July 4, 2022 – Week 5, Day 1

Band Pec Flyes/Wall Slides with Band/Band Y Raises (3 second holds)
lb’sx20/mbx10/µb’sx10
lb’sx20/mbx10/µb’sx10

Plyo Push-ups
bwx3
bwx3
bwx3
bwx3

Incline Bench Presses
45x3
75x3
105x3
135x3
165x2
185x2
205x2
225x2
245x3
220x5
205x5
205x5

Seated Dumbbell Strict Presses (no back support)
10’sx10
40’x5
58’sx5
70’sx5
80’sx10
70’sx15

Neutral Grip Seated Dumbbell Power Cleans
10’x10
40’sx5
60’sx10
60’sx10
60’sx10

Paused Banded Triceps Push Downs (2 seconds)
abx10
sbx15
sbx15
sbx15

Stretching

Comments: Day off for holiday so plan was to train earlier in the day than usual. Still got issue with the left side shoulder and neck. Annoying. Very similar to what I was having happen when prepping for the show in Atlantic City last year (when I had to work around injury from the box jump fall). I’m wondering if it has to do with not having my tempur-pedic pillow (accidentally left it at the hotel in June) so much flatter pillow for the past month. But only had this start up really in the last two weeks. See if raising up the pillow does anything. Various neighbors setting off fireworks pretty much since the month of July started every night so far. I was focusing on a lot of things all at once and getting anxious and eventually got to training about an hour or so later than planned. Triset with bands to start things off. Band pec flyes to start. My elbows were feeling achy and my shoulders/pecs/biceps were feeling tight so I did some half motions before I really engaged my pecs for this exercise. The wall slides seemed to get some of the shoulder discomfort to go away briefly. Y raises weren’t that bad. But still noticing the left shoulder neck issue. Plyometric push-ups were next. No changes here with it being 4x3 with minute rest. Just trying to get myself higher off the ground. But again, might just be me lifting my arms up more than really getting any height. Not entirely sure on the intent. Outside for incline bench. No pauses. Plan here was to do triples and doubles up to a top set of 5 reps (2RIR or REP8) and then take off a little bit for 2x5. Report back RIR for the top set and last set. Incline has been very temperamental for me. I already had lowered my expectations after how last week went and even that wasn’t enough for how today went. I was hoping to do 255lbs but could tell that was too much early on and stopped doing 30lbs jumps and went to 20lbs jumps (switched from 3’s to 2’s). I was still feeling confident I could do 245lbs for the planned stuff but nope. I felt I had it after the first two reps but then I didn’t. Couldn’t get the fourth rep to lockout for my right side and had to bail. I didn’t have things setup with missing a lift in mind so that was a bit awkward and painful to get out of. So that really sucked. I then adjusted the set of 5 based off what I just did. That seemed fine enough. Probably could’ve gone heavier but I didn’t want to chance it after this disaster. Even with longer rests, I wasn’t feeling like I was recovering well between them and they felt heavy on the down sets. Very frustrating. Already insecure about my pressing at this point. It seems to be the thing that goes away first as you get older and I still haven’t cracked 150kgs. My incline bench is probably weaker than what I can overhead press strictish style. Block pressing felt easier than this did. I know this just means there is potential not yet reached but damn is it frustrating demoralizing. So not in a great mood or mindset after that. Back into the garage for training. Dumbbell pressing but not single arm stuff. Still with a core/balance component. Seated presses with no back support. Trick would be getting the dumbbells to the shoulder. Plan here was a set of 8-10 with 2-3RIR and then a set of 12-15 with 3-4RIR. I figured that I’d probably have to do a combination of solid dumbbells and plateloaded dumbbells and that I better get some sets in with both styles so that going from one to the other wasn’t jarring or mess me up. But wasn’t sure how things would feel so unsure if I’d be doing the heavy set or light set with plateloaded dumbbells. Left biceps was a little sore getting stuff to shoulder. Balance was a little tricky but nothing I couldn’t handle. So with this being a bit of new movement, I did a few more reps and sets than usually would to get ready. I was kind of expecting 70lbs to be my top set but it was too easy and I shut it down. These felt fine and not much in the way of shoulder issues here. From there it was the neutral grip seated dumbbell power cleans. Now set for 3x10-12 with 3RIR. No set weight but I was planning on sticking to the weight I did last week. However, I wanted to move things along as odds were I’d need to be ready for dinner with family (hence starting training earlier) so I decided to just do some more sets to warm things up as best as I could and just use the oversized 25’s on the plateloaded dumbbell handles as close enough to what I did last week. The added diameter added a level of difficulty as I had to keep them farther out to the side to keep from hitting the bench and my legs. So these were a bit unwieldy. But no pain or irritation in the shoulders like two weeks prior. Biceps were a little tight. Last thing for the workout was band triceps stuff. Pressdowns with 2ct holds. 3x12-15 at RPE 8. Holds on triceps tend to really fatigue me and I haven’t done much over light bands from what I could see for these with holds. I figured average band would work. It was too light. I did more reps just to make sure the subsequent fatigue factor didn’t show up and nothing so I went up to strong band. This was good and it got harder as I went but still within the effort range by the end. Put stuff away and stretched. Really hoping that these aches and just general feeling of blahs and not being strong enough subside.