After the second month of this Endurance Macro, I’m starting to feel, I’m convincing myself anyway, that it’s the right thing to do after a Power Macro. The power sessions give you a great sense of moving a ton of weight. However, they really cut into how long you can endure being……...uncomfortable. The Endurance Macro uses the gains made during the Power Macro and gets you really working outside of your ………comfort zone. Breathing hard, fatigued legs, little aches and pains, the need for recovery stretching, use of foam rollers are all little reminders that my body is under a continuous assault…….....got to be able to take the punches to stay in the game. If you want to make gains on that Last 10 Pounds you need endurance, you need tenacity, you need to be able to take a licking and keep on ticking. And this macro will get you there.
So last month, I described what the lower body splits look like. But what am I doing to during the first 30 minutes of my upper body routine?
Triple Pec Set (20 to 30 Minutes)
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Muscle Group;
Pecs and Lats
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Exercises Included;
- Flat Bench Guillotine Press
- Incline Narrow Grip Press
- Dumbbell Row
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Exercise Procedure;
This is an exercise that consists of 2 bouts of 3 supersets. There is no rest between supersets. There is a 4 minute walking rest between bouts. Each superset incorporates 8 reps each of flat bench guillotine press, incline narrow grip bench press and dumbbell rows. After a good warm up, starting at something closer to 50% of your ORM, complete 8 guillotine press reps, complete 8 incline press reps and 8 dumbbell row reps (each side). There is no rest between sets or supersets. After 3 supersets (1 bout), find a treadmill and set the speed at 3.3 MPH. Walk it off for 4 minutes then repeat with 3 more supersets.
- Because the weight is fairly light, keep the lifts slow and deliberate.
- The guillotine presses need to be wide grip and the lift focus should be at the bottom, getting a good stretch across the chest (pecs).
- The incline press should is narrow grip, elbows out with focus on the upper portion of the lift; squeeze the pecs to push the bar up.
- The incline press will always be 10 lbs lighter than the guillotine press.
- Progression should be added weight up to 70% ORM then drop back to 50% and add a 4th superset to each bout.
There is no rest between exercises within a superset or the 3 supersets that make up a bout. There is a 4 minute walk between bouts. This is the rest period. As you progress through the endurance macro, add weight until you approach 70% ORM then back off to 50% and add another superset to both bouts.
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How You Should Feel After the Exercise;
This routine should tire you out. After several weeks the huffing and puffing should subside after the 2 superset bouts. However, if you lift too heavy going into the first bout, you may not recover for the second bout; the challenge is to keep the same weight for all 6 supersets and be close to failure in that 6th round. Keep the lifts as slow as possible; rely on brute strength instead of generating power with speed (anaerobic instead of aerobic). You should feel a good lactic burn in your upper pecs as you move from the incline bench to the rows. If DOMS extends for several days, back off the weight. If you feel the 3 superset bouts are a bit too much during a given workout, again back off the weight, stick to a minimum of 3 supersets per bout. I always feel these the next day during a run; the chest tends to tighten up.
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June 2015, Starting Weight Guillotine Press 135 lbs and on Incline Bench’s 115 lbs.
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Following the Triple Pec Sets, jump into a set of chest dips and standing overhead presses (smith, barbell or dumbbell). After this follow-up set try some pull ups combined with a second set of dumbbell rows. By this point you should be pretty well cooked. Finish up your workout with some additional bicep and lat work and I guarantee, when you’re done, there will be a sigh of relief; this workout is not for the faint hearted.
Cardio Status………
As we stated at the beginning of this Macro, the cardio is a bit aggressive; maybe. It certainly seemed that way when we started out at the end of May. My legs were very fatigued and pretty stiff most days. However, over time the fatigue has faded and the soreness has subsided. Those niggly little aches and pains in the hips, knees and ankles have finally subsided into a dull background noise.
So have I been following my planed program to the letter? Not really but I am consistent. I have stuck with a four day per week run schedule plus two days of sandbag carries. The runs consist of a good mix of Split 20’s, SLOG’s and VSR’s. I’m putting in 12 to 15 miles per week and I’m slowly pushing that distance with every run session. The biggest change to my original plan is not incorporating a monthly tempo run to gage progress. I just don’t feel ready for that challenge yet. And I have yet to complete a widow maker.
Instead of the Tire Drag, I went for the Sandbag Carry. I bought a SPRI 30 pound sandbag through Amazon. Twice a week I just hoist this thing up on my shoulders and take off on a 2.5 mile power walk. I find that the walks give me a chance to actively recover from the run days plus I practice walking (and running) posture and perform breathing exercises during the walks; e.g. breathe through the nose and expand the diaphragm, not the chest. The 30 pounder is getting a bit on the light side so I will be ordering 40 and 50 pounders in the near future to facilitate progression. These sandbag carries are kinda’ fun and easy to incorporate into any long term routine. Highly Recommended!!!!!
The Stop Watch and The Rinse Cycle………….
