Offset deLorme Cycle

[Moonduck]

Still in the middle of rest days, and off days. No lifting til wednesday, boo.

We were going to do a modified version of the Westside system for our next cycle, but in discussing it with my group, we're going to do something differ for a mini-cycle first. You've probably seen me talk about deLorme before. We're going to do it again, but we're going to do it differently.

Standard deLorme cycle takes two movements, and only two so choose well, and does them in a Heavy-Light-Medium pattern. With Heavy, Light, and Medium being defined as both volume and comparative intensity. You basically do ascending supersets using various percentgaes of your 10RM for sets of 5, with no rest between the invidiual sets within the superset.

Heavy superset
50% of 10RM for 5 reps
75% of 10RM for 5 reps
100% of 10RM for 5 reps
Rest
Repeat until you miss a rep

Light superset
50% of 10RM for 5 reps
Rest
Repeat until you equal the sets done on heavy day

Medium superset
50% of 10RM for 5 reps
75% of 10RM for 5 reps
Rest
Repeat until you equal the sets done on heavy day

Pretty simple, and you do this for two movements, with the classic combo being deadlift and bench press, with the cycle lasting 4-6 weeks (4 worked for us). Increase the upper body movements by 5# each week, and lower body movements by 10# a week.

This is a surprisingly effective program, and did wonders for us, both in strength and mass. It does, however, have a few problems.

1) It's only two movements. This is okay if you are looking for raw strength and mass and using the proper movements, but it doesn't possess variety, nor, in our case, does it properly cover the Big Three in powerlifting. There's also the boredom issue with only two movements.

2) Light days suck balls. Let's face it, why take the time to hit the weights if you're just gonna do a coupla weedy sets with nothing weight. Yes, there's a VERY good reason to do a feeder workout like this, but, wow, did these sessions ever drive me freakin crazy. Go heavy or go home, damn.

3) Time - with doing essentially 15 reps per set, with two weight changes per set, and generally 5-7 sets per movement, and doing two movements, the heavy day was a freakin marathon grind. The light days were 15 minutes of waving my arms around, and the mdeium days were still too short to feel like I was doing something. (Yes, the hardest part about the deLorme cycle for me was feeling like I wasn't doing enough. If it didn't work SO freaky well, I would never even consider doing it again). I didn't mind the grind. Hell, I preferred it. If I don't do enough in a given session, I'm unsatisfied and will do random lifting to compensate. Never a good thing with me, as this means wierdness like heavy bent presses and other craziness.

DeLorme cycles work though. Loads of sub-maximal volume properly performed really burn the groove of a movement into you. Frankly, strength is a skill, and deLorme is all about some practice. And the Heavy-Light-Medium structure is flat awesome for recovery. And, after the ME with no sets=across sporadic intensity of Westside, I wanted to do some serious repwork. The potential for hypertrophy is never far from the minds of my more beach-muscle-obssessed training partners (tehy would all lift like pansy bodybuilding pump-lifters if it weren't for my bull-headed drive for strength strength strength).

So, with that in mind, I decided to use the H-L-M structure of deLorme and expand it, while keeping up with the stripped down nature of it. No, I didn't add loads of curls, or wrist exercises, or any crazy. I did add squats though. You can't have a proper powerlifting cycle without squats. Or a proper oly lifting cycle, or even a proper bodybuilding cycle. Squats are that important.

So here is my Offset DeLorme Cycle. We're gonna give it a test run for four weeks and see how it goes. At worst, it'll give us a break before we launch into the next cycle (deFranco's Westside for Skinny Bastards with serious partials work and a strong emphasis on BW power movements).

(See above for descriptions on what constitutes heavy, light, and medium for this structure)

Sunday:
Squats - Heavy
Bench - Light
Deadlifts - Medium

Tuesday:
Squats - Light
Bench - Medium
Deadlifts - Heavy

Thursday:
Squats - Medium
Bench - Heavy
Deadlifts - Light

Same weight increases as above (5#/ week upper body, 10#/week lower body), and same set/rep/super-set structure as above.

It is still a deLorme cycle as it maintains the structure, load parameters, etc. The difference is that we do not load the same for different exercises on any given day, as in the standard deLorme. However, it allows an additional movement not seen in the original, as well as allowing for meaningful time to be spent under the bar, unlike the standard deLorme cycle. This may have a negative effect, but the lads are still very willing to try it. And, as it is a 4 week mini-cycle, we're not in any danger of losing what we now have.

