating. Vomiting is not an easy feat for me unless I’ve eaten something rotten and toys with my internals. During training or even when I’m out-drinking a lot of you big motherfuckers out there, it isn’t easy. It’s like a marker now you see, and in my next flipping session I’ll proceed to test myself again and again and again, and because I do a good job with tracking my routines, I can measure improvement with ease. Quite simply: I was pushed further than before, and since I like statistics and breaking my own numbers, I’ll persist with my own way, my passion towards my own continuous improvement. And I apply this methodology in my life (except I don’t log it.... LULZ!), not just when I’m moving heavy shit.

Nutrition
Total: 2,400
Protein: 262g
Fat: 120
Carbohydrates: 31g
Meals: 1

Notes
Correcting my numbers on paper. Not 2,200, more like 2,400. I’ve been cheating lately, in fact I do it everyday thanks to my love for peanut butter. “Just an extra 50g of peanut butter will do, nobody will notice... ^_^”. LULZ

Damage Control

• N/A

Notes
Tits are tight, sore at mild levels. Delts are clear, they rarely get sore for me. Back and especially the upper back/traps, are still fucked up to buggery. I fucking love it, now sore on it’s 4th day. Eat those calories motherfucker, sleep like a baby, and in the background I know the muskel growth is being looked after. The right and injured tricep tendon daily loading was maintained and as per my notes yesterday, a good portion of it triggered no tingles. Great fucking sign. Back and pectoral stretches have also been maintained.

Day 5 - 13/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: High
Sleep: 6hrs 30min

Recovery
Rest duration was sufficient, just. But quality of sleep wasn’t. It dropped to 6 the night before last, had a beautiful sleep. Last night, temps dropped to 16 degrees and I still had the fan going. The massive contrast in temperature change is affecting my quality of rest, plus I’ve been quite distracted pretty much every night of the week. I will take more control of this.

Routine - AM
Fasted (IF): 10hrs 30min
Routine: Analogue stationary bike 20min (9min hill climb @ 3min intervals)
Duration: 20min

Notes - AM
A solid MIIT, warms me up for the rest of the day. This has been a ritual now. To me this makes a difference, it is a true warm up for the entire day, a pre-workout workout for my afternoon workout.

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 15hrs
Routine: Waist down
Duration: 1hr 30min

• 5min Treadmill incline LISS warm up
• Barbell box squat (35cm: Parallel for 168cm vertical height): 10xBar 10xBar 5x60kg 5x60kg 5x80kg 5x100kg 5x105kg 4x110kg 3x110kg 5x100kg 5x100kg 5x100kg 10x80kg 6x80kg 5x80kg 5x80kg 5x80kg 5x80kg 30x60kg 5x60kg (PB-W)
• Romanian deadlift: 10x60kg 10x60kg 5x100kg 3x140kg 3x160kg 5x100kg 10x60kg (PB-R)

Notes - PM
Well there we have it. 2 of 2 PBs for today and my first week of my experiment is going great so far. Keep It Simple Stupid (KISS) principle. I may repeat whatever I’ve done this week again next week, followed by switching ALL my key routines for each muscle group that I train the week (or two) following. It’s like a sneaky way of giving key routines a one to two week period of deloading while I still fucking smash the body. I’m thinking also that on after every 6th week when my two week deloading phase begins that perhaps I’ll keep all routines to accessory wanky spanky routines. We’ll see.

OK onto the session. All I can say is that all is looking fucking great. I’m very proud of the development of my weak squats, massive power imbalance when compared to my deadlifts. Romanian deadlifts were rushed but I still managed to pull a repetition based PB. The highlight of this session however was on set 19 where I completed 30 repetitions. Two strength and conditioning coaches got in front halfway through the set and I could hear them shouting out encouragement through the dubstep tunes that was playing at max volume through my iPhone. I was made some weird loud noises and in the end released a fucking massive WHOOOOOOOO! and filled that fucking strength and conditioning area with my energy. Absolute bliss, and I’m EXTREMELY LOVING the support and encouragement from these professionals. Many high five’s were done. Once again, I send a thank you to all of them that have assisted me in one way or another. They do contribute to my progress.

My glutes are sore now. Fuck DOMS, the soreness is already here. Time to look up a wheelchair hire, potentially the ones where I don’t have to get up to take a shit.

Nutrition
Total: 3,600 calories
Protein: 380g
Fat: 110g
Carbohydrates: 250g
Meals: N/A

Notes
Weight-in enforces my observation early last week, that my new baseline is now 74kg with a weekly range of 73.9kg (weight-in today, usually lightest on a Fridays) and 75.4kg (Monday weight-in). Adjustments last week appear to be looking great. The short term plan for now is to maintain these intake numbers and let the body settle before I increase the intake again. And this time it’ll be in the form of meat change, something a lot more energy dense.

