October 30, 2018 – Week 8, Day 1

5 Minutes Expresso Interactive Upright Exercise Bike

Leaning Calf Raises
BWx30

16” Goblet Box Squats
20x25

Shoestring Romanian Deadlifts
45x20

Band Rows
MMBx20

Push-ups
BWx15

Bodyweight Plank
20 Seconds

Biceps Stretches
20 Seconds
20 Seconds

Front to Back Hip Swings
BWx10/10

Side to Side Hip Swings
BWx10/10

Axle Clean and Jerks (one clean)
85x1
105x1
125x1
145x1
165x1
185x1
205x1
225x1
245x1

265x7

Pulldowns
95x10
155x8
185x8
215x8
245x8
275x8

Incline Dumbbell Bench Presses
35’sx10
70’sx8
90’sx8
110’sx8

Stretching

Comments: Work still wearing me down. Went and got an adjustment after work from chiro to see if that alleviated the shoulder issue any. I really carry a lot of tension in my neck and traps. I figured it wouldn’t hurt to work on the other aches while I was there. Shoulder traction definitely got something to shift back but hard to tell if everything is good at the moment. Other things moved too that felt became tight. I have alternatives to work around the issue but I’d rather not if it’s feeling well enough if what I’m doing will be the big money exercises and programming. SC Nats happened and I know I would’ve done poorly with the events. Warmed up on the exercise bike as per usual. 156bpm highest reading this time I think. Felt good. Found out the pacer was set to the max as I wanted to try and push it a little more. Oh well. Calves were tight and stiff feeling. Ankles a little achy. Goblet squats were ok. Ached at the start but felt better by the end. Knees were a little stiff at the start on the RDLs and felt a little better by the end. Band rows felt good. Really trying to work the different positions of my shoulder and hand placement to get the back and shoulders moving and feeling good. Then pushups. I had the option to do these at an angle to not stress the right shoulder as much. I figured I’d at least see if my shoulder was feeling ok before committing to that. Not great but better than it had felt all last week so that is something. Just got to keep an eye on things. Have another massage coming up in two weeks and might go to the chiro again. Plank was easy, not much to say here. Then the biceps stretches. Felt ok here too. Hip swings after that. Nothing really shifted here other than my hip. Lifting next. Axle yet again. Same thing with 20lbs jumps in singles to the top set and then rep away. Using the new rubber plates. Not sure how they will hold up but I feel like the lighter ones bounce more than the old ones did. Again, treating every attempt on the clean the same. Focused and controlled until the second pull. Still going good with the pulls being above my belt. I’ve had issues in the past with it being too low. Just got to keep practicing. Axle has been making me nervous with how sore my arms feel after a few sets from the stone of steel work. But this time no super soreness. But still supremely cautious. Had the wrist wraps this time and put chalk on first thing so that it didn’t become a pasty mix later if I was sweating too much. 245lbs was when I had to take a moment to adjust after racking the weight. I had been able to pretty much clean and jerk with little break in between but 245lbs needed a moment. Lockout felt a little harder than I wanted it to.  Working set next. I really wanted 8 reps here as that would be a slight lifetime PR. Axle has not felt comfortable. So much focus has been on long or dumbbell and I guess having the log on my body and the short dip has made me feel like that is more comfortable. I don’t feel as stable on the axle now. Keep going out front. I was worried I’d only get a double after how the second rep felt. Then it was a little rocky on the fifth rep. Managed to get another two reps before missing going for the eighth. The seventh felt an awful lot like the ninth rep last time I did these so I knew that next rep was going to be hit or miss by that point. I’m sure this will click eventually. Reps after this. Pulldowns have been feeling good so figured I’d strike while the iron is hot. No super soreness in the arms so I wouldn’t feel like I was limited today. Did the max amount of sets with a plan of matching the most weight I’ve done so far since coming back from injury and improve my reps on it. After the warm-up, it was sets of eight with 30lbs jumps. I might be limited to around 300lbs for total weight on these but will have to see. 275lbs was definitely near my limit for these reps but it felt good. Incline dumbbell to end the day. This had been an exercise I was testing out on Saturday to see if it was better or worse and it didn’t feel nearly as bad as flat dumbbell bench. Machines on incline hurt and I think that is because it is a fixed path and I can move the dumbbells. Knowing that the idea is to build up the pectorals to protect the shoulders helped me figure things out a little. I figured on doing the minimum sets to keep shoulder stress down. If the dumbbells were too much, I could switch to using a log which would reduce ROM. If that was too much, pec deck was an option. Warm-up didn’t the best but it wasn’t terrible. Felt better than flat dumbbell had done last week. I wanted to move through things quick so I was expecting there to be dumbbells for the planned jumps. I had forgotten that the one 70lbs dumbbell broke so I had to improvise with a 65lbs dumbbell and 5lbs weight from the cable stack. Made that side very awkward to balance but I got through it. I felt a little light headed after that set. Not sure what that was about but I guess I was holding my breath to try and keep steady. Same thing happened with 90lbs. I had a bad shouldering of the dumbbells and almost pulled me off the left side of the bench. 110lbs and the wraps were on. This would be interesting. Didn’t start off well. I guess I was used to the long handles of the dumbbells with plates as I biffed the shouldering here too but recovered. Finally got things adjusted after the first three reps. Got a little wonky on number six and corrected again for number seven. Eight was starting to get away from me but I think I had another two ugly reps there. My shoulder didn’t explode so that was good. Home to stretch, recover and eat.

