My BodyBlog

Got back from my business trip Friday afternoon a couple of hours early.  With my wife away until dinner time, and with nothing pressing on my desk, the gym beckoned to me!  Since chest and shoulders were worked hard the day before, and I wanted to leave lower body until Sunday as planned, I decided to do a high volume arm workout.  I did bi/tri supersets and jumped rope in between the weights.  I decided to do 1000 jump rope reps before leaving the gym.  I started doing sets of 50.  I’d do 2 sets of these, resting 15-20 seconds in between, after each tri/bi superset.  That worked until I got to set #17, when I could only do 1 set at a time.  I was getting very tired by then but I was so close to my goal that it kept me going.  What a great feeling to get it done and what great cardio!  The arm workout was intense too, I did 30 sets all together.  Felt it in my biceps Saturday which is not the norm for me.

Saturday I was again called upon the help with a move, this time a lot of boxes from one house, in a vehicle, then out of the vehicle and into another house, plus many trips up and down stairs.  I lost count of how many trips up and down I made.  It was a hot day too, I was sweating and I know it was just as good a cardio workout as I could have done at the gym.  Saturday evening I found myself exhausted.  Workout (with sprinting HIIT) Thursday, workout (with jump rope) Friday, then the moving (especially the stairs) on Saturday.  I went to bed early and had a great 9 hours sleep!  Waking up Sunday I felt refreshed, although legs were a little sore.  Today’s workout is all about squats starting out, so I’ll just have to see how it goes!  I’ll save this post as a draft and pick it up again later….

On my way to the gym I was called upon to help move the last item of furniture for my sister-in-law - a heavy old wooden desk.   This was a b***h to move, it was just me and her so we mostly slid/pushed the thing along the floor, except for when it had to be lifted into the van.  Anyway, after about half an hour we got it done.  Arriving at the gym, I realized that I DID NOT want to squat.  Legs were already tired from all the cardio and the moving activity over the last 4 days - and now I’m supposed to squat heavy?  Starting out on the program two weeks ago I promised myself that I would stick to my plan for the whole 12 weeks unless physically unable - here was the first real test of my conviction.  Even if I didn’t do all my planned sets, reps and weights, I had to do some squatting or else feel like I don’t have what it takes to push through when the going gets tough, which is the true quality of a successful bodybuilder.

After a short warmup I got down to it.  Working sets were 135×12, 185×10, 205×9, 225×6.  The 225 set was hard, legs started to burn.  I went to 245 and only had 2 reps in me.  Finished off with 1 rep at 255.  All reps were good form and ATG.  Down in the hole at 255, feeling tired and knowing the effort it would take to get up, I felt content and satisfied.  This level of fatigue is what I want to achieve, I know that it will pay big dividends.  That was it for squatting, I’m so glad I did it!  Next was HIIT, but before heading upstairs to the machines, on impulse I did a set of pullups and banged out 12!  New personal best!  I spent 25 minutes on the arc trainer, hill interval setting at level 7.  Worked up a good sweat but I could have worked harder.  I’ll know to set it higher next time.  After the squats and cardio I had new found energy.  I finished my workout with 9 quad sets (thigh abduction, leg extension), final being a triple drop-set on the leg extension machine.  This caused a great burn.  I then did some calf work, 6 sets in a all.  I left the gym a tired but very satisfied.

I have a few long days of work this week, so I’m planning on resting until Wednesday which will be start of week 3 of 12, an upper body workout.  Lower body should be well rested when Friday rolls around, when I’m planning to go big on deadlifts!  Hope everyone has a great week!

This entry was posted on Monday, June 22nd, 2009 at 7:27 am and is filed under Training. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.