Ridiculous

Ok, it's been a bit ridiculous.  I haven't updated in over 20 days.  That's a fucking long time.

There's no possible way I can go back throughout all 20 days and give a detailed recap of what has happened.  However, I can give a few important points and catch up to where I'm currently at.

I have been going to the gym since my last post.  A few weeks back, James and I agreed that we would slightly change things up.  Instead of just doing 5x5 (or 4x5 if we were being lazy) for almost every muscle group, we're going to go on cycles.  One cycle is 3x8, next cycle is 5x5, and final cycle is 5x1.  Then it would be a mixed week of things like cleans, box jumps, turkish get ups, etc.

We'd be changing up the actual exercises we do too.  One day is bench and chinups, another day is squats and deadlifts, and the 3rd day is shoulder press and rows.  We can also mix in some of the miscellaneous stuff in there in the form of dips, biceps, fly's... that sort of thing.

In preparation for this change, over the last week and a half James and I began attempting 1 rep max sets for each of our main lifts.  I don't remember which days we did what.  But here are my maxes.

Bench - 215
Squat - 305
Deadlift - 375
Clean - 155


The bench and clean are pathetic, but I'm pretty happy with the squat, and very happy with the deadlift.  I should footnote that the deadlift was done with straps.  I normally go without them, but have always felt that my back could lift more than my hands could.

Once we found our maxes, Sunday we began the new routine.

Sunday - 5/12/13
Bench - 3 sets
95x10
135x8
165x8
165x8
165x8

Chinups - 3 sets
No weight x 8
No weight x 8
No weight x 8

(Yeah, I was feeling pretty weak)

Close Grip Bench Press - 3 sets
Empty bar x 10
55x10
95x8
105x8
115x8

I've never done close grip before, so it was a little awkward.  Felt good overall though.  Obviously bench we had to go a little lighter to get 8 reps for 3 straight sets, but 165 was perfect for me.  On the 3rd set I struggled mightily, but got all reps with no spot.

If all goes well, today should be squats and deadlifts.  I'm a little nervous at pairing these 2 together, but from what I've read it's absolutely doable.