Building The Beast

[BeastBuilder]

30/08

Bench

Bench Press > 2 Triples - 140kg

2 Doubles - 150kg, 155kg

2 Triples - 145kg

Low Incline DB Press > 45x15, 50x12, 60x12, 60x10/40x10/30x10

Hammer Strength IsoRow/Assisted Wide Grip Pull Ups > 4 sets of 12/8 - 2.5pps/-30kg

Cable Flys > 4 sets of 20 - 5pl

Straight Arm Cable Pulldowns > 12plx25, 15plx20, 18plx15, 18plx15/14plx15/10plx20

Good feels yesterday.

Pressing was easy. Felt odd as Coach said last lot was looking really easy so for the next few weeks I'm benching with zero leg drive. Feels weird as given that I've just spent the last six months learning how to do it properly etc, but should work out well and build some raw upper body pressing strength then when I bring legs back into it should mean gains all round. That's the theory anyway lol.

Still pressed over the programmed numbers easily and will keep legs out for the next few weeks.

I basically setup as per usual but before unracking the bar I lose all the tension in my hips and put my feet out flat by the end of the bench and don't even bother trying to push through them. Still keep the tight arch and tight upper back, or as much as I can without my legs pushing up as well.

Accessories were on point, good pump, made the most of a few machines/isolation exercises at FitC. Only couple of us training so was good rest periods etc.

[BeastBuilder]

31/08

Squat

Squat > 4 sets of 6 - 207.5kg, 160x10

Bench > 3 sets of 8 - 125kg

Pause Squat > 5 sets of 3 - 165kg

GHR > 4 sets of 12 - BW

GHR Sit Up > 3 sets of 25 - BW

Reasonable session today. Squat was ten times better than last week but I suck at tightness for reps. Coach wants me to treat them all as singles and reset each rep, hold breath the whole time etc. It gas's me so hard after a couple reps haha. Makes the sixes hard as hell. Glad I'm down to 5's next week I'm pretty sure haha. Weights are easy, but trying to keep technique absolutely perfect I'm shit at. Oh well always more to improve on I guess !

GHRs are pissening. One of the best exercises you can do I reckon to help your big three. Guna love having the ability to have these back in the programme ! Getting back into the feel of it, might add weight next week. Time to get dat Hammy Drop gains !

[Skeletor]

GHRs are pissening. One of the best exercises you can do I reckon to help your big three. Guna love having the ability to have these back in the programme ! Getting back into the feel of it, might add weight next week. Time to get dat Hammy Drop gains !

 

Fark i cant believe how hard they are to do. I got a GHR in my shed and never really used it but tried a couple weeks back and had to use an assistance band hanging from the roof after a couple reps lol.  

[BeastBuilder]

Fark i cant believe how hard they are to do. I got a GHR in my shed and never really used it but tried a couple weeks back and had to use an assistance band hanging from the roof after a couple reps lol.

Bro they're hard as to master but when you do, the gains are real.

I taught myself to do them with a broomstick at our old gym, slowly increasing ROM and pushing myself up less, eventually got there. Now I can rep them relatively easy. I used to do them with SSB and a couple 10's when I was cranking them all the time. Hopefully get back near that soon and let gains rain lol.

Definitely keep trying them man, couple times a week and you'll get good at them and the squat/dead feels will be sick.

[BeastBuilder]

1/09

High Volume Legs

Leg Extension > 2 sets of 25 - 8pl

2 sets of 25 - 10pl

Walking Lunges w KBs > BWx15m, 8kgx30m, 12kgx45m, 16kgx60m

(All lunges done with a double rep each step)

Sissy Squats > 3 sets of 15 - BW

Leg Press > 3ppsx40, 5ppsx40, 7ppsx30, 9ppsx30, 11ppsx20, 12ppsx20, 8ppsx35, x35, 6ppsx45, x45

DB Romanians > 25kgx15, 35kgx15, 2 sets of 12 - 40kg

Leg Extension > 3 sets of 25 - 50kg

(Slow Eccentric, Squeeze&Hold Contraction)

Pretty sickening session today, literally. Lots of volume, some decent weight, getting these suckers to grow !

