January 26, 2019 – Week 20, Day 3

5 Minutes Elliptical

Leaning Calf Raises
BWx30

Sumo Box Touches (10” Box)
BWx25

Regular Box Touches (10” Box)
BWx25

Bird Dogs (1 second holds)

BWx10/10

Superset: Band Rows/ Modified Angle Push-ups
MMBx20/BWx15
MMBx20/BWx15

Biceps Stretches

20 Seconds

20 Seconds

Log Strict Presses
(Miscellaneous Log 8”)

55x8

(Miscellaneous Log 12”)

100x2
125x2
150x2
(Beast Metals Log 13”)

176.5x2
201.5x2
226.5x2
251.5x2
201.5x8

28” I-Beam Farmer’s Walk w/ Sled (on turf)

122.5+35x60’ in 8.22 seconds

172.5+60x60’ in 9.08 seconds

212.5+80x60’ in 10.25 seconds

262.5+100x60’ in 12.09 seconds

302.5+100x60’ in 12.64 seconds

Standing Arm-Over-Arm Pulls (on turf)

75x60’ in 13.61 seconds

125x60’ in 16.25 seconds

175x60’ in 19.66 seconds

225x60’ in 22.58 seconds

275x60’ in 26.13 seconds

Prowler Pushes (high/low on turf)
125x50’/50’

125x50’/50’

125x50’/50’

125x50’/50’

125x50’/50’

