Movement creates movement

The meaning of life is movement. Fuck 42.

Are you depressed and dont feel like leaving the bed? Start moving.

Are you injured and feel like you should take a month off working out? Start moving.

Are you devoid of passion for anything you're doing? Seeing a pattern here? Move.

This is not to say you need to go balls to the wall in each one of these scenarios, but if you choose to park your rear as opposed to choosing action, there isn't going to be a magic bell that goes off in your head when you feel up to moving again (dongggggg! Oh I feel great! Time to get schwifty again). Nope. Wrong. What will happen is you will continue to create a dent in the couch long after you've needed to.

Easy wins I like to choose in these scenarios:
- Bike to the store for something inconsequential to add to dinner. Mixes a mission with moving.
- Go for a dusk walk by the beach. Play volleyball. Win. Rejoice.
- (favorite) High set low rep high pulls or snatch high pulls.
1x2xmax weight
15x2x(80% max weight), 1min rest
- 10min dance practice

Choose movement. Choose life. Get stronger.

High frequency days 11, 12, and 13: nope

Two training days in this block.

1
Dips bw+120x1
Dips bw+85x3x3
Hack squat 405x1
Hack squat 325x3x3

Heavy sets on both were crazy easy. Hack squat back off sucked balls.

2
Dips bw+65x8
Dips bw+35x42 reps
Hack squats 295x8
Hack squats 245x17 reps

200 reps of lateral raises, tricep pushdowns

4 rounds of HIiT 40s/20s

3
Later in the day I did some partials for fun
Rack pull 655x1
Shrug 495x3, rack pulls until failure
Shrug 405x10, rack pulls until failure
Shrug 315x30, rack pulls until failure

High frequency day 10: we have unfinished business o-ren

No sleep. Still feeling kind of down and tired. Focussing on completing small tasks has really helped me get moving (thanks Tim Ferris!).

Training went well despite this. I'm thinking I need to lay off the easy squat warmups entirely until my groin heals. Its certainly not preventing me from killing other movements, but the squat itself won't get better until my groin can fully cooperate.

Zercher squat 265x1x1
Dips bw+120 1x1 easy
Dips bw+85 3x3 easssy
Hack squat 405x1 easy
Hack squat 325x3x3 surprisingly really fucking hard

High frequency day 09: your chest looks like Jim stein

No training today. Off work for the first time since January. I ended up flat out sleeping most of today.

Physically I feel pretty good. Can explode if I need to (danced the night away last night). That being said, conditioning is shit, mood is kind of bleh.

High frequency day 08: Dracula last words were check mate

Same kratom bar. Fuck sticks.

Training
Front squat 225x1, groin still hurts a ton
Dips bw+60x8, bw+30x47
Hack squat 285x8, 235x42

Pump achieved in shoulders, arms, and legs

I may need to find a different way to warm up my legs other than front squats until my groin recovers.

How do I feel?
Woke up for the first day this week full of piss and vinegar. Love it.

The higher volume was difficult. I want to ride this wave of energy by bringing back conditioning (i.e. break dancing). It's no fun to get winded by sets of 10.

Hack squats are easy, but higher rep sets are really difficult. My quads crap out way way before everything else.

High frequency day 07: even dogs don't go to heaven

Sitting in a kratom bar, so format be damned.

Training
Nothing heavy today
Mix of band presses, curls, RDL's, and sidewinder wrist rolling.

This is actually pretty nice. I still get a full body pump without needing to be in the gym.

How I feel?
Tired as fuck. Depression dude. It is a bitch.

Super productive at work. Sex drive a little below average. Sleep is solid. But TIRED. My goal is to continue to knock 1 thing off my to do list daily (outside of training) to keep busy.

High Frequency Day 06: What can I say? Dicks dicks dicks

<Training>
FS 225x1
Dips 115x1, 75x3x3
Hack Squat 375x1, 335x2x3
Lots of light shoulder, arms, and lower back volume

<Post Training>
15min cardio
Stretching
</Post Training>

</Training>

<How do I feel?>
Tired coming in, great coming out. My groin is starting to hurt pretty badly, so front squats stopped prematurely. Everything else was easy peezy.

Energy and mood relatively good all day despite no sleep last night.

</How do I feel?>

High frequency day 05: Elvis is definitely not alive

<Training>
Nothing. The piss was taken out of me from the moment I woke up to the moment I couldn't sleep.

<Post Training>

</Post Training>

</Training>

<How do I feel>
Oddly horny? Like....I want to fuck everything in a 12 mile radius horny? This happened last time I entered HF as well. Just weird.

