Sticking to my recent rash of Rocky references, have a look at Rocky's face. This was what my body was like up until a month ago:
In relative terms, this is what I feel like now:
I am obviously not like this superhero, but the comparison is notewrothy. I am able to lift weights again and it does not hurt. Oh, the joys of weightlifting and life in general. I missed lifting so badly. The legend Tommy Hayden is also coaching me and this has proven to be a winner so far. Tommy knows an awful lot about weightlifting and I know he will help me. I am just starting my third week of my first cycle and it is as basic as it comes. This is where the genius lies. It is basically progressive and it tells me exactly what to lift and how many times to do it. No silliness on my part and it takes me out of the equation.
My program is delightfully basic: There are four sessions and I alternate them each week:
Day 1/3
Snatch: 2X3@70%
1X3@75%
6x2@80% Week one
1x1@85% + 5x2@ 80% Week two
1x1@90% +4x2 @80% Week three
95%+ with no back off sets Week four
Power Clean and Power Jerk: follows the same progression as above.
Day 2/4 are the same progressions but with the Clean and Jerk coming first and the power Snatch coming after. I cannot squat because my ankle is still in jiblets, so I am doing 6x3 in the barbell split squat at the moment. I love this movement very much. it opens up my hips at the end of my sessions when I get really tight and I get some excellent squating movements done uniaterally which is a winner when you cannot squat bilaterally.
I train three times a week weightlifting and once a week doing an upper body strength session. Tommy wanted me to train four times a week, but in my first cycle back, I don't want to do this in case I aggravate me lower back. In my first week, I definitely could only have done three sessions because I was pretty sore at the third despite getting a massage and two soft tissue trreatments that week. I had to actually leave the final bit of my workout because my lower back started hurting again,
In my second week of training, I was able to get all three sessions in fully and also step up to 85% weights. I actually felt healthier at the end of the week than I did at the beginning of the third week. My hips are the most flexible they have ever been and are still improving slowly but surely. My hip flexors, quads and hamstrings are still relatively tight, but they are getting better also. I was lifting better in the second week and starting to get my feel back for the weights.
I am now two sessions into my third week and with the weights going up to 90%, I can definitely feel it in the body as a whole. It has been so long since I have lifted anything of note that it will take me a while to get used to the heavier weights again. I have faith in myself though. I have an Irish squad session this weekend and it is a week short in my program, but I will see what I can lift on the day anyway. I am basing this program off a conservative 110/140 so they will be my obvious targets.
It is really nice to be back in the weightlifting world again. I missed not being a participant in the sport and I can't wait to train with and hang around with the lads again.
One thing I know is that in my weightlifting and athletic career, I don't want to have one of these moments because I gave up:
It would be too easy to give up. A lot of people have told me to give up becuse of my hip, but that is not what I am about. I will find a way to lift the weights that I want to lift and I am very happy I am going about it the right way so far. I am getting more flexible and mobile in my joints and I will continue to get healthier and stronger. I will just have to go about it in a different way to most people! If i have not reached this guy's standard of movement in the next few months, I can officially be called a loser by Murph while he wears this guy's awesome pants:
Showing posts with label injuries. Show all posts
Showing posts with label injuries. Show all posts
Monday 27 February 2012
Saturday 11 February 2012
What I learned from a disappointing sixth installment in an awesomely primal franchise.
Well, I thought I would make a blogging and weightlifting comeback; if I enjoy writing it, I will stick with the blog. Weightlifting: always! My last few months of blogging was a chore though, so I am glad I stopped.
For the last three months I have not been able to squat or do the classical lifts. This was immensely frustrating, but like all things in life, reflection leads to learning. So, in this comeback post, I will give a brief rendition of where I am now and what I have been doing since September. Here is the soundtrack to listen to while you read this post:
On Monday, I had my first proper weightlifting training session in three months. I loved being able to do the classical lifts again and it kicks several shades of fecal matter out of regular strength and conditioning work. Today's post shall be about what I was doing from July up to mid November.
When I came back from California Strength in the end of June ( you read the posts below and also watch the amazing interviews ), the back problem I had continued to get worse and I modified my lifting so that I could continue. In August, I found out that I had a labral tear in my right hip and an osteophyte in my right hip and a smaller one in my left hip also. This is where a bony growth forms to protect the damaged joint and is essentially osteo-arthiritis. This worsening condition was obviously causing havoc on the right hand side of my body and led to me getting a lower back injury that I could not shake from April to mid February. My old rugby shoulder injury prevented me pressing at all and my right ankle had also taken a beating and had a debilitating wear and tear injury. To put it bluntly, I was a shambles.
