August 9, 2021 – Week 4, Day 1

Mobility Prep
 
Circus Dumbbell Clean and Presses (Dumbbell with Fat Gripz Extreme)
40x1 L
10x1 R
40x1 L
10x1 R
40x1 L
10x1 R
40x1 L
10x1 R
40x1 L
10x1 R
40x1 L
10x1 R
40x1 L
10x1 R
40x1 L
10x1 R
40x1 L
10x1 R
40x1 L
10x1 R
40x1 L
10x1 R

One Arm Half Kneeling Landmine Presses (3 seconds negatives)
emptyx5
+20x5
+40x5
+60x5
+75x5
+90x11 (miscounted)
+78x10
+78x10
+78x10

Paused Half Kneeling Single Arm Band Pulldowns (3 seconds holds)
sbx10/10
sb+mbx10/10
sb+mb+µbx10/10
sb+mb+(2)µbx10/10

Paused Incline Bench Dumbbell Cuban Rotations (3 seconds holds)
10’sx10
10’sx10
10’sx10

Supinated Band Front Raises
mb’sx20
mb’s+µb’sx20
mb’s+(2)µb’sx20

Banded Pec Flyes
lb’sx15
lb’s+µb’sx15
lb’s+(2)µb’sx15

Single Arm Band Triceps Pressdowns
lb+µb/µbx20
lb+(2)µb/(2)µbx20
lb+mb/(3)µbx20

Stretching

Comments: I can be patient until I am not. Most of the time, I can do the wait for delayed gratification. But other times I can’t. Today I was allowed to take off the sling and the wrist brace and use as needed. But not exactly cleared to use my arm again. I was told I could test my ROM with it but to not lift for another 3 weeks. I’m kind of listening and kind of not. The PA that diagnosed this recent issue was the same that had looked at my knee when it was giving out on me. He had indicated it was potentially a torn meniscus or stretched LCL but that normally someone is in extreme pain when that happens. MRI and seeing doctor found nothing and determination was one side of the quads on that leg was overreaching. So leery that this also is an overly cautious diagnosis. I 100% believe that I have a sprained wrist. I’ve had this injury before and it took me 3-4 weeks (I still competed after spraining it on the first event at 2017 Nats) and I think I only took that much time despite the pain because I caught the flu at that Nats and couldn’t do stuff for two weeks. The elbow fracture is where I’m not sure. If fractured, it is very small (not 100% certain if a shadow or fracture per PA but he was like 90% sure) and in a spot that immobilizing the joint doesn’t seem to do much vs letting it be free. Sling was more to let it rest. And I had been testing my ROM during the week (christ I’m a bad patient) when I was allowed to take the stuff off to shower. I’ve already been doing things like typing and writing with the hand again and picking up items like toothbrush or a coffee mug. I’m telling myself not to go full bore on things at least unless I feel no discomfort of any kind. I did have intention of doing light band stuff with the injured side at least. At this point, I have full ROM in the elbow and only hampering thing is the that the forearm muscles tense up. My wrist does not have full ROM without pain yet and that was to be expected. Any honestly, full ROM isn’t required for what I need to do and I kind of what my wrist to not be all loosey-goosey. With that in mind, I had to make decisions on competition. While things seem good, I’m withdrawing from the August show. I’d be cutting things too close and a lot of additional stress that comes with it just not worth it. I am still planning to compete at the October competition though I may need to drop out of the pro qualifier portion and do the regular show. But I have up until 2 weeks out to make that decision. I may have only 5 weeks of solid unhindered training. So on to the training. Sleep wasn’t the best since I went “cold turkey” on the anti-inflammatories that night so I was feeling stuff that I hadn’t been. But I’ll get used to it. Midsection, lower back and hips beat up from last session. I wore my wrist brace for the workout. Initially, the workout was just going to be like my upper body day last week with going right into training without any mobility stuff. After talking with Drew, he gave me the ok to add some things. Namely, the foam rolling and the PNF stretching. I felt I needed these with the big emphasis on the thoracic spinae muscles with doing so much ssb stuff last week and potentially for this week too. Initially didn’t feel like I needed it at all but then I finally got stuff to relax and got to the deeper muscles that were super tight and sore haha. I also did some movement prep stuff with the wall slides and TKE step-ups. Also brought in the BTN split presses with the empty axle. These wouldn’t have been needed if I was not adding an exercise to the workout that hadn’t been programmed. I had been liking the motor learning circus dumbbell stuff and I figured I could do that stuff even with the not 100% arm. My main concern had been lockout and that seems resolved. I was told to do 10 singles with cleaning the dumbbell with good side (no assist from injured arm) and if I was ok, do the same with injured side (but use both arms). I decided to do it for both arms and picked 10lbs for injured side and 40lbs for good side. These felt good. So good I lost count of what I was doing and did 11 singles for each. Into the garage for the rest of the workout. With fans going. It had been like 90 I think outside so got a good sweat going too. So first up of the real workout was landmine presses. Kneeling version. I’ve done these in the past standing and maybe kneeling too. Pretty big weights for the standing version if I recall correctly. Like +200lbs. No clue what this or that is weight in hand. Not as important to figure out like viking press for event specificity. Told to work up in 5’s with 3ct negatives to a top set of 10 reps and then do more reps with percentage of that. Anchoring this was a bit of a hassle. I wasn’t sure what the weights added would feel like with the jumps but I guessed right. 90lbs felt good but I guess I miscounted and did an extra rep. Hard to keep track with counting negatives and reps when getting near limits haha. Went with 12.5% drop for the down sets. These got exhausting. Forgot my wrist wrap on the second one. Shoulder and triceps were feeling beat from these. Thankfully some rest with the next exercise being back focused. Single arm lat pulls while kneeling. Haven’t really pushed these. Plan was 4x10 each side if I could manage. Initially going to do much lighter band on the injured side (either gripping it or anchored to elbow like last week) but for whatever reason, this grip and the angle didn’t bother things in my wrist or forearm. There was some pressure but no pain. So screw it, I guess injured arm is game for this. My initial band tension wasn’t enough so I just kept adding. Honestly, the second band tension could’ve been enough for this but I’m kind of glad I kept pushing things. So up next was dumbbell upper back and shoulders. Rotations, with holds. It was an unknown if my injured side could do these. It could so I did. 10lbs was just right. Felt good. The rest of the workout was bands and more or less trying things out to see what sticks. First experiment was trying to work the anterior deltoids in the scapular plane. Initial thought was anchoring to elbow and supinating to keep in elbow crease. That wasn’t really working. I texted Drew to confirm intent as I wanted to test other things out. Pronated grip for injured side was not really an option, too much stress on the wrist and forearm. Anchoring at the elbow was putting stress on the forearm muscles that were inflamed. Oddly enough, the wrist brace and slight angling of hand to supinated actually was the only way that didn’t irritate stuff. So I did them that way. Always seen gymbros do these with cables and thought “what a bunch of tools”. Well I was the tool today. As I did with the lat pulls, I increased tension each set. Then next was band flyes. Essentially doing cable crossovers with bands. A little awkward but didn’t seem to irritate injured side so game on here too. Really got good contraction for the pec muscles. Balance is a bit tricky with these in that my bodyweight needs to be an anchor to keep from getting pulled back by the bands. Also kept increasing tension on these. Last bit for the day was single arm triceps with bands. I wanted to do stuff for injured side to just work ROM and light work so I did. Again, kept increasing the band tension but only really small amount for injured side. Put everything away before eating 3 huge burritos for dinner and then stretching. Hopefully I didn’t overdo things on the injured side but will have to wait and see.