Drown, Crash and Blister: A Strength Based Routine for the Endurance Athlete

[E90335i]

Introduction
This is a journey, a test and a way to revive a lost athlete's soul. As an athlete ages in life, one finds themselves away from their beloved sport. It can be from other priorities, loss of interest, you can't find anyone to join you and injury. I played all sports growing up, football, soccer, cross country, track, golf, hockey and tennis. The one sport I really advanced in was volleyball. I received a scholarship to play competitively in college. Only 2% of all high school athletes continue in to college, even less receive a scholarship. It was a great experience to play a varsity sport in college. My career ended early. The toll of my legs springing me in to the air ended up disintegrating my knees. Very recently, I had 2 major knee surgeries. A ruptured quad tendon, torn MCL and a torn quadricep. All had to repaired twice.

So why continue to compete? Why test your body? Why torture your body further? Some people are born competitors. Some people love the challenge. Some people accept torture and some people never give up. I hate losing more than I like winning. It's a sickness and it isn't for everyone. As I age, I don't train harder, I train smarter. I know my limits, when to push them and when to take a rest day. It isn't about winning or losing, it is about winning or learning. My experiences from other athletics has helped me learn what it takes and how to train to win.

This routine is based on weight training and interval training to excel in an endurance sport. Specifically the ultimate endurance sport, triathlon. This is a less is more approach. Almost every endurance coach is all about volume. Just keep pushing yourself longer and longer.There is a time and place for everything. I will need to do LSD (long slow distance) training, but what happens when you need the power to push up a huge hill on the bike or power through the wind? How is training at a low speed for a long time going to push you through that grueling test? You need power to easily get you up that hill and conditioning to keep you going. The same with the swim, power through the start to get you in to position to then cruise the remaining distance. Your power can destroy the will of your competitors and they will give up mentally and will then settle for a moral victory.

I am a lot more educated and have tested almost everything. Physically and nutritionally. I have stopped believing any of the "broscience" I was taught growing up. All that crap you read that is really an advertisement. So follow me. Follow my path, my struggles and my successes. Hopefully I can inspire you to train and enjoy a new experience in life. It's access to the most powerful drug in the world, adrenaline.

The Split
Sunday - Legs - Weights
Monday - Swim - Long Slow Distance
Tuesday - Running
Wednesday - Swimming Intervals for speed - Circuit Training With Weights
Thursday - Biking
Friday - Heavy Weight and Light Weight Circuits
Saturday - Rest

That is the plan laid out. Each week, everything changes a little bit. For example, I will try to challenge myself to swim longer during the LSD training. Then on Wednesdays, I will try to challenge myself with more sprints or shorter rest periods to enhance my VO2 (maximal volume intake and uptake of oxygen). Same with the weights. Some circuits I will go up in weight, some I will challenge with higher reps and some I will challenge to beat my time (see how fast I can complete X reps or X rounds in a time trial). I actually am not cleared to run yet, so I will be walking at a fast pace on an incline. Once I am cleared to run, I will also start incorporating bricks, which is a back to back conditioning workout. You would use bricks to get used to transitioning off of the bike to the run in a triathlon. The strength comes in at each week I will either do heavy circuits, reps of 3, or just test my max on certain exercises.

Nutrition
Pretty simple, eat clean. I will be eating foods like:
Proteins - lean meat, chicken, lean ground turkey and protein powder.
Carbs - rice, oats, beans, vegetables and fruit.
Fats - Healthy oils, peanut butter, nuts and avocados.

I will avoid breads, processed foods and anything with a lot of ingredients I cannot pronounce. I will attempt to limit my alcohol intake. I love beer, really love beer. I could drink everyday! However, I know it will affect my workouts first thing in the morning.
Nutrient timing. I will always eat my largest meal post workout and the rest of my meals will be smaller and nutrient dense. I will eat when I am hungry. I am always hungry, but try to resist eating more than I should so I can cut weight as well. I actually prefer to not eat before a workout, just a pre workout only.

Supplements
Fish oil
Creatine
Antioxidant support
Protein powder
Garlic
Multivitamin
Pre workout/Intra workout

Just the basics here. Pretty straight forward.

Goals
The goal here is to get lean, conditioned and back to athletic shape. I want to try to compete in a half ironman. I will test sprint distance, Olympic distance and then the half ironman distance. One day, I would love to be able to get to Kona and do a full ironman. The older I get, the harder it will be. This is also a learning process. Learn what works and test out a theory of less is more. I would also love it if some one else learned from me and was able to improve their athletic conditioning.

