Friday 18 September 2009

Shortest Workout Ever: Body by Science Legs-Only Session (#14)

Location: Woodcock Sports Centre, Aston University
Date: 16th September

Fourteenth BBS Big 5 session:


Session 15*Session 14*Session 13Session 12Session 11Session 10Session 9

Session 8Session 7Session 6Session 5Session 4Session 3Session 2Session 1

LbsTULLbsTULLbsTULLbsTULLbsTULLbsTULLbsTUL

LbsTULLbsTULLbsTULLbsTULLbsTULLbsTULLbsTULLbsTUL
Pull Down155
155-1551:551551:511551:491502:131501:51
Seated Row1201:441201:421152:021151:561151:311102:021002:15803:08
Overhead Press60
60-601:36601:44601:48601:38601:36
Chest Press951:37951:52951:39902:01901:391001:111001:17901:28
Seated Row105
105-1051:481051:391051:381101:291201:04
Pull Down1451:561451:461402:091352:111302:151301:561252:151102:26
Chest Press85
85-851:32 *851:1485(1:10)901:13951:03
Overhead Press601:33601:28601:37601:49601:37601:38601:4480, 700:35, 0:25
Leg Press330
3301:42330-330-3301:333202:14320-
Leg Press3102:303002:012903:242802:12260-2503:02230, 2704.312002:57
Total Time
3 mins8 mins8 mins11 mins14 mins10 mins

25 mins14 mins25 mins25 mins22 mins28 mins27 mins
Rest period
6 days7 days7 days7 days7 days8 days

9 days11 days6 days8 days7 days7 days8 days
Notes
Leg press only this week due to recently skipping it - but no upper body because seeking longer rest period overall. Full session next week. No leg press because recovering from race. *Chest press not on ususal machine so may have affected time. Still feel like stagnation rules. No leg press because race on Sat. Stagnation on all exercises suggests 7 days rest no enough. Or not enough calories?Finally got that 4th rep with OH press. Because the chest press was in use, did leg press before chest and chest press on a different machine. Lack of progress in pressing is mitigated by pulldown and leg success. Overhead felt better even tho TUL staticLess rest and a change in exercise order threw timings into disarray. Surprised by Overhead Press not being better

Baffling underperformance on chest and surprising improvement on legs, which may partly reflect increased intensity.Finally finding the sweet spot for leg press. Much less rest, so not surprised by overhead press suffering. Previous week's overhead press gains may have been due to slower reps. First real signs of progress now that I have stability on the weights.No leg press, hence shorter workout time. Was saving myself for fell race at the weekend.Still finding it hard to judge the right weight for leg press.Struggled to find right weight for leg press. Still finding the correct weight for all exercises.Had to change weight with overhead because misjudged it.


"TUL" = Time Under Load
Red =
got worse
Blue =
improved
Black =
weight changed or improvement did not exceed a previous best

Post Workout Nutrition: Primal/Paleo Breakfast of Champions (recipe here), 40 minutes later.

The whole workout took 3 minutes because I did some tuck jumps and free-standing squats beforehand as a warm up.

9 seconds of TUL was a modest improvement on my last Leg Press effort, although we should bear in mind that normally this comes after 4 other exercises, whereas this time it was from fresh.

On the other hand, it also comes after two weekends of mountain running activity (here and here), the first of which was fairly demanding. In that respect, I was relieved not to have regressed.

As I menioned in Session 13, I wanted to do a legs session this week because they been neglected for two consecutive sessions - but since I am going to increase my rest period to at least 9 days, I skipped upper body.

Then next week, it will be back to a full session, followed by a rest periods of 9+ days for all body parts.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hello,

Tell me, how how is your breathing as you reach fatigue? That is to say, are you attempting to hyper-ventilate as you start to bog down near the end of the set. This is a big mistake I note most newer trainees failing to do; if you don't pant and fast, you're dead in the water and you'll get stuck.

Also remember that you're attempting to move faster as fatigue sets in. Don't get so caught up in hitting 10 seconds perfectly; if you first attempt to move faster and you surge, you haven't yet learned to use the speed in between being stuck and throwing the weight.

