Moving On..
I took a minor hiatus from the barbell for a few days (2) to reset my body, mind, spirit. I’ve been busy. Just not with keeping up with my log and my recent discoveries.
It’s been a transitional period of sorts; I’m acclimating to life’s curveballs and the sordid realization of what aging brings along with it. However, the slow process of shedding the cocoon of youth and valuable realizations has alleviated some of the uneasiness that approaching forty has stirred inside me.
One of the painful truths that struck me recently as that the vigor I once possessed of waiting all day to lift and kicking in the gym door like a rodeo bull released from the gate is gone. Prolonged squat sets of 20 + reps and Deadlift AMRAPs until I bleed from the eyes followed by hours of accessories are just no longer in the cards. And the thought of that hurt. My joints have been barking for a long time. Reluctantly, I’ve slowly begun yielding to their demands. However, with old doors closing, new ones emerge. And maybe after the period of decay where yesterdays glory years evaporate, something better awaits.
The new door
The last weekend, I spent at the gym, along with the subsequent week, trying to solve my dilemma. I played around with kettlebells and bodyweight for a few days along with a host of “strength stretching” exercises. I was pleased to find my front lever, planche positions were relatively close to where they were at my peak.
I did a litany of random exercises but in a very yin modality. I’d realized that for a long time, I felt that if I wasn’t driving myself into the ground while training, I wasn’t accomplishing anything. But then after those two light days I realized…training can actually give you energy and make your feel better physically while for the past several months, I’ve achieved the opposite effect. So I needed a reset. I needed a new goal.
I’d realized I blamed certain exercises for certain injuries that I’d recently accrued. In reality, I should’ve blamed myself for not listening to my body, making necessary adjustments, or preparing my joints properly. After a few days of “strength stretching”, I’d considered doing a stretch of time sans barbell. This would’ve been with the intention of returning back to it stronger. However, I’d hadn’t achieved anything yet! Luckily, an impromptu bench session reminded me that this lift was moving along nicely. Why interrupt it for some minor hip and knee issues?
I’ve had major beef with deadlifts the past few months. Namely because they
a) haven’t budged
b) seemed to take more than they gave
I did a sumo session on Thursday and to my dismay, they felt completely foreign. While I didn’t get hurt and the weight moved fine, I knew they felt like a bad first date with a Tinder match - things just weren’t clicking. Frustrated, a returned home wondering if I’d let the day slip away with another crappy deadlift day, which I’d grown wary of long ago. I realized, all these days started the same way - I’d go in, do very little warmup and jump to three plates, despite two and a quarter feeling like crap, then at three plates, do a few singles getting tired, annoyed that they don’t feel right until canning the session and sitting around the gym confounded for twenty minutes before deciding there was nothing else worth doing.
It disgusted me.
However, at home, something clicked and I had a practice barbell with 190 lbs. I decided to practice. And went back to the gym…
Minimalist training, maximal focus.
That night I pulled 120 kgs in the conventional deadlift for 5 x 5 in what finally felt like “the groove.” I was treating the deadlift like practice instead of a mental warfare game with myself. I’ve been pussyfooting around deadlifts for a long time. If it wasn’t a PR, or heavy, it was a waste of time. I’d ignored accumulating a solid amount of reps at submaximal weights and everytime id approach the deadlift with a heavy weight, my mind would be chanting “you’re gonna regret this….” Often, it was right.
I decided then that I was going to “practice” the deadlift proper. I’d had times where I didn’t deadlift for weeks or months and come back and hit a pr from doing other training. That wasn’t gonna happen this time. I needed to reset and engrain a solid technique and approach to deadlift. So I’ve decided to narrow my focus to bench pressing and deadlifting.
The Cycle I avoided
It’s always been hard for me to follow powerlifting cycle. It’s like, if I’m not PRing regularly, I have no confidence, no gauge for progress. This isn’t how it has to be. Only now am I accepting that sun maximal volume may be just what I need: a good amount of practice, some hypertrophy, and a lighter load. Then I recalled the Surovetsky cycle.
I’d realized I’d already performed a a couple bench press workouts with the exact beginning percentages and reps as the S cycle and one 5 x 5 of deadlifts with that percentage. I decided I’d run a concurrent cycle for both bench and deadlift. I performed a few sessions already.
For the bench press, I decided to stick to the main moves I’ve been using: the Larsen press (intensity day) and the feet up Duffalo bar press (volume days). I’d already done an intensity day last week, doing 4 paused sets of singles with 215 lbs (88.5 % estimated max) each set with a longer pause.
Here is one example
And the volume (5 x 5)
The volume day is set to end the cycle at 190 lbs x 2 x 2 before maxing out on the final workout. I’ve already performed 195 x 3 x 2 sets so this is perhaps too easy. However, the point is to do a large volume of medium intensity anyways. The plan is to screw a lot of volume, perfect the pause, and become stronger in the bottom position. As Louie says “it’s more important that it raises your classic lift.”
For the deadlift, here was one
Surovetsky calls for touch and go on the volume days however, Pavel admonishes that this is preferable for sumo pullers as conventional lifters have a harder time reaching proper start position on descent. I found this to be true and puzzled this conundrum during warmup sets until I found my rep performance method.
As seen in the video, instead of touch and go, I did controlled negatives and without disconnect my upper body from the bar, reset my hips and went for the next rep. I think this’ll work just fine.
Also, I took a very thorough approach to setting up, not rushing in, making sure everything was aligned. I tried various grips, various foot positions but this one along with the over/under grip felt the most natural. I will stick with it through the cycle.
Accesory/ Extra work
I’ve decided for most of the cycle, to do namely only kettlebell work as opposed to traditional powerlifting/bodybuilding work, relying mostly on my two barbell lifts to achieve most of the strength results. However, my stretching and bw days earlier in the week, made me recall their value in a program and how I’d always wished to integrate them into barbell training. In the past week, after Miam work I’d done very easy cooldown work and kettlebell and mobility work on off days. A list of approved exercises are
Swings (all types)
Goblet Squats
DB KB FS
Single Leg RdL
Renegade Lunges
Kb snatches
Halos
TGU
Arm Bar
Pullovers
All ab work/ single leg work
Hanging
Band work
A lot of these exercises have had what Dan John has called a “tonic” effect on my body. On my volume deadlift day, all I did was a few easy walking lunges, light single leg deadlifts and side bends. On bench volume day, did pullovers and front lever tucks. The latter helps decompress the back and connect the abs to arms.
Of course, I might throw some other things in there, more so on the intensity days after the main lifts. Since I won’t be barbell squatting, I’ll do more light squats such as KB FS, or in the water well squats.
Thus far I’ve done 2 bench workouts and one deadlift volume day. Thus, my planned cycle will be as follows
Day 1 Deadlift (intensity)
Day 2 Bench (intensity)
Day 3 (light work)
Day 4 Deadlift (volume)
Day 5 Bench (volume)
Day 6 Light
Day 7 (Off)
Light days are optional but preferred and should never take away from the main lift days. This is my plan for the next eight weeks. I hope to pull 200 kgs by the end.