The Maximus Pact

[Shadowblaze]

Sorry about all the low quality posts recently, the weather has been taking a toll and on top of that school hasn’t been breezy.

We now have wildfire smoke reaching where I live and it’s been hurting my lungs physically and in terms of my workout performance. This morning I woke up and my room was almost 30 degrees celcius the entire night which has been ruining my sleep aswell. I’ve been running on autopilot for the past while.

Today is no exception, I’m so fatigued and overall tired and I have to study so much.

When this all clears up I will try to put some more effort into this again, but life hasn’t been complying much. I hope you guys understand.

 

[Dustin07]

I think we just finished our summer tbh. Monday/Tuesday we reached about 92f and I noticed my wife and I both slept pretty poorly on top of the sheets etc, but we do have a small a.c. unit that filters through the slider door in our room I have been able to turn on in the middle of the night so that helped. But we finally have rain forecasted for the next few days, followed by 72f ish weather so I think we're about to head into an early fall here in the pnw.

We now have wildfire smoke reaching where I live and it’s been hurting my lungs physically and in terms of my workout performance.

thats a frustrating one, I'm grateful we haven't had it that bad in a while... it will pass, hopefully you guys get some rain to help clean the air soon.

 

[Shadowblaze]

I think we just finished our summer tbh. Monday/Tuesday we reached about 92f and I noticed my wife and I both slept pretty poorly on top of the sheets etc, but we do have a small a.c. unit that filters through the slider door in our room I have been able to turn on in the middle of the night so that helped. But we finally have rain forecasted for the next few days, followed by 72f ish weather so I think we're about to head into an early fall here in the pnw.



thats a frustrating one, I'm grateful we haven't had it that bad in a while... it will pass, hopefully you guys get some rain to help clean the air soon.

Thanks for the kind words bro, 92f is crazy. It’s a few degrees colder here but we’re from the north so it’s a big adjustment for us. I don’t have an AC unfortunately, but I have a rotating fan I put in my room, but even with that it gets pretty hot in my room.

 

[Dustin07]

we usually have at least one triple digit day every summer but this year summer started about a month early, and never got super hot. it just stayed very dry basically April-Now, with a drought declared June 5th, but aside from being a bit annoying dry, it never got super hot. normally we have rain until about the 4th of July then a nice 2 months.

 

[Shadowblaze]

we usually have at least one triple digit day every summer but this year summer started about a month early, and never got super hot. it just stayed very dry basically April-Now, with a drought declared June 5th, but aside from being a bit annoying dry, it never got super hot. normally we have rain until about the 4th of July then a nice 2 months.

I don’t know if you prayed for rain here, but today out of nowhere it started raining. It’s nice to have nicer air to breathe a cooler atmosphere.

 

[Shadowblaze]

Day 29:

Today was a good workout, I slept pretty good aswell.

We started pre season rugby training today but I can’t make it, I have a test tmrw I have to study for tmrw. I will go again on Tuesday.

I hit chest hard today, I had to take overhead tricep extensions out of my routine since I got too strong at them and it got annoying adding plated to the full cable stack, so I am throwing in close grip bench instead.

I finally hit 260x6 on bench and 250x7, so
I’m close to doing the 260x7 I want to do before my 315 attempt.

No physique photos but today was a crazy good workout overall.

 

[Dustin07]

I finally hit 260x6 on bench and 250x7, so
I’m close to doing the 260x7 I want to do before my 315 attempt.

a lot of your numbers are close to a lot of my upper end PRs. 225 x 12, 250 for 5-7+ etc.
my 1rm best was 305 so my 225 x 10-12+ reps hasn't translated to a 315 for me, personally, but your upper end higher rep sessions really look like they have potential. I love that 260 x 6-7.

Have you thought about running a legit program? I had good success with conjugate to get me over 300, but then when I switched to Cube after watching Hyde break 405 with it, I pushed up to 305 and my 305lb rep PR was far cleaner and better than the 300. I think largely because of my work with pause/comp style bench reps.

