Milo234's Training Log

[Milo234]

My name is Jonathan, and I often go by Milo234 online.

I would describe myself currently as a late stage intermediate, bordering on advanced lifter. I'm focused on just generally getting stronger at the powerlifts with a goal of competing sometime this year in my first raw powerlifting meet. In addition to focusing on powerlifting I do some bodybuilding hypertrophy work as well.

I meticulously track everything I do at the gym in my old-fashioned paper training log notebook, and my plan is to update this online log approximately once a week or a few times a month with my progress for individual weeks. I always think about my training by comparing things week over week, and I think my training log will be easier for others to read and comprehend if I post it that way. Hopefully my training log will give other people ideas, and maybe some people will make some insightful comments along the way as I post my thoughts and discuss specific challenges I'm having.

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Biometrics

Age: 31
Height: 6' 0"
Body Weight: 280-285 lbs
Body Fat Percentage: ~31.5%
Lean Body Mass: ~195 lbs

I'm quite a bit overweight and have pretty bad cardiovascular conditioning currently, but my goal is primarily to gain strength and muscle mass while either maintaining my weight or dropping weight very slowly. Hopefully over the next two years I'll increase the lean body mass 10-20 lbs and drop my weight some for a net loss for 5-10% body fat, but that is not a primary training or diet focus for me. I tend to eat anywhere between 3600 and 5000 calories per day with the norm probably around 4000-4500 but don't carefully track.

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Injuries

I injured my right knee playing hockey in middle school. As a result I have had some challenges with deep squats. I have a considerable size and strength imbalance between right and left quads, however I feel like I am right now making good progress overcoming this. I'm in the middle of some hypertrophy work for quads that involves ATG front squats with a narrow stance, and this seems to be working wonders.

I also tore a muscle in my right rotator cuff bench pressing about six years ago. Over the last year I have completely fixed the problem by doing lots of dumbbell and barbell presses as well as learning proper form on the bench press.

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Training History

I have been lifting weights on and off since 6th grade, mostly off, and I really haven't known what I was doing until the last year. I've been seriously in the gym consistently 4+ days a week now for a year. As a noob, not knowing what I was doing, I made a point of always bench pressing and doing biceps curls, so my bench press is relatively my best lift. A year ago I would have said that my squat was better than my deadlift, but now that I've made a lot of progress over the last year on my deadlift, I feel like my deadlift is better than my squat.

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Strength Stats (for lifts I care about)

Estimated* Raw Powerlifting Meet Expected Total (if I were to compete next week): 1165 lbs

Low Bar Squat 5x5 PR: 335 lbs
Estimated* Low Bar Squat 1 RM: ~405 lbs
Front Squat 6 sets x 4 reps PR: 230 lbs
Estimated* Front Squat 1 RM: ~300 lbs
Bench Press 5x5 PR: 260 lbs
Estimated* BP 1RM: ~320 lbs
Deadlift (Conventional) 5x5 PR: 350 lbs
Estimated* Deadlift 1 RM: ~440 lbs
Barbell Press 5x5 PR: 160 lbs
Estimated* Barbell Press 1 RM: ~200 lbs
Barbell Curl 5 RM: 105 lbs
Estimated* Barbell Curl 1 RM :~125 lbs

*Estimated 1 RMs above are based on a combination of the assumption that a 5x5 PR is approximately 80% of a 1 RM (I read somewhere that it might anywhere between 79-84% so 80% might be too low) and/or sets I've done to failure recently

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Current Goals

My current medium term goal, i.e. next six months, is to hit the advanced numbers on Kilgore's Weightlifting Performance Standards. For my body weight, these are:

Goal Press: 200 lbs
Current Estimated Press: 200 lbs
Goal Bench Press: 335 lbs
Current Estimated Bench Press: 320
Goal Squat: 445 lbs
Current Estimated Squat: 405
Goal Deadlift: 505 lbs
Current Estimated Deadlift: 440
Olympic Lifts - I don't train these
Other lifts:
Goal Barbell Curl: 135 lbs
Current Estimated Barbell Curl: 125 lbs

On the Press I'm either extremely close or possibly at my goal. I just need to test it.

For Bench Press I'm very close to my goal. I don't do actual 1 RMs often in training, but my shorter term goal for the next two months is to keep pushing Bench Press strength gains then do 315 for a few singles once I feel confident I can do that so that I can get the ego lift of 315 actually demonstrated.

Squat is the lift where I feel least confident in making this goal, but I may be closer than I think. I'm currently planning to do hypertrophy work on squats for two more training blocks, then I'll do some strength focused training to see how high I can push my squat.

I have been making beastly progress on Deadlifts for the last six months. I'm currently systematically adding 10 lbs to my deadlift every 4 weeks and feel pretty good about hitting 505 on the Deadlift within six months.

I'm feeling good about the Barbell Curl Goal. I'm currently figuring out how to rebalance my volume for biceps work with lat work, but I expect once I get that worked out, numbers will fly sky high.

Longer Term, after making the Advanced Numbers, the Elite Numbers are the obvious next step, and after that I can focus on perhaps the Russian Classification System Class II and Class I, etc.

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Books I've Read on Strength Training include:

Starting Strength by Mark Rippetoe etc (I'm actually in the middle of this right now)
Practical Programming for Strength Training by Mark Rippetoe etc.
Scientific Principles of Strength Training from Renaissance Periodization
The Bridge from Barbell Medicine
The Westside Barbell Book of Methods and other Westside Barbell information including BP Secrets DVD, Squat and DL Secrets DVD, Manuals for BP Squat and Deadlift
The Reactive Training Manual by Mike Tuscherer
The New Encyclopedia of Modern Bodybuilding by Arnold Schwarzenegger
A Practical Approach to Strength Training by Brzycki

I would very much like to get additional book recommendations if anyone has any other books to recommend. I would say that each of the books I have read helped add some useful knowledge, and some were more helpful than others, but the only three books that I would unconditionally recommend to anyone are SS, PPST, and Scientific Principles of Strength Training.

[Milo234]

Current Training Plan Overview

I currently organize my training week into a 4 day split, and I add a fifth day where I come into the gym for 20-30 minutes and just work on calves once a week. To accommodate my schedule, my training days are:

Tuesday Calves
Wednesday Deadlift Focus
Thursday Bench Press and Lat Focus
Saturday Squat Focus
Sunday Press and Biceps Focus

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Training Plan Details

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Wednesday Deadlift Focus

1. Deadlift: 4 or 5 sets to failure at fixed weight; ~3-6m rest

Deadlift loading scheme is to use a 4 week pyramid where where each 4 week cycle I add 10 lbs and try to beat my old rep records. eg:

Week 1: 330 lbs
Week 2: 340 lbs
Week 3: 350 lbs
Week 4: 360 lbs
Week 5: 340 lbs, beat Week 2 PRs
Week 6: 350 lbs, beat Week 3 PRs
Week 7: 360 lbs, beat Week 4 PRs
Week 8: 370 lbs

2. Paused Low Bar Squats: 10 sets x 2 reps; 1m rest; increase weight 5 lbs every 3 weeks

I'm doing these with a light weight for recovery, neuromuscular efficiency, technique practice, etc.

3. Back Hyperextensions holding Barbell: 5 sets to failure, hypertrophy focus; increase weight 5 lbs each week; ~1m rest

I just finished doing 5x5 while increasing the weight by 5 lbs every week and failed at 120 lbs. I'm going to do this hypertrophy focus for 4-8 weeks before switching to strength focus and seeing if I can then beat my old 5x5 record of120 lbs.