Damage Control

• N/A

Notes
Pecs sore reduction, now at mild levels. Back/traps soreness reduced, now also at mild levels (fuck me dead, today’s the 5th day!). Quads/hamstrings are mildly sore most probably due to the sprints and excess tyre flips.Daily loading on injured and healing right tricep tendon maintained as well as the daily 1hr back and pec stretches, bely gut boi.

Weekend Outlook going Into Week 3

Training
Weekend tricep tendon conditioning in the form of shoulder routines will continue as well as the usual broxperimentals. the remaining time will be considered as a passive rest period.

Nutrition
Flexible as usual, but responsible. I’ve been pissing it up far too often over the past few weeks, just balancing things out just a little. But, this isn’t a promise. I get way too tempted when the ladies are involved/ I’ll just play it by ear.

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Less is More: Another Experiment

So I’ve been training seriously for over a year now. As far as nutritional approaches, that’s been on-going for three years. The initial 12 - 16 months were spent leaning up from a starting point status of being fat, my starting point was January 2009 @ 82.5kg. I must note that a few years prior I was over 100kg at an obese for someone at 168cm (5’6) in vertical height and especially for someone with a small frame with my Filipino/Chinese/Spanish background. I dropped from 100kg+ down quite rapidly but fell off the bandwagon bringing be back up to an untrained (in appearance) 82.5kg. To me, nutrition is the harder thing to grasp out of the two (the other being training) but I feel I am quite in tune in the nutrition department. Both nutrition and training do equally play a part but in essence, nutrition is King. Depending on what one’s goals are, I know that nutrition is always the area that will need adjusting/tweaking. Training will always stay hard regardless. I must also note: that all of what I’m posting here today is irrelevant if you are a roid bro, which is fine by me but it isn’t my thing and I don’t do it. I find the end result that much more meaningful and rewarding when every gram of mass you put, fat you drop, and kilogram that you lift. I’ve seen roided up gorillas who weight 2x more than me lift less than I do. See, most people will feel bad, I actually feel good. I don’t do shortcuts. What’s worth working for in essence is worth it. Nothing more nothing less. And besides, the nerd in me is having fun breaking numbers.

Nutrition
There are so many things the fitness world will attempt to feed you, in magazines, forums, blogs, etc. but all in all, it isn’t really all that hard once you attempt different approaches allowing time and consistency to assess the end result. Being a nerd also helps since I do write technical reports, benchmark performances, etc. The same applies for training. Nutrition, despite being the more challenging for me out of the two, somehow comes easier to me than training. I’ve made around 5 revisions now of my current intake, and despite how anal my logging/journals look, it comes easy to me and you wouldn’t be able to tell that I was counting meticulously. Starting last week, I’ve only made a simple change of increasing my weekly intake to 1,800 calories, injecting 600 calories on my heavy tension days only: Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I’ve basically maintained carbohydrate intake but increased my fat intake and a little for protein. Nothing complicated, just inject the numbers and increase the food. I’ll maintain this for another 4 to 8 weeks at least and further assess things at the end (and throughout).

Training
This is the main point of this post. As I mentioned, nutrition comes easier to me even though I feel in general it is the harder of the two to grasp, I’m still toying around with training after more than a year of lifting. I am not a full time athlete, I am a full time IT SOE Developer and spend most hours of the day in front of a computer watching p0rn all day and having a pull under my desk in the office. So, I don’t have the flexibility and time a full time athlete would have. Over the past 6 months, I’ve been noticing that certain lifts suffer because I seem to try and do too much. My routine has been quite simple. Mondays are dedicated to back (includes lats and traps). Wednesdays are dedicated to tits. Fridays are dedicated to everything waist down. Please note I don’t do isolated work on biceps and triceps. For one, I think they are small muscle groups and having dedicated time for them will make my training calendar longer, currently it stands to a week. I’d rather stick to a 7 day training cycle not 10 or 15. Why? Convenience. Remember, I am an IT professional by day. The other reason is that I’ve picked certain routines for muscle groups that, from experience, train these smaller muscle groups as a secondary, ie. dips do quite well in smashing both my tits and triceps. Pull ups do quite well in smashing my lats and my biceps, etc.

I usually have between two to three key routines for each muscle group. And I am finding myself extending my session times in trying to fit all of them. And, in attempting them in one weights room visit, usually the first performed will be performed at optimally whilst the remaining planned routines actually suffer. For example, during chest days my key routines (key is personal, one I know/feel works for me) include dips, chest presses (incline or flats), and pull overs. Another example is for my back days, my key routines are dumbbell rows, seated cable rows, pull ups, and chin ups. Which ever one routine I choose to do first will always be optimal most of the time, the remaining suffer in numbers and it gives me a false sense of progress (or lack of). So the change starting today: keep it simple. The plan, in summary: is to only do ONE key routine per muscle group per day and cycle the key routines between a week or on a fortnightly basis. And since I love my volume, I will have no troubles ensuring that enough time are spent breaking muskels. My blog journal this week should give an indication, when compared to previous weeks should give an indication on the changes also.

