Another week of workouts are now under my belt. This week finished up 70% of my one rep max and I’m moving on again to 80%. That 10% sounds small until you get under the bar and have to lift it. Then you realize just how big 10% really is.
Amazingly even though I’ve been eating at a calorie deficit for the last 10 weeks, my strength is still going up. I’m convinced much of my improvement is purely the mental effort pushing the physical effort. If you don’t track your exercises, weights and reps each workout you are seriously missing out.
Each week I look at the prior workout and see how much weight or reps I did. If I hit the goal reps that I planned, I increase the weight 5 lbs. If I didn’t hit the goal reps, I add one or two to each set and aim for that number. Having a number in mind really gives me something to work towards. Without tracking, I’d never know if I was improving or not.
I think one of the reasons I love lifting so much is that there isn’t any competition besides myself. It doesn’t matter what anyone else does or lifts in the gym. I’m the only one I worry about as competition. Yesterday I was in the gym and a woman came over and asked me how much weight I was using and proceeded to look at my stack.
It took me a while to learn this, but it doesn’t matter what someone else is lifting. You have no idea where they are in their workout, how long they’ve been lifting, if they are cutting or bulking, doing low reps or high reps, and a thousand other factors. All of these and more impact how much or little someone lifts.
For example, my bicep curls range from 15 pounds to 35 pounds depending on what I’m doing that day. That’s a huge range and the number makes no difference. Someone might laugh at 15 pounds, but if it’s high reps at the end of a workout I find it pretty difficult to lift. Weight is just a number.
The only thing that matters is that you are challenging yourself and improving your own fitness. Work to better your personal records each week and you’re on your way to being the best you.
Wow – you are still rocking the training! I love seeing how you keep increasing from week to week!
The workouts are amazing. The weight isn’t going up as fast as the beginning which is to be expected while cutting, but amazingly it’s still going up. Loving the results and the challenge. I cannot wait until October!
Are you competing in a fitness contest?
Yes, my next contest is in 6 weeks. On October 26th.