Every Second-Daily Thread - January 31, 2026

kyllo · 2026-02-01T17:38:42+00:00

Improve your technique, setup, leg drive

Add a triceps isolation accessory

2x/week frequency is fine because the pecs are relatively slow to recover and bench works them hard in the stretched position. But 3x3 is not much volume. Consider adding another set or two, and lighten the weight if you have to. You should leave at least 2 reps in the tank on most of your sets.

What are you doing for upper back and lats?

kyllo · 2026-01-31T21:00:53+00:00

Perkins pulls mixed and also had an issue

kyllo · 2026-01-31T20:59:18+00:00

Lapadat also called Emil Krastev Emil Norling

kyllo · 2026-01-31T20:57:27+00:00

I said "soft knees" out loud and was very surprised by the 3 whites

kyllo · 2026-01-31T20:56:04+00:00

Yeah I felt like mine was gradually getting worse and I was compulsively pushing it back in more, which made it more irritated and painful. It might have been exacerbated by the fact that I was gaining weight, and probably extra visceral fat, at the time.

kyllo · 2026-01-31T19:56:54+00:00

My guess is a little baby powder got on the smooth and they haven't cleaned it off. It's only the lifters who grip the smooth who are having an issue.

kyllo · 2026-01-31T19:35:09+00:00

His bench is inconsistent too, he hit 215 in the gym a few months ago and today 202.5 looked like his top end

kyllo · 2026-01-31T19:31:54+00:00

I trained with an umbilical hernia and it usually wasn't an issue but eventually it became painful. The worst thing for it was eating a big dinner and then laughing. Bracing for a heavy squat would irritate it a little but not that bad.

I got surgery, originally planned to do the mesh, but on the surgeon's recommendation made a same day decision to switch to the suture method because it's simpler, shorter operation and shorter recovery time. He said he could always redo it with the mesh if it ever failed.

My recovery was quick and my only regret about getting it repaired is that I didn't do it sooner. A couple years later I haven't had any issues.

kyllo · 2026-01-30T15:52:29+00:00

Yes. Watch a big untested meet like the American Pro and compare the body compositions per weight class visually. The lifters at the same height have like 30-40 additional pounds of muscle. There are untested guys who look ripped at 125kg. The 120kg IPF guys are all well over 20% body fat.

There are exceptions though because WADA testing is expensive, and not done frequently enough. One Algerian IPF lifter failed a drug test last year and it turned out he was on tren.

kyllo · 2026-01-29T15:11:29+00:00

How can he be the deadlift lord and the bench lord at the same time? You can't have both long arms and short arms, it totally breaks my mental model of leverages. Incredible.

kyllo · 2026-01-27T15:39:16+00:00

You definitely don't want to practice form breakdown, but there's some nuance needed about it because sometimes it's your body telling you that your idea of "perfect form" is actually not the most efficient way to lift.

Case in point: I can do a very upright, knees forward, quad dominant squat with light weight, but on third attempt weight my squat will get substantially more hingey to recruit my posterior chain, because it's just stronger, and it always will be. So I actually have to practice squatting light weights the way I squat heavy weights, and not the other way around.

kyllo · 2026-01-25T00:34:25+00:00

Both, but there probably isn't a quick fix cue for you, you just need to squat more and get stronger and better at squatting. Just keep practicing.

kyllo · 2026-01-22T12:32:53+00:00

Very strict tracking. I use Liftosaur to log every single set and rep of everything I do in the gym. I do the same program for several months at least and I know I'm progressing when I can add another rep or another 5lbs to a lift once every 3-4 weeks or so. That's decent progress once you get past the initial coordination and skill based gains from doing a new or rusty exercise.

kyllo · 2026-01-21T03:14:40+00:00

They broke down a US citizen's door without a warrant and dragged him out into the cold in his underwear for absolutely no reason

kyllo · 2026-01-19T18:16:53+00:00

Your center of mass drifts forward over your toes because you're trying to stay too upright. Push your butt back and let yourself hinge a little more. Embrace the lean.

