A marathon swimmer lifts so he can swim long

[IronMike]

Wow, totally forgot about this. Probably due to the fact that we moved, yet again, on 1 July last year. Last summer was busy! Now living in Boston.

So, what have I done since my last entry? Much.

Swimming. Did a bunch of races last summer. In fact I entered five. And completed four!

USMS Middle Distance Open Water Championship, in Reston, VA. Two miles in Lake Audubon. Fun and fast.
VA State Masters Open Water Championship in Midlothian, VA. 5K in the James River. The current was brutal. Half of each lap was against the current, and we had to do four laps. While swimming with the current is nice, the time it took me to cover the 625 yards with current was not half the time it took me to cover the same distance against the current. In fact, my stroke count was three times as many on the against current side than on the with current side. And that's where I failed. On my last lap, on the with current side, with only half of the against current side to go till the finish chute, I was pulled from the water for exceeding the time limit.
Wild Fish Swim in Salem, MA. Two miles in a bay, two laps. Outstanding and a beautiful day for my first swim in this area. And I placed third in my age group and got a pint glass as a reward!
Swim and Fin in Salem, MA. 5K in a different body of water near Salem. This time three long laps. So much damn fun, and great to have a successful 5K this year. And wonder of wonders, I placed here, too. Third again! No pint glass this time but a very nice "shell" medal.
Swim the Suck in Chattanooga, TN. 10+ miles in the TN River. I'd done this swim the first time in 2012 and absolutely loved it. This swim normally sells out in a couple minutes when registration opens on 1 Feb (for an October swim!). Not knowing exactly where I'd be in October 2018 I didn't sign up. But after Russia kicked us out and I found myself here in the states, I'd wished I'd signed up. Sure enough, the race director put something out on her FB in August saying she had 3 slots available, first 3 to email her get them. I was email #9. She knew how much I loved this swim so a few weeks later when she got another slot open, she contacted me and gave me 12 hours to respond and register. Sure as shit I did. I found out my uncle (who kayaked for me in 2012...escort kayaker is required) and aunt would be near Chattanooga then and agreed to kayak for me again! The swim was a bit changed as they moved the finish down a bit, making the swim more like 10.5 or even 11 miles long. No problem. I was very prepared and had my nutrition plan figured out. I was tired of swimming at around the 4 hour mark, and hit the finish buoy at 5:15. Great marathon this year!

Lifting.

During the summer, cut back to two a day, like an H and an L day. Rereading this post, amazed that I had hit 210 last year in squat. I'm just now back at that. In summary: I swam a lot during the summer (not as much as I should have) but kept up the lifting twice a week with a few instances of no lifting due to sickness or work travel. The goal the wife and I set was a powerlifting tournament in September at our local YMCA. So, okay, it's a Y, so it was very amateurish, but fun. My wife did all three events and placed in bench and squat. I only wanted to do deadlift. I had moved to doing DL only once per week, following a plan I found in T-nation. It seemed to work as I did 325# at body weight of 175# which I was happy about.

But after that, I took about six weeks off. I had Swim the Suck coming up and concentrated on swimming. When I went back in November, I thought I'd be ok just deloading about 30% from my last lifts. That was a mistake. I couldn't walk for about 2 days and had to take another few days off. So I started way down in all my exercises and have been slowly building up ever since. My current 5RM are:

Squat: 210
OHP: 90
DL: 295

I dumped bench a couple workouts ago. Hurting my shoulder too much, while OHP does not. I've decided to concentrate on OHP from here on out. I would rather do one OHP at 135# than one bench press at pretty much any weight. Might sound silly to some of you, but that's fine. To that goal, I just this week started an OHP program I found on T-Nation. I'm only 2 of 3 work days in but I like it so far. I'm willing to give it a go for the 16 weeks it runs to see if I can get my OHP 1RM up. Not expecting it to be 135# at the end of the program, but I believe my 1RM will be higher than now.

Three weeks ago I started the DL program again. Also 16 weeks long and I'm hoping for a 1RM in the neighborhood of 350 at the end. My long-term goal for DL is 405.

