How much has your bench gone down to now? And at what body weight?
I’m working towards a single 225 lb bench but it’s really hard work. I’d love to be able to do 225x10.
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My body weight now hovers around 160 lbs. I was near 220 lbs at my peak of just lifting.
Now most my workouts are just geared towards maintaining where I’m at, so I consider my strength at about a peak, easily maintainable number. For bench press I’ll usually do around 185x6. A few weeks ago I tried 225 for the first time in years and hit 3 reps.
With some decent focus on strength I could probably get to 225x8 for bench, 255x8 for squat, and 275x8 for deadlift, but I’m a bit over that anymore.
That being said, I’d encourage anyone interested in finding their strength potential. It can be a lot of fun.
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Is that natural? At your height that would put your FFMI well over 25 unless you were of the more powerlifter body shape. I can imagine it being hard work living and eating to stay at 220 lbs.
I can 5 reps at 185 lbs, maybe I could do a single 225 then. I’ll still wait till it feels a bit more comfortable though.
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When I was just lifting I was on TRT and my doctor was very… liberal with what he would prescribe… I have now been completely off for 3.5 years. It is remarkable that I was able to get my levels back to a tolerable level. It was also a very miserable rollercoaster for 6 months. They are still low (around 250-300 ng/dl) but I feel ok. My muscle mass is fantastic all things considered. My energy and drive is a bit low but I’m able to get through a lot of high quality workouts (at about 370 hrs of training this year).
My BF was incredibly low at my peak, probably 6-8%. I still look very good and balanced now, just much smaller.
You’re spot on regarding the food, and that’s the most underestimated. Eating enough healthy food is insanely hard. A typical day might be:
Morning shake with 1 cup dry oatmeal blended fine, 2 scoops Protein, 2 cups egg white, 2 cups almond milk, banana, amino energy
Over the course of the day - 2 protein shakes with 2 scoops each
8 hard boiled eggs with 2 packets oatmeal
Meals 2/3/4 were usually 1-2 cups rice or potatoes, veggies, and 6-8 oz of a meat
There is not much more challenging than sitting down to each meal, still completely stuffed from the last, and knowing that meal is what’s standing between you and your goals.
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Since TR added strength and I have a gym at home again I have finally started to get back into doing some supplemental strength training. I actually started months ago then a home project blew up the gym with boxes and finally cleared it out this weekend. Also for the first time decided to track via the garmin, overall decent at counting reps, the weight input via the watch was semi useless since I often do alternating sets, so like bench press and use a grip trainer or curls and situps. But that is easy enough to add back via the app.
It was nice to see after my workout that I hit most groups on the garmin heat map. I skipped some I had been doing previously for time but figured I would ask here for some suggestions for hitting the gray muscle groups. I can do a list of what I did in this workout too if that is useful.
Lunges and barbell good mornings are 2 I know I didn’t work on this time, I did some (50) situps and maybe doing alternating side/twist ones would hit some of this side ab muscles in gray? I think the lunges and/or good mornigns would hit that lower back and also probably make the hamstrings a primary. Not sure what they are showing for inside and outside of the thigh from the back, but are hit on the front.
I have a squat cage with pull up bar, barbell, more weight in plates than I can currently use, dumbbells from 20-55? and a few kb (I think 35lbs, 5lbs, and a 1lbs… its a paperweight). I started to build a cable machine to use off the rack years ago and then never did it, now they sell them so may pick one up later this year, but money is tight. So right now can’t do anything with cables.
I thought I had seen before where you could enter a workout in garmin and see what muscles it hit but I can’t seem to find it now.
It looks like you’re missing a deadlift variation of some sort from your program. That should turn the yellows red.
The grey muscles on your abdomen are your obliques. You need an exercise that involves rotation or resisting rotation. The Internet will provide.
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Yeah no deadlifts in that workout. They are a favorite (why I have more plates than I can currently use) but for some reason I wasn’t doing them earlier this year so in my quick knock this out before the tot woke up didn’t think to add them in when going over my old routine. So that is on the list to work back in.
Had oblique in my head then for some reason thought I was wrong so didn’t type it, thanks for confirming. Will just switch up situps for something rotaty situpy for now.
I think total time on that as about 1:10 and that included me moving around stuff in my notes and overthinking weight selection and like 5 minutes of warming up (pvc pipe mimicing movements I planned to do that sort of thing). I also didn’t superset the first couple exercises so I should be able to work in 2-3 more to cover everything and still keep it around an hour.
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Russian twists are phenomenal for obliques. Stiff leg deadlift will really hammer your hamstrings. As an alternate to deadlift, bent over barbell rows or using a close grip attachment with landmine attachment/setup to do bent over close grip rows is also fantastic.
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Looked up russian twist, will watch a few videos to see if I like the movement.
Used to do barbell rows (2 houses ago) wasn’t working them in earlier this year, will give them a try.
I hadn’t looked into a landmine attachment due to ceiling height limitations, less than my barbell length, but for something like that it wouldn’t be an issue. Will look into other exercises I could do with it to see if it will be worth it.
Thanks
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Using the landmine attachment, also look up the landmine press (shoulders) and landmine press for rotation (shoulders and obliques).
I just started doing the landmine press a year or so ago and honestly now it’s my primary shoulder exercise 90% of the time. Can use the body to squeeze out a couple extra reps vs seated shoulder exercises.
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Weightlifters compete in weightlifting - snatch & clean + jerk. Just like bodybuilders compete in bodybuilding - Physique, classic. Not mutually exclusive hobbies but they are different sports 
I’m only playing.
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In that aspect, I should have said powerlifting and bodybuilding, although I never competed in either