Foxybass Training

[Foxybass]

Hello from a cold, grey England. This is my first training post. Before I start, here’s a big thank you to Mehdi and all who consistantly post their training logs. You are truly inspirational.

A bit of history; 2 years ago my diet was awful. I didn’t exercise, I drank plenty of alcohol and smoked. I played in a band and was living the dream. The way I was going I wouldn’t reach 50 years old. There’s a bit more info in “First Time Here”.

Many many years ago I played football, tennis and cricket. I also enjoyed jogging and lifting weights. I never followed a programme. So I was relatively fit once.

I’m 5’9” and weight 88kg. I’m 40 later this year. I have a beautiful supportive wife and two daughters (4 years, 11 weeks old). I have to do my training before I go to work. Here’s the schedule;

Mondays: Up at 5am – Treadmill @ 10km per hour. Started at 15 mins have worked up to 20 mins.
Tuesdays: Up at 4am – Stronglifts 5x5
Wednesdays: Up at 5am – Treadmill.
Thursdays: Up at 4am – Stronglifts 5x5
Fridays: Day off
Saturdays: Up at 6am – Treadmill.
Sundays: Up at 6am – Stronglifts 5x5

My diet is slowly getting there. I started Fitday a few weeks back and have adjusted a few things. On average I'm slightly over 3200 calories a day. I drink loads of water; maybe too much. A typical day;

Wake - Whey Shake (with oats if doing Stronglifts), coffee
Exercise
6am-7am – Oats & All Bran with milk, 3 eggs, spinach
9.30am – 200g chicken, turkey or beef, carrots.
12 – Tin of tuna, spinach, salad
2.30pm – 250g cottage cheese, apple
5pm – 250g cottage cheese
7.30pm – Evening Meal (homemade chilli con carne, or chicken curry or stew or spag bol or a casserole)
9.30pm – 250g cottage cheese then bed

As you can see, I love cottage cheese. Sleep isn’t brilliant because of the kids but it’s no problem…yet.

I’ve been working out on my second attempt at Stronglifts for a few weeks. This is where I’m at after today’s workout;

8 mins on treadmill. Loads of stretching.
Squats 40kg: 5/5/5/5/5
Bench Press 70kg: 5/5/4/4/4 (1st stall)
Bbell Rows 50kg: 5/5/5/5/5
Pull Ups: 4,3,2

The squats feel great. The above took me around 75 mins and that included getting our eldest her milk and putting on Little Mermaid 2 dvd for her in between the squats and bench press. I’m not too keen on Little Mermaid but Pocahontas gives me the h#rn. Workout time is a factor especially during the week. I need to somehow get it down to around an hour or so. I love barbell rows, but I will change to inverted rows when I can’t progress anymore.

Any suggestions or comments would be appreciated.

Catch you soon.

[bluestreak]

Gday mate. Glad to see you started a training log. I've got a 4 yo but I remember the first few months... I workout in the morning as well. Leaves me feeling pumped up for the day.

Don't worry about drinking lots of water. I have a Brita filter and fill it up many times during the day.

Your lifts are looking strong, though your squats are low compare to everything else. Why is that?

Also, have you considered doing HIIT instead of plain cardio? From what I've read, it's actually more effective to put the cardio/HIIT after your workout, not before.

I understand there are other musicians amongst us - check out Beppe's log.

Keep going strong.

[Foxybass]

Cheers for the reply Bluestreak. Realy appreciate it.

My squats are low because I had to restart and really focus on my form. During my first attempt at Stronglifts I started to lose the plot. I was obsessed by increasing the weight rather than getting the foundations in place first. Now I'm progressing well and it feels totally different.

Thanks for the tip on HIIT. 20 mins on the treadmill at the same pace is dull but I have my mp3 player on to get me through it. I'll have a research on HIIT and mix things up a bit. Cheers for that.

Catch you soon.

[holvoetn]

Thanks for the tip on HIIT. 20 mins on the treadmill at the same pace is dull but I have my mp3 player on to get me through it. I'll have a research on HIIT and mix things up a bit. Cheers for that.

When you research HIIT, also checkout Tabata for when you are short on time.
4 minutes: 8 cycles of 20 secs pedal-to-the-metal, 10 secs recovering.
That should wear you out pretty fast

Now, the key here is that after applying this scheme, your metabolism will remain elevated for DAYS after !!
You can do this with elliptical, sprinting, pushups, BW squats (but be careful about form !!!), ... use your imagination.

