“Simplicity means the achievement of maximum effect with minimum means.”
Clean and Jerk Anatomy ~ gareththomasnz
Due to a quirk in my work-week schedule (I was needed for an engineering run for about 7 hours or so on Sunday), I was afforded a little extra time to spend in the gym. Not a bad way to spend some downtime between and after work. It was an absolutely beautiful day in Eastern North Carolina, though, and I’d initially planned (prior to my work-related rescheduling) to bike and sprint. When duty called, though, I had to re-calibrate and find something else to do. The following, then, is what I ended up with. Not much in the way of any significant pre-planning, here — I just showed-up at the gym as time permitted, took inventory of what was available, and went to work. What I ended-up with was the following, deceptively easy, superset/combo:
- Squat Clean + Front Press + 2 BTN (Behind-the-Neck) Split Jerks (alternating the lead foot on each jerk). The entire combo, once through, is considered 1 rep.
- Weighted Pullups, alternating between regular and reverse grip on each set
Defining the exact number of reps performed on each round of each exercise I did here is tough. What I do know is that I started off doing about 4 full reps of the Squat Clean combo at a light weight, and progressed up to the point of only eeking-out a single full rep, at a substantially increased weight, on the last set. I kept the weight on my pullup belt the same for both the regular and reverse grip pullups, and did 2 reps/set with a regular grip and 4 reps/set with a reverse grip. And again, I alternated grips set to set. I did between 7 and 10 rounds (I lost count) of this superset/combo with plenty of rest/full recovery between sets, while I really pushed to achieve heavier weights within each set. Total gym time was about an hour — an eternity compared to my normal gym outings. It was a really good shock to the system, though — and I do mean that in a good way. I don’t recommend doing something like this often, but I feel like the body responds to an extraordinarilly hard bout every so often, as long as it’s given adequate rest following. I used Monday and Tuesday as recovery days.
In Health,
Keith
Leave a Reply