Exodus Strength

2023 Jan 17 Tuesday (late night)

Run: 3.5 miles

2023 Jan 18 Evening

Main
Ssb Squat: 240 x 5 x 5
Bench: 275 x 3s x 5r
Bench: 250 x 5 x 5
T-Bar Rows: 200 x 5s x 10r

Aux
Ab Wheel: 10r

Tonnage
Ssb Squat: 6,000
Bench: (4,125 + 6,250) = 10,375
T-Bar Rows: 10,000
————————————————————
Total: 26,375

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Felt a little beat up going in today, but once I got going things were fine.
Incidentally, lower abs still screaming from ab wheel two days ago. So I did ab wheel again, thinking somehow it might help.

hector wrote: ↑Wed Jan 18, 2023 6:49 pmIncidentally, lower abs still screaming from ab wheel two days ago. So I did ab wheel again, thinking somehow it might help.

I can't say whether it helps or hurts in my own experience, but I certainly approve of this logic.

Thursday Night (late night)

Ssb Squat: 285 x 4s x 1r
Bench: 285 x 1s x 5r

Run: 3.5 miles

******************************
Legs were already shot coming into squats tonight. Just did some singles to get a stretch and some blood flow.
Bench was weirdly fresh. Decided to get my daily minimum of 4 reps at 285 all done in one set, which I made for 5 just for fun.
If that’s not a 5RM, it’s close.

While legs were shot for squatting, they were kinda ok for a slow, late night jog.

2023 Jan 20 Friday Night Lifting

Main
Ssb Squat: 260 x 3s x 5r
Bench: 275 x 3s x 5r
Bench: 250 x 8s x 5r
T-Bar Rows: 200 x 6s x 10r

Aux
Scapular Chins: 5s x 10r
Reverse Hyper: 160 x 5s x 10r

Tonnage
Ssb Squat: 3,900
Bench: (4,125 + 10,000) = 14,125
T-Bar Rows: 12,000
————————————————————-
Total: 30,025

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After running last night I only got 3.5 hours sleep according to Fitbit. Work went late today. Fried AF coming into my session. Light squats are a reflection of leg DOMS.
That said, I consider myself hugely fortunate to be able to lift tonight. Loved every minute.
Like last week, I had no good rationale for so many backoff sets of bench. Just felt good, were time efficient, and fun.
But the ticket. Take the ride.

Haven't read your log in a while Hector but was thinking wow, it seems like your bench is doing really well. Then I checked the previous page - Kidney Stone?!! My god I passed a kidney stone a couple months ago. I thought I was dying as I was in so much pain! Two waves of nausea and extreme pain: One while standing in line at the store, then it went away and I went home and then the second time at home writhing on the floor and my family insisted I go to the hospital.

I didn't know what was going on and didn't know it was a kidney stone. Went to the hospital had Xrays and all that but the pain stopped. Later that night I peed out a nice kidney stone. Hardly felt it. I'm making sure I'm drinking lots of water and avoiding eating lots of nuts/beets and other foods high in oxalic acid.

Hope your kidney stone issues go away!

Skid wrote: ↑Fri Jan 20, 2023 8:34 pm Haven't read your log in a while Hector but was thinking wow, it seems like your bench is doing really well. Then I checked the previous page - Kidney Stone?!! My god I passed a kidney stone a couple months ago. I thought I was dying as I was in so much pain! Two waves of nausea and extreme pain: One while standing in line at the store, then it went away and I went home and then the second time at home writhing on the floor and my family insisted I go to the hospital.

I didn't know what was going on and didn't know it was a kidney stone. Went to the hospital had Xrays and all that but the pain stopped. Later that night I peed out a nice kidney stone. Hardly felt it. I'm making sure I'm drinking lots of water and avoiding eating lots of nuts/beets and other foods high in oxalic acid.

Hope your kidney stone issues go away!

Skid, thanks so much!
I’m glad your kidney stone resolved.
My story is similar to yours. I thought my appendix or some other organ was going to burst. Pain was terrible. Drove myself to the hospital, x rays showed a kidney stone.
From then on the pain would be terrible, but intermittent. I kept thinking I’d passed it bc the pain would go away for a few days. Then, it finally finally passed.

What little I’ve gained in bench has unfortunately been lost from squat and deadlift. But I’m working on resolving that.

