Master The Met

This will be my fourth year running 42 flights of stairs for the American Lung Association. I put together my largest team yet - 10 people - and we raised about $1200. Last time I checked, the entire event had raised a little over $250,000. This is fantastic, and due to the contributions of many of you. Thank you very much.

We’re racing early this year. Our team’s start times will be just after 9:00 on Saturday morning. I’m feeling pretty good about the whole thing. I’ve been alternating between running up and down a tall set of stairs at the YMCA (30 steps / flight, 60 laps up and down) and time on the StairMaster-like machine (1000 steps @ 120-130 steps/minute).

I’ve backed off my pressing work a bit and focused most of my energy into running stairs and high-rep squats and lunges. The key to making it to the top of the stairs in one piece is controlling (or overcoming) lactic acid.

A Typical Workout

“Stretching”

Butt-Kick Steps

High-Kick Steps

Spider-Man Steps

Lunges

Foam Rolling

Warm Up

Jumping Rope

Overhead Squats

15-20x @ 45#

15-20x @ 95#

10-15x @ 135#

few @ 185#

Squats

20x @ 185#

20x @ 225#

3-5x 20-30x @ 245#

Lunges

200m Walking Lunge @ 135#

EITHER

60 “laps” up&down 30 step staircase

2 stairs/step, running 2/5 laps

OR

2x 1000 steps on stair-machine @ 120-130 steps/min

w/ plenty of rest between the two rounds

I’ll come back here early next week and post pictures, times and a general post-event wrap-up.

…and hopefully I’ll have some more important things to write about here more often.

1. Borrow or otherwise accumulate and appropriate sum of resources to create an infrastructure, then sell access to that infrastructure. The fax machine is a fine example, but much business works this way. Someone takes out loan to start the business with the understanding s/he might not have positive cash flow for a few years. S/he then has to convince the group (through marketing and sales) to buy the product or service, thus repaying the loan and paying a profit.
2. Accumulate funds through government tax dollars.

The upside of the first is that it (often) rewards and encourages good ideas with profit. The downside is that it can often be too risky. That is, even very good ideas might not ever get off the ground because the potential entrepreneur is too risk averse to take out the requisite loan needed. Also, it (often) relies on banks to provide the loans - these days banks are particularly stingy with their money, regardless the validity of the idea.

The upside of the second is that the risk is widely distributed. If the idea fails, each person’s stake is usually so small as to be unnoticed. There are some counter-examples, certainly - modern warfare is one of them - but most government-run projects are (compared to the size of the entire population) relatively small.

For instance, the National Institutes of Health spends a little more than $31 billion annually on medical research. About 80% of that money is awarded through about 50,000 grants to researchers and universities around the country. If we assume an average distribution, each grant is ~$500,000. Divide that by the 307 million people in the US, comes to $0.0016 per person per year.

$31,200,000,000.00 * 80% = $24,960,000,000.00
$24,96,000,000.00 / 50,000 grants = $499,200.00 per grant
$499,200.00 per grant / 307,006,550 people = $0.001626 per person per grant

If one of those grants turns out to be a horrible waste, 1/10th of a penny for each of us is a pretty small risk. On the other hand, if the researcher had to put up $500,000 of his/her own money s/he might not be willing to take the risk.

The downside, of course, is that there’s often little incentive to do things efficiently (if it’s not your money) and that it involves coersion (if you don’t pay your $0.0016/per grant, you go to jail). I’m not a big fan of coersion and think that, almost always, there’s a better way.

Monday Workouts

Due to the holiday, the gym was closed on Monday. I changed my schedule so I was outside on Monday. I went to a local park with a seriously huge hill all the local kids sled on.

15x

Sprint Up Hill

Catch Breath

Hard.

Wednesday Workout

It was Military Presses and Deadlifts this morning.

Military Press 5-3-X day

Worked up to 5x Press @ 145#

Deadlift 5-3-X day

Worked up to 9x Pull @ 395#

5x Assistance Work

10x Dip @ BW+50#

5x Chin Up @ BW

10x Deadlift @ 225#

It was a good morning.

