0.5 miles in 7:42

Bench Press: 135x15, 135x10, 205x10

4.62 miles in 20:00

Another 60 minutes of cardio today, half elliptical and half treadmill at 6:30 in the morning. Cardio is a lot easier with something interesting to watch while exercising. In our case, we are working through Season 1 of Smallville.

Cleans: 135x4, 135x2, 135x2, 135x1, 135x1, 165x1, 165x1, 185x1, 185x1, 205x1, 225x1, 245x1, 265m, 265m, 275m

Deadlifts (overhand grip): 275x3, 315x3, 335x3, switched grips, 355x3, 385x2

Ahu and I did 90 minutes of cardio tonight. We set up a movie projector and watched a DVD while exercising. I did 30 minutes of elliptical, then 30 minutes of treadmill, then 30 minutes more of elliptical. A few more nights of this and we'll be seeing some progress.

Tonight was the best night of Olympic weightlifting ever. The other night of technique practice really worked well. Randy and I both had good form and Randy set two personal records tonight, just by getting his form right for once. Personally, I increased my best snatch by 5 lbs. We did a lot of sets but were able to keep moving the weight up with every set.

Snatches: 20 kneebends, 20 kneebends, 135x2, 135x2, 135x2, 135x2, 155x2, 155x1, 165x1, 175x1, 190x1 miss, 190x1 miss, 190x1 (PR), 205x1 miss

Cleans: 205x2, 205x2, 205x2, 205x1, 225x1, 235x1, 245x1, 245x1, 255x1, 270x1 barely missed, 270x1 another bare miss

Tonight we worked on power cleans, with an emphasis on practicing technique, specifically getting the drop right. The drop part of the clean has been very troublesome for both Randy and I. Before tonight, Randy never dropped right once and my drop consisted of me moving my legs farther apart. However, the inch or two I get from moving the legs allows me to clean up to 265 lbs. whereas Randy has never gotten past 235 lbs. If we can master the drop, it's highly likely that our cleans will go up significantly, probably above 315 lbs.

So we spent a lot of time practicing form tonight and the last few sets saw us having almost perfect drops with 185 and 195. In fact, getting the drop right enabled both of us to move up from 185 to 195 after many prior sets and much fatigue. In previous workouts, very few sets could be achieved due to the fatigue. We wouldn't be fatigued in the pull, but the attempts at catching the weights while fully standing was too much to do very many attempts. Now, there is no fatigue generated from the catch, and all effort can be put towards the pull.

Cleans: 115x4, 135x4, 185x3, 205x2, 225x2, 235x2, 255x3 missed all

Cleans (form): 205x2, 185x2, 185x4, 185x3, 185x3, 185x2, 185x2, 195x1, 195x1

Cleans: 135x3, 185x2, 205x1, 255 miss, 255 miss, 255 miss, 255 miss

High Pulls: 255x3, 275x3

Deadlifts (without right hand facing up): 275x2, 315x2, 365x2 dropped, 315x3, 315x3, 335x1 dropped

As you can see in the deadlifts, my grip needs work. I can pretty easily deadlift over 425 with the usual grip but when grip is same as used for cleans, I drop the bar at 365. Much work to be done here. Also need to consider using the hook grip soon.

Push Press: 135x4, 185x2, 205x2

Hang Cleans: 185x4, 205x4, 205x2