Today I decided to get some training volume up a different way. Normally after 2-3 sets of Assisted MU my form breaks down and I either need to move onto something else or require the use of more assistence (which i am trying to avoid)
So today I decided to keep the assistence the same throughout the day and did the following every hour on the hour from 8am - 4 pm- 8 sets.
1. Jungle Gym XT - L-seat pullups x 4 reps (held last rep for slow 5 count) 2. Tiger Push ups on the valslides x 15 reps 3. Assisted muscle up combo- 5 assisted MU>>10 Dips at top (unassisted) >> 10 assisted pullups. I did a video to show exactly what this is.
Before every set I did a small warm up - 5 mins max Forward and backwards roll Foam & softball rolling of thoracic / shoulder area JGXT mobility Cable - row >>ext rotation>> press 15 L & R
Each mini workout took 10 minutes each hour to complete.
I quite like this approach to getting skills volume up whilst keeping fresh. I might start doing this with my handstand walking and parallette work also. (of which I constructed one half of perfectly out of Plumbing pipe however I left one of the pipe elbows back home in Darwin so I could not finish the other parallette...pissed off too as I was looking to pick these skills up whilst away this fortnight).
Intermittent Fasting
I am back on the IF cycle now I have some consistency to my diet & training regime. Its tough to get any continuity when I am back home in Darwin.
I did 10 days of IF at 16/8 (16 hours fasting with 8 hours feeding) then 5 days where it was more like 13/11 and now I am back to 16/8. I have already dropped 2kg in 4 days just by reducing my eating times by 3 hours. I am down a total of 4kg, 111kg down to 107kg which is pleaseing.
My eating schedule looks something like this
Last meal 7.30pm the night before
6.30am Up and get ready for work.
7.30 Arrive at work and do my shoulder routine or Eischens Yoga
8.00am start work
8am -11.30am 2 x coffee (with stevia and a small amout of rice milk) and 2 green teas. Today because I was doing mini workouts on the hour I sipped on a essential/branch chain amino drink prior to each one. This is the norm with fasted training. Normally I do not train in a fasted state as I have my first meal 2 hours prior to training which seems to work better for me.
11.30- First Meal big bowl with a mix of oats, raw muesli ,pumkin & sunflower seeds, almond flakes(soaked overnight in rice and oat milk). I also add raw meal protein powder and a banana to the mix. Its awesome, I love this meal.
1.30pm Usually my workout time of the day (except for today)
2.30 Protein smoothie (post workout)- bananas, spinach leaves, blueberries (frozen), cocoa nibs, rice,hemp and pea protein mix. I love these too. I normally make enough for two shakes and drink it later in the day.
4.00pm- 2 x spinach and peanut tofu wraps ( rye or barley mountain bread wraps)
5.00pm Half of second protein drink.
6.00pm Ride home and normally do some bodyweight drills at the school playground
7.00pm Finish the remaining half of protein drink
7.30pm Dinner- Big bowl of salad and steamed veggies (with anything from vegetable pilaf, to a chickpea/lentil mix) or anything else that looks good at the shops that I can add to the mix. I eat for nutrients most of the time and rarely for taste.
I snack on trail mix and organic food vegan protein bars if I need more food.
I am quite enjoying this way of eating as I am not starving myself and I am not limiting myself if I want to splurge (if I want eat badly or have a beer I do). The morning fast is actually easy to get through and I can eat all afternoon without watching calories (which I have never been a fan of!)
This is certainly a good way to trim down (which is my aim to reach some goals with bodyweight drills) without crash dieting and without reducing your training performances.
I got back to work last Thursday the 27th of October. I work away for two weeks at a time at a remote fire station posting if you were not aware.
Whilst I am away I am going to really start concentrating on my shoulder health, they are starting to play up again. The daily routine (which I started yesterday) looks like this.
Shoulder Pre-hab Routine 1) Foam rolling- use a roller, hockey ball. and pressure point spike 2) Chest expander rotations (inlocates etc) 3) TNT cable work (side raises, rear riases, row to external rotation topress) 4) JXGT pulls and stretches from all sorts of angles 5) Assisted backdomes (over swiss ball)
It takes about 15 minutes in the mornings and already I feel better.......probably in my head.
