Tue 8 Nov 2011
W.O.W. 11/6/11-Busy
Posted by Doug McGuff under Uncategorized
I did this WOW on Sunday.
Lumbar Extension on SS Systems Pulldown
MedX Leg Press (with EST)
Nautilus Pullover with SS retrofits
MedX Row with SS cam
MedX Chest Press (with EST)
Unfortunately, work and life have been so busy that I have no topic for this post. I did want to start a new WOW and allow everyone to drive this week’s discussion. I promise a full post with the next WOW.
Post your WOW’s and your comments.
I can testify to him being out-of-pocket. We put a new name on the front of UE “Ed and Sherry’s House of Horrors” and he hasn’t called me about it yet!
So I’m cranking away during my workout and come to some Nitro Curls. I’m doing this to the best of my ability, emptying the tank as quickly as possible, adding up to a nice TUL bump over last week.
After that, I moved over to the neck extension and proceed to pick an entirely too light weight and stop the set just shy of 3 minutes. However, during this wonderful exercise of cervical vertebra control, my arms experienced all sorts of tingling and electric-ish cracking. I observed this with equanimity and as soon as I got off the neck ex it dissipated. I suspect a good pump plus zero movement (just hanging at my sides) led to a bizarre occulsion effect.
Also of note: we have a crappy lumbar extension that I picked up for cheap. The good news is that I have (almost) infinite range adjustment so I attempted to mimic the Renex lumbar extension. If you’ve never felt the proximal portion of your erector spinae in full contraction you don’t know what full range of motion of your spine is.
WOW 11.9.11
Nautilus Leg Press
Nautilus Back
Nautilus Abdominals
Nautilus Incline Chest
Nautilus Compund Row
Wife’s WOW
Nautilus Leg Press
Nautilus Incline Press
Nautilus Compound Row
Mr. Wizard (me) uses a metronome to count his TUL’s. I didn’t check the dial and was doing my leg presses on a beat of 50 instead of 60. I figured out the time later on and had an increase in TUL over last week anyway.
This is my 8th week of BBS. (Seven on Nautilus and one on body weight while traveling…) Results so far…about a 5 pound weight loss, significant decrease in back and hip pain, increases in in poundages in all lifts (although I am still a bit embarrassed about my weights used…), a shift in body mass from my waist to my shoulders and legs (I’m back in 34 pants), while playing around with my Grandpa’s oxygen saturation monitor I was at 99.9% saturation with a 49 bpm heart rate (absolutely no traditional “conditioning” work), and who knows what else is going on inside me. I am sleeping better.
I’ll report back in another 2 months. I do need to “clean up” my diet a bit.
Last night, I helped my mom out with her WOW, and tonight I had my WOW:
My Mom:
Week 4 11/8/11 Wednesday 5:30PM 7 days rest
HammerStrength Lat Pulldown 72 1:29
+ 2 lbs -49 sec
Retrofitted* Nautilus Lateral Raise 32.5 1:31
+ 2.5 lbs -1:45
Nautilus Lower Back 120 3:38
45 lbs -4:52
SuperSlow Systems Seated Row 100 3:00(+)
+ 27.5 lbs - 2:00ish
MedX Chest Press 84 2:12
0 lbs + 22 sec
Retrofitted* Nautilus Leg Curl 50 1:53
+ 5 lbs -27 sec
SuperSlow Systems Leg Press 155 2:09
+5 lbs -9 sec
Tim:
Week 43 11/9/11 Tuesday 8 Days Rest Time 5:30 PM
A of C Split routine
HammerStrength Lat Pulldown 102.5 lbs 1:28
+0lbs + 2 seconds
MedX Chest Press 200 lbs 1:07
+0 lbs - 8 seconds
Retrofitted* Nautilus Hip Abductor 50 lbs 1:50
New exercise
SuperSlow Systems Leg Press 187.5 lbs 1:24
+0 lbs -10 seconds
Wrist Curl 30 lbs 1:27
+0 lbs +24 seconds
Since this is the fourth WOW ever for my mom, I’m pretty surprised how strong my mom’s back is on the lower back machine, and how long it’s taken me to get her correct weights for all the exercises.