In your other post you mention something about deadlift 1x10. Why 10 and not 5 ?

[Foxybass]

I did a treadmill session this morning. Taking Bluestreak's advice I mixed things up a bit. It was hardly HIIT but I did 1 minute jogging then 1 minute quite fast for 20 mins or so. The treadmill takes a good 15 seconds or so to ramp up the speed and I felt a little uneasy at first at the faster speed. The thing is the 20 minutes flew by. I couldn't believe where the time went. I felt really shattered after but mentally I felt fresh. I'm normally brain dead after a session on the treadmill because of the sheer boredom. Cheers Bluestreak.

@ Holvoetn. Thanks about the Tabata. Never heard of that before. I'll have to check that out.

About my deadlift goal. It's 10 x 125kg because when I bought my weights I made a big mistake. I still had some weights from when I trained in my teens. I thought I'd save some money and make use of those but get a new bar and some heavier weights. So I made the mistake of buying a standard bar that has a maximum lifting capacity of 125Kg. I wish I had read everything on Stronglifts before I started. That's the trouble with me; I get an idea and just rush ahead without thinking long term. Once I can't progress anymore with the equipment I have I guess I'll join a gym.

Looking forward to tomorrow. I've got an overhead press stall to deal with.

Until that day....

[Foxybass]

Tuesday 13 Jan

Walk, slight jog on treadmill (just to warm up). Loads of stretching.
Squats 42.5kg: 5/5/5/5/5 - Need to work on squeezing the glutes more.
Overhead Press 42.5kg: 5/5/5/5/5 - Very heavy for me & struggled on the final rep but nailed it.
Deadlifts 90kg: 5 - Crap. Felt as though I wasn’t using my legs enough. 80kg next time and work on form. I really don’t want to injure myself.
Chin Ups: 7,7,5 - Coming along good. 6 months ago I could only do one.

Really pleased with myself. Had a poor nights sleep but still up at 4am.


Wednesday 14 Jan

Treadmill: Warm up then approx 1 min @ 9km, 1 min @13km repeat for 15 mins. Warm down.
Stretching.

Ended up eating a lot last night. The wife felt ill and she couldn't eat all her evening meal. Didn't want to waste it! Feel good for it this morning though.

Looking forward to smacking the bench press in the face tomorrow morning.

[bluestreak]

When I first started working out, I too did running but I also found it incredibly boring. That type of sprinting is more fun. I highly recommend The Bear (see this link, scroll down).

Good job on the OHP - took me a long time to get to that point Are you checking your form on the deadlift? I use my digital camera to occasionally take videos (one recent video in my log).

Regarding your glutes, you might want to add this to your off day routine. It will help your squats (helped me quite a bit):
hip mobility
glute activation exercises
soft tissue work

[Foxybass]

Cheers Bluestreak. Will investigate all your comments. Wish I could help someone with advice. I feel like I'm taking from everyone and I can't offer anything in return. I guess in a year's time I'll be able to offer some advice gained from my experiences.

Thursday 15 Jan

Walk, slight jog on treadmill (just to warm up). Loads of stretching.
Squats 45kg: 5/5/5/5/5
Bench Press 70kg: 5/5/5/5/0 (2nd stall)
Bbell Rows 50kg: 5/5/5/5/5
Pull Ups: 3,2,3

Squats felt great. 5th rep in 4th set of Bench Press was dangerous and I just couldn’t do anything on the final set.

Enjoyed the workout and I’m feeling healthier and stronger.

[Mouse]

My squats are low because I had to restart and really focus on my form.

Foxy
Don't worry about this - if you've been at this for a while you'll know how quickly the weight will stack up.

Deadlifts 90kg: 5 - Crap. Felt as though I wasn’t using my legs enough. 80kg next time and work on form. I really don’t want to injure myself.

If i can give you a tip about deads:

Read as many posts on the blog as you can about this.
I find hip snap is the key for me with loads of glute involvement.

Some good numbers here though
Keep it going

[bluestreak]

Great bench - wish I had those numbers. How much of a break are you giving yourself? It can be anywhere up to 5 minutes, especially if you're aiming for a PR. I usually wait for my heart to calm down.

