Saturday 2 July 2011

02 JUL 11 -- Squat 3x5

Well, I never got around to that set of curls in the basement home gym. I did, however, indulge in several beers last night. It's the long weekend, and yesterday was our national holiday (I'm Canadian), so I spent the evening at home with my family, enjoyed some cold beers while sitting on the deck, and turned my attention upwards to some stargazing while reclining on a rather comfortable deck chair. Intermittently, there were fireworks going off in the distance, which was especially to my advantage as my house sits on a high hill overlooking the town. Cold beer, comfortable chair, starry sky and fireworks, all in the setting of a breezy summer night. Life's finer moments to be savoured.

Now, for some training results.

The training max for the squat is 490 lbs, and this is 3x5 week of the 5/3/1 program:

Warm up sets:
135 x 5 (not part of the program, but I always like to warm up with two plates so I can stretch my way downwards a little more for a deeper squat)
195 x 5
245 x 5
295 x 3

Working sets:
320 x 5
370 x 5 (the sets were going very smoothly and I was feeling strong on these numbers)
415 x 10

The requisite number was supposed to be 5 reps, and Wendler would have me stay with the requisite this week, but like my last workout, I wanted to see what I could handle at that weight. I had to make some slight pauses on the last three reps, and the last one was a real upward struggle, but I cracked them off, met my goal for the day (10 reps was what I set the goal at), and then had to catch my breath after I came out of the rack. I was very happy with the max set.

Assistance work was simply going back to 50% of the working max, 245 lbs, and doing 5 x10 squats, working on going deep, and striving for the benefit that only deep squatting can give. Afterwards, I did hammer curls for 3 x10 with 50 lbs dumbbells, training both arms to go up simultaneously, not alternately. I would have done 5 x 10, but I needed to get back to the house, as I was running out of time.

I had a discussion about training in between sets with a young fellow, a high school kid who has just graduated. A member of our national paralympic soccer team, he wants to develop a superstrong bench press, so I referred him to check out the Ryan Kennelly program, which is essentially the Westside method of training, utilizing a max effort and dynamic effort split for lifts. Ryan is the world's best bencher, as you can see in this video, throwing 1050 lbs off his chest:

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