adpowah's training logs

Minor side step from the cut, I started DUP. There are a lot of iterations of it but I am just doing the program that was listed in the Mike Zourdos study and eating for strength.

During the first week of each DUP group, hypertrophy training consisted of 5 sets of 8 repetitions for the squat and bench press at 75% 1RM. During the second week of training both hypertrophy and power days consisted of the same sets and repetitions as they did in week 1. For training weeks three and four subjects performed 4 sets of 8 on the squat and bench press, while weeks 5 and 6 called for 3 sets of 8 repetitions for the squat and bench press. The load for hypertrophy progressed each week based on each subjects’ individual adaptations (22). Power training was performed as follows: 5 sets of 1 repetition at 80% 1RM during weeks 1 and 2, 4 sets of 1 repetition at 85% in weeks 2 and 3, and 3 sets of one repetition at 90% in weeks 5 and 6. Strength training consisted of 3 sets of maximal repetitions at 85% 1RM on all three exercises during week 1. Following week 1, the load used on strength training days progressed from week to week as follows: week 2-87.5%, week 3-90%, week 4-90%, week 5-92.5%, and week 6-95%.
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Do for the first day I just did the volume day (5x8@75%)and I was incredibly sore. I was just testing it out so I tried it on a Friday, one of my first workouts after RFL, and like I said above it really kicked my butt. So I did it again on Monday, I was still a pretty sore but i just repeated the workout so the hypertrophy was on Monday. Sadly I missed my first power day which would have just been 5 sets of singles or squat and bench.

So today I did my 3 sets of AMRAP @85% for the big 3.

Squat was pretty flat and I hit 270 for 3, 3 and 5 (last set being low bar). So estimatedly that puts my 1rm at 315 and I was programming at 320. So nothing there.

Bench was a better story where my AMRAP went 7, 5, 6 at 190lbs which put bench at 235 and I started with my planning at 225. So that was pretty encouraging.

Deadlift AMRAP was 7,1,1 at 335lbs. After the first set I decided to play it cool for the last two sets. I still had to move a friend later in the day and hitting 7 reps was my goal which puts my estimated 1rm at 415lbs and I had been programming at 395. This felt pretty good considering I hit a 360x3 the previous week. Anyways I am going to ride out the next 5 weeks on this program and then try and see what I like and what I don't and migrate it back to a more HST looking workout.
 
I finished my first (consistent) week and started into my second. So far the lifting has been encouraging. For this weeks volume day for Bench I did a 5x8 @ 180lbs and it went really well. Last week at 175lbs I missed my last two reps on the 5x8. It was nice to see bench increasing. Next week I will go to 180 for my 5x8. This will be a new frontier for me I've never really benched that much for that kind of volume, pretty exciting.

Squat is ok, for volume I did my 5x8 @ 235lbs. I hit my numbers but for sets 4 and 5 I switched to low bar. I'm not in love with my squat performance. I fall out of form more than I want, I hit weird sticking points, sometimes my hips twist throughout the motion etc. I just don't really like squatting but that's the main focus of this program so I am just going to ride it out and keep improving my skill/mobility etc. Next week I will go to 240 for my 5x8.
 
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Finished my second amrap day and it worked out really well. I made some adjustments to my squat and everything came together and I got 265 x 10. Bench went pretty good, it had been going so well that I had higher hopes but it was still good and got 205 x 6 and failed at the top of the 7th. This still represented an increase over last weeks projected 1rm but I wanted more. Deadlift was like bench, I increased but I thought I would get a bit more, anyways I got 350 x 7 and I had wanted 9. Anyways, if I can keep at this pace a 400/300/500 might be possible by July.
 
Had a good volume day. With the adjustments I've made in squat form the sets have gone much better. Entering the 3rd week the program moves to a 4x8 so I kicked up the weight a bit and did 250lbs on the squat, sets went great. Bench I went to 185 for the 4x8 and they went pretty easy too. It was neat to see at the beginning of the cycle I did my amrap at 190 for 7 reps but hit my volume day at 185.

