After flirting with 3- and 2-riser box squats in late May I decided that I felt good enough to restart a 3×5 template similar to Starting Strength, electing to start at about 50% of my pre-surgical 1RMs. I hit a point where I’d been feeling like crap with light lifting for a long time, and then a light switch flipped on and I was REALLY READY all of a sudden. I have occasional aching in the periphery of the incision but nothing major pain-wise. There are a few funky spots that open up occasionally but have been treating them with silver sulfadiazine to good effect.
As suspected, the surgery’s net effect on my strength training will be extremely positive. Squat depth has improved markedly with the excess tissue removed, but I need to mob a little more to keep the depth there (I am just hitting parallel on free squats). Current plan is to run an LP in conjunction with John Kiefer’s Carb Nite (a cyclic ketogenic diet) through the end of the summer. This will hopefully get me down to about 220 and hold there at solidly sub-20% body fat, ideally closer to 15%. Then I’ll restart WSB
I’m tracking everything on Livestrong again. Diet-wise I find that I feel better running a little more aggressively on protein (200 g/day on rest days, 300+ g/day on lift days) than fat (60-120 g/day, higher on rest days) when doing carb restriction. This means lots of chicken breast and getting 2-3 scoops of whey on lift days. Just had my first carb-up after the prep phase and I definitely feel the old familiar thermal effect. Nice to be back on track.
Sub-goals for this period:
1. Squat 315x3x5
2. Deadlift 315×5
3. Bench 185×5
4. Accessory work to correct kyphosis and improve bench arch: barbell rows, ring rows, thoracic mobility
5. Accessory work for pectoral and triceps hypertrophy
06-01-2013
Squat: 45×5,5 95×5, 135×5, 185x3x5
BB Row: 95x3x8
Good Morning: 95x3x8
Seated DB shoulder press: 30sx3x8
06-02-2013
Stationary bike 13.4 miles in 60 minutes (punishing my quads to get them re-adapted to movement)
06-04-2013
Squat: 45×5,5, 95×5, 135×5, 165×5, 195x3x5
Bench: 45×5,5, 95x3x5
Deadlift: 95×5, 185×5
Triceps pushdown, blue band: 3×12
DB rollbacks: 25x3x8
06-06-2013
Squat: 45×5,5, 95×5, 145×5, 200x3x5
BB Row: 135×5, 95x3x8
Military press: 45×5,5, 65x3x5
Good morning: 95x3x8
Hammer DB curl: 200sx12x4
Shrugs: 60sx12x4
06-08-2013
AM Saturday weigh-in: 233.4 pounds (+5.4 pounds from lowest recorded adult weight)
06-09-2013
Squat: 45×5, 95×5, 135×5, 185×3, 205x3x5, 135×10
Bench: 45×5,5, 65×5, 100x3x5
DL: 135×5, 190×5 (tried the “chair deadlift” setup, was actually pretty intuitive)
Incline DB bench: 30sx12x4
Banded triceps pushdown: 15×4 with hold at bottom (~1 second)
Beards Over Barbells 