The Apache Webserver

Another example of a piece of long-distance communication infrastructure is, of course, the internet. And with it, comes web servers - the most popular of which is the Apache http server. The Apache HTTP Server Project was started by eight guys who, each realizing the benefits of combining their efforts to minimize double-work, banded together to plan releases for the http server now known as Apache.

One might ask, how or why did these fellas hook up? How did they decide to contribute to the project (instead of simply writing their own)? And then, once it was built, what made the Apache server so much more popular than its competition?

It turns out, the initial Apache server was a simple addition of a few patches, by eight guys, to the most popular web server at the time, NCSA HTTPd. The Apache project didn’t (at least initially) create something new, but instead built upon the huge success of an already existing product.

This still doesn’t answer our questions, though. It simply pushes our questions back one more generation. Why was NCSA HTTPd so successful, and why did the developers decide it was in their best interest to share the code rather than keep it only for themselves.

The NCSA stands for National Center for Supercomputing Applications is a private/public partnership at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. It is largely funded with federal and state funds. The NCSA was responsible for Telnet, one of the first graphical web browsers and, of course, the web server NCSA HTTPd we’ve been discussing. Because of the public/private nature of the partnership, and because of the significant public funding, everything the NCSA produced is available to the public for “free”. (Free = paid for with tax dollars).

That is the reason the NCSA HTTPd server was open source in the first place, and, because of the free (like speech and like beer) nature of the product, it was a huge success. It was on the back of that giant that the Apache HTTPd Project built its success.

So, one other way to convince a group of people to act in a way that may not seem initially beneficial to any one individual would be to convince a bureaucrat to get behind the effort and fund it with tax dollars.

Wednesday Workout

Wednesday, as my grandmother would say, “was a doozy”. It started out cool and dry with a slight breeze. It ended in a serious thunderstorm downpour.

Warm Up

10x High Steps

10x Butt Kicks

10x Walking Lunges

10x Scapular Push Ups

10x (ea. leg) 1-leg Glute Bridge

10x Spiderman Walk

Those Burpees Suck (a variation)

400m Run

10x KB Swing @ 24kg KB

20x KB Snatch @ 24kg KB

30x 3-stair hop

40x Push Up

50x Sit Ups (feet anchored w/ KB)

60x Burpee

10x KB Swing

400m Run

The Finale

400m Lunge

The rain started, just barely, as we began our lunges - the very lightest of sprinkles from the sky. The rain became a real “rain” about 1/3 finished, and became a serious thunderstorm downpour with about 100m to go.

My ass is still sore today.

Today

Bench Press & Chin Ups

5x Press @ 110#

5x Chin Ups @ BW

5x Press @ 135#

5x Chin Ups @ BW

5x Press @ 160#

5x Chin Ups @ BW

5x Press @ 180#

5x Chin Ups @ BW

10x Press @ 205#

5x Chin Ups @ BW

Squats

5x Squat @ 155#

5x Squat @ 190#

5x Squat @ 225#

5x Squat @ 260#

9x Squat @ 295#

5x Assistance Exercises

10x Squat @ 185#

5x Chin Ups @ BW

10x Weighted Dips @ BW+50#

I teased, “The first guy to buy a fax machine was particularly risky, yes?”

JB responded, “re Fax: not if he bought two of them.” This is a particularly good point, and one I want to discuss today.

Have Patience

As it turns out, the first fax machine was not made in the 1970s or ’60s…not even in 1900s, but, instead, the first fax machine was made in 1843. The first several uses of the machine in business applications were total failures. In the 1860s, a fax-like service was set up between Paris and Lyon, France. It was to work similarly to the telegraph. Obviously, the guy who set up that service bought two of the machines (as JB mentioned) and tried to sell access to his machines.

That business collapsed in less than 5 years.

Some 70 years later, in the 1920s, AT&T set up a similar service for reporters following political candidates on the campaign trail to fax photos back to their papers’ and magazines’ headquarters. Again, AT&T invested in the infrastructure (several fax machines) and then sold access to that infrastructure. They did a little better in their marketing; that is, they aimed their service at a small niche and highly specialized group of people - specifically, newspapers with the money to have traveling journalists and photographers. This time, the fax machine was relatively successful.

