Workout: What did you do today?

[grindy]

Yeah I don't like long workouts either. My trainer has a program that makes my workout the most efficient with the shortest time. So we aren't there for a long time. It's usually 30 to 40 mins. then we are done.

Yeah I end up using the gym as a social space too. Pre and post workout mostly, I end up talking to the front desk person along with a few people that come in that's how I ended up getting a podcast started. My podcast is from a guy that I met from the gym and some of the people that we see come in are going to be our guests. I'm pretty much the producer of the podcast.

I do something similar but I go up instead of down and I do a specific number of reps. So I start with 20 lbs and do 15 reps then 30 lbs and 12 reps 40 lbs and 10 reps etc until I get down to 6 reps.

What's your program like? Would be interested to see everyone's program actually.

Mine's pretty basic.
I usually switch the order of the big movements on each of the two days and make the first movement of the day heavier than when I do it second.
Pull day: Barbell Rows and (weighted) pull ups, after that a superset of either cable curls and face pulls or band pull aparts and incline curls. I also superset calves with one of the big movements.
Push day: Bench press (barbell or dumbbell on an incline bench), overhead press and a superset of either french press and lateral raises or cable pushdown and cable upright row. Also supersetting some neck training in there.
Legs: Squats (normal ones and Tom Platz style narrow stance squats on a slant board to really target the quads), deadlifts (conventional or Romanian) and back extensions on both days for that sweet-ass sweet ass.

[jimmy jazz]

Grindy when you are doing your squats and bench what sort of weights are you using and for how many reps?

Also I'm assuming you train alone, you use the clips when benching?

[grindy]

Grindy when you are doing your squats and bench what sort of weights are you using and for how many reps?

Also I'm assuming you train alone, you use the clips when benching?

My weights are really unimpressive. Currently I do normal squats for three sets of 8 with 82,5 kg and narrow stance squats with slant board and squat shoes for three sets of 10 with 72,5 kg. As for barbell bench press I do three sets of nine with 67,5 kg.
I also usually do a rest pause set of 20 reps after heavier sets as kind of a down set do add a bit of volume and as technique work.
I used to do one day with rep ranges between 4 and 6 and one with around 10, but I managed to hurt my knee and elbow simultaneously last autumn which really set me back and screwed up my progress and I dialed back the intensity a bit after that. I'm fine now though and I'll by slowly lowering my rep ranges in the next weeks and months.

I have a squat rack and I do my bench presses in there as well which really helps. I used to be somewhat scared to really go to failure on those lifts before but now it feels really safe.

How about you? What are your reps and weights? Do you deadlift? Deadlift is probably my most successful lift with three sets of five reps with 125,5 kg, which is obviously still not particularly impressive but at least better than my poverty bench.

[jimmy jazz]

Around the 100kg mark for squats. I did 120kg for three sets of 10 last night but I usually wouldn't do reps that low for legs. Normally around 20.

Bench is around 100kg but reps a lot lower, 4-6 for a heavy session.

I do RDL but not standard deadlifts. Around 100kg there as well.

How come you're at 70kg for bench, safety reasons?

[grindy]

Around the 100kg mark for squats. I did 120kg for three sets of 10 last night but I usually wouldn't do reps that low for legs. Normally around 20.

Bench is around 100kg but reps a lot lower, 4-6 for a heavy session.

I do RDL but not standard deadlifts. Around 100kg there as well.

How come you're at 70kg for bench, safety reasons?

Nice numbers, I hope to get there in 1-2 years.
I'm generally pretty weak and due to being quite tall and slender, with long arms I'm not really build for bench. Plus I've been starting from scratch several times due to injuries or just being inconsistent with training. But I'm optimistic that I'll get to 100 kg soon at least for one rep, currently I'm probably somewhere around 85-90kg for one rep.

[jadis]

I have a chest day, a back day, a shoulders day and a legs day. I do lots of isolation, really enjoy those.

I'm benching around 80 now (4 reps), down from a pre-pandemic peak of almost 100

My best deadlift has never been significantly higher than my bench, I don't remember ever crossing the 100 kg mark. It was never one of my faves so you could say I neglected it. I only very recently resumed doing them after the pandemic and I decided to start from scratch to work on coordination and mind-muscle connection.* Not sure I've ever really "gotten" this exercise though I've always loved the burst of energy you get good back exercises.

I'm as far from "ego-lifting" as it comes though, I think. What I want from the gym is to feel energized, focused, in touch with my body and those kind of things.
 


*On the subject of mind-muscle connection, my current struggle at the gym is working out without my earbuds and my favorite radio shows. Cause part of why I love isolation is that you don't have to be as totally focused as you are during deadlifts or bench. It's fun when there are people I like there, like one of the junior trainers I'm friendly with. But on certain hours during the day it's like a social club for annoying people and hearing the conversations (a lot of which are in Russian) makes me wanna die.

[grindy]

I have a chest day, a back day, a shoulders day and a legs day. I do lots of isolation, really enjoy those.

