The Miseducation of Jimbo Slice

5/3/1 - Wave 1 - "5/3/1" Day

Bench:
60kg x5
85kg x5
105kg x5
117.5kg x3
132.5kg x4

Dips:
bodyweight 4x12, 1x15

Lucy Press:
60kg x10
80kg 3x15

Pendlay Row:
80kg 5x12

Bench was ok I guess... PR's are 135kg x5 and 140kg x4, so not really too far away I guess. It annoys me not being at PR levels, but Kev keeps trying to convince me it's normal!!!

Finally got the monkey off my back on the dips. Been struggling to hit 4x12, never mind a 5th set. Extended my breaks a fraction today and blasted thru.

Moving up on the Lucy Presses too... did 3x10 (hard) in week 1, 3x12 in week 2 and now 3x15. My planned progression worked, so I'll go to 85kg next cycle and hope to repeat.

Wanted to beat my old PR for the chins today, but my shoulder just said not thanks after about 7 reps. Moved on to Pendlay Rows instead. They suck. HARD. It's so nasty having your stomach jammed up against your legs and being unable to breathe for a set. My erectors and upper back were in bits after it tho so I guess it's worth it!

the drifter wrote: »

SLDL's all the way to the floor.....ive so being doing them wrong...

You don't HAVE to do them all the way to the floor!!! I've done em both ways (stopping just about 2-3 inches off the floor and coming back up). Can handle more weight the latter way obviously, but I really like the former as an assistance exercise post DL's.

kevpants wrote: »

It is normal. Just keep reminding yourself that you are getting stronger. After a couple of cycles you'll be breaking those PR's even with the extra fatigue from the previous worksets.

Haha it's hard to tell myself i'm getting stronger when I'm below PR levels tho

I'm not due to be up at 140kg for another 3 months now, so if I don't hit at least 6-8 with it then I'll be hitting the wall!

5/3/1 - Wave 1 - "5/3/1" Day

Squat:
60kg 2x5
100kg x5
130kg x2
145kg x5
165kg x3
*belt on*
185kg x5

Oly Squats:
130kg x10
120kg x10
110kg x10
100kg x10
90kg x10

Pulldown Abs:
warm ups
Stack x10
Stack +20kg plate 2x10

Russian Twists:
5kg plate x12 (ie 6 per side)
10kg plate 3x12 (ie 6 per side)
4kg 'bells 1x12 (6 per side)

Didn't go tooooo mad on the squats today becuase of the Crossfit Challenge I'm doing tomorrow. Mighta squez (spelling??) out another 2-3 reps with the squats if I pushed it. I've been skipping 4-5x a day for 3-4 minutes a time to practice so my legs were a bit drained from that I suppose.

The oly squats were grand. Better this week than last. I'll add 5kg per cycle to these. Might not seem like much but 4-5 months down the road I'll be hitting 155/145/135/125/115 all x10 after my main squats so there's a bit of potential there. I'm still only 3 weeks after a meet so fatigue's a bit of an issuse. Deload next week will be nice.

Skipped pullthru's cos my hams were still tender from DL's earlier in the week.

Abs were cool. Getting back to PR levels on the pulldown abs. The reps were really hard today tho. I might go to 22.5kg after my deload.

The russian twists suuuuuuuuuck. Feels like my obliques and abs are going to be ripped right from my rib cage. I LOVE em.

May as well stick a write up of the day down too.....

First impressions, the gym was quite easy to find!! (even for a northsider like myself). I think there were like 3 or 4 turns from the M50 and I was there. It's handy the way it's marked on google maps too.

The gym itself if pretty sweet!! Pretty much anything could need to do any productive training (not just Crossfit!!). Some more weights, and reinforced platforms and you could probably do some very productive oly and powerlifting workouts there too.

I hate doing this, because I know I'll forget someone, or spell someone's name wrong, but I met some new people off the forum at it too (and these are the ones that I post here) - Colm (duh!!), Dominic (flapjack man!), Ruairi, Tom, Ed, Dave and Bobby. If I've forgotten to mention someone, call me on it!!!

I knew I was in for a rough day, and despite Colm's advice I decided to make it harder on myself by squatting on Friday night!! It was only mid way thru the day that I found out some of the crafty CF so and so's had been deloading and resting up for it since the start/middle of the week.... I almost wish I was like Malteaser and not able to compete

Anyway....

