My Training Log

[amounirl]

3-23-12: Max Effort Deads

OHP Deload
10x75
8x95
6x110

Deadlifts
5x135
5x185
3x205
3x250
5x295
3x340
1x385 20 lb Beltless PR!
Added belt (I always use a belt for my last 2-3 work sets but I'll start mentioning it from now on)
4x430 25 lb PR!!!

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qfo6vTYAYZE&feature=youtu.be

Chin ups
1x8

Pretty great day today, got a pretty massive PR on deads, I'm pretty stoked. I would never yell like that in a real gym, but since it's my school gym I had some fun with it and douched out a little bit =P. Maybe I'll make my goal for next time to divert all that yelling energy into getting a 5th rep, but for now I'm pretty stoked with this lift. All my rest periods took forever but I managed to fit deadlifts in 1.5 hours, with just enough time to squeeze out some neutral grip chins to elongate my spine. Cut is going well, although surprisingly I only weigh about 193.8 right now, even though I ate carbs last night. Hopefully by the end of the weekend I should be back up around 198 carb loaded.

 

[miked8c]

It took you 1.5 hours to finish your sets of dead lifts? Not trying to be a dick by any means but that is crazy.

 

[amounirl]

When I said 1.5 hours, I meant the whole workout was under 1.5 hours because that's how long the class period is, I don't know why I said it just for DLs. I do take pretty long in between sets to rest though, especially with deadlifts, plus I was also doing OHP in between the first few sets of deads. The whole lifting part of the workout, everything that I logged, took about 1 hour 15 mins, excluding stretching and dynamic warmup movements. I probably spent about 10 minutes between heavier sets of DLs, 5 between lighter sets because of OHP. I know that's pretty long rest but how is that crazy?

 

[miked8c]

It just an eye opener for me. I work up to 405+ in 15-20 min.

Going from 135 to 315 usually takes me about 10 min. then its 3-5 min between sets for 315-365-working weight.

Its not crazy, just interesting, like don't you kind of lose your focus when your waiting 10 min. between your sets? Especially if your talking with your buds?

My rest in like 1 min. of putting more plates on, and then 2-4 min. of just visualizing the lift and getting my mind right. Anymore then that and my body kind of gets psyched out and my mind wanders.

Again, just curious. If you were doing multiple working sets (singles, doubles and triples) I would understand, but if your just ramping up to a single working set I don't understand all the rest.

Different strokes for different folks I guess.

 

[amounirl]

Oh all right, like you said different strokes for different folks. I've heard some pros only use 5 min rest periods between sets of squats and deadlifts with ~700 lbs, and then others take 4 hours total per workout. I used to do shorter rest periods when I was messing around with the conjugate method because I would only work up to a top max effort set using singles for warmups, and I didn't need to recuperate much, but on 5/3/1, even though the first 2 work sets are lighter, I still need to rest up between them. Usually on bench I rest 3 mins between lighter work sets and 5-8 mins between heavy work sets, squats/DLs are 5 mins for light work sets and 8-10 for heavy work sets.

I've heard taking shorter rest periods optimizes hormone levels because it minimizes cortisol and maximizes GH if you rest between 60-90 sec between sets, or something like that. When I was first starting out I did Stronglifts 5x5 and I used to power through my warm ups then take 2-3 mins in between work sets, but now, if I took less than 3-5 mins rest, I know I would be missing weights I would otherwise be able to lift. When I do cardio though, I always do interval training with shorter rest periods, or tabata style training (shadow boxing, hitting punching bags) with 20 seconds on, 10 seconds off.

About the focus, I probably end up taking longer rest than I need between sets because I always end up talking with friends a lot, but when it comes time to lift I'm able to spend about 30-60 sec focusing and psyching myself up while I'm setting up, and then be able to put all my focus into the lift.

By the way I checked out your log, I saw you did something like 10x3 bench with 225 lbs and only 90 sec rest periods, at around the same weight as me, props on that man, good stuff, there's no way I could give up my long rest periods when lifting heavy weights haha.

 

[miked8c]

Haha yeah, right now its at around 255 for the 10x3, here are some videos of my lifting before I cut down to 180, this was when I was 195:

Back Squat: 475x1 - YouTube

Bench Press: 315x1 - YouTube

Deadlift: 500x1 - YouTube

In terms of resting, I think the short rests for me are more of a mental thing. I also do less reps than you do on warm up weights, once it starts getting heavy I will usually switch over to singles and doubles to preserve my strength.

Like its good how you can chat it up and then switch right over 60seconds before a set and hit the weight. I, on the other hand, get visibly pissed off when someone interrupts me to try to talk to me while I am warming up.

Don't know what it is.

 

[themondtster]

From what Ive been reading five minutes is optimal and ten at most. Been reading alot of stuff from Coach Poliquin and about Olympic lifters and that's why they do multiple training sessions a day. They train to near max on everything and use long rest periods but keep workouts between 60-90 minutes and no longer. So like one hour on clean and jerks, then later an hour on squats, then again later an hour on snatches. Depends on the individuals, the range, and total weight lifted.

from my Transformer Prime

 

[amounirl]

Dang nice lifts mike, your bench form looks pretty much perfect, how old were you and how long had you been lifting in those videos?

And that's also what I've heard, that 60-90 mins is optimal. I guess ideally I would train like an olympic athlete and seperate my training into 2 90 minute sessions per day but that would just not be practical for me, I only have 90 mins per day to lift, so I end up rushing my assistance work or skipping lifts sometimes, it sucks. In the summer though I"ll just train for as long as I need since I'll be working out at a commercial gym, even though training for 2-4 hours a day isn't hormonally optimal, I still was able to make great gains that way. But one day I hope to own a home gym so I can work out whenever I want.

 

[miked8c]

This was in October at the 15th RPS Power Challenge, North Attleboro Boston.

I was 19 at the time, and still am. Started getting serious about weight training at 16. Thanks for the compliments on the bench form, I don't arch that much in training BTW, or pause at the bottom, but that was regulation haha.


I've only been following your log for the past month, do you organize your days by muscle groups or by compound movements?

I find that if I dedicate four days a week to the power movements, one for each OHP,DL, Bench, and Squat I can finish each workout in less than an hour. If you only workout 3 days a week then its a different story and I can see how you may need to spend longer in the gym.

Usually the first 20 min. of my workout is dedicated to the compound lift and then the second 20-40 minutes is for accessories. So I don't understand how workouts could go over an hour.

The only time this happens for me is on Saturdays when I back, bis, tris and core in one workout.

 

[amounirl]

Yeah I'm following Jim Wendler's 5/3/1 with a little twist to accomodate for strongman, my schedule goes:

Sunday: Strongman
Tuesday: 5/3/1 Squat
Thursday: 6x3 Bench
Friday: 5/3/1 Deadlift/OHP