May 13, 2023 – Week 9, Day 4

Bulgarian Split Squats with Rotation
bwx5/5
17.5’sx10/10
17.5’sx10/10

Sandbag Tosses (10’ away)
30x1
35x1
40x1
45x1
45x1
45x1
45x1
45x1
45x1
45x1
45x1

Frame Carries
Titan Fitness (16”)
Casual Pace
115x50’
115x50’
Makeshift (18”)
Normal
276x50’
376x25’
476x25’
BiggDogg Strongg (20”, 1.5” handles)
568x25’
638x25’
Drop and Turns Halfway
700x100’ in 25.23 seconds
Normal
700x50’ in 10.82 seconds
700x50’ in 11.63 seconds
568x25’

Stone to Shoulders
Atlas Stone
205x1
235x1
265x1
290x4
Stone of Steel
252.5x4
252.5x4

Atlas Stone Roll-ups
290x8

Wide Grip Rolling Bar Hangs
bw+45 for 45 seconds
bw+45 for 25 seconds/bw+35 for 15 seconds

Stretching
 
Comments: This session had to deal with some changes I had to work around. The first was that the gym was closed from11:30AM to 2:30PM because of a seminar. Seminar was to be Mark Felix and Nick Best but Mr. Best had to cancel and it was just Mr. Felix. Maybe it would be valuable but I’ve not felt like going to seminars would be helpful. I’m also not very good with social situations. Both are in the area for the wedding I’m invited to next week. So options were to either come to the gym really early to get things knocked out before 11:30AM or show up after 2:30PM. Seeing as how worn this week has having me feel and that it was pretty much going to rain until the seminar started and start up again right after (but eventually stopping for good), it made more sense to rest and go later. But then there was also plans to have dinner with family since my mother would be spending time with grandkids and my older sister on Mother’s Day. So it was going from one thing to the other. I slept in because I knew it would be a later day for me and I didn’t want to eat breakfast at normal time and then be low energy or starving but have to hold off so as not to get an upset stomach and to be able to eat a late dinner. It was raining a little but I didn’t think it would be as bad as it ended up being driving out. The traffic sign said it would take 20 minutes to get to my exit (6 miles) so that had me concerned (it was wrong but still). There were like 8 cars on the side of the road. So that added a bit of time. And then there was construction as I was getting into Lancaster so added more time. So ended up about a 30 minutes later than I had planned. But I guess later was better as far as avoiding rain. It was cool but very humid in the gym as the fans weren’t going. I decided to try out some different things warming up for the start of the session. Namely using a kettlebell weight on my knee for the knees over toe stretching. Maybe that helped things as I went into the Bulgarian split squats. Even though it didn’t feel like it helped last week doing a bodyweight set for half the reps, I did it again. Rather have the jitters be on the bodyweight set than a weighted set. These felt fairly good with the adjustments. I guess I’ll see if this is repeatable for next week. So then it was time for sandbag toss. It was damp and raining a little. Not enough to really hamper anything. I mean, if I was able to do sets in the torrential downpour that one week, I can handle a little drizzle. The lighter week. My hamstrings near the glute inserts were feeling tight. Now last time had been 10x1 and this time 8x1. But same weight. Although not really I guess in that last time was to be 42.5lbs but got the 5lbs increments. Maybe too fixated on those jumps as there is no reason I can’t adjust the weights with the spare sand as needed for the day. But this time was to 45lbs and I had plans afterwards. But note to self that I don’t need to be so rigid to these things. Again goal was shorter rest and no misses. Hard to really tell until I’m done for certain. And I seem to be having issues with setup for filming as the “dumpsters” keep getting moved and then avoiding direct rain on the camera. I set down a towel on the ground for where the bag was to rest to hopefully keep moisture on it down (there was enough fabric to cover if needed). I pretty much had decided to do these all as hop back style to work that as well as see if this was viable really beyond just the very first bag in the competition series. Based off this, it is not. I’d say two of the tosses had the height and I got the distance from target right. Few were below the height but a fair number I was too far away with the trajectory I was doing. That is one disadvantage to the setup in that the hard “smack” denial lets you know that part. What I need to work on is getting into position efficiently without sapping energy. Perhaps next time when I won’t feel crunch time of later in the day session and having to go someplace afterwards. Time for frame work. I got things set up for this and it was mostly just light rain and it had essentially stopped by the time I had worked up to the big frame to take outside. I wasn’t sure how things were going really as every other set felt easy while the even sets felt difficult. Like 376lbs felt like nothing and 476lbs had me questioning my life decisions. Anyway, the plan was to do RPE 8 (675-700) for a set of 100’ with a drop and repick at 50’ and then either use the same weight for 2 sets of 50’ or drop 10% off if needed with goal being more speed intent. Kind of had to decide if I was doing 675lbs or 700lbs. Plan was 700lbs from the start but as I mentioned, stuff was feeling a little rough. I could do about a 100lbs jump from 568lbs to the working sets with 675lbs but not if I was doing 700lbs. I’d need to do an in between to be on the safe side with the amount of weight. 