Legion Fitness Living

This phase of my program has me maintaining the weight of my lifts and increasing the reps. My target was 7 reps of 115kg on my first set. I just missed it. Watching the video back, I’m looking to see if I was pushing for at least 5 seconds on the stalled bar. And if the bar was still slowly moving. ALWAYS ALWAYS bench with safety arms when you don’t have a spot. Watch to the end of the video to see how to safely fail a bench press.

Slick hands

I’ve squatted 3 times a week since mid January. About 8 or 9 weeks. I’ve gradually increased the weight each time (3x a week). Starting with 5kg increases, then 2.5kg increases eventually to 1kg. I started conservatively at 3x5@80kg after the long Christmas break so that I wasn’t too sore. I’m due to squat 3x5@123kg on Friday. This is simple progressive overload. The weight is feeling fairly challenging for me to keep increasing 3x a week so I’ve substituted in a split squat in place of one of the three squat sessions. I’ll continue to progress the squat twice a week. When twice a week becomes too hard, even in small 0.5kg increases, I’ll back it off to once a week and add in another squat assistance exercise in its place. Slow consistent progress is how you get strong.

After nearly a month off training over Christmas, I feel slow, flat and unmotivated. A lot of people feel extra motivated this time of year. Not me. After lifting some all time best numbers towards the end of last year, it’s disheartening to think of where I was to where I am now. I’ve been here enough times to know how to approach getting back into training though. The way you do it is through ACTION. Just do something. Get back in there and force yourself to move. It’s hard to begin with, but I know once the habit comes back, it gets easier. Once the momentum builds the motivation returns.