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Thursday Bench Press and Lat Focus

BP

1. Bench Press: 5x5, increase 5 lbs each week; ~3m rest
2. Incline Bench Press: 4 sets to failure; increase 5 lbs each week; ~2-3m rest
3. Wide Grip Bench Press: 4 sets x 6 reps; increase 5 lbs each week; ~1-2m rest
4. Flat Bench Dumbbell Fly: 4 sets working towards a goal of doing 10 reps each set with 45 lb dumbbells; 1m rest; it's worth noting that my fly looks like a neutral grip dumbbell press except that I keep my hands out wider than would be normal for a press but not as wide as people often think when they think flys

Lat Hypertrophy Work

1. Flat Bench Dumbbell Row
2. Lat Pulldown Pronated, Medium-Width Grip
3. Neutral, Close-Grip Lat Pulldown
4. Hammer Strength Iso Low Row Machine

I just finished a 3 week training cycle trying to determine my Maximum Recoverable Volume for lats then deloaded. I found that I could not recover from 4 exercises x 6 sets per exercise x 8 reps @ ~65% intensity. I am planning to do something similar again, but this time try to hit the MRV after four weeks instead of three by adding sets more slowly. My current plan is to do:

Week 1: 4x8 on each of the 4 exercises
Week 2: 5x8 on the first 2 and 4x8 on the last 2
Week 3: 5x8 on all 4
Week 4: 6x8 on the first 2 and 5x8 on the second 2
Week 5: 6x8 on all 4

I strongly suspect I will not get to week 5. Figuring out my MRV for lats has screwed up my biceps training and limited grip training. I need to rethink those.

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Saturday Squat Focus

1. Low Bar Squat: 4 sets x 8 reps; ~3-5m rest; increase 5 lbs per week
2. Front Squat: 4 sets x 5 reps; ~2-3m rest; increase 5 lbs per week; add an extra set every week
3. Leg Press: 4 sets x 10 reps; ~1-2m rest; increase 20 lbs per week; add an extra set every week
4. Stiff Leg Deadlift: 4 sets x 6 reps; ~2-3m rest; increase 5 lbs per week

For the first three exercises I'm trying to focus on quad hypertrophy. I'm going to keep adding weight and sets every week (except not adding sets on LBS) until my body fails to recover, then deload. Then whatever information I gain will be used to plan the next training block. After one more training block like this, I plan to resume 5x5 +5 lbs per week on LBS for strength.

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Sunday Press and Biceps Focus

1. Barbell Press: 5x5; microload 1lb per week; 3m rest
2. Bench Press 5RM: increase 5 lbs per week
3. Close Grip Bench Press: 4 sets x 6 reps; 2m rest; increase 5 lbs per week
4. Close Grip Incline Bench Press: 4 sets x 6 reps; 2m rest; increase 5 lbs per week

Additional Triceps Isolation Work

1. Flat Bench Dumbbell Triceps Extensions: 3 sets to failure; 1m rest
2. Flat Bench Dumbbell Elbows Out Extensions (Tate Presses): 3 sets to failure; 1m rest
3. French Press with Easy Curl Bar: 3 sets to failure; 1m rest

I cycle the weights on the Triceps Isolation Work in a manner similar to the Two Steps Forward, One Step Back Approach. So the weight I use will look something like this

Week 1: 25 lbs
Week 2: 30 lbs
Week 3: 25 lbs
Week 4: 35 lbs
Week 5-8: repeat Weeks 1-4 trying to beat previous rep records

I plan to increase the weights by 5 lbs approximately twice a year as these are all hard exercises to add significant amounts of weight to.

Biceps

Current Routine is a huge mess because the last four weeks of experimenting to determine my volume tolerance for lat work has destroyed my ability to do any significant extra biceps work. I have been doing a 5 RM test every week, increasing by 2.5 or 5 lbs. I just failed at 110.

[Milo234]

Week of 12/26

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Tuesday 12/26/17 - Calves

Standing Calf: 60x12, 165x6, x6, x6, x5, x4, 150x5, x4

Note: The above notation means I set the weight to 165 lbs and did 3 sets of 6 at that weight, then a set of 5 and set of 4 at that weight. I then lowered the weight to 150 lbs and did a set of 5 and set of 4 at that weight.

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Wednesday 12/27/17 - Deadlift Focus

DL: 135x12, 225x6, 5 sets x 350 lbs x 5 reps
Paused Low Bar Squats: 135x5, 185x5, 10 sets x 250 lbs x 2 reps
Back Hyperextension: BW (body weight) x12, 125x2

My hamstrings felt incredibly fatigued on Wednesday because I had just exceeded MRV on the last squat hypertrophy cycle the previous week. My goal on back hyperextensions was to do 5x5 @125 lbs but since I failed on that I decided to end a productive 2-3 months of adding 5 lbs to the bar and decrease the weight and do some hypertrophy work for a few 4 week cycles

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Thursday 12/28/17 - Bench Press and Lat Focus

Bench Press: 45x12, 95x12, 185x5, 5 sets x 255 lbs x 5 reps - PR
Incline Bench Press: 45x12, 135x5, 190x12, x9, x8, x7 - very happy to have hit 12 reps, new PR weight for 12 reps
Wide Grip Bench Press: 45x12, 95x12, 4 sets x 195 lbs x 6 reps - WGBP is a relatively new exercise for me so all lifts with it are PRs, but so far so good
Flat Bench Dumbbell Fly: 10PA (per arm) x12, 45x10,x7,x5,x5

My fly rep counts were lower than last week, but I think that is because I increased the weight on all the other lifts, so I'm not worried about it

Flat Bench Dumbbell Row: 30PAx12, 70x0, 2 sets x 50 lbs x 8 reps
Lat Pulldown Pronated, Medium-Width Grip: 45x12, 2x95x8
Neutral Grip Pulldown, Close Grip: 2x100x8
Iso Low Row 2x110x8

The 70x0 indicates that I could not do a single rep with a 70 lb dumbbell. This is because I hit my MRV last week when I did 6 sets x 70 lbs x 8 reps. So I deloaded all of my lat work. Lats felt on fire for last week.

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Saturday 12/30/17 - Squat Focus

Low Bar Squat: 135x5, 185x5, 225x5, 4 sets x 285 lbs x 8 reps
Front Squat ATG: 185x6, x6, x5, x5
Leg Press Narrow, High Stance for Quad Focus: 0x10, 90x10, 180x10, 4 sets x 270 lbs x10 reps
Stiff Leg Deadlift: 135x6, 4 sets x 270 lbs x 6 reps - PR

I have been having trouble with my grip in the low bar squat. I'm trying to use a thumbless grip as suggested by Rip in SS, however my hand sometimes slides over the top of the bar and my wrist ends up holding the bar in place for the last 1-2 reps of some sets. This is very annoying. I had some other trouble with the bar resting on my wrist and putting weight on my elbow while using the thumbless grip. I think I've fixed that now by focusing more on contracting my upper back muscles, but grip has been a continual issue for me on low bar squats. I've only been doing them for about three months, and I think I'm getting better at them, but I'm open to grip pointers if people have suggestions.

On the Front Squats, I dropped from sets of 6 to sets of 5 because maintaining the olympic rack position is difficult for me. Because of this I prefer to do lower repetitions per set on front squats which seems fine. I probably just need to get stronger in my upper back then I can do some higher rep sets with front squats, but for now I'm switching to 5 reps per set on my front squat hypertrophy sets.