October 27, 2018 – Week 7, Day 3

5 Minutes Misc Stationary Bike

Leaning Calf Raises
BWx30

16” Goblet Box Squats
20x25

Shoestring Romanian Deadlifts
45x20

Band Rows
MMBx20

Push-ups
BWx15

Bodyweight Plank
20 Seconds

Biceps Stretches
20 Seconds
20 Seconds

Front to Back Hip Swings
BWx10/10

Side to Side Hip Swings
BWx10/10

Stone of Steel Over Bar (60”)
138x1
185.5x1
234.5x1
280x0
280x1
336x1 PR+6lbs & 2.5”
EMOM
302x1
302x1
302x1
302x1
302x1
302x1
302x1
302x1
302x1
302x1

Wide Grip Axle Hang

BWx25.75 seconds

Prowler 2 Drags/Pushes (turf)
145x93’/93’
165x93’/93’
185x93’/93’
205x93’/93’
225x93’/93’

Stretching

Comments: Body and mind beat. I was tired and had been getting maybe 6-6.5hrs of sleep a night. I had wished two people competing at SC Nats good luck, forgetting the competition isn’t until Saturday. It had started to rain when I left work so I figured I’d just get dinner ready. Ended up breaking another desk chair at home, despite being 70lbs under the max weight limit. I’m not that heavy damn it. I already had a plan to wake up at 8:30AM so I just set that for my alarm, not having to deal with getting up a lot like usual. Wet and cold in the morning but made good time for the gym. I had brought stuff to fix and make sandbags. Quite a few people there today, but not the owners so not really able to do anything to make a 300lbs sandbag. Left lower calf has been getting crampy since Friday night for some reason. Not sure why. I had used the car buffer on it before leaving to keep it from cramping while driving. Knees sore too and right shoulder tight and achy. Warmed up on the exercise bike. Felt good today. Probably the Kendrick Lamar playing of the sound system. Calves felt good after that. Just very tight. No knee issues on goblets today. RDLs felt better today too. Band rows were super easy. Trying to pull to feel how my shoulder structure is moving on the right side. Push-ups were not the best. Right shoulder aches initially but I can manage. Plank is nothing really at this point. Biceps stretches felt good. Needed it today. Hip swings were ok too. Time to lift the weights. Stone of Steel is here again. Sticking with it since it allows me to work my weak point on stone lifting and odds are high real stones won’t show up at the Arnold. Not to say this doesn’t make me nervous. I’ve had two injuries on the SOS. The back one and the arm one. Back from bad programing and the arm one more that I was being stupid with my lifting and grip slipped. I don’t blame it on the SOS. Still makes me nervous sometimes. Ok, most times. Plan was to do 50lbs jumps this time. Working on the form adjustment I made last time right from the start. I definitely need a few lifts to get ready as I feel like I’m going to black out after the first two singles from how much I crush the stone and extension to the top of my chest. I weighed it before every set to make sure I had the weights right. 