With how things went after the competition, it became too much to try and stick to getting things posted up timely so I pretty much sidelined things until I had a moment to breathe and get the competition write-up done. Was still training and uploading the videos as scheduled but just held on to write-ups and figured to just post all of the previous week's training as one post. I will likely be back to the individual day posts going forward.
June 26, 2023 – Week 1, Day 1
Single Band Arm Archer Rows/Kettlebell Windmills
lbx10/10 – 30x5/5
lbx10/10 – 30x5/5
lbx10/10 – 30x5/5
Wall Sits/Banded Seated Leg Curls
bwx30 seconds/mbx30
bwx30 seconds/mbx30
bwx30 seconds/mbx30
Deadbugs (5 second holds)
bwx10/10
bwx10/10
Walking – 17 minutes
Stretching
Comments: It was dumb of me to come back to work on Monday after the competition. I was so tired when I got home that I didn’t have time to really decompress and debrief myself. And coming into work with expectations that anything I had asked for help with the week prior or to be covered for the one day I was out was also dumb of me to expect. But it lead to quite a high spike in my stress coming back to that and still not being resolved by the end of the day when I had to come in for an all day meeting/training day and likely get nothing done as well. So feeling that stress wasn’t helpful. But I guess the fact I didn’t need to take any ibuprofen this day was a good sign. Right knee is achy but hopefully that goes away with doing some lighter off season stuff for these next few weeks to correct things and recover. This workout was optional and I could’ve just gone for a walk but I felt that I needed to do some moving around as I did some walking during the weekend (and I didn’t get sore calves) and I wasn’t going to be able to do my usual walk during lunch or after work because I’d need to commute and wear work clothes. I was very surprised I wasn’t feeling incredibly stiff and sore doing the initial mobility stuff for the session that started with those archer rows and windmills. I kind of forgot that I was to do them with a split stance that first set. I was fully expecting my shoulders to be pissed off about the windmills as they had felt that way just doing the motion the day before when I was trying to warm up for Day 2 of Regionals. I also had thought maybe I was using too much weight as it was to be more a low RPE of 3-5 and flow state. But it seems that I was on the low end of effort here with that. Remembered to do the split stance the second set. Got a little too excited with the kettlebells and hit the ceiling the second set getting them into position. From there it was a combo for the knees. Wall sit isometrics followed by band leg curls. Ridiculously light band tension (micro to mini) for high reps. Tendon health and muscle stuff. Isos were an idea I was thinking of looking at for the legs with the knee stress. Among some other ideas. But I’ve been so swamped and not had time to really put things into more articulated thoughts. And I need to find the time to do that to. Felt like my legs need to be bigger and stronger. Even with this low effort hold, my quads were twitching like the Thing being found out during the blood test scene. Last “exercise” was dead bugs. I’m good on these when the motion is constant. But put in holds and the lower abs are just screwed. These were thankfully without the band resistance like last training session. But the hold time was longer. And I was to do these with 60-90 seconds rest. I was fatiguing quite hard and had to take a brief rest most of the way through the second set and then resume to finish up the set. These are tough. But likely showing an issue/weakness. Feeling like I have a lot of those lately. Last thing was some cardio. Options being walking or sled drag. Since it had been raining hard (and I wouldn’t need to worry about weights or clear streets), I went with walking. I ended up taking a little longer than the suggested 10-15 minutes but I felt that was fine since I knew I wouldn’t get time tomorrow to do anything. Stretched and iced my knees after and I made and ate dinner. Went to bed really frustrated with just my current situation.
