Weightlifting people, here! Ongoing chat thread...

pinkhorse I find if I lift when I'm ill it makes me feel much worse/ extends how long I'm ill. I wouldn't recommend lifting with tonsillitis! Let your body recover without putting the extra stress on it

pinkhorse I tend to wait until I'm completely better, on the principle that a week or two off won't set me back much and it's not worth risking being ill for longer - I have done myself a mischief in the past by exercising when ill.

I haven't had tonsillitis since I was a child so I'm not sure of what your exact symptoms would be - however if you have a temperature at all I would suggest you're not well enough to train. What are your energy levels like? Are you managing day to day stuff fine enough?

Do you guys lift when you're ill? I have tonsillitis but am starting to feel better in myself now the antibiotics have kicked in.

Could I do some lifting? I've ruled out running as worried about breathing hard in the icy cold air but what about lifting?

Yes, I've got a few exercises from the physio to do to get the lats, etc, firing and then we'll build up from there. She said it should be quite quick because I'm already relatively strong (get me!) and have good muscle memory (get me again!).

Thanks for the ring work tip Johnny I'll ask my physio about that when I see her next week. What d'you do specifically?

I reached my target of 100kg leg press! Woohoo! Managed a set of 10 and then couldn't do it again but I did it! Yay!

Upper body today.
Bench press 2 x 10 x 20 and 1 x 10 x 25
Shoulder press 3 x 10 x 6 (each handweight)
Seated row 4 x 10 x 20
Pull ups using the Total Gym - 2 x 10 at incline of 14. THEN. Then. OMG. I had to do as many as I could. 17 at 14, 20 at 12, 13 at 10. Arms died at that point.
Then a decent amount of work on my core to finish, dead bugs, Russian twists and planks.

Good session, I'm still feeling it now. We spoke about nutrition too and I've set a goal to lose 4kg in 8 weeks which should be doable. My next "gym goal" is to do a full pull up without using the total gym. I'm aiming to be able to do this by Easter.

closet I also have weak lats. Ring work is helpful if you have access to them as you use lats to stabilise, or otherwise push ups on a bosu- basically anything that requires side to side stabilisation.

V quick session today

• 3 x 8 one arm shoulder press at 10kg. Reckon I can do sets of 10 next time so long as I give myself 2 mins between sets

• 3 x 5 dips - may be able to do 6's but I wanted to get 3 sets in and I haven't done these in ages so didn't risk it.

• Accumulated 15 neutral grip pull ups (3,3,3,2,2,2). Tired after the dips even though it should be different muscles.

2x 10 hamstring curls at 43lbs alternating 2 x10 leg extensions at 62.5lbs (should've been 3 sets but ran out of time).

Nearly coughed up a lung after some light deadlifts this morning, but apart from that everything felt good. (I'm not actually still ill, but I tend to have a cough for a good couple of weeks after a cold)

Deadlifts: 5 x 5 x 80 kg
Smith machine incline bench: 5 x 10 x 40 kg
Hip thrusts: 2 x 8 x 50 kg, 4 x 8 x 60 kg
Overhead barbell press: 3 x 10 x 35 kg
Core work - leg spreaders and leg raise supersets
Shoulder finisher - 6 way thing/reverse hyper superset

That is a bummer! Were there any suggestions for ways to activate your lats? I had never heard of serratus muscles!

I find I do consciously have to stop shoulders taking over with quite a lot of lifts.

Gah, after a really great upper body session on Saturday I've now been instructed to lay off all presses, rows, flies, raises, etc, by the physio I saw today about my niggling shoulder. Apparently my mid-back is quite stiff so my upper shoulders (traps, deltoids) have been over-compensating for my completely dead lats and serratus muscles. So, I have to get them firing properly and then build the upper body stuff up slowly again. Bummer, as I finally felt like I was beginning to progress on my presses. But, on the flip side it might explain why progress was quite so slow.

Was feeling smug about making it to the gym yesterday, until I got up this morning, and my legs didn't want to work!

Benchpress - 35kg - 4 x10
Back squats - 50kg - 4 x 10
Walking lunges - 4 x 2 x 10
Leg Extensions - 35kg - 4 x 10
Lat Pulldowns - 43.5kg - 4 x 12
Bicep curls - 15kg barbell - 4 x 10
HIIT on treadmill - 15mins

I'm back in black! First time on the bike today and first time at the gym in two weeks. Took it very easy, kept the weights light and did shorter sets.
Back squats 60 kg 5 x 5
Bench 45 kg 5 x 5
Back hyperextension with 15 kg plate - 5 x 10
Lat pull down 36 kg 4 x 10
Leg press 130 kg 6 x 6
Incline dumbbell curl 6 kg 4 x 10

Got some unsolicited advice from a gym bro this morning re: dumbbell curls. This dude always used to annoy me - just the way he walked around annoyed me - and I was expecting to be irritated by his advice, but actually he was really helpful so I've decided he's OK now.