Now I just have to figure out how to add in more BW cleanly, and without stressing already overtaxed systems.

[cheesedog]

That all sounds very interesting. Can't wait to see how it works.

On the subject of the BW exercises, it would probably be a good idea to emphasize planes of movement that aren't being hit much with the weighted work. Overhead push and pull, horizontal pull. The legs are being hit hard, but some lighter single-limb stuff would be good.

[Moonduck]

Well, deadlift stresses the same muscles used in the pulls, but not in the full ROM. So pulls really are the weakest area of the program. I'm not willing to devote full time to a pull, as this is intended to do nothing but full ROM movements of the big three, but I am thinking some GtG pull-ups on the off-days would be a good idea.

The biggest thing here is a mental break from the hard-charging constant ME stuff of the Westside method.

[Moonduck]

Started it tonight. Wow, tired now.

Basically it was heavy squat, light bench, moderate dead.

It was WAY hard. Harder than expected. The last coupla reps on each superset of the heavy lift were ROUGH.

Box Squat
5 supersets of:
5 x 145#
5 x 225#
5 x 295#
This was actually brutal. Surprisingly so. 295# is a weight I'm usually fast and snappy with. The last three reps of each set were nowhere near fast. Ugh.

Bench
25 x bar + doubled up mini-bands
I was supposed to do 5 sets of 5, but did not honestly feel like messing around. Banged out the 25 reps and called it done.

Dead
5 supersets of:
5 x 165#
5 x 255#
This is chunp weight normally, but after the squats from earlier, it was work. Gonna take a bit to get used to this style.

Finished with a variety of chins, pull-ups, and commando pull-ups.

[cheesedog]

Wow, that's some serious volume! Were those box squats high box or low?

[Moonduck]

Low. Our box is crazy low, as one of the guys is short, and I wanted him to be able to low-box as well. I put 10 pads on top for parallel, and was lifting off of 8 piads. So maybe 1.5" below parallel.Then factor in compression, as they're gym floor pads, and not heavy ones, so it is 2" plus.

Apparently this makes the box squat harder. It is like running in sand. you don't get the same push back from the box surface as you would on a hard box. Squatting off of a soft surface box is apparently one of the new cool things they're doing at westside. Of course I would accidentally do something the hard way....

[Moonduck]

Last night was deadlift night. We decided to back off on the total sets for dead due to CNS impact. It proved to be a good decision.

Deadlift
3 supersets of:
5 x 155#
5 x 245#
5 x 335#
This was a bit more rough than I expected. then again, I don't do dead for reps, so I really wasn't used to it. The weight was heavy, but didn't feel heavy, if that makes sense. At 75% of 1RM, I should expect that it would feel that way.

Also struggled with grip. Probably more to do with lack of grip endurance work.

Squat
25 x 145#
I was supposed to do 5 sets of 5, but did not honestly feel like messing around. Banged out the 25 reps and called it done.

Wow, that was WAY harder than I expected. Sure, I could've banged out 5-8 more, but, wow, not an easy set.

Bench
5 supersets of:
5 x 55# + doubled up mini-bands
5 x 105# + doubled up mini-bands
Done for speed. The 105# plus bands went up quick-quick for the first 3 reps, then not so quick.

[Moonduck]

Bench
5 supersets of:
5 x 55# + doubled up mini-bands
5 x 105# + doubled up mini-bands
5 x 155# + doubled up mini-bands
Went up nicely. Failed on the last rep of the last set.

Squat
5 x 145#
5 x 225#
Had a problem keeping the bar on my back. Apparently my legs were set to GO and I kept popping the bar up offa my back at the end of each rep.

We ran out of time, so we ditched the light deads.

Really kick-ass session. It started out slow, but picked up steam like crazy. By the end, pretty much everybody wanted to keep going.

As an aside, wow, my back is sore. I kept a very tight arch all throughout the bench, and I didn't relax it much while plates were being loaded. As a result, ugh. Back = sore and tight.

[Moonduck]

Switched around the order a bit so we weren't doing heavy squats and medium deads the same night. The guys felt it was way too much lower body work. Can't say that I disagree.

