Comment

This is ridiculous! Blogger won't even allow me to comment anonymously (and no, it's not waiting to be approved...) and yet it'll allow me to log in to post. Bizarre.

Anyway, as far as coming back to the track is concerned, if it were possible to run the sessions for free, I'd be there already, but it's not, so I'm not! Lots of life stuff going on, but I'm moving house in a couple of weeks, so once that's done (and I've recovered from paying the bond!) I should be able to start back. Just in time to remember what a track bike is for Round 1 of the SSS...

23 July

File this one under interesting interaction, unsolicited advice. A guy who I think is the owner or manager of the gym came up to me today, talking about my squat form - after my first warmup set with just the bar. This set I do super-slow and often hold at the bottom for a few seconds, just for general warming/stretching/balancing purposes. So anyway he comes up, starts chatting a little, and tells me that I need to be looking up - not at the ceiling, but at the far (~50m away) intersection of the wall and warehouse roofline. So we have a discussion about keeping a neutral neck, he suggests that my balance is too much on my toes and that that's because of looking forward/down as I do. So I take that on board, and because I'm a nice chap (and it's still an unloaded bar) I do my next warmup set looking more upwards. And the balance does actually feel slightly better, and I can feel it more in my quads than my hamstrings.

But of course that's not where I want to feel it, and a loaded bar (even at my current workset weights) balances vastly differently than an empty one. So I don't change for my worksets, and though he's wandering around still, he only briefly comes up a little later to ask if I tried it, and almost ruefully (but genuinely) comments "Still want to do it your way, that's fine!"

And it is.

S: 102.5 (Starting with the belt already for worksets, helps me to remember to do my valsalva properly more than anything else at this weight)
B: 57.5
D: 125

Plus an extra powerclean (I do these, by the way, partly to shake my legs out slightly, partly to remember how to do them, and mainly so as to get the bar back up on the rack to take off the last plates, as it's easier that way.)

Proper PC worksets start back again on Thursday.

19 July

Whoops! We'll just backdate this one, shall we?

S: 100
P: 50 (Plus a single at 60)
D: 120 (Plus a single PC at 60)

16 July

Back to school tomorrow, back to riding up silly little hills. Hopefully it won't get in the way of training too much.

S: 95
B: 55
D:115

5-star

Look, it's a cheap gym. $3.30/session, no contracts or any of that sort of thing and not many people use the rack, so I can usually walk in, work out and walk out without much delay. But it's not the most tempting place to go. Mirrors everywhere, cold or hot but rarely comfortable, and acres of machines. But it's got heavy things, and there's still a place to lift them (though I'm constantly slightly worried that any given time I arrive there my rack will be gone) so it'll do. And I think I mentioned that it only costs $3.30.

S: 90
P: 45
D: 110

Oh, and thanks for the comment Kev - for some reason blogger is happy for me to sign in to write posts, but won't let me comment. I suspect that that says something about their relative importance.

Still going

Highlight of the day was someone asking to work in with me, saying they remembered me from a couple of months ago and how he couldn't believe how strong I was. I helped him with his squat form, which was a weird combination of high and low bar techniques. Nice feeling for the day.

S: 85
B: 50
D: 105

All right then

Back to serious training. Not everything is out of the way - major one being moving house (hopefully!) or finding someone to come share in the next month. But... enough crap is out of the way that I can committ to consistency again. Imagine if I'd stayed consistent and not stopped almost everything back around Easter? Ah well.

S: 80kg
P: 40kg
D: 100kg

Yeah, paltry. But it's a start. And it should get me back to a 150kg squat in time for the first round of SSS...