[E90335i]

This is the section that I will update with videos, articles, recipes, reviews of products and body composition stats.

Videos

Articles

Recipes

Product Reviews

Body Stats
12-11-13
weight: 224

[E90335i]

Swimming
150 yard warmup
20 x 25 yard sprints with 15 deep breaths between lengths
100 yard cool down with stretching

Felt good actually. It wasn't as difficult as I thought. I started to fatigue around length number 15. I will do this again next time so I can do all 20 lengths while not feeling fatigue to save energy for the weight circuits.

Weight circuits
10 rounds of 10 reps each exercise for time.
assisted pull ups
push ups
fixed barbell rows 90 lbs
fixed barbell overhead press 90 lbs

19:07 to complete. Holy sucked! Everything was easy but the overhead presses. I couldn't get 10 at round 5. I had to drop the fixed barbell every time I got to them. It added a lot of time to the circuit. I should be able to cut 3 minutes off of this circuit in the future once I get stronger and more conditioned with the overhead presses. I should go up on the rows, but I wanted to use the TRX bands. The area to do the TRX bands was packed and had to use a different area.

Ab circuits
3 rounds, 10 power leg raises superset plank til failure.
3 rounds, weighted ab crunches superset weighted oblique twists

Calves
high rep angle calf raises. 8 sets until failure, about 20 reps with varying angles.
Seated calf raises. 3 sets of 90 pounds, 30 reps.

Overall good workout. Got my ass kicked with the weight circuit. I really need to improve on the overhead presses. It zapped me pretty hard and was dripping in sweat and breathing really heavy.

[E90335i]

10 minute warmup on elliptical cross trainer
foam roll and stretching

30 minutes level 12 on bike about 80 RPM's
2 minutes at level 15
30 second rest
3 minutes at level 15
5 minute cool down

Felt good. I decided to add a few high level minutes to mimic a tough uphill climb towards the end. It was tough, but I need to get used to those power intervals. Alegedly burned about 550 calories.

[E90335i]

Went for 3 rep max on supported T-bar row.
180x3, Failed at 185. Only got 2 reps.

10 rounds for time:
5 chin-ups
10 push ups
10 high incline sit-ups
Completed in 13:15

I like chin-ups because you are less likely to cheat. Push-ups were actually tough becausey tris and front delts were sore from Wednesdays tough circuit. Sit-ups got tough towards the last few rounds and had to use my arms to pull on my shorts to assist me up.

Accessory work. Certain muscle groups weren't fatigued or sore, so I did a few isolation exercises to help with strength for future circuits.
Machine flye
2 sets 250x10
Machine shrug
2 sets 360x12
Lateral raises
2 sets 35x10
Dumbbell curls
2 sets 45x12 each arm
Angled calf raise drop sets
3 sets 350/250/150

[E90335i]

This is a great documentary on how hard athletes push themselves

[E90335i]

Ok, so i didn't know about not being able to go back and edit older posts. Otherwise I would have not made post #2. So lame. It would have been a great reference tool for everyone.

[E90335i]

10 minute warmup on cross trainer elliptical
foam rolling for mobility

machine leg press
105x20, 135x20, 165x20, 195x20, 235x20
abductor/adductor
95x20, 105x20, 115x20
one legged glute presses
60x15, 60x12, 60x10
DB straight legged deadlift
55x15, 55x15, 55x12
one legged machine leg curls
45x15, 45x15, 45x15
medicine ball hip raise
BWx15, BWx15

stair master
20 minutes, 50 steps per minute, concentrating on the calves.

Overall good workout. Surprisingly my knee didnt bother me, so I went heavier than normal on the leg press.
GO BEARS!

[E90335i]

150 yard warmup
1650 yard swim (33 laps in the pool)

Felt good. My arms were tired still from a hard workout Friday, but overall a good swim. Plus, it's never bad to relax in the hot tub afterwards

[E90335i]

Walked on the highest incline at 3mph for 40 minutes. Super exciting...

