Mobility Prep
Nordic Leg Curl Negatives (5 seconds)
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Nordic Leg Curl Negatives (5 seconds)
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Keg Tosses (15’, from 10’ away running up to keg)
25x1
25x1
25x1
25x1
25x1
25x1
25x1
25x1
25x1
25x1
25x1
25x1
25x1
25x1
25x1
25x1
25x1
25x1
25x1
25x1
Safety Squat Bar Dead Squats w/ bands (+20lbs bottom/+70lbs top)
65x3
115x3
155x3
205x3
245x3
295x3
295x3
295x3
295x3
295x3
65x3
115x3
155x3
205x3
245x3
295x3
295x3
295x3
295x3
295x3
Yoke (beltless)
Casual Pace
210x50’
210x50’
Normal
210x50’
300x50’
400x25’
450x25’
500x50’ in 9.31 seconds
520x50’ in 9.78 seconds
540x50’ in 9.43 seconds
560x50’ in 10.30 seconds
Casual Pace
210x50’
210x50’
Normal
210x50’
300x50’
400x25’
450x25’
500x50’ in 9.31 seconds
520x50’ in 9.78 seconds
540x50’ in 9.43 seconds
560x50’ in 10.30 seconds
Power Keg Loads Over Bar (56”)
144x2
194x2
244x2
294x2
344x2
384x2
346x1
346x1
346x1
346x1
346x1
346x1
346x1
346x1
144x2
194x2
244x2
294x2
344x2
384x2
346x1
346x1
346x1
346x1
346x1
346x1
346x1
346x1
Safety Squat Bar Step Ups (12”)/Dumbbell Side Bends (3 seconds hold, Fat Gripz)
65x12/12 – 65x12/12
70x12/12 – 65x12/12
75x12/12 – 65x12/12
65x12/12 – 65x12/12
70x12/12 – 65x12/12
75x12/12 – 65x12/12
Stretching
Comments: Out to train at the gym again. All gas, no brakes I guess. Would be a test of sorts I think to see if I recover quicker from competition under the new training and the post and pre contest training. Although it could be considered a light contest that I did so may not be the best gauge of things. I got a bit of a later start to my day as packed up to train in the morning rather than the night before and I had to fill up the car. Traffic really bad for no reason going through the highway near the city on the way there so I ended up getting there later than planned too. As far as what I had in store for myself today, it seemed to be prep for the October show with event work for the August show. Movement prep stuff had split squats and brought in hip airplanes that I haven’t done in several years. My balance on those is crap so I do need a slight balance assistance on those. Trying to control and hold positions. Getting blood flow to the small of my lower back where the disc bulge is. Can be hard to tell if it is helping or irritating. So start of the training was a little shocking. Nordic leg curl negatives. These are freaking brutal and I’ve had my hamstrings just straight up cramp up on me initiating the movement in the past. So usually done later in the session but this they were first this time. I had to get creative with setup as I didn’t want to bother anyone to hold my ankles (and no one there was going to weigh enough to counterbalance my mass at the time) so I ended up using the inverse leg curl machine for my setup. Plan being to wake up the hamstrings. This certainly did. And man were these tough. Next up was keg toss. Still singles. Didn’t realize that it had been over a month since I last did these. Double the reps so 10 tosses this time. Last time it had been a light to moderate keg and it said moderate this time. So I added 2lbs of a sand to the keg to get a nice 25lbs. Having watched video from the last time they had this event at the contest in August, I saw they had them run up to the keg for the toss. I was initially only going to do it for the first and sixth as it is a five keg series but I figured with the compressed timeline (6 weeks) that I should practice for all of them to get that ingrained now. Lot of activity in the parking lot so I had to really target my tosses (biker gang back and some people trying to leave the parking lot). The bikers seem to think keg toss is way more badass than sandbag toss from the reactions I heard before they left haha. Though regardless of what I toss, they get bored after I do it like 4 times. The unyielding quality of the metal for grip definitely makes these harder on the fingers compared to sandbag tosses. Only really notice when the volume goes up. Last toss I mimicked what I would do if I was going for the next keg. Mostly to see how I would do and because it was the last one so I didn’t have to worry about chasing down the keg in the EMOM time limit. I definitely think that needs work for me to get my breathing right to go fast. So back inside for squats. Squats with the ssb. With bands. And done as rack squats. Advised to do them at 60% with for 5x3 with bands that were 10-15% of 1rm added. Rack height I was told to lower to parallel or so so I dropped the pin height 1 from what I’ve been doing the rack squats from. Just using the same max weight for these to get the percentages so the band setup was the same as what I did the week before the contest. Bands slightly more tension at the bottom with it being not as deep as when I go into a full squat. I was told to keep rest 60-90 seconds so I set timer to go off every 90 seconds. Told to keep solid brace and move fast. Initially, my left knee wasn’t liking to get under the weight so I was a little nervous that this ROM without knee sleeves wasn’t good but that seemed to go away as I got ready. Initially thinking that maybe this weight would be too much but I guess once I said to myself this was my working weight, the weight felt pretty darn easy, only having it feel like something on the first rep of the fourth set when I mistimed the timer. These went pretty good. Then it was on to a test of