Summary
This is just me, being my own lab rat. My attempts to try new things, assess, and tweak as necessary. I don’t get comfortable with anything in terms of training. This isn’t just a goal-oriented approach, but because I love trying new things. I’m a slut in many ways, and training is one of them. Rock on motherfuckers.

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Week 1 - Cruise Control - 2011 Summary

2011 Summary

What can I say, looking back to analyse the past 12 months, it’s been the greatest year in terms of results with a ton of invaluable information. Information and lessons in the form of being my own lab rat and my ability to be more in-tune with my own body. It’s been a great first year and a bit of proper lifting. And when I say first year, despite starting this healthy lifestyle in 2009 is that I spent most of 2009 and 2010 cutting and experimenting and I did fall off the bandwagon at some point. 2011 marks many milestones not only psychologically in and out of the gym but also to have greater control in all things related strength and fitness. Although I am content with strength and body composition, I ain’t stopping as this has now been a passion and life style. There were few injuries (some still evident and progressing to 100% recovery) but I have been responsible and mature with their management and all are going through a steady progression towards full recovery. 2011 has been a great momentum and I cannot wait to how things will look like in the next three years. I’m not hoping for anything, however as with life, I am not focused on the past nor the future but what matters is what I do “now” and that will shape my future. Here’s a brief timeline for 2011, information on weight on the scales and a matching (only one I could find to match the day, I don’t take progress pics daily...) image to get an idea of body changes:

January 3 2011 - 72.8kg - Start of the year

February 26 2011 - 68.4kg - Leanest (Unintentionally dropped this low - lesson)

December 23 2011 - 73kg (Currently 74kg) - Last one with progress pic and weight in of 2011

It’s quite incredible, the changes of composition with very changes in weight on the scales. Content, this is just the beginning.

Day 1 - 02/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: High
Sleep: 9hrs

Recovery
It has been average. Lot’s of late nights but I suppose I slept in a fair bit as well. Started last weekend quite nicely since a fair bit of alcomaholz were consumed in consecutive days but ensured I was well rested for today with sufficient numbers under my belt before tackling today’s mammoth routine.

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 14hrs
Routine: Back
Duration: 3hrs

• 5min SBike LISS warm up
• Cable row: 10x60kg 10x60kg 6x80kg 6x100kg 6x130kg 6x110kg 6x110kg 6x80kg 6x60kg 6x125kg 6x125kg 6x60kg (PB-W)
• Cable wide grip lat pull down: 10x30kg 10x30kg 6x60kg 6x80kg 6x100kg 6x80kg (PB-W)
• Dumbbell row (gym’s heaviest dumbbells): 6x30kg 6x40kg 11x60kg 8x60kg 6x60kg 7x60kg (PB-R)
• Barbell rack pull (bar at 1" above knee height): 5x70kg 5x70kg 5x120kg 5x170kg 5x170kg 5x170kg 5x200kg 5x240kg 1x270kg 5x200kg (PB-W)
• Pendlay row (under grip): 6xBar 6x60kg 6x90kg 6x90kg 6x120kg 6x60kg 10x60kg 10x60kg (PB-W)
• Barbell shrug: 10x70kg 10x70kg 10x120kg 6x170kg 10x120kg 25x70kg

Notes - PM
Incredible. I’ve gotta love the results of my first day back in a fully equipped weights room after not being in one for about a week and a half, I worked mainly on hotel apartment gyms (once) whilst majority of the time I didn’t train or if I did it would be nothing but using kettlebells and a moderate weight dumbbell (yes, singular). Perhaps the performance today was a combination of eating 1+ pizza, 6 burgers (4x double quarter pounders), a large chocolate milk shake, and 2x large chocolate sundae plus rest plus deload off the barbells/heavy weights, I’m not sure. Cable rows were much cleaner hence I picked a dirty weight to move up to, new weights based PB there. I’ve decided to incorporate heavy lat pull downs so since I never really do them (otherwise they’d be in my milestones table), I’m marking that as a weights based PB also. Rows were also easy and this time there were no disturbance to the right lateral epicondylitis issue, BOOOYAH! A new repetition based PB there. Rack pulls were also strong, I like, another weight’s based PB. Same goes for the pendlay rows which were conducted at an under grip grip. I ran out of ooomph for the barbell shrug so I did not push further than 170. Which, wasn’t really surprising as this must be the first time I’ve trained heavy lasting 3hrs in total.

Nutrition
Total: 4,800 calories
Protein: 280g
Fat: 140
Carbohydrates: 522g
Meals: 1

Notes
Nutrition has been COMPLETELY flexible over the past week and half. But surprisingly, I’ve only found myelf a kilo and a bit heavier today weighting in at 74.2kg. A little water weight but I know it’ll be all gone by the end of the week as I return to my usual (and yet changing) training regimen. Today’s increase was ad-hoc since I planned on training for 3hrs or so, I would rather cram the calories today than a non-lifting day. Don’t ask me why, it just works for me.

