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mrthingyx

mrthingyx

mrthingyx

Man of Honour
Joined
3 Apr 2003
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Location
Cambridge
Right... time for a new log.

For the next year, I'm going to stick to an Olympic training regime to crank the maxes on my Olympic lifts with the aim of competing at some point in 2014 (edited thanks to JoeF1!).. no idea when or how, but I'll work that out later. :D

Current stats:

WEIGHT: ~87.5kg
HEIGHT: 181cm
BF: ~11%

Training will involve the two primary lifts for 3-5 days a week (time-dependent):

- snatch;
- clean'n'jerk

Assistance work will be somewhat minimal, but based around:

Primary:
- front/high bar back squat;

Secondary;
- deficit Bulgarian split squats;
- overhead military press;
- Pendlay rows;
- deadlifs (first pull/SLDL

The general training regime will follow the approximation below:

- snatch (30-45 minutes);
- clean'n'jerk (30-45 minutes);
- back squats (3*5) or front squats (4*3)
- Secondary assistance work.

I have a rest day (today) that involves some arm-based silliness in the work gym with one of the coaches, because we all need strong tendons to lift big weights, right? ;) :D

Here is the youtube channel that hosts the videos of my training for stuff over the past year, so amuse yourselves at my expense. :)

So here we go...
 
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Today was ARMs with the coach, under the auspices of resting my legs and back... :o

OHP ss/w CLOSE GRIP CHINS 4*10

OHP: 45kg
CHINS: BW

Shoulders were burning by the end of this...

DUMBELL BENCH ss/w WUDE GRIP LAT PULLDOWN 4*10

BENCH: 30-32.5-32.5(8+2f)-27.5(8+2f)
LAT PULLDOWN: setting 14 out of 20...?

Bench completely ruined me, and I had to be assisted on the last two sets. It was quite funny, actually, because my pecs still felt good but triceps had nothing left (dumbells would get around 10 inches off my chest and then stop... :D). Lat pulldowns were great but forearms died. Who uses hook grip for lat pulldowns? Seriously? :D

TRICEP PUSHDOWN ss/w 21s 4*10...

PUSHDOWN: 7/20
21s: BAR-25-25-25

Pushdowns were hellish: my fried triceps just about coped but it was pretty agonising. The 21s were just brutal, too. I can't curl for toffee.

LATERAL RAISE ss/w PREACHER HAMMER CURLZ 4*10

LAT RAISE: 12kg
PREACHERS: 8-8-10-10

Nice shoulder burn and pump... but the guns were fried. 8kg didn't feel too heavy, but my brain just couldn't get my muscles working. :cool:

Back to the less serious work tomorrow... :)
 
Urgh. Arms are still in pieces from yesterday., so might have to wind back on the serious workouts... :(

Lots of warmup today, as I felt REALLY sluggish. Combination of bar snatch and overhead squats, followed by some stretching.


SNATCH WORK (Power snatch from floor -> two hangs)

40-50(1)-60(1)-70-75-75-75-70

75kg is definitely where I bottle the catch and it winds up being a power snatch. As such, will be dialing back to 70kg for this week.

Don't get me wrong: powersnatching 75kg is fun, but kind of pointless in the grand scheme of things.


CLEAN WORK (Power clean from floor + jerk -> two hangs +jerks)

70-90-95-95-95

Failed a couple of catches at 95kg as I wasn't catching on my heels; also failed a couple of jerks because I wasn't getting my head through enough. Will stick with this weight for this 'week' and see how we go.

Because of all this Olympic fun, squatting was a bit lame...


FRONT SQUATS 3-3

50-90

Pretty pointless, tbh.


Overall

Need to get my timing sorted so that I don't neglect fun accessory work. Now that I know what my working weights are (was hoping for 75kg and 100kg for the exercises above, but hey) I can start hammering them out like a wannabe boss. :cool:
 
Diagnostic session this morning, followed by some training with another one of the coaches at work...


SNATCH DIAGNOSTICS
Using QuikCoach (android rip-off of Coach's Eye) and regular phone camera, I decided to look at what my snatch bar path was doing to understand why I get nervous about catching...

SNATCH LOOP!

There is the answer: shoulders aren't far enough forward at the start of the second pull, meaning the bar loops around. It's not a perfect test as the bar was quite light, but this won't help bigger weights. Second video is my attempt at resolution (leaning further forward, bum further back)...

LESS SNATCH LOOP...

Reduction is slight, but I also have to be careful to make sure I get the full quotient of hip drive. Part of the problem is too much ankle flexion meaning my hamstrings don't have enough to do.

Oh, well... onwards and upwards! :)


FRONT SQUATS 4-3-3-3-3-3

40-70-90-100-100-100

That's better.


PUSH PRESS 3*3

70-70-80


PAUSED HIGH BAR Singles, it was meant to be a five count, but I basically sat down there for as long as it took to feel uncomfortable... probably around 8-10 seconds each one...

70-90-109-100-110

Interesting. Notice my lumbar flakes out randomly if I don't concentrate... not really a problem at this weight because my quads take over, but that's not really the point. :o


Overall...

