You both may be getting tired of hearing about this but, be encouraged, I sense the end may be near.
The morning workout ended just five minutes ago with no problems.
It was an arms and legs session and I was surprisingly strong.
Going into it I felt tired, lazy and wondered if I was being attacked by some infestation of germs.
Dragging myself into the gym room by the collar of my shirt I began the party with my famous (infamous?) combination V-up leg-lift crunch move.
32 reps later I still felt tired, lazy and wondered if I was getting sick.
Then it was on to incline dumbbell curls.
I managed to do 42 reps spread over three sets for a total of 1,680 pounds lifted.
This was a 5 percent increase over the last time I had done this exercise.
Hmmm, not bad for feeling tired, lazy and maybe sick.
Then it was time for the moment of truth - squats.
I did a warm-up set of 20 with 95 pounds on my shoulders.
No hamstring problems but I could feel him back there on my left thigh whining about the inequalities of life.
Just you wait, I thought not too loudly. (they can hear loud thoughts, I have found)
Then the bar got fixed up to where it weighed 165 pounds.
Time to get serious about this workout.
Get sloppy or distracted in this move and you can break something.
Under the bar I go, checking side to side placement/balance of the bar.
I straighten my legs to get the bar up off the pegs and fully onto me.
We check ankles, knees, hips, lower back for any problems or complaints.
There were faint murmurings from all of them, but nothing to signal a cancellation of the move.
Down I went.
Gently and not too deep just to test how everybody was feeling.
Left ham did not like the depth and squeaked ever louder the deeper I went.
Just you wait... I thought as I came up to complete rep one.
Down I went again, this time a tad deeper.
Ouch! from left hammy.
And up.
With each rep I tried to go a bit deeper to loosen everyone up, but the plan was to finish all three planned sets even if my injured hamstring limited how deep I could go down.
I took set one all the way to 20, the planned end.
After a four minute rest we began set two.
The rest helped and the first two sets (warm up and work set) had loosened up everyone so they were feeling pretty mellow.
Set two went swimmingly.
Twenty-one reps all deeper than those in set one.
Suddenly there were no more thoughts of lazy, tired or sick.
I was good to go.
Set three was a party.
I worked to keep every part aligned vertically using my big wall mirror (often misinterpreted as a tool of narcissism).
The closer I got to twenty reps the deeper I tried to go, eventually bringing the bar to within six inches of the safety rails.
And, in spite of the still-touchy hamstrings on my left leg and the extra deep range of motion, I still knocked out 22 reps.
My, how frisky we get sometimes.
Total weight for the exercise - 17,325 pounds.
Sadly, that was 5 percent off my last session doing this exercise.
I am pondering adding ten more pounds to this exercise.
As I often poetize - twenty is plenty.
So I cautiously pronounce my left hamstring healed.
The true test will be this Thursday when I do lunges again.
Wee shall see...
Next, it was seated overhead barbell triceps extensions, where I managed to squish out an extra rep over the previous go-round of this exercise.
This totaled 2,080 pounds spread over three sets and 79 reps.
Interesting.
I finished the party with seated heel raises with 295 pounds (nearly my entire weight set) sitting on my knees.
My three sets totaled 79 reps for a total of 23,305 pounds - a 23 percent increase from the previous do-wa of this exercise.
That was a surprise kuz I was really weak the last time.
Session total = 47,096 pounds.
Woo hoo.
In God we trust.
.
No comments:
Post a Comment