280lbs I made a mistake. It was easy enough off the floor but I kept it too low and didn’t bother to adjust it or my stance and short changed the load. That was on me, sloppy mistake. Would’ve gone over my old bar height of 57” but not 60”. Even though it was easy lift, I redid it before moving on. Had to get it for real before moving up. 280lbs appears to be the most I can put in the SOS with just 25lbs plates before it hits the top and bottom support structures so I switched to 45lbs plates to go on. I had in my head that my best no grip assist lift on this was 335lbs so I put in weights to make it just 1lbs more. I was apparently off by 5lbs so this would be a 6lbs and 2.5” PR if I got it. Risky considering how much trouble 314lbs gave me three weeks ago. I got set, Rhianna was playing, and I gave it a go. Felt like I had some resistance picking it up but I knew I had it unless I underestimated how well I can crush and extend at the same time. And over it went. Yeah. Then it was time for the EMOM with 302lbs. I elected to continue with no assistance stuff. My receiver gloves are missing and I didn’t bring my grip shirt. Putting on tacky towel might make it hard to get an honest grip time for the axle bar hang after this. First rep felt good and tough. Underestimated things on the second one and it ended up being a bit more lower back on the extension as I didn’t square my stance and bring it in. Every lift I went up and beyond for the extension. Quite pleased with how this went. Axle bar hang for time after that. I just had a feeling it was going to be tough today to even match my previous time. My thumbs were still feeling sore from circus dumbbell. I guess the increased weight and the solid steel handle make a difference. I got set and I knew right away that this was going to be a fight to even get past 10 seconds. I just crushed with everything I had. My upper body from my lats to my fingers was in on this. In the end, I was just under a second shy of my time last session. Still good in that this was another session going over 20 seconds. This one is so fickle in that some weeks it feels great and others it is a struggle to improve. I guess that is going to be the case when you are pushing the grip to the max. Prowler on the turf to end the day. Goal was to improve on the weight from last time. It was raining so the doors were closed which meant that if I went with my usual length of tow rope for the drag, I would be short about 3’ so I figured I’d fold the lines in half so that I could get the full length done. I took my time on the rests periods for these. During the breaks, I checked on how my friends were doing at Nats, checking in with Mike, and fixing up the sandbag stuff. This was the heaviest I’ve started the sled with on the turf. The third set, someone was doing a conditioning circuit so I had to keep to the right a bit more than usual. Ended up running over a cone so had some additional friction working against me near the end. Had to toss it aside to push it back. Thankfully, the push portion didn’t really bother my shoulder as it was more when I got that initial start to move it rather than arms extended. Final set I had  to wait a little as some people came in with their horse like dog and they pulled out the conan’s wheel. That was definitely a tougher run but still good. Before I left, I tried out some other exercises to see if I could find stuff to work the chest muscles without bothering the shoulder. I’m hoping some rest and recovery will help. May need to see the chiropractor after work Monday if still an issue. Home to stretch and recover. Events for the Arnold are supposed to be announced Sunday night allegedly.

