Happy Easter to everyone! It’s Sunday afternoon and I just got home from a wonderful Easter spent with my family. It’s a beautiful day here in Austin and as we pulled into our neighborhood and I saw people out walking, jogging and bicycling it made me think of the soreness in my legs and my leg workout with my buddy Dennis on Good Friday.
Dennis, who will be 59 next month, has been plagued for years with bouts of atrial fibrillation. While it’s not life-threatening (in most cases) it is a very serious condition and usually leaves Dennis drained for a few days. On Friday as we were warming up Dennis told me that he had wound up in the emergency room with atrial fibrillation just over 24 hours earlier. He said, “I had another bout of atrial fibrillation early Thursday morning, so I’m going to have to take it easy today.”
I believe it was in the April issue of Ironman Magazine that someone had written a letter to the editor blasting me about being obsessed with training because I was training again just 4 days after having my hamstring tendon reattached in 2007. I want you to know that I’m not obsessed, but I am driven! And, so is Dennis! He came in to train legs just over 24 hours after being in the emergency room. He intended to take it easy, but as we got into the workout my training intensity got him fired up and he pushed harder and harder. After doing high rep leg presses with some fairly heavy weight we went to the squat rack. Sometimes after the high rep leg presses I’m worried whether I’m even going to be able to squat with 135 lbs, but somehow I get through that set and just keep going. After doing a hard 10 super-deep reps with 225, I cranked out 20 with 185. 2O reps was my goal for that set but I really didn’t think I had enough juice left in the tank to get all 20, but somehow I did. I never expected Dennis to follow suit, but he said, “Ya know, I don’t mind getting beaten at golf or tennis, or other stuff like that. But there’s three things I can’t stand to be beaten at….fighting, football (Dennis played college football and then coached for 30 yrs.), and weigh training!” He tightend up his belt, stepped in the squat rack and knocked out 20 reps! Then we finished with 3 sets of extensions, curls and calf raises.
Here’s the workout:
Leg press 90X30, 180X20, 270X20, 360X20, 450X20, 540X20, 630X20, 500X55
Squats 135X10, 185X10, 225X10, 185X20
Leg Ext 100X12, 120X12X10
Leg Curls 40X12X10X8
Hack machine calf raises 150X15X12X12
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