Sisyphus Is Smiling

[Jay Nera]

TRAINING-- Powerlifting gives me purpose. To become stronger than I was yesterday. Gravity doesn't change. It will remain constant today and tomorrow. I either get stronger or I improve my technique... But gravity never changes. This journey is about overcoming obstacles. I've had my fair share of injuries and setbacks. I've pushed that boulder up the mountain to only have it roll back down again as soon as I hit an injury. But my character never wavers...it builds. You've all been there before. This is my journey and even when I make it to the top of my mountain that mountain will only gain more height and I must push this heavy boulder further...climb higher. The key to realize is that I enjoy pushing that boulder up this wretched unforgiving mountain...that weight on my shoulders..I don't wish that this rock were to get lighter..i wish to endure more.....it gives my training purpose.
"The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy."

Normally, I have a Bulgarian mentality when it comes to training. I like to lift heavy and lift often. High frequency and high intensity. In the last year I have learned to be more patient and to bring down the intensity. This is due to injuries.

My split for the last 4 years:

Mon-Upper body press
Tues-Front Squat/Back squat
Wed-Upper body press
Thurs- Deadlift
Fri-Upper body press
Sat- Squat
Sun- Rest

Upper body days consist of any of the following: bench press, close grip bench press, feet up flared elbows bench press, floor press, standing overhead

I do hundreds of pull ups a week. Anywhere from 400-600.

I like to follow up all lower body days with box jumps. ( I have only started doing this again because my injuries are all healed up).



My next competition is Raw Unity Meet 7 ( RUM 7) in February 2014 and I will be starting my peaking cycle in November.

I will start posting my training here.

[Universal Rep]

Welcome to the FORVM brotha. In for the ride. Good luck on the WR goal...

[BaconGrease]

Excited to follow your training. I read your log in the past and always enjoyed your posts. Good luck with your training!

[DANO]

Subbed for sure.... huge fan of pullups myself

[Shukin]

I'm along for the ride, hoping to pick up applicable knowledge

[P Diesel]

Jay i dnt know ya. but ur reputation speaks for itself. and my brothers i have repsect for speak highly of u, so thats enough for me. i look forward to meeting u brotha and welcome home

P

[Jay Nera]

Welcome to the FORVM brotha. In for the ride. Good luck on the WR goal...

Thank you. It's good be here.

Excited to follow your training. I read your log in the past and always enjoyed your posts. Good luck with your training!

Thank you. I'll still be posting on my upstrong blog but it will be more thoughts and rants and less training. My daily training will primarily be posted on here.

Subbed for sure.... huge fan of pullups myself

No business like monkey business.

I'm along for the ride, hoping to pick up applicable knowledge

Me too man.

Jay i dnt know ya. but ur reputation speaks for itself. and my brothers i have repsect for speak highly of u, so thats enough for me. i look forward to meeting u brotha and welcome home

P

Thanks for the welcome. Looking forward to it too man.

[Jay Nera]

Still in my off-season training. Keeping things very light in general... and today is a light day as I am pressed for time and nursing a minor nuisance.

Standing Strict Press: 225x5x5
Close Grip Bench Press: 315x5x11 sets in 25 minutes. (CAT style)
Feet up flared bench to upper chest: 315x8x3 sets

I do not normally do 3 different barbell presses but I have injured my wrist flexor tendons pretty badly and cannot make a fist right now. (From spotting girls squatting and catching the bar instead of spotting them properly at the chest...my forearm is strained..and I'm pissed.)
Anyway, normally I would do a lot of shoulder work, focusing on the rear delts, and a lot of tricep work but with my forearm pain I am forced to avoid the assistance work for a week or so.

A quick day. 60 mins in and out.

[Shukin]

Where can one read about "Bulgarian" training? Do you recommend any particular books?

[Firefist]

Feet up flared bench to upper chest: 315x8x3 sets

Really interested in this one. Can you elaborate on the benefits?

[Masterbench]

Congrats on joining Universal/Animal!
What type of progression do you use?

[Jay Nera]

Where can one read about "Bulgarian" training? Do you recommend any particular books?

The Weightlifting Encyclopedia is a great start. Googling "Ivan Abajiev" or the Bulgarian method will land you many interesting videos and outlines as well. I had the pleasure of listening to Aleksandar Varbanov for two days discussing weightlifting and the bulgarian method. He has a weightlifting club in the Toronto area at the Academy of Lions if you're ever there. I believe it's called the School of Champions. Abajiev is actually doing a seminar 2 hours away from where I live in a few weeks and hopefully I can make the trip to see him. I think Juggernaut did an article on it recently as well because some of my crossfitters have been asking me about it ...but I haven't had a chance to read their take on it.

[Jay Nera]

Really interested in this one. Can you elaborate on the benefits?

