Author: J

“The Inflation Of Gas Station Iced Coffee” :

The cheap iced coffee went from 99¢ + tax to (mathematically it must’ve been) $1.49 + tax.

Funny given the guy behind me in line was talking about inflation to me as the massively long line of iced coffee and slurpee purchasers (solidly 12 people buying such things at lunch hour) inched forward.

“How are you today?”
“Good. Just this iced coffee.”
“That’ll be $1.65.”
I laugh, “when did that go up – I had the dime ready and everything”, as I reopen my wallet for another dollar bill.
“March 20th, 21st? Maybe the 22nd.”
“Ahh, bout a month back then.”
“Yeah, bout a month back.”
“Well dang, everything is 30 to 50% up – just as bad as the grocery store.”
She laughs, “yep, as bad as the grocery store”.

I’ve bought a grand total of two iced coffees in the past six months, once here, once somewhere else plus a customer or a manager giving me one a handful of times in addition over the past year.

A decent number of coffee milks as well, which is where I get my somewhat caffeine hit or maybe it’s the placebo of thinking I have drank caffeine.

Shit is addictive. Shit often makes me an easily out of breath, highly outgoing, frequently needing to shit, while profusely sweating, squirrel.

Caffeine while lifting means for me something like if I PR within five singles I PR within five singles – otherwise I gas.

Four years ago a bang energy drink was a never again experience for me.

Despite my size I am a lightweight when it comes to stimulants.

Never having touched alcohol or smoked (anything – which surprises people) I expect the same of these substances if I ever was to partake in any.

Now it’s lifting time.
Barefoot and shirtless in the sun?
Yes. I shall.

…..

Well it didn’t end up barefoot…
and we get to the heart of the thing (the post) ;

…..

“I’m Not An International Level Weightlifter” :

~430pm (post workout(s))
I’m not an international level weightlifter, and realizing this ; I’m entirely okay with doing stuff no international level weightlifter would be doing in this day and age (2023).

Seriously – the bulk of today’s lifting was using split form.

First I snatched singles from 95lbs to 205lbs by every 10lb jump left leg forward, totally pressing out the 205lb single which would never have passed under weightlifting rules.

…there was a half hour gap in time as I spoke on the phone…is this one or two sessions then…

Secondly I split cleaned with the opposite leg/the right leg forward a dozen singles with 165lbs to roughly even out the stimulus.

Attire?
•demolished xxwide basketball shoes that I bought at 16yo and only wore a handful of times that summer never wearing them again til about christmas/new years a few months ago – could’ve been barefoot shrugs
•sun stained/sun bleached sweat pants
•no shirt – in the sun – at least considering I had shoes on ie half a problem
•skullcap pulled over headphones – the needy for music while lifting cossack cap look
•work gloves – to keep my hands clean of whatever grease is on the new bar/new bumper plates and does not seem to just wipe off

That’s competition legal attire I’m sure, channelling Steve Justa (rip) in backyard weightlifting, maybe someday when snatching heavier than bodyweight to “make it official” on the platform lol

…..

Having done split snatches and split cleans, the split clean requiring me to pull absurdly low (just above knee height? it felt that low – rationally it’s probably higher than mid thigh – definitely can work on splitting fast and low so as to pull low – a new step to learn) vs how high I pull during a power clean, with my quads having crazy high tension/cramping…

I bumped the weight to 205lbs and power cleaned into three sets :

•1c+5p+2pp (5p at 205lbs is a PR tie as I recall)
•1c+2p
•3c+1j + ~50yd oh walk

↑ these all done with no splits as was my usual (I’m teaching myself to split snatch, apparently split clean as well), power cleans, strict presses, a couple push presses, and the jerk a push jerk power jerk (my feet jumped, widening slightly).

journaling
the j is pronounced as a y – yournaling, just as the jogging is pronounced yogging – is swedish ya

lol

Persistence & Tenacity

4/20/23 ~930pm
That’s why I bought the kettlebell!

It’s about 2130, I stepped outside, grabbed the 32kg kettlebell, did a set of one arm cleans each side, and a set of side bends each side – fin, done, did it, done did it 🙂

The kettlebell is clutch for minisessions, whether traveling, late night, frequent, or being lazy about setup/breakdown.

(the thing is set weight – just use it for whatever movement(s) and for whatever length of time)

A kettlebell of decent weight is a one stop shop.

And I haven’t yet went hard with the ones I own!