 

[Shadowblaze]

a lot of your numbers are close to a lot of my upper end PRs. 225 x 12, 250 for 5-7+ etc.
my 1rm best was 305 so my 225 x 10-12+ reps hasn't translated to a 315 for me, personally, but your upper end higher rep sessions really look like they have potential. I love that 260 x 6-7.

Have you thought about running a legit program? I had good success with conjugate to get me over 300, but then when I switched to Cube after watching Hyde break 405 with it, I pushed up to 305 and my 305lb rep PR was far cleaner and better than the 300. I think largely because of my work with pause/comp style bench reps.

Yeah I thought about buying Mitchell hoopers powerbuilding program. The reason I have hopped on a proper program yet is because I’m not as specialized in powerlifting or bodybuilding, I’m more of a hybrid athlete (bodybuilding, sprinting, powerlifting, rugby combined) so I feel that going all out on a specific program may hurt my performance in one of those areas.

But I graduate in September and will be taking some time off until I start working so I’ll have plenty of time to workout more and grind, so I will definitely hop on a structured program then.

Yeah, the bench translates differently for everyone in terms of their strength to endurance ratio, Ik a guy who did 225x11 and could do 315 and Ik people who can do 225x13 and can only do 305, it all just depends on how your genetics factor in to which muscle fibers your most blessed with.

For me I have some translating heavy bench into a 1rm which is why I’m trying to go heavier than I usually do before my 315 attempt.

 

[Hyde]

How can you need to do overhead cable tricep extensions, which are an isolation, with the full stack plus a plate on a gym pin, but you’re only closegripping a single red for 6 reps? That doesn’t jive at all.

 

[Shadowblaze]

How can you need to do overhead cable tricep extensions, which are an isolation, with the full stack plus a plate on a gym pin, but you’re only closegripping a single red for 6 reps? That doesn’t jive at all.

I go to two separate gyms, at 1 the full stack is 77lbs, which I add a 35lb (more doesn’t fit) plate to as I attached in the photo of my workout a few days ago. The other gym I usually go to the full stack is 95lbs and the cable itself is right in front of the cable stack so I can’t use a gym pin on that one, but they have those 7.5lb add on mini plates which I take from practically every other cable machine and lat pulldown for my overhead extension set.

Overhead I usually do 110lbs, close grip bench I do 155 or 135, but that was my first ever time doing it. I see some people do close grip bench with a shoulder width grip and atp it’s not even close grip, that’s just a normal bench. When I usually do my normal bench I already do a closer grip, barely outside shoulder width. I also grip really close and do more of a jm press style close grip bench which makes it harder and I slow the eccentric. On top of that I hammered bench hard that day and was more fatigued.

 

[Shadowblaze]

I go to two separate gyms, at 1 the full stack is 77lbs, which I add a 35lb (more doesn’t fit) plate to as I attached in the photo of my workout a few days ago. The other gym I usually go to the full stack is 95lbs and the cable itself is right in front of the cable stack so I can’t use a gym pin on that one, but they have those 7.5lb add on mini plates which I take from practically every other cable machine and lat pulldown for my overhead extension set.

Overhead I usually do 110lbs, close grip bench I do 155 or 135, but that was my first ever time doing it. I see some people do close grip bench with a shoulder width grip and atp it’s not even close grip, that’s just a normal bench. When I usually do my normal bench I already do a closer grip, barely outside shoulder width. I also grip really close and do more of a jm press style close grip bench which makes it harder and I slow the eccentric. On top of that I hammered bench hard that day and was more fatigued.

I found this photo of me benching a while ago and you can see during my normal bench sets I already grip close, on close grip I go super close and bring the bar down closer to my neck for more of a skull crusher / jm press type movement.

