Strength I, Day D, Workout 1

One of my personal goals has always been to do unassisted chin-ups, and this was put on hold last year when my biceps got "twingy" on me, though in the middle of Hypertrophy I three months ago, I swapped the Wide-grip lat pulldowns with Assisted pull-ups so I could ease back into working towards this goal (like subtracting more than half my body weight from the load). This continued with Hypertrophy III's Mixed-grip chin-ups albeit with increasing difficulty from my getting heavier from the creatine. Still, I've learned to "contract everything" (as NRoL says) and use my lats and upper back more, and this morning I managed 5 consecutive chin-ups at 202lbs. It's not a lot, but it's a start. I wonder how many reps I could've done if I were 30lbs. lighter at 172lbs. August of last year, but then again, I wasn't as strong back then. Chicken-or-the-egg.

Strength I, Day C, Workout 1

It's been months since I've done regular Deadlifts (start of May), but thanks to all the single-leg and back stuff I've been doing since then, I made some major strides today, in particular, 1RM (rep max) at 364lbs. sans belt too! The last time I attempted something this heavy was one year ago when I strained my lower back big time (even with the belt) and couldn't easily sit or lie down for a week. (Once again, the Happy Wrap came to my rescue.)

Even though I feel I can eke out a bit more effort next time, I'll probably have to use a weight belt again just to be safe. I'll also have to ask a couple of trainers for some tips to avoid injury during the execution of the lift. This is very dangerous territory I'm in.

Strength I, Day B, Workout 1

Since I had somewhere else to be all day, I did another early morning workout, and having all the equipment practically to myself (because there was hardly anyone around) got me thinking about rescheduling my workouts in this phase even though it'll involve consecutive days, which NRoL frowns upon. Still, the days would fall on weekends when I'd the chance to rest up more, and I could actually do a proper upper body superset like I did today.

Speaking of which, I'm looking forward to see just how much I can bring up my single-rep Bench press. So far the benchmark to beat is 224lbs. Wish I had as good a time with my Bent over barbell rows, but my pathetic grip got in the way. Guess it's back to the wrist straps for me. As for the return of the Dumbbell shoulder presses, it's a bit of a bitch keeping myself from doing push presses.

Strength I, Day A, Workout 1

Woke up extra early today so I'd get into the gym before any of the regulars did so I could "hog" the power cage to do this "wave loading" version of Squats that had 6 sets with 3 minutes rest in between. Why the big gap? Two of those sets were single reps, which--if I read NRoL correctly,--were max reps. I think I did an OK job with 344lbs., but I'll have to ask for a second opinion next time just to be sure I'm not doing anything stupid when I'll be trying something heavier.

The last two Squat sets were low-weight/high reps, which turned out easier than I thought. The same, however, cannot be said of the return of the hated Bulgarian split squat/Step up combo with an added curse-inducing twist: zero rest time in between the two exercises during a superset. I mean, WTF? Thought I was playing it smart just using 5lbs. dumbbells, but I still got pwned. I was going to blame my increase in bodyweight for the added difficulty, but stopping creatine two weeks ago and the protein shakes for a few days early this week (back on both starting today) coupled with getting sick last week resulted in a 5lbs. weight loss. And now that I have to start doing cardio again, I'll probably be going below 200lbs. again, which is good since I'm around 20lbs. heavier than I'd like to be.

Hypertrophy III, Day 2, Workout 15

Dude... this phase is, like, totally baked. I'm so gonna binge tonight.

Hypertrophy III, Day 1, Workout 15

Boy, that was a nasty cough I picked up last Sunday. Not only was it bad enough for me to call in sick from work yesterday, but also I had push down my workouts a couple of days so I'd have some time to recover.

I'm still not 100% today (just the remnants of the cough), but I just had to get my ass back into the gym. I think I mentioned before that months of working out have been derailed due to getting sick for one week. I wasn't going to let that happen, again.

