April 2, Final weighted routine of LIIFT4.

April 2, 2019, Tuesday - LIIFT4, wk8, d3: Shoulders and Arms Circuit + Shoulder Care Yoga + TCF + Push/Pull-Up Challenges.

I was excited to do this routine because it is the last weighted routine of the LIIFT4 program.  I was a little wary at the same time because it was on this routine two weeks ago that I injured my left lat on the Upright Rows.  So, with that in mind, I decided to go a little lighter on that move, but I kept the same weight on the other moves as last time.  So here is the rundown of the routine:

Block 1
Shoulder Press - 17x2 kgs
Hammer Curls - 10x2 kgs
Upright Rows - 10x2 kgs
Skull Crushers - 10x2 kgs

Round one went by like a breeze.  I was feeling good and I could really feel the target muscles activating.  Round two started... I did the Shoulder Presses and right after I finished, I felt myself and my body literally crash.  I started to shake and I felt winded and weak.  I had a protein bar on hand, so I quickly got it and ate it.  When I thought about it, I hadn't eaten for about 7 hours so I guess it was bound to happen.  I'll have to keep a watch on that from now on.  Anyway, after about 10 minutes, I felt my strength come back and I resumed the workout.  After the second round finished, I felt incredibly pumped in my arms.  I mean popping pumped like my muscles would rip out of my skin, pumped.  I don't remember feeling that pumped in a long time.  I hit failure on the last rep of each move of round three.  Looks like the weights were just right.

Block 2
Front Raise - 5x2 kgs
Wide Curls - 8.75x2 kgs/ 7.5x2 kgs/ 7.5x2 kgs
Lateral Raise - 5x2 kgs
Triceps Kickbacks - 8.75x2 kgs/ 7.5x2 kgs/ 7.5x2 kgs

This block went a lot smoother, but I knew that 10 kgs would be too much for my biceps so I went down in weight.  After the first round, I knew I had to go down a bit more, so I ended up at 7.5 kgs.  The lowering of the weight was to accommodate my biceps, I think my triceps could have handled the heavier weight, but I didn't want to take the time of switching the plates every time.  With this block, I felt more of the burn than the pump.

Burnout
Swimmers - 4x2 kgs/ 4x2 kgs/ 5x2 kgs
Full Biceps Curls - 7.5x2 kgs
Triceps Push-Ups - All on my toes

No set rep count for the burnout, but 30-second moves and 15-second transition breaks, with 30-second breaks between rounds.  For the Swimmers, I felt the burn with the 4 kgs, and I got in about 7-8 reps.  For the third round, I went up a kg and got only 6 reps.  But I had to mostly drop my arms instead of controlling them down like I was doing with the 4 kgs.  For the Curls, I was seriously considering dropping to 6.25 kgs but didn't because I decided to work on eccentric movement so I was going to slow the pace down and lower the reps.  The rhythm was 1-3.  But a little faster on the last reps to get to 10 total. That BURNED!  I was happy to do all the Push-Ups on my toes.  I really thought I was too fried to do them on my toes and was completely prepared to go to my knees, but I was surprised that I had the strength to stay on my toes.  Here too, I worked on the eccentric movement at the same pace as the curls.  PUMP and BURN!

Core Block
Side Reachers - 20 reps
Dumbbell Extensions - 7.5 kgs, 7 reps

I was able to maintain a good pace on the first move for all three rounds, but the weighted move, I had to tap out (put my feet on the ground) pretty quickly in the first two rounds.  But somehow, in the third round, I was able to crush it and go continuously for the whole 30 seconds.  I surprised myself.

This routine totally fried my arms and shoulders.  I could barely reach up and grab my water bottle to drink.  But I felt that I accomplished a good work today.  I did the Shoulder Care Yoga and the Flows, and then I did the two challenges.  I was supposed to do three sets of 10 situps in the Pull-Up challenge, but instead of that, I just did day 1 again.  Day 1 was three sets of 1 pull-up.  Sounds like nothing, but for me, today, it was a big something.  From a dead hang and after frying my arms and shoulders, it was something.  I was thinking that since I already did a bunch of Triceps Push-Ups, I would just say "done" and be done.  But I decided to keep the challenge schedules separate from the main workouts.  Luckily day 2 only required 7 push-ups.  Easy, but NOT easy.

In the end, I burned 789 kcals.  That is a big burn for an upper body workout.  About my legs after yesterdays workout, all day I didn't feel much soreness, but after work, I started to feel my legs tightening up and then getting sore.  So any stretching I did tonight felt good.  I had more issues with my left ankle and right knee today than soreness.  And that came from decending stairs.  Going up stairs was fine, but coming down got painful after like three steps.  I'll get treatment tonight.