Workout update

My earlier plan was to attempt my max bench press and push press in the second week of September. But around August 15, I had gotten a couple of days of rest after two days of light workouts. So I had decided to test my maxes during that weekend.
On 17th August, I had attempted my max bench. My previous max was 98kg (or 99kg, used a barbell whose weight I didn't know exactly) done in April 2013. This time, I did 100kg, then 105kg, and then failed at 110kg. I wanted to go for 107kg after 105kg, but the gym didn't have plates smaller than 2.5kg.
On 19th August, I had attempted my max push press. My previous max was 87kg, done in November 2012. This time, I hit 90kg, and then 95kg. The 95kg itself was a critical lift, so I hadn't attempted 100kg. Two days back, on 28th August, I had hit 95kg again.

In addition to the presses, yesterday I had squatted 110kg for 5 singles, Powerlifting style, without belt or spotters. Although it is in no way an impressive lift, this is the first time I have squatted 100+ without any knee pain. And I have also started feeling more confident with my Powerlifting style squat (I have switched from Olympic squats to Powerlifting squats in March). I am not rushing to load more weight on the squats yet, I'm allowing for my knee to heal sufficiently before I start to hit new maxes. Though PL squats are going fine, it hurts when I attempt a deep front squat. Classical cleans and snatches are still a strict NO for me. And in addition to squatting, I'm now hitting heavy deadlifts - 65kg or 70kg for 2 or 3 reps.

My gym subscription expires in two weeks. I'm hoping to push my maxes a little further in this short period- 100kg push press and 110kg bench press are what I have in mind for the second week of September.

Nausea and Acidity during and/or after workout

A lot of people might have had this problem at some point or the other. I have been having a problem with acidity in the last 1 year or so, but I mostly neglected it. In the last 6 weeks it really started to affect my training. I had to cut short several training sessions when I started feeling nauseated. So, as always, I did a little bit of research on google and tried a few things. And after a couple weeks of trying different stuff, I am now totally fine. And now I share my wisdom.

One of the biggest reasons for nausea is excessive caffeine consumption, in whatever form you take it- coke, coffee, energy drinks, whatever it is, too much caffeine is bad for you. Earlier, I used to drink tea for 3-4 times a day and it was okay. I slowly switched to coffee and recently I have been drinking coffee for 3-4 times a day and I'm guessing that is when I started getting nauseated. It is also possible that this acidity and nausea are because of my change in lifestyle (I've gotten really fat in the last 15 months, and my physical activity has also gone down). Whatever it is, coffee is bad for you. Stopping coffee suddenly is not good since there are some problems associated with caffeine withdrawal. If you can't cut down on coffee, at least stop drinking it a few hours before workouts. Chocolates also cause acidity.

Another reason for nausea during workout is lack of endurance. If you have not been doing a lot of cardio and endurance training, chances are that you are getting tired too easily. People often get tired during their workout and start feeling light headed. Whenever this happens, nausea follows. I have found a simple way to work around this.
Usually, if you push for too many reps in a set, you start feeling light headed. Instead of that, split the reps into more sets. For example, if you have to do 3 sets of 12 reps with 90 seconds rest between sets, split it into 6 sets of 6 reps each (with a rest period of 45 seconds) instead. When you do this, you will still be training with about the same volume, the muscle will still be fatigued sufficiently since you are not allowing enough rest between sets, and your cardiovascular system gets sufficient time to recover from one set and start producing blood glucose again (This is all my theory. What matters is, splitting high-rep sets into low-rep sets with reduced rest period has worked for me, and I expect it to work for someone else too).

The final and the most effective suggestion is- start eating bananas and drinking curd. Even at times when I feel like I'm definitely gonna puke, I drink a couple of glasses of banana lassi and it goes away in a couple of minutes. Last month, I used to take antacid tablets to get rid of this problem, but the relief was extremely short-termed. A glass of banana lassi (put a banana, about 200 mL of curd, 50 mL of milk, sugar, and some flavor if you want) a couple of times in the morning and a couple of times in the evening, especially before workout, totally relieves you from acidity and nausea.

