Failure

Jul22
by Duf on July 22, 2013 at 5:42 pm
Posted In: Endurance activities, Injuries

Hello, my name is Duf, and I am a failure. (sometimes)

It is really an odd thing trying to analyze the mind-body connection that pushes an individual during physical activities.  I have never quite figured out why some days I feel like I can carry the world on my back while others feel like the slightest breeze can blow me of course of my intended goal.

I have had a track record of pulling off some big physical milestones (30 pull ups, 75 push ups) out of the blue just because that day I had made up my mind to do it. So on days that the exact opposite happens, I feel really weak, discouraged, and just generally bad about myself.  Today was an example of one of those days.

Over the weekend I hadn’t done any cali/strength/bar training, just doing an endurance brick on Sunday of road biking followed by swimming.  I figured the two days “off” should set me up for a strong showing at the gym today.  I went into today’s workout with two highlighted goals.  I wanted to get more than 20 reps in a pull up set (haven’t done that in awhile) and also do a set of 50 chest to floor push ups.  I failed both goals.

On my pull up set I bailed after struggling to squeak out a 20th rep as my grip was failing. That was at least close to my goal, it was the push up set that really bothered me.

I did the first 40 reps consecutively and was locked out in plank position, taking a quick breather before trying to get the last 10.  I drop down a do rep 41, and then after it felt more difficult than I anticipated, dropped to my knees and scrubbed the rest of the set.  It was almost a subconscious thing, the idea flashed into my head that I was tired and BOOM, with no internal discussion, I bailed.

I was quite angry at myself for not being able to follow through on my pre-workout goals.  Maybe it is because we are right at or just past full moon, a time on the calendar where I historically am not at my best mentally or physically.

Maybe part of my struggle is because I am walking around close to 10 pounds heavier than when I set some of my personal bests in pushing and pulling numbers.  Sure at 170 pounds I looked rather gaunt and arguably unhealthy but it was less body weight to move around on the bar as well.  I am not quite sure how much of my added pounds are muscle from things like regular squats / dead lifts and how much is pure chub from less discipline in my food intake.

Or maybe, I am just old and forgetting that I am playing around in a young man’s world.

 

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Let’s talk about 355

Jul17
by Duf on July 17, 2013 at 5:28 pm
Posted In: Exercises, Injuries

So ever since Fi shamed me into resuming dead lifts as part of my weekly workouts I have been making some steady progress which continued today with a one rep mixed grip pull of 355 pounds.  The progress has been encouraging but has also felt borderline dangerous at times.

When I dead lift at heavier weights (285 and up for me), I experience various sensations that are not very pleasant.    After my 5 reps at 285 today I grabbed on to the leg press machine for stability.  The bright dots in my field of vision and light headedness felt like I was on the runway for pass out city.

When I get to the single rep sets there is that pull across the lower back which has lessened as I have gotten stronger but still is a steady reminder of a potential back injury lurking in the weeds.

Then today just as I pulled 355 off the deck I heard a sickening crunch in my twice scoped right knee, more than likely some of my damaged meniscus getting squished around.  By tomorrow I should know based on the amount of swelling and degree of limp if I did any serious damage.

So despite the various hazards heavy dead lifting seem to present to my 45 year old body, I plan to keep plugging away at them until I get derailed.  375 would be nice, 400 would be epic.  As is I am only a few pounds away from pulling double my bodyweight, another goal.

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5 is a big number

Jul11
by Duf on July 11, 2013 at 5:36 pm
Posted In: Physical challenges

One of the Bar-barian pledges that I am FB friends with posted a workout he did the other day.  He did rounds of 5 pull ups, 5 dips and 5 push ups.  The goal was to see how many he could complete in 30 minutes of time.  He managed to get 26 rounds which works out to 130 reps of each exercise.  I had done similar high volume routines before but not this particular combination so I figured I would give it a try.

I had no idea how it would go, especially after my gym performance yesterday which was pretty pathetic.  I have had kind of a rough week thus far and it has been taking it’s toll at the gym.  I have felt unmotivated and sort of like I am just going through the motions. I figured 30 minutes of non-stop body weight reps would be a good way to shock me out of it.

