PDA

View Full Version : Driven By The Beast - My Journey



Pages : [1] 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Sprint
07-20-10, 10:53 am
Been putting off starting a Journey of my own for a while.
First off, Im not a competitive bodybuilder (although I may well take to the stage at some point in the future, but not yet), & my training compared to a lot of Animals is somewhat unorthodox in so much as most folk here have 1 sport/training style. People who have read previous posts of mine may be aware that Im a competitive track athlete, & train as such. However, I have a love for bodybuilding training, and admire the physique that comes along with it.
Probably the best way to describe me is a bodybuilding sprinter. Or a sprinting bodybuilder. Take your pick.
Right, my Journey. Along the way there's going to be rants, about all sorts (I have a tendancy to go off on tangents), training logs, and maybe the odd delve into the dark recesses of my mind.
So, briefly, who am I and how did I come to be where Im at?

My father used to be a bit of a bodybuilder (no contests, he just enjoyed lifting weights) and as such I always had a bit of a fascination with it. This would've been the path I followed but, I'd always been something of a quick runner and at 15, just when I was ready to hit the iron full on, I went and broke a couple of school records during House Athletics (sports day). A week later I'd joined the local athletics club, Lincoln Wellington A.C. For a couple of years, at least, the iron was on the backburner.

Now, as a competive athlete, I lived 100% clean. No alcohol etc. When we hit 18 my friends & myself used to go out to the clubs, I was always on orange juice. Aged 20, I started dabbling with the iron. I'd sufered around 18 months of various injuries on the track & was growing disillusioned with it, shortly after, I left the track entirely.
Training in my bedroom & garage with little equipment, I made some rapid progress. Within a year, I was still going out to clubs (still not really drinking much, even though I was no longer involved in athletics) & people were asking what gym I went to & so on. I grew out of my garage and joined the local gym.
Soon afterwards, it was noted that I was of a similar size as the nightclub doormen. I decided, seein as I dont really drink, I may as well get a job as a doorman, still get to see my friends & make some extra money. So I did.
Here comes the shitty stuff.
I met a lass doing the job (a colleague, gorgeous, petite, seemed all sweet but she was hard as fuck). Fell madly in love. Now I used to train at 6:30am, after a night on the doors. Now myself and my lady would finish work, and we'd be cuddled up in bed at about the same time as I would be leaving for the gym. I didnt touch a single dumbell , stopped eating right, and lost 2 stone of lean, hard earned muscle in 6 months.
The relationship ended, not my choice at all (2 and a half years later, Im still not over her) and eventually working together was just too hard. So I left and started studying to become a Personal Trainer. Rejoined the track, went back to the gym.
Plus having been exposed to some fairly heavy violence in the job over a couple of years, things that used to shock me now no longer had any effect. Something that started to bother me a little and as a result Im now what people consider to be a very cold hearted person when it comes to things such as violence, gore etc.

Today, Im a self employed Personal Trainer, managing director of my own personal training company. I never speak to my ex these days. we havnt spoken in well over a year. She always used to say I never had any ambition. Fact is, I did have loads of it but when I met her, I'd have been content to live in a cardboard box if it meant I could share my cardboard box with her. Now, 1 day I'll get back in touch with her, when I've got my own gym & say "look what I've achieved".

Until then, however, there's unfinished business elsewhere. I still hold the junior 60m club record, but there's a whole host of club records that are going to be mine. Indoors, the senior 60m, 150m, 200m and 300m. Outdoors, the 100m , 200m & 300m. Im going to take those records, whilst having a physique like a bodybuilder.
Now it must be stated that Im not gigantic, nor massively strong in comparison to some of my fellow Animals. Plus Im fairly short. Vital statistics are 5ft6, weighing 170. BF 12.5%. What people dont see is that I have a lot of muscle but actually a pretty small skeletal frame, as a result everybody who I speak to thinks that Im around 190-195, because I look much heavier than I actually am.
I can also put on a hoodie & look like I've just droppped 3 stone instantly. (something that suprised the other PTs at my gym, none of whom are well built in any sense other than about 20 pounds of excess lard) when they were told about me & Id been described as being "built like a brick shithouse". I turned up wearing my jacket & Ive since been told that they all looked at me and thought "he's tiny". Then soon after I broke out my training vest for a session. I've always been pretty vascular, & that along with being pretty muscular, the general response was "where the fuck was he hiding that?"

So that's where I am right now, looking to debunk the myth of all personal trainers being useless arseholes (altho a lot of them are, but not all) & bring an air of respectibilty to my profession, looking to steadily expand my business, spread the Animal ethics because there's way too many idiots in the gym showing no respect and/or trying to intimidate other gym users, and, of course, looking to smash those club records.

That's a fairly lengthy introduction. I'll make no apologies for use of bad language in the future, I'll try & keep it to a minimum but I tell it like it is.

Sprint
07-20-10, 11:31 am
strange how things happen. My ex I previously mentioned...whom i havnt spoken to in well over a year...I literally typed the previous post and went to check my account on a well known social networking site and she's just added me as a friend!
The power of the Forvm! I take my resting heart rate reguarly and it's usually extremely low, (varies between 54-62 typically) I had the shakes when she added me, I just took it & it was 108! Then I threw up. Yep, defintely not quite over her...

Sprint
07-20-10, 6:43 pm
Track session tonight, went well. Running 60s round a bend. Nice, loose & relaxed. Off to my old gym in the morning to catch a session with my old training partner Andy. The one who shat himself whilst bench pressing & carried on to finish the set.
Always an awesome session when we get together.

Cellardweller
07-20-10, 9:11 pm
Look what I found.

Sprint
07-21-10, 5:48 am
alright matey

Sprint
07-21-10, 6:00 am
Good session at my old gym this morning.
Couple of light sets hitting 14-16 reps on lat raise machine, followed by a couple of light sets of shrugs 12-14 reps to warm up.

4 x 8 arnold press supersetted with lateral raise polished off with a drop set on each exercise after the 4th.
3 x 12 bent lateral raise
2 x 8 heavy dumbell shrugs
"run the rack" drop sets 1 arm at a time on lat raise machine to polish things off.

This is my staple shoulder routine, what changes is the finisher. Alternate between running the rack & the 40rep finisher of bent lateral raise, lateral raise, upright row, shoulder press, finished with an isometric hold at the final rep.
It may not suit many of you out there but believe you me, this has brought my shoulders up to being my standout bodypart. (delts used to be lacking quite badly)

Note there's no isolation work for front delts. My training buddy throws in some front raises, I dont as my front delts are well developed & not lacking in strength.
Also, my traps don't take too much 'springing'. Genetics & sprinting have seen to them being very well developed, too much shrug work & they blow up completely. The shrugs are as much to help develop grip as the traps.

Finished off with some ab work in the form of crunches (keeping it simple) & core stability.

Sprint
07-21-10, 8:34 pm
Noticed the multi-hip machine at my gym is knackered (again) bloody cheap cables. False economy, they only replaced it 2 months ago. "Maintanence has been informed" which means it might get fixed tomorrow, or maybe next year. Shit, when I open my own gym anything that needs to be repaired will be repaired asap. Seein as Im 1 of the very few that use it, it's not seen as a priority (unlike maintanence/management sitting on their asses & not sorting the stuff that needs sorting. Thats their priority) Although I did get 1 of the lifeguards using it not long ago & she loves it, & is constantly in one ear of the management for them to get it fixed, whilst Im in the other. Fingers crossed.

Ever the optimist, Im hoping it'll be sorted by friday for when I hit legs. I use that baby for my adductors, I like the stretch under tension I can get with it. With a big competition less than 2 weeks away, they still aint 100%.
Just a cable...might be sorted in a couple of days...

Sprint
07-22-10, 8:55 pm
Not the best track session tonight, a speed session of 20m, 30m, 40m, 50m. Supposed to be 3 sets with short recovery between each. The left adductor felt a bit 'nippy' towards the end of the first 40m, had a bash at the 50 & within 15m it nipped again so that put paid to the session. Feels pretty much ok now & didnt tighten up afterwards so may just be the old scar tissue from the previous tears that I was feeling. Still, competition weekend after this one coming so not risking anything right now, especially if it means going through a speed session running at some easy pace. Kind of negates the point.
Multi-hip machine at the gym still not been fixed - big suprise!

Legs & some plyometrics tomorrow but will be keeping things basic & feeling it out a little bit, plus a load of stretching. Will have to leave the squats for tomorrow I think, just in case the adductor is considering dropping a bollock on me, so some wide stance leg press instead. Again just to feel things out.
Polished off with a boatload of stretching.

Sprint
07-23-10, 6:37 pm
Decent leg session, happy with it.
Core work, felt good & strong.
Plyometrics, the adductor felt ok throughout.
Stretching, well cant really have a bad stretching sesh.

Mutli-hip machine still not fixed...

Sprint
07-25-10, 5:25 pm
Hit chest today, very quick session, nailed a bunch of drop sets on incline smith machine press, then attacked some incline cable flyes again with some drop sets thrown in.
Just wanted a nice pump & got it, im keeping things short, sweet & simple with the competition coming up on saturday.
Once that's done, there was the British Athletics League cup/plate final which we have qualified for, but took a quick check on the club's website today & the fixtures list says it's been cancelled with no further info, so I'll have to wait until I see my coach on tuesday to find out what's doing. When there's no more competitions this season, I'll be hitting the weights hard to pack a bit more lean muscle on. That would've been after 11th sept, now it depends on when and/or if they rearrange the plate final.

And the multi-hip machine still aint fixed...

Cellardweller
07-26-10, 6:15 pm
Looking good in here Sprint. Stay focused on that competition.

Sprint
07-27-10, 6:51 pm
Focused as ever mate. The adrenaline's been bubbling away for ages now, fortunately Im keeping it on a leash so it doesnt drain me.

The adductor is feeling ok, might have been a tweak of the scar tissue - I think that's pretty much all that's holding me together these days ;)

Caught my coach unawares tonight, seems the only person who knows about the final being cancelled is whoever is in charge of club's website, but they've not thought to give any info, so we're all still in the dark.
Good session tonight tho, practising relay changovers. I havnt even held a baton for about 4 years let alone actually do a changover. By coincidence, Steve was there tonight as well. He left the sport due to family committments (in the form of 2 young twins) and is currently training for the Ironman contest so he's been off doing his own thing. Anyway, back in the day he used to be the 2nd leg runner on the 4 x 100 relay team, and I was the lead off runner, & each week in the season I was handing over to him in competition for about 3 years, plus time & time again in training, & we never dropped the baton or missed the changover, not even once so we paired up tonight.

First 1 was comfortable, then a couple of raggedy ones, then we swapped roles so he was passing to me. Again nice & comfortable. Then coach stopped the session so all the pairs could watch 1 pair run at a time & judge them on the changover. If the changover goes well, with no problems, the watching groups got press ups, and if it's not a perfect changover, the athletes performing have to do them. So everybody's got their eyes peeled for the slightest thing to save themselves from the press ups.

The first one I passed to Steve & we gave a demonstration in keeping calm & having presence of mind in the heat of the moment when Steve set off a fraction early as I was running in, & as such we were rapidly running out of changover box but Steve wasn't aware of the full situation, as the outgoing runner he's 'blind', sprinting forwards & everything is down to the incoming runner to make the calls, so mid-changover I called "slow!" so he just checked a couple of strides to allow me to close in to hand the baton over before we ran out of room. Everybody else got the press ups, even though our changover wasnt perfect the coach was impressed enough by our improvisation to complete the changover within the box.

Then we swapped roles again with Steve as the incoming runner, again with everybody else stood on the bank watching. Now, me & Steve ALWAYS got the baton round in competition, but 1 changover in particular has always stayed with us, purely for the perfection of the whole thing. The calls, repsonses, timing & movement was 100% bang on the money. Fully extended, slick, the whole works.
This second changover with everybody watching tonight was probably second only to that one. You know, you just know when it's absolutely nailed on & we both knew it on this one. I heard his shout to go, I went. The changover box is about 5-6 strides away, Im just about hitting my 7th when I hear him call for me to reach behind to take the baton. The second my arm reaches full extension behind me, I feel the baton hit square in the palm of my hand, and I'm away. You need just that little bit of attitude as a sprinter & as I cruised away, passing everybody else watching, I look calmly to my right (whilst at full sprint) & give them an air kiss, knowing they've got the press ups to do. (couldnt resist, having a bit of fun helps bond the group).

Buzzing after that session. I fucking love it when you have a good session. The good feeling stays with me for a good day or so afterwards. No more weights until after the competition now, just stretching & a bit of core stability on thursday, plus a gentle warm up on the track in the evening.

Sprint
07-27-10, 6:52 pm
Oh yeah, update on the multi-hip machine at the gym...still hasn't been fixed.

Sprint
07-29-10, 6:25 pm
Just a nice little tickover tonight, some skips & bounds & a bit of light stretching.
The Cup/Plate final is definitely off. Not to be rearranged (fuck knows why. It sucks as well as we were the Plate holders) & we're still waiting for the date to be confirmed for the promotion playoff. Finish in the top 2 in the league & we're through to the playoff. We're currently in a good position to do that but we want to take top spot to be league champions along with the playoff shot.

Update on the multi-hip machine...*drum roll*...still not fixed.

Sprint
07-30-10, 3:38 pm
Night before the competition.

The adrenalin's been shooting through my veins for a few days now but just the last few hours it's been really pumping.
I have to keep reminding myself that it isn't a championships, that is to say it's not an individual competition. It's the final league match, so we're all competing for points for the club. For some reason the current Team Manager goes around all the athletes in training in the final week or 2 to check who's available for each meeting. Nothing unusual in that, but he makes a list of who's available and only tells people who's doing what when we actually arrive at the stadium. Go figure. Now Im fairly certain I'll be going in the 100m, pretty sure I'll also be going in the 200m & the 4 X 100m relay is a certainty.
However, our top shot putter & javelin thrower is on holiday (shit timing) so I've got a feeling I may be doing those 2 events as well. And a slim chance of running in the 4 X 400m relay as well.

Of course, thats all assuming the adductor holds up, & that's where the nervousness is coming in. Excitement for the actual competition, but nervous as hell that I could be opening up for some fairly nasty shit.

It's not all about me tho, it's all about the club. Each event winner gets 6 points, 2nd place 5, then 4, 3 and so on.

The overall points total from all events get added up & the club who finish top from each meeting gets 12 match points, then 10 and so on, & its those points that make up the league points, with the total events points being used as 'goal difference' in the case of a tie on match points.

We're currently top of the league by a single match point overall, so it could yet come down to event points difference. So there can be no excuse for the club not having a rep in every single event. Hence why I'll give the javelin a chuck if they need me to. I've never done it before, not even in training but if I lob it & come last, the club gets an event point, if nobody lobs it, the club gets no points.

Spikes are in the car. Blocks are in the car. Sat Nav's charged up. Good meal of carb/protein, & some healthy fats & a multi-vit.
Just munching some fruit now & drinking plenty to ensure Im well hydrated.

Ready to go. LETS FUCKING DO THIS!!

Sprint
08-01-10, 7:50 pm
LEAGUE CHAMPIONS BABY!!!

FUCKING YEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!

We won the match, and took the league by 9.5 points.

Ended up running the 100m, 200m, and 4 X 100 relay. No individual wins for me, but due to being unsure about the adductor, I eased out of the blocks in the 100m & just smoothly went up through the gears & it all felt good. Only hit top gear over the last 20m or so, & closed up on the bunch rapidly to give the judges a decision to make. I felt I was 3rd, & maybe snuck 2nd. My coach & team manager were on the finish line & both felt I had 2nd, but judges gave me 5th. The only club that could catch us in the league were Rotherham, so we were focused on beating them in each event, & I beat their man in the 100m so even if the judges got it wrong (which they may or may not have done) it wouldnt affect our chances of winning the league.
Had I have been more confident with the groin & taken the race from the start, I'd have run away with it by a comfortable margin, the rate I was catching up when I finally felt good for flat out.

Before the 100m, on the start line (actually ON the start line, about to get called to our blocks) 1 of the guys looked at me & goes "fuckin hell, enough steroids mate?"

Now, I've been accused of taking them many, many times (never have taken them, never will regardless of my bodybuilding aspirations. I was a track athlete before I was a bodybuilder, and a clean track athlete at that) But those accusations have always been in the gym, which serve to be little more than a backhanded compliment i suppose.

Regardless, those accusations on the track are a whole different matter so when he said it I turned to him & said pretty firmly "never taken steroids, this is 5 years of fucking hard work & knowing what Im doing."
He looked slightly taken aback & said "oh, fair play mate". Then I gave him a whipping in the race.

The 200m, again the plan was to cruise from the blocks & feel things out. Drawn in lane 1, and lane 2 was empty which wasnt a huge issue, just made me feel like I was waaay back running the bend cos there was nobody bridging the stagger between me and lane 3. Anyway, opened out coming off the bend & took 4th, again closing on the leader. unfortunately the Rotherham guy held me off to take 3rd.

Our 4X100m relay team was a patched up one. Then 5 mins before we were due to race, the patched up team had to be patched up & we ended up with a long distance runner filling in on the 1st leg. Not ideal, but he put in a solid shift & got the changover done (then ran a brilliant 4th leg in the 4 x 400 relay for us, to seal victory, but it was really won on the 3rd leg with Matt taking the baton in 3rd place & Rotherham had it all sewn up, a good 30m ahead at this point but Matt flew past the guy in 2nd place & somehow caught the Rotherham dude on the 2nd bend, and took a good 10m out of him down the home straight. I didnt run in that 1 myself).

I was 4th leg, anchoring the team. By the time I got the baton, the top 3 were long gone. No way I could've caught them, but I knew Rotherham were behind us so I just made sure to keep him in my pocket. I had another gear to go to if he got on my shoulder but he never got close enough to put me under pressure & I was closing on the leading 3 but not close enough to worry them.

The club ended up winning the match on the day, & the League overall.

And the adductor felt fine! Bit tight now but that's general tightness from the exertions, nothing sinister.

Sprint
08-01-10, 7:51 pm
Oh yeah the multi-hip machine still aint been sorted.

Cellardweller
08-02-10, 3:46 pm
LEAGUE CHAMPIONS BABY!!!

Regardless, those accusations on the track are a whole different matter so when he said it I turned to him & said pretty firmly "never taken steroids, this is 5 years of fucking hard work & knowing what Im doing."
He looked slightly taken aback & said "oh, fair play mate". Then I gave him a whipping in the race.



Congrats on the win. Great job putting that guy in his place on the track.

Sprint
08-02-10, 7:51 pm
Congrats on the win. Great job putting that guy in his place on the track.

thanks buddy, felt good i can tell you.

just about come down from the high today, been buzzin the last 2 days.

Sprint
08-02-10, 7:55 pm
in all the excitement I forgot to post about my workout on sunday.

just hit chest again, and again kept it nice, quick & simple.

seated chest press 3 x 8-10
incline bench press on smith machine 1 giant set comprising of 5 drop sets shooting for around 6 reps per weight
incline cable flyes 4 x 8-10 with 3 drops after the 4th.

been hitting this for a few weeks now & really gets a good pump in the chest, & the chest is responding nicely with regards to size.

Sprint
08-03-10, 7:26 pm
The multi-hip machine's been fixed!!

Sprint
08-03-10, 7:30 pm
Tonight's track session, 3 x 3 50m.

I didn't actually train with the main sprint group tonight, the adductor didnt feel 100% during the warm up but just a residule leftover from saturday. Nothing sinister, but didn't want to get caught up in the competitiveness that occurs in training at times (something Im normally immune to these days anyway, having matured over the years).