After looking at my Wrist curl, it would maybe add between 3-5 seconds TOPS when i was doing 8 exercises instead of 5. I’ve also been taking a break from creatine, so that would explain some decrease in performance.
Question for ALL TRAINERS: when you have a brand new client, and you are trying to select the correct weight for each exercise, how many workouts go by for the average client until you have them getting to Momentary Muscular failure within the 90 second (or whichever time you like each client to fail around)
I try to get there by 3rd WOW to the 5th WOW. It depends on how I am at guessing the correct weight stack and how much I can correctly guess how much to add (or lower in extremely rare cases). Also, How many use the 10/10 superslow protocol? I do and found that although 90s is suggested as the max TUL, that I don’t feel like I empty the tank as much due to the longer positive and negative. So, I usually like the 2 minute mark.
Thoughts? I think it would be cool to take a poll if there is no time for Doug to post a specific topic to talk about.
@Jon, It sounds interesting how you are playing around with your grandpa’s O2 monitor. I wish I had a “toy” like that to measure our O2 for beginning clients and see if there are changes from WOW to WOW.
Cheers, Tim Horine
Tim,
Typically by about he 3rd-4th workout I can hone in on the right weight. In my opinion, the first two workouts at minimum are brain shutdowns…fear, apprehension about what’s happening. Once the client realizes that they’re not gonna die and this is really a beneficial program, we tend to see the real strength levels.
10/10? I use it…my partner uses it…and it’s a constant battle to get the clients there. I wind up saying “slow down” in my sleep. And I can often get the positive on an 8-10 but lots of folks want to use the negative as a respit…and then can’t figure why they lose the turnaround.
If I have someone who just won’t slow down I often times put them in a mid-point static hold after a couple reps. In my opinion that’s better than exercising like we’re at Curves and it certainly reduces the chance of injury.
90-120? I’m not sure that going 120 matters a lot…wouldn’t go beyond that…the important thing is “empyting the tank”
All my opinion by the way….
curves? roflmao. You’re hilarious Ed. My WOW is tomorrow. I’ll post it later. Just wanted to let you know you made my morning.
Great WOW with Ed Garbe at UE. The new sign is truth in advertising for sure.
SS Pull down with two pop pins, hard focus on lower end of reps
MedX Chest Press
J-rep style Flies on MedX Chest Press
Abs
MedX leg press and calves
All in all, a basic but intense workout. The exclusive focus on the lower half (or even third) of the rep on the pull down was a tough start to the workout, but it ramped up the intensity fast and the rest of the workout seemed to benefit from that.
@Ed-I’m glad you mentioned the mid-point static hold done before failure. I was wondering if anyone else did this. When I have someone who reaches “mental” failure before physical failure (they wont give me everything they have), I revert to static holds midway through the set and gradually try and get them to do a normal set over time. It seems that people are able to push a bit harder with the static, where some will just quit early when doing full ROM moves. Has anyone else experienced this?
Tim Horne:
You can pickup an Ox Saturation Monitor (combined with a HR) at Walgreen for about $49. Periodically they go on special for $10 off. It is put over your finger and returns readings in about 5 seconds
Thomas,
I also like the holds in lieu of rep assists. I know when we do rep assists that the client is not supposed to feel our assist, but half the time when I do them it’s like they hand me off the weight.
I think it’s just a psycological reaction that as soon as they see my hands on the equipment it’s like “Oh wow, Ed’s gonna do some of these reps now” and bingo I’m getting a hernia trying to hold the weight from a wierd position till I can convince them that we haven’t had a role reversal.
So the holds max out the client and save Ed from getting a workout he didn’t anticipate.
Anyone else have similar issues with rep assists?
Happy 236th Birthday to the
United States Marine Corps
Semper Fi,
Hugh
GOOD POST HUGH!!
