Arkk's Weight Lifting / Fitness Thread

Gravel said:

Go light with them. They're seriously one of the biggest ass kickers for legs I've ever done. I almost always feel like vomiting afterwards.

I think when I was doing a 3 plate squat I was still only doing bulgarian split squats with like 50 pound dumbbells.

Click to expand...

Thanks.

When looking up vids on how to do them I think I discovered what I was doing wrong with my pistol squats. I think because I'm weak, inflexible and awkward I was leaning too far forward, putting my knee much further beyond my toes. I'll try to incorporate them again in the future when I build up to it.

Weight lifting is one of those activities that you really don't want to fake it till you make it.

Gravel said:

Go light with them. They're seriously one of the biggest ass kickers for legs I've ever done. I almost always feel like vomiting afterwards.

I think when I was doing a 3 plate squat I was still only doing bulgarian split squats with like 50 pound dumbbells.

Click to expand...

Thanks again for the suggestion. I did the bulgarian split squats today and they fit in nicely. I was able to do 3 sets of 10 unweighted per leg. It feels good to finish a leg workout without any kind of weird strain on my hips/knees and instead feel like my legs are jelly. I still want to work up to being able to do a high quality pistol squat, but I'm not there yet.

Another thing that's really helping is murdering my hip flexors and gluts by rolling them with a tennis ball before every workout I do. I got a foam rolling set that came with a bulbous ball thing, but I still like the tennis ball better. I need to get a softball and racket ball from the store to try them out.

Tuco said:

Mother fucker talks about and then comes down on me for talking about instant results.

Click to expand...

Hah you got me. I thought I said a month.

Tuco said:

To avoid shitposting too much, here's what I'm doing every day with my regular workout:

Click to expand...

Interesting video. He said pretty much everything I was going to say, only he said it better with technical terms. I think the most important part was the first 2 minutes when he was talking about why your hamstrings are so tight. Stretching for 15 minutes a day aint gunna make up for 8+ hours of doing it wrong. When you're sitting at your desk, you can be stretching your hamstrings. I also suggest massages concentrating on your hammies. He used that ball as a ghetto massage, but the real thing from a good masseuse will be better.

I didn't even realize how awesome my sitting posture was until he explained it. When i think of all the ergonomics experts who told me to lean back and sit with my feet flat on the ground, I laugh.

My desk at work is positioned such that I can't extend my feet =\ I'd have to get a new desk or drill a couple feet sized holes in my desk to avoid it.

Hard to imagine. Is it the design of the desk or clutter underneath? Can you post a picture of that torture device?

Maybe lean back and put your feet up? Ask for a sit/stand desk? Standing would be better than sitting with feet flat.

Ended my keto diet yesterday. Was about three months of no bullshit, fewer than 20g of carbs diet with one cheat day where I had a few beers that probably put me at 30g. First month I lost 20lbs, second month I lost 8lbs. I lost two pounds the entire month of September while working out 3-4 times a week, eating 1500-1700 calories a day (170g of protein) and fewer than 20g of carbs. I'm not upset over the last month but it was a pretty disappointing wall since I hoped to get to 190 before switching.

Anyway, I've switched to bulking. Here's what I looked like last night.


I'm 194lbs, 6'2". No idea what body fat % I am. 25%? 20%? I don't really care.

I don't have a strong opinion about what I'm going to do, but right now the plan is some form of:
1. Intermittent Fasting (8 hour feed window) ala leangains.com, following the training vs resting day macros here:
Leangains Macro Calculator

which is:
Rest Days 156g protein, 116g carbs, 155g fat. 2,483 kcal total
Training Days 156g protein, 556g carbs, 82g fat. 3,587 kcal total

I really have no idea how I'm supposed to eat 556g of carbs. I ate until I was sick tonight and only got to 2700 kcal, 244g carbs. Going from 1700cal, 20g carb to this is extreme, but I'm sure it'll get easier.

Besides training vs resting days and an eight hour window, leangains recommends a protocol of eating two moderately sized meals before a workout and then most of your calories in a meal after your workout. This is pretty tough for me since I generally can't eat a lot at one time.

2. I track my diet/weight in myfitnesspal. I figure I'm supposed to gain 0.5lbs a week on a steady bulk, so I'll adjust my caloric intake based on that. I'm sure I'll balloon up from starting to take creatine as of yesterday along with whatever water comes with actually having muscle glycogen.

3. I'm roughly following a Push/Pull/Legs program like:
Dumbbell P/P/L (Proposed Alternative to Dumbbell Stopgap) • r/Fitness
A Linear Progression Based PPL Program for Beginners • r/Fitness
Coolcicada's Push/Pull/Legs Routine

I only have dumbells (up to 100lbs each), a bench and a pullup bar, so I can't do the big lifts (deadlift, bench, squat) properly. I might join a gym in a couple of months.

