My own twice weekly weight training workouts have been ticking along quite nicely for the last few months. My lower back has been good and my many sets of Bulgarian Dead lifts with 100 lb dumb bells have have not indicated any problems.
A few days ago, I decided to join my wife on one her runs. She is training for a half marathon this year, in Oslo. " Sprinting " the final 200 meters resulted in me picking up a lower back strain. Amazing! Let your guard down at this age and you are made to pay . . . .
All this has made me alter my training, just to try and work around the injury. The last few days, I have performed workouts made up of a circuit of exercises. I have picked 6 moves, performed one after the other until completion, rested one minute and repeated 5 or 6 times. Training in this way, gives you an indication of where your own conditioning is at. When I fully recover, I have decided to add one workout to my current schedule to include this type of training.
This circuit training reminded me of one of your previous champion bodybuilder's of the sixties, Bob Gajda. In 1965 & 1966 he won Mr. America, Mr. USA & Mr. Universe. His training at that time was his own version of circuit training, namely PHA or Peripheral Heart Action Training. An extremely unusual form of training in those days. I have read that his unique style of training is regaining in popularity ( I am not sure about the "regaining " aspect, as was it ever popular? ) in many of the top gyms in southern California as the preferred method by which to develop optimal health and physical conditioning. I believe he still practices as a sports therapist. I have to say that we all tried it back then, but dropped it in favor of achieving the " pump ", the one thing that his workouts were trying to avoid. Mmmm . . . come to think of it, I also failed to mention that this type of training was damned hard!
