Stats:
Age: 37
Sex: Male
Height: 6'2"
Weight: 175lbs
Background:
I never really contemplated physical fitness until I was in my early 20's. By this time, my metabolism was being outpaced by pizza, Mexican food, beer, and margaritas. I had brief stints with Men's Fitness workouts and Body for Life. Nearing 30, I fell prey to the P90X hype and did a phase of that. I lost weight but Tony Horton was not going to be recruiting me for the next informercial. I was tired as hell and tired of hearing those same jokes over and over.
In my early 30's, I went Paleo for health reasons -- looking to mitigate mystery joint pain -- and happened to lose quite a bit of weight. I ate this way for roughly three years and during the process, of course, I became familiar with Crossfit. I briefly joined a box, but I couldn't stand the "fraternity/social" vibe and the cheezy encouragement of one another. I just wanted everyone to leave me alone and let me do the WOD. Ultimately, I ended up quitting and building a home gym in my garage where I did mainsite for six months. This wore me down. I got a little stronger and my cardio tolerance went up, but mostly I just finished every workout feeling dead. The most I ever deadlifted was 225 and the most I ever squatted was 165. Those were probably singles and my form was likely atrocious.
After quite a while off, I had a friend at work introduce me to Mike Matthew's Bigger Leaner Stronger. Accompanying this book is a one-year weightlifting program which I just completed last week. While it's based around the four core lifts and doing three sets of 4-6 reps -- sounds familiar -- it also incorporates a lot of accessory work and has a huge focus on calories/macros. I learned a lot of discipline on this program and saw some good results. I'm currently in the best shape I've ever been in my life.
Currently, my working sets are:
Press: 105
Bench: 170
Squat: 200
Deadlift: 255 (I've done 275, but my form sucked and I tweaked my back)
These numbers represent on average about a 50% increase in strength over the course of the 1-year program. I'm pleased with that progress, but I'm not blown away by it, especially with the reading I've done in SS and regarding the novice effect. My ability to capitalize on this phenomenon was constrained dramatically by the fact that during the first six months of the program, I was eating between 1700-1900 cals/day.
On the other hand, the benefits of the program were two-fold: i) I did not miss a single workout the entire year and learned that I have a lot of discipline, and ii) I gained the habit of tracking what I eat and learning how it affects my weight and composition. I started the program around 178lbs and 21% body fat. At my leanest, I was down to 158lbs and 7.7% body fat. And, while it was fun to have abs for the first time (which I've since lost), I want to get stronger.
The Plan:
So, BLS has a sequel (Beyond BLS), but he clearly states that it's for an intermediate lifter and gave some weights you should be able to lift prior. I am nowhere near those levels. As a result, I started looking around for something to do next. My buddy Alex wanted me to try Dan John's Mass Made Simple, but after buying it and looking at it I've decided that is for another day. I've known about SS for quite some time but had the notion that since I just lifted weights for year that perhaps I was no longer the target audience (obviously a misguided notion). Then, I stumbled across Wendler's 5/3/1 and the spreadsheetability and recipe-like nature of it really appealed to me. I was resolved to do it until I read a thread on here where people claimed it was also more of an intermediate program and perhaps even shouldn't be done until after Texas Method. At the same time, my buddy Thomas is in my ear about how he does SS and his lifts are all ahead of mine (except bench). We're built similarly, so it was a persuasive point; especially since he's only been lifting for 4-6 months compared to my 12.
So, here I am. I'm working my way through Starting Strength and Practical Programming. I've bought the app and have read all its content and watched all the videos. I'll start this Monday, April 25th, 2016.
While I enjoy writing, I'm not sure how many people really follow these logs or if it's more of a self-serving diary. With the idea that hopefully some people will follow along and give advice, I'll try to keep my posts to the point and easy to read.
Thanks in advance for any help.