Back to the gym

I can't describe how good it felt to be lifting again...I missed it far more than I realized.  Unfortunately, I was a bit overzealous and managed to tweak my shoulder and had some minor issues with external rotation of my right arm.  Luckily a little Tiger Balm, and my shoulder is back to normal.  The level of soreness I'm experiencing right now is incredible, though.  I was lifting for about an hour, I'm again following Alwyn Cosgrove's New Rules regime.  Hypertrophy I, workout A covers the upper body, utilizing an alternating set routine.

For day 1 all rep ranges were 5x5: incline dumbbell bench w/ seated cable rows, standing dumbbell shoulder press w/ lat pulldown (or pullups), and close-grip barbell bench press w/ high pull, all followed by 3x15 for abs, in this case I did decline bench crunches.  The rep ranges rotate between 5x5, 4x10 and 3x15, abs are always 3x15.  I've decided to supplement the full workouts with some isolation work, on upper body days I will be doing 3x15 for biceps or triceps (alternating by workout), and 3x15 for calves on lower body days.  The specific exercises will change workout to workout, but I'm just hoping for a little extra mass gain in those specific parts.  We'll see how it works out, I might change it based on physical fatigue and he like.

If that wasn't enough, I ended the day with an hour of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, which is always fun.  It was about 30 minutes of drilling and 30 minutes of hard sparring.  Basically reviewing the basic hip throw, while adding a new grip to the throw, and then working on scissor sweeps from guard.

All in all, I was pretty wasted after all that, but today I woke up feeling energized and ready for another day like that (yeah, I'll get it on Wednesday).  I'm looking forward to karate tonight, hopefully get some free-sparring and good kumite drills.

Hopefully I'll be able to stay on track with my weight-lifting, weight-loss and training goals and peak just in time for Ippon Cup in September...wish me luck!