Monday was a bench day at Apollon, and the movement for the day was a 2-board press with 5 sets of chain (about 200lbs.)
This sucked!
Not in a bad way, it was just one of those exercises where the weight feels like a bazillion pounds, from about 135 up. I know it's exactly what I need though because I need to bring my lockout up to get better in my shirt.
Warmed up, then went:
135 x 5
Added chains
135 x 1
185 x 1
225 x 1
245 x 1
Yep, from the time I added the chain, I got 4 total sets, haha. I guess the next time we do this I'll have to take more conservative jumps. Since I did so little volume before petering out, I decided to break out a shirt and keep going for more top-end work.
I kept the 2-board and went:
315 x 1
365 x 1
405 x 1
455 x 1.
As a side note, I used a Metal prototype shirt that Metal sent me last year. I hadn't worn it in a while, but I do remember it being a little too big on my last time I wore it. This time however it didn't feel big at all, even though I was a few pounds heavier last time. This is great for two reasons. First, I really like the shirt and am looking forward to giving it another go next week. Second, it means that I've probably retained a good deal of muscle as I've lost weight.
For assistance, I started at the hammer strength low row, and did 10 sets of 10 with 2 plates and a quarter. I like doing 10 x 10 on my main upper back work because it seems to help a lot with hypertrophy. Plus, after shirting up I rarely want to do much else, so If I've already promised myself 10x10, Im gonna get at least 100 reps. I also did 4 sets of 15 dips, triceps pushdowns, rope extensions, dumbbell flys and some machine curls.