Bluebirds, Butterflies, and Barbells - A Starting Strength Journal

[PeterGibbons316]

Background:
I'm new to the site and have learned a lot in the short time I have been here. I lifted some in high school, but was more or less a bench curler. Joined the power lifting team in college for about a week. Lifted off and on recreationally ever since, but never really had any idea what I was doing. In February of 2010 I hurt my back lifting something at work, and the doctor told me to stop exercising hoping it would fix itself. It didn't, and I got fat. Went to a specialist who was able to properly diagnose my condition as low-grade isthmic spondylolisthesis and said the best thing for me would be to lose some weight, and start lifting weights to strengthen my core. This was back in August of 2010. I started doing P90X and went through two rounds of it dropping about 40 pounds and really getting into shape. I was in such great shape that I decided to start training for a half marathon. This was when I joined this site and started doing a lot of reading and learning a lot about fitness in general. I learned that I wasn't getting very strong doing P90X because it's not a very good strength program. I then decided that I would do SS once I ran the half marathon. Last Saturday I finished the half in under 2 hours which was my goal, so I am very pleased with myself. I've been working for the past month on upgrading my home gym and I am super excited to finally be putting it to use!

A friend of mine that I work with is going to be lifting with me. He is recovering from his 2nd ACL surgery and is tired of tearing ACLs likely due to lack of leg strength. He also ran the half marathon this past weekend which is amazing if you ask me considering his surgery was just a few months ago. He may or may not create an account on here and post in this thread regularly as well.

Goals:
I can't speak for my friend, but my goals are to run this program until linear gains are exhausted gaining about 1 lb/week in the process. If it takes 40 weeks, then I'll gain 40 pounds. Long term I think I'd like to deadlift 5 plates, squat 4 plates, bench 3 plates, and press 2 plates - all with 15% BF or less. But those goals are somewhat arbitrary and perhaps unrealistic.

Routine:
I'm sure most people are familiar with it but here it is:
Workout A:
Squat
Bench Press
Deadlift

Workout B:
Squat
Press
Power Clean

First week - Wednesday: A, Friday: B, Sunday: A
Second week - Wednesday: B, Friday: A, Sunday B

We both travel often during the week, so this way if one of us is out of town for the week we only miss one workout - no big deal.

Videos:
I'm going to try to post videos from all our workouts. Please consider all videos as us asking for critique on form. Neither of us has ever seriously performed any of the lifts as part of our routine other than bench press. I can't wait til Friday to post vids of us doing power cleans, that should be hilarious.

All feedback on videos is welcome and greatly appreciated

Diet:
I'm not planning on posting a detailed diet. I might put up total calories and protein, but logging every last thing I eat gets real old real fast. I was losing about 1 lb./week at 2,000 calories/day so I'm going to start by increasing that to 2,500/day hoping to gain about 1 lb./week. Will adjust as needed.

5/4/11 - Workout A (First workout)
We did everything by the book to find our starting weights....
Squat:
2x5x45 - too light
1x5x65 - too light
1x5x75 - OK for my friend, too light for me
1x5x95 - too light
1x5x105 - OK for me
2x5x75 - remaining worksets for friend
2x5x105 - remaining worksets for me

Bench:
2x5x45 - too light
1x5x64 - too light
1x5x85 - too light
1x5x95 - too light
1x5x105 - OK for me, too light for my friend
1x5x115 - too light for my friend
1x5x125 - OK for my friend
2x5x105 - remaining worksets for me
2x5x125 - remaining worksets for my friend

Deadlift:
1x5x65 - too light
1x5x95 - too light
1x5x115 - OK for my friend, too light for me
1x5x135 - OK for me

I compiled the last set for each of us in this video (me in green, my friend in white):

Missed his deadlift since we only did the one workset and weren't sure when we would stop.

I think for squats we will have to work on getting the camera at a lower angle. It looks like I'm not quite hitting parallel, but hard to tell.

Weight/Diet:
Weighed in this morning at 192.2 lbs., and had about 2300 calories with 174g of protein.

Again, all feedback is appreciated.

[RipplyMuscles]

Hey man, this looks great. My only advice is for your friend to get a larger shirt! jk...but on a serious note, how much milk are you and your friend consuming in a day?

[PeterGibbons316]

Hey man, this looks great. My only advice is for your friend to get a larger shirt! jk...but on a serious note, how much milk are you and your friend consuming in a day?

