I'm a musician, singer/songwriter, blogger, writer, poet, bodybuilder, movie lover, music lover, video gamer, history/political buff, conservative/republican, etc. I like to do a lot of things.
I went to the gym earlier today after I got home from the mall. Today was chest day at the gym and since I read some stuff about hypertrophy lifting, I decided to experiment with it a little today. So as soon as I entered the gym, I went to the dumbbell rack… trying to decide an amount of weight that would be the heaviest for me. So I decided to try 60 lbs. dumbbells for chest press on the floor. Welp, looks like I couldn’t lift 60 lbs. dumbbells at all even if I tried so I immediately stopped… put the 60 lbs. dumbbells back on the shelf and went 5 lbs. lower. So I tried 55 lbs. dumbbells and that was it for me; however, I only could lift 8 reps each which is perfect for hypertrophy. Remember, hypertrophy lifting needs to be around 8 – 12 reps when you can’t do the last rep… meaning “lifting to failure”. I could only do 8 reps so I lifted 8 reps for 4 sets each with a minute resting in between so that was perfect.
I did hypertrophy lifting for dumbbell flies and dumbbell incline press too. For dumbbell flies, it was 30 lbs. for me and I could only do 10 reps for each set with that one. For dumbbell incline presses, it was 40 lbs. dumbbells and I only do 12 reps. for that one which is good. So next time I do chest day next week, I’m going to do a little heavier on dumbbell flies and incline presses.
Most bodybuilders recommend hypertrophy lifting as it is the best mass building. However, you don’t want to do hypertrophy lifting all the time as it is good to mix it up. I think I’m going to do hypertrophy lifting for a pretty long while.
From what I read about sets and reps…
Light weights and high reps is for endurance
Heavier weights ’til failure between the 8 – 12 rep range is for hypertrophy
Lifting super heavy and low rep range between 1 – 5 is for strength.
That’s what I read about through various bodybuilding articles I’ve read online.
Hypertrophy lifting is the most popular though and I see a lot of guys at my local gym workout that way. Lift the last rep when they can’t do that anymore, I guess that’s why they do a lot of weight dropping.
I really would like to improve my chest greatly and I think I just found a way. I am feeling results in the chest finally ’cause I’m feeling the pecs getting bigger.
A lot of people think muscle building is a slow process which is kind of true. You can build BIG muscle quickly, as long as you work out hard, lift heavy, eat a lot. It doesn’t really take 10 or 20 years to get ripped. You can get ripped in a year or two if you do it right.
This is great news. The latest Elder Scrolls game which was “Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim” was released back in 2011. It’s been a long while since a new Elder Scrolls game has been out. When “Skyrim” came out, it became a massive hit. The game still is a massive hit. “Skyrim” is still a pretty big seller which was why the game was re-released for the PS4, XBox One and Nintendo Switch later on.
I can see why “Skyrim” was a massive hit and continues to be because it’s a pretty big game, that’s why. It’s a pretty big open world game with lots of quests. A lot of quests are never ending though. You can play this game for hours and hours. There’s no shortage of gameplay ’cause of the radiant quests. It is still possible to beat the game, though… just gotta beat all the main ones.
While I’m a pretty big Elder Scrolls fan, I’m still playing “Skyrim”… the SE version on the PS4. I would like to play the older Elder Scrolls games but the PSN store doesn’t have ’em but Steam has Elder Scrolls III and IV.
I like Elder Scrolls ’cause I do love playing epic fantasy RPG games. No doubt, Elder Scrolls is the best RPG franchise for sure. It is the most addicting game ever as I can’t stop playing. I’m trying to finish up all the main quests still.
I love video gaming. It’s another hobby of mine and what I do to escape from everything. Can’t wait to see the full trailer of this game which I’m sure Bethesda will release pretty soon.
I think I know why I have been struggling to get gains on some parts. It’s because I haven’t really been doing hypertrophy lifting on some stuff. Ya know, choosing a weight where you can lift to failure between the 8 – 12 rep range. When you can’t lift the last rep, it needs to be in 8 – 12 rep range only. That’s hypertrophy lifting after reading about it some. Honestly, I have been doing that with some body parts but mostly I just lift what I can handle. If all you’re doing is lifting what you can handle for 12 straight reps, that’s not really a true lift really. The last rep needs to be anywhere from 8 – 12. I really need to do this more often.
