[TheAth-ah-lete]

I'm finally deciding to make a log here, BUT BE WARY SHERDOGGERS! I am a rambler, and I can't promise to keep up with this all the time, and if you guys flame me it's very possible I will cry, take my ball and go home. I do keep a training journal in a notebook also, but honestly, I kinda just want a place to ramble and get a little feedback every once in a while. Today was actually the first time I ever posted a program of mine on the internet because I don't want to put up with some short fat mofo tell me to go follow some cookie cutter program, however Monger gave me some great advice and it kinda motivated me to find out if I can get some good info and tips from other educated posters around here.

Like I said I ramble so don't expect a whole lot of coherence.

Stats:
22 years old. I actually had to think about that for a second.
6'0"
210lbs ~12%BF
Bench-Don't give a fuck, you'll find out why if you keep up with this.
Squat-Somewhere around 300+
Deadlift-345 DOH grip
OHP-135


I was a fat kid growing up, in 7th grade I was 5'6" 212lbs, and by 15 I was my current height and 250lbs. During my jr. and sr. years I pretty much stopped eating and got down to about 175. About 2 years ago I was 227lbs. and over 20% bodyfat, I drank to the point of getting blackout drunk a couple times a week, and smoked at least a pack of cigarettes a day. I had gone to a personal trainer for about 6 months a year or two before, but I had never watched my diet or quit drinking and smoking so I didn't make much progress, but I think at the time I was around 195, so I knew I needed to be working out and I thought about going to the trainer again but just couldn't afford it. Instead I got "The Bodysculpting Bible For Men". I worked hard and consistently so I made good progress. Within 3 months I looked like a different person and was around 207lbs. and was no longer following the program laid out in the book.

In March of 07' I bought "A Fighter's Heart" by Sam Sheridan. I had always wanted to fight and had boxed my buddies in high school so I found a local MMA gym and started training. Injuries and stupidity has hindered my progress, though I HAVE made progress in some area all the time. I've had my knee messed up where I couldn't roll, shoulder and neck issues, broken fingers and toes, and poor training habits. In my case I don't have a problem getting to the gym, I have a problem knowing when I need to slow down and let my body catch up. I easily tend to forget that I stopped playing sports in jr high, and smoked since I was 15.

I did a grappling competition last year, then in February of this year I had my first amateur MMA fight scheduled. The fight never went through though because I got a ringworm from training that kept me out of the gym for 2 weeks, then I was back one week and got a staph infection. For anyone who's interested I had an infection on my knee and back. The one on my back was the serious one. I had to squeeze about a CUP of puss and blood out of my own back. It was disgusting and cool at the same time.

After the staph infection I decided to take a break. I was pretty discouraged that ever since I started training MMA I was constantly hurt and on top of that I just can't fucking afford a shitload of doctor bills. I spent the next couple months evaluating. I realized I needed to slow my roll a little bit and walk before I run. I stayed in shape doing a couple 5ks, cycling, and lifting. No matter what I know that now excercising is a part of my life. I don't feel right if I don't do SOMETHING everyday.

Plus us former fat boys never forget how to eat, so when I don't train my weight goes up pretty quickly. I'd much rather eat a shitload and burn it off than eat like a bird and just work out 3 hours a week.

[TheAth-ah-lete]

So a few months ago I got back into MMA. I was still dealing with bad cardio during mma training even though I seem to be in pretty decent shape, so I once again had to step back, evaluate, and realize I'm sometimes retarded. I've cut waaaaayyy down on my lifting and "conditioning" outside of the mma gym. As much as I love to lift, at the end of the day I want to be a fighter. So during this time I started back and was gassing in class I was doing about 12-13 workouts a week consisting of 4 sessions weightlifting, 3-4 sessions of MMA/BJJ, and 4-5 sessions conditioning.

THat just ain't right for someone in my position. Maybe 3 a days are fine for professional athletes, but it's not for me yet. I may not have been overtraining, but I was definitely doing more than I needed to and it was causing my performance to suffer in mma. Plus, what the fuck kind of fighter does 4 weightlifting session a week and only 3-4 actually training fighting?

I told you I'm retarded sometimes.

