Beat Saber released an update adding 150% speed to ranked mode.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXlXdhzL2WI

s e n d h e l p

I'm actually super happy about it because it's now giving me something to work towards on a LOT of songs. I mentioned in my last post I was hitting the limits of what was available to me but this is like a whole range of new content. OTOH, I'm now hitting EVEN MORE tracking issues… so it's even more frustrating. But it's still super fun.

They also added a "small notes" mode which is to me ridiculously funny. I'm gonna train it at some point most likely. It doesn't affect the scores right now as it's flagged "beta".

Okay, my current routine is looking something like this:

M, W, F

Workout 1

Goblet Squats w/ 35lb Kettlebell

• 6 sets of ~15-20 reps

Workout 2

Pullups

• First 6 sets (each followed by 4 negatives, in their respective grips):
  1. Wide grip: ~8 reps
  2. Neutral grip: 6 reps x 2 sets
  3. Chin ups: 6 reps x 2 sets
  4. Wide grip: ~4 reps
     • on the last negative, I dead-hang for ~15s
• Next 6 sets (all wide grip and each followed by a negative->dead-hang)
  1. 1 rep x 2 sets
  2. 3 reps
  3. 4 reps
  4. 3 reps
  5. 4 reps
• Next 3 sets (all wide grip, but no dead-hang)
  1. 1 rep
  2. 2 reps
  3. 3 reps
• Final set
  1. Chin ups: 6 reps
  2. Neutral grip negatives: 4 reps
     • on the last negative, I dead-hang for as long as possible

Workout 3

Pushups

1. Diamond push-ups: 10 reps x 11 sets

Tu, Th

Workout 1

Kettlebell Swings w/ 35lb Kettlbell

• 6 sets of ~30-40 reps

Workout 2

Bodyweight inverted rows

• First 6 sets w/ feet elevated:
  1. 10 reps x 2 sets
  2. 8 reps x 4 sets
• Next 5 sets w/ feet on the ground:
  1. 10 reps x 5 sets

Workout 3

Bodyweight dips

1. 10 reps x 2 sets
2. 8 reps x 2 sets
3. 7 reps x 2 sets
4. 8 reps x 2 sets
5. 7 reps x 1 set
6. 6 reps x 2 sets

Well, that about does it. For most of these exercises, I keep my rest period at 1 minute for ~the first half and then increase to 1.5 minutes for the rest of the sets. Sometimes I go as long as 2 minutes. It's fairly simple, in terms of not having to do a whole buncha different exercises, and I'd say it's working out well for me.

As of Friday this week, I will have gone to the gym three times a week for eight weeks straight, aside from the one day I took off because I pulled my hamstring. It's the most consistent I've been in a long while.

I'm going to take the same course again, but after that's done I'll consider signing up for the gym proper. The gym membership itself seems kind of expensive especially in comparison to just the classes, but the membership includes some coaching and I really like the instructor. I've come to realize that external structure is really important for me.

The class was structured around getting some very basic movements down in the first week to elaborating on those by adding weight or getting more dynamic, so I'm interested to see if there's a marked improvement for me doing the first week over again. After doing weighted and walkout planks I'm sure I'll be able to hold a regular one for longer.

Also my fiancée now has visible biceps and I am so jealous. Holding out hope for mine soon. :p

My work offered a weekly yoga class so I've been doing that every Tuesday! It seemed there was enough demand that they're going to add anither class starting next week so there'll be two classes a week. It's all virtual, and I like it because I don't have to turn on my camera haha. But I'm super happy to be taking yoga classes. Definitely getting better/stronger and working on my balance and stretching myself out. I love it so much (sans some of the woo woo but I can get past that, it kind of comes with the turf). But it feels really nice to be doing stuff, especially after I damn near ruined my knee trying to get back into running. I'm easing back into the fitness stuff, though I would murder someone to go swimming (I'm waiting until after I get a vaccine for that).

