November 26, 2023 - December 2, 2023 - Week 5

 November 27, 2023 – Week 5, Day 1

Dynamic Warm Up

Seated Reverse Band Axle Presses (back support, chin height, 110lbs assistance)
131x5
161x3
191x2
221x1
251x1
281x1
311x1

Band Assisted Pull-ups
sbx5 at pin 12
sbx5 at pin 15
sbx5 at pin 18
sbx5 at pin 21
sbx5 at pin 24

12” Log Incline Bench Presses
90x10
130x5
160x5
190x5
220x5

Stretching
 
Comments: Winding down. Saturday had been the last touches for two of the events and with the remaining three to come. It appears that finally found a caloric intake that is pushing the scale up now. But perhaps this is a outlier considering it was Thanksgiving. If anything, that made it harder to get my usual meals in. But not the usual foods. Back above 270lbs so I’m about the weight I was in March. And all it took was adding 800 calories to my daily intake. Kind of frightening to think that I was losing weight on over 4200 calories a day (on a lower day). But apparently that 4oz of yogurt a day got me over the 3 week plateau. Keep monitoring and make sure that I’m adapting to the changes. Work was surprisingly not as stressful as I was expecting it to be. It was weighing on me with stress stuff because of the stress related dreams. Either from eating foods I usually don’t allowing me to remember them or just enough stress that those particular dreams happen. Felt full most of the day (I also been feeling full since Saturday evening haha). Cold outside but not so much I needed to wear warm ups to warm up. Movement stuff to start things off. Joints felt surprisingly ok with warming up. I knew there would be some soreness in biceps, quads and hamstrings. Wore the warm ups setting things up because it was a little windy and I didn’t want my hands numb. Starting things off with reverse band work with the axle again. As expected, to a single. But a little different. 30lbs jumps as expected but indication was to only go up 5lbs more than my top double and stop there. There was even notes that if I didn’t feel like that would go to call it at 281lbs (the last jump). I was feeling pretty good but again, hard to gauge on this particular lift since dead stop and the 30lbs jumps can be a bit rough. Had to keep myself from wanting to deviate and do 316lbs and line things up for that. It was odd in that it like every other set my right shoulder felt achy. Noticing the power belly is in effect now with the belt and bracing. I had to make myself take a little more rest with it just being singles after a few sets. Especially because these get tough quick and misgrooving the lift is costly. 281lbs was almost that. It didn’t feel like I had a lot of power when I was setup to press but then something clicked and it just went up easy. Last time, my first rep with 306lbs went up fine but then I got stuck for forever at the sticking point on the second. This should be no problem for a single if it is like that first rep. I got set and gave it a push. And it stalled before it could event get above my head. I was shocked but I didn’t let it get to me. Something had felt off. I decided I’d try again immediately (like 15 seconds rest) and this time I had it a little more forward and actively compressed my shoulder girdle. And voilà, goes up with not that much effort. Felt similar to the first rep with 306lbs last time. I kind of was dumbstruck with the result (a complete miss and then an easy lift). I really need to be more consistent with my overhead. But I will make sure for next time (assuming this continues as an assistance lift after this competition) to do this going forward. So that I feel tight and don’t feel like I have no power. So again, not the most ideal way for things to go but I hadn’t put in a full effort on that first miss so more just a partial attempt warming up for the real thing moments later. A little bit of rest putting that setup away before moving on to band assisted pull-ups. Sets of five reps this time and indication was to start up higher (pin 12) but take bigger jumps (3 pins vs 2 pins). This would have me doing the last set at the bottom pin I can use for this setup (pin 24). Really the next step from there is no band assistance really but can still play around with different band tensions up and down the rack. As there seems to be more control as not swaying as much and can lower my bodyweight to get in more reps in this plane as well as work on the full ROM. My only concern really was the biceps. I didn’t want to strain/pull them at all this time around. It had happened near the beginning last time and perhaps that had to do with having to pull myself up slightly to get my legs on to the band. So I stood on a 6” pad for the first few sets to help get on to the band and then removed it as the band was lowered. No issues. At least not for the biceps. Left shoulder was feeling pretty tight and tense. Similar to how it had felt the very first week. Not something to be concerned about. Moved through this fairly quickly but made myself rest for the last two sets. I’m always surprised when the top set I aim for on these ends up feeling really easy. This happened for this as well. Definitely good for more but calling it because this is what I was to do for the day and let my arms recover. Log on incline to finish up the session. I had expected these to be like 6rm with the same progression but it was listed for 5rm and it only indicated to go up 10lbs from last time. Maybe that was the right call as things were feeling a little heavier than I would’ve liked. That could also be from me seeing that it was a slight increase and was perhaps not attacking things if it was closer to what my abilities would be. I was also letting the log linger for a bit longer on the chest with the lower reps (besides the first set) and knowing not pushing the limit here. But this could also be the reason for the taper. I need to keep that in mind that the competition is where things are going to matter in the scheme of things. This is to get things peaked for a big log press and the idea should be that this be the heaviest these exercises should be so far but also be with the least volume and fatigue. To stimulate and not annihilate. Put stuff away before stretching and then cooking up dinner.