Pre-Fatigued the f*ck out of the Quads before heavy leg pressing, felt mint, the Lunges really killed it, increasing distance with weight was not a good plan but dam, dat pump was hard to argue with. Sissy Squats stretched it out but made it worse really lol.

Leg Press was stoopid crazy, high rep double ladder style sets, gotta love it.

Session took about an hour, we hussed it pretty quick, was mint !

[BeastBuilder]

2/09

Bench

Bench Press > 2 Triples - 130, 140

5 Doubles - 145, 150, 155, 160, 165

2 Triples - 150, 150

Yates Rows > 70x15, 100x12, 100x12, 120x12, 140x10

Close Grip Bench > 70x15, 120x12, 130x10, 140x10, x10

Pull Ups (Wide Overhand/Wide Neutral/Medium Underhand) > 4 sets of 5/5/5 - BW

Pretty happy with how yesterday's session went. All the Bench weights felt easy hence increasing the weight each time. Still no leg drive, so am really happy with how quick the bar is moving even with longer pauses. Not many reps per set but given the amount of sets it all adds up to a pretty decent amount of good rep volume at decent weights.

Accessories felt pretty good too. Didn't have a second round of Bench programmed so just used Close Grip as my secondary pressing exercise. Felt good to get some weight on there, been awhile since I've done it but reps were easy, paused first and last rep each set. Good pump.

[BeastBuilder]

3/09

Delts & Arms

Seated DB Press > 8x15 (Cuban Style), 20x20, 30x20, 40x12, 45x10, 50x8/15x24(Alt DB Front Raise)

Seated Side Raise > 15x20, x20, 20x12, x12, 12.5x26/x8/x5 (Rest Pause Last Set)

Standing Cable Pull Aparts/DB Side Raises > 4 sets of 25/12 - 15kg/10kg

Flex Lewis Tricep Giant Set > 4 rounds - 25 reps each - 1st-35kg, 2nd-40kg, 3rd&4th-42.5kg

Wide Grip High Cable Curls/Rope Cable Curls/Barbell Curls > 4 sets of 20/20/20 - 40kg/45kg/35kg

Reverse Grip Squeeze Pressdowns/DB Curls > 3 sets of 35/5~4~3~2~1/10 - 40kg/6kg

Fuarkkk ! Mean sessions today, pump was pissening, body felt good, good flow, really enjoyable session. Quick too, took just under an hour.

DB Pressing felt good, bit fatigued from yesterday, would have liked more reps or weight as I have done more before but still smashed my Delts hard so can't complain too much, also haven't gone heavy on them in awhile so can't expect miracles.

The Flex Lewis Giant Set I think I've said about before but just in case, it's five exercises, Hands Apart Rope Pressdowns to Hands Together Rope Pressdowns to Wide Reverse Grip Pressdowns to Close Grip Pressdowns to Overhead Rope Cable Extensions. The pump is nuts, doing 25 reps a pop is 125 reps per round so builds up pretty quick, 4 rounds, 500 reps. Lactic acid is insane haha.

The superset at the end was something Steve showed me last week, pay attention Rat Bibby if you want Arms like a future IFBB Pro lol. The Pressdowns you squeeze the shit out of the contraction at the bottom, slow up and explode down to lock out. The Curls are light as but still fucked me, you do one arm at a time but hold a peak contraction with the other arm while you're doing the reps. So do five reps left while squeezing right then vice versa then four reps left while squeezing right and vice versa all the way down to one. Then curl both with an exaggerated pronated grip at the bottom (palms facing behind you basically) and an exaggerated supinated grip at the top (trying to get your pinky to the roof) while squeezing, and do ten on that. It sick. Looks easy but I'll let you find out for yourself.