October 25, 2018 – Week 7, Day 2

5 Minutes Precor RBK 835 Recumbent Bike

Leaning Calf Raises
BWx30

16” Goblet Box Squats
20x25

Shoestring Romanian Deadlifts
45x20

Band Rows
MMBx20

Push-ups
BWx15

Bodyweight Plank
20 Seconds

Biceps Stretches
20 Seconds
20 Seconds

Front to Back Hip Swings
BWx10/10

Side to Side Hip Swings
BWx10/10

16” Manta Ray Box Squats w/ bands
45x9
95x3
Added Bands (+115lbs)
45x3
95x3
135x3
185x3
230x3
230x3
230x3

16” Jack Stand Pulls
135x1
245x1
315x1
405x1
Added Straps
470x1
470x1
470x1
470x1
470x1
470x1
470x1
470x1
470x1
470x1

Smith Machine Plank
BW+75x60 Seconds

Stretching

Comments: Tired. Running on fumes. Again. Not sure how it became like this again just three weeks later for essentially the same workout. Maybe 6hrs of sleep a night. Didn’t walk the day before. I knew I couldn’t take the day off as I know I need more rest after doing this upcoming stone of steel workout. Right shoulder ache is starting to drive me nuts. Discovered that all the old bumper plates are gone and replaced with thinner, slick bumpers. I liked the old ones as I could use them to make a squat box or raise up platforms for filming stuff. Again, yet another old, good thing taken from the gym. Not like anyone would maybe want that stuff. Little thrown off by that. Virtual bikes were in use so I used a recumbent bike to see how that felt. 124bpm highest reading this time. Didn’t want to push it as I felt my right quad near the knee feel like it would cramp up if I went to hard. ROM is different. Easier on the joints but feels weird. Calves felt ok. Tight but still easy. No issues with my ankles. Knees were ok on goblet squats. RDLs I felt ok as well. Band rows were good on the back. Really tight. Push-ups were so so. Right shoulder isn’t feeling the best. Still strong, just aches. Plank was easy. Then the biceps stretches. Not as tight as I was expecting they would be. Hip swings went well. On to the weights as is the case. New squat variation in the mix. Decided to go with the manta ray attachment. Makes for a super high bar placement and kind of bridge between the different bars and a regular bar for the squat. I really had no idea where this weight would be at but it appears it has always been behind the other two, even with a high box so I decided to aim for maybe 450lbs as my max single to base the workout off of. Idea for today was to work up to 50% bar weight with 25% in bands on top of that. Lucky for me, this meant the same amount of band tension as last time since my 1rm was going to be lower. Also with how the bar sits, it might have been more at the top then last time but a little bit. The setup was a bit off as I had to use step platforms to squat to. The new bumpers are unforgiving and it takes a lot more of them to stack. Bands ended up being a bit out in front of me. I felt really slow but it doesn’t look like it was slow on camera. Last moment I decided to add 5lbs to the goal so that it was 20lbs difference between manta, ssb and csb. I felt the first rep felt strong and then it felt like I was moving through water the next two reps. This felt tough. Jack stands out for the rack pulls. Keep on adding weight to these. Singles up to an EMOM. Supposedly 75% of my projected max. It was going to be interesting to see how this went with how my middle back has felt. Knees a little creaky getting into position. Getting close to 500lbs for the sets now. Doesn’t feel as fast as it looks on camera. Definitely getting harder to control the weight back down. Rep I felt that I did the best as far as timing and technique was the seventh one with the following eighth rep being the worst as that came and bounced into my shins putting it back down. It’s good that I could keep on going and going with those singles. If the pattern continues, I think 500lbs is the weight next time these pop up. Like last time, took my time putting the stuff away so that I could rehydrate a little before doing another weighted plank hold to end the session. Smith machine again and I figured I’d just do 20lbs more than last time. Don’t want to overdo it with these as I build up the strength and endurance with more and more weight. This actually felt better on the abs than 55lbs did last time honestly. I took my time after that to stretch at the gym. Trick or Treat night so no sense being on the road until after 8pm or deal with children in the road. So burritos to recover again it was.

October 23, 2018 – Week 7, Day 1

5 Minutes Expresso Interactive Upright Exercise Bike

Leaning Calf Raises
BWx30

16” Goblet Box Squats
20x25

Shoestring Romanian Deadlifts
45x20

Band Rows
MMBx20

Push-ups
BWx15

Bodyweight Plank
20 Seconds

Biceps Stretches
20 Seconds
20 Seconds

Front to Back Hip Swings
BWx10/10

Side to Side Hip Swings
BWx10/10

Circus Dumbbell Clean and Presses
Plate Loaded Dumbbell with Fat Gripz Extreme
(2 stage 2 second pauses)
31x1 R
31x1 L
51x1 R
51x1 L
71x1 R
71x1 L
91x1 R
91x1 L
111x1 R
111x1 L
121x1 R
121x1 L
EMOM Circus Bell
131x1 R
131x1 R
131x1 R
131x1 R
131x1 R
131x1 R
131x1 R
131x1 L
131x1 L
131x1 L
131x1 L
131x1 L
131x1 L
131x1 L

