5x5 and other stories

johnybean

Kelly Starrett has a brilliant youtube page here which has over 500 videos of mobility WODs. He recommends getting
1. Foam Roller
2. Lacrosse balls (I find a single hockey ball does the trick here)
3. Resistance bands (like the ones discussed here, I went for the green and red ones from D8 fitness)
You said you are on board with the foam roller so I will skip that one (Would just add to get the grid foam roller if possible, not the cheap knockoffs as they wont last you long, recommendations for good foam rollers here)
The hockey ball is good for getting into those areas where your foam roller cant reach such as your scapula. its also good for applying pin point pressure to trouble area. for me, this entails rolling my calves with the hockey ball and sitting on it with one cheek of my gluteus maximus and rolling the crap out of it. I also roll it up and down my quads while watching telly in the evenings.
The resistance bands are good for stretching your hips, glutes and hamstrings. you can also use them to assist with pulls ups and dips if you want.
That is an outline of the three main pieces of mobility equipment, you can do without the resistance bands for now if you want. I would also recommend Kelly's book "becoming a supple leopard" but you will get loads of info to get started from his youtube page.
One of the great things about the mobillity stuff is that you can do it anywhere. You should be doing relevant mobility/foam rolling stuff prior to each workout but you can also do foam rolling/hockey balling for a few minutes every day.
Another long winded answer to a simple question

awesomelakes

johnybean wrote: »

Kelly Starrett has a brilliant youtube page here which has over 500 videos of mobility WODs. He recommends getting
1. Foam Roller
2. Lacrosse balls (I find a single hockey ball does the trick here)
3. Resistance bands (like the ones discussed here, I went for the green and red ones from D8 fitness)
You said you are on board with the foam roller so I will skip that one (Would just add to get the grid foam roller if possible, not the cheap knockoffs as they wont last you long, recommendations for good foam rollers here)
The hockey ball is good for getting into those areas where your foam roller cant reach such as your scapula. its also good for applying pin point pressure to trouble area. for me, this entails rolling my calves with the hockey ball and sitting on it with one cheek of my gluteus maximus and rolling the crap out of it. I also roll it up and down my quads while watching telly in the evenings.
The resistance bands are good for stretching your hips, glutes and hamstrings. you can also use them to assist with pulls ups and dips if you want.
That is an outline of the three main pieces of mobility equipment, you can do without the resistance bands for now if you want. I would also recommend Kelly's book "becoming a supple leopard" but you will get loads of info to get started from his youtube page.
One of the great things about the mobillity stuff is that you can do it anywhere. You should be doing relevant mobility/foam rolling stuff prior to each workout but you can also do foam rolling/hockey balling for a few minutes every day.
Another long winded answer to a simple question

Thanks for that! As someone who is completely new to all of this you're answers are really helpful. Will definitely look at getting this equipment in the next few weeks.

awesomelakes

Workout B today:

Squats 2x5 @ 25kg, 3x5 @ 30kg
Couldn't record, didn't have the handy squat rack in the corner today. Felt good, although the 30kg was a bit tough. Focusing a lot of not letting my knees go in, keeping my chest up, and leading with my hips. Hoping I'll get the hang of it all soon.

Deadlift 1x5 (60kg)
Got the first four reps fine, it was tough but got them all done. Had to repeat the fifth one three times, until it was perfect. One of my hands kept slipping. Haha I swear I felt like a lion whose ripping apart a gazelle and simultaneously giving birth to Jesus Christ when I got that last rep in. Had a huge smile on my face, even though the lads deadlifting around me all had a 60kg warm up.

Overhead Press 4x5 @ 8kg, 1x5 @12kg
I've been doing it wrong noooo. Dropped weight, fixed form, and it was still tough as hell. Definitely my least favourite exercise.

Mr. Manager

awesomelakes wrote: »

Workout B today:

Squats 2x5 @ 25kg, 3x5 @ 30kg
Couldn't record, didn't have the handy squat rack in the corner today. Felt good, although the 30kg was a bit tough. Focusing a lot of not letting my knees go in, keeping my chest up, and leading with my hips. Hoping I'll get the hang of it all soon.

Deadlift 1x5 (60kg)
Got the first four reps fine, it was tough but got them all done. Had to repeat the fifth one three times, until it was perfect. One of my hands kept slipping. Haha I swear I felt like a lion whose ripping apart a gazelle and simultaneously giving birth to Jesus Christ when I got that last rep in. Had a huge smile on my face, even though the lads deadlifting around me all had a 60kg warm up.

Overhead Press 4x5 @ 8kg, 1x5 @12kg
I've been doing it wrong noooo. Dropped weight, fixed form, and it was still tough as hell. Definitely my least favourite exercise.

Fair play on going over the BW for the DL. Don't worry about what others are lifting around you cause they're sure not looking at what you're lifting

Keep it up.

awesomelakes

Absolutely raging that I had to take a weeks break due to medical reasons. Will be back with 5x5 on Monday morning, really can't wait for it.

Tomorrow I'll be heading to the gym for a bit of stretching, and maybe just some light work to check my forms. It's been a tough week with college so I'm dying to do something.

awesomelakes

Been dreadful at logging lately.