Damage Control

• N/A

Notes
Little maintenance was done for half part of these holidays except for the first week where stretches and tricep tendon loading were maintained. The weekend saw absolutely zero maintenance. Surprisingly though, things don’t seem to have worsened in particular the lateral epicondylitis on my right arm. Tricep tendon hasn’t complained for a while so Day 3 of tension training this week shall be interesting. The mild abdominal wall strain doesn’t seem to have been aggravated at all over the holidays as well as the elbow and ankle tenderness which I noted for some time when I was doing crazy squat volume training. Great start.

Day 2 - 03/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: High
Sleep: 5hrs+

Recovery
The low numbers aren’t intentional. My body thrives in the cold and I’m known to sleep with no clothes on during winter. It hit a max of 35 yesterday in Canberra and I find anything between 15-19 a suitable temperature for sleeping/rest temperature but it only hit 28 at around 1AM for me.

Routine - AM
Fasted (IF): 8hrs
Routine: Analogue stationary bike 20min (9min hill climb @ 3min intervals)
Duration: 20min

Notes - AM
Feeling awesomesauce yo.

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 13hrs
Routine: Sprints + Fat fucking tyre flipping + farmers walks + push ups SUPERSET
Duration: 55min

• 5min jogging/skipping warm up, 2x around the track
• 10x field length sprints @ 75% 16s-20s range sprint duration + 60s walk (from one edge of field to the other)
• 5x fat fucking tyre flips + run back to two standard tyres and farmers walk it back to the fat fuck tyres + 20 push ups: Total flips - 9x5 + 1x10 (55 flips total) - 2x tyre farmers walk 9x14 strides + 1x20 strides (146 strides) + 10x20 push ups (200 push ups total) - FUCK-ME-DEAD

We meet again. I've missed you.
You've grown and made babies.

Notes - PM
Max temperature outside: between 32 and 35 degrees, clear blue skies, very little to no breeze, all the right ingredients for a fucking stinking hot day, perfect (I’m not being sarcastic either, I welcome any factors that can intensify training environments)! This was quite an upgrade to the last creativeness I could come up with, with minimal objects at hand that I could play with, compared to the last session which was before the holiday break, three days before Christmas. That one went well, and I loved it. The one today, I LOVE IT EVEN MOAR!

Sprints felt easier and I didn’t realise that I was going 16s on some sprints. This time, there were no tingling sensations I noted on the last session on the final sprint (10th). I found a big fat fat tyre that was nearly my height, and being a midget at 168cm, that wasn’t hard really. I’d love to find out the stats on this, it was one big fucker and upon accidentally stumbling on it, it brought a massive grin to my face (on top of whatever dirty pervert grin I already have). The entire flip routine was fucking awesome. I used three tyres. The idea was flip the fat fuck 5 times, run back to the two standard sized tyres and farmers walk them right next to the fat fuck then do 20 push ups. Rinse and fucking repeat. Routine started at one edge of the oval/field and finished at the opposite end. It’s left me feeling awesomesauce. I feel like my body just upgraded from N/A to a big fat pair of twin turbos with high octane fuel. Once I hit the showers, a good 20 minutes after the session, inside air conditioned facilities I could not stop sweating. I didn’t even wait for the warm water, crank up the cold water and jump in. Which, to give you an idea of the heat in conjunction of the routine’s intensity, felt so good I’ve had to make sure I’ve cleaned up the cum stains on the shower wall I may have left behind. Even now, nearly 60min post routine, I’m still sweating. Fantastic. Fucking awesome. This is what I call metabolic. It seems my body likes this, I love this, and it works for me. For now I’ll stick to these routines and stay away from the barbell snatches/hang clean and jerks to rest my healing lateral epicondylitis situation on my right arm.

Nutrition
Total: 2,200
Protein: 262g
Fat: 120
Carbohydrates: 31g
Meals: 1

Notes
Increasing my non-heavy tension days intake to 2,200 from 2,000. I will be more proactive with any anticipated drop in weight, I plan to slowly hit 80kg or so whilst keeping my waist line at around 30” to 32” and would like to get back to a very lean 75kg. 74kg is now my new starting point for this year. Oh and I forgot to show a visual of what I mean by “relaxed” (or maybe an alternative is flexible) nutrition. As an example, on top of eating 1+ pizza, large chocolate thick shake, 2x other burgers, alcomaholz, I made an evening pick up of this beauty because I was feeling mildly peckish. 4x double quarter pounders + 2x large chocolate sundae FTW.

A tad peckish. Just a tad.

Damage Control

• N/A

Notes
Healing right tricep tendon injury maintained as well as the usual 1hr pectoral and back stretches. Surprisingly, nothing is sore today, weird considering the 3hr fuck fest my back went through yesterday in which I achieved 5 PBs.

