**Marcus's HIT Dungeon**

[Rusty11]

Try your upright rows single arm with a dumbell. Much easier on the shoulder and IMHO just plain better.

Great. Something else I've never tried. Keep 'em coming, kel.

[DCI]

Sorry man. Can't imagine, don't want to.

Thanks JM yeh don't think anyone can imagine unfortunetly

Some things never make sense. Very sorry to hear buddy.

Thanks Kel, this is definetly one of those times it doesn't ever make sense.

[Java Man]

One of those days. Intendded to work shoulders and calves but just not feeling it tnight. Ended up doing 3 sts of flat bench @ maintenance weight and some db shrugs. Try again tomorrow. Lol. I listen my body and it said 'not tonight'

[AD]

One of those days. Intendded to work shoulders and calves but just not feeling it tnight. Ended up doing 3 sts of flat bench @ maintenance weight and some db shrugs. Try again tomorrow. Lol. I listen my body and it said 'not tonight'

or you can "command the m-fking" muscle to do its job, fletcher style

[DCI]

At jm, sometimes those are the best nights for me just demand it from your body and make it respond but I think everyone has times when there body just goes **** it

or you can "command the m-fking" muscle to do its job, fletcher style

Love fletcher, even if you leave its still your mother fvking set lol this story about his uncle is hilarious this is the jist of it

Ct fletcher
Uncle Johnny was left out prison to bury his mother for the day handcuffed and legs shakeled armed gaurd . He one big mother ****er vains bursting he stood up and told every shut the fuc up even the mother fucin dog stopped barking . I tell ya bud one funny ****er

[marcus300]

Thanks man, yeh it was an intense workout. You really have to gwt your mind into the assault and battery you are going to do to yourself. Its one of the main things I have learned

Yeh he's ok but his wife had a baby last week and died the poor child died this morning in his arms it was one of the hardest things I have read in a long time.

That's terrible news and so tragic, don't know what to say its so sad

[DCI]

Thanks marcus, I'm like you don't know what to say to him how can words help

[marcus300]

I am getting ready for pre-exhaust shoulder this morning, just getting my head in the right place and I am feeding and watching videos while I write....Will do an update of the workout when I get back

[AD]

Thanks marcus, I'm like you don't know what to say to him how can words help

was it due to something the doctors expected or was it totally unforeseen?

[Java Man]

or you can "command the m-fking" muscle to do its job, fletcher style

I did command them. They said 'no fvckin way mfvker. Its NOT your set!'

[Igifuno]

I am getting ready for pre-exhaust shoulder this morning, just getting my head in the right place and I am feeding and watching videos while I write....Will do an update of the workout when I get back

Looking forward to seeing the workout. Prime the mind, feed the body, and light it up.

[DCI]

was it due to something the doctors expected or was it totally unforeseen?

Unexpected, went in for surgery and the outlook after the surgery wasn't positive there nothing in the scans etc before the birth didnt show up anything.

[AD]

Unexpected, went in for surgery and the outlook after the surgery wasn't positive there nothing in the scans etc before the birth didnt show up anything.

Such a tragic thing to happen. I may need to see a shrink just thinking about it.

[DCI]

I know, its an awful thing to happen to anyone tbh you do feel useless as a friend what can ya say to help them like

[Giggle]

Thanks for answering Kelkel. It makes a lot of sense - but I never thought of it that way.
Cool - sounds good to me.

Some form of inclines. To me it's just common sense. I've yet to see someone with an over-developed upper chest and under-developed lower chest. It's usually the area that needs more work so I like to work it while fresh. I'm also not concerned with how much weight I can push on flats so doing them second or so is just prudent for balanced development, IMHO.

Glad all this is working for you Giggle! I will start to follow your thread as well.

[marcus300]

Shoulder & abs


Pre-exhausted - HIT


Not been in the gym for a few days due to commitments so it didn't take long for me to be full of fire to get on with it.


Standing single side DB lateral raises
3 warm up sets - got my shoulders really warmed up due to the trouble ive been having with my left delt
1 working set - hit 6 reps in very strict form and managed to push pass the pain and pump in my delt to get another 2 reps out, then double dropset right down to the last drop to were I could hardly move my arm.


The pain was immense and the pump was killing me but that's probably due to Austin pre workout NO he got me to try lol, had to take a min rest before I did the other side because I was panting really hard due to not doing any cardio for a few weeks. Once I had finished both side delts the only relief from the pain was to rest my arms above my head against the wall. Took around 90 seconds to slow down my breathing and get my aggression to start my next movement.


