Cable Pulls and Handstand Pushups

23 September 2011

A quick workout consisting of cable pulls and HSPUs (the latter assisted, feet against wall).

Front chest pull RYR x 12 reps

Assisted HSPU x 5 reps

Overhead downward pull YRY x 10 reps

Asissted HSPU x 5

One-arm front pulldown double yellows x 10 reps

Assisted HSPUs x 5

Chest Expander Training

16 September 2011

Front chest pull RYR x 10

Overhead downward pull YRY x 10

Back press GYG x 8, GRG x 5

One-arm front pulldown triple oranges x 10 per side

Front lateral raise double oranges x 10

Archer pull double reds x 10 per side

Bicep curl double reds x 10 per side

Cable Pulls

1 September 2011

Simple but tough workout - hit as many reps with the first listed resistance, then immediately follow up with asmany reps as possible at a slightly lower resistance. Terrific burn in the muscles.

Front chest pull red-yellow-red x 9 reps, RRR x 5 reps

Overhead downward pull YRY x 8 reps, RYR x 5 reps

Back press GYG x 7 reps, GOG x 6 reps

Front lateral raise double orange x 10 reps

Neck press-out double orange x 20 reps

Archer pull double reds x 10 reps

Bicep curl double reds x 10 reps

Reverse curl double orange x 12 reps

Back To Cable Training!

10 August 2011

Did a quick cable session today just to blow the cobwebs off the cable set:

Front chest pull x 12 (8 reps RYR + 4 reps RRR as a drop-set)

Overhead downward pull x 12 (8 reps YRY + 4 YOY as above)

Back press x 12 (7 reps GRG + 5 reps double green cables)

Archer pull x 12, double reds

Bicep curl x 12, double reds

Front lateral raise x 12, 7 reps double oranges + 5 reps single yellow cable

Forearm curl x 12, double oranges

Lost quite a bit of pulling strength from the layoff, but am still doing okay. I will slowly reintroduce cable pulls into my weekly routine. Surprisingly weak in the tricep-dominant movements, especially archer pull in which I have lost a lot of strength.

Weekend Training - Syd Devis Course No. 3, Week 6

Over the weekend:

One-arm FCP, anyhow - resistance used: three orange cables (OOO)

One-arm upward push, anyhow - two greens and a yellow (GYG)

Two-arms FCP, anyhow - two yellows and an orange (YOY)

Two-arms back press, anyhow - GOG

Dislocation, anyhow - double oranges

Overhead downward pull, knuckles out - YRY

Two-arms upward front chest pull, legs apart - double reds

One-arm military press - triple reds

Ten reps each, all executed with flawless form, will be increasing the resistance next turn and starting at 5 reps again.

Syd Devis Course No. 3 - Week 5

12 March 2011

Saturday morning cable pulls:

One-arm FCP, anyhow - resistance used: three orange cables (OOO)

One-arm upward push, anyhow - two greens and a yellow (GYG)

Two-arms FCP, anyhow - two yellows and an orange (YOY)

Two-arms back press, anyhow - GOG

Dislocation, anyhow - double oranges

Overhead downward pull, knuckles out - YRY

Two-arms upward front chest pull, legs apart - double reds

One-arm military press - triple reds

Got nine reps on all of them, except the one-arm upward push on which I repeated the 8 reps I didn't get last time.

Assistance exercise - bicep curl (ROR) x 10 reps each arm

Syd Devis Course No. 3 - Week 4

3 March 2011

Struggled to get all the progressons today, my upper body is still fatigued from the pressing session earlier in the day. Still managed to move along nicely:

One-arm FCP, anyhow - resistance used: three orange cables (OOO)
One-arm upward push, anyhow - two greens and a yellow (GYG)
Two-arms FCP, anyhow - two yellows and an orange (YOY)
Two-arms back press, anyhow - GOG
Dislocation, anyhow - double oranges
Overhead downward pull, knuckles out - YRY
Two-arms upward front chest pull, legs apart - double reds
One-arm military press - triple reds

Hit the required eight reps for all exercises except:

One-arm upward push, anyhow - only got 7 with the left arm and did not keep arms properly locked out.

Syd Devis Course No. 3 - Week 3

19 February 2011

Moved a bunch of heavy furniture all day, made time for a bit of cable training in the evening.

One-arm FCP, anyhow - resistance used: three orange cables (OOO)
One-arm upward push, anyhow - two greens and a yellow (GYG)
Two-arms FCP, anyhow - two yellows and an orange (YOY)
Two-arms back press, anyhow - GOG
Dislocation, anyhow - double oranges
Overhead downward pull, knuckles out - YRY
Two-arms upward front chest pull, legs apart - double reds
One-arm military press - triple reds

All for seven repetitions. I am so far managing to hit all progressions.

Syd Devis Strandpulling Course No. 3 - Week 2

12 February 2011

One-arm FCP, anyhow - resistance used: three orange cables (OOO)
One-arm upward push, anyhow - two greens and a yellow (GYG)
Two-arms FCP, anyhow - two yellows and an orange (YOY)
Two-arms back press, anyhow - GOG
Dislocation, anyhow - double oranges
Overhead downward pull, knuckles out (substituted for press behind neck) - YRY
Two-arms upward front chest pull, legs apart - double reds
One-arm military press - triple reds


All done for six good, consecutive reps.

Asistance exercise - bicep curl (ROR) x 5 reps per arm

No KB swinging as I'm trying to heal my calluses.

Kettlebell and Cable Madness!

5 February 2011

Today I did the kettlebell work first. It was simple and straight-forward:

One-arm KB swings @ 35 lbs. x 200 reps (100 per arm), interrupted several times to gasp for air

One-arm KB clean and military press (cleaned twice, then pressed one after the second clean): 53 lbs. - 62 lbs. - 70 lbs. - 78 lbs. Repeated once for each arm.

