24 October 2014
Intensity Day
Well it was certainly an intense day for lifting. There was no waiting around for equipment to day which was great but it was a day of ups and downs (no pun intended).


Squats - Warm ups on squats tonight felt pretty good. I forgot to drop a rep off at 120, 140, 160kgs so I lifting a few extra kgs. When I got to my work set I unracked and out of the corner of my eye I saw a guy over by my camera and I thought "damn it not again". A couple of weeks ago a guy stood in front of my camera on a set of 190kgs and so I did a second one to record it. Tonight it threw my concentration off seeing someone over around the camera again. I made my first rep and on the second one I lost tightness in my shoulders and the rep went to hell and I dropped it onto the safeties. I decided to do another set but I didn't have a double in the tank. I did two more singles to get the tonnage in. Just goes to show that lifting is as much mental as physical sometimes.


Bench Press - Tonight was a big night on the bench for me. After having a bad squat session I wasn't sure what was going to happen on the bench. Warming up felt really good right up to 100kgs. I didn't drop any reps and just did 5 reps on all my warmup sets and only rested after the last one. I got our local energizer bunny to give me a spot and in the end he had a chance to just rest. I nailed my 5 reps nice and solid, I might even of had one more in me. This is a good rep PR for me on the bench and the 1RM calculator on my app said my new !RM is over 140kgs. That works great because 140 is what I want to hit at my next comp in Dec. If I keep going I might even do better than 140Kgs in Dec.


Sumo Deadlifts - Tonight I added a little weight to keep some progress going. I also used different shoes to get a better grip on the floor than the slippers I have been using. I felt good on all my reps and did all of them with a overhand grip. Grip was only an issue on the last rep at 160kgs. I think next week I am going to reduce the volume leading up to my top sets down to 3 reps and add more weight again. I am interested to see how these go as they get heavier.


Deadlifts - The first 2 sets of conventional deadlifts felt pretty good but the third set felt a little rough on the lower back. It wasn't enough to think I was in big trouble. But I think enough to show up some fatigue from the sumo volume and that is enough of a reason to reduce the sumo volume.