Been working on the blog the since morning. Have all the time in the world on this Sunday but reckon the body's call for a rest is warranted. Feeling really sore after yesterday's chest session at the gym.
Came up with a lot of acronyms for some things as its hard to find a suitable description to the things I have been doing.
It would be hard to recall what I did last week, nevermind last year eh..
...so IGP or what I call Intermediate Goals (for) Pullups is just the 'method' for monitoring progress since the beginning when my focus was... of course, about improving pullups.
The whole wake up call of how it all started have been repeated to death on this blog, so just summarily
- 09 Apr 2022 - 0 proper pullup
- 25 June 2022 - 4
- 21 Jul 2022 - first double digit - 10 reps in a set
- Aug 2022 - first >1000 pullup in a month
- and more...
But as I filtered and take a look today of this past 17 month, I notice more.
First, improvement came fast and furious initially like many who experienced it would have known.
Knowing or unknowingly-- from the beginning I embarked on fixing a number and work towards completing it and subsequently push harder by cutting down the number of sets and or the time needed to finish it each day.
This began with a modest 10 reps in Jul 2022 after I stupidly and forcibly crank out 40 on 02 Jul. All the reps were anytime but good and proper. It was just about sticking the chin over the bar. Hardly any pre-pulling setup of shoulder/ scapula and because of the low doorway bar-- I was doing it with legs perpetually crossed at the back.
However adding volume to a session was relatively easy in the beginning... 10 became 20, then it was 25 and within a couple of days became 30 and then 40
Starting from 20 total reps/ session, I was also trying to cull sets involved by now 20 in 5 then 4 and 25 in 5,4,3 sets etc. Followed by 30 in 4 then 30 in 3 and so on...
The set culling plateau came at 40s in 4
First significant max rep/set came slower too.. First 15 in 1 materialize after mid Oct 2022 (the previous was 12 in 1 on 31 Jul... after that, been struggling with 12 to 14 but never quite made it until 19 Oct for the 15 reps). From there it took another 3 months before I reach 17/set.
Not indicated in the filtered table above but there was one entry of 39 in 3 - Yes I was stuck as early as Jan 2023. Unable to unlock that 40in3 set IGP.... which took another 8 months.. and only achieved last week in Sep 2023 which incidentally is when the max rep/set was broken again... 18 this time.
The trend is therefore clear... as I move up the numbers or downing the sets involved each time-- that journey towards that next waypoint will certainly take longer.
The one thing is that the form for all my reps as time went on is now getting cleaner. Though most time not as strict as when on normal training days when going for PR but have made sure that they are at least decent ones.
MPUG? ...WTFIT!
Ok, enough about numbers on pullup and coined up abbrebviation... just one final one.
15 or more in 1 for an MPUG aka Monthly Pull Up Gauge. This is the latest as I am tapering on pullups now so as to find more time and energy to focus elsewhere. Basically its just mounting the bar and doing 15 or more a few times a month... so long as i don't fall below that, I'm good. If things deteriorate-- then its time to come back to more pull training.