Obviously if you're a beta phaggot with zero to very little mind muscle connection then you probably won't find it hard and will go heavier etc but that's not where the benefit is. The strong isometric contration at the top absolutely rapes it and the reps get pretty hard tbh lol. Must have looked funny me struggling with bitch weights but idgaf wot du u bench brah haha

[Skeletor]

Haha another insane workout. I don't think I could even get half way through that before the pump dropped me but screenshotted for future reference lol. That flex lewis one looks pretty hard core aye.

[BeastBuilder]

Haha another insane workout. I don't think I could even get half way through that before the pump dropped me but screenshotted for future reference lol. That flex lewis one looks pretty hard core aye.

Lol you'd be surprised bro, can push through quite a bit before you literally can't do it.

There's a vid of him doing it on YouTube if you wanted to have a gander.

Let me know how you get on if you try some of these. I usually come up with them on the spot, go into the gym with a general idea of what I'm hitting obviously and some kinda of idea of order and if i wanna focus on anything but usually just wing it and lift stuff till it hurts/pumped as fuark. As long as taking the muscles to failure and getting cell swelling, it works. Don't have to programme numbers and exercises like with the more powerlifting geared sessions. Makes it a lot more interesting imo.

[ThreeWhiteLights]

What do you mean cuban style?

[BeastBuilder]

What do you mean cuban style?

Movement I learnt off Joe De Franco on Youtube. Real good to warm up the shoulders/ruin them as part of a superset if you want.

Start with the DBs down by your side then shrug up hard and bend your arms to around 90degrees with DBs still down, then rotate at the shoulder with the DB moving in a big arch in front, don't just flick it around and up, until you're in a normal DB pressing position then do a quick press and reverse the movement. Same principle on the way down, big arch with DBs, not just flick it.

The key is the control of the movement and doing each step, you're basically trying to make it harder than it should be.

[BeastBuilder]

4/09

Deadlift

Deficit Deadlift > 225x4, 6 Triples - 245kg

Romanians > Sumo - 100x12, 140x10, 180x6

Snatch Grip - 2 sets of 12 - 100kg

Leg Curls/Leg Extensions > 70x10/12plx20, 80x10/12plx20, 90x10/12plx20

Pull Throughs/Wide Grip Pulldowns > 3 sets of 12/12 - 70kg/100kg

Barbell Ab Rollouts > 5 sets of 10 - BW

Pretty solid session today. Deficits are still a prick, hardest part about the reps is trying to keep in the right positions and not just use my back to pull it up. Makes the reps slower off the floor than if I just craned it but ingrains better motor patterns and builds the right muscle groups so pays off eventually.

Felt good on the Sumo Stiff Legs so thought f*ck it, might as well cook while the pan is hot haha. Heaviest I've been and after the volume I had already done I was happy with six solid reps, all dead stop and start.

Rest of accessories were just getting blood moving really and getting the volume in on the right places.

Ab Rollouts raped me, haven't done them on Deadlift day in awhile, forgot how hard it makes it lol. Paused every last rep at the bottom, stoopid idea but mean haha. Had Ab cramps on the couch for a fair while afterwards while I decided what is life..

Cheat night tonight has been successful so far, can feel dat food coma coming on hard.

Can't afford the real thing so gotta make the most of dat GH release when I'm deep sleeping haha

[BeastBuilder]

6/09

Bench

Bench Press > 9 Triples - 130, 140, 150, 150, 155, 155, 160, 160, 160

Close Neutral Hoist Pulldowns > 2ppsx15, x15, 3ppsx12, 4ppsx10, 5ppsx8

Pec Dec > 70x15, 77x15, 84x12, 91x10

Bent Over Cable Crossovers/Straight Arm Rope Pulldowns > 3 sets of 20/20 - 6pl/55kg

Pretty dam happy with his today went. Awkwardest position to bench from today but was still nailing it easy. Instead of just going flat loose feet I had to spread my legs in front of the bench like a starfish with my toes pointing up and back of my heel on the ground. Tightness definitely took a hit I think, and obvs zero force going through lower body. Still reps came up easy. Was a metric f*ck ton of volume to be honest, was pretty gassed by the end of it so to handle it all well enough was prettt stoked.