 

[Hyde]

I go to two separate gyms, at 1 the full stack is 77lbs, which I add a 35lb (more doesn’t fit) plate to as I attached in the photo of my workout a few days ago. The other gym I usually go to the full stack is 95lbs and the cable itself is right in front of the cable stack so I can’t use a gym pin on that one, but they have those 7.5lb add on mini plates which I take from practically every other cable machine and lat pulldown for my overhead extension set.

Overhead I usually do 110lbs, close grip bench I do 155 or 135, but that was my first ever time doing it. I see some people do close grip bench with a shoulder width grip and atp it’s not even close grip, that’s just a normal bench. When I usually do my normal bench I already do a closer grip, barely outside shoulder width. I also grip really close and do more of a jm press style close grip bench which makes it harder and I slow the eccentric. On top of that I hammered bench hard that day and was more fatigued.

For the record, JM benched with the max legal width, pointer on the rings - his tricep work, later called the JM Press by others, was probably more like the width of your comp bench. He also had very broad shoulders.

People doing closegrip bench really just need to move their grip in a few fingers from whatever their regular bench is. This is definitely enough to feel a big shift in stimulus to the long head tri, but lets you keep using very big weights (often 90% of your bench numbers). Years ago my CG was pointer on the smooth, but I also benched way inside the rings as well at the time (which is terrible for getting strong, but it takes time to build strength in a wider grip for many).

But for more of a JM Press, I’d say your numbers are pretty spot on then.

 

[Smont]

For the record, JM benched with the max legal width, pointer on the rings - his tricep work, later called the JM Press by others, was probably more like the width of your comp bench. He also had very broad shoulders.

People doing closegrip bench really just need to move their grip in a few fingers from whatever their regular bench is. This is definitely enough to feel a big shift in stimulus to the long head tri, but lets you keep using very big weights (often 90% of your bench numbers). Years ago my CG was pointer on the smooth, but I also benched way inside the rings as well at the time (which is terrible for getting strong, but it takes time to build strength in a wider grip for many).

But for more of a JM Press, I’d say your numbers are pretty spot on then.

My normal grip is ring finger on there first ring of the bar

When I CGB I just move my hands in about 3 inches. This puts my hands about as wide as my hips.

The last bench press competition I did I noticed that I had probably the most narrow grip in the entire contest. The guy who beat me had one of those excessively wide grips where it looks like the bar only comes down about 3 in before it touches his chest. I couldn't do that even if I wanted to, it would rip my shoulders out the sockets

 

[Shadowblaze]

For the record, JM benched with the max legal width, pointer on the rings - his tricep work, later called the JM Press by others, was probably more like the width of your comp bench. He also had very broad shoulders.

People doing closegrip bench really just need to move their grip in a few fingers from whatever their regular bench is. This is definitely enough to feel a big shift in stimulus to the long head tri, but lets you keep using very big weights (often 90% of your bench numbers). Years ago my CG was pointer on the smooth, but I also benched way inside the rings as well at the time (which is terrible for getting strong, but it takes time to build strength in a wider grip for many).

But for more of a JM Press, I’d say your numbers are pretty spot on then.

Wow I had no idea about all this, truly thanks for all the help. I’m pretty new to this powerlifting training and haven’t even been training for that long so I appreciate all the tips!

so when im doing close grip I should go too close since its worse for strength and only move my grip in about an inch?

Also what do you think of Mitchell hoopers powerbuilding program? That one seems the best for me and my goals.

 

[Hyde]

Wow I had no idea about all this, truly thanks for all the help. I’m pretty new to this powerlifting training and haven’t even been training for that long so I appreciate all the tips!

so when im doing close grip I should go too close since its worse for strength and only move my grip in about an inch?

Also what do you think of Mitchell hoopers powerbuilding program? That one seems the best for me and my goals.

I’d say what @Smont said is spot-on: about 3 finger widths in from your normal bench works great.

I wouldn’t buy any programs from Mitch Hooper. There’s nothing profound in there that isn’t available for free already.