Bodyweight Training
I am really loving the bodyweight training these days. I would say 90% of my training is with bodyweight and associated bodyweight tools. At times its 100%, which I am thinking will become the norm, one set of heavy KB deadlifts 4 days ago and my lower back is still giving me grief...... a no brainer really!!
With the Lifeline portable gear I bring down here with me I can train anywhere anytime: at work, at the palyground or at home after work. Its great to have a gym everywhere I go.
The gear I have with me at all times
Lifeline Skipping rope- heavy & extra heavy Lifeline Power jumper Lifeline Pullup revolution (and body belt) Lifleine Jungle Gym XT Valslides (Power wheel is too big to bring down unfortunately)
This gear is all I need for all my training and all fits into a small carry bag which is also super light to travel with.
Training Thursday & Friday October 27 & 28th
Thursday I went back to relive the Boomerang upper body workout except I did it in a 30 work / 30 sec rest format. I then rested for two minutes then did it in a 15 work / 15 rest format.
I really like this workout. You do have to get cracking to get to your next exercise in the 15/15 sets though. Results as follows. The pullups were all asisted by 30lb in both drills.
JGXT Bulgarian split squat 4 x20 L & R ( first 10 reps were jumps, second 10 regular reps) JGXT Hamstring curls 4 x 8 L & R (held supine bridge whilst doing all reps on one side)
Friday
I decided to have a mess around with Muscle ups and variations today and ended up having a good little workout. Found an awesome warm up exercise for muscle ups on the cable machine we have down here after the getting the idea from a work mate (Aiden O shea- whom I have cool little clip of doing a power jumper assisted Maltese cross on the gymnastic rings which I will post next blog.)
Here is a clip of the muscle up warm up exercise I did. 4 sets of increasing weight
3 x Assisted Muscle ups (23kg assis)6 reps, at top of 6th rep>>>10 full bw dips>>then back down for 10 assisted pullups. All done one after the other whilst remaining on the bar.
4x 2 sets - Super slow eccentric drop / static hold Block handstands- picked 4 positions on the way down from the top of a HS and held each positon for 5 secs. Pushing back to the top for the second rep was very very tough.
3 x 8 assisted rollouts from standing
Rode my bike home 8km and on the way stopped at the school playground and alternated dips with PUR pullups for 20 mins. Didnt count reps just kept good form and varied the grip or angle of the movement each set.
When I got home I messed around with some push up variations and combinations for 10 mins.
This past week has been a terrrible week for my training.
I flew home from work last Thursday the 20th of October and took the day off due to the 6 hour flight home knocking me around. Things did not progress much from there.
I have a lot going on at present, so my mind has been everywhere but in my training, my sleeping pattern has gone out the window and so has my eating regime. I had been closely sticking to an Intermittent fasting protocol (16/8- 16 hours of fasting followed by 8 hours of refeeding) which had been going well stripping 3kg in 10 days with no noticeable strength loss. Due to the heat of Darwin forcing me to train early in the morning my fasting has been interupted earlier in the day than I would like. I do not do well training on an empty stomach so the fast has taken a back seat this past week.
Speaking of the heat it has been a disgrace here lately and I really look forward to the day I move down south (yes it is that bad!!). I love the people here and the lifestyle is very laid back however training is such an important part of my life and it suffers hugely in the heat and humidity of the top end.
So training in the past week went something like this
Thursday - off
Friday
Silverback upper body challenge. To gain access to the silverback club a 6 min pass mark is required in this challenge (one of many requirements to gain memebership)
10 reps clean & Push press with 2x36kg KB>> 45 dips>> 25 Pullups >> 55 pushups >> 10 reps Cl & PP with the 36s
I was going well until the second round of 10 reps where I really struggled. My time was 7.01 mins which was down from my previous best of 7.10. Not bad but know I can improve by 20-30 secs. Dont know however where I am going to find the rest of the time to get under 6 min tho...hmmmm
Saturday
Valslide 50m>> skipping doubles heavy rope 50>> vals 45m >>45 doubles>>> etc down to 20 and 20. This took me 18 mins but i was toasted in the heat.
Sun- off
Monday - attempted clean and press drill 15 work/15 rest for 10 mins with the 2 x 32kb and pulled it at 30 reps as I was flat big time. Pulling out of the Cl & PP gave me the shits big time so i decided to take it out on one set of deadlifts with the 2x 64 kg kb (thick handled too which is massive disadvantage) and got 28 reps so the day was not a total loss.
