Bench Press – Page 11 – Nick Momrik's Fitness Logs

Beat Barbara

The strained muscle in my back is feeling better and better. My low back has felt pretty good and not feeling any affects from the cleans on Friday. Hamstrings are still a little sore from the GHRs. Went to open gym at noon.

Warm-up

5:00 Assault Bike (46 cals)
Dead Hang
Bottom Squat Hold
Kip Swings

Conditioning

Barbara
5 rounds, each round for time

20 Pull-ups
30 Push-ups
40 AbMat Sit-ups
50 Air Squats
3:00 Rest

This workout has never been a strength of mine, but was hoping I could go sub 20 today for a big PR. I knew it was a big ask to think I could average less than four minutes per round, especially if you look at my history of rounds. New strategy today though. I wanted to try all sets of 5 for pull-ups and push-ups with very short rests.

Worked out really well! My rests got a little longer between pull-ups and push-ups, but still very short. It felt like my sit-ups slowed down the most and I was able to keep pushing myself on the squats. Crushed my goal and went 18:44 for a PR by nearly three minutes! When I came in at exactly four minutes in round four I pushed hard in that final round trying to make sure it was better because I really wanted 4:00 or better when it was my goal to average that round time.

Date	R1	R2	R3	R4	R5	Total
Sep 22, 2012	4:23	4:26	4:26	4:33	4:27	22:15
Nov 16, 2014	3:37	4:12	4:29	4:59	5:07	22:24
Apr 16, 2017	3:52	4:06	4:19	4:42	4:38	21:37
Mar 31, 2019	3:27	3:41	3:37	4:00	3:59	18:44

Something fun to think about, with no way to know, is what contributed most to this improvement? Am I really that much fitter than 2 years ago? Doubt it. Is the Engine Builder program already paying off? Maybe a little bit. Did my lighter body weight help? Definitely some. How much did the new strategy help? Probably a lot. The PR is probably due to a combination of all of these things.

Accessory

3 Sets

30 Arms Only Rowing Strokes
30 Rower Curls

Started with the damper at 1, then 2, and finally 3. This was a huge arm pump! Everyone was laughing at our unique use of the rowers.

Strength

Bench Press

5×45#
5×95
5×125
5×155
5x5x185

Didn’t have much left in the upper body for benching, but good to hit it fatigued for something different.

After the Duke game I finished the 4th week of Engine Builder.

Engine Builder – Interval

3k Row
3:00 Rest
2k Row

My goal was to hold a 1:50/500m pace through both, which I thought would be extremely difficult after already having done a long workout. I did it for the 3k with a time of 10:59.5. I couldn’t hold on during the second half of the 2k, finishing with a time of 7:24.7, which is only 4.7 seconds off that goal. Calories were 221 and 145.

To be honest, it turned out better than I expected, especially after 250 squats this morning.

I really love having a rower at home and the numbers don’t lie, especially this month after starting Engine Builder.

This doesn’t tell the whole story though, because I also do plenty of rowing in class at the gym. Here’s a chart from BTWB for rowing distances.

Three months in, 2019 is nearly my second biggest year for rowing. The chart for rowing calorie workouts shows a different story.

After I looked into these charts, it makes a lot more sense that 2015 had been my best Open finish until this year. In my opinion rowing is the best way to improve your engine.

Speed Levels

My body (and ego) was already very sore when I got out of bed this morning. Thinking back on 19.5, it’s not the first time I gave in on a 20 minute Open workout when shit got tough. I knew I was resting way too long between sets of thrusters, but I didn’t make a change. Not thinking to switch to kipping C2B after I felt the butterfly disappear was a huge mistake too. As always, more things to improve and at the end of the day, it’s just fitness.

Last night after dinner I ate a whole pint of ice cream for the end of the Open. I ended up eating 3,700 calories for the day and dropped a pound on the scale! After finally recovering to the green zone yesterday morning, it was a high strain day at 15.5, so I probably shouldn’t have stayed up until almost 2am. Apparently I’m recovered to 61% this morning though.