Box Squat
5 supersets of:
5 x 145#
5 x 225#
5 x 295#
This was actually brutal. Surprisingly so. 295# is a weight I'm usually fast and snappy with. The last three reps of each set were nowhere near fast. Ugh.

Bench
5 x 55# + doubled up mini-bands
5 x 105# + doubled up mini-bands

Skipped out on light deads due to time issues.

The big thing is that the new bar showed up. I realised something VERY uncool when I got it open - our old bar was light. You expect that something will weight the proper amount when you buy it, but the freakin cheap POS weighs 8-10# less than the new bar, and the new bar is 45# definitely as that is what the actual packing slip says. You know that UPS would nail the shipper for mor emoney if it was more than what was listed.

This displeases me BIG TIME. This means that all of our numbers are wrong. Every one of my PR's has been dropped by 8-10#. My total went from 1075# to 1045-1050# or so. Sure, it ain't a big number, but damned if I ain't pissed to see it drop all because the bastards at the sporting goods place lie about how much the bar weighs. Now I'm wondering how badly off the plates are.

Yes, I know, it's all relative. So long as I am getting stronger on the same weights, I'm getting stronger. It just pisses me off.If I say that I have a 385# best squat, than I damned well expect to be able to bang out a 385# suqat under any bar. Now I realise that my best was 375#, and it might be less. FUCK!

[Fatman]

Yeah, that's tough... I was actually happy to learn that the exercise bar I use at my friend's basement gym was in fact 0,5 kg heavier than we thought :D

So if I add the big 3 together I'd come up with a 1,5 kg (about 3,3 lbs) increase in my total... also my best squat rose from 172,5 to 173 kgs. Which made me very happy, as I'm not proud of my squatting ability (I weigh 95-97 kilos, so that's still far from the double-BW squat which I'm shooting for). However, back to your post, as you said - as long as you're making progress the weight is not important.

Unless you're a competitive weightlifter, it doesn't really matter. I know competing with oneself is even more intense than competing with other people, but your numbers don't really matter in everyday life (OK, I said it; now all I have to do is convince myself to believe it :)).

[Moonduck]

Unless you're a competitive weightlifter, it doesn't really matter. I know competing with oneself is even more intense than competing with other people, but your numbers don't really matter in everyday life (OK, I said it; now all I have to do is convince myself to believe it :)).

That's just it, I am competing against myself, and I feel cheated. And, no, I'm no damned good at telling myself that the numbers don't matter. I suck at it. The numbers do matter, and there's nothing I can do to get them to not matter in my head.

Actually, I screwed up. The last set of squats wasn't quite in those reps shown. I'd had a massive build-up of irritation and, for lack of a better word, rage, and I was FIRED UP when I hit the rack. Instead of doing 5, I just kept going (doing reps rest-pause style). By the time I hit ten reps I was feeling dizzy, but still had more in me. Rage is good. It was probably good that I racked it then because I missed one of the hooks and got the joy of holding the bar at an extreme angle while one of the guys rushed up to help me rack it. Luckily the collars held and I did not apparently injure anything, but more reps might have been a bad idea.

Lemme tell you, I could barely stand after that, couldn't control my breathing, and couldn't even take a drink for a few minutes afterwards. My heart rate was through the roof, blood pressure was singing, and I was light-headed as hell. That's some good stuff. It tells me that I would probably dig 20-rep breathing squats too. Gotta try those.

Note: The weights stayed the same from the first workout to this one in the post. In reality, the first workout's weights were 10# lighter due to the damned bar being light. So there was a 10# improvement over last week.

[Fatman]

Note: The weights stayed the same from the first workout to this one in the post. In reality, the first workout's weights were 10# lighter due to the damned bar being light. So there was a 10# improvement over last week.

I'd be pretty happy with that. 10 lbs. on a weight you do for reps is good.

[cheesedog]

I actually went through the trouble of weighing my bars and weights just to see how accurate they are. The bars are right on but one 35# plate is about a pound shy. I tell myself "Self, it's only a pound, it doesn't matter" but I can feel the difference on that side, and it annoys me. :x
Planning on buying a couple new 45# plates soon, I might just get another 35# and toss the old one.