Workout 1
5 rounds for time, must be <10 mins:
5 Push Presses/Jerks w/60kg
10 Pullups/Chins
15 Double Unders (I scaled these down to 45 single unders)

Had a discussion with Dominic before starting about the best tactics for this... but I'm not gonna lie, they went out the window after the second round. The measured planned approach doesn't work when your heart feels like it's gonna explode!!!!

I got thru R1 without much trouble, think I actually managed to keep pace with Colm to that point, needless to say, I was left for dust after!! R2 and R3 were pretty brutal. The chins were absolutely KILLING me. It's not easy doing them when A) You don't know how to kip, You're 108kg, C) Your shoulder tries to subluxate every time you hit full extension, and D) The real reason - you're soooooo out of shape.

Made it thru the 5 push presses on the 4th round, and 9 of the chins before I was timed out. I don't remember who spotted me during it, it may have been Bobby?, but whoever it was I owe a big thank you to because you really pushed me on.

A quick note to say, Will is on a different level. I think he did the workout in <6-7 mins unscaled, which is just frightening, especially when you've tried it and failed misearably!!

Workout 2
3 rounds for time, must be <10 mins:
200m run
10 KB swings w/24kg 'bell
10 Burpee box jumps

On paper, this looked relatively easy, and while I was far from confident I thought I might make it around in <10!! I think I musta got a fast group because after about 100m in the first run I was down by 10-20. They were half way thru their swings before I started!! At that stage I was feeling ok so got thru the swings and caught a few people, and that was the closest I got. The burpee box jumps (aka fall on the floor, get up and stand on the box) were brutal. The REAL killer was how tiring it was on my quads (damn Friday squats!), because having to set off on a 200m run after doing all that was a total soul destroyer. Having to do it 2x times before I was finished reeeeeally sucked. On the last run I just told myself "don't stop", it was the longest 200m of my life, and from the moment I set off I wanted to just walk, but I told myself all I had to do was keep moving, even if it was only a shuffle! Got thru the last round of KB swings again easily enough and just kept moving thru the last round of "fall on the floor, get up and stand on the box". I think my time was 8.something. Way down the table, but amazingly not last!!

As an aside, on this event I saw one of the ballsiest things ever. One of the lads (I won't name names, everyone who was there knows who he is) had hurt his hand earlier in the day on the pullups and wasn't able to support his bodyweight for the burpees, so he was basically doing a one arm push up/forearm lift for the majority of it. Probably not the smartest of things, but a great representation of the never say die attitude.

Lunch
Mickk from irish-lifting.com showed up just before lunch with a toy for us to play with... a 42 inch plyo platform. I fancied my chances at it becaus I'd gotten up onto approx. 41.5 inches the week before. I tried and failed a few times. However, Dominic was immediately up on it doing his matrix style slow mo jumps (which have to be seen to be believed - someone turn gravity back on!!). Mickk followed and got on it too, then the fun really started.... they started stacking plates and mats on it too!! I think it probably got to around 48-50 inches with both of them getting onto it without very much hassle at all.

Inspite of Dom's protestations and warnings that I was probably going to kill my CNS (he was right, but I've a deload this week so it's ok!!), I kept ploughing away trying to get up onto the 42 box. And just before everyone had given up and was about to finally go inside I got p!ssed off and did it. I reckon I coulda gone higher too Maybe some day when I'm fresh I'll get the chance. As least I got bragging rights over a certain someone now!

Workout 3
200m 15kg med ball clean and throw

It didn't get off to the best start, but Mickk saved the day and bailed up to his warehouse with Will to supply us with some loaner balls for the event. Once I saw what it was I knew it could be my event. The ball was heavy enough that it would probably tire the others out, but not so heavy that I wouldn't be more than comfortable with it (finally my strength came into play!!), and the distance was short enough so I wouldn't tire out. Amazingly I won my group and did it in under 3mins. 2.53 to be exact I think Not even near the fastest time of the day, but it was nice not to be dead last for once.