So when you describe this work out it doesn’t sound like much.  After all, a lot of people can do 5 reps of these exercises.  Through the first 3 or 4 sets I was coasting along pretty well. I was trying to make sure all of the movements utilized solid form with full ROM.

As the sets started to pile it became more important to try to keep the reps as explosive as possible to keep blowing through the numbers with out totally gassing out on a set.  Once I completed round 10 I was in bust ass mode.  Combining the movements back to back makes each one more difficult than if you were doing just dips, push ups or pull ups by themselves.

By the time round 20 was over I was gasping for air. When I finished the last push up in round 23 at the 30:00.2 mark I dropped to my knees as the sweat dripped from my forehead.  I was spent.

The pull ups, as expected are the biggest hurdle to climb.  In total during the half hour I repped a total of 345 reps spread evenly at 115 per exercise.

It was a good stress flushing exercise.  Max reps in blocks of time are always a great mental and physical test. Thanks Steve P for the idea!

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Lifting heavy things

Jun26
by Duf on June 26, 2013 at 2:21 pm
Posted In: Lifting Heavy Things

Last night after work I went outside to do very different types of exercise.  First was a hard mode attempt at the Bender.  The stiff legged leg raises are so tough for me because of both my poor hip flexibility and very long legs.  I BARELY got a 7th rep.

I then tried again to do a better elbow planche on top of the pull up bar.  After an embarrassingly bad bar over I got my body straighter but quickly tipped forward and flipped over the bar.  In a way it was good that I tipped over, it helped me get over the apprehension of what would happen if I did so.  I was worried that I could possibly lose my grip and fall off the bar but I was able to hold on easily without crashing to terra firma.

1045218_10152324161242841_783531003_n[1]Finally I messed around with my smaller, 200 lb tire.  I wanted to see if I could pick it off the ground completely.  Doing so involved first leveraging the tire on my thighs, grabbing the inner bead of the tire and leaning back.

I got the tire elevated and was even able to get it above parallel with the ground.  I thought it would be cool if somehow I could flip it up and over my head but doing so would require more strength/power than I currently possess.

I would like to try this same move with the bigger 300 pound tire sometime.  The size and shape of these tires makes lifting them entirely different than trying to pull the same weight when it is hung off a nice and tidy barbell.

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Planching in high places

Jun21
by Duf on June 21, 2013 at 2:11 pm
Posted In: Exercises

A little while back I saw Fi trying an elbow planche on a pull up bar but she couldn’t quite pull it off.  Ever since then I had the idea that I wanted to try to do that as well.  My floor elbow planche is pretty solid so I figured doing it on a bar would not be much different.  Well, it IS different.

Before getting on top of the bar I planted my elbows on my hips and looked at my hands, trying to gauge how far apart my supinated grip on the bar should be.  I grabbed on and did a sloppy bar over to get on top, the first time I did a bar over with a chin up grip.

I found the process of getting my arms/elbows in the right position far more difficult up on the bar since my body weight was already being supported on them.  I slowly started to pitch my body forward.  Despite only being 8 feet in the air, having my head out over the bar with nothing below is a bit of a weird feeling.  I really concentrated on using my biceps to make sure I didn’t go flipping forward.

I held the planche briefly although my body wasn’t as straight as it should be.  For whatever reason I found it very hard to get my elbows firmly planted on my hips which made holding it for any period of time very tough.

I flipped myself back up and tried a few more times but had less success with each subsequent attempt because of fatigue.  Simply holding myself upright on the bar with that grip felt difficult by itself as my center of gravity felt more off the bar than it does when I am up top with a pronated grip.

I then moved to my two big tires, wondering if I would have more success on their wobbly, but more or less flat surfaces.  At that point I just didn’t have the power required to hold myself up for any period of time.

Even with only the brief success, it was a good start.  It exposed me to the sensation and fear of being stretched out horizontally over the bar.   It would be awesome if eventually I could get on top of the 11 foot high bar and pull off this hold cleanly…

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