I'm benching around 80 now (4 reps), down from a pre-pandemic peak of almost 100

My best deadlift has never been significantly higher than my bench, I don't remember ever crossing the 100 kg mark. It was never one of my faves so you could say I neglected it. I only very recently resumed doing them after the pandemic and I decided to start from scratch to work on coordination and mind-muscle connection.* Not sure I've ever really "gotten" this exercise though I've always loved the burst of energy you get good back exercises.

I'm as far from "ego-lifting" as it comes though, I think. What I want from the gym is to feel energized, focused, in touch with my body and those kind of things.
 


*On the subject of mind-muscle connection, my current struggle at the gym is working out without my earbuds and my favorite radio shows. Cause part of why I love isolation is that you don't have to be as totally focused as you are during deadlifts or bench. It's fun when there are people I like there, like one of the junior trainers I'm friendly with. But on certain hours during the day it's like a social club for annoying people and hearing the conversations (a lot of which are in Russian) makes me wanna die.

What exercises do you do on the various days? This is quite an unusual split imo, especially having a separate shoulder day.

[jadis]

I dunno what the different pullups and pulldowns I'm doing are called in English lol

The head coach is the one who designing individual programs for everyone and they are small diagrams showing the motion rather than verbal descriptions. Also he's Russian and all my previous trainers were Francophone

I should have an old program somewhere in my stuff but don't know if I'm going to find it in the two days I've got here (I'm flying to France for a month on Sunday)

[grindy]

I dunno what the different pullups and pulldowns I'm doing are called in English lol

The head coach is the one who designing individual programs for everyone and they are small diagrams showing the motion rather than verbal descriptions. Also he's Russian and all my previous trainers were Francophone

I should have an old program somewhere in my stuff but don't know if I'm going to find it in the two days I've got here (I'm flying to France for a month on Sunday)

If your program works for you and you're having fun and progressing then that's the most important thing but tbh the more I hear about your trainer the more sus he seems. Making things needlessly complicated is charlatan 101. Strength and hypertrophy training, especially for beginners, shouldn't be particularly complicated and should mostly rely on basic exercises. Obviously everybody and every body are somewhat different and one can always play around with stances, grip widths etc. but a pulldown is a pulldown no matter whether you do it with a wide or narrow grip, underhand or overhand etc.

[jadis]

Respectfully, who are you to say that?

Like, what's your expertise?

I'm not a beginner btw

[grindy]

Around the 100kg mark for squats. I did 120kg for three sets of 10 last night but I usually wouldn't do reps that low for legs. Normally around 20.

Bench is around 100kg but reps a lot lower, 4-6 for a heavy session.

I do RDL but not standard deadlifts. Around 100kg there as well.

How come you're at 70kg for bench, safety reasons?

Holy shit, I just realized that you said that you usually train squats with 20 reps. That is insane. This is taxing af and requires a lot of willpower. Props.

[jimmy jazz]

Holy shit, I just realized that you said that you usually train squats with 20 reps. That is insane. This is taxing af and requires a lot of willpower. Props.

Thank you mate.

I prefer higher reps for legs. I've done heavy with low/moderate with high and my legs respond better with higher reps.

And yes it is very hard.

[grindy]

Respectfully, who are you to say that?

Like, what's your expertise?

I'm not a beginner btw

My expertise is being generally very interested in this stuff and reading and watching a lot about it, although I understand that my meek numbers might make me seem somewhat unreliable.
There are various definitions of what beginners/intermediates/advanced lifters are. This can be tied to both strength and years of proper training. I assumed you are a beginner due to your numbers and because I read somewhere that you haven't been lifting that long. It wasn't meant as an insult and I'd consider myself a beginner as well, although I have trained in some way for over twenty years now and have accrued a fair bit of knowledge, if I may say so myself. I haven't been consistent though and have trained stupidly and followed lots of shitty advice and marketing gurus when I was younger.

[jadis]

I've been working out for ~15 years, relatively consistently though often pretty lazily. Never been driven with regards to numbers, I just like feeling good.

I haven't seen any beginners benching almost 100kg though. Nothing to write home about, clearly, but not a beginner's weight.

I've developed pretty good form from working with good trainers but I'm aware that there's a limit to my understanding of the mechanics behind how exercises work because I don't know anatomy.

The head trainer at my current gym is an exceptionally knowledgeable guy. He doesn't "complicate" things, he gives very specific instructions adapted to each trainee. He has professional sportspeople coming from afar to train with him and he also does wonders with older people who need to recover after strokes or car accidents.

What you said did sound slightly patronizing to me.

[grindy]

Sorry, I misunderstood your training history. And 100kg bench is certainly quite nice and I'm not knocking it but I've also known naturally strong guys achieve it after a few months of training.
Didn't mean to be patronising, just saw a potential red flag and pointed it out but of course I could be very wrong. As previously stated, the most important thing is that you like your program and have good results and if you do, then who cares what I think.