So I kinda knew that I didn't need to be training to get my squat and deadlift numbers up, but rather increase my work capacity, so I would deadlift and squat one right after the other with only 60 second rest periods between sets. Now I am back to training with my own limited equipment (I'll have to post pictures). I don't have a squat rack, but I do have some dumbbells, 500lbs. of olympic plates, a couple barbells, and a couple benches. I decided since I can't back squat, and because my hamstrings and glutes are way behind my quads I will concentrate on my deadlift. I did my first 1rep max in over a year on 8/19/08 and hit 345. Felt like I could have done more if I hadn't fried my grip with my warmup sets. That kind of got me motivated to see how long it would take me to hit 405. So now let's talk about my goals.

[TheAth-ah-lete]

Number 1: I want to fight. Truth is though I just don't think I'm ready to step in the cage yet. About every amateur event I've been to has been full of dickheads in a hurry to call themselves cagefighters who come out and look like shit. I don't want that to be me, so I'm planning on doing an amateur MMA fight in about a year and until then I will enter a couple grappling competitions and see if I can't find an amateur kickboxing or muay thai match though those are hard to come by in my area.

Number 2: Train MMA/BJJ consistently 4 times a week. I know this sounds stupid, but sometimes shit gets in the way, and it helps me to make short and long term goals. For the rest of 2008 the most important thing in my training life is getting to the gym 4 times a week, everything else like lifting and conditioning comes after that.

Number 3: In October start training once a week one on one with my mma coach. Probably focusing mostly on muay thai. It's about fucking impossible to get someone to even hold pads for me decently in the regular mma class where there are usually more new guys than there are those of us who have been around more than a year.

Number 4: Deadlift 405 by October 19th. I haven't trained to get my deadlift number up ever so I think deadlift training with the intent of putting weight on the bar should get me up to 405 pretty quickly.

Number 5: Get down to 195. I have been in complete control of my weight for the last 2 years. There is nothing I hate more than people saying they can't gain/lose weight no matter what they do. When you're disciplined and you're either taking in or burning more calories than you need it's IMPOSSIBLE not to accomplish your goals. However, I like to eat as I mentioned. When I had that mma fight scheduled I was about 197, after a week of the staph I was 185. During my time off I did a TON of cardio, lifted 4 days a week, ate a lot and ate clean and I was looking pretty damn good at 210. Then I loosened up on the diet after hurting my neck in a grappling competition and got a little over 220 again. Weight doesn't scare me anymore, but I realize even 12% bodyfat is more than I need to carry around, especially if I'm going to compete at 185. Right now I'm back at 210, and I'm sure when I get back to 195 I'll be wondering why I let myself get heavy again.

[Merrill]

Damn you are a rembler.

Interesting story. Did you quit smoking? It's a bitch and I fall off the wagon sometimes.

Good luck with everything. You are still young and can accomplish a lot.

[TheAth-ah-lete]

NOW ON TO THE PROGRAM!

It may not look like yours. You may not like it, but I have my reasons. As I mentioned earlier I don't gve a fuck about my bench, and the reason is because ever since I was a kid, even when I didn't do any kind of excercise, I still did pushups. My chest is huge compared to my pathetic back, so I guess I should have added to my list of goals that I want to fix my imbalances. To go about doing that I've done more pulling than pushing. For a while I kept flat benching, then incline benching, and I just kept having worse and worse shoulder issues. I stopped overhead pressing and benching completely for a while and spent that time doing posterior chain work. When I did add back in pressing I started doing decline db bench for the first time and after about a month to 6 weeks of that A LOT of my issues were alleviated, though I still need to bring up my back.

Also, I've always made my programs out to have me lifting at least 3 days a week, but usually 4, and on top of that I was doing a lot of running and some extra conditioning workouts. Truth is I found that stuff was hurting me during MMA so I've cut down my volume to just a couple money excercises, I've cut out my everyday roadwork, and am instead focusing on shorter more intense conditioning workouts. So here goes/


Monday-
a.m. Conditioning. This is different everytime but usually consists of rope skipping, burpees, pushups, situps, bw squats, lunges, barbell circuits, Ross style workouts(magic50 is my favorite so far). Intense stretching and core work.

p.m. MMA. Monday's are always really hard and you never know what exactly what we're going to do except it usually consists of shadowboxing, sprawls, conditioning, technique drills, sparring, rolling, or more drills.