DB alternate single front raises

2 feel sets - these were painful, my delts were very pumped and the lactic acid was in force but manage to grit my teeth to judge what weight I was going to do for my working set.

1 working set - hit 6 reps each side then double dropset, this sent me over the edge. The pre workout NO was firing me into some serious pain pumps and the mental approach I had was so focused I ripped them to bits,

I was bent over a bench after the set trying to get my breath and trying to put my arms in a position were it didn't fuking hurt. Got disturbed at this stage by a guy asking me questions but I was able to answer them within 30 seconds so it wasn't to bad then I moved onto my next movement.


Seated DB bent over rear laterals

2 feel sets - really hard to judge what I was going to do for my working set because the pump was making it very difficult so went for a RP working set
1 working - hit 6 reps on first set and did 3 rest pause right down to 1 rep. By this time due to being bent over and also me breathing heavy I was gasping for air. I fell on the bench with sweat dripping off me. I was thinking to myself fuk me these were just isolation movements ive got the big pressing coming up now.

I took a couple of mins to myself while I was trying to compose my breathing to think why I am here and why do I do this to myself, walked over to the smith machine still thinking.



Smith machine shoulder press

2 feel sets - the weight dropped right down due to pre exhausted my delts but the intensity was higher than ever, every slow strict rep I could feel right in the muscle belly of my delt and it was painful, after my 2nd feel set and had think of stuff what made me angry, stuff my haunts me in my head was sends my adrenalin through the roof. I was getting extremely angry and I knew what weight I wanted to shift on my working set and I knew I had to dig deep than ever to lift it due to my shoulder being in bits. 1 min rest and I had hold of the bar tightening my grip and I was zoned out, I was looking straight in front of me but everything was black, I couldn't hear anything except my internal voice going over the things what are very emotional to me which makes me feel I could lift any amount of weight. My hands were twisting on the bar and must of been in this state for another 30 seconds before I unlocked it.

1 working set - I pounded the reps out in slow strict form, it was heavy but my adrenalin was firing on all cylinders and I wasn't stopping, every time it came down I made an almighty grunt to pushy the fuking bar back up again. I was on my 8th rep which was a shocker to reach this rep range and I knew the 9th rep was going to be a serious struggle and I had no spotter - the bar came down and I push my fuking bollcoks off to raise the bar but it was slowing, I was at complete positive true failure and I had to twist the bar to lock it at half way up, I suddenly jumped up and took a plate a side off each side and I started again but this time I was more aggressive due to the last half rep, I pounded the reps out and again i was in shock at the amount of reps i was able to do, the pain was intense and the burning lactic acid was getting to much and i started to struggle again i managed to push another 2.5 reps out again and took the 2nd drop to true positive failure, again i jumped up and took another plate of each side for some reason this fired my up again but my delts were in bits. I twisted the bar and the fuking thing slowly came down and i started to rep again. My shoulders felt like bowling balls and i managed to go to failure again and even had to twist the bar just above my head i had to crawl out of the machine. I got my water bottle and i couldn't put it to my lips the water went everywhere all over my chest but it didn't matter because i was dripping in sweat anyway. I manage to get the bottle to my mouth and i was exhausted. Really need to start cardio up again i was heavy panting and took me a few mins to compose myself. A guy came over and said " how the fuking hell do you do that?" as soon as he said that my mind came back down to earth and i said "ive no idea"


BB shrugs
2 feels sets - which i can only describe this by torture but kind of nice torture, felt like hot pokers being pushed into my delts and traps. The pre workout NO had me some serious pumps going on ( Austin you cvnt) which felt amazing.

1 working set - smashed it with a triple drop set and on the last set i held the bar up for a count of 2 on every rep and fried my traps. I honesty can say it felt like a thousand bee's stinging me over and over again all over my traps. Took it to complete failure right down to quarter then i stretched the living daylights out of my traps by letting the bar just hang.


Abs

Hanging leg raises
4 sets - high reps to failure


crunches
4 sets to failure


DB side bends
2 sets- high reps


Home to feed

[Igifuno]

^^ holy hell that was like a damn movie. I'm in torture right now traveling and won't be able to get in there today. Likely going to be eating bars, nuts and shakes all damn day.

Nice Marcus.. Fuel.

[kelkel]

Great read Marcus. Makes it like "being there" quite honestly. Again, except for the ab stuff. I left the discussion at that point as usual.

[Hazard]

That's my delt routine right there..... Except for smith presses - I do dumbell presses or Arnold presses

[marcus300]

pre workout NO - courtesy of Austin

4 grams L-Citrulline
3 grams L-Arginine
2 grams L-Lysine

[kelkel]

That's my delt routine right there..... Except for smith presses - I do dumbell presses or Arnold presses

That's something I need. Heavier dumbells. I'm limited with mine now. Looking on craigs list all the time for heavy powerblocks in my area but as yet, no luck. It would give ma a lot more options.

[DCI]

Great write up marcus serious shoulders

[Hazard]

That's something I need. Heavier dumbells. I'm limited with mine now. Looking on craigs list all the time for heavy powerblocks in my area but as yet, no luck. It would give ma a lot more options.

I got a set all the way up to 125lbs

Not using them currently either......

[Igifuno]

That's something I need. Heavier dumbells. I'm limited with mine now. Looking on craigs list all the time for heavy powerblocks in my area but as yet, no luck. It would give ma a lot more options.

You workout at home kel?

[DCI]

Yeh man, he trains in his dungoen the lucky bastard

Tonight was legs for me trained in a diff gym so was a nice change but its cool to use diff leg press machines etc there is a diff feeling off them.

Warm up with light squats then onto heavy squats.

Hack squat
Leg press
Hamstring curls
Leg extensions

All were 3 set builders then 2 dropsets very intense workout. No pissing around just lifting and going the sweat the pain was oozing outta me. With what happend today wasn't in the mood to **** around.

Great work out

[Igifuno]

Glad you had a nice release and that you were able to channel what happened into a focused workout.

[DCI]

Yeh it was a terrible sight really really awful to see a father carry a babies coffin

[Rusty11]

I don't post my workouts, but I gotta say today was nice. Leg day. For squats, I usually do 2/3 warmup sets, then 2 working sets. I did the same today, but for the first time I did 2 drop sets at the end. Working sets were PRs for7, then took 10# off and did 7. Took another 10# off and did 7. Fawk. I was freaking shocked. At that point, those black spots and lightheadedness told me to stop. After a couple of minutes, I continued on with my routine. But, those squats were the highlight for me. Love drop sets. Why didn't I do these way back when? Anyway, been 45 min and feeling good with a 3" dent in my traps...lol.

Question...reading marcus' shoulder workout, it seems single arm side and front raises are the way to go. I've been doing both sides at once. Are most of you doing single arm?

[kelkel]

I don't post my workouts, but I gotta say today was nice. Leg day. For squats, I usually do 2/3 warmup sets, then 2 working sets. I did the same today, but for the first time I did 2 drop sets at the end. Working sets were PRs for7, then took 10# off and did 7. Took amother 10# off and did 7. Fawk. I was freaking shocked. At that point, those black spots and lightheadedness told me to stop. After a couple of minutes, I continued on with my routine. But, those squats were the highlight for me. Love drop sets. Why didn't I do these way back when? Anyway, been 45 min and feeling good with a 3" dent in my traps...lol.

Question...teading marcus' shoulder workout, it seems single arm side and front raises are the way to go. I've been both sides at once. Are most of you doing single arm?

Variety does it. I'll do them:

Standing
Seated (it's surprising how different they feel just sitting down)
One arm with support
One arm with support & leaning toward working arm.

Drops and RP can still apply.

[Rusty11]

Kel, sorry if it's an obvious answer, but what do you mean by "one arm with support"? Thanks, buddy.

[Hazard]

Variety does it. I'll do them:

Standing
Seated (it's surprising how different they feel just sitting down)
One arm with support
One arm with support & leaning toward working arm.

Drops and RP can still apply.

^^^^ this

Seated is a BIG difference!

I mostly do standing and both arms at the same time. It depends how fast I want to be. Every 3rd week or so I change it up

[Rusty11]

Thanks Hazard. Think I'll try them seated next time. I need to learn to change things up more often.

[Hazard]

For those that havnt noticed...... I'd just like to point out kels rear delts in his Avi hahaha

[kelkel]

Kel, sorry if it's an obvious answer, but what do you mean by "one arm with support"? Thanks, buddy.

Just that you need to hold onto something to give yourself balance. To add a bit more tension stand closer to the support you're holding on to and then lean out a bit, effectively lowering the shoulder you are working thus creating an angle and putting more stress on that delt. Try it and see how it works for you Rusty.

