Randy's Quest for 5/4/3/2

[Randy Scheingold]

Forgot to log, so here are 2 workouts:

4/18 Week 97 Day 3 (Week 3 with Karl)

Press 152.5x5x5 (5x5 PR...I think)
CGBP 205x5x3 prescribed, got 205x3
Chins - 3x5 Negatives prescribed, got 3 negative

Press
- Solid work, but pretty tiring. Bar speed good at fist, then slowed a bit by later reps.
- layback way worse as sets went on
- Not worried, ths is normal on 5x5, this is fatigue from 3x5 Press on Sunday, 3x5 Press on Tuesday, and today's 5x5

CGBP
- Left arm was cranky (elbow & shoulder). Grinded out 3 reps. Could have done more, but got lazy/was worried about aggravating my arm

Chins
- Tried a set of negatives...not sure my ROM was any better...per video (coming) later
- Felt very awkward and elbow starting hurting a little


4/22 Week 98 Day 1 (Week 33 with Karl)

Squat 330x1x5 (Gym PR tie...better than last attempt)
DL 370x3 (Rep PR)

Squat
- 365x3 second walkout
- Felt very confident, bar actually felt good on my back
- Tried to focus on hips & depth, some reps better than others
- None crazy high, although a few may be parallel
- Overall my confidence is growing....405x1 will be mine this year
- I also think I am starting to feel when I get the bounce...not during the rep, but on video the deeper reps look faster to me. And when the eccentric motion is faster, I tend to go deeper too.

DL
- Felt good, moved fast

Questions
- How many squat singles would you white light?
- Don't forget to pick a day for some prowler work starting next week
- Elbow still a little cranky....although today it feels fine. So Squats\DL are not causing it nor aggravating it

[Randy Scheingold]

4/24 Week 98 Day 2 (Week 33 with Karl)

Press 170x4,1 (4 Rep PR....best I've done before is a single). 15lb shy of my all time PR.
Bench 200x5x3
Chins Neutral Grip - 5,4,4

Press
- I felt froggy, so i went for it...bar got too far in front on reps 3& 4 and I couldn't get the 5th one
- Rested for 60 seconds and got the 5th rep
- first 2 reps felt great, 3 & 4 felt very hard...but it was more a form issue than a strength issue
- Let's repeat and get the 170x5 next time. I don't think we need to taper yet.


Bench
- no lift off, not easy, but no problems either

Chins
- Still questionable ROM
- Elbow not too bad, rear deltoids more sore than anything else
- I feel these a lot in my back, which seems to be a good thing

HIIT
- Went to the gym near the hotel with a coworker, didn't want to make him wait another 10 minutes, so will do this tomorrow on the hotel treadmill

Questions
- How do I get my ROM better. is it an anthropometry issue? are neutral grip chins just harder to get over the bar. Or is it that there was no "bar" per se?

[Praetorian]

Looks like you're getting pretty close to your press goal! I'm putting all of my hopes and dreams into squats right now because I think it's closest out of all of my lifts, but still probably 3-4 months out from 400.

[Randy Scheingold]

Looks like you're getting pretty close to your press goal! I'm putting all of my hopes and dreams into squats right now because I think it's closest out of all of my lifts, but still probably 3

Yeah - Its taking a lot of discipline to not load up 200lb on the bar and just give it a shot. But I am making steady gains...5lb per month or so on my 5 Rep max, so why blow it and lose 2 weeks out of the month. I alternate Press and Bench. My e1RM from a 245x5 bench is 285lb...but I'm not really sure how accurate that is for my bench.

[Randy Scheingold]

4/27 Week 98 Day 3 (Week 33 with Karl)

Squat 305x5x4 (5 Rep & Volume PRs!!)
Press 147.5x5x3
Rack Pull 370x5 (PR!)

Squat
- 355x3 sec walkout
- 1st set felt the hardest, probably didn't rest enough from warm ups
- Mostly good depth, a few parallel, a few slightly high
- Overall no harder than last week really...which is AWESOME

Press
- No big deal, not easy, due to exhaustion from squats, but bar speed was decent

Rack Pulls
- Warm ups were great
- Tried using bumper plates to get the right height...they were a little squishy....next time I'll use the wood planks they have
- 370x5 felt very hard and on video not sure I looked it out well enough. I'm assuming this was from Volume PR Squats though

Note:
- I was exhausted and underfed coming into this. Was on a flight last night that was 2.5 hours delayed, didn't get home until 1am. Up at 7am this AM
- Ate like shit yesterday due to being stuck at the airport for hours. And didn't have anything solid to eat before my workout...just a protein shake and a pre-workout
- BUT...I didn't give up and I got it!