 

[Smont]

When my hands are too close together I only feel it in the elbows and not in my triceps and it can get pretty damn painful. Plus if my hands are too close together on the way down my elbows have to flare out but with the medium close grip they can come straight down where they're almost hugged against my torso if that makes sense. That puts my tricep into a much longer range of motion than if I had put my hands too close together.

 

[Shadowblaze]

Day 30:

Today was a good lift, I’m off to a church event rn so I can’t talk too much. It’s been raining crazy all day, I’m glad since that means the air will be better and less Smokey. I squatted slightly less deep today so I went a bit heavier than I would have gone. Same for back extensions, I went to a completely different gym today which I never go to and the back extensions they had didn’t allow me to go very deep.

I had another test today, it was not good at all. I hope I didn’t fail.

 

[Shadowblaze]

Day 31:

I’ve gotten back into the rhythm a bit more, im glad. The weather isn’t too crazy anymore.

I slept in today, I deserve it after the past week lol. It’s my sabbath day today, I prefer to take it on saturdays.

Today was a good lift, I threw 230 on the bar since I was benching with no spotter and wanna get a bit more endurance work in and hit it for 11, last time I hit 225x10/11 (spotter touched the bar on the last rep) so I’m glad I did that. I’m gonna do some more lower rep and higher rep work before my big 315.

Physique is looking insane too, pretty diced. I have veins on my chest again.

I also practiced rugby for half an hour and worked on passing and tackling, my left handed passes have improved a lot.

I’m attempting 315 in exactly 2 weeks.

 

[Shadowblaze]

Forgot to attach photos of my workout app

 

[Shadowblaze]

It’s kinda funny honestly, for a while it was very hot and dry here and there was a lot of wildfire smoke. Then the day after Dustin says he hopes there some rain we record our most wet day in 113 years, keep in mind it’s summer.

 

[Dustin07]

Thats awesome dude, I knew you were in Canada but I didn't realize you were only a couple hours north of me!
Yeah that rain was much much needed. You guys must have got more than us, but I was happy to see puddles on the ground for the first time in a while. It was enough to add substantial green to my yard though!

 

[Shadowblaze]

Day 32:

Today was a great day overall, but very busy. I went to school, went to tutoring, trained and now I’m home, ate and I’m going to bed again soon.

I just wrote a test, it’s the first one I have ever failed so I gotta Lock in hard.

As of yesterday I’m 8 months sober from weed aswell, so that’s pretty cool.

Today was a great workout too, I hit the same set I did last time (335x8) on squat, but hit it for a greater depth so it’s still progressive overload, lunges are going great too. Back extensions went up too and I hit it for more depth than last time aswell.

I have my first day of rugby pre season training tmrw, so I’m probably not going to the gym.

 

[Dustin07]

335 x 8 is a solid set.
also I'm a big fan of the tutoring whether a person "needs" it or not. at that college level it's really great to have that focused study time with someone who already knows the material better than you. I only used a tutor I think in trig or stats, I can't remember, but if I was smart I would have likely had a study group for ALL math. actually, languages too. I've already forgotten 99.9% of my Chinese, lol.

 

[Shadowblaze]

335 x 8 is a solid set.
also I'm a big fan of the tutoring whether a person "needs" it or not. at that college level it's really great to have that focused study time with someone who already knows the material better than you. I only used a tutor I think in trig or stats, I can't remember, but if I was smart I would have likely had a study group for ALL math. actually, languages too. I've already forgotten 99.9% of my Chinese, lol.

Yeah, the stuff we’re learning rn is rough. And at the university level you require at least 70% to pass, at least here. We’re doing electrical code and legal stuff rn and it’s really tedious.

Thanks for all the encouragement! I can still only squat to parallel because of my spine, I do enjoy doing full ROM movements too which is what I try to do on my last set of lunges, just go as deep as possible, ass to ankles.

