4/30/24
No chalk? High humidity?
✓✓ lol – lowering the clean yesterday was scary as it seemed like mother nature was making both my hands and the kettlebells’ handles perspire through no fault of my own.
I don’t care to purchase chalk online, and don’t care to go looking for it in a store.
I’ll use “poor man’s chalk”. Just pointedly have a rag on hand to wipe my hands and wipe the bells with.
It flashed me back to the SoCal Bodybuilding Gym, where despite some amount of open air in the building’s design, and despite it being california, it did get high humidity there.
I’d just grab a paper towel between sets, go between my fingers, across my hand, and across the bar.
Reapply as necessary.
Same deal with a rag and kettlebells.
It’s not a negative, it actually forces your grip to solid up quickly.
…..
If I was in a gym?
I’d probably have a love affair with the leg press.
I always liked loading it up, then getting sets of 35, 50, 75 reps.
On no other movement have I enjoyed heavy and high reps for legs as much as on the leg press.
It’s gotta be at least 4p, 5p (plates a side), 35 reps a set minimum, preferably slow on the negatives – let the muscle work.
I’d read years ago, a guy saying you should be able to leg press 50 reps with your squat 1rm, and I’ve found that to be a jump off point type guideline.
No piece of equipment is as unfairly razzed on as the leg press (plate loaded and angled).
Yeah it’s not squatting, however –
Frankly it allows for more overload of the legs, this cause it’s easier on the system.
Once you have a feel for effort you can go hog wild with the leg press, these 350+ rep, ten set workouts, like four days in a row, do something else for one, practically daily volume sessions.
Too I’d do a bunch of seated row.
I like seated row.
And I’d bench, front squat, actually do a deadlift instead of just kettlebell everything…
But it’d all be supplementary to the press.
The press is the main movement.
All the other lifting to build up the musculature for the clean & press.
Some things don’t change.
…..
What I’m doing right now?
With each passing day I’m doing more kettlebell jerks whether one bell or two bell 40kg.
I expect this to add to my shoulder girdle, add to my triceps – it’s new stimulus, and new stimulus always adds hypertrophy.
It’s still handling heavy while not pressing, the pressing is bottoms up variations and going to be hog wild volume when my adjustable competition bell arrives.
I can’t wait to get my hands on that, put 18kg in it, and see if I can press it x50 right hand.
2kg jumps.
That’s gonna allow me to really train bottoms up to solidly 32kg left, to really do high reps before a small progression, to do some double bell stuff, and to add one arm swing volume.
I’m so excited.
Maybe video format will just be a 20:00 video, no cuts, unabridged – random pressing, swings, juggling (yeah an adjustable competition bell FOR JUGGLING), spend all day uploading (sorta lol)
…..
I don’t know when I’ll decide to start barbell clean & press again, but I feel the kettlebell stuff is base building – that the increase of glutes, forearms, shoulders, lats, and thighs would mean I’ve a good chance of ugly power cleaning then pressing 300lbs in the near future.
…..
After two days of almost only meat and eggs I’m fantasizing about the weekend – donuts, pizza, soda…and really craving a bowl of oatmeal with brown sugar.
I think I’ll make one as a preworkout meal, then smash 2h swings and possibly jerks.
15×7 with the 40kg strikes me as enough to offset a small bowl of oats, besides I’m not really stringently set on anabolic diet type keto.
Guidelines.
Definitely going to need to eat more than 1lb meat and five eggs in a day though.
…..
445am
I gave into the craving.
1c oatmeal, big spoon of brown sugar, tall glass of milk, handful of chocolate covered coffee beans
Not gonna be keto today by the looks of it, 50g carbs in oats alone, probably a 16oz glass of milk, no clue the carbs in brown sugar, or the handful from the handful of coffee beans.
……
515am
2h Swings 40kg
15×7 in 1:20 intervals
BUC&P 16kg
x5/side
the swings worked out to ~:15w/1:05r
they felt great, I can see this making me not only feel, but be real solid – my glutes are way more dense over the past few months, and my back – lats, upper back, all of it really, the entire backside (glutes, hamstrings included) has sometimes explosive growth
this can easily work to 10×10 emom or better
the bucp was simply to check it off, though I passed on the days walk being immediately after – great way to be outside for the sunrise
great sweat, breathing a little heavier – feel good all around, an excited to progress this, can easily see myself going to a 60kg or something eventually (more finance than strength related wait)
listened to korpiklaani album “karkelo” in headphones as I went – nice way to spend the lift
…..
Soccer ball for around a half hour, about an hour after the kettlebell.
Nice, reactivated the sweat I had going, and also dribbled the soccer ball every day this month.
15ct was roughly today’s best – I’ve still yet to his a 20ct, but I’m now able to occasionally get the right knee/thigh involved, have pretty decent ball control with the right foot, a ways to go with the left foot, and am still genuinely enjoying it.
It’s a nice thing to mix with kettlebell training.
I picture myself practicing it regularly for longer, though maybe not rigidly mandatory every day.
We’ll see.
It and the kettlebell could be things I do for life.
…..
4pm
New kettlebell has arrived.
Tried it out briefly – double 16kg cross hold briefly after some presses, before some snatching, then went for the days walk – a short half mile one.
The blood flow from walking feels great, just swinging the arms loosens the entire shoulder girdle, while reactivating all the small upper back muscles which the kettlebell hits hard.
A moment of soccer ball after.
630pm
Hey it’s an adjustable kettlebell – amrap 24kg bup is calling my name (since til today I couldn’t use the normal bell jump that is 24kg)
BUCP
10x24kg left
BUP
20x24kg right
The bucp was a happy accident, improvising on the fly cause of falling out of the pressing groove.
The bup was a decent set.
…..
745pm
•six eggs
•six sausage links
•frozen mixed veggies
•ketchup
•1c oats
•brown sugar
•16oz milk
Maybe I’m not eating keto, but it’s pretty low calorie, quite clean, and good wholesome hearty food to go with all the kettlebell lifting.
I’m sore, kinda tired, and pretty full – I could’ve done without the oatmeal again, but I’d spent all day thinking about another bowl, so made it anyway when the egg dish was about done.
I sit here typing, relaxing before finishing the meal thinking “food is fuel”, and realize that’s a breakthrough for me.
Today would be a sustainable cutting diet for me.
And it was enough for a day of pretty high energy expenditure, though…I have little desire to do my night’s pushups (not that I won’t).
(oh shit – a little 200 calorie snack bag of generic cookies cheat item – oh no – thought I’d just enjoy it before pushups, shower, bed)
…..
Pushups
2×5
…..
It’ll be interesting to see where I am in a few months on pullups after all the kettlebell lifting which is all shockingly high in demand on the lats.
5 pushups just before midnight
Persistence & Tenacity