Day 3 - 04/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: High
Sleep: 7hrs 30min

Recovery
Surprised at the overnights totals considering the heat.

Routine - AM
Fasted (IF): 11hrs 30min
Routine: Analogue stationary bike 20min (9min hill climb @ 3min intervals)
Duration: 20min

Notes - AM
Hey mang, I feel awesomesauce!

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 16hrs
Routine: Chest/Shoulders
Duration: 1hr 40min

• 5min Treadmill incline LISS warm up
• Incline dumbbell press (45 degrees): 9x30kg 9x30kg 6x40kg 6x50kg 5x70kg 4x70kg 6x60kg 10x60kg 6x60kg 6x50kg (PB-R)
• Flat bench dumbbell flye: 6x30kg 6x38kg 6x45kg 2x55kg 3x55kg 4x50kg 8x45kg
• Seated barbell military press: 6xBar 6xBar 5x40kg 6x40kg 6x40kg 6x40kg (PB-S)
• Dumbbell isolated side lateral raise: 6x15kg 6x25kg 6x30kg 8x37.5kg 6x32.5kg 6x32.5kg (PB-R)
• Dumbbell reverse flye: 6x30kg 6x40kg 5x70kg 6x45kg 6x45kg 6x45kg (PB-R)

Notes - PM
Great session but it went longer than I had planned. The last session resembling this exact set of routines were done two weeks ago and the holiday break was a nice deloading period, I did however attempt to train the same muscle groups over the holidays but I had to make do with moderate dumbbells and heavy’ish kettlebells.

Incline dumbbell presses are now clearly stronger and I’ll keep grinding this until I can do a double digit set before moving up the weight. Flat bench dumbbell flyes are also stronger compared to two weeks ago. It’s still 10kg behind my recorded PB however these ones now are MUCH cleaner. Seated (upright) military barbell presses also show a noticeable improvement. I just started doing these in a power rack, previously with a smith machine but the power rack allows safety whilst still being able to start every rep from the side pins where the bar rests. The bar rests below the neck but I can easily push out to the starting position. Like the incline dumbbell presses, the 40kg is now my starting grinding point and will not be moving up until I can hit double digit repetition counts on a set or two. Dumbbell lateral side raises were also strong although quite dirty on the 37.5kg on the left arm. I must note that I do have the opposite arm holding onto an elevated bench top for support. Reverse flyes, although dirty on the 70kg, were also dirty. I’ll repeat myself again: clean up the dirty (safe boundaries), pick a new dirty weight, clean that up again, rinse and repeat.

Nutrition
Total: 3,000 calories
Protein: 351g
Fat: 50g
Carbohydrates: 238g
Meals: 2

Notes
Weight-in stats for the beginning of this week tells me I am anticipating a 1kg drop at the end of the week or mid next week. Going to make adjustments starting next week to counter this. Increased energy will be allocated to heavy tension days and I am looking at between 800 to 1,000 calories increased for the week split up between 3 days, Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, my heavy tension days.

The post workout dishes for this week: a crap load of rice, a touch of green fibrous vegetables, chicken cooked in a dish I forgot the name of but consists of a mild curry with some coconut cream (ZOMG I LOVE coconut cream!). All downed with 3 scoops of chocolate whey brotein, 6 tablespoons of Milo, with the shaker topped up with full cream milk. *high five*

Damage Control

• N/A

Notes
Tricep tendon loading, back and pectoral stretches maintained. Back is still clear, like the eye of the storm, I’m sure the 3hr back fuck fest (5 PBs of 6 routines) will kick in, surely. Otherwise, perhaps my body is adapting, or going through a change. Who knows. A close eye on things as always will be applied. during my last chest/shoulder session which was four days before Christmas, I flagged two routines that bothered the lateral epicondylitis issue on my right elbow. Today, the area was not bothered however now, 30min post routine, I can feel it but only just a little. Improvement nonetheless.

Day 4 - 05/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: High
Sleep: 7hrs 20min

Recovery
A much cooler night but I ended up hitting bed pretty late. All good though, slept in for a good 1hr 20min, LULZ.

Routine - AM
Fasted (IF): 9hrs
Routine: Analogue stationary bike 20min (9min hill climb @ 3min intervals)
Duration: 20min

Notes - AM
A nice early morning pre-workout workout for my afternoon tyre-flipping-farmers-walking-need-moar-air-give-me-some-vitamin-d workout.

