RealFolkBlues

How do bench exercises feel, in general? Also, you said squat was your number one lift. Do you have a quad press machine that has the weight loaded on your shoulders like a backpack? We've got that one at my gym in addition to the old-school one where your head is close to the ground. If you have it, does it feel ok? Sorry, I'm (fortunately) not super familiar with back issues and how to cope with them when lifting.

Thanks and likewise! BW+90lbs pull-up is alpha as hell, bro. Is that gonna be a pull-up (palms facing you) or a chin-up (palms facing out?) Seconding hack squats for Halt. Hadn't thought of those, but definitely gets that back of the leg. For that matter, dead lifts are pretty great, and hit the hams/calves. Given the concerns you mentioned about your arm giving, you might want to set up a variation inside of a power rack just to be safe, but the plus side there is that you can actually do a dead lift to a deficit position, which is even harder and hits the back of the legs even better. Hack, I don't suppose you do martial arts, do ya? If so, do hook kicks.

Bump. Also, Greyboy. Good stuff. Do you guys like acid jazz? I do.

Seriously, though, if you're looking for moderate strength gains and mostly fat loss, you don't need a gym at all. There's tons of ways to drop pounds and get swole with just calisthenics. Does your gym have a cable machine? If so, you can use it set real low and/or with a bench. It's not gonna be perfect, but you can still hit your hamstrings and glutes, which is what you activate in a leg curl. Also, Halt, to your earlier question given your health concerns, I'm gonna go against my usual instincts and recommend the Smith machine. I'm not a fan of this machine in general, because people do squats with it (which I'll grant is what it looks like it's for but is in fact way worse than free weights for,) and it takes up a ton of space in the weight room. That being said, it is very safe and I've seen it used to good effect when people put a bench underneath. As to goals, I need to get on that Fitocracy thing, I reckon. I was on Fitlinxx (somewhat similar but just at the Y pretty much,) but now that's went away, so some goal/progress tracking might be nice. Most of my goals are not lifts, but sure, let's put em down in writing: -275 1rm bench -315 1rm squat -bodyweight push jerk -improve flexibility, particularly in my back and hamstrings -cut 10 more lbs so I'm sitting around 165 most of the time, at which point I should have a... -six pack Again, aestheticism and even pure strength take a distant back seat to ability to perform martial arts/fight, so my main goals are as follows: -Improve (really learn any) grappling -Get some cage experience with my betters and have the cardio/muscular endurance to consistently roll with competitive fighters -Box -Finish my pudao form and concurrently become decent with the weapon -Learn how to do a kip-up (just for fun) My number one fitness goal for this year, though? Become a personal trainer/MA instructor. I got a plan, don't worry. I think all of these are very reasonable goals, except for maybe the six pack. That has a lot to do with genetics, but my abs are reasonably defined now at 175, so mayhap I'll have the old washboard stomach at 165, if I get there. My lifting goals are pretty much just what I should be doing by year end if I continue to follow 5/3/1, which I see no point in stopping, so I'm pretty optimistic. Sorry for the long post, everybody, but good luck to everyone on their own goals! Let's do this, bros!

Right on, Soul Splint and Cyril. Working out IS a competition. But only against yourself. As long as you're improving (which virtually any workout makes happen as long as it doesn't injure you,) you're winning. As for those people who post ridiculous crap on the internet, how pathetic must those people's lives be to do that? Speaking of posting lifts on the interwebz, I had a great squat day on Wednesday! Man, I forgot how nice it was to squat with a weight belt on. My back was hurting a little that day (think I just slept on it wrong, honestly,) so I put one on for my last working set and ended up doing 8x205 ass to grass. It felt great. I felt like I could have done at least a couple more. That's all well and good, especially since I got squished on my bench the day before. Lolz. My 5x195 became a 3x195 and man that last one was rough. My spotter claimed he barely helped, which is probably true, but it sucks I couldn't even get a fourth rep. Eh well. I honestly think bad nutrition/sleep had something to do with that one. BTW, I ended up choosing push jerks for my explosive lift, based largely off of some of the horror stories I heard from a trainer at the gym about injuries she had seen from power cleans. I never really liked those guys anyway.