June 28, 2023 – Week 1, Day 2
Paused Hatfield Bulgarian FFE Split Squat (3”, 2 seconds)
65x5/5
95x5/5
125x5/5
155x12/12
155x12/12
Front Squats (5-1-0-0 tempo)
45x3
75x3
105x3
135x8
135x8
Nordic Curl Negatives
bwx5
bwx5
bwx5
Kettlebell Power Pin Swings
104x8
104x8
104x8
104x8
104x8
Hollow Rocks
bwx25/15/10
Stretching
Comments: In a surprise to nobody, Tuesday also didn’t go great. At least for the first half of it. Stress from work and not getting the assistance I’ve been asking for in some cases for 2 weeks and feeling the crunch of having stuff be do while I will be out and not having a workable plan. And having to come in for day for manufactured reasons. But also because I haven’t had the chance to really decompress from competing. Really seeing how important that is for my continued mental health. I’m irritable. Didn’t get the chance to do anything exercise related Tuesday because of having to go into the office all day. Doesn’t help feeling envious of other competitors that also competed that are hitting life-time PRs while I’m nursing things and trying to figure out where the bruises on my upper arms came from. This was going to be a much harder workout compared to Monday. That was more for moving around. This was going to be a session where I get bad DOMS because these things haven’t been at the forefront. I should note that I was distracted from things outside myself and wasn’t aware that there was more air quality alerts due to more fires in Canada. I probably should’ve noticed but didn’t figure out until after training. But it wasn’t as poor as it was the last time. Starting things off was my choice of unilateral quad dominant exercise with some tempo involved. Tempo on lower body stuff (especially quad dominant) was going to really put a hurting on me. I had a few ideas in mind and I was having a hard time deciding what was the medicine I needed. Eventually settled on the convoluted hatfield Bulgarian split squats with the front foot elevated. Supposed to be lower RPE and do 2x10-12 with 1-2ct pauses. I felt having the back leg elevated like this would take the “assistance” of that leg out of the equation and work the inner thighs/hips but adding the holding the rack to provide stability and assist in more weight to load eccentrically and be able to complete the sets. I think free standing stuff can be lighter stuff and come later so as not to put so much side to side stability strain on the knees just at the moment. As still feeling the competition. These were needed but lord were they terrible. Feeling almost immediate soreness and breathing hard. But I managed to get through these. Then it was on to front squats. Tempo here too but much longer eccentric. This was actually something that I was going to suggest to Drew as an idea to do (part of it anyways) but we appear to have been of the same mind with the unilateral tempo stuff and now front squats. Front squats seem to feel fine for my knees even when they feel quite crappy vs spinal loading of say the ssb. But I still need to work out my thoughts and articulate it as far as the overall plan of approach. This was also to be lower RPE and for 2x8. With the long eccentrics and how my quads were already feeling, I knew I wasn’t going to get very heavy here and that was fine. These were getting challenging near the end. Nordic curls were up next. Just 3x5 and indication to control the eccentric. I wasn’t too sure how the hamstrings would feel after competing but things were good. I do like doing these kind of exercises as I’ve seen the positive effects for the tendons and the hamstrings but they are not an always exercise as they are quite hard to recover from if done successively. At least for the small muscles in the lower leg that connect. The rest of the session was newish things to me. Power pin swings. Initially I was reading this as training for power stairs but now seeing it might just be to work on the motion of loading the hips for a sandbag toss. To build that up. I don’t have a power pin at home (3 at the gym that I think might be mine but not 100%) but have a loadable kettlebell handle that should work for this. Little different from the usual loading as it was 5x8 and I don’t think I’ve had anything programmed for that many sets on an exercise for those kind of reps. Not complaining, I’ve done this kind of stuff before. Just interesting. I’m not 100% certain I did these as expected. RPE was to be higher than the other stuff but maybe I cut it light as unfamiliar with the movement. I do feel I got better as I went besides the last set. Last thing was a variation of the hollow hold pose. But adding some dynamics to it. Rocking back and forth for core work. Looked silly and something I’ve probably done before out of boredom in some variation. But likely it was going to be tough. Plan was 50 total reps with breaks as needed to keep the RPE 7. I did what I thought was 50 in one clip and took a rest but thought about it and realized that maybe this was only 25 reps as the back and forth might just count as one rep. Better to be safe than sorry. So I did the rest over 2 sets. These lower abdominal exercises just seem to be really tough for me. And likely something that needs improvement. But seem to be tough to recover from. Cooked up dinner and stretched. No icing, letting the inflammation in the legs run its course.