(32kg I purchased recently, 20kg and 16kg gifts from a coworker recently, 20lb a gift from my mom when I was 14yo)

…but, feeling how effective one bell work is, and I’m partial to the one arm clean – I could over time invest in heavier and heavier bells with the one arm clean as my “being diesel one stop training shop”.

I’ve been seriously impressed by how well the kettlebell works the midsection.

To the point I should be on a high volume, hour a day, “odyssey” ala 2019’s “dip odyssey”.

The one arm clean is a bicep builder in disguise, while dropping the bell down is a trap stretch – the thing is full body without you really thinking of it as such.

The implement itself leads to training density, combined with it’s natural tension demands is a great combination for wind.

Muscular stimulus and wind…
See that point again about a training odyssey.

🙂

You’re training wind with an odd cannonball shaped weight!

This is a very good thing.

…..

Every session today, the first clean and press every rep ground to overhead with a barbell, this one one arm cleans with a kettlebell – the lesson is training density, more volume.

I’m badly in need of being in shape.

I like being big and strong.
Lifting density will get me on the path to, and give me much needed wind.

Odyssey, hint hint.

…..

We always have all the tools.
It’s that we must use them rightly.

Persistence & Tenacity

4/20/23
This is becoming a once every week or two type thing for me :

I setup the barbell loaded to 405lbs, and pull it.

So far from actually training the deadlift 405lbs feels pretty heavy, me being mostly unused to heavy full body strain as i haven’t trained that sort of stimuli, while going there at work is somewhat infrequent and often in a different movement pattern ie a piano is a deadlift and carry type thing, whereas a giant mattress often sees me driving into it like a tackle sled as we take it upstairs.

Ten days or two weeks back I pulled a cold single at 405lbs.

Yesterday I doubled it without warming up.

9×405 is my PR at that weight, actually done no warmup, but already sweating from driving to the gym itself…fall 2018, I was in cali, with my body used to new england fall – therefore it felt like summer to me, and I was warm without warmups (not that I need them anyway).

Recently I’d written of only pulling double overhand.

All the bicep curling I’ve done lately has made mix grip feel fine for me again – I like this, and do intend to keep plugging away on an infrequent set with 405 for “what can I get with some still in the tank “, plus holding the last rep for a bit of grip work.

(if people do holds doh for grip work – why not holds with mixed grip – it’s still holding and working the hands)

A little bit of underhand “yates” rows would balance the stimulus should I feel the need.

The olys are my overhand stimulus.

…..

…..

It’s pretty cool how solid a 185lb clean and press is now, a year and a half into the movement around that weight as most stimulus, and it seems that a 405lb deadlift is my “baked in” walk around strength level.

My training philosophy is aimed that direction ; to never peak, but to get stronger with what I can always do – I haven’t much looked for higher low rep maxes, but to get a certain weight to 10, even 15 reps, occasionally higher, then add some weight, and get back up to those reps.

First you see a reps PR banging them out with loose form, then the reps start getting more strictly done, then the amrap #s start coming around with strict form and/or pauses.

You can just build a base of strength forever and be good.

How long to go from 1×405 mixed grip to 20×500 doh?

Doesn’t matter. The journey is what matters, stroll, enjoy the scenery – it ain’t a sprint.

Besides…the start is already “good enough”, you’re just casually getting even better.

There is no program. What exactly I do is on a whim. I try not to do the exact same session on paper twice in a row.

I like lifting weights – therefore I do. Therefore I lift anywhere from most days to every day.

For me it’s sustainable, and frankly I feel that a bunch of short lifts (5-10 sessions weekly, five to forty five minutes each) with the focus on back, legs, and shoulders – the pc&p the easiest answer, even done exclusively would work well for a whole lot who don’t take this approach.

Dude, baseline forever.
-J

4/19/23
The 19th is late enough in the month to discuss how curling most days this month has worked out.

I did not curl every day, but most, and sometimes it was curls, sometimes reverse curls, sometimes both.

I started with reverse curls, then switched to mostly curling.

It may be one challenging set each day, otherwise something done more in the tone of moderation like 5×5 at what would be 12-20 reps had I repped out.

Now I have a different training history than most american males – I’ve mostly ignored direct arm work over the years, so if/when I do focus on barbell curls it’s effectively new stimulus for me.

Just before typing I curled 21x95lbs, a couple days back it was 12x115lbs, the heaviest reverse curl set was 12x95lbs about two weeks ago, though sticking to 65-75lbs is better stimulus there same as 95lbs vs 115lbs on the regular straight bar curl.

None of this may be “perfectly strict”, but it all passes my standard for “strict enough”, while none of it could be called “cheat curls”.

