Dufisthenics

Today I saw an old man doing some very stylish bicep curls.  He was sporting dual 12 pounders that he would alternate curling around his back at the bottom of the movement.  It was a cross between marching and a dance move.  Of course silly movements are not exclusive to the older crowd at Planet Fitness but they certainly have a comfortable majority.

So I did smith machine deadlifts for the first time in awhile, probably pushing two months.  You may recall that the prior two times I tried deadlifting on the smith I walked away with a tweaked lower back.  When I did my warm up set with two 45’s on each side I could again feel the beginnings of some discomfort in that same lower right quadrant.

Instead of immediately calling it quits I did some analysis of my starting position.  What I came up with was my shins were too far away from the bar.  With a smith machine especially, since there is no back and forth movement it’s important to start as close to the bar as possible, otherwise you wind up in an awkward and dangerous position where you are pulling with too much back and not hip thrust.  I shifted my feet forward until my shins were brushing the bar and managed to do reps with as much as 150 pounds of additional weight without feeling significant lower back strain.  It’s funny how sometimes you have to kick things out of cruise control and spot check how you are doing movements when problems arise.

Today’s Workout 

5 minutes cardio/stretching

15 pull ups

Smith squats – 105lbs x 10, 155lbs x 8, 195lbs x 4

Smith DL – 195lbs x 10, 285lbs x 5, 325lbs x 1, 345lbs x 1

Seated leg curl – 100lbs x 10, 140lbs x 8

Seated leg extension – 110lbs x 10, 170lbs x 8

Seated calf extension – 190lbs x 10, 290lbs x 8