I decided I’d start the year off with a 10 day 1500 reps daily run.
(Actually thought 500 hindu squats for the rest of the month in addition, decided against it.)
Whereas last time was bodyweight only, pushups, bodyweight squats, and abs this time I made use of the equipment I had, and broadened the categories out to push muscle/pressing, legs, abs.
I believe I did some pullups daily as well.
I used weights, calisthenics, flexing, and holds.
(8-9×50 of btn presses was good, as was getting 450 reps with 65lbs in sets of 30-40 which was shockingly difficult, I didn’t get to do such things last time.)
A static exercise was either timed like in the case of leg work, 1 second = 1 rep, or each mental count was equal to ⅓ of a rep meaning 500 reps static abs would be 1500 counts. Even the days I did flexing or the Bruce Lee front raise hold (the hold I timed like the leg statics) instead of using only pushups, I made sure to get 50+ strict pushups a day, with a few extra credit mantra reps tacked on.
The first few days I got it all done in the morning.
On the 3rd it was 500 hip thrusts off the living room couch. This was more difficult than the hindu squats of the prior two days, but felt much better on my knee.
On the 4th I did 500 reps of sissy squats.
Just phase 1 and up though.
That ended up an all day affair, gone was doing it all in the morning. The 500 sissy squats may have been the hardest leg thing to get through that I’ve ever done. You feel them quite well on the part of the quad near the knee. It’s a great exercise.
On the 5th I did 500 step ups using the highest park bench there. It was a good challenge, on the 6th visually my quads looked a good deal bigger overnight.
The rest of the leg work was mostly static exercises, and that category was mostly flexing in warrior pose for the quads and glutes…outdoors. However bodyweight squats and pacing around the yard were mixed in to a degree.
4:30 seconds in that pose before switching which leg is forward is quite meditative, and that long (9:00 combined) qualifies it as aerobic isometrics.
I did mostly flexing and vacuums for the abs. The first few days were crunches or toe touches, the rest the aforementioned. It would’ve been better to use crunches primarily. Right now they’d be good to do frequently, towel over the tile, plenty have done such exercise on hard surfaces. A few thousand a week I believe would change my physique.
Diet was a couple days of cleanish (kielbasa, beans, rice, steak), the end was steak, a good deal of milk, and serious amounts of frozen food, cereal, and anything I could get my hands on.
Zero supplements.
Sleep was pretty good through it all, the volume was wiping me out, I switched to statics as they were easier to recover from day to day.
Bodyweight? Somewhere in the 250s I’d guess. Upper body looks a little bigger, as do quads, and my waist is definitely smaller. My track pants are getting loose even while cinched up.
(I wonder how much of this is the lack of heavy squats/deadlifts/partials vs vacuums vs recomp)
I didn’t step on a scale once, nor do I care to. As a man, completely outside of the gym it doesn’t matter. There is only performance, and the mirror.
Coincidentally on the 5th when I walked into a gas station a maybe 5’3″ tattooed Hispanic gang banger type got wide eyed and went “woah, you’re a big dude. You a bodybuilder?” One, it’s surprisingly easy for me to reply “haven’t really lifted for months”, he then goes in shock “that’s natural!”, I replied “pushups, shit ton of pushups”, “damn…cool” as he nodded his head. Looking back it dawns on me that as a big, tall, strong, red bearded man I’m often perceived as super human. It makes some funny shit, in and out of the gym make more sense. They’re looking at you like you’re Kryptonian.
Lessons :
Activity will guide the cravings.
Just massively up volume to lean out.
Hip thrust more often, I used them years ago unweighted when I couldn’t lift. Keep them in rotation.
Buy an exercise ball for peak contraction leg curls.
Sissy squats are like a compound equipment mashup of the leg extension and glute ham raise.
It’s time to lose more rigidity in my training, I’m outside a gym. Just move, and hit the whole body daily.
Leaning out could be tied to the high volume of flexing. It definitely is euphoric.
The front raise hold has serious potential.
One arm pushups for strength. Clap pushups for power. Do more than just high reps. You can do them weighted too.
While the anecdotes differ, the consensus is that Bruce Lee held a weight of 8-10lbs (usually described as a small metal ball, maybe a shot put) in a static front raise hold for a serious length of time alternating hands but without stopping the exercise.
30-45 seconds per shoulder, I may have gotten up to 60 or 75 seconds once.
It’s a very Kung Fu feeling exercise. I liken it to the wall sit but for the shoulders.
To get in today’s 500 press reps, I set a timer for 8:20/500 seconds.
Alternating hands I made 5:00/300 seconds before finishing the last 3:20/200 seconds after maybe 5 minutes resting (during which I hit a minute in each hand, plus of course still hitting some pushups after, daily habit you know).
Give the front raise hold a try. As part of feeders they’ll grow your shoulders very quickly even while only using a 10lb dumbbell.