Haha, thanks!

Both of us are around 20% BF and I have had NO problems in the past gaining weight, so the GOMAD thing isn't really necessary for us. I only have about 12 oz of milk a day - usually with 2 scoops of whey in it.

[Kirra]

In on this. Squats need to be a tad deeper.



Deadlifts look really solid to me.

[PeterGibbons316]

In on this. Squats need to be a tad deeper.



Deadlifts look really solid to me.

Thanks!

It's amazing what you see the first time you ever watch yourself on a video.

I did a pretty good job going light enough for the first session, my chest, arms, quads, hams, glutes - all feel fine today. The only place I am sore is my upper back, and I'm pretty sure it's from the squats as I'm still not yet flexible enough to really get my hands behind the bar and in narrow. It will come in time though.

[PeterGibbons316]

So I realized today that it is really hard for me to switch gears and try to eat to gain weight after trying to lose weight for what seems like forever Today I got home and had only had 1800 calories and like 140g of protein - AFTER having a large roast beef sandwich from Arby's. So I had 3 scoops of whey in 16 oz of milk to make up the difference. I hate having to do that though. I need to work on finding ways to get more protein in my diet..... 200g of protein is a lot.

[MatTheCur]

Your workout partner's going to have to check his squat form ... Looks like he's trying to unfold himself, instead of drive up from the hips/heels...

Could hurt him in the long run! In for this, if you don't mind... I'm at a bit of a crossroads myself, and am looking for some insight through different journals!

[Kirra]

Something you should probably read regarding diet etc:

http://startingstrength.com/articles...n_rippetoe.pdf

Parallel squat:

[BrianRCampbell]

Your workout partner's going to have to check his squat form ... Looks like he's trying to unfold himself, instead of drive up from the hips/heels...

Could hurt him in the long run! In for this, if you don't mind... I'm at a bit of a crossroads myself, and am looking for some insight through different journals!

Partner here. Thanks for the input. I'll focus on keeping a straight vertical motion without the front and back motion you can see on the first video. Should I try to keep my center of gravity back a little more, on my hips & heels instead of balls of my feet & quads & back?

Also -- I've had reconstruction surgery on both ACLs (patellar autograft both times). The right was a couple of years ago, and the left was about 5 months ago. Left knee flexibility is almost as good as new, but not quite there yet. Strength in both of my legs is greatly diminished. Does anyone have any advice on strength training after recent ACL surgery?

[MatTheCur]

Partner here. Thanks for the input. I'll focus on keeping a straight vertical motion without the front and back motion you can see on the first video. Should I try to keep my center of gravity back a little more, on my hips & heels instead of balls of my feet & quads & back?

Also -- I've had reconstruction surgery on both ACLs (patellar autograft both times). The right was a couple of years ago, and the left was about 5 months ago. Left knee flexibility is almost as good as new, but not quite there yet. Strength in both of my legs is greatly diminished. Does anyone have any advice on strength training after recent ACL surgery?

Always keep yourself balanced on your heels/hips. That's where you should be driving up from. It also makes it a bit more difficult to fall forward!

As for your second question, I do not know, sorry. I'm not an expert in all things fitness/injury... Just going along with what I do know and what I've been doing! I would venture to say, though, that you should probably start light and go slowly.

[PeterGibbons316]

Oh man, what a great workout today. We had our first fail and learned how to do power cleans - all in the same day!

First a question on safety that I should have troubled myself with a long time ago.....

Brian failed his first rep on the last set of squats today, he went down and decided that he couldn't come back up, so he said "help" and like an idiot I'm just standing there making a video and not really able to help. He was only there for a second before falling forward and the safeties caught the bar. Is that OK? Is there a better ditch technique we should practice so this doesn't happen again? Do I need to quit bull****ting around with all the videos and concentrate more on making sure we don't hurt ourselves???

Anyway, on to the workout.....

Squats:
Brian:
45x5
45x5
45x5
50x3
65x2
85x5
85x5
85x0 - failed on first rep

Myself:
45x5
45x5
45x5
65x3
90x2
115x5
115x5
115x5



Sunday Brian will try 85 lbs. again. I don't really think this is a stall, just a breakdown in form mixed with excessive soreness and lack of experience performing the lift.