One of the things that I always feel off with is the rest period between sets (supersets). So I bought a stopwatch and began timing myself to see where I fell. And the answer is as I suspected, consistently inconsistent for all ancillary exercises, the ones completed after the main show, e.g. the Triple Pec Set, Triple Leg Set. For example, one of the routines I like to complete with my upper body splits are a set of bodyweight dips and then a set of standing presses; on the smith or with dumbbells. To complete these two exercises as a superset, it takes approximately 30 to 40 seconds. If I base my rest period on heart rate or how I feel, sometimes I’m not ready (less that 1 minute), I fatigue out early in the set and sometimes I’m over-rested (greater than 2 minutes). So what I have decided to do is set a cycle time, maybe 3 minutes. And in those 3 minutes, complete the two exercises and incorporate the rest period. And at the 3 minute mark; rinse and repeat. If I feel over-rested, shorten up that cycle time, not enough rest, extend the cycle time. The goal; complete four sets and fatigue out in the last few reps of the fourth set. I think this makes more sense than a strictly timed rest period.
We’ll give this a shot and report back on this in future blog entries.
That Pesky Rest Week…………
It is hard NOT to do too much during the designated rest week. After 3 weeks of a pretty aggressive training schedule, I guarantee you will be ready for a week off. However, after the first day or so you may be climbing the walls looking for a place to run and something heavy to pick up. Exercise is pretty tough habit to break; I get awfully anxious just hanging out. To keep active (as compared to my road trip last month), I incorporated a couple of 12 hour splits to break up the week. The original plan was to keep up the 4 day full weight routines and just cut back on the cardio. However, to see if my observations from last month held water I decided to cut back on the lifting sessions as well. And were my observations validated? Maybe!
· Was there a ‘Mirror’ improvement? During this rest period there was no dramatic loss in weight, water or otherwise. The only thing I did notice was a better outline along the obliques, especially where they merge with the love handles. So maybe a little tighter, maybe a little leaner. This time I’ll do before and after photo shots to see if there is progress over the next several months.
· How about those ………..Masculine Feelings? Going into this rest week, there was a definite decline. However, by the end of the week, not a complete recovery but working towards it. As far as this observation, I will say without a doubt ‘YES’, working strictly towards Endurance will impact the big ‘T’ in a negative manor.
12 hour splits; what are these? I have written about these before in reference to one of the many books I have read and commented on; Body by Science. So in that book review, I described what I consider a max effort whole body workout. Basically, complete a Lower Body Split workout in the evening followed by an Upper Body Split workout the next morning; e.g. a 12 hour split. And that’s just what we decided to do for this rest week. Monday night at 5:30 pm; the Triple Leg Set. Tuesday morning at 4:30 am; the Triple Pec Set. I’m limiting the work to just the main show; NO ancillary sets. Repeat on Thursday evening and Friday morning. So how did this work out? It’s actually a bit on the…...non-fatiguing…….side; not really as stimulating as I thought it would be. But hey, this is supposed to be a rest week, right? And the evenings and mornings I’m not pushing steel, I just take a walk; mostly. I did sneak in a SLOG on Wednesday.
The Nicotine Trials…………..
After many hours of contemplation and study, I decided to start out with 2 mg nicotine lozenges for my initial trials. You park these between your gum and cheek for 30 minutes or so; the lozenges have a faster absorption rate then a patch, more of an acute dose. The actual peak dose is similar to what a 15 mg patch would generate; 7ng/ml. However, the absorption rate is much faster, 20 minutes vs. 4 hours and after an hour, you’re pretty much back to normal. The reason I was looking at faster absorption; I have read where nicotine may disturb sleep, similar to coffee. I am quite sensitive to coffee after 4:00 pm and I cherish my sleeping habits.
My first trials were during the third week, second round (month) of the Endurance Macro and continued into the second rest week. Just after lunch on a Wednesday, a rest day, I took the first dose just to get a feel for the effects. The packaging says 20 minutes to dissolve the lozenge; more like 1 hour. The first 30 to 40 minutes after finishing the lozenge; pretty jittery and then, after an hour or so, the jitters mellowed out to sort of an anxious feeling. This lasted for maybe another hour. Validated that 2 hour half-life; as advertised. And, as I found out later, I could have gotten the effect I was anticipating without the jitters by spitting the thing out after 20 to 30 minutes. Remember this if you decide to give nicotine a shot, the lozenges do NOT dissolve as advertised.
The next trial was a Friday morning VSR; spit the lozenge out at the 20 minute mark. The most notable effects were intense salivation, heavy sweating, and running to the restroom 10 minutes into the run. And during subsequent ‘nicotized’ cardio (and non-cardio) trials; same effect. One must remember that nicotine is a parasympathetic nervous system stimulant. It affects, it stimulates, the salivary glands, the sweat glands, the stomach and the intestinal tract. Believe me when I tell you that a mouth full of saliva, profuse sweating and those urges………..to evacuate your bowels………will let you know you have taken an acute and an effective dose. However, by the end of the rest week I was pretty much acclimated, at least my bowels were, so we started the patch per the initial plan going into the third month of this endurance macro. I will report on that in my next entry.
And the journey continues, its non-stop and its treated seriously when chasing that Last 10 Pounds.
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