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Sunday 12/31/17 - Press and Biceps Focus

Barbell Press: 45x12, 95x5, 135x2, 5 sets x 159 lbs x 5 reps - PR
Bench Press 5 RM: 45x5, 95x5, 185x5, 225x3, 265x5 - PR, but not an impressive PR. I just added BP5RM to the work out and deliberately started at an easy weight. I expect to keep adding 5 lbs per week to this for the next 3 weeks at a minimum
Close Grip Bench Press: 5 sets x 205 lbs x 5 reps - PR
Close Grip Incline Bench Press: 45x12, 95x6, 4x185x6 - PR, but not an impressive PR. I just added this into the routine and picked a conservative weight. I expect to keep adding 5 lbs for some time

Triceps Accessory Work Week 2 of 1213 Progression

Flat Bench Dumbbell Triceps Extension: 10PAx12, 30x9, x5, x4
Flat Bench Dumbbell Fly: 10PAx12, 15x4 - I was trying this exercise for the first time like a traditional fly and decided I didn't like it
Flat Bench Dumbbell Elbows Out Extensions (Tate Presses): 30x19, x17, x? - I forgot to write down the third set
French Press Easy Curl - 20x12, 70x6, x5, x4

Since this is my first training log post, it will not be obvious, but all of my reps on the above exercises are huge decreases from the last four week cycle. My old PR on the FB Dumbbell Triceps Extension was 25 rep and it dropped to 12. This is because I just added in Close Grip Bench Presses AND Close Grip Incline Bench Presses, so I'm reassessing what the rep records to beat here should be as well as whether this extra volume is not appropriate. The Close Grip Incline Bench Presses actually made the French Presses exceedingly hard, so I'm starting to think I was wasting my time for most of the last year doing French Presses instead of Close Grip Incline Bench Presses. I now really like the Close Grip Incline Bench Press.

Biceps

Barbell Biceps Curl 5RM: 45x5, 65x5, 85x2, 105x5 PR!
Incline Bench Dumbbell Curl: 30x4
Seated Dumbbell Hammer Curl: 30x3
Preacher Curl to Failure: 75x10

Biceps work is a huge mess because of the lat volume tolerance testing

Grip

Barbell Static Hold (30s rest): 3 sets x 135 lbs x 30s

I like to do 3 sets of Barbell Static Holds with short rest periods for grip, but my grip is totally fucked by all the lat work volume tolerance testing. My forearm muscles can't tolerate much additional work beyond the main lifts since they get a lot of stimulation elsewhere so over time I have drifted towards just these three quick sets.

[Milo234]

Tuesday 1/2/18 - Calves Focus

Standing Calf - 60x12, 165x4, x5
Horizontal Calf Single Leg - 70x17, 90x12, 110x13

I had some serious trouble with calves this week. I did something on the first set of standing calves that made my ankle feel weird. I've generally had a lot of trouble with figuring out a decent calf routine, so I'm trying to read up on calf exercise technique since I suspect maybe my technique is bad. I'm open to suggestions for good information on calf exercise technique.

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Wednesday 1/3/18 - Deadlift Focus

Deadlift: 135x12, 225x6, 330x11, x9, x7, x6, x4 - ~5m rest between sets
Low Bar Paused Squats: BWx5, 135x5, 185x5, 10 sets x 250 lbs x 2 reps
Back Hyperextensions: BWx12, 95x8, x7, x6, x6, x5

I'm very happy with 330x11 on the deadlift. This gives me an estimated 1RM of around 450 lbs, although estimating based on an 11 RM isn't the best idea. These deadlifts were really, really tiring. My form is starting to break down a little with my back rounding. I need to keep focusing on good form when deadlifting.

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Wednesday 1/3/18 - Bench Press and Lat Focus (Note: work out 2 of the day - there was a snow storm on Thursday so I did my Thursday training on Wednesday evening this week)

Bench Press: 45x12, 95x12, 185x5, 5 sets x 260 lbs x 5 reps - PR!
Incline Bench Press: 45x12, 135x5, 195x12, x9, x8, x7 - PR!
Wide Grip Bench Press: 45x12, 95x12, 4 sets x 200 lbs x 6 reps - PR!
Flat Bench Dumbbell Fly: 10PAx12, 45x10, x8, x6, x5

On BP I'm happy with 5x5@260 PR, but it felt pretty easy. I suspect I have 5x5@270 in me. Will find out over the coming weeks.

On IBP I'm quite happy with recent progress. I've been able to successfully add 5 lbs a week for some time now and still hit 12 reps on the first set. This is going very well.

On WGBP PR isn't quite as impressive as this is a new exercise, but it feels like the weight I'm using is challenging. We'll see how long I can keep increasing weights.

On FBDBF rep counts are improvements over last week which is good.

1 hour 25 minutes to complete all of the above

Flat Bench Dumbbell Row: 30PAx12, 4x75x8
Lat Pulldown Pronated, Medium-Width Grip: 4x120x8
Neutral, Close Grip Pulldown: 4x130x8
Iso Low Row: 4x145x8

This is week one of another training cycle to assess lat MRV. So far so good. I'm starting with 5 lbs more than the last four week cycle and will add sets going forward

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Saturday 1/5/18 - Squat Focus

Low Bar Squat: BWx5, 135x5, 185x5, 225x5, 4x290x8
Front Squat ATG: 5x190x5
Leg Press: 0x10, 90x10, 180x10, 5x290x10
Stiff Leg Deadlift: 135x6, 4x275x6 - PR!

On LBS I had more grip problems this week. I tried chalk, but it didn't seem to help much. Will keep working on finding the right grip.

On Front Squats I screwed up my rack position on the 2nd to last rep of the last set, so the last set was technically a set of 4 followed by a set of 1.

On Leg Presses I feel like I started with a relatively light weight, hence I'm increasing by 20 lbs per week. We'll see how this goes.

On SLDLs things have been going quite well for several months. Maybe I can keep this up into the 300s, though I wouldn't be surprised if progress stalled on these soon

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Sunday 1/6/18 - Press and Biceps Focus

Barbell Press: 45x12, 95x5, 135x2, 5x160x5 - PR!
Bench Press 5 RM: 45x5, 95x5, 185x5, 225x3, 270x5 - PR!
Close Grip Bench Press: 45x5, 5x210x5 - PR!
Close Grip Incline Bench Press: 45x12, 95x6, 4x190x6 - PR!

BBP - microloading by 1 lb per week seems to be going well. This may not be aggressive enough, but I feel like +50 lbs in one year on the press is pretty good based on the strength standards.

BP5RM - I used the Bench Press platform set up rather than a bench in the squat cage today. I feel like I bench press better in the cage than on the platform because the platform benches are too soft. So this 5RM felt harder than usual.

CGBP - PR is good. I added these to my routine recently and started with a conservative weight, so maybe I'll be able to add 5 lbs for quite a while, but I still feel like I'm making great progress on these.

CGIBP - Maybe I started with too light a weight but I'll keep adding 5 lbs every week until it's too heavy

Triceps Accessory Work

Week 3 of 1213 progression

Flat Bench Dumbbell Triceps Extension: 7.5PAx12 (10s unavailable), 25x15, x10, x7
Flat Bench Dumbbell Elbows Out Extensions (Tate Presses): 25x21, x16, x14
French Press Easy Curl: 20x12, 60x10, x8, x7

All of these were improvements over the last time I used these weights, so another successful triceps day!

Biceps

Barbell Biceps Curl 5RM 45x5, 65x5, 85x2, 110x4
Seated Dumbbell Hammer Curls (to failure): 30x9, x7

BBBC - I failed to get 110x5 and the 4th rep was a grinder/slight cheat. Estimated 1RM based on 110x4 to failure is about 125 lbs. 10 lbs to go to make my goal of 135.

Grip

Barbell Static Hold - 185lbs x 30s

I screwed up my grip on the bar for this and lost motivation to continue afterwards and also ran out of time. Also lat work is screwing with Biceps and Grip work, so I need to make a new plan for Biceps and Grip work.