Strength

Bench Press

8×45#
8×95
8×125
8×155
8×180
8×195
8×205

It’s an extra challenge on this wider Titan Fitness rack, especially when using the spotter arms. Made me slow a bit on my reps and focus. Went 10 pounds heavier than the last couple of times I did sets of 8.

Accessory

4 Sets

10 Good Mornings (45#, 33X1 Tempo)
20 Banded Pull-throughs (green)

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Conditioning

100m Row
2:00 Rest
100m Row
2:00 Rest
250m Row
4:00 Rest
500m Row
8:00 Rest
1,000m Row
4:00 Rest
4,000m Row

The BTWB fitness level keeps using rowing intervals (I’ve brought it up to their Support team in the past) as if it’s a time trial, so this workout was specifically to improve some of my rankings in the speed category. I did a 16.2 for the first 100 so bumped the damper up to 8 and got 15.9, still off my 15.5 PR. I left the damper for the 250 and got 40.3 seconds, also off my PR of 38.3.

Look how much the rower moved during those first 3 sprints! I bet I lost some time.

Then I set the damper back to 5-6. Got 1:30.5 for the 500 meters, which is pretty far off my best 1:23.5. I faded pretty hard on the last quarter of both the 250 and the 500. Hoped for 1:45/500m pace on the 1k, but my legs didn’t have it. Ended up with a time of 3:34.7, which is only 5 seconds faster than the 1k repeats I did last night. Those sprints really drained my power. Then I was holding an easy 2:10/500m pace for the 4k, which took 17:16.8.

Still a lot of room to bring the 1k and 500m times closer to my potential.

Sunday Bro Session

Good to be home and get a good night of sleep. I’m already missing the great San Diego food though. I put on almost three pounds, but that may all be water weight from so many carbs. WHOOP was saying that I burned around 4,000 or more calories most days I was out there because of all the extra walking I was doing. My recovery score is low again at 36% after no workouts yesterday, but the travel home from SD.

Strength

Bench Press

10×45#
10×95
3×135
3×175
3×205
3×225
3×240
3×250

My best triple is 255 almost exactly two years ago, so I’m happy to hit this today. If I can’t work on my lower body lifts, at least I’m getting my bench press back and can make another run at 300.

Conditioning

15:00 AMRAP

5 Strict C2B Pull-ups
10 Hand Release Push-ups
15 Hollow Rocks
20 Side Plank Jumps

I did all singles on the chest to bars and was surprised at how great they felt through the entire workout. Push-ups were all unbroken sets and didn’t slow down much. The side plank jumps were the gasser. This was a deceiving workout. I did 8 rounds plus 5 pull-ups.

Accessory

4 Sets

5 Jefferson Curls (45#)
10 Glute Bridges (3s hold)

New movement with the Jeffersons. Damn good stretch down the posterior chain and especially in my hamstrings at the bottom. The Oly coach out in San Diego said I might have weak glutes that result in my back tweaks, so I’ll try adding in more accessory work like this. I guess the rehab stuff I did last year had a good amount of glute work, so I’ll have to go back and look at that too.

Dumbbell Curls – 21s

7-7-7 @ 25#
7-7-7 @ 25#
7-7-7 @ 20#

That lighter third set felt pretty easy now, but the next two sessions will be all with 25s before switching up to one of the alternative 21s workouts.

Engine Builder – Endurance

While watching Michigan vs. Michigan State I thought I’d add an extra cardio session since all I have planned for tomorrow is 24 minutes on the Airdyne.

24:00 Row

The plan was to hold an easy 2:05 / 500m pace and I was spot on the entire way. Finished with 366 cals – 5,760 meters.

2019-03-17-24min-row

1904

I actually recovered really well after the travel due to some periods of deep sleep even though I wasn’t in bed as long as I’d like. I did a lot of walking this morning and got a lot of sun, then went to CrossFit 1904, where Bryan coaches and trains, by 3pm.

My back is getting a lot better each day and I haven’t had a shot of pain that stops me in my tracks so far today. Didn’t want to lift anything and risk tweaking it again, but I could bench press.