But here's a few changes I've made:

-Squat has gone up from 30kg to 40kg with no knee pain.

-Deadlift has gone from 60kg with poor form to 65kg with better form, although I'm a bit disappointed with only a 5kg increase.

-Benchpress has plateaued at 32.5kg, which I'm fine with because I've neglected this and focused more on push ups for the past while.

-Have changed my routine from 5x5 to something Hanley wrote up because I found I was getting stuck on weight a fair bit going up 2.5kg every session with the 5x5. Going to take it a bit slower ad steadier from now.

Just about to place an order with D8 Fitness as well, about to get a foam roller and some bands.

A few things I'm hoping to get done by Christmas:

- Squat BW (50kg)
- Deadlift 70kg
- Benchpress 35kg (really struggling with this one so I thought I'd make the challenge easy enough)

awesomelakes

Just back from the gym.

Workout A

Did some stretches, worked on mobility for 15ish minutes.

Squats 5x5 35kg

Did inverted rows in between. Found the squats hard enough, but kept the form tidy. For the last few sets I'm not sure if I was going low enough each time, will focus on this in my next session. I also think I'm flaring out my elbows a bit, will work on this too.

Inverted Rows 5x5
Felt great, definitely need to significantly lower the bar next time.

Push Ups 5x8 (with two 25kg weights underneath)
Still can't do a full push up for this many reps, so I just go down until my chest hits the top 25kg weight on the floor. Hoping to drop down to just one 25kg weight by next week, but we will see. Did deadlifts between this.

Deadlifts 5x3 50kg
Dropped down to 50kg instead of my usual 60kg, felt pretty fúcked at this point and would not have gotten all my sets in. The last set was pretty crap, lots of rest in between and I had to redo the last rep 3 times until I was happy with it. Arse could have been a bit lower during the lift too but kept my chest up and really felt it in the hamstrings so form must be improving.

Plank 2x45secs
Absolutely fúcked at this point. Longest session I've ever done, possibly in my life. Want to work my way up to doing 5 sets of 45 seconds over the next few weeks, then I'll work on increasing the time.


Ended the session with some yoga stretches, then took the uphill cycle home because I was so full of energy (and also because I got a new bike and it's pretty unreal).

NOW the real work starts.

My damn diet, finding it so hard to not do the usual student thing and order in or just cover some pasta with cheese and call it a meal. But I really have to control this for both fitness reasons and medical reasons, so I'm going to start logging daily how much protein, carbs and fat I should be eating, and how much I'm actually eating. Here's today so far:

Protein: 99/120
Carbs: 132/100
Fat: 65/60

[well balls ]

Aiming for around 1,500cal a day, hoping to increase in the future but for now this is enough of a struggle as it is.

awesomelakes

Just got a foam roller, bands and a lacrosse ball.

Was hoping I'd be able to bring the foam roller to the gym but it is huge so looks like it'll be just for home use, will update how I got on with the lot tomorrow after my gym session.

As for kcals, protein, carbs and fat today the answer is just not enough and never again will I ever try to do an assignment all day on just two cans of red bull ever again. Ever. Feeling crappy. :rolleyes:

awesomelakes

Workout B today:

Deadlift 5x5 40kg
Had to put down all my weights today, physically couldn't get the 5x5 with 50kg. Feeling a bit disappointed but I'm going to put it down to having an off day and the fact that I've never done 5x5 with deadlifting.

Push Ups 5x5
I think I'm getting better with these, could bring the chest down a bit more today.

Squats 5x8 25kg
Really struggled doing sets of 8 with these, so I put the weight right down. Next time I do 5x8 I think I will put it up though.

Inverted Rows 5x8
Did these between the squats, felt fine but the last set was a bit tougher than I thought it would be.

Plank (RKC) 3x15secs
Could have probably gotten the 5 sets I was supposed to do but laziness took over.

Ended this session with some more mobility work, some yoga stretches and some really awful foam rolling. Going to look up how to actually use a foam roller today because I had no idea what I was doing.

ThunbergsAreGo

awesomelakes wrote: »

Giving that niggling pain in my knees one more week to sort itself out, then it's off to the physio! Would much rather be down €50/€60 than to be injured this early on in my training.

On a brighter note I'll be off wall climbing tonight! Decided to do something fun after all the work I've been putting in to my course recently.

Good log btw!

Quick question on the knee pain, i was on 5x5 and goot this myself was it inner/outer? Mine was right knee upper inner of knee cap

awesomelakes

naughtb4 wrote: »

Good log btw!

Quick question on the knee pain, i was on 5x5 and goot this myself was it inner/outer? Mine was right knee upper inner of knee cap

Thanks!

Mine was more of a constant dull throb, with sharp pains in the upper part of my knee cap when I was cycling. Fixed it with some stretches and a better squat form, I reckon I was just trying to go up in weights too fast without perfecting my forms.

I'd suggest you go see a physio if your pain persists though, I'm not a doctor I'm afraid, just a lowly undergrad!

Good luck with your training, hope 5x5 is going well for you.