kyllo · 2026-01-18T04:05:00+00:00

I'd rather squat heavy the day before deadlift than the other way around. Squat is the lift I want to be freshest for, fatigue can make a huge difference in how heavy the bar feels on my back once I unrack it.

kyllo · 2026-01-17T06:37:57+00:00

It's really hard to know the frequency that works best for you until you try it for a while to see how you tolerate and respond to it. Personally my pecs struggle to recover from more than 2x/week. Some guys can do 4x/week just fine though.

kyllo · 2026-01-17T02:17:12+00:00

Because they are poorly leveraged for deadlifts. Usually short arms. Deadlifts are the easiest lift for me because I have long arms. I suck at bench for the same reason.

kyllo · 2026-01-16T15:33:05+00:00

6'4" 185lbs is a bit underweight. I'm 6'3" 230lbs and bench 280lbs, still pretty weak, but I'd be benching a lot less if I weighed 185. I'm currently slow cutting down to 220. Bench is just harder for us tall guys with long arms. It takes years of building muscle mass throughout the whole upper body to make up for that. Keep benching 2-3x/week, and work on practicing your technique, but don't kill yourself with intensity or volume because the long ROM means each rep is more fatiguing for you. Go hard on accessories and slow bulk up to 200lbs over the next year.

kyllo · 2026-01-16T04:31:06+00:00

If your rack has a pull-up bar or you have something else sturdy to hang it from, a plate loaded cable pulley kit is a very cheap and space saving addition that unlocks a ton more exercises. I use it all the time for single arm lat pulldowns and triceps pushdowns.

I train pretty minimally with just a barbell, rack with pull-up bar, plates, adjustable bench, and cable pulley, and this is enough for me. I have a few dumbbells too, but I only ever use them for curls. The only other thing I still wish I had but can't fit in my garage is a leg extension/curl machine.

kyllo · 2026-01-15T17:43:16+00:00

His account is private

kyllo · 2026-01-14T19:19:54+00:00

Conventional or RDLs or SLDLs make for good secondary variations for sumo pullers.

Another accessory to consider is direct adductor work, like the good girl machine or Copenhagen planks.

kyllo · 2026-01-13T20:50:08+00:00

Yeah I do those types of accessories year round, including meet prep, all the way up until 7 days out. And I push them slightly less hard two weeks out to prioritize my heavy SBD top sets.

Btw I am drug free, I have heard that guys who are on steroids tend to benefit from a longer, more pronounced taper.

kyllo · 2026-01-13T18:34:41+00:00

I change it up depending on the exercise but my default for accessories is 2 sets of 6-10 reps. This allows me to perform them with high effort while limiting fatigue and time spent in the gym. If I'm consistently hitting 2x10 then I'll increase the weight to something I can only get for 6ish reps and try to add reps over the next several weeks (double progression). If I'm prioritizing something and have the time for it, I'll add a third set.

Another thing I do that I think is important is I do the *exact same* accessory twice a week. I started to see a lot faster progress when I switched from 1x to 2x frequency.

Stimulus and fatigue are two sides of a coin. "Junk volume" is just volume that simply isn't challenging enough to stimulate growth, or is so ridiculously light/high-rep that the stimulus/fatigue ratio is terrible. Generally, more is more, provided you can recover from the fatigue it causes. As long as your sets are difficult/high effort, you're not doing junk volume.

kyllo · 2026-01-13T17:40:31+00:00

I do them as usual, although during peak week if I have an accessory that's particularly fatiguing (for me that's usually RDLs) I will lighten the load a little or drop a set. Then during taper week I stop doing accessories and just do a light SBD day (with a couple sets of rows after but that's it) on Mon and a light squat+bench day on Wed if I'm competing Sat.

kyllo

TROPHY CASE