resolute (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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lifting_heavy_things2012-01-01 01:37 pm
resolute) wrote in lifting_heavy_things2012-01-01 01:37 pm
Video tutorials
Happy New Year, all!
Today is a rest day for me, and I am taking this opportunity to refine and re-examine my lifting goals. First and foremost, I think I need to let go of the weight-based goals I have, and focus instead on incremental improvement. Why? Because in my efforts to Lift More Weight, I am screwing my form.
I am spending the day watching the Starting Strength demo videos:
http://startingstrength.com/index.php/site/videos
(Not sure of availability outside the U.S.?)
I think in the new year I am going to pull back to, say, 80% of the weight I am lifting and work steadily on form. This frustrates me, emotionally, you know? I like measuring the gains in numbers. I like measuring the increases in the weights. But ...
But my knees are killing me, and I know it's from bad squat form. And my shoulders are constantly sore, and I know it's from bad press and bench form. And I *cannot* get past 165# on my deadlift and 95# on my bench, and I know it's because my form is bad and my auxilliary muscles are not keeping up with the weight.
So.
I don't make New Year's Resolutions. Resolve is not a decision, it's a process. In the coming year I am going to back up and improve my process. I will practice the good form and not worry about Fitocracy points or what the guys next to me are squatting. I will try Good Mornings, and Romanian Deadlifts, and Sumo Deadlifts, and I will learn the proper forms for them.
What about the rest of you? What Heavy Things are you going to lift this year? What are you going to learn or try?
Today is a rest day for me, and I am taking this opportunity to refine and re-examine my lifting goals. First and foremost, I think I need to let go of the weight-based goals I have, and focus instead on incremental improvement. Why? Because in my efforts to Lift More Weight, I am screwing my form.
I am spending the day watching the Starting Strength demo videos:
http://startingstrength.com/index.php/site/videos
(Not sure of availability outside the U.S.?)
I think in the new year I am going to pull back to, say, 80% of the weight I am lifting and work steadily on form. This frustrates me, emotionally, you know? I like measuring the gains in numbers. I like measuring the increases in the weights. But ...
But my knees are killing me, and I know it's from bad squat form. And my shoulders are constantly sore, and I know it's from bad press and bench form. And I *cannot* get past 165# on my deadlift and 95# on my bench, and I know it's because my form is bad and my auxilliary muscles are not keeping up with the weight.
So.
I don't make New Year's Resolutions. Resolve is not a decision, it's a process. In the coming year I am going to back up and improve my process. I will practice the good form and not worry about Fitocracy points or what the guys next to me are squatting. I will try Good Mornings, and Romanian Deadlifts, and Sumo Deadlifts, and I will learn the proper forms for them.
What about the rest of you? What Heavy Things are you going to lift this year? What are you going to learn or try?
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I also want to get to 5 handstand push-ups. I haven't tried these yet, but I was watching two guys in the gym doing them and I was jealous.
I have another goal of yoga 2x a week. That's a lot harder because I can't always afford yoga class, and I often don't have time to go. It's hard to do at home because my husband and son are both noisy, and they resent my needing to have the house quiet to focus on yoga, so I have to wait until they're both out of the house, which is pretty impossible!
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I'm very proud of my 15-year-old. He's always been a couch potato and had started to put on weight. Now that he's getting into karate, the weight has stabilized and he can outdo me in push-ups for the first time ever. He's going to be able to lift a moose if he keeps this up.
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...one set of each of my exercises, five reps, because it has been just that long since I have done jack shit about my upper body strength.
My achievable-soonish goal is to do at least that much every day for a month. Looking for achievable-mediumish goal and achievable-longish goal.
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What Heavy Things are you going to lift this year?
Myself, mostly. I plan to continue NRoLfW and work towards a chin-up and a push-up.
I also want to be able to deadlift my body weight in good form. (A little voice in my head is suggesting I cheat by getting my body weight down. I suspect that voice to be evil.)
I want to be able to get into a handstand without the aid of a wall, and keep it reliably for ten full seconds. Balance is a weak point for me, and handstands are a safe way to work on it. And if they do something for upper body strength, too, I'm not complaining.
Related things: I'll continue looking for a gym that suits me better (cheaper would be nice, too), and at the same time try to work up the courage to ask a trainer if they could help me on form. (But I'm still afraid of being mocked, or yelled at, so that goal might be the least realistic.)
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