Getting fit in Morocco

[allenkt]

Wow, this was one of my hardest days yet. But then again last night I started taking a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu class and it is pretty intense. By the time I was done sparring my arms were dead and I literally had almost nothing more to give. So there was that. Class was from 6-8pm last night and then I hit the gym with the following workout at 9:30am.

30 seconds rest between sets for squats and deadlifts. But I was exhausted for the superset and just couldn't do it. I probably should have lowered the weights but instead I rested more than 30 seconds. Before doing the last set up step-ups I actually rested for 3 minutes


Squat 3 x 15 @ 140, 140, 140

Deadlift 3 x 15 @ 140, 140, 140

Bulgarian split squat 3 x 15 @ 70, 60, 60
Step-up 3 x 15 @ 60, 60, 50

Reverse crunch 3 x 15

I finished my Surge and made it home without puking which I thought was quite the accomplishment at this point. I laid on the couch for 45 minutes then got up and went to my jiu-jitsu class at noon. Luckily I don't have anything to do tomorrow except for jiu-jitsu. If this doesn't kill me I should be in decent shape before too long

[stingo]

Yeah doing other things in addition to a full weight workout is tough, so good job adding to the overall load.

[allenkt]

Fairly decent workout today. The incline bench was hard but I managed to get all reps. And honestly, I think one of the hardest parts was just getting the dumbbells into position for the lift!

90 second rest periods for the following (although had about 120 seconds between one set of should presses due to someone else using the weights):

DB incline bench press 5 x 5 @ 140, 140, 140, 140, 140
Cable seated row 5 x 5 @ 170, 170, 175, 175, 175

DB shoulder press 5 x 5 @ 110, 110, 110, 110, 110
Wide-grip lat pulldown 5 x 5 @ 140, 140, 140, 145, 145

BB close-grip bench press 5 x 5 @ 145, 145, 145, 145, 145
High pull 5 x 5 @ 110, 110, 110, 110, 110

Swiss ball crunches 3 x 15


And now I'm off to jiu jitsu class

[allenkt]

As I posted in the NROL forum, today was a hard day. I'm finding it hard to stay motivated on my harder lower body days. But I'm making good progress so I will continue


Squat 4 x 10 @ 165, 165, 165, 165

Deadlift 4 x 10 @ 175, 175, 175, 175 (this was quite hard by the end)

Bulgarian split squat 4 x 10 @ 90, 90, 90, 90
Step-ups 4 x 10 @ 80, 80, 70, 70

Reverse crunch 3 x 15

I did decide to try benching at the end just to see where I was. Last time I hit 205 but with a pain in my right pec so I'm not sure what I could have done.

3 x 135
1 x 185
1 x 225 (with spot, had to have slight help to get past sticking point)

Somewhere around 225 is my all-time best flat bench press so I was fairly happy with this.

[allenkt]

Another 3 x 15 day today but it was upper body which doesn't wear me out quite as much. Overall a decent workout although I have to type this with one hand because I jammed my pinkie finger at jiu-jitsu today so I'm icing it right now.


DB incline bench press 3 x 15 @ 110, 100, 10 @ 100 / 5 @ 90 - total wt
Cable seated row 3 x 15 @ 130, 130, 130

DB shoulder press 3 x 15 @ 70, 60, 11 @ 60 / -4 @ 60 - total wt
Wide-grip lat pulldowns 3 x 15 @ 95, 100, 100

BB close-grip bench press 3 x 15 @ 90, 90, 90
High pull 3 x 15 @ 70, 70, 70

Swiss ball crunch 3 x 15

[allenkt]

Fairly decent day today. I got up a bit late so my timing was a bit off (I prefer to get into a routine and go at the same time) but no big deal. Also, I was hoping to increase my shoulder presses today but no such luck. Once again I did negative reps at the end by doing a push-press to get the weight up then lowering it as slowly as I could. Thought that was better than giving up on the reps. Also, as you can see, on the last set of DB incline bench presses I had to change weights after 7 reps because I couldn't do any more. So as quickly as possible (probably 10-15 seconds elapsed) I racked the 65lb DB's and picked up 55lb ones and continued for the last 3 reps.