Press:
Finding starting weights:
45x5 - too light
65x5 - too light
75x5 - just right
75x5
75x5

Unfortunately the ceiling in my basement are a little low, and Brian is a little tall. Neither of us is motivated enough to carry the bar and some weights upstairs and outside in between sets so that Brian can do them standing, so the adopted rule is that anyone over 6' tall must do overhead pressing seated.....



Watching Brian's 2nd set I noticed that he was bringing the bar down really far. We determined it is because he was doing more of an upright bench press, letting his elbows flare out to the sides and then pressing up rather than come forward and press from the front. So the last set we ditched the video and just worked on that form and then even did a bonus 4th set afterward to get it right.

Power Cleans:
Finding starting weights:
65x3 - too light
75x3 - too light
85x3 - just right
85x3
85x3
85x3
85x3

So I thought this was going to be absolutely hilarious because neither of us had ever done power cleans before today. Honestly it wasn't nearly as terrible as I imagined. Brian still can't really jump with the messed up knee and all, but I think the explosiveness can still exist without an actual jump. Anyway, I don't really know much about the power clean, so I'll just keep my comments to myself on this one and will accept any and all feedback given.



General format question:
Would it be better if I showed all of my squats then all of Brian's? Or perhaps made separate videos and had 6 total instead of 3?

All feedback is welcome and appreciated! Thanks!

[PeterGibbons316]

Oh yeah, I forgot to post what is probably my second favorite piece of gym equipment:



Helps keep us on track. Brian's lifts in red, mine in blue - press and clean are the same so those are green. Tacked up on the right is a chart I made to help us calculate warmup percentages quickly.

[Kirra]

So I thought this was going to be absolutely hilarious because neither of us had ever done power cleans before today. Honestly it wasn't nearly as terrible as I imagined. Brian still can't really jump with the messed up knee and all, but I think the explosiveness can still exist without an actual jump.

Yup.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KM9PDmrFWnM

Also, watch some Rip vids on youtube about the squat. Your friends seems to have no hip drive.

Have you read the book?

[BrianRCampbell]

Despite the obvious flaws, my squats felt better today. I found that I wasn't angling my knees outwards as I go down. I was going into more of a baseball catcher's stance, on the balls of my feet with my legs basically parallel forwards. This is an old habit (I caught for many years) that I'll have to fight, but consciously spreading my knees felt much better. Still need to work on depth and keeping my center of gravity back towards my heels.

I would like to point out that PeterGibbons is a powertool for posting the tiny weights squat video. >:[

My power cleans obviously also suffer from lack of leg strength. That should come back quickly as my legs come back to life.

[MatTheCur]

If you need to dump the weight on your squats, don't fall forward... Let yourself fall back on your ass, or sit down as soon as possible.

Also, if someone says "Help", you drop whatever it is you're doing and help. No ifs, ands, or buts. That's just the way it goes. Might want to think about a semi-permanent rig where you can have your camera sitting the entire time, recording the workout.

Finally, learn to drive with your hips. It feels a little weird, almost like you're doing it with your back, but you'll find that it helps a LOT. Also make sure that you're not holding the weight up when you're squatting, but that you have your hands draped over top, keeping the bar on your shoulders.

[PeterGibbons316]

Yup.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KM9PDmrFWnM

Also, watch some Rip vids on youtube about the squat. Your friends seems to have no hip drive.

Have you read the book?

Nice video - Brian, check that one out!

I've got the book and have read all but the assistance exercises sections. I let Brian borrow it earlier this week and I think he only had time to read some of the chapter on squats. So on most of this stuff it's the blind leading the blind, and any problems in Brian's form are likely due to poor instruction on my part.

The videos have been pretty good for this in that we have been watching ourselves between sets and trying to make improvements when things don't look/feel right. The feedback on the vids here is even more helpful though, so thanks for that!

As far as hip drive is concerned....are you talking about me (navy) or Brian (red)? I just reread the section on hips in SS which talks about driving the hips straight up. I feel like Brian is doing that, but maybe too well? It looks like his hips are coming straight up pretty well, but then his back is staying bent. In my reps though, I'm driving my hips up and then forward and straightening my back more to stand up. Is that correct? What's the best way to try to fix this?

[PeterGibbons316]

I would like to point out that PeterGibbons is a powertool for posting the tiny weights squat video. >:[

I really am. But think about how awesome it will be when you come back and watch it in August when you are doing your warmups with 3x as much weight!