[Moonduck]

I have four 35# plates. They do one thing - hold my rack down. The only times they are brought out are for rack lockouts and pin pulls. Other than that, they get to sit on the back pins of the rack and keep it stable.

Well, my back started hurting yesterday. Not good, nope. Luckily, I recently made friends with a massage therapist. She has officially reached the "Good friend" list, as she heard me whinging a bit about the back, and drove to my house with table and oil. She worked me over for about 90 minutes. Wow, never had a full massage before. Had some minor stuff done by massage therapists I've known in the past, but never a deep-tissue sports massage like that.

I feel awesome.

Seriously, my back isn't perfect, but it is WAY better than yesterday, and you would not believe how much better my neck feels right now. I didn't even realise how stiff and immobile my neck had gotten until she started messing with it a few days back. Apparently while my neck has been growing (bench press), it has also been stiffening. Wow, the deep tissue stripping on the neck, guh. It hurt, but I was in heaven.

So scamper off and find a good massage therapist. It's worth it. I feel like a million bucks this morning.

[hara_12]

I have a temp Shiatzu Massage therapist in my clinic right now...very nice. Painful at times....but very beneficial.

[Moonduck]

I've felt like the aforementioned million bucks all day. She's called me numerous times just to enjoy the fact that I was in such a crazy good mood.

Seriously, wow, I feel good.

[Moonduck]

Bench night

Bench
5 x 55# + doubled up mini-bands
5 x 105# + doubled up mini-bands
5 x 140# + doubled up mini-bands

Tough, but doable.

Squats
25 x 145#, just to get the blood into the legs

Again, we decided to forego deads. Too many people feeling rough. Ade's shoulder was wrecked, Al's back is still messed up, and Alan couldn't even begin to make depth on squats because his quads were blasted for no apparent reason.

Me? I feel grrrreat. Ahhhhh. I lifted well, and did so much more cleanly. Even though I was close on those last reps, they went up with no sticking, no hitching, and no wierdness. Slow, but smooth and steady the whole way. Rawr. And my back didn't even really complain about the arch either. It's a little warm right now, but no biggy.

And the coolest part? My massage therapist friend came over and I got her lifting too. After having her work on and assessing her movement, strength, and work capacity, I realised that she was stronger than even she expected, but, like a cyclist, it is all concentric strength. She is used to pulling and pushing the client's muscles, and this means working lots of concentric contraction, but there is no lowering phase on this. So, much like you do with a cyclist, I am starting her in easy. She got on the bench and did 45# x 6 x 3, with me providing extra light resistance by hand on the last rep. Good stuff. She was banging the bar up, but I could tell that she was struggling when lowering it, so my assessment proved correct. Now she is fired up to lift some more, and this is an awesome thing.

I love having motivated, high energy people around when I lift. Beats dull, grumpy bums any day. And, moreover, she has actual goals, unlike most of the guys. And I have been discussing with her how to set up a program that will meet those goals while also keeping her work concerns in line (hand strength, keeping the hands from getting damaged, not doing so much that she can't move the next day, etc).

I also added in some face pulls with a mini-monster band for shoulder and upper back health, and the requisite handful of pull-ups. Gotta get my BW happiness in.

[Moonduck]

My therapist friend came over last night and worked on my neck again. Apparently I'm doing something bad that is causing huge ugly knots to form along various muscles of my neck.

I told my wife last night that she owns the rest of me, but my therapist friend owns my neck, period. Fortunately my wife has an excellent sense of humour and laughed at the statement, but, damned if it isn't true. My neck is my therapist's playtoy at this point.

May or may not be lifting tonight, we'll see. I told the guys to stay home, as they were all too busted up. The right side of my back is still tight, so I may just forego deads myself. Depends on how I feel this evening, and how motivated I am.

[Moonduck]

Haven't lifted since the last time I posted. I've done some BW, and done a bunch of trailriding. And, wow, the Trail Gods were hungry today. They reeeeally extracted a pound of flesh from me today. I lost count of the endos, spills, and wrecks. I flat tore myself up.

Ripped both my gloves, caught a branch in the dome (didn't notice it until I saw the ding on my lid), skint the snot out of both forearms, ate about a pint of gravel, bruised my abs, bruised the left forearm badly, and got a really, seriously nasty bruise on my left quad.