Accessories were pretty chilled, just working the muscles, getting a pump, nothing heavy after all the benching.

[BeastBuilder]

7/09

Squat

Squats > 200x3, 5 sets of 5 - 215kg

Bench > 3 sets of 8 - 135kg

Pause Squat > 3 sets of 3 - 170kg

GHR > BWx12, x12, +5kgx10, x10

GHR Sit Ups > BWx25, x25, +10kgx25, x25

Pretty good session, getting back into the swing of things with Squats. Felt better than last week that's for sure, but still plenty of room to improve over the next ten weeks to hit the numbers I want in Oz.

Reps were in no doubt and came up easy, hardest part if trying tk hold tightness and make every rep perfect.

Accessories felt good. The Bench was pretty rough on warm ups and first set as Chest was pretty sore from yesterday. Still fast and tight so just extra practice Benching fatigued like I will be in a comp situation.

Adding some weight to the GHR and Abs was mint, getting back into those hard as well. Feels real good. Just what my Posterior Chain and Core needed to ramp things up.

[BeastBuilder]

8/09

High Volume Legs

Leg Extension/Walking Lunges/Cable Leg Press > 4 sets of 30/15m/20 - 8pl/BW(Double Pump Reps)/210lbs

Paramount Squat > 1plx12, 2plx10, x10, 2.5plx8/1plx7/Emptyx8

(3-1-1-1 Tempo, Dropset Last Set)

Leg Press > 4ppsx50, 7ppsx30, 10ppsx27/x9/x6, x23/x8/x4, 8ppsx30, x30

(Rest Paused Heaviest Sets)

Smith Machine Romanians > 4 sets of 12 - 1pps

Leg Extension > 55kgx35, 65kgx30, 60kgx15/x15/x9/x6/x4/x10

(Occlusion Set, 15 sec rests, wraps off for last rep set)

Legs officially done and dusted. Was sweating like a pedo at a wiggles concert.. was redic.. Pace was intense and once I did the occlusion on the last extensions I was totally wrecked lol.

Did a fair amount of volume and few hard sets before Leg Press to pre fatigue the Quads a bit again, felt solid. Had a pretty good pump before we even started the heavy stuff so only got worse from there.

Occlusion was crazy as always. Can confirm the pain was real, but felt fucking mean taking them off and getting a f*ck ton of blood forced in there.

Love these bodybuilding sessions. Feel like I'm putting in the hard yards and reaping the rewards. Legs feel like they're definitely growing. Gotta get some meat on these sticks to hit a big squat later on !

[BeastBuilder]

9/09

Bench

Bench Press > 4 Triples - 130, 140, 150, 160

3 Doubles - 165, 170, 170

Yates Rows > 80x12, 120x10, 3 sets of 10 - 140kg

Bench Press > 4 sets of 5 - 130kg

Wide Neutral Grip Pull Ups > 4 sets of 15 - BW

Stoopid chest.. Was still a lil tender and not quite fully recovered from Sun/Mon but yolo. The no legs is raping my chest since I don't get the pop off the bottom from the leg drive so it's all chest and also no legs means less arch so more ROM so again more chest domination. Will pay off in the end, hard work at the moment though !

Felt pretty solid overall, couple of reps I lost tightness at the bottom but nothing major, still no doubt on any reps and reps in the tank every set.

Upper body feels like it'll grow from the extra muscle power needed for the looser, less powerlifting benching. Definitely knows it's working harder.

Will be awesome to add the legs back in. Confident on big numbers later in the training cycle once I do that, plus start throwing some Slingshot work in in 2-3 weeks time.

[Bigken1985]

What happened to your leg bro

[BeastBuilder]

Lol nothing bro

Coach has just told me to flick my feet out in front of me and kinda starfish on bench for the time being as my pressing was too easy. Remove leg drive from the equation so I just build some general upper body pressing strength, then theoretically when I add legs back in I'll be in a better place.