November 29, 2023 – Week 5, Day 2

Dynamic Warm Up

Deadlifts (straps)
135x5
225x3
315x2
405x2
495x2
565x2

Sandbag Squats (to 18” box)
112x7
175x7
225x7

Planks
bw+40x60 seconds

Side Planks
bwx60/60 seconds

Stretching
 
Comments: Really seems like the temperature and weather really doesn’t care about an easing in period. It’s like for fall it was decently warm and then uncomfortably warm and the appropriate for like two weeks and then busting down the doors and saying “it’s winter now!” as it has been windy and below freezing this week. Enough of a squall that got some snow flurries while out walking yesterday. Moisture on face was freezing while out walking and spots you wouldn’t think would get cold (like bottoms of feet) were. If there was maybe a week to break into this, but it is like a switch. I was a bit nervous for the session. Last deadlift before competition and it was going to be tough, despite how it was written. Expectation had been that it would be work up to a “conservative single” with that being 585lbs for what was likely going to be a challenging single. It make senses with how the trap bar pulls went with it being 5’s then a triple and a single. But this is to be a rep event and I’m expecting like 1-3 here. So doing a top single probably not the best thing so that meant it was going to be a top double. Suggested was 565-585lbs for a conservative double. Seeing as how my best double post 2016 injury is 585lbs and that was for essentially a touch and go double (with the second rep being a real fight), 565lbs was where my head and plan was at. Especially because more reps were being asked working up compared to the past few times. Anyways, warming up felt fine as far as the mobility stuff. Besides the stuff I had to do outside in the freezing cold. It was colder than it was Monday evening. Did the mobility ankle/hip stuff. Had been watching deadlift videos and trying to get things to be better for me to initiate the lift. 135lbs felt ok. No knee aches like last time. Trying to start with the weight a little bit away from me rather than right on my shin. See if that lets me get better drive and not be so far forward. So far so good. 225lbs felt fast as per usual. Maybe not the fastest it has felt. But that isn’t always indicative of how things will go. Same as aches and such during mobility work. 315lbs felt ok. I was feeling somewhat better about the odds in my favor on this. Maybe this will feel amazing. This is where the workout deviated from the past two standard pull sessions. At this point, it switches to singles. This time nope, sticking with doubles all the way up. This isn’t that unusual as something I’ve done before (2018) but it is a way to add more volume and fatigue prior to the top set. I know, sounds a bit ridiculous to say “fatigue” with a total of 16 lifts total for the deadlifts with only 6 of them requiring a hard belt. 405lbs felt pretty good for that first rep but felt not so much the second. I was a little concerned about my lower back on the left side feeling a little achy, coupled with my left calf being twitchy all day. Sometimes that is symptoms of disc compression stuff. Also left side lower abdominals were feeling tense. But can’t imagine what I’d have done to cause that in the past 3 days. Push thoughts that I’m fragile out of my head. 495lbs didn’t feel great. Maybe it moved well but I didn’t record it. It was not having me feel confident for the top set. 565lbs it was then. Used bumper plates for the remaining weight to be added so the bar was full. Again, more for my own amusement and make it look like more weight on the bar so not in my own head about things. I could tell as the weight was getting added I was feeling more comfortable with having the bar closer. I think worry that too far away would strain my lower back as I’ve done that before trying to get the right position. I had this I told myself. Only way I didn’t is if I screwed up something. And I did have it. First