Worth it just to get the view of my snatch bar path (not possible at home), and get some technique tweaks from there. Very happy with that (obviously irritated that technique needs further refinement, but that's just Olympic lifting, full stop... :D)...
 
Slept badly last night and was sorely tempted to skip training and stay in bed...

SNATCH WORK (from floor, two hang power snatches)

40-50-60-60-70

Technique. Applying remediation from yesterday's analysis makes the lift feel very odd, but when it works, it work. It was pretty cool catching one of the 70kg reps precisely where it should have been - made it feel light as a feather (:confused:).

CLEAN WORK (from floor, two hangs. Jerks after each lift)

70-90-95-95

Really hard. Front squatting yesterday made this a lot harder than it should have been. :) Adjusted technique (as above) meant deep catches were very clean, so am quite happy with this. :)

Skipped a couple of jerks on the last set because I was exhausted. :D


EDIT: Weight is up at 89.1kg after training and dumping now I'm eating properly. Diet now involves a lot more everything and a consistent amount of protein (around 150-180g/day), generally spread over each afternoon, with some obnoxious brotein shake after training and in the evening, generally comprising:

- 100g dextrose;
- 40g brotein;
- 5g creatine;
- 1g beta alanine;

All mixed with around 400ml full-fat milk... :eek: :D I'll probably wind this back when I start softening up, but for now I'm enjoying the lack of consistent physical exhaustion that came with my approach to CBL.
 
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'Pump' day...

Training partner didn't turn up, so decided to do my idea of ARM day...

FRONT SQUATS Triples

70-90-104-104-104

HIGH BAR 4*6

70-70-90-90

RING DIPS ss/w WG PULLUPS 4*5

BW, BW, +5, +5

Some more paused squatting (both front and back), trying to get my lumbar as stable as possible, as noticed my upper back rounding again in the fronties.
 
No worries. :)

High bar tops out for reps at around 110kg - I haven't tried more than triples recently for some reason or other, but I can't clean/snatch more than that, so there isn't much point (from my training perspective).

That's the public justification, anyway. :D

I have thought about dropping back on the technical work to concentrate on squats/deads/whatever, but have far too much fun with weightlifting to reduce it. :o
 
Ouch - second training session for today! :o

I noticed some upper back collapse earlier today, and so have been to see (one of) our resident SnC coaches for some cleanup.

Diagnosis?

Tight lats (dorsal? insertion, near quadratis lumborum) and tight hip sapsule.

So I have a few new stretches to work around these problems, both of which hurt quite a lot. :)

However, front squats for 5 were pretty tough after this morning, so was cut down to...

50-50-70-70

And I was done. Intervention was between each set to adjust for stretching, but my quad insertions were burning already from this morning, so hammering them again was... amusing.

DOMS is going to be nasty tomorrow. :D
 
Ruth. Horrendous session this evening...

All triples...

SNATCH: 50-60-60-70-70-75
CLEAN'NJerk: 60-80-90-100(1ff)-100(1ff)
FRONT SQUAT: 60-80-90-100(f)

Managed to drop one of the 100kg jerks onto my thigh. That hurt. A lot. And will probably ruin my training for the next week. :(
 
reiyushin said:
100kgs from overhead to thigh :/ ouch!!!!
Click to expand...

Yup! I caught the bruise today whilst unracking for a first pull and I almost screamed. But then I'm a big jessie that lifts in high heels. :D

FRONT SQUAT (triples) 40-60-70-90-105-100-100

Whilst I don't think the pre-load warmups caused the problem, I noticed I'm lifting off my mid-food at 105, which continued at 100 (And couldn't fix with a second slow set), so backed off at this point. Did some remedial work, but...

SNATCH FIRST PULL (fours) 70-110-90
 
Quad still black and purple, so everything but Olympic lifting today...

CLEAN FIRST PULL (8s) 70-110-130-130-130
DUMBELL BENCH (8s) 25-30-35-35(7f)
PENDLAY ROW ss/w CG PULLUP (5s) 70/10-80/10-70/10-80/10
DBSS (5s) BW-10-20-25-25-27.5

The rep patterns are odd because I was looking for weights that I could move as fast as possible - explosively, if you will (i.e. no difference to BW movements).

I now can't feel my posterior chain when I sit on it. :D

EDIT @ 10:45... DOMS inbound. Already. :cool:
 
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Working out with a colleague who has embarked on some weird "undulating routine with a hypertrophy bias..."

Basically, he's going 12-5-3 reps between three sessions... and today was his 3-rep workout.

So...

JERKS (3) 50-70-90
THRUSTERS (5... cuz I'm a boss) 60-60-60
BACK SQUATS (5) 50-70-90

That was interesting. Never done thrusters before (essentially a full squat push-press) and they were pretty metabolic for 5 reps (stupid CrossFit exercise), but were nice to really focus on heel drive for the PP element (and squat, too, but...).

It wound up being more of a coaching session for this dude as he needed a fair bit. However, I haven't done any jerks since last Saturday so it was pretty fun.

Legs were still completely ruined from yesterday's silliness, however, but... it meant that I weighed in at 89.9 after a loo visit, yesterday. Awesome. :cool:
 
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