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 12hrs
Routine: Flipping Tyres
Duration: 40min

• 5min jogging/skipping - warm up
• Half field fat fucking tyre flips: 5x SUPERSET double tyre farmers walk 30 paces (10x each direction) SUPERSET 20 push ups
• Random complex (devised by athlete): Overhead medium tyre lunges x 10 (tyre press and opposite knee raise on the rise per lunge) SUPERSET 10x high jumps (knee tucked at highest point) SUPERSET 10x push ups SUPERSET 10x random core stuff @ v-sit position (ie, v-sit leg crosses): entire round x3
• Half field fat fucking tyre flips: 26 flips from one side to halfway mark - speed edition, non-fucking-stop

Notes - PM
Fucking great session. I had a training partner and he’s a track and field athlete. I did not expect any less from him but I was proud, a proud Enterprise SOE Admin nerd. I’ve never trained with anyone before with these sessions I’ve been doing. Initially, a strength and conditioning coach wanted to join in but he pulled out due to a meeting. Then this athlete turns up hahaha so I was unprepared. At the end I thought it would be nice to speed flip the fat fuck tyre from one end of the field to the other but took the athlete’s advise and started off at half field only which was about 26 flips. I was breathless at the end of these flips, I was a lump of spring roll leaning against the fence gasping for air. I’ll aim to be able to complete an entire field in two weeks time, I reckon that’s very doable. It was also nice the athlete was present as he noted I bend my back a bit and asked whether it hurts my back. I mentioned no but took this in and started flipping them at full sumo deadlift position. I was keen on another half field run then on my first flip I fucking collapsed on the grass: left calf cramped. I’ve been limping ever since. Nice. Going to up the sodium intake a bit (I’ve subconsciously reduced them to eliminate some water weight I’ve gained from the holidays) me thinks. All in all, this session wasn’t as taxing to the body as I would have thought compared to Day 2’s session but in paper the intensity is about the same. This tells me one thing: progress. It’s getting easier. There are now talks of heavy sledge hammers, power bags, prowlers, sleds, and kettlebells. This playground keeps fucking growing. The coaches are now keen to join in. And soon enough we should be able to have a nice obstacle course type runs happening. Aaaaaaaahhh so awesomesauce!

Nutrition
Total: 2,200
Protein: 262g
Fat: 120
Carbohydrates: 31g
Meals: 1

Notes
Standard non-heavy tension day.

Damage Control

• Left calf cramped during fat fuck tyre flips

Notes
Tricep daily loading prescribed by the physio for my injured/healing right tricep tendon maintained despite it was a chest/shoulder day yesterday. Back and pectoral stretches also maintained. Forearms are moderately sore. Back is finally sore however only at mild levels, very mild. Pectorals are sore also at high levels. Good stuff good stuff.

Post PM Routine: limping, left calf cramped up majorly.

Day 5 - 06/01/2012

Motivation Level: High
Energy Levels: High
Sleep: 6hrs+

Recovery
Distractions. And no, I wasn’t gaming you fucking nerds. I haven’t gamed in two weeks or more now and if I do I’d be lucky to do a total of an hour in an entire week. I’m a busy man mang.

Routine - AM
Fasted (IF): 11hrs
Routine: Analogue stationary bike 20min (9min hill climb @ 3min intervals)
Duration: 20min

Notes - AM
Awesomesauce. The usual pre-workout workout for my PM workout. Coach L was there to chat with, it seems he’s doing the pre-workout workout thingo as well, but he’s hardcore and did 45min worth of intervals. Hehehe.

Routine - PM
Fasted (IF): 16hrs
Routine: Waist down
Duration: 90

• 5min Treadmill incline LISS warm up
• Barbell deadlift: 4x70kg 4x70kg 4x120kg 4x120kg 4x160kg 4x160kg 1(2)x180kg 4x180kg 8x160kg 20x120kg
• Barbell box squat (35cm: Parallel for 168cm vertical height): 10xBar 10xBar 10xBar 5x60kg 5x60kg 5x80kg 5x80kg 5x90kg 5x90kg 5x90kg 10x60kg
• Leg press: 8x180kg 5x250kg 3x350kg

Notes - PM
Session felt tough as soon as I hit the the 90kg squats. I didn’t feel fatigued, my body was, and form was starting to go out the window, or I sensed it would if I pushed myself any harder. Leg presses were rushed and the stress to the body was evident as soon as I started them. Romanian deadlifts were originally planned right after the box squats however my lower back started feeling sore after the 10 set deadlifts (which were done at a conventional stance). Not injury, tingle, nerve sore, just sore. Not even lower back pumps. I know what “unsafe” sore feels like and I’ve done it once maybe around three years (when I first entered this lifestyle) ago when or after doing deadlifts but I was nowhere near meticulous back then with my fitness/strength journals compared to today so I cannot really pin point that particular occurrence.

Today was tackled quite differently compared to the other heavy tension days this week. I had a massive milestone of finally hitting 200kg (73kg body weight) on the deadlifts prior the 2’ish week break and I was content with not going gung-ho today, that was not the intention. It was however to ensure I fuck my legs up, so I have a reason to say “You can be on top, fuck me hard now sweetie.”. But, it doesn’t feel like I’ve smashed them enough. No big deal.

