Journey to Olympus

[Zee-man]

Workout #51 - Saturday February 26, 2011

Squat - 285lbs (PR)
Bench - 210lbs (PR)
Deadlift - 345lbs (Former PR)

Workout went well. I missed Thursday as Friday I was taking a day off to spend at home and as such ended up having to work late Thursday night to "make-up" for a last minute request. Go-go people respecting vacation and giving you a heads up on shit before its due (when assisting another department).

Squats were good. I really tried to piss myself off before doing the set to help out with the drive. Think it benefitted if nothing else than for the mental aspect. Elbow was pretty good afterwards, though over the weekend (I think Sunday) I hyper-extended it playing with my Doberman, so much for it healing.

Bench was awesome. The first set is always the worst for me, because the muscles have to get used to stabilizing the new weight. Same here, wavered a bit on the first set but finished strong on second and third. Would be really awesome to hit my BW Bench before a reset, here's hoping.

Deadlifts I attempted doing alternating grip for the first time since doing SS. I did it back when I was lifting with some co-workers and was double alternating for a mean 225lb Deadlift (lols). I almost messed up my set from laughing at the situation. I literally felt like a monster with the grip strength I felt. I attribute it fully to doing double-overhand all this time. I will for sure continue to do it on my now warm-up sets or for general grip work with the fat gripz. (Prior to this I was not warming up Dead's. I felt that the intense work from Squats and Bench warmed the body up quite well. I guess I'm a bad student.) Looking forward to some awesome gains. To remove the chance of developing any imbalances, I intend to switch which hand is palm up and which is palm down each Deadlift workout. Seems the best route to avoid adjusting grip midset.

Good stuff. Here's looking to 290lbs on Squat. I really want that 300lbs Squat... even more I want the 315lbs. I think the girlfriend wants it to, as she has mentioned numerous times she misses my clean-shaven handsome face.. I tell her I have no idea what she's talking about, because I'm definitely not the clean-shaven type :P. Handsome... well my mom thinks so.

[Zee-man]

Workout #52 - Tuesday March 1, 2011

Squat - 290lbs - 5, 5, 4 - Fuck and to top it off, my fucking elbow is really fucking hurting.
Press - 175lbs - 2, 3, 0 - Fuck again. Thanks to my fucking left elbow pain these were pretty much shot, though I don't even know if I would have gotten 3x5 anyways.
Pendlay Rows - 130lbs - x/x/x - Wouldn't you know it, the elbow fucked these over too.

Great fucking workout tonight. Gained 10 (debateably 15) pounds on Squat before I will need a reset, for the third time, only 5 pounds before a reset is needed for Press, and to top it all off my left elbow now hurts from doing anything heavy.

So now I get to spend all day tomorrow looking for a way to fix this issue, heal up, and somehow continue to at least maintain (because progression will most likely halt) until my elbow is back in good repair. Great fucking news. I even focused on keeping my wrists locked, my elbows up (was even trying to force them higher to fix it), so I just don't know. And even better, I will spend all day tomorrow trying to find a solution on the forums, and how to "heal up" most likely not find anything incredibly useful and then bother to ask only to get "use the search function" or get some big debate for the purpose of mental masterbation and e-peen stroking.

Never been this upset after a workout to date. I don't mind the failure, its the fact that now I have an injury that I not only don't know how to fix (or where the actual problem stemmed from as opposed to what just aggravated it) but it may halt my progress altogether on something I've invested a lot of blood, sweat, and mabye even tears in achieving.

[Zee-man]

Did some research, at this point I suppose I need to buy a fish oil supplement and try to tighten my grip (ie be narrower). Back to shoulder dislocates, and this and future weekends I'll start doing the dips and curls I had planned on doing when I moved to Advanced Novice.

More research tomorrow.

[peacerenity]

I don't know what specific type of elbow injury you have, but if it's a sort of deep joint ache that happened gradually over the course of a set and didn't suddenly strike you all at once, I think I had something similar. It's not as serious as you think: the soreness was mostly gone by my next workout, and gone entirely by the one after that. I never did figure out what caused it though.