My legs look good, my arms look good but pretty much the only thing I’m struggling on is the chest. I have figured out what was wrong. I need to lift a little heavier until I can go to failure between the 8 – 12 rep range. It needs be around there in order to get gains. I’m going to lift this way with all body parts from now on… lift hypertrophy style. I’ll always try to figure out ways to get gains on all body parts.
Of course, there’s nothing wrong with lifting full 12 reps easily without struggling ’cause that also helps build muscle no matter what you think of it. If you want to get even more gains, gotta do hypertrophy. I will from this point on.
I’ve been lifting weights for 10 years or a little over now and I never thought of lifting this way. I want to have a hot and sexy body and not afraid to say that. I feel I already do and looking good now but could use more improvements, though.
If I want to look like those guys you see in wrestling and the action movies, hypertrophy lifting seems to be the way to go. Yeah, yeah, yeah, some of you will think steroids did it to those guys but I disagree. It is possible to get that look naturally. It can be done.
I didn’t watch UFC 225 last night and I’m glad I didn’t. I love CM Punk and all, but I had a bad feeling he was going to lose for the second time in UFC. It didn’t turn out to be a very good fight at all so I’m glad I didn’t waste my money on it. Punk got beat pretty bad and was left in a bloody mess as you can see.
Is Punk done in the UFC and MMA altogether? According to Dana White himself, he said he is but Punk himself hasn’t responded to Dana yet. You can tell that Punk has passion for MMA and loves it. He wants to continue and keep at it despite losing and not being very good. He does have a lot of balls for wanting to give MMA a try, though. Dana may say Punk is done but looks like Punk wants to keep going. In my opinion, Dana shouldn’t be so quick in ending his career after two losses. I think Dana should give him another chance and give him a third fight.
Punk likes it and you can tell that he does. If it turns out that Punk will be done with UFC and MMA, what’s next? A return to professional wrestling like in WWE? I doubt it ’cause Punk clearly said already that he’s done with WWE and wrestling altogether. If he’s completely done with UFC/WWE then I don’t know what he’ll do next. We’ll have to wait and see. Maybe he will return to WWE, who knows? Anything is possible.
I still love watching MMA, though. I just don’t watch it that much anymore ’cause their ppvs are overpriced.
Led Zeppelin got together again to celebrate a new book that the band has been working on lately. It’s a book to help celebrate the band’s 50th Anniversary. The book will feature rare photos of the band on stage and off stage of their career. The book will also feature art work from the band’s archive and contributions by photographers. This book will be kind of similar to the Jimmy Page photo book.
As a huge Led Zeppelin fanatic, I’m probably gonna buy this for sure. Led Zeppelin maybe done touring but I’m sure the guys will put on some event for the book’s release like maybe an autograph signing and meet & greet ’cause that would be pretty cool if they did that.
They’re still looking good together, though. I will always love Led Zeppelin no matter what people says or thinks. They had a great career and a great run. Let them retire. I would like them to go on another tour but if they don’t want to, that’s fine with me. I wish people would leave them alone and let them do what they want to do.
I wish Jimmy Page would go solo again… it would be nice if he put a new project out. I actually want a new Jimmy Page solo album more than another Led Zeppelin tour and I really mean that.
The new “Halloween” movie trailer dropped this week and I got goosebumps watching it! Looks fucking awesome, I would say! I’m a huge Halloween fan. I’ve seen all of the movies… even the two Rob Zombie “Halloween” films.
Some of you may ask, why was this new movie made??? Well, John Carpenter always had a pure dislike for the sequels that came after the original Halloween and if you do a little google research, Carpenter had some negative things to say about Rob Zombie’s two “Halloween” films. The studio Blumhouse/Miramax were in development of a new Halloween film and they brought John Carpenter in to help out with the script some. John Carpenter also scored the music for the new movie as well. Carpenter didn’t like all the other Halloween movies and he wanted Michael Myers to be more frightening than the Rob Zombie version.
So this film wants to ignore everything else about Halloween (sequels/remakes) and this new film is going to be a direct sequel of the Carpenter’s 1978 original. This means that Jamie Lee Curtis is back as Laurie Strode and Nick Castle is back as Michael Myers.
In this trailer, I loved how they honored Dr. Loomis by showing a drawing of him so that was a nice tribute to Donald Pleasance. Just to remind you, Donald Pleasance passed away in 1995 so obviously he won’t be able to come back, but I’m sure he gets mentioned a lot and I’m pretty sure there might be a few Dr. Loomis flashbacks from the original movie.