sorts with yoke. Until fairly recently, I never had a problem with yoke despite having reasons to have problems. I literally fractured a vertebra doing yoke a decade ago. And usually with how contests go, I tend to have issues with getting warmed up for yoke since I’m generally a lot taller than other competitors. There have been instances where my only warm-up has been the empty implement. I think out of all the times I’ve done yoke in contest, I’ve only been happy with how I’ve done twice and both of those times were in 2018. After the pain relapse end of 2018, yoke hasn’t been the same really. I’ve gone up to 800lbs maybe once since then. February 2021 was the last time I did yoke and I just gave up on it as I had to psyche myself up with belt to move 500lbs when I’ve done over 1000lbs a handful of times. So haven’t touched it over than to move 90-210lbs around to use it for setups for other events in over five months. And I got a contest coming up in early October for 1000lbs as part of a medley. So for today, this was tipping the toes back in to the very deep pool. I was advised to do 4x50’ beltless with it being no more than RPE 6 and not having to go full speed if I didn’t feel comfortable. In my head, I wanted at least 500lbs so I could confront myself from earlier this year. Still have concerns with lower back stuff. I started things off with doing casual pace with it empty. Just taking a walk. Then added some speed to it. Oof, hamstrings feeling that shift in gears. Not quite top speed. I then switched to half distance before getting to the goal weight of 500lbs. Now as far as what I was looking at, I was hoping to at minimum hit 60% of my all-time best beltless yoke of 800lbs. Had to go way back to figure this as I tended to have my rehband belt on and still refer to it as beltless when really it isn’t. My best with rehband belt only was 935lbs (what I broke my back on haha). The stretch goal was 70% of that (560lbs) but I’d settle for 500lbs. Comfortable but not terribly fast. It felt too easy so I said screw it, I’ll add 20lbs a set. I ended up getting stuck in a conversation with someone at the gym after my third run so I did cooldown a bit before going. My times compared to my belted runs are about 3 seconds slower. I have to wonder on strategy as I won’t be fast if I get 1000lbs at contest with the short time frame so should focus be on a solid start and steady pace or keep trying to go faster right off the bat? On to more event work with power keg loads. August contest has max keg load (max of 455lbs) and I should be good on that. I think. Thing is despite being good at stones, I’ve never really had to push much with keg and haven’t had to do more than 350lbs in competition. Plan for today was to work up to a smooth double (RPE 7-7.5) and then drop of 10% and do 8x1 EMOM. As with stones for last training cycle prep, I had the height 4” above contest. No one has used the power keg at the strongman gym for a long time as it was covered in dust, cobwebs and had one decent sized dead spider and two large dust bunnies inside. Weights are estimates (144lbs empty with spacers) as the battery powered scale was dead and the other scale is a pain in the ass to get out and it only goes up to 350lbs which I was certain I’d be going over based off how I felt I should do. I took big jumps. Mostly I think because it takes time to load and secure the power keg. We have kegs that go up in 25lbs jumps to 325lbs but the contest is using a power keg for all the attempts and it just feels different to me. I didn’t take the weight seriously on my second to last double. I had tried to quick lap and go and missed on the second rep. This seemed to have been good tactic for me but I guess there is a limit when it comes to strength that it doesn’t work. The keg down flat is a good bit tougher for the next load at these weights. So I did only a 40lbs jump for the last double. First one was easy, second rep not so much. So I may have gone a little above the effort I was supposed to. The tie breaker for the show if multiple people get the 455lbs is time which could be a problem for me as I take it slow to not tear my biceps on the pick with these heavy weights. The EMOM the weight was just a bother to lap it but the loading was so easy. I reset the keg each rep. Tape saved my shins. Last item for the day was a super set of step ups with the ssb and dumbbell side bends. I was told to do holds and use a fat gripz if I wanted to on those. I was hoping to go heavier on the step ups but reconsidered with how my knees were feeling. Box height I was told to do it from 14-12”. Trying the 14” was just not happening as it seemed like a weak spot for my knee and it was a stilted extension of the knee with just the bar. Goal was to do RPE 7 for both and that wasn’t happening at 14” so I went with 12” and that was a ton more manageable. I wasn’t certain what fatigue would be like with the number of reps, not doing step-ups in a long ass time and having the obliques fatigued with the side bends for the following sets. In hindsight, I could’ve gone heavier on the step-ups. The dumbbell weight was perfect assuming grip work was the goal as that was getting toasty by the end. Still decent oblique work but definitely could’ve done a lot more weight if not using a fat gripz. Stretched and packed up my big circus dumbbell to start training at home during the week with it and relaxed the rest of the evening.