I’ve had an idea through this week about a new approach. The idea has been lingering in my mind for a while now and I will take action starting next week. It’s about the simple idea of “less is more”. See, I like to break PBs all the time. It tells me I have more muskels under my skin, numbers don’t lie. But these milestones are now slower to come by. My suspicion is fatigue. As simple as that. No, nutrition is in check and rest/sleep usually are as well. It’s my approach, that I exert so much awesomesauce on the first set of whatever muscle group I am targeting at the time that the remaining routines suffer. For now though I will save this for a separate post but I’ve already got a new approach in my mind and I will lay it out in a fresh post. Less is simple.

Nutrition
Total: 3,600 calories
Protein: 380g
Fat: 110g
Carbohydrates: 250g
Meals: N/A

Notes
Weight-in: 74kg. One mission of many for this week: to intercept/prevent the weight drop prediction (accurate after a series of weight ins and other factors). Outcome: fucking successful. Maintained and held onto 74kg.

As I noted a couple of days ago, I have planned to increase energy intake primarily to intercept any state of being into the deficit, in effect leaning up/dropping weight. I have not adjusted training much but it seems based on the series of weight-ins this week that training and/or one or more factors is showing me that I may face a 1kg drop by the end of this week or mid week next week. This is just me being proactive and with my ability and attention to detail with “the” primary tipping (key point: nutrition), I can more or less accurately predict behavior, and in essence, taking action isn’t such a blinding exercise. The increase is approximately 1,800 calories in the week and since I have three major heavy/tension sessions, a 600 calorie increase has been injected to those days. Strength is clearly up and strength in numbers does not lie. This change was put in place during Day 3 of this week but did not record it. From then and now, it has given me enough time (or so I hope) that this change itself isn’t going to do much apart from prevent the possibility of leaning up/dropping weight.

Another thing to note is that in all this time I’ve always taken a multi-vitamin. I’ve tried generic ones for most of the time but recently tried ones called “Orange Triads” which were shipped from the US. They are much stronger (apparently) than the off-the-shelf ones you’ll see at the groceries/pharmacies. Well, I’ve been off multi-vitamins for a good 4 weeks now and regardless of whether it is some cheapo generic one or top-shit heavily marketed stuff from your fitness magazines/forums/intarwebz, all I can conclude is that it does jack shit. Fatigue is nowhere in sight. There haven’t been any weird growths around my body. My mood, well that’s still unchanged and people still think I’m on drugs. The frequency of my erection haven’t changed. The hardness of my boners still make diamonds pretty jealous. So all in all, nothing’s changed apart from financially I’m saving myself a few dollars. Perhaps I can understand (which was the main reason for me) that it may be beneficial for someone who is doing contest prep or for someone who’s daily intake is at a deficit but for those who aren’t, unless it was professionally recommended by your medical practitioner, eat real food you can chew and Bob’s gon’ be your fucking Uncle.

Damage Control

• N/A

Notes
Pectorals are sore now at moderate levels. I find it incredible that my back has not undergone through any soreness at all this week despite fucking them up real good for 3hrs with 5 PBs. 4x double quarter pounders + 2x large choc sundae, preventing DOMS/soreness since 2012. Tricep tendon loading, pectoral and back stretches totalling 1hr maintained. Left calf is fucking sore from yesterdays absolutely fucking hilarious moment of collapsing like a brown tanned up egg-roll on my 3rd (planned and supposed) set of big fat fuck tyre flipping. I got Mr. Track and Field athlete worried for a sec, I was like “It’s all good dude, this one is just hard to stretch out *chuckle/cry*”, LULZ!

Weekend Outlook going Into Week 2

Training
Tricep conditioning with a series of dumbbell and kettlebell presses as well as some broxperimentals will continue as per usual. Other than that, the remaining time will be spent as a passive rest period.

Nutrition
Flexible as usual. I have cleared dates that have been arranged this week and this weekend. I feel at times a quiet one is needed, my party quota overfilled over NYW/NY. Although in saying that, I do feel like drinking French Martinis (which I was introduced to last weekend) which I’ve been fuuuuucking craving this week. Even in the gym! As a friend said this morning: “You always say you’ll have a quiet one but end up having a big one anyway”, and who knows, that might happen. Let’s not plan it aye, I love being spontaneous. ;)

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Personal Bests / Milestones - 2012

Update: This is a new revised table for 2011. The old one is still under an old post here which was created on February 2011 which I will also keep to keep track of progression, in particular comparing 2010 vs 2011 strength levels. I have also been meaning to reorganize them accordingly, so now they are more organised to my liking/preference.

My personal bests and milestones will be recorded here. I've been meaning to make a post about it to further add that extra attention to detail to this passion of mine called recomposition and strength and here it is. Apart from getting myself out of the current 68kg weight class (towards 80kg of awesomeness), I'd like to get stronger in the process and so far it's been a nice progression from a fat weakling me to a lean stronger me. Well, for my height and weight anyway. I know I'm no power lifter nor am I competing in bodybuilding competitions (despite many suggestions, sorry), I enjoy being strong. Plus, being stronger than some guys up to 20kg heavier than makes me chuckle just a little bit. Teeeheee.