Hi Doug,
Question from reading Arthur Jones “The Fifth step”, Arthur mentioned training the “surplus fibres” reserve and a “chemical reserve”…But while the “chemical” reserve should be retained for emergency use only, the “surplus fibres” reserve must be used regularly if a fast rate of growth is desriable. Can anyone explain the differences in the “reserves” or the process? Is this is what is meant by “emptying the tank as quickly as possible”? How can you avoid the “chemical reserve?
Thanks
Steven
WOW:
Nautilus rotary neck
deadlifts
-short rest-
deadlifts
Trap bar shrug
WOW:
Leverage leg press
Next Generation pullover
Next Generation lateral raise (static)
Nitro compound row
And I also wish the USMC a happy birthday. Goodnight Chesty, wherever you are…
@Greg
That “Good night Chesty Puller . . ” line made remember that every night at OCS, we had to lay in our racks at the position of attention and sing the Marine Hymn and conclude it with that line.
WOW
Calf Raise
Low Back
Leg Press
Pulldown
Chest press
@Ed
Thanks for the “thumbs-up.”
I laughed about at the “hernia” line. I found the same to be true. I no longer do rep-assist and opt for the static hold.
Hugh
WOW, thursday morning:
next gen. shoulder press
barbell curl+ pullup
push down+ome negative dips
nautilus 2st neck flexion/extension
abdominal crunch on lat pully
Shoulder exo rotation
Increased the shoulder press with 2 kg.and decreased the barbell curl with 4 kg. The shoulder press went very good with a sudden increase in breathing near failure and shaking limbs(arms and legs).I decreased the resistance of the curl to focus more on contraction , this since I experienced no progress for at least 4 months .So I thought that I had to make sure that all the effort would go to the intended muscles (lesser outroading)and see how progress will manifest itself.The feeling in the muscle was better because (I think)the last rep was a very hard one while at the same time less leaning back to get the rep. This was my main problem with the somewhat heavier weight .I also (I mentioned it before) have after alsmost every workout a twitching right cheeck just above the corner of my lips .This uncontroleable twitching is the same as I and I guess many of you also have experienced in the upperbody. Has anyone a idea what it can be?
Does anyone of you have a 2st neck machine? I still have troubles with the correct adjustment of the seat and the pad.Any ideas are welcome.
Enjoy your weekend,
ad
I usually aim to have someone getting to full failure on the leg press after about 3 workouts. As said earlier this one is the most mentally taxing exercise for a beginner and can be the hardest one for them to accept the pain on. Pulling movements like a row if feel I can take a first timer to failure on as they are easier to keep form on and I can use that as a teaching tool to get them to realize that getting stuck is a good thing. I actually find that the chest press can be one of the harder ones for people to get to proper fatigue on as they will often try to twist the weight out putting to much into the shoulder. But I agree with Ed that using a low static hold at the end of a set is usually the best way to get someone used to the idea of not being able to move the weight.
I do also have a question for Doug H. also:
Last week you mentioned that you had spend 17 hours on the gym floor, Damn. How many training sessions to you work in a day? Is something like that a normal occurrence for you? My max so far is 26 sessions over 15 hours and there’s not much left of me by the end of that, so how do you keep yourself going through a shift like that? Can you pass a bit of your wisdom on to me?
Thanks all
Big 5
Cybex overhead: up 10 lbs, down 5 reps.
Pulley row: up one rep.
Cybex chest press: up 5 lbs and one rep.
pulley pulldown: up one rep.
Cybex leg press: up 5 lbs, same reps.
It’s challenging to nail the form on pulley machines. When I can’t hold the form, I’m calling that “failure.” The Cybex pulldown just bears little resemblance to the pulldown in the book.
Any advice would be helpful.
Interestingly, my workout partner is an employee of mine, a 59-year-old female, who has never been much of an exerciser. I am a 57-year-old female and former body builder and compulsive exerciser, golfer, tennis player, outdoorswoman. I thought the discomfort of BBS might cause her to drop out, but she really likes it. That’s good. Strong employees beat weak ones!
