July 30, 2022 – Week 8, Day 4

Patrick Stepdowns (3 second eccentrics)
bwx20/20 at 6”
 
Drinky Birds
mb+17.5x10/10
mb+17.5x10/10
 
Front Squats w/ bands (+10lbs bottom/+56lbs top)
45x3
95x3
135x3
185x3
225x3
225x3
225x3
225x3
225x3
 
Keg Carries (high carry)
Turns at 25’
200x100’
Turns at 50’
250x310’
 
Backwards Tire Sled Drags
145x30 seconds
145x30 seconds
145x30 seconds
 
Stretching
 
Comments: Last session requiring any kind of effort really. Tried to make myself treat this as low key as I could. Just another day. Get done and be done. Also trying to get myself to go to sleep earlier so that I’m rested and recover as well as not have it be such a shock waking up early day of show to drive out there. Since it was a really short workout, I was debating sleeping in longer than I did. I was also trying to rationalize driving out to train for this one since I could do everything at home. I think the two reasons I went with were that I wouldn’t have to try and replicate band tension setup to be exact (even if it didn’t need to be) and that I’d be able to test keg on not uphill/downhill terrain. Getting out there a little early usually means more congested traffic heading out there. Which ended up being the case and apparently for no reason. I ended up thinking about how I’m maybe seeing one or two people from the past few training cycles still getting after it. It is possible that times of day aren’t matching up but it has felt like I’m seeing less and less familiar faces and usually left to my own devices. Wondering if it was really worth the effort to be friendly and remember names. Even getting there earlier, I seem to still be on the end of when the larger training group is finishing things up. I did get to see some familiar faces briefly with that. However, being here with less people does seem to make it not so hot in the gym. Staring things off with the little things. As has been the case for a few sessions, starting off with stepdowns (actually every weekend training this cycle) and then the drinky birds (newer addition as had been the lying clam planks). Last week had been a reduction in difficulty with the sets and eccentric count and this was more so. Just one set at 6” which was about half the height I’d been working up to and about half the count for the eccentric. Being such, I had no need to work up to this height. I did decide to try something different by using a hard foam setup instead of something firmer. One being that I didn’t have to protect my Achilles tendon from being rubbed raw and the other was that it added an additional stability component which has been some idea behind getting the lower limbs to kind of wake up and to their part. So this was easy. Since the usual spot I use to do the drinky birds was kind of crowded by people doing atlas stones, I stayed out in the wind tunnel for these. Shot them from a different angle. These seemed to be fine enough. Ran into a hiccup after these. Plan here was front squats against bands again but do 205-225lbs for the 5x3. Same band tension and same kind of rest. The problem was being too focused on the bands that I apparently forgot to pack my lifters. I pretty much always front squat with them and they had been recommended for use during this cycle of training on front squats. I don’t think I’ve ever front squatted in the particular shoes I was wearing. So had to chalk that up to an error on my part and just hope that this didn’t screw things up for me as far as the movement. The weight was light enough. I think I did sit back more with these shoes vs my lifters. Knees ached a bit more than I would’ve liked here but tolerable and within parameters. I still can’t believe I didn’t pack them. This would be the third time in my strongman career I’ve not packed the right shoes (the other two times were for competitions; one in 2013 and the other in 2018). Then it was time for keg carry. Warm up as needed and do one good set of conditioning style. Goal was distance over load on the assumption that load will be less of an issue for show when recovered. Suggested was 250-275lbs here. I was advised that if I felt that keg carry style would strain my biceps/back too much then I should go with a sandbag bear hug carry where I pick it off of a platform. For me, I didn’t think that that option would actually be the best thing as bear hug can feel like even more biceps for me and it can be hard to appropriately engage the lats and arms picking something off an elevated platform vs from the ground. Since the idea was distance over weight, I elected to do the 250lbs keg. I had to fight myself on that as the ego wants heavier but I knew lighter was the right course with the show next week. I needed to know I could go the distance. Just because I tell myself that the uphill/downhill after sleeping 17hrs and half my usual food intake is much harder vs flat surface and not dealing with a depressive episode doesn’t mean I’ve convinced myself. I tried to think about warming up as odds are that there will be minimal stuff so I felt best way to do that was 200lbs keg and do shorter distance for the turns as that is where things get tricky. That seemed fine enough. But I was still nervous with 250lbs. Not because I couldn’t do 100’ with it in my sleep but because I was worried that I couldn’t do 200’ super easy. I felt that I wasn’t going the distance on these during the cycle. I can’t rest on my laurels. I assume everyone is gunning for this that competes with me as much or more than myself, even if it is one of my better events. Training for speed vs distance is different and it can be a bit of mindbender as you feel slow but have to know that this pace is sustainable and will mean you outlast them all. And that is kind of how it is. I didn’t feel light on my feet or fast that first 100’ and same with the second 100’. But the point was that the first and second 100’ felt the same. I knew I had 300’ in me after I got 250’. I again made sure that I made the turn around before dropping. I had more in me. This actual was a PR for me for max distance as I’ve done this keg for 300’6” in the past as a straight shot so turns added is an added bonus. Save it for show. So that was a relief. Last thing was some backwards sled drag work. Idea here was something to get the lungs working with 30 seconds of effort followed by 60 seconds rest for three sets. Suggest distance that I’d cover each run being 100’. The issue with that long a distance was that it would cause inconsistencies in difficulty as odds were high I’d need to turn the object around and some parts are uphill and downhill where I can do sled drags. And then there was dragging around weights when I’d rather not for a conditioning exercise at the end of the third training cycle in a row. I’m not a fast backwards sled mover in most instances. Here for a long time, not a fun time it seems haha. So I wondered if I could get away with having low weight and high friction in the form of a tire drag. Plop a keg on top of it for some added resistance. This seemed to work but I was only able to move it 159’ over the three sets. I never stopped moving, it was just as fast as I could go with the resistance as it was. My legs didn’t feel tired and I was really breathing that hard really with the minute rest. I could’ve probably done it all in one set really. I put stuff away and decided to stretch out at the gym before heading home. There was an accident on the road shortly after getting outside of the city limits leaving that slowed things down but odds are with how it was clearing up that if I had left the gym when I was done rather than stretching first, I’d have still gotten stopped there.