Lol, yeah, up here in the mountains I'm gonna have beachfront property by the time I'm an old man. Oy vey... Also, I guess tanning booths really do have a purpose beyond vanity, then. That's pretty neat.

Whatever it was, it wasn't really my bag. Thanks for the suggestion, though, Timaeus! I do like odd time signatures, though.

Yay, jazz! Next to classical, it may be my favorite genre of music. In general, I think higher of instrumental music than lyrical. That's definitely the case with jazz, where singers tend to make me almost immediately switch the station/skip the track.

I'm fortunate enough to live in a place that gets all four seasons, lol, so I don't get too much winter, thankfully. It's easily my least favorite, mainly just because I hate driving in the snow. I'm even reasonably ok at doing it, I just hate to do so. Also, SADD (Seasonal Affective Depression Disorder) is totally a thing that happens to many of us, myself included. I don't get it so bad, but yeah, there are days in the winter where I'm just much gloomier for no apparent reason, and then I look up and remember.

I wouldn't say it's unhealthy. I think that's pretty normal after long hours with a clear task to complete, especially when it's a creative endeavor like a song. I imagine you were pretty excited about this song? It's pretty much just the letdown from being done with something you really enjoyed, I would think. Pretty normal.

Man, this is great. As if I needed more reason to look forward to MAGFest this year.

I'm doing 5/3/1 right now, which means I'm always doing 6 sets, 3 (serious) warmup and 3 working, with the reps on the working sets (and the weight of course) varying depending on which week of a four week cycle I'm on. It's a good program. My form is ok, I think. It's definitely not going to get me confused for an Olympian, but I haven't hurt myself yet lol. Maybe we should compare notes at MAGFest? Wouldn't that be ironic, a lifting group formed from game music nerds at a con?

Double post like a boss! Sorry guys. So I got squished on my squat max yesterday. I was supposed to 5x190, 3x215, and 1x240. I got my 5 and my 3 pretty well, but I think I set the sidebars too high on the power rack for my 1 rep max. Went down, hit the bars, and couldn't get back up. I don't know what possessed me to put the bars that high, as I normally get down pretty low and complete my lift just fine. Meh. Anyways, I dropped the weight down to 235 and put the bars back where they normally were and managed to get it done okay. But man, I am not satisfied at all with my squat. At 175 and doing as much kicking as I do, I feel like I should be able to push a lot more weight. What do you guys recommend? Like I said, I've also started doing the supplementary lifts to make it an actual leg day now, so I've added in leg curls and quad presses, but anything otherwise, other than just to quit whining and do more squats? Which, I'll admit, I should totally do. Also, here's one for you guys. Can you overtrain your abs? That is, since rest is fundamental for gaining strength in other muscle groups, is it okay that I tend to do some, if not a lot, of ab work every day I work out, even when that is during consecutive days?

Thanks for the endorsement, it's been good thus far for sure. It's a mountain, but I've been climbing it for a minute now. With the other stuff I've been doing and occasional weeks where I got poor nutrition (these things happen when you're a dad,) there was like a month or two where I was cutting weight and had to drop my lifts and/or keep them level. It gets pretty tough. I'm about to add in power clean, though I wonder at this point on if I should go with power clean, or go with another good Oly lift like clean and jerk. Also, I started doing the supplemental lifts on my lifting days this past week. Oh man, cable pulls.

Cool. Glad you approve. Also, that's my favorite urban legend maybe ever.

She's cute as a button, man! Grats! Kids are the absolute best. The second year is a ton of fun, too. Is she walking yet? Also, I feel I would be remiss if I didn't ask this. Can she DJP?

