Exerbabble for 1-13-7

Still fighting off my cold. I made a mental note to go easy with the weight today.

HGM Phase VI: “Washboard Worthy”, Day A, Workout I

Abdominal Circuit:
Incline Reverse Crunch: 3×12 @ BW
45-degree Side-Bend: 3×12 @ 10 lbs
Cable Crunch: 3×12 @ 100 lbs
Bridge: 3×30 sec @ BW

Power Clean, Squat, & Press: 5 @ 85 lbs; 10, 8 @ 75 lbs

RDL & Bent-over Row: 3×10 @ 85 lbs

Superset:
Pull-ups: 5, 4, 3 @ BW
DB Incline Piston Press: 3×12 @ 25 lbs

current bodyweight: 158 lbs (-.8 lbs; weekly average of 158.65 lbs)

Normally I mull over the coming phase for a while and ponder how I’ll handle it. I had to review it this morning before leaving for the gym.

The abdominal circuit was a nice warm-up. I checked the rest periods. 1 to 2 minutes? That’s a large margin of error, someone fell asleep on the job writing that rest period. That’s supposed to be a swiss-ball oblique crunch in there, but I simply could not figure out how I was supposed to lay on the ball without falling over. Seriously. I’ve seen other people do it, but I really don’t pay that much attention to how they’re doing it. So I just did it on the 45-degree back-extension apparatus. Plus, this keeps me from having to walk all across the gym twice. I just do the first three, then go over and bridge for 30 seconds. (Though, I’m supposed to increase the 60 seconds by the end of the phase.)

I had a suspicion that my primary problem with power clean, squat, and press would be remembering to squat. Seriously. I just kept forgetting to squat! You know, all my reading of olympic lifts indicate that you’re not supposed to do much more than 6, let alone 10. Whatever. There’s two parts to this phase, so I won’t kill myself trying to overload the weight. I’ll just try to really get my form down while the weight is low. The weight was almost too light, I can rip 75 lbs off the floor waaaay too easily. I bet I could power snatch it.

Anyway, I think next time I need to work on remembering to squat. Pressing isn’t a problem, though I need to make sure I go straight from a squat into a push press, without a pause. Well, I could pause, but I’d have to quarter squat anyway to push press. I just want to avoid shoulder pressing the weight, as I do intend to eventually be push pressing more than I can shoulder press.

The RDL/B-o Row was rather easy, as expected. I did notice I was rotating to one side, however. I think it was to the right side. I’ll try correcting that. Oh, and for shits and giggles, I didn’t use the squat rack. For both these ‘hybrids’, I loaded the weight on the floor. Personally, I just wanted the room.

Okay, seriously, my pull-ups are not progressing. I’m wondering if I should just use the damn lat pull-down machine, even though it’s an inferior exercise. I don’t seem to respond to negatives. The only time my pull-ups increase is when I do them. Gee, imagine that. I went stupidly light with the incline piston press, to get the motion down. Neural patterns, and all.

Adjustments: Increase the cable crunches to 110 lbs, it was too easy. Increase RDL & B-o Row to 95 lbs. My reps were very clean, I can easily increase the weight. Increase the incline weight to 30 lbs.

(I didn’t get around to summarizing this phase, in part because it doesn’t seem like it matters. Even if I explain each exercise, nobody really understands what I’m doing. But, if anybody wants me to write it out, I’d be more than happy to.)