Still, it took another 40-50 years after that success before fax machines began to become a ubiquitous form of office communication - gaining popularity in Japan before finally making it to my dad’s (and yours, likely) office sometime in the late 1970s.

So, the moral of the fax machine is, if you want to change the world with your product, service or message, aim first at a highly-specialized niche (who also have the money to support you), solve an immediate and specific problem, then patiently wait for the trickle to the masses.

Friday and Monday Workouts

I’m still on 5-3-1, or rather a variant 3-5-1-deload.

Mondays are Military Press and Deadlift with Press, Chin Ups and Deadlift volume/assistance work. Fridays are Bench Press and Squat with Weighted Dips, Chin Ups and Squat volume/assistance work. Wednesdays, while the weather is still beautiful, is still outside at the nearby middle school track.

Today I worked up to an 8x @ 135# Military Press and a 13x @ 350# Deadlift.

After that, it was 5×10 ea. Press @ 95#, Chin Ups @ BW and DL @ 245#.

Real life has often gotten in the way of blogging, and eventually my thoughts became, “It’s been so long, I can’t just post yesterday’s training. I have to have something insightful to write.” and I had nothing insightful to write, so I didn’t write at all. And then the task became more difficult by a day. Newton’s First Law is pretty damn universal.

Lex I: Corpus omne perseverare in statu suo quiescendi vel movendi uniformiter in directum, nisi quatenus a viribus impressis cogitur statum illum mutare.

Wednesday Workout

Let’s start with the easy part.

Warm Up

10x High Step

10x Butt Kick

10x Walking Lunge

10x Spiderman Walk

10x Scapular Push Up

10x (ea. leg) 1-leg Glute Bridge

3x Circuit #1

15x BW Squat

10x Lunge

5x Squat Jump

Tire Drag

…

I’m not sure I have written about it here yet. I acquired a used truck tire. It’s not a big tractor tire or anything like that - it’s the size tire one might use on an F-150 or similar full-size truck or SUV.

I have a length of 1/2″ chain wrapped around the tire and a couple small carabiners holding it all together. I have a very large carabiner attached to those, and a heavy-duty tow strap run through the large carabiner. The tire can be dragged by the tow strap.

I’ve been doing this for some time, and began looking for a way to load the tire. Last weekend I fashioned a shelf of sorts out of 3/4″ plywood to sit inside the tire. It’s perfect for holding kettlebells and sandbags. =)

Tire Drag (cont.)

3x 25m drag @ Tire + 2×16kg KBs + 1×24kg KB (123#)

3x 25m drag @ Tire + 1×16kg KB + 1×24kg KB (88#)

3x 25m drag @ Tire + 2×16kg KBs (70#)

3x 25m drag @ Tire + 1×24kg KB (53#)

3x 25m drag @ Tire + 1×16kg KB (35#)

3x 25m drag @ Tire

3x Circuit #2

10x Press/Push Press/Jerk @ 2×16kg KB

10x Overhead Squat @ 2x 16kg KB

20x Push Ups

20x Swings @ 24kg KB

It was beautiful weather - about 70°F, not very humid, the slightest of breezes. A wonderful morning. Except I think I lost my stopwatch. That sucks. But other than that, yesterday was really nice.

A Little Something Extra

Besides the workouts I’m logging here, I’m going to make a point of writing other stuff here. I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how groups make decisions (or how people make decisions that influence others and therefore “appear” to be group decisions)…and, similarly, how to encourage groups to act where there is a clear benefit, but where it might be particularly risky o be the first. (The first guy to buy a fax machine was particularly risky, yes?)

I don’t know how long that particular topic will last, but if it dies, it will be replaced by something else. The point is, I’m going to try to write more.

The Salt

My wife sent me a joke via email today.

Bank of America recently conducted a password audit of their online customers and found one Steve Buchanan of Auburntown, TN with the following password:

MickyMinnieDonaldDaisyGoofyBugsBunnyElmerFuddRoadRunnerNashville

When the customer service rep called and asked Mr. Buchanan why his password is so long, he replied, “I was told it had to be at least 8 characters long with at least one capital.”