Just tagged on the end, running totally bymyself just keeping things nice, loose & relaxed. No issues with the adductor during the actual session.

It's all good.

Sprint
08-05-10, 8:33 am
Just ticking over in the gym at the minute. Happy with the shoulders, happy with the arms & back. Want to bring my chest up a bit so giving that the very quick sessions I've mentioned before just to get a good pump going. Seeing decent progress off those at the minute.

Promotion playoff is 15th august so just under 2 weeks then it's time to look ahead to the indoor season.

May as well state my goals for the indoors right here & now.

Run a P.B. for the 60m. If I manage this, I'll set a new club record seeing as my current PB is the Junior 60m club record, & is quicker than the current senior record. (only been timed twice as a senior over 60m, both of them coming of the back of 3 years away from the sport & running with the troubled adductor)

Never been timed over 200m indoors, but my outdoors PB is quicker than the club indoor record. Now I've only ran a bend once indoors & found it very tricky with the banking, so to take the club record is a big ask, but again Im targeting that.

Going to have a bash at a couple of 150s in some open meetings, just to get some more experience of running bends indoors, & considering hitting a 300 or 2 for the same reason plus it'll help bring my 200m time down both indoors this winter & outdoors next summer.

And I've got an eye on the club indoor record for shot putt, because I only threw the shot for the first time a couple of weeks ago after a normal track session & was challenging the record, so it'd be nice to add another string to my bow & be able to contribute further to the club's league & cup charge next season.

Back to the playoffs though. The way it works, there are several regions in the North of England. North East, North Central & so on. I lose track exactly how it's broken down but theres 4 or 5 of them, each forming their own League. All of this is in Division 2, the same format goes down into Divisions 3 & 4, but Division 1 is just one Division with no separate regions throughout the North.

Anyway, we're currently in the 2nd Division. We finished top, so we're now League Champions after the final League Match last weekend. The top 2 in each League in Division 2, across the regions, go into a promotion playoff. A single one off match, the winner of which gets promoted to Division 1. The top division. Even though nobody can take away the fact that we're League Champions, it is possible that we could finish up as champions but not get promoted so the job's far from done.

Sprint
08-05-10, 8:32 pm
Lovely track session tonight.

Nice little sprint pyramid, 120m, 130m, 140m, 150m, 140m, 130m, 120m.

Took them all at afairly decent pace, felt nice & relaxed all the way through. Shit, when things are flowing they just flow. Fucking love it when Im running well. Strange how form can come and go seemingly without rhyme nor reason but when it's there, everything just feels so easy.

Don't get me wrong, felt tired at the end & the legs will be sore for a couple of days (especially considering it's legs at the gym tomorrow. Will mostly be plyometrics, but some weights will be in there. Would be rude not to make use of the newly fixed multi-hip machine) but was leaving the other lads in my group, just cruising away from them.

The adductor felt fine. Been holding back for so long in training due to the psychological effects of the repeated tears in the muscle. I ran a couple of indoor open meets last winter, thinking that would sort me out but it didn't really have the desired effect. Maybe because they were just open meetings, as an individual. On saturday it was a League macth for the club, with the title within our grasp. The combination of the importance of the title & with it being a league match & not wanting to let my club mates down forced me to push my aprehension to the side & push things a little. As a result, I've got renewed confidence. I know the groin can withstand the stresses now of a flat-out sprint.


Wearing my sprint spikes again, up on my toes, extending the stride at speed.
I feel like a new athlete.

Sprint
08-07-10, 4:03 pm
Hit up some legs today. Not too much weights, focused mainly on plyometrics.

Hurdle skips
Length jumps from a dead stop
Length jumps with a pre-set "bunny hop"
3 x 4 depth jumps
Explosive standing jumps
8 x 3 (three) metre sprints

4 x 10 Leg Press with isometric holds at the bottom of each rep

3 x 14 Hip Flexors on multi-hip machine

2 x 14 Adductors on multi-hip machine

Plank on exercise ball

Table Top on exercise ball

2 x 20 crunches

2 x 20 rowing sit ups

Sprint
08-08-10, 6:37 pm
Still keeping things fairly low key right now to stay fresh for the Promotion playoff on sunday. Knocked in some arms today, using some Fat Gripz for the first time. Nasty little bastards, loved them!

Preacher curls w/Gripz 4 x 8-10
Reverse Preacher curls w/Gripz 3 x 8-10
Rope Hammer curls 3 x 10-12
Incline Dumbell curls w/Gripz 3 x 8-10
Dumbell Hammer curls w/Gripz
supersetted with --------3 x 8-10
Dumbell Hammer curls without Gripz

Tricep Pressdown w/Gripz 4 x 12
Tricep Pulldown (reverse grip pressdown) w/Gripz (Holy Shit!) 3 x 8-10
Rope Pulldown 3 x 12 with 3 drop sets on 3rd set
Single arm pulldowns 3 x 12 with 3 drops on 3rd set

Job done. Just keeping things ticking over, & sampling the Gripz. Lifts were down by 30% in some cases using them. Really enjoyed them, using them for supersets with the exercises & weights for a set with them followed by a set without really pumped the forearms and hands (yes, hands). Definitely recommend them.

Sprint
08-10-10, 6:58 am
Went back to my old gym for a cameo appearence with my old training buddy. So much for taking it easy in the run up to the promotion playoff..

flat bench press 4 x 6
incline dumbell flyes 4 x 8
smith machine incline press 5 drop sets each weight to failure
seated chest press 3 x 10
machine flyes 3 drop sets each weight to failure

Then a bunch of core strength & abs.

I dont usually train this much volume for chest these days, normally 3 exercises, 10 total sets tops and im out.

Things always get a bit silly when we get together though.

Sprint
08-11-10, 9:02 pm
Chest is nice & sore from yesterday.
Biceps are still slightly tight from using the fat gripz on sunday, was feeling it in the tri's for a few dyas as well but yesterday's chest session seems to have flushed that out.

Few days to go until the playoff, just warming up at the track in sessions now. Much to my coach's bemusement. The week before a competition I always just warm up, with the exception of the last one where I did a session on the Tuesday before the comp on the saturday. My coach just lets me get on with it, albeit with a slight smile. It's just how I do things.

The adrenalin's been pumping for a couple of days now, and there's still 3 more to go. It's been a long week waiting for it to come around and there's still half of it left. I just wanna get out there and do my thing.

Sprint
08-12-10, 8:16 pm
Just a steady warm up at the track tonight. Couple of skips & bounds. Finalised various bits & pieces for sunday, e.g. who's going in what car etc.

Definitely running the 100m & 4x100m relay, 200m is up in the air as to who will be doing it for us.

Not happy about some things at the club. There's an alarming lack of youth coming up through the ranks, the main athletes representing the club in these competitions are still the same athletes who were the main guys & girls 10 fucking years ago. Hats off to them, still doing the business but there's hardly anything following us through.
Back when I was 15, 16, there was a group young lads. 5 or 6 of us, all good friends & really competing in training. That edge showed in competitions with all of us week in week out hitting within a tenth of a second of our PB's. Not boasting but I was the quickest out of our little group, & so I was always chosen to travel with the senior squad to competitions but I knew if I eased back just a fraction in training, 1 of the other guys would take my place in a heartbeat. We were all fast enough to hang with the seniors, and we earned their respect.
Now, there's 2 or 3 young lads the same age as we were then, but running at least a full second slower over 100m (for all you non-track athletes, thats a fucking lot) than we were back then. More worryingly, those lads have shown NO improvement over the past 12 months. As a result, we have to put in a long distance runner into our 4x100m relay team. We did the same thing in the final League match due to last minute changes being required which are the norm with these kinds of things. However, going into the Promotion playoff, our first choice 4x100 team now contains a long distance athlete as opposed to putting him in at the last minute to patch up the team.

Those seniors who took me under their wing when I first started out are marching towards their late 40s now, they'll be the first to admit they're not running as fast as they were 10 or even 5 years ago. They won't be able to carry the club on their shoulders forever, and the problem seems to be getting worse. We have plenty of athletes at the club, we're not the biggest club but we do have many athletes. Unfortunately, a lot of them aren't making that extra step up, and a significant amount of those who have made the step up see unwilling to represent their club in competition. Fighting for promotion to the top division, having just been crowned league champions, this weekend is a prestigious event. A chance to write a new chapter in the club's history. To add our names to the list of the athletes who represented the club in what has become known as "The Golden Era" some 60 years ago due to the club's success. We can become a part of that, & have athletes talk about us the same way in 60 years' time. We have that chance, and those who have stepped up in ability to be able to represent, are choosing not to.

I genuinely fear for the club's future. I fear that in another 5 or 10 years, we won't just be putting out a weak team for league matches, but maybe we won't be putting out a team at all because the new generation do not wish to take the baton and run with it.

Nothing we can do about it now though, all we can do is nail it on sunday and get promoted. Maybe that'll capture the imagination of those unwilling, and maybe spur those incapable to kick on and make that step up. I know I have many years left to give to the club yet, and I know the more mature seniors will continue to defy the sands of time to try and keep the club competitive for as long as it takes until a new wave is ready and willing to take us on to greater heights.

Cellardweller
08-12-10, 9:13 pm
Sounds like it time for you to take some of the young bulls under your wing Sprint. From some of the shit you've been posting lately, you'd be a hell of a mentor and probably could get some new blood in just by creating an intense Animal atmosphere around you.

I'm not going to pretend to know anything running, but what's the big difference between running on an indoor track and an outdoor one? How does it affect your times?

Sprint
08-13-10, 3:46 pm
Thank you for your support. I've taken a few of the youngsters on in the past & it's something I really enjoy doing.
It's something that maybe I can start putting into practice a bit more now that I'm nearing my old self in terms of performance. Unfortunately 3 years out of the sport & subsequent injuries on the long road back meant the new generation have never seen me perform at my best. All they had were stories, & I can understand why some would choose not to listen to me at first because during my rehabilitation most of them were running faster than me.
Now, however, I've overcome the physical problems & resulting psychological issues & am handing them their asses to them in training. This does lend itself to the age-old issue of "substances" when a bodybuilder goes from being 5 or 6 metres behind you, to being not alongside you but 5 or 6 metres ahead of you on each run in the space of 2 weeks (Such was the extent of the psychological damage getting sorted in the space of a single day).

I hope that my returning to past form allied with my added experience of being on the floor and climbing back up can help some of our athletes make a step up. At the very least, it's given the previous front-runners something of a hare to chase in training.

In terms of running indoors as opposed to outdoors, there's a few diffrences. There's the difference in atmosphere (which never affected me as long as the venue has god air-con, Sport City in Manchester didn't, and it got stuffy as all hell in there).
Other than that, the track can sometimes 'feel' different but again never really bothered me when Im running. No time to think about that. There are different distances, in official championships, outdoors we have the 100m, 200m etc as standard. Indoor championships have 60m, then jump up to 200m. Some open meets as opposed to official meets run 150m and 300m indoors, but then a few do that outdoors.

The biggest difference are the bends. Not an issue over 60m as it's just a straight, it's the indoor version of the 100m, in a sense. However, anything that involves a bend indoors causes things to go a bit wonky. The bends indoors are banked, suprisingly steep. I was told that at top speed you dont notice the banking...I did! You're constantly fighting against dropping down into the lane inside you. Takes some figuring to get it sorted, I've only ran a single bend indoors ever, it's not an art that has come naturally to me.
Outdoors, everything is flat.
The only other difference is that the track is 200m long indoors, with a 60m straight running down the middle, inside the oval 200m. Outdoors is a oval 400m, with no straight down the middle because the straights are 100m and so accomodate the shorter sprint.

My reasons for getting stuck into some indoor work this winter are firstly to run the 60m, as there's a lot of pressure on getting out of the blocks well & this is the only aspect of my running that needs work on following my lay-off. I've always responded in pressure situations so that should do me a lot of good. Secondly, I want to master the art of indoor curve running, and I've got my beady eyeballs on the club's indoor 200m record. I'm already the junior 60m record holder, faster than the exisitng senior 60m record (Ive never been timed as a senior over 60m so never got a shot at that record) & Im expecting to take that record as well this winter.
Plus with the shit weather in this country, getting some indoor work gives an opportunity to really get in some sharp, speedy work as opposed to the usual winter grind out sessions of repeated 300s in training. Good for strength, not so good for speedwork.

Sprint
08-15-10, 4:49 pm
FUCKING YEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !

The Club finished second in the Promotion Playoff, & with the top 2 winning promotion to the 1st Division, we're on our way!!

Myself personally, 3rd place in the 100m & have re-established myself as the clubs no1 sprinter. After 3 years out of the sport, with some serious injuries since returning, 2 competitions & I'm back where I belong.

The Team Mananger asked me to run the 2nd leg in the 4 x 100m relay as the back straight is actually the longest leg (the 3rd leg, around the 2nd bend, is the shortest) & there was a strong headwind down the back straight. Due to me being the top sprinter, & the most powerful, he decided it would be better for me to power through the wind. The decision worked & I knew I was flying. Cruised past 2 other athletes (no mean feat when you take into account the stagger that only really evens itself out on the 3rd & 4th legs), it's obviously possible to move up places in terms of where you are as a team, but to actually physically pass athletes on the 2nd leg is going some. Of course, Chris played no small part in me being able to do that by running a solid 1st leg to put me in a position to be able to get in front of anybody.

Apart from flying past the other athletes, after we'd finished Marc to whom I passed to, said he looked at me coming in and thought "Fuck, he's shifting at a fair rate of knots here". I honestly don't think I've ever ran that fast with regards to top speed ever. Felt amazing.

So we're there, Division One. Fucking exhausted, but buzzing!!!

Sprint
08-17-10, 7:48 am
A journey back to my old gym for another session with my old training partner. Don't normally hit back on a track day, so kept things fairly easy on the whole. Just ticking over, no deadlifts due to track later.

4 x 10 pull ups to warm up
4 x 8-10 low cable row
3 x 8-10 machine row
4 x 8-10 wide grip lat pulldown
3 x 6-8 reverse close grip lat pulldown

Then polished off with some ab & core work, along with some stretching to ease my legs off prior to tonight's track session.

Sprint
08-17-10, 7:57 am
There I am this morning, at my old gym, post-workout getting changed whilst my training buddy's in the shower.
A guy I used to talk to quite a lot when I trained there full-time came in, & we had a quick chat before he goes "Alright then, so what pop are you on?"

I figured I knew what he was getting at by the word 'pop' but I said "You what?"

"You know, what pop are you on?"

"Nothing mate, never have, never will."

"Fuck off, what are you on?"

"I told you, nothing. I'm competing in athletics again, they do random drugs tests so I can't afford to be on anything."

"Fuck off, I've been in this game long enough to know you're on something."

"100% honestly...NOTHING."

"Oh, fair enough."

And off he walked.
I used to say to people who demanded to know what I was doing differently to them "Come join me for a workout, then you'll understand why I look the way I do, and you look the way you do." But I don't think it'll make much difference, if any at all. So Now I'm saying to them "Pay your way and live with me for a week. Train when & how I train. Eat what & when I eat. Sacrifice what & when I sacrifice. Live my life for 1 full week, and imagine doing that for YEARS. Then you'll see where our paths differ."

I'll be posting this comment in my other thread about "secrets" as I feel it's relevent there as well as here.

Cellardweller
08-17-10, 7:51 pm
Awesome job at the meet Sprint. I get fired up reading shit like that. You know you're only going to get better.

Sprint
08-18-10, 8:29 am
Awesome job at the meet Sprint. I get fired up reading shit like that. You know you're only going to get better.

Thanks for your support bro. I kind of regret those 3 years spent out of athletics, although without them I suppose I'd never have gotten into bodybuilding as much as I did. Things happen for a reason I guess. What's important is the here and now, whilst looking to the future.

Sprint
08-18-10, 8:17 pm
Shoulders today.

Everything's done with dumbells, allowing my body to take it's natural plane of movement.

2 sets nice light shrugs to get some blood pumping into the general area.

3 x 6-8 arnold press
supersetted with
3 x 6-8 lateral raise

2 x 12-14 bent lateral raise

2 x 40 rep finisher comprising of:

10 x bent lateral raise
10 x lateral raise
10 x upright rows
10 x shoulder press

All done with the same dumbells, no rest, soon as that 10th rep is done it's straight into the next movement (The only time I count reps to a specific number).

Rest 2 mins, repeat. You better believe this gets you pumped.

Notice there's no isolation movements for the front delts. The arnold press hits these, & they're well developed enough from chest sessions to need their own specific work.
Also note the lack of heavy shrugs. Due to genetics & the sprinting on the track over the last 10 years, my traps are plenty big enough. They also respond incredibly well to shrugs, so much so that I only throw them in once every 2-3 shoulder workouts. Any more than that & they explode.

I use shrugs to improve grip strength as much as trap development. Lately I've been treating myself to dangles from the pull-up bars. 2 hands, then moving to 1 hand, then moving to the other hand, then back to both hands. All changes done without dropping.

All in all, good session. Ploughed through it although I seem to be feeling the effects of going a bit easy on myself in the build up to the recent athletics meets. Clearly left it long enough to suffer from inactivity as opposed to keeping it short enough to benefit from a slight break.

We live & learn.

Sprint
08-19-10, 7:50 pm
For some reason I didn't put in Tuesdays track session.
Wasnt the best.

Coach called them 70m power-ups.

70m run at 90%, straight into a 70m cruise, then straight into another 70m run at 90%

5 of these, in effect giving 10 runs of 10m.

Was feeling the effects of sunday's exertions in my legs, the adductor was a bit tight in particular. Still some scar tissue in there I guess. Anyhow, did 3 of the runs but just felt too tight in the groin to risk the final 2.

Tonight, felt much better. Got soaked by the rain tho, not massively heavy but a constant fall that eventually drenched us all.
Rolling 40s, a 10m jog into a 40m run. kept it light, fast & easy. 3 sets of 4, just the slightest hint of tightness in the groin but I think the session will have eased it out.
Hitting up some plyometrics, legs & core in the gym tomorrow.

Legacy
08-19-10, 8:02 pm
Doing a good job combining weight lifting and track bro. Good to see others who enjoy the iron game but also have passion for other sports.

Sprint
08-19-10, 8:29 pm
Thanks bro. I find the 2 do compliment each other to a certain degree. Im just about the only athlete at my club who enjoys running into a headwind, just power on through it.
It may fly in the face of some science, but I was never one to set in stone what the textbooks tell us. In any case, with both weights & sprinting, there's a load of anabolic hormones being released.

Sprint
08-19-10, 8:31 pm
[QUOTE=Sprint;998379]For some reason I didn't put in Tuesdays track session.
Wasnt the best.

Coach called them 70m power-ups.

70m run at 90%, straight into a 70m cruise, then straight into another 70m run at 90%

5 of these, in effect giving 10 runs of 10m.

QUOTE]

That should've been "in effect giving 10 runs of 70m." Not sure where the extra '1' came from.

Sprint
08-20-10, 5:16 pm
Plyometrics, legs & core today.

Started off with a nice steady run on the treadmill, only 1 km just to get last night out of my legs. Felt pretty loose anyway, but wanted to really ease them off nicely.

Plyometrics consisting of:-

Hurdle skips
Step ups focusing on light, fast steps
Step ups with isometric holds focusing on exploding from a dead stop
Standing jumps for length & height

Then onto the weights, keeping things light, very quick & explosive. From a dead stop each time. A brief pause at the bottom of the squats, and resting the bar on the ground for a second on the deads. Reasons being there's no bounce, so no momentum and each rep is explosive from a complete dead stop, like coming out of the blocks in a race. The first 10-15 metres of my sprinting is what needs work now.

