Monday, April 11, 2011

5X5 = I'm waving it

So today's upper body day. Overhead presses, backrows and pushups are on the menu. Main workout is the overhead presses while backrows and pushups are pretty much for desert.

Anyway, I was supposed to add more weights today since I could already comfortably do a 5x5 of 23kg. So today total weight lifted was 25.5kg. And...

I failed miserably.

I couldn't even complete 5 reps in even one of the sets with 25.5 kg on. It went pretty much like this:

Warmup sets
23kg = 8 reps
10kg db shoulder press = 8 reps per arm

Actual sets
25.5kg = 4 reps
25.5kg = 3 reps
25.5kg = 3 reps (cheated on the third: did a push press instead of a strict one)
23kg = 5 reps (felt like my CNS was in danger of being overcooked... so back to easy stuff)
25.5kg = 4 reps (again cheated on the last rep. Not good.)

I think reducing the weights for one of sets helped. But perhaps I was a bit too overzealous in wanting to lift 25.5kg. Next time I might wanna try this instead:

20kg = 8 reps
23kg = 8 reps
24kg = 5 reps
25.5kg = 5 reps
25.5kg = 5 reps
23kg = 5 reps
25.5kg = 5 reps

Let's see whether next time I can actually get 5 reps for all the sets with the new weights.

And yeah... I know. I can't even press 25.5kg. Pathetic. I'm weak as heck. Don't rub it in.


2 comments:

Adeline said...

hey come on...!! u r much better than me ok? even with 22.5kg I am already struggling k? U know what I just found out? My upper body is really weak. I think i really need to focus more on upper body than lower body. Maybe twice upperbody and once for lower body in a week. Good job on that! U deserve a praise!

KevL said...

Girls, here's my personal experience. There was a time when I was really weak with shoulder presses. I stopped doing them and focused more on bench press and a few months later I could shoulder press so much more. I know Aizan doesn't like bench presses, but well it's worth a try. Pavel did say that you can do with much more weight with the bench press to work on the shoulders at the same time, and I've personally experienced that increase in shoulder strength before.