So this is what I chowed-down on Sunday evening, following a rather long day spent in the fixie saddle.

What you see here is a 1 lb, applewood smoked ham steak, from my good friends at Greene County North Carolina’s Rainbow Meadow Farms.  You can’t really tell from the photo, but that good-tastin’ bad boy takes up the entire bottom of the plate.  At the 5 o’ clock position there is a little bit of Tropical Tradition’s Atchara (fermented papaya); tasty and highly recommended.  And that’s a stir fry of chopped broccoli, red and green cabbage, carrots, green peppers, radish and celery there on top, obscuring the real size of the ham stake.  I “fried” the steak – actually, I just seared each side, as it was already smoked – prior to tossing in the veggies so that I’d have olive oil and the ham drippings to stir fry with; damn it made those veggies taste fantastic!  And the contrast with the fermented papaya was out of this world.

I also spent quite a bit of time in the saddle on Friday and Saturday as well.  It will be interesting to see how I integrate, after my move to Austin, what I anticipate to be much more of biking and running (sprinting)-centered lifestyle, with my weight training.  Of course, I will have the tremendous advantage of having access to varied and state-of-the-art equipment at Efficient Exercise, so I’ll be able to intensify my workouts, and thereby shorten my actual gym time.

I also plan on finally piecing together a full garage gym.  Anyone in the Austin area looking to unload some bumper plates, Oly bars, and plyo boxes, be sure and look me up  🙂

Ok, so here’s what I did in the gym on Saturday evening, on the tail-end of that day’s extended fixie session:

DB snatch (aka, the Cred) + single-arm split jerk: (reps listed are per-arm) 65 x 3; 75 x 3; 85 x 2; 95 x 1; 100 x 1; 105 x 1, 1, 1.  Missed the left-side jerk on the 1^st and 3^rd attempt; 2^nd attempt wasn’t pretty, but it was a “green lighter”.   Made all three attempts on the right side.  Hopefully once I get resettled I can get some clips of this movement to post.  It’s one of my favorite combination movements but, unfortunately a combination that’s rather difficult to explain; one of those things that’s much better shown than discussed.

following that, I shifted into Mentzer-esk mode with the following –

Atlantis pull-down machine: 350 lbs x ~10 reps (5,0,5,0 tempo) to positive failure, then 3 cheat concentrics + “extended” negatives.  By “extended” I mean that the first round was about 8 secs, roughly 6 or so for the second, and the third was an ugly 3 or 4 second negative.  Holy lat and bicep pummel, Batman.  Total TUL was approximately 135 seconds.

… moved right along then to the following pre-exhaust pairing:

Atlantis pec-deck: 180 lbs x ~ 10 reps (5,0,5,0 tempo) to positive failure + an approximate 8 second static “push”.  ~ 60 seconds TUL

then immediately to:

Atlantis machine flat press: 180 lbs (5,0,5,0 tempo) to positive failure, followed by 3 forced reps + extended negatives.  I lost count of reps, here – but really, though, that doesn’t matter so much, as I know what the total TUL was (approx. 75 seconds).

Again, it’s much, much better to perform this method of training with either a great partner (and one who’s not checkin’ out the babes on the stair-steppers), or a trainer who’s well versed in HIT applications…and who is also not checkin’ out the babes on the stair-steppers.  We do the best we can with the options we have, though.

Depth vs Spin –

I’ve long considered Seth Godin as one of amongst a very small group of individuals (including Rob Bell, and Clay Shirky for example) who totally “get” the new social construct, and Seth’s recent post, How long before you run out of talking points? is another in a long list of the guy’s outta-the-park hits.

Those of us who immerse ourselves in the world of Physical Culture are especially sensitive to all of the “spin” and surface-level (at best) understanding that’s unleashed upon the public on a daily (hourly?) basis.  Just listen to all the “leading authorities” on this subject or that; the total lack of knowledge/understanding displayed is shocking.  And unfortunately, this is the window through which the vast majority of the population “sees” Physical Culture.  Is there any wonder as to why our society in embroiled in the heathcare crisis that it is?  The real wonder is why we’re not actually worse off than what we are.  I guess I should concentrate more on “H8’n the game, not the playuh”, but things such as Shape Ups and the Cookie Diet just ain’t gonna cut the most direct path to to an exemplary expression of Physical Culture, folks.

“When you have one eye on the goal, you only have one eye on the path.”

As a correlate to “Depth vs Spin” idea – and certainly applicable to the realm of Physical Culture — is the notion of following one’s intuition and intelligence to gather knowledge, and what, for that matter, the true definition of “knowledge” is to begin with.

Seth Roberts recently posted this piece, “A World Suppressing the Uniqueness Inside Each of Us” in which he references this fabulous Valedictorian address purportedly given by Erica Goldson during the graduation ceremony at Coxsackie-Athens High School, on June 25, 2010.  Now whether this was truly a Valedictorian address or not, I can’t be sure of.  What I am sure of, though, is that the message is *spot-friggin’-on*.  And not only is this is the case in “education”, writ large, but the same can be said of diet, health, and fitness writ large — the totality of what I term “Physical Culture”.  Take an n=1 approach toward achieving your own ultimate phenotypical expression.  Keep both eyes on the path; the destination will take care of itself.