[E90335i]

swimming
150 yard warmup
20x25 sprints with 15 deep breaths rest
100 yard cool down

weight circuits
3 rounds, no rest, 15 reps each
95lb hand clean and press
BW TRX band rows
power leg raises

3 rounds, no rest, 15 reps each
assisted pull ups
dips

3 rounds, no rest
battle ropes, 30 reps each arm
walking planks, 40 feet

grip work
hold pullup position as long as possible
superset with push ups AMRAP

Felt pretty good today. swimming went fine and swam with board shorts for more drag. I will continue to do the swim sprints with board shorts to make it more difficult. The weight circuits were tough. The first rounds were all quick and easy, but had to take a few deep breaths to continue on during the 2nd rounds of all of them.

[E90335i]

weighed in at 220 this morning. Down 4 lbs thus far.

[E90335i]

10 minute warmup cross trainer elliptical.
foam roller mobility work
30 minutes of 2 minutes at level 10 on the bike and 1 minute level 15.

It got tough towards the end, but it is what I needed! I listened to Paleo Runner podcast about Ironman training. Pretty interesting because I try to follow a whole diet. Clean foods and minimize anything processed or has 90 preservatives in it.

[E90335i]

Took a few days off because one of my mom's dogs had puppies, so I had to help her out to make sure the dogs were healthy. Especially is this cold weather. I also cheated on my diet with some holiday snacks at work, but a few cookies never killed anyone. So I punished myself with a long workout.

LSD swim
200 yard warmup
3 rounds of 500 yards with a 2 minute rest between rounds.

Legs
adductor/abductor
3 sets 120x20

leg press
130x20
145x20
160x20
175x20
190x20

glute press
3 sets each leg
60x12

leg curls
3 sets
70x15

straight legged deadlifts
2 sets
55 DB'sx15

body ball glute/ham raise
3 sets
BWx15

angled calf raises superset with bodyweight squats
200x20 / 20 BW squats
220x20 / 20 BW squats
240x20 / 20 BW squats
260x20 / 20 BW squats
280x20 / 20 BW squats
300x20 / 20 BW squats
320x20 / 20 BW squats
340x20 / 20 BW squats
360x20 / 20 BW squats

Very tiring, but felt good. Definitely worn out and do not feel like cleaning my condo. Laying on the couch watching football seems so more appealing. But, my fiance has the dogs with her out of town, so I have to clean. hogwash.

[E90335i]

10 minute elliptical cross trainer warmup

stretching and foam rolling. The foam roller was very soft, which I believe led to my knee hurting after the workout. There wasn't enough tissue release and I think that is why my knee still hurts 2 days later. I hope this isnt a sign of things to come.

30 minutes on the bike.
2 minutes level 10, 1 minute level 15.
Tough and really tested my strength.

[E90335i]

5 minute elliptical cross trainer warmup.

strength sets.
incline close grip bench press superset with pullups.
135x8 / 5 pullups
185x5 / 5 pullups
205x3 / 5 pullups
215x2 / 5 pullups

10 set circuit for 10 reps each exercise:
40 lb DB's push press
assisted pull ups
dips
TRX band rows

19:40 seconds total time. Very tough, sweating a lot and the time was long because I had a decent walk to the dip station and TRX band rows.

grip test:
hang from pull up bar with one arm. only lasted about 10 seconds.

[E90335i]

10 minutes on elliptical cross trainer.
Foam roller
30 minutes intervals.
2 minutes level 10
1 minute level 15

Felt tough. My injured knee actually swelled up a lot. Have to take it easy next time.

[E90335i]

back from banned camp.

200 yard warmup
20 sprints with 15 deep breaths rest period
100 yard cool down

tabata

5 rounds with 30 second rest between each round
pushups until failure
pull ups until failure
30 crunches
DB clean and press with 40lb DB's until failure
15 leg raises

swim felt good. I got some new goggles that are awesome. the last 19-20 sprints I combined without rest. next week I will have no rest the last 2 50's. each week I will try to do more and more 50's without rest. hopefully I can get good enough where I am down to 100's without rest.
The tabata felt good, seemed easy. Didnt want to push it too hard because I like to push it on fridays.

[E90335i]

Just rode the bike for 40 minutes. Felt good. Listened to my favorite podcast. I like the fat burning man by Abel James. Great information. I listen to h in my car as well.

[E90335i]

7 minute warmup on cross trainer elliptical.

8 rounds with 30 second rest after each round:
Push ups til failure
Pull-ups til failure
OHP 135 lbs
Sumo deadlift high pull 45lb plate - 20 reps
Body weight dips
Plank til failure

Sweating like a mofo at the end. The overhead press got tough and only got 1.5 reps on the last round.