Tuesday
Today I had a big plans for my training as I have had some time off in recent days. Not to be however!!
I had planned on doing 10 rounds of the following with the 10kg vest on but got through 5 rounds before the heat claimed me!
JGXT Muscle up x 12 reps
Dips x 12 reps
34" box jumps x 12 reps
The 10 kg vest cut my breathing off big time and I again just did not feel good at all. Instead of perservering with bad sets i called it early again.
I am thinking i am going to have a full week off intense work and go back to having some fun with strength skills work- Handstands, Muscle up technique work, planches, levers etc. No reps just strong movement with good form with plenty of rest.
Here is a picture that just goes to show you anything is possible- 255lb one arm handstand. Damn
Due to my right shoulder continually playing up (extreme Infra & Teres inflammation / soreness) I have been doing the following in the mornings to flush the area full of blood and gain some more mobility in the area.
Adducted External rotations 3 x 10 (increasing band resistence each set)
Side cable raises 3 x 10
Low to high band row / external rotation to press 3 x 10
Chest expander drills
Hockey ball rolling.
Back domes
This is day 3 of this procedure and I already feel relief in the area which is also easing the elbow pain I have been having ( I always new this was related just too lazy to add the extra little things in......usual story with injuries!!).
Training
Today I did a 15 sec work / 15 rest for 5 min drill of the following exercises
1) Clean & Push Press 2 x 28 kg kb = 50 reps (Goal was 50 which I got fairly easy, 5 reps every 15 secs for 10 sets .... 32's here I come)
2) Dips / 20kg Assisted chin ups ( 5 sets of each ) - 12,12,9,9,9 / 12,10,9,8,8
3) Bulgarian Split squat (both front & rear leg raised for increased depth) 1 x 32kg kb, 8 reps for all 5 sets L & R. I will go to 1 x 36 or 2 x 20 kg next time.
4) PW walks- (used valslides) got 15m for each of the 10 sets.
I only rest 2 mins between each of the exercises so I got the workout done in 30 mins.
Awesome workout, I really like this.
Rode the bike home from work 8km into a howling headwind (took forever on the mountain bike)
Monday 17th of October
Shoulder routine in the morning as well as some hip opening Yoga and Mobility work
I took the day off from training as I felt jaded. I did however ride the bike home from work...again into a howling headwind which was tough.
Foam rolled and did some yoga whenI got in from the ride
Tuesday the 18th of October
Morning - Shoulder routine / Hip opening work (and some extreme rectus femoris myofascial rolling which was murder)
I started my workout today with 9 sets of 10m handstand walking (I wanted to get to 100m but got an headache on the 7th set which did not go away so I stopped after 9 sets)
Waited a bit for my headache to subside which it did....strange!
I then did the following circuit.
A) Bodyweight push press 8 reps (got the hang of these today and got good clean reps)
B) Bodyweight cleans - 12" to 24" box jumps(2 red bands onthe power jumper) 10 reps
C) Assisted Muscle ups (36kg of assistence) 8 reps- these felt great today and got the transition a lot more quickly
did the above for 6 round.
Bar- barian style Buy-out
A) Daimond push ups 50 reps - 30,10 & 10
B) 50 Pullups (assisted 40kg) 24,16, & 10 reps
Rode home...No headwind thank god.
Here is Head Bar-barian Zef after the Jungle Gym master course in Chicago doing Muscle ups resisted with an orange C-Band. He went on to do the same with a yellow C-Band (70lbs of resistence at top) which I failed to record...damn it!
Day 3 into my intermittent fast diet and it still has the thumbs up. I am starting to feel lighter & leaner already...if that is possible in three days!!!
I am super clear in the mornings whilst fasting and my training has not suffered at all. I seem to be eating the same sized meals however I have probably cut out 2 meals per day due to the morning fast. Just goes to show you that you really do not have to feel hungry or make whole sale food changes to lean the body up.
Training
Today I decided to do 10 sets of 5 reps of a Bodyweight Clean & Push press / Assisted Muscle up drill.