60 second rest periods between exercises within the superset:

DB incline bench press 4 x 10 @ 130, 130, 130, 7@130 / 3@110
Cable seated row 4 x 10 @ 160, 160, 160, 160

DB shoulder press 4 x 10 : 10@90, 7@90 / -3@90, 7@80 / -3@80, 8@80 / -3@80
Wide-grip lat pulldown 4 x 10 @ 120, 120, 120, 120

BB close-grip bench press 4 x 10 @ 120, 120, 120, 120
High pull 4 x 10 @ 90, 90, 90, 90

[allenkt]

Today was the dreaded 3 x 15 lower body day. One thing I'll add here is that I started using Power Drive (by Biotest) and that has seemed to help.

So I get to the gym early today because I wanted some time to rest between the workout and jiu-jitsu. And one note about the gym where I work out (Gold's), there is only one squat rack in the entire place (can you see where this is going?). They used to have two but in their infinite wisdom they replaced one with another Smith machine (they now have 3 of those). Anyway, I get there and a guy is doing shrugs in the squat rack. I was semi-ok with that because at least he was going heavy. But I started to get rather annoyed when 3 people, at different times, came up to him to have conversations. By the time he was done I was back to my regular time ....so much for getting there early. Oh well. More notes at the end.

30 seconds rest between exercises within supersets:

Squat 3 x 15 @ 150, 150, 150

Deadlift 3 x 15 @ 150, 150, 140 (this last rep set turned into 3 x 5 @ 140)

Bulgarian split squat 3 x 15 @ 60, 60, 60
Step-up 3 x 15 @ 60, 60, 50

Reverse crunch 3 x 15


Squats went pretty well but the deadlifts just killed me. My back started to get pretty sore and I had to rest 60 seconds before the last set. And even then I could only do 5 reps before I'd have to rest for about 10 seconds.

If you look at the weights on the split-squats and step-ups you'll see they are the same as last time. But the difference was the rest periods. Last time I was absolutely wiped out and ended up resting 2-3 minutes between exercises. The first set went fine today but for the last two, I ended up with 30 seconds rest between legs and 60 seconds between exercises. I'm sure not ideal, but I figured it was better than last time. And that's my goal....to always improve in some way over the last time.

[allenkt]

Crap. Dammit. And ouch. Not one of my better days. I had to quit about 3/4 of the way through my workout because my elbows were in so much pain. I'm not sure what is wrong but I'm glad it's Friday so I get to rest for a few days. Here is what I was able to do:

DB incline bench press 5 x 5 @ 150, 140, 140, 140, 140
Cable seated row 5 x 5 @ 180, 180, 180, 180, 180

DB shoulder press 5 x 5 @ 110, 110, 110, 110, 110
Wide grip lat pulldown 5 x 5 @ 145, 140, 140, 140, 140

BB close grip bench press 5 x 5 @ 150, 150, x, x, x
High pull 5 x 5 @ 95, x, x, x, x

Swiss ball crunch 3 x 15

[allenkt]

A decent day today but I'll admit that I'll be glad when Hyper I is over. The lower body days really take their toll and I'm ready for a change.


Squat 4 x 10 @ 175, 175, 175, 175

Deadlift 4 x 10 @ 175, 175, 175, 175

Bulgarian split squat 4 x 10 @ 100, 100, 100, 100
Step-ups 4 x 10 @ 80, 80, 80, 80

Reverse crunch 3 x 15

[allenkt]

Forgot to record my last workout. This is from 4 June, a 3 x 15 upper body day and felt pretty good.