3 x 8-10 squats
4 x 8-10 deadlifts
3 x 12-14 hip flexors each side on the multi-hip machine
3 x 12-14 adductors each side on multi-hip

Then a bunch of core work

3 x 25 crunches
2 x plank on exercise ball (Yep, a PT on an exercise ball. Not too stereotypical)
2 x 20 rowing sit ups
1 x 25 side leg raises each side

Some nice easy stretches to finish.
A good session.

Had to attack the multi-hip machine with a spanner& pair of pliers tho. The screw connecting the 2 plates had been overtightened, restricting the movement & pinching the pivot for the cable.
This means that the cable is constantly doubled back on itself, putting it under greater strain than the straight tension it's designed for. Obviously this is why the cable has snapped twice in a matter of months.
Whatever tit did it needs a kick in the face. Stupidity boils my piss.
No point in telling the management, they don't listen to the members let alone a self employed PT. You'd get "Uh, right. We'll get it looked at." Fuck that, I found the tools & went to work on it myself.

Anyway, my d.i.y. job means it's under slightly less stress now. Not perfect, but better.

Legacy
08-20-10, 5:19 pm
Looks good bro. I like the explosions you used. Good work.

Sprint
08-20-10, 5:22 pm
Looks good bro. I like the explosions you used. Good work.

Cheers dude, just doing what I can to get to where I need to be.

Legacy
08-20-10, 5:23 pm
Cheers dude, just doing what I can to get to where I need to be.

Thats what lifes about bro

Sprint
08-22-10, 5:01 pm
Hit up some chest, abs & core today.

Still keeping the chest stuff simple & brief. It's really doing the trick.

Seated chest press 4 x 8-10
Smith Machine incline press 6 drop sets to failure each weight.
Incline cable flyes
supersetted with
Decline press ups (It's all about the upper chest) 4 x 10-12 flyes, press ups to failure. 3 drop sets on 4th set flyes.

Nothing left in the chest, pumped to shit & veins sticking out all over the place. Good session.

Then 3 x 3min rounds on the punchbag (I had a minor disagreement with the manager & receptionist earlier in the day, & had my gloves in the car so off I went)

Followed by a circuit of crunches, rowing sit ups, side leg raises & various core exercises with an exercise ball.

Legacy
08-22-10, 10:03 pm
Hit up some chest, abs & core today.

Still keeping the chest stuff simple & brief. It's really doing the trick.

Seated chest press 4 x 8-10
Smith Machine incline press 6 drop sets to failure each weight.
Incline cable flyes
supersetted with
Decline press ups (It's all about the upper chest) 4 x 10-12 flyes, press ups to failure. 3 drop sets on 4th set flyes.

Nothing left in the chest, pumped to shit & veins sticking out all over the place. Good session.

Then 3 x 3min rounds on the punchbag (I had a minor disagreement with the manager & receptionist earlier in the day, & had my gloves in the car so off I went)

Followed by a circuit of crunches, rowing sit ups, side leg raises & various core exercises with an exercise ball.

Looks good bro. That cardio on the bag is great, best way to do cardio in my opinion for heart health

Sprint
08-23-10, 10:23 am
Yeah I don't think people fully appreciate how tough bag work or any kind of sparring really is until they give it a shot. Like I say, was a bit stressed following a disagreement earlier in the day. Fortunately I've mellowed over the past cuple of years (or is that matured?). Had the incident occurred maybe 2 years ago, the counter would've had an imprint of the receptionist's face in it, with the manager not far behind. The pair of them took an actual step back when I turned on them.
When the red mist's coming down, it's best to walk away. Part of growing up is realising the mist's about to envelop you.

Then the negativity got channelled into positivity, which is infinitely more productive to all parties.

Sprint
08-23-10, 6:27 pm
Nailed some back today

Pull ups 4 x 10 to warm things up
Barbell Row 4 x 8-10 (Using underhand grip, I prefer the feel)
Lat Pulldown on Hammer Strength Iso-lateral 4 x 8-10
Seated Row on Hammer Strength Iso-lateral 5 x 6-8 (Was going to be 4 sets, but Eminem's new album on the ipod...a 5th seemed like a good idea).

Treated myself to some dangles from the close grip pull up bars to finish. 2 hands, then 1 hand, other hand, both hands, 6 pull ups, followed by another dangle from both hands.

Forearms nice & pumped along with the rest of the back after that.

Legacy
08-23-10, 7:08 pm
Looks like a pretty solid back day bro. Love seeing the hammer strength equipment in there, wish more guys would realize the potential of them.

Sprint
08-23-10, 9:00 pm
Yeah to be honest I avoided them initially, soon as I used them the first time tho it was like Christmas. They're my favourite toys now. I love how it's actual plates you put on, as opposed to sticking a pin in a stack. Just brutally simple equipment as well.
Plus being iso-lateral they can show up imbalances the same way as dumbells can.

Sprint
08-24-10, 7:14 pm
Good track session tonight

Bit of a sprint pyramid.

50m, 60m, 70m, 60m, 50m twice through

Felt good & relaxed. Was really windy tonight, we ran with the wind as usual. Would've preferred doing them into the wind, or at least one set into the wind. Sort the men from the boys that way, but the coach is the boss.

Sprint
08-24-10, 7:55 pm
1 more outdoor competition to go this season. The BAL (British Athletics League) final. Held down in London (another new stadium I've never raced at) on 4th September.

Going to be a big one. Each athlete is only allowed to do 2 events, including the relay. So essentially only 1 individual event per athlete.
Only 1 athlete per event as well. Now, of the sprinters in the mix for the 100m and 200m there's myself, Neil and Chris. 3 athletes, 2 events. Somebody has to be left out. Granted, whoever doesn't make the individual events will be in the relay team. Which will be interesting in itself. It's a good 4 hour journey down to London from where we are, so we'll see who's prepared to make an 8 hour round trip just for a single run in a relay.
All things being considered, I should be in the 100m. Really, Neil should be the 200m. As much as I don't like saying this because Chris & myself get on really well. I'd much rather see Chris in there than Neil, however I have to admit Neil probably should get the nod.

As for myself, I should be in the 100m, & really want to be put in for it. Fuck I want it so bad, it's a higher level of competition than we normally compete at. We're the only club in the final who don't get funding. Just making the final has been an achievement & the general feeling is we'll just raise awareness of the club to attract new talent and hopefully secure funding ourselves. But I want to fucking win. At the very least, I want us to be competitive there.

From an individual point of view, that means whoever runs in whichever events are all going to have to be bang on form. It's going to take PB's just to be anywhere in the mix. I fucking thrive on that sort of pressure. I want to go in that 100m so bad. Still, if I get picked for the 200m instead I'll happily take that, & if I'm chosen for neither and have to make the 8 hour round trip just for a relay leg i'll be gutted but I'll happily take that as well. The club's bigger than any 1 athlete & even if we aren't competitive it's going to be a great day and the camaraderi & togetherness at club events is wonderful. I love spending time with people from the club, in training at the track or the special training days out the sprinters have when we go to the coast for a morning of sandhill training with an afternoon of football (soccer)or to Sherwood Forest (about an hour's drive) for a morning of running up & down hills in the woods, followed by an afternoon of football. I just enjoy hanging with them, I've known most of them for over 10 years & consider them as much a part of my family as I do my actual family.
The Final is going to be a great experience, doing what I love with the people that I love and I want to play a part in that, even just be a part of that, no matter how small that part may be.

I'm not sure either of the other 2 guys are willing to do that. We've had in the past athletes refuse to go to meetings just for the relay. I can understand where they're coming from, but at the end of the day, if you're not good enough to be the best in your individual club at your event, you need to either accept it or dig the fuck in and try to claim your place. Fucking earn it, don't sulk about it.

The decision will be the team manager's though, we should find out either on thursday or maybe he'll leave it until the very last minute next week. We'll see. Either way, I'll be there on 4th September. Hopefully in the 100m, maybe in the 200m, but even if it's just the relay I'll be there.

Giving it everything I've got. I know no other way.

Legacy
08-24-10, 10:23 pm
Good track session tonight

Bit of a sprint pyramid.

50m, 60m, 70m, 60m, 50m twice through

Felt good & relaxed. Was really windy tonight, we ran with the wind as usual. Would've preferred doing them into the wind, or at least one set into the wind. Sort the men from the boys that way, but the coach is the boss.

I like your thinking bro

Sprint
08-25-10, 6:52 am
I like your thinking bro

Just makes sense to me to train with all different conditions, can't choose the direction you're going to run in at a competition. If it's a really strong headwind, that's what you're running into. At least if you've trained running into the wind on a few occasions you've got more of a feel for it. Plus the extra strength that comes with it. If it happens to be a tailwind on the day, it's a bonus.

Sprint
08-25-10, 7:00 am
Went back to my old gym again today for another session with my old training partner.
He's a real volume trainer these days, & wanted to show me the monster he'd put together which unfortunately included chest (mine's still a bit sore from sunday) and biceps (which are feeling my back session a bit from monday) but Im up for anything. He said he was going to break me, I said he wasn't. He didn't.
The session went as follows...

Incline dumbell flyes 3 x 8-10
Flat bench press 4 x 8-10
Incline smith machine press 3 x 6-8
Preacher machine reverse curls 3 x 8-10
Preacher machine single arm curls 2 x 8-10
Preacher machine forced negatives (Hellraiser) 2 x 8+4

Cable crossovers 3 x 10-12 supersetted with
Close grip pull ups 3 x 8-10

Seated chest press 1 x 8-10 with 4 drop sets
Isolateral bicep curl machine 2 x 8-10

Sprint
08-26-10, 5:57 pm
Good track session tonight

50m, 150m, 50m, 150m twice through with jog backs inbetween each run.

Done this session a million times with walk backs & it's testing, but tonight was the first time with job backs. I preferred it to the walk backs, helped keep the rhythm flowing through the session but ramped up the intensity by a long way. Felt like I was going to barf by the end, coach's daughter did actually barf.

Good session.

Legacy
08-26-10, 10:27 pm
How many other people do you do your running with?

Sprint
08-27-10, 8:55 am
Well it's an actual club, broken down into senior sprint, middle-distance and long distance groups. Then there's a junior group for youngsters who move up into the relevant senior group when they're good and/or old enough.

Depending on the session, the sprint group gets further broken down into pure sprinters and 400m runners, usually throughout the summer as the speedwork differs for each event. For a 100m runner, our speedwork consists of stuff like 40m, while speedwork for a 400m runner is stuff like 250m.
Within THOSE groups, athletes are sometimes paired up or put into groups of 3-4, again depending on the session. Typically you'll be put into a group of around 4 for each individual run. Overall in terms of the sprint group as a whole there's usually around 12-15 of us.

Cellardweller
08-27-10, 4:25 pm
at the end of the day, if you're not good enough to be the best in your individual club at your event, you need to either accept it or dig the fuck in and try to claim your place. Fucking earn it, don't sulk about it.

Giving it everything I've got. I know no other way.

I don't care what the hell you're doing, this is truth.

Sprint
08-29-10, 2:46 pm
Hit up some legs yesterday.

Plyometrics followed by weights

Squat 3 x 10-14
Deadlift (In me socks) 4 x 10-12

As ever, focusing on pausing briefly at the bottom of each rep & exploding up. Don't need to work on the stretch-reflex with the weights as the plyometrics develops that power.

Adductors on Multi-hip 3 x 12-16 each side
Hip flexors on Multi-hip 3 x 12-16 each side

Good session.

Sprint
08-29-10, 3:55 pm
Went to a mate's BBQ last night. Straight from the plyometrics/legs session, so you better believe I was HUNGRY. Just as well really, he'd overestimated the amount of food he'd need because everybody decided to get pissed on the booze & were too bloated for the grub (although not too bloated for for drinks).

I was just on the water with the big comp coming up, but decided to treat myself to a cheat meal (lasting 10 hours). He said "All this has to be eaten today."

I just put a plate beside the BBQ and said "This is my plate, any surplus just stick it on there."

Chicken, pork, burgers, sausages, the works. Plus some meat on a stick (no idea but I ate that as well). I never have white bread either but he had loads of white rolls so I went to town on them, plus he'd made some chicken pasta which again nobody touched so I ploughed through half of that. Was good to catch up with folk, mostly friends from school who I've known for about 15 years, but due to our respective work commitments I only get to see them every 4 or 5 weeks these days. Was good to catch up.

Legacy
08-29-10, 7:18 pm
Went to a mate's BBQ last night. Straight from the plyometrics/legs session, so you better believe I was HUNGRY. Just as well really, he'd overestimated the amount of food he'd need because everybody decided to get pissed on the booze & were too bloated for the grub (although not too bloated for for drinks).

I was just on the water with the big comp coming up, but decided to treat myself to a cheat meal (lasting 10 hours). He said "All this has to be eaten today."

I just put a plate beside the BBQ and said "This is my plate, any surplus just stick it on there."

Chicken, pork, burgers, sausages, the works. Plus some meat on a stick (no idea but I ate that as well). I never have white bread either but he had loads of white rolls so I went to town on them, plus he'd made some chicken pasta which again nobody touched so I ploughed through half of that. Was good to catch up with folk, mostly friends from school who I've known for about 15 years, but due to our respective work commitments I only get to see them every 4 or 5 weeks these days. Was good to catch up.

Hell yeah bro, nothing like a good ole fashioned bbq. Sounds like a good eat, pork and burgers and chicken pasta.

Sprint
08-30-10, 3:26 pm
It was good, dude sure knows how to do a bbq

Cellardweller
08-30-10, 3:30 pm
Sometimes you need to load up some. Way to show that BBQ who's boss.

Sprint
08-30-10, 3:43 pm
Yeah without a doubt. Was nice to just cut loose for a change.

Legacy
08-30-10, 10:13 pm
You got me in that BBQ mood, just had some ribs lol

Sprint
08-31-10, 8:20 am
That's me, spreadin the bbq love

Sprint
08-31-10, 6:41 pm
The fucking BAL Final has been called off. Well, not called off as such, only our club aint going.
Why? Because we can't get enough athletes to put a full team out.

I said to the Team Managers "If we go with a full strength team, we know we're going to get hammered, we'll get hammered with a half-strength team. Either way we're going to get hammered so let's just go and do it."

They decided not to in the end. I kind of understand their decision, what I can't understand are the so-called athletes who can't be bothered to compete. We're the only club that made the final who aren't funded by the Government, so it was a huge chance to raise awareness for the club & stake a claim for funding. We'll never get funding if our own athletes can't be arsed to represent the club in a major competition.

The Men's Team Manager has said he is standing down after this, because he's had enough of some athletes saying they'll be available to compete and then in the week before a competition they pull out.
We've got a bunch of people there who don't wish to compete and make it very clear they don't wish to compete, which is fair enough.

I'd make a stand to be the Team Manager next season but I'd end up falling out with so many people it's probably not worth it. My attitude towards the athletes who can't be bothered isn't so much as "That's a shame, we'll sort something else out." as more of physically dragging them off the track and telling them to not bother coming back until they've pulled their heads out of their backsides.

Fucking gutted, and quite frankly disgusted.

Sprint
09-01-10, 7:37 pm
Given that now I won't be competing until November, it's back to normal training for me.
Back session today

4 x 10 pull ups varying from wide (as wide as the bar allows me to grip) to narrow
4 x 8-10 bent over rows (underhand grip, I prefer the feel)
4 x 6-8 rows on Hammerstrength iso machine
5 x pull ups to failure each set. Ended up pulling partials, half reps, quarter reps then finishing moving all of about 2 inches. Fancied something a bit different to end it.

Felt good, back pumped, forearms really pumped.

SpankyC
09-01-10, 7:45 pm
Given that now I won't be competing until November, it's back to normal training for me.
Back session today

4 x 10 pull ups varying from wide (as wide as the bar allows me to grip) to narrow
4 x 8-10 bent over rows (underhand grip, I prefer the feel)
4 x 6-8 rows on Hammerstrength iso machine
5 x pull ups to failure each set. Ended up pulling partials, half reps, quarter reps then finishing moving all of about 2 inches. Fancied something a bit different to end it.

Felt good, back pumped, forearms really pumped.

Like the work!!!! Yea i like underhand bent rows too, i can actually feel a stretch and contration in my whole lat, rather than when doing overhand all i feel is my upper back being contracted.

Sprint
09-01-10, 7:53 pm
Like the work!!!! Yea i like underhand bent rows too, i can actually feel a stretch and contration in my whole lat, rather than when doing overhand all i feel is my upper back being contracted.

That's exactly what Im talking about!

Cellardweller
09-01-10, 9:10 pm
Awesome work on those pull ups man!!!

Legacy
09-01-10, 9:54 pm
Given that now I won't be competing until November, it's back to normal training for me.
Back session today

4 x 10 pull ups varying from wide (as wide as the bar allows me to grip) to narrow
4 x 8-10 bent over rows (underhand grip, I prefer the feel)
4 x 6-8 rows on Hammerstrength iso machine
5 x pull ups to failure each set. Ended up pulling partials, half reps, quarter reps then finishing moving all of about 2 inches. Fancied something a bit different to end it.

Felt good, back pumped, forearms really pumped.

Sucks your competition got cancelled. Welcome back to normal training though, good back day.

Sprint
09-02-10, 3:22 am
Awesome work on those pull ups man!!!

Cheers bro, I decided to hit those rather than the Hammerstrength lat pulldowns this time, just keeping things fresh.

Sprint
09-02-10, 3:28 am
Sucks your competition got cancelled. Welcome back to normal training though, good back day.

Sucks aint the word, I could just about accept it if the whole thing was cancelled but not going because we couldn't get a team together, I don't know. I feel sorry for the others who were up for it, but can't understand the ones who weren't. Don't know if it they're a bunch of bottlers, or if they're just lazy fuckers or what. Either way, how they can call themselves competitive athletes is beyond me. I find their attitude offensive to say the least.

Still, like you said, back to normal training now. At least for a couple of months.

Sprint
09-03-10, 8:46 am
Strange old session last night.

35m at a "quick 800m pace" building up into 35m "400m pace" building up into 35m "95%" building up into a 35m flat out sprint.
3 sets of 3.

Uncomfortable, to say the least because you can't settle into any sort of rhythm.

That said, a lot of the juniors needed the session explaining (I kid you not) 8 times. EIGHT FUCKING TIMES.

Each phase is marked by a cone. You run to the first cone at a quick 800m pace, when you reach that cone you pick it up to a 400m pace, when you reach the next cone you pick it up to a 95% sprint, when you reach the next cone it's flat out until the final cone. Walk back, repeat.

THIS HAD TO BE REPEATED EIGHT FUCKING TIMES TO THEM.

These people are 16, 17, 18 years old. Juniors, yes. Children, no.

Coach explained the session, immediately after he'd finished talking 1 of the girls (who has a reputation for being thicker than a whale omellette) goes "What are we doing?"
Coach explained it again, twice through.

We were walking around to the start when they asked me what we were doing...I explained, twice because after the first explanation they asked me again.

We got to the start, at which point they started asking Coach what we were doing.

At this point, I said "You've had it explained to you 5 times in the last 3 minutes already and you're asking again? How the fuck do you find your way to the track each week?" & had to walk away as Coach began explaining the session...again.
The Whale Omellette was involved in every explanation as she still couldn't grasp the concept.

Needless to say, halfway through he's having to shout to them when to pick it up and to what level, although I don't think Whale Omellette was getting shouted at, she finally got it right but that said she was running with a lass who does listen and does have her head pretty much screwed on.

Afterwards I hit the gym on my way home & jumped on a treadmill for some quick running over distance (well, 1.5km, thats long distance for me) followed by some intervals on the cross trainer. Winter training starts in 2 weeks & I want to get a bit of a jump on it by increasing my lactic acid threshold early, even if it's just by a bit. I want to get a good winter in.

