New Phase of the Grow Season

Verse of the day: Fight the good fight of the faith; take hold of the eternal life to which you were called, and you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses. -1 Tim. 6:12

I am not doing a contest this year. But, I am guest posing at the INBF Atlantic Coast, in Greensborough, NC, on the 27th of June. So I am taking the next 4 weeks to shave off a little extra fat and work on the presentation portion. So I will change my split to increase the volume of my training and will only take 1 rest day a week. My current game plan looks like this:
Day 1: legs
Day 2: chest/ delt/ tris
Day 3: back/ trap/ bis
Training Monday- Saturday and resting on Sunday. This is subject to change.

Wed., 5/27/15, LEGS

Verse of the day: But as for you, do not grow weary of doing good. -2Thes. 3:13

I got in a great workout today. My friend Joe jumped in with me and help me push it. It was just the basics, and  pretty low volume. The theory here is: stimulate, not annihilate. We did: 5 warm-ups and a failure set for squats, 1 feel set and 1 failure set + drop set on the leg press, 1 feel set and 1 failure set of single leg curls, and 1 feel set and 3 failure sets of calf presses. The pump was awesome.

Mon., 5/25/15, Upper Body

Verse of the day: But the Lord is faithful, and He will strengthen and protect you from the evil one. -Thess. 3:3

Today I got in a great workout. My triceps, especially, were pumped from all of the pressing. I used a technique that I call the choo-choo: you start with super light weight and increase weight doing 5 reps until you can't get 5, then go back down getting as many as possible all the way to the start weigh.. no rest! I did this for biceps and triceps. Here's the whole workout:

5 sets incline Hammer press
1 set incline dumbbell press
1 set flat dumbbell press
1 set dips
2 sets pull-ups
1 set pull-downs
2 sets machine rows
3 sets Hammer Strength shoulder press
1 super-set lateral raise
    with bent-over laterals
choo-choo train cambered bar curl (5 sets up, 4 sets down, no rest)
choo-choo train pushdown (7 sets up, 6 sets down, no rest)

Wed, 5/20/15, legs

Verse of the day: whatever you do, do it with all your heart, as working for The Lord and not for man. -Col. 3:23

I got in an excellent leg workout this morning. My lower back was still a little stiff, but I stretched thoroughly and controlled every rep, and had no issues... Knees feel great too- no problems. I wasn't sure if I would do a bunch of reps or put a little more on the bar. Due to encouragement from a couple  dudes in the gym, I opted for the latter. After finishing the weights, I ended it with another thorough stretch session. Here's the workout:
Squat: 45-25;135-10;225-6;315-6;405-6
Leg press: 450-10; 900-13
Calf press: 540-15;750-12
Single leg curl: 80-9,65-10
Seated calf: 210-12
Machine calf: 400-14

Mon., 5/18/15, Upper Body

Verse of the day: Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are earth. -Col. 3:2

I got in a great workout yesterday. I knocked the volume down just a hair, but really put in the intensity. It was very fast, focused and intentional. For the chest, I continued my strength battle for the 10th rep of 360lb on the incline hammer strength press (I missed it by a hair again!) The chest was finished with the incline dumbbell press- just 1 set to failure. For the back I did 3 sets of V-grip pulldowns and 1 set of machine rows. The focus for delts was width, so I started with 3 sets of machine presses and finished with 1 set of laterals. I just did 3 super-sets of cambered bar curls and pushdowns for the  arms, and threw in 1 finishing set of skull-crushers to end the upper body. The workout ended with some decline crunches and of course the stepmill.

Thur., 5/14/15, Upper Body

Verse of the day: do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others. -Phil. 2:4

Today I got in a great upper body workout. I lightened the weight up a little and increased the reps. The intensity was still very high. Here's how it looked:
4 feel sets + 1 failure set of incline dumbbell presses
1 failure set of flat dumbbell press
1 failure set of dips
1 feel set + 1 failure set of Free-Motion pulldowns
1 feel set + 1 failure set of 1-arm dumbbell rows
1 feel set + 1 failure set of seated dumbbell presses
1 failure set of bent over lateral raises
2 feel sets + 1 failure set + 1 pump set dumbbell curls super-set with pushdowns
Most of the working sets were between 10 and 14 (the curls were 6 and the dips were 20)

