Vlad's training log

[Vlad]

Impressive Vlad, that deadlift. I'm speechless really.

Thanks, Guru!

[Vlad]

9 Mar 2009. Workout 24.

Squat: 71 kg (156 lb) - 5x5
warm-up: BW – 2x5, 21 kg – 2x5, 31 kg – 5, 41 kg – 5, 51 kg – 3, 61 kg – 3

BP: 43.5 kg (96 lb) – 5x5
warm-up:
I/O shoulder exercises
BP: 16 kg – 10, 21 kg – 2x5, 31 kg – 5, 38.5 kg – 3

Squat was difficult, but still doable without problems. BP was unexpectedly difficult today, and the bar was rather wobbly on the last set. Both of my shoulders did not feel well today. I had some pain in the front deltoids, but I was able to stop the pain by massage. So I was a kind of pain-free for the working sets.

I am not sure at the moment what is the real cause of my shoulder pain since my rotator cuff muscles are fine. I suspect that it could be due to biceps, since I started to do chin-ups (in addition to pull-ups) last week without any preparation. Initially it was OK, but when I did pull-ups last week (workout 23), I had pain in the front deltoid during the exercise. Now my biceps contain painful trigger-points, and I know that they should send pain to the front deltoid, but it still feels weird that you can get shoulder pain due to biceps.

To summarise, my working theory at the moment is that by starting doing chin-ups all of a sudden in the middle of my training cycle and without any progression from low load to high, I overloaded my biceps and created trigger-points in them. Since biceps attach to the top of the humerus (the bone between the shoulder and elbow joints) and in front, this creates pain in the area where the front deltoids are. So I have decided to abandon chin/pull-ups for the moment to see if this leads to the shoulder recovery. I will also continue doing massage of the shoulder and biceps muscles. I would be really un-happy if had to stop heavy training of BP and OHP due to a shoulder injury. But I don't care much about the assitence exercises.

So I will continue with BP and OHP as planned, but only if pain-free after the warm-up (and massage if necessary), and time will show if I am right or wrong.

[guru]

Well, you're more knowledgeable about this stuff, but the front delt pain can be caused either by biseps as you say, or by the pectoral muscles.

Anyway, good luck with this. See you fully healed soon.

[Vlad]

Well, you're more knowledgeable about this stuff, but the front delt pain can be caused either by biseps as you say, or by the pectoral muscles.

Anyway, good luck with this. See you fully healed soon.

Thank you, Guru, for your support. Yes, upper pecs could be the reason too, but they seem to be OK. However, I treat them anyway, just in case.

[bluestreak]

Great progress Vlad. That deadlift was great. Took me a lot longer to get to that point Do you find you need chalk for your hands?

If it's any consolation, it seems you are going through exactly the same thing I did. The chin ups/pull ups were causing a lot of pain and I had to throw them out - as well as all my assistance exercises. I also struggled for a long time with my bench in the 50 kg range and OHP in the 30 kg range. In addition, my squat got really heavy and ultimately caused an injury (poor form). I also had the chronic fatigue, which was partially all the milk and partially long hours at work. The good news is that I've been able to overcome everything but it's taken me a long time.

In addition to everything you are doing, the only other thing to suggest is to study your form on all your exercises. Little things can make a big difference. I've found it useful to take videos periodically. Looking back, I can see a big difference in form and understand why I previously had problems in my wrists, shoulders, lower back, etc.

Keep going strong. I know you'll get past all these problems

[Vlad]

Thanks for your support, Bluestreak!

It's really good to know that there are people with similar problems and that they (you for example) have been able to solve them. It's really motivating! Long time does not scare me if I know that in the end it will be fine. My strengths in the upper body just sucks at the moment compared to my legs and back, so I guess it's inevitable that it will take a long time to get to a decent level.

I will try to video myself, but at the moment I need to overcome a mental barrier of doing it in front of other people, particularly for the BP where I struggle with a chicken weight.

[Vlad]

Great progress Vlad. That deadlift was great. Took me a lot longer to get to that point Do you find you need chalk for your hands?

Thanks! I use chalk for my heavy set of 5 reps. Otherwise my hands become slippery. For the warm-up sets I do not use it.

[DaveT]

I will try to video myself, but at the moment I need to overcome a mental barrier of doing it in front of other people, particularly for the BP where I struggle with a chicken weight.

Try not to delay videoing yourself, because if your form is off, you'll only have to deload at a higher weight or in the worst case, you may injure yourself. Who are you lifting weights for? You or other people? Once you answer this question, you stop caring about what other people think about what you're doing. They may laugh now, but guess who'll be laughing when you rack your BW on the bar and BP it for 5 reps with good form. Then you'll get up with a smug smile.

Your squat seems to be coming along nicely and your DL is awesome! You seem to have a huge amount of physiological knowledge, so I'm sure you'll sort out your aches and pains soon. Good luck and keep at it!

[Vlad]

11 Mar 2009. Workout 25.

Power clean: 43.5 kg (96 lb) - 5x5
warm-up: 16 kg -5, 23.5 kg -5, 28.5 kg -5, 33.5 kg -3, 38.5 kg -2

Squat: 73.5 kg (162 lb) - 5x5
warm-up: 41 kg - 2x5, 51 kg -5, 61 kg -3, 68.5 kg -2

Power clean was fine. Still do not need to jump with full power: tried a cuple of times and the bar went up too high. I experimented with not doing squat as a warm-up for power clean. That was not a good idea. The legs and back felt non-responsive during the intial warm-up sets. Furthermore, after power clean, even though I was very warm, I was not prepared to squat 41 kg due to the lack of flexibility in the legs. I thought that doing power clean would prepare my legs for the squat, but apparently it did not. So next time, I will warm-up for power clean with light sets of squat as usual. The experiment failed.

