Thread: Is that it?
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Old 04-01-2008, 08:00 AM   #8 (permalink)
Bytsi
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#1. You are probably not using challenging enough weight.
#2. Are you following the rest periods outlined in the book?
I second this comment! I was also an "intermediate" lifter and when I read the book, I thought about skipping the first stage. But instead, I decided to really max my weights so I'd hit failure (not "kinda hard" - failure as in "I can't do one more without dropping this weight or hurting myself by compromising form badly). I stuck strictly to the rest times and... let's just say that as I approach my last few workouts in stage 1, it's kicking my butt! I have raised my weights beyond what I ever thought I could, but I am drenched in sweat after the 30 minutes (it takes a little longer when you get to the 3 sets part).

Give it a chance before you say it's too easy - sometimes it takes a couple of workouts to figure out the weights that are right for this particular program.

Also, I'm a woman who can do tons of full-body pushups (because we do them all the time in martial arts), so I did them extra slow (try pausing for 2 seconds at the bottom of every rep), I did T pushups, and I also do a step version where I put one hand on the end of a step (other hand on the floor), do a pushup, then walk myself on my hands across the step so the other hand is on the step (and the original hand is on the floor), repeat, go back, etc etc - it really adds to the challenge. There are tons of pushup variations (legs on a bench or ball, adding dumbbells, etc) you can look into...

And if you're still worried, you can always do HIIT too!
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