Week 9 - Lifting Heavy Stuff
This was a cutback week so volume was about 2/3rds normal which gave me a chance to recover and also mix things up a bit. The big change for the week was to the weight lifting routine but first I need to do some more shameless bragging about a Thursday tempo run even if the treadmill and I are having a squabble. The treadmill revolted on this run. The hard/fast run was only 5 miles and it was inspired by all of the articles the last few weeks about the IAAF banning the Nike Alphafly and/or Vaporfly. I broke out the original Vaporflys and decided to swing for the fences. With about 0.6 miles to go in the 5 mile run the screen on the treadmill changed as if I touched it. It showed the distance for a few seconds and then went back to normal. This happens all of the time from the sweat I'm throwing around. A minute later when I would have had less than a half mile to go I tried to change the screen so I could watch the distance on the way into the goal. The screen wouldn't change. Nothing. I tried cleaning the screen while running 10.3 mph. Nothing. I cleaned it again. Nothing. Uh oh. I gave up and did some math, which is a problem at this point, and then added a minute just in case. When I hit the point where I had to have at least 5 miles in I pulled the emergency stop and crossed my fingers that the distance would display. It did. It had me at 5.25 miles, but then I knew the TM wasn't up to speed until the 0.06 mile mark, which is when I started my watch, and there was a delay of a few seconds before the screen came up so I guesstimated that was another 0.02 miles and declared it 5.17 miles @ 5:57 pace. I've never done a training run under 6 minutes a mile before. I was stoked!
During the run I started thinking about why I don't do more speedwork. The reality is I've had a habit of hurting myself with efforts that are too fast or too hard. I'm not as scared of speed as I used to be and I think that has everything to do with the time that has been spent in the weight room. I'll never be able to prove it, but I'm very hopeful that all of the work lifting heavy stuff has made me substantially more resistant to injury. With 34 weeks (eek!) of high volume training left to do it is hard to imagine anything more important to accomplish in these early months than getting strong enough to take the beatings that will happen when I can get outside and start piling on the bike miles.
November 16th - Body Pump started
November 17th - Heavy Weight Training started
Yes, I'm not very bright. I went from no forms of strength training to 3 forms of strength training many times a week all at once. Oops. A key component to not getting hurt was getting the right help. Physical therapy was setup by someone I've worked with before who has always been very helpful. Heavy weight training was a plan put together by my friend Jake who is unbelievably knowledgeable in this area. Jake was very strict about making sure that I could lift weights correctly and emphatic that doing the movements right was much more important than doing them with even heavier weight. With this being said, the weight amounts he had me start with felt heavy. None of the training was easy. It was all hard work. While lifting these weights may have been easy for other people, they were not easy for me. Each exercise was setup as 4 sets of 10 repetitions each with 30 seconds rest between each set. As the weeks went on the weight amounts for each exercise increased and while they never seemed to go up by much at any one time I'm proud of the overall change. Over the 11 weeks prior to this week the amount of weight that I would lift each session increased by 45% for the same exercises. The fancy scale at home that tries to guess my % muscle may not agree that I've added more muscle but I've definitely gotten a lot stronger. Just for the record Mr. Fancy Scale my swim suit feels tight on the legs and my arms have never looked like this so give it up already and admit that I've added muscle. Thank you very much. Pretty please?
The big change for this week? Instead of lifting 4x10's, I'm now shifting to 8/8/6 where the goal is to do 3 sets of 8 reps each but the last set should be to failure and failure may come before reaching the 8th repetition on the 3rd/last set. This might not seem like a big change, but from what people that are smarter than me say (Hi Jake! Hi Steve! Hi Internet!), lifting heavier weights for less reps should create more of a central nervous system stimulus which can lead to an adaptation where the body actually creates new neurological connections to enable greater coordination between muscle cells. My goal is to continue this approach until the end of February and then re-evaluate. When comparing across the same set of exercises I'm now lifting 14% heavier weight than I was last week. That's a big jump, but it might not be enough. Frankly, lifting to failure scares me. The heavier weights are a challenge and I often finish with almost nothing left in the tank but I haven't quite had the courage to increase enough where I can't get beyond 6 reps on the last set most of the time. I'll keep challenging myself and adjust as my experience and courage grow.