The high volume day was FUN, not doubt, but I'm kind of worn down today. Not sure if that is a sustainable long term solution or not. 

</How do I feel?>

High frequency day 04: Gwen Stacy was a total whore

<Training>
Front squat 255x1x1
Dip 1x8 bw+55
Dip 42 reps bw+25
Hack squat 1x8 275
Hack squat 42 reps 225
Get a pump in my neck, abs, arms, and back
Pullups, reverse flies, band pushdowns, cable curls

Total time: 27min

<Post Training>
Nothing
</Post Training>
</Training>

<How do I feel>
Better than I should after 2 days of drinking. Decided today will be a volume day of sorts, and just worked squats up to an easy 'daily minimum' single.

The hunger struck really hard after this session. I. Ate. Everything.

Not feeling strong yet, but I'll get there. To reiterate, the most fun thing is the daily arms and shoulders work. It's super easy and feels awesome.

Quick note that is not in the training details. All arm and shoulders work is 2 to 3 light sets to failure. I use a different movement every day. I try for a minimum of 20 reps per set, and liberally cheat once I hit failure.

</How do I feel?>

High Frequency Day 03: Even chicks have to pee

<Training>
Front Squat 1RM 270, a fucking grinderrrrrr

Hack deadlift 1RM 365x1, still way too easy

Hack deadlift 315x3x3, again, easy
Get a pump in my neck, abs, arms, and back
Pullups, reverse flies, band pushdowns, cable curls

Total time: 25min



<Post Training>
Nothing
</Post Training>
</Training>

<How do I feel?>

Emotionally pretty good. Lifting wise this day was the hardest so far. It's disappointing to barely hit a 275 FS, but it has been a long time since I've done squatting of any type.

My favorite part of daily lifting so far has been the arms and rear delt work to be honest. Arms are feeling strong, and the additional rear delt work is making my left shoulder feel great.

May be mixing it up over the next few days to see how I feel.

Something along the lines of:

- FS: Hit a daily minimum (i.e. heavy, but I could get a triple easily)

- Press: 1x1, 3x3 or fuckton of volume

- Pull: Same as press

</How do I feel?>

High Frequency Day 02: Electric Boogaloo

<Training>
Dip 1RM bw+105
Dip 3x3 bw+70
Front Squat 1RM 265
Front Squat backoff 3x3 215x3x3
Get a pump in my neck, abs, arms, and back
Pullups, reverse flies, band pushdowns, cable curls

Total time: 25min

<Post Training>
Stretching
Cardio: Walking on a 10% incline for 15min
</Post Training>
</Training>

<How do I feel?>
Started today feeling sore as a mother fucker, kind of depressed, but also more willing to jump out of bed and kill the day.

Front squats feel really lousy. I haven't done them in months, so the groove where the bar sits is painful as fuck. Combo that with the movement pattern being all off.

Still, just day 2.
</How do I feel?>

High Frequency Day 01: Back in business

Lifting has gotten a little stale recently. I'm falling back into old patterns of endlessly trying to figure out wtf I want to do in the gym and why. Mix that into reaching a particularly low point in my life, I need to help my mind pick itself up my strengthening its wrapper.

My previous dive into high frequency was a fun ass experiment. Within 2 weeks I reached a 315 front squat and 500 deadlift; two lifts I had been unsuccessfully chasing for years. Let's do this shit.

Each training day will consist of:
- A squat 2RM, backoff of 3x3
- Either a Press or Pull 1RM, backoff sets may be 3x3 or 1-3xBILLIONS depending on the exercise
- Pullups, arms, abs, neck work

I'll switch out a movement or change a movement (see: add reverse bands, decrease range of motion) when I stall.

<Moves>

Squat:

• FS against bands, FS, RB FS
• ZS against bands, ZS, RB ZS

Press:

• OHP against bands, OHP
• RGBP
• Dips
• FP
• LM Press
• Inc DB Bench
• DB Bench
• DB Press

Pull:

• Jefferson
• T bar row
• Behind the back deadlift
• Snatch dead
• PC
• SHP

</Moves>

<Training>
Front Squat 2RM 255x1x2
Front Squat backoff 3x3 205x3x3
Behind the back deadlift 1RM 335x1
Behind the back deadlift 3x3 275x3x3

Total time: ??? I messed up and didn't record this

So, I'm depressed and feel weak as shit. Yup...this workout sounds about right. Fortunate thing is that daily training will push these numbers up quickly.