And my initial thought - my very first thought, was not laughter but,
“WHAT! Bank of America doesn’t hash their passwords with a ≥ 256 bit salt before storing them in a database!?!”

And then I had to take a deep breath when I realized just how sad that is.

Monday

Squats: Warm Up

5x Back Squat @ 155#

5x Back Squat @ 190#

Squats: 5,3,1

5x Back Squat @ 255#

3x Back Squat @ 290#

7x Back Squat @ 325#

5x Barbell Circuit @ 95#

6x Bent Over Row

6x Hang Power Clean

6x Thruster

6x Squat Jumps

6x Good Morning

45 sec. Rest

Tabata Erg

I aim for ≥100m each 20 second interval

I hit it my first three intervals

After that, my shortest interval was 88m.

Wednesday

Bench Press & Chin Ups: Warm Up

5x Bench @ 115#

5x Chin Up @ BW

5x Bench @ 140#

5x Chin Up @ BW

Bench Press & Chin Ups: 5,3,1

5x Back Squat @ 190#

5x Chin Up @ BW

3x Back Squat @ 215#

3x Chin Up @ BW+15#

2x Back Squat @ 240#

1x Chin Up @ BW+40#

5x Barbell Circuit @ 95#

6x Bent Over Row

6x Hang Power Clean

6x Thruster

6x Squat Jumps

6x Good Morning

45 sec. Rest

‘Round the Gym

One round is:

• One 4-line sprint ladder on the basketball court
• Walk one lap around gym
• Sprint up two flights of stairs to the indoor track
• Job one lap around track (100m)
• 10x burpees
• Walk down stairs to basketball court

8 rounds, untimed

This Morning

Deadlift: Warm Up

5x Pull @ 185#

5x Pull @ 225#

Deadlift: 5,3,1

5x Pull @ 305#

3x Pull @ 345#

7x Pull @ 390#

5x Barbell Circuit @ 95#

6x Bent Over Row

6x Hang Power Clean

6x Thruster

6x Squat Jumps

6x Good Morning

45 sec. Rest

Summer Schedule

With this 5-3-1 cycle complete, I’m going to begin meeting again outside on at least one morning per week. Monday will be a deload day - foam rolling and mobility work. Wednesday morning will be outside with, hopefully, the normal crew and maybe a few extra.

In the meantime, everyone have a Happy Father’s Day. Enjoy being a father, if you are one. Call or visit your father, if you have one. If none of that applies to you, have a good weekend regardless.

Training

I’ve been continuing with 5-3-1-ish template with two tweaks: I added both Hang Power Cleans and Weighted Chin Ups. The cleans are easy to figure. You use bar weight just as you would deadlifts, bench press or anything else. Chin Ups are trickier because you have to factor bodyweight into the 1RM, then subtract it back out at each percentage. The math isn’t tricky, so much as the implementation. That is, on many of the lighter sets the equation calls for negative mass.

I considered a few approaches for this issue:

1. Use the Gravitron or the Lat Pulldown machine.
2. Loop a rubberband over the bar and under my foot or bent knee.
3. Just ignore any negative number and do BW instead.

I opted for #3 above there. It certainly makes the last, all-out set very challenging. I haven’t missed a chin yet, but I also only rarely go above the minimum required reps (5, 3 or 1).

Besides the 5-3-1, I’ve been doing a lot more barbell circuits, tabata rowing erg and sprint intervals (running 8-10x 4-line basketball court ladders on the minute).

That and a deliberate reduction in kCal has led to a ~10#/2″ loss in three weeks. If the Accu-Measure is as accurate as its name implies, most of that has been fat. That’s good. I’m aiming for sub-10%BF over the next 4-6 weeks. We’ll see how that goes.

The good news is, my lifts have all stayed pretty constant (with my deadlift even going up) during this weight-loss period. Same strength at less bodyweight is good.

It’s been too long to recap all my workouts, so I’ll just post this morning’s.

