geek gets tough

[jjeane]

Sleep is good. It is my friend. I miss it when it's not around. lots!

I can't wait to do some serious organizing. Baby jail is so worth it just for that.

today! the never-thought-i'd-make-it-this-far-in-this-program workout
Week 11 MADCOWVolume Day
Squat 75x5, 100x5, 130x5, 155x5, 185x5 huffed and puffed and knee caved once, too, but i did it!
Bench Press barx5, 65x5, 80x5, 108x3 (failed. supposed to be x5), 108x3 (just to do it)
Bent Over Row barx5, 65x5, 85x5, 100x5, 110x5 (scheduled to do 113, but chicken out. felt wiped out)
Good Mornings- 110x8, 110x8 (again lowered weight bc i felt wiped. it's accessory, so it doesnt matter as much)
Ab Rollouts- 10x4 (wanted to give in and not do as much, but forced myself. My abs are super weak.)

Thoughts

Happy, even though I failed bench. Again. I don't know if I am ready to reset or not. I kinda want to. I might, just because I am restricting calories again as well as doing cardio (hopefully daily cardio). Maybe I should. What do you guys think?

My stoopid bodymedia thing hardly recognized any of my workout. wtf???According to it, I only produced seven minutes of moderate intensity with that workout. NO WAY. I was sweating before I was done. Just no way.

Is this thing not much more than a pedometer? HALP BMFL users!

Still a great workout Geek!
If you figure out how to get vigorous activity minutes you let me know. For real. I only get like 10 a day. I am like WTF? Even days I lift. I only got like 2 the day I did that bench,squat, clean and press circuit. And I was about to die. So I hear you. I have done other things I thought were vigorous and got nothing. If you figure that one out I would like to know.
That is some serious calorie burn. For me to get over 3000 my steps have to be closer to 14000 or 15000. You take a lot of steps walking around a house cleaning up after children!!

[thehobbes]

Good job on that workout, nothing to be unhappy about there Geek! Amazed at your squat progress! I'd prob reset on bp at that point, seems like you REALLY want to haha. Bp and ohp will always stall first, so reset, and ATTACK!

My stoopid bodymedia thing hardly recognized any of my workout. wtf???According to it, I only produced seven minutes of moderate intensity with that workout. NO WAY. I was sweating before I was done. Just no way.

Is this thing not much more than a pedometer? HALP BMFL users!

I have determined this is because things like a squat set lasts what, like 45 seconds? It's intense but adds up at the speed of a ham traveling uphill through molasis in a snowstorm. My all time record for Vigorous is 2hrs 22min, and guess what, did not lift that day at all, was at work like 16hrs straight, with a lot of short sprints back and forth allll day, and that's what made that all add up. I really think it has more to do with heart rate than anything. There are days I will get less than 5min Vigorous. Meh, what can ya do, I'm a powerlifter not a marathon runner. If you want the Vigorous to add up you need to go running or something. Some squat/DL sets may not even be vigorous because they don't last long enough to get your heart rate up there.

Seven minutes of actual lifting (not rest, not setting up equipment, not getting into position) is A LOT of time to be weight lifting srs.

Oh also when I was sawing wooden boards I got a bunch of Vigorous points, you guise may want to try building shiz. lol

[geek23ka]

So I have to clean more? Yuck.

i know, right? so tired of this whole cleaning thing.

Seeeeee??? That's it! It took me three days to clean after the new year. Then it took me 3 hours last weekend. Today it only took me 30 minutes, so now I have resorted to going through drawers, organizing/throwing out papers, etc. Honey's pretty happy. All he has to do is cook (which he loves) and the kitchen is cleaned up before he can even sit down for the evening.

I am so proud of you, Geek!!!!! Week 11! Way to go!

Your second 108 x 3 bench press made me .

Dunno what to tell you about the BMF. Mine is similar. The way I view it is if I were to total the minutes that I am ACTUALLY lifting, it would only be between 5 - 10 minutes. The other time is loading/unloading weights, being distracted by Raising Hope on TV, etc. P? Lori? Auntie Ham? Any insight?

aww, thanks ms red. turns out there was more moderate activity than was showing up on the ap. dont know why that is, but there you go. im glad i downloaded. i do need to step up my game today. trying to get the mini-terrorist to sleep. hopefully he will pass out soon so i can do some cardio.

Still a great workout Geek!
If you figure out how to get vigorous activity minutes you let me know. For real. I only get like 10 a day. I am like WTF? Even days I lift. I only got like 2 the day I did that bench,squat, clean and press circuit. And I was about to die. So I hear you. I have done other things I thought were vigorous and got nothing. If you figure that one out I would like to know.
That is some serious calorie burn. For me to get over 3000 my steps have to be closer to 14000 or 15000. You take a lot of steps walking around a house cleaning up after children!!

i havent seen one minute of vigorous. i wonder what they mean by vigorous? bc when i do the elliptical my heart rate gets in the 170's. i consider that to be vigorous. maybe i'm just lazy. haha.

still happy with this thing, even though it isnt perfect. i cant wait to be a cyborg and download all of this info instnatly, and see it on the screen i wear over my eye, direct from hormone levels controlling heart rate/vessel pressure etc etc. that would be so freaking cool. /sci-fi geekery

here is today


as you can see my sleep sucked, 6 hours, kinda broken and weird. and today i am definitely more low energy. i'm going to fight to get more steps/activity in tonight and then hopefully pass put a reasonable hour. my husband and i stayed up late watching Judge Dredd. It was awesome! super bloody, but also really cool.

[beatha]

Getting jelly of your BMF charts . . . Obi-wan want's try one when she's back at work again - put all our steps/cals burned to shame - so I think I can use that an excuse to purchase one and hijack it for myself when she's bored with it Smart B is smart . . . lulz.

[geek23ka]

Getting jelly of your BMF charts . . . Obi-wan want's try one when she's back at work again - put all our steps/cals burned to shame - so I think I can use that an excuse to purchase one and hijack it for myself when she's bored with it Smart B is smart . . . lulz.

its lots of fun so far, b. ill keep you posted.

[Redfizz]

I love how you refer to your little one as the little Terrorist.

It reminds me of when Baby Sinclare from The Dinosaurs suffered from the terrible 2's.

[pharty]

My buddy (GM at a Best Buy) told me they are coming out with one this Summer that can tell you how many squats and curls and stuff! Amazeballz if that really works!

[geek23ka]

Good job on that workout, nothing to be unhappy about there Geek! Amazed at your squat progress! I'd prob reset on bp at that point, seems like you REALLY want to haha. Bp and ohp will always stall first, so reset, and ATTACK!

I have determined this is because things like a squat set lasts what, like 45 seconds? It's intense but adds up at the speed of a ham traveling uphill through molasis in a snowstorm. My all time record for Vigorous is 2hrs 22min, and guess what, did not lift that day at all, was at work like 16hrs straight, with a lot of short sprints back and forth allll day, and that's what made that all add up. I really think it has more to do with heart rate than anything. There are days I will get less than 5min Vigorous. Meh, what can ya do, I'm a powerlifter not a marathon runner. If you want the Vigorous to add up you need to go running or something. Some squat/DL sets may not even be vigorous because they don't last long enough to get your heart rate up there.

Seven minutes of actual lifting (not rest, not setting up equipment, not getting into position) is A LOT of time to be weight lifting srs.

Oh also when I was sawing wooden boards I got a bunch of Vigorous points, you guise may want to try building shiz. lol

ninja post!! how did you do that? i even replied to b before seeing this. haha!

maybe my heart rate needs to get to 200 before its vigorous exercise for me. ughhhhhh

I love how you refer to your little one as the little Terrorist.