I had to do another set at 41 kg for the squat warm-up to stretch my legs. Then at the higher warm-up weights I still did not feel comfortable. Eventually I ended up doing a lot of warm-up reps, but still the warm-up was not optimal. So next time I will always start with two sets with an empty bar (it worked previously very well).

Needless to say, squat felt very heavy after such a warm-up. But every subsequent set was getting easier and easier, and the last one did not feel very heavy anymore.

All in all, a decent workout anyway.

[Vlad]

I will try to video myself, but at the moment I need to overcome a mental barrier of doing it in front of other people, particularly for the BP where I struggle with a chicken weight.

Try not to delay videoing yourself, because if your form is off, you'll only have to deload at a higher weight or in the worst case, you may injure yourself. Who are you lifting weights for? You or other people? Once you answer this question, you stop caring about what other people think about what you're doing. They may laugh now, but guess who'll be laughing when you rack your BW on the bar and BP it for 5 reps with good form. Then you'll get up with a smug smile.

Your squat seems to be coming along nicely and your DL is awesome! You seem to have a huge amount of physiological knowledge, so I'm sure you'll sort out your aches and pains soon. Good luck and keep at it!

Thanks for the advice and your support, Dave! You convinced me. I'll try to do it as soon as possible.

[bluestreak]

Thanks for the advice and your support, Dave! You convinced me. I'll try to do it as soon as possible.

Great to see! The average digital camera takes video; I find that works best. How about you take video of your push ups as well? If so, I'll a video of my push ups as well.

BTW, why no bench press in your last workout? Deltoids still hurt?

With the OHP and bench, I found it useful to go in on off days and do really light sets 3x3. I use it as an opportunity to reinforce form and get blood flow, muscle movements in sore/hurt areas. Yet another thing to consider. I believe this is what helped me get past the 40 kg mark in my OHP.

[Vlad]

Great to see! The average digital camera takes video; I find that works best. How about you take video of your push ups as well? If so, I'll a video of my push ups as well.

I have ditched all the assistence exercises for the moment. So no video of push ups at the moment. Sorry.

BTW, why no bench press in your last workout? Deltoids still hurt?

I am doing right now (as posted previously) a modified version of SL 5x5, in which the lifts of two regular workouts (A and B) are spread between three workouts during a week.

This way I do the following:

Workout 1 (Mon): Squat and BP
Workout 2 (Wen): Power clean and squat
Workout 3 (Fri): DL and OHP

This way I train my lower body 3x per week and upper body 2x per week. This was done to save time (so that I am not late for work) and to get more recovery (particularly for shoulders) still training 3x per week.

My left shoulder is problematic at the moment. I suspect it is from the biceps (which is rather bad in the left hand at the moment). I intend to do OHP tomorrow anyway, if there is no pain after the warm-up. I hope that fixing biceps with the massage will solve the problem.

With the OHP and bench, I found it useful to go in on off days and do really light sets 3x3. I use it as an opportunity to reinforce form and get blood flow, muscle movements in sore/hurt areas. Yet another thing to consider. I believe this is what helped me get past the 40 kg mark in my OHP.

I do not have time at the moment for more training. I have hard time keeping my schedule as it is. But I will definately keep it in mind for the future.

Thank you for the advice and support! I really apreciate it.

[Vlad]

13 Mar 2009. Workout 26.

DL: 125 kg (275 lb) – 1x5 NEW PR
warm-up: 60 kg -5, 75 kg -4, 85 kg -3, 95 kg -2, 105 kg -1, 115 kg -1

OHP: 33.7 kg (74 lb) – 3x5
warm-up:
I/O exercises
OHP: 11 kg – 3x5, 16 kg -5, 21 kg -5, 26 kg -3, 31 kg -2

Today is Friday 13. I felt really not well, and at the same time I was supposed to go for a PR in DL. So I thought maybe it was not a good idea to do it today. But then I told myself to stop this silly superstition nonsense, and just do what I was supposed to. I remember the way Bluestreak put it after doing 130 kg DL for the first time: “I just went into a zone where I felt no pain and just lifted it”. My last DL was very hard for me, so I thought that today I would definitely need to go into a zone to lift even more, particularly under such circumstances. The warm-up for DL was pretty difficult, but at 95 kg I started to feel much better, and 125 kg went up 5 times. The first 3 reps were actually not so difficult (relative to the way I imagined they would be, of course). The last 2 reps were much harder, but still went up without sticking anywhere. So I did not have to go into a zone today. Maybe next time. Very glad about DL today.

My left shoulder is still not OK, but after the warm-up, I did not have any pain, so I decided to crank up the weight as planned. The weight felt hard today (did I say it before?), but still went up quickly without problem. On the first set, my left arm was slightly slower locking out, but later it was as fast as the right one. Did not have time today, so just did 3 sets.

A good workout in spite of … OK I do not mention that nonsense

[nburge]

Hey! Great effort Vlad - glad to see you're hitting records all the time. I also wouldn't worry about the chicken weights - I've just got to 45kgs on bench which is less than most of the others in the gym seem to want to curl, but I'll get there eventually. We all will, and then we can sit back and smile.... I had an unhelpful git tell me to do 10 reps, and that he could squat 275kgs when he was my age this morning - I just ignored him; I'm only in the gym for one person - me.

And all you guys of course

[guru]

The weight felt hard today (did I say it before?), but still went up quickly without problem.

I know, I know. Now when I read it in your log, I automatically assume that you have at least 10-15 kg in you.