Chest Supported Rows
80x15
170x8
260x8
350x8
440x8

Dumbbell Bench Presses
35’sx12
55’sx8
75’sx8
95’sx8
115’sx8
135’sx8

Stretching

Comments: Gone for a walk the past two days. Right side middle of my back is sore and I think it is from the heavy frame hold. Just a guess as even though the weights increased on farmer’s walk, keg and sandbag, it wasn’t anything outrageous. Trying to avoid taking anti-inflammatories or applying Icy Hot if I can. Feeling at least somewhat rested right now but who knows when it will go to crap. Some of the younger guys at the gym apparently follow my Instagram and thought it was cool I’m qualified for the Arnold. I still feel like I haven’t done anything and need to keep pushing forward. Still so far away from where I want to be. Warmed up on the bike. Had a good distance in the time limit. Not my best but up there. I think the heartrate max was 159bpm. Calves felt pretty to start but my left ankle decided to feel crappy and achy on the last five reps. Goblet squats felt ok. Little ache in the knees but not much. RDLs I’m still working on keeping my lower back rigid and not relaxing it. Band rows felt good on my back and shoudlers. Right shoulder a tad achy on the push-ups. Right side felt stiff. Plank was pretty standard. Needed the biceps stretching today. Hip swings loosened up my lower back and hips some. Circus dumbbell here again. Warm-up and then the EMOM session of seven singles per side with the pause and hold style. Luckily being warmed up I didn’t feel any issues with my mid back. 20lbs jumps working up. I was finally going to be using a weight that would allow me to use the biggdoggstrongg bell so I took 10lbs jumps after I got to 111lbs so I could do another jump (and put another 25lbs plate on) so that the bell wasn’t such a big shock. The handle is shorter but it’s longer. I wanted to try and do this session without support stuff like wrist wrap or rehband belt. Chalked the hell out of the dumbbell once it was time to go as well as my shoulders. It felt a little awkward at first on my right side but I was fine. Third rep I noticed I was pushing it out away and I knew that was just me not focusing so I made it a conscious effort after that. I have to work at it more on the right side to get the dumbbell to do what I want. Last one felt and looked the best. Only took six sets to get it right. Left side was really easy. I noticed about halfway into the set that the camera wasn’t recording as the battery died so I had to replace it. I had no idea how long it had been off as I was pretty focused but it appears I only missed one set. Chest supported rows after that. I had this itch to go for broke. Dumbbell was going to be lighter and easier and I wanted to push it on the assistance stuff today. Go for things that might be overreach. Maybe because I know I need to get to the next level for the Arnold or I wanted to take out some work stress frustration. I had thought 440lbs for the top set on the rows. But maybe that was too much. But I figured I’d start really light and do plate jumps and see how 350lbs felt and go from there. All the work up sets felt really easy. Maybe I do 400lbs and then 440lbs. I figured that I’d probably need to give 440lbs my all if I was trying it since it would be 30lbs more than I’ve ever attempted and 410lbs for ten was pretty darn tough last time. Got my hands rechalked and braced myself. Yeah this was hard. Really hard. No more left in the tank on this. Had to wait from my vision to regain focus afterwards. I was using 120lbs less on this exercise a year ago so I’m making progress somewhere. Dumbbell benching after that. The safe bet would’ve been just go up 5lbs per dumbbell. But I didn’t want any tiny plates so I just went with 10lbs plates. That meant it would be 135lbs for the top set. That didn’t feel like it was going to happen with how my right shoulder felt. I still fact good with moving weight but it was really achy. Probably circus dumbbell coming back down on it (I did try to minimize that). I miscounted that first set and did sets of eights with 20lbs jumps per dumbbell. 115lbs was somewhat challenging. 135lbs may not happen today. But I told myself that getting one rep was a PR here and it’s kind of neat to be doing essentially a barbell with 45’s on each side in each hand.Definitely felt substantial picking them up off the ground. Pressure from the collars on my thighs definitely woke me up a bit. Wrist wraps were on tight so I had to do it. Struggle bus of a first rep but I got my groove down. Wasn’t certain until I got the fifth rep that I was going to get eight. I think I had another two reps there. It was very difficult to control the weights and keep from favoring one side over the other like I sometimes do when trying to push further. Going to need to eat and recover. Home to stretch and massage and took some Aleve before bed to help with the tightness in my back and aches in my joints.

October 20, 2018 – Week 6, Day 3

5 Minutes Misc Stationary Bike

Leaning Calf Raises
BWx30

16” Goblet Box Squats
20x25

Shoestring Romanian Deadlifts
45x20

Band Rows
MMBx20

Push-ups
BWx15

Bodyweight Plank
20 Seconds

Biceps Stretches
20 Seconds
20 Seconds

Front to Back Hip Swings
BWx10/10

Side to Side Hip Swings
BWx10/10

18” I-Beam Farmer’s Walk
117x50’ in 5.43 seconds
207x50’ in 6.83 seconds
277x50’ in 7.62 seconds
277x50’ in 8.09 seconds

BiggDoggStrongg Frame Hold
690x43.33 seconds

Keg Over Bar (60”)
175xpick
225xpick
275x10

Sandbag Carry (turns at 50’)

275xpick

275x100’ in 14.88 seconds

275x100’ in 17.60 seconds (bearhug)

