My Training Log

Sooooo…..

I thought I’d blog some training. Reason being I’ve had no time or opportunity to write anything substantial since I’ve started back work with the schools. I am working with an underage team too and a boxing coach I was previously only writing programmes for has taken to asking me in more often to coach one on one. Then there’s Kyuzo and all that comes with that. So in short, I’m short on time to write anything substantial, and I did originally start this blog as a training journal. So since I can log training on my phone without too much effort I’m going to update this more often with training sessions and so on. It won’t all be interesting, and it may not even be good, but it’s going in the books.

Current stats:
Age: 34
Height: 188cm
Weight: 84.5kgs
Bodyfat Guesstimate using the look in the mirror and pinch your ab method: I’d say between 12 and 14%
Bodyfat Guesstimate based on flex in the bathroom mirror under a light method: Easily 6%

Current goals:
After some knee issues earlier in the year, strengthen my fully rehabilitated knee and increase leg strength generally. Keep my back and neck in good shape to do Jiu Jitsu without pain. Get a little bigger just based on the fact that I like to be heavier than I am right now. Increase eyebrow mobility to do a full Roger Moore lift.

What’s been happening up to now:
I’ve been training away in BJJ but have been trying to get at least one squat day in once per week. I’ve been mainly hitting Revolution Fitness owned by one of my BJJ in hiatus students Hanley. It’s a nice small facility and since I’m pretty sure I would punch someone in the face in a commercial gym one day, it suits me down to the ground. I started 6 weeks ago with literally no idea what would happen when I bent my knees with a bar on my back.

To build up my leg strength, I’m using the Wankov method, which is where you take 50% of your starting weight, divide it by your own bodyweight, subtract 3 and add 1. This is your starting number of reps. Then you estimate your 1 rep max by really, really thinking about it quite hard. After this you take the first number of that and get the corresponding number from the alphabet. This is the first letter of the name of the girl you’re going to marry.

Actually what I’ve been doing is starting from a very low base, ensuring my movement and technique is good, and adding small increments to the bar each week. Before lifting one Friday morning in August I hadn’t lifted anything heavier than a 40kg kettlebell with my legs in 2 years. Before that, I hadn’t done a traditional back squat for 3 years, IP was all box squats and single leg lifts. Every time since has been like the first time I squatted… ever.

So the plan is to work up to a heavy set of 3 each week and then follow up with 3 sets of 5 at around 80% of that, or 3 sets of 8 at 60% of that for volume and technique.

Day 1 went like…
Squat
20kgx10, 40kgx2x8, 60kgx5, 70kgx5 80kgx3, 60kgx2x5. Essentially an inglorious fact finding mission. I did some benching, and some ab stuff, and some arm stuff. But I’m not really interested in what I did after the squats.

Day 6 (today) went like…
1) Squat
20kgx10
60kgx5
80kgx5
100kgx3
110kgx3
80kgx3x5
2A) Dips 5×8
2B) Fat Bar Chins 5×8
3A) Fat Bar Curls 20kg 3×10 (actually more like 10, 9.5, 8)
3B) Band Pushdowns 3×10
4) Roger Moore raises 3×10

Not so bad. Happy enough with the squats though all 3 reps at 110kg were all very different looking. I don’t have a number in mind as to what I’d like to lift I’m just going to keep adding 10kgs to the bar every week and when that stops working, I’ll add 5kgs to the bar every week. But based on this morning’s efforts, I’d say 140kgx3 in another 4-6 weeks would be a pretty decent goal, but I’m not going to beat myself up about it if I get stuck lower. As long as the knees are good, I’m good. The fat bar stuff was griptastic, though Hanley failed to inform me as to how awful the fat bar curls were, especially after the 60mm chin up bar for 40 reps. However the narcissist in me must point to the tremendous arm pump that made my tee shirt sleeves shrink… Eyebrow work was poor. The fat bar just took all my mojo.