Sprint
09-04-10, 2:46 pm
Leg session in the gym today.

Usual plyometrics

Hurdle skips
Single leg step ups focusing on pause at the bottom & exploding up each rep.

Squats 4 x 10-12 again brief pause at the bottom, working on exploding up.
Deadlifts (in me socks) 3 x 10-12, same as above. Slow on the way down, lightly touch the bar on the ground for a count then exploding up.

FUCKING MULTI-HIP MACHINE IS BROKEN AGAIN!!!!!
The cable's snapped yet a-fucking-gain. It's because the plates are too tight together, I loosened them myself last time but fuck me if they havn't been tightened again, so as the plates pivot, the cable gets doubled back on itself. Unbelievable. Heaven help whichever numpty tightened it if I find out who it is. Fucking idiotic prick.

So...
Hack squat on machine 3 x 10-12 still pausing at the bottom, exploding up.

Then a bunch of abs, obliques & core work.

Tune in for the next installment of whether the multi-hip machine ever gets fixed...

Sprint
09-04-10, 2:53 pm
There's a chap at the gym who keeps asking me when I train, because he's never seen me actually train, only when Im working there.
I explained to him I don't have set days and times due to work, and my sessions are typically done within about 45mins to an hour so it's a small window compared to the rest of the day when Im actually training.

Today he turned up when I was mid-session and walked right up to me..

"Hey, you training?!"

"Yeah..."

"What you doing?" *asked as Im standing in the power rack.

"Squats, Im hitting legs today."

At this he wrinkles his nose and goes "Oh, no...I don't train legs..." and walked off.

Posted this in my "Secrets" thread as well, seeing as it's a little bit relevant there too.

Legacy
09-05-10, 12:02 am
Nice leg work bro

Sprint
09-05-10, 9:57 pm
Nice leg work bro

Cheers dude.

Keeping things simple, everything's moving in the right direction regards to my goals so it's all good.
Really enjoying my deadlifts at the minute, my love-hate relationship with squats is slowly moving to a love-love relationship as well.

Sprint
09-05-10, 10:12 pm
Chest today. Still just keeping things simple & looking for a good pump.

Seated chest press on Hammerstrength 3 x 8-10

Then a bit of a wait for a couple of pretty boys wearing matching, fitted t-shirts to finish on the Smith machine

A nice, easy set to re-warm things up on the Smith, around 16 or so reps, kind of lost count.

Incline Smith machine press 1 set, followed by 5 drops. Each weight to failure.

Cable Crossovers
supersetted with
Incline cable flyes 4 x 8-14. 4th set followed with 3 drops, then onto 2nd exercise which included 3 drops as well.

Not the most hardcore movements, but the combination of drop sets & supersets destroyed me. The final superset with drops included led to what was effectively 8 sets done with as much time as it takes to remove and reset a pin, and to adjust the bench & change the height of the handles. Im no pussy, but this had me dry-heaving in the gents shortly after I'd finished, & had the shakes for a while afterwards (I coudln't even face my post-workout shake for a good half an hour afterwards).

I think cables are sometimes overlooked in the pursuit of 'hardcore' exercises. Constant tension & the ease to incorporate drops make them a valuable tool for chasing the pump.

Legacy
09-05-10, 11:11 pm
Chest today. Still just keeping things simple & looking for a good pump.

Seated chest press on Hammerstrength 3 x 8-10

Then a bit of a wait for a couple of pretty boys wearing matching, fitted t-shirts to finish on the Smith machine

A nice, easy set to re-warm things up on the Smith, around 16 or so reps, kind of lost count.

Incline Smith machine press 1 set, followed by 5 drops. Each weight to failure.

Cable Crossovers
supersetted with
Incline cable flyes 4 x 8-14. 4th set followed with 3 drops, then onto 2nd exercise which included 3 drops as well.

Not the most hardcore movements, but the combination of drop sets & supersets destroyed me. The final superset with drops included led to what was effectively 8 sets done with as much time as it takes to remove and reset a pin, and to adjust the bench & change the height of the handles. Im no pussy, but this had me dry-heaving in the gents shortly after I'd finished, & had the shakes for a while afterwards (I coudln't even face my post-workout shake for a good half an hour afterwards).

I think cables are sometimes overlooked in the pursuit of 'hardcore' exercises. Constant tension & the ease to incorporate drops make them a valuable tool for chasing the pump.

Looks like a serious pump you got going on. "Pretty boys wearing matching fitted shirts" hahahaha

Sprint
09-06-10, 8:22 am
Looks like a serious pump you got going on. "Pretty boys wearing matching fitted shirts" hahahaha

1 of the best pumps I've ever had.

Yeah, actual proper matching t-shirts. The sort you'd consider wearing on the town for a casual night out. Tight fit, speaking of pumps, if they were to get a good pump going their shirts would be fucked.

On reflection I should've invited them to join me..

Sprint
09-08-10, 8:12 am
An uncomfortable track session last night..

4 x 200m, in continuous relay form so recovery of about 45 secs between runs.

Hit me harder than I was expecting. Im having a bit of a playabout with pre-training nutrition at the minute to see how my body reacts out of morbid curiosity than anything, & can safely say just munching on some grilled turkey isn't the way to go.

Sprint
09-08-10, 8:16 am
Back to my old gym for another workout with my old training buddy this morning...

Light dumbell shrugs 2 x 8-10 to warm up

Arnold press
supersetted with
Lateral Raise 4 x 8-10

Bent lateral raise 2 x 12-14

40 rep giant set of
Bent lateral raise
Lateral raise
Upright row
Shoulder press
10 reps each exercise, never put the dumbells down until rep number 40.

Lateral raise machine, 1 arm at a time. 1 set folllowed with 7 drops, running the rack moving up a pin at a time. Repeat on other arm.

Job done.

Cellardweller
09-08-10, 10:54 pm
Great Job Sprint. Bet you were feeling that when it was done.

Legacy
09-09-10, 12:07 am
I bet that 40 rep giant set killed you in the end, looks tough. Good shit bro

Sprint
09-09-10, 7:50 am
Great Job Sprint. Bet you were feeling that when it was done.


I bet that 40 rep giant set killed you in the end, looks tough. Good shit bro

Yeah you better believe it was tough.

I implore you to give the giant set a bash, front, middle & rear delts get targeted along wit the traps. Forearms get a bit of extra work too as they're not used to gripping on for 40 reps without a break.

It's typically done twice through, with a full 2 min break between sets and each set has an isometric hold at the top of the 10th shoulder press until you can't keep the weights there anymore.

I prefer the giant set, my buddy prefers the drop sets on the lateral raise machine, so we compromised and did 1 each.

Sprint
09-11-10, 8:27 am
Training on Thursday at the track.

We're in "Free Time" now which is a 2 weeks period to break up the final competition phase from the summer & the shift into winter training.

During this period, Coach still puts on set sessions as normal but you've got a choice if you want to do it, or do another track session of your own making or go try something totally new like pole vault etc. If you choose the Coach's session, you can do it to whatever intensity you want.

He'd set up something a bit different, a run around the outside of the track, on the grass, up a little grassy embankment, onto the cycle track that runs around the outside of the grass on the outside of the track, then back down to the track for a minute's recovery before doing it again.

Rough distance is about 450metres, to be done 5 times.

I want to get a good winter in, & as ever I spend the free time doing the coach's session to the same intensity as if it were a normal session.

This was hard though, because the cycle track is concrete, couldn't wear my spikes. After training in spikes for years, suddenly going to wearing trainers was like wearing fucking clogs. The lack of grip was scary as well. I suppose I've been spoilt over the years.

Tough old session though, could hardly breathe by the final run.

More worryingly, the last 2 days, my adductor has tightened considerably. I thought I was over that now, it might still be a little bit of scar tissue (although I doubt it, considering the intensity & power generated in my final outdoor competition. Any scar tissue would've torn being put through that) or it could be a slight strain. It's definitely not a pull or a tear, I'd have known right away during the session.
Problem is, the tightness caused by a strain can very easily lead to a pull or torn muscle and I'm back to square one again.

I'll monitor it over the next couple of days, probably won't even do anything on tuesday at the track, and see how it is for the thursday.

Got a leg session today with a kickboxing friend of mine. I'll feel things out, but right now will probably end up training him rather than joining him.

We'll see. Feeling a bit down because of it to be honest. I just want to fucking run. Is that too much to ask?

Sprint
09-11-10, 6:04 pm
So hit up the legs today with me mate.

Plyometrics

Squats 4 x 10-12
Deadlifts 3 x 10-12
Leg Press 4 x 12-14

All done with the customary pause at the bottom & exploding up.

Then some core work followed by a bunch of stretching.

The adductor felt ok with the exercises, altho it pulls when I walk & can feel it when I stretch it out. Fuck sake...

Sprint
09-11-10, 6:08 pm
Oh yeah, multi-hip machine still not fixed.

Cellardweller
09-12-10, 5:39 pm
Have you seen a physical therapist for that adductor? Need to focus on healing that shit this winter. Sessions are looking good as usual bro.

Sprint
09-13-10, 6:39 pm
Have you seen a physical therapist for that adductor? Need to focus on healing that shit this winter. Sessions are looking good as usual bro.

No, havn't seen a physio. Been a bit stubborn there, seen so many physio's in my time.

Can be weeks with no problems, even competed with no problems, then it'll rear it's ugly head.

However, it seems the leg workout has flushed it out a bit. Loads of stretching the last few days, & getting my thumbs in there. Feels pretty much a-ok again now, still going to cruise training tomorrow though.

Sprint
09-13-10, 6:48 pm
Got together with one of the other PT's today for a chest & back session.

Flat bench press with a fat bar (a really fucking fat bar, can just about get my hands halfway around it) 4 x 8-12

Barbell row (with the fat bar again...brutal) 4 sets, rep range varied from 5-10 (underhand grip,with fat bar...ended the sets pretty early)

Incline smith machine bench press, 1 giant set with 5 weight drops (3 for the other pt, he's used to the stereotypical pt training shit. Overcomplicated, soft exercises. Drop sets were a shock to his system)

Hammerstrength Iso-lat pulldown 4 x 8-10

Cable crossovers

supersetted with 4 x 8-12

Incline cable flyes

Then 3 sets pull ups to failure with as wide a grip as the bar allows.

Sprint
09-13-10, 7:02 pm
Multi-hip machine...not fixed.

Firedrake
09-13-10, 8:51 pm
Solid work! I like the "really fat bar"!

Legacy
09-13-10, 9:39 pm
Chest and back on the same day huh, how are you feeling? I've tried to do that before but died out. Tough

Sprint
09-14-10, 7:33 am
Solid work! I like the "really fat bar"!

I felt "fat bar" didn't quite do it justice. It's like a drainpipe. I always considered fat bars to be around the same thickness as fat gripz, this thing was more obese.

Sprint
09-14-10, 7:38 am
Chest and back on the same day huh, how are you feeling? I've tried to do that before but died out. Tough

It was tough. Really good though, something I'll be doing again for sure.

I might throw in some proper supersets rather than straight sets of each muscle group.

Bench press with barbell rows sounds tasty to me.

I'll keep you updated, I fancy doing some random supersets, deadlifts with tricep pressdowns & shit like that.

Sprint
09-14-10, 6:27 pm
Track tonight.

Adductor wasn't feeling great but felt better as I warmed it up.

Cruised some 200m interval training tonight.

5 runs of 200m, with a 60m jog inbetween each run, into a pretty funky head wind.
I think the headwind helped a lot, because it forced me to chop my stride a bit which mean I wasn't overstriding & this stretching the adductor out at pace.

Felt good. There's going to be a bit of paranoia regarding the adductor given my 'previous' with it.

Feeling good now. Bring on that fucking winter training.

Legacy
09-14-10, 9:38 pm
Take care of that adductor bro, don't want another injury

Sprint
09-15-10, 7:33 am
Take care of that adductor bro, don't want another injury

Definitely not. These days I wear lycra leggings over lycra shorts for that extra warmth whilst warming up. With trackies on top of those of course. Depending on the weather, I either strip down to the shorts for the actual session or just whip off the top layer.


PS. I make no apologies for the visions of blokes in lycra that this post may have conjured up.

Sprint
09-17-10, 8:08 am
Track last night.

12 x 100m, each ran at aroundabout 400m pace, with jog back recovery & straight into the next run.

Felt pretty much goosed by the 4th run. Almost dead by the 6th run, thought I was going to puke after the 9th run.

Winter training has well and truly started.

Sprint
09-17-10, 8:12 am
Back to my old gym for another session with me old training buddy this morning.

Hit up some arms.

Preacher machine 4 x 10-12
Reverse Preacher machine 3 x 8-10
Barbell curls 4 x 8-10
Dumbell hammer curls 3 x 8-10
Rope hammercurls 3 x 8-10 2 drops on 3rd set
Bicep curl machine 2 x 6-8

Tricep extensions machine 2 x 8-10
Dips 3 x 10-12
Dip machine 3 x 10-12
Single arm overhead extensions 3 x 8-10
Pressdowns w/straight bar 4 x 8-10 with 4 drops on 4th set.

Volume work as usual when we get together. Makes a nice change here & there.

Sprint
09-17-10, 8:18 am
Changed up my usual Sunday working hours instead of starting at 10am, I'll be starting at 1pm to give me time to hit the track at 10:30 sunday mornings, finish training, have a shower & food at the gym before first client gets in.

It's a smaller training group on a sunday (the truly dedicated athletes who can get out of bed, & have resisted the urge to go out the night before. Even the ones who have gone out are willing to train with a hangover so fair play).

Gives the coach a chance to work with us a bit more as individuals & as such quite often it's more technical work rather than the mid-week's blasts.

Been a while since I hit the track on a sunday, due to work commitments. But I figure in for a penny, in for a pound.
Chnaging up when I hit legs, because I don't fancy having weights in my legs for a track session so I finish at 6pm on sunday & the gym closes at 7, so just enough time to throw in some plyometrics/squats/deadlifts etc as I see fit & depending on what I'll have done that morning.

Sprint
09-17-10, 10:26 am
Have just read The House's latest article, 'Grow On'. It's right there on the homepage if you havn't yet read it.

" Well, let me start by asking you this: If you earned a spot on an all star team or, better yet, if you made it to a championship game, would you pass up the chance? Would you pass on it even if you weren't the number one pick or number one team? Shit, I know I wouldn't and brother I know if you were a true Animal you would not pass it up either. Competing in the Olympia had been a dream of mine, a goal I have had since I started bodybuilding...
Anyone who has stepped on stage at any level knows that bodybuilding is not won or lost on the day of the show. It is won or lost in the months leading up to the event, because it is a battle each day and the day of the show is the day you show your winnings from all those previous days of battling yourself. Don't get me wrong... I want to win as much as the next guy ... but sometimes winning is bettering yourself. Sometimes winning is just going after your personal best.

...Is it better to lie down and just roll over and not put up a fight? Never. I will fight for my best even if my best puts me dead last. I will not give up. I will not quit. Surrender has never been an option for me.

...because I finish what I start."

It made me think about the athletes at my club, refusing to compete in the British Athletics League final a few weeks ago. We'd made the final, we were by far the smallest club to have made the final & we were going to get smashed to pieces, so a number of our athletes refused to compete.
As a result, the club didn't send a team down to London because they didn't see fit to pay out for a coach when our own athletes weren't interested.
Unfortunately, this meant the athletes who did want to compete in what would've been the biggest competition for the club in years were denied the opportunity.

I love my athletics club. It's not a big club, the facilities are shit. We had a tiny little hut to get changed in, and they demolished that to build a proper changing rooms for the footballers & said we can have use of it. For now, whilst building is on-going we have nothing. If it rains, our stuff gets wet.

But it's my club. Becoming a member over 10 years ago allowed me to discover who I truly was. I don't consider my fellow members to be team-mates, or even friends. They're family to me. I've sacrificed my body in the past for the club, finishing races that I've suffered injuries in when I'd have been better off just stopping but finishing meant getting a point for the club & not finishing meant getting nothing.
If I have to put my dignity & pride on the line & get my ass kicked, it's a small price to pay for getting the club recognition in a national competition & hopefully securing government funding to improve the facilities & attracting new athletes.

It makes me fucking sick. Next season, those same 'athletes' who refused to race will be happily competing in smaller competitions, winning & celebrating like they're the dogs' bollocks. They're happy to be big fish in a little pond, but the chance to be a little fish in a big pond & they pussy out quicker than they can run.

Me? Fuck the pond, I want the fucking ocean.

How they can look themselves in the mirror each morning is beyond me. Knowing that the person looking back at them shrank back into the shadows when the time came for them to step up.
How they can call themselves 'competitive athletes' knowing full well that they had the opportunity but not the guts to stand tall & go for theirs.

The Team Manager has stepped down as a result of everything. A man with genuine passion and enthusiasm for not just our athletes at our club, for all things athletics-related.

They let him, themselves, the club and everybody connected with it down so badly.

Where the club is now, it's better than that. Unfortunately, some parts are rotten. But the core is golden. A mixture of youth, experience, passion & most importantly, loyalty.

Next season is our centenary year. A milestone in our history & I feel honoured to have the chance to be a part of it. We're going to have a great season, both as individuals and as a team. We may not win every race, or take the League title again but you can bet your ass that we'll be giving it our very best, every single inch of the way. Busting our balls to get to the finish line 1/100th of a second faster, or getting an extra millimetre on a throw or a jump.

We may not be competitive with other clubs in every meeting, but we'll always be comptitive with ourselves. Aiming to surpass our lifetime's best. To better the heights that we've reached in the past when performing at our absolute optimum levels.

And as for the ones who held us back & let us down this season, they'd better revise their priorities, cos a change is coming.

Legacy
09-17-10, 11:45 am
Back to my old gym for another session with me old training buddy this morning.

Hit up some arms.

Preacher machine 4 x 10-12
Reverse Preacher machine 3 x 8-10
Barbell curls 4 x 8-10
Dumbell hammer curls 3 x 8-10
Rope hammercurls 3 x 8-10 2 drops on 3rd set
Bicep curl machine 2 x 6-8

Tricep extensions machine 2 x 8-10
Dips 3 x 10-12
Dip machine 3 x 10-12
Single arm overhead extensions 3 x 8-10
Pressdowns w/straight bar 4 x 8-10 with 4 drops on 4th set.

Volume work as usual when we get together. Makes a nice change here & there.

Damn dude volume

Sprint
09-17-10, 5:14 pm
Damn dude volume

Yeah, always the same when we get together.

Sprint
09-18-10, 3:38 pm
Back session today.

4 x 10 pull ups to warm up. First 2 sets using Fat Gripz around the bar.
4 x 8-10 bent over barbell rows, plus 2 more sets with Fat Gripz
3 x 8-10 close grip rows using a triceps bar
4 x 6-10 Hammerstrength lat pull down

Then some dangles off close grip pull up bars to stretch the lats & give the forearms a final work through.

ontheEDGE
09-18-10, 8:00 pm
Like the back workout, hit it hard. Also nice read a few posts up. Those that you spoke of don't have the passion you do. Maybe it's still easy for them to look in the mirror because they just don't care. Fuck em. If the things they do and their shit attitude can ignite your passion then good - use it.

Sprint
09-19-10, 5:58 pm
Like the back workout, hit it hard. Also nice read a few posts up. Those that you spoke of don't have the passion you do. Maybe it's still easy for them to look in the mirror because they just don't care. Fuck em. If the things they do and their shit attitude can ignite your passion then good - use it.

Damn straight bro. Still pisses me off tho.