This month as I more and more closely approach 25x95lbs I laugh that I was once on the gym floor complimented for that as a cheat curl set, whereas now – on the opposite end of my 20s, it is in the ballpark of my current strict PR, soon to be passed.

A week or two back, on my roughly once a week set of pullups I hit 9 at a bodyweight of 290lbs.

I’ve long known more biceps = more pullups, which is something to keep in mind for those on the compound lifts only approach.

All those I’ve known to naturally be good at pullups are long armed and heavy on the bicep development with long bicep insertions.

I have trex arms, my natural proportions being a very thick chest, arms that look small to moderate in proportion, with very short bicep insertions.

The opposite of those natural pullups guys.

My best pullup ability came from moderate to high volume on a daily basis with lots of weighted pullups in there.

That was two summers back.

My bodyweight PR was either 27 or 29 reps weighing somewhere between 235 and 265lbs (somewhere on the lower end – I’d estimate ~245lbs – I was losing weight with a physical job and doing an hour of pullups, a good deal of them weighted, every night, with a rotation of three training partners), and in the same 6-8 week period I pretty regularly hit 20+ at bw+20-30lbs, regularly did moderate effort sets of 8, say 3×8 at bw+45 as a training stimulus, know I hit bw+70, and think I hit a very ugly bw+90 single.

Right now pullup ability is coming back, on a set once every 5-14+ days simply cause all the curling surely has me going the more biceps route while weighing my lifetime heaviest.

Again more biceps = more pullups, and this is going to be pretty substantial/dramatically so when you’ve disregarded curls for the half of your life that is your training history.

Persistence & Tenacity

Lifting Music :

nelly – air force ones (on repeat for the bulk of this months lifting)

When you workout for long enough, there are times where you “forget” stuff you know works.

It’s often related to what you haven’t done in awhile or moreso what you haven’t had access to in awhile.

For example ;

I’ve long neglected squats, and have long known how real world applicable high reps done with enough weight make you.

I’d forgotten what high rep front squats felt like.

I’d forgotten what high rep overhead squats felt like.

It doesn’t have to be a regular back squat.

You can train any movement in whatever rep range you desire.

Think about olys for a second.
It’s accepted to do high rep kettlebell movements, but the weightlifting movements and variants on a barbell are for some reason not to be done.

The barbell is more blue collar in america than the kettlebell.

Maybe in russia they’re fairly ubiquitous and just found lying around, but here they cost a pretty penny.

(not that one relatively heavy kettlebell shouldn’t be acquired and put to use cleaning til the cows come home)

In america though, you’ve no excuse to not own a 300lb weight set.

Reality is that one could set you up for life, no gym dues or gym commutes ever required again, though you might have to purchase a higher quality bar at some point (look for good tensile strength at a low cost – or just get a texas power bar following the buy nice don’t buy twice principle).

I practically have forgotten the leg press.

It’s been a year and a half since I’ve had access to one, and about four and a half since I’ve had access to one able to be loaded up.

The high rep benefits of the squat, most of them are there with high rep leg press, but the leg press is much easier mentally.

This can make it better for leg growth than the squat, you just don’t have to dig as deep as when putting a bar on your back for truly challenging 15s, 20s, 50s, 100 reps forces you to go.

You can push the leg press to 75 reps, be seeing stars, hobble to your next exercise, and be ready to do that again pretty quickly – not anguish mentally, stressed out in fear of your next squat session.

Both approaches have their pros and cons, both have their place.

I really find benefit in the overhead squat for high reps.

Wicked light is acceptable, the empty bar.
Weighted too is acceptable.

I’ve gotten to about 20×135 overhead before, and say all amateur weightlifters should ride their first or final power snatch into an amrap.

You might not be able to do that.
If so drop the weight some, and rep that.

If you can leave a barbell loaded to a nice curl and overhead squat weight, side bend too (I love them – it’s an addiction – and don’t forget one arm snatch), that can be your light high frequency bar.

The smith machine is actually real good for going dumb and getting some brute force into you.

All three powerlifts can be done in one, and you approach it not as “the bar path is wonky”, but “I will be one with the machine”, lock into place (moreso than you can with a barbell), and just strain in that line against dead weight.

Being locked in you can actually apply force in a direction the barbell would never allow.

The smith machine may get you to a 405+ lb bench faster than benching free weight.

You just amrap the shit out of a bunch of sets (like 10-15×15-30 at ~200-220lbs benching – yes).

