well, wowsers. so much for 'agh ack eek cycle 3 and fives week again already yike so soon so much weight i don't think i can but gee i guess i should at least haul myself in there and wave at the weights'. surprise of the second half of my life: i like hanging out in gyms just for the sake of hanging out there. spent the afternoon there, pretty much. by the time i left i'd done all three of a stronglifts B day, instead of just the 'well, let's at least try deadlift' i had been thinking of. in order from most to least rewarding:

deadlift: 100/115/130. not in the least my best lift, this time around. i think only got 5 on the last set, but that's okay since that counts. i did the middle set with 120 instead of just 115. and a LOT of warmup, and 5-sets of rows in between at 50/60/70/80, just to prove i still can do that 80lb row.

press: 50/55/57. the last set was actually three at 60 and then three or four at 55. again, i'm gonna count it since i was cleaning the bar for my warmups and for the other two sets and that's more work than you first think it will be. prolly record it as 6 final reps too.

squats: i did it \o/ 60/70/80 and i think 7 reps for the last set. really didn't plan to or think that i could, but it's amazing what you do do when someone else is working in with you and you can't faff around doubting yourself. i started with really wide grip, got progressively tighter and 5 pounds heavier with each set all the way up from 45 to 60, and then decided to just dig in and to the 10-pound progressions prescribed. dude i was sharing with started at 95 and was lifting 200+ on the next peg up from mine by the time he was done, so i got some upper-body accessory in just doing my part of the loading/unloading for him.

squat magic bullet this week: LEVATOR SCAPULA MUSCLE. good grief. seems like when that one's too tight, nothing goes right with a bar on your back.

now i eat a watermelon, and tomorrow i rest.

samanthaluangphixay wrote: »

Day 5 - Workout A

Squat @ 65 lbs for 5x5
Bench @ 55 lbs for 5/3/5/4/5 - this one will be a challenge for sure. I anticipate staying here for a few more rounds.
Barbell Row @ 55 lbs for 5/5/4/5/5 - almost!!! I thought I was going to get it but something happened during that middle set that had me only get 4. It's all good though. Progress, not perfection.

I also did a few sets using an Iso-bench machine while waiting for the bench to free up. First time doing that.

Tomorrow I have a cardio kickboxing class so I won't be doing a Stronglifts workout. Back to it on Wednesday though!

Ps. Does anyone ever feel off-kilter when they are not in their gym? Due to the family situation, I was in a different weight room today and I felt so foreign. I didn't know anyone or where any of the equipment was.

i got galvanized by a t-nation article on lower trap activation and scapular stabilizing, so i went into the gym and did a whole bunch of let-me-just-stand-here-and-glare-into-space-while-i-move-one-body-part-through-one-half-of-an-inch in various forms.

then, since controlling that left shoulderblade is more or less what is wrong with my whole bench pressing life, i lay down on the bench and did a very slow series of 5x5 with the bar, totally for the purpose of 'watching' that left lower trap for its role in it all.

took the squat shoes on the possible principle that all of it might transfer over to me and the bar in my squats, but didn't actually use them as i didn't trust it that far. the rest of my day is going to be the lacrosse ball and pecs.

t day. idk where my numbers and his numbers for ohp got themselves out of sync, but his were a little bit up from where my spreadsheet says. i think he rounded my training weight up to 70lbs whereas my sheet has it at the literal value of 67.5. anyway, on my sheet the weights were 44, 51, 57.5, but on his board they were 45/52.5/60. given the 2.5 pound extra, i don't feel too bad about missing my 5 on the last set. anyway i went back 30 seconds later and did another 3 just for so-there purposes, so i feel like i covered that base and i'm good for 3's week.

i was also watching the lower trap on my left super-carefully, so didn't have very demanding expectations given the subtle way that this shifted my form. he did say he was going to invent a new leaderboard just for me. 'closest ohp bar path to nose' because i'm not just close but super-consistently close. still, somehow on the final rep of the last set, i just lost the 'shelf' and could not get it back, so that was the cause of the final-rep fail.

deadlifts were 100/115/130. i got 6 of those and then another 3 after i took a short rest. following that i did 3x5 rows at . . . i guess it was 75, which wasn't bad at all considering. again, hyper-attention on setting my left shoulderblade without letting the rhomboid/lat/serratus take over from the lower trap, so i'm happy with all of this session really.

mr squats was on 'vacation' - he said - so instead of the usual lifts he just did 500 reps whamming a huge tire with a huge hammer. super-impressive consistency in his force and timing - he took 18 minutes to do it and it was like working in the same room with a giant steam train.