Bench 220 x 3

So today was a pretty horrible day. BUT, it wasn't a complete waste, because I figured out something cool. Basically, I watched a ton of great benchers recently, and noticed something they do that is different from me. I have always tried to BLAST weight off my chest, THROUGH lockout. Basically throwing that shit up as hard as I can. One thing I noticed with guys like Eric Spoto and CT fletcher, however, is they seem to squeeze to lockout, rather than trying to blast through it. Basically, as I was benching today, I had an end-point of the rep in mind, and tried to squeeze the weight to that end point, rather than just trying to blast it with everything I had. The result? I felt much more in control of the weight, reps seemed more consistent and uniform, and I felt my chest muscles working much better than usual. Although it certainly didn't result in a magical bench PR, I think it is a step in the right direction and something I am going to continue to do in future training sessions.

Started with 5/3/1 bench. Felt good warming up with this style change. Hit 95, then 135, then went to 170 x 3 and 195 x 3. Neither felt easy, but the control felt good. Finally, loaded up 220 and hit it for a very solid 3, and went for a 4th that pretty much pinned me. Pretty disheartening, but again I need to keep in mind all the stressors holding me back. I can't worry about bad workouts. One thing I definitely noticed was that the muscular fatigue was way easier to predict with this style of benching. Instead of hitting 3 easy reps, then all of a sudden failing, rep 1 was medium, 2 was tough, 3 was tougher, etc. Dropped back to 195 and hit it for 3 doubles, with a  long pause on at least 1 rep of each set. Weigh definitely moves a little slower with this style, but something about it just feels right. I think I am going to stick with it for a bit, and see if maybe I have an easier time making gains with this.

Next, did 3 x 16 rear delt flyes with 12.5 dumbells.

Next, strict press was atrocious. Hit the bar, then 115, then 155... I wanted to try and go 3 x 8 today, but I only got 6, 5, 4. Really bad. But it almost made me feel better, because that tells me that today was just an overall shitty day, which excuses the benching a little. 220 x 3 is pretty bad, but if today was a pretty terrible day through and through, then 220 x 3 might indicate that I am actually making some progress haha.

Finally, ended with some high rep cable pulling.

So, pretty terrible day, but I just have to keep my chin up. Bicep is feeling slightly differrent today - less bothersome in the morning, before I trained, started to feel it while I trained, but still not painful at all on it's own. However, now it is sore to the touch - when I press is, it feels like a bruise or some doms. That could be a good sign (i.e. it's on it's way to healing) or a bad one. But it's still not really affecting my workouts or painful unless I press it, so I'm not too worried. I think tomorrow, however, I am going to take it REALLY easy, simply because I need the recovery - probably walk instead of run, and so some really light weight, high rep arm stuff and that's it. I need to really err on the side of recovery this next week and a half. I'm so close to the finish line, just got to stay mentally strong and be very careful. Lets keep at it.