Have an awesome Veteran’s Day.
WoW(~25 mins):
-TruSquat: Up 10#(20%)
-MedX Leg Abductor
-MedX Leg Press: Up 10#
-MedX Leg Curl
-MedX Leg Extension
-MedX Leg Press Negatives(5)
-SS Chin Ups
-MedX Chest Press: Up 4#
-MedX Seated Row: Up 4#
-SS Push Ups
-Chin Up Negatives
-SS Dips
First SS workout in ~3 weeks. Continued nice, steady progress.
jeff
Rose,
Not exactlty sure what you question is? Is it how we define failure or the differences in machines?
The good news about your employee joining you is that BBS also seems to keep people more healthy…less sick time…colds/flu. And when folks do get ill, the recovery time seems to be faster.
Ed,
The Cybex pulldown at my gym looks nothing like the pulldown Doug is demonstrating in the book. So instead of using that, I rig the pulley to approximate it. There is no row machine like the one in the book, so again I rig the pulley machine, but there is no support against my chest to keep my back stationary so I really have to be conscious of my form. I’m sure you’ve worked BBS without ideal machines, just wondering what advice you could offer on adapting optimally to what gear is available.
Quite honestly I would defer to some of the folks on the site who have used Cybex more frequently. I’ve used it at my daughter’s gym but that was a while ago and would hesitate to offer advice on such short usage.
The two key areas I always concern myself with is lower back and neck…if someone is gonna get hurt, those are usually the two culprits.
Hugh, Thomas, Doug H., Skyler et.al…any advice for Rose please?
Rose,
At my gym we have both Nautilus and cable equipment and IMHO the cables work just fine as long as you keep a good arch in your back (referring to the row. But you can work to a great fatigue on those. Since you are working with a training partner I may recommend having her help you with some forced reps, since it does not have the variable resistance cam. This way you can be sure to get fatigue through the full range of motion. As you reach fatigue, I have never had problems with peoples low back on these movements either.
@ Steve,
I take a perverse pleasure in working long,crammed days at the beginning of every month.That way,I have all my monthly operating expenses covered in two days and the remainder of the month is a big 28 day party.
When I was a young man I worked six full days a week.Now I go hard for four days,plus a half day on Friday and a half day on Saturday.On Sundays I go to the gym,pull out the Bose stereo system,turn it up to 11 and dance around and play air guitar for a couple of hours.Then I come back home and jump back in bed with my wife.
Amy’s WOW:
chin ups straight to:
MedX Avenger pulldown
Nautilus incline press straight to:
MedX Avenger overhead press
Hammer leg press(sickness modified)
Nautilus pullover
Doug.
Good post!
Question…Saturdays…is that an overflow/makeup day for clients or do you have folks regularly scheduled for that day?
My perception is that it would be difficult to have folks make a commitment for a weekend day.
Hi Ed,
Ten regular,standing appts. every Sat. morning.It’s not a makeup day.Sometimes I do makeups on Sunday mornings,but only if the client has a history of reliability and I have advance payment.
Thanks for the feedback Doug. We have regular standing appointments on Saturdays, but it also fills up with people who need to make up sessions from the week.
On another note, I am in a bit of a quandary. I really like to use hammer strength machines for my own workouts because of there low friction and overall feel. But it can move much more quickly through my workout by using machines that are not quite as good. I did the machine workout yesterday and had a “cardio” effect that I have not had in a long long time. So I guss my question is how beneficial is this reaction? Or am I better off staying with the hammer strength but needing a bit more time between lifts to set the weights? I may be able to work harder on each lift with a bit more time between movementsl, but probably not as likely to get that overall cardiovascular effect.
Sorry, slightly off topic: someone posted a while back about an iPhone ap they’d made for HIT training. I’m just wondering if anyone can recall who that was? I’ve found one ap but wasn’t sure if that was the one mentioned here. It’s called HIT Pro Log by a guy called Neil Kelly but it didn’t ring any bell.