[Milo234]

Overall, decent week

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Tuesday 1/9/18 - Calves

Standing Calf - 60x12, 120x5, 165x8, x7, x7, x6, x8, x6, x6, x6, x6, 30x15, x13, x13

I made up my mind before this work out that I was going to do my best to get to 60 reps no matter how many sets it took, and it ended up taking 9 sets at 165. I felt however like I didn't get a very good work out, and so on a whim I decided to put the weight very low and do as many reps as I could. I felt like I got a very nice lactic acid build up in my calves with the 30 lb sets and had some reasonable DOMS the next few days after this, so I think maybe my form is just crappy with 165 lbs and I really need to drop the weight. So I'm gonna start using much smaller weights going forward on calves. I feel very good about this plan.

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Wednesday 1/10/18 - Deadlift Focus

Deadlift - 135x12, 225x6, 340x10, x6, x6, x6, x5
Paused Low Bar Squat - BWx5, 135x5, 185x5, 10 sets x 250x2
Barbell Back Hyperextensions - BWx12, 100x8, x7, x6, x6, x5

Before this week's deadlifts I reread Starting Strength's description of deadlift form, and I think it helped a lot with prevent back rounding. Form was pretty good and I really felt it in my hamstrings. I kept my back up. I pushed my knees out at the bottom. I focused on extending my spine before each rep. On set 2 I only got 6 reps when I thought I should have gotten more, but I realized afterwards that I was being slow off the floor. On sets 3-5 I focused on being fast off the floor and was able to get a good number of reps in. 340x10 gives estimated 1RM around 450 which is good. One challenge I'm having with deadlifts is consistently getting the bar in the right place in my hand. I think I'm getting better at this, but I'm still not super consistent about setting up correctly on the first rep of the first set and end up adjusting as the sets go along.

LBS - My right wrist slipped over the bar again. I'm still having grip trouble with LBS.

BBH - Good

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Thursday 1/11/18 - Bench Press and Lat Focus

Bench Press - 45x12, 95x12, 185x5, 5 sets x 265x5 PR!
Incline Bench Press - 45x12, 135x5, 200x12, x9, x8, x7 PR!
Wide Grip Bench Press - 45x12, 95x12, 4 sets x 205x6
Flat Bench Dumbbell Fly - 45x12, x10, x6, x6

BP - quite happy with 5x265x5. First time I felt like 5x5 +5 lbs per week progression may be coming to an end. Probably can get 5x5 at 270 and 275. Not sure about 280.

IBP - The last rep of the first and second set were both grinders, so it's looking like I've finally gotten to a weight where I am unlikely to be able to do more than 12 reps in the future. Estimated 1RM 280 lbs.

Flat Bench Dumbbell Row - 30x12, 5 sets x 75x8
Pronated Grip Lat Pulldown - 45x12, 5 sets x 120x8
Neutral Grip Lat Pulldown - 4 sets x 130x8
Iso Low Row Machine - 4 sets x 145x8

Good progress on lat hypertrophy work. We'll see when I exceed MRV.

Treadmill 3% incline 3.2 MPH 5m 138 HR

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Saturday 1/13/18 - Squat Focus

Low Bar Squat - BWx5, 135x5, 185x5, 225x5, 295x3
High Bar Squat - 225x1
Front Squat - 135x2
Stiff Leg Deadlift - 135x6, 4 sets x 280x6 PR!
Leg Press - 0x10, 90x10, 180x6

I unexpected exceeded my Maximum Recoverable Volume last week and my quads completely crapped out on me this week. I was expecting to need at least 1-2 more weeks before having to deload, but today turned into an unplanned, forced, poorly executed deload. I'm glad that it was my quads that failed me since the goal of this training block was quad hypertrophy. It appears that 14 sets seems to be my maximum recoverable volume for this day. I think I'm going to start one more hypertrophy cycle next week and start with only 6 or 8 sets instead of 12 so that it will take me longer to exceed my MRV and will give me a longer accumulation phase. I'm going to keep the exercises the same - LBS, FS, LP but add sets much more conservatively. I'll see if 13 sets exceeds MRV as well as apparently 12 does not and 14 definitely does. After a 5 week hypertrophy block I'm going to go start a strength phase.

LBS - I'm still having form issues with LBS. I reread starting strength and realized that I had been forgetting to keep my chest up. Keeping my chest up helped keep the bar in place. I also read that most likely people put the bar too high when doing LBS, so I deliberately put it lower than usual. This seemed to prevent the bar rolling down and my hand rolling forward over the bar. Unfortunately I felt like my elbows were bearing some of the weight, so I need to keep working on figuring out proper form on LBS. I'm open to pointers if anyone has suggestions.

SLDL - Happy that I was able to set a PR on this since quads crapped out and not hamstrings. Looking good to keep adding more weight for the foreseeable future.

Treadmill - 5m 3% incline 3-3.5 mph 132 HR
Matrix Elliptical Machine - 5 minutes, Level 10, 3 minutes forward, 2 minutes backwards

Did 10 minutes of cardio since I crapped out so early on squats.

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Sunday 1/14/18 - Press and Biceps Focus

Barbell Press - 45x12, 95x5, 135x2, 5 sets x 161x5 PR!
Bench Press 5RM - 45x5, 95x5, 185x5, 225x3, 275x5 PR!
Close Grip Bench Press - 5 sets x 215x5
Close Grip Incline Bench Press - 45x12, 95x6, 4 sets x 195x6

BBP - I feel like the relative intensity of my barbell press has dropped over the last few weeks. This suggest that microloading by adding 1 lb per week is too little. I'm going to start adding 2 lbs per week.

BP5RM - I had a lot of DOMS in my chest and triceps but this still wasn't very hard. I feel good about hitting 280 and 285 and probably 290. We'll see if the DOMS is better next week.

CGBP and CGIBP - Good. Triceps were pretty sore today but made it through this just fine. Feeling good about adding more weight to both

Triceps isolation work

Flat Bench Dumbbell Triceps Extensions - 0x12, 35x0
Tate Presses - 35x1
French Press with Easy Curl Bar - 20x12, 80x1

My Triceps were extremely sore today and I really couldn't do these. I think that after two months of increasing the weight on my volume day and adding in more close grip bench pressing and incline bench pressing, I've finally gotten to the point where this additional triceps work is overkill. So I'm going to take these out of my routine for the next few weeks and see how things go. Still feeling good about progress on BP-related exercises.

Biceps

Competition Style Strict Biceps Curl with Easy Curl Bar 1RM Test - 25x5, 45x5, 65x5, 85x2, 105x1, 115x1, 125x1 PR!, 135x0
Seated Dumbbell Hammer Curls - 3 sets x 25x8

I tried doing a competition style strict biceps curl today leaning up against the wall with knees locked, hips and upper back against wall, and heels 12 inches from wall. I was quite happy to see that I got 125 lbs which was my estimated 1 RM for doing a standing strict barbell curl with a regular barbell. So apparently I am extremely strict on my standing barbell curl. I think going forward during my current lat hypertrophy phase I'm going to do 5x5 +2.5 lbs per week on barbell biceps curl and hammer curls for sets of 8. Hopefully that'll be a reasonable quantity of volume to allow recovery even with all the lat work.

I took off grip work this week. Felt like my grip is getting enough stimulation for now. I'll add some grip work back in after I finish my current lat hypertrophy block.

[Milo234]

Overall pretty good week. I've temporarily given up on low bar squatting due to elbow pain. Next week I go back to work after being on paternity leave for 3 months, and due to baby sitting restrictions my workout schedule is now going to be Tuesday, Wednesday, Saturday, Sunday. Hopefully the transition will just be seamless. At some point I probably will need to start using the gym at my office instead of the nice gym near my home, so I may have to vary my exercise selection a tiny bit due to equipment differences and need a week or two of adjusting to the new training environment.

