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Two days off and I was eager to get back in the gym. External obligations and scheduling issues, coupled with lack of desire, kept me from the gym for longer than I like. I missed two days’ worth of exercise, but I did go hard for the sessions before, and my body could use the recovery, so I didn’t fret too much about it.

I was eager to get in today and hit shoulders with some arms, and I leapt to it. I warmed up with dumbbell shrugs with 45s, then jumped right to going heavy. I wanted to see if I could hold 90s and keep good form on my shrugs – my shoulders are strong enough to lift the weights, my grip strength is my current weak spot. Gotta buy some straps. My hands didn’t give out, and I was able to do three sets of eight reps each with the 90 pound bad boys. I barely made it on the last set, the dumbbells were straining to fall from my fingers, but I cranked through. I did a flush set with 60s for 15 reps to end shrugs, then I went to barbell raises.

Since my grip strength was pretty shot, I stuck to the Olympic barbell only for the shrugs and did five sets of ten reps each. My medial delts were starting to scream pretty loudly, and I started to sense some binding in the shoulders, so I made sure to not push it too hard. I finished up with three sets of barbell curls, holding my upper arms stiff and steady, and focusing on contracting the biceps hard, keeping constant tension on them. Then I did some rope triceps pressdowns for three sets and wrapped the workout with some medball twists and a soak. A good session.

I didn’t want to go to complete failure and exhaustion today, because I’m doing my first Zumba class tomorrow, and I hear it’s going to kick my butt. That’s also why I decided not to train legs today, gotta save something for tomorrow.

Weight: 219.2

Shoulders & Arms

Dumbbell shrugs – 45 x 15, 90 x 8/8/8, 60 x 15
Barbell raise – 45 x 10/10/10/10/10
Barbell curl – 45 x 8/10/7
Rope tri pressdown – 60 x 10/8/6
Medball twists, 16# – 25/25
Soak – 10m
3735 + 2250 + 1125 + 1440 + 800 = 9350 pounds moved

Back day. I wasn’t really feeling up for today’s workout. Maybe some stress about a day spent waiting for word on service to my car, half-expecting trouble or at least shady service. No such thing, I received excellent service from the AutoNation Toyota dealer on Arapahoe – they didn’t try to sell me parts I didn’t need, they serviced my car, and even threw in a wash when I picked it up. I ended up spending about half of what I was expecting, so that was a good thing.

Still, I didn’t have a lot of energy for the gym. I just wanted to get in, get my lifts done, and get out again. I hit back hard and fast, doing two exercises, five sets on each, to failure. Then, since I was done early, I stopped by the trainers’ desk and had my body composition tested again. It has been about 11 days since I last did it and I wasn’t expecting much of a difference, but got some great numbers. My weight had dropped a pound and my bodyfat two percent. That means that I’ve lost fat and put on a good amount of muscle in the past week. Now obviously, hydration levels play a big factor and I don’t think I’ve put on four pounds of muscle in a week, but it is good reinforcement to see concrete progress from my efforts the past two weeks. If I can keep going at this rate, hehe, it’ll only be eight weeks until I’m down to nine percent bodyfat. 😀

Weight: 220.9

Back

Lat pulldown – 80 x 10, 100 x 8/8/6/6
CG cable row – 100 x 8/8/8/8/8
3600 + 4000 = 7600 pounds moved

Body Composition, 5pm

Weight: 225.3

Bodyfat: 24.1%

After a couple days completely off from the gym, most of the soreness has disappeared from my bod. I was active, helping family move on Sunday, but didn’t spend any time even soaking at the gym. My quads are still a tad sore up by the hips, but the rest of me was feeling fit and strong today.

I was stoked to lift chest today. Eager to see if I was indeed getting stronger, or if last week just happened to be a good chest day. Turns out I AM getting stronger! I was able to do two sets of decline presses with 180 pounds for reps this week, as opposed to just one set last week. It felt great to be able to press some serious poundage. I blasted chest with six sets of decline presses and then five sets of cable flyes. I was able to go a bit heavier on the flyes too, adding another set of reps to my initial 60 pound starting weight, before needing to drop down to 50 for the rest of the five sets. I finished off with some twists and a soak and called it a day.

Weight: 223.6

Chest

Decline press: 90 x 12, 180 x 6/5, 140 x 6/4, 90 x 7
Cable flyes: 60 x 6/4, 50 x 6/5/4
Medball twist, 16#: 25/25
Soak: 10m
4910 + 1350 + 800 = 7060 pounds moved