Confession
- I never did my HIIT...should have used hotel treadmill for sprints...got lazy. Let's program prowler again though.

Questions
- is depth legit enough to pass me onto 310x5x4 next time?
- Take a look at my (bad side video)...Dave always though my right side was 2in higher than my left. Notice anything. That side does like slightly high to me. But there is a weird point where my quad tilts back down and then goes flat for a while...and the crease of the hip appears higher than the left side. Next VD, I may film both sides at the same time so you an compare. Only matters for competitions really.
- Were rack pulls legit or did ROM suck too much?
- Should I throw the prowler in on Saturday after Volume Bench?

Squat - Set 3 - Good side


Squat - Set 4 - Bad Side


Rack Pulls

[Randy Scheingold]

4/29 Week 99 Day 1 (Week 34 with Karl)

First: Feedback from last workout
--Squats: I'll work on holding the knees out, now that I am getting more confident in depth & not tipping forward.
--Press: Agree, there was 1 or 2 reps that I didn't lock out on each set...need to stay focused even when I'm fatigued
--Rack Pulls: These felt very heavy, hence the shitty lockout. But I do no feel overly fatigued (low back or legs) right now. I think I am adapting to the higher volume of higher weights in general. I believe the heaviness was more from fatigue after squats.

Today's workout

Bench 227.5x5x5 (probably a 5x5 PR, but not certain)
CGBP 205x6x3
Chins (Regular grip) - 5,5,3
Prowler (baby steps to start - 105lb x 15 yards x 4 sets)

Bench
- No lift on first set, lift on each subsequent set
- 5 min rest and supersetted chins twice
- Overall felt very solid, 5th rep slowed down on the last few sets, but never in doubt
- No elbow pain...yet...

CGBP
- No liftoff on set 1, yes liftoff on sets 2 & 3
- Much harder then regular press
- Form felt of a bit...but no video here
- Elbows started to hurt here.....
- 5 min rest, 1 supersetted chins set

Chins
- Felt fine, until set 3 (during CGBP)...then elbows hurt....called it after the triple to not aggrevate the elbows

Prowler
- Was not very hard, should have added more weight and tried to run faster (ideally switching back to my regular sneakers not my adipowers)
- I want to do these again, so tell me when. Next time, I'll bump it up to 135lb and try to stretch it to 20 yards (assuming no one else in that room and I can maximize space)

Questions
- How is ROM on chins, seemed better to me...but not sure
- thoughts on whether CGBP could be causing the elbow pain?

Bench Set 3 (I know I need to go faster on Rep 1...!!!!)


Chins Set 2

[Randy Scheingold]

5/2 Week 99 Day 2 (Week 34 with Karl)

Squat 335x1x5 (Gym PR! 15lb shy of all time PR. Highest weight ever squatted excepting my 350x1 at the fall classic)
DL 375x3ish (Gym PR! 10lb shy of all time PR. Highest weigh ever deadlifted excepting my 385x1 at the fall classic)
Deadmill HIIT - 4 sets of 20sec on 100 sec off

Squat
- 375x3 sec walkout (I wanted to feel 375 on my back )
- 3 reps at depth, first rep very slightly high, 1 rep not filmed
- Head position sucked, which killed hip drive, which is why these were grinders...getting to the point where I need someone yelling mid set probably...
- there was no way I was getting doubles or triples on these....but I am still very happy. I didn't think about this before, but prior to 3 life time reps (Fall Classic 330 & 350) and Bucktown Crossfit meet last summer (330), I have never squatted more than 315 for a set of singles. I am now squatting 20lb higher than that and chasing down my all time PR..without any tapers.

DL
- This is probably 375x2, since I failed to lock out the last rep. And frankly, I sort of hitched the 2nd rep.
- Still, ditto to my squat comments...prior to the last few weeks the best I had down in the gym was a single at 350...so we are making progress.
- Rested 3 min and tried to do a make up single...couldn't break it off the ground I guess I was done for the day
- And this is after heavy Rack Pulls + 4 sets of my 5 PR squats a few days ago

Deadmills (a la Andy Baker's recommendation)
- On the road again, no prowler.
- These were not easy at all

Question
- Do we repeat 375x3 next time or taper to doubles? Or reset back to my last 5RM...I think that was 350x5

Reps 1, 2, 3, and 5....camera f-up on rep 4

[Randy Scheingold]

5/3 Week 99 Day 3 (Week 34 with Karl)

Bench 250x5 Prescribed, Got 250x3x2 (5lb shy of my 3RM PR...from last April...)
Press 155x5x3 Prescribed. Got 155x5x2, 135x5
Chins 3x5 Prescribed...NADA...inner elbow pain again