 

[Shadowblaze]

I can’t believe I just hit this, I threw on 275 to see how many I could get and hit it for 5! I thought I would get 2 or 3

On top of that my bw is up a few pounds after starting tudca xt, it’s a lot better than solo tudca imo and will be posting a review soon since it’s still unreleased.

 

[Shadowblaze]

Day 33:

Rugby training went well yesterday and school went pretty good today too. I had a great day overall.

It was an insane workout, hit prs on almost everything.

Something funny happened too, I was doing tricep dips in the seated dip machine and the full stack is way too light so I added 2 plates to the full stack and the worker said I can’t do that. It was funny, she said I was too strong. I have to get more creative with tricep training, can’t do push downs, overhead extensions or dips. I like to do 2 tricep exercises, rn I can only do jm press / close grip.

Does anyone know any good tricep exercises? Should I just start doing single hand exercises so I can do it more easily?

 

[Dustin07]

on the tricep OH extensions I often play around with the angle because some times it can irritate the elbow but the rope extension, and the pully lower than my ass behind me, I can usually find the right spot.

I also like cable pull downs, single arm. I change the angle of my body's orientation to the cable each set to rotate between inner and outter head of the tricep.

DB kickbacks hit it pretty good for me in that 12-15 rep range.

skull crushers tend to irritate the elbow for me but sometimes I can get away with a single db overhead standing style skull crusher with both hands in the middle holding it. I think its the angle, but a standing extension/skull crusher like that with a barbell is no good. however laying on a flat bench for an ez bar skull crusher works well for me, (db's, no good). again, its usually about finding hand placement. narrow is better on the ez bar lying skullies for me.

on those push downs, what is the point of irritation for you? a flat bar or the V bar attachment can irritate my elbow, but with the rope attachment gripping it with palms facing each other I do much much better. after a few reps, or even sets sometimes if the elbow is achey, I can start to spread the rope out and start to externally rotate the palms to get a better squeeze.

those are my go tos. some of them sound like they don't work for you but depending on your issue I admit they dont' always work for me either until I find the right position. CGBP might be another good option.

 

[Shadowblaze]

on the tricep OH extensions I often play around with the angle because some times it can irritate the elbow but the rope extension, and the pully lower than my ass behind me, I can usually find the right spot.

I also like cable pull downs, single arm. I change the angle of my body's orientation to the cable each set to rotate between inner and outter head of the tricep.

DB kickbacks hit it pretty good for me in that 12-15 rep range.

skull crushers tend to irritate the elbow for me but sometimes I can get away with a single db overhead standing style skull crusher with both hands in the middle holding it. I think its the angle, but a standing extension/skull crusher like that with a barbell is no good. however laying on a flat bench for an ez bar skull crusher works well for me, (db's, no good). again, its usually about finding hand placement. narrow is better on the ez bar lying skullies for me.

on those push downs, what is the point of irritation for you? a flat bar or the V bar attachment can irritate my elbow, but with the rope attachment gripping it with palms facing each other I do much much better. after a few reps, or even sets sometimes if the elbow is achey, I can start to spread the rope out and start to externally rotate the palms to get a better squeeze.

those are my go tos. some of them sound like they don't work for you but depending on your issue I admit they dont' always work for me either until I find the right position. CGBP might be another good option.

Personally I don’t get irritation on tricep exercises other than elbow heavy ones like deep paused JM press or cgbp

I think what I’ll do is continue with cgbp, and add in some tricep push downs and overhead extensions but most likely single arm ones.

Thanks for all the suggestions.

I don’t like to over science weightlifting at all but I do know that movements like overhead extensions, cgbp and skull crushers target the long head of the tricep more so I do like to include one of those for the long head. Push downs and other type of tricep exercises are better for the medial and lateral head of the triceps but not long head which is why I like to throw one of those types of movements in too, hence why I always do 2 tricep exercises.

 

[Shadowblaze]

@Hyde what are some good techniques to be strong on a certain day? I’m trying my 315 soon and wanna be good to go, should I take a deload the week before or just continue training but not to failure?

