I was injured and had to travel for a month. Gave me a chance to heal up and lose weight (I'd put on quite a bit of fat in the past two years in my attempts to "man up" to something beefier and stronger).
So now I have a chance to start fresh. I'd been overdoing it with the squats and milk. So I had chronic knee inflammation and effusion, was slow and was getting a pudgy. Strength gains had slowed pretty good too.
was wondering where you were! how was traveling? looks like you were having fun from the FB pics.
With my lower leg healed up, I've done a couple jump sessions in the past five days. My standing vertical is already back to my old best ever of 28" and perhaps a little over it. I'm down from 180+ to ~175, weaker on the squat I'm sure, but feeling much faster and more agile than I have in a long time.
So I want to build back up from this much better base. Standing vertical nearer to 30" than it's ever been in my life, body fat as low as it's been at my bulkier state, and a squat that's probably around 315 (down a bit from my high bar "naked" peak of 365 a few weeks ago). I'm looking for advice...
nice man!
Got very clear goals: stronger squat, higher vert, longer broad jump, faster sprint. Upper body stuff is really backseat.
Any ideas on volume and frequency for squats, jumps and sprints? I was thinking heavy squats once per week and lighter ones another day to keep DOMS to a minimum. As for volume, keep it down and use the squat mostly to potentiate the jumping. Also alternating emphases from cycle to cycle: up squat for a few weeks, then focus on jumping.
I am trying to avoid getting fat with rapid weight gain this time around. My Olympic squat is decent at 2x bodyweight, but I need to get to 2.5x bodyweight eventually.
As for upper body, I figure bench, overhead and chins once per week is plenty. Not trying to bench the gym, and honestly more concerned with pull up strength as it used to be fairly impressive with me.
i'd go with something like:
session: jumps or short sprints/reactive work, squat, upper
i'd hit that every other day.. you can easily go by feel with something like that, and get in a nice groove because you have a rest day the following day.. so if you don't feel like jumping, hit up some short sprints at any intensity plus optionally some low level reactive owrk (MR half tucks, jump rope, etc).. then hit up squat, again, if you feel like pushing it, go for it, if not, stay within that "maintenance mode" set/rep scheme or just go very light to maintain that efficiency under the bar.. then finish off with some upper.
on off days you could just hit up recovery stuff (icing/leg drain), low intensity activation exercises, & stretching.... or just pure rest.
something like that would be crazy simple and allow you to recover, push yourself, and get in that high frequency of motor learning needed for "ballistic work" such as jumps/sprints etc.
peace man