Bench
- Had lift off and felt like form was solid. Just didn't have 4 or 5 reps in me.
- Rested 7 minutes and knocked off another triple, no more difficult than the first
- Annoyed I didn't get the 5 Reps here. Not annoyed that we did a 5lb jump, 2.5lb less wasn't going to get me Reps 4 or 5.
- Inner elbows angry after these sets

Press
- These were super hard and I rested 6 to 8 minutes for each set
- Couldn't get a single rep of set 3...so stripped off the 20lbs and got a challenging 135x5

Chins
- Didn't want to aggravate the elbows further

Questions\Comments
- Not sure if this was just 1 bad workout or my presses are starting to stall. I missed 1 rep on last Press ID (got 170x4). We've also had to reset CGBP as they are causing some inner elbow pain
- Let me know where we should take things. I'm disappointed on Bench...mostly because exactly 1 year ago I was at 255x3...then tapered singles (in your 5/1+...so just 1 heavy single) up to 270x1 and failed at 272.5 So in some sense, I haven't really progressed bench at all. Although this was 250x3x2...last time is was 250x3 on my 5/1+ day...at least I got 2 triples today...And I think I could have gotten another triple with some rest today.
- Is this my neuromuscular inefficiency and do we keep pushing VD up for 5x5 and starting riding triples for as long as we can? Even tapering volume day to triples when needed?
- Also not sure what to do with my elbows.....
- Or...am I overthinking all of this and I had GYM PRs on Squat and Bench 24 hours ago and my old ass just needs more recovery????

Bench Set 1


Press Set 2



Note: I'm not freaking out, just pissed off at my weak bench and crappy elbows.

[Randy Scheingold]

5/7 Week 100 Day 1 (Week 35 with Karl)

Squat 310x5x4 (5 Rep PR! and Volume PR!)
Press 150x5x3
Halting DL 305x8 (PR!)

Squat
- 365x3 sec walkout. continues to be a HUGE help. 310 felt lighter on my back than my last 275x1 warm up
- Head position pretty good on most reps, got worse by set 4
- Most reps good depth, a few parallel, a few high
- I think the HIIT is start to help my conditioning a bit, looking forward to keeping that up and seeing if I get less winded on heavy sets of 5
- 8 to 10 min rest, with very little supersetting...just bar only presses and my first weighted press warm up

Press
- Felt MUCH MUCH better than last time.
- No real problems, but played it cautious with 8 min rest
- I did superset Halting warm ups

Halting DL
- No real problems here either

Questions\Comments
- How is depth, these sets are probably my better 2, but the others weren't too far? Do we keep moving up or repeat?
- Lots of programming questions for next week:
---- What are we going to do for CGBP? Try them 1 more time and focus on letting the elbows flair a bit?
---- What do we do about DL ID? I got 370x3 last time, but my lockout sucked on rep 3
---- What do we do about Press ID? I got 170x4 last time.

Set 3


Set 1

[Randy Scheingold]

5/9 Week 100 Day 2 (Week 35 with Karl)

Press 152.5x5x5
CGBP 205x6x3
Chins - 3 sets prescribed, 2 reps done...

Note: Still feeling pretty beat up. Staring to get an appetite again though, which is a good sign. Hamstrings & adductors have been sore as hell for 3 days, just started to get slightly better today. Sleep has been off (stress related). I tried some bar only Squats to get the blood moving today. They were UGLY as hell. Barely hit depth, totally vertical torso, major knee slide. And legs/low back not happy. Although I am staring to feel looser now that I am done...

Press
- Hard, but I wasn't going to quit them.
- Bar speed looked decent to me despite them "feeling" hard.
- 5 to 7 min rest...and real rest, no supersetting as I didn't want to miss any reps

CGBP
- Focused on letting the arms flair if needed. Video shows I still keep the elbows pretty tucked, but these did feel better.
- Perfect weight & reps, bar speed started to slow on reps 5 & 6 felt hard. Otherwise good
- 5 min rest
- Did not superset chins until the last set as an experiment. No Elbow Pain!

Neutral Grip Chins
- 2 reps
- Felt VERY weak and inner elbows felt "stretched". I punted before they started to hurt. Not sure if this was psychosomatic or real though.
- And I think we need to keep an eye on the DOMS. Not squatting for 5 or 6 days and then doing a 4x5 at a 5 Rep PR weight seems to be taking a toll

Questions\Comments
- Thoughts on the under recovery? It has been a stressful few weaks, but I also wonder if I am underrecovered and that is contributing
- So, if we punt on Chins...what do we do for the guns and for the back?