The good news is that this week marks the end of Hypertrophy III, and I just have one more workout to go before I take a week off the weights. NRoL suggests that if I wanted to, I could restart my cardio before embarking on Strength I. Well... maybe next week.

Hypertrophy III, Day 2, Workout 14

Apparently another reason why I was weaker-than-usual in my last workout was because I was at the onset of a cold thanks to the schizophrenic weather we've been having all week. Sometimes I'm susceptible to the manic sun/depressing rain tandem.

Anyway, last night I took extra steps to make sure I didn't miss my workout this morning, and thankfully, I came out unscathed. Not wanting to press my luck and have a relapse, I went straight home after having lunch.

Hypertrophy III, Day 1, Workout 14

It's happened before, and it happened again this morning.

Since I got so tired going for broke with my Barbell bent-over rows (today being my last "high-rep" upper body day), I accidentally started off my Incline bench presses 10lbs. heavier than I intended from reading the wrong figure off my notebook. This continued all the way to the last set where I almost bombed out my last rep. I thought my right arm would be the one to flake out on me, but it was my left. Fortunately, I just had enough strength to hook the bar on the lower left rung of the Incline apparatus.

Note to self: Improve my handwriting.

Hypertrophy III, Day 2, Workout 13

The workout was exceptionally exhausting this morning from not having enough sleep last night and still being sore from Sunday. At least I'm still able to walk.

Hypertrophy III, Day 1, Workout 13

Today I entered the homestretch of this phase, and I started it off with my last "heavy" upper body workout, which I made the most of by making some personal records: one 4-rep 224lbs. set on both the Barbell bent over row (finally had to use wrist straps) and Incline bench press (having a spotter around "just in case" makes a world of difference) and one 184lbs. Barbell push press set (wish I made 4 contiguous reps, but I'll settle for the 3+1 I did).

It's great how the Heel-raised back squats and Split good mornings I do on leg days benefited the rows and push presses by conditioning my torso the handle these loads without my having to use a belt. I suppose the same is true the other way around. Just goes to show how crucial working the core is.

Hypertrophy III, Day 2, Workout 12

It's been said that every workout should have exercises that you hate to do as they're probably the ones your body needs to do, and since starting the New Rules of Lifting, I've hated single-leg exercises, and as painful as they were, they really got my quads growing and not just the ones near the knees. Now to figure out how to target my hamstrings better.

Height	5'3"	Oct 07	Nov 06
Weight	206.5 lbs.	+5 lbs.	+29 lbs.
Chest	44.75"	+0.5"	+3.5"
Neck	16.25"	no change	+0.75"
Upper Arms (unflexed)	15.875"/15.75"	+0.125"/+0.25"	+1.375"/+1.375"
Upper Arms (flexed)	16.625"/16.375"	+0.25"/+0.25"	+1.25"/+1.25"
Forearms	12.25"/12.125"	no change/+0.125"	+0.5"/+0.625"
Waist at navel	41"	+0.5"	+5.5"
Hips	45"	+0.5"	+4.5"
Thighs	27"/27"	no change/no change	+2.0"/+2.0"
Calves	16.25"/16.125"	+0.125"/+0.125"	+0.5"/+0.375"

Comments

• Kind of frightening that I gained almost 30lbs. in one year, and while the flab tells me otherwise, I don't feel fat, well, not the same kind of fatness I had over two years ago. Also, last month's 5lbs. jump can be attributed to a new improved batch of creatine powder (supposedly "hardcore") and an increase in my protein intake (Little Miss Muffet, sat on her tuffet, eating her steaks and whey).
• With my bigger upper body, I've moved on from being a "Marge" to a large though I'm keeping my medium shirts around for next year when I start cutting in earnest (or so I hope). If I'm lucky, I won't lose too much size and regain the defintion I lost.
• Since I try measure my thighs around the same place every month, its seeming stagnation belies the fact they have gotten thicker up towards my glutes that have gotten huge. That's genetics for ya. To think I fit into 32" jeans last year. Anyway, I took a couple of pics so you can see for yourselves what I have to live with.