Finished off Steve Cotter's six week full-body kettlebell routine and wrote up my thoughts on it. I'll copy/paste some here, but you can go here for the full text: https://erikcieslewicz.medium.com/program-review-full-body-kettlebell-workout-by-steve-cotter-modified-72b3c1eda4c8

Here's some thoughts:

The grind is real.
As I mentioned at the end of RKC RoP, all those presses were giving me sore shoulder joints. This program has less emphasis on pressing, but there’s still presses on both days and so I don’t think my shoulders ever truly recovered. The result was sore joints pretty much all six weeks of this, which also made the presses a bit of a slog.

But even outside of that, the rest of this program feels very grindy. I think part of it is there’s no progression. With RKC RoP, you’re always pushing to get that 5 x (1,2,3,4,5) ladder done so you can move up to a heavier kettlebell. With 5/3/1, there’s a loading strategy to keep increasing difficulty. This is just six weeks at the same weight, reps and sets. It’s tough to feel engaged. Add in there’s only two days of work you bounce back and forth between over and over again. So, about three weeks in, I was feeling a combination of less motivation and more worn down.

This may be more on me than Cotter’s design. When I saw those low weights, I assumed it was more of a beginner program. But given that this is four days a week of full body workouts, including the exact same exercises two to four times a week, a lower weight may have been best to make sure I didn’t get worn down! All that volume on the same muscles over and over again added up!

That said, having a full day dedicated just to arms was enough to keep me getting 5 days a week most weeks (I missed one day all program and that was due to getting the COVID-19 vaccine and dealing with the side-effects). Vanity is a good motivator, but also without any overhead shoulder work, and less emphasis on lungs/cardio and more on hypertrophy, I knew I wouldn’t be suffering when those days came up. At least not in a way I dislike.

One thing I wish I could have done is do this with more than two weight choices. I understand that Cotter likely wanted to make his program accessible and so putting all these lifts at different weights starts to mean only people with gym access or a large collection of bells can do it. But he’s already asking quite a bit with three different weights and two of each of those. So, why not go all out?

Particularly, the presses being at the same weight as stuff like swings seems really unbalanced. Strict pressing engages a small amount of shoulder and arm muscles and doesn’t use gravity or momentum to help. Stuff like swings engage the entire posterior chain and have the benefit of gravity helping out, meaning you can do those much heavier than presses. But that’s not how this program is designed.
I thought about further modifying this program to fix just that. Use 80 lbs for stuff like two handed swings, 40 lbs for some of the overhead presses, for example. However, I like to work outside and carrying more than two bells outside seemed more trouble than it’s worth. So, I slogged through some 62 lb presses. Considering the progress on my arm size, I’d say pushing myself to press that heavy worked out.

The lack of rows, or direct biceps work at all, is also not ideal. I’m perhaps more tuned into seeing that since my arms are very tough for me to grow, so I look for arm work almost right away. But this program, outside of biceps, seems to hit basically everything really well. The closest we get are the cleans, which do engage the biceps a bit, but the primary movers on kettlebell cleans are the posterior chain, with the biceps taming the arc at the end. That’s stabilization more than direct work.

I also think this program may over work the posterior chain a little bit. There’s almost too many cleans and swings, all of which heavily engage those muscles. While these are fun, explosive movements, at a certain point we can accept the chain has been worked. Then on top of those, we add in some deadlifts. The deadlifts are a bit of a dead zone in the program, they aren’t explosive movements, so they don’t spike the heart rate, in addition to working muscle groups already thoroughly covered. I guess they’re a good rest before doing snatches, which are very demanding.

I went for a ~15 mile bike ride with a friend yesterday wandering around the city where she lives. It was lovely. I did get a little sunburn, so I gotta start packing sunscreen again!

Yesterday I drove over to the base of the Santa Cruz mountains and then biked up to the ridge, doing a small loop. I caught a nice view of Half Moon Bay from the top, which wasn't something I expected and was a nice surprise. I beat Google Maps' predicted time by 25%. This trip was all on pavement, but one of these days I'll buy myself a mountain bike to do off-road cycling up in the mountains. That'll cost quite a lot of money so I'm holding off for now.