2023 Jan 21 Saturday Night

Squat: 225 x 3s x 5r
Bench: 285 x 2s x 1r
Bench: 300 x 1 x 1
Bench: 305 x 1 x 1

305 felt easy, but still no idea how close I am to a new 1RM at 320.
Those 1RM calculators never work for me. My 5RM is always much closer to my 1RM than the calculators predict. And that easy single at RPE 8 is sometimes only a few pounds away from a tortured 1RM.

So maybe I’m close to 320. Or maybe not. I’ll keep benching 6 or 7 days a week, I’ll hit it when I hit it.

2023 Jan 22 Sunday Afternoon

Squat: 225 x 3s x 5r
Bench: 285 x 1s x 2r
Bench: 305 x 2s x 1r

Got my daily minimums in again (few sets of squats at 225, and at least 4 bench singles at 285 or more).
So this isn’t actually the NSuns Press-Every-Day program. It’s a slightly easier/abridged version.
Actual version would have me benching at least 4 reps of 285 on my actual workout days as well, which I don’t. On workout days I do lighter work sets at much higher volume.
I don’t think I’m losing much though.
Would practicing heavy singles 6-7 days per week on top of regular workouts be that much better than practicing heavy singles 3-4 days/week on top of regular singles?
Maybe?
If I were much stronger then I think for sure.
But I suspect it’s a minimal difference for my level.

Addendum: Since I did my 85% for 5, according to NSuns press-every-day programming, I should increase my 4 Rep daily minimum by 5lb from 285 to 290.

2023 Jan 22 Sunday Afternoon

Run: 4 miles

###########

Increased my loop from 3.5 miles to 4 miles. I still stop for frequent walking as needed, but running felt great today. Some inclines I used to reflexively walk I now find myself running.

2023 Jan 23 Monday (Late Night)

Ssb Squat: 260 x 3s x 5r
Bench: 275 x 3s x 5r
Bench: 255 x 5 x 5
T-Bar Rows (wide grip): 200 x 5s x 10r

Tonnage
Ssb Squat: 3,900
Bench: (4,125 + 6,375) = 10,500
T-Bar Rows: 10,000
———————————————————
Total: 24,400

###########################

Work went late. Then life went late. So, lifting started at 11pm. Just finished now.
Too tired to get everything in. But got the basics.

2023 Jan 24 Tuesday Night (Daily Minimums)

Squat: 225 x 3s x 5r
Bench: 290 x 1 x 1
Bench: 300 x 3s x 1r

Since I benched 285 x 5 the other night, this is the first night raising my NSuns daily bench minimum weight for 4 reps from 285 to 290.

Some days it’s easy. Some days it’s less easy. But I think 1RM strength is slowly trending upward.

2023 Jan 25 Wed

Main
Ssb Squat: 260 x 3s x 5r
Bench: 280 x 5s x 3r
Bench: 255 x 6s x 5r
T-Bar Rows (close grip): 200 x 6s x 10r
Ssb GoodMornings: 150 x 5s x 8r

Aux
Scapular Chins: 5s x 10r
Reverse Hyper: 160 x 5s x 10r

Tonnage
Ssb Squat: 3,900
Bench: (4,200 + 7,650) = 11,850
T-Bar Rows: 12,000
Ssb Goodmornings: 6,000
————————————————————
Total: 33,750

#############################

Traveling. Which will f up my training streak. (Only one day off so far this year!)
Luckily it’s an afternoon flight, so I got in an unusual early session.

Ssb Goodmornings are awesome. Gotta stop cutting them out to save time.

Talked to my old boss yesterday. He deadlifted 585 at 181. He also admitted to PEDs, but still awesome.

2023 Jan 28 Saturday morning

Ssb Squat: 240 x 5 x 5
Overhead Press: 150 x 5 x 5
Lat Pull-down: 100 x 2s x 10r
Lat Pull-down: 120 x 2s x 10r

Tonnage
Not much. Better than nothing.

###########################

Halfway through my week out to town.
Got a day pass and a minimal session. When I’m on the road, I consider any possibility to work out at a gym with a barbell to be a victory, even if I couldn’t bench, which was situation today. Meant I could get in some overhead pressing, which I’m generally deficient in.

Sudden transition:

(Not including names of religions in story bc I don’t need to in order to get point across, and because behavior here wasn’t representative of that religion.)