This Morning

5-3-1 Military Press & Hang Power Clean

Warm Up

5x Press @ 65#

5x Press @ 80#

5x Clean @ 85#

5x Clean @ 100#

5-3-1

5x Press @ 110#

3x Press @ 125#

8x Press @ 140#

5x Clean @ 140#

3x Clean @ 155#

8x Clean @ 175#

5x Circuit @ 95#

5x Bent Over Row +

5x Hang Power Clean +

5x Thruster +

5x Jump Squat +

5x Good Morning +

60 sec Rest

Slight Cool Down

Walk 400m around indoor track

3-5 minutes

8x 4-Line Basketball Court Ladders

Start on the back line +

Sprint to free throw line and touch with fingers +

sprint to the back line and touch with fingers +

sprint to the center line and touch with fingers +

sprint to the back line and touch with fingers +

sprint to opposite free throw line and touch with fingers +

sprint to the back line and touch with fingers +

sprint to the opposite back line and touch with fingers +

sprint to the back line…

…one round each minute.

Worked up a nice good sweat, a high pulse and respiration rate and burning legs. Success.

Coming Weekend

This weekend upcoming should be relatively quiet. Tomorrow my family and I will be celebrating the survival of a good friend, remembering those who were not as lucky and doing our part to find a cure so there can be more of the former and less of the later.

Other than that it should be pretty quiet.

With a little luck (and my actually sitting down to write something) I’ll do a weekend follow-up on Monday.

Again, I’m running behind. Here’s Wednesday and Friday.

Wednesday Military Press

3x Warm Up Circuit @ 65#, 95#, 115#

8x Bent Over Row +

8x Power Clean +

8x Front Squat +

8x Press/Push Press/Push Jerk +

8x Back Squat

Military Press

5x Press @ 75#

3x Press @ 105#

3x Press @ 120#

8x Press @ 135#

Assistance Work #1

8x Floor Press @ 185#

6x Zercher Squat @ 185#

5x Chin Ups @ BW

8x Weighted Inclined Sit Ups (lvl#2) @ 10# (held behind head)

Assistance Work #2

8x Floor Press @ 185#

6x Zercher Squat @ 185#

5x Chin Ups @ BW

8x Weighted Inclined Sit Ups (lvl#2) @ 10# (held behind head)

Assistance Work #3

7x Floor Press @ 185#

6x Zercher Squat @ 185#

7x Chin Ups @ BW

5x Weighted Inclined Sit Ups (lvl#2) @ 10# (held behind head)

My Zerchers were weak Wednesdsay. My hips were hurting, my hamstrings were kinda tight and my lower back hurt. 6 reps each round was just taking it easy and trying to loosen things up.

Front Squats (Today)

3x Warm Up Circuit @ 65#, 95#, 115#

8x Bent Over Row +

8x Power Clean +

8x Front Squat +

8x Press/Push Press/Push Jerk +

8x Back Squat

Front Squat/dt>

5x Squat @ 135#

3x Squat @ 190#

3x Squat @ 215#

10x Squat @ 240#

Assistance Work #1

15x Incline Press @ 135#

5x Warm Up Squat @ 135#

15x (ea. arm) 3-pt Rows @ 70# DB

5x Warm Up Squat @ 185#

Assistance Work #2

15x Incline Press @ 135#

20x Squat @ 225#

15x (ea. arm) 3-pt Rows @ 70# DB

20x Squat @ 225#

Assistance Work #3

12x Incline Press @ 135#

15x Squat @ 225#

12x (ea. arm) 3-pt Rows @ 70# DB

15x Squat @ 225#

That’s 70 Squat reps @ 225# in about 20 minutes. My legs were absolutely dead when that was finished, and I had a wicked headache. Awful.

That last set of 15 was a killer. The good news is I’ve noticed significant increase in the thickness of my thighs since I’ve started this high-rep squat phase. The bad news: my waist is getting a bit bigger too. I’ve been constantly hungry, eating like mad. That helps, I’m sure. Both effects.

Two more weeks - I’ll work up to 4×20 Squats @ 225#, hopefully - and then I’ll deliberately and significantly reduce kCal input and increase kCal output. See if I can strip some of this padding off my 6 pack. =)

All my lifts seem to be going up in steady fashion. That makes me happy. For now, it’s just more of the same.