Margo A ski erg is like an ergo drum attached to a wall vertically with arm cables - you only use your arms/ body to pull the cables- I guess it's called a ski erg as it's similar to a cross country skiing movement. I've only ever seen them in Crossfit gyms, possibly as they're sometimes part of the Games so people need to practice. Most people do them standing so you engage your whole body in pulling down but I can't at the moment due to my casts so I sit on a bench and do it with my arms. It's a bit village but the closest I can get to cardio.

Bit of a "Saturday" session today (I.e. did some stuff I was supposed to do and then just played around a bit. BIG discovery- there is a dip bar. I just hadn't noticed it as its part of another machine. No more dips off the bench for me.

4x10 DB benchpress at 30lbs.
3x 10 front raises 5kg alternating with 3 x 10 tricep dips off the bench
3x 10 hamstring curls at 43lbs alternating 3 x10 leg extensions at 62.5lbs
Accumulated 17 neutral grip pull ups (4,3,3,3,2,2). I need to start timing this. At the moment I just go by feel.
3 x 30 second hollow holds with 20 second breaks
2 x 30 second dead hang with knees raised to chest. Should have been 3 but it hurt too much.
Messed around on the newly discovered dip bar a bit. Messed around with the Swiss balls and bosu's a bit.

I use the phone app too. You can also add recipes, which is a handy thing if you cook a lot and also tend to eat similar meals on rotation. Eg - if you really love lasagne and you eat it every couple of weeks or whatever, you can enter your recipe for it and then how many portions are in that recipe. You only need to do that once and then whenever you have lasagne you just add it from your recipe section.

It also has a vast database of pretty much every food item you can buy ever, and you can scan barcodes with your phone to make it quicker to find the item on the database. However - sometimes the nutrition information isn't accurate so you need to double-check.

It’s a faff to start with but then less so as it remembers what you’ve eaten. I mostly use the phone app

Thanks Closet shall have a look at MFP. Is it a big faff entering everything?

What's a seated ski erg Johnny?

This morning:
20 mins HIIT - bit pissed off, so in the mood for going for it, which was good and feel less pissed off now!
Abdominal pull downs - 50lb 10 x 4
Chest press - 30lb 10 x 4
Seated leg curls - 55lb 10 x 2, 7 x 1 and 5 x 1 always kills me
Abductors - 55lb 10 x 4

Lighting technical session with my PT this morning. All basically focused on shoulder protraction and scapula engagement.

3x single arm DB press 8kg
3x 12 cable row with band
3x 10 lat pull down using ring on a band
3 x10 plank with elbows on Swiss ball ( 5 circles each way).
5 minute baseline test on the seated ski erg
Assisted stretching

My first weights session today after about 2-3 weeks of not training much (ill, tired, work). Today was butt and legs!
Back squat 30kg 3 sets (10, 10, 8)
Leg press 50kg 3 x 10
RDL 32.5kg 3 x 10
Hip thrust 32.5kg 3 x 10

Then a finisher of 3 sets of 20 KB swings (16kg) and 30 frog pumps (I have got over the embarrassment of doing these in public).

I need to work on making sure my hips don't rise faster than my shoulders on my squats. But overall, I'm pretty happy with how I'm progressing on these lifts/ movements. I'm making steady gains each week.

Margo I've been tracking on mfp for the past month, on and off, and it's incredibly helpful. It's really, really helped me get my perception of what I eat in tune with what I actually do eat! I've also upped my carbs and bit and I've found the scale is creeping down again even though I'm not trying to lose weight (although that could be because I haven't lifted much over the past couple of weeks)

Sorry to hear you are still poorly Findo.

Aha, Johnny gotcha. That's still pretty cool and I couldn't do that. It sounds like it needs lots of core body strength to hold that position.

This morning:

20 mins HIIT
Leg extension (with toes out to get some inner thigh action too) 55lb 10 x 4
Ab pull down 50lb 10 x 4
Back pull down 45lb 10 x 4
Rowing lifts 50lb 10 x 4

Will reduce carbs a bit & see how I go on the blubber front.

Margo I'm not sure I did what you think I did . I'm not doing a pull up onto the rings. I'm setting them just above hip height and then pressing down into them with my arms straight (like being at the top of a dip but on rings instead of bars) so my feet are off the floor. Then I just hold myself there.