It reminds me of when Baby Sinclare from The Dinosaurs suffered from the terrible 2's.

i havent seen the dinosaurs. must be what you youngins watched. back in my day it was hong kong fooey. i got terrorist from pharty!! and he def terrorized me this morning. and i gave in to his negotiation tactics. 4 am screaming bloody murder for orange and crackers and milk.

My buddy (GM at a Best Buy) told me they are coming out with one this Summer that can tell you how many squats and curls and stuff! Amazeballz if that really works!

brb spending eleventy thousand dollars every six months for the upgrade.

im addicted.

[geek23ka]

my bench is failing so badly on madcow, it doesnt really matter anymore if i follow the routine. i neet to reset it. i might do smolov for bench to see if that helps. anyone have any ideas? i am way novice in terms of what i can lift for bench.

today
madcow deadlift day week 11 (repeat of week ten bc i failed week 10 deadlift)
squat - 75x5, 101x5, 129x5, 129x5
ohp - 45x5, 60x5, 71x5, 85x5 (whoa!)
deadlift - 135x5, 171x5, chalked up at this point 207x5, chalk and mixed grip for final one 245x5 success!

i am still undecided about resetting everything. i dont think i will, but i have to play around with bench to see whats what. i dont know why its such a weak lift. my ohp is chugging along as is my BOR. wth??

activity yesterday. sleep = sucktastic



sleep today

[jjeane]

Yuck o on the sleep geek!
I will be curious to see what people say to do on your bench. I hit stuck today on Dl and am not sure what to do?

[ilovethe80s]

geek you said smolov and I started salivating. lol! If you are confident in your shoulder set up or you think it is at a point where the frequency would help with a few small adjustments, I'd say heck yes. It is such a great opportunity to practice and cement technique, and the PR at the end is the icing on the cake. I think the most important thing is making sure you've got the shoulder set up and you don't have the tendency to roll up on your lifts - those little delicate shoulder structures deteriorate quickly if they end up doing more than their share with that volume/ frequency.

I also think that bench is all technique, so anything that allows you to practice is good (one of the reasons I love smolov jr). Or just reset madcow, it's brought you this far so far, maybe its good for some more. maybe just knocking back a bit to work on perfect reps with speediness would get you a few more pounds? Bench is always slowest. Actually that and OHP but yours is doing great.

[geek23ka]

Yuck o on the sleep geek!
I will be curious to see what people say to do on your bench. I hit stuck today on Dl and am not sure what to do?

stuck?? you're at 185x5x2! i would not call that stuck, girl.

geek you said smolov and I started salivating. lol! If you are confident in your shoulder set up or you think it is at a point where the frequency would help with a few small adjustments, I'd say heck yes. It is such a great opportunity to practice and cement technique, and the PR at the end is the icing on the cake. I think the most important thing is making sure you've got the shoulder set up and you don't have the tendency to roll up on your lifts - those little delicate shoulder structures deteriorate quickly if they end up doing more than their share with that volume/ frequency.

I also think that bench is all technique, so anything that allows you to practice is good (one of the reasons I love smolov jr). Or just reset madcow, it's brought you this far so far, maybe its good for some more. maybe just knocking back a bit to work on perfect reps with speediness would get you a few more pounds? Bench is always slowest. Actually that and OHP but yours is doing great.

yeah, i was thinking smolov because its a ton of practice, rather than fighting for PR's every single session. is there is spreadsheet for smolov jr floating around?
someone else suggested 5/3/1, so was considering that as well. i bet smolov has more total reps though, and that's really what i think i need. just time to work on the lift.

that sleep i've had the last couple days is more my norm, unfortunately. baby is back up to his tricks.

also, my scale is acting funny. the baby has been picking it up and slamming it, so i wouldnt be surprised if it were broken. im going to put new batteries in it, but it's reading funny. today it's read from 239 to 248. notaccurate.jpg wish i knew what i weighed in this morning.

[jjeane]

Lol at the kiddo and the scale. Mine have broken 2 so far!!