[Kirra]

I'll rewatch the vids in about 5 hours, I'm at work now and can't use youtube.

[Kirra]

You are both reverse curling the power cleans. Bring the bar slowly to the mid thigh and then JUMP/EXPLODE. Both of you are launching it from the ground up to the shoulders.

[PeterGibbons316]

So somehow I got Windows Repair virus on my laptop and was in the process of getting rid of that **** when it decided to restart itself and now it won't boot up. So no videos until I can get that working but I can still update.

Squats
Brian:
45x5
45x5
45x5
50x3
65x2
85x5
85x5
85x5 Bar speed looked good, will increase to 95 next workout.

Myself:
45x5
45x5
50x5
75x3
100x2
125x5
125x5
125x5 Bar speed looked good, will increase to 135 next workout

We were trying to work primarily on our grip during squats, moving our thumbs outside the bar to help get the forearms in line with the wrists and support the weight with the back and not the wrist. This required a wider grip and slightly higher bar placement than usual, but should improve with flexibility.

I decided that since Brian is a good 6 inches taller than me that we should really be adjusting the safeties and J-hooks between our sets, so we made sure to do that this time. Doesn't take but an additional 30 seconds anyway.

I also practiced ditching at the bottom of a failed squat, just in case.

Bench Press
Brian:
45x5
45x5
65x5
90x3
120x2
135x5
135x5
135x5 Bar speed looked pretty good, going to try 145 next time.

Myself:
45x5
45x5
55x5
80x3
100x2
115x5
115x5
115x5 Bar speed looked good, 125 next time.

Both of us have a lot of experience benching, so we are doing 10 lb. jumps at the moment. We will see how long that lasts......

Deadlift
Brian:
65x5
65x5
80x3
110x2
135x5 Bar speed looked good, but form was breaking down. Will try 155 next time.

Myself:
65x5
65x5
90x3
130x2
155x5 Bar speed looked good, 175 next time.

Eventually I will be able to post the video, but you will be able to see Brian's back rounding. It was more or less straight on the warmups, but then rounded on the workset. We will have to work on the form more during the warmups next time. Not sure if you will be able to tell in my video, but I am really bad at lifting the weight with good form, and then lowering it with atrocious form, so I will have to work on that more as well. We are doing 20 lb. jumps on deadlift, but I think that will only last for one maybe two more workouts. Before we started this program I was doing 200lb. RDLs so I should be fine until I get there, but I want to ease in to it so I don't have an early stall.

[PeterGibbons316]

Here is the deadlift video. You can see after every rep I am having to drop my hips down to reset and straighten my back. Also, you can see Brian rounding his back. A few reps he though he was going to do a power clean and so he threw a shrug in for good measure......



After watching the video again I think both of us are good to go up another 20 lbs. next workout.

Squat and bench vids to come later.....

[PeterGibbons316]

As promised.....



After watching my squat videos again, I seem to be cheating on the depth a bit, so I will have to work on that.



Depth looks great on these!

Hey man, this looks great. My only advice is for your friend to get a larger shirt! jk...but on a serious note, how much milk are you and your friend consuming in a day?

Just for you....



So I found a large dri-fit knockoff at Target on the clearance rack and as it turns out - just because there is an L on the hanger doesn't mean the actual shirt isn't XXL.

Bench press felt great and looks pretty good. Only issue was the J-hooks were just a tad too high for me, so when I finished each of my sets I was lifting the bar even higher to rack it. I've got some extra pieces of flooring that I might place under the bench to get me up just a little higher in the future. Bar speed was great though, so no issues going up 10 lbs. again.

[randyyle]

subbing on this, i don't know if you change your calories or not but i read that you were on 2k and losing 1lb per week, so thats a 500 deficit, which means if you keep doing what your doing with a 2.5k calorie intake, you will maintain, so you gotta eat more then 2.5k to gain weight.

[PeterGibbons316]

subbing on this, i don't know if you change your calories or not but i read that you were on 2k and losing 1lb per week, so thats a 500 deficit, which means if you keep doing what your doing with a 2.5k calorie intake, you will maintain, so you gotta eat more then 2.5k to gain weight.