Messed around and did some accessory work for fun, deadlift holds and some BTN presses at super low weights.
 
Had a really crappy Wednesday, I was super beat up and spent too much time messing around on the computer. I was really achy and more shoulders started hurting again. I only made it through 1 set of bench. I went home and worked on my mobility big time hoping to get myself healed up by Friday.

Friday went ok. I need to stick with high bar squats until I get my form down for low bar. Anyways, Friday is amrap day. Squats I got 300 x 5, Bench I got 220 x 5 and Deads I got 365 x 5 (I really wanted 6...). To be honest I think I over reached a bit between the great workouts I had on the previous Fri/Mon, anyways I am really working on my active recovery so that I can have a good volume day this Monday.
 
So last Monday I had squats at 4x8@255lbs and bench 4x8@190lbs. I was starting to feel like I was getting sick but I wanted to stay on my schedule and I figured I would just rest a lot and be back on track for Friday. While I hit my numbers the cold was pretty brutal and I was in no shape to work out. I ended up losing 5lbs and felt terrible during the week and a half being sick.

Yesterday I went back into the gym and just worked up to the weights I had done previously for a single set. I'm not sure if I would have attempted to hit the full sets x reps if I would have gotten them but it's possible the weight wasn't really that heavy. Anyways this Friday I will hit the amraps again and see where my strength is. If it is in the ball park I will just continue with my 4th week as if there wasn't a an 11 day break. If it isn't close then I will restart with my new training maxes.
 
Here was my log before I got sick.

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Here is my log since I recovered. I changed it up a bit so that I am doing hypertropy, power and then strength for each of the big 3 but on a rotation so each day I am doing one of each for each of the lifts. You can see the first week back that I hadn't recovered from being sick so I had to drop my weights. This resulted in hitting some unusually high numbers in my AMRAPs. I will adjust that next cycle.


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Interesting, I'll give DUP a try after I finish my linear progression if I want to continue focusing on strength, it seems promising.
Are the power movements the 5x1? Where I'm guessing you use a little less weight than on the strength days but you lift it as explosively as possible?
 
Yeah, I try and be explosive if I have the energy or I work on perfecting my form. Sometimes I am pretty wiped out from hypertrophy so I just use it as a recovery day. Five singles at the percentage is frankly pretty easy so you have some room to play with there. When I first started the program I didn't understand the concept of power day at all but I've really grown into it.

I also don't have the percentages listed in there. Hypertrophy starts at 75%, Power is 80% and Strength (amrap) is 85%. In the original study those percentages increase to create a peaking situation. I don't really care about peaking so I don't do that I just have a linear increase of 5lbs per week to create a progressive overload.

I also do some accessory work but it's less regulated and I don't really keep a written record of it.
 
I like it, where did you originally get the setup from?
It's definetly powerlifting oriented, not sure if you could also throw in a vertical push, vertical pull, and horizontal pull as well on the same setup, it may be too much for each day. Perhaps it would have to be put in as minimal accessory work.
 
Overall: So I wrapped up my first full cycle of DUP which I capped at an arbitrary 8 weeks. I liked the week to week progress and I was able to deal with the fatigue by keeping myself to just one set of amraps. Two things that particularly resonated with me was the variable rep patterns and the weekly amrap set. I liked that I used different weight and rep schemes throughout the week and then that I could test my progress with the amrap. In future iterations I may move the amrap to once every two weeks since, while it is fun, it may be impeding my progress.

Problems: I dealt with some muscle stiffness throughout the cycle; hips, upper and lower back and the pecs. To combat this I did a lot of mobility work on the off days, sometimes up to an hour while watching television with the wife. This mainly consisted of foam rolling and using a baseball to work the tender tissues. I picked up a couple of static stretches that really helped out with all the fibers that connect into the hip bone. The main stretch that really helped out with the hips and particularly the gluteus medius was where you cross your legs, keep them straight and push your chest towards your toes. Evidently you can do this standing (which I did) or sitting.