For anyone that is still reading by this point, thanks! Also, you might want to try an over the counter sleep aid next time if this post hasn't got you snoring yet 💤
I should probably explain that the real detail is a little bit messier than the summary above. One part of the heavy lifting routine that hasn't gone the best is doing deadlifts. I didn't like them so any excuse I could get to not be able to get them in was readily accepted. The result is that I've seen almost no growth, but I think that I'm finally on a happy path. I now do deadlifts at home as part of physical therapy training. I also enjoy them a lot more now that I built some small blocks to set the weight on. I'm a tall guy (6'4") and it is just not comfortable reaching down so low to get to the bar. Of course if I was more manly and there were bigger round heavy thingies on the bar I wouldn't have to reach down as far either but I'm not there yet 😝 As a result of all of this, I'm going to continue doing deadlifts as 4x10's on 30 seconds rest until I get caught up. I've also decided to add the overhead press in the mix of things I do during a heavy lift session and I'd like to practice at a lower weight with higher reps until I get more comfortable. The overhead press has been my biggest weakness during Body Pump so maybe adding it here with help me there. Core work, without weights, continues to be 4x10 on 30 seconds rest when part of the heavy lifting routine as well.
Bike - 58 miles
Run - 24 miles
Body Pump - 2 times
Heavy Lifting - 2 times
Duration - 11:30 hours
Physical Therapy - 3 times
%Fat - XXXXX
%Water - XXXXX
%Muscle - XXXXX
During the run I started thinking about why I don't do more speedwork. The reality is I've had a habit of hurting myself with efforts that are too fast or too hard. I'm not as scared of speed as I used to be and I think that has everything to do with the time that has been spent in the weight room. I'll never be able to prove it, but I'm very hopeful that all of the work lifting heavy stuff has made me substantially more resistant to injury. With 34 weeks (eek!) of high volume training left to do it is hard to imagine anything more important to accomplish in these early months than getting strong enough to take the beatings that will happen when I can get outside and start piling on the bike miles.
Strength Training in Review
November 14th - Physical Therapy startedNovember 16th - Body Pump started
November 17th - Heavy Weight Training started
The big change for this week? Instead of lifting 4x10's, I'm now shifting to 8/8/6 where the goal is to do 3 sets of 8 reps each but the last set should be to failure and failure may come before reaching the 8th repetition on the 3rd/last set. This might not seem like a big change, but from what people that are smarter than me say (Hi Jake! Hi Steve! Hi Internet!), lifting heavier weights for less reps should create more of a central nervous system stimulus which can lead to an adaptation where the body actually creates new neurological connections to enable greater coordination between muscle cells. My goal is to continue this approach until the end of February and then re-evaluate. When comparing across the same set of exercises I'm now lifting 14% heavier weight than I was last week. That's a big jump, but it might not be enough. Frankly, lifting to failure scares me. The heavier weights are a challenge and I often finish with almost nothing left in the tank but I haven't quite had the courage to increase enough where I can't get beyond 6 reps on the last set most of the time. I'll keep challenging myself and adjust as my experience and courage grow.
For anyone that is still reading by this point, thanks! Also, you might want to try an over the counter sleep aid next time if this post hasn't got you snoring yet 💤
Weekly Stats
Swim - 5000 yardsBike - 58 miles
Run - 24 miles
Body Pump - 2 times
Heavy Lifting - 2 times
Duration - 11:30 hours
Physical Therapy - 3 times
Body Composition
Weight - 206 pounds - more next week%Fat - XXXXX
%Water - XXXXX
%Muscle - XXXXX
