When I was a lass of 28 and my friend Maggie Green and I were workout partners, we used to talk about building "pecs to the neck." Well, we probably never achieved that state of pectoral development, but we did progress.
I have never been a particularly strong bencher, but there’s something about the movement I love. Today I woke up thinking about benching and decided I was going to rep with 95 pounds. I’ve been playing it safe since I started working out with free weights again last May–fairly high reps, moving up in little increments. A typical example would be 12 reps at 80.
But this was one of those days when I felt strong. I did three quick warm-up sets–65 x 6, 75 x 5, 85 x 4–and all felt good. Got all excited about putting the 25s on the bar and got four very good reps at 95. Anne helped me when I bottomed out on number 5.
Then it was on to pull-ups, dips, and the usual stuff I do for upper body.
Anne, on the other hand, was having one of those blah workout days and wondering why. Who knows? Sometimes it’s obvious–you stayed up too late the previous night, you’re getting over a cold, you’re depressed about something, your hormones are wacko. Much of the time you never know.
Part of the discipline of lifting is to bear with your blah days without letting them depress your spirit.
Isn’t this interesting? Today I can’t lift what I could lift last week or last month. Whatever. I guess I’ll just keep on with my workout, knowing that for every unexpected "weak" day, there’s an unexpected strong day when you feel like you could tear the roof off the place without breaking a sweat.
This is mysterious stuff.
I love it.
