Kevin's journey to become an all-around better person

“If you spend too much time thinking about a thing, you'll never get it done.â€

Monday 8/11/08

Before working out, I rode my bike 20 minutes to and from drivers ed, at a vigorous pace. Also, I had done half an hour of bboying (basic toprock and footwork)

WORKOUT:

Active flexibility drills

Some rotator cuff prehab

Weighted dips(+10) 5/5/5

Pseudo push-ups 5/5/5/5/5

Head-stand push-ups 2/2/1/2/1

Medium pronated grip pull-ups (+20) 5

(+25) 5/5

One-arm pushups (both arms) 2/2/2

Advanced front lever(four sets) 17/18/20/22 total = 77

Band assisted tuck planche (four sets) 20/15/10/8/8 total = 61 (weak near the end - I had been GTG-ing this throughout the day)

Bent-leg L-seat hold (three sets) 10/15/9

Hanging leg raises 5/4

My focus on some exercises was slipping, due to my family watching the Olympics and going crazy whenever a Chinese gymnast or diving duo did well (and this especially sucks because they always do outstanding)

From this workout, you can see that I am focusing most of my attention on 'pushing', which is VERY important in both bboying (freezes), and swimming. Another thing, I am not doing much low-rep work on my legs, as they are already somewhat disproportional. This is because I have hammered them with Rippetoes, 5x5, smolov, and other programs. However, like I stated in my introduction, I am in no way letting my legs wither away.

Overall, I think I am making good progress, especially on the front lever. However, I still need to get used to straight-arm work, as the lack of familiarity hinders my progression on the planche.

7/10, thanks for reading!

If you are trying to increase your vertical jump, Air Alert has had better results for me and everybody else who has used it over any other jump program.

http://www.airalert.com/

Keep in mind that before you start air alert or any plyometrics program you should be able to squat at least 1.5 times your weight for maximum benefits

jumpupandfly said:

Keep in mind that before you start air alert or any plyometrics program you should be able to squat at least 1.5 times your weight for maximum benefits

Thanks for the reminder, but

1. I have reached that milestone already

2. I believe I read somewhere that there is no 'requirement', but I think you acknowledge that with your statement of 'maximum benefits'. After all, you wouldn't tell a child to squat 1.5x their bodyweight before playing hopskotch, right?

8/12/08

One hour of bboying, relatively light. Tomorrow I'm working out with some friends, in which I will probably give into the peer pressure of benching to hell. So I cut down a little on this workout (no HePU's or OAPu's)

WORKOUT:

general warm-up

shoulder pre-hab

Dips (+15) 5/5/5/5/5 very smooth and easy +5 pounds

Pseudo-push ups 5/5/5/5/ I try to lean over more and more, making the exercise harder. I will try to peak out at 5 reps every time.

Pull-ups (+25) 5/5/5/5/5

Advanced tuck front lever (four sets) 22/20/20/18 1:20 +3 from yesterady

Assisted tuck planche (five sets) 20

(weaker, red band) 20/14/17/8

Facepulls (for shoulder balance) 45 12/12/12

Finger-tip push-ups 5/5/5

SHORT TERM GOALS, by this day next week:

-Dips (+25) for 5x5

-Full, smooth pseudo push-ups.

-Pull-ups (+30) for 5x5

-Tuck planche without assistance

-Advanced tuck front lever for 30 seconds

-Finish my make-shift mushroom

-Pass my segment 1 driver's ed test

Questions:

- What other pulling exercises can I do, which can make my training close to 50/50 push/pull? I know a lot of pushing exercises, but can only think of pull-ups.

- Where are pseudo pushups supposed to hurt? They KILL my chest, and leave my triceps and shoulders unscathed.

8/10 Thanks for your time! It means a lot to me.