rep went up as fine as I can manage it at this point. The second rep seemed to come up good speed wise off the floor but did slow down a good bit. I’d give myself 50/50 for another rep here. Survived the deadlift for this prep. 585lbs should happen for at least a single unless I screw up. Peak, rest and excitement hopefully will mean reps. After being done with deadlifts, I took a break for oatmeal and to collect myself. I had skipped my last meal of the work day as I was nervous that I’d end up throwing up if I ate so close to training when max effort pulls and I’ve been feeling a bit full in general since Thanksgiving holiday as well. Get some food and drink in me before finishing up the session. Ended up taking longer than I was expecting to but the rest of the workout moves pretty quickly once deads are done and the weights are put away. Sandbag squats to a parallel box. Plan same as last time with it being three sets of 5 progressively getting heavier but this time sets of 7 reps. I had been expecting to have this go up to the next weight sandbag (265lbs) but I wasn’t too bummed about this staying the same. Front squats were pushed more last week and I had been stressed last time with my right biceps after the cramp and such last time these came up. Thankfully my biceps were much better at dealing with the strain I put upon them this go around so there was not issues with Monday session that lingered over to this session. But I was feeling fatigue. Quads were feeling stiff/sore which would be a bit surprisingly looking at how I deadlift. You’d think it was all lower back haha. Knees were a bit achy. Not as comfy feeling as last time but a ton better compared to that very first session on these. There is never issues with the small light bag on these with keeping it high and off my legs. It gets tricky with the bigger and floppier bags. These added reps also add up too. 175lbs bag I went a little different in how I held it compared to last time. I felt I was fiddling around with it too much before I got to the meat and potatoes. Just tried my best to pull it into myself and keep it off my thighs as much as I could. At least make sure it was off them when I started the lift. 225lbs is firmer so I can do that one a bit better as far as keeping it upright and off my thighs. I could tell my biceps were getting a little worked here (especially the right one). Just slow and methodical with these. Not rushing and controlling the lift. It isn’t like this is the limit for me but it is good work and tough work with not a lot of weight and using the leverage to make it tough. That was pretty much it for the garage training. The planks work better on the soft carpet as opposed to the hard concrete as far as the stress on my elbows. I feel like I can also “feel” my feet and toes more with a substrate with give to it. As the idea is not just to hold but to be tense. 20lbs on the regular planks last time had felt easy. I don’t think I considered what scaling wise would be with weight but I figured 20lbs was an easy adjustment so another 20lbs wouldn’t be that bad. It was a lot tougher than I was expecting it to be. Could also be from the heavier pulls and the sandbag reps and from having a belly full of oatmeal as well (ok, not full but not an empty stomach). Could also be because the dumbbells I added are more centered in one spot vs the ankle/leg weights. But it was fine, just harder than I was expecting. 60 seconds fine. I had already put all the sandbags away so that I could just go into the side planks after putting away the backpack and the weights. Side planks no weight added again. Felt comfortable really. No sweating really this time because of how cold it was. These were needed to balance out how stiff my midsection was feeling after the previous exercises. Cooked up dinner and ate before stretching out. Not many sessions left. I have a general idea of where I am at but not sure where I stack up at the competition.