Sprint
09-19-10, 6:03 pm
Track this morning.

200s with transition phases every 50m.

First 50m at a steady 1500m pace, second 50m at an 800m pace, 3rd 50m at 400m pace & the final 50m at a 200m pace.

6 runs, nice & relaxed.


Then a little bit of legs in the evening in the gym.

4 x 8-12 squats, focusing as ever on a slow decent, pause & controlled explosion
3 x 10-12 deadlifts, as above.

Pretty much all that was required following the morning's jollies.

Sprint
09-21-10, 8:23 pm
Track tonight.

Still making the transition to full on winter training.

2 sets of 4 40m tonight but with a 20m build up into them.

Still had sunday's squats & deads in my legs & found it hard to generate much speed. Felt good, strong & powerful, but still lacking that sharpness.

Got 2 sessions planned at my old gym with my buddy on thursday & friday mornings. Shoulders on thursday & chest on friday. Can't wait.

Sprint
09-21-10, 8:32 pm
Multi-hip machine still isn't fixed.

Also, most of the dumbells are loose. One of the ends of an Olympic bar fell off completely the other day. Fortunately nobody was hurt.

I asked where they kept the alan keys so I could tighten them myself & was met with the response "We're in the process of buying one."

That's not a set. That's a single key. This was over a week ago, & the "process" is still being, well, processed.

I don't profess to being a d.i.y. expert, but in order to buy an alan key, I'm fairly sure the process consists of the following steps:

1. Make a note of what size key is required.
2. Go to local d.i.y. store (less than a 10 minute drive from the gym).
3. Find correct size alan key in store (ask assistant if needs be).
4. Purchase key.
5. Return to gym.
6. Use key to tighten assorted dumbells.
7. Keep key for future use, preventing the need for steps 1-5 to be repeated.

"In the process of buying one".

If this were a joke, it'd be sad.

Because it's for real, it's fucking tragic.

Legacy
09-21-10, 9:57 pm
Multi-hip machine still isn't fixed.

Also, most of the dumbells are loose. One of the ends of an Olympic bar fell off completely the other day. Fortunately nobody was hurt.

I asked where they kept the alan keys so I could tighten them myself & was met with the response "We're in the process of buying one."

That's not a set. That's a single key. This was over a week ago, & the "process" is still being, well, processed.

I don't profess to being a d.i.y. expert, but in order to buy an alan key, I'm fairly sure the process consists of the following steps:

1. Make a note of what size key is required.
2. Go to local d.i.y. store (less than a 10 minute drive from the gym).
3. Find correct size alan key in store (ask assistant if needs be).
4. Purchase key.
5. Return to gym.
6. Use key to tighten assorted dumbells.
7. Keep key for future use, preventing the need for steps 1-5 to be repeated.

"In the process of buying one".

If this were a joke, it'd be sad.

Because it's for real, it's fucking tragic.

You had me laughing on this one bro. We had an 80 lb dumbbell at our gym completely snap in half when a guy was lifting. Luckily it fell on his chest and not his head.

Sprint
09-22-10, 9:09 am
You had me laughing on this one bro. We had an 80 lb dumbbell at our gym completely snap in half when a guy was lifting. Luckily it fell on his chest and not his head.

The entire situation boggles the mind.

It's shameful that gym owners allow their business to provide such shoddy service to customers.

Out of the thousands of gyms worldwide, or maybe even millions, only very few could ever be described as being in "good condition"

I accept that you can't please all of the people all of the time, especially with regards to this industry as everybody has different goals and requires different things to achieve those goals.

But to not have an alan key to tighten the weights when they've been loose for 6 months & are now actually falling apart, or taking months to replace a single cable.

Im sure Im in the majority where I say it'd be nice if the place was clean, but not vital as I'm not looking to eat off the floor (unless I spill some shake & have to lick it up)
and it'd be nice if the music wasn't 'In The Navy' or 'Unchained Melody' (I shit you not) but I've got my ipod.

All I really ask if that the equipment isn't left to get in such a state that it disintegrates in my & other members' hands.

Sprint
09-23-10, 8:17 am
Shoulders today with my old training buddy (Who had his bike nicked from outside the gym earlier in the week, thieving bastards)

Light shrugs to warm up 2 x 8-10

Arnold press supersetted with lateral raise 4 x 6-8 with a drop set on each exercise on the 4th set
Bent lateral raise 2 x 10-12
40 rep giant set as mentioned before
Single arm lateral raise on machine, running the rack with 1 set performed with 7 drops.

Huge pump, especially after the superset/drop set combo on Arnold press/lateral raise.

hjayss
09-23-10, 8:29 am
Looks like you have it all set up really nice lots of volume with a goal at the end of it all sprint to the finish solid job ... the arm day lots of volume lotta sets...how do you feel afterwards.....

Sprint
09-23-10, 9:59 am
Looks like you have it all set up really nice lots of volume with a goal at the end of it all sprint to the finish solid job ... the arm day lots of volume lotta sets...how do you feel afterwards.....

Thanks bro.

Pretty much goosed.

Typically I don't do that much volume, but usually at least once a week I head back to my old gym to catch a session with my old training buddy who can't make it to the gym where I work at now, & he's very much a volume trainer.

Most of the time at my new gym it's just me. I get in, do my thing, get a pump & Im done. When we get together though, we've got slightly different preferences in terms of exercises & as a compromise end up doing both preferences.

Usually just once a week though & usually a different muscle group each week, so it kind of adds variety to each respective muscle group every 3-4 weeks.

Sprint
09-23-10, 6:22 pm
Track this evening. Got drenched in a thunderstorm, soaked through to the gonads.

2 x 4 120m, nice & relaxed. Felt good, light & easy. Not hugely quick but fairly swift.

Chest tomorrow at my old gym with me buddy, then on Saturday I've scored him & his folks free day passes, so we're hitting back together at my current gym.

Sprint
09-24-10, 5:25 pm
Adverse weather conditions caused some traffic chaos this morning, preventing the session with my training buddy (he didnt want to bike to the gym in the rain).

So we're going to hit up a back/chest workout tomorrow at my gym.

Legacy
09-24-10, 6:06 pm
Shitty weather over there in the UK huh?

Sprint
09-24-10, 6:14 pm
Yeah the temperature's dropped from 'warm' to 'fucking chilly' over the last 2 days with nasty ass wind & a whole load of rain.

Didn't stop me from running in it, but my training buddy didn't wnat to bike in it.

He's an awesome training partner - when he gets in the gym. Only sometimes he doesn't want to get in the gym as much as he should want to.

Sprint
09-25-10, 7:39 pm
No wonder we got soaked the other night. Apparently we had almost half the average monthly rainfall for september in a single day.

Anyway, chest & back today at my new gym with my old training partner.


Barbell Row 4 x 8-10
supersetted with
Incline dumbell flyes 4 x 8-10

Hammerstrength iso-lat pulldown 4 x 8-10
Hammerstrength iso-row 4 x 8-10
Close grip pull ups 4 x 10-14
supersetted with
Incline cable flyes 4 x 8-10 with 3 drops after the 4th set.


Multi-hip machine still not fixed.....

ontheEDGE
09-25-10, 8:39 pm
No wonder we got soaked the other night. Apparently we had almost half the average monthly rainfall for september in a single day.

Anyway, chest & back today at my new gym with my old training partner.


Barbell Row 4 x 8-10
supersetted with
Incline dumbell flyes 4 x 8-10

Hammerstrength iso-lat pulldown 4 x 8-10
Hammerstrength iso-row 4 x 8-10
Close grip pull ups 4 x 10-14
supersetted with
Incline cable flyes 4 x 8-10 with 3 drops after the 4th set.


Multi-hip machine still not fixed.....

Nice way to mix things up, I like it.

Sprint
09-26-10, 3:22 pm
Plyometrics this morning.

A circuit of plyometrics, couldn't even begin to go through it all. Suffice to say, after an hour & a half we were pretty much done.

Sprint
09-28-10, 8:47 am
Feeling good today, thought I'd be experiencing more DOMS than this following the plyometrics on sunday.

A bittersweet feeling really. I love DOMS, but at the same time I want to be as fresh as possible for the track tonight.

ontheEDGE
09-28-10, 11:36 am
Yeah I know what you mean with the DOMS, it's kind of weird how I want them, but I don't but I do, lol.

Sprint
09-28-10, 12:05 pm
Yeah I know what you mean with the DOMS, it's kind of weird how I want them, but I don't but I do, lol.

It's a love-hate relationship lol

Legacy
09-28-10, 2:51 pm
Plyometrics this morning.

A circuit of plyometrics, couldn't even begin to go through it all. Suffice to say, after an hour & a half we were pretty much done.

An hour and a half of straight plyos is tough. Must be hurting after that

Sprint
09-28-10, 6:18 pm
An hour and a half of straight plyos is tough. Must be hurting after that

There was a lap's walk halfway thru, & a couple of minutes rest period at various stages throughout so we could maintain good form.

But yeah, sunday night I felt rough as sandpaper.

Sprint
09-28-10, 6:36 pm
4 x 200m tonight in the form of continuous relays, so having run your 200, your team mate then runs a 200, and passes on to the 3rd member of your team who runs the remaining 200 back to you, at which point off you go again giving about a 45 second recovery period between runs.

Felt really good, really strong.

Coach was full of praise, said I was "flying" in every run.

Tried a new pre-workout shake tonight.

30g whey, 30g oats 3.2g Beta-alanine, 3.2g Citrulline Malate blended in 300ml water.

Think that might be a staple throughout the winter.

Legacy
09-28-10, 10:35 pm
4 x 200m tonight in the form of continuous relays, so having run your 200, your team mate then runs a 200, and passes on to the 3rd member of your team who runs the remaining 200 back to you, at which point off you go again giving about a 45 second recovery period between runs.

This looks like a solid running routine right here. I might have to get on something like this for my cardio and running days

Sprint
09-29-10, 11:15 am
This looks like a solid running routine right here. I might have to get on something like this for my cardio and running days

It definitely keeps you working. The continuous relays are good because they have an element of interval training to them, with really short recovery times so lots of calorie burning going on there.

Plus because you're in a team, it pushes you to finish otherwise the session gets shat on for your buddies with nobody to continue the loop.

Sprint
09-29-10, 6:43 pm
Arms tonight.

3 x 8-10 Preacher curls
2 x 8-10 Reverse preacher curls with drop set on the 2nd.
3 x 8-10 Rope hammer curls
2 x Dumbell hammer curls

Then Bambam's naked olympic bar set where you shoot for 100 reps using just the olympic bar, taking as many sets as you need to reach the 100.
Don;t ask me how many sets it took, I lost count. All I know was that I was pulling sets of 4 & 5 to get over the line. Huge pump, crazy vascularity.

3 x 8-10 Tricep pressdowns (I like to use the straight bar) 3 drops on the 3rd set, then straight into:
3 x 8-10 Tricep pulldowns, using an underhand grip on the straight bar.
3 x 8-10 single arm overhead extensions
2 x 20 Tricep dips, just using bodyweight.

Cellardweller
09-29-10, 7:44 pm
Awesome arm work out. Those naked 100's are a bitch. I haven't done them with my normal bicept workout though. Props for throwing them in there.

Legacy
09-29-10, 10:04 pm
Then Bambam's naked olympic bar set where you shoot for 100 reps using just the olympic bar, taking as many sets as you need to reach the 100.
Don;t ask me how many sets it took, I lost count. All I know was that I was pulling sets of 4 & 5 to get over the line. Huge pump, crazy vascularity.


Sounds brutal. I wonder if you could do the same with triceps doing like an extension or something. Ill have to give this a shot with the barbell curl

ontheEDGE
09-29-10, 10:29 pm
Those 100s do sound awesome. Gonna have to check them out

Sprint
09-30-10, 8:44 am
Awesome arm work out. Those naked 100's are a bitch. I haven't done them with my normal bicept workout though. Props for throwing them in there.

The 100s, bitch aint the word!

Was loving the veinage going on. Kept my shoulders as far back & low as possible to minimise cheating the bar up.

Sore today, I usually feel it 24-48 hours after, not usually the very next day.

Love it!

Sprint
09-30-10, 8:47 am
Sounds brutal. I wonder if you could do the same with triceps doing like an extension or something. Ill have to give this a shot with the barbell curl

Im sure you could do it with just about anything, let me know what you come up with bro.



Those 100s do sound awesome. Gonna have to check them out

Yeah, give them a go. Won't be the last time I do them, that's for sure.

It was Bambam who introduced me to them.

Sprint
10-01-10, 7:59 am
The dreaded 12 minute run last night.

Typically done near the beginning of winter training, then again towards the end.

It's fairly simple, see how many laps you can do in 12 minutes.

I've never reached 7 laps before, so I really wanted it this time. Closest I've ever got was 50m short. 7's been like the magic number for me for years. A couple of the other sprinters can get into the 8's, but they're 400m specialists & I spend my winter training chasing them. The pattern is usually staying with them for the first few runs, then spending the second half of the session pushing as hard as I can whilst trying not to puke as they get smaller and smaller in the distance.

That's pretty much what you get when a pure-bred sprinter trains for speed endurance with 400m specialists. It benefits me though, so it's all good, & when the season starts with all the speedwork & what not I become the 'hare' for them to chase & use me as the yardstick for measuring their progress so it works really well. Half the year is spent me chasing them, and half is spent them chasing me.

Anyway, so getting 8 laps for them is a regular thing each year. Me? Never quite got to 7.

Until last night, 7 laps & 10 metres!! Well pleased with that. It needed a bit of a sprint finish down the home straight to ensure I got to the line (& then a little way past it) & it hurt like hell.

But finally, 7 laps!

Will happily settle for 7.5 at the end of the winter when we do it again. Looking to jump to 8 is probably a bit too big an ask, but hopefully 8 will be very much on my radar next year.

Anyway, that's enough long-distance talk. Apparently it's 400m, 300m, 200m on sunday so getting back to something resembling sprinting.

ontheEDGE
10-01-10, 8:28 am
Congrats man that's great you got that 7! It's the hard work paying off.

Sprint
10-01-10, 9:35 am
Cheers bro, felt like shit this morning tho!!

Amazing how 12 minutes' worth of training can totally destroy you.

Cellardweller
10-01-10, 5:36 pm
12 minutes of high intensity. Good work brother.

Sprint
10-01-10, 6:34 pm
Thanks bro. It knocked the shit out of me, as it does every time I do it.

Back tonight.

3 x 10-2 wide grip pull ups to warm up
5 x 10-12 barbell rows
4 x 8-10 Hammerstrength iso-lat pulldown with drop set on the 4th
4 x 6-8 Hammerstrength iso-row
4 x 8-10 wide grip pull ups, supersetted the final set with close grip pull ups to squeeze a few extra reps out of it.

Sprint
10-02-10, 3:53 pm
Chest this afternoon.

Keeping it nice & simple as ever with chest.

4 x 8-10 Hammerstrength seated press
Incline bench press on smith machine. 1 giant set including 5 drops.
4 x 8-10 Incline cable flyes with 3 drops on 4th set.

Job done.

Legacy
10-02-10, 5:31 pm
Chest this afternoon.

Keeping it nice & simple as ever with chest.

4 x 8-10 Hammerstrength seated press
Incline bench press on smith machine. 1 giant set including 5 drops.
4 x 8-10 Incline cable flyes with 3 drops on 4th set.

Job done.

Simple indeed

Sprint
10-02-10, 6:05 pm
Simple indeed

Gives a really good pump, & seeing decent gains using this workout. Brutally efficient & effective.

Sprint
10-03-10, 6:41 pm
Track this morning, with a whole load of standing water due to constant rain, & a whole load of wind.

400m, 300m, 200m, twice through.

Training with a 400m specialist, & managed to keep him in my pocket on every run.

As he said halfway through, "I can't get anywhere near you."

The session in general, & cos I was giving it the beans to push the guy, left me pretty much folded in half at the end & feeling goosed all day.

Worth it though, when a 400m runner says that to you after you've just broken him over his distance in his type of session.

Sprint
10-04-10, 5:19 pm
Shoulders today.

2 x 10-12 Light shrugs to get warmed up
4 x 6-8 Arnold press with drop set on 4th set
4 x 8-10 Lateral raise with drop set on 4th set

First time in a while I havn't supersetted those 2 exercises.

2 x 10-12 Bent lateral raise

2 x 40 rep giant set as mentioned a few times on here.

Really good pump.

Back to my old gym in the morning for some arms with me old training buddy, who's going to get introduced to Bambam's 100 rep bicep curl naked olympic bar torture.

SpankyC
10-04-10, 6:08 pm
Shoulders today.

2 x 10-12 Light shrugs to get warmed up
4 x 6-8 Arnold press with drop set on 4th set
4 x 8-10 Lateral raise with drop set on 4th set

First time in a while I havn't supersetted those 2 exercises.

2 x 10-12 Bent lateral raise

2 x 40 rep giant set as mentioned a few times on here.

Really good pump.

Back to my old gym in the morning for some arms with me old training buddy, who's going to get introduced to Bambam's 100 rep bicep curl naked olympic bar torture.

hell yeah nice work in here bro, love the volume!

Sprint
10-05-10, 8:29 am
Cheers dude. The volume is up & down, depending on what Im doing & who Im doing it with.

Sprint
10-05-10, 6:10 pm
Arms at my old gym this morning.

3 x 10-12 Preacher curls
4 x 8-10 EZ Bar bicep curls
3 x 10-12 Dumbell hammer curls
100 reps with naked olympic bar

4 x 8-10 Tricep pressdowns with 3 drops on 4th set
Moving straight into
3 drops Tricep pressdowns with underhand grip
4 x 6-8 Single arm overhead extensions
3 x 10-12 Single arm pulldowns across the body using D-Handle, with 3 drops on 3rd set.

Legacy
10-05-10, 9:36 pm
Arms at my old gym this morning.

3 x 10-12 Preacher curls
4 x 8-10 EZ Bar bicep curls
3 x 10-12 Dumbell hammer curls
100 reps with naked olympic bar

4 x 8-10 Tricep pressdowns with 3 drops on 4th set
Moving straight into
3 drops Tricep pressdowns with underhand grip
4 x 6-8 Single arm overhead extensions
3 x 10-12 Single arm pulldowns across the body using D-Handle, with 3 drops on 3rd set.

Looks like a good pump. How did your old training partner deal with the 100 reps on the naked bar?

Sprint
10-06-10, 8:21 am
Looks like a good pump. How did your old training partner deal with the 100 reps on the naked bar?

He struggled his tits off. From about halfway through, his forearms were burning so much he could hardly lift the thing. I suggested he switch to an overhand grip for reverse curls. He declined, bizzarely...

Sprint
10-06-10, 8:27 am
200m Parleufs at the track last night.

Im sure I've mentioned them before. Put in a pair, 1 stands halfway down one straight, the other diectly opposite halfway down the other straight.

1st runner runs the 200m consisting of 50m straight, 100m round the bend, and 50m halfway down the opposing straight to where their partner is waiting. When 1st runner reaches their partner, they jog across the middle back to where they started, whilst 2nd runner runs their 200m around the other half of the track. So 50m of the straight, 100m of the other bend, and 50m of the next straight to where their partner started.

Idea is the person jogging reaches the other side at the same time as the person running the 200m reaches them, so its staright from the jog into the next 200m run.

Interval training, basically.

We did it with 6 runs last night, so 6x200m spaced out by the jogs across inbetween.

Been really pushing it for the last couple of weeks, & I think Im starting to feel the effects of that. My calves were screaming, & I felt totally goosed after a couple of runs.

