Hamstrings, back today for my last training day of the week. This being my first full week of working out, I now feel wiped and this particular workout kicked my ass, even though it may look like a walk in the park to some people.
For hamstrings, I focused on heavy deadlifts with a burn-out set of stiff-legged deadlifts. Then, I moved on to lat pulldowns with a wide grip, focusing on the isometric hold at the bottom of the movement and really emphasizing the negative portion of the movement i.e. trying to prevent the bar from moving back up to first position. Then, I do one-armed dumbbell rows off the bench as well as standing, and finished off with a few sets of standing lat straight-armed pushdowns to burn out and pump as much blood into the muscle as possible.
Utilizing the isometric and negative during back workouts is something I learned from watching former Mr. Olympia Dorian Yates in a training video with personal trainer and YouTube personality Mike Thurston. He said that the back muscles are best trained in the isometric and negative portion of the movement, so I decided to incorporate that same principle into my workout and it really made a big difference! I was huffing and puffing and barely able to stand by the end of this workout!
I also felt a little bit like I overdid it, but I know that my central nervous system will take some time to adjust to the amount of stress I’m putting on it.
This might even help my sleep because, as of right now, I’m not able to sleep that well. I think the excess cortisol that my body is producing is causing me to lie awake at night and have a harder time falling asleep. Either that, or I’m partially carb-depleted and the lack of the hormone leptin is negatively effecting my sleep. I’m not 100% sure right now, to be honest with you, but I do know that I will figure out the cause and address it and when I do, you will hear about it. Trust me.
Then, we talked a bit about angry parents at school board meetings, put-downs from the 90’s that really should come back, and misleading ads that encourage you to take a pill in order to lose four pounds of fat a week. Fat chance of losing weight doing that.
Talk Monday,
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