Shamus5’s BodyBlog

I finished up that last WO program with about two weeks I did not track. I didn’t really do much gaining on it and I didn’t really lean out too much either. All in all it puffed up some muscles and strengthened secondary muscles. It wasn’t a waste of time because my chest looks pretty big even though I lost some strength. I am done with that now.

I am now doing a powerlifting program. I am not going to track it because some of the things are unorthodox. I am focusing on one muscle group a day with 3 lifts. Then doing 3-4 secondary lifts that doesn’t use the main muscle group. There is really only 1 or 2 focused lift a day. It is 7 or 8 sets going from 10 reps to 2-3(form breaks and failure) with an aditional 8 rep cooldown. It is working wonders on my legs and back. I don’t think it works as well for shoulders and chest.

I like the heavy wieght. Ripping calluses, type heavy weight. More later.

I know I have only been bodybuilding for about six months but one thing I know is that the pics of these guys shredded are like competition photos. No one that is trying to gain muscle has BF% anywhere close to any of the ab-centric pics that draw VISITS.

I started to lean down a little over a month ago and I have taken it slow so I can still gain strength. Today I weighed in at 200.5 before my WO which is down 8lbs from 5 weeks ago, and I am stronger now. I am 6′1.5" and 200.5LBS and cutting. If I focused entirely on cutting I reckon I could get to about 190 and about 185 if I cut H20 too. But if I cut all that I would lose several LBS of muscle. So why the frick would I do it unless I had other motives?

All I’m saying is that if you work out for a couple months and starve/dehydrate yourself…you will have cut up abdominals as well.

I am making some gains on this program.

http://workout.bodybuilding.com/Shamus5/

The gains aren’t coming as fast on this program as the 5×5 but I expected that. In fact I didn’t know if I would gain much at all doing this high rep WO. I am putting up personal best work sets again every WO which is always exciting. So my plan to keep gaining strength while losing fat is "KIND OF" working. The dang fat is going but it is going slow. I have gone from a high of 208 to 202. I may have put on some muscle too so I think I have lost around 7 pounds in the last month.

I has been hard for me to cut down too much on my calories while I am lifting so hard. I can’t justify cutting serious weight while I keep gaining strength. And since I don’t really need to lose weight for any reason I am fine with it going slow right now. I may plan to do a real cut when I either plateau on this WO, get sick of it, or my muscles need a break.

Also, I don’t think I get a pump with NO products. 

Back on track at TPG. Completed 6 good WO in the last 8 days. http://workout.bodybuilding.com/Shamus5/

I want to really push myself going into Thanksgiving. I may go out of town and miss a few days. I won’t make the mistake of doing nothing for a week on end. As a bonus it would please me to look impressive with family all around.

I think I am getting closer to understanding how my body gains. I know that I really didn’t lose anything by not having a WO in a week. I just didn’t gain, and any failures of reps didn’t really mean anything. I don’t know if that was clear but what I think is that there is "muscle memory" and it bounces back quick if trained correctly. Next time I switch my WO program instead of taking 4 days off entirely I am going to taper down my muscles instead of stopping cold. I still have no clue about diet though.

My quads are still sore after 72hrs PWO. I don’t think they hurt me that much on DL but I need to see if that kind of soreness is not actually good. Is it? I have one big leg day on this program, but do DLs and SLDLs 3 days before, and cleans the day before.

More on Supps when I get around to it.

So, things come up and you have to break your routine. It happens to everyone and it happened to me this week. I went a whole week without hittin the iron and to make things worse it was after week one of a new program. I feel like I haven’t gained and may have even lost some of the great momentum I had going in my body. I know now that I have to try and do something to break down my muscles a little if I have to do this again. Some things are more important tahn lifting heavy….right? Of course. But then, why am I so pissed that I haven’t gained.

Weight is still up. The hiatus also had my diet jacked. It sucks when you are trying to eat right, in front of people. They think you are crazy or judge you for some reason. I caved and I regret it.

I ain’t all bad. I got some new supps that I will talk about later.

Squat deep!!! Even though I’m not squating too much in this program.

I had some significant soreness and I was too aggressive with weight on Leg day but I think this program will definately help me long term. I am excited to see what kind of gains I can get doing this program for 6 weeks.

Bad news is I haven’t lost any weight and it is too early to tell if I am leaning out any. I feel like I am still gaining size but the size could just be better shape. Either way I am happy I am starting to look better. It isn’t really my goal to drop pounds anyway, I just want to lean out.