Then just squat in it for moderate reps (heavy – eventually you’ll tip the machine – yes – no joke, tip the machine), and pull in it for amazingly high tension low reps (light to moderate, but damn near failing over from how much your muscles are firing – see being locked in applying force in a direction the barbell would never allow).

Ground to overhead, in bunches, practically exclusively is how I put on an upper back.

Lots of military presses was the best thing I ever found for my shoulders.

More biceps = more pullups.

Get strong at curling, do lots of ugly olys, and you’ll probably be decent at pullups.

Add weight to pullups as often as possible. Even 3s at bw+2½lbs is worthwhile, and six months later doing amraps of 20+ at bw+20-30, moderate/training effort/fairly easy 3×8 at bw+45 leaving a bunch in the tank, heck two years later I hit 9 pullups weighing 290lbs.

That’s likely correlated to the strongest curling I’ve ever done.

12x115lbs recently, with PRs very frequently, like every second day frequently.

Use what you have access to in this moment…
You just gotta lift.

Persistence & Tenacity

4/17/23
When the equipment is at home you’re entirely okay with doing something real minimal, and something is better than nothing.

By all means, spend years smashing serious volume.

But, being able to hit a quick 5:00 lift is nothing to scoff at.

It’s 5:00 longer than most work out for, and to a large degree ; physical success is simply racking up years of wins, just doing something, anything, with heart.

If you buy into the approach you use, it works.

You could lift everyday. You could lift once every week or ten days.

You could use machines only.
You could use nothing but your own body.
Dumbbells? Kettlebells? Barbell? Sandbag?
= All Good

There’s always a way to train.
The details do not matter an iota.

The important part is that you do something, anything.

I’m not going to a gym, you know with people around other than me – I felt bummy about it to a fairy large degree in the work truck as we drove back to the shop.

At home I took a long nap, woke up feeling real groggy, real bummy after that…stepped outside to “do something”, just a good set of curls and side bends, three sets, 115lbs, curl, side bend left, side bend right.

Fin.
Didn’t not lift today.

I don’t see any local gym option to lift that I like.

I’m not particularly digging lifting alone all the time.

Is the answer open my own facility?

I really need to make some money, getting clients, personal training – I’d be able to live on ten clients a week, but would be entirely okay with working twelve hour days every day.

Get that many clients and I’m a millionaire soon enough…that would solve the low end of the american wage scale problems.

I like lifting. I’m good at getting people out of their head, and into real effort.

“Dude, STOP COUNTING, try to think of nothing, listen to me, I’ll tell you what you did after the set is over.”

That works for a bunch of people.
The outside voice saying it bypasses the inner voice.

99% of the physical is mental.
Heck, life is completely mental.
Own your mind.

Persistence & Tenacity

At present my primary lifting purpose is to build the deadlift in an unconventional manner…

I’ve started swinging a 20kg kettlebell while
before that I had the idea of seeing how the one arm deadlift carries over to the deadlift – the one arm deadlift my main barbell lift.

I’d already known what light, low rep, high muscular activation deadlifts do for me.

The way I’m doing one arm deadlift is similar – though it has a higher component of full back activation, you feel one side pump, it’s a cool feeling.

Thus far it’s 5×5 each side with 95lbs, another session singling up to 155lbs each side – no straps, never straps.

Occasionally I barbell one arm snatch.

The clean and press is taking backseat for a bit – the optics (I want video) and performance, particularly grip, of a solid 225+ lb one arm deadlift is too appealing right now. 🙂

For work I’m delivering houses ; on occasion this can be VERY bicep intensive, occasionally lower back and/or quad heavy.

Deadlifting in a normal powerlifting manner may not be the ideal approach for you personally.

I’m finding the one arm deadlift to be much easier on my body than the conventional deadlift – more euphoric, more challenging on the obliques, maybe on the hands…doesn’t wipe out my lower back which is a consideration for work.

It is a way to solid up the hands.

I no longer believe in training mixed grip, and do not care to use my long owned, rather awesome, but long unused spud straps.

(it doesn’t get better than spud inc for lifting straps – you’ll never break them)

Repeat ; deadlifting in a normal powerlifting manner may not be the ideal approach for you personally.

Look at both high level crossfitters and professional strongman – they both have good to great deadlifts.

The high level crossfitter doesn’t focus on the deadlift though they do lots of pulling.

The professional strongman too isn’t focused on a deadlift 1rm, but has a great deadlift – they do lots of varied heavy pulling.

Why are you running the “normal” gym script?

Run your own program.

Persistence & Tenacity

Lifting Music :

savannah dexter – big trucks
↑ don’t judge me – it’s silly fun lol