Defeating My Brother In Glorious Lifting 2.0

[brettj]

I was dead tired yesterday, so I did my workout today. My coworker who's really into biking showed me this app called "Strava" that's pretty nifty. Basically uses your phone's GPS to give you your speed and distance and maps out your whole run for you. I used it today and went for a run around the jail - one lap is pretty close to half a mile it turns out. Good news is that running outside is way less boring than running on a treadmill; bad news is that my time sucked. Running on gravel/grass/dirt is harder than a treadmill I guess. Or else I just suck.

Anyways:

Run: 5.5km in 37min


I did my pushups/othershit at home since I didn't have time on my break:

100 push ups in 6min (I also did 47 in a row to start off. Decent pace too, under a minute.)
55 sit ups in 6min
22 chin ups in 6min

The running is really stressing me out. I am not good at it, and it really does not mix with well lifting at all. I'm thinking of maybe doing my HIIT as a run too to get more practice, and also maybe cutting my squatting days to one? Still hoping I just adapt to the volume, but part of the problem today was my legs just felt like cement from the singles on Thursday. Going to stay the course for a bit, but progress is slower than I want.

[brettj]

Today: Tempo run and density blocks for my bodyweight stuff.

Tempo run: 4 rounds of 4min with 2min rest in between. I decided not to try to keep the intensity for all the rounds the same anymore so that I can push up the intensity on the first round. I did 9,8,7 and 6 mph. Was pretty easy, so I'll increase it again next week.

100 push ups in 6mins
60 sit ups in 6mins
20 chins in 5mins - stopped early because my elbow hurt

[brettj]

Squat: 320x15r (4,3,3,3,2)

Bench: 185x18r (4,4,4,3,3)

Dropping the cleans because I suck at them and I'm doing chins 3x a week.

[brettj]

Assault bike: 9 rounds of 20s at RPE 10, 5:1 rest. Hit ~1450 watts on first round.

Push ups: 75 in 6 minutes
Sit ups: 55 in 6 minutes
Chins: Did more of a power day type thing here with weighted chins. Unweighted x2, 15x2, 30x2, 45x1x2

I'm thinking about switching out my push ups and situps here for some kind of variety too... Fatigue seems to really mess up my performance on this day, and I need some variety just for my sanity I think. Maybe high rep bench press and plank or something? Weighted sit ups?

I think I could eventually do a light run here too. The assault bike gasses me, but after a bit of a break I was feeling pretty fresh. Might be okay to get a bit more running volume in here eventually.

I'm going to have to start attending some boot camps again now that I'm back in shape from my time off. Might just have to roll with the random stress and drop certain things depending on how it goes.

[brettj]

Power day today. Changed the schedule again without making through an entire week... My reasoning is good though. I think having 2 days off in a row is pointless, so I'm doing three days on, one day off, 2 days on, one day off with the same order as before.

It was supposed to have me fresh for Power day which would have worked except I ran to a couple of codes at work and I'm sore despite the rest. Going from sitting to your ass to sprinting ~200 meters by surprise several times causes some DOMS...

Anyways:

Squat: 315x2, 345x2, 365x2, 385x1x2, 405x1

I think 405 is pretty reasonably 90% right now, meaning a ~10% decline in 1RM due to running all the time and losing 20lbs.

Bench: 175x2, 187x2, 200x2, 212x1x2, 225x1

Bench seems sort of finicky. 225 actually felt fairly easy, not like 90%. So maybe I haven't lost 10%. Or probably it just fluctuates between a certain range day to day and today was a good day and last week a bad day.

[brettj]

Run went pretty decent today, especially considering it's my short shift day so I'm running on 4 hours sleep, and I'm also sore and stiff from heavy singles yesterday.

I ran 4 miles (6.4km) in just under 37 minutes. Kept a pace of 6.5mph the whole time. Not super impressive, but I felt like I could have gone a lot longer too. So if I can manage that in a very fatigued state, I'm optimistic about my current abilities, and I think I can only improve from here.

One of my buddies at work who's on another cycle now told I'm looking like I really "thinned out" though. FML.

[brettj]

Tried doing my tempo run today and was going to try 4min at 9.5mph, but then the treadmill broke after 30s, so I went do do laps around the centre instead. I did 3 half mile laps. The first lap was something like 3:20s, then my stupid app wasn't working but the others were slower. I'm thinking the mph were like 8.5/8/7.5. The run outside is considerably harder, and I think it's because it's basically cross country. I"m either running on gravel paths or grass, so that probably explains some of the performance difference. I was bagged today (last day of my set) and struggling, but some of the inmates at the jail were having a sweat outside and were heckling me (in a friendly way, these were well behaved guys) as a ran by so I had to stay strong.