I’m excited for this film and I can’t wait. As long as John Carpenter was involved with this film, I’m sure it’ll be really good. Hopefully this movie does well in the box office and I’m sure it will. It could be a box office smash.
I have a Dell computer and Microsoft Windows 10. I was gonna buy myself new video making software but now I no longer have to ’cause like the title of the topic says, Microsoft just gave me a free one due to the new update from last night. I had to update the system and each update, Windows give you new things. Microsoft PowerDirector for Dell just came to me for free and got installed on my computer.
I messed around with PowerDirector a little bit just to check it out and see what it’s like and I liked what I saw. I want to start making video blogs again and I’ll probably start making them on PowerDirector. This software allows you to make professional like videos that would be good for youtube or whatever. I also plan to get back into making videos of my live music performances at home. I want to make all kinds of different videos ’cause I’m thinking about reviving my youtube channel and I probably will.
When I do revive my youtube channel, I am going to keep politics out of things, though ’cause I know that stuff can get myself suspended ’cause I know how youtube and FB likes to censor conservative voices. If I were to return to youtube, I’ll just stick with the music, maybe make fitness videos too and videos about life.
Would I ever make official music videos of my original songs? Ya know, make MTV/VH1 styled videos like a lot of local bands and artists have been doing these days. I used to be against making music videos of my original songs but I think I’m gonna give it a go and give it a try.
Glad I have new video making software finally and I was pretty surprised when Microsoft gave this to me. They gave this to everybody who has a Dell computer and Windows 10. I want to get back into making videos again like I used to and I will. I enjoy making videos. It’s fun.
Just listened to the new Pumpkins song like 5 times straight and it’s fucking awesome. The Pumpkins are back and the band are back in their true form! This is how we want to hear the Pumpkins… heavy and hard rocking! I’m glad James Iha and Jimmy Chamberlin are back.
This song definitely reminds me of their earlier days for sure. The song is definitely a tie between “Siamese Dream” and “Mellie Collie”.
I hope the rest of the new album sounds like this. Can’t wait to get the new Pumpkins album. I’ve been a long time Pumpkins fan. Have been since the very beginning.
Since June is “Scoliosis Awareness Month”, I thought I would post something about it and try to help promote scoliosis. This is an interesting video blog and a lot of this stuff resonates with me.
I had my scoliosis surgery when I was real young. Had a nasty double curve and I had no choice but to get surgery on it which means replacing the spine with the Harrington Rod. I have scoliosis for life which is something that I have to live with. My scoliosis adventures would be a very long book but to keep it short and simple… the scoliosis surgery was brutal and long. At the end of the day, though, it was all worth it. Through high school, I couldn’t play sports because of it. I couldn’t play baseball, basketball, football, etc. None of that shit. That’s okay, though ’cause I had no interest in sports to begin with.
I did, however, always had an interest in bodybuilding. I finally got into bodybuilding like 10 years ago or a little over. When I first started talking about getting into bodybuilding, predictably… people started getting worried right away and started criticizing me about it. They’re like, “Bodybuilding is gonna ruin your curvature even more!” I’ve been doing bodybuilding and lifting weights for like 10 years or a little over. Believe it or not, it’s been that long already and I haven’t had anything happen to me.
People immediately assume that bodybuilding is dangerous for scoliosis but not at all. It’s perfectly safe ’cause there’s a lot of people out there in America with scoliosis that are into bodybuilding… yes, lifting heavy weights and all. People with scoliosis that are into bodybuilding do everything: bench pressing, dead lifting, barbell squats, etc. There are a lot of people with scoliosis that are in great bodybuilding shape.
I’ve gotten into yoga recently and that doesn’t do anything to make the curvature worsen either. I can do most yoga poses perfectly fine except that I can’t do back bending stuff ’cause the metal rod can’t bend which sucks but I’ll live with it.
I’m doing serious bodybuilding, lifting kind of heavy and all and I haven’t had anything happen to me yet. Bodybuilding with scoliosis is perfectly safe. To those that have it and if you want to lift weights then go for it. Nothing is stopping you.
Yeah, you’re going to get all kinds of jealous people calling you out about it. People saying stuff like, “You shouldn’t lift heavy weights ’cause it’ll destroy your back” and blah blah blah but don’t listen to the critics and doubters at all. I never did. I just go in the gym and do my thing. Don’t listen to anybody and do whatcha wanna do. Prove the doubters wrong that you can do this.