 

[Dustin07]

@Hyde what are some good techniques to be strong on a certain day? I’m trying my 315 soon and wanna be good to go, should I take a deload the week before or just continue training but not to failure?

Hyde is the man on this! he can even give you some recommended ramp up /warm up weights when you make your attempt, he's walked me through prep for a number of PR's when I broke through 300/305 etc

 

[Shadowblaze]

Hyde is the man on this! he can even give you some recommended ramp up /warm up weights when you make your attempt, he's walked me through prep for a number of PR's when I broke through 300/305 etc

His knowledge on all this powerlifting training is much better than mine for sure.

What I’m thinking of doing is 4 days before the pr just do lighter intensity training, not to failure.

And for the warm up I’m thinking of doing it like this:
-Do all my scapula and rotator cuff warm ups
-135x4
-185x3
-225x2
-250x1
-275x1
-290x1
Then try my 315

 

[Dustin07]

I'm guessing you're inline or very close with where his recommendations will land, he may very well suggesting cutting down that last training session even lighter than you plan. I think he had recommended no more than a 7% jump between that last warm up to PR attempt for me IIRC but I could be wrong.

For comparison two notes come to mind. I think I went 290 to 305 last time I made a PR effort.
Also, when I completed a 6 week cube cycle I failed my PR effort but did get super heavy training stimulus in the effort and the dropsets that followed. ate like a pig and rested a few days, came back the next week and hit my PR easily. in fact 305 was far cleaner for me than 300 when I first hit that.

Make sure you are rested, fed, carbed, and salted.

 

[Hyde]

Do you have access to a dip/pullup tower or supported leg raise station to do proper dips?The cable/selectorized seated dip machines are basically for people too weak, or using excessive volume to drive an adaptation.

Another staple is Skullcrushers, either with DBs or EZ Bar. Do them strict, do them with a rolling pullover for heavier weight, however you do them - lying skulls work! I usually wear elbow cuffs on them anymore; they can be hard on the joint.

@Hyde what are some good techniques to be strong on a certain day? I’m trying my 315 soon and wanna be good to go, should I take a deload the week before or just continue training but not to failure?

Your deload plan sounds good. Extra rest days make a big difference. Day before, load up on salt, water & carbs; you want to max glycogen stores & spill over hard into a watery bloat. Pasta, rice and soy sauce, ramen, pizza, fast food, Chinese buffets - lots of ways to do it, but eat bigger than usual and focus on excess carbs and sodium.

I would make the last jump 295, going back to that 7% max jump size Dustin mentioned.

 

[Shadowblaze]

Do you have access to a dip/pullup tower or supported leg raise station to do proper dips?The cable/selectorized seated dip machines are basically for people too weak, or using excessive volume to drive an adaptation.

Another staple is Skullcrushers, either with DBs or EZ Bar. Do them strict, do them with a rolling pullover for heavier weight, however you do them - lying skulls work! I usually wear elbow cuffs on them anymore; they can be hard on the joint.



Your deload plan sounds good. Extra rest days make a big difference. Day before, load up on salt, water & carbs; you want to max glycogen stores & spill over hard into a watery bloat. Pasta, rice and soy sauce, ramen, pizza, fast food, Chinese buffets - lots of ways to do it, but eat bigger than usual and focus on excess carbs and sodium.

I would make the last jump 295, going back to that 7% max jump size Dustin mentioned.

Yeah our seated dip machine stack is pretty light, but I don’t do it traditionally where I do a regular grip with a bit more chest involved, I grip at the very front and really make it a tricep dominant lift. When I grip at the very front it’s the exact same movement pattern as a regular cable push down. I’ll try cgbp, lying skull crusher and some push downs. Thanks!