That said, the session was at 18:30. 12 hours previous I was at my old gym hitting up some arms, & had then been at work all day.

ontheEDGE
10-06-10, 1:21 pm
No doubt you've been pushing it lately. So what are you on? LOL just kidding i know you hate that question and you don't touch that shit. Really though as far as a multi, creatine, etc?

Sprint
10-07-10, 6:49 am
No doubt you've been pushing it lately. So what are you on? LOL just kidding i know you hate that question and you don't touch that shit. Really though as far as a multi, creatine, etc?

Lol, Multivitamin, creatine, whey protein, beta-alanine, citrulline malate & carnosine.

Sometimes I'll throw in some bcaas and/or glutamine if I feel I'm not recovering as well as usual.

The creatine, citrulline malate, beta-alanine & carnosine is all pre-track, mixed into a shake with protein & oats.

I take whey & creatine right after a gym session, & the multi is at breakfast. If Im not training, track or gym, I only take the multi.

Sprint
10-07-10, 4:47 pm
Track tonight.

Was feeling a bit rough, as it's my dad's 50th birthday today so I went to my sister's house as it's not far from where he lives, & at 3am we drove out there & covered his front door, wondows & cars in balloons, bunting and various other bits & pieces.
Then crashed out on her sofa for a couple of hours with her West Highland Terrier cuddled up to me, before spending some time at dad's to talk about the previous night's antics & how we managed to get it all done without waking anybody up.

Then it was on to the track.
Like I said, feeling really rough to start with, but ended up running really well.

A nice suprise of some speedwork, to break up the grind of winter training.

40m, 50m, 60m, 70m, 80m, with jog backs in between each run. Done twice through.

Felt light on my feet, good leg speed, powerful strides. Everything just felt really easy & I was leaving the group right from the line & just moving away from themover the course of each run.

What Im most pleased with, was my acceleration off the line. It wasn't massively explosive but certainly quicker than I was managing towards the end of the season.
It used to be the strongest part of my running, but the 3 years out blunted it immensely, & the adductor tears just buired me further.

It's the only thing that needs to be sorted out now, which is frustrating as there's very little chance to work on it during winter training.

The plyometrics, explosive squats & deadlifts in the gym seem to be starting to come together now though, even though I havn't done them for a couple of weeks as I adjust to training on the track an extra session a week again.

Plus I got onto youtube today & was watching clips of Maurice Greene (My favourite sprinter) with his 2000 Olympic gold in the 100m, his 100m World Record breaking run & his 60m World Record run.
Maybe there was a little bit of inspiration there, which carried over into the session.

I'm buzzing for competition now, hopefully I'll nail some good indoor comps starting next month.

And I just know Im going to have an awesome outdoors in the summer. I know it's going to be my best season so far. The adrenalin is pumping already!

Sprint
10-08-10, 6:34 pm
Back today.

4 x 10-14 really wide grip pull ups to warm up
4 x 10-12 deadlifts, explosive as usual
4 x 10-12 rack pulls to mix it up a bit, with a really wide grip
4 x 8-10 pull ups with a few dangles thrown in on the 4th set to stretch the lats & fry the forearms.

I normally do deads on leg day, but as Im still getting used to 3 times a week on the track from twice, hitting the legs in the gym has taken a back seat.
Everything else was done to hit the posterior chain, but I wanted some quad stimulation as well, which is why I hit the deads prior to the rack pulls so that they were engaged along the way.

Legacy
10-09-10, 12:42 am
I like that you usually do deadlifts on leg day bro, hard to do. Squatting and deadlifting in the same day takes endurance.

Nice work throwing in the pull ups man, being able to control your own bodyweight is important.

Sprint
10-09-10, 9:48 am
I like that you usually do deadlifts on leg day bro, hard to do. Squatting and deadlifting in the same day takes endurance.

Nice work throwing in the pull ups man, being able to control your own bodyweight is important.

Thank bro. I think I'll start hitting the legs on a friday again, it's just a case of warming them up nice to loosen off after the thursday nights' antics & take things easy during the first few runs of sunday morning.

Sprint
10-09-10, 6:40 pm
Arms today, done at a really quick pace as I had to get out to the clubs annual awards presentation in early evening.

3 x 10-12 Preacher machine curls
3 x 8-10 Reverse preacher machine curls
4 x 8-10 Dumbell hammer curls
4 x 10-12 Rope pulldowns
4 x 8-10 Single arm dumbell overhead extensions
4 x 8-10 Single arm pulldowns using d-handle

Bam's 100 bicep curls using naked Olympic bar

Then 100 reps on Tricep pressdowns using straight bar

Huge great pump, made taking a shower afterwards difficult. Normally I'd have enjoyed that but it was a bit of a ball-ache cos I was in a rush!

Sprint
10-09-10, 6:51 pm
Had the clubs annual awards presentation tonight. I honestly wasn't expecting to win anything & to be honest I didn't want to win anything as I didn't feel as though I deserved any award. That's not me trying to be all modest or fishing for compliments, I've only done 2 competitions this season.

Anyway, when the award came up for top male senior sprinter, my name was read out with the other 'nominations'. To say that suprised me was a bit of an understatement. I turned to my coach & said "No! I've only done 2 competitions, I shouldn't be nominated"

Then they read my name out as the winner.

I initially said I wasn't going up to collect the trophy & medal, but everybody on our table, including a couple of more senior athletes as well as my coach urged me to go up.

Felt a bit embarassed to say the least. Sure, time-wise I shoudl've been up there, & I suprised a lot of people being able to put in the peformances that I did having only started competing right at the end of the season, but there are other guys there who'd been representing the club from April onwards, & there I was picking up the trophy having come into things late on. The only reason I was able to contribute to our League victory & promotion is because the other guys had done the earlier graft to get us into that position.

Everybody said afterwards that even though I'd only done 2 competitions, I'd proven myself in those 2 competitions as our top sprinter, & on top of that I'd battled through injury to get back there. The recognition was nice, & I was flattered & honoured as well as feeling embarassed. But to be honest, I'd much rather one of the others had won.

Next year though, I intend to win the trophy again, only this time I will have truly earned it.

Legacy
10-09-10, 10:41 pm
Arms today, done at a really quick pace as I had to get out to the clubs annual awards presentation in early evening.

3 x 10-12 Preacher machine curls
3 x 8-10 Reverse preacher machine curls
4 x 8-10 Dumbell hammer curls
4 x 10-12 Rope pulldowns
4 x 8-10 Single arm dumbell overhead extensions
4 x 8-10 Single arm pulldowns using d-handle

Bam's 100 bicep curls using naked Olympic bar

Then 100 reps on Tricep pressdowns using straight bar

Huge great pump, made taking a shower afterwards difficult. Normally I'd have enjoyed that but it was a bit of a ball-ache cos I was in a rush!

Looking good man. I bet those 100 reps killed you at the end

ontheEDGE
10-09-10, 11:28 pm
Hey congrats man! Staying humble is what helped get you to where you are today. Nice to see your efforts get recognized, keep up the hard work.

Sprint
10-10-10, 3:59 pm
Looking good man. I bet those 100 reps killed you at the end

You got me to thinking about other stuff for 100 reps.
I fancied something relatively easy to ditch everytime I hit failure, so plumped for the pressdowns.

Fucking horrific, in a good way.

Definitely not the last time I'll be doing them!

Sprint
10-10-10, 4:00 pm
Hey congrats man! Staying humble is what helped get you to where you are today. Nice to see your efforts get recognized, keep up the hard work.

Thanks buddy. Im sure I'll feel better once Im over the feeling like a fraud!

I'll definitely earn it next year though, Im itching for the new outdoor season so bad.

Sprint
10-10-10, 5:08 pm
Track this morning.

Feeling the effects of the back session, didn't have much bounce to my running today.

12 x 100m with walk backs in between, quite a hot morning as well. Suprising for this time of year, expected these kinds of temperatures some 3 months ago.

Sprint
10-11-10, 9:03 am
Chest last night,

4 x 8-10 Hammerstrength chest press using Fat Gripz to change it up
2 x 8-10 Incline Smith Machine press using Fat Gripz on first set, then 3 drops on the 2nd
5 x 8-10 Incine Cable Flyes pyramiding up in weight each set then 3 drops on the 5th.

Pumped & done.

Cellardweller
10-11-10, 5:42 pm
Quick and dirty. I love it.

Sprint
10-11-10, 5:49 pm
Quick and dirty. I love it.

It's what I call "In, out & wipe".

Sprint
10-12-10, 7:24 pm
Track tonight.

4 x 300m with 100m walk recovery between runs.

I went with the 400m specialists again tonight, the first run I got boxed in a bit, & the pace felt decidely slow.

So on the 2nd run I took it out from the start & gave them a choice of pick it up to stay with me, or stay at the same pace as the first run. They came with me but couldnt catch me.
Same thing again on the 3rd run, then on the 4th I took it out quickly again but a couple of them came past with 150m to go as my legs filled with lactic.

Good session, hopefully by the end of the winter I'll be able to hold them off for the entire session. Then when the speedwork starts in the summer, I'll blow them out of the water. I've got an advantage in so much as I've just got to kep trying to stay with them for as long as possible over the winter & the extra speed endurance will come.

It's working quite nicely, like tonight. I'm using my speed to set a pace faster than they'd normally like, so they're getting pulled along quicker, but then towards the end of the session, as I die on my arse, Im getting pulled along faster than I'd normally be going at that stage of fatigue as I try to stay with them.

It's making for some incredibly hard & intense sessions, almost every run in every session is being taken seriously. No 'fillers' here, which will hopefully pay off well for everybody when the season kicks off.
It's going to be tough, being in the top division but there's no way any other clubs are working as hard as we are right now.

Sprint
10-20-10, 6:29 am
Well, looks like The Forvm's back.

Going to take some getting used to the new navigation & whatnot.

Been hitting it up hard in the gym & on the track as ever. Too many sessions have been had in the meantime for posting them all up.

But track last night,

6 x 200m in continuous relay form, so a rest period of about 50-55 secs between runs.
Nice little tailwind down the back straight, of course balanced out by the nice little headwind on the home straight.

The air was so cold, felt like my lungs were burning. By the time we'd finished, just couldn't get my breath back. I wanted to take deeper breaths but the deeper the breath the more intense the burning.
It took all of us about 10-15 minutes to get our breath back after we'd finished.

Lovely stuff.

Sprint
10-20-10, 6:30 am
Nailed some chest this morning at my old gym.

3 x 10-12 Machine flyes
4 x 6-8 Hammerstrength flat bench
4 x 8-10 Incline DB flyes
2 x 6-8 Incline Smith Machine bench press with 4 drops on the 2nd set.

Then a bunch of core & ab work.

Pumped & home.

Cellardweller
10-20-10, 6:13 pm
I like the pre exhaust with the flyes before hitting that HS flat bench. Bet you got a good burn. I wish my gym had a couple Hammer Strength machines.

Sprint
10-20-10, 6:29 pm
I like the pre exhaust with the flyes before hitting that HS flat bench. Bet you got a good burn. I wish my gym had a couple Hammer Strength machines.

Yeah it did the trick, although it wasn't actually planned to be an out & out pre exhaust, it was just that every man & his dog were in the free weights area using everything we wanted to get our paws on, so rather than stand around doing not a lot we decided to bang out a few flyes.

I've always used to do flyes first in my workout, partly for pre exhaust reasons & partly because I find them good for warming up, as long as you start light & gradually increase the range of motion.
I'm not sure why I stopped doing that to be honest, this morning was the first time in a while.

Hammer Strength stuff is quality, no 2 ways about that.

ontheEDGE
10-21-10, 8:15 am
I'm not a big fan of the chest flys but this seems like something I want to try. I'll hit them light and with good form like you said, use them as a warmup. When I go heavy with flys I allways feel some shoulder pain and a definite drop in range of motion so this method may just work. Chest day is in a few days so I'll let you know how it goes.

Sprint
10-21-10, 9:36 am
I'm not a big fan of the chest flys but this seems like something I want to try. I'll hit them light and with good form like you said, use them as a warmup. When I go heavy with flys I allways feel some shoulder pain and a definite drop in range of motion so this method may just work. Chest day is in a few days so I'll let you know how it goes.

Once you're all warmed up, go as heavy as you can whilst keeping decent range of motion & without the shoulder pain & keep that as your "new heavy".

Just remember when you're hitting flyes with free weights, don't bring the 'bells together at the top, you want to be stopping them a about 4 inches apart, but squeezeing your chest as if you've got a pen between your pecs & you're trying to hold onto it.

With free weights, once you get your arms vertical you're just balancing them rather than keeping tension on the muscles unlike cables where its constant tension throughout.

Sprint
10-21-10, 6:24 pm
Track tonight.

2 x 3 120m at 85%

The adductor tightened up a bit last thursday, hasn't felt quite right since.
Could feel it a bit whilst warming up tonight, but did the runs nice & light & relaxed. Didn't really feel too bad.

Still on course for the 20th November.

Legacy
10-21-10, 7:15 pm
Track tonight.

2 x 3 120m at 85%

The adductor tightened up a bit last thursday, hasn't felt quite right since.
Could feel it a bit whilst warming up tonight, but did the runs nice & light & relaxed. Didn't really feel too bad.

Still on course for the 20th November.

Injuries put you behind on the game. Take care of that adductor so you don't injure it again.

Sprint
10-23-10, 5:32 pm
Injuries put you behind on the game. Take care of that adductor so you don't injure it again.

Yeah, just going to tone things down a bit after tomorrow, got a full day of hill runs in forests in Nottingham, about 45 mins drive from here. A once a year thing with the club, always good for a day out. After that, I think it'll be a coast to the comp to keep things ticking over & give my body a chance to recover & build from being pushed to the edge for the past month or 2.

Sprint
10-23-10, 5:37 pm
Dropped a quick arm session yesterday, nothing spectacular, just a tickover session.

3 x 8-10 Preacher curls
3 x 8-10 Reverse preacher curls
3 x 8-10 Dumbell hammer curls
2 x 6-8 Concentration curls

3 x 20 Close grip press ups
3 x 10-12 Single arm overhead extensions
3 x 8-10 Tricep pressdowns supersetted with Reverse grip pulldowns, following each set of reverse grip with a set of overhand pressdowns. The weight is dropped from the overhand for the underhand grip pulldowns, & kept the same as the underhand when moving into the 2nd lot of overhand. Gives a good pump.
3 x 8-10 Single arm reverse grip pulldowns with a D-handle, really focusing on the squeeze.

Sprint
10-25-10, 10:27 am
Disaster! In Nottingham on sunday for hill runs through the forest with the club, not long into 1 of the runs I somehow managed to go over on my left ankle.

No idea how, it happened on the flatest part of any run, no tree roots, pot holes, not even a dip anywhere. We were all at a loss as to what happened.

But my foot went over onto the outside, as with a normal twist, but the rest of my leg from the ankle upwards, & my entire body fell the opposite way, leaving the foot planted on the outside, so the ankle was in a stretched & twisted postition & then effectively had my entire bodyweight wrench it over.

I heard & felt the crack before any pain, & my initial thought was "That's broken", this was followed a split second later by a feeling like my ankle had just exploded, as the pain hit.

Luke, the lad I was running with was about 5 feet away & heard the crack over the sound of his own running. He carried on to get help, & my coach arrived with Marc, another athlete.
He thought I may have snapped my achille's tendon at first cos all Luke said was there was a loud crack & I went down. I led there in the dirt for a few minutes whilst my coach & Marc assessed the damage.
Turns out it's ligament damage, need to wait until the swelling goes down & see how it reacts over the next 7-10 days before we can start to consider the possibility of running again by mid-december.

What looks for definite is that I won't be running any 150s, 200s or 300s this winter now, there's no chance it'll be able to take any bend running for a long time. The 60m is a slim chance as it's purely on a straight. I was due for the 60m & 150m in November but that's not happening now. There is a slim chance I'll make the 60m in December, which I need to do if Im going to be able to go to the North of England championships in January.

At the minute, my entire indoor season is over before it's even begun.

Devastated. Relieved that I didn't break it as first feared, or snapped the Achillie's, but still completely gutted. There's no words for it really, been pushing so hard the last couple of months & will have nothing to show for it.

Cellardweller
10-25-10, 3:46 pm
Damn, sorry to hear that brother. Ice, ice, ice. You're pretty limber from all the running so hopefully you didn't tear anything. I had a partial tear and was gimping around with a crazy boot on for 3 months. But then I'm not a runner. You'll bounce back soon.

ontheEDGE
10-25-10, 5:50 pm
Terrible news man, I'm so sorry to hear. You'll be back in it yes, but it still sucks. Good luck with the recovery.

Sprint
10-25-10, 5:52 pm
I hope so. I am as one with the ice pack, we're old friends & have been quite intimate over the years.

Sprint
10-27-10, 12:23 pm
The swelling has started to go down, there's some bruising that has come to the surface but not as much as was expected. The pain & stiffness is easing off gradually & there's some mobility around the joint now. Still strapped up when I have to walk around but walking is possible now.

So it was back to the gym. Shoulders this morning,

2 x 10-12 Light dumbell shrugs
4 x 6-8 Arnold press with drop set on 4th
4 x 8-10 Lateral Raise with drop set on 4th
2 x 10-12 Bent lateral raise
2 x 40 rep Giant set with isometric hold at the top at the end of the 4th exercise.
2 x 6-8 Heavy dumbell shrugs

Sprint
10-27-10, 12:36 pm
Amidst the recent doom & gloom, a flicker of light emerges.

It would appear that I may have found a girl who not only accepts the iron life, but embraces it.

Needless to say, I met her at the gym, through a mutual friend. We've been getting to know each other better over the last couple of months & she started having sessions with me (Half price, I couldn't charge her full whack).

Definitely some chemistry between us, & the flirting has been steadily increasing. She's come along to the track with me a couple of times as well.

Then last week we went to the cinema, & ended up holding hands, she was stroking my arm with her other hand & rested her head on my shoulder.

She often compliments my physique, but more importantly she understands the hard work & dedication required to make progress. She's a bit of a cardio nutter though, loves her spin classes but I try not to hold that against her.

Nothing official yet, we're just taking things slow but have clarified to each other that the attraction is mutual.

She's studying photography at uni, & has to do a project involving a documentary of a sorts. She's doing it on fitness & part of it will involve her taking pictures of me & my training buddy from my old gym as we go through a workout. After some discussion, we've decided to superset chest & back for the session.
Then I'm doing a narrative (apparently) for the documentary, as well as doing an interview explaining what I do, why i do it, what I eat, why I eat it & my thoughts on the fitness industry on the whole.
As she put it, "It gives me a chance to spend some more time with you."

Can't wait.

Cellardweller
10-27-10, 7:46 pm
she started having sessions with me (Half price, I couldn't charge her full whack).


LOL this is so loaded I can't touch it. Glad to hear you found a girl Sprint. Hope it goes well.

Sprint
10-28-10, 9:43 am
LOL this is so loaded I can't touch it. Glad to hear you found a girl Sprint. Hope it goes well.

Na man, nah lol PT SESSIONS!!

Sprint
10-28-10, 10:17 am
Back this morning.

3 x 10 Pull ups to warm up.
4 x 8-10 Barbell rows
7 x 6-10 Rack pulls (The last 2 sets were for 3 reps each but the rest in that rep range)
Didn't mean to get 7, but I was enjoying myself
4 x 6-10 Hammerstrength Iso-row.

Lots of back thickness today. Was good.

Cellardweller
10-28-10, 3:18 pm
Na man, nah lol PT SESSIONS!!

Whatever you guys call it on your side of the pond. :) Nice back work too.

Sprint
10-28-10, 5:14 pm
Whatever you guys call it on your side of the pond. :) Nice back work too.

LOL!!!