Tue., 5/12/15, Legs

Yes. It is leg day again. Someone asked me today if I started squatting in all my workouts. Ha! Not quite... All my leg workouts, but not all my workouts. That's how much I centralize the squat: people think it's all that I do! Today it was actually all I did for my quads:

squat: 45-25; 95-25; 135-25; 225-15; 275-12; 325-6; 225-15
leg curl: 125-20, 13+3
calf press: 360-20; 540-20; 680-12; 540-13

Mon., 5/11/15, Upper Body

Verse of the day: ...walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called, -Eph 4:1b

I set short term strength goals in my head and focus on a particular exercise for a muscle group for a while. This helps me make progress. I've been psyching myself up for a while now to get 360 for 10 reps on the incline Hammer Strength chest press. I have narrowly missed it twice now. This morning I got the 10th rep about 1/2 way up. It will go!!! I am close. Today was very similar to the last several Monday's:

incline hammer: 50-25; 180-8; 270-6; 360-9 + fail
incline (high) dumbbell: 90s-8
flat dumbbell: 75s-16
pulldown: 135-13; 180-10; 225-9
row: 135-6; 225-10
Hammer shoulder press: 180-10; 270-5 + drop set
seated lateral: 35s-10
cambered bar curl: 60-6; 105-10; 85-10
  super-set with pushdown: (rope) 100-15; (V) 240-10; (rope) 100-14

Fri., 5/08/15, Legs

Verse of the day: the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him. -Eph. 1:17

I got in a great leg workout this morning. My lower back was feeling pretty stiff, so I did not go very heavy and everything was very focused and controlled. Here's how it looked:

squat: 45-25; 95-12; 135-6; 225-6; 275-6; 335-15
leg press: 450-15; 540-15; 630-15
standing 1-leg curl: 100-12 (1-set-absolute-failure)
seated calf raise: 90-15; 140-15; 190-9+4

Thur., 5/07/15, Upper Body

Verse of the day: Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, this he will also reap. -Gal. 6:7

I got in an awesome pump this morning. I only had about 35 minutes to do the whole upper body, so there was no messing around. It was fast and focused. Here's how it looked:

5 sets incline dumbbell press
1 set flat dumbbell press
1 set dips
2 sets Hammer Strength uni-lateral pulldown
1 sets 1 arm row
2 sets seated dumbbell press
1 set bent over lateral raise
3 super-sets dumbbell curl and lying triceps extension
1 set decline crunch
1 set machine crunch

Tue., 5/5/15, Legs/ Food

Verse of the day: Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labor in vain. -Ps 124:1a

I got in a great leg workout this morning. It was all basic stuff. The volume is still low, but my intensity is cranked. It's basically 2 failure sets for quads- squats and barbell hack squat; 1 for hams- a lying single leg curl; and 1 for calves- the smith machine calf raise. (Though I did 5 warm up sets of squats, 1 feel set of barbell hack squat and 2 warm-ups of calf raises.)

To "re-give" you an idea of what my diet looks like right now here's what I ate yesterday:

meal 1: whey protein (I like p4p muscle iso-whey, it's a good quality); oatmeal
meal 2: chicken breast
post workout: whey protein with fast digesting carb
meal 3: chicken breast; sweet potato
meal 4: 4 eggs; peas
meal 4: yogurt; casein protein; oatmeal; peas
meal 5: chicken; beans; brown rice; corn; avocado; spinach; salsa; cheese
meal 6: whey protein; casein protein

(I don't normally drink this much protein powder, but I was running low on cooked food.)

Week # 25, Mon., 5/4/15, Upper Body

Verse of the day: My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is perfected in weakness. -2 Cor. 12:9

This weekend involved several diet "cheats." (I was out of town for my wife's birthday.) So, this morning I went to the gym early and got in a little extra time on the stepmill. My workout today was great. I got a killer pump (the extra sugar and fat probably didn't hurt.) I added a couple extra sets in here and there, just to get some more blood in the muscle. Here's how it looked:

incline hammer strength press: 90-25; 180-6; 270-6; 360-8 + fail
incline dumbbell press: 75s-12; 90s-7 + fail
pull down: 165-12; 195-12; 225-6
row: 135-10; 225-8
hammer strength press: 180-10; 270-6 + fail + drop-set
seated lateral: 25s-10; 35s-9
pushdown: 120-20; 160-15; 210-10
  super-set with cambered bar curl: 60-12; 80-10; 110-5
Swiss ball crunch/ bosu ball crunch/ decline crunch/ kneeling rope crunch/ machine crunch