December 1, 2025 – Week 14, Day 1

Dynamic Warm Up

Axle Push Presses
36x10
66x5
96x5
126x3
156x3
186x2
216x2
246x2
246x2
246x2
246x2
246x1 (3 misses)
246x2

Neutral Grip Incline Dumbbell Bench Presses
56’sx10
85’sx6
85’sx6
85’sx6
85’sx6
85’sx6
85’sx6

Dumbbell Push Presses (5 second eccentrics)
70’sx5
70’sx5
70’sx5
70’sx5
70’sx5

Barbell Z Presses/Heels Elevated Goblet Squats (4-0-4-0 tempo)
95x3/bwx8
135x8/bw+50x8
135x8/bw+50x8
135x8 (1 missed rep)/bw+50x8

Supinated Bent Over Dumbbell Drag Rows/Supported No Touch Single Leg Reverse Lunges
80’sx12 -- bwx12/12
80’sx12 -- bwx12/12
80’sx12 -- bwx12/12

Stretching

Comments: The filling up of the sandbag on Saturday I may have overdid it as far as my focus on that task as a few of my knuckles were scraped raw and got a slight bruise one knuckle and some fingers still sore. That was expected. But something in my right wrist and forearm area started to feel sore and swollen Sunday and into today. Can be painful at times but I seem to be able to do anything I want. Also a bruise on my left inner thigh which I think is from an errant dismount with the circus dumbbell on Saturday. Weight up a little from last week. Probably due to irregular food and sleep schedule. I was not looking forward to getting up early to start off this month. But made it through the day. Due to inclement weather, the office was going to be closed tomorrow so that meant that I had to work from home. Which was fine by me as that meant I could sleep an extra hour and be comfortable and not have to worry so much with getting the workout this evening done super fast. Commute home wasn’t bad but man is it dark out driving. It took a bit to get ready as I had to review the new training sessions and figure out what I was doing since not able to do this in the office. Soft tissue foam rolling was fine. Not much in the lower legs as seems to be the case at the beginning of the week. Hamstrings fine, a little sore near the glute tie-in I imagine from box squats. Quads needed it a decent amount (especially the right side) and so did upper back. Neck rehab stuff followed and that was good. Felt needed to get my shoulders and chest not feeling so tight. From there stretches for hips, knees, ankles and hamstrings. Did a dead hang as well before going on to train. Close to freezing outside. Axle out of the rack again. The heavier session. I had expected it would be something like this with how the last week and week prior had been with it alternating and going back up with the option to add a little more to the previous time doing the same reps and potentially sets. The suggested was 240-245lbs for 5x2. Last time I had done 242lbs for this and that was 4 weeks ago when I took off for DLS shift and did training in the daylight. I’ve been just doing 6lbs instead of 5lbs with my axle weighing 26lbs as close enough and not worry about the fractional plates all the time. I was not sure how this would go. I was feeling like I was ok at times but other times I was worried. My lower back was feeling a little sore and at times warming up my shoulders would feel sore. Axle has really become something that irks me with how easy it is for me to mistime and miss a lift. I’m proud of myself for not letting that completely derail the session and quit by coming back and getting it but it is getting damn tiring with the frequency it pops up on pressing. I was glad my sore wrist/forearm thing wasn’t hampering my abilities today. Things seemed to be going well here. I wasn’t taking my usual shorter rests here but I wasn’t taking a double rest at this point. I did stretching things out by having myself rewrap my wrist wraps and I did have to retie my shoelace after one set. I could tell that I was fatiguing but didn’t feel as bad as it was two weeks prior when I just hit that wall midway. I felt like the lessons from the previous week were helping. Four sets down and just one left. And I’m not sure what happened here. I unrack the weight and walk back thinking I will launch it up but I don’t feel stable in the dip and have to redo it. It goes up but lockout is a little tough and lose balance a little and have to get myself settled before trying for the last rep. Gets stuck at my sticking point and I rack it. I rest of like 10 seconds and try again so that it is “one set” and it is even a worse attempt at the second rep than the first. Getting frustrated. I step away and take about 30 seconds before going at it again. It goes up higher but still sticking point and me trying to strain through it to lockout I have my