The fun find was trying out behind the back deads for the first time and absolutely loving them. This was a case where I could have done way way more than I had in me for today, but I want to save some in the tank for when I acclimate to the form. My lower back feels fucking amazing the day after these, and my groin isn't compromised like it is during Jefferson deads. Good times. Great oldies. Fox 97.

<Post Training>
Stretching
Cardio: Walking on a 10% incline for 15min
</Post Training>
</Training>

How do I feel?
Shitty really. It's day 1 bruh.

How you perform versus how you look

Behind every routine change, every gym session, and every rep, strength was always the original goal. The idea of chasing a better version of me was intoxicating. The idea that every time I was out on the dance floor or playing a sport was also a test drive/diagnostics of what I've built was awesome (if not done what silly).

Somewhere along the way, I got lost. I still told myself that I was chasing strength on my notebook record, but the results I looked for were in the mirror. If what I saw in the mirror disappointed, I correspondingly would project this image out into the world. Stating the obvious, this is a very very bad idea. It focusses on what I didn't have instead of what I bring to the table. It creates the idea of 'if I could just do X I would be accepted.'

It's crazy, but that's how negativity gets rooted. It doesn't sound like negativity, it sounds like a goal that you jusssssst can't reachhhhhh.

Conversely, every time I've looked my best and felt my best is linked to when I simplified my diet and training. Sticking to the original goal of getting as strong as possible centers my self esteem. Possibly because my attention can be diverted to other kicking ass in other avenues of life (as opposed to writing this week's 5th routine). Possibly because the payoff from a focussed mindset is more powerful than one that does not know what it wants.

In either case...life is good, lifts are up, focus is honed in. Hope everyone is out there kicking ass in and out of the gym.

Focus routine 3000 (45min run time)
Note: 3-4x a week, change up when daily max stalls. Expected run time is 7 to 14 days. I.e. run squat press 1 for 14 days, switch to pull 1, switch to squat press 2, switch to pull 2, repeat
Note: each daily max movement will be lower body dominant, but essentially a full body movement

Squat press 1
Front squat x daily max
Partial front squat 1x10
Hise shrug 1x20
Pause front squat 15x1 (80% daily max, 1min rest)
Various db presses super set with bodyweight pullups
Stretch and foam roll
Neck curls 1x100

Pull 1
Jefferson Deadlift x daily max
Partial JD 1x10
Shrug 1x20
Jefferson Deadlift 15x1
Various db presses super set with bodyweight pullups
Stretch and foam roll
Neck curls 1x100

Squat press 2
Zercher squat x daily max
Partial zercher squat 1x10
Pause zercher squat 15x1 (80% daily max, 1min rest)
Various db presses super set with bodyweight pullups
Stretch and foam roll
Neck curls 1x100

Pull 2
Snatch high pull x daily max
Partial snatch 1x10
Shrug 1x20
Snatch high pull 15x1
Various db presses super set with bodyweight pullups
Stretch and foam roll
Neck curls 1x100

Brain Droppings

When is it a good time to move on? Moving to St Pete is the best decision I've ever made, but I wonder if I'm falling into the same ruts and habits I had back in Atlanta. Moving one time proved that I can make a family wherever I go. Moving a second time may be necessary to meet my goals.

I'm saying this sitting in a house I love. Surrounded by people I love. In a city that can only be described as fucking paradise. If I don't act on this feeling, I'll be fine. But I need to know what's out there.

Come July, Denver is getting a test drive.

High Frequency Lifting: Deadlifting Day 5

High frequency log day 5

Deadlift weight has crept into my old max from years and years ago. It used to be a hard max, now it's just Tuesday. Confidence is high, abs are starting to look solid.

One side effect is kinda weird though. My dreams have been deeper and more meaningful than usual. As in a direct representation of what is going on in my life. Most recently, I've been fighting my way through dungeons that resemble the water temple from 'A Link to the Past.' Instead of your usual run of the mill Zelda enemies, I've been fighting cultists armed with spears. My journey through the depths have been more about the fear of getting lost than the elation of going on an adventure. Something to think about if this keeps persisting.

4/4/17 Workout
Sumo deadlift 445x1, 385x3, 325x8
Parallel chinups 42 in 3 sets
RDL 210x3x12
ss
Arnold Press 45x3x12
ss
Rolling Thunder Grip 110x2x30 seconds per hand
ss
Ab rollout x2

High Frequency Training: Past Lifting

High frequency lifting on its own has offered up a few major benefits in the past 1.5 months.