June 29, 2023 – Week 1, Day 3
Alternating Dumbbell Bench Presses/Bird Dog Dumbbell Rows (2 second holds)
10’sx10/10 – 20x10/10
40’sx5/5 – 40x5/5
70’sx8/8 – 70x8/8
70’sx8/8 – 70x8/8
70’sx8/8 – 70x8/8
Iso Seated Log Pin Presses (5 seconds)/Dumbbell Lateral Raises/Band Y Raises to Hold (10 seconds)
87x3/26’sx10/µb’sx10
87x3/26’sx10/µb’sx10
87x3/26’sx10/µb’sx10
Overhead Band Triceps Extensions
mbx20
mbx20
Stretching
Comments: As expected, I was feeling sore today in the lower body. And likely would be even more so the next day. Just the way things are when it comes to this particular brand of soreness for these muscles and when they are worked in a way they haven’t been used to for a good bit. Some of the stress has been alleviated with having a plan. May not be a good plan but telling myself there is a plan at least lets me afford the option to differ the burden to another time. Essentially working on getting stuff done at work (I’ve been given some break in workload due to time out of office) and waiting until this weekend to finally get some thoughts and ideas down on the proverbial paper. So potentially holding on to these workout session write ups (but posting videos ASAP) until the end of the week so that I don’t feel like I have to get them done. Especially with the upcoming vacation break and those being just band and bodyweight sessions, not really a need to post them while away. But back to the training session. So air still not great. Same as the day before. I think paying attention and being aware of it makes me notice it more. But it isn’t as bad a level as it was the one day when this first happened. This workout was a fair number of exercises but all clustered together. First was a pairing of antagonistic muscle groups. Alternating dumbbell bench presses supersetted with bird dog rows. I’ve not done alternating style pressing before but I have done the bird dog rows. I’ve liked those as something to get back into the swing of things. But I was also thinking more chest/pectorals were probably needed to be built up for log pressing. No tempo related things for the pressing but holds for the rows. I set things up so that I could drop the dumbbells for both exercises. I wasn’t too sure on the style of pressing here really as it said alternating and notes indicated to “seesaw”. I warmed up seesawing the weights and then did alternating (holding the weights at lockout of the non-pressing side) for the first two working sets. I wasn’t sure if this was a time under tension thing (the former) or a mobility thing (the later). I felt more chest effort in the holding at the top and needing to stabilize vs the more mobility based one. Honestly didn’t feel like that much. I was a little concerned that the left side wouldn’t feel that great on these. It was good that the 70’s were the right call for weight. Not much ado for the bird dog rows. Those have been something I’ve done before. Just took a bit at times to figure out which leg corresponded with which arm for the balance. Balance on these is tough at the start but I know it will improve. Forearms near the elbows were feeling the competition at this point. So the next part was more stuff sandwiched together but not any antagonistic groups. More of several different aspects with some priming followed by exhaustion tactics. This took a bit to setup because while some of it wasn’t new (the dumbbell and band stuff), I hadn’t done log iso pressing into pins before. I was to do them seated for triples with the empty log for 5 second efforts at the midway point. I wasn’t sure if my rack setup would be the right one to get the right ROM. I will say it was easier to setup things for anchoring the weight down for an overhead press vs a deadlift. I was initially not feeling the log getting things setup so I was a little concerned that the hill to climb here was going to be more than I wanted to get to an appropriate level. I can’t really make sense of what the numbers for viking press really meant in the grand scheme of things since estimates and I bombed it at competition. But once I got to it I was feeling pretty good. The triset was to be those into dumbbell lateral raises. 10 reps here at RPE 6. I knew that these would fatigue hard with doing isometrics and pairing with static holds and reps of the next exercise. I still went a little heavier just to have it be not too easy if I guessed wrong. The last bit being the y band raises into hold. 10 reps here and then a hold for 10 seconds on the last rep. I misread the rest time so I did go longer than planned for this triset. The isos felt better each set but the fatigue on the reps for the other stuff was noticeably getting tougher. How it does seem to go when I’ve done this kind of thing. Last thing was triceps. Band stuff for overhead. 2x12-20 reps here. Notes said to use micro or mini band and anchor to rack or dumbbell. I was a little confused with things as mini band is quite light tension and it would be difficult to have this setup where I’d feel I had 3-5 reps left for a set of 20 reps. So I did try and get as much tension as I could out of it and really controlled the movement. Also went with the shorter rest period range. Did neutral grip the first set and pronated the second to just get different angles worked. Put stuff mostly away (I left the setup for pin pressing for next week) before stretching and then eating dinner.
