Adarq.org

Lol its goign to be a long week until next sunday when I get to jump again but I can't wait to try out this relaxed thing 

Good to see you're taking the common-sense approach of [cutting fat --> increase strength --> increase reactivity] to increase vert/athleticism. Intelligent training goes a long way.

Thank you

Thanks raptor. Do you think if you jump faster you can jump higher? I try to get as much power out of the jump thats why i jump slow, i could try speeding it up and see what difference it makes. Will try that next time.

Also, i was thinking recently that I shud do some hang cleans as an assitance ex to build some traps for highbar squats. might kill two stones with one bird that way, if i can improve explosiveness as well. does that sound like a good idea? i'll prob leave the fancier plyo, jump specific stuff for when i've finished cutting and then maxed out on my squats though.

 

diet stuff
Been putting in the work this weekend. Fasted like 14 hours yesterday, might have been 16, I can't remember exactly, then did 1.1km fasted cardio on the TM. Counted my calories for the day and they were around 1600. And today I fasted 19 hours! But i was so hungry by the end, I forgot I was supposed to do fasted dreadmill werk. Still, I drove at a high level of concentration for about an hour, so maybe that burnt a lot of calories, haha. Gonna eat around 1600 today too. And i might go out and play some ball later but I couldn't go to my usual pickup game due to family stuff.

bodycomp
When I look in the mirror I think, yea a kilo of moobs, about 2kilo around the belly, and maybe a kilo around my lower back. But that mirror lies and flatters like a motherfucka. All it takes is taking the regular forthnightly progress photos to realise that. I've still got more back bacon than my local KFC. It's kind of depressing that guys who lift around my height are LEANER at 90kg/200lb bw than I am at 83/183lb. Still, im not panicking, lemme get down to 80kg and if I still have ways to go to 10% then I can throw my hands up and complain about the genetics i've been dealt with, until then, just gonna put my head down and put in the work.


vertical jump stuff
I need a goal for my vertical and think the top of the shooting square on a backboard might be a good one. I've been searching online and it seems the top of the square on a backboard is 136" above the ground. That means if my standing reach is 98" (w/o shoes) - I would need to jump ~36" to touch the top corner of the square. I'm guessing my two step vert is around 31" now, so I'd need to add 5" on top of that. But then I haven't been jumping much for the last 5 wks since I got my first dunks. I did last wk but it bothered my ankle which I thought was perfectly healed until then - footwear is a big factor, the wrong shoes hurt my ankle more often than not.  And sadly my new shoes are no good. The other thing is my SVJ is very close to my moving jump, so that probably means once ive done cutting/squatting, i need to add some vertical specific training. But i'll cross that bridge when I get to it.

Training
CGBP 5x78.5, 6x75, 6x72.5
WGBP 3x5x67.5
BS 2x110 (HBBS - PR? It's a new lift this HBBS so why not)
SQ 2x107.5 (PR), 1x110 (PR), 2x106, 2x2x100
BS 5x107.5 (HBBS PR), 5x105
5x30m sprints (best time 04:34 - PR!)
5 SVJs (best jump 30" - PR)

BP notes - I don't like to do a lot of BP on fridays, esp this grindy. But the reason I did it today was because I didn't bench on Monday. That's why. Next week I will do a set or two of BP in the AM and get out of the gym. WGBP looks considerably more "normal" than CGBP - but I made a decision a while ago to stick with CGBP as my main lift since I want to have healthy shoulders as a priority and i'm not build for benching obviously so progress at the cost of broken shoulders is a dead breaker. WGBP is still light, and I don't intend to push it too far - just keeping it there for assistance since I have no chest development to speak of.

BS (I)notes - I like high bar. I am sold now. I wish I had switched to it a LONG time ago but my stupid ego wanted the stupid LBBS milestones which were never going to happen because LBBS is the WRONG lift for my body type. I could probably have done another rep on top of 110x2 but I was "saving" myself for front squats, so yeah. I was suprised to set PRs today. It's only like the 2nd or 3rd workout of using HBBS but it's becoming very familar, very quickly!

SQ notes  - I used Lance's recommendation and aimed for 10 reps of above 90% of 1RM. Here is the problem, what is my 1RM? But I worked that into the workout after going for 3x107.5 and racking it after getting 2 reps, I knew my 1RM was around there, and the next set was 1x110 which I would say is/was my training max - and probably pretty much my 1RM. Using that I calculated 90% was above 99kg, and lance had said to do singles with >90% but I did doubles instead to save time. That's funny because it still took me waaaay too long to finish squatting. I should probably move around the squatting load so half of it is AM and the rest PM. or something. Work in progress.

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRgw-YYUGJw" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRgw-YYUGJw</a>
^1RM of 110kg - I was happy with this, it gave me a lot more confidence with the following sets knowing I could squat 110kg and anything lower than that would be do-able. Thanks lance for putting me on to singles and doubles.

BS (II)notes - Considered going for a third set but i wasn't sold on grinding myself into the ground with yet another set of squats, maybe 2 is enough. If i can progress with 2 sets why should I do more than that? I loved that I got 5x107.5 HBBS - my form was okay too. Looking forward to more squatting next week!

Then sprints, I wasn't happy with my starts on sprints. It just seemed i wasn't coming out strongly enough. Well finally had a breakthrough on my last sprint. I got my left knee down and used it to help push off the ground (usually only use my right leg). This made a difference, i came out blazing, and then I pushed hard as i could, and my time blew me away. Now keep in mind this was done after a whole load of squatting so i'm confident I can do a lot better if I work out a way to redistribute my friday squatting so i'm not too fatigued by the end of the PM session. That should help my sprints.

And yeah a PR on SVJ - i'll take it i guess. I'm still fat so hopefully I can improve a lot here. Wouldn't it be nice to have a 36 SVJ?

Oh and i've been diet compliant for 3 days now - will try to make that 10 days in a row so I can break into the 82s.

I see what you mean, i tend to go dear diary mode a bit too much even tho I try avoid it sometimes. Maybe I shud make 15 minute youtube videos instead and then you'll say, why can't you just write it down somewhere so i can read it in like 2 seconds Thanks though, also to vag.

There are different ways to look at preworkout stimulation. Some people believe that excess stimulation is unnecessary and counter productive. I remember reading Glen Pendlay on either P&B or IGX (i can't recall which)

INTENSITY

Intensity one thing i have noticed over the years is that some lifters need much more emotional arousal to lift top weights than others. i have also noticed that it is the emotional arousal itself, not the lifts, that brings on fatigue, and possibly overtraining. consider this. in lifters who can lift 95-100% weights without getting "psyched up", there is usually the ability to lift these top weights very often, sometimes daily, without undue fatigue.

However, with lifters who need considerable emotional arousal to lift these weights, they CANNOT be lifted often, certainly not more than once a week. this obviously leads one to the conclusion that the emotional arousal itself, not the weights lifted, is the mechanism leading to fatigue. before anyone flys off the handle, ill admit that one can overtrain without getting psyched up if they try, and the physical stress of lifting obviously plays a part, i am only saying that the EMOTIONAL arousal plays a bigger part than most would consider.

Now, i consider it a truism that it is not sensible to let your ability to lift with or without emotional arousal determine your lifting frequency or volume. in other words, psyching yourself out of your mind every time you squat to get your best possible poundage, then simply accepting the fact that you can only squat once every 10 days is not sensible. personally, i limit pssyching up in training. true, i support a businesslike atmosphere, and yell and scream at liftes daily.

But i DO NOT let lifters pace for 3 minutes working themselves into a frenzy before a lift. just go up to the bar and lift it is in my opinion the best training strategy. what does this have to do with all of you? well i know that some of you feel unable to train very often. i know that "overtraining", loss of motivation, etc, are subjects discussed somewhat regularly on this board and by lifters everywhere. my suggestion if you have experienced this or are experiencing it, is to not only look at your workouts, but look at your attitudes and arousal during your workouts. try to do 2 or 3 weeks of training where you DO NOT psych yourself up prior to sets. you may find several things.

