Exercise part 6

Resuming normal exercise routine.  Controlled experiment.  Recorded both in my trainer's booklet, and here on this blog.

The protocol:

• I am doing semi-standard superslow protocol, with nouveau Aretae-icing treatment:  
• Standard superslow:
• 1 set of each exercise:  
• 1 rep constitutes a 10 second positive, 10 second negative.   
• This is followed by perhaps some half-reps to more fully exhaust the muscle and or some trainer-assisted reps (she's a 95 pound pixie, and can't move any of my weights significantly).
• It ends almost always with some effectively isomorphic activity, as I push with all my might for the final 10 seconds, and the weight goes the wrong way..
• The goal is to completely exhaust the muscle group
• The expectation is between 1 and 3 minutes per 1-set exercise (targetting 1:30 to 2:00).
• After the set, one should not be able to move the machines again.
• I do 3 exercises each session:  The new set&sequence is 
• Seated Row 
• Chest press 
• Leg press .  
• I am doing this 1x a week, 
• Thursday evenings after work, so I always have 7 days rest.  
• However, my wife is due in the next 3 weeks, and the baby dropped yesterday, so I may be less than perfect on timing.
• Noveau Aretae Icing treatment
• After my first set, place hands and feet in separate buckets of icewater with lots of floating, barely melting ice (because that guarantees the water is near 32 degrees F).
• Ice for 2 minutes (more or less)
• Then dry hands and feet with towel/paper towel/shirt.  Replace shoes sometime before 2nd leg press.
• Repeat the entire set a 2nd time
• This is fully impossible without icing on this time frame.
• leg press especially is super-insanely impossible
• After my 2nd set, repeat the icing.

The experiment:  I will be doing this for between 4 and 6 weeks.
Goal:  Huge improvements

Details:
Exercise 1:  Compound row.

• Compound row #1 before icing:  170 lbs @ ~90 sec.  This was too much weight.  
• Compound row #4: after icing. 150 lbs @ 75 sec.  Most of this after the first full rep was partial, and assisted reps and isometrics.
• Plan for next week:  170 twice.

I summarize this as roughly 2 sessions @ 160, which means next week is 170.

I started compound row this week, because I maxed pulldown.
I went from pulldown 100 to pulldown 200 over the course of 3 months without icing.  With Icing, though, my pulldown on 3 consecutive sessions was: 205, 220, 240.  The machine maxes at  259 pulldown, so I elected to not use this to measure.

Exercise 2:  Chest press.

• Chest press #2 before icing:  160lbs @ 90 sec.  
• Chest press #5 after icing: 160 lbs @ 75 sec.
• Plan for next week:  170

I should probably have done 155 instead...last session wasn't iced, and I didn't get as much of an improvement as I wanted.

Before I started icing, I had moved from chest press 90 to 130 over 4 months, in 5 lb increments.  Since icing, I moved, in 4 sessions (more weeks, no exercise in between) from 130 to 140 to 150 to 160.

Exercise 3:  Leg press.

• Leg press #3 before icing:  300 lbs @ 90 sec
• Leg press #6 after icing:  300 lbs @ 60 sec
• Plan for next week: 315

Because I maxed the leg press @ 445 4 months ago, we have been changing the seat settings on the leg press to make harder work.  We opted to move it drastically this week, so as to make something measureable for my ice-protocol.

I am now so close to, and so angled from  the leg press that it takes substantial work for me to contort my body into the setting without smacking myself in the ear with my knee.  I gave up early on the 2nd leg press, for insufficient willpower.  I could perhaps have gone another 5 seconds had I the psychological fortitude.

Observations:

Physical results of all-out superslow exercise.

1. I get many symptoms of hard exertion after these exercises.  Leg press of course is the largest of the impacts.  In order of occurence:
1. Mild sweat
2. Auditory muffling
3. Heavy sweat
4. Dizziness
5. Color change (to grey), as per happens to me under heat exhaustion.
6. Nausea -- This has only happened once
2. I hit point 2 after 2nd exercise, and point 3 after 3rd.
3. After icing, 1,2,3 vanished.
4. I hit point 3 again, minus the auditory muffling, after exercise 5.
5. My wife observed #5 in me after exercise 6.  Sweat and greyness fixed via icing.

Other observations:

6. My blood sugar was too low today.  I was shaking after part of exercise 4, and it got worse along the way.  I think the nausea symptoms are blood-sugar related, though, so I don't think it was too bad.  I do think it will need to be fixed for next time, via a concoction of Honey and BCAA's (that my work-buddy the competitive cyclist suggested) taken about 45 minutes before the workout.
7. I've drunk an insane amount (4 glasses) of raw milk today, as well as having had a 42g protein drink, immediately upon arriving home after the workout (15 minutes later).  
8. Between exercise #3 (leg press) and walking to the ice, my leg collapsed, not thoroughly able to support my weight.  A moment of rest, and I was able to continue.
9. This, today, was the hardest exercise routine I've ever done in my life.  All 8 minutes of it.  I think the icing may have handled the soreness, but the persisting weakness is absurd.  We'll see tomorrow.
10. I've also been sleeping large amounts.  Go to bed, wake up when ready, then go to work.  Usually 8 hours.  I've been reading on the importance of sleep.
11. I've also been standing more than usual.  Again..too much reading on the importance of not sitting down.

More on the exercise front next week: