I changed my workout routine for June and July. Here’s what I came up with:

Chest & Triceps

Dumbbell Bench Press
Dumbbell Lying Triceps Extension
Smith Machine Incline Bench Press
Smith Machine Close Grip Bench Press
Cable Cross Over
Cable Standing Triceps Extension

Back & Biceps

Close-Grip Front Lat Pulldown or Underhand Pull down
Overhead Cable Curl
One-Arm Dumbell Row
Standing One-Arm Dumbbell Curl Over Incline Bench
Pullups or Wide-Grip Lat Pulldown
Hammer Curls
Dumbbell Bicep Curl, if feeling ambitious

Shoulders

Smith Machine Overhead Shoulder Press
Front Incline Dumbbell Raise or Dumbbell Front Raise
One Arm Incline Lateral Raise or One Arm Side Lateral
Cable Rope Rear Delt Row
Cable Up Right Row

Legs

Smith Machine Squat
Smith Machine Hack Squat
Seated Leg Curl
Leg Extensions
Seated Calf Raise

Abs

Ab Crunch Machine
Torso Rotation

A few notes about the routine… There are a few exercises where there’s one or the other. For the back and biceps, I thought that on some days the pullups were a little too intense, so I substituted different pull-down exercises instead. In the shoulder workout, I figured out that the incline exercises were causing me some shoulder and neck pain after a few weeks, so I discontinued those exercises and I’ll consider bringing them back at a later date.

My goal has been 3 sets of 8 reps for each exercise. Once I do three sets of the same weight, I increase the weight on the last set. After I can successfully do 8 reps in the last set, I increase the middle set as well, and the same for the first set. Once I get to the same weight on all three, I start the process over. This has resulted in noticeable gains, specifically in my chest and arms.

Now that I have some development, I’m going to shift my focus in my next iteration of my workout to endurance and cardio. I’d like to trim a few percent off of my body fat so that things look a little more proportional. I’ll be making a new workout program with basic exercises, that I’ll do 2-3 sets of 12-15 reps at 70-80% of the weight that I’ve been doing. This should get my metabolism in gear for a while. I will likely only keep that up for a month or two because I really enjoy the heavy weights. Of course, I’ll try to keep you posted of my progress.

I’m sure any serious bodybuilder or weight trainer has dropped the weight at least once in his training career. I’ve dropped weights before, but never on myself, at least not while lifting. I’ve balanced dumbbells on my knees before and had them fell and pinch a finger — that’s one thing and it was my own stupidity. Yesterday, however, I dropped a dumbbell on my chest.

It could have been much worse — I’d been trying to lift heavy in March and April before my “moving hiatus”. This was my second week back and I was working my way back up to (and on some exercises exceeding) my previous weights. My workout partner is having a rough time in his personal life and was off his game. I’d just noticed during the previous rep that he wasn’t spotting me, but I thought I was fine. As I was pushing for my last rep of my last set of incline dumbbell bench presses with a 50 lb weight in each hand, I lost control of the dumbbell and it started to fall toward my face. Now, keep in mind that my muscles hadn’t failed — I’d just lost focus and lost control, so I focused my strength to getting the dumbbell to not fall on my face. Instead, the dumbbell came to rest with some force against my clavicle on my left side.

Of course, it hurt. How couldn’t it? But it didn’t hurt as bad as I’d expected it should. I didn’t see the need to get checked out — I think I’m just bruised, but there’s no visible bruising. The area is a little tender to the touch and only hurts when I poke it or extend my arms really far in a manner that stretches my chest muscles.

In summary, I’m definitely fine, but it just makes me realize the importance of a spotter and keeping focused. I’ve always lifted light enough to get away without a spotter, but I’m crossing over into a new realm so to speak!