left foot slip and it is a no go. I let the intrusive thought win and just chuck the weight on to the j-hooks and it partially catches as the weights on the right side fall off onto the platform. Ok, a bit of an overreaction and now I got to pick stuff up. But it gave me enough time to cool down and rest. I was going to try this last double again and get it as a double rather than just a single to get the reps. Everything felt against me getting this last double as I felt unstable the entire time but I just went deeper in my dip the first rep and it launched up there. But still feeling unstable and I just went for the second and it didn’t get past the sticking point and actually started to come back down. But somehow, I managed to just brace and muscle it out. Not ideal but I got my fifth double. I’m not sure about my body handling these upper body sessions as lower body seems to be responding better. But I’m far enough out that it isn’t something to impact the competition. But I do think I need to figure out if changes are needed so that I’m having a good time with my hard time. I was still feeling a bit raw about the axle stuff and how it ended so I went right into the dumbbell pressing in the garage and worry about putting stuff away until later. A merciful reduction in weight on these this time around. Notes were 80-85lbs for 6x6, have these feel confident. I only did one warm up set with the loaded handles so that I could keep things moving along. Shoulders a little achy and again, thankfully no issues with the wrist/forearm on these. I feel these felt consistent form wise and I had less shoulder instability with the right side. I didn’t have to take double rests to get through the sets and was able to stick to somewhat normal rest periods so that was good. Back outside for dumbbell push pressing with the 5 seconds eccentrics. Same weight as last week but now 5x5 instead of 5x4. I knew that the extra rep each set was going to be a ton harder. It is just one more rep per set but these 5 second eccentrics just roast my shoulders. I wasn’t feeling quite as explosive on these compare to the past two sessions. I took slightly longer rests (not quite double time) to hopefully keep things moving but also get more rest to deal with the added reps. I got through them but man were my shoulders feeling dead. From there it was on to the supersets. Both being the same exercises as last time but adjusting in the reps. So for the first pairing of z presses and heel elevated tempo goblet squats, both were for 8 reps. When I had first done the z presses this training prep, I had done 135lbs for a set but with the change in exercises after that, my shoulders are feeling a lot more fatigue at this point and had to pull back. The suggested was 135-145lbs on these. Just based on how my warm up felt, I knew 135lbs would be a challenge this session. And it was. No stoppage the first set, a slight breather to get the last two the second set and then a difficult time on the third set as I rushed going for the last rep and missed it so I had to take longer to recoup and get it. All the last reps of these sets were grinders to finish. I do try to avoid grinding lifts as while I can do them and can grind out a lot, it tends to make it harder to recover and leaves me feeling, well, ground down. The goblet squats I wasn’t sure how my knees were going to feel as a little achy. I actually didn’t walk on Sunday as I was trying to get my affairs in order and felt that was more important and would help my knees feel better with the cold. Adding weight actually felt better than unladen. Suggested was 45lbs but I felt I could do more weight with the rep reduction here so did 50lbs. That seemed to be fine. Could see the light at the end of the tunnel of this workout. Last pairing for the evening being the weird rows and the new supported single leg thingies. Same weight and sets as last time but both now being 12 reps. I did adjust the weight displacement on the handles to try and have more clearance for my thighs with the drag style. I was advised to try and have my hips back more so as to increase the ROM. The single leg stuff I was instructed to try and stand closer to the support so that I was more upright and less leaning forward. In hindsight, I should probably start with my left side on these going forward as that appears to be the less strong side on these with the odd knee ache I get (not patella stuff like the right). This got finished up and put stuff away before finally getting to eat a late dinner and then stretching.