Planks

BWx30 Seconds

BWx30 Seconds

Side Planks

BWx20/20 Seconds

BWx20/20 Seconds

Stretching

Comments: Another day of event training out in Lancaster. I have a cold and I knew I was getting one Thursday and it happened Friday so I didn’t go for a walk as I figured that it made more sense to try and get rest. I got up early (sort of) as I scheduled another chiro session in the morning. I had thought about cancelling it with being sick but I really wanted to get in as many sessions as I could this month so that I could make it so that I’d have an evaluation of care review be done at the end of the month. I had got my copy of my old MRI from 2016 finally and learned some new things about my spine. Not sure if it will require changes going forward with strongman at this time but it was good to know. Essentially approved to try for 50% contest weights as symptoms have improved in my leg enough. So as long as I don’t have serious flare up next week while training this stuff, I’m competing. I was a bit slow going with the cold in the morning. I has been awhile since I’ve been sick. Lot of people there again which is good and bad. Good in that it means the gym is growing and more people are doing the sport. Bad in that it can mean equipment is being used and I may be asked to help. But it’s a fair trade in that I ask people to help me with filming some events and I needed help last week setting things up. My back was feeling a lot better so I was able to move things by myself mostly. Gym had stuff moved around again. Apparently the landlord wants to keep some space for other purposes so stuff had to be moved to allow for a large walk way between properties. I used the old elliptical trainer to warm-up. Continuing to abstain from seated cardio warm-ups for now. I spend a lot my day sitting at work and at home anyways. I alternated directions every 30 seconds. I will stick to this only on this day as too much elliptical work (every session or longer sessions) has given me knee issues. But I feel fine with what I’m doing now. Calf work was easy. Box touches both styles felt great. Birddogs were pretty good too. I guess one of the benefits of early training. Band rows and modified push-ups after that. I couldn’t really find a spot for the push-ups now that stuff was moved. I tried a different setup this time but it feels so easy compared to what I do at the Y. But it is just a warm-up anyways. Biceps stretching was good. Not as tight as I thought they would be. Time to lift. Strict presses with the log again, plan being doubles with 25lbs jumps. I had a better idea of how to set up things with the jerk blocks. I put the rubber mats down and then the crash pads so that the log would sink into the pads and not “roll around”. I warmed up with a smaller log and then switched in the regular log. Didn’t really have anyone to help so I ended up cleaning that to my shoulders to put it on the platforms. Cold was definitely throwing my balance off on these but I persisted. Then it was time to switch out to the big red. This was a bear to clean to the shoulders. But I need to get used to it with most contest logs I have in competition planned have as heavy or heavier a log base and it is good to get used to different logs. Balance was even more askew with this log. I decided to measure the diameter to make sure I wasn’t imagining things and it confirmed it was a 13” log. Which is fine, just got to keep that in mind. I will need to get familiar with this log as this tends to be the size of the heavier empty logs. I probably shouldn’t have made another 25lbs jump for my last double. That first rep I pressed it out in front of me and I thought, crap, guess this is just a single. But I got recentered and leaned back and got my hips engaged and put up a second rep crisp, like the reps before should’ve been. Down set for eight, I took 50lbs off. Cutting it close as far as difficulty but I got the reps and my form was better as far as keeping it in a good grove. I left things there as I figured it would take a lot of energy to tear down and it was going to take some effort setting up the other events. Rather save it until the end (no one else was going to need the log and blocks today) when I’m done and don’t have to conserve energy. Next was farmer’s walk. Plan was to do same thing as last time with a little more weight per hand and a little more weight on the sled. My mind wouldn’t let me. I was to try maybe 20lbs more per hand but the plan for me with at least 300lbs. I had this stupid song “Break My Stride” by Matthew Wilder stuff in my head the past two days. I had a thought that was kind of a “no duh” moment as I had been using mats to elevate the handles when there are blocks set at 12” that are meant to support weight that I could’ve been using the whole time. Plus they were light and had hand holds. So I ended up using those and the slightly lower pick I-Beams (that are slightly heavier) to get the same pick height as last time. First set with the empty handles and sled I felt a little slow. I think this was because I didn’t do any real warm-ups like last time where I did empty sprints (running like I was holding handles), a run with just the sled and then a pick with the handles. But I seemed to do better as I went after that. I made an effort to control the handles down at the end so that I didn’t damage the turf. So a little extra grip and lower body work as I did a hold and then lowered them to the rubber mats at the end. So the plan was quarter, plate, quarter, plate so that the final run would be the handles with 2 plates per peg for 302.5lbs. Also increased the sled weight by 20lbs for the last two runs. Second to last set was almost the same as my top set last time (slightly less in the hands but 20lbs more on the drag sled). I ended up being a just a hair faster. I’m not sure what happened on the final set but with 40lbs more per hand, I managed to get just over half a second slower. Maybe I took that run more seriously. I felt it was important as part of my confidence recovery to do it. My grip felt solid and my body felt good. Contest weight doesn’t seem far away, even with it being regular pick height. More standing arm over arm work after that. I had two choices after the farmer’s walk; one more arm over arm followed by conditioning work and the other being more working the individual parts. Option two was if I wasn’t approved to do the standing arm over arm stuff. I was allowed to do things up to 50% so I decided I’d do it as I feel I need to compress the timeline to get my technique down on this. It is very different from seated style arm-over-arm. Weight for contest is 550lbs for 60’ after the block carry but it’s hard to figure out what that will actually be as it will be on a slick convention floor. For instance, at Beast of the Bluegrass last year, the prowler drag portion of the medley was listed as 300lbs. I trained with the prowler on black top with 300lbs added to the prowler (370lbs). They ended up making it 485lbs or so and it was still way easier than what I was doing in training. The only thing was getting it to start moving as shoes were slick on the floor. As my feet will be on mats at the end, this shouldn’t be a problem and turf is way harder than black top. But I had no idea how it would feel compared to the Exer-Genie stuff from last week. So I started with an empty prowler and added 50lbs each run. I started away from the rope with one of the 12” wood block to simulate the transition I will need to make from the block to the rope (I will be using the block part next week hopefully). I’m noticing that the levers that make me good at the seated variation aren’t helping here on the standing variation. My long arms still help but my height appears to be a hindrance as the closer the implement gets, the angle of the pull changes and less of the rope is on the ground keeping it from swaying. So I need to work on my positioning when it gets to that point. The two options I’m looking at are trying to drop down lower (from the start or at that point) to try and keep the angle more constant or keep the rope on the ground more or trying to match the swaying of the rope with my body (like a boxer weaving) Last set was getting fatiguing and it was 50% of contest weight that I ended on. Not my limit thankfully. I got a little extra work in by stripping the weights down each set and pushing the prowler back to the start with the low handles. I feel I’m improving on this a lot. These kinds of events and the different techniques and training are one of the many things I like about this sport. Finished up with some conditioning work. Maybe not the best thing with a cold haha. With the gym move around, right now it isn’t easy to setup a single straight run of more than 60’ so I figured that I could do 50’/50’ just pushing the prowler down with the high poles and then back with the low handles as that felt okay when I was resetting the arm-over-arm. The other option was to drive home and do them in the street but that just seemed like too much at this point as I had already been there close to 5.5hrs. Felt good, legs started to get fatigued on the last two sets haha. Then planks after that to finish the session. Almost forgot to do them as I was distracted with helping people on stones. Still good, regular style a bit harder than the side style. Home to stretch, recover and finally eat. Cold is wrecking me right now. I need to take some Nyquil, put on a humidifier and get some shut eye.