So here's my current program:

Day one
OHP: technique day, varied set/rep combos
Squat: continue the NLP, 2.5# increase each time.
LPD or seated row: 3x8

Day two
Squat
OHP heavy
OHP assistance exercise, currently dumbbell Cuban press, 3x6
vertical pulling exercise, currently LPD, 4x8
Shoulder isolation exercise, currently db front raise, 3x8

Day three
OHP: technique day, like day 1 but diff set/rep combos
Squat
DL: Heavy

So to update this log, here's yesterday's workout (not including warm-ups):

Squat: 210#, 2x5. In the third set, first rep, right shoulder (problem shoulder) cramped up. Racked the weights, stretched out the shoulder, started again. Cramped up again, so ended up only 2 reps in set 3. So will re-lift 3x5 @ 210# on Wednesday.
OHP: 1x5 70#, 1x5 80#, 1x5 85#
Cuban db press: 3x6 at 7# db. This is a weird exercise and I can def feel it in my right shoulder. Will move up slowly with this one.
LPD: 4x8 at 120#
db front raise: Don't remember ever doing these before, and for the same right shoulder-reason, started at 5# dumbbells. Will move up slowly.

Glad I found this log again.

Yards this week: 2500
Current 5RMs:
Squat: 210
OHP: 90
DL: 295
Best song listened to while writing today: Sinister Kid by The Black Keys.

[IronMike]

Well, today.

I normally don't lift in the mornings. Had to today because traveling for work the rest of this week. I think the warm-up that is my work day helps me when I lift in the afternoon. Felt so cold this morning!

OHP: main set after w/u was 8x3 @ 65#. Easy peasy.
Squat. Ugh. 201# Could only do 3 reps each for the first two sets. Third set first rep, ouch. Thought I'd at least try to do 3 total. Unfortunately, couldn't get up from the second rep; fell forward and was done.
DL: Today's main set was 5x1 @ 235. Easy.

And that's it. Now S3 then call Uber to the airport. Next lifting day: Saturday.

Yards this week: 2500
Current 5RMs:
Squat: 210
OHP: 90
DL: 295
Best song listened to while lifting today: Carnival of Sorts (Box Cars) by R.E.M.

[IronMike]

Got back yesterday from my business trip and in the gym today.

OHP: main set was 4x5 @70# and 2x3 @80#
Squat: Still at 210#. Couldn't do 5 reps in any of the 3 sets, but did do 3x3!
Seated row: 3x8 @120#

Felt great. The squat became 3x3 instead of 3x5 when I was coming up from rep 3 set 1 and could barely get up. So, did 5 min rest btwn and did the 3x3. Checked back in my last couple weeks and that's the best I'd done at 210# so far. Next time I'm going to try 3x4, then after that 3x5. Once I succeed at that set/rep scheme, then I'm going to move up only by 2# each time.

Yards this week: 2500
Current 5RMs:
Squat: 210
OHP: 90
DL: 295
Best song listened to while lifting today: Conversation 16 by The National.

[IronMike]

Need to catch up. This is Wednesday's workout.

Squat: Moving up! Did 3x4 at 210#. Will try 3x5 next.
OHP: 1x3 @ 75#, 1x3 @ 85#, then 95# max reps and I managed 2 keeping my form.
Cuban press: Meant to move up to 10# dumbbells, but they killed my right shoulder. Did 1x6 with 10# then did 2x6 with 7#. (My gym only has one 8# and one 9# dbs.)
LPD: 4x8 at 125#. Heavy. Will repeat this weight next week.
db front raise: 3x8 with 10# db.

Two great swims on Tue and Wed this week. Can definitely feel the swim when I'm lifting. I got a cramp a couple times while doing something requiring my to put my hand near my lower back. Cramp went from my lower back, through my lats, all the way to my delts. Hurt like hell.

Summer marathon season shaping up. Have two on the schedule so far: Boston Light Swim (8 miles), oldest open water race in America! That'll be on August 17. Second one will be Swim the Suck (~10.3 miles). This'll be my third time doing that one. The swim be on October 12th.

Yards this week: 5000
Current 5RMs:
Squat: 210
OHP: 90
DL: 295
Best song listened to while writing this today: Rebellion (Lies) by Arcade Fire.

[IronMike]

So yesterday.

OHP: 10x2 @70#. Easy enough, so concentrated on form. My bummed-up elbow prevents me from doing these with shoulder-width grip, so I'm stuck almost doing a wide grip. Also can't "rack" the weights on my chest/shoulders due to the limited mobility of the right elbow, so I don't spend much time with the weights down as they're just hovering in space.
Squat: 1x3 @210#, 2x5 @190#. Ugh. My return to more regular swimming has had an effect I think. I barely got those 3 @210# up. But wanted to finish out the set strong with 2x5 so dropped 10% and finished. This may become my usual on Fridays: 1x however many of the 5 I can do, then deload 10% and 2x5. We'll see how Monday goes with 72 hours of recovery.
Good mornings: 3x10 @45#. This is week 4 of my DL program and no DL, just lower back ancillary exercise(s). Haven't done GMs in decades so started low.