1. Paralysis of decision making is a thing of the past

I have no reason to ever revisit set and rep schemes, order of exercises, and progression/failure models. Keeping things basic only requires me to focus on what I'm doing now and what I'm doing next. A cool side effect of this benefit is that I'm able to focus the energy that usually goes into reconfiguration elsewhere.

2. Strength is up. Perception of strength is up a fuck ton

Let me explain. In terms of putting up decent numbers with the movements I'm training, I am consistently outperforming my old approach. My improvements are not magical, but they are significant. I'm especially excited for when I revisit a movement to answer 'did my floor and ceiling strength increase.'

Perception of strength is how I feel day to day. I feel nigh fucking unstoppable. My energy is high, outlook is optimistic, and sex drive is over 9000. This by itself was worth the entire experiment. It is worth noting that these perceptions dropped off suddenly when I reached the apex of my last movement cycle (i.e. when I hit a 500 zercher squat).

Today I wanted to talk about the non-lifting aspects of high frequency training, and their role in what I'm doing.

1. Conditioning
Frequency: 3-6x a week
Optional: yes, but you really should be doing this

Lifting for short intense sessions daily will increase your work capacity, but only for lifting for short intense sets. While lifting will increase your Strength, conditioning is an umbrella term for staying in shape. This includes running, HIIT, pushing sleds, etc. A conditioning session should get your heart rate screaming and challenge your will power as opposed to your strength.

Although I'm sure my lifting has played a large part in how I operate day to day, I also feel like I would be reporting very different benefits to this style of training if I was also not conditioning to stay in shape.

2. Stretching
Frequency: every day
Optional: no
I don't care if you are lifting daily or not. From age 24 to 29, I was constantly feeling some sort of pain or was moving with some sort of disability. In my mind, this was either a part of getting older or a result of my hard core [sic] training. I wasn't 100% wrong...but from ages 30-32, I've moved better than I had during most of my 20s. The answer was keeping my body stretched and stretched often.

Get this done in 10min a day and feel the difference.

High Frequency Training 1/24/17 (26 days in)

Checking in to talk a bit more about where high frequency/high intensity/low volume has taken me. Here is where I'm at...

Day 1
Zercher Squat: 315x1
Pullups: BWx10 (shoulder injury, real pain in the ass)

Day 26
Zercher Squat: 465x1 (reverse band tension used)
(Only 7 days in) Dips: BW+55x1 (added 100lbs of band tension)
Pullups: BW+80x1

I have not taken measurements unfortunately. My legs have been getting unruly big. My back and arms have not seen the same amount of growth, but it is only recently I've really been able to push my upper body.

Pros: 
- All the things I like to be up are up
Sex drive, energy, excitement for things in and out of the gym (this one is my favorite)
- Difficult to do, easy to maintain
Minor tweaks like daily volume to accommodate for sleep and diet are manageable

Cons:
- Doing the same thing every day gets stale
This is to be expected. I'm about ready to change out zercher squats for rack pulls

Running list of things I've learned:
- As Broz stated, 'the way you feel is a lie.' Soreness is not a reason to skip a workout

- Stretching every day is mandatory
This goes hand in hand with prehab work. Make time for it or get injured
My typical day is 22min lifting, 5-10min conditioning, and 10min stretching

- Conditioning isn't mandatory, but you really fucking should
You will build work capacity by lifting every day, but it is going to be work capacity for low volume stuff. Getting your heart rate up a few times a week (running, HIIT, etc) is not going to take away from your lifting. Rather it's going to add to your gas tank in and out of the gym.

High Frequency Training Part Deux

I've taken a dive back into high frequency training. Just like last time, I fucking looooooove it. My workouts are quick, heavy, productive, and leave me excited and fresh to hit it the next day. More than anything, it frees me from the constant reconfiguration of sets and reps. At the end of the day, that shit never really brought me much in terms of weight progression or expedited my size/lean goals.

Right now, here is the way I'm approaching things.
- Lower body movement
- Upper body minor pulling movement
- Upper body pressing movement

The rules for picking a movement is that it must be loadable over a long period of time (2 week minimum). Preferably, I should be able to use band tension to make the exercise harder and easier (to extend the length in time each movement can be utilized).

For the last 18 days, I've been following:
- Zercher Squat
- BW Pullups
- Dips

Each day involves working up to a top set (1-5 reps depending on the load). I may stop there or do a few additional backoff sets. The emphasis on each backoff set is that they must be explosive, but sets/reps doesn't really matter.

