Lifting to Live

[Bill Anders]

Yessir!

It'd be nice if that train kept rolling along, but it didn't this week. Updates later.

[Bill Anders]

2/24/25 - Monday
DL H @ 8' 385x5 385x4
SQ L @ 5' 280x5x2

Notes —
DL - Heavy Set. Focused on complete reset between reps. First three reps were smooth. I must have not cranked my lats tight enough on #4, as it came up just off my legs, then #5 came up a few inches, then hit a brick wall. Immediately conferred with Chase, left it alone, and will go to a Triple next cycle. Unloaded the bar with no issues and sat on the bench for a few minutes before the light squats. As soon as I stood up, my right lumbar seized. A few minutes of trying to work it and I called the workout so that I could run home and have the Massage Therapist attack it before the I had to stand up and walk around for the 4.5 hours of evening sessions. It was manageable. But it kept me from my scheduled Press workout on Tuesday and I was still hobbling on Wednesday. The tweak happens, even though I still have no idea exactly why, even though I have some suspicions. The frustrating part is that I hit the wall on my DLs last year at 400x4, so this could point towards a slide backwards, although I'm still a bit young for that to happen, especially that large of a slide.
SQ - Light sets. Scrubbed.

2/27/25 - Thursday
OP I @ 5' 175x1x5
SQ I @ 5' 370x1x5

Notes — As mentioned, the Tuesday workout didn't happen. It wasn't just the tweak, but sinus-related nausea, which is also very draining, meant that I was not going to Press overhead. So that slid to Thursday. My lumbar region was still quite tender, but I knew that I needed to get it moving and just see how it felt. I was just going to work up to what was pain-free and work that weight. Luckily, that was the programmed weight for both lifts.
OP - Intensity Singles across. Empty bar was not comfortable, but as soon as I pressed 95+, the issue disappeared during the lift. Walking to and fro between warmup sets and the singles still saw me hobbling around and I know that I really tempered my hip thrust, but each Single went smoothly.
SQ - Intensity Singles across. Similar to the Press, the empty bar set was not comfortable. But loaded to 95+ and the issue disappeared, except during the unloaded periods. The Intensity Singles were all good, as the tweak had me really focus on getting everything right. All good.

2/28/25 - Friday
BP I @ 5' 257.5x1x5
OP L @ 5' 140x5x2

Notes —
BP - Intensity Singles across. Still dealing with the lumbar tweak, even as the Massage Therapist continues to work on the issue, which migrates posterior to anterior and back during the days. Thankfully, it wasn't an issue for these Intensity Singles. Smooth and steady. All good.
OP - Light sets. Eighty percent of the previous day's Singles, but these were what was already programmed, so I still did them. All good.

[Bill Anders]

Note — Still dealing with the lumbar tweak from the previous Monday, but it's slowly subsiding; I still had to work around it for a few things this week, but I'm continuing to work through it, which is the right thing to do.

Also, I've been trying to figure out how to increase the stress on both of my presses. especially my OP as they have been getting shakier than I'd like for them to be. With my H/L press days being 2x/week (Tue/Fri), that means that I need to add a third pressing day. So either I tack on sets after my lower body days (Mon/Thu), which turns an already long session into a marathon grind that I don't have time for, or I add an extra day (same), which means that I'm lifting five days a week. Chase and I have discussed adding a third day for a quite awhile, and always return to "that's a bad, bad idea," as weekly recovery would suffer. So instead, we've swapped my Light session (really just used to keep the groove greased) for Intensity pin-variants of the parent lifts. They'll run opposite my three week 4-Day H/L Split schedule, with the most heavily overloaded, shortest ROM session being during this week, the Volume week for all of the lifts. The next two weeks will see lighter weights over a longer ROM, so the Intensity tapers down while the main lifts see lower Volume and higher Intensity. Another experiment on this 57 year old body.

3/3/25 - Monday
HDL H @ 7' 335x8
SQ L @ 285x5x2
SS 46kgx2x5

Notes — A Monday shit show. As soon as I grabbed my phone to text my bride and let her know I arrived at the gym at 0525 for the 0530 session, I was greeted with "you forgot your breakfast". Ffffffff. Luckily, the normal 0700 clients were no-shows, so I had time to run to the house and grab it. After the 0900 session cleared, I quickly change to workout in the 90 minutes before the noon session. Except I didn't throw my cleaned gym clothes in the bag. Fffffff x2. So I focused on the important lift of the day (HDL), which I could do in the clothes that I wore to coach in.
HDL - Heavy set. This is a 20lb reset under the last session, which Chase recommended as it was getting above 90% of my full ROM DL (which also failed at 4 reps last week). Lighter did not mean easier, but at least it seemed reasonable for the first few reps, unlike last time. But make no mistake, reps 6-8 were soul-searching, as this lift should be.
SQ - Light sets. Skipped, as I was not going to squat in my street shorts that I wear during the coaching sessions.
SS - Light doubles across. This was going to be scratched anyway, as my lumbar tweak would have not fared well.


