Grassroots Strength Training - Bodybuilding, Power Lifting, Etc.

The_Jed said:

   I took some time off and let my joints recover a bit. My youngest kid (15) has been bitten by the weight lifting bug. We ran through their 1rm on the core lifts and I built a 5/3/1 BBB program template around them. We just started week two of cycle two and the progress both in both physique and strength has been staggering; at 5'8" and 123 lbs the kid benched 120 x 1, squatted 215 x 1 and deadlifted 260 x 1. Today 205 was deadlifted for 15 clean reps so, it's safe to say that 1rm has gone up a bit. Lol

 

 

   I'm back on my "Vengeance" program:

 Day 1= legs, chest, shoulders, triceps

Day 2= legs, back, biceps

Day 3= transverse plane/core, boxing, cardio

Day 4= KB Rite of Passage, ACFT

Day 5= transverse plane/core, boxing, cardio

Day 6= rest

Day 7= rest or start program again, depending on how I feel.

 

While lifting with my kid I've been able to squat again. It's like I've stumbled upon the fountain of youth!

My kid has grown a bit over over the past 23 months or so. He's now 5'9" and weighs close to 150. His lifting stats have gone up too.

Deadlift - 315

Squat - 335

Flat Bench - 200

I know this is less of a strength/power training thing, but I figure it's worth a shot: has anybody with an Apple Watch noticed that their Vo2 Max metric does not exactly line up with what they're feeling in terms of training progress? Often I will make great personal improvements in my endurance and tolerance for intensity in my cardio exercises, but when look at my Vo2 Max afterwards, it has stayed the same or gone DOWN. And of course, all of the info I find when I search "how to improve your Vo2 Max" is for people who seemingly just learned that exercise exists. 

For reference, I do an hour of moderate-to-intense cardio almost every day, and my Vo2 Max never breaks 29, the top of the "below average" zone. Last night I did a half hour on the elliptical and a full hour in an intense dance class, and my number dropped to 28.1. When I had covid in August it was 27.6. Maybe I'm misunderstanding the metric, but surely there should be more than a 0.5 point difference between "I literally can't get out of bed" and "I'm easily doing a lot more exercise in one day than most people I know do in a week"?

I'm 64 y.o. and lift 2 to 3 times a week.  In warmer weather, I'll bike 12 miles about as frequently.  I've probably put on 10 pounds of mostly muscle since I started lifting regularly and increased my protein intake significantly about 2 years ago.  Still trying to balance diet and exercise to get the weight to stabilize.  I've never been much over 180 and I figure now is not a good time to weigh the most I've ever weighed.  Two years ago I weighed around 170.

I'm not familiar with Vo2 max, but I'll look it up. 

I find that diet has a huge impact on how well you feel, and also performance.  I've made some significant changes to my diet in the last couple years, eating big salads with some kind of protein (tuna, leftover chicken, cheese, cottage cheese, etc.) for lunch and trying to keep dinner small.  Sugar is the devil.

In reply to Nicole Suddard :

It appears that the Apple Watch calculates Vo2 max by monitoring your heart rate and GPS position and then relating these two parameters.  If I read this article correctly, you need to be actually moving, covering ground, i.e. not on a treadmill.

https://marathonhandbook.com/apple-watch-vo2-max-accuracy/