***

The most important part of lateral raises is to learn to raise the weight with the shoulder and elbow, so to speak. Too many people are overly concerned with raising the dumbell and not lifting the weight with their shoulders. How high you raise the dumbell means absolutely nothing. Your hands are only the tool to hold the weight here. As you are elevating the weight your shoulders should be rising and you should feel a contraction in your traps. The dumbell should never be above the elbow. IMHO.

[Java Man]

Yeh it was a terrible sight really really awful to see a father carry a babies coffin

Awww fvck. Sometimes I just want to grab life by the neck and shake it. Made me think of my own kid and how lucky those of us are who have not had to deal with such a thing. I'm going to use this anger tonight in the gym. I don't even know the guy but this just pisses me off.

[Java Man]

Shoulder & abs


Pre-exhausted - HIT


Not been in the gym for a few days due to commitments so it didn't take long for me to be full of fire to get on with it.


Standing single side DB lateral raises
3 warm up sets - got my shoulders really warmed up due to the trouble ive been having with my left delt
1 working set - hit 6 reps in very strict form and managed to push pass the pain and pump in my delt to get another 2 reps out, then double dropset right down to the last drop to were I could hardly move my arm.


The pain was immense and the pump was killing me but that's probably due to Austin pre workout NO he got me to try lol, had to take a min rest before I did the other side because I was panting really hard due to not doing any cardio for a few weeks. Once I had finished both side delts the only relief from the pain was to rest my arms above my head against the wall. Took around 90 seconds to slow down my breathing and get my aggression to start my next movement.


DB alternate single front raises

2 feel sets - these were painful, my delts were very pumped and the lactic acid was in force but manage to grit my teeth to judge what weight I was going to do for my working set.

1 working set - hit 6 reps each side then double dropset, this sent me over the edge. The pre workout NO was firing me into some serious pain pumps and the mental approach I had was so focused I ripped them to bits,

I was bent over a bench after the set trying to get my breath and trying to put my arms in a position were it didn't fuking hurt. Got disturbed at this stage by a guy asking me questions but I was able to answer them within 30 seconds so it wasn't to bad then I moved onto my next movement.


Seated DB bent over rear laterals

2 feel sets - really hard to judge what I was going to do for my working set because the pump was making it very difficult so went for a RP working set
1 working - hit 6 reps on first set and did 3 rest pause right down to 1 rep. By this time due to being bent over and also me breathing heavy I was gasping for air. I fell on the bench with sweat dripping off me. I was thinking to myself fuk me these were just isolation movements ive got the big pressing coming up now.

I took a couple of mins to myself while I was trying to compose my breathing to think why I am here and why do I do this to myself, walked over to the smith machine still thinking.



Smith machine shoulder press

2 feel sets - the weight dropped right down due to pre exhausted my delts but the intensity was higher than ever, every slow strict rep I could feel right in the muscle belly of my delt and it was painful, after my 2nd feel set and had think of stuff what made me angry, stuff my haunts me in my head was sends my adrenalin through the roof. I was getting extremely angry and I knew what weight I wanted to shift on my working set and I knew I had to dig deep than ever to lift it due to my shoulder being in bits. 1 min rest and I had hold of the bar tightening my grip and I was zoned out, I was looking straight in front of me but everything was black, I couldn't hear anything except my internal voice going over the things what are very emotional to me which makes me feel I could lift any amount of weight. My hands were twisting on the bar and must of been in this state for another 30 seconds before I unlocked it.

1 working set - I pounded the reps out in slow strict form, it was heavy but my adrenalin was firing on all cylinders and I wasn't stopping, every time it came down I made an almighty grunt to pushy the fuking bar back up again. I was on my 8th rep which was a shocker to reach this rep range and I knew the 9th rep was going to be a serious struggle and I had no spotter - the bar came down and I push my fuking bollcoks off to raise the bar but it was slowing, I was at complete positive true failure and I had to twist the bar to lock it at half way up, I suddenly jumped up and took a plate a side off each side and I started again but this time I was more aggressive due to the last half rep, I pounded the reps out and again i was in shock at the amount of reps i was able to do, the pain was intense and the burning lactic acid was getting to much and i started to struggle again i managed to push another 2.5 reps out again and took the 2nd drop to true positive failure, again i jumped up and took another plate of each side for some reason this fired my up again but my delts were in bits. I twisted the bar and the fuking thing slowly came down and i started to rep again. My shoulders felt like bowling balls and i managed to go to failure again and even had to twist the bar just above my head i had to crawl out of the machine. I got my water bottle and i couldn't put it to my lips the water went everywhere all over my chest but it didn't matter because i was dripping in sweat anyway. I manage to get the bottle to my mouth and i was exhausted. Really need to start cardio up again i was heavy panting and took me a few mins to compose myself. A guy came over and said " how the fuking hell do you do that?" as soon as he said that my mind came back down to earth and i said "ive no idea"


BB shrugs
2 feels sets - which i can only describe this by torture but kind of nice torture, felt like hot pokers being pushed into my delts and traps. The pre workout NO had me some serious pumps going on ( Austin you cvnt) which felt amazing.