You might find that you just plain feel better out of the gym, not so "drained" and tired as usuall. you might find that you are able to handle more training volume. and finally, you will almost surely find that in time you will increase your ability to lift heavy weithts without psyching yourself up, it is in fact a learned ability. and when this happens, youll find you have the best of both worlds, youll be lifting as heavy as possible, without draining yourself emoutionally. youll feel better, youll lift better and be albe to lift more and more often... and youll find that your mental state in everyday life is just plain better. and finally, PLAN your all out, crazy, psyche up and frothing at the mouth workouts. itll be a pleasant change of pace every couple of weeks! itll be something to look forward to, not just the daily grind.

and another one from a different forum by Glen

LEARNING to give as close to 100% physically as is possible without undue emotional involvement is a... LEARNING experience, for most people at least.

Just because you cant do it doesnt mean it isnt valuable, or that you cant learn to do it better.

Just as with most things, it will be hard at first, keep trying, and you will get better.

If you never plan to get anywhere near your physical limits or really push yourself, this isnt really important. But if thats not the case, the closer you get, the more advanced you get, the more important this will become.

I did write something on the net about this, cant remember where or when though. It is something that anyone who coaches a few hundred lifters will eventually see. Some kids can lift 90-95% of their maximum with about as much excitement as getting out of bed in the morning. Others need to psych up. The kids that can do it without psyching up can lift very near their maximum many times per week, those that need to psych up, can do it much less often. I personally believe that learning to lift weights over 90% of your maximum with no emotion is one of the keys to frequent training.

My view is squarely in the middle. Sometimes you need stimulants, even if just as a placebo (i feel stronger with my preworkout stack)  to get thru a workout that is mentally daunting. Sometimes you just need a boost. But for day to day and week to week  training I agree with Glen that you don't want to become reliant on psyching up, whether thru supplements or listening to the rocky speech on youtube or whatever. If most workouts are approached with a calmness then it takes less of an emotional drain on the body and it's easier to maintain consistency in training since sessions don't ask for too much out of you mentally. Like i've already mentioned the more often you take stimulants the less effective they are as you become desensitised to the effects. Saving them and using them sparingly is probably a good idea. Or you could keep ramping up the dosage as some people are prone to do, but i'm not sure that's a great idea either. Just my 2c.

Quote from: entropy on August 23, 2012, 01:27:31 am

I think i'm close to moving from average to fitness in bodyfat

Ripped (<10%) --- Athletic (<13%) --- Fitness (<15%) --- Me --- Average (~20%) --- Fat (>20%)

I'll prob be in the "fitness"  category when I get to 82kg. And athletic at around 80kg.

On a tangent, if I were to start doing a lot of cardio, my bellyfat would go down appreciably and i'd look a lot leaner but without changing my strength/weight ratio much. But i'll do that later, even though i'm sick of being fat :/

That's me too. We are the same bw, same bf, more or less same responses to diet/bulk.
But i never get unlazy enough to do my cardio. I also don't want to go below 82-83 kg, probably because i was weak and skinny all my life. So i end up cycling between 15-20% bodyfat / 85-90kg. 15% feels good for me, i could use some less belly slab but oh well...
Keep it up man , i enjoy this journal a lot, both the training progress and the insight/literature.

lol I am my own worst enemy. I know if I can string together 7 days of perfect compliance to a diet i'll get MUCH leaner than i've ever been but that's proving to be difficult. I did manage a whole week this month, and saw progress but since then its 2 days on, 1 day off, then repeat, kinda going nowhere fast. I really hate cutting. I know everyone does but i've struggled a lot with it because i've been cutting for so long and the days of going 6 weeks strictly without tripping up are long gone. I can't bring up the same amount of discipline now as I did then. Maybe because it's more to do with my body fighting to keep the bodyfat than before. It's hard to say.

I actually enjoy cardio, gives me a chance to listen to some music and unwind. It just sucks when it fatigues legs which leads to bad squat workouts. Maybe I shud just swallow the temporary hit to lifts and get the cutting out of the way though.

My brother came over this weekend and for some bizarre reason he went out and bought a massive chocolate cake. He ate like a slice or two and then left the rest in the fridge for me to finish. So i've been slowly working thru it, a slice here a slice there. I was doing so well just avoiding food I shudnt eat but i haven't got the self discipline to avoid indulging the cravings when the temptation is so near.

But yeah I shud just get the cutting out of the way and stop fucking around. Starting NOW