I finally understood why every time I trained hard, my hips and back would get stiffer and tighter so that I could not really train at all. My hip function was basically non existant in my lifting and I could never fathom how to get them to extend properly. When I worked on my flexibility, it never improved and my hips seemed to get more painful. With the results of the scan it finally dawned on me what was happening and it was more a blessing than a curse. Ignorance was most certainly not bliss in this case. I did not understand why I was not improving. Now I do.
In order to help my back injury recover and to protect my hip from getting worse, I changed how I trained. Instead of lifting from the floor, I lifted off either two thick plates or blocks that went between my shin and the bottom of my knee. I got a load of work done on my back, shoulder ( an old rugby injury that would not go away) and my hip. So, I trained from the low blocks from mid July to the end of September and I got stronger in these positions. I also started doing more pulling exercises and did some push presses also for general strength. I still couldn't press in the bottom range and all the work I had done on it did not seem to help my back or my shoulder at all. I also started squatting to a bench and when I started, I was really weak in these positions. In the beginning, I struggled with 180 and then two months later I hit 200 for a triple. Weak, yes, less weak then before. I was also still able to Front Squat and I hit 167kg which was a 2kg pb. Embarrassing, yes, but I got stronger in most things while my injuries continued to worsen.
Eventually, I got to the stage where I had to stop pulling off any kind because my back was quite inflamed and it hurt lifting with the bar. In the next post I will take you on my journey from November to mid February. I will address the things that I have learned of course, and over the next few weeks, I will write up a post about the biggest things I have learned since my lifting debacle that has been my last 9 months. But, this is a happy post because I know I will be a better lifter because of all this!
Power Snatch from blocks, then above knee and then below knee with 100kg:
Power Clean with 120 from block, then above knee, below knee and followed by Jerk:
Bench Squat single with 210kg:
This is a complete cliche of a speech, but cliches can be awesome. This is the message of my post and it shall be explained soon.
For the last three months I have not been able to squat or do the classical lifts. This was immensely frustrating, but like all things in life, reflection leads to learning. So, in this comeback post, I will give a brief rendition of where I am now and what I have been doing since September. Here is the soundtrack to listen to while you read this post:
On Monday, I had my first proper weightlifting training session in three months. I loved being able to do the classical lifts again and it kicks several shades of fecal matter out of regular strength and conditioning work. Today's post shall be about what I was doing from July up to mid November.
When I came back from California Strength in the end of June ( you read the posts below and also watch the amazing interviews ), the back problem I had continued to get worse and I modified my lifting so that I could continue. In August, I found out that I had a labral tear in my right hip and an osteophyte in my right hip and a smaller one in my left hip also. This is where a bony growth forms to protect the damaged joint and is essentially osteo-arthiritis. This worsening condition was obviously causing havoc on the right hand side of my body and led to me getting a lower back injury that I could not shake from April to mid February. My old rugby shoulder injury prevented me pressing at all and my right ankle had also taken a beating and had a debilitating wear and tear injury. To put it bluntly, I was a shambles.
I finally understood why every time I trained hard, my hips and back would get stiffer and tighter so that I could not really train at all. My hip function was basically non existant in my lifting and I could never fathom how to get them to extend properly. When I worked on my flexibility, it never improved and my hips seemed to get more painful. With the results of the scan it finally dawned on me what was happening and it was more a blessing than a curse. Ignorance was most certainly not bliss in this case. I did not understand why I was not improving. Now I do.
In order to help my back injury recover and to protect my hip from getting worse, I changed how I trained. Instead of lifting from the floor, I lifted off either two thick plates or blocks that went between my shin and the bottom of my knee. I got a load of work done on my back, shoulder ( an old rugby injury that would not go away) and my hip. So, I trained from the low blocks from mid July to the end of September and I got stronger in these positions. I also started doing more pulling exercises and did some push presses also for general strength. I still couldn't press in the bottom range and all the work I had done on it did not seem to help my back or my shoulder at all. I also started squatting to a bench and when I started, I was really weak in these positions. In the beginning, I struggled with 180 and then two months later I hit 200 for a triple. Weak, yes, less weak then before. I was also still able to Front Squat and I hit 167kg which was a 2kg pb. Embarrassing, yes, but I got stronger in most things while my injuries continued to worsen.
Eventually, I got to the stage where I had to stop pulling off any kind because my back was quite inflamed and it hurt lifting with the bar. In the next post I will take you on my journey from November to mid February. I will address the things that I have learned of course, and over the next few weeks, I will write up a post about the biggest things I have learned since my lifting debacle that has been my last 9 months. But, this is a happy post because I know I will be a better lifter because of all this!
Power Snatch from blocks, then above knee and then below knee with 100kg:
Power Clean with 120 from block, then above knee, below knee and followed by Jerk:
Bench Squat single with 210kg:
This is a complete cliche of a speech, but cliches can be awesome. This is the message of my post and it shall be explained soon.
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