Strength

Bench Press

10×45#
10×95
5×135
5×165
5×195
5×215
5×225
5×235

Up five pounds from the last time I did sets of fives.

Conditioning

5 Rounds each (I go you go)

10 cals Assault Bike
10 Burpees
10 Strict pull-ups

I was able to push it on the Assault Bike, my back felt pretty good on the burpees and then I did quick singles for all of the pull-ups. We finished in 15:57.

My back is tight after the work, but was able to get in a good sweat without tweaking things more.

I hope 19.4 is something I can do on Friday!

Another Tweak!

Here are my updating rankings after 19.2. I’m switching to using a percentile, which is standard compared to saying “top X%” like I have in the past. Last weekend I spent a lot of time creating an epic spreadsheet of my results in every Open and each workout. Cool data to have going forward.

19.2

Open Men: 21,830/164,227 (86.7%)
Masters 35-39 Men: 3,457/33,391 (89.6%)

Overall

Open Men: 16,760/183,948 (90.9%)
Masters 35-39 Men: 2,402/37,204 (93.5%)

My placing in the workout was down a bit from 19.2, but good enough to rise in the overall standings for both divisions. Getting even one clean at 225# would have been a huge jump in the rankings for that workout. It still turns out to be my best two-week start to an Open. Let’s keep it rolling…

Warm-up

5:00 Assault Bike
Dead Hang
Banded lat opener
Lunges
Step-ups
OH DB Hold

WHOOP said my recovery had only gone up from 37% to 44% with almost 9 hours of sleep last. I felt great this morning and my back had recovered quite well. I was moving well through warm-ups. Then I went to move my dumbbell across the gym and TWEAK as I stood up. Fuck!

Conditioning

CrossFit Games Open Workout 19.3

200′ Dumbbell Overhead Walking Lunge (50#)
50 Dumbbell Box Step-ups (50#, 24″)
50 Strict Handstand Push-ups
200′ Handstand Walk

Details:

10:00 time cap.
Lunges and handstand walk are 25′ lengths with a 5′ section for each rep.
Step-ups must alternate legs.
HSPU use a 24×36″ box for hands, though the fingers may extend past the line.

My plan was to switch hands every 50 feet of lunges. I was fine starting out with my left arm, but with my right shoulder bothering me lately I could only go 25 feet, so I switched the dumbbell every 25 feet the rest of the way. Got through those in 2:41.

I went right to the corner of the box and got in to it. I felt my back on every box step-up, which was fucking horrible. I kept trying to figure out if there was a way I could step-up to limit the shot of pain, but there wasn’t. I supported the dumbbell over a shoulder with one hand under the head of it. I think I moved it side to side after 16, 30, and 40 reps. My tiebreak was 6:42. Ugh, four minutes is a lifetime on that movement.

By the way, I have to mention how stupid the alternating step-up standard is. It slows everyone down and it’s nearly impossible for both the judge and the athlete to keep track of since it’s not an efficient or fast way to do step-ups.

I wanted to do doubles for the HSPU as long as possible with no more than a 5 count rest. Unfortunately my back affected me coming off the wall too, but I adjusted that easily to not affect my timing or anything. I got through 8 or 10 reps doing doubles when I started to feel the second rep getting slow so I changed to singles with shorter rest. That worked surprisingly well and I was able to quickly get back on the wall for another rep. Squeezed out a double before the buzzer for 31 strict handstand push-ups!

I had no expectation of finishing those 50 even though I would have loved to get just 5 feet of handstand walking since I’ve been working on the skill. Maybe next year.

Going in to this workout I was hoping to be done with the box around 5:30 or 6:00 at the latest, but the back tweak and shoulder issue really changed that. On BTWB a score of 124 was the 90th percentile so that was my goal (even though I rarely hit that 90+%). My score of 121 almost got there so I’m really happy with the effort. Currently it ranks in the 88th percentile on BTWB, so after more scores come in it’ll be right there with my 87 and 85 ranks for 19.1 and 19.2.

