Jack_of_all's Journal

[jack_of_all]

ok, my first year of training has come to a close. im taking the first week of 06 off to test my maxes, but once thats over ill be training harder than ever (hopefully). i feel like this year has been very challenging and between the first 3 months of the year and the last 3 months of the year i have made literally all my gains, 5 of the other months were spent trying to get stronger but getting weaker and the other was me getting on the right track and back up to speed. at any rate, i feel like things are starting to look up, i have gotten through my first year with only very minor injuries (so far! knock on wood :D) and have made some decent strength gains despite having things pretty much fall apart through the middle of the year.

a quick review of my year.

starting maxes:

bench press-135
Squat-160
Deadlift-215
Military press-105
Clean-100

anyway, as of right before everything went wrong, these were my year end goals, and they still are.

bench-250
Squat-300
Deadlift-350
Military press-180
Clean-200

well, i dont know how things will turn out. the bench looks doubtful, but im pretty sure i can hit 240. the squat should be easy i ATF squatted 260 for 4 sets of 4 on monday; im not used to squatting paralell though, which is how im going to max, so i wont get all that much more strength going to paralell (it will definitley be enough though). my deadlift is the one i feel best about, ive deadlifted 360 (ie: 10 lbs more than my max, so ive already made it) for a triple and it was not a strong feeling day. though i dont list it, i actually hope i can hit 405 next week and im not all that far off (if i can just get really phyched up lol). im probably going to miss the mil press by ~15 lbs, but we'll see, since im used to doing the exercise pre-fatigued i will have an extra kick when im maxing it out by itself. the clean is iffy and probably not going to happen. i switched to powercleans earlier in the year and never adjusted my max to a powerclean, so even though i can PC around 165 for several reps, i doubt i can get a rep off with 200, it will just be too heavy. gotta hope though, and im going to try my best to make my goals. as i see it, if i was able to do them all then i made them too easy, its important to set the bar high.

im also cutting. i want to be as lean as possible to be in the lightest pl'ing weight class possible, but i'd also like to be the strongest guy in my school (im definitley an underdog for that one, but the guys benching in the lower 300's have been there for a couple years stagnating, and i just might be able to get up there in the next year). so once i'm at a very lean weight, theres a good chance i'm going to just turn around and bulk right back up without competing at that class.

well, i have some cool ideas that im gonna try out next year and im looking forward to having several months to reach whatever goals i set rather than having a sudden wake-up call in september. i just hope i remember to keep it simple (bolded for my sake so i dont forget and do something too out there :D)

ill post my year end maxes (which, ironically, im testing during the first week of next year) after i make them. hopefully i keep up with this journal unlike in the past lol.

[trasmi21]

What's your stats, Height, Weight, any idea of your bf%?

Good luck on meeting your goals, make an update on how it went.

[jack_of_all]

at the end of this day i weighed myself and was 185.5 (at the end of the day 2.5 weeks ago i was 198 lbs, but a lot of the sudden loss is just because i went straight from cutting to bulking and there is just a lot less food inside me, ive been eating 2200 cals a day and im losing weight a little quick, if it becomes a problem ill start eating more, but right now it doesnt seem to be one). im 5'6'' and 16 years old.

i was going for max attempts today and started off with bench.

i started off with a light warmup set and then started throwing the weight on (i know i SHOULD warm up more, but in the past i havent warmed up at all). i had the bar at 225 and made an easy single, nothing to it. then i get it up to 240, a little harder, but ive had far harder reps in my workouts. the 240 was touch and go, and since im not in a meet right now, touch and go is how i max. now here is where i may have made a mistake. i could have probably nailed 245, but i went for 250. i wasnt all that tight and i could have arched my back some more (forgot to mention that im training to be a pl'er, so this is something i should probably work more on in and of its own right). i get it to my chest and start up, about 3 inches off my chest i run out of steam. so i start trying to press it in a sort of J shape (more over my face, im benching in a power rack btw) i get better leverage this way, and for maxing out im not inclined to avoid it. i got about another inch but was just too tired. i held it there for a couple seconds fighting gravity, and at last lost. on the way down i noticed that my shoulder hurt (ive hurt it a couple times in the year, nothing serious then and not all that serious now). later i went for 250 again, and when i hit the bottom i felt pain shoot through my shoulder and gave it up. i hope my shoulder gets better soon, because i've still got my shoulder presses to do and i want to try and take 250 or at least 245 at the end of the week (im convinced that if i get really tight, get my arch a little bit higher and try to explode off my chest i just might get through my sticking area)

after this i start out with squats. no warm-up, im a lazy slob when it comes to warming up, i'll warm up in the future, but i didnt hurt myself. put 285 on the bar. boom, hard, but i nailed it. put 300 lbs on the bar. i start off and end up well under legal depth, coming out of the hole my hips rose a little soon, but i was still able to accomplish the rep (and in turn my year end goal). then i put 315 on the bar and got crushed (thank god for safety bars lol). so my squat goal was accomplished.

tried out cleans. i couldn't bring myself to actually clean the weight, i just used a powerclean and maxed at 180, if i knew how to drop under and really gave it my all i could probably do that 200, but i dont, so to heck with it, i trained hard and i've gained a lot of strength, but i couldnt give a crap about my oly lifts.

i still need to try military and deadlift, neither looks good. i already have got my dl year end goal, but i tried unsuccessfully to dl 365 on friday, so it looks like i might be stalling out and/or losing ground there.

so out of 5 goal lifts, 2 have been accomplished, i might get the bench one but the others are pretty much not gonna happen. imo, if i got all my goals then they were too easy.

so my current maxes are:

squat:300
deadlift:360
bench press:240
powerclean:180
military press: 140 (most ive done in a workout, i hope i can do more than it :D)