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Tuesday 1/16/18 - Calves

Standing Calf - 0x12, 30x12, 45x12, 60 x12, 75x8
Standing Calf Slow Eccentrics - 60x9, x8, x7
Treadmill 3% 3.5 mph 10m - 144 Heart Rate

Form was very good. I'm feeling pretty good about using low weights now on calves. I got some quality DOMS, especially in my right calf which is weaker.

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Wednesday 1/17/18 - Deadlift Focus

Deadlift - 135x12, 225x6, 350x6, x6, x6, x5, x3
Low Bar Squat Paused - BWx5, 135x5, 185x5, 5 sets x 225x2
Back Hyperextensions holding Barbell - BWx12, 105x5, x5

DL - Last time I did 350 I did 5x5, and my form was much worse and involved a notable amount of back rounding. I would say that on all of these reps today, there were only 2-3 that involved back rounding. So I didn't totally blow away my rep record from 3 weeks ago, but I still think this is decent progress. I'm not sure whether this is too many deadlifts. This was pretty damn taxing quite frankly. Given that I've fixed my form up and the number of reps I can do has dropped, I'm going to just try adding 5 lbs each week and probably go with 4 sets of 5 going forward.

LBS - My quads were still pretty much destroyed from functional overreaching 11 days ago, but this was good. Elbow pain is still a problem. After watching many videos on Youtube and browsing the starting strength forums, I experimented with a much wider grip with elbows more down than up similar to how a lot of super heavy weights do LBS. This made my elbows pain free on the actual repetitions, but my elbows still hurt while racking the bar. With the wide grip I have the problem that I might jam my fingers when racking the bar and inevitably I seemed to do something dumb that involved putting a bunch of weight on my elbows while racking the bar. I think I'm going to put off low bar squats for a while and go back to high bar squats to allow my elbows to heal for some time. I'll look into low bar squats again when I do my first competition.

BH - Hamstrings were toast after those deadlifts. Not quite sure what I'm going to do going forward yet. I was hoping to do more sets with this weight but felt dead. Will see next week.

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Thursday 1/18/18 - Bench Press and Lat Focus

BP Work

Bench Press - 45x12, 95x12, 185x5, 5 sets x 270x5 - PR!
Incline Bench Press - 45x12, 135x5, 205x11, x8, x6, x6
Wide Grip Bench Press - 45x12, 95x12, 4 sets x 210x6
Flat Bench Dumbbell Flys - 10x12, 45x10, x10, x7, x7

BP - Happy with 5x5 @270 PR. Feel like 275 is probably doable. Not sure whether I could get 280.
IBP - New PR 11RM. Finally surpassed the weight where I can do 12 reps. I'm gonna keep increasing the weight 5 lbs every week until I hit a 9RM then I'll probably switch to 4x6
WGBP - good
FBDF - Beat last week's rep records by a little, good

Lat Work

Flat Bench Dumbbell Row- 30x12, 5 sets x 75x8
Pronated Grip Lat Pulldown - 45x12, 5 sets x 120x8
Narrow Neutral Grip Lat Pulldown - 5 sets x 130x8
Iso Low Row - 5 sets x 145x8

So far so good on week 3 of this hypertrophy block. Felt a nice burn during the workout and DOMS next few days. I don't think I've exceeded MRV yet, but we'll see next week.

FBDR - 5x75x8 felt much easier this week than last week.
PGLP - I seem to not be able to do very good pauses when the bar hits the chest. Maybe next training cycle I'll lower the weight on this exercise and focus more on pausing at the chest for a full strength of upper back muscles.

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Friday 1/19/18 - Calves

Bodyweight Stair Calves at Home - x20, x20, x12

Still had a lot of DOMS from Tuesday's work out

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Saturday 1/20/18 - Squat Focus

High Bar Squat - BWx5, 135x5, 185x5, 225x5, 3 sets x 275x8
Front Squat ATG - 3 sets x 195x5
Stiff Leg Deadlifts - 135x6, 225x6, 4 sets x 285x6 - PR!
Messing around with deadlift variants - 2 sets

Quads are recovered from functional overreaching! This marks the start of what will hopefully be 4 weeks of hypertrophy work followed by a deload week. The plan is to do the following set counts while increasing the weights each week:

Week 1 - HBSx3, FSATGx3
Week 2 - HBSx3, FSATGx3, Leg Press x3
Week 3 - HBSx3, FSATGx4, Leg Press x4
Week 4 - HBSx3, FSATGx5, Leg Press x5

HBS - So nice not to have elbow pain squatting. This weight was considerably easier than I thought it would be. I'm happy about that.
FSATG - Feel like ATG squats are really helping my right knee
SLDL - Time between sets is getting to be about 3-4 minutes now, so I'm not sure how much longer I can keep this up. Also my hamstrings felt like toast from Wednesday's deadlift workout, so maybe a reduction in volume on DL day will help here. The extra warm up set at 225 made the first set feel smoother.

I experimented with a few variations on DLs. I tried a 1 + 1/2 deadlift that I saw in a Sheiko training plan. That was awesome. I tried pauses just off the floor and just below the knee, but I felt like the 1 + 1/2 deadlift was better for my back than those. I also tried deficit SLDLs with a small approximately 1 inch deficit. The deficit only made a little difference it felt like. I think I may consider adding the 1 + 1/2 deadlift to my routine at some point in the future.

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Sunday 1/21/18 - Press, Triceps, Biceps Focus

Barbell Press - 45x12, 95x5, 135x2, 5 sets x 165x5 - PR!
Bench Press 5RM - 45x5, 95x5, 185x5, 225x3, 280x5 - PR!
Close Grip Bench Press - 5 sets x 220x5 - PR!
Close Grip Incline Bench Press - 45x12, 95x6, 4 sets x 200x6 - PR!

Press - Happy with the PR. I decided last week that relative intensity had dropped a bit too much such I went from 161-165 this week. Intensity felt reasonable. I'm going to increase 2 lbs per week going forward on this.
BP5RM - Happy with this PR. Estimated 1RM 325. This is starting to feel close to a real 5RM. I can probably do 285x5. Not sure whether I can do 290x5. Depending on how I feel after 285x5 next week I will decide whether to do 290. After I feel like I've hit my best possible 5RM I'm going to keep going heavier but changing to 2 sets x 3 reps, 3 sets x 2 reps, 1 set x 3 reps, 5 sets x 1 rep, 3 sets x 1 rep and hopefully hit my big long term goal of 315 in 7 weeks and probably surpass it by a lot. I had a crapload of DOMS in my chest today. Hopefully the new schedule next week of Wednesday-Sunday for bench pressing will alleviate this and make the heavy set easier.
CGBP - easy weight. I probably started with too low a weight on this, but that's ok. I'll just keep adding more weight.
CGIBP - I took relatively short rest between sets this time and almost failed on the last rep of set 4. I'll deliberately take 2-3 m rest between sets next week to make sure that doesn't happen again.

Barbell Biceps Curl - 45x5, 5 sets x 95x5
Seated Dumbbell Hammer Curl - 3 sets x 25x9

BBC - This was a pretty tough weight to complete. Going to microload +1 lb per week on this and see how it goes.
SDHC - This was pretty easy. Will keep increasing the reps per set now. Depending on how I feel in a few weeks I may increased to 30 lbs dumbbells.

Overall this seemed like a reasonable volume for biceps given my current lat work. I would like to add back in preacher curls since I feel like looking at my arms that the muscle closer to my elbow has gotten smaller without them. I'm still trying to figure out my biceps volume tolerance with the current lat work though, so I will add more volume back in slowly.

[Milo234]

This week I switched from training on Wednesday and Thursday to training on Tuesday and Wednesday. As a result of only 6 days of rest I ended up needing to deload on the bench press. Also, I had an emotional breakdown after deadlifting indicating that I need to deload on deadlifts next week.