There was lots more fun had inside with me trying to learn some muscle ups, and failing miserably, while getting to see Neil and Ed do them without even breaking a sweat. I did manage to do some clapping pull ups and flying push ups tho so I was happy enough with that Got to have a nice discussion with Dave, Ruairi and Dominic about the state of the Irish fitness industry and the blinkers some people people seem to be wearing to protect their eyes while their head is in the sand!! It was really informative and was thoroughly impressed with how openly everyone was prepared to discuss matters.

The one thing that REALLY impressed me throughout was the camaraderie and group spirit. Everyone was cheering everyone on, it was kind of powerlifting-y in that respect. Even the "outsiders" got great support.

Overall I think I came 13th (?) out of however many competed, coulda been 25? A nice respectable mid table finish if so.

Colm and Will have a great thing going up there, and thanks a million to them and everyone else involved for being such great hosts and doing such a fantastic job with the fund raising.

While I won't say I've been converted, I can see why Crossfit is so popular and useful. The group atmosphere, good coaching and general sense of fun and accomplishment involved in finishing one of the workouts is really nice!

As far as I know, Colm has more in store in the not too distant future which, so watch this space I guess!! Can't wait to see the vids and official write up from the day either.

Thanks again to all who turned out and made it a great day!!

5/3/1 - Wave 2 - "5" Day

Bench:
70kg 2x5
90kg x5
107.5kg x5
115kg x5
122.5kg x7

Dips:
bodyweight +5kg 5x12 - WTF??

Lucy Press:
85kg 3x10

Pull ups:
bodyweight 1x8, 4x6

I haaaaaaaaaaate benching. Really I do. Dunno wtf's going on with it these days. I'm going to blame my poor performance today on the sets leading up to 122.5kg. I better not be staring down the nose of another month of sh!t bench workouts. Kev tells me it'll be ok, but I don't really believe him!!

Dunno what's doing on with the dips... after struggling to do 5x12 with just bodyweight for a month, I strap on 5kg and get 5x12. Weeeeird.

Lucy Presses were good, trying to explode them off the steps a bit more this week.

Chins were feeling good. Not getting absolute full extention at the bottom, but I'm doing a 2-3 eccentric so I reckon that's making up for it!

Squatting on Friday... finally a chance to go after a PR.

brianthebard wrote: »

My back also feels good after ab work, especially if it was tight before, I figure the ab stuff gets blood into the area/stretches it out? Or it could in some way be bad for your back but I don't want to think about that...

Dunno tbh.... non-sore back = happy back. I'll take it any way I can get it!

Happy Birthday to my log!!! It was 2 years old 2 days ago

Here's a run down of the last 2 years progress;




Not ALL that happy with my raw progress ....

Squats: 185kg x1 ---> 207.5kg x4 (so +22.5kg and 3 reps - that's approx 40-50kg on my max I guess)
Bench: 130kg x1 ---> 140kg x4 (so +10kg and +3 reps - approx 25-30kg on my max)
Deadlift: 220kg ---> 260kg - at least (so say +40kg on my max)

Heh... maybe it's not as bad as I thought.



It all happened on the equipped side tho;

Squat: (single ply suit and 2m knee wraps) 220kg x1 ---> 305kg x1 (+80kg)
Bench: (single ply) 155kg x1 ---> 205kg x1 (+50kg)

Total: 590kg ---> 770kg - conservative (+180kg)

If I could stick even half that amount on my total again over the next 2 years I'd probably consider it a success!! Should have me up to between 870 and 900kg... that'd be ridiculously sick.

Kev M wrote: »

Very impressive sir, if I could do half that in the next two years I'd probably be over the moon.
Could you imagine still having this log running in another two years, and posting a 900kgs total :eek:. This would have to be one of if not the most successful logs out there.

Cheers Kev... that'd be pretty amazing alright eh?? I don't see why it couldn't happen.....

I mean I went from 590kg in May '07 to 707.5kg in July '08 to an estimated (and conservative) 780-790kg in July 09!!

It'd be really nice to log back on the log when it's 4 years old and see the change in my lifts!! I don't know of any other logs that would show such a radical change and evolution. I'd love to see em if they exist tho!

cardio,shoot me wrote: »

from watching your 305kg squat vid id say theres easily more in the tank there! 10kilos at least like!

Should be at least... tried 317.5kg after that but was dead at that stage!