Isolation exercises.
DB curls 50x10
Chin up holds until failure
135lb BB wrist curls.

Overall tough workout. Sweating pretty good and didn't really have the energy for much else.

[E90335i]

Felt good today. Finally getting stronger on the hack squat station. I loaded on 360 lbs. doesnt equate to that on a barbell, but that is what I added and could comfortably get 10 reps with a deep range of motion.
Not going to bore anyone with exactly what I did, but here is the exercises in sequences:
10 minute warmup of cross trainer elliptical machine.

foam roller for myofascial release.

adductor and abductor superset
hack squat station
leg curl machine
glute presses
straight legged deadlift with dumbbells

20 minutes on the stairmaster with calf emphasis.

[E90335i]

Swam 33 laps in the pool. Felt great. I didnt need to rest and could kept going. oddly, I didnt eat well the night before and had a great workout at 5:30 in the morning. I ate pizza, cookies and beer. My typical diet is salmon, vegetables, fruit with protein powder, greek yogurt with fruit. So, eating like crap helped me have more energy and workout with better endurance. Especially since I work out on an empty stomach.

[E90335i]

Still cant run because of my knee. So, I walked on the highest incline for 40 minutes at 3 mph. It felt good and was getting tiring. I had a little bit of a lack of sleep. so it was nice to be able to get some decent cardio in.

[E90335i]

200 yard swim warmup

16 lengths at sprint speed at 25 yards
2 x 50 yards at sprint speed
100 yard cool down

felt good. slowly getting better and sprint distances.

weight circuits.
10 rounds of AMRAP with 30 second rest
pull ups
push ups
low to high row (full stack)
dips

3 rounds of:
hanging leg raises superset with planks

3 rounds of:
DB side raises with DB curl to shoulder presses

3 rounds of:
weighted crunch - weighted side crunch - weighted oblique twists

4 drop sets of:
angled calf raises (triple drop set)

Overall felt good. Much needed long workout. I ate a lot last night and had a big breakfast. So I was fueled and ready! I just need to have a light dinner to not overdo on the calories.

[E90335i]

Rode the bike for. 40 minutes. Felt fine. Legs were a little fatigued already from previous workouts during the week.

Good news is, I'm down 10 lbs and now weigh 214. 9 more pounds to go before I start running.

[E90335i]

7 minute warmup on cross trainer elliptical. Foam roller for myofascial release.

5 rounds with 30 second rest between each round, AMRAP:
Close grip bench press 205lbs
Superset
Sumo deadlift high pulls 135lbs

2 sets until failure:
High incline sit ups

5 rounds with 30 second rest between rounds, AMRAP:
Clean and jerk 95lbs
Superset
Deadlift 135lbs

2 sets until failure:
High incline sit ups

3 rounds with 30 second rest between rounds, AMRAP:
Pull-ups
Push-ups
TRX band rows
Close grip push-ups

2 sets until failure:
Knees to elbows


Was sweating a lot. Pretty fatigued muscle wise from previous workouts in the week, but nothing too sore. Felt good and wanted to nap when I got home.

[E90335i]

swimming
16 sprints at 25 yards
3 sprints at 50 yards
15 deep breaths between each sprint for rest.

DB push press
35x10
40x8
45x6
50x6
60x5

body weight circuit, 10 rounds of AMRAP
pullups
pushups
low to high row (full stack for weight)
dips

high incline situps
3 rounds of AMRAP

worm crawlers
3 lengths as far as possible (went about half of a bball court)

[E90335i]

10 minute cross trainer elliptical
Foam rolling and lightweight DB warmup
Round 1
Incline DB
Superset DB rows
Then incline sit-ups
50 lbs DB's, AMRAP, 5 rounds

5 minutes at 80% effort step mill

Hang clean and snatch 95 lbs
Superset TRX band rows
Plank
AMRAP, 5 rounds

5 minutes at 80% effort stationary bike

Pull-ups
Superset with dips
Hanging leg raises
AMRAP, 5 rounds

5 minutes 80% effort step mill

DB curl to shoulder press
High incline sit-ups

5 minutes 80% effort stationary bike

Farking tough. Felt good.

[AlexLifting97]

Best of luck on getting lean bro Subbed and Repped

[E90335i]

1750 yard swim

45 minutes on the stationary bike.

Both felt good. I wanted to run as well, but ran out of time because family was in town.