Finding a Happy Medium

I just got back from the gym, having done Day A of my new workout. Things went very well (except for one thing which I will get to shortly).

I feel very strong on the rack pulls. I used my top weight of 115# for the 3 rep set and then down 5# each set from there on. I can definitely see making a progress goal of 135# for the 3 rep set by the end of January. For the next superset, I started with the 45# fat bar for the hip thrust which felt fairly easy so I went up to 55# for the next two. The cable pulldowns felt really good, and I went with 45# for those.

The problem came with the stability ball plank. I couldn't for the life of me balance on one arm to do the sword stab motion. Not even with my feet really wide. So I did it in a regular plank which was definitely hard enough. I'll email Rog to make sure this is an ok regression to do. Floor presses were good and I used 20# for those. The kettlebell sumo deadlifts were awesome. I used a 24 kg kettlebell for 2 sets. The trick with those is keeping my concentration to stay tight in my upper back and core, while making sure to use my glutes instead of my lower back to lift the weight. This will be good training for eventually going back to sumo deadlifts with the bar.

I took Rog's advice about eating more pre-workout. I had one of my healthy pumpkin muffins and a Quest bar with two cups of coffee before I left the house and it was plenty of fuel for the entire workout. So, as I see it, the most important thing for me to focus on in the coming weeks is to push myself enough with pushing too much. I can see I wasn't pushing myself hard enough the last couple of months, but now that I'm feeling better I can't let my eyes be bigger than my stomach, so to speak. I can't let my ego push me to try to lift heavier than what I can safely recover from. I'll need to carefully evaluate how I feel between workouts so that I can make a good judgement about whether I'm ready to increase reps or weight at the next workout. I really don't want to injure myself again and go back to square one.