Today's session

4x 10 DB bench press 30lb DBs
3x 10 front raises 5kg alternating with 10 tricep dips off the bench
3x 10 hamstring curls at 43lbs alternating 3 x10 leg extensions at 62.5lbs
Accumulated 15 neutral grip pull ups (4,3,3,3,2). My first set of 4 so happy with that. I know my technique isnt perfect as I cant do a full drop due to bar height and I'm swinging a bit at the bottom but definitely seeing progress.
3x8 one arm shoulder press with 10kg DB
3x30 second hollow holds with 20 second breaks

Evening all!

've been back at work since Monday but I am STILL not well enough to train: it's been over a week now. I swear I can feel my muscles withering away! And it looks like the rest of the week is a write-off as well - just day-to-day stuff is exhausting enough right now. At times like this I appreciate how much my sense of identity and wellbeing depends on my being able to exercise regularly. I'm not sure if that's a good way to be, but it's where I find myself.

I had success with logging on mfp, Oogle, when I lost weight recently. It's a bit of a faff at first but gets to be second nature and it automatically saves stuff you eat so you don't need to find it again in the database, plus you can create recipes and save those. You can change it so it tracks macros rather than calories, but I just tracked calories.

No eating plan here, Margo - just keeping an eye on calories in/out. But I know some people have success with cutting back on carbs to change things up if weight loss is stalling.

Mega busy week at work, so didn't have time to record my stuff but went Monday & Tuesday mornings & did a combo of all my usual stuff.

I can feel muscles starting to tone now, but that makes me even more conscious of the layer of fat on top of the muscle - as it is more distinguishable now that the muscle is harder IYSWIM.

I may have to consider hacking back on carbs. Do any of you have an eating plan?

Are you lifting your full body weight on the rings Johnny? (If yes, I am awestruck.)

I have put weight on again, my body fat % is up and muscle mass is down. PT has gently said "lets look at your diet" so I now have to log everything with myfitnesspal and send him screenshots daily. Admittedly, I have eaten an awful lot of shit recently.

Slight knee injury but battled through lower body today.

Lateral walk 1/2 aisle x 4
Lunges full aisle x 4 with 12kg
Glute bridge 3 x 10 x 10
Hamstring bridge 3 x 10
Squats 3 x 10 x 16 (used a dumbbell today rather than a bar)
Leg extension 3 x 10 x 20
Calf raise 3 x 21 x 40

It was good but I've walked away furious with myself for being such a dick with my diet. I'm also going to make it to the gym 4 times a week rather than 2-3. I did a good cardio session on Friday but I know I can push myself further.

Saw my PT today but mainly a technical rather than hard session

10 mins shoulder monbility drills

3 x 10 scapula push ups (harder than they look) alternating with 3 x 10 horizontal scapula shrugs. These are mainly just to help me learn to engage my scapula when doing pull ups/ ring work etc.

3 x 20 second holds in the rings, trying (but mainly failing) to turn my hands out. Managed to keep shoulders down and back and hips forward so that was good.
3 x 10 lat pull downs (really light weight- focusing on keeping left shoulder back

8 x 30 seconds on/ 30 seconds off assault bike arms only. OMG. Triceps are gonna kill tomorrow.

• 4 x10 DB bench press (30lb/13.5kg DB)
• 3 x 10 front raises 5kg alternating with 3x 10 tricep dips off the bench
• 3 x 10 hamstring curl 43lbs alternating with 3 x 10 leg extension 62.5lbs. Glutes were failing by end of 3rd set of hamstring curls. When I get these casts off I am going to have some major glute work to do. I m literally "weak assed" at the moment.
• 3 x 30 seconds on/ 20 seconds off hollow body curl
• 1 x 2 pronated pull ups plus 3 x 3 neutral grip pull ups.
• 3 x 10 shoulder press 10kg. Bridging from previous weight of 20lbs (which is 9kg) was surprisingly hard. Had to drop down to 8 for the last set to maintain form.

Ugh- still waiting for my first cold/cough of the season and I guarantee I will get scratchy throated the second I finish work to fly back to the UK.

• 15 mins shoulder mobility with 12lb bar
• 4 x10 DB bench press (25lb DB)
• 3 x 10 front raises 5kg alternating with 3x 10 tricep dips off the bench
• 3 x 10 hamstring curl 43lbs alternating with 3 x 10 leg extension 62.5lbs
• 3 x 3 neutral grip pull ups (last set was tough- gallows legs).

Went home to DS telling me he's going to vomit due to eating way too much candy at our apartment building's Christmas fete. Joy.