Ohrn Identity

Today was awesome, and let me explain why.  I went to workout with my brother today, something that doesn’t happen very often, and I decided to try to max out with him as my spotter.  You always do better, I think, when you can trust the dude that’s spotting you.

Anyways, so I decided I wanted to try to max out on bench today.  My goal for this summer was to get up to 305 on bench by the end of July.  Today, I was going to hit up 285.  It was going to be awesome.  So I get down and do a couple of warmup sets.  135 x 6 and 225 x 3.  I jump up to 265 to see how I’m feeling, and I hit that no problem.  Piece of cake in fact.

So, I decided to go right to 285.  I prepped myself mentally, and bam, I got it.  It was so easy.  I though to myself, I can do more no problem.  So I went to add 5 pounds on either side, and I thought to myself… this is stupid.  Why do 295 when I can hit 300 right now?  I searched the gym for the 2.5 pound weights, but couldn’t find them, so I just ended up adding 10 pounds on either side.

Here I am, ready to do 305 when my previous max from 3 weeks ago was 275.  I was so excited.  Could I do it?  I got down on the bench, clenched my ass, and pulled my shoulder together.  I breathed slowly 3 times, counted 1, 2, 3, and got my lift off from my brother.  Down the weight came to my chest.  I tapped and pushed up.  It went up without any difficulty.  Absolutely crazy, I thought to myself.  There’s no way I just did that.  I checked the weight again.  Sure enough, I hit 305 with ease.  I still had an entire circuit workout to do, so I stopped at that point, but man… it was awesome.

In addition to all this, I had the best workout I’ve ever had today.  My brother and I pushed super hard, and by the time I left the gym, I was exhausted.  I felt so good though.  It was absolutely amazing.

Woo for me hitting 300 ahead of schedule, Now, I’ve just got to push higher.

Man, today started out like it was going to be very, very disappointing.  I wanted to try to get a ton of weight on my deadlift today so I can move closer to my goal of 500 pounds.  I started out with a light warmup of 290 x 6, then jumped up to 400 x 4.  That was pretty good.  Then, I went up to 445 x 3 and got that easy.  I then jumped up to 465, but I couldn’t lift the weight off the ground.

Boy was I pissed.  I thought to myself, "Nick, you can’t give up yet.  You can get this."  So, I dropped the weight back down to 445 and did 3 reps.  I bumped it up to 455 and I got 2 reps.  My legs were on fire at this point.  I knew I could get the 465 though.  So I loaded it up.

I reached down and grabbed the bar… took 3 deep breaths and counted to 3.  On 3, I squatted down and pulled up with everything I had.  Pulling through the balls of my feet, I knew if I could just exert a little more force, it would leave the ground and I’d be golden.  I let out a primal grunt (luckily no one else was in the gym) and pulled up more.  The weight came off the ground.  I got the rest of the rep by breathing out as hard as I could.

I watched myself in the mirror on that rep.  I could see every muscle in my body straining against the weight.  My face, neck, and chest turned red.  All my veins popped out of my skin.  But I got it.  I got 465.  Now, I’m only 35 pounds away from my goal that I need to hit by the end of July.  Wish me luck.

Man, I feel great this morning.  It is ridiculous how good I feel right now.  I look like a freaking behemoth.

Today was shoulders, traps, and biceps day.  I started out with seated dumbbell military press.  I did 10×65, 8 x 75, 6 x 85, and 3 x 90.  It was great.  Then, I moved onto front dumbbell raise with 10 x 40s, 8 x 45s, 8 x 50s, 6 x 55s.  Then, it was moving on to lateral dumbbell raise.  I tried out a new technique I read about in Muscle & Fitness where you take the lateral raises above horizontal to about 135 degrees.  I had to decrease the weight from what I usually use, but I think I really worked my traps with that exercise today.  I finished up shoulders with bent-over lateral raises.

Moving on to traps, I started out with upright row where I did 8 x 95, 4 times.  I supersetted that with Dumbbell Shrugs using the hundreds.  Again, 8 x 100s, 4 times.  Moving on to biceps I did barbell curl, hammer curl, preacher curl, and high tower cable curls.  I finished up with a set of 21s.  7 - 7 - 7 of upper half, lower half, and full rep of exercise.

Like I said, I felt awesome today.  I just wish my gym allowed you to wear sleeveless shirts.  I’m looking forward to legs day tomorrow, I’m going to go for the 1/4 ton deadlift first thing.  I hope I get it!

Last week, I decided to post a few pictures of myself in the BodyBuilding.com forums.  The response was overwhelmingly positive.  I got compliments on almost all aspects of my upper body, in spite of my pale whiteness. This was, to say the least, very, very encouraging.  The funny thing is, I don’t think I’m anywhere near where my potential can take me.

Over the summer, when I’m away from campus and the nasty cafeteria food, I’m going to be trying to drop 3-4% bodyfat.  I’ve decided that I have what it takes to be a fitness model, and only a few changes in my diet are necessary for me to attain the level of fitness that can put me in position to take on that task.  So, I’m setting a goal now, that by the end of the summer I will sitting at 11-12% bodyfat while still maintaining my current musculature.

My goal is this.  When I graduate I would like to be one of the few quality software developers/fitness models in the US today.  How awesome would that be?