Geezer's Long March Toward the Elite Sneaking Up On the Finish Line

[Mark E. Hurling]

I resisted an on-line log for some time before starting one here. I always kept a purely numeric spreadsheet with goal weights and reps and whether or not I got there for that session or not. This log has given rise to more coherent and organized thinking about what I do. The writing it down and organizing it in more or less grammatical sentences clarifies my thinking. Then there’s the advice you get here when you ruminate about that somewhere other than the confines of your own head. So I’m just happy as Hell to get my workouts logged and posted so that it feels like I actually did them.

1-25-12

Weight: 245.5

5 minutes warmup on the bike. (Medium Day)

Bench Press: 215 5-5-5-5-4. Since I can still feel a little of the owwie in my pec I picked up from this a week or so back I didn’t try to gut out the last rep.

Curls: 90 5 x 5.

Pinch Grip: 150 and I couldn’t hang on the damn thing at all even wit a 10 lb. drop to reset. I have no idea what’s going on with me losing my grip, so to speak.

Average heart rate for this session was 142 bpm. Even with 3-4 minute rest intervals.

Jujitsu tonight had me teaching newbie kids the basics. One of the girls was teamed up with boy who was constantly correcting her when she wasn’t wrong on her technique. I asked her if he was her brother. She said no he’s my cousin. I asked her isn’t it funny how boy cousins always think they know than you do? She went into a fit of giggles and her cousin got embarrassed and started stuttering. The mom of one of them sitting along the sidelines heard me and cracked up. Fun for all.

The adult class had me getting some coaching and fine tuning of choking technique with a green belt overseen by a really great 4th degree black belt. Excellent teacher. He guided us through the finer points of how to displace the sternomastoid muscles of the neck with a very gentle touch. Then on to seal off the carotids and you’re on your way to dreamland in seconds. It’s amazing how so little strength and effort are required to do this. Then we did the rice bale throw which is similar to judo’s tomoenage. But ours doesn’t use an assist with the foot and ends in a choke as the other guy hits the mat. As usual, when I get thrown my 245 pounds hits the mat with a resounding WHUMP! This stops the rest of the class in it’s tracks for about 30 seconds or so while everyone takes a long look at the floor to make sure there’s no crater there.

1-26-12

Weight: 246.5

In and out fast with a GXP, foam roller and stretching.

1-27-12

Weight: 247

5 minutes warmup on the bike. (Light Day)

Standing Overhead Press: 110 x 8 x 3 +10. I started with dips, but now I know where the owwie came from recently. The right pec did not like this move. So I switched to the press. I’m going to do the lying triceps press instead for the foreseeable future. Funny because it’s very much like the really old school pullover and press that I started doing in high school in the 60’s from Hoffman’s old Strength and Health mag. I’ve doing it on and off ever since. Just not in the last year or so.

Power Clean: 135 x 8 x 3. Still working on the rack and not using my arms for pull.

Squat: 135 x 3 x 6.

[Mark E. Hurling]

Weight: 244.5

Off to a Saturday session of jujitsu today for the first time this year. Great to be back in that routine. After some of the most appallingly stupid meetings and teleconferences I was in at work this week it's especially good to find this form of release. I can think of a few hours of my life I'll never get back and that I swear made me dumber. The Santa Ana winds kicked up around 60 and damn near blew my aging Camry off the road both to and from the dojo.

I got paired up with the OCD green belt and we were supervised by a 2nd degree black belt while we worked on chokes. The black belt has matured in the last few years because he used to fuck with me an put the hurt on when he could sneak it in. This ended a few years back when after he tweaked my elbow hard enough in an arm bar I hauled it backward in a one-arm row that dragged him right along with it. He then got some lateral side hip thrust that flung him into the wall hard enough to put a 2' x 2' dent in it. He quit his BS then and Master Bellman made a point of keeping us on opposite ends of the mat until recently. But he taught some good points. Of course the green belt when into an analytical mobius loop that we had to keep pulling him out of to get anything done. A couple good takeaways were to use the tips of the fingers to dig in to the trachea on a bear claw choke rather than the finger pads. Better penetration to the windpipe with slightly more angled fingers. We did the rice bale and I thought I was going to get killed by the green belt. He somehow managed to turn me in mid air and land me at a 90 degree angle to my frontal approach attack. My neck is still very sore and my head feels like it was used as a conga drum.

[Mark E. Hurling]

Weight: 246

5 minutes warmup on the bike. (Heavy Day)

Standing Overhead Press: 165 x 1-1-1-1 This was supposed to be 5 sets of 3 but today was not one of those days to brag about after last week's triumph. I woke up with a posterior chain giving me no end of complaints from the L-5 to the atlas vertebrae from jujitsu yesterday. The upper back and neck were particularly troublesome so that probably accounts for my dismal performance on this lift. Last weeks round with 160 wasn't a cake walk, but I didn't expect this kind of struggle. I couldn't even get 1 rep on the 5th set.