This is my best three-week start to the Open due to consistent placing. I hope I don’t wake up with a really bad back in the morning and it can recover for 19.4. Especially since I’m flying out to San Diego on Tuesday for a little vacation. I’ll be out there for Friday Night Lights and hopefully battle by buddy Bryan.

Strength

Bench Press

10×45#
8×95
8×135
8×155
8×175
8×185
8×195

Don’t need my back to bench. Matches the 8×195 I did in January, which felt good after those strict HSPU.

Got home and putzed around for an hour before hitting my cardio so I could relax for the rest of the day. I’m on vacation all week!

Engine Builder – Speed

2 Rounds

8:00 Airdyne (AD2)
4:00 Rest

Based on recent intervals I hoped to hold 80 RPM for these. I was in the ballpark, seeing 79-80 quite a bit when RPMs came around on the monitor. My calories were 258 and 262 with distances of 3.13 and 3.15 miles.

Side Plank Jumps are Better

My nutrition wasn’t great last night and I was up late, so I’m feeling tired today.

Strength

Bench Press

10×45#
6×95
3×135
3×165
3×195
3×215
3×230
3×240
3×245

Only 10 pounds shy of matching my best triple, so at least I’m getting some of my strength back in my upper body. Wish I had tried 250 instead of 245 for that last set.

Helped with plate changing and cheering on some 19.2 attempts, so 25+ minutes before the metcon.

Conditioning

2 Cycles

3:00 AMRAP (continue reps in the 2nd cycle)5 Bar Muscle-ups
- 20 Reverse Lunges (50# DBs)
2:00 Rest

Wore my grips and was able to do all sets of bar muscle-ups unbroken. The lunges got rough and I was surprised how nasty that first three minutes was. I got 2 + 11 in the first cycle and finished with 4 + 21. In the second cycle I was playing around with looking back towards the ceiling in my kip, which it felt like kept me patient in the pull. Something that needs more testing for sure.

Midline

4 Rounds

20 Hollow Rocks
20 Side Plank Jumps (alt)
50 Hollow Flutter Kicks
10/10 Wood Choppers (30#)

I like these plank jumps to the side a lot better. Finished in 9:01.

Accessory

Dumbbell Curls – 21s

3 Sets 7-7-7 @ 20#

The end of the 2nd and 3rd sets got tough. Will I be able to bump up to 25# for one set next time? Maybe I should try increasing the weight on the first set instead of the last one.

Several hours later I went out to the garage…

Engine Builder – Speed

3 Rounds

5:00 Airdyne (AD2)
2:00 Rest

Based on my best 10 minutes for cals I figured 85 RPM would be a good pace for this. Turns out that was too hot for today. My legs felt heavy from the lunges. I tallied 175, 167, and 174 calories. Happy with the comeback on the final one. You can see from my heart rate that I didn’t push the second interval. Weak sauce!

I really need to fix my custom Airdyne monitor so I can keep an eye an all of the numbers at once.

Done Early

My neck and low back are a little tight from looking up at the wall for 152 reps. My shoulders are a little sore too, but my lower body seems fine so far. I set an alarm to get up for the 9am class since my rest schedule is changed for the Open.

Warm-up

5 Rounds

1:00 Run
3 Strict Pull-ups
5 Push-ups
10 Air Squats

I started to feel my legs more every set of squats.

Strength

Bench Press

10×45#
5×95
5×135
5×165
5×195
5×215
5×230

I hadn’t looked at my logs since the workout went up after getting to the gym, so I couldn’t remember what I’ve been lifting. Nice surprise to smoke the 5×215 I did a month ago. Gains baby! We were on a clock, so maybe working up with fewer sets made a big difference.

Conditioning

6 Rounds

50s Double Unders
10 Push Jerks (115#)
30s Plank
10 Ring Rows
20s Hollow Hold
10s Bent Hollow Hold

This was really an alternating EMOM with 3 stations, but it was easier to record on BTWB like this. I started with a nice set of 75 double unders, but missed a couple of times in most rounds, so was usually getting 65-75 reps in about 45 seconds due to transition time. The push jerks weren’t too bad and the ring rows felt really solid. This workout got a lot sweatier than I was expecting because there really wasn’t any rest with the holds.