Haha. First off, my wrist flexors in my left had are really messed up right now and it hurts to hold anything over 315 in the bench or the squat and I can't even hang from the pull up bar nor can I deadlift anything right now. It sucks. That being said, I normally like to do heavy dumbell presses as assistance instead of 3 different barbell presses in a day.

The feet up flared elbows is something I ONLY do in the off-season and I treat is as an accessory. So I will always perform my regular bench workout first and then drop the weights and do some flat back flared lifting. I use it to hit the chest differently. Feet up flattens my lower back eliminating the arch and also increasing ROM of the press. It also obviously takes away leg drive. This forces me to use my chest muscles more. Flaring the elbows really forces the chest to work differently. In the off-season, I am not lifting heavy, the goal is to stay healthy and build more muscles. So the intensity is relatively low and the volume is high. In varying the bench press my two favourites are narrow grip(not close grip) bench press and feet up flared elbows pressing...in the OFF-SEASON.. When I am peaking I like to focus solely on the 3 lifts with little assistance.

[Jay Nera]

My wrist flexors are bugging me a lot. I would normally do CAT squats today but am nervous to irritate this forearm any further.

So I am using the safety squat bar which I rarely ever use. When I do use it I use it very differently. I don't like to use the hands. I once posted a quick article on my Upstrong blog titled "Hellrazors" or "Hellraisers" something like that explaining why I like it.
But basically, if the handles and the camber in the bar are pointing on the same angle, the heavier the weight on the bar, the more it will push your head forward and chest down...I like doing this sometimes because it's like Squat-gone-bad every rep. The workouts suck but they really jack up your posterior chain.

No Hands Safety Squats: 145x5, 235x3, 325x2, 415x2, 505x4x4sets, 455x6x2sets, 415x10
Box Jumps: Jumping on a '32 5x5. I am just starting to box jump again because my knees are feeling healthier and I like jumping because it keeps me feeling athletic. So I jump on a low box and the goal is to land on the middle of the box with straight legs. This lets me know that I displaced my body explosively and is likely similar to jumping on a '50 or so.
Hollow rocks: 40 x 3

[Firefist]

Haha. First off, my wrist flexors in my left had are really messed up right now and it hurts to hold anything over 315 in the bench or the squat and I can't even hang from the pull up bar nor can I deadlift anything right now. It sucks. That being said, I normally like to do heavy dumbell presses as assistance instead of 3 different barbell presses in a day.

The feet up flared elbows is something I ONLY do in the off-season and I treat is as an accessory. So I will always perform my regular bench workout first and then drop the weights and do some flat back flared lifting. I use it to hit the chest differently. Feet up flattens my lower back eliminating the arch and also increasing ROM of the press. It also obviously takes away leg drive. This forces me to use my chest muscles more. Flaring the elbows really forces the chest to work differently. In the off-season, I am not lifting heavy, the goal is to stay healthy and build more muscles. So the intensity is relatively low and the volume is high. In varying the bench press my two favourites are narrow grip(not close grip) bench press and feet up flared elbows pressing...in the OFF-SEASON.. When I am peaking I like to focus solely on the 3 lifts with little assistance.

Very cool. Thanks for the insight brother. Will definitely be picking your brain more in the future.

[naturalguy]

In

[Dman]

Welcome aboard the Forum Jay lookin forward to seing how you train & learning from you!!

[Jay Nera]

10/11/2013
Light work on bp because of my wrist. Contemplated not training at all to save wrist but I felt like getting some blood flow in. Gangster wrapped my left hand like crazy each set so that there was zero wrist movement. All bench presses whenever I do my 25 minutes 'games' are controlled decent, slight pause, explode up.

Narrow grip bench press: 315x12 sets in 25 mins
Feet up flared bench: 315x8x3 sets(paused)
bw dips: 3 sets of 30-35 reps
tricep work using bands

Frustrated with my wrist.

10/12/2013
Up at 7am to train early so I can hit a wedding.
For the past month I have tried sqapping my thursday dead day with my sat back squat day. So today would be a DL day but since my grip is painful and non existent... front squats.
Front Squat: 135x5, 225x3, 315x2, 405x2, 455x2, 495x2x4sets, 405x8x3 sets
Box jumps: 5x5
Hollow rocks: 2 sets of 40

Legs felt pretty jacked up from the volume and the short rests I gave myself because I was in a rush for the wedding.
I woke up at 231...went to bed at 240. Italian wedding served a lot of food. :)

[Theonidus]

Huge fan of your article in Power magazine and looking forward to seeing Animal dominate the future RUM meets.

[Jay Nera]

Huge fan of your article in Power magazine and looking forward to seeing Animal dominate the future RUM meets.

Thanks man. I really hope that raw powerlifting...well powerlifting in general grows. I'm really pumped that Animal is getting involved in powerlifting and privileged to be a part of it.