I am thinking of trying a thermogenic but I need to learn more about what I need to eat and do for them to really work. I am still eating a ton right now so I guess I am kidding myself about the whole "cutting thing" anyway. I also haven’t started cardio. So you know I’m not too serious about cutting. Maybe once I settle into this WO I can do a jog in the morning or something.

Leg day is for real men!

http://workout.bodybuilding.com/Shamus5/?opt=det&ref=940832

Like I expected the 2nd WO destroyed my biceps like the 1st WO destroyed my triceps. I was so torn up I already had to take an extra day. I like the program I have outlined because it has the high intensity  I am looking for to burn some fat. The downside is that my muscles are used to one 5-rep work set and this program has two to three 10-12 rep work sets which is quite a shock. I hope my muscles can adapt after the first week because I am in a ton of pain right now.

I plan on using this program until I get pretty cut. I am excited and dreading this. I have probably not had less than 12% BF since I was 10 years old and I hope to get well below that mark. I am about to order some supps to help with this but I am still researching which ones to get. In the past I haven’t really like fat burners but to accomplish my goal I will probably have to just do it.

Any thoughts on supps to buy would be appreciated.

Squat deep!

I set out to just look better when I started lifting again. Since then I have realized that I also want to get pretty big as well. But since I wrote down that I wanted to bulk for a while and then cut down I feel like I have to do what I originally wanted to. So at the 205lbs mark I will now cut down to…. whatever I see fit. And to do this I have started on a much different WO program.

My new program will be a 6 or 7 day split. It might be 7 days(2,off,2,off,off) this week to let my muscles adapt but I think after that I can cut it to 6 days.

1. Chest/Tri/Calves/Abs

2. Back/Lats/Bi/Forearm/Abs

3.Off

4. Shoulder/Traps/Calves/Abs

5. Legs/Forearm/Abs

6.Off

My 1st WO is below.
http://workout.bodybuilding.com/Shamus5/?opt=det&ref=938222

I am doing high reps for definition. I am also using Dumbells a bunch for the 1st time. The DBs made me realize that my triceps are a major weakness for me. They burned throughout the WO and I expect them to get quite sore. I anticipate the same for my biceps. I have never worked my arms a ton before. Note my pathetic 15" arms on my bodyspace. I was hoping to be one of the only guys to bench 300+ with 15" arms….Haha.

Anyways, I am battling my diet right now cause I got to eat so much when I was bulking. It is also football season and I tailgate every Sunday with beer and tailgate food so this cut is gonna get tough. I guess I will have to suck it up and eat as clean as I can all week.

Any Supps that a guy on a cut must Have?

Squat deep and train hard guys!

So I learned that the 5×5 is an excellent way to gain serious strength. I did gain some mass but lost some definition. That was probably cause I was eating like a horse. The mass I gained was almost entirely in my core plus thighs. Even with my auxiliaries my arms didn’t gain that much and I was too beat to really do much abs during the program. I also had to cut some auxiliaries as I went deeper into the program. As the weight gets heavier it Really starts to take a toll on you.

But as I think about  it , it is so worth it.  I mean, At the end I was repping previous maxes in about 7 weeks. And those weren’t really true maxes. They were rep-max estimates. So in fact in weeks 5-7 I was repping more weight than I had maxed before. Amazing. It blew my mind when I was lifting 3 plates for reps on squat… or when some guy told me I was benching a lot of weight.

I am really really pleased with it. Now for my first cut. I am not really trying to lose weight for something but I want to get more defined. It is all about learning through hard-ass-work-experience here in The Proving Ground.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Finished up my 6th week of my 5×5 WO program. http://workout.bodybuilding.com/Shamus5/

I haven’t done any 1-rep maxes on any lifts but my working maxes have gained huge.

Bench +35lbs, Squat +60lbs, Deads +60lbs, Bicept +15lbs, Rows +35lbs, Overhead +20lbs

All of that in six weeks. I was able to bump up my program several times on a few lifts and at least maintain all of them. So in 6 weeks I completed 7-11 weeks worth of gains in the program. The biggest gains were in Squat and Deadlift followed by Rows, Bench, and Military. I used strict form, especially on squat which is now a quality lift, and I am confident these gains are real.

This program was challenging and painful. There was a ton of aches and I had to listen to my body to figure out what kind of auxiliaries to do. I had to learn when to back off, like take an extra day, and when to bump up the work sets.

I have gained about 14 lbs since I started the program and have been eating clean most of the time. I have gained some fat from excess calories, I have been eating tons. This program was also had less pace than I am used to. My mass went up a bunch at first and I think my muscles are ready for a shock. I am ready to start shedding some weight and getting cut. I will do measurements first.

I highly suggest a heavy weight program like this for an intermediate lifter. I will talk more about the program later.