January 1, 2026 – Week 18, Day 2

Dynamic Warm Up

Long Bar Deadlifts (straps)
163x5
253x3
EMOM
343x2
343x2
343x2
343x2
343x2
343x2
343x2
343x2
343x2
343x2

Seated Safety Squat Bar Goodmornings (21” box)
65x10
65x10
65x10

Kettlebell Swings/Gorilla Rows
55x30 seconds/40’sx30 seconds
55x30 seconds/40’sx30 seconds
55x30 seconds/40’sx30 seconds
55x30 seconds/40’sx30 seconds

Single Leg Glute Bridges (no rests)
bwx10/10
bwx10/10
bwx10/10

Stretching

Comments: Having a deload week and it also being a week where I have a half day and a day off work is what is needed to hopefully get me back on this horse. It has been cold and windy this week and I’m seeing branches from trees in my back yard in my front yard. I feel that my head space is recovering quicker than my body is at this point. But mind leads the body in most cases like this. So while not 100%, I’m liking that I’m at least not cannibalizing myself with negative thoughts and inaction. Perhaps coping mechanism but I’m planning and thinking about what I’m doing and what to be kind of categorizing to feel like I have things under control. Wednesday I walked after I was done with work and I could tell my joints and such are still recovering. Though my knees could be just feeling the jumping around I did Tuesday. Sleep was weird as I didn’t really fall asleep until close to 2AM and then was up about 10AM or so. Cold today but training could be done in the garage so not having the wind factor and also be able to kind of warm up the space with my body heat and house. I needed even more soft tissue work for my legs (calves and quads) then I did on Tuesday. Again, could be just recovery from what I put them through on Tuesday session with jumping around like a sugar high induced pre-teen at a trampoline park. But hopefully I’d get that feeling of heaviness out of my legs that was present Saturday. Neck rehab wasn’t too bad. Stretching for hips and such after that I did end up doing a little extra just with how my lower body was feeling. From there on to training. So the workout indicated working up to 325-345lbs for 10x2 done EMOM style on deadlifts. Didn’t specify if doing with long bar setup but I figured that I’d do that. I had it a slightly different setup here as usually I do my thin 45’s and then 25’s that are rubber inside the sleeve extenders but since this was a much lighter session, I did my rubber 10’s and 25’s which is about the same width for the inside plates and then did 45’s that are bumper plates and then undersized 45’s to have it be similar to what I was doing. This got me to 343lbs after doing plate jumps to get there. Only wearing straps, no other support gear. I figured that should be fine with what I have here and I’d like to see where things are with my body. My right knee and right hip are still a little wonky. These felt fine enough considering things. The EMOM did give me the opportunity to practice the setting up of straps a good bit as I will need to be cognizant of time with attempts at show. Worked up a decent sweat here. In order to keep myself warm and not cool down between stuff, I put my warm ups on when I was tearing down and setting stuff up and that seemed to work. After hydrating a little, it was on to the next thing. It has been a good while since I’ve done seated ssb gms. Told to be light and work for blood flow here at 8-10 reps for these sets. I figured I’d just do the empty bar and that seemed to be the right choice. I think I like these more than Jefferson curls honestly when it comes to ROM. The next pairing was a bit of new one for me. Kettlebell swings with gorilla rows. I’ve not really done a lot of kettlebell swings over my strength training career and I don’t think I’ve ever intentionally done gorilla rows. With the idea kind of being work as the pairings were for timed effort rather than reps, I had to make sure I didn’t over do it. I kept things relatively light here with the swings and the gorilla rows I opted for 40’s rather than 70’s. I didn’t doubt I had the strength but I wasn’t sure about the good form and such for sets of 30 seconds, especially since biceps had been a touchy one last week. Definitely felt like swings were easy and rhythmic almost. Like something that I could do for longer time like kettlebell sport is done. The gorilla rows were pretty easy. I may not have done this exercise before but I’ve consistently had to act like a great ape to chase my nieces and nephews over the past few years so I guess that helped with feeling comfortable in the setup. Last thing was just bodyweight stuff. Single leg glute bridges for 3x10 each side. I think besides it being something like that the main component was that I was to do these with no rest (at least how I read it) so only rest being the time the other leg wasn’t working and just one into the other. So about 1 minute and a half or so of just doing glute bridge lifts. This was pretty easy all things considered. My conditioning with things like this has improved with the lengthy offseason. I put stuff away and ate a decent bit (only did breakfast before training) before stretching. Another day of work and then the weekend to hopefully finish up recovering so I can finish strong.