Thursday, August 14, 2008 by Daniel

5x5's, and a couple level 2's

I wanted to knock out the last couple skills on the list that I thought I could achieve, so as part of my warmup today I did:

30 V-ups
Handstand hold: 1 minute

The V-ups weren't pretty, but there were 30 of them, and I BARELY got my minute hold - the last few seconds were agony, and it killed my wrists, but I'm happy to have those done. Everything that's left on the list is something I'm gonna have to fight for.

5x5's
Back Squat: 140
Bench Press: 135

From comments on the forums about the video I posted a week ago, I ditched the pad, held the bar lower on my back, kept a neutral neck position, and tried to keep the weight on my midfoot instead of rocking forward onto the balls of my feet. This was successful, and in some ways made the squats more comfortable, but they also felt harder than last week. But I think the form IS better, and I could more easily drop below parallel.

The bench was hard, but just manageable. I'm 45# from bodyweight (level 2) on this, and it just seems so far away. According to online one-rep max estimators, I'll be able to 1RM 180# when I can 5 x 160#. That's 25# away. Seems more doable. I'll keep plugging away at it.

2 comments:

Ev said...

Huh, that's an interesting ratio of backsquat to benchpress weight. Interesting is code for "not right." Methinks you could probably squat a lot heavier and may be having some form issues. Talk to Max about this. He can fix your squat.

Daniel said...

No, I know I can squat more. It's just part of the linear progression of the 5x5's - a little bit more each week.

Besides, the Level II standard is bodyweight for each of them, so they can't be THAT far apart in expectations as a newbie, can they? I mean, I know the upper limit for squats is a lot higher than bench, but it'll take me a while to get there.

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