[Foxybass]

Sunday 18 Jan

Walk, slight jog on treadmill (just to warm up). Loads of stretching.
Squats 47.5kg: 5/5/5/5/5 - Need to work on squeezing the glutes more.
Overhead Press 45kg: 5/4/3/3/2 – Shoulders felt great after.
Deadlifts 70kg: 5 – Worked on form. Still not good enough.
Treadmill – 1 min jog then 1 min fast and repeat for 10 mins.

Above took 90 minutes and I felt beat.

Based on the advice from Bluestreak and Mouse and all the last weeks reading I’ve done on Stronglifts I’ve changed my schedule to;

Mondays: Up at 5.30am – Soft tissue work. Hip and glute stretches.
Tuesdays: Up at 4am – Stronglifts 5x5
Wednesdays: Day off
Thursdays: Up at 4am – Stronglifts 5x5
Fridays: Day off
Saturdays: Up at 6.30am – Soft tissue work. Hip and glute stretches.
Sundays: Up at 6.30am - Stronglifts 5x5

Our 13 week old daughter is being an angel. She's sleeping right through the night. With the above changes; I think I'll be getting enough rest/sleep now.

I’m not very flexible in the hips and my hamstrings do get tight. I sit at a desk all day at work so that doesn’t help. I’m hoping that the stretching will improve the form on squats and Deadlifts.

@ Bluestreak - Cheers; I'll swap my bench numbers for your squats please! I was giving myself a 3 minute rest in between the sets. I'm on my 3rd stall tomorrow so I'll give it 5 minutes and see what happens.

Thanks guys.

[bluestreak]

13 weeks old... I remember those days. Took my daughter much longer to sleep properly.

Good job mate. I too have a desk job. Those mobility exercises do help. Thankfully, my hamstrings were in a pretty good state when I started but my hip and ankle mobility was a shocker.

If you can, do the soft tissue and mobility exercises every day before you start your lifts. That's what I do. It makes for a longer workout but it helps a lot. Also helps get your heart rate up. You can also do them on your off days.

[Foxybass]

Tuesday 20 Jan

Cheers Bluestreak. Your sound advice is working.

Walk, slight jog on treadmill (just to warm up). Loads of stretching; ankle mobility, hips & glutes.
Squats 50kg: 5/5/5/5/5
Bench Press 70kg: 5/5/5/5/5
Bbell Rows 55kg: 5/5/5/5/5
Chin Ups: 9,6,4

Squats felt much better. I’ve only done a few extra sessions of soft tissue work, hip stretches and glute activation stretches on my days off and I can already feel the difference. I can now feel where the power is coming from.

I took 5 minutes rest in between the bench press sets and nailed them. I think I might get 72.5kg.

Last 2 reps in final set on barbell rows were a joke. I think it’s time to switch to inverted rows. I’m going to have a read and try them soon.

Chins were ok but my mind was elsewhere. It was a long session, my time was running out and I still wanted 10 mins jog/sprint on the treadmill.

Catch you soon.

[Foxybass]

Thursday 22 Jan

Woke up just before 4am and felt great. Couldn’t wait to get started.

Soft tissue work, hip & glute stretches. Walk, slight jog on treadmill (just to warm up).
Squats 52.5 kg: 5/5/5/5/5
Overhead Press 45kg: 5/5/5/5/5
Deadlifts 60kg: 5
Only 8 mins on treadmill – 1 min jog then 1 min fast; not quite a sprint.

Squats - Best form so far. It’s still light but it feels good. I must focus more during warm up sets instead of rushing to get them out the way.
Overhead Press – Took 5 minutes in between sets. Form was good but I felt very light-headed after the final set. I reckon’ I could get 47.5kg this time before a deload.
Deadlifts – Form was much better. I’ll increase the weight if it still feels good next time.

Above took just over 2 hours but still had time to cram the tons of oats and eggs down the trap before leaving for work. I’ve done no ab work at all but I really feel them. Complete rest tomorrow and looking forward to week 4.

[holvoetn]

Squats - Best form so far. It’s still light but it feels good. I must focus more during warm up sets instead of rushing to get them out the way.

Warm up sets are very important, don't skip them.
But also make sure you are not burning too much energy.
Your last two sets or so should only be done with max. 3 reps, maybe even 1 or 2 for the very last.

Overhead press is the most difficult for most people. FWIW I also completed 47.5kg this week