Early morning run; Late morning Chest, Back and Abs, Nov 30, 2011

Cardiorespiratory Endurance:
Wednesday, 5:30am 2 mile run.
Shorter run today, only 2 miles but I increased the pace to compensate for the decrease in distance.  Friday morning will be a longer run again.


Resistance Training:
Today I started with back then moved to chest and finished with abdominals. Here's another of Poliquin's pull-up routines that I found to be quite effective. It's versatile with changes in grip, a good tempo and short rest times.  These are non-assisted, dead-hang pull-ups and chins.  No cheating, but you can reduce the reps if you're not to this level.


Back

One set of wide pronated grip pull-ups     8 reps        rest 45 seconds    
One set of supinated chin-ups                 6 reps        rest 45 seconds    
One set of narrow neutral grip pull-ups     5 reps        rest 45 seconds    

One set of wide pronated grip pull-ups     7 reps        rest 45 seconds    
One set of supinated chin-ups                 5 reps        rest 45 seconds    
One set of narrow neutral grip pull-ups     4 reps        rest 45 seconds
One set of wide pronated grip pull-ups     6 reps        rest 45 seconds    
One set of supinated chin-ups                 4 reps        rest 45 seconds    
One set of narrow neutral grip pull-ups     3 reps        rest 45 seconds    
One set of wide pronated grip pull-ups     5 reps        rest 45 seconds    
One set of supinated chin-ups                 4 reps        rest 45 seconds    
One set of narrow neutral grip pull-ups     3 reps        rest 45 seconds    
One set of wide pronated grip pull-ups     3 reps        rest 45 seconds    
One set of supinated chin-ups                 3 reps        rest 45 seconds    
One set of narrow neutral grip pull-ups     2 reps        End of exercise   

*Neutral grip just means semi-supinated grip (i.e. palms facing each other)

This routine gives about 67 pull-ups total.  It can be modified to do more or less depending on individual capability.  When i'm in peak shape I push for the 100 pullup mark.  Something to remember is that pull-ups are to the upper body what squats are to the lower body.  Forget the lat pull-down machine, there is no singular exercise that is more effective for building upper body functional strength.

Chest

Here is another variation on a 6-12-25 routine. 

A1 Incline Bench Press - 6 reps

Rest 10 seconds

A2 Push-ups - 12 reps

Rest 10 seconds

A3 Dumbbell flys, flat bench - 25 reps

Rest 2 minutes then repeat for 4 sets total

Abs

A1 V-ups on flat bench, 20 reps, no rest

A2 Flutter kicks, 50 reps

Rest 1 minute, repeat for total of 4 sets

B1 Straight leg raises on vertical knee-up / ab tower, 20 reps

Rest 10 seconds

B2 Ab roller wheel extensions, 12 reps at 3-1-X-0 tempo (3 seconds on the eccentric, 1 sec hold, X = concentric portion as fast as you can manage, 0 rest at top of movement)

Rest 90 seconds repeat for 3 supersets.

Regards/

J