Randomly answering Multiple choice questions

Most exams these days have multiple choice questions. When I was preparing for one such exam- EAMCET, one of our math lecturer had strongly recommended one technique- to verify if the equation/expression is satisfied by the options, instead of solving the equations. Though it is not in the best interest of the students, at least that involved a little bit of solving. But what if a student just randomly answers all questions?
Considering that these exams typically have more than a hundred questions, and that tens of thousands of students take these exams, it is safe to assume that when a typical student randomly answers a question having 'n' options, the probability that the answer will be correct is 1/n. In questions with 4 options, if a student randomly marks an option, the probability that it will be correct is 25%.

Now, consider the case where each correct answer is awarded 4 marks, and each wrong answer is awarded -1 marks. If a student randomly marks 1 out of the 4 options, the score he will gain is (4)x (1/4) + (-1) x (3/4). 1/4 is the probability that he is correct, 3/4 is the probability that he is wrong. So, this student will, on average, score 1/4 marks out of a maximum possible 4 marks. i.e, he scores 1/16 of the maximum.
Suppose the student puts in a little effort and somehow confidently eliminates 1 out of the 4 options, and then randomly marks 1 out of the remaining 3.  Now, the probability of him being right is 1/3, and being wrong is 2/3. In this case, he scores 4x1/3 + (-1) x 2/3 = 2/3, out of a maximum of 4. So, he scores 1/6 of the total marks (in the previous case, he scored only 1/16).
If he confidently eliminates 2 out of the 4 options, he scores 4x1/2 + (-1) x1/2 = 1.5 out of 4, or 3/8 of the total marks.
If he confidently eliminates 3 out of the 4 options, he scores 4 out of 4 marks.

Comparing different other cases, like no penalty for wrong answers,  6 options, etc:

	4 options +4, -0	4 options +4,-1	4 options +4,-2	4 options +4,-3	6 options +4,-1	8 options +4,-1
Random	25%	7%	-12.5%	-31%	-4.2%	-9.4%
Eliminate 1	33%	17%	0%	-66%	0%	-7.1%
Eliminate 2	50%	38%	25%	12.5%	6.25%	-4.2%
Eliminate 3	100%	100%	100%	100%	17%	0%

 
I suppose that most exams have either no penalty, or a +4,-1 system with 4 options. Having no penalty is a huge incentive for those who can't solve all the problems to randomly mark answers. They have nothing to lose. Considering that even the best of students often fail to score a 100% owing to various reasons such as time constraints or exam pressure, and that the cut-off scores (especially for reserved seats) are usually quite low, the current system is really not fair. If the boards decide to go for 6 options instead of 4 options, the equation drastically changes. If they move to 8 options and also impose penalty for wrong answers, no one will ever try to randomly mark answers. Also, students will be discouraged to verify the options by substituting into equations- simply because there are too many options to try and check.
It really surprises me that the IITs are really not considering something like this. Increasing the number of options is not a difficult thing. It takes a little bit of extra effort, but it would definitely limit the role of luck in the exams.

Workout update: Cluster sets, singles and dynamic sets

Most importantly, I'm have started to squat again. I did 90kg back squat for 4 sets of 5 reps yesterday. Although it wasn't hard, I'm taking it slow. I have switched from deep Olympic squats to Powerlifting squats. I'm hoping to get to 110kg or 120kg in the next 5-6 workouts and work at that weight for the next 1 month.

A month ago, I was cribbing about my knee injury and about how the gym near my home is not good enough. But thanks to that, I am trying new workouts. All my earlier workouts were built around squats. Now, I can't squat as much as I used to (due to the injury), and can't deadlift heavy (the barbell isn't good, no proper plates). So I am focusing on improving my upper body strength and a little bit of conditioning. Although it is still a bit early to vouch for the routine, I am going to do it anyway.

My earlier routines usually contained several compound exercises- squat, deadlift, bench press, military press, push press, barbell rows and pullups/pulldowns. I used to go for 3-5 sets of 2-5 reps for those exercises and call it a day. But now I am doing it in a totally different way. I have included cluster sets, singles, dynamic sets and complexes.