Tuesday-
a.m. Weightlifting. Deadlift. 3x3-5. BOR 3x3. Shrugs 2x10. Decline weighted situps 2x10-12. Stretching.

p.m. BJJ. This class warmup is usually run by a nazi. I don't like the guy but at least I know I'm going to get a hard warmup in. Ungodly amounts of rollouts, breakfalls, shrimps, forward shrimps, side shrimps, wheelbarrows, pushups, and situps/crunches. This guy loves to do what he calls "circle of death" after all this which is where we all get in a circle and go around the circle alternating between 10-20 pushups and 15-30 situps depending on how many people are there.

Wednesday-
a.m. Light stuff like a couple minutes jump roping then stretching for about 20 minutes.

p.m. MMA. Usually a little lighter than Monday,, but not always.

Thursday-
a.m. Weightlifting. 1 legged squat 3x5 with 15lb. dumbbells. These are hard as a bitch but the dumbbells actually make it easier though they made me more sore in my upper back than I would have imagined. I blame that mostly on poor form though as I'm not used to these. Pushpress 3x3. Personal shoulder routine focusing on posterior delts.

p.m. BJJ. Also usually lighter than Tuesday class.

Friday-
OFF...well, still do a little warmup and some stretching.

Saturday-
a.m. Off or MMA.

p.m. This is the only day I can manage to get to a pullup bar and dip station at a park next to my apartment. Since my pullups are so weak anyways I want to give most of my attention to them on this day. Not sure what kind of rep scheme I'll be using. Before I've done 5x5 with bodyweight, but right now my neck is fucked up AGAIN so I know I can't even do 5 right now without falling to the ground in agony. Also after the chins and dips I do intervals or sprints at the park followed by a mile or two jog.

Sunday-
Off or riding my bike or light jogging. Just something to get some blood going, not trying to get in a hard workout.

[Bamaispriceless]

I'll be keeping us with this one brother, glad to see you started a log. Good luck and welcome to the training logs.

[TheAth-ah-lete]

Originally Posted by Merrill

Damn you are a rembler.

Interesting story. Did you quit smoking? It's a bitch and I fall off the wagon sometimes.

Good luck with everything. You are still young and can accomplish a lot.

Yeah, and you said that before you saw my next post.ahahahaha

Yes I quit smoking, I can't believe I left that part out. The day I started reading the bodysculpting bible for men I took the half pack of smokes I had on me, the unopened pack in my truck and crushed them up and threw them in the trash. I ain't gonna lie though, every once in a while when i'm drankin' I'll spark one up, but I usually end up thinking they taste gross and I throw it out halfway though...except when I was in Vegas about three weeks ago. Which reminds me of a story I can ramble about, my experience at Xtreme Couture.

I knew months in advance that I would be going to Vegas for a family vacation and while I dreaded trying to save the money to go there I started looking forward to training at Xtreme Couture. Randy is my fucking hero, followed closely by Forrest, so that was the place I had to go. We got to Vegas on a Thursday afternoon and by 5 most of my family was 5-6 drinks in and already gambling. I had a few and lost a little money then I remembered that I could gamble away my money over the next 3 days so I was in my hotel room and asleep by 9:30 Las Vegas time. I woke up bright and early at 7a.m. and was downstairs asking for directions by 7:30. The bellboy told me it was a 3 mile walk to West Sunset Rd and that I was crazy if I tried to walk it and it would take me till noon.

I figured he was an idiot because there's no way 3 miles could take 4.5 hours. I figured the walk would be a good warmup for the workout. Well, I'll make this long story short. The layout of the roads was unfamiliar to me and it somehow became a 6 mile hike, part of which I jogged. It took me a full 2 hours and 25 minutes. In that time I drank over half a gallon of water and an energy drink, I was dripping sweat, cramping all over the place, and to make things worse I hadn't eaten since he night before since I had planned on getting there within 45 minutes and didn't want to work out on a full stomach.

