Sami's Starting Strength Experience

[Sami]

Yeah, I'm almost positive I started eating too much too soon. But I kinda enjoyed and didn't get too heavy. The good thing was recovery was super fast and even after a month, nothing was feeling too heavy apart from the OHP, but I've been going up by 5lbs on that every time so it was no surprise.

I've taken about 2 weeks out but I'm free now so will be starting back 100% this week. I'll not go crazy on the eating until I start struggling with the weights.

I'll have a look at the microloads link, thanks.

Anyway, all my exams are finished and I'm off to find a gym today.

[Sami]

I found the "Basement Gym." It's more than I could have possibly imagined.

First, I drove right past it. The 2nd time around, I found the solitary red cast iron blast-proof door. Over the rusted iron door was written in black lettering; "The Basement Gym: Open Mon Wed Fri". That's it. No phone, no website, email or business hours. The door was unlocked (lucklily) so I opened the door.

It was pitch black and looked completely desolate. There was a stairway going down, and it looked like the cracked peeling paint was painted 50 years ago. I stumbled my way down and managed to make out a door way, but couldn't see into it at all. I took out my phone for the light, but it was still too dark. But I was able to see an electrical switch. It wasn't really a normal light switch, it was a heavy duty circuit breaker-style switch. Anyway, I hit the switch and all the lights came on.

I was rewarded with room after room of, old school, hardcore, black iron gym beauty. This place looked like it was straight out of the 1970's. There were loads of iron plates, barbells, dumbbells and several machines. There was writing on the wall, about different PB bench-presses: "Terry: 504lbs, George: 497lbs... etc".

At first I thought the place was abandoned, but I saw, scattered throughout, a few modern items to contrast the old relics.

Well, since there was no one there, I left a note stuffed in the 'light switch' and I await a response. If I don't hear anything, I may go by on Wed night and just find out what's going on over there.

[Sami]

Went to the Basement Gym the other day. Very cool place. Met 2 guys training there. One was pretty big bulked-up bodybuilder (I could tell he was a BBer from the skin tight synthetic t-shirt and gloves). The other guy was an ordinary little guy, oriental. Both seemed cool/nice though. They said the guy in charge will be there tomorrow and to come back then.

?20 a month and no admin/initial fee.
There only open from about 17:30-21:30 Mon-fri which is slightly annoying, but I wanted to train in the evenings anyway (perhaps 23:00 would be better), so it's not too bad.
They've only got one squat rack, not a cage though. That is a slight concern, but not major.

I found another gym around the corner, Shapers, that was ?40pm (no initial fees), and they have 2 proper power cages, and 3 Oly bars. It's a normal gym with squash, tennis, pool etc. Not really keen on it except it has cages, but it's twice the price and 1/100th as cool as the Basement Gym.

I'll start out at the Basement Gym, but if the bar starts rolling over the top of my fucking head on a regular occaison, or I get AIDS from a rapist bodybuilder, I may go to the normal gym.

That was on Wednesday. Just had a session last night (Thurs) at the basement gym, and so far, mixed feelings.

It was busier today, probably about 15 guys. No big powerbears, no big BBers, no big anyone really. Everyone was pretty much doing crunches and curls of some sort. One guy did leg presses. :|

I was the only guy on the squat rack. Someone had used it before; there was 25kg on the bar and the maxipad. :/

The place itself seems cool as fuck though, just the people so far... I'll give it a couple weeks and wait for the monsters to come.

I just don't want to be the biggest squatter there, because that would be sad. The thing, there are a lot of drawbacks with this place. Only open 5:30 to 9:00, no toilet, no anything! I had to piss outside behind some building in the bushes and got poison ivy on my ankles.

It doesn't have a power cage, even the squat rack is shit, it doesn't have vertical bars, it has two bars running at about 30 degrees from the wall to the floor. This means I can't simply take a one-step walk out, I have to take about 3-4 steps just to walk out, otherwise I hit the bars in the hole. There's a big fucking mirror in front of the rack which kind of fucks me up a bit (I'm not used to it). There are two bench press stations, none of which are the right height for me; the rack is either too high or too low (this is a minor thing).

One good thing is I don't really need chalk; all the rust from the plates seems to do the trick. But I do really like the iron plates, much better than the rubberised ones everywhere else. They're just fucking cool.

The one thing that really attracted me to this place, was the hope that I could train/learn with some big monsters. That would easily allow me to completely forget all that other shit. I just wouldn't give a fuck. But if I'm the biggest squatter amongst a bunch of broke bicep curlers...

The place down the road, Shapers, has two proper power cages, all the conveniences of a normal gym, but still isn't frilly.

Then again, maybe I'm just being a pussy.

All I know is that any place that has fucking stalactites growing from the ceiling has to be cool.

[Sami]

Anyway, as for the training, well I've had 3 weeks off so wasn't expecting much.

Squat: I left off at 90kg last time so I thought I'd try the same and it went up well.

Bench: Again, I left off at 60kg, but it felt pretty heavy this time. I managed to complete the first two sets, but failed the last rep of the last set. But that's because I didn't rest long enough before the set. They were closing at 9:00 and it was 9:05.

Deadlift: I had to stop after bench press because they closed so I didn't get to deadlift. Not happy about that.

Squat: 90kg 5, 5, 5
Bench Press: 60kg 5, 5, 4
Deadlift: n/a


I probably should've dropped the weight a little.

[Tor]

Hey Sami,

Great description of the Basement gym. Sorry the place isn't living up to the hype. Sounds like, in actuality, it's just a cheap place for people to work out, and the crustiness and the cold iron is just incidental to this cheapness. Still, I'd be curious to know who the owner was. Maybe he's a grizzled, powerlifting maniac who's waiting for a young Jedi to come along to instruct.

Probably not. And the place down the street has power racks.

Tor

[Sami]

Doubt it. He wouldn't have hand painted bodybuilders on the walls. :/

[Tor]

lol oh, shit. You didn't mention that first time around. Nevermind, then.

[Sami]

Goals: (for reps or 1RM, don't really care at the moment)

Bench Press: from 60kg (for reps) to --> 100kg
Squat: from 90kg (for reps) to --> 140kg
Deadlift: from 100kg (for reps) to --> 170kg

Is it possible in 6 months?

[WatsupHannity]

It's possible, but I think you'd have to be quite genetically-fortunate. Maybe 12 months is a better goal. In any case, I don't know how useful long-term goals are with strength-training. What I mean is, it seems to me you follow your program, eat the meals, go after your weekly targets and workouts, and then the long-term stuff will fall where it falls. Just my 2 cents.

[Sami]

I don't think I'm genetically fortunate. But yeah, I agree with your view. It's not like once I get there I'm going to stop training, is it? I guess I mean, I'd like Starting Strength to get me to those weights before having to do a new training method/program. Anyway, we'll see.