3/4/25 - Tuesday
OP H @ 5' 157.5x5x4
PB15 I @ 3' 270x1x5
Prowler 59kg @ 5laps

Notes —
OP - Heavy sets across. Still protecting the lumbar tweak, which shows during the loading of the bar and walking around, but not during the actual press. However, I still limit the hip thrust, which does impact the drive of the bar a bit. Otherwise, all good.
PB15 - Intensity Singles. I haven't done this in a couple of years, so today was to be exploratory. I started out at 270, which is +10lbs over this cycle's Intensity singles programmed for the third week, and that seemed to be just right. For clarification, the "15" portion of the label means hole 15 of the Texas Strength Systems rack, which has holes set 2" apart. I set the pins for 17, so the ROM for this is just a couple of inches from dead stop to lockout. Next week will be PB14, with a 10lb drop, then the last week will be PB13, with another 10lb drop, which will be an inch or so off the chest.
Prowler - Five laps, loaded with 59kg on top of the 47kg sled. I should probably just start combining the weights as we do the bar+plates, but then I can't handle the math, an issue that I am known for, to the point that I wear this t-shirt while coaching.

3/6/25 - Thursday
PC L @ 3' 63x2x5
SQ H @ 5' 335x5x4

Notes — A nice surprise as Stef Bradford popped by for a few minutes while she was in town for other things.
PC - Heavy Doubles across. Scratched due to lumbar tweak, which is getting better, but still apparent.
SQ - Heavy Sets across. These were heavy and shaky, but never in doubt. Well, except for one rep during the second set, where the bar felt like it started to roll down my back, which was a great incentive to get bent over correctly. Keep those nipples down, people! All good.

3/7/25 - Friday
PP36 I @ 3' 190x1x5 190x1, 195x1, 197x1x3
BP H @ 4' 240x5x4

Notes —
PP36 - Intensity Singles. Same nomenclature as the PB above. Hole 36 puts the bar about 2" above my head for that last few inches before lockout. Using the same exploratory plan as the PB, I started +10lbs over this cycle's Intensity Singles weight. That 190 sailed up, although I was out of the groove and wobbly a bit as this was the first time in a couple of years that I have done these. My lockout was a bit forward, so it was wobbly. 195 was better, but I still had room to move, so I went with and stayed at 197. The three Singles were right where I needed to be, with that third one a grinding grind to lock it out. All good.
BP - Heavy Sets across. I was running out of time in my hard-limit 90-minute workout window before the noon crew showed up, so I started "supersetting" the warmups with the PP36 reps, then cut the recovery between sets from my normal 5' to 4'. These were appropriately heavy, but no concerns with finishing the sets. All good.

[Bill Anders]

3/10/25 - Monday
SS L @ 3' 47kgx2x5
SQ L @ 5' 285x5x2
RP H @ 8' 435x5

Notes —
SS - Light Double across. Still feeling the lumbar tweak, so I continued to scrub these. For me, this lift is a "get to know the technique" lift, as I don't have any Olympic competition aspirations.
SQ - For the first time in awhile, I moved these to precede the heavy pull, since I had scrubbed the Snatches. At 75% of this cycle's Intensity Singles, these are light. Except these two sets felt heavy AF. They went fine, but I was surprised at how heavy this light load felt (this is where the narrator voices over and says something about foreshadowing). All good.
RP - Heavy set. The warmups had me wondering about the workweight, as even the lighter reps felt heavy AF. The first rep was a grind, which then led to four smooth, crisp, steady reps. As always, that first rep was a lie.

3/11/25 - Tuesday
OP H @ 5' 167.5x3x4
PB14 I @ 5' 260x1x5

Notes —
OP - Heavy Triples across. Warmups were normal. First set, first rep out of the pins, the room went black just as I locked out, but I got it back into the pins. Reset, took a couple of laps around the platform, and attacked again. First set, second rep, same result, same prep. First set, third rep, as soon as the bar got to my eyes, it all closed down. There was no way I was going to get 12 total reps this way. But I set my rest timer and sat down to get ready for the second set. Alarm beeps, I get up and start to cinch my belt. I've been using Hole 5 for my Dominion belt for years now, but suddenly had the thought about using Hole 4. The next three sets sailed just fine, with no further issues. Since I had a hanging rep to clear off the board, I rested a few minutes and to check my hypothesis, I cinched to Hole 5. Same result as the first two, with the room fading away at lockout. So I'll pay attention going forward.
PB14 - Intensity Singles across. As described last week, this Pin Bench is set in Hole 14 of the SS Rack, which puts the bar at about 4" off the chest when arched. So this is 2" lower than last week's PB15, which is a couple of inches below lockout. All good. But to confirm the sinus issues that were giving me fits during the OP, every time I set up on the bench and stood up, the room went for spins heavy enough that I had to grab the rack and stay steady for a moment.