 

[Dustin07]

we have the stack style dip machines (roc-it and another one I think) as well as the hammer strength plate-loaded style which I like a LOT LOT more. with the hammer strength if you use it normal I definitely tend to get more pec and delt engagement no matter what I do. which I'm OK with, but if you sit on the seat backwards, I found it really isolates the triceps more. it can get tricky though if you don't have the seatbelt to hold you down and you're reverse dipping 100lbs over bodyweight cause you don't have the little quad bar to hold you down.

 

[Hyde]

Yeah our seated dip machine stack is pretty light, but I don’t do it traditionally where I do a regular grip with a bit more chest involved, I grip at the very front and really make it a tricep dominant lift. When I grip at the very front it’s the exact same movement pattern as a regular cable push down. I’ll try cgbp, lying skull crusher and some push downs. Thanks!

When you grab it at the front though, you have the most leverage, requiring even more weight to get a given stimulus. It’s just a poor tool for someone with developed triceps to keep building that development.

The hammer strength machine like Dustin said is really the only one that will let someone use whatever load they need.

I also forgot to mention a Closegrip high incline benchpress - that is a ton of arms.

 

[Shadowblaze]

When you grab it at the front though, you have the most leverage, requiring even more weight to get a given stimulus. It’s just a poor tool for someone with developed triceps to keep building that development.

The hammer strength machine like Dustin said is really the only one that will let someone use whatever load they need.

I also forgot to mention a Closegrip high incline benchpress - that is a ton of arms.

Yeah I’ll swap them out for single arm extensions, it’s the same movement but easier to progressively overload and it’s gonna be hard for me to ever get to the full stack when I can only use one arm.

 

[Shadowblaze]

Day 34:

I would have had rugby training today too but I have some work paperwork I gotta fill out.

Other than that school was good, I’ve gotten more into the rhythm with my sleep. I sleep 7.5 hours every night, for me that gets me feeling the best while also spending the least time sleeping, so it’s a give and take.

I hit a big squat set today, 345x7. For my 2nd set when I hit it it was so hard I thought I was gonna fail the last rep. I hit some heavy lunges too, after the first set my forearms got so pumped up it was crazy.

My weight fluctuates a bit but I’m about 170lbs evening weight.

I haven’t really hit sprints hard in about 2 weeks since I pulled my quad but it’s feeling good so I threw in lighter sprints today.

I accidentally put 150x12 on my first set of calf press instead of 450x12, so ignore that.

 

[Shadowblaze]

Man I’ve been living the same day every day for the past month. I wake up at 6am, eat, go to school, hit the gym, go to tutoring or study, come home, eat, and get ready for bed. I haven’t wavered from this routine at all.

I’m so excited to be graduating in September, I’m gonna take a few months off and not work and just focus on chilling, rugby and the gym. I think I deserve that. I’ll have a new found appreciation of my free time after stopping school for sure.

 

[Shadowblaze]

Man I’ve been living the same day every day for the past month. I wake up at 6am, eat, go to school, hit the gym, go to tutoring or study, come home, eat, and get ready for bed. I haven’t wavered from this routine at all.

I’m so excited to be graduating in September, I’m gonna take a few months off and not work and just focus on chilling, rugby and the gym. I think I deserve that. I’ll have a new found appreciation of my free time after stopping school for sure.

It’s gonna get even more crazy, the next 2 weekends are completely booked. I have a wedding this weekend and gotta study

 

[Dustin07]

that's a monster squat set, nice work!

Man I’ve been living the same day every day for the past month. I wake up at 6am, eat, go to school, hit the gym, go to tutoring or study, come home, eat, and get ready for bed. I haven’t wavered from this routine at all.

get used to it young padawan, they made a whole movie about it.

 

[Shadowblaze]

that's a monster squat set, nice work!



get used to it young padawan, they made a whole movie about it.

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Yeah, I know it will get better, the thing is I drive 45 mins to school every day and 1.25 hours back from school every day, on top of the at I do homework for abt an hour a day. So when I actually start working that will
All get better and I’ll have like 3 more hours in my day.