1 working set - smashed it with a triple drop set and on the last set i held the bar up for a count of 2 on every rep and fried my traps. I honesty can say it felt like a thousand bee's stinging me over and over again all over my traps. Took it to complete failure right down to quarter then i stretched the living daylights out of my traps by letting the bar just hang.


Abs

Hanging leg raises
4 sets - high reps to failure


crunches
4 sets to failure


DB side bends
2 sets- high reps


Home to feed

Nice glimpse inside your head Marcus. Good timing for me too... I owe myself a extra intense shoulder wrecking due to my lack of energy yesterday. I left the gym, but it's still my mutherfvkin set hahaha!

[Rusty11]

Just that you need to hold onto something to give yourself balance. To add a bit more tension stand closer to the support you're holding on to and then lean out a bit, effectively lowering the shoulder you are working thus creating an angle and putting more stress on that delt. Try it and see how it works for you Rusty.

***

The most important part of lateral raises is to learn to raise the weight with the shoulder and elbow, so to speak. Too many people are overly concerned with raising the dumbell and not lifting the weight with their shoulders. How high you raise the dumbell means absolutely nothing. Your hands are only the tool to hold the weight here. As you are elevating the weight your shoulders should be rising and you should feel a contraction in your traps. The dumbell should never be above the elbow. IMHO.

Thank you, sir. Great info/advice.

[Java Man]

^^^^ this

Seated is a BIG difference!

I mostly do standing and both arms at the same time. It depends how fast I want to be. Every 3rd week or so I change it up

Good call. I've been doing laterals while standing for the past few months. Last week, I used the cable with arm fully extended, tight form. That was a good burn too.

Edit:
Lol this post is out of left field. I didn't say what I intended to - that I'm going to do my laterals seated for a while now.

[marcus300]

I don't post my workouts, but I gotta say today was nice. Leg day. For squats, I usually do 2/3 warmup sets, then 2 working sets. I did the same today, but for the first time I did 2 drop sets at the end. Working sets were PRs for7, then took 10# off and did 7. Took another 10# off and did 7. Fawk. I was freaking shocked. At that point, those black spots and lightheadedness told me to stop. After a couple of minutes, I continued on with my routine. But, those squats were the highlight for me. Love drop sets. Why didn't I do these way back when? Anyway, been 45 min and feeling good with a 3" dent in my traps...lol.

Question...reading marcus' shoulder workout, it seems single arm side and front raises are the way to go. I've been doing both sides at once. Are most of you doing single arm?

Kel answered your question great its all about variety and changing things around so your body doesn't get use to one way of working. The body does adapt so swapping and changing things will keep it making further gains. Sometimes I will just hit forced and negatives and then the week after I will focus on rest pause or I will use a variety of RP, force +negs and drops all in the same workout.


From my personal standpoint I am using pre exhaust on my major bodyparts due to the injuries and the prevention of further injuries, also when you et older your joints what have took years of battering just ache like fuk and using a pre exhaust for me drops my major compound lifts down in weight but increases the intensity which I know is going to send me into further growth because my body isn't use to doing isolation exercises first. Ive also started to have a deep muscle ache right inside the belly of the muscle which is only because of the pre exhaust and incorporating my failure techniques.


Like Kel said I also do lateral raises in various ways but I do like the standing single db lateral raise supported, I always try and slightly when at the top of the movement make sure my little finger is slightly higher than my thumb, like your pouring water with the DB, this transfers most of the effort and tension right onto the lateral head of the delt and takes out any front delt, if done correctly the burn is right on the side lateral head, ive found this to be very beneficial with adding size the side delts. The seated side lateral raises are also a great movement because you take any kind of body momentum out of the equation and you can use very strict form which again if you use the failure methods can be very effective

[DCI]

Awww fvck. Sometimes I just want to grab life by the neck and shake it. Made me think of my own kid and how lucky those of us are who have not had to deal with such a thing. I'm going to use this anger tonight in the gym. I don't even know the guy but this just pisses me off.

Let us all know how you get on with it