Hope that kinda makes sense lol. But yea nothing wrong with my legs man haha

[maccaz]

Lol nothing bro

Coach has just told me to flick my feet out in front of me and kinda starfish on bench for the time being as my pressing was too easy. Remove leg drive from the equation so I just build some general upper body pressing strength, then theoretically when I add legs back in I'll be in a better place.

Hope that kinda makes sense lol. But yea nothing wrong with my legs man haha

been seeing heaps of people doing starfish bench lately on ig etc, one day when you get instagram (lol) check out melbournestrengthsystems (alex deken) and _big_bad_wolf_13_ (rhyss keane) they both strong as and use starfish bench often to kill leg drive

[BeastBuilder]

been seeing heaps of people doing starfish bench lately on ig etc, one day when you get instagram (lol) check out melbournestrengthsystems (alex deken) and _big_bad_wolf_13_ (rhyss keane) they both strong as and use starfish bench often to kill leg drive

I'm quite liking it. And is good way to make the movement harder without detracting from my usual movement patterns etc, probably the bench equivalent of a deficit deadlift or pause squat.

IG I'd get too annoyed at, I find FB bad enough lol.

[BeastBuilder]

10/09

Delts & Arms

DB Front Raise/Side Raise/Rear Raise > 4 sets of 15 each - 9kg

Seated Side Raises > 10x25, 15x20, 17.5x15, 22.5x12, 25x10, 15x20, x20, 10x30, x30

Chest Support Rear Raise/Barbell Upright Row > 4 sets of 30/15 - 10kg/40kg

Low Incline Yates Press/Alt DB Curls > 5 sets of 30/30 - 37kg/20kg

Squeeze Tri Bar Pressdowns/Barbell Preacher Curl > 5 sets of 20/12 - 12pl/35kg

Hands Apart Squeeze Rope Pressdowns/Drag Curls > 5 sets of 20/15 - 10pl/35kg

Good workout today. Got in and got it done. Not as much volume as usual but more time under tension focused so was gassed by the end.

Delts was sick, warm up then double ladder style sets of side raises had them full and pumped redic. Didn't hit as pressing as given my Bench volume atm and the toll it's taking on my chest/shoulders/tris I thought would be best to give heavy pressing a break for a lil. That's the beauty of these sessions on the fly, nothing set in stone thay I have to do, can just put in the work elsewhere.

Arms was back to the old Tri/Bi supersets. Love dat shit. Dickskin is coming along nicely, new forearm veins and some creeping up my Tris and inside my Bis. Guna look mint if I can lean up a lil more. At least I'll look strong, even I get my ass handed to me by the Ozzys lolol.

Pump was pretty disgusting with all the squeezing reps going on. Big stretches on the Bicep exercises and a real focus on trying to involve the Lateral Head of the Tricep as much as possible. It piss.

[BeastBuilder]

11/09

Deadlift

Deficit Deadlifts > 2 Triples > 240kg

4 Fours > 255kg

Romanians > Sumo - 100x12, x12

Snatch Grip - 100x10, x10

Lying Leg Curls > 50x12, 65x12, 80x10, 95x6

Cable Pull Throughs/Seated Cable Rows > 3 sets of 12/12 - 60kg/100kg

Barbell Rollouts/Reverse Crunches > 3 sets of 12/25 - BW

Pretty hard session today. The Deficits raped me hard. Heaviest I've ever gone on it, but felt a lot harder than it looked. Felt like I was slow and like my head was going to explode. Watching the videos I was still quick as off the floor etc so was a lil odd but happy enough. Positioning wasn't quite where it needed to be but was awesome for the Glutes and Upper Back.

Accessories were on point, just added to the fatigue and pumped feels. Didn't go heavy on anything but didn't need to tbh.

Body is buggered, always a big session given the size of the muscle groups being used plus just the fact that Deads are always badass, Deficits even worse haha.