Much easier than cleaning and pressing a dumbbell of equivalent weight. The 78 lb. kettlebell went up easily even with my left arm.

As for cables, I did something from the Syd Devis book All About Strand-Pulling - his third month course. I will from now on follow this progression in my cable training - best to heed the words of a champion expander puller and notable oldtime strongman:

One-arm FCP, anyhow - resistance used: three orange cables (OOO)
One-arm upward push, anyhow - two greens and a yellow (GYG)
Two-arms FCP, anyhow - two yellows and an orange (YOY)
Two-arms back press, anyhow - GOG
Dislocation, anyhow - double oranges
Overhead downward pull, knuckles out (substituted for press behind neck) - YRY
Two-arms upward front chest pull, legs apart - double reds
One-arm military press - double greens (too light - next time I'll try triple reds)

Assistance exercises:

Front lateral raise - double reds x 10
Bicep curl - ROR x 10 per arm
Behind-the-back lateral raise - single orange x 10

Some of these exercises are new to me, it was an interesting experiment. As prescribed, I did all of these for five consecutive reps and will be adding one rep until I get to 10, after which I will add resistance.

This should be a good alternative routine, I had stalled on the one I was doing before which just consisted of rest-pause sets with as much resistance as I could use. Hopefully the wisdom of Syd Devis will help me out of the slump.

Extra Day - Cables and Kettlebells

29 January 2011

Cable pulls - rep totals are given (done as singles, doubles and triples):

Front chest pull YRY x 4, YYY x 6

Overhead downward pull YRY x 3, YYY x 8, YGY x 2

Back press YYY x 5, YGY x 5, GYG x 5

Bicep curl YY x 10

Straight-arm pulldown YY x 10

Kettlebell session:

Double KB swing @ 18 lbs. each x 20 reps
One-handed KB swing @ 36 lbs. x 20 reps (10 left, 10 right) x 2 sets
OA KB swing @ 45 lbs. x 20 reps (10 left, 10 right) x 2 sets
OA KB swing @ 53 lbs. x 20 reps (10 L, 10 R) x 2 sets
Double KB swing @ 18 lbs. each x 20 reps

One-arm KB clean: 53 lbs. x 5 reps, 62 lbs. x 5 reps, 70 lbs. x 3 reps, 78 lbs. x 3 reps (per arm)

KB breathing shrug - from a pair of 18 lbs. to a pair of 70 lbs., 10 reps at each weight, total 40 reps

Aerobic Isometrics

30 July 2010

Aerobic isometrics have been around for a while, but were little known to the public until Ironmind published Steve Justa's excellent book Rock, Iron, Steel. In a twist of the classic functional isometric contraction theory, where one exerts a brief 100% effort against an immovable object for 6-7 seconds, the contraction is longer but at a suitably lower intensity (30-40% is suggested).

I decided to use my long TNT cables for this. It is pretty much impossible to gauge the intensity of the contraction over such a long period of time, so the cables keep me honest - I stretch them to the desired position and hold them there for as long as possible. This is important: after 20-25 seconds the effort seems closer to 60%, and toward the end of the set my muscles are shaking badly and the handles are almost impossible to hold in position.

Some exercises were tough to set up with cables, so I reverted to the Universal Strength Apparatus sold by bodyweightculture.com - the best suspension device on the market, also doubles handily as a portable isometric power rack.

I used light cable resistance and aimed for one minute - long contractions. Made it on most sets, had to cut it short on a few of them. Some exercises I used were:

Bicep curl 3 positions
Tricep exercises - pushdowns, overhead extensions
Horizontal row 2 positions
Chest press 2 positions
Bent-over row 1 position
Straight arm pulldown to sides 2 positions

Some exercises used with the USA:

Deadlift
Bent press
Lateral raise

A few sets of one-minute wall sits

Etc., etc.

This is decent low-intensity work, burns like hell while you're doing it but doesn't strain the joints.It also feels like I could do it a few times a week without interfering with my other training.

5/3/1 Program - Week 34, Day 3 Plus Cables

24 April 2010

Back squat:

Warmup 2 sets (50 and 110 kgs)
133 kgs (293 lbs) x 5
148 kgs (326 lbs) x 3
165 kgs (364 lbs) x 6 (very solid reps, probably had 2-3 more but I felt a pain in the lower abdomen so cut it short while the going was still good)

Hanging leg raise: 5 sets x 12 reps

Good-morning:

50 kgs (110 lbs) x 10
80 kgs (176 lbs) x 6
100 kgs (221 lbs) x 6 reps

EZ-bar curl:

37.5 kgs (83 lbs) x 5
47.5 kgs (105 lbs) x 5
57.5 kgs (127 lbs) x 3
67.5 kgs (149 lbs) x 1
70 kgs (154 lbs) x fail x 2 attempts (no cheat curls today)

Then later:

Back press YGY x 5, GYG x 5 (owned that sucker for a big PR)

Front lateral raise YY x 10 reps

Bodybuilding With the TNT Cable System

7 March 2010

Had a great workout today using the TNT cables and door attachment. I set the attachment to three different positions and did a bunch of exercises from each position, working in the 10-12 repetition range and getting a great "pump". Resistances varied - basically I stuck with whatever felt moderately heavy for each exercise (as this was a sort of 'active recovery').

The exercises performed were as follows (1 light and 2 moderate sets):

Straight-arm lat pulldowns
Tricep pushdowns
Kneeling cable crunches
Mid-height cable crossovers
Cable twists
Horizontal rows
Bicep curls from low cable position
Cable-resisted crunches
Up-right rows
Bicep curls
Lateral raises (1 set only)