Legs 10-14-13

Leg Extensions 3 x 12 reps
Leg Presses 4 x 8-10 reps
Hack Squats 4 x 8 reps*
Leg Curls 4 x 8 reps

*This was a triple drop set.

45 minutes of cardio

No squats or stiff leg deadlifts today. It is vacation week and just trying to get in and get in some quality training.

10-15-13

Did some bench pressing just to get in the gym and move around a bit. Hitting more chest work tomorrow with my back training. No cardio today. Going to hit an hour tomorrow.

Arms and Calves 10-13-13

Biceps-
Alternating Dumbbell Curls 4 x 8 reps
Supersetted with
Cable Hammer Curls 4 x 8 reps
Barbell Curls- 4 x 8 reps
Cable Curls to Forehead- 4 x 8 reps

Triceps-
Gall Presses- 4 x 8 reps
Dumbbell Skullcrushers- 4 x 8 reps
Rope Pressdowns- 4 x 8 reps*
*last set was a quadruple drop set

Calves-
Seated Calf Raises- 4 x 8 reps
Standing Calf Raises- 4 x 8 reps

Cardio- 45 on stationary bike

Notes- Nothing makes my triceps "pop-out" more than rope pressdowns. The last drop set especially really hits  them hard. I feel for overall triceps width this is one of the best movements. On the other hand because of a metal plate and screws in my right hand barbell curls are proving to be very ineffective for me. To use any real weight it ends up hitting my upper forearms more than my biceps. Dumbbell Curls on the other hand are very effective because I can control the movement of my wrist and use heavier weights comparatively.

Delts 10-12-13

Note-We were slated to train our calves with our delts but Missy has suffered a back injury so she could not train her shoulders so I decided to hold off on calves until the following day when we train our arms.

Military Press- 4 x 8 reps then I worked up until I hit a 2 rep max pr.
Dumbbell Side Lateral Raises- 4 x 8 reps
One Arm Side Lateral Raises- 4 x 8 reps
Bent Over Rear Lateral Raises- 4 x 8 reps
Barbell Shrugs- 4 x 8 reps


The military press pr was pretty awesome because I hit 2 reps with 20 MORE pounds than my previous best 1 rep max. I haven't been performing much heavy overhead pressing work as I have been focusing primarily on side and rear deltoid development. This was quite dumb thing for me to do honestly because while side and rear lateral work is good  nothing beats heavy overhead pressing. It makes up one what I consider the 5 fundamental lifts in weight training (the others being squat, bench press, deadlift, and bent over barbell row).

It is a good thing Missy skipped this training session. I tweaked my mid back slightly during the session. It feels fine now but it would have really aggravated her existing injury if she had done the same.

Leg Training 10-9-13

When we train our legs we are referring to primarily the quads and hamstrings. While it is almost impossible to train the upper legs without indirectly working the calves, we do our actual calf training when we train our shoulders. We do this because generally we are so "drained" after training our legs that calves were being done as an after thought. We would end either just doing a couple of lazy sets or not doing them at all. By training them on a separate day we can really work them hard which is a necessity when it comes to calves. Everyday every step we take hits the the calves directly so they are used to high volume stimulus with a relatively heavy weight (bodyweight). Doing a few lazy sets of calf work on a seated calf machine will do not a damn thing for them. Instead you have to really push the heavy weights with big lifts like standing calf raise machine and calf raises on a leg press machine.

But enough about calves, last night was all about building big upper legs.

DEEP Squats- 4 x 6-8 reps
Hack Squats- 4 x 8 reps*
Leg Presses- 4 x 8 reps
Leg Curls- 4 x 8 reps
Lunges**

*The last set was a triple drop set. This was super intense and really smoked my legs.

**I am including this lift in here even though we did not perform it. We both went VERY heavy this session after having not gone (too) heavy for the past month. Both of our legs were like noodles by the end. Trying to do lunges would of been damn near impossible because of balancing issues with our legs so fatigued after the three big compound lifts.

This serves to prove a point that doing an endless amount of lifts is not necessary. As you notice I did not perform leg extensions. While leg extensions are a nice isolation exercise for the quadriceps, what really builds big quads is squats and leg presses. Sometimes you need to drop the small stuff and really focus on moving some heavy ass weight on the big stuff. Trust me if you are really pushing the poundages and doing a drop set or two, a few compound leg exercises is all you need to think you are on the stairway to heaven (or the highway to hell).

Back Training 10-8-13

Last night we trained our backs along with hitting our biceps for a couple sets. We train our arms on a separate day but like to hit them with a few sets earlier in the week (Triceps with Chest and Biceps with Back as they already play a big role in training those bodyparts).

Warmup
Wide Grip Pulldowns/Chins - 3 x 8 reps

Close Grip Underhand Pulldowns - 4 x 8 reps
Seated Rows with V-Grip-  4 x 8 reps
One Arm Rows- 2 x 8 reps*
Barbell Bent Over Rows- 4 x 8 reps
T-Bar Rows- 4 x 8 reps
Dumbbell Pullovers- 4 x 8 reps
Cable Curls to Forehead- 4 x 8 reps

*I tried a new setup on these and I simply did not like it. I could not get a good contraction in my lats so I decided to just move on to the barbell rows.

Missy did the same minus the bent rows and tbar rows because she has been fighting a back injury the past week. Instead of the barbell rows she did a pulldown where you place an incline bench away from the pulldown machine and lay back on it to perform the lift. I will look up the name later.

Special Note- I rotate deadlifts in our training. Week 1 is no deadlifts at all but heavy barbell rows and tbar rows. Week 2 we do deadlifts for 4 x 5-8 reps and go lighter on the barbell rows and tbar rows. On Week 3 we max out on deadlifts and drop the barbell and tbar rows altogether but instead perform back raises. 

Chest Training 10-8-13

We are starting a new 12 week training cycle so I thought I might post up some sample training sessions. For myself it means training 6 days a week (each week I hit one bodypart twice a week) and 6 days of cardio as well. Yesterday was chest training. We also usually hit one or two triceps exercises with chest.

Bench Press- 5 sets of 5-10 reps plus a final drop set.
Incline Bench Press- 4 sets of 8 reps
Dumbbell Flys- 4 sets of 8 reps
Cable Crossovers- 4 sets of 8 reps
Rope Pressdowns- 4 sets of 8 reps*

*last set was a drop set.

Missy performed the same training but did Gall Presses instead of the rope pressdowns.

I then did 30 minutes of cardio on stationary bike.

On bench presses I worked up to a new 5 rep max so I was pretty happy. I actually almost got it for 6 reps. It was so close. I had it maybe 3 inches from lockout and held it there for what felt like an entirety. I still think if I had been a little tighter on my setup I could of made that 6th rep easily.

Tonight's training is back with one or two bicep lifts as well. I can't wait.