I hurt. Bad. So bad. After I got home, I hit the bath, and made sure I had epsom salts in it.

I'm still aching like crazy pretty much all over. This is what you get when you try to ride too fast for your skill level, the trailconditions, and the stickiness of your tires.

I find it kinda amusing that I told the guys to unbreak themselves, and here I go and get just mangled.

And y'know what? It was dead fun. I'd do it again. Well, maybe I wouldn't do the faceplant into the huge log. That sucked. The rest of it? sure.

[cheesedog]

Sounds like you had a blast! Other than the spills of course.

[hara_12]

I just got a new bike this past weekend. Nothing fancy, Walmart special. But it is like night and day compared to my old bike that I got at a garage sale. I am planning on breaking it in with some trails here in town over the 4th.

[Moonduck]

Heh, at your weight, a Wal-mart special isn't awful. I woulda wrecked that bike. I paid about $400 for mine, and have put a coupla hundred more into it getting it almost where I want it. Is it a spiffy bike with lotsa bells and whistles? Nope, it's tough as hell though, and has a lifetime warranty on the frame. With my size, and the way that I ride (well, the way that I crash, and the fast parts between the crashes) I positively HAD to buy a tough bike.

I should've picked up a Freeride style bike like my buddy's Mullet by Gary Fisher; his rig is bulletproof. The frame geometry makes her a twitchy bitch though, and that would've been real bad when I first started out. I wanted a bike that was still streetable, and his really isn't. Nowadays I've got my trusty ole Peugeot (aka The French Whore) for road work (just need to true the rear triangle, the result of an oooold wreck. I hate always going left a bit =P ). My Trek is almost strictly off-road. This means I can afford to get tire with more bite. I'm thinking Panaracer Fire XC's. I hear good things about their bite, how tough they are, and they don't cost a mint.

My left leg still hurts a bit, and is still WAY tender. Both sides of it are tender, actually. My left forearm still looks like trailpizza, and is still swollen. Actually, today was the first day that it did not have a huge lump right there. I was starting to wonder if the swelling would ever go down. Abs are fine, back is fine, hand hurts a bit, but not bad. Right ankle is hurting for no apparent reason. In short, I'm still a wreck, but I have been downgraded from trainwreck to mere auto wreck.

I did not lift Tuesday, and do not plan to lift tonight. I do plan to lift on Sunday though, and I have been doing a lot of BW stuff for rehab work. It's nice to be able to get my sweat on and not work at massive intensities.

The big things was that I was wound tight as hell last night, and dragged out my heavy bag. Did 3-4 rounds of a coupla minutes each. Mostly punching, some knees, and the occasional kick or thai clinch. Nothing organised, just working to get out some aggression, get mah sweat on, and feel better. Of course I felt freakin great afterwards, and I got some very appreciative looks from a lady friend that was hanging out while I was working the bag.

Feels good =)

[Moonduck]

Y'know, taking a week off to recover and deload is only a good idea when you refrain from stressing your system more than when you are lifting. After the bike crash and some stupendously exhausting personal events, I am beat slam down. Bags under my eyes, weight is up and down, and I can't think straight enough to set up tomorrow's training session.

Sheesh, I need a deload from my deload.

[Fatman]

I've found that you can't really plan your workouts, at least not when things get heavy for your strength level. I rotate a basic pull-press-squat routine, doing each session once a week. Sometimes I'll have a pull (deadlift) day on the schedule, but my lower back and legs don't feel strong that day, so I'll find out what works and do that instead. Other times my pressing will suck and I'll switch to squats, only to see the weight I used for several heavy singles in my last squat session go up easily three or more times.

I've also noticed that I get into periods where one of my lifts is progressing well, and then it makes sense to go all-out on that particular lift and try for a personal best. Thing is, your body will more often than not give you signals like this and set its own periodization schedule. Just don't get too stuck on your workout plan - go with what feels right on a given day. Sure, structure is important: you shouldn't do bench presses three times a week and neglect everything else in the meantime just cause benching feels strong. However, you could lower intensity (maybe up the volume) on the other lifts and possibly go all-out on the bench.