Also I got sick <insert baby cry face>, I faced a pretty serious flu. It took me down for 3 weeks and I was pretty weak for about 2 weeks after you can particularly see the effects in week 1 of DUP2, further it cut DUP1 down to just 3 weeks and a day.

Successes: The big success was my strength gains. Measuring them accurately is a little hard because between DUP 1 (about 3 weeks) and Dup 2 (8 weeks) because of the sickness. Regardless I was still really happy with my strength progress over the total of 11-12 weeks of DUP. In the first two weeks of DUP 1 I had a projected total of 985 and 1040 averaging at about 1015ish. By the end of DUP2 my projected total was 1150, granted these are projections but it was still really encouraging to see.

In practical numbers squat went from a 255x7 to a 305x9. Bench went from a 195x7 to 225x6 (bench seemed to suffer the most from getting sick). Deadlift went from 335x8 to 385x7. My squat has the most room to grow as I continue to work on my form. Right now I still squat high bar to protect my shoulders but I will continue to work on moving back to low bar. Further my hips have fought getting good at squatting but they are coming along slowly (stupid me for sitting so much of my adult life).

Next cycle: I am not going to do an SD, I kind of took a off day on the last Wednesday where I skipped my Deadlift 5x1 and my squat amrap, I was just kind of tired and didn't feel like making it happen that day. Friday I came back and hit my volume for squat and a new rep pr for Deadlifts and today (two days later) I am feeling good and ready to go lift. So I am jut going to keep this gains train rolling for as long as I can.

I won't be really changing anything for this next 8 week cycle, I will continue with my same general format. Due to the progressive nature I am projected to do my amraps with 390lbs for squat, 270 for bench and 455 for deadlift. Based on today's strength that means bench and squat will be about 95-100% of my 1rm for the amrap (so I will probably only be getting singles/doubles in the final weeks). This may be too much time under near max loads so if I start to get too beat up I will decrease the weights.

I may also have to halt the progression (or just slow it) for fatness reasons. At the start I was about 188 and now I am about 196, I defintely look a little fluffier and I have the wife on "fat-man" watch. If I get too heavy looking when I start into the 200lbs I will have to diet down. I am hoping to make it through once last cycle and pull 500lbs (which is my goal) before dieting down, so we will have to see how that goes.
 
Damn, real solid PRs there. I hope for progress like that when I start my bulk. Your bench and squat #s pre-DUP are where mine are now, basically.

Good work.
 
Well I am in week three of DUP2 and I continued on from the previous cycle, point being that the weights are getting pretty heavy. This week the amraps were all of my previous 1rms from July. Friday or Sat morning I am doing my Deadlift amrap but so far bench was 230x5, squat was 340x3 which wasn't great. The previous week I did bench-215x9 and squat-335x6. Anyways bad weeks happen.

I've been having a lot of soreness since mid last week, I think I overreached a bit and my recovery protocols have slipped a little (or a lot). Anyways back to the supplements (fish oil, potassium, calcium, and some green concentrate), in bed by 10pm, regular foam rolling/mobility work and dropping beer from the diet.

I'll be pulling 405 tomorrow or Saturday and I am hoping to get 5-6 reps. Based on projection I'd guess I want 7-8 to be able to pull 500 so I am still a ways away from my goal.

As far as weight goes I've been at about 200lbs for 2 weeks. 200 is a big benchmark to see if I had turned into a fatty but the wife and I are pretty happy with the body fat levels so I am going to push to 210 and reassess then. (Last time I was at 200 all my cloths stopped fitting, this time its not an issue so far which is very nice.)
 
I know, I love it, but the negative affects are pretty clear on my training. :(

I need to beef beer meal replacement option...
 
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