Jim vs. Deadlifts, Rowing

Not feeling chatty about this one.

Deadlift
255 x 3
295 x 3
335 x 3
315 x 3
275 x 3

That went well.

500m row
2:19
2:26

That went, eh.

Jim vs. Deadlifts, Bench Press, Rowing

Long workout today. Started with 5×5 deadlifts, which are just unlike anything else.

Deadlift
235 x 5
275 x 5
315 x 5
295 x 5
255 x 5

The third set was 95% of my 5RM, and this was just brutal. My legs and back were just wiped after this. So I moved onto the bench press.

On the minute for 10 minutes:
Bench press x 2, 145lbs

Used more weight than last time, and still didn’t really feel like I was pushing myself. Truth be told, I should probably just do three reps on the minute if I’m gonna do bench this way.

Finally, went upstairs to finish up.

500m row – 2:20

Not a great time at all, but by this point I was sweaty, tired, and had no pop left at all. Good time to stretch and call it a day.

Jim vs. Cleans, Rowing & KB Snatches

Another day of doing things differently.

Watching some of the videos the US Olympic team put out about weightlifting, I got to thinking that I do strength work (frequently), and I do skill work (rarely), but I never combine the two. So I changed that up today: I set a time for ten minutes, put 95lbs on the bar, and did all kinds of clean variations: squat cleans, power cleans, hang cleans, hang power cleans, clean and jerks, you name it. I really focused on my form, throwing myself under the bard, bringing the bar straight up my body, etc. I think my form at the end was much, much stronger.

Now, I only went ten minutes for two reasons: one, I know when I don’t force myself to rest, I do a lotta reps, and that was definitely the case today. Two, I wanted to give myself time for this Crossfit Virtuosity joint:

Row 500m
Rest 1 minute
30 KB Snatches (5olb dumbbell)
Rest 1 minute
Row 1000m
Rest 1 minute
50 KB Snatches (5olb dumbbell)

Finished that in 15:12, and it blasted me. I confess that I was a bit out of it at the end, so I may have only done 44 snatch reps the second time around. But I’m 75% sure I did ‘em all, and either way I’m glad I did this one.

Because I honestly spent a lot of time trying to talk myself out of doing it. But I did it anyway, and I haven’t done that in a little while.

Jim vs. Deadlifts, 500m Row

I did not want to work out today, but I want to have worked out. Also, I told myself that even if I went, I wouldn’t do heavy single deadlifts like I’d been thinking about doing.

Self-deception is sometimes very, very useful.

Deadlifts
305 x 1
345 x 1
385 x 1
365 x 1
325 x 1

Those felt good, and I got back up to 95% of my max.  So I decided to wrap up with some rowing.

500m row
2:00
2:24

That first time is my fastest in about 7 months, and just six seconds shy of my PR. It also left me gassed, which is  why the second time is still so much worse.

But overall, not bad for a day when I almost didn’t go in at all.

Jim vs. A Light Workout, Rowing

Still not feeling great, so I’m gonna make this at least partially a light week.

Today, that meant doing a light workout: basically, I did a round of my usual warm-up — stretching, push-ups, pull-ups, etc. — and then ended the round with a n untimed 500m row. Did two rounds, total.

Good to move around a bit, I suppose.

Jim vs. One-arm Dumbbell Shoulder Press, Rowing

Decided to do some unilateral work today.

One-arm DB shoulder press
50 x 3 (each arm)
45 x 4 (each arm)
40 x 5 (each arm)

That went quite well; it might make it into next week’s rotation, using heavier loads.

500m row
2:13
2:21

Slight improvement over last time. I’ll take it.

Jim vs. Deadlifts, 500m Rows

Visiting with an old friend.

Deadlifts
315 x 3
285 x 4
250 x 5

Been a while, and it felt like it. I need to build back up to my 3RM with these reverse pyramids. Not sure how many weeks it’ll take me to do it, though.

500m row
2:17
2:31

Those time’s aren’t stellar, but at least I’m back to timing myself.

Jim vs. Bench Press, 500m Row

Are my workouts sucking because I have less energy, or do I have less energy because I’ve been doing sucky workouts?

Bench press
195 x 3
175 x 4
155 x 5

OK, this didn’t suck, per se. But it wasn’t terribly ambitious, either, and getting three reps on a load 10lbs lighter than my 3RM was harder than it should’ve been.

500m row – 2:08

14 seconds slower than my PR, and I only did the one. This week is done.

Jim vs. Power Snatch, Rowing

Pretty straightforward day, starting with a variation on a workout I’ve done a few times. This time, I did power snatches instead of power cleans.

95lb power snatch x 2, every minute for 10 minutes

Interestingly, I did a similar workout in May, but only doing one snatch per minutes; same weight, though I was doing full squat snatches for that one. In any case, this certainly didn’t feel twice as hard as that did.

Then I went to the upstairs part of Teagle, which can pretty much only mean one thing.

500m row
2:14
2:22

No record-breakers, there. But considering I did heavy deadlifts yesterday, plus a bunch of pull-ups, and then power snatches today… I think my pulling muscles may have been somewhat fatigued.

Jim vs. Another Light Workout, Statistics

Did another light workout today; basically, take yesterday’s workout and substitute untimed 500m rows for untimed 400m jogs.

This was also my first workout in September, which means the time had come to put August’s 18 workouts into my little Google Docs spreadsheet. Here’s the chart of my workouts per month for the last three years:

Kind of a huge jump in the orange line, no? Right now, my average workouts per month by year are:

2009: 15.0
2010: 12.8
2011: 11.4

Per week, it’s:

2009: 3.5
2010: 2.9
2011: 2.6

Note, before August the 2011 averages were 10.4 and 2.4, respectively. One month made a notable change, but even if I keep it up 2011 will lag far behind. Though it’ll hopefully give me a jump-start on 2012. And to be fair, the break between years is pretty arbitrary. Maybe I’ll track it in terms of years blogging, see how the numbers work.

EDIT: Changing the year breaks doesn’t make as much of a difference, though it does reduce the contrast between years somewhat:

I’ll start tracking both, out of curiosity.