^Yeah, I was just talking about this last night at the gym, actually. None of us stretch like we ought to. Have you done yoga? It's good stuff. I recommend it for everyone, ever. It, Tai Chi, and Pilates I think can help anybody regardless of their level of fitness or fitness goals. Also, stretch after you work out, or at least warm up. Stretching cold basically just becomes a warm up, rather than working on flexibility. Thanks a bunch! Yeah, I've been thinking maybe doing some cleans/jerks. I was terrible at power clean back in high school, but I'm stronger/less goofy now than I was then. We shall see. Yeah, for the last several months I've been doing 5/3/1 on bench and squat, which if you're unfamiliar is 3 warm-up sets of 5 or fewer reps, and then 3 working sets of 5 reps the first week, 3 working sets of 3 reps the second week, and then a set of 5, set of 3, set of 1+ the third week before ending the month with a de-load. After my benches I've been doing some other upper body stuff like shrugs and lateral raises, and I've been doing tons of pull-ups in the last several months (though I need to install the pull-up bar in my new place, been slacking on that one.) My squats I still feel like need lots of work (I'm not really happy with my max or my form, though both are improving,) so I don't plan on quitting those, but I'm not sure where I wanna go with my other stuff. Thanks for your advice, though, for sure! I'm thinking power cleans are gonna have to happen. Gonna work the old school power 3 like in high school.

Hey everyone, thanks for the advice prior to my test of this past Saturday! After almost seven grueling hours of all kinds of stuff (kicks, forms, self defense, etc.,) I passed and was awarded my second degree black belt! I screwed up my right hand punching a brick the wrong way twice, and my hamstrings have been a little tight over the last several days, but overall I'm pretty ok, and did alright on test day. I took Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday off, but got back into the gym last night to pretty good effect. Did my 3's on bench, ending at 3x195. Usually I would do other arm stuff, but my arms were still a little tired from the test, so I worked the bags instead for about 20 minutes before finishing up with Fight Gone Bad. I'm excited now, though, because I feel like I can safely vary my routine without worrying about under-performing on an upcoming event. So guys, what are your suggestions for some good stuff to do? My top priority is practical strength. That is, I want to be in good shape for a fight should it occur. Usually burst strength is what you need for this, from what I've read. I've cut down to hovering around 170 lbs, but wouldn't mind cutting just a little more, as muscular endurance is one of my focuses. Finally, this coming year I plan to get my personal trainer certification and start pursuing this as a career. Any thoughts or advice on this or what to do now?

Very nice lifts then, bro! I know it can be hard for you tall skinny guys to bulk up, so good job on that one too. Also, the way you describe it, it does sound like the migraine was unrelated. Bummer that had to happen after being pumped up like that. :/ Going easy this week has been really weird for me. I've been more or less going ham for a while now, so taking a week basically off is bizarre. Yesterday I did three sets of bench, three sets of squats, and like 10 or 15 minutes on the bag, and then like an hour and some of martial arts, but that was the first time I'd worked out since Friday last. I didn't know what to do with myself almost on the days before. Frankly, I meant to work out a little bit more earlier in the week, but it just didn't happen. Meh, it should be fine, but I hope my lifts don't suffer next week. I'm glad I'm on my 3's next week. Besides my de-load week, it's probably the easiest in 5/3/1.

Hey! Nice lifts, man! Especially those squats, that's good stuff for ass to grass. By that you mean more than 90 degrees, right? For perspective, how much do you weigh right now? You may have that down somewhere in this thread, but I'm too lazy to look lol. Sad to say, but they may have been related to your migraine. Did you have good breathing and hydration? Who knows, maybe it was just bad timing. Nonetheless, nice work, guy!

^ Thanks a bunch! Yeah, I've only been working on this stuff for like 10 years. I oughtta be ok. It's just one thing to say it, and another to do it, ya know?

^ Thanks much! I feel fairly confident, but I'm still super nervy. Wish me luck, guys. I'm gonna need it.

Hey thanks for the advice! Events have actually made it so that I haven't worked out this week thus far at all, and just a little this past weekend. I plan to get some light lifting and cardio today in addition to some more light training. Going easy has been strange, but I think I can be patient given the circumstances. I've been hydrating quite a bit and upping my carbs already a bit (bread, lentils, potatoes,) and will continue with this. Dinner the night before I was thinking of making some spaghetti with meat sauce and garlic bread. My breakfast plan for that morning: bacon, eggs, bagels with cream cheese, banana, berries. Whatcha guys think? I'm also going to stretch a lot starting today.