AM fasted weight = 194.6 (back to where I was 2 weeks ago before sickness & travel)
Last week was Week 9 of our current 12 week program and it was also the sixth week of our highest volume portion (weeks 4-9). Weeks 1-3 and 9-12 are lower in volume, but a bit crazier when it comes to intensity techniques. Week 9 was also the last week for bands on the leg press and bench press. I got an awesome safety squat/yoke bar from Donna for my birthday and she made sure it arrived by Tuesday so we could use it for our box squats! Thanks honey:)
- Monday = Arm/Calves: I remember feeling very explosive and fresh coming back from my illness and traveling. This was the first day I felt 100% since the previous Tuesday. We did a cool arms session called Crazy 8’s where we performed giant circuits of 3 bicep & 3 tricep exercises before resting. We did 4 rounds of 8 reps per movement.
- Tuesday = Legs: Seated Leg Curls, Banded Leg Press, Yoke Bar Box Squats (bar = 80-85lbs + 40lbs chains), Heavy DB Lunges, and BB RDLs. We worked up to 6 pps on the leg press last week. The squats were 3 sets of 8, and we worked up about 220 at the bottom and 260 at the top with chains. The box squat is a relatively new move for both of us and the yoke bar is VERY different than a traditional straight bar, a combination that kept our squat day fresh to say the least! Here are the videos of the banded leg press & the yoke bar squats…
[tube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQ2hJIYHELc[/tube]
[tube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jb8HFYRauZU[/tube]
- Thursday = Chest/Shoulder: Started off with our new flat bench Hammer Strength piece and I worked up to 2 plates and quarter per side for 2 x 8. Cris hit 3 plates per side on his last set before we moved to incline BB BP, Incline DB BP, and then banded BP. We trashed shoulders with an awesome tri-set of DB rear-delts, band pull-aparts, and spider crawls before finishing with cage presses.
- Saturday = Back: Nothing to crazy or exciting here…Meadows Rows, seated cable rows, pullups, shrugs, and banded hypers. The banded hypers are REALLY helping our lower backs and I am anxious to see how well they carry-over to squats and deads in the coming weeks. We do our shrugs with a 3 second pause at the flexed position, which makes 4 x 10 burn like crazy!
Post your questions or comments below…