My best advice is just to rest it until your next workout and make sure you're not doing anything funny with it your next workout.

[gamedog]

Rest the elbow and baby that motherfucker! Fish oil, ice, rub emu oil on it, go get a massage, do whatever you have to do ;-) nice work on the squats even though your elbow interfered with the last set. Very nice work!

Like I said, baby that elbow. You're in a groove and you're kicking ass, so pay attention to the little details, do what you need to do to keep up the momentum and prevent yourself from getting derailed, and keep at it. You'll be squatting the big 300 in, literally, no time at all!

[Zee-man]

Workout #53 - Tuesday March 8, 2011

Squat - 275lbs - Reset to see if my elbow would heal before I got back up to 290lbs and further.
Bench - 215lbs - PR - Felt damn good.
Deadlift - 355lbs - I did alternating grip. This time (as opposed to last) I had my left hand palm up and my right hand palm down. I am convinced that muscular balance is off if you focus one side, because my grip strength, or at least my level of comfort Deadlifting in this hand setup was worse than with my hands in the opposite setup.

I went to GNC to buy a Fish Oil Supplement to help my elbow heal. I'm now taking it every day. While I was there a skinny dude came in and was checking out the CYTO-GAINER, MASS STACKER, etc. Caps because these are the big jugs with flashy words on it, I mean how else do you sell. So I went over to him and told him that if he wanted to gain mass, just drink milk and eat lots of protein. He looked at me like I was giving him ground-breaking stuff, so I asked what his program was. He had no idea. Insert SS advertisement here. I told him to come to this site, and hopefully he has by now and found some good information. The one thing that concerns me most about all the trolling that goes on in these forums, and general stupidity from people like msingh, is people genuinely want to find answers and learn the right way to get big/strong, and someone else messes up an exceptional opportunity by bad-mouthing or being unwelcoming to newbie questions. Just my two cents.

[Zee-man]

Workout #54 - Thursday March 10, 2011

Front Squat - 155lbs - Decided to give these a try mid-week as prescribed by Advanced Novice.
Press - 175lbs - 5, 5, 4
Chins - 2, 2, 2, 2, 2

[Zee-man]

Workout #55 - Tuesday March 15, 2011

Squat - 280lbs - No lower back pain. No incredibly discomfort in the elbows.
Bench - 220lbs - PR - 225lbs here I come baby!
Deadlift - 365lbs - PR - Bar is now full up, ordered 4 45lb steel plates from Rogue Fitness

In addition to ordering 4 45lb steel plates from Rogue, I also ordered a 100lb Heavy Bag to use for my Conditioning. I am intending to start working on my punch and kick technique, get back into flexibility, and prep to return to karate. I was at my best conditioning/overall fitness wise, when I trained for my black belt before college. I think by doing this as cardio, I will drop my extra fat, maintain my muscle, and re-train old muscle/train the new muscle to perform its intended purpose. To become a warrior. Buying 6'x4'x3/4" rubber horse stall mats at Tractor Supply this weekend to serve as the "platform" for deadlifting with the steel plates. Z's gym is coming along nicely! Now accepting members.

[gamedog]

This is excellent work! Your squat is coming along nicely, I'm thrilled to see your new bench PR and I like your deadlift. You were concerned once you started getting up there, and you pressed on and made it happen. I'm pleased to see your efforts coming to fruition here, you're definitely maxing your gains, and doing a hell of a job at that! Keep it up!

[Zee-man]

Workout #56 - Thursday March 17, 2011

Front Squat - 160lbs
Press - 175lbs - 5, 4, 2 - Time for a reset. Going to go up in 2.5lb increments this time.
Pendlay Rows - 135lbs

Front Squats were a bit tougher than last time, ie it wasn't as easy. I did note less shoulder/wrist pain, but I also noticed I was putting more weight in my hands than back on my shoulders. Will have to really focus on that next week.

Thanks Game, appreciate the congrats. Just trying to be a big dawg like you.