Friday Bench Press

Last time I benched, I was playing with a new set-up. I have always had a big strong arch in my back, solid foot placement with steady leg drive and retracted scapula. I typically set myself under the bar so the bar is directly over my diaphragm. I then pull back my feet and set my legs hard underneath me. Finally, I grab the bar and pull myself into the tightest arch I can manage - ending with my weight on my retracted scapula and my face under the bar. This allows for what I’ve always thought was a pretty stable surface from which to press.

I watched a video of a man who set his feet about mid-bench, rolled his hips forward and then basically did a back bend under the bar onto his upper back. His claim was that produced a much tighter surface from which to bench, but required a ton of flexibility.

The good news, as I saw it - flexibility is something I possess. As J.B. says, “flexibility is [my] super-power”. Always has been. I thought I’d give this new setup a try.

It was awful. I’m plenty flexible to do a back-bend under the bar, but just couldn’t get a solid leg drive and the angle of the bar was all wrong. Maybe I’m too flexible. Maybe I just needed to work at it until I found the right angle. I don’t know. I kinda don’t care. If it ain’t broke…etc. Friday I was back to my normal setup.

3x Warm Up @ 65#, 95#, 115#

8x Bent over Row +

8x Power Clean +

8x Front Squat +

8x Press/Push Press/Push Jerk +

8x Back Squat +

8x Good Morning

Bench Press

5x Press @ 125#

5x Press @ 160#

5x Press @ 185#

9x Press @ 210#

Assistance Circuit Round #1

10x Incline Press @ 135#

5x Squat @ 135#

15x (ea. arm) 3-pt Row @ 70# DB

5x Squat @ 185#

Assistance Circuit Round #2

15x Incline Press @ 135#

20x Squat @ 225#

15x (ea. arm) 3-pt Row @ 70# DB

15x Squat @ 225#

Assistance Circuit Round #3

12x Incline Press @ 135#

12x Squat @ 225#

10x (ea. arm) 3-pt Row @ 70# DB

10x Squat @ 225#

I was hoping to get 3×15 Squats @ 225# after the first set of 20. That didn’t happen.

Deadlifting Today

3x Warm Up @ 65#, 95#, 115#

8x Bent over Row +

8x Power Clean +

8x Front Squat +

8x Press/Push Press/Push Jerk +

8x Back Squat +

8x Good Morning

Deadlift

5x Pull @ 200#

5x Pull @ 260#

5x Pull @ 305#

12x Pull @ 345#

Assistance Circuit Round #1

15x Dips @ BW+35#

10x Squat @ 135#

15x Face Pulls @ #10 plate

10x Squat @ 185#

10x Power Curls @ 95#

Assistance Circuit Round #2

15x Dips @ BW+35#

10x Squat @ 225#

15x Face Pulls @ #10 plate

5x Squat @ 275#

10x Power Curls @ 95#

Assistance Circuit Round #3

12x Dips @ BW+35#

5x Squat @ 275#

15x Face Pulls @ #10 plate

4x Squat @ 315#

10x Power Curls @ 95#

I haven’t done Chin Ups in a while. My elbow had been giving me lots of problems and chin ups really aggravated it. I’ve obviously lost a lot of chin up strength in that time. Must work on that.

A (Possible) Beginning

There’s a guy with whom I work. He lifts. We’ve had some brief conversations in the past about lifting. It seems like he does a bodybuilder-style, 3-5 x 10-15 isolation exercise, body-part-split-type program. I, obviously, don’t; though we’ve never had any conversation about my “program”.

We were sitting in a meeting room the other day, waiting on the rest of the meeting invitees to join us. He turned to me and asked me a question about the leg press. I answered, honestly, “I have no idea. I’ve never done a leg press.” He was shocked!

“What do you do for your legs?”

“Squats, Deadlifts, Zercher Lifts, Overhead Squats, Front Squats, Cleans, Lunges, Good Mornings…”

“You don’t do any leg press? What about leg curls?”

“Nope.”

“Really? …”

He confided he rarely squats and never does any of the other exercises I mentioned.

I saw him this morning. He said he deadlifted for the first time, on his “back” day…and admitted he actually kinda liked it and was interested in learning some of those other exercises. I offered him an invitation to come lift with us anytime he wants. We’ll see if he takes me up on the offer.