I’m in a hotel. There’s a religious convention going on. Everyone has been nice enough and I’ve had zero issues with anyone here. Nor would I expect to.

This afternoon there was a group of teenagers at the pool (members of this religion) that would combine an exclamatory statement of a different religion with a vulgar statement. For instance, (exclamatory statement of a religion they’re not part of + “that girls is such a whore.”) And they did this shit every 30 seconds. So they were mocking a religion while also being cunts in general.

They’re teenagers. Or maybe early 20s. They were in an altered state from at least one substance. There wasn’t any point in talking to them. And yet I simultaneously felt so bad that some kid of the mocked religion might walk by or go in the pool. I firmly believe there was no productive conversation to be had, and yet simultaneously kind of hate myself for not calling them out.

Fuck. I don’t know. Another reason I want to pull out of society.

hector wrote: ↑Sat Jan 28, 2023 12:30 pmI firmly believe there was no productive conversation to be had, and yet simultaneously kind of hate myself for not calling them out.

::nods::

hector wrote: ↑Sat Jan 28, 2023 12:30 pm This afternoon there was a group of teenagers at the pool (members of this religion) that would combine an exclamatory statement of a different religion with a vulgar statement. For instance, (exclamatory statement of a religion they’re not part of + “that girls is such a whore.”) And they did this shit every 30 seconds. So they were mocking a religion while also being cunts in general.

They’re teenagers. Or maybe early 20s. They were in an altered state from at least one substance. There wasn’t any point in talking to them. And yet I simultaneously felt so bad that some kid of the mocked religion might walk by or go in the pool. I firmly believe there was no productive conversation to be had, and yet simultaneously kind of hate myself for not calling them out.

Fuck. I don’t know. Another reason I want to pull out of society.

I think you did the right thing honestly. You wouldn't have gotten any points across to a bunch of kids (teenage or early 20s, their brains aren't fully developed). It just would've caused a scene and it's not your job to intervene for the sake of someone else. Had you called them out it just would've caused a scene and probably emboldened their "us vs them" beliefs. Kids are cruel and every group has shit heads in it.

The part about leaving society is something I 100% agree with for reasons like this.

SnakePlissken wrote: ↑Sun Jan 29, 2023 5:46 am

hector wrote: ↑Sat Jan 28, 2023 12:30 pm This afternoon there was a group of teenagers at the pool (members of this religion) that would combine an exclamatory statement of a different religion with a vulgar statement. For instance, (exclamatory statement of a religion they’re not part of + “that girls is such a whore.”) And they did this shit every 30 seconds. So they were mocking a religion while also being cunts in general.

They’re teenagers. Or maybe early 20s. They were in an altered state from at least one substance. There wasn’t any point in talking to them. And yet I simultaneously felt so bad that some kid of the mocked religion might walk by or go in the pool. I firmly believe there was no productive conversation to be had, and yet simultaneously kind of hate myself for not calling them out.

Fuck. I don’t know. Another reason I want to pull out of society.

I think you did the right thing honestly. You wouldn't have gotten any points across to a bunch of kids (teenage or early 20s, their brains aren't fully developed). It just would've caused a scene and it's not your job to intervene for the sake of someone else. Had you called them out it just would've caused a scene and probably emboldened their "us vs them" beliefs. Kids are cruel and every group has shit heads in it.

The part about leaving society is something I 100% agree with for reasons like this.

Thanks.
Yeah, sometimes the optimal course of action is also a shitty course of action.

Forgot to mention, the gym I visited has an EliteFTs SSB bar. As far as I could tell, not superior to Titan’s. Padding was firmer, that’s about it.

2023 Jan 31 Wed Night

Ssb Squat: 270 x 3s x 5r
Ssb Squat: 240 x 5 x 5
Bench: 250 x 5 x 5

Had only taken 1 day off this year until a week ago.
Then I went on travel.
Only got 1 lifting session in this past week.

Running was good though. Need to do a better job logging that.

2023 Feb 02 Thursday Night

Squat: 225 x 5 x 5
Bench: 290 x 2 x 2

In a rush tonight, so I knocked out my 4 reps of 290 as doubles instead of singles.

I take a week off for travel and it’s like my body forgets how to lift. Benching 250 for 5 x 5 feels heavy the first sets on my first night back. But, by the 4th set it’s easy again. And a day later, tonight, doubles at 290 are flying.

Hope I can stay awake to run later tonight.