Right now I'm tracking my lifts in a spreadsheet and trying out different stuff. My workouts are in flux but the current state and weights (All weights are for each dumbbell)/volume are below. I make no apology for the pretty modest weights, I'm taking things slowly:
Push day:
DB Benchpress: 50lbs 3x13
DB Overhead Press: 30lbs 3x11
DB flyes: 20lbs 3x13
Seated Tricep Extension: 50lbs, 3x10
DB Shrug: 80lbs 3x6
Incline Bench: 30lbs 3x8 (going light on these because they hurt my shoulder before)

Pull day:
DB Deadlift: 60lbs 3x15
Pullup: unweighted, 3x8
Bent DB Row: 40lbs, 3x15
DB Curls: 20lbs 3x10
One-arm DB row: 40lbs 3x15

Leg Day:
DB Squats: 60lbs 3x15
Some weighted neck workouts: 3x10
Bulgarian Split Squat: unweighted, 3x12
DB Lunges: 20lbs 3x7


I figure in a couple months once my routine stabilizes and my improvement starts to flatten more I'll probably settle into a more specific plan.

The PPL routine has someone training 6 days a week, which is difficult for me to follow. We'll see how I do now that I'm eating at a surplus, but I expect to take a rest day twice a week on average.

4. I'm finishing up physical therapy for my shoulder. For the last month and a half I've been doing my PT exercises (focusing on thoracic mobility, chest stretching, shoulder strength, rolling back my shoulders etc) every morning. Right now I'm planning on continuing that with a short workout in the morning focusing on shoulders and may add other stuff to it over time, not sure. I may drop it since working out 5 days a week is pretty taxing and a lot of time anyway.

5. Supplement wise:
. I take protein powder if I have trouble hitting 155g of protein (not hard to meet that), and I eat protein powder pre-workout.
. I take this multivitamin: https://www.amazon.com/Optimum-Nutrition-Opti-Men-Multivitamin-Supplement/dp/B0015R3AAO
. I eat a couple fish oil pills with every meal.
. I'm taking creatine and glutamine

6. Food source wise I eat a lot of red meat, chicken, eggs and spinach. I'm switching to eating a lot of oats. My wife is on a keto diet, which makes eating together hard because everything she makes is super fatty. She made nachos tonight with keto-chips which are pure fat. I'm sure I'll develop my diet over time, but eating a healthy carb diet is a pretty new idea for me. I'm really craving a PB&J and haven't had bread in 3 months...


None of the above I feel sure about, all criticism is welcome. Ossoi , come argue with me now.

Thanks, Ossoi .

Eidal said:

Tuco

Is there any reason you can't get a power rack? Power rack and bench, barbell, dumbells, and plates are really the only things you need.

For home gym tryharding, a cable machine would really round it all off.

Click to expand...

I'm thinking about it, but seeing where I can get with DBs.

Eidal said:

Upper body, DBs can take you pretty far -- dips and a weight belt + incline db press + row variants...

Lower body, fuck no. How are you going to properly squat 200+lbs? Hold a 100lb dumbell in each hand up against your chest? Probably not...

Click to expand...

This is what I do right now (with 60lb DBs)


I think I'll be able to do 100lb DBs, but beyond that? I'll have to look at a rack or a gym. I don't have room for a rack and don't want to buy one and a set of olympic weights, so it'll probably be a gym.

Ossoi said:

If you are training at home with dumbbells then I would give this/these workouts a go.

Click to expand...

Thanks, I'll give a watch tonight.

I'm eating breakfast for the first time in two months thanks to your advice btw. It's amazing how much hungrier I am eating a 2700 calorie diet with carbs on it vs a 1700 cal diet with zero carbs. It's like a new spectrum of hunger I haven't felt in three months. Yesterday was torture waiting for lunch time to keep within my intermittent fasting window.

Eidal said:

Tuco my 135lb wife squats 185 so... yea. Hope springs eternal.

edit: I'd also nitpick the range of motion in the two images. Note that he doesn't drop below parallel. My understanding is this puts a great deal extra force on the knees since they're "catching" the weight as opposed to the hamstrings/glutes. Then, because the hammies/glutes aren't catching the weight, they aren't properly engaged in the lift... bad for growth. Obviously the guy in the images looks good and all but he probably actually does a real workout to look that way =P

Click to expand...

Yeah, that guy does most of the lift examples in bodybuilding.com. When I do mine I bend down until the weights touch the floor, which brings me more than parallel if I'm keeping my back straight like I should.

Itlan said:

Tuco you need to fill out your lats and obliques badly or you'll continue to have that hourglass figure.

So I hit 355x4 and 405x4 on squat and deadlift. Officially stronger than I was 2 years.

Don't take time off people. A year of wasted time because I couldn't get my shit together.

Click to expand...

Right now I have one pull day that looks like:
deadlift
pullups
bent over DB rows
curls
one-arm bench DB rows

What should I do in addition to that?

Not sure if this really impacts obliques, but I've been doing a few planks between sets at each workout, for lack of a better ab workout routine.

Ossoi said:

If you are training at home with dumbbells then I would give this/these workouts a go.

Click to expand...

Is that the asshole banging Rosie Jones, aka the love of my life?? His workouts are good, ya.

Great job Tuco, you've come a long way baby