I have no idea if this who it was, but I remember Drew Baye knew about someone developing an App. It looks useful, but really only for someone who doesn’t have a trainer who is recording things for them already. I used to do it solo for about a year and 2 months before I had a trainer, and used the iPhone’s timer. THe nice thing was that it had the lap function for TUL and the time between each exercise and added it up for the total time of the workout to see how much time it actually takes to workout.
on another note, i earlier asked about creatine cycling. I found that the studies on animals suggest a need to cycle due to down regulation of natural mechanisms having to do with creatine function in the body. However, the only study that was done on human models shows no difference in the bodies natural production vs. supplemented creatine. So, according to the research we have to this date, it would suggest humans don’t need to cycle creatine use, and do just fine with 3-5 grams supplement/ day.
Cheers, Tim
Ok Tim, thanks for that. It was maybe on Drew’s site that I read about it rather than on here. As I say, it was a while ago now.
The iPhone app mentioned here a while ago was called “HIT Record” by Howard Kelly. Simple but useful
Hi Doug
I was re-reading the your Ultimate Exercise Bulletin #1 and I have a question:
Do you still feel that variation in one’s program is not necessary? Over the years,since UE#1, many “experts” have been recommending exercise variation.
Thanks and Be Well
Terry
Terry:
Where did you find UE Bulletin #1. I can’t seem to find it on the site.
Thanks,
Bill
@Bill
I think RenEx is selling it on their site. If not there, check out the UE site. Hugh
Thanks
@ Steven Turner,
I’m back, but playing catch up. I did want to address your question. I am not certain what Arthur intended, but I think of the “reserve fibers” as the higher order motor units that are called into play after lower order motor units have already been recruited. Literature shows this occurs with loads as light as 40% 1RM (a measure I don’t particularly like). I think you can be fairly certain of involving these “reserve fibers” at about 85% the way to failure. However, 85% is hard to measure and interpret. You can be absolutely certain by going to failure. Between 85% and full failure you are simply firing the motor units more rapidly. This IMO is the beginning of the chemical reserve. IMO the chemical reserve only gets tapped deeply with deep inroad technique (continued effort against the movement arm after failure has stopped). Some believe that deep inroad technique is very valuable. Others believe that it involves excess stress that is hard to recover from. I generally felt that tapping the chemical reserves is like “butterfly hunting with a bazooka”. The RenEX folks feel that excess stress occurs from “outroading” (form discrepancies that allow one to move heavy weight or demonstrate improved performance at all costs) and that if this is eliminated, and the tank is emptied as quickly as possible, then there is plenty of reserve energy left over for deep inroad, which they view as very productive. I am not sure yet where I fall on this issue, but am currently experimenting with it on an N=1 basis. This is a great topic for continued discussion. Lets hear what others think.
Terry,
It may be necessary, but not for the reasons usually thought (P90X muscle confusion anyone?). Usually equipment limitations are the underlying cause for needing variation. When equipment has serious sticking points, this may tempt form discrepancies to show “progress” or simply limit efficient fatigue. Varying the equipment or movement can work around this. Another option is to vary protocol to make good use of the equipment’s imperfections. Jreps are an excellent option, as are Max Pyramid, Max Contraction, Timed Statics etc. Another great topic to develop further. UE-1 will be available soon off the RenEx website soon. I am currently out of print, so we will have to await the RenEx offering.
WOW
Toe Press
Leg Press
Pulldown
Chest Press
Reverse Abdominal Curl
Neck Flexion
Neck Extension
Simon Shawcross
Noted Chris. Thanks.
Doug
Thanks for your reply, I was happy to find out that I am utilizing the different protocols that you mentioned since my equipment does have sticking points.
I appreciate your BBS website and its’. members.