I hope these suggestions help; make sure to check out the workout videos of Vee, Bo, and Doug on the BBS youtube; you'll see them do this as fatigue sets in.

Best,
Skyler

Methuselah said...

Thanks for the advice Skyler - although I am not 100%, I think I am breathing more heavily as fatigue set in. I'll make a more conscious effort to monitor this next time. I know what you mean about the speed. I have been trying to get my training partner to slow it down after he has got past the sticking point. I think we are pretty good at avoiding the 'surging', and we don't really think about the 10 seconds, although when you look at the times and reps we still manage to get pretty close. Thanks again - will report back in a couple of weeks!

Deline said...

4 days of rest, not enough for me.

This weeks numbers:

Overhead Press 130/1m, 90/1m
Pull Down 165 / 1m5s
Chest Press 165 / 44s
120 / 35s
Seated Row 165 / 45s
Leg Press 400 / 56s

Curls 100 / 32s
Triceps 130 / 41s
Crunches 70 / 31s


Here's last week's for comparison:

Overhead Press 130/57s, 90/38s
Pull Down 167.5 / 54s
Chest Press 165 / 1m3s

Seated Row 165 / 44s
Leg Press 400 / 55s

Curls 90 / 44s
Triceps 130 / 49s
Crunches 70 / ?

So it looks like I need really more days of rest between exercises. I’m thinking the day of the exercise, I can’t count that towards rest. I need to count full days after wards (at least # of nights I actually sleep from last time I did the exercise).

So from Monday to Friday, that’s 4 days of rest and apparently that’s not enough. I also did not eat breakfast, so I had more than 12 hours of "fasting", which maybe had something to do with it? I don't know.

Good news is I finally got over a minute on my overhead press.

The pull down seemed better, although I couldn’t find the 7.5 rubber weight so I had 2 lbs less, which would account for the extra 10s of improvement I suppose.

The other good news, I didn't have nearly the grip problems I had before, so I'm going to continue without gloves for now.

Chest Press was down significantly and I think this all comes from not resting enough. I also stepped Chest Press down to another 120 lbs for 35s, so this seem to really wear me out.

Seated Row and Leg Presses also suffered lack of improvement. I was however pretty worn out.

I also did a set of Curls and Triceps exercises. All of which are down. Going back to a 5 days on the next iteration. Based on past history, I SHOULD see improvements compared to this week.

Arms are bigger though all around so that's exciting. And, I'm thoroughly annoying my gf with them, because I continuously talk about them or check them in any mirror I happen to come across. Geez, I'm becoming that "guy" but oh hell, it's fun!

Disappointed for this week's lack of overall increases, and some significant decreases, but on the flip side, I know NOW that I need more than 4 days (nights) of rest, so that's good. I also felt like I "worked" more since there was no one at the gym, and I moved from machine to machine pretty briskly.

I await now 5 days with bated breath.

Methuselah said...

Hi Deline - what is the rest period you had been using previously? I seem to recall it was 7 days. I am pretty sure if I went down to 4 days of rest I'd struggle.... but let's see what happens with my new 9-day minimum rest. Tomorrow will be my first upper body for 14 days, although a little too much alcohol at the weekend may adversely impact.

Deline said...

Well Methuselah, I had "scheduling" pressure so I thought let's try it and see what happens. Clearly not a good idea, and I have further proof of the need for real rest with today's stats.

I just go back from the gym and I was rushing through the exercises because they gym was starting to fill up quickly for lunch hour.

Nevertheless, 5 full days showed improvements.

Overhead 130 54s
Overhead 90 55s
Pulldown 165 52s
Chestpress 165 50s
Chestpress 120 47s
Seatedrow 165 1m10s
Legpress 400 1m6s
Curls 100 34s
Triceps 130 44s
Stomach 70 41s

I'm going to do 5 days rest for another session, then go back to 7 days to compare results.

So far I felt day's gym work was much better despite having to switch up machines because someone was camped out on the pull down.

I know at least... 4 days... not enough -at all-.

:)

D

Methuselah said...

Deline - yeah, it's a pain when someone else is on a machine. When I get a new house with more space I am hoping to persuade my training partner to join me in purchasing a Nautilus multi-gym so that we never have to worry about that again!