Thanks for all the kind messages.

I’ve never watched Groundhog Day but I’ll watch it now, I heard it’s good.

 

[Dustin07]

Yeah, I know it will get better, the thing is I drive 45 mins to school every day and 1.25 hours back from school every day

yeah thats my daily commute now, maybe when crypto moons again I'll cut that back to 5 minutes lol

 

[Shadowblaze]

Day 35:

Today was a good day, I studied a lot and got dismissed early. Usually I would train tomorrow but I have a wedding I’m going to so im taking that day off.

It was an average workout today, nothing great but nothing bad. My endurance was lacking a bit today, could only do 225x11 when I did 230x11 last week.

I got that book Hyde suggested, it just came in. I’ll be reading it soon, probably after my birthday when stuff clears up a bit. Thanks for the suggestion!

 

[Shadowblaze]

Day 35:

Today was a good day, I studied a lot and got dismissed early. Usually I would train tomorrow but I have a wedding I’m going to so im taking that day off.

It was an average workout today, nothing great but nothing bad. My endurance was lacking a bit today, could only do 225x11 when I did 230x11 last week.

I got that book Hyde suggested, it just came in. I’ll be reading it soon, probably after my birthday when stuff clears up a bit. Thanks for the suggestion!

Forgot to put the photos of my workout in again lol

 

[Shadowblaze]

I’m gonna be taking a deload the next week for a few reasons.

I ate poorly at the wedding, I gave myself one cheat day since I haven’t had a proper one in about a year. I went ham on the food and none of it was healthy lol, so it’s probably gonna aggregate my autoimmune stuff for a bit and I don’t wanna train hard and aggregate it more.

Also because I’m going for 315 soon and I have to study a lot for upcoming tests and need the time.

 

[Shadowblaze]

Day 36:

The wedding was amazing, honestly the best day of my life. I’ll attach some photos.

Life has been pretty good recently, I’m taking that deload I told you guys about so today was a light leg day. There was this girl I was hanging out with a decent amount over the summer, we would go to our young adults group at church together and it was always really fun. She’s super religious like me, but now she’s going back to school in California and I’m pretty bummed she’s leaving. But I told her we should hang out when she gets back so hopefully we can go to our church Christmas events or something along those lines.

Since I got home so much earlier I took a detour home and went to a local park and just sat there for an hour watching the planes fly by and just thinking and praying. I’ll attach some photos of that too, it was nice just kinda doing nothing and bathing in the sun.

Btw I’m starting the GOMAD diet (gallon of milk a day) but I’m gonna slowly introduce it since I still have gallbladder issues. I used to drink 2 litres of milk a day when I was the biggest I ever was and it helps so much with muscle growth and weight gain. My buddy is doing it and he gained 15lbs in 2 weeks, that’s an entire pound a day.

 

[Shadowblaze]

I’m going to rugby training today so I’m not gonna lift.

My upper body is feeling a bit sore for some reason, I’m gonna do upper tmrw probably but just light and no big compound lifts really, I gotta be fresh for this saturdays 315.

 

[Hyde]

GOMAD is a terrible diet for 99% of lifters. Your buddy gained 15lbs of scale weight in 2 weeks - how much of that do you think is muscle? How fast do you think protein accretion can occur? You can’t gain that amount of tissue on any amount of anabolics in that time, just waterweight (and in this case, significant bodyfat too).

Yes he will be getting stronger, but the takeaway here is you need a surplus of quality nutrition - everything beyond that will become fat. So why not do what you know worked so well for you - TLAD (two liters a day)?? And to your point about a slow introduction, you would probably make progress adding just one/day. Then when that slows down as you grow and adapt, you bump the calories again later if needed.

Diet, like training, is to be a progressive adaptation process. You don’t eat 8k calories to become an open weight pro strongman; you only eat it BECAUSE you became an open pro strongman over time.

 

[Hyde]

Sounds like you had a great time btw; beautiful pics