1) Bodyweight Cleans- essentially jumps from a seated position simulating a KB clean. Usually i would use a power jumper but I left it at home so I decided to use 25kg on the cable stack with a waist belt attached (see video below)
2) Bodyweight push press- this is done by starting in a headstand on 10" blocks and bringing the legs down close to chest then kicking them up as you press into a handstand.
3) Assisted Muscle-ups. I have slowly dropped the assistance weight down with these. I had 25kg of assistance which is down form 35kg a month or so ago.
I took a video of one of the last sets so the form is not super clean. It is also not in the order I was doing the other sets, I had to set it up so I could catch it on my iphone without too much messing around.
I did some research today trying to find some ways to shake my diet up to give me some more energy and perhaps lose a bit of weight.
It seems I am a slave to my diet these days, I always seem to be eating even though its all good clean whole foods. With my current goals all aimed at bodyweight strength (bar-barian bar exam) these eating habits appear counterproductive.
After coming across the website www.leangains.com and their methods of intermittent fasting achieving great results at getting athletes lean without really having to "diet" I decided to give it a go.
I am in day 2 of my new eating plan and I love it. The basic guidelines are as follows:
Each day you fast from 14-16 hours. Essentially this starts after dinner at night until 11-12am the next day. There are a whole range of benefits to fasting.
You can either train in a fasted state (adding in creatine & BCAA) and eat your 3 main meals aftert training or have your first meal before training (which is what I am doing).
You can still eat exactly the same way your are now (no drastic changes required).
You get all your calories in 3 big meals with either 2 0r 3 of these after your training depending on your bodyweight goals and training style ). With all your calories coming after training whilst your insulin sensitvities are heightened the chances of gaining fat are greatly reduced even eating a moderate amount of rubbish if you so desire.
So far the fasting has been a breeze. I have a couple of coffees in the morning and it gets me through to 11am no problem whereby I have my first meal. I eat as much as I like in the 3 meals for the day so I do not feel like I am dieting at all, I am certainly never hungry.
Read the research behind the fasting principles they make a lot of sense. The diet myths, "you must eat breakfast", " you have to eat every 3 hours to keep your metabolism up", " you should eat 6 small meals per day to increase muscle gain" are all a load of rubbish.
I admit I have been hood winked by the food and supplement industry research handed down to the unsuspecting public over the years with biased conclusions that create these corporations massive income ever seeing the light of day. So do yourself a favour and get onto www.leangains.com and at least read some of the diets myths that get debunked.
Training
Today I was to do lower body work but I still am a little stiff from the jumping drills earlier in the week.
Instead I decided to do one max set of farmers walk handles deadlift. I loaded the bars with 75kg on each handle with the aim of getting combined total of 25 reps in as few sets as possible. After doing 25 with the 64kg kettlebells earlier in the week I thought I would get 20 reps rest quickly then finish with 5 reps.
I started slow but kept banging the reps out and ended up doing all 25 reps in one set which I was very happy with. I will aim at getting 25 with 80kg on each handle next week.
I rode the push bike home 8km into a raging headwind which toasted my thighs and stopped at the school playground where I messed around with jump muscle ups and Parallel bars L-Seat to HSPU
Here is a clip of the PB L-seat work, its not exactly international gymnastic standard however it certainly is progress for me which I am pleased with.
I trained with Ian Mckoy today. Ian is up from Sydney visiting the MBG to get a handle on some of the MBG methods before he heads off next week to do the CNT course in Madison.
Ian is great bloke and would be a good addition to the MBG in Australia.
Today we did a jump workout
A) 2 green bands on the Power jumper trying to hit a 9 ft 5" ceiling for 3 sets of 5 reps.
B) 3 sets of 5 with 1 green band rebound jump style.
We then took the power jumper off and did some 1 step approach jumps for a dozen or so reps at the basketball rim. Man Ian can certainly jump getting a good grip on the rim each jump and I am guessing being 5'8" or 5'9" in height. He also nailed a 51 inch standing box jump which is impressive.
We also messed around with some single leg jumps off both L & R appraoches at the b,ball rim
The workout was finished with 25 reps deadllift as heavy as possible. Felt quite good and good all 25 reps with the two 64kg bells.
Wed 12th of October
Had today off as I had not had a day off training in over 12 days (except for the 30 hour trip home from the US which did not help my recovery one bit, so I did not count this as a rest day)
Thursday 13th of October
Today I flew back to work (another 6 hours on a plane which did not have me amped to train at all)
I just decided to do something simple today so I did a bar-barian style "buy-in" 10-1 style.
