Exerbabble for 5-14-6

I hit failure. Which I consider a good thing. But I’ll get to that.

I think a lot about what I’m going to do next workout. Hey, better than a lot of things I could be thinking about. I try to relatively stay with whatever routine I’ve written for myself. Have some sort of consistency. Yet the longer I do this, the more I find myself just listening to my body. Same way masturbation is best when you’re in the mood, and sometimes you have to take a break. ..Okay, odd analogy.

I was reading something by Dave “Fucking” Tate, when something clicked. Without getting into detail, instinctive training isn’t a matter of tossing out your program, but more listening to yourself. I push myself rather hard. We know this. Part of me wanted to do some heavy leg stuff today, but I decided, “No, you said you’d do front squats/good mornings twice, followed by back squats/romanian deadlifts once. Stick to that, at least, for four weeks.” At least that, I can keep to.

I kept going today despite the fact that I need to give my shoulders a rest. So I ditched the upright row/decline press pair in favor of incline press/bent-over row. I mince words. Today’s workout:

Incline Press: 8, 8, 6 @ 85 lbs
Bent-over Row: 5×5 @ 95 lbs
Front Squat: 3×5 @ 125 lbs
Good Morning: 3×8 @ 65 lbs
Seated Calf Raise: 4×6 @ 90 lbs (+60 lbs)
(Hanging) Leg Raise: 3×10 @ bodyweight
current bodyweight: 146 lbs (-.4 lbs; weekly average of 145.3 lbs)

I’ve since change my form on all benching, lowering the bar in such a way that my elbows don’t flare out. I only felt something in my left shoulder during the lockout. But. I could tell that my right arm was doing more work than the left, even though the bar was level. I can tell. I stopped short of failure and racked the weight.

With a mirror in front of me for once, I made sure I really controlled the weight during my bent-over rows.

Now. Front squats. Two days ago I did 5×5 @ 115 lbs. I pushed myself today. I made myself go all the way down and back up. I was making those funny faces in the mirror. (No, I don’t grunt. That’s just rude.) Five sets can feel like an eternity. After my second set, I pushed on to my third, reminding myself to maintain intensity, don’t cheat range of motion. Going into the forth, I have a sneaking suspicion that I wouldn’t finish. But rather than just stop, I thought, “You know, I’ve never hit failure before.” I went down, came back up, then went down again and.. the bar found the rack. *laughs* I laughed slightly getting up and racking the weight.

I’ve read some things by Chad Waterbury on t-nation. Part of his shtick is the Central Nervous System. As taxing as it is on the muscles themselves, you can’t underestimate how taxing lifting is on your CNS. Hitting failure is typically not a good idea, at least not consistently. But as a relative n00b, it’s good to know where my limits are. And for once, I hit it, completely, 100%. I like that. Anyway, my point is that I have to take at least two days off, maybe three. Another thing I’ve read recently was a trainer who bet some lifters that he could add 1/4 inch to their arms in a relatively short span of time. Guess what he did. He had them rest for a couple days, and boom, they grew. It’s so hard to rest when you want to keep pushing yourself, but muscles grow when you’re sitting on your ass. Tear them down, build them back up.

I made my first smoothie today, based off of this. It tastes.. well, the banana wasn’t ripe enough. I’ll probably use plain oatmeal next time, as we have some. If I were to do this often enough, I’d be motivated to buy plain yogurt. I used only one scoop of my whey powder, as I seriously don’t need that much protein in one shot. *licks lips* It was tasty enough, and I’m definitely full now. I’ll last until dinner.