June 2, 2025 – Week 2, Day 1

Dynamic Warm Up

Axle Push Presses
32x5
62x3
92x3
122x2
152x2
182x3
182x3
182x3
182x3
182x3
182x3
182x3
182x3
182x3
182x3

Dips
bwx5
bw+45x3
bw+80x8
bw+80x12

Pull-ups
bwx12
bwx12
bwx9

12” Log Seated Overhead Lockouts (7” ROM)
180x2
230x2
270x4
270x4
270x9

Leaning Dumbbell Lateral Raises/Paused Half Kneeling Band Face Pulls
29x12—12/abx15
29x12—12/abx15

Stretching
 
Comments: I survived the first week of this training plan. I was feeling a bit stressed with the car and insurance stuff but I had a good dinner with family Sunday so that helped with alleviating some anxiety. Feeling pretty sore in my hamstrings and forearms from Saturday training. I don’t like really training later on Saturdays as I feel like I need more time to rest up from those sessions. I kind of knew my forearms would be sore from the zercher carry stuff as that was the case when I was training for conan’s wheel a few years back. Knowing things would be sore is kind of why I’m not hitting grip directly at the start of things here. I’m good at Hercules hold so working other things and then get that on board. Also probably the axle high pulls. Weight dropped some more as under 260lbs for the first time in I’d say in like close to 2yrs. And I was only that weight for like a month or so before I started trying to get my weight back from being the incredible shrinking man. Work wasn't terribly stressful today but I got stuff to follow up on tomorrow. I did put in request that is being reviewed by supervisor about leave for worlds so hopefully that goes through. Warming up does take a bit longer with the neck rehab stuff for training as well as doing foam rolling stuff and knee health things. It could also be that some stuff just takes longer, such as doing 10 sets of push press. Warming up was needed with how body feeling. I was not sure how the push pressing would go as trying to do these for right now without any support gear. Last week had been 10x5 with 60% of training max and just doing my normal rests of about 90 seconds (usually less). That had been pretty intense volume for me and I was quite sore in my chest and feeling fatigue in my triceps. I was also feeling sore tendons in my shoulders. All things I was expecting with that training. This time was switching to 10x3 with 67.5% of training max. So 20lbs more than last time but decrease in the volume. Same number of sets but I tend to do better with lower rep sets on things for this many sets. It is kind of startling to see how dropping reps but increasing by 20lbs feels easier in a why. I stuck to mostly rebound reps on these. My left shoulder was a little achy but things felt solid here. I almost stopped at 8 sets because I thought I was doing that many but luckily corrected. I didn’t have any “I do one more and then stop” feeling here. Ninth set I got a little off balance walking back so I ended up doing these with no rebound. Last set I did a little walk in place after the last rep before putting it down. This was a good result I feel. It is still really light weight all things considered but feels good. I’m just not sure entirely what is next. I had planned to the inverted juggernaut but I’m not sure that doing a max rep set on push press with how it is a dynamic movement will really translate from doing 10+ reps on a set for max. I got to think on it a little more and see if I’m sticking to that or doing something else instead. Next was dips. I had not intended to be doing these every week with the initial program plan but now they are. Triceps were fine with them this week as this didn’t surprise them. Last week it had felt similar to how they were when I had done them with weight for the first time in years. My shoulders were feeling a little achy without any weight so I wasn’t too sure about the actual sets but I guess it is just ballast weight I needed as felt better with weight added. I feel that if I was doing every other week, I’d probably have jumped up to 90lbs but seeing as not the case and juggling temperamental shoulders that I need to keep an eye on as far as recovery. My neck/shoulder issues have seemed to be kept in check with being more aware of what the issue is and doing the rehab stuff. So adding 5lbs to last time as that I could get somewhat comfortably with the bumper plates and metal plates. A little bit of swinging with the weight but I did well enough here. Moved on to pull ups. I had not meant to initially do 3 sets last week but I did so this was just doing the same this week and try to add a rep to the last set. Not trying to do more than 12 a set as I tend to fatigue over time on these, even with longer rest. I knew that adding reps was going to be a tall order with my forearms feeling beat up from Saturday. I should hopefully adapt to this stressor shortly but it was definitely present today. Tougher but I did manage to get an extra rep on the last set here. Plan here is to stick with bodyweight and add reps and then do lower reps but more sets with weight added. I was taking time here with making dinner to hopefully have my arms recover enough for another set. Log rack work next. I felt like I had the log just a bit too high in the rack last time and I felt like I should lower it. On reason being that I wouldn’t need to be propping things up on the wood tiles I had. And perhaps this would be closer to how I had things for rack work when I was doing these at the Y and really saw a carryover to my overhead pressing. With lowering the rack height an 1” and just how triceps feeling, I felt it was best to lower the weight accordingly. I had done 300lbs last week for the top set but I even had mentioned how it felt a lot harder than 270lbs had felt and it wasn’t just easy reps there with 300lbs. 270lbs was setup as a warming up weight and if it felt challenging, I was going to switch to that weight rather than try and push 300lbs too soon and burn out. It was the right call I think here on both counts as this felt more like an overhead press assistance rather than me just locking out weight and the weight was appropriate. Superset to end the training. Same as last time with side leaning laterals and band face pulls. Increased the weight for the laterals and lowered reps to 12 reps but kept the band tension and reps the same for face pulls. I’m considering doing similar progression to what I’m doing with the rack ssb gms in lowering the reps over these 4 weeks and then potentially starting over or swapping out a different exercise. These didn’t feel as rough compared to last week and while the second set was harder, it wasn’t such that I felt like I was struggling at any point. Put stuff away and ate dinner before stretching.