I’m tempted to get a dumbell handle so as to weigh this heavier, though adding time is currently on the table.
Then (during feeders a few months ago), and now I like the sound of a 5 minute hold without switching hands.
My training is shifting.
PostScript : September/October 2015 I was doing this, forgot about it until now.
I’ve always liked exercising in the winter…outdoors.
Whether in the fall or winter going back to 16 years of age I’d often find myself in the dark, and out of breath having exerted myself in a time where most would allow the cold air to keep them indoors watching television or maybe inside on a treadmill likely with television (still) not panting, not sweating.
Flipping the tire, swinging the sledge, sprints, jump rope, calisthenics, movement.
(Like cartwheels…or jumping jacks.)
This isn’t gym training. Tonight moreso, again I’m finding myself at peace with getting it in without a gym membership.
I rember running during the first snow of the year, a bit cold, snow hitting my skin, breathing deep of the chilled air because it made me feel alive.
There was the preseason wrestling prep of sprints, jump roping, running, with a walking cooldown. Sometimes I’d repeat the entire session because it felt so good. The expending of energy filling me with an abundance of more.
In three weeks I’d have good wind, enough to never have an issue with gassing.
Cardio in the cold air, I’ve used the method since to get my cardio shape/wind back.
I’ll forever know that a short period of pounding the pavement, and skipping the rope will grant me wind.
Yesterday, then again today it was long static holds at night to get through this run of 1500 reps daily (write up coming on the 10th or 11th). Smelling the trees, making sure not to slip on ice, and ending with some bodyweight squats on my feeling dead legs.
(It may be the same leg work for a while. I’m digging the air, the holds which have ended up quite meditative, and bodyweight leg work these two nights thus far.)
In the winter you’ll have the place to yourself. The other day I did 500 step ups, and goofed around with a soccer ball I found laying around without another soul in sight.
It’s a nice time, about as quiet as civilization can be.
As I finish typing this up, I hear panting and hard footsteps…a jogger, ~8:00 pace. Cool, I’m not the only one.
Tommorow it’ll be more of the same.
From those high school nights with headphones. It’s the right vibe, the right mood for the thing :
Years ago I stumpled upon this Russian youtube channel. It was one of those things that simply left an impression. Dude does 100s of pullups, and frankly looks built like someone who does massive amounts of pullups, notice the size of his lats.
Form police would say his form is terrible or some other bullshit as an excuse as to why they can’t do this sort of thing. I saw it differently…
He doesn’t look particularly small, and who cares what form he uses. It was an eye opener as to the possibility of really pushing reps high, I’ve done so with pushups…and am built accordingly.
There’s something to be said for simply applying yourself to the task, the training, at hand, and running it as far as you possibly can.
All you have is the floor? Pushups, situps, bodyweight squats, etc as far as you can.
The internet is misguided on what amount of reps can build strength…
It’s commonly accepted that strength is 1-5 reps per set, some will say up to 12…in reality strength is built by getting stronger…this can be at any rep range, or even with holds, carries, poses, etc.
Low reps and high reps can both build strength. They can both build mental toughness, but in different ways.
The low rep exercise done to max will activate a fear of hurting yourself, it builds balls. High reps are more likely to mentally drain you, you’ll be hesitant to get under the bar and slog it out til the sets over, they build determination.
Notice how both can build strength, both mental, and physical.
However, I say it’d be more beneficial to almost everyone to get REALLY FUCKING strong at higher rep ranges.
Why not approach the bar with the goal of hitting for 50 reps what most would be content to hit for 1, 3, 5 reps?
It’s a whole different world, and while you won’t hit a powerlifting world record level weight for 50 you can get damn heavy weights on high rep ranges with consistent effort.
I’d argue the higher rep range is superior, especially for those training at home and/or alone due to a couple factors.
Safety-less likely to need a spotter.
Less Equipment-with a higher rep range you don’t need as much weight, ergo less equipment is required.
A 300lb weightset is often thought of as not enough weight. That’s looking at it wrong.
Can you deadlift and squat that set for 50 reps?
Can you power clean that set and press it for reps…cold?
Add in another 200lbs, make it a 500lb set and ask those questions again.
See how the high reps can make you diesel yet?
It’s not being content to train halfheartedly for high reps like the majority of commercial gym goers (I have an exact person in mind as I write this), but to take that high rep range and attempt to hit other’s 1 rep maxes for those same high reps.
A whole different world, one usually only discovered by bodybuilders, you too can enter it, and reap it’s rewards.
The premise groks with me, and the idea struck me the other day between sets of military press that…
Frequency is my way of respecting the lift, falling into it’s frame.
I’ve never really done infrequent for any length of time. While I don’t hold it against myself for getting into the place (the bodybuilding gym in Cali), having lasted 2 or 3 weeks at 2x weekly before upping it to ~5 since I dug the atmosphere (it’s amazing what crawling with hot chicks can do), in the yard the infrequency comes naturally.