December 2, 2023 – Week 5, Day 3

Dynamic Warm Up

Zercher Yoke Carries
150x50’
250x50’
300x50’
350x50’
400x50’
450x50’
500x50’
550x50’
450x207’2” (2 minutes, 85’ course)

Stretching
 
Comments: Weather and temperature is now seeming to be bouncing around. Thursday fine enough that I was feeling warm wearing the long sleeves walking. Too dicey to do stuff Friday as it was raining but the rain was freezing as it fell. Don’t want to be slipping and it got even more rain as the day went on. Got some slight aches here and there. Looking forward to the deload it seems. That’s the issue with shorter training cycles is that they get to the point quick but also means the build up is less gradual and gets taxing. After Wednesday, the remaining workouts until competition are just one main exercise after warming up. The strongman gym was closed for a powerlifting meet so my options were to either train at home or go to the powerlifting gym. It wasn’t really up for debate. I was going to the powerlifting gym. This had been planned out and I had scoped things when I was going there during Nats prep to see what was there depending on when this workout would fall during the training cycle. Ended up on the conan’s wheel week. I have yokes at home but one is bolted and currently an eyesore in the backyard for when I want to do tosses or viking press. The other is light and it could work but the thin crossbar didn’t prepare me well for this kind of event in the past when I was prepping for it. The powerlifting gym had a yoke and that would work for me. I had every intention of waking up as if I was going to work but I felt tired and turned it off and hoped for the best as far as when I’d rouse from my slumber. About 90 minutes later appeared to be the answer. The gym is like 15 minutes away and I had just one thing to do so it wasn’t really an issue. Just meant that I’d have to wait a little later in the evening to eat my dinner with the pot roast. I had already gotten most everything ready the night before. Fog because it was cold yesterday and now warmer and evaporating all the icy rain. The owner wasn’t there at the gym as he was competing. Some people there. No music and it smelled a little funky. Before I started warming up, I had to figure out where I was going to be doing stuff. There wasn’t enough space inside to do 50’ runs and it wasn’t exactly clutter free. I know I can become wobbly and uncoordinated on this. Thankfully, I don’t need nearly as much weight as I would for regular yoke on this so I didn’t need a pallet to move things or have to keep the sliding door open for very long. Mobility stuff inside. Stuff had been moved around so I did have to get creative with some of the things (like the bar hang). I do prefer the environment at the Lancaster gym. Reminds me why I tend to not be with the powerlifting people all the time (granted some of them were previously doing strongman). I can blend in if I want to but I’d rather not. Just focus on what I’m doing and move on. Zercher yoke carries were the only thing on the docket. No sled work afterwards as indication was to save legs for the last long workout on Monday. Last time, I had done a modified workout with blessing from Mr. Westerling with testing out the actual conan’s wheel. What I was originally supposed to do was this workout which had been same as week one; work up to a top set of 50’ and then take off 100lbs for more fun. The blacktop seemed to be more even where I had done the yoke and wheelbarrow stuff last time but the gate seemed to be stuck so could only really move my body through it so that left me with the spot I had done it the first time which was uneven. Which was fine. I knew this would be a tougher session with the unstable yoke and the footing. Yoke is lighter empty but felt fine to start. It might have a slightly thicker crossbar from the one at the gym. No tape on the crossbar so plan was to wrap my arms partially for this. The longer “feet” and with how they weren’t exactly secured did have me wonder if I should lower the pick height more but it seemed to work out. I seem to have gotten over the wanting to pass out feeling on this but really going to be on the day to see if that is truly the case. Because I’ve not actually gone night night in training. Always at the competition. But it does seem to be not go right away. Pick it up and then try to shrug it up again and brace and then go. Like mentally grit my teeth for the gut punch. I honestly think this lightbulb moment actually came from PA’s Strongest last year when I felt like I was going to black out when I picked up the keg for the max carry and willed myself to stay awake. So goal for the top weight was to be 20-50lbs more than what I did last time. First week I did 500lbs (goal had been like 450lbs) but then did the conan’s wheel workout instead the next time when that was to be the same workout at that time. So really, I was thinking about maybe doing a set after the 550lbs I had planned. It was going to depend on how things went. And it was a little tough to figure out how I was feeling as the slant of the course. It’s a good thing that I slowed down and thought about what I was doing when adjusting weight as I almost misloaded 100lbs warming up. 500lbs felt pretty good so I knew 550lbs should happen here. The pick felt a bit more labored than I would’ve liked. I felt I was going well but near the end it was definitely lower in my arms and I was moving quite slow to finish out the run. Well, that’s the answer there; this be where we stop. So took off 100lbs for the last part of this. The options being to do 2 minutes of back and forth with whatever space I had available or to do 2 max distance sets (second set matching distance with however many drops needed). I just don’t have the space like I used to in the past for the max distance stuff straight shots. So it was going to be the 2 minutes of it. I had learned from the conan’s wheel session that I am missing something with doing only 50’ runs in that I let my upper body recover. Longer runs weight was sliding down as I went and I need to work on that. The revolution on the setup at the gym was about 80’ so I wanted to try and have a length of at least that and I was able to get things setup with moving stuff around to get a little bit longer than that. I had to temper my expectations because this was not as stable a setup as the other gym nor was the footing stable. This would be like at my house with mix of uphill and downhill. First run went fine if a little slow. I think that I rushed my start once I got around to do the second pick up and I ended up having the weight low in my arms way too early. I ended up having to drop short as I was dragging it. I had hoped to not have drops except in the 85’ drop zones. So a short walk to the finished spot. Better pick third time but I was definitely feeling the fatigue and ended up dropping again. I knew I had one more in me and I wanted to make sure that I didn’t drop again before time went. This was tough and my legs and glutes were just as shot as the upper body. I knew that I had gotten over 200’ on this so that was the goal (the low end of it). Again, I have high expectations of myself. Slammed a protein shake before putting all the stuff away before getting back home to eat some more and then stretch out. A week left to go.