July 1, 2023 – Week 1, Day 4
11” Floating Kabuki Trap Bar Deadlifts (Versa Gripps, 5-1-0-0 tempo)
65x3
65x3
115x3
175x3
225x3
285x8
307.5x8
329.5x8
B-Stance Romanian Dumbbell Deadlifts (same side)
40x5/5
80x5/5
110x15/15
110x15/15
GHD Back Extension Holds
bwx37 seconds
bwx37 seconds
Paused Band Assisted Quad Fallbacks (3 seconds)
abx3
abx3
lbx5
lbx5
lbx5
Hip Belt Backward Tire Drags
50x200’
50x200’
Stretching
Comments: Finally got the chance to go for a walk on Friday. Air was still bad. Been bad longer than it was last time. Supposedly will be out of the red tomorrow (it was purple the last time). I felt that I needed to walk to help with the soreness in my legs. Doing soft tissue work would help but not nearly as much as also walking around and moving. I had to wait until after work as I couldn’t guarantee I’d walk my usual 2 miles and be back before my lunch break was over. I was feel that stiff. I had initially not planned to go out to train at Lancaster since this was offseason training and the idea with the sessions had been to allow for them to be done at home if necessary since I’d be spending 9 days away from home. The gym also is having events happening this month that could affect gym hours (I wasn’t sure about middle of the month but won’t be here but there is end of the month). However, with the release of event details for Nationals of the deadlift being a trap bar I’ve not used before (kabuki) and the gym having that bar by chance, it made sense to go to the gym. Especially since I could do some of these planned exercises better there then at home and maybe I needed to get out of the house. I had intended to sleep in more but my body said up and I got out there early enough to see people training other stuff for upcoming shows. There had been a partial downed power line on the way so that was something too. I could tell I was still on edge as I was feeling irritated if someone got into my peripheral at the start of things (feeling like they were too close to me). Didn’t really do much mobility work here. I got things setup for the deadlift. Contest will allow the briefs I wore for Nationals last year but didn’t bother with them at this point. So plan was to do 3x6-8 on floating trap bar pull. 3-5 second eccentric with brief pause about 1-2” off the ground. Pick height being 10-12”. This trap bar did look very different with the opening on the one side. It provides its own stand to make loading and unloading weight easy. The knurling is very harsh. Tested out Versa Gripps and my long straps here and decided no really difference in feel other than it taking longer to get the normal straps locked. Competition will be using kilo plates so another reason to test things out and see how they feel. I was initially thinking 285lbs but then thought might be too much after the weights I had to use for front squats with the same tempo so maybe low 200’s instead of high 200’s. I got set and felt like 285lbs was going to be too light and that I could do more. Unlike say the front squats or the complicated single leg work from Wednesday, this wasn’t something I had every day access to or had done all the time. So I added 10kgs a set with making sure the RPE didn’t go above the top end of RPE 6. I took a bit of a break to kind of talk with people and get the sweat to stop for a bit as I put the stuff away. This was helpful and I don’t think I have to use this exact bar to train for the show if I have to. Next was unilateral work. Kind of. I say kind of as there is an emphasis but not truly one side doing the work. Just more so one side with the stance and weight placement. This was b-stance rdls. Didn’t say dumbbell but notes were to do weight on the side the at forward so that left dumbbell or kettlebell. And dumbbell would allow greater ROM. I’ve done these with dumbbells in both hands and dumbbell in opposite side so this was a little different. It is probably a good thing I did these at this gym as I wasn’t expecting 80lbs to feel that easy and need to do 110lbs. Plan as low RPE for 2x10-15. Even this weight had felt lighter than expected. No acceleration reps. So I did these full ROM rather than just mid shin to get a good stretch and kiss the ground. I took short rest and switched sides. Maybe I should’ve rested between sides as the left side felt a lot tougher. Rested before the second set. That set was harder compared to the first for obvious fatigue related reasons. So that was done. Next was back work. Well lower back and glutes. Plan being to hold the lockout of a back extension on the ghd for 2 sets of 30-60 seconds. Add weight if needed. I felt that I’d probably fatigue quick here but tested and immediately saw that no weight was going to be fine for me. Managed to get 37 seconds both times. This is definitely something that will need to be brought up considering the demands for nationals and just seeing how my body was from Day 1 to Day 2 of regionals. The last bit was for the quad/knee health. It was up to me on the order but I felt the order as written was how I was going to go about it. First part being those quad fallbacks. But using band assistance to keep RPE low and reinforce good form with pauses. I’ve done these without bands and with band resistance but it was more of me having the flexibility to get into the final position but not really moving through the full ROM and putting the stress where it needed to be. So I think these with band assistance are a better thing for me to work on this aspect. Ankles can be temperamental on these over time as well. I could probably use less band assistance, more that I needed to get comfortable with the ROM and not have things so tight to get my head touching the ground again. Last thing was light sled work. Lowest RPE thing here. I figured that I’d do 2x200’ with the essentially empty tire sled as that would meet the criteria and get blood pumping. This was probably barely the low end but it checked the box. Put stuff away and stretched before heading home. Need to use my Sunday wisely to get my thoughts in order finally. Or I’m going to miss it.
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