Comments: Out to train at the gym again. All gas, no brakes I guess. Would be a test of sorts I think to see if I recover quicker from competition under the new training and the post and pre contest training. Although it could be considered a light contest that I did so may not be the best gauge of things. I got a bit of a later start to my day as packed up to train in the morning rather than the night before and I had to fill up the car. Traffic really bad for no reason going through the highway near the city on the way there so I ended up getting there later than planned too. As far as what I had in store for myself today, it seemed to be prep for the October show with event work for the August show. Movement prep stuff had split squats and brought in hip airplanes that I haven’t done in several years. My balance on those is crap so I do need a slight balance assistance on those. Trying to control and hold positions. Getting blood flow to the small of my lower back where the disc bulge is. Can be hard to tell if it is helping or irritating. So start of the training was a little shocking. Nordic leg curl negatives. These are freaking brutal and I’ve had my hamstrings just straight up cramp up on me initiating the movement in the past. So usually done later in the session but this they were first this time. I had to get creative with setup as I didn’t want to bother anyone to hold my ankles (and no one there was going to weigh enough to counterbalance my mass at the time) so I ended up using the inverse leg curl machine for my setup. Plan being to wake up the hamstrings. This certainly did. And man were these tough. Next up was keg toss. Still singles. Didn’t realize that it had been over a month since I last did these. Double the reps so 10 tosses this time. Last time it had been a light to moderate keg and it said moderate this time. So I added 2lbs of a sand to the keg to get a nice 25lbs. Having watched video from the last time they had this event at the contest in August, I saw they had them run up to the keg for the toss. I was initially only going to do it for the first and sixth as it is a five keg series but I figured with the compressed timeline (6 weeks) that I should practice for all of them to get that ingrained now. Lot of activity in the parking lot so I had to really target my tosses (biker gang back and some people trying to leave the parking lot). The bikers seem to think keg toss is way more badass than sandbag toss from the reactions I heard before they left haha. Though regardless of what I toss, they get bored after I do it like 4 times. The unyielding quality of the metal for grip definitely makes these harder on the fingers compared to sandbag tosses. Only really notice when the volume goes up. Last toss I mimicked what I would do if I was going for the next keg. Mostly to see how I would do and because it was the last one so I didn’t have to worry about chasing down the keg in the EMOM time limit. I definitely think that needs work for me to get my breathing right to go fast. So back inside for squats. Squats with the ssb. With bands. And done as rack squats. Advised to do them at 60% with for 5x3 with bands that were 10-15% of 1rm added. Rack height I was told to lower to parallel or so so I dropped the pin height 1 from what I’ve been doing the rack squats from. Just using the same max weight for these to get the percentages so the band setup was the same as what I did the week before the contest. Bands slightly more tension at the bottom with it being not as deep as when I go into a full squat. I was told to keep rest 60-90 seconds so I set timer to go off every 90 seconds. Told to keep solid brace and move fast. Initially, my left knee wasn’t liking to get under the weight so I was a little nervous that this ROM without knee sleeves wasn’t good but that seemed to go away as I got ready. Initially thinking that maybe this weight would be too much but I guess once I said to myself this was my working weight, the weight felt pretty darn easy, only having it feel like something on the first rep of the fourth set when I mistimed the timer. These went pretty good. Then it was on to a test of sorts with yoke. Until fairly recently, I never had a problem with yoke despite having reasons to have problems. I literally fractured a vertebra doing yoke a decade ago. And usually with how contests go, I tend to have issues with getting warmed up for yoke since I’m generally a lot taller than other competitors. There have been instances where my only warm-up has been the empty implement. I think out of all the times I’ve done yoke in contest, I’ve only been happy with how I’ve done twice and both of those times were in 2018. After the pain relapse end of 2018, yoke hasn’t been the same really. I’ve gone up to 800lbs maybe once since then. February 2021 was