Friday, May 25, 2012

Smolov Jr. Day 2 Week 1.

Not much soreness in legs today. I will be, and have been, stretching and foam rolling every day to help my legs stay fresh. Here's what I do nightly (Note: I really don't know what I'm doing, but it seems to work):


Also, cold water therapy makes you feel brand new. I recommend it:



On to today's workout: today was day 2, week 1 of Smolov Jr. which I'm running for close grip bench press. I switched to close grip grip after realizing I'm much stronger with the narrower grip. For one, It's obviously easier to keep your elbows tucked with a close grip, which keep my lats very tight. My lats feel like springs when I push the bar off my chest. And two, I think I have stronger triceps than shoulders. Oh and my elbows and wrists seem to line up better with the narrower grip. Anyway, I don't have any specific goal with bench press at the moment, only that it I can comfortably bench 3 plates or more at all times. At the moment I can comfortably knock out singles in the low 300's. Just for the lulz you can see how far my bench has come in a year: 220x2, max out or black out, baby! Oh, and I've run Smolov Jr. previously for overhead press with very good results, so I am as confident in this program as I am confident in it with squats.

My benching schedule for the next three weeks. 
As you can see, I'll be lifting every day. Squat one day, bench the next. Today's video shows I still have a crap bench set up, but I'm trying to be more conscious of how tight my legs, glutes, and back are when I'm benching. I find it difficult to maintain tightness over multiple reps, though. I'm also pausing every final rep to mimic the lift in competition.

Boring-as-shit bench video below, but it has a pretty sweet song in it:


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