Each day should look like:
- lifting <25 min for all working sets
- conditioning 5-10 min, not every day
- stretching 5-10 min
- each subsequent day, increase the weight by 5-20lbs

Right now, movement progression looks like this:
- Zercher Squat > Rack Pull > Front Squat > High Pulls
- Dips > OHP

Zercher Squat/Front Squat/Dips/OHP
- Black band added resistance
- Blue band added resistance
- No added resistance
- Blue band assistance
- Black band assistance
Rack Pull
- Black band added resistance
- Blue band added resistance
- No added resistance
- Snatch grip, regular grip, sumo grip
- Start on pin 2, end on pin 5
High Pulls
- Snatch grip
- Clean grip

Example Workout (from this morning):

- Zercher Squat 385x1x3 (black band assistance)

- Zercher Squat 280x5x1 (no resistance, for speed), super set with BW Pullups

- Dips Black Band Added Resistance, +15lbs x1x3

- Dips Blue Band Added Resistance, +15lbs x1x5

- Dips +15lbs, x1x5

- Dips BWx5

Backoff zercher sets used 1min rest after pullups were performed

All dip sets were performed 30 seconds after one another

Lift like everyone else, look like everyone else

I feel the program hopper demons on my back. I hurt my shoulder doing too much assistance work, then brutilized it more by not backing off on my heavy work. Every fucking time this happens I go back to my giant one note file full of programming ideas from the last 8 years. Most of them are light clones of each other. Few have produced results. None have worked consistently more than once (this is the most baffling part...I've been unable to return to something that worked before).

I'm fucking done with programs. They've brought me nothing but angst and cognitive dissonance on whether I'm doing something helpful of harmful. I'll tell you what has worked...
- heavy fucking Partials (all rep ranges)
- high frequency training, low volume and exercise choice

I was looking back to one of Bugenhagen's youtube videos when I heard something that rang true.

"Lift like everyone else to look like everyone else"

Eric goes on to talk about the problems most people have is a lack of intensity, not whether they were doing 3x6-8 instead of 3x10. Oh, was your common ass rep scheme the problem, or are you the problem? Ding ding I'm the problem.

The last time I ventured into instinctive high frequency, high intensity, and low volume training I hit 2 lifetime lifting goals withing 2 weeks. Goals that I had no idea how I was going to reach with my regular progression. Goals that I can now hit on a shitty day with little prep. What's more is this type of training is fun as hell. Burn through a movement and juice it for all it's worth, the switch to a different movement or make the same movement easier (and keep adding weight).

I'm pumped as shit. I don't want to lift to look like everyone else. At best, I've lifted to look slightly better than everyone else, and that is a huge waste of time. Game on.

Leeman Powerbuilding Part Deux

As a follow-up to my last training related post, I wanted to share the type of training I'm doing right meow. I've been at it for around 2 months, and everything has been feeling pretty damn good.

Routine

Lower body movement x1 set to failure, (drop weight 20-50lbs) x5 sets to failure-1 rep

Partials x5

Lower body assistance x3 super set Abs x3

Minor lower body assistance 2x100

Upper body press x1 set to failure, (drop weight 20-40lbs) x5 sets to failure-1 rep

super set

Upper body pull x1 set to failure, (drop weight 20-40lbs) x5 sets to failure-1 rep

Upper body press assistance x5 super set Upper body pull assistance x5 

Minor upper body assistance 5xamap

The idea is to milk a single movement for as long as possible until I hit a hard single (on the x1 sets to failure). Once I find my new max, I'll switch out the movement and start training something new. In general, I'm adding 10lbs a session to all lower body/partial movements, and adding 5lbs a session to all upper body/oly movements. I'm adding weight to assistance and minor assistance work, but adding weight isn't really the goal of those exercises (feeling the weight is the goal in those cases).

Say for example I hit a front squat of 240lbsx11 reps. In my next session I'll attempt to hit 250x11 reps. The reps will naturally go down with time, but my goal will be to rep my old max by the time I get there in a few weeks.

Progression of Movements

Lower body movement: Front Squats > Power Cleans > Back Squats > Snatch high Pulls

Partials: Shrugs > Rack Pulls > Snatch Shrugs > Snatch Rack Pulls

Upper body press: Floor Press > Overhead Press > Close Grip Bench > Push Press

Upper body pull: Chinups > Pendlay Rows > Pullups > Barbell Rows

Examples of other movements...
Lower body assistance: RDL, Leg Press
Lower body minor assistance: Leg extensions and/or curls
Upper body assistance: Handstand pushups, pullups
Minor upper body assistance: Lateral raises, bodyweight rows