the last time I did yoke and I just gave up on it as I had to psyche myself up with belt to move 500lbs when I’ve done over 1000lbs a handful of times. So haven’t touched it over than to move 90-210lbs around to use it for setups for other events in over five months. And I got a contest coming up in early October for 1000lbs as part of a medley. So for today, this was tipping the toes back in to the very deep pool. I was advised to do 4x50’ beltless with it being no more than RPE 6 and not having to go full speed if I didn’t feel comfortable. In my head, I wanted at least 500lbs so I could confront myself from earlier this year. Still have concerns with lower back stuff. I started things off with doing casual pace with it empty. Just taking a walk. Then added some speed to it. Oof, hamstrings feeling that shift in gears. Not quite top speed. I then switched to half distance before getting to the goal weight of 500lbs. Now as far as what I was looking at, I was hoping to at minimum hit 60% of my all-time best beltless yoke of 800lbs. Had to go way back to figure this as I tended to have my rehband belt on and still refer to it as beltless when really it isn’t. My best with rehband belt only was 935lbs (what I broke my back on haha). The stretch goal was 70% of that (560lbs) but I’d settle for 500lbs. Comfortable but not terribly fast. It felt too easy so I said screw it, I’ll add 20lbs a set. I ended up getting stuck in a conversation with someone at the gym after my third run so I did cooldown a bit before going. My times compared to my belted runs are about 3 seconds slower. I have to wonder on strategy as I won’t be fast if I get 1000lbs at contest with the short time frame so should focus be on a solid start and steady pace or keep trying to go faster right off the bat? On to more event work with power keg loads. August contest has max keg load (max of 455lbs) and I should be good on that. I think. Thing is despite being good at stones, I’ve never really had to push much with keg and haven’t had to do more than 350lbs in competition. Plan for today was to work up to a smooth double (RPE 7-7.5) and then drop of 10% and do 8x1 EMOM. As with stones for last training cycle prep, I had the height 4” above contest. No one has used the power keg at the strongman gym for a long time as it was covered in dust, cobwebs and had one decent sized dead spider and two large dust bunnies inside. Weights are estimates (144lbs empty with spacers) as the battery powered scale was dead and the other scale is a pain in the ass to get out and it only goes up to 350lbs which I was certain I’d be going over based off how I felt I should do. I took big jumps. Mostly I think because it takes time to load and secure the power keg. We have kegs that go up in 25lbs jumps to 325lbs but the contest is using a power keg for all the attempts and it just feels different to me. I didn’t take the weight seriously on my second to last double. I had tried to quick lap and go and missed on the second rep. This seemed to have been good tactic for me but I guess there is a limit when it comes to strength that it doesn’t work. The keg down flat is a good bit tougher for the next load at these weights. So I did only a 40lbs jump for the last double. First one was easy, second rep not so much. So I may have gone a little above the effort I was supposed to. The tie breaker for the show if multiple people get the 455lbs is time which could be a problem for me as I take it slow to not tear my biceps on the pick with these heavy weights. The EMOM the weight was just a bother to lap it but the loading was so easy. I reset the keg each rep. Tape saved my shins. Last item for the day was a super set of step ups with the ssb and dumbbell side bends. I was told to do holds and use a fat gripz if I wanted to on those. I was hoping to go heavier on the step ups but reconsidered with how my knees were feeling. Box height I was told to do it from 14-12”. Trying the 14” was just not happening as it seemed like a weak spot for my knee and it was a stilted extension of the knee with just the bar. Goal was to do RPE 7 for both and that wasn’t happening at 14” so I went with 12” and that was a ton more manageable. I wasn’t certain what fatigue would be like with the number of reps, not doing step-ups in a long ass time and having the obliques fatigued with the side bends for the following sets. In hindsight, I could’ve gone heavier on the step-ups. The dumbbell weight was perfect assuming grip work was the goal as that was getting toasty by the end. Still decent oblique work but definitely could’ve done a lot more weight if not using a fat gripz. Stretched and packed up my big circus dumbbell to start training at home during the week with it and relaxed the rest of the evening.
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