I came home and did:

105 pushups in 6min
77 situps in 6min
24 chinups in 6min

I might try to get my anaerobic sprints in on Wednesday by running rather than the bike, just to get more running practice. That would mean I could also cancel my gym membership since I mostly use it for the assault bike now. Everything else I can do at home or outside.

[brettj]

Squat:

325x15r (4,3,3,3,2)

Bench:

190x18r (4,4,4,3,3)

[brettj]

Airbike sprints: 10x20s 5:1 rest:work. Hit ~1450 on first sprint, still broke 1000 on final sprint, so happy about that. When I first started these I'd be happy to get 600 watts on my final sprint.

Weighted chins: 0x2, 15x2, 30x2, 45x1x2, 0x8

Weighted situps: 16x10, 20x10, 25x10

Bench Press: 95x20, 135x12, 135x10

Things were getting kind of stale doing only the density blocks for my bodyweight stuff, so I'm doing this as the middle day - upping the intensity a bit.

Then I ran a slow easy mile for some added running volume/practice. All in all I don't even feel very tired after all that.

[brettj]

Yesterday:

Squat: 325x2, 345x2, 365x2, 385x1x2, 405x1 @RPE8

Bench: 185x2, 200x2, 210x1x2, 225x1, 185x5

All felt fairly easy.

Bodyweight: 203

Tonight is a distance run and my bodyweight stuff. Going to do it at work.

My wife is also lifting and hit some PRs this morning. I am living through her currently since I don't lift.

[brettj]

Saturday:

Ran 9 laps of the jail in 45min. I'm not really sure how far that is at this point because the app I've been using doesn't seem to work properly. The GPS was saying the signal was weak, and then when I looked at the path after I was sort of jumping around. So that might explain some of the discouraging runs I've had doing that lately.

Today:

Tempo run. 4 rounds of 4min with 2min rest in between. Did these at 9.5/8.5/7.5/6.5 mph. Heart rate after each round was around 180, and then fell down to mid-low 130s after two minutes rest. This was encouraging. I think I could run a 6min mile if I really pushed.

[brettj]

Airdyne sprints: 20s 5:1 rest x10. Hit 1500 watts on first one, struggled to keep it above 700 by the end. It's day six (last day of my working set) though, so I'm always bagged that day.

Push ups: 85 in 6mins - skipped these too many times and feeling it today
situps: something in 6mins - lost ount

chin ups: brettjx2, brettj+15 x2, brettj+30 x2, brettj+45 x1rx2s, brettj+50 x1

I was sick of working out at this point, so I decided not to do anymore running.

ETA: Also I weigh 200lbs as of 10mins ago. So I've lost 30lb since my heaviest.

[brettj]

Friday:

Squat: 310x2, 330x2, 355x2, 375x1x2
Bench: 175x2, 187x2, 200x2, 212x1x2, 225x1, 187x3

Saturday:

Ran 4miles at a pace of 6.5mph on 1% incline

[brettj]

Didn't post last week. Basically I did the exact same thing as the week before but missed my distance run, so not that interesting. I've been doing this program for 6 weeks or so now, and noticing some trends and also starting to stagnate a bit. Here are some thoughts:

-Really hard to run a lot and fit squatting in. They both badly effect each other. I find after even a long distance run I'm fine to run again the next day, but my squat will suck. And if I squat, my legs feel like bricks and which makes running hard. Conditioning is my priority at this point, and I want to add another day or running in, I've decided to bump squatting down to one day a week (gasp!). Sorry to anyone who comes here for the squatting.

-Push-up are stagnating. My max is usually around 45-50 which allows me to hit my goal (the top score of 47 on the test I'm training for). I'd like be able to hit mid 50s or 60s though just to have some flex room, but I don't seem to really improve at these. I'm thinking of switching it up and doing some high rep endurance benching to see if that helps.

-Chin ups are pretty stagnate too. I've been doing a "power day" in the middle of the week with them where I do weighted chins. Not sure if this helps, but it's fun. I think I need to practice kipping (gasp!) because from the video I've seen they don't seem to be too strict about form so that's a way to bump my score.

-Sit ups. No idea. I have no idea what I'm shooting for, and I don't seem to get better at these. No idea what to do.

-Yesterday I ran 9km in under 55 min. Pretty close to my goal of doing 10km in under an hour. Not bad for a 200lb man. I also did this at a 1% incline because I've read that makes the treadmill close to the same difficulty as a trail.