Starting from the top...
I will also note that 99% of these records are me in a deficit/cutting stage (last two months) as I doubt I could have achieved them without leangains/IF (perhaps I should add another column...)

Back

BW	Reps	Routine	Weight
72kg (conventional) 73kg (wide)	1	Barbell deadlift	195kg (conventional) 200kg (wide)
75	12 (PB-R:6x1,12x1,6x3)	Dumbbell isolated row	60kg (gym's heaviest)
75kg	7 (PB-S:7x1,6x1,6x1)	Cable row	130kg
73.5kg-75.5kg	8	Cable V-bar pull down	100kg
74.5kg	8	Barbell row bent over under-grip	110kg
75kg	6 (PB-S:6x1,4x1)	Cable wide grip lat pull down	100kg
74kg	1	Barbell rack pull	270kg
72.4kg	1	Barbell Shrug	240kg
72kg-73.5kg	25	Wide grip pull up (BW only)	N/A
75.1	4	Close grip chin up	BW+35kg
72.6kg	6	Chin up	BW+35kg
73kg	27	Chin up (body weight)	N/A
70kg-75kg	5	Wide grip pull up	BW+25kg

Shoulders

BW	Reps	Routine	Weight
74kg	10	Dumbell isolated side lateral raise	37.5kg
74kg	7	Reverse flye (bench leaning)	70kg
73.9kg	3	Barbell upright row	60kg
70kg-75kg	4	Seated dumbbell military press	2x27.5kg
70kg	2	Seated barbell military press (smith)	60kg
70kg	3	Standing barbell military press	50kg
71.9kg	8	Front plate raise	25kg
73.4kg	6	Dumbbell isolated front raise	13kg
74kg	7 (PB-RS:7x1,6x1,6x1,5x1,5x1)	Seated barbell military press	40kg

Chest

BW	Reps	Routine	Weight
70kg-75kg	1	Flat bench dumbbell press	2x45kg
70kg-75kg	6	Incline bench dumbbell flye	2x30kg
70kg-75kg	4	Dumbbell pull over	52.5kg
73.2kg	3	Dumbell flat bench flye	65kg
70kg	6	Weighted push up - human weights	BW+45kg
73kg	105	Push up	BW
70kg-75kg	60	One arm push up	BW - 30 left and 30 right arm
71.5kg	3	Cable cross-over	80kg
74.1kg	6	Cable low isolated unilateral raise	60kg
74kg	8 (PB-R:8x1,5x1)	Incline bench dumbbell press	70kg
74kg	5	Bench dip	BW+75kg
73.5kg-75.5kg	4 (38xBW)	Dip	BW+50kg
67.7kg	6	Dumbbell French press	42.5kg

Legs/Calves

BW	Reps	Routine	Weight
75kg	5 (PB-RS:5x1,4x1,3x1)	Barbell back squat	110kg
72.1kg	1	Leg press	425kg
73kg	4	Leg extension	143kg (machine max)
74kg	3	Romanian/Straight-legged barbell deadlift	160kg
75kg	8	Standing calf raise	360kg (plate max)
72kg	5	Seated calf raise	120kg
73.5kg-75.5kg	10	Smith machine standing calf raise + triangle block	170kg
72.5kg-74.5kg	8	Machine lying hamstring curl	50kg
72.6kg-73kg	8	Leg press machine seated calf raise	450kg

Misc/Core

BW	Reps	Routine	Weight
70kg	20	Cable crunch	75kg (cable max)
75kg	8	EZ bar rollout	BW - last rep 60 seconds hold
67.7kg	2	EZ bar curl	50kg
68kg	4	EZ bar close grip curl	45kg
68kg	4	EZ bar wide grip curl	42.5kg
68kg	5	Dumbell zottman curl	2x12kg
68kg	4	Cable short straight bar tricep pushdown	18 (machine/cable)
68kg	6	Cable reverse grip short straight bar tricep pushdown	10 (machine/cable)

Planned Milestones

Milestone	Progress/Best Record
Dip bodyweight	18kg away
Barbell back squat arse-to-grass 2x bodyweight	40kg away
Dumbbell bench press 1.5x bodyweight	22.5kg away (11.25kg per arm)
Chin/pull close/normal grip 1.5x bodyweight	12.5kg away (close grip chin up broken, see 'arms' table)
Barbell deadlift 2.5x bodyweight	done and fucking dusted already, co-efficiency 2.5 broken

There are several other routines that are cable based that I should have recorded however the machines/devices only show numbers so putting them up is pointless. Bars have been weighted by me in the gym on a scale to ensure accuracy (attention to detail...)

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