Hello there fellow Buff Buddies! I hope that some of you are still following the programs you've set up and are still posting journals/reading other posts.

This week sees me getting into week 7 of Kris Gethin's 12 Week Muscle Building trainer and hitting his DTP workouts. Let me preface the rest of this post by saying that DTP workouts are the absolute devil, and deserve to be relegated to worst place in the farthest reaches of existence.

The above image is an example of how DTP (dramatic transformation principle) works. This is a workout style created by Kris himself, and is designed to FORCE your body to grow by shocking it. A normal DTP set sees you doing a super set (doing two exercises back to back with no rest) of two exercises with a reverse pyramid of reps.

For example, the image shows that you would superset leg press and calf press. So you would load up the weight, and hit 50 reps on leg press, as soon as you stop begin the 40 reps on calf press. Ideally you'll use the same weight so that you don't have to waste time switching them out. You'll rest the appropriate amount of time suggested and begin the next set of 40/30, 30/20, etc. However, this week's program has us hitting the DTP Extreme version.

There isn't an image to show it, but an example of DTP Extreme can be seen here. This was my workout today and it was painful. In this variation, you hit a reverse pyramid on all workouts, going 30, 25, 20, 15, 10, 5, 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30. On sets 1-6 (30 to 5), you do it as normal, taking as much time to rest as needed. But on the ascension (5 to 30), you use the weight that you used on your set of 20 descending, and you rest equal to your reps.

Example: On leg press, I did 180lbs for 20 reps descending, so I put that same amount on for the ascension. Do 5 reps, rest 5 seconds. 10 reps, rest 10 seconds. 15 reps, rest 15 seconds. 20 reps, rest 20 seconds. 25 reps, rest 25 seconds. 30 reps. Done. For some quick math, one exercise is comprised of 210 reps, 105 at your own pace, the second set of 105 in less than 5 minutes (depending on how long you take to rep them out + the 1 minute and 15 seconds you're allowed to rest).

Needless to say, after the 12 sets of leg press, 12 sets of both leg extensions and hamstring curls, and 12 sets of seated calf raise with DTP implemented, I had trouble walking out of the gym. But this workout was amazing, and I'm proud of myself for hitting as hard as I could and leaving nothing on the gym floor.

Also, weighed myself this morning and I'm back up 2 pounds from last week (had gone from 193 to 188, back to 191 today). This is to be expected after my Thanksgiving splurge.

Hope everyone's week starts off well!