I left my training log at the gym and almost lost it and had to go back to the next morning at 5 AM when the gym opened to retrieve it! Sadly I also think I lost my shoes at the gym this week, but that won't really affect training much since I do almost everything in socks anyway, but I liked that pair of shoes.

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Tuesday 1/23/18 - Deadlift and Calves

Deadlift - 135x12, 225x6, 275x3, 355x5, x5, x5, x5, x2
Paused High Bar Squat - BWx5, 135x5, 185x5, 10 sets x 250x2
1 + 1/2 x 2 Deadlift - 135x3, 185x3, x3
Standing Calf - 0x12, 75x10, x9, x8, x7

DL - I was aiming to get 5x5 however that didn't happen on the fifth set. Despite completing everything, I had a major mental breakdown after the workout. Thinking about the deadlifts made me want to cry. So I'm deloading next week, then focusing on increasing the weight. It's quite remarkable how when residual fatigue builds up it can affect your emotional state.

HBS - Good

1 + 1/2x2 Deadlift - I'm gonna try adding this exercise into the routine to get some additional pulling volume as a replacement for back hyperextensions. We'll see how it goes.

Calves - good

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Wednesday 1/24/18 - Bench Press and Lats

Bench Press - 45x12, 95x12, 185x5, 4 sets x 250x3
Incline Bench Press - 45x12, 135x5, 3 sets x 185x5
Wide Grip Bench Press - 45x12, 95x12, 3 sets x 185x4
Flat Bench Dumbbell Fly - 10x12, 3 sets x 35x6

BP - 185 felt extremely heavy as a warm up. I almost didn't feel like finishing the warm up set with 185 because it was so hard. I think only having 6 days to recover instead of 7 made the normal overload workout impossible so I cut the weights on all my exercises by 10% and cut the number of reps by 50% this week. Will resume overloading 5x5 +5 lbs per week next week.

Lats

Flat Bench Dumbbell Row - 30x12, 6 sets x 75x8
Pronated Grip Lat Pulldown - 45x12, 6 sets x 120x8
Narrow, Neutral Grip Lat Pulldown - 5 sets x 130x8
Iso Low Row - 5 sets x 145x8

So far so good on lats. I'm not sure whether I exceeded my maximum recoverable volume this week or not. Will find out next week. If I didn't, then this is an interesting data point indicating that my lats can tolerate a helluva lotta volume when doing hypertrophy.

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Saturday 1/27/18 - Squat

High Bar Squat - BWx5, 135x5, 185x5, 225x5, 3 sets x 280x8
Front Squat ATG - 3 sets x 200x5
Stiff Leg Deadlift - 135x6, 225x3, 290x5, x4
Leg Press - 0x10, 90x10, 180x10, 3 sets x 310x10

Squats - So far so good. Still on progress with my hypertrophy plan to add more sets each week. Form broke down a little on front squats. I lost my rack position mid set twice and had to re-setup in the middle of the set. Will focus more on good rack position and keeping back up next week.

SLDL - I was supposed to do 4x290x6 this week, but I failed at 5 reps on the first set and 4 reps on the second set giving another indication that I need to deload on deadlifts next week.

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Sunday 1/28/18 - Press, Triceps, and Biceps Focus

Barbell Press - 45x12, 95x5, 135x2, 5 sets x 167.5x5
Bench Press 5RM - 45x5, 95x5, 185x5, 225x3, 285x5 PR!
Close Grip Bench Press - 5 sets x 225x5 PR!
Close Grip Incline Bench Press - 45x12, 95x6, 4 sets x 205x6 PR!

BBP - I decided to increase the weight by 2.5 lbs instead of 2 lbs this week. This was pretty hard. Was very happy with the PR. Will try increasing by 2.5 again next week.
BP5RM, BP, CGBP, CGIBP - with deloading on Wednesday and a little extra time to recover this week it felt fine to do the normal workout.
BP5RM - Quite happy with 285x5. Feel like 290 is pretty doable. Not sure whether 295 is doable. This gives estimated 1RM of 330 which is almost my goal of 335. If I successfully keep increasing the weight by 5 lbs per week on my heavy sets it'll only be 11 weeks before I'm doing 335, probably for a few singles. It'll be exciting if I can hit that goal in March.

Barbell Biceps Curl - 45x5, 5 sets x 96x5
Seated Dumbbell Hammer Curl - 3 sets x 25x10

So far so good on the biceps. Microloading +1 lb per week on the barbell curls seems reasonable. 3x25x10 felt pretty hard. Not sure whether I could do 3x25x11. Also fatigue from lat work might be interfering a little.

[Milo234]

Overall this was a pretty good week. I deloaded on deadlifts this week. I exceeded my maximum recoverable volume on lat work last week and had to deload on lats this week. Squat hypertrophy work and bench press and press strength work went well.

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Tuesday 1/30/18 - Deadlift and Calves

Deadlift - 135x12, 225x6, 315x5, x5
Paused High Bar Squat - BWx5, 135x5, 185x5, 10 sets x 250x2
1 + 1/2x2 Deadlift - 135x3, 185x3
Standing Calf 0x12, 75x11, x10, x8, x8

DL - Deload - I cut the intensity by a little more than 10% and did half as many sets of five as usual.
HBS - Good.
1 + 1/2x2 DL - I deloaded and just did some light volume. Still need to figure out what the right intensity and volume for this exercise is.
Calves - Beat last week's rep records. I probably need to do some more intelligent programming for my calves, but at least the intensity now that I've dropped the weight a lot seems reasonable.

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Wednesday 1/31/18 - Bench Press and Lats

BP
Bench Press - 45x12, 95x12, 185x5, 225x1, 5 sets x 275x5 PR!
Incline Bench Press - 45x12, 135x5, 210x10, x7, x6, x5
Wide Grip Bench Press - 45x12, 95x12, 4 sets x 215x6 PR!
Flat Bench Dumbbell Fly - 10x12, 45x10, x10, x8, x6

BP - Glad I could hit another 5x5 PR. Feel pretty good about prospects for 280 5x5. The random 225x1 set was because someone was using the power rack so I had to warm up on the crappy bench press set-ups and then switched to the power rack and wanted to do another warm up in the power rack.
IBP - I suppose this is probably about a legitimate 10RM. This gives an estimated 1RM of 280. This was 28 total reps. I think if I increase the weight by 5 lbs, I probably won't be able to do 10 reps next time, and probably my total rep count if all sets are taken to failure will drop by quite a bit, so I'm switching to 4 sets x 6 reps starting next week and am planning to increase the weight by 5 lbs per week as long as I can manage it going forward.
WGBP - good
FBDF - good - beat last week's total reps by one or two.

Lats
Flat Bench Dumbbell Row - 30x12, 75x0, 2 sets x 55x8
Pronated Grip Lat Pulldown - 45x12, 2 sets x 100x8
Narrow, Neutral Grip Lat Pulldown - 2 sets x 105x8
Iso Low Row - 2 sets x 115x8

75x0 showed that indeed I exceed MRV last week. I maybe could have done one rep or two reps, but it was very clear that my lats were dead and it was time to deload. I feel pretty good about how this five week lat hypertrophy training block went. Last week my lats exceeded MRV at 22 sets after working up from 16-18-20-22. I think next time I do a lat hypertrophy block I will start with 18 sets and work my way up by adding 1 set per week until I hit 22 to see how that impacts recovery. Now that I've finished two high quality lat hypertrophy blocks, I'm going to do some strength work on lats. I haven't quite figured out how I'll do the strength work, but it'll probably be dumbbell rows 5x5 +5lbs per week and then 4x6 or 3x5 on the rest of the exercises increasing 5 lbs per week. I'm not so sure increasing by 5 lbs per week on dumbbell rows is very realistic because that's +5 lbs on the dumbbells which is quite a bit to add, so maybe this strength block won't last very long, but we'll see how it goes.