638lbs did not inspire confidence as it was feeling quite heavy and like I was going to black out near the end. Need to not have that be a thing. No set rests on this so I did take my time here. With it being an odd number of runs, I had to spend some time backwards shrugging and dragging the frame into position to make it easier to put away. This was pretty much contest weight and conditions. Weight slightly less and the distance slightly longer with grip slightly thicker. Pick felt slow but grip was holding strong. I think I was a little nervous the repick was going to be a slog but thankfully it wasn’t that bad and I was able to get up and going. Just legs felt heavy. Finished just over 25 seconds. Sub 25 seconds is the goal for the show and I feel I can do that now. So good to be hitting this with still essentially 5 more weeks to go (so two more touches). It was a bit ask of myself to add 50lbs to this from last time but I did it. So I was initially going to go down 10% for the two runs. But I reconsidered. I was not going to set any land speed records today with any weight I felt at this point. And it did say same weight or 10% if needed. And I could do 700lbs for these two runs. I think part of it was that it is likely this event is going to be the last event of a two day show so fatigue may be a factor so work harder and get that grit and graft done and pull back the next few sessions. These weren’t very fast runs. Surprisingly, the first run was not the slowest I’ve done this weight. Pick was a lot harder on the second one and I made up for it with footwork but it was really slow compared to what I’ve done. Had help with taking weights off so I was able to put frame away quickly before it started raining again. Took a bit of break chatting with Andrew about training theory and I think also to give myself some time to cool down. I needed to not be so sweaty for stone work and I had turned on the fans after the people that were there before me had left. Get the air circulating. and it was time to do some stone lifting. Slightly different from last time and the time before. I’d say this was kind of a combination of all the three past stone to shoulder sessions. Work up to a top set and then down sets. The top set was to be something that I felt was RPE 8 for 4 reps. So like 2RIR. Other parameters were getting them done in like 45-60 seconds. I wasn’t too sure here as last time I had done 265x6 and like 4 of those reps would’ve been within the time limit. I’m finding with this exercise that I’m thinking it is harder than it is and it became quite clear to me last time when I was doing all the singles and then the rep set. As those singles were feeling quite tough and I felt that 4 reps was going to be really hard to get. And then I got 6 reps and felt better as I went. So I felt I had to push things here and get myself to believe I can do this weight for the reps I need to do. So singles and plan was the 290lbs stone. Lighter stones weren’t feeling that great. Combination of the frame work and I think just having my legs feeling squats and Nordic curls. Or the smaller diameter was something I wasn’t treating seriously or just messed with my setup as the 20” stones felt better. I got set (takes a bit to get myself ready) and went at it. Pacing was about 10 seconds to complete a rep and then 10 seconds rest. So got 4 reps but a little over 70 seconds total. I’m hitting the goal range with over 96% just like with the frame carry this far out. So it is more getting recovered and faster on transitions. For the down sets, I had the stone of steel. As I was to do 2x4 with 10-15% less and the next stone was 265lbs and slightly outside that range. I think I also wanted to go a little lighter just to get a faster pace and deal with a different stone that was slicker. Used a ton of chalk (order new chalk). First set I was a bit cautious and then on the second set I picked up the pace considerably. I hesitated slightly on the last pick since it had gotten a little away from me. First set just under a minute and the second set just under 40 seconds. If I can get myself feeling that confident and comfortable, I think 5-6 reps is possible. No back extensions. More stone roll-ups. Just a set of 8 reps this time around at RPE 7. I figured I’d use the 290lbs stone since last time it was way too easy with the 265lbs even without any sticky stuff. These were still quite comfortable once I got the stone lapped. I probably could’ve done 310lbs. Perhaps next time (assuming these are there). Last thing for the session was rolling bar hangs. Plan was do two sets to get a total of 75-90 seconds of work and then rest 2-3 minutes between the sets to recover. In the past, I’ve gone lighter to make it through as I tend to be good the first set and then struggle afterwards. I think with how well last time went with a good bit of weight added I thought maybe I had gotten over that. Nope. First set I had 45 seconds with 45lbs added and that felt pretty good. Not a max but within 10 seconds of dropping. Plan was then to get 30 seconds with the same weight. But nope, ended up losing my grip 25 seconds in so I stripped the weight off and put 10lbs less and got back up (took about a minute) to do a drop set with netted me an additional 15 seconds. Guess I need to be mindful of that when it comes to grip work not allowing hook grip. Put stuff away and drove home to have a late dinner with family (more of me eating while they visited and talked with me). It was after 9pm when I got home and stretched out. I was too tired to ice my knees before bed.