6/15/08

Handstand push-ups 5/4/3

Dips (+20) 5/5/5

Pseudos 5/5/5/5/5

Pull-ups (+25) 5/5/5

Front lever one leg accumulate to 60 in 3 sets

Tuck planche (less help than less time) accumulate to 60 in 4 sets

NEXT WEEKS GOALS:

STOP PROCRASTINING AND STUDY MATH

Dips (+40) for 5's

Chin-ups (+40) for 5's

Tuck planche for 30 seconds

Straddle front-lever

One circle on my new mushroom

My thoughts on band-assistance on planche progressions

For most trainees with no prior experience with gymnastics, straight-armed work is a...'pleasant' surprise. From personal experience, it is frustrating, as 'bent arm' would logically be more difficult....but instead, it is reversed. In order to build up familiarity with the flexibility and strength requirements of the planche pression, bands are extremely effective.

Coach Sommer's progression is GREAT when it comes to a basic temple However, the stages outlined in his article should be treated as 'key-points', rather than steps. The main reason is this is because going from the frog stand to the tuck planche directly is quite impractical, and very frustrating. Logically, there must be steps in between that familiarize the trainee with straight-arm work, as well as the core support.

A exercise that addresses this problem is the straight-armed frog stand: http://www.crossfitportland.com/archives/21 . However, this exercise does not reduce the load placed on the arms, and also is very difficult to achieve the proper 'lean' in.

From personal experience, I can tell you that I progressed very fast with bands. One week earlier, I was not able to hold a split second of the tuck planche. Now, I can hold it comfortably for a good period of time. I know some gymnastics prodiges probably plopped right into a planche, but my progress was mindblowing to me.

My procedure was to hang a band from a dip bar. Luckily, I had 3 bands of varying resistance, as well as adjustable dip bars. Therefore, I had many many choices in terms of difficulty.

The only problem is that you MUST emphasize the forward lean, and try to resist the assistance provided by the bands. If you are slacking, you will actually lose strength in this position.

8/19/08

Late night (1 am) workout. ...damn. I've been REALLY busy in the past few days: lots of AP psychology and economics selfstudy. But I HAVE been working out. Unfortunately, i haven't recorded it. Hopefully you can tell by my progress that those workouts have been worthwhile.

Dips (+30) 5/5/5/5/5 easy and solid...a surprise for me

Headstand push-ups- 5/5/6 (cutting short due to time)

Pull-ups(+30)- 5/5/5 easy...except elbow kept popping

One-legged front lever- (6 sets, aiming to increase leverage so I can only do 10 seconds each)

Tucked (UNASSISTED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)planche(6 sets, same style as above)

L-sit on parallettes, strving to achieve arm-hip alignment -

Lets go over my goals I set last week:

-Dips (+25) for 5x5 - smashed

-Full, smooth pseudo push-ups. -subjective, so arguable. I dont think so

-Pull-ups (+30) for 5x5 -yes

-Tuck planche without assistance -!!!

-Advanced tuck front lever for 30 seconds -passed

-Finish my make-shift mushroom -and it looks NICE, ill put up pics later

-Pass my segment 1 driver's ed test -barely

QUESTIONS: my elbow pops on pull-ups....help?

where would i put mushrooms circles in my workout? beginnin

9/10, not because of the work today, but because of achieving my goals. Thanks for reading

Barry, a lot of time my elbows like to pop when I hang on a bar. In fact, I hang from a bar every morning or night to loosen them up and do the same thing in my WU. Sometimes, they will pop and I feel like I can straighten out a little more. This is how they have been for as long as I remember.

If it is causing you pain, then I would not worry. My shoulder likes to do the same adjsutment often when hanging or stretching on the yoga ball or foam roller. However, that's because I know it's all fugly inside and slightly uncomfortable. Again, popping my elbow makes it feel better and there is no pain more of a " loosening " like popping my back or neck in hanging or seal stretches, bridges, yoga ball stuff, neck movements.

However, it rarely continues to pop. Maybe some bent arm elbow stuff if it's too loose to protect. I know I need more for my right as I feel it aching in back levers.

I have been working out for the past few days; however, I haven't published the workouts- they are not very significant.

In the meantime, on my band-assisted rampage, I decided to go astray from the usual planche progression. I'll be going directly to the band-assisted full planche and ultimately reach a point in which I am doing the real deal.