Thanks bro.

Legacy
10-28-10, 9:10 pm
Back this morning.

3 x 10 Pull ups to warm up.
4 x 8-10 Barbell rows
7 x 6-10 Rack pulls (The last 2 sets were for 3 reps each but the rest in that rep range)
Didn't mean to get 7, but I was enjoying myself
4 x 6-10 Hammerstrength Iso-row.

Lots of back thickness today. Was good.

I would always choose thickness over width. Something feels great about being a thick son of a bitch lol

Sprint
10-29-10, 5:53 pm
I would always choose thickness over width. Something feels great about being a thick son of a bitch lol

I feel thickness is harder to come by, & therefore more satisfying to achieve.

Plus there's just something good about getting hold of some (relatively) heavy-ass weight.

Sprint
10-29-10, 6:49 pm
Arms this morning, I've gone back to training first thing in the AM & I'm loving it!

Driving to the gym whilst it's still dark, gym's virtually empty so no waiting or asking folk how many sets they've got left. The majority of the few folk who are there are due to be at work soon & so they don't hang around wasting space.

3 x 8-12 Preacher curls
3 x 8-10 Reverse preacher curls
3 x 8-12 Hammer curls on preacher bench
3 x 8-10 Incline dumbell curls

3 x 10-12 Tricep pressdown
3 x 8-10 Single arm overhead extension
3 x 8-10 Single arm tricep pulldown with D-handle

Bicep curl for 100reps with naked Olympic bar
Tricep pressdown for 100 reps.

Huge pump. Done.

fawaz
10-31-10, 12:19 pm
Arms this morning, I've gone back to training first thing in the AM & I'm loving it!

Driving to the gym whilst it's still dark, gym's virtually empty so no waiting or asking folk how many sets they've got left. The majority of the few folk who are there are due to be at work soon & so they don't hang around wasting space.

3 x 8-12 Preacher curls
3 x 8-10 Reverse preacher curls
3 x 8-12 Hammer curls on preacher bench
3 x 8-10 Incline dumbell curls

3 x 10-12 Tricep pressdown
3 x 8-10 Single arm overhead extension
3 x 8-10 Single arm tricep pulldown with D-handle

Bicep curl for 100reps with naked Olympic bar
Tricep pressdown for 100 reps.

Huge pump. Done.

fricken hardcore.go hard and strong.liking the routine.to the pain!!!

Sprint
11-01-10, 5:34 pm
fricken hardcore.go hard and strong.liking the routine.to the pain!!!

That's it bro, doin it all the way home!!

Sprint
11-01-10, 5:40 pm
Not updated for a couple of days, but the ankle is slowly on the mend. Going to try a very steady jog along a straight on thursday.

20th November competition is definitely out, as is the 300m on the 11th December as there's no way it'll be abke to take running a bend at all, but there is some hope that I will be able to make the start line for the 60m in December.

I'll know more after thursday, if it can't take a gentle jog, there's no way it'll be up to a full-blooded 60m 5 weeks later.

Hit some chest on Saturday, didn't push it too much due to the photoshoot workoutfirst thing in the AM on tuesday where we'll be hitting up some chest & back.

Saturday's chest session:

3 x 8-12 Hammerstrength seated press
4 x 6-8 Incline flyes
Incline Smith Machine bench press, 1 set with 4 drops, reps ranged from 4 - 10
4 x 4-10 Incline cable flyes

All set for the big workout tomorrow, then the day spent with the new girl in my life. Things are progressing nicely, still nothing official but I'm liking the direction in which things are headed.

Sprint
11-02-10, 6:46 pm
So the photoshoot workout went really well...here's what we did.

3 x 8-10 pull ups
4 x 6-8 Incline dumbell flyes
4 x 6-8 Barbell rows
Incline Smith Machine bench press, 1 set with 4 drops, reps from 5-10
5 x 2-10 Rack pulls (Loving the rack pulls at the minute, my current favourite exercise)
4 x 6-10 Hammerstrength Iso-Row
3 x 6-10 Incline cable flyes
3 x 8-12 Cable crossovers


& then spent the day with the photographer a.k.a. the new girl in my life.

Fantastic day, taking things slow but I'm assuming we're a couple now, as we spent all day cuddled up on the sofa & decided we would just play things by ear whilst at the gym as one of the other PT's there has a huge crush on her & has asked her out a couple of times & neither of us wants to upset him as he's a decent fella.
But then before she went off to her spin class, she gave me a huge kiss right in the middle of the gym which is about as clear an indication as you can get.

Good times.

Sprint
11-03-10, 8:35 pm
Arms this evening, was considering shoulders but didn't fancy pressing stuff overhead with yesterday's monster still hanging round in my system.

3 x 8-10 Preacher machine curls
2 x 8-10 Reverse Preacher machine curls
4 x 8-10 Rope hammer curls
3 x 6-8 Dumbell/Concentration/Hammer curls (1 set of each)
4 x 8-10 Tricep pressdown with 3 drops on 4th set, straight into...
Reverse grip Tricep pulldown with 3 drops
4 x 8-10 Single arm overhead extension
3 x 8-10 Single arm tricep pulldown with D-handle. 2 drops on 3rd set.

Sprint
11-03-10, 8:36 pm
And yup, we're a couple. :)

Legacy
11-03-10, 9:59 pm
So the photoshoot workout went really well...here's what we did.

3 x 8-10 pull ups
4 x 6-8 Incline dumbell flyes
4 x 6-8 Barbell rows
Incline Smith Machine bench press, 1 set with 4 drops, reps from 5-10
5 x 2-10 Rack pulls (Loving the rack pulls at the minute, my current favourite exercise)
4 x 6-10 Hammerstrength Iso-Row
3 x 6-10 Incline cable flyes
3 x 8-12 Cable crossovers


& then spent the day with the photographer a.k.a. the new girl in my life.

Fantastic day, taking things slow but I'm assuming we're a couple now, as we spent all day cuddled up on the sofa & decided we would just play things by ear whilst at the gym as one of the other PT's there has a huge crush on her & has asked her out a couple of times & neither of us wants to upset him as he's a decent fella.
But then before she went off to her spin class, she gave me a huge kiss right in the middle of the gym which is about as clear an indication as you can get.

Good times.

Sounds like things are in order for you bro. Always good to have a girl who trains in the gym and does it hard. What do you plan on doing with the photoshoot? upload some pics if you can bro. See some progress.

Sprint
11-04-10, 7:54 pm
Sounds like things are in order for you bro. Always good to have a girl who trains in the gym and does it hard. What do you plan on doing with the photoshoot? upload some pics if you can bro. See some progress.

For some reason i can't get photobucket to upload any pics, or i'd have stuck a bunch on here already.

The photoshoot is for her uni project, she based it on fitness & decided to go to town on a workout me & my buddy did. She's going to be taking plenty more pics of me cos she's big into her photography. Once the ankle's back in 1 piece we'll be doing some of me running using a slow shutter speed & other bits & pieces that I don't fully understand.

Sprint
11-04-10, 8:04 pm
Shoulders this afternoon.

2 x 10-12 Light dumbell shrugs
4 x 6-8 Arnold press with drop set on 4th
4 x 6-8 Lateral raise with drop set on 4th
2 x 10-12 Bent lateral raise
2 x 40 rep giant set as mentioned frequently in my other shoulder routines

Huuuuuuuge pump.

Legacy
11-05-10, 5:46 pm
Shoulders this afternoon.

2 x 10-12 Light dumbell shrugs
4 x 6-8 Arnold press with drop set on 4th
4 x 6-8 Lateral raise with drop set on 4th
2 x 10-12 Bent lateral raise
2 x 40 rep giant set as mentioned frequently in my other shoulder routines

Huuuuuuuge pump.

Looking good bro. I did that same workout pretty much yesterday. Good pump

fawaz
11-06-10, 3:58 pm
Shoulders this afternoon.

2 x 10-12 Light dumbell shrugs
4 x 6-8 Arnold press with drop set on 4th
4 x 6-8 Lateral raise with drop set on 4th
2 x 10-12 Bent lateral raise
2 x 40 rep giant set as mentioned frequently in my other shoulder routines

Huuuuuuuge pump.

yeah this is an awesome routine for shoulders.

Sprint
11-06-10, 4:49 pm
I enjoy my shoulder routine. It's worked for me for a while, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Chest today

3 x 10-12 Hammerstrength seated press
4 x 6-8 Incline dumbell flyes
Incline Smith Machine bench press with 4 drops
2 x 6-8 Incline Dumbell flyes (for some post-exhaust fun)
4 x 6-10 Incline cable flyes with 3 drops on 4th
4 x 10-14 Cable crossovers

Then some abs, core & stretching as a treat.

Ankle's feeling pretty sore following thursday's little jog, so won't be at the track sunday morning. Will go for another steady jog tuesday evening.

Sprint
11-07-10, 6:47 am
So I've finally got my tail over to the new UniversalUSA site & created a bit of a profile on there.

Still under the name Sprint, but now I've managed to get some pics of from the photoshoot the other day. Only a few for now, will add some more at a later date when I get time.

Sprint
11-09-10, 6:53 am
Tried some legs yesterday, to see how the ankle feels.

4 x 10-12 Squats
3 x 8-10 Hack squats on machine
3 x 15 Step ups on each leg. No weight.

Ankle felt ok on the squats. Shit on the hacks, and ok on the step ups.

Sprint
11-09-10, 6:53 am
So my girl went off on one last night. I was due to go round hers to catch a film, at 6pm she text asking when I'd be finished with my final client & what time I'd be round, & that she had loads of films & a big tv & couldn't wait to see me. At 8pm she text saying things are moving too fast & we should back off.
Now, we're taking things slowly. 2 weeks in, we've kissed & cuddled, nothing more. She's been happy with that, & I've not made a move to take things further. She said she really likes me a lot, and knows I really like her, and said she thinks we'd be great together. So to say I was confused as hell is an understatement.

She's apologised since, & said she wants us to be together. I still have no idea what it was all about, but it's put me off a bit. She said she'll explain more in person when I see her. Fuck knows. I think we're still together, but I've taken a bit of a step back because of it.

Anyway, hit some back this morning.

3 x 8-10 Pull ups
4 x 8-10 Barbell rows
5 x 8-10 Rack pulls
4 x 8-12 Hammerstrength Iso Lat pulldowns with a drop on the 4th
4 x 6-10 Pull ups to finish.

Then some shit on an agility board to start strengthening the ankle.

Sprint
11-10-10, 6:56 am
Me & the girl are back on. What sparked it off, I've got no idea.

Anyway, shoulders today.

2 x 12-14 Light dumbell shrugs
4 x 6-8 Arnold press with drop on 4th
4 x 6-8 Lateral raise with drop on 4th

Then I saw a chap hitting shoulders as well, & gave him some advice, which turned into quite a lot of advice. Can't complain, it's the nature of my profession.
I lost a bit of the pump & momentum, & the weights I wanted for my bent lateral raise & 40 rep giant set had just been grabbed by another fella & I didn't fancy waiting any longer than I already had.

So I popped out 2 more sets of Shrugs before loading up a Triceps bar & doing some Bent Over Rows with it, focusing on leading & squeezing with the rear delts as much as I could.
The threw in some plate pinches for the hell of it at the end.

Legacy
11-10-10, 7:17 pm
So my girl went off on one last night. I was due to go round hers to catch a film, at 6pm she text asking when I'd be finished with my final client & what time I'd be round, & that she had loads of films & a big tv & couldn't wait to see me. At 8pm she text saying things are moving too fast & we should back off.
Now, we're taking things slowly. 2 weeks in, we've kissed & cuddled, nothing more. She's been happy with that, & I've not made a move to take things further. She said she really likes me a lot, and knows I really like her, and said she thinks we'd be great together. So to say I was confused as hell is an understatement.

She's apologised since, & said she wants us to be together. I still have no idea what it was all about, but it's put me off a bit. She said she'll explain more in person when I see her. Fuck knows. I think we're still together, but I've taken a bit of a step back because of it.

Anyway, hit some back this morning.

3 x 8-10 Pull ups
4 x 8-10 Barbell rows
5 x 8-10 Rack pulls
4 x 8-12 Hammerstrength Iso Lat pulldowns with a drop on the 4th
4 x 6-10 Pull ups to finish.

Then some shit on an agility board to start strengthening the ankle.

Girls can fuck with your head man and it sucks lol. Just gotta learn to filter out the BS from the real shit. Good to see things are back on. Killer back session man, 20 sets usually will kill it lol

Sprint
11-12-10, 10:15 am
Girls can fuck with your head man and it sucks lol. Just gotta learn to filter out the BS from the real shit. Good to see things are back on. Killer back session man, 20 sets usually will kill it lol

100% bro. Everything's cool now tho, we went out for a meal yesterday & spent 3 hours just talking & she apologised (several times) & explained everything. Not that she really had to, I'd already forgiven her, she's too damn cute. Then we headed back to hers to cuddle up for a bit before I popped to the track & she went to yet another spin class (counting the million or so spin classes she does every week, she works out more than me)

Anyway, back to the old gym this morning to hit up some arms.

2 x 8-10 Machine preacher curls
1 x 8-10 Reverse machine preacher curls with 3 drops.
3 x 10-12 Dumbell hammer curls with drop on the 3rd
3 x 8-10 Bicep curls on some iso-curl machine. Quite enjoyed them.

4 x 10-12 Tricep pressdowns
3 x 8-10 Single arm overhead extension
4 x 8-10 Tricep dips on machine with bodyweight + 55kg.
4 x 10-12 Single arm pulldowns with D-handle plus 3 drops on 4th
2 x 10-12 Pulldowns on some iso-pulldown machine with 2 drops on 2nd.

Always volume with my old training buddy.

Huge pump.

Cellardweller
11-12-10, 4:50 pm
Glad things are going good with the new girl. Hope that ankle is mending up too. Arm session looks good.

Sprint
11-12-10, 5:15 pm
Glad things are going good with the new girl. Hope that ankle is mending up too. Arm session looks good.

The ankle is slowly getting better. Im not sure it'll ever be 100% again, but I'm planning something resembling a run next week as opposed to the little jog I did before.

And the girl's an absolute cracker.

fawaz
11-13-10, 6:50 pm
100% bro. Everything's cool now tho, we went out for a meal yesterday & spent 3 hours just talking & she apologised (several times) & explained everything. Not that she really had to, I'd already forgiven her, she's too damn cute. Then we headed back to hers to cuddle up for a bit before I popped to the track & she went to yet another spin class (counting the million or so spin classes she does every week, she works out more than me)

Anyway, back to the old gym this morning to hit up some arms.

2 x 8-10 Machine preacher curls
1 x 8-10 Reverse machine preacher curls with 3 drops.
3 x 10-12 Dumbell hammer curls with drop on the 3rd
3 x 8-10 Bicep curls on some iso-curl machine. Quite enjoyed them.

4 x 10-12 Tricep pressdowns
3 x 8-10 Single arm overhead extension
4 x 8-10 Tricep dips on machine with bodyweight + 55kg.
4 x 10-12 Single arm pulldowns with D-handle plus 3 drops on 4th
2 x 10-12 Pulldowns on some iso-pulldown machine with 2 drops on 2nd.

Always volume with my old training buddy.

Huge pump.

very hardcore professional routine.

Sprint
11-14-10, 5:35 am
very hardcore professional routine.

Thanks bro.

Going to have another somewhat tentitive leg session later today.

fawaz
11-14-10, 9:48 am
Thanks bro.

Going to have another somewhat tentitive leg session later today.

good luck with that.my advise would be to keep it hardcore but dont go too heavy on the sqauts.keep sqauts high volume.try doin them after youve done everything else so its pre exhausts.what works for me best.

Sprint
11-16-10, 1:47 pm
good luck with that.my advise would be to keep it hardcore but dont go too heavy on the sqauts.keep sqauts high volume.try doin them after youve done everything else so its pre exhausts.what works for me best.

Keeping it in mind right there bro

Sprint
11-16-10, 1:49 pm
So im still training, & looking at hitting up a bodybuilding contest in 2012 to give me time to bring up my weak points, aka chest & legs.

Got some serious issues with my girl right now (well I dont think she is my girl anymore)

Actually my girl's got some serious issues with herself.

So whilst training hard, I'll not be updating here for a while.

Peace bros.

Sprint
12-28-10, 5:17 pm
So I'm back!

The girl turned out to be a complete fruitcake, albeit a very attractive fruitcake. As bonkers as they come, I'm not sure she should even be allowed to be allowed out on her own.

Anyway, been training hard. Hitting a lot of PB's over the last few weeks. Strength has really leapt recently, not 100% sure why. Only thing I've done is increased my carb & fat intake a bit.

ontheEDGE
12-28-10, 9:02 pm
Welcome back bro!!! That sucks about the girl but now you can move on and kick some ass.

Sprint
12-29-10, 12:36 pm
Welcome back bro!!! That sucks about the girl but now you can move on and kick some ass.

That's exactly what I intend to do bro! & exactly what I've been doing!!

fawaz
12-30-10, 10:24 am
That's exactly what I intend to do bro! & exactly what I've been doing!!

i know how hard it is but you gotta get back on track in order to be the best that you can be so you can achieve the things that would inspire you and make you feel great.

Cellardweller
12-30-10, 4:03 pm
Girls come and go but the iron is always there. Welcome back Sprint.

Cellardweller
01-25-11, 2:11 pm
Quiet in here bro. What you been up to?

Sprint
02-22-11, 11:21 am
Hey up bros, still been training hard as you'd expect.

Going fairly well both in the gym & on the track. Tweaked the groin a bit again 3 weeks ago but got away with it & things are moving nicely again, only missed a week as a precaution.
Managed to salvage something from the indoor season, went to the Northern Athletics Indoors Championships & didn't do huge things altho after the ankle, that was never on the cards, but still ran the fastest 60m time by anybody at the club this season. That was important, cos there're a few young lambs who keep snapping at my heels these days & I had to show them that it's a dog eat dog world, & I've still got the biggest teeth.

Big bonus from those champs when Jessica Ennis, the World Heptathalon Champion & favourite for Olympic gold next year turned up. The champs were in Sheffield, held at her home track. I've had a bit of a crush on her for a few years & suddenly she was warming up 5 feet from me! Never been star-struck before but I was buzzing after that.
Didn't say hi to her though, even though she's got a reputation for being down to earth & always has time for people, we were both warming up & as an athlete, I felt I should conduct myself as such, & left her to her own preparations.

In the gym, I'm ripping it up as ever. Hoping to get on stage this winter, initially I was going to do the British naturals during the summer, but I don't have the classic natural shape. Shoulders & back are waay bigger than the naturals who get on stage. Initially I thought that gives me an edge, but having spoken to one of the guys at my gym who's competed (unnaturally) for a few years, the judges at the naturals probably won't be looking for somebody with my shape.
The inital plan was to do both the naturals in the summer and then the 'other' in the winter, as I felt it would be an achievement & hopefully an inspiration to others who think they need to take things to get anywhere, if I could hold my own in both codes. Plus the naturals do the whole drug testing thing as well as polygraphs (lie detector test) & I liked the idea of having a piece of paper confirming that I was natural to wave in the faces of the numerous people who keep telling me that I am taking stuff (Yep, they actually tell me. first they ask me what I'm taking, then they tell me I am).

But a slight change in plans means Im more than likely going to just stick to the winter show, still doing it naturally of course. Not only because that's my choice but also because when you compete under UK Athletics rules, you can get called up for a drugs test at any point be it during competition season or not.

Im still here bros, just been a bit busy with other bits & pieces.

Sprint
02-22-11, 11:22 am
Girls come and go but the iron is always there. Welcome back Sprint.