[ilovethe80s]

Uh oh, my kids got my last scale, too. I don't know what it is they do to it but they don't work after they get a hold of them. Sometimes if you move the scale at all, even nudge it, you need to reset it. If you step on and step off (so it reads zero) that is supposed to reset it. My kids are always banging the scale around so I keep a kettlebell next to it to weight first and see how off it is. Last one though was dead beyond repair.

The smolov calculator I used is an excel file, I can send it to you if you like, there seem to be lots of calculators online as well.

This is an excel one (not sure if it is the one I have): http://www.mediafire.com/?om5tmgnmhm1

and an online one:
http://joshmahony.com/weights/smolov_jr_old.php

[thehobbes]

Geeeeeek, just reset that bench. What weight can you do fairly easily for 10 reps?? 5 reps on bench is pretty taxing, maybe back it off and do a few days of 7-10 rep sets to get your mojo back and work on your form. Form is 10x easier to work on when you're doing an easier 8 rep set instead of struggling under the weight trying to hit 5 reps.

I tried to enable the heart rate monitor thing on BMF through this free Garmin app they direct you do, can't get it to download though, anybody successfully do it?? I'm rethinking the Vigorous thing = high heart rate, it keeps giving me Vigorous for time I'm at work but I haven't been moving very fast the last couple days, it's wayyy more exhausting doing squat/DL compared to what I'm doing at work so I am still confuzzled.

[vanessa40]

Hey geek..just wanted to stop in and see how you have been. I also wanted to thank you for your kind words about Muffin. I am feeling a little better everyday. I started back lifting today. Tomorrow back on my diet plan. Thankfully i did not gain.
You take care and thanks again

[Lou1se]

Great work on the OHP's and Deads!

Ha! I see you got your fancy gizmo :-) Shall be interdasting to hear your thoughts on it in a few weeks.

[geek23ka]

test

edit: success! i havent been able to post here for two days. it kept giving me an error page when i posted.

ill be back soon after i finish my workout. first day of smolov. dont be mad, hobbes! it might fail, but at least i will get lots of practice in this way. im going to calculate for less than my est. 1rm in order to be able to get practice in this first round.

[geek23ka]

Smolov Jr.
1RM 110
Add LBs Week 2 3
Add LBs Week 3 3

Week 1 (Not Rounded)
Mon 6x6 75 77
Wed 7x5 85 83
Fri 8x4 90 88
Sat 10x3 95 94

Week 2
Mon 6x6 80 80
Wed 7x5 85 86
Fri 8x4 90 91
Sat 10x3 95 97

Week 3
Mon 6x6 80 80
Wed 7x5 85 86
Fri 8x4 90 91
Sat 10x3 95 97


my plan.... see you guys soon! so happy i can post again. i wonder wtf that was. i was scared i was banned, but i could read everything, and my user status said "registered member" instead of "banned"

*scratches head*

[geek23ka]

today - MADCOW Week 11 Intensity Day
Squat - 75x5, 101x5, 135x5, 160x5, 189x3, 135x8
Bench Press - (75x6)x6 (day one of smolov jr)
Bent Over Row - barx5, 65x5, 80x5, 96x5, 115x3, 75x8
Bench Dips 3x8
BB Curls (barx8)x3
Skullcrushers (52x8)x3
(PR in bold)

Thoughts
The squat at 189 was hard. The first one, I struggled like mad to get that lift back up. I was frozen stuck at one point and really thought I was gonna have to bail. Thankfully, I got it. The second rep my knees caved in and the third rep was HEAVY but I didn't lose form. Holy ****balls was it ever heavy.

Nutrition
I am shutting up about nutrition. Trying to just keep my head down and do it. My weight after Christmas was 252. Today it was 244. Making headway, but it's the same headway I've made before so while I am happy there is progress, I won't be really happy until I hit 225, which is my first mini goal.

[jjeane]

Way to go on the weight!! Progress is progress. I have faith in you!

Nice workout. Nice PR"S as well!!!

[gobbles23]

Awesome job!!!

[geek23ka]

Way to go on the weight!! Progress is progress. I have faith in you!