-Today I ran 2.3km at a pace of 8.5mph. To get the top score on the Leger beep test you need to hit stage 11.5. For Stage 12 you're running a cumulative distance of 2280 meters. You start out at about 5mph and speed up until you run stage 12 at 8.4 mph. So considering I can now run the entire cumulative distance at a speed faster than the top speed I've pretty much blown this out of the park. I'm excited to actually get tested on this and see what I can hit.

Plan going forward is something like this:

Sun: off
Mon: Short distance run (2-3km, as fast as possible to mimic Leger)
Tues: Distance run (working up to 10km then improving 10km time)
Wed: off
Thurs: boot camp or tempo run
Fri: HIIT
Sat: Squatting

Not sure how I'm going to do the push-ups/bench/chins/situps yet. I may do 3 times a week benching/chins in an HPS format, and try do some density blocks/testing a couple times a week? Not sure.

[brettj]

Last Thursday: tempo run 4min intervals at 9.7, 8.7, 7,7 and 6.7 mph with 2min rest

Friday:

Assault bike sprints: 10x20s 5:1 work rest
weighted chins: 0x2, 15x2, 30x2, 45x1x2, 55x1, 0x5x2
bench: 175x2, 185x2, 200x2, 212x1x2, 225x1

Saturday: Squat 315x2, 345x2, 365x2, 385x1, 405x1, 325x3rx3s

Today:
Ran 2.5km (1.55miles) in 10.59 minutes at a pace of 8.5mph.
Bench: 155x10x2 x9, 135x10
chins: 0x8, x7, x5, x5

Everything is going well, except it's hard for me to make myself do situps. I hate them, and they never improve.

I was looking up run times in local races to get some gauge of where I'm at. The best 3k run time I found was like low 13min, so if I can keep up my 2.5k time for another .5k I could beat that. If I can get under 1hr on my 10k I'm at least ahead of the average, but nowhere near a competitive time. I think at 200lbs (198 as or yesterday) I won't really be able to be super competitive at the longer distances - just carrying too much weight. I'm feeling pretty good about my shorter distance runs though, which is what I'd be tested on anyways so I'm happy.

Also my brother squatted 485 in provincials so he's beat me again and I won't be able to catch up anytime soon. He hurt his back though, and is now travelling in Germany for the summer so hopefully he gets weak there.

ETA: Just read a random source claiming that the ideal distance running weight for a guy my height is about 165 or so.

[brettj]

Nothing interesting to report. Running, barely lifting. I can still squat 405x1 fairly easily, and bench 235 for what feels like at most @9 at a bodyweight of under 200lbs now. None of my metrics are improving at this point though, I can bang out 50 pushups, bang out 10 chinups with a few left in the tank, and do 30+ sit ups in under a minute. I ran 6 miles the other day with moderate difficulty, and my short distance runs are really good. Everything has plateaued though, so I'm thinking of switching things up for a while. The next police class starts in a couple of weeks, and I'm probably not getting into that one at this point, so I might go back to lifting for a month and get a bit of my strength back for a break, and then try to improve cardio again. Not sure yet, but there doesn't seem to be much point in hammering away at the cardio without much improvement if I don't need to be in class shape.

[Wilhelm]

I just noticed you are in Canadia.

Are you going to be a Mountie?

[brettj]

I just noticed you are in Canadia.

Are you going to be a Mountie?

Trying to become local police currently... Being a Mountie can be rough because they can post you anywhere basically. Not sure my wife would be thrilled to move to northern Manitoba haha.

[brettj]

So the next class for the police starts tomorrow, and I'm on step 7.5/8 in the hiring process, so not making it into this one. Bit of a bummer, but whatever. I'm pretty much a lean mean cardio machine at this point, but starting to get beat up and bored with all the running.

Next class is in December, so I'm thinking of taking a bit of a break from the constant cardio and getting some of my strength back while trying to maintain conditioning. I'm thinking maybe 1-2 months of MM cycles (making sure to actually do the cardio days) and then back to running to prep in case I get into the December class.

I think I'm actually going to run vanilla MM without modification. First week might be less volume, just to get back into the groove but other than that I"m going to follow the template. Not necessarily trying to hit any PRs, but maybe just put back on a couple of pounds and keep my lifts up.

[brettj]

MM W1D1

Squat training max: 450 (total guess)
Bench training max: 250 (total guess)

Trying to get in as many reps as I can this week, then going to redo W1 next week with all the reps hopefully.

Squat:

315x20r (5,5,4,4,3,3) Pretty hard. Squatting or running. Pick one not both I guess.

Bench:

175x30r (5,5,5,4,4,4,3)

Pretty easy actually. Maybe too light... Playing around with a slightly wider grip.

Chins:

About 5min EMOM: 25r (7,5,5,4,4)