[BeastBuilder]

13/09

Bench

Bench Press > 130x4, 140x4, 150x3, 160x3, 170x2, 175x2, 150x6

Low Incline Cable Flys > 4 sets of 15 - 6pl

Cable Rope Rows > 12plx15, 14plx15, 16plx12, 18plx12

Incline DB Press/Bent Arm Barbell Pullovers > 3 sets of 12/12 - 45kg/35kg

Dips/Straight Arm Pulldowns > 3 sets of 15/20 - BW/45kg

Solid session today surprisingly, felt tired as and had had a busy day with a ton of driving so wasn't expecting anything major, was going to hold back on the weights tbh. But on the working sets on the way up everything felt solid and tight and fast enough. The 175 double is equal to my heaviest double I did last training cycle with leg drive etc so to hit that reasonably comfortably with zero legs was a big plus ! One more session without leg drive on Wednesday then back into it next weekend. On track for some big numbers !

Accessories felt good afterwards as well, good bloodflow and pump, everything was moving well and contractions were top notch, didn't need much weight and stuck to isolation mostly, trying to work on the weaker points of my physique chest and back wise so should also hopefully transfer over to strength department as well.

[BeastBuilder]

14/09

Squat

Squats > 4 Triples - 215, 230, 230, 240

220x5

Pause Squats > 3 Triples - 170kg

Bench > 3 sets of 5 - 142.5kg

GHR > BWx12, +5kgx12, x12, +10kgx12

GHR Sit Ups > BWx30, +10kgx25, x25, x25

Pretty happy with how the Squats felt yesterday. Didn't have any niggles or discomfort for the first time in forever, usually my either knee or hips be a slut but was fine yesterday, warm ups were a breeze. Even the working had reps in the tank which is mint, definitely the easiest 240 has ever felt, had 3 or so reps in the tank I would say.

Pause Squats were tight and felt pretty easy given that I take wraps and belt off for them.

Bench was a bitch, Chesticles were still pretty tender from yesterday so luck it wasn't much volume lol. Reps still moved well and technique was on point which is the point of it I think. To get me used to setting up well for Bench after having to Squat first as this is the order comps go in so might as well build some conditioning specific to my sport.

GHRs are making a comeback with a vengeance, my set up on Squats and Deads are loving it. Will definitely notice it more when I go back to pulling from the floor I think but yea nothing quite replaces a proper GHR

[BeastBuilder]

15/09

High Volume Legs

Leg Extension > 2 sets of 50 - 8pl

2 sets of 30 - 11pl

Leg Press > 5ppsx40, 9ppsx30, 12ppsx20, 14ppsx15/12ppsx12/10ppsx8/8ppsx8/6ppsx8/4ppsx10/2ppsx10, 12ppsx23/10ppsx14/8ppsx6/6ppsx6/4ppsx8/2ppsx10, 8ppsx50, x50

DB Romanians > 4 sets of 12 - 40kg

Hack Squat/Walking Lunges/Cable Leg Press/Leg Extension > 3 rounds of 20/15m/30/30 - 1pps/BW (Double Pump)/250lbs/10pl

Leg Extension > 2 sets of 6/12/6/6 - 8pl (Slow&Squeeze/Normal Pace/Slow&Squeeze/Extreme Slow Negative Only)

Hnnnnggggg.. Walking like fucking new born Bambi right now. Not looking forward to tomorrow, but gotta love the volume !

Had an extra lad train with us today so had to introduce him to real man volume lol.

Also made it so we could do epic drop sets on the Leg Press so made the most of that ! My endurance on those sucks since haven't done then in forever but was sickening.

Came up with the Giant Set with just whatever machines were free at the time. Ended up being about 100reps per round so happy days. Did exactly what it was planned to do which was just an insane pump with relatively light weights.

The Extensions to finish were inspired by some of Dennis James' videos. If you haven't seen his ideas/work, look it up ! He's awesome for hypertrophy training and just getting max time under tension. So yeah was varied tempos and reps through one set. Six slow and squeeze, 12 at a normal pace like controlled but not emphasising any part of the movement, then another six slow and squeeze, finish with six where your partner pulls it up for you and you squeeze as hard as you can resisting all the way down super slow. Great way to end a session