The swim Friday morning (0600; lifted at 1500) was awesome. Been reading about USRPT, or Ultra-Short Race Pace Training, so thought I'd try it. Theory is that you do massive amounts of repeats at short distances at a set pace and rest. Mostly for sprinters or swimmers doing pool events. Not really made for marathoners but some marathon swimmers have been using it. Thought I'd try it to increase my 5K finish times. So the main set was 20x100 yards on 1:40 pace, leaving every 2:00. I managed all 20 (not the goal of the workout) hitting 1:37 to 1:39 every time. The main point is to not make every set but to make the first failure move further and further right as you get more and more fit. I chose a time that was too easy. Next week I'll try this again but do 20x100 on 1:38, leaving every 2:00. See where my first failure falls.

Yards this week: 7700
Current 5RMs:
Squat: 210
OHP: 90
DL: 295
Best beer drunk this week: Founders Brewing's Curmudgeon's Better Half

[IronMike]

Today, finally.

OHP: main set was 3x5 @70# and 3x3 @80#.
Squat: Finally! 3x5 @210#. On Thursday or Friday I'll attempt 3x5 @212#
Seated row: 3x8 @125#.

Yesterday morning had very little time to swim so only got in 2000 yards. Did some nice speedy 25s though, work on my speed. We'll see if that helps any this summer.

Yards this week: 2000
Current 5RMs:
Squat: 210
OHP: 90
DL: 295
Best beer drunk (so far) this week: Dogfish Head Brewing's Palo Santo Marron.

[IronMike]

Great swim this morning. Today was the USRPT again, but this time 20x100 hitting 1:38 leaving on 2:00. First fail didn't come till rep 12 and second fail at 18. Next time I do this I'll try to push that first fail to the right. Will have to check the USRPT sites to see how long I'm supposed to stick to this. Do I adjust the time to faster if I complete it with only one fail that is at the end, like rep 18 or 19?

Yards this week: 4700
Current 5RMs:
Squat: 210
OHP: 90
DL: 295
Best beer drunk (so far) this week: Dogfish Head Brewing's Palo Santo Marron.

[IronMike]

Well that was awesome!

Squat: After taking, what? 6 sessions? to finally succeed at 210# 3x5, I walk right up to 212.5# and do 3x5 with no issues. Boo-yah!
OHP: Main set was 3x75#, 3x85#, 1x90# then max reps at 95#. I managed 3 at 95#.
Cuban press: 1x6 with 9# db (ouch, stupid right shoulder), then 2x6 with 7-pounders.
LPD: 4x8 at 125#
db front raise: 3x8 with 10# db

Yards this week: 4700
Current 5RMs:
Squat: 212.5
OHP: 90
DL: 295
Best song listened to during the workout today: Housequake by Prince.

[IronMike]

Hard swim this morning. Did a test which, after some math, sets my critical swim speed, which is apparently the time per 100 yards I could maintain for a 1500 yard race. The resultant time today, my new CSS, is 1:49. What this does for me is set a time in my head from which I can determine set times in future workouts. When I was training to swim around Manhattan, I would do long sets (e.g. 10x1000) on CSS+:30, meaning (using this new CSS) I would do each 1000 on 23:10. To keep me to the time, I use device called the Tempo Trainer. This tiny thing goes under my cap and will beep each time I'm supposed to reach a wall. So for 1:49 +:30 I would hit the wall on 34.75. The longer the race, the longer my CSS. For a 5K I would probably do 1:49 +:03, so I'd hit the wall each time on 28:00. I'll do a CSS workout once a week, and retest my CSS in about 6 weeks.

Yards this week: 7700
Current 5RMs:
Squat: 212.5
OHP: 90
DL: 295
Best thing I watched while writing this today: Kangaroos attacking a paraglider in Australia

[IronMike]

OHP: Main set 12x1 @75#. Technique day. Easy. Long.
Squat: Worried about today. I've failed a lot at the Y. (I normally lift on base.) Main set was 3x5 @215#. And I did it! Damn that felt good.
DL: Today was DL day, with a main set of 5x5 @225#. Heavy but doable.

Yards this week: 7700
Current 5RMs:
Squat: 215
OHP: 90
DL: 295
Best thing I watched while writing this today: Thor: Ragnarok