Stretching

Comments: Very stressful day of work yesterday. Had to vent a little. Ended up staying up a bit later than I was wanted to. Meant I hit my snooze button like a dozen times the following morning until I felt I had slept enough. Gym was packed. Lots of people, doing lots of things. Evan had a photoshoot for one of his sponsors and Omar was in charge of media. Of course I had to tease a bit haha. Brian and Lyndsey doing their last workouts before SC Nats and Sarah doing some Official Strongman Games events. Everybody had their thing so kind but didn’t end up being too difficult to coordinate. Warmed up on the ole’ reliable exercise bike. Nice and easy today. Welcome easy coast compared to the virtual bike stuff. Calves felt ok. Felt much springier today and not as tight. Goblet squats were also ok. Felt like they were achy in the knees but no pain. RDLS felt ok, trying to keep the back rigid. Band rows were super easy and needed. Push-ups felt ok, shoulder joints were achy today. Plank was ok, felt some achiness in the right shoulder. Biceps stretches felt good. Upper body not as tight as it was Thursday. Hip swings felt pretty good. Right hip needed it. Then the event work. I had to wait a little bit for the lanes to clear up (photoshoot and some weird “fight” training). Farmer’s walk to start off the day. Able to have someone film this time. Empty implements were stupid easy. Plan was to work up to top weight and do two sets. Weight would be just under 275lbs but it was easier to just go slightly above. Didn’t feel like I needed another run with the empty handles to get going so I put on a plate for the next set. Felt good, I figured I’d have a good day. Sub seven seconds on that. Hard belt on for the top weights. Went for the belt to be at the tightness I usually use for the heavy runs. I may need to do a jump in between eventually so that I can break in the belt a little more for breathing as I definitely felt light headed near the end of that first run. Only two tenths slower than last time with 20lbs more per hand and sub eight seconds which is a PR for this weight. I felt the pick was slow but I moved quick. Second set I thought I was moving faster because the pick felt better. But it appears I wasn’t hitting that top gear all the way and was about half a second slower. Both runs were better than my previous best time with this weight for this distance. Frame hold again. 10-20lbs more than last time depending on how I felt and if I could get it to be within 30-60 seconds. I didn’t have microweights last time so what I had as 670lbs was really 668lbs. I know I said 2lbs doesn’t matter but that was the day before. I brought them this time so that my weight was 690lbs. I knew this was going to be a bit tougher. Just not sure how much more. No warm-ups as I felt that the jump from my last set of farmer’s walk wasn’t that big a gap like last time was. Also didn’t have to worry about cookout stuff haha. Definitely felt heavier in my hands haha. I was wondering if I was going to get past 15 seconds with how it felt. But I managed to gut it out and dropped it just a little over a second short of last time’s time. This appears to be the most I’ve attempted to lift on this frame. I plan for 20lbs more next time so this will get interesting. Keg load was next. Not looking forward to this. It gets exhausting. Last time my “return” was too effective and kept banging into my shins and giving me bloody spots and bruises. However, doing away with that meant the set was going to take longer. Easy picks with the weights to warm-up. Taped up my thumbs to keep from damaging them. I notice more pressure on them as the weight increases and I try to brace to get extension. My setup was a tire with a mat on it and lighter kegs surrounding it to keep it from rolling away. Felt okay at the start. Rep four I lost count a little. Couldn’t tell if it was five or four so I just said it was four so that way I made sure to at least get ten reps. Keg feels like nothing in my lap, just so far out in front of me as I pull it up my shins. Didn’t seem to matter where I placed my hands to extend. Extension didn’t feel like a problem. Rep seven the keg escaped. Halted the pacing I had going and allowed my body to get tired more so than it had been with that momentary break. Took my time with these last few reps as I wanted no mistakes. This was tiring and dread doing this again with the heavier sandbag. Speaking of sandbag, that was the last item for the day. Carries for speed. I fixed up the 275lbs sandbag with some gorilla tape at the top. For whatever reason, it feels less “packed” than the 250lbs bags, more alive. Brian had found another “dolly” to use for moving stuff and it was larger so it seemed like it would work well to move the sandbag. I picked up the sandbag and dropped it from waist height on the dolly. This action crumpled the dolly. Must have been why it had a note that said “free” on it. So I had to get the hand truck. The extra 25lbs were noticed on the pick. First style was as if I were going to load it. Felt much better this week as I was within a hundredth of a second of my fastest time with the 250lbs bag. Second half of the course I was much faster. Having a hard time building up the speed and then gauging the strides I need to get to the line for a quick turn. Bear hug style was a different story. It was tough to get the sucker to stay upright, collapsing under its own weight. Just seemed longer, couldn’t carry it high enough (I think I thought it would be faster to pick and go rather than try and adjust it to get higher) so it was on my legs a bit. Hamstrings and glutes were smoking after this was done. About three seconds slower than the last run. However, still good compared to what I was doing earlier with sandbags. Home to stretch and recover.