When I first started bodybuilding, I didn’t know what the hell I was doing. I made every mistake in the book so I did heavy research on bodybuilding so I can do everything right and take it more seriously. When I first started, I started out on machines for a long while… working all body parts in one day which is good for a beginner. Then a few years later I moved on to free weights like dumbbells and barbell stuff. I used to go to the gym like 3 times a week. Just workout whenever I feel like it. Sometimes 1 or 2 times a week and admittedly I did take a little break off bodybuilding a long time ago but no more of that shit.
I now take bodybuilding very seriously and want to stay committed. For over a month now, I’ve been going to the gym 4 times a week. Doing the 4 day split: Arm Day, Chest Day, Leg Day and Back Day. That’s how I do it. I’m going to stick with this routine for the rest of the Summer and Fall/Winter. Workout all year round. Do this on a full time basis. It’s time to move on up and take it to the next level.
It is possible to become the best shape of your life even with scoliosis. Yeah, I’m with this guy in the video above ’cause I too used to be afraid to take my shirt off ’cause of the scar on my back, but thanks to bodybuilding, I’m not afraid anymore. I’ve grown to love my scar on the back and grown to love my curvy body. Being shirtless with scoliosis in front of people may seem intimidating to some but you can’t deny the confidence and bravery. I’m no longer afraid to be shirtless in front of people anymore like I said which feels amazing.
Yeah, when I posted my shirtless pics publicly… I’ve got a mixture of positive feedback and some pretty nasty feedback. That’s okay with the nasty feedback ’cause they’re probably jealous losers who don’t even work out at all. The negative feedback makes me even more empowering and stronger. When you get people making fun of you still ’cause of the way your body is… no doubt they are a little jealous of your muscular physique so pay no mind to them.
I’ve been doing research on scoliosis lately and want to try interacting with other people online with scoliosis. It’s not a well known condition but it should be. Everyone should know about it and bring more awareness to it. I wish politicians would start talking about it. It may not seem like it but there’s a lot of people out there with scoliosis. It’s a big problem. I used to keep it quiet on this kind of thing but now I think it’s a good idea to start talking about scoliosis.
This is great news and it’s just another reason to get all excited for the “Top Gun” sequel. Iceman is coming back! Which is really cool ’cause this movie wouldn’t work without the Iceman.
“Top Gun: Maverick” has already started filming this summer and now the casting has just started.
So far Tom Cruise and Val Kilmer are the only two stars confirmed for the sequel. I’m sure the film makers will sign more to the film so we’ll have to wait and see. Will Kelly McGillis return as Charlie Blackwood who played Maverick’s lover in the first one? I think there’s a pretty good chance we’ll see her too. Only thing though, Kelly is 60 years old now so I’m not sure a love story continuing between her and Maverick would work. I’m sure they’re gonna get Maverick a new love interest in the new movie, a younger female, of course but I’m sure Kelly will be back.
I think it’s a possibility this film could be a full on reunion. Everyone from the first movie could be coming back including Tom Skerritt as Viper.
Of course, the only character that can’t be returning to the new movie is obviously Goose ’cause you all know what happened to him in the first movie, right? It would be cool if Anthony Edwards could return but it wouldn’t work. I’m sure there’ll be some Goose flashbacks and I’m sure the film will honor Goose in some way by having someone else to play piano to sing “Great Balls of Fire” or “You Lost that Loving Feeling”.
Back to Val Kilmer… it’s gonna be interesting, though. I haven’t seen Val Kilmer in a new movie in many years. I think Kilmer is a phenomenal actor and he has starred in many great films in the 80’s and 90’s. I think the reason we haven’t seen much of Val lately is ’cause he has been having health problems, lately, I think? Looks like he’s all better now.
Can’t wait to see who the rest of the cast will be. There will be some familiar faces from the first movie and I’m sure they will bring in some new actors as well. I’m sure they’ll find Maverick a new love interest, a new female and younger. You know how all Tom Cruise movies are. He always have a young hot looking love interest in his movies. They’ll do the same with this one as well. Anyway, it’s gonna be really cool to see Val and Tom reunite ’cause they haven’t starred in a movie together ever since the first Top Gun movie was released in 1986.
Kev
The Official Music Website of Kevin Brock – Brocking N' Rolling
K'Brocking 
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