[Moonduck]

Well, after the deload week, we decided to do a repeat of the last time we did heavy squat and moderate bench. No reason to up the weights after taking a week off. Not a good move, as I could've easily done the next week's weights on each. Quad hurt a bit, but I was raring to go anyone. Once I warmed up, no pain at all.

We did decide to cut each down to 3 sets, instead of the usual 5. It was too damned hot and muggy to do more work than what we did.

All in all, the session was short, but did what wanted it to do without wrecking my leg more. Tomorrow is heavy bench, moderate deads. Not sure how I feel about that. My back has been tight as hell all day from benching.

[Moonduck]

Tuesday was supposed to be bench night, but the weather said otherwise. My bench is outdoors (under my deck), and the outdoors was VERY wet. I find it hard to bench when I streams of water hitting me in the face. That didn't sound good.

So I messed around with the kettlebell for a bit, then did some dumbbell work and chin-ups and the like. Whee.

Wednesday I decided to get back on the bike and hit the trails again. I have healed up enough that I can ride without pain, and figured it was time to give it a go. I rode like a god. Dead perfect, no crashes or unplanned dismounts, and came in under my best time ever for the three trail circuit I ride.

So lifting has been lame this week, but riding was good. I guess I got my deload from my deload week =)

[cheesedog]

Sounds like you needed a break from the heavy lifting. A little R&R can be good.

[Moonduck]

Yeah, like I said in your thread, fatigue accumulates. I discussed things with the lads, and were done with this cycle. Too many injuries, and even more accumulative fatigue than Westside. So, we're gonna go back to Westside after a week's rest. Yeah, it's kinda crazy, but this offset delorme is a real beast for some reason. Yeah, the intensity isn't exactly heavy, but the mental effort required is a recipe for massive burnout.

As I stated before, it'll be a modification of deFranco's Westside for Skinny Bastards, with progressive partials added in a la Bud Jeffries. I plan to start with floor presses and low-box close-stance squats. Why? *shrug* Just because. I dig the floor press, and I've been getting steadily wider in my stance, so some close stance work is a good idea.

[cheesedog]

Sounds interesting. Mixing Westside with the Jeffries partials might be a potent mix.

[Moonduck]

Life has been entirely disruptive lately. I used to pride myself on getting under that bar every time I was scheduled to do so. Lately life has just gotten in the way. Injuries in my crew, work, personal issues, my own (non-lifting) injuries, and sundry other crap have kept me away from my bar, my rack, and my iron.

The worst thing is that I can't say that I miss it right now. I have no real time, and less energy to devote to it.

The new issue is NEPA. Non Exercise-related Physical Activity. With summer has come a long list of things needing done yesterday. So my physical activity level in general has climbed way up, while my Time Under Tension has gone way down. I am generally tired enough from non-training related stuff that I don't feel like training even when I've got a few minutes to do so.

The up side is that we've called the delorme stuff done. It was simply too much of a grinder for the whole crew to keep it going. It never looks like it at the start, but damned if it doesn't wear a guy out.

[Fatman]

Dude, don't be a stickler to schedule. Train when you feel like it. I've cut down my weight training sessions to 2 times a week (sometimes 3) and haven't felt this strong in a long while. Super-hot weather (35+ degrees Celsius) really affects your energy levels and accumulates fatigue.

[Moonduck]

Yeah, the heat has been a factor. Getting out to the bench last tme was brutal. The heat and humidity were completely stifling.

As usual for an off-week, I've tried to get some trail time in. I hit my normal circuit again today, and well, I hit it. I've been really wound up lately, which has been a major demotivator in training. Combine my personal turmoil with my crew being beat up, and it is just damned hard to get under the bar. Trailriding has become my favourite release. I hit the trail, bomb it good and hard, and come home feeling better.

Well, when I'm really wound up, like today, I'm sloppy. I spilled three times on the novice trail. The NOVICE trail. After that, I did just fine on the Advanced and Expert trails. No spills. But the frikken Novice trail left me with a lightly strained right ankle, bruised left outer quad/hip flexor, and a skint and bruised right knee. Banged up my left forearm again, as well, same spot as before.

I'm nowhere near as bad as previous, and not in any pain really, but it is still annoying as hell. I rode sloppy and my time was slow. All around a crap run.

And, worse, I didn't really work out any issues. I was basically as wound up afterwards as I was before, just more tired. Can't flippin win.