I walked in the door asked for a day pass and was told that muay thai started in 5 minutes. I quickly changed and wrapped up and they called us onto the mat to start skipping. We did 12 minutes non-stop jump roping and every couple minutes they would yell out, "20 pushups, 20 situps!" Then "20 squats, 20 pushups, 20 situps!" Then "20 jump squats, 20 squats, 20 pushups, 20 situps!" Some of the guys weren't even quarter squatting and were cheating on their pushups, I just can't get myself to do that though even though it makes me look like the out of shape one when I'm tired after doing the excercises properly.

The walk took more out of me than I ever would have imagined and during the shadowboxing I was trying as hard as I could to not let everyone see that I was about done in already. After the shadowboxing we did partner technique drills. My partner's movement and handspeed was way better than mine so I found myself trying to keep up with him. I ran across the mat and puked yellow bile up into the trash can for what seemed like forever. As I was hunched over the trash can Amir Sadollah gave me a friendly smile and chuckle and said, "Working hard?" People always seem to say this when I puke. I wish I could have explained, "Look I can usually handle this, but I walked 2.5 hours to get here and I haven't eaten!" without sounding like a pussy, but we all know how excuses sound once they leave your mouth and honestly all I could muster then was "Uuuhhhhh."

He seemed to understand.

I went back to my partner, slowed it down a bit, then we did 3 rounds on the thai bags. During this my calves started cramping up really bad and I was had no snap on my punches or kicks. We ended class with clinch sparring. I was actually feeling like I got my second wind there, but my partner was going pretty hard and I ended up having to finish the class with the most painful puke of my entire life, which is saying quite a bit, and I sat out on the bench the last 5 minutes of class.

Everyone was extremely cool and it was a great experience as well as the most painful workout I've ever had. I wised up and took a cab back to the hotel. Here's the crazy part, I weighed in around 222 before I left for Vegas, and during that whole morning ordeal and workout I drank about a gallon of water, an energy drink, and a mountain dew, and when I got on the scale at the hotel spa before I got a massage I weighed in at 207lbs. I know it's not that big a deal to cut that much weight when you're trying to, and I can easily lose 7 or 8 lbs. in a regular training sessions, but I was trying my damndest to stay hydrated and I still lost 15lbs. through the morning.

[TheAth-ah-lete]

Originally Posted by Bamaispriceless

I'll be keeping us with this one brother, glad to see you started a log. Good luck and welcome to the training logs.

Thanks man. I just started checking the logs out and I decided I had to get in on this.haha

[TheAth-ah-lete]

I hope someone is going to read this because I'd like to hear how everyone else's back squat transfers over to their 1 legged squat.

Like I said before I got edged out of my old gym I was doing a 3x3 squat with 60seconds rest periods and 3x3 deadlifts also with 60 seconds rest. Basically I think that means my numbers from that cycle don't mean much. I was using 265 for both squat and deadlift and I was having such a hard time with my deadlifts that I was shocked as hell at how easily I put up 345 with a double overhand grip. I was squatting 265 for 3x3 so I'm assuming I could put up at least 300.

I've done 1 legged squats before, but these were 1 legged box squats just to parallel. Yesterday I did 3x5 ASS TO GRASS 1 legged squats with a 15lb. dumbbell in each hand. At some points my balance was off and I'm sure my form was horrendous for the most part, but I was shocked at how fucking hard these were, and today not only are my legs and glutes(esp. glutes), but my entire back is pretty fucking sore as well. I am guessing the back soreness is due to poor form, but are pistols that much harder for you guys who are squatting at least 300lbs. and more?

I'm pretty pumped to think about what my back squat will be like once I work up to doing high rep pistols with a weighted vest.

[Reloaded]

Wow, no joke you write a lot. I was thinking of checking out some gyms if I ever go to Vegas... and I cheat like a mofo in classes. I find if you do them correct you'll be the last person and be punished even more.

It is a challenge too to get someone to hold pads properly if their new, but a few blasts on the pads usually helps them figure it out.

I'm just starting to do bw. pistols, I can't imagine weighted ones as of yet.

Best of luck, keep your hands up and your chin down.