Nice workout. Nice PR"S as well!!!

Thank you so much.

[geek23ka]

Awesome job!!!

Hey there posting ninja! Thank you!

[ilovethe80s]

189 x 3 SOUNDS hard, I'm fatigued just reading it. Awesome that you were able to do it! I'm sure today made you stronger, a big drop in the bucket (and you will sleep well tonight ). You think you can get your reps next session or reset?

For your smolov, just a few pounds added each week, so really just for the benching practice? Will you be able to handle shoulder/ tri accessories on top of smolov (is that why you are going light)?

[beatha]

Holy ****balls was it ever heavy.

^but it felt good afterwards knowing you fought and held form . . . yep?

Good Job Geek.

[geek23ka]

189 x 3 SOUNDS hard, I'm fatigued just reading it. Awesome that you were able to do it! I'm sure today made you stronger, a big drop in the bucket (and you will sleep well tonight ). You think you can get your reps next session or reset?

For your smolov, just a few pounds added each week, so really just for the benching practice? Will you be able to handle shoulder/ tri accessories on top of smolov (is that why you are going light)?

i hope i pass out soon. toddler is already asleep, and he hasnt been sleeping well these past few days, so i need to sleep while i can.

i really honestly do not know if i can do 189x5. im freaking scared, ill tell you that much. i have never actually bailed on a squat before. and i know the more i move forward in madcow the closer i get to a bail.

i didnt know how much to add for smolov jr! Should i add more? I do want benching practice for sure. The 6x6 today with just one weight that i could do over and over, definitely helped me with set up and execuion. the 75# felt lighter each time i did it. Should I add more than 3 pounds at a time? I think I could get 115 for my 1rm, and I went lower bc I do want practice, but I don't want to cheat myself out of an opportunity to gain some strength.

I am keeping the shoulder accessories bc I feel like they have helped me immensely. Want to keep them in, and stay friendly with them. Also want to introduce back extensions somewhere, if I can figure out how to do them on the bench.

^but it felt good afterwards knowing you fought and held form . . . yep?

Good Job Geek.

YES! I was really happy that I didn't break form on that third rep. 80's mentioned in her thread about the forward lean/shift as being more mental than anything, and I think it's that way for me, too. I had the ability to lift it with goof form, but the first two reps were so surprising that I reverted to my lizard brain rather than keeping focus on technique.

Thank you, beatha

[PunkyCindy]

Congrats on your squats, so proud of you! I sure do miss those suckers more than anything else.

[ilovethe80s]

I think you'll be surprised with your smolov PR. Keep in mind it is a peaking program so whatever you leave with 'might' not be what stays when you lower the volume in a normal program. But it is a good indicator of what your bench will be in the very near future, and it feels so great to know that you CAN do that amount of weight, puts fire into your training going forward

Just my .02 but I would go for the gold here, lol. If it were me:


Smolov is magic, it knows exactly how much you can take, by the last week the final few sessions are like, you feel like that was it, you leave everything in you on the bench, but you look at the numbers like - i can't believe I just tripled my 1rm!! It's up to you, not trying to peer pressure you or anything


I got a lump in my throat reading 189 x 5 so I can only imagine how you feel, lol! You can do it! Every week you are getting stronger, and you were able to keep form on the triple, which is super impressive. Just breathe, think and get ready for each subsequent rep as you always do - you've got this!!

[geek23ka]

Hey geek..just wanted to stop in and see how you have been. I also wanted to thank you for your kind words about Muffin. I am feeling a little better everyday. I started back lifting today. Tomorrow back on my diet plan. Thankfully i did not gain.
You take care and thanks again

<3

Great work on the OHP's and Deads!

Ha! I see you got your fancy gizmo :-) Shall be interdasting to hear your thoughts on it in a few weeks.

it will definitely be interesting. im curious myself.

Congrats on your squats, so proud of you! I sure do miss those suckers more than anything else.

i cant wait for you to get back in it!! thanks.