Cluster sets: For proper muscle growth, both weight and reps are important. But its hard to hit more reps with heavy weights. In a cluster set, you break down a set into 2-4 mini-sets with a little break between these mini-sets. I usually do it this way- In each set, I do 2 reps, rest for 20 sec, do 3 more, rest for 20 sec, and then 2 final reps. Between sets, I usually rest for about 2 or 2.5 minutes (I decide on a rest period stick to it). The set I just described is a 2-3-2 set, a total of 7 reps. I sometimes hit 2-3-2 sets, sometimes 2-2-1 sets. Two days back, I benched 90kg for 4 sets of 2-1-1. I am training without a spotter, so I have to limit my sets to only those with which I'm completely confident.

Singles: They are just that- single reps. Each set has only 1 rep. Between each set, I usually take about 45-60 seconds rest.

Dynamic sets: These sets are to build speed. The idea is to push a light weight (~50% of max) as fast as possible. I usually go for 3 reps in these sets.

Complex: Complexes are for conditioning. I take a barbell- either 30kg or 40kg loaded, and do a series of exercises. The exercises I am currently using are - Power clean, Jerk, Back squat, Military press, Good mornings, Barbell rows, Deadlifts. A typical complex will be 30kg x5 reps. In that set, I do 5 cleans, then 5 jerks, then 10 back squats, then 5 presses, then 5 good mornings, then 5 rows and finally 10 deadlifts (I do twice the number of reps for squats and deadlifts). I use complexes for fat loss, conditioning, endurance and cardio.

In a typical workout, I use 1 main compound movement, and 1 or 2 assistance movements for that muscle. Till last week, I used to load up on both the main and assistances. But now, I'm going heavy on the main movement, and going for light fast reps with the assistances. I am not posting any pics yet, but the cluster sets have really been a revelation. They are great for both strength and building muscle. As for warm up, stretching and warm down, I have totally abandoned stretching and warming down after workout. My warm up consists only of performing 2-3 sets of benchpress or push press for 20-30 reps with empty barbell.
If my work sets in bench press are of 85kg, I do something like
20kg: 3 sets of 20-30 fast reps (warm up)
40kg: 8-12 reps
55kg: 5 reps
70kg: 2-3 reps
75kg: 1 rep
80kg: 1 rep
85kg- Good to go.
The weights between 20kg and 85kg are usually decided by what plates are lying around.


My workouts go something like this:

I train on all weekdays, and take off on the weekends- that's 5 days of training per week.

Day 1
Flat bench press -  Complex sets: 80% for 5 sets of 2-2-2
Inclined dumbbell press  (Chest -Assistance 1)  2-3 sets of 5-8 reps
Dumbbell pullovers   (Chest -Assistance 2)  2-3 sets of 6-10 reps

Close grip bench press - 3 sets of 5 reps
Back squat- 4-5 sets of 5 reps
Skull crushers (Triceps -Assistance) 2 sets of 5-8 reps


Day 2
Push press -  Singles : 5-10 sets
Dumbbell/Military press (Dynamic, superset with push press) : 5-10 sets of 3 reps
Dumbbell upright rows (Deltoid- Assistance 1): 3 sets of 4-8 reps
Dumbbell lateral raise (Deltoid- Assistance 2): 2-3 sets of 10-15 reps
Lat pulldowns: 4-5 sets of 4-8 reps
Kroc rows: 2-3 sets of 15-20 reps
Forearm, biceps curls: 3-5 sets of 5-10 reps
Clean complex - 3-5 sets of 4-5 reps for each exercise

Day 3 same as Day1
Day 4 same as Day 2

Day 5
Power clean and Jerk - Upto 60kg
Power snatch - Upto 40kg
Bench press/ Push press - Dynamic sets: 10-12 sets of 3 reps each
Dynamic assistance work
Squat- Light weight

For Day1 and Day2, I use heavy weights on the main movements. For Day3 and Day4, I reduce the weight slightly (by 5% to 10%) and increase volume slightly.

In the first 2 days of this week, I have done bench press for cluster sets of 2-1-1, and Push press for 5 singles of 85kg (supersets with 5 dynamic sets of 45kg for 3 reps). I hope to hit new PRs in about 3 weeks- 110kg in bench press and 95kg in push press.