Pull-Ups: Bodyweight x 5 x 3.

Deadlifts: 285 x 3 295 x 3. After the press I didn't expect a lot from this even though this weight is still somewhat below anything taxing for for me. But I'm still reprogramming long held habits of form and am determined to get things right before going to the wall. The low back did not stop me at all. I did however forget to wear long socks and now my shins are gratered up from the knurling. I also discovered how much difference even 1/2" can make in distance from the shin when coming up. Like at least 20 lbs. were added since the previous rep.

Finished out with a GXP and then went out to steak and eggs for breakfast with Dearly Beloved.

[Oldster]

Finished out with a GXP and then went out to steak and eggs for breakfast with Dearly Beloved.

Mmm mmm good! My favorite! Probably way too favorite. I probably have it 10-12 out of 30 days. Elk steaks and fresh eggs from my hens, along with nice piping hot sourdough bread that I am FINALLY getting better at!

I'll say one thing though Mr Foohey, you kung foo types take a lickin' and keep on tickin'!

[Mark E. Hurling]

I'll say one thing though Mr Foohey, you kung foo types take a lickin' and keep on tickin'!

It's the main reason I include the battering I get when I'm not under the iron. It's the balancing act between recovery from effort and recovery from trauma. Usually minor but now and again edging toward the less than minor.

[Mark E. Hurling]

Weight: 247.5

5 minutes warmup on the bike. (Medium Day)

Bench Press: 215 x 5 x 5. Nice to move on after missing the last rep last week and then Sunday’s less than stellar session with the standing overhead press.

Curl: 95 x 5 x 5.

Claw Grip: 210 x 2 x 5 PR! Also glad that at least this dimension of grip has not faded on me. I have to stand in a braced back stance to do this now or I’d be hauled off my feet when I use the cable stack. Lots of odd looks when I do this. The IronMind claw curl webbing looks strange enough but when coupled with the whole enchilada, well I can see why it draws some perplexity.

Foam roller and stretching.

[Jonathon Sullivan]

Congrats on the grip PR!

[Mark E. Hurling]

Thanks Sully!

Dang what a week at work. Talk about life getting in the way of other things you’d rather be doing. I spent Tuesday night into Wednesday morning overseeing moves at work until after midnight. Long day. Then I got paged at 0410 to come in because there was a fire. I went from Elmer Fudd to wide awake about the same speed the nose wheel of a 747 goes from 0 to 100+ on impact at landing. Hustled in and got ready to perform inadvertent disclosure debriefs on the city fire dogs if need be. Happily it wasn’t necessary. A little personal satisfaction on my part too. They tried using a fire axe to get into one of the areas I designed and discovered that steel acoustic doors and 9 gauge expended metal in the walls just chips the axe head. But there was no fire there anyway so no harm was done. Other than to someone’s ego in turnout gear. Went home again to come in later that day and got three more pages at 0810 when I decided to throw in the towel on sleep. The 2nd caught me in the shower and the 3rd caught me taking a dump. The last two resulted in blistered ears for the callers when I informed them I was on my in anyway. So I’ve been trying to catch up on my sleep ever since. No jujitsu (again!) because I conked out on the sofa 5 minutes after getting home Wednesday night. Couldn’t even contemplate getting up in the morning to lift until today.

Weight: 246

5 minutes warmup on the bike. (Light Day)

Lying Triceps Press: 65 x 3 x 12. Lots of fun revisiting an old favorite of mine. I haven’t done reps that high in a few years, so that was different too.

Power Clean: 135 x 8 x 3. This is coming along. The rack seems to be getting a little better but I’m confident Rip and company will pick me apart on this at the March seminar. I asked a couple of older guys, geezlings maybe, to step a leetle further back while I did these because I have a tendency to stagger backward on the rack every now and then.

Squats: 135 x 3 x 6. I’m struggling with the triad of hand spacing, bar depth on the back, and hand orientation on the bar again. Seems like it should be simpler to get this right.

Finished off with a GXP that fatigue prevented me from doing earlier this week, foam roller and stretching.

[Oldster]

Some mighty good lifting and a great PR of late, old man. Very very nice.

I like doing a big of direct tricep work every now and then, your lying tricep press is always a good one. My DB pullover and press is another good one but terribly demanding.

No wonder you keep hanging in the upper 240's in BW, your tri's are just pumped up and growing all the time!

[Mark E. Hurling]

That must be it I guess. The arms have stayed at 17 1/2" and the chest still tapes at 52" which I still think is more about my lats and traps than that thicket of white hair in the front. Funny though, the mustache has nearly gone from grey to white too, but my hair just has some sprinkling of silver in the brown.