Due to not training with anyone I just timed how long my sets took and doubled this time (to simulate two other people doing their sets in between whilst I held an incline plane / plank before starting my next set). This was a nasty wake up to start the workout.
I then did 4 sets of 3 reps alternating the following
a) HSPU - on 10" blocks. Head touching the floor each rep and waiting a second to deload before pressing back up (these were tough)
b) Pull ups with 20lb added (held the last rep for a 10 count)
I finished the workout with 4 sets alternating assisted muscle ups (70lb assitance) for 6-8 reps and block L- seat to handstands for 3-4 single attempts each set. Video below is of one of my attempts. You will notice the very graceful dismount :)
I have just returned from the U.S where I spent my time training and hanging out with Jon Hinds, Jeremy Liban and some of the awesome MBG crew. I was also priviliged enough to workout and pick up some expert training tips off the Bar-Barian training crew. Youtube what they can do you will be impressed!!
I was lucky enough to be invited over to participate the first Jungle Gym suspension training master course which was expertly run by MBG founder Jon Hinds in Chicago.
It was an awesome course where I got to meet some great trainers. I am now in a position to run the Jungle Gym courses Australia wide which will begin early next year.
The NY based training team the Bar-barians also made the journey to Chicago to do the course. These guys are super humble and also super human in the feats they performed on the bars....and also some of the exercises they performed on the the Jungle Gyms. Considering they have never used any suspension training tools prior to this course it was very impressive stuff. I will post some of the clips I took of them in future blogs.
The bench mark to get into their training crew is the following
5 Muscle ups (non kipping)
45 dips
25 Pullups
55 Push ups
5 muscle ups.
All done in under 6 minutes.
If that is not hard enough, all the movements must be done without coming off the bars (or dropping to the floor in the case of the push ups). This is ridiculously difficult.
Lets just say i wont be part of their crew in the near future..... unless i cut my legs off!!
I was fortunate enough to spend most my time in the US training with Jon Hinds, The Bar-Barians and Jeremy Liban (An awesome guy and also a freaky bodyweight master). I picked up some great tips and also had some great workouts which all performed in great spirits, it was a pleasure to be in such company.
Whilst hanging around in Madison ,Wisconsin for the week after the course I was also fortunate to meet and spend some time with Jon's family. Jons mother Joy and father Bobby are two super generous and amazingly energetic people. I certainly hope I am as vibrant as both Joy and Bobby when I am into my eighties.
Whilst in Madison I was also lucky enough to get to see a college football game. The Wisconsin Badgers played the Nabraska Cornhuskers for the first time in over 30 years as the CH had just been invited back into the BIG TEN. What an awesome spectacle with over 90 thousand people attending in this sell out crowd the performances by the band, dancers, cheerleaders and crowd were outof this world. It truely is an event of epic proportions. It is said that the college games have a much bigger following than even the NFL.
Training
I will list the last workout I did before leaving the US as there were too many others to list here. I will certianly be including some of the tips i picked up in this blog in the coming weeks.
HS Walking & J-ROCK workout.
Worked out out with Jon and pocket rocket Jeremy Liban- this was a cool workout.
Started with a U GO I GO format on handstand walks for 10 m each set. We got to 150 mbefore we stopped.
This was followed by 3 rounds alternating HSPU and Pullups in a J-Rock fashion (hardest to easiest version until you hit 20 reps). We did however rep out the last set even if it went past 20 reps.
Each set was made up of 3 mini sets until you hit 20 reps or more.
HSPU- set 1 with BW >> set 2 with 1 yellow on the BXT >> Set 3 2 Yellow on the BXT
Pullups- set 1 bw >> Set 2- 2 green on the PUR >> Set 3- 3 Bands on the PUR
Set 1 Set 2sets 3
HSPU11 / 910/9/49/8/4
Pullups10/6/59/6/68/7/6
Finshed with a bar-barian style buy-out (cant finish workout until the buy-out is done)- 50 daimond push ups.
Here is picture of the boys before they headed back to NY.
L to R- Jon Hinds, Myself, Zef, Rick, Andy and Jude in front. Thanks guys!
