Nel's Training Log

El Nel wrote:

As Always, tips/suggestions are welcome.

lockout is tough because your hips come up early and that later causes your back to fold up like an accordion. By keeping your hips low and keeping your back tight/straight, you put yourself in a good position for an easy lockout

Thanks, I'll work on it.

El Nel wrote:

My hand hasn't properly heal so the bar was slipping away.

When my hand had ripped open I found using wimpy wrap with athletic tape helped. Doesn't help with a lot of reps though.

Sammie Jo wrote:

El Nel wrote:

My hand hasn't properly heal so the bar was slipping away.

When my hand had ripped open I found using wimpy wrap with athletic tape helped. Doesn't help with a lot of reps though.

this happened to me once over the summer and i had to use painters tape

I've never really had a callus tear. I have this one little spot on the inside of my right ring finger that likes to crack open when I deadlift really frequently, but that's about it.

I was using tape but it didn't occur to me to use wraps too. I'll keep that in mind. Thanks.

Sammie Jo wrote:

El Nel wrote:

My hand hasn't properly heal so the bar was slipping away.

When my hand had ripped open I found using wimpy wrap with athletic tape helped. Doesn't help with a lot of reps though.

Squats 5x5 225lbs

Bench press 3x5 190lbs

Chin ups 3x10

Back extensions/Glute-ham raise 5x10

I decided to add some light deadlifts focusing on my technique/keeping my form.

Conventional deadlifts 2x5 135lbs

Sumo deadlifts 2x5 135lbs

Snatch grip deadlifts 2x5 135lbs

The Texas Method only requires me to deadlift on Mondays but adding this extra session today felt good and I'm thinking about keeping it. Any thoughts?

If you decide to keep this light deadlift day, i would recommend doing speed/acceleration work with it. Keep the weight less than 65% and do a series (6-eight) of singles or doubles. Focus particularly on accelerating the bar as fast as possible

Got it. Do 6 sets, wearing sunglasses and a smile on my face, of singles or doubles focusing on accelerating the bar. lol

Nah, but in all seriousness, I'll do that, thanks for the advice. I assume I should be doing this only with my sumo deadlift (which is my normal deadlift stand), not like I did today with different deadlifting techniques. Right?

Ahh you edited the smiley face wearing sunglasses! My response is not funny anymore!

You're not getting a stretch reflex in your squat and I think it would definitely still help to make sure you're driving off your heels. On your first rep you pivot your left foot as you descend which is dangerous but I think all of this is associated. I think the parts of you that need to stay tight and stable are too loose and unstable and the parts of you that should move need to be even more dynamic like this:

I looked up stuff about the stretch reflex. This will for sure help. Thanks

I was supposed to squat 285lbs for 5x5 but for some reason my lower back was bothering me. It felt as it I had a rod (vertically, center right) on my lower back. It didn't hurt too much but it was uncomfortable and it was affecting my depth. I squatted up to 275lbs, did a couple of sets to see if it would loosen up, it did so I went for 280lbs before jumping to 285lbs but it started feeling uncomfortable again so I decided to stop squatting.

Any ideas what this might be and/or what to do? I'm foam rolling like a pro to see if it goes away.
Squats 4x2 275lbs, 2x2 180lbs

Bench press (pause) 1x5 185lbs, 1x3 205lbs, 1x2 225lbs, 1x5 185lbs  Again when arching my back to bench my lower back hurt the same way.





Deadlift (speed/accelerating) 2x2 225lbs, 2x2 245lbs, 2x1 275lbs and here I stopped because of the same problem with my lower back.

Not sure exactly what the source of the pain may be. However, I have had low back pain from arching while I bench before. I've come to realize that it's mostly because I was arching my back the wrong way. I was putting all the arch in my lower back. When I started to practice making the arch a result of tightness throughout my entire back, primarily my upper and middle back, the pain I was experiencing went away. It's come back a little once or twice, but It's always been because I got lazy and just started to put a ton of bend in my lower back. I don't have the worlds greatest arch when I bench, but it's gotten quite a bit better over the months, and, more importantly, I no longer have lower back pain when I bench. Perhaps the pain you experience when you squat has a similar source. I don't know if you are over arching your low back when you squat or not, but I could see that causing similar discomfort to arching while benching. I try to remember to keep my back tight and to "breathe into my lower back". this keeps me from putting too much bend in my lower back.

Also, who was your spotter? Looked like you might have had a third rep in you.

Yeah, maybe it was something like that. I might give a rest, skip tomorrow which is supposed to be my light day and try to lift again on friday. And the spotter, some dude I didn't know. I shook my head so he would help me with that last one. I probably could have power through it but when pushing I kept feeling that pressure on my lower back so decided to bail before making it worse.

Thanks for your input, Andy.

i obviously did not see your arched bench set up, but i did watch your squat from roughly 10 days ago and i noticed just like andy said, your mid-lower back was tight and in excellent position but your mid-upper back looked pretty laxed and loose. it is hard to describe tightening this region without having a visual but chad wesley smith explains it well in this video:

Dude! This makes a lot of sense I do those things and didn't know I was doing it wrong. Thanks a lot, I'll work on correcting this things.

Squats 1x3 130kg, 1x1 140kg, 1x3 150kg

That first one was kind of iffy and the other two are barely below parallel so I'm just going to open with 315lbs at the Intramural and make sure I hit my depth.

Pause Bench Press 1x2 90kg, 1x3 100kg

I wanted to get a video of the 1x3 100kg but my phone ran out of space. I got to say, these looked really nice and clean. I know, if there no video it didn't happen. However, I have Coffman, Anderson and Kevin as my witnesses. That counts for something, right?

+1 for heels not coming up

El Nel wrote:

I have . . . witnesses. That counts for something, right?

Means nothing NOTHING

Will wrote:

Means nothing NOTHING

Damn it! Give me an hour or two. Going back to the gym to record a new set.

Intramural Meet

Squat 315lbs, 340lbs (PR!)

Bench Press 225lbs, 335lbs

Deadlift 365lbs, 390lbs

Hey! Nice job man. I saw the video and you had good attempts and made them all look easy. Were you using the Lilliebridge knee wraps for your skwats? (kind of difficult to tell)

Thanks man!

No, I was using Grizzly knee sleeves. Im still not used to squatting with wraps so I bought a pair of sleeves to kind of help with the transition. They were pretty cheap and I like using them so far.I'm thinking about investing in some SBDs, from what I got from your youtube video they are a pretty good investment.

I'd think the sbd knee sleeves are going to cause a similar joint distraction as the wraps (because they're max thickness) but there won't be a big increase in pressure since they aren't so tight  but idk what I'm talking about really