December 3, 2022 – Week 6, Day 4

Hip Airplanes (0-10-0-10 tempo)
bwx5/5
bwx5/5
bwx5/5

Safety Squat Bar Squats (beltless)
65x10
115x8
155x6
205x4
245x8
250x8
255x8
260x8

One Leg 15” Block Pulls (3-1-1-0 tempo)
65x3/3
105x3/3
145x3/3
185x8/8
185x8/8
185x8/8

Seated Safety Squat Bar Upper Back Goodmornings (5-0-0-5 tempo)
225x60 seconds
225x60 seconds

Backward Sled Drags (uphill)
595x125’

Stretching
 
Comments: Feeling less like I have cold each day now. And if I did have one, it was extremely mild one. The borderline of weak cold or bad allergies. Getting to just sleep in probably helped as well the night before. Still some concerns with the session just because ear stuff can lead to balance issues and this session has quite a bit of balance component to it. Arnold entry was posted but no weights provided on it (assuming athletes actually invited have the weights from seeing others talk about it). Some changes that would benefit me greatly. One is that the one medley sounds like it is just loading and not running with the items and it is a lot of items to load. An event from Day 2 is now Day 3 and the replacement is arm over arm. And the Day 3 events are max circus dumbbell and power stairs with a mystery event too. So I’m pretty much already training for this stuff with prep for both upcoming shows as I’ve previously mentioned. I’d very much like to do the Arnold with these circumstances but have to get the invite from people declining or dropping out. Any ways, on to training. So with the weather as it was (raining off and on with periods of sun), I had to kind of time things in a way that I either got finished before it would rain again, wait until after it rains again or try and do it so that the rain stops at the end when I need it to for the last part of the session. I went with the last option as one would be going too early and the other too late. I also couldn’t go to the strongman gym even if I wanted to for this week because they were running a big powerlifting meet that was both Saturday and Sunday. First thing was hip airplanes. This was the same as last week with it being 3x5. I decided to switch up with side I started out with on these (I usually do the left side to pivot) to see if that helped with the balance issue. My left side tends to be tighter but I seem to always have some balance thing going on with some reps on the right side despite it feeling like the easier side. I’ve pretty much fully committed to using support on these with how much time these are in those positions over a set. Right side felt fine that first set but left side my hips and hamstrings felt tight and my left calf felt like it was going to cramp up trying to keep balance. Thankfully, those sensations lessened as I went. Of course last rep of last set right side I had my one balance issue but progress in that usually I have 2-3 of those over the sets. From there it was on to squats with the ssb. I was initially peeved with what was posted as less weight than the previous week for 4x8. But then looking at it saw that it was actually a range of 235-250lbs. No support gear and report back RIR on the last set. I felt if things felt good as far as adapting to how the bar felt on my back compared to last week that I’d do more warming up reps and do at minimum 245lbs but plan was to either do 245x2x8 and then 250x2x8 or just go up 5lbs a set if feeling really good. Or not. The weight felt decent enough on my back and more reps warming up wasn’t terribly taxing. I was initially concerned that hips might be still too tight but they were fine. Left knee was taking a bit to feel good. As is sometimes the case with squats (especially when I’ve taken a break from them), the first few sets may not be accurate of what I can actually do. Which has sometimes meant repeating sets working up like in the past training cycle. So I knew that basing things off that first set would probably short change myself. Like if I had stuck with 205lbs last week. So 245lbs this week felt harder than I would’ve liked. I decided though to do the 5lbs increase plan on the assumption that it would work out for me. 250lbs felt easier than 245lbs so seemed I called it right. But then 255lbs felt similar to 245lbs after the first three reps and then I was like damn it. 260lbs though I guess I was finally warmed up and serious because this felt like a joke. If I rated the sets for RIR, it would be 1st 5RIR, 2nd +5RIR, 3rd 5RIR and 4th 8-10RIR. Thing is that it can be hard to gauge things on these as there is a point where my core can’t hold the brace well enough at a weight compared to everything else without a hard belt. But that is how it feels at these weights. I just know that squats help at the mid range on pulls as far as the middle back is concerned with the ssb after that one cycle of none and just front squats. Legs felt great but there was something missing. So from there it was on to the single leg block pulls. Indication was last week of these and going from the floor next time. Same tempo and 3x8 plan. No RIR indicated but weight suggested as 175-185lbs. As last week and no RIR, I decided to push it to 185lbs. I felt I could do it but it would be tough. I knew this would be tough as this was harder balance wise than the hip airplanes with support and my grip fatigue. My grip was fatigued a lot more than usual for the week from added grip work on Wednesday and the increased TUT on the zottman curls from the night before. Balance usually seems to be better on my right side for these and as such, usually feels stronger. While balance was still better, fatigue was higher for that side today. Right knee was feeling sore/tender, probably from squats. Manageable. Also noticed at this point that it had started raining again. My hope being that it would stop before I finished my garage training. Grip, lower back and hamstrings were feeling it today, though lower back wasn’t feeling as rough as it did last week. Everything held up on me to the very end. So it would seem I adapted to the squats before the pulls nicely enough as both were harder and heavier plans this week. The next exercise was the seated gms for the upper back. Advised to go lower than last week by adding changes to the tempo. So instead of just a 5ct hold at contraction to also do 5ct eccentric. I was still tempted to keep the same weight as last week but I listened since I’ve not done tempo on these before and who knows how that will affect things. Same 2x60 seconds. Unrack still feels awkward but the actual movement itself is pretty easy. Doubling the time essentially means less reps in the time limit. I’d finish the rep I was on when time went. I do think this is doing more for me vs just the hold at extension but I think I need either more time for the sets (like 2 minutes or more) or to just have set reps to do. But I did like the feeling of the eccentric control. Last thing was sled work. This was why I needed it to stop raining, which it did. But still very damp out despite the sun being out. Notes indicated this was the last week of these and then add in a carry instead. So what was listed was to warm up as needed to RPE 9 for 100-150’. Adjust distance as needed. Because of the street being such and resetting taking like 5 minutes, it was best to set a course that was 150’ with markers at 125’ and 100’ in the event those distances were sufficient. I was going to do 50lbs more than last week but elected to go up 90lbs to push. Warming up was again walking backwards with the handtruck loaded with 180lbs for 3 trips of about 125’. I could tell from the start this would be tough with the road wet from just how the empty sled felt pushing it downhill to the start. This was going to be tough. I had set the start well down the street so that I’d finish near my driveway for ease putting things away. But that also meant that the start would be harder because of the road down that way. So hard start and a hard end if I went past the 125’ mark. I was worried I made a big mistake when I started as things were really slow going. The nylon rope was starting to slip and I ended up wrapping it around my hands to take the grip out of it. I got a good pace eventually but then I slipped on a wet twig and fell on my butt. Ugh. Got back up and collected myself and got going again. With how this started, I was feeling like I’d not get to 50’ but things started to go well and I saw I passed 100’ and figured I could do 125’. Legs started to get pumped at that point and I stopped there as I knew the last 25’ would be about as tough as the start was and this was fine for RPE 9 as doing that would be RPE 10 with the current road conditions and my fatigue from the fight to just get to this point. Drank a protein shake and put stuff away before stretching out.