Time for a new workout

I took the old geared MTB out for a spin over the weekend for the first time in ages and I didn't like it. For some reason it feels clunky & cumbersome and seems to suck energy out of me & lack efficiency compared to the single speed. In theory, gears should make things easier but in practice I'm much slower and it seems much harder work.

I thought about it and while some of the effect I'm feeling comes back to the suspension taking some of the energy out of my pedaling, the alloy frame having a "dull" feel compared to the steel 29er and I'm not used to the slightly different balance & geometry of the old gearie, but the main reason I think is that to get the most out of a geared bike you really have to spin, spin, spin!

And that's the problem. I just don't like spinning. I know it's supposed to be better aerobically but I find the opposite. It just wears me out faster. My heart rate maxes out, I'm quickly out of breath and my legs go lactic much faster. Plus I get crippling pains in the arches of my feet after 10 minutes or so.

If I stick back around 80 rpm and get out of the saddle and grind the hills I can last for hours, and that's why I like the single speed offroad. (Onroad is a different story though and I'm fast finding that gears are much better there. SSing on the road has me sitting on ridiculous RPMs on the flats and I only last about 10 minutes before my feet are in agony).

Then as I was reading some over 40 transformation stories on bodybuilding.com for motivation, I noticed that the guys that looked the most impressive all had arms 18" or above. I remembered that about 10 years ago (before I entered my depressed and obese phase) I too had arms about that size and could also bench 170kgs on a good day. At the moment my arms are around 16" and I'm lucky if I can bench 120 kgs.

I started thinking about how I achieved it back then and why I wasn't getting similar results with my current training program which is a variation of the Body for Life program with lots of pump sets & short rest breaks. Then it dawned on me. I'm mostly fast twitch muscle fibres which are good for explosive efforts but really crap for long duration, lighter stuff. Just as I've found on the bike, I respond best to slow, short, gut-busting, heavy loads. High repetition, pump type exercises don't really do much except tire me out. I'm a sprinter, not a marathon runner.

So it's time to go old school.

I'll work a basic 2 day split for upper body on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday & Friday. (I don't train legs regularly in the gym because they're already humongous from the cycling and good genes).

Day 1 is pushing (Chest, shoulders & triceps)
Day 2 is pulling (Back, biceps & abs)

2 exercises per body part
3 - 4 sets per exercise consisting of one warmup set with a light to moderate weight followed by 2 heavy sets of 2 - 6 reps to absolute failure.

Because I work the same bodyparts twice in a week I'll mix up the second session with different exercises for that body part.

Cycling wise I'll fit in whatever I'm in the mood for which will mostly be 30-60 mins most week days with a couple of longer rides on the weekends. If I start feeling a bit worn out I'll throw a rest day or two in.

Goal: 18" arms, 140kg bench & a serious decrease in bodyfat.