Vanguard's Training Log - 2017 Edition!

[Vanguard]

New Program - 4 Day Upper / Lower Split - Week 1 - Day 1

Weight 211.8

Upper Strength

Incline Bench - 1 x 6 x 185, 3 x 6 x 155
Bent Over Row - 3 x 6 x 135
Chin Ups - 3 x 6 x BW
BB Upright Rows - 3 x 8 x 65
Rear Delt Row - 3 x 8 x 55
Close Grip BP - 3 x 8 x 135
BB Curl - 3 x 8 x 80

Decided to create my own program and try it out for three weeks before I sit down with Alberto again. One of my goals is to learn to program my own training so it will be interesting to get Alberto's feedback. While this is new it felt pretty good and I think having at least two days rest before hitting the same muscles again will be better especially over the summer. The other thing I am going to do is if I end up only getting 3 days in for the week I will just carry on and get day 4 in the following week and continue on. No rule saying you have to get all 4 days in 7 days.

[Vanguard]

New Program - 4 Day Upper / Lower Split - Week 1 - Day 2

Weight 213.2

Lower Strength

Squats 1 x 6 x 275, 3 x 6 x 235
Deadlifts 1 x 6 x 315, 3 x 6 x 275
Leg Ext 3 x 8 x 270
Leg Curls 3 x 8 x 250
Calf Raises 3 x 8 x 290

Backing off a bit on the weight for both squats and deadlifts. Focused on form and will slowly increase the weight over time. I think I got caught up in lifting more and more and was probably why my performance back slid and if I kept doing it was probably going to lead to injury. Smarter to back off, focus on my form and ensuring I get in the proper amount of volume in. At the end of the day I am a bodybuilder not a power lifter.

[Vanguard]

So I ended up taking Thursday and Friday off work and helping move my brother and his family over both days. Needless to say it was a lot of picking stuff up and putting stuff down.

I think it would be wise to count that as my training for the week and i am just going to rest and recover today and tomorrow and then get back to training on Monday.

[Vanguard]

4 Day Upper / Lower Split - Week 1 - Day 1

Weight 212.6

Upper Strength

Incline Bench - 1 x 6 x 185, 3 x 6 x 155
Bent Over Row - 3 x 6 x 135
Chin Ups - 3 x 6 x BW
BB Upright Rows - 3 x 8 x 65
Rear Delt Row - 3 x 8 x 55
Close Grip BP - 3 x 8 x 135
BB Curl - 3 x 8 x 75

So decided to restart this training block since it got off to a bit of a rough start with me moving my brother over two days. Kept the weight the same except for barbell curls as it was a tad too heavy last week and I wanted to ensure I kept good form and focused on feeling the mind muscle connection.

[Vanguard]

4 Day Upper / Lower Split - Week 1 - Day 2

Weight 212.8

Lower Strength

Squats 1 x 6 x 275, 3 x 6 x 235
GHR 3 x 6 x green band
Leg Ext 3 x 8 x 270
Leg Curls 3 x 8 x 250
Calf Raises 3 x 8 x 290

So I have taken this week and next week off as IPL Worlds is currently happening in Calgary were I live. I also have a bunch of summer projects that I need to get completed so the last few days I have been to tired after working on that to get my training in. Today I decided to do my training first just to ensure I get it in. I also decided to stop deadlifting for now and maybe forever. My goal is to maximize hypertrophy and after listening to the Revive Stronger roundtable discussion with Eric Helms, Mike Israetel and Menno Henselmans on exercise selection I decided to swap out deadlifts for GHR.

For progression I am starting out with a green band to be able to get six reps and will work up to 3 sets of 8 at which time I will swtich to a slightly weaker band (red) and work my way back up to 3 sets of 8. I will progress this way until I can do it with body weight only and then slowly start add in weight.

Training in the morning made the weights seem heavier. There was a study that showed training mid afternoon like I usually do was when most people are stronger. My secodn big project should be completed today and then I just have the gym to finish up so I should be able to go back to training in the afternoon's starting tomorrow.

[Vanguard]

So here is what I have been working on over the past couple days.

Project # 1 is a raised garden for my wife.

raised_garden.jpg (421.13 KiB) Viewed 261 times

Project # 2 is a storage shed that I built from scratch.

storage_shed.jpg (331.48 KiB) Viewed 261 times

[Vanguard]

4 Day Upper / Lower Split - Week 1 - Day 3

Weight 213.8

Upper Hypertrophy

Incline Bench - 3 x 12 x 135
Incline Cable Flies - 3 x 12 x 60
Inverted Row - 3 x 12 x 200
Pulldowns - 3 x 12 x 200
One Arm Cable Lateral - 3 x 12 x 45
One Arm Cable Pulldown - 3 x 12 x 55
One Arm Cable Tricep Ext - 55 x 12,11,7
One Arm Cable Hammer Crul - 3 x 12 x 45

Man I really enjoyed this training session. Tweaked a few of the exercise from what I had originally wrote down. Originally I had face pulls for rear delts but thinking about it I thought if pushing the weight up hits the front delts then pulling down should work the rear head. I have never done this before as a single arm movement where you can come down directly to you side and man this really hit my rear delt. I also decided to do one arm at a time for tricep and biceps. For tricep at the bottom of the movement I then extended my arm backwards behind me to really get a crazy contraction. Weight was a tad to heave for doing this so will likely drop the weight down to 50 for next time. I did the same for bicep curls except I started with my arm extended behind me and then curled up to a 90 degree hold at the top.

This was good volume and I got a crazy pump. Think I will try a preworkout next time to see if that makes it even better. I will try and get some video footage of the exercises to better explain what I am doing but right now I am working on completing my garage gym so not going to post any footage until its done which should be next week.

[Vanguard]

Sorry for no updates. Been working on the gym which all of the construction has been completed and I was just to sore and tired to train on top of it all. Spent 10 hours today painting and still have a second coat to do tomorrow and then the art work starts. Hoping to have it all done tomorrow or Wed at the latest. Not able to train with all that fresh paint.

[Vanguard]

4 Day Upper / Lower Split - Week 1 - Day 4

Weight 214.2

Lower Hypertrophy

Squats 3 x 12 x 135
RDL 3 x 12 x 95
Bulgarian Split Squat 3 x 12 x 70
One Legged Curls 3 x 12 x 45
Calf Raises 3 x 12 x 210

Well gym is finally completed. I need to make a video to show what it looks like. It was great to finally be able to train again and because I have not done a lot of higher rep training as of late for legs I went fairly conservative. Legs are fried after so glad that I do go easy. I have my consultation with Alberto tonight so we get his input and then see if this new program works or if he has something better in mind.

[Vanguard]

So here is the YouTube video showing the gym. Looking back at that first picture before I started this back in May of last year it's certainly come a long way.


youtu.be/0idhKNOJtyA