(Aside : Maybe I feed off of “show mode” when lifting, and prefer other training styles in solitude.)
I’d been worrying about that (frequency) and my lack of squat rack a ton.
Mythical strength’s article changed my perspective.
Already I don’t respect the “lifting knowledge” that getting injured is a given…as to me it’s not even a possibility.
I’ve always disrespected the idea of needing time off to recover. I got great results from 6-9 months of daily squatting, and my lifetime deadlift PR was after 21 or 23 days and ~30 deadlift sessions in a row.
I already know that for me to squat sub-405 it would take a full fledged smiting by God. I’m always good for it. ALWAYS.
Perspective change : all my lifting can be like this.
Not only will they not drop, but they’ll progress without being trained.
My self imposed daily PT takes care of it all. (I’ve felt this a while actually.)
I may simply lift once a week, and very likely only one lift.
The opposite of my frequency love sounds like 52 sessions in a year, one lift per session, and a few lifts total.
The initial idea was alternating military press week and sldl week.
Pretty close to the ultimate of disrespect to frequency.
Ditto to no barbell squatting at all…which still will have me at 405+, though I’ll likely hit some overheads, or drop the bar to my back for some…whenever.
(There’s also goblet squats. Have I posted the one dumbbell workout yet?)
Needing everything gym and gym related to be pristine is…prissy.
That petite chick telling me ” yeah, but all the guys at this gym are bitches” (related to tire flipping) was just so…right. I’d made myself gym persona non grata for roughly that belief before, and hearing it come out of a sexy little thing was admittedly a hilarious and well appreciated external validation. It’s hard to not like a place where a hot chick mocks the gay & metrosexual thang that is ingrained in male gym culture… absolutely hysterical!
(Girlie had no idea why that statement amused me so much.)
While I’m yard lifting that bitch (the barbell) deserves the worst of me, neglect, and utter disregard/disrespect while still going my way (getting stronger).
Maybe this made sense, which coincidentally the linked article wholly did, well at least to me anyway.
I had a blast regularly using the bosu ball at the gym.
It is a surprisingly fatiguing thing…on the nervous system.
(Though there was one at the bodybuilding gym I actually didn’t use it there. Some strange combination of social phobia (it’d look really weird there, somehow that didn’t stop me at the other one) and the sense of maximizing my time there getting big and strong as it was the closest to perfect place to get big and strong that I’ve ever experienced.)
I found that regularly standing on it (the bosu ball, not either gym’s roof) and then adding exercises such as bodyweight squats, calf raises, and attempting to pistol squat deep, and harder balances like on toes, one foot, or one foot on toes while on it was a nice addition to my training. It carried over in strange places, my ability to power clean, and box jump improved.
Now the bosu ball is a decent chunk of change for a toy to balance on. I’ll likely buy one in the future, I like them, and have an experiment that I want to try on it.
(Lots of bodyweight squats on it as my primary leg work. Could I squat to front kick eventually? What benefits would a high quantity of work on it have? It’d be more be more nervous system engaging than muscular, what would happen to my build?)
But for now I don’t have one…
Luckily when one exercises with the mind of a child there is a strong sense of play…
Winding down from a high volume workout I started to spot land broad jumps between sets of btn presses, saw a brick, and got the idea.
Balance play…by standing on an upturned brick, which was not on the most flat of ground. It wobbled depending on where I’d reset it each time I fell off.
Whatever you’re trying to do, the necessary tool is already available to you. You just have to have an open mind and find it.
The world is there…everything you need to get fit. It’s there.
When you exercise play some, and try some balance work, most anyone could use it, and it’s quite fun.
PostScript : Or you can close your eyes and balance on foot foot for as long as possible. No equipment required. Try it, the efficiency of effort/effectiveness will surprise you.
On a whim during summer 2017 I discovered the most awkward way to do a barbell front squat.
Sparking my memory of the thing glorious variation was a surprise stumbling across YouTube video of damn near the exact same variant a few days ago…
“Woah! I’m not the only one to have ever done this!” – Me in shock as I do odd looking shit with barbells.
This is what I did :
•Sumo stance
•Power curl
•High rep squat
In British parlance a “sumo stance power curl & curl lockout front squat for reps”, because yes those 3 bullets were the steps of the exercise.
By holding at the top of a curl (underhand grip, straight up/vertical) you get a serious isometric for the upper back and biceps. It’s way more time under tension than if you were just doing straight power curls, and by positioning it’s very awkward as far as upper body demands go.
I’m sure someone would disparage how the back limits the legs here or some shit, and to that I ask…anyone care for some weird strength?
Being that I’m lifting outside without a rack…I again have another variation of squat to keep in the bag of tricks.