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Saturday 2/3/18 - Squat Day

High Bar Squat - BWx5, 135x5, 185x5, 225x5, 3 sets x 285x8
Front Squat - 4 sets x 205x5
Stiff Leg Deadlifts - 135x6, 225x3, 2 sets x 260x6
Leg Press - 0x10, 90x10, 180x10, 4 sets x 330x10

HBS + FS + Leg Press - So far so good. Hypertrophy work is going well. Today I focused more on leaning back and putting more of the weight on my heels while squating, but this was a bad idea. It made me feel like I was engaging by glutes and hamstrings more, but it also made my knees hurt afterwards. I need to focus more on getting the correct balance on both my heel and the ball of my foot going forward. I was happy that I managed to maintain the rack position on my front squats very well the whole time this time.

Perhaps worth noting, on Thursday at work after lunch I stopped in the gym and did 5 front squats with 135 while wearing jeans and dress shoes. I think this helped with my right knee a tiny bit. I may look into adding a very light squat work out on Thursdays at work. Seems like some increased frequency could help my squat and my knee.

SLDL - I deloaded on this as part of my DL deload. Cut intensity by 10% and cut reps by 50%. I was able to complete all the reps with a double overhand grip without too much difficulty which was nice at 260.

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Sunday 2/4/18 - Press, BP Heavy Day, Triceps, Biceps

Barbell Press - 45x12, 95x5, 135x2, 5 sets x 170x5 PR!
Bench Press 5RM - 45x5, 95x5, 185x5, 225x3, 290x5 PR!
Close Grip Bench Press - 5 sets x 230x5
Close Grip Incline Bench Press - 45x12, 95x6, 4 sets x 210x6

Press - I'm happy I got this PR. I increased by 2.5 lbs per week for 2 weeks now. I feel like this weight was pretty darn challenging. I think I'll only increase by 2 lbs per week going forward and see how that goes.
BP5RM - Quite happy about this. 290 is the heaviest weight I have ever actually bench pressed even though my estimated 1RM has been quite a bit over 290 for a while. The last time I did 290 was on 6/21/17 or 229 days or 7.5 months ago as part of a mock powerlifting meet that we had for fun at the gym at my work. I also deadlifted 380x1 for a new PR during that. 290x5 gives an estimated 1RM of 337, so I have increased my bench press by about 47 lbs in the last 7.5 months. That feels like pretty good progress. My estimated 1RMs on deadlift are now around 440-450 so my deadlift has gone up by at least 60 lbs during that same time. I don't feel like attempting another 5RM next week. Not sure if I could get 295. I maybe could, but for now I feel like switching to 2 sets of 3 reps and continuing to increase the weight by 5 lbs on heavy days. Also, now that there are 3 days between BP volume day and intensity day, I'm wondering if maybe another very light workout to maintain neuromuscular efficiency on Friday would be good.
CGBP and CGIBP - The weight is starting to get a little more challenging. I still solidly feel like I can add 15 lbs to both of these before I might have real trouble, but it is starting to feel pretty intense. I was cursing at the barbell today while doing CGIBP. Feeling mad at the barbell was a bit unusual so I wonder if that means anything in terms of needing to deload. We shall see... I'm realizing that maybe reviewing my form on CGBP and CGIBP might be good as it's possible that this could be getting a bit rough on my wrists or elbows.

Biceps
Barbell Biceps Curl - 45x5, 5 sets x 97x5
Seated Dumbbell Hammer Curl - 25x11, x11, x9
Preacher Curl Ez Curl Bar - 75x4, 45x15

So far so good on barbell curls. I'm starting to notice that the way I'm doing my barbell curls competition style doesn't put much pressure on the lower part of the biceps near the elbow, but it is helping a tiny bit with my biceps peak. I'm going to start adding preacher curls back in to make sure the whole muscle gets a reasonable workout. Today's preacher curls were kinda random and not well thought out. I was surprised at how few reps I got at 75 lbs because I know that I have gotten at least 10 reps before at 75, but that was probably not after such super high intensity barbell curls. I beat my record for total reps on hammer curls by 1 rep compared to last week, so I guess that's good. I still need to work on figuring out what my biceps routine should be. Now that I'm starting a strength block on lats next week, I'll increase the volume on biceps work a bit over the next few weeks.

[Milo234]

Overall this was one of the crappiest weeks of my life in the last couple years as I got really sick. I wasn't feeling great on Tuesday, but I got through my DL workout ok, but fevers started after that and continued until Friday morning. Against my better judgement after Motrin temporarily lowered my fever on Wednesday I went to the gym to do my bench press and lat work out and got through them ok but a little more tired than usual, but I then had continuous fevers for 40 hours after that and Motrin ceased to be effective. I skipped the gym on Saturday for the first time in a long time, and did some unplanned deloading today (Sunday).

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Tuesday 2/6/18 - Deadlift Focus

Deadlift - 135x12, 225x6, 275x3, 4 sets x 360x5
Paused High Bar Squats - BWx5, 135x5, 185x5, 10 sets x 250x2
1 + 1/2x2 Deadlift - 135x1, 3 sets x 195x3
Treadmill 3.5 mph 3% incline 6m - 150 Heart Rate

DL - pretty happy with 4x5@360. My plan is to keep adding 5 lbs to the bar every week on deadlifts and doing 4x5 until I can no longer handle 4x5, then I'll drop to 3x5 and add some extra 1+1/2x2 DLs to get volume elsewhere. If I can get to 3x5@390 in 6 weeks then that would be a pretty solid indicator that I can do 455, so that'll be my new short term goal for the next two months and then I can start telling myself that I'm on my way to 500! Worth noting - I did this workout at my work gym rather than my regular gym, and the bar at my work gym is kinda crappy for grip, so I'm going to probably make a point of driving out of the way to train DLs at home unless my schedule really becomes too demanding at work.

PHBS - These felt like shit, probably because I was sick, but I got through them.

1 + 1/2x2 DL - These are a lot harder than I thought they would be. Gonna keep adding 5 lbs a week to these and see how they go. I may need to start using an alternating grip soon.

Treadmill - Can't believe my heart rate was this crappy. It really should be down near 130 or less. I need to do a little more cardio. I'm getting fatter. Maybe all the DLs and being sick had something to do with this too.

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Wednesday 2/7/18 - Bench Press and Lats

Bench Press - 45x12, 95x12, 185x5, 225x2, 4 sets x 280x5 PR!
Incline Bench Press - 45x12, 135x6, 4 sets x 215x6 PR!
Wide Grip Bench Press - 45x12, 95x12, 4 sets x 220x6 PR!
Flat Bench Dumbbell Flys - 10x12, 45x10, x10, x10, x7

BP workout took 96 minutes which is a bit longer than usual, probably because I was super tired from being sick. I can't believe I hit all these PRs despite being sick. I feel pretty good about continued PRs on IBP and WGBP, but I'm not sure how much longer I can sustain PRs on regular BP 5x5.

Dumbbell Row - 30x12, 5 sets x 80x5
Pronated, medium grip, lat pulldown - 45x12, 3 sets x 125x5
Narrow, neutral grip lat pulldown - 3 sets x 135x5
Iso Low Row - 3 sets x 150x5

This week begins my first strength phase for lats! We'll see how strong my lats have gotten. I'm just gonna keep upping the weight 5 lbs each week until things start to fail. All of these initial weights were deliberately chosen to give me at least 2 weeks or so until the weights will start being a little challenging. Dumbbell rows 5x5@80 were surprisingly easy.