Be Well
Terry
WOW’s for Norm and Dot:Oct 31st,Nov 8th and Nov 15th
Norm and Dot have just returned from a wonderful 4-week vacation in England visiting friends and relatives, followed by a 2-week sea voyage back home via Miami and then a flight back to Montreal. Our trip was filled with lots of fun activities: long walks along the sea coast, hills, farmers’ pastures, golfing, pubbing and being pampered while on board the ship – the Celebrity Eclipse. We were very mindful of the benefits of maintaining our exercise program and we are happy to report that we did our “Big 5’s” twice on English soil and twice aboard the ship. The equipment in both cases was different from our condo’s which we are used to. Therefore the resistance levels were somewhat of a guess. Nevertheless, we performed to exhaustion the best we could and felt the better for it. Furthermore we went on several long nature walks whenever we could.
Now the good news! Today (Nov 15th) we jumped right back into our program at home and found even a minor advance in our tul’s. Even more interesting is that our body weights remained constant in spite of over-indulging at times in some of our food and beverages. We feel absolutely wonderful. This was the first time we incorporated the BBS program into our vacation activities. We recommend it to all who travel.
Norm and Dot
Just performed chest press, compound row, and leg press stage rep style. The first round through I did 12 reps for the top of the stroke and 12 reps of the bottom of the stroke. I then went through and reversed it performing the bottom part and then the top of the stroke. It took about 13 minutes. This protocol has always been the most metabolically demanding workout I’ve ever done. I’ve never made it through without stopping for a brief rest. The best I’ve done is stop at about the fourth exercise and rest for about a minute. What is suprising is that this protocol barely phases my workout partner. He is 22 years younger.
Greg
Norm,
You and Dot continue to represent what BBS is all about. Keep up the good work.
Greg,
I wouldn’t be to amazed by your 22 year old training partner. Give that guy a real career, mortgage, wife, kids etc. and he will recover a little more slowly. I also bet you are doing the protocol in a more demanding style….you have really learned how to create a demanding workout. I also suspect you are stronger and doing a lot more mechanical work. Lastly, you are tall and muscular…a combo that I have always found to produce the biggest metabolic punch.
WOW
SS Leg Press
SS Pull Down
SS Chest Press
Each performed until failure with a 10-20 second static hold.
Hugh
11.16.11
WOW
Nautilus Leg Press
Nautilus Low Back
Nautilus Abdominal
Nautilus Incline Press
Nautilus Compund Row
Wife:
Nautilus Leg Press
Nautilus Low Back
Nautilis Incline Press
Nautilus Compound Row
We’re both getting stronger. I am seeing a reduction in body volume, my wife is starting to “muscle up” after several years of illness. She has just been cleared of lupus and Rheumatoid arthrits.
This has been a real good process for her. The “physical therapists” had her using a Body Blade and bouncing on a ball. She is now actually gaining useable strength.
Jon,
That is great news about your wife. We hear over and over again about folks with RA and autoimmune disease having clearance of their disease symptoms (or loss of diagnostic criteria) after incorporating BBS and an ancestral diet.
Doug had commented (if I remember right)about having difficulty going to sleep after having completed a training session. I experienced that last night and I have been very hungry all day today. Had my normal breakfast(0515)that normally keeps satisfied until well after noon. Not today. By 0900 I was hungry and drank a protein shake. By 1200 I was hungry and had lunch.(Usually have very little at lunch. Trying to work toward eating only twice a day.) If I had the time in the schedule I’d take a nap! All from a 6-minute workout?
Hugh
hI,
No workout this week because I will take a week off.I do this every second cycle of a 3 way split.I started this right after the summer holidays and this will be the 3 time I prolong my rest days. I feel that this helps me very well with recovery.I also make sure that I go to bed around 23.00 pm. A few days per week I come home from work at around 22.00 and will eat a decent meal .Ofcourse I then feel very awake and not prepared to go to sleep before midnight. But now I just go to bed anyway at 23.00 and will fall a sleep without any problems(The fact that it s dark earlier helps also).This gives me a additional hour of sleep per night. But it is not only about the hours of sleep but also the time at which I go to sleep that improves my energy (among other things)over the course of the day.
So for the one s living in the same time zone,
have a good night.
ad