I think you are probably right. I'm going to stay at 2500 for another week to be sure, but right now it looks like I might not be eating enough. When I was losing 1 lb/week on 2k I was also doing P90X and running 4x/week. I was thinking that by dropping all that extra activity I might not have to eat as much, but I weighed in this morning at 190.6 - a 0.4lb gain this week. Of course yesterday morning I was 192.4 so who knows. I'll wait another week and then adjust accordingly.

Thanks for the sub!

[randyyle]

Oh if so, then that might be the reason why your gaining weight

[MatTheCur]

I think you are probably right. I'm going to stay at 2500 for another week to be sure, but right now it looks like I might not be eating enough. When I was losing 1 lb/week on 2k I was also doing P90X and running 4x/week. I was thinking that by dropping all that extra activity I might not have to eat as much, but I weighed in this morning at 190.6 - a 0.4lb gain this week. Of course yesterday morning I was 192.4 so who knows. I'll wait another week and then adjust accordingly.

Thanks for the sub!

General rule of thumb is:

10 x BW in calories for weight loss
15 x BW in cals for maintenance
20 x BW in cals for gaining

Just generally, in general, generally speaking, Mr. General.

[PeterGibbons316]

5-10-11, Workout B
Squats
Myself:
45x5
45x5
50x5
80x3
105x2
135x5
135x5
135x5



Brian:
45x5
45x5
45x5
55x3
75x2
95x5
95x5
95x5



Press
Myself:
45x5
45x5
45x5
55x3
65x2
80x5
80x5
80x5



Brian:
45x5
45x5
45x5
55x3
65x2
80x5
80x5
80x5



Power Clean
Myself:
65x5
65x5
65x5
65x3
75x2
90x3
90x3
90x3
90x3
90x3



Brian:
65x5
65x5
65x5
65x3
75x2
90x3
90x3
90x3
90x3
90x3



Notes:
Today was pretty awful. I mean, it felt good. Squats seemed good. But our form on press and cleans is just really bad.......where to even start?

I did a really terrible job on getting my head back under the bar on my presses. Also, I need to be mindful of my ceiling since during the warmups I was banging the bar into it. I have to do the lift with a wide stance and knees just a tad bent to avoid this. We were both messing around with our grip to force us to get our hands in, and our elbows up. Brian has a bad habit of having a grip that is way too wide and then having elbows flaring out like he is doing a seated bench press. I think the narrow grip did a good job fixing that, but he still has a tendancy to bring the bar down too low and have the elbows back a little. His last set was laughable - as you can clearly see him laughing through the whole thing. Just shows that it is certainly possible to have a grip that is too narrow on this one.

My power cleans were absolutely terrible today. I intentionally slowed down the initial pull to focus more on my hip drive, but that was about it. I don't think I got into the rack position properly in any of my reps, and I don't think I shrug at all. I also hit myself in the face with the bar at least twice. Brian's first few sets were more or less reverse curls, but he is definitely getting a nice shrug in there as well. His last two sets were actually pretty good. He said he was getting tired and felt like he was just thrusting the weight up with his hips.......which is exactly what you are supposed to do. I think his last rep is the best one of the day for each of us.

So yeah, we still have a lot to work on when it comes to presses and cleans.

Also, after work (and before our workout) we played a couple games of Ultimate Frisbee. Well, I did anyway, Brian described his participation better as "actively spectated," which is more or less accurate however he did score the game winning point - I didn't score any points. I'd love to be able to say that our workout looked so awful because we were tired from playing frisbee, but it really didn't seem to make a big difference honestly. My heart rate monitor tells me I burned like 1000 calories. I didn't eat an additional 1000 calories today. I did have 2 grilled cheese sandwiches in addition to my standard lunch, and a protein bar as I'm sitting here writing this up, but even with that I was only at 3000 calories for the day. I did get a **** ton of protein though at 260g which is really just overkill, but whatever.

I changed up the format a bit - better? Worse? Anything that would make it read easier?

Thanks!

[randyyle]

Yeah way simpler to read, will watch video in 2 hrs or so, not at home, at work placement

[randyyle]

Good work, tell brian to work on his depth, stretch more etc.

Why is he doing seated press, is it cause the ceiling thing ?

[PeterGibbons316]

Good work, tell brian to work on his depth, stretch more etc.

Why is he doing seated press, is it cause the ceiling thing ?

Yeah, I'm only 5'10" and I have problems - he is 6'4" so a standing press is completely out of the question.