Treadmill - 3% 2.6 MPH 5m - 132 Heart Rate

I guess this was another abysmal cardio performance, but the Motrin was wearing off and I felt like crap.

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Sunday 2/11/18 - BP Heavy + Deload: Press, Triceps, Biceps, and Squat

Since I skipped Saturday due to feeling sick, I moved my core Saturday exercises to Sunday and deloaded everything except the heavy bench press sets.

Barbell Press - 45x12, 95x5, 135x3, 2 sets x 155x6
Bench Press Heavy - 45x5, 95x5, 185x5, 225x3, 2 sets x 295x3 PR!
Close Grip Bench Press - 2 sets x 205x6
Close Grip Incline Bench Press - 45x12, 95x6, 2 sets x 190x6

BPH - I'm quite happy I hit 2x295x3. The final rep of set 2 was a tiny bit grindy but not much. My estimated 1RM based on last week's 290x5 is 337. Assuming that is at all accurate, 295 would be approximately a 4RM weight and 300 would be just under a 3RM. It seems to me to be rather unrealistic to be able to complete 2x3@3RM, so I think next week I will switch to 3 sets x 300x2 and see if I can do 3x2 @300 and maybe @305, although 305 is more than the estimated 3RM, so I may have to transition to singles at that point unless I just keep getting stronger each week which may happen. I seem to recall that Louie Simmons' Westside training book recommended not doing more than 3 lifts per week at 90% or more or you risk excessive CNS fatigue. I'm not sure whether I'm getting into that realm or whether it matters much if I do four or five singles instead. Regardless, I plan to start try 5 singles at 305 or 310 and go from there.

Deloads were fine and easy on all the other stuff.

Barbell Biceps Curls - 45x6, 65x6, 2 sets x 85x6
Preacher Curl with EZ Curl Bar - 2 sets x 65x6
Seated Dumbbell Hammer Curl - 2 sets x 20x8

Now that I'm doing less volume on lats, I'm going to start increasing the number of sets I do for biceps. I think my biceps MRV with no lat work is probably a little over 20 sets based on previous training history, so I'll aim to be pushing the volume into that range over the next four weeks.

High Bar Squat - BWx5, 135x5, 185x5, 225x5, 2 sets x 250x6
Front Squat ATG - 2 sets x 185x5
Stiff Leg Deadlifts - 135x6, 225x3, 2 sets x 260x6

I was supposed to do one more overloading, high volume quad hypertrophy training session this weekend before deloading, but since I was sick, I decided to just deload. Next week I'm gonna start a strength phase for high bar squats as planned. I plan to run a 2 day per week Texas method style program. I think I'm going to start with 5x5@300 on Saturday for volume day and 315x5 for heavy day on Tuesday and take it from there. My record 5x5 for low bar squats was 335, so I think this should be a decent starting point.

[Milo234]

This week went very well for deadlifts and bench press, but I injured my neck doing high bar squats by placing the bar mostly on my traps but partly resting against the bone. This caused one of my cervical vertebrae to hurt like hell for several days and it still hasn't fully healed almost a week later, so sadly I had to skip squats on Saturday. On deadlifts, I really focused on keeping the bar next to my shins this week as well as putting my feet slightly closer together than usual and it made the lift feel drastically easier.

I've noticed that my weight has continued to creep up. I'm around 295 lbs now which is a bit higher than I thought I'd be, but my body fat percentage has stayed the same. So this is probably good weight gain for strength gains.

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Tuesday 2/13/2018 - Deadlifts + Squat Intensity

Deadlift - 135x12, 225x6, 275x3, 4 sets x 365x5 PR!
High Bar Squat Intensity Set - BWx5, 135x5, 185x5, 225x5, 275x3, 315x5
Paused High Bar Squat - 5 sets x 255x2
1 + 1/2x2 Deadlift - 135x1, 3 sets x 200x3
Standing Calf - 0x12, 75x8, x8, x8, x8, x6
Treadmill - 3% incline, 3.6 mph, 5 minutes, 138 heart rate

DL - I put my feet slightly closer together than usual and made a point to try to actually drag the bar up my legs more so than usual and it felt noticeably easier. Hooray for form improvement!

HBS Intensity Set - I was fairly happy with 315x5. This felt relatively easy. Sadly I injured my neck on one of the warm up sets by letting the bar rest against my cervical vertebrae and my neck has hurt for a week.

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Wednesday - 2/14/2018 Bench Press + Lats

Bench Press - 45x12, 95x12, 185x5, 225x3, 5 sets x 285x5 PR!
Incline Bench Press - 45x12, 135x6, 4 sets x 220x6 PR!
Wide Grip Bench Press - 45x12, 95x12, 4 sets x 225x6
Flat Bench Dumbbell Flys - 10x12, 45x10, x10, x10, x8

Dumbbell Row - 30x12, 5 sets x 85x5
Lat Pulldown Pronated, Medium Width Grip - 45x12, 3 sets x 130x5
Neutral, Narrow Grip Lat Pulldown - 3 sets x 140x5
Iso Low Row - 3 sets x 155x5

BP, IBP, WGBP - I'm amazed that my numbers keep going up. Hell yeah! Hurray for Texas Method! My neck hurt like hell while bench pressing today after Tuesday's injury.
FBDF - Beat last week's rep count by a couple, that's good

Lat Work Overall is going ok. Dumbbell rows were pretty easy with 85s. The regular lat pulldown I think I picked a reasonable weight on, but the neutral grip and iso low row are too light. I'm going to increase by 10 lbs next week.

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Saturday 2/17/18 - Squat Day

Squat - BWx5, 135x2
Front Squat 135x1, x3, 185x2
Stiff Leg Deadlift - 135x6, 225x6, 4 sets x 290x6 PR!
Leg Press - 0x10, 90x10, 180x10, 270x10, 360x5, 450x5, 540x5, 5 sets x 630x5
Leg Extension - 50x12, 125x13, x8, x7, x7, Drop Set 125x6 ->110x3 -> 95x3

Sadly I injured one of my cervical vertebrae on Tuesday and I couldn't do squats today, so I did leg presses instead. Unfortunately I think I might have suffered a very minor injury to my shoulder of all places while doing leg presses. I hold onto the hand rail extremely tightly while doing leg presses, and while lowering the weight with my legs I ended up jerking my body and felt a minor pain and small popping or snapping noise coming from the area of my left collar bone or shoulder. It doesn't seem to be causing too much of a problem so far, so maybe it wasn't anything too bad.

SLDL - Happy with the PR here.

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Sunday 2/18/2018 - Press + BP Heavy + Biceps + Triceps

Barbell Press - 45x12, 95x5, 135x4, 5 sets x 172x5 PR!
Bench Press Heavy - 45x5, 95x5, 185x5, 225x3, 265x1, 2 sets x 300x3 PR!
Close Grip Bench Press - 4 sets x 235x5 PR!
Close Grip Incline Bench Press - 45x12, 95x6, 4 sets x 215x6 PR!

Barbell Biceps Curl - 45x5, 5 sets x 98x5 PR!
Preacher Curl with EzCurl Bar - 60x11, x8, x6

Press - Very happy with the 5x172x5 PR. This felt easy. Will continue microloading by 2 lbs each week.
BPH - Very happy with 2x300x3. This was the first time I've ever bench pressed 300 lbs! Woot! This felt easier than last week when I did 2x295x3. Maybe this is because I wasn't sick this week. Look out 315!
CGBP+CGIBP - Good!

Biceps Curl - i was happy with 5x5@98. This felt relatively easy. I'm making good progress. I'm adding preacher curls back in I've decided. I ran out of time for hammer curls. My biceps, shoulders, and triceps had horrific delayed onset muscle soreness the next day after this workout (i.e. today).