Pump you Up (Pushups)

[Blarg]

I'm mixing in the pistols with deadlifts, and still doing the one-armed push-ups. I still do them all in sets of five, and even less than five if five will be a failed rep. I keep doing sets until each rep starts to become ridiculously hard. Sometimes that means lots of sets of five and then a sudden drop-off in strength, sometimes it means I'm quickly doing many more sets of 4's and 3's instead.

But, like I originally said, I don't count, so I couldn't say for sure on a numerical basis how I'm doing.

That said, my legs are still sore from squats two days ago, my low back is sore from deadlifts, and my shoulders are over my one-armed push-ups of a couple days back. I do a funny flip flop of feeling much weaker some days than others, but my last OAP routine was very strong, and I can tell I'm getting stronger on them. I'm starting to get a somewhat noticeable(to me anyway) separation in my chest muscles, the upper from the middle, and I think I'm putting some meat on my traps. My shoulders are definitely bigger, too. My legs are not advancing as quickly because I'm doing a lot of deadlifts on some of what used to be my squat days.

On the grippers, I'm doing okay in my work-outs, but I haven't closed the #2 yet and probably won't for a while. I just closed the #1 on about the beginning of the month, so that's fine. Getting the #2 to 1/8 of an inch doesn't mean I will close it yet for a long time. Yesterday I did a brutal amount of volume and now my hand feels really sore.

I do notice my hands are getting bigger and thicker already, which is kind of cool in a way. There's getting to be more meat on the outside of the hand by my pinkie.

My 16 kg. kettlebell, I haven't been getting all that much use out of, as the deadlifts have been killing my low back, so I don't want to use it for swings, and the one-arm push-ups are making it feel way too easy for presses. I use it mostly for tricep work now, standing and seated French presses, I think they call them.

And I'm eating like a hog to try to put on mass. Even got some protein powder and creatine and take both regularly. It seems I'm active enough that I'm not turning it all into fat.

Things are coming along well. I just wish my low back wasn't so sore. I probably have a lot more enthusiasm than brains when it comes to deadlifts. I'd better start thinking with my brain instead of my muscles or my ego.