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Hey guys,
I wanted to update the board on my training. I've been slowly turning the off season up and have made some changes to my training. I usually have always trained alone of with one partner. Since my show, I've picked up 3 partners, each with own unique qualities that are adding to my program. One guy is a former competitor, in his 30's now, had competed for a decade. He is a dr of chiropractic and a strength and conditioning coach. The amount of knowledge he has is humbling. We've examined my weaknesses and corrected bad habits in my training that will hopefully help me build these areas up. In some cases, I've gone to using very little weight and started over. As is the case with my squat. Because of my bio-mechanics, I dont have a lot of ankle flexion. This drastically limits the depth of my squat unless I take a very wide power lifting stance. The problem is, the weight goes to my glutes and hams, instead of my quads, which are one of the muscles I need to bring up. About 8 wks ago, right after my show, we began bringing my stance in, by having me place my heals on 5 lb plates while squatting. With this correction, I am able to squat ass to calves with a shoulder width stance.
He also has had me abandoned my belt. I've suffered low back problems for years. One wrong move and it would spasm for days or weeks, leaving me unable to squat. We have slowly strengthened the lower back using beltless squats and deadlifts. At first, he had me doing squats with only body weight for 20 reps. Each rep is perfectly controlled, all the way up and down, never locking out and always keeping tension on the muscle. He has me flairing my quads, all the way up and down. I'm not joking. For the first few wks, with all these adjustments, I was struggling to squat, using just my body weight! My quads were burning and my lower back was on fire. We've slowly built up. There have been times that my back has gone out, but thankfully, he's a chiropractor and can adjust me, on the spot. At this point, I'm squatting 225 lbs for sets of 12-16 for 12 sets on leg day, plus pre-exhaustion on extentions, followed by pressed and possibly more more extentions on a different single leg machine at the end. Then we come back and train hams on a separate day.
For gear, I've recently started on test and deca. Nothing special. Just the basics. The basics work well. For my food, I'm not counting cals at the moment. I'm just slowly adding more food, as I can. When I feel I can't comfortably add more, I'll count what I'm eating and begin looking for ways to add more. My metabolism is fast and it's hard for me to get fat, so that isn't a big concern for me.
I wanted to update the board on my training. I've been slowly turning the off season up and have made some changes to my training. I usually have always trained alone of with one partner. Since my show, I've picked up 3 partners, each with own unique qualities that are adding to my program. One guy is a former competitor, in his 30's now, had competed for a decade. He is a dr of chiropractic and a strength and conditioning coach. The amount of knowledge he has is humbling. We've examined my weaknesses and corrected bad habits in my training that will hopefully help me build these areas up. In some cases, I've gone to using very little weight and started over. As is the case with my squat. Because of my bio-mechanics, I dont have a lot of ankle flexion. This drastically limits the depth of my squat unless I take a very wide power lifting stance. The problem is, the weight goes to my glutes and hams, instead of my quads, which are one of the muscles I need to bring up. About 8 wks ago, right after my show, we began bringing my stance in, by having me place my heals on 5 lb plates while squatting. With this correction, I am able to squat ass to calves with a shoulder width stance.
He also has had me abandoned my belt. I've suffered low back problems for years. One wrong move and it would spasm for days or weeks, leaving me unable to squat. We have slowly strengthened the lower back using beltless squats and deadlifts. At first, he had me doing squats with only body weight for 20 reps. Each rep is perfectly controlled, all the way up and down, never locking out and always keeping tension on the muscle. He has me flairing my quads, all the way up and down. I'm not joking. For the first few wks, with all these adjustments, I was struggling to squat, using just my body weight! My quads were burning and my lower back was on fire. We've slowly built up. There have been times that my back has gone out, but thankfully, he's a chiropractor and can adjust me, on the spot. At this point, I'm squatting 225 lbs for sets of 12-16 for 12 sets on leg day, plus pre-exhaustion on extentions, followed by pressed and possibly more more extentions on a different single leg machine at the end. Then we come back and train hams on a separate day.
For gear, I've recently started on test and deca. Nothing special. Just the basics. The basics work well. For my food, I'm not counting cals at the moment. I'm just slowly adding more food, as I can. When I feel I can't comfortably add more, I'll count what I'm eating and begin looking for ways to add more. My metabolism is fast and it's hard for me to get fat, so that isn't a big concern for me.