Off-Season Update

Well, it’s time for another off-season update. I’ve been following my old faithful 4 day split:

Monday: Shoulders & Back + occlusion for triceps & biceps

Tuesday: Quads, Hamstrings, Calves + occlusion for quads and hamstrings

Thursday: Chest, Triceps & Biceps + occlusion for triceps & biceps

Friday: Backs (upper and lower), Hamstrings, Glutes, Calves

While i’m only doing weight training 4 days a week, i’ve been doing cardio up to 6-7 days a week (30 minutes at a time) + throwing abs/core in 3-4 days per week outside my main workouts. Now that spring is upon us, the outdoor work begins…fired up the lawnmower this weekend (rain prevented me from finishing my task) + did some weeding

In the last couple of months, I feel that training has been going quite well and i’ve been firing on all cylinders. Been weighing around 218-220 lbs in the morning. I have implemented a couple of things in the last few weeks to shock my body into growth. The first is 100 rep totals on exercises. Do your warm-ups sets and choose a weight to do all your sets with…continue doing sets until you hit 100 reps total.

a few weeks ago, I did this on incline D-bell press for chest with the 100 lb d-bells…last week on my tuesday leg workout I did it on squats w/ 315 lbs…then later in the week did 100 reps on SLDL with 315. You take the equivalent volume of GVT and add the element of time (performing the same number of reps in as few sets as possible). We had another chest workout where we did 100 reps w/ 3 plates per side on HS Chest Press and then 100 reps w/ 100 lbs per side on cable flys…BTW, if you get to 100 but your workout partner hasn’t yet, you keep going until he/she finished, so sometimes you end up doing more than 100…i think i ended up doing 120 reps on seated lateral d-bell raises with the 30′s on a shoulder workout.

In addition to the 100′s (which we don’t do every workout), i have also added the occlusion training for triceps, biceps, quads and hamstrings back in the last 3 weeks…I always feel I get a nice response in terms of strength and muscle fullness when I perform occlusion training.

The Fitness Challenge to raise money for the humane society is coming up on April 21st:

http://teamanimal.net/fitnesschallenge/

the last time I promoted this event, I did trap bar deadlifts with 405 lbs:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hafd5IPs1xk

and 850 lb tire flip:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJhdl33perA

with the event right around the corner, i’ve had to decide what i’ll do to raise money this year. Friday, I finally had a decent show of strength on Trap bar deads friday at 500 lbs, so i’m considering doing this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FDUG7t5P39w

I will likely also do Barbell Pause Squats w/ 315 lbs:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_Cn95yyMvw

So those are my numbers to beat.

Friday I had the opportunity to use a Prowler…Been itching to use this thing for awhile now…F***ing awesome!!! Absolutely Brutal!!! This was exhausting (done after 4 heavy sets of deads)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4zzdmipiKn4

I will definitely be incorporating this tool in my training on friday’s on a regular basis…great for conditioning

That’s about all there is to report at this point.