I wasn’t excited about moving so early, but it feels good to have a workout done for the day.

Sore Shoulders

Forgot that I posted about weeks 3-4 of my calorie counting yesterday.

My bis and tris seemed to feel fine from yesterday. Until I got in to today’s work.

Strength

Bench Press

10×45#
6×95
6×135
3×165
3×195
3×215
3×225
3×235

Definitely started to feel some of the fatigue from Friday and Saturday as I got deeper in to the sets. Happy to hit that because it was back on July 31st I barely got 235 for a single!

Conditioning

7:00 AMRAP

10 C2B Pull-ups
5 Hang Squat Cleans (115#)
5 Push Jerks (115#)

I warmed up with 45 and 95 pounds. Did the chest-to-bars in 2×5 each round. My first round was under a minute and I knew that wouldn’t last. Shoulders really felt the fatigue in the 2nd or 3rd round. Made it through 5+6.

Midline

4 Rounds

10 Hollow Rocks
10 V-ups
10 Tuck-ups
10s Hollow Hold
1:00 Rest

Haven’t done our favorite ab workout in months so I thought it would be a good test after all of the higher volume stuff we’ve been doing on Sundays. My last round wasn’t pretty, but I finally completed all 4 rounds without breaking it up. My time was 6:08.

Skill

Spent some time working on my balance and handstand walk practice.

32 on the Rings

Had a blast at the Sky Zone Trampoline Park yesterday and managed to stay injury free except for a few dings on my hand from the obstacle course. Legs seem fine from all of the jumping too.

Strength

Bench Press

8×45#
8×95
8×115
8×135
8×155
8×175
8×185
8×195

That was 10 pounds heavier than a month or so ago. Might have been able to go up one more set.

Conditioning

4 Rounds

8 Muscle-ups
50 Air Squats

Went infinitely better than I expected; I thought for sure I’d end doing singles in the 3rd or 4th round. I was able to do 2×4 every round with 20-30 seconds of rest! Dips got tough at the end. I held a controlled and steady pace for the first three rounds of squats, knowing I couldn’t jack up my heart rate for the rings. First round was done a little bit under 3:00 on the clock and slowly drifted off that pace for the next two rounds. Then I pushed the pace on the last 50 air squats to make up a lot of time and finish at 11:46.

Maybe there is something to the power of the Sunday pancakes!

Midline

50 V-ups
30s L-hang
50 Twisting Crunches
30s L-hang
50 Lemon Squeezes
30s L-hang
50 Twisting Weighted Sit-ups

Pretty terrible with the high reps. I did all of the hangs in two sets of 15 seconds they were so bad after the V-ups that kicked it off. Took around 12 minutes.

Heading out to buy a used Concept 2 rower I found for $500. I’ve been keeping my eye out for a long time, but they rarely ever get listed for sale and even more rarely under $700.

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Don’t Break

Much needed rest day yesterday after nine in-a-row, with two of those being active recovery days. My shoulders were a little sore, but felt fine this morning.

Strength

Bench Press

10×45#
8×95
4×135
4×165
4×185
4×195
4×205
4×215
4×225

Barely made it on the last set. Improvement over the 5x5x215 from last week.

Conditioning

10-8-6-4-2 Thrusters (135#)
50-40-30-20-10 Double Unders

I got this one from Beyond the Whiteboard in the Heavy Fitness Level category. Warmed up with 5×45, 5×95, and 3×115. My goal was to go unbroken, but I had no idea what the thrusters would feel like. I just remember being the EMOM with 3×155 a few weeks ago being nasty. I made it through everything unbroken and probably could have picked the bar sooner after each set of double unders. Finished in 4:57. I’m pumped I was able to do those unbroken.

Midline

2 Rounds

30 V-ups
60 Bicycles
30 Weighted Sit-ups (30# slam ball)
60 Flutter Kicks
30 Leg Raises
60 Mountain Climbers

These higher rep core movements get so bad in the first round. Took about 14 minutes to finish.