Never a truer word spoken buddy.

fawaz
02-22-11, 2:39 pm
sprint.where you been man where you been?

Sprint
02-23-11, 7:03 pm
sprint.where you been man where you been?

Usual places buddy, just not here!

Still smashing up the gym & tearing up the track.

fawaz
02-24-11, 5:11 am
Usual places buddy, just not here!

Still smashing up the gym & tearing up the track.

yeah good luck with your competition when do you start dieting for it?

Sprint
02-24-11, 8:25 am
yeah good luck with your competition when do you start dieting for it?

Depending on what shape I'm in, around mid-August, which is slap bang in the middle of the athletics outdoor season, so I'll be in fairly tight shape to start with anyway & might be able to get away with leaving it an extra week or 2.

fawaz
02-24-11, 9:34 am
Depending on what shape I'm in, around mid-August, which is slap bang in the middle of the athletics outdoor season, so I'll be in fairly tight shape to start with anyway & might be able to get away with leaving it an extra week or 2.

good luck with your prep.if u need to know about dieting i know alot about it and there are plenty of diet articles on this website.

Cellardweller
02-25-11, 1:46 pm
Those bits and pieces will get you sometimes. Glad to hear you're still hitting it.

Sprint
02-26-11, 7:54 pm
good luck with your prep.if u need to know about dieting i know alot about it and there are plenty of diet articles on this website.

Thanks bro


Those bits and pieces will get you sometimes. Glad to hear you're still hitting it.

Yeah, no matter what I'll still be on it, don't you worry about that!

Sprint
02-28-11, 9:19 am
Enough was enough just recently, bear in mind that cos I work in a gym I tend to do quite a lot of observing people. I do it discreetly tho, I'm not one of those gimpy personal trainers who just stares at everybody and everything.
Sometimes I get new ideas for my own training, sometimes I get nice little pointers of what not to do, and sometimes it's all I can do to not laugh my veggies off at some poeple.

There's this guy who goes to my gym. Now, he's got a ginourmous gut on him. That's fair enough, not everybody is in peak shape. He's been going there for at least as long as I've been there though, which is 10 months now, & still looks the same. Aside from that, he walks around with his nose in the air looking down at everybody around him. In addition to this, he puffs his chest out (which also puffs his massive stomach out as well), and swaggers around like he's something special.

Now, if that wasn't enough, all he does is legs. When I say he does legs, he hits some leg presses followed by leg extensions and that's yer lot.

Now, if THAT wasn't enough, he loads up the leg press & proceeds to bang out a dozen reps or so per set. On every rep, the sled moves 10 inches at most. Having seen this guy's 'routine', it's always quarter reps leg press, leg extension, mince around like he's top dog. Session over.

So now you know this guy, let me set the scene for what happened 2 weeks ago.
On sunday's, I do inductions for the gym. I just happened to be doing an induction for a couple of young ladies, & we made our way into the free weights towards the leg press machine. Immediately next to the leg press, is the leg extension where our friend is perched.

On the leg press, is a whole bunch of plates. Knowing this idiot's routine, I'd be prepared to bet several hundreds on him being the lazy whatnot who left them there.

I saw my chance, & took it.

Stripping the plates off, I started talking to the 2 girls. The idiot was only 5 feet away, but I raised my voice a touch to really make sure he could hear what I was saying:

"Now, sometimes you'll get this. Lazy pricks just leave their shit everywhere when they're finished. I don't know if it's because they think they're too fucking special to clean up after themselves, or they're just too weak to lift the plates off. Either way, I'd hate to see their houses because no doubt it'd be an absolute shit hole."

I notice the idiot looking at me out the corner of his eye. And I wasn't done just yet.
I got down into the leg press to give the girls a demonstration, & continued with my speech:

"Now, thing is with this machine is to get a full range of motion. You want to be coming down so it feels like your knees are right in your face. It's harder, and it hurts a lot more, but it's the right way to do it. What you're going to see is muppets, usually the same muppets who leave their shit everywhere, doing little quarter reps like this"

*does a rather accurate demo of the arrogant idiot's leg press reps*

"But that's pointless. Why do they do that? Because when you're doing quarter reps like that, you can use more weight, so they think it's more impressive. Fact is tho, if they actually did proper reps, they'd have to drop the weight by a huge amount cos they actually aren't as strong as they're trying to kid people. By doing full reps, they'd realise they're actually weak as piss. But then they wouldn't be able to swan around trying to convince themselves they're something special."

At this point, our fat friend gets off the leg extension & walks away. Since then, he's not been able to bring himself to make eye contact with me.

And he uses a larger range of motion on the leg press now, altho he's still only pulling half reps. The swagger has been toned down a bit as well.

fawaz
02-28-11, 1:54 pm
Enough was enough just recently, bear in mind that cos I work in a gym I tend to do quite a lot of observing people. I do it discreetly tho, I'm not one of those gimpy personal trainers who just stares at everybody and everything.
Sometimes I get new ideas for my own training, sometimes I get nice little pointers of what not to do, and sometimes it's all I can do to not laugh my veggies off at some poeple.

There's this guy who goes to my gym. Now, he's got a ginourmous gut on him. That's fair enough, not everybody is in peak shape. He's been going there for at least as long as I've been there though, which is 10 months now, & still looks the same. Aside from that, he walks around with his nose in the air looking down at everybody around him. In addition to this, he puffs his chest out (which also puffs his massive stomach out as well), and swaggers around like he's something special.

Now, if that wasn't enough, all he does is legs. When I say he does legs, he hits some leg presses followed by leg extensions and that's yer lot.

Now, if THAT wasn't enough, he loads up the leg press & proceeds to bang out a dozen reps or so per set. On every rep, the sled moves 10 inches at most. Having seen this guy's 'routine', it's always quarter reps leg press, leg extension, mince around like he's top dog. Session over.

So now you know this guy, let me set the scene for what happened 2 weeks ago.
On sunday's, I do inductions for the gym. I just happened to be doing an induction for a couple of young ladies, & we made our way into the free weights towards the leg press machine. Immediately next to the leg press, is the leg extension where our friend is perched.

On the leg press, is a whole bunch of plates. Knowing this idiot's routine, I'd be prepared to bet several hundreds on him being the lazy whatnot who left them there.

I saw my chance, & took it.

Stripping the plates off, I started talking to the 2 girls. The idiot was only 5 feet away, but I raised my voice a touch to really make sure he could hear what I was saying:

"Now, sometimes you'll get this. Lazy pricks just leave their shit everywhere when they're finished. I don't know if it's because they think they're too fucking special to clean up after themselves, or they're just too weak to lift the plates off. Either way, I'd hate to see their houses because no doubt it'd be an absolute shit hole."

I notice the idiot looking at me out the corner of his eye. And I wasn't done just yet.
I got down into the leg press to give the girls a demonstration, & continued with my speech:

"Now, thing is with this machine is to get a full range of motion. You want to be coming down so it feels like your knees are right in your face. It's harder, and it hurts a lot more, but it's the right way to do it. What you're going to see is muppets, usually the same muppets who leave their shit everywhere, doing little quarter reps like this"

*does a rather accurate demo of the arrogant idiot's leg press reps*

"But that's pointless. Why do they do that? Because when you're doing quarter reps like that, you can use more weight, so they think it's more impressive. Fact is tho, if they actually did proper reps, they'd have to drop the weight by a huge amount cos they actually aren't as strong as they're trying to kid people. By doing full reps, they'd realise they're actually weak as piss. But then they wouldn't be able to swan around trying to convince themselves they're something special."

At this point, our fat friend gets off the leg extension & walks away. Since then, he's not been able to bring himself to make eye contact with me.

And he uses a larger range of motion on the leg press now, altho he's still only pulling half reps. The swagger has been toned down a bit as well.

yeah good stuff sprint.i train alot of kids in my age because they want to learn and gain a good experience so i always tell them to use proper form and weight that they can handle but also struggle with.

Sprint
03-01-11, 7:34 am
yeah good stuff sprint.i train alot of kids in my age because they want to learn and gain a good experience so i always tell them to use proper form and weight that they can handle but also struggle with.

Handle but struggle with, I like that.

Sprint
03-02-11, 11:50 am
We've got a 'pt zone' at my gym. Full of kettlebells, powerbags, suspended bodyweight equipment meant to strengthen your core & allow you to train for 'functional strength'.

Im the only pt who never takes their clients in there. Want to improve your core strength? Get a bar on your back & get your ass into the ground. When I get asked how that would strengthen their core, I say "On the suspended bodyweight stuff, you start sagging in the middle & not much happens. Get a loaded bar across your back & start sagging, you're well & truly screwed. You've got no choice but to keep everything tight, or you end up dead."

A couple of the pt's are really into all this so-called functional shit. Fuck knows what it's called but one exercise is lifting a light dumbell up to the side & over the top of the head, whilst at the same time taking an exaggerated step out to the opposite side with the opposing foot. When challenged, they told me it was "functional strength training".

Excuse me for pointing out the obvious...but using a dumbell that's light enough for the person holding it to be swinging it around, up to the side & over the head a dozen times isn't exactly strength training.
In addition, when the fuck does anybody perform any kind of move like that outside of the gym (or inside, for that matter apart from the unfortunate souls who listen to such bollocks)? Very rarely at best, so how can it be functional?

So they asked my opinion on "functional strength training" with something of a smirk. These 2 have been in the pt business for around 10 years now, compared to my 10 months & have loads of qualifications on various fancy courses so they like to swan around like they know everything & are always right.
It's at this point I feel the need to point out that despite being "strength coaches" neither can lift as heavy as I can, nor are they anywhere near as developed as I am in terms of physique.
And they always bleat on about kettlebells, saying how they improve athletic performance. They train with them, I don't. I'm a competitive athlete (voted top male sprinter at the biggest athletics club in the region last season, & set a club record almost 9 years ago that still stands) while they've never set foot on the track.
Sometimes qualifications provide fuck all apart from an unjustified sense of arrogance.

My answer to the functional strength training question was to train with free weights in lifts such as squats, a form of shoulder press, rack pulls, deadlifts, bicep curls & the like.
I then went on to justify this by asking how often they stand from a sitting position each day, compared to how often they swing something out to the side and over their head whilst stepping 3 feet the opposite way.

Take a drink, what are you doing? Grasping an object in a neutral hand position, and taking it from around waist-height to face-height. Hammer curls anybody? That cup sure as shit isn't being swung around the fucking room above your head.

So I'm an athlete, how does it all equate into being functional for sports performance? If I can drive powerfully upwards directly against gravity, from my ass being in the ground, with more than my bodyweight resting across my shoulders, it's going to make driving from the blocks, not quite directly against the pull of gravity, with significantly less weight to move a hell of a lot easier...and faster.
Rack pulls frying my entire posterior chain, giving me more power in each stride over the second half of the race.

We don't see eye to eye on such issues, but when they can match me on the track, bring themselves to take their shirts off & go pose for pose with me in front of a mirror, keep up with me weight for weight, rep for rep, or show me some novel way of taking a drink, maybe I'll start listening to them.

Sprint
03-07-11, 8:31 am
So I've been upping my game for my leg sessions. Every single rep on squats is ass to ground. Feels a million times better, not least on my knees. Going all the way down actually hurts them less. Naturally I'm having to use a touch less weight, but I feel prouder of myself for hitting so low on every rep than I did with a bit more weight on the bar.

Just started throwing in some hack squats on a machine at the end. Again, all the way down. Not much weight but I'm hitting these after I've pumped out 3 sets of warm up leg presses (makes the squats feel better) before hitting anywhere from 6-10 sets of squats, then back to leg press for some proper working sets. Anywhere from 5-8 sets. At the end, I like to drop the weights a bit & smash out a couple of sets with really close stance, my outter quads need a bit of attention.
Then it's leg extension & lying leg curls in superset fashion, until 4 sets of each have been done. No rest whatsoever here, the stations are right next to each other & it's literally back & forth between the 2. Rest when all 8 sets are complete.
Then I hit the hack squats, usually 4 or 5 sets, like I said all the way down to the bottom. After the prior work giving me a nice good pump, sitting down that low makes my lower extremeites feel like they're going to burst.

The doms is starting to slowly diminish, but I'm still feeling friday's legs by tuesday morning, just not quiet a sbad as when I started hitting this routine. That's why I've been hitting some hack squats at the end, just to throw a little suprise in there.
Leg development is coming along nicely.

Cellardweller
03-07-11, 9:31 am
Leg day is sounding brutal. Good stuff in here.

Sprint
03-07-11, 8:16 pm
Leg day is sounding brutal. Good stuff in here.

Yeh, typically leaves me doing the robot/i've-shat-myself walk for 2-3 days afterwards. Always hit them on friday, & just about recovered by tuesday afternoon with a few hours to spare before getting on to the track.

fawaz
03-08-11, 1:53 pm
great leg routine for bringing up the quads for your competition.strength and honour.

Sprint
03-08-11, 7:20 pm
great leg routine for bringing up the quads for your competition.strength and honour.

That's the goal bro.

Hamstrings get some work in there, but they also get a fair hammering with rack pulls on back day.

Sprint
03-08-11, 7:57 pm
Getting back into the habit of posting up my sessions.

Track tonight, with the outdoor season due to kick off in about 5 weeks ish, give or take.

Now, these days my track sessions typically follow this routine...

The first couple of runs I use as an extended warm up, picking up the pace run by run as I loosen up (given my injury past, it's a useful precaution).
Then I spend the next however many runs putting in the work, and typically my final run is slightly slower partly due to fatigue & partly due to me using it as the beginning of my cool down. Sod's law says that's when something will let go; when I've paid my dues for the session with my effort runs once I've loosened off.

Now, there's always been a thing at my club, and it's usually the younger lads who are guilty (altho there's a guy there 2 years younger than me who moans about others doing this & he's one of the most guilty) of saving themselves for the final run.
Every generation has suffered with at least a couple of lads who do it. Basically, they train at the same intensity as everybody throughout, until we get to the last 2 or 3 runs of the session. Suddenly, they're running a fucking hell of a lot slower than everybody. Then, on the very last run, they go flying off & hammer everyone because they've just taken a bit of a breather.
Both my coaches (husband and wife team) hate this, as do all the senior athletes. I've hated it since I started when I was 15. Firstly, they're not doing themselves any good. Better off being too fucked by the time the last run comes around, that's how I work it. That's how the other athletes who have made any progress do things.

There's a group of 3 or 4 16/17yr old lads there now, Not running anywhere near what I was at their age, nor are they improving at all. Just not making that step up, & they're all guilty of saving themselves for final runs.
What really bugs me is that after that final run, they swagger off looking pleased with themselves because they finished at the front.

I actually got told to cool it a few weeks ago by my coach & another senior athlete because I started bollocking one of the lads for doing it. Second to last run on a 60metres session, he's nowhere. Absolutely nowhere. Final run he blasts out, but don't try that shit with me. Even having missed a almost 8 weeks with damaged ankle ligaments, I came back after little more than 3 weeks training to set the fastest time at the club over 60m this indoor season. I ran him down & passed him with 10m to go.
Then I started saying to him "Where the fuck was that effort on the second to last run?"

He ignored me & was walking to his bag (no swagger, he'd saved himself & still been beaten).

I called over to him again "Oi, where the fuck were you 2 runs ago?"

Coach & Mal came over asking me what was wrong.

"That little ****, fucking saving himself. He was nowhere on the second to last run, then suddenly he's blasting off like it's the Olympic final."

Anyway, so tonight it was 150s. Only a couple of sets, & in my group there's 3 of us, including one of the lads who always saves himself.
I cruise the first couple of runs, it's cold & I'm not risking shit right at the start so I sit on the other guys' shoulders.
Next set, & I'm away. The 3rd guy in our group pulls out with cramp, leaving me & this lad.
We've got 3 runs left, I leave him by about 5metres over one run.
2 runs left, I leave him by about 20m.
Final run, just coming off the bend, suddenly he's on my shoulder & starting to inch past me. I'm content at this point to cruise this final run, if he's going to run it like he has the last 2 then I'll finish just slightly ahead of him, & I've paid my dues today with the earlier runs where I pushed it.

But he's not running them like the last 2, he's suddenly gone from being 20metres behind me to being slightly ahead of me. My first thought was "fuck it, cruise & bollock him at the end", but in a split second I thought "He won't listen, they never do. You know what, you want to fucking race, let's ignore the fact that I've hammered myself in the last 2 runs, and let's fucking race."

I switched up a gear with 80m to go, & started slowly leaving him. Only by about half a metre or so, but I'm in front of him & to be honest, I'm still feeling relatively comfortable. Yeah, I'm pushing it but I'm relaxed. In control. So much so that I turn my head slightly & say to him "Not quite good enough lad, not quite good enough."
I can sense him tightening up with the effort to get back level with me, & his younger - under developed - muscles starting to reach failure. He's not got countless reps of rack pulls, squats & leg presses under his belt. I'm not feeling much lactic acid building up, & the little that is there feels these days like a familiar friend.
The line approaches & I've eased away from him by about 3 metres. 5 metres from the end I look over my shoulder with a relaxed smile & say "THAT'S how you win a race, boy."

He doesn't say anything, he's fucked. Wasn't expecting to have to push it that hard on the final run, he thought I was spent from putting in the effort where he slacked off & wasn't ready for a battle.

My coach came over to me & started questioning what I was doing. "You saved yourself for that last effort, I'm not happy, do you want another set??"

"No," I replied, "I didn't save myself. I destroyed him over the 2 runs before because I was putting it in & he was saving himself. Suddenly he's blasting the last run & I thought No, I'm not having it."

We've got a good relationship, after 11 years together, & I respect her without question but I felt it necessary to stand my ground here. She relented when she heard my explanation. "Yeah, he'll do that, it's what he does, but you put him in his place."

Her 17 yr old daughter, who does little to hide her crush on the lad, piped up "Well, not really you didn't."

I said "Didn't I? I took him apart on the previous 2 runs, he was nowhere, then finished in front of him on the last run. Yeah it was closer than the others, but Iwas talking to him down the home straight whilst in front of him just keeping him in my pocket."

"Yeah, but nothing ever shuts you up."

Sometimes I can't win. But fuck it, hopefully I taught the little prick a lesson.

Whether he learns from it is quite another thing.

A10
03-10-11, 12:22 pm
subed good shit bro!

Sprint
03-10-11, 5:40 pm
subed good shit bro!

Thanks buddy.

Continuous relays tonight, in 4 x 100m fashion until each person had completed 2 laps. Basically it's 8 x 100m with about a 50sec rest in between.

Fucking windy. I don't mind too much running into a headwind to be honest, as the only bodybuilding athlete at my club it puts me at an advantage using my extra strength. While all the others start to struggle, I'm able to power through it. Obviously not quite as fast as you would in more favourable conditions, but I'm more comfortable than the others.
Hamstrings were feeling a little tight on the warm up, but they eased off as the session went on.
Then it was straight to the gym for some arms.

3 x 6-10 Preacher curls
2 x 6-8 Single arm Preacher curls*
3 x 6-8 Reverse Preacher curls
3 x 6-8 Dumbell Hammer curls, coming across the body*
3 x 6-8 Rope Hammer curls

5 x 6-10 Tricep Pressdown using a straight bar
3 x 8-10 Tricep Pulldown using an underhand grip on the straight bar
3 x 8-10 Single arm overhead extension*
3 x 8-10 Single arm pulldown using a d-handle*
3 x 10-12 Pulldowns with rope handle.

* Switching from one arm to the other and back again with no rest inbetween until all sets are done. Fucking. Intense.

Huge pump going on. I didn't do BamBam's 100 curls with a naked O-Bar simply due to energy levels being sapped from the track session.