So to preface, I've been dieting for the past few months...dropped from a fat 260lbs to a slightly more svelt 230lbs (but still am easily double digit bodyfat). During this time, I dropped strength slightly, but not by much.
Being a college football player (and trying to make a position switch) I have recently for the past two weeks decided to clean "bulk" per se, note that I am not trying to gain mass but rather just purely strength.
I feel that I have endomorphic tendencies...freshman year when I really started lifting, I put on a good 40lbs, about half of it good weight. Then again my diet was ****, and I drank like a fish, but I still feel that I have an easy time putting on muscle, its just that the fat comes along with it.
So, the past two weeks I've been trying to put the strength back to where it was pre-30lb loss. I started up a 5x5 routine, and was making great progress...today however, doing lightish deadlifts (probbaly 75% of my 1RM)...(btw I've got currently a 340 1rm bench, 440ish 1rm squat and 460ish 1rm dead).
So I warmup, 135x5, 225x5, 315x5, then I start my working sets of 350. First two sets, down no problem, I mean I havent feel this good in awhile, I'm just exploding the weight up. Third 350 set, the second rep on the way up I feel and hear a giant pop, and my leg gives out.
Trainer says its a moderate-bad hamstring pull, and its gonna take a couple weeks (he said 4-6) to get back to being able to handle weight again. He cautioned me that hamstrings are very easy to reaggrivate if you dont fully heal the first time, and can be a total pain in the ass for a lifetime if you dont take the proper precautions.
So...
I've never not lifted legs before. I found that the 5x5 full body **** worked wonders for me, and dont know what to do.
I've decided to continue cutting, because if I was to just try putting mass on my upper body I feel that I would get fat quick.
What kind of a routine, or what modifications to my current one, could I do, just looking for possible strength but mostly as a substitute for cardio?
My current split:
All sets done 5x5
Monday: Squat all same weight, flat bench working up to a 5rm including warmup sets as my 5 sets, bent over row working up to 5rm, weighted abs for 4 sets
Wed: Deadlift all same weight, incline barbell bench same weight, pullups BWx5 (I can juuust get all 5 sets right now), cleans same weight
Friday: Squat work up to 5rm including warmups as sets, flat bench same weight, bent over row same weight, 3 sets of curls and skull crushers/dips.
Same weight stuff means that it doesnt include warmup sets...and I dont do any other assistance work besides whats written...I figure if I want to squat/bench/dead big, what better way than to do them alot without screwing around with isolation assistance work.
This is what I did last summer, and it works well for me. I kind of want to stick to the benching at least 2x per week. With a reduction in cals, I know that doing 3x per week benching will be unproductive if not downright detrimental.
Any ideas? Up the reps? I'm using CNW's Thunder/Nitro Evolution stack currently, but I think I'm going to go off the creatine for awhile.
Thank you.
Being a college football player (and trying to make a position switch) I have recently for the past two weeks decided to clean "bulk" per se, note that I am not trying to gain mass but rather just purely strength.
I feel that I have endomorphic tendencies...freshman year when I really started lifting, I put on a good 40lbs, about half of it good weight. Then again my diet was ****, and I drank like a fish, but I still feel that I have an easy time putting on muscle, its just that the fat comes along with it.
So, the past two weeks I've been trying to put the strength back to where it was pre-30lb loss. I started up a 5x5 routine, and was making great progress...today however, doing lightish deadlifts (probbaly 75% of my 1RM)...(btw I've got currently a 340 1rm bench, 440ish 1rm squat and 460ish 1rm dead).
So I warmup, 135x5, 225x5, 315x5, then I start my working sets of 350. First two sets, down no problem, I mean I havent feel this good in awhile, I'm just exploding the weight up. Third 350 set, the second rep on the way up I feel and hear a giant pop, and my leg gives out.
Trainer says its a moderate-bad hamstring pull, and its gonna take a couple weeks (he said 4-6) to get back to being able to handle weight again. He cautioned me that hamstrings are very easy to reaggrivate if you dont fully heal the first time, and can be a total pain in the ass for a lifetime if you dont take the proper precautions.
So...
I've never not lifted legs before. I found that the 5x5 full body **** worked wonders for me, and dont know what to do.
I've decided to continue cutting, because if I was to just try putting mass on my upper body I feel that I would get fat quick.
What kind of a routine, or what modifications to my current one, could I do, just looking for possible strength but mostly as a substitute for cardio?
My current split:
All sets done 5x5
Monday: Squat all same weight, flat bench working up to a 5rm including warmup sets as my 5 sets, bent over row working up to 5rm, weighted abs for 4 sets
Wed: Deadlift all same weight, incline barbell bench same weight, pullups BWx5 (I can juuust get all 5 sets right now), cleans same weight
Friday: Squat work up to 5rm including warmups as sets, flat bench same weight, bent over row same weight, 3 sets of curls and skull crushers/dips.
Same weight stuff means that it doesnt include warmup sets...and I dont do any other assistance work besides whats written...I figure if I want to squat/bench/dead big, what better way than to do them alot without screwing around with isolation assistance work.
This is what I did last summer, and it works well for me. I kind of want to stick to the benching at least 2x per week. With a reduction in cals, I know that doing 3x per week benching will be unproductive if not downright detrimental.
Any ideas? Up the reps? I'm using CNW's Thunder/Nitro Evolution stack currently, but I think I'm going to go off the creatine for awhile.
Thank you.