3/13/25 - Thursday
PC H @ 3' 64x2x5
SQ H @ 5' 355x3x4

Notes — Wednesday was my regular recovery day. I worked an early shift at the gym (0530-1330), at well, and had a great 9.5 hours of sleep. Only to wake up feeling like a bag of hammered shit. Whatever.
PC - Light Doubles across. Scrubbed due to the continuing lumbar tweak issues. It's getting better, and I probably would have given them a go this day, but (see note immediately above).
SQ - Heavy Triples across. As they should be, these felt heavy as hell, but they all went without me worrying about completing a rep. First set, done right after my bride's, shown below, with some excellent industrial fuzz thanks to the Revolting Cocks —

Do Ya Think I'm Sexy

3/14/25 - Friday
PP34 I @ 4' 180x1x5
BP H @ 5' 250x3x4 195x3x3

Notes — Last week, during my Volume Week, Chase and I were discussing my programming, as we often do as I throw out "what if" scenarios just for discussion sake. As is laid out in Practical Programming and the other books, the answer is almost always "it depends." We were discussing how much overall stress that I've been exposing myself to over the last couple of months, having been going non-stop since I got back into OKC mid-October. So that's five months of unbroken training, while piling on Olympic lift stress on top of the normal 4-Day Heavy/Light Split, which I've also shed these last couple of weeks. Since he sees me lifting at least once, if not twice a week, he has an idea of where I am. So he threw out "have you considered a deload week?" Nope. Lots of discussion about that and how it's only described in the Advanced programming sections of PPST and BBRx. I'm not an Advanced lifter, but I haven't experienced the normal deloads of vacation or trips that I normally have in a five month stretch. So we programmed one in after I finished this cycle (week after next).
This morning, after another great night of sleep, I felt like an even softer bag of hammered shit. I was a workout or two away from hitting the wall. So the planned deload week was starting today.
PP - Scrubbed, as it would violate the deload.
BP - Heavy Triples across. Reprogrammed to deload levels. In all honesty, this is the lift that I'd likely hurt myself on. So keeping with the concepts of the deload week described in the Two Steps Forward One Step Back programming in PPST3 and BBRx, I dropped this to 75% of this cycle's Intensity Singles and did Triples across. The other option is to do a normal warmup up to the final weight, which I might do next deload. As far as the Triples, these felt heavy AF and quite grindy for what the weight actually was. The grind confirmed that it was time. So I'll start programming a deload, but the continuing discussion is whether to run two cycles (six weeks) then add one, or just add it after every cycle, which would likely let me run this program for a long, long time.

**Note - and before anyone asks or suggests, this is not an instance of overtraining. I've been there in other sports and this is definitely not that. There's no suppression of appetite, no mood swings, no constant irritability, etc. I've been run down, but that's it. So as the weights get heavier and I'm decreasing the frequency of my lifts overall in order to stretch the recovery and adaptation window, the deload will do help with that. Granted, if I throw in a vacation or similar, then I'll have to schedule around that. But I'll deal with that when it comes.

[Fred J]

I am glad to see that you are lifting regularly and still take the time to post it here. There is a lot of good info in here for folks to read. I hope your sinus problems subside soon. Now it seems that you might be shifting from cold and ice to tornado season. We are preparing to be in a tornado watch in a few minutes here. Oh joy.

[Bill Anders]

Thanks, Fred!

Sinus issues won't resolve. This is OK, after all. It's been that way here ever since I first set foot in this state back in '95. Every visit back over the years has been a suffer fest. Nothing changes.

Yep, I'm not looking forward to storm season. Too many close calls last year. This year will be more stressful, as my bride is here now, too. It was easier last year when she was out in the NW and not dealing with it.

Stay safe tonight! It's an ugly one. We had winds up to 70mph yesterday as that system deepened and blew up to our east.

[Cole Gorton]

ehh, frustrating to not have things go exactly as planned but your adapting and doing the best you can at the moment and still training, so i doubt there will be any big picture issues and im sure youll be back to hitting it hard in no time. good job

[Bill Anders]

Thanks Cole!

No frustration, other than I wanted to get through this coming week's Intensity Singles before the break. No PRs, but one step closer on each one. It's all part of the learning process, too. Especially as I read the section in BBRx on the TSFOSB deload, which stated that most Masters don't need it, because life usually puts one in via sickness or vacation. This is the longest straight run I've had, since I usually have several week+ vacations during my normal lifting season, so it makes sense that it caught up to me (on top of all of the other life stuff). I'll enjoy dialing it back this week, especially since we have a few concerts to go to later in the week. I can focus on enjoying those just a bit more, perhaps.