My first "Starting Strength" workout

[dethgrind]

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So, did I do this right? Am I supposed to be more tired after the workout? How many auxiliary workouts should I be doing after finishing the 3 basic ones (like pull-ups/dips/abs)? And why is there only 1 set of deadlifts? I don't get that.

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You won't be tired for the first couple of weeks because you aren't skilled enough at the movements to actually use all of your strength. Soon enough you'll be crying after three heavy sets of squats. Just be patient.

Have you read the link in the faq to the bodybuilding.com post? It's really good, it'll answer all your other questions.

[shemp]

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Am I supposed to be more tired after the workout?

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You won't be tired for the first couple of weeks because you aren't skilled enough at the movements to actually use all of your strength. Soon enough you'll be crying after three heavy sets of squats. Just be patient.

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This is a pretty good answer to what seems like a faq.

[Wolfram]

Thanks for all the advice guys.

Yes, I have been reading the bodybuilding.com post extensively. It's great. It just helps to get some of the ideas affirmed by asking here as well (and sometimes I skiped over the relevant section).

My plan right now is to continue doing similar weights as I did in the first exercise without adding any weight for 1-2 weeks, just to get the form right. I'm on the fence whether I should cut out the auxilliary exercises. I think I'll definitely do some ab-work once a week, but maybe lay off the dips/chinups till later.

I must say I find it kinda odd that you're supposed to add weight for each and every exercise, and I'm fairly pessimistic that I'll be able to do that for the bench-press 'cause I've been doing that for a while now and have not been able to add much weight so far. We'll see how it goes thought.

I'll keep posting here.

[Wolfram]

Did my second workout today, this time with a friend/spotter.

Squats: 2x5x135, 1x3x135
I used the same weights as last tim but [censored] me, this time around it seemed much harder. I failed the last set and got a slight tingling in my right glute and left groin. I'm going to seriously cut down the weight for next time.

Mil.press: 1x5x88, 2x5x77
First time for this exercise so I didn't know what weight to use. First set seemed a bit hard, so I cut the weight down to get better form and make sure I paced myself. Second 2 sets were reasonable form so I'll try that weight again next time.

Pen. Rows 3x5x110
This one didn't seem to hard, weight was adequate and I hope my form was ok. I tried looking straight forward while doing the exercise but this resulted in a little pain in the top spinal bone (no idea what that's called), but that could be cause it was sore from the weekend (out drinking and slamming my head etc).

This time around I did no auxilliary exercises as per recommendations.

After the workout and during stretching I noticed that my left groinal area was pretty tender. I think I might have aggrevated an old sports injury during the squats [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img] But I'm not quite sure. It's just a little tender/tingly, and only hurts (and not terribly so) if I split my legs kinda wide.

Man I hope I'm not injured, cause that would suck and make me look pretty foolish after all the warnings I was given to take it slow. It's just that the weight really didn't seem that heavy when I tried it last friday, so I really wasn't worried at all.

I'm going to play basketball tomorrow, and I'll check and see how it feels then. Then I'll be super careful on wednesday when I do the squats again. Maybe I'm just to old (32) to be doing squats 3 times a week?

[TimM]

When I started this program I was age 40, and did it for 12 weeks. Don't start so high on your weights. Give yourself some time to learn the movements and get the form down, and get your strength up. Rippetoe usually starts people around 85 lbs on squats. Also, did you do the warm-ups? They really help.

[Wolfram]

Yeah, I did like 2 sets of air-squats, and 2 sets with the bar.

I'm def. going to cut down on the squat weight. What do you think about the other weights? Remember that I've been doing the bench 1 day a week for the last 3 months, albeit 2x12 at a lower weight.

Tim, Why did you quit after 12 weeks? What's your current program?

[TimM]

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Yeah, I did like 2 sets of air-squats, and 2 sets with the bar.

I'm def. going to cut down on the squat weight. What do you think about the other weights? Remember that I've been doing the bench 1 day a week for the last 3 months, albeit 2x12 at a lower weight.

Tim, Why did you quit after 12 weeks? What's your current program?

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Bench may be high, you could have started at the 2x12 weight, and when you're increasing it 5 lbs every Bench workout, the weight goes up fast. Deadlift seems fine, you can probably go up by 10 lbs each for a long time. Military Press may be high to start with. If you start at 77, and 88 was hard, you won't be able to add weight for long unless you microload (I'm now down to adding 1 pound every two weeks on these).

Here's my old log.

Once you stop being able to increase weights on squats and deadlifts every workout after several resets, it's time to move to a different program.

I'm currently doing a variation of the Texas Method from Practical Programming. I just changed to this after 10 weeks:

Week A:
Tues: Back Squat 5x5 / Military Press 5x5 / Assisted Hammer Grip Chin-ups 5x5
Thurs: Zercher Squat 3x3 / Bench Press 3x5 / Floor Barbell Rows 3x8-12
Sat: Back Squat 5RM / Military Press 5RM / Deadlift 5RM / Assisted Dips 3x8-12

Week B:
Tues: Back Squat 5x5 / Bench Press 5x5 / Assisted Wide Grip Pull-ups 5x5
Thurs: Zercher Squat 3x3 / Military Press 3x5 / Floor Barbell Rows 3x8-12
Sat: Back Squat 5RM / Bench Press 5RM / Deadlift 5RM / Assisted Dips 3x8-12

Instead of increasing every workout, the weight is increased week to week, or in the case of MP and BP, every two weeks.

I created a new log on BB.com to build some post count there. Not even sure anyone reads it, but whatever.