DB incline bench press 3 x 15 @ 110, 110, 12@100/-3@100
Cable seated row 3 x 15 @ 140, 140, 140

DB shoulder press 3 x 15 @ 70, 10/-5@70, 12/-3@60
Wide grip lat pulldowns 3 x 15 @ 100, 100, 100

BB close-grip bench press 3 x 15 @ 95, 100, 100
High pull 3 x 15 @ 75, 75, 75

[Lost Dog]

Those numbers are getting up there!

[allenkt]

Originally Posted by Lost Dog

Those numbers are getting up there!

Thanks LD! I'm going to post later today or tomorrow the differences from the beginning of H1 and the end. Should be fun to see.

[allenkt]

Workout on Monday, June 9th should be asterisked because I did it with an injury...lol. You can read about it in the injuries forum but the short story is that a 45lb plate fell on my shin before starting the deadlifts and scraped the skin off to the bone. It kind of hurt but I didn't want to lose the workout so I just sucked it up and drove on. Oh, and in case anyone notices, this workout really should have been done last Friday but I had an injury that couldn't be ignored. On Friday at my jiu-jitsu class I fell badly and hurt my back. Felt like my right kidney was bruised or something but regardless I didn't feel I could squat and deadlift like that. So I waited until Monday when it felt better (it hurt all weekend).


Squat 5 x 5 @ 250, 240, 240, 240, 240

Deadlift shrug 5 x 5 @ 240, 230, 230, 230, 230

Bulgarian split squat 5 x 5 @ 140, 140, 140, 130, 130
Step-ups 5 x 5 @ 140, 140, 140, 130, 130

Reverse crunch 3 x 15


I should also note that on the step-ups, the limiting factor is becoming how much weight I can hold in my hands. The 70lb DB's in each hand were getting very heavy and my forearms were getting just as much of a workout trying to hold those things. If I weren't at the end of H1, I would probably move to a bar pretty soon instead of DB's.

[allenkt]

Hypertrophy 1 is almost to an end! Today was my last upper body day so I only have one more workout to go. I am seriously considering taking a 30 day break between H1 and H2 and doing the Velocity Diet for a month to lose some of this fat. If I do it now then I'll look good for the last half of the summer. If I wait until after H2 then I won't be able to start until August. So I don't know....we'll see. Anyway, here was today's workout. Felt pretty good.


DB incline bench press 4 x 10 @ 140, 130, 130, 130
Cable seated row 4 x 10 @ 165, 165, 165, 165

DB shoulder press 4 x 10 @ 90, 90, 90, 6@90/-4@80
Wide grip lat pulldowns 4 x 10 @ 130, 125, 120, 120

BB close grip bench press 4 x 10 @ 130, 130, 130, 130
High pull 4 x 10 @ 95, 95, 95, 95

Swiss ball crunch 3 x 20


Finally making progress again in the shoulder press so I was happy about that.

[allenkt]

I should note that I have done the Velocity diet before (almost 2 years ago) so I know what it entails and I know I can do it. Heck, last time I did it during the Thanksgiving season....now that was a challenge!

[allenkt]

Yippee! Today was the last day of Hypertrophy 1! This wasn't perhaps one of my best workouts but I'll explain. First, I don't know why but I've been eating horribly the last two days. My protein intake was down, eating a lot of carbs and more junk then I've had in a long time. But even so I wasn't eating very much. For example, I went to the gym at about 3:00 this afternoon but I'd only eaten twice so far. Not really the best set-up for a 3 x 15 leg day....lol. And secondly, I wasn't sure how to approach today's workout because I start the Velocity Diet tomorrow and will be back in the gym tomorrow evening doing the first workout for that plan (which includes deadlifts on the Monday workout). Anyway, this is what I did tonight:


Squat 3 x 15 @ 155, 155, 155

Deadlift 3 x 15 @ 135, 135, 135

And that was pretty much it. I feel kind of bad for skipping the last superset (of bulgarian split-squats and step-ups) but I decided to do it anyway.

I'll be back in 6 weeks to continue with Hypertrophy 2