JFord

I feel funny messaging about a medical issue but here goes:

I’m officially an old guy at 67. There is no conceivable metric by which I can be considered a young man or even a middle-aged man. I take little solace in my assertion that 67 is the new 66.

It’s catching up to me.

A few weeks ago I was at my synagogue and I had a sudden, bad coughing fit when some food went the wrong way. I stood up to get better ergonomics, saw stars, and the next thing I know I’m on my ass leaning against a table looking up at bunch of concerned faces. I’m told I lost about 10 seconds of consciousness.

I was totally fine: no broken stuff (including my head). Finished up the meal fine with zero lasting effects other than profuse embarrassment. Drove myself home without issues. No alcohol was involved. Only grape juice!

The issue is this. Yesterday I was squatting a work set and grinded out rep four and REALLY grinded out five. I was definitely seeing stars halfway through five. I leaned forward a bit (form went to hell) so I’d fall forward if I fainted (which I didn’t). I use safeties on my rack that are set up fine I think. I’m trying to stay hydrated before lifting but might be able to do better.

I’ve had a gap in my training and have been fairly successful at clawing my way towards my previous PR (250 for five). Today’s lift was 212.5. I’ve been going up 2.5 lbs at a time.

Does anyone have experience with this problem and hopefully know how to mitigate it? I’m pretty committed to sticking with heavy sets (for me).

Mark Rippetoe

Have you changed your breathing pattern between reps?

JFord

Actually, I HAVE changed my breathing patterns between reps. In the past, I’ve taken one breath between reps 1, 2, and 3. I then usually needed to take additional breaths between 3-4 and 4-5.

I have started doing one breath before each rep, valsalva’ing, and go. If I’ve had to take more breaths because I ran out of wind after a rep, I do all five reps but consider it a failed set and I use the same weight my next work-out until I can do five reps in a row, with no additional breaths.

Mark, I remember a post of yours years ago that said that as long as you complete five reps and the bar stays on your back, the set counts as completed. Then recently, I read an article also written a while ago, but sometime after your post, by one of the SSC coaches saying you just go from rep to rep without pause (except for the one breath).

I thought I’d give that a try because you never wrote a response to it. The end result is that I progress more slowly from a lower baseline of workset weight.

Should I go back to allowing myself more breaths between reps? Should I return to your original standard of a successful set as long as the bar never leaves your back?

Mark Rippetoe

As long as the bar is not racked, it is one set. And if you need to take 5 breaths between each rep, do so. The SET is the concern, not the time it takes.

Agilic

I'm curious about the opinion of you and/or the board on my cholesterol levels, which have been well above the tolerated ranges for years. The 2 GP's I've seen in the last decade have both recommended immediate intervention with medication despite a family history of high cholesterol and no adverse health effects (both grandfather's lived to 90+ and father is 74 without a health incident as of yet). Here are my latest levels: LDL 255mg/dL, HDL 44mg/dL, Trig 95 mg/dL, NonHDL 274 mg/dL, Total 318 mg/dL.

I guess what my question boils down to is; are these levels high enough that if you were 33 you would go on medication for life per doctor's recommendations (I'm always skeptical of doctors and the medical industry in general), or try to get the levels down through dietary intervention, or not worry about it given the fact the high levels are genetic and have not caused health issues for family members of recent generations.

Mark Rippetoe

This is not "extremely high cholesterol" unless you are the Lipitor salesman or his client. Let me recommend a very good book: Doctoring Data

FatButWeak

Instead of reading the tea leaves of your blood to guess whether you are "at risk of" building atherosclerotic plaque, why don't you take a picture of your arteries instead to actually look to see if there's any plaque build up?

Using blood lipid tests to guess at heart disease is as stupid as using blood tests and checking for calcium levels, inflammation markers and trace proteins similar to what's in marrow to guess whether a bone is broken. Take a fucking x-ray, stupid.

The picture of your arteries they take is called a coronary calcium scan and its a type of CT scan where they actually measure the thickness of the build up - if any - of plaque in your arteries. Very diagnostic, very no nonsense, very no guessing. You then get a score, which is either "youre fucked and full of plaque" or "you have no plaque" or you have some plaque." You may have to pay like, I don't know, $100 bucks to get this done since the globo-homo-industrial-military-pharmacology-gubmint complex doesn't actually want you to know if you have plaque. That way they can keep selling you drugs to treat a "disease" that you may have because your "associated factors" place you at a "high risk" of getting the disease (heart disease, that is). This makes you fearful and easy to control.

Take the bull by the dick and go get a calcium scan and stop being afraid of fucking cholesterol.