October 18, 2025 – Week 7, Day 3

Dynamic Warm Up

Heel Elevated Safety Squat Bar Squats
65x10
115x8
155x6
205x4
245x2
280x1
315x4
315x4
315x4
315x4
315x4

12” Log Clean and Push Presses
88x5
110x4
132x3
154x2
176x2
198x2
220.5x0
220.5x3
220.5x3
220.5x3
220.5x3

Yoke
200x50’
300x50’
400x50’
EMOM
500x50’
500x50’
500x50’
500x50’
500x50’
500x50’
500x50’
500x50’
500x50’
500x50’

Split Squat Pulses/Ab Wheel
20’sx45 seconds/45 seconds – bwx12
20’sx45 seconds/45 seconds – bwx12
20’sx45 seconds/45 seconds – bwx12

Rower
1500m in 5 minutes 57.20 seconds

Stretching

Comments: Survived the week of in office work again. I thankfully didn’t feel so rundown this time around needing to take allergy meds or Dayquil Friday like last week. I’d spent the past two days keeping an eye on my right knee with the aches as well as my right heel/ankle. Stress and focus on that I guess with things going on. I can’t exactly be my most comfortable in the office like I can when at home. Funeral stuff for the one uncle is set for next month and is local so taking leave for that. Work is about to get more stressful unfortunately after feeling like I was in a good spot due to the continuing federal shutdown. The last one in 2018 had not been great but there was apparently enough funds that people getting the assistance my department provides were mostly unaffected as resolved in enough time there wasn’t a lapse. This is apparently not the case this time around and notified there isn’t funding for next month. Notified about this in the early afternoon Friday. On top of that, nothing after 10/15/2025 is considered approved. Still supposed to continue working and processing but nothing will be provided until federal government reopens. And that is on the assumption that it will be reimbursed. But I’ve seen how things have not been honored with the federal government. This has never happened during my over 13yrs at this job and the people needing help and my coworkers are worried. With everything this week, I fell behind with some things and felt it was best to get sleep and worry about those things later. I woke up for Saturday about the same time as last weekend but I was a bit slower getting out to train taking care of things that I had let pile up. I was pleasantly surprised that driving out to train was fine. I was apparently late for strongman stuff as people doing that left by the time I finished with my warming up but other people not doing that did eventually show up. Foam rolling was needed for my lower legs but not really much elsewhere and then moved on to the neck rehab stuff. Did some stuff for my ankles and knees (and my hips/abs) before doing stuff with stretches for the hips, ankles and knees and dead hang for decompression. The knees and ankles were feeling ok considering things. Then on to training. Still doing the ssb squats with heels elevated and atg style. I was a little nervous with things as knee aches and ankle/heel. But bodyweight in that position was fine and figured I was good. It isn’t like me doing anything was making things worse (or better). Plan was to do 5x4 with either the same weight as last week or a little bit more. Knees weren’t feeling as bad warming up as last week so that was a little surprising but good for me here. Same warming up with more reps like last week. At least until I got to 2 plates. At this point, I had to see what felt good and options being either same jump as last week or a little more if I was feeling good. I made a change in my hard belt here to see if that felt ok. I’ve been using the more flexible hard belt so far with these squats as I’d been treating them more for building leg drive in my overhead rather than squats for squats sake. But since it has been a few weeks where the notes of “light squat” have been removed, I figured that I should adjust and have the firmer support for my midsection and core if it didn’t impact my mobility. It did not and the single felt decent so I went with 10lbs more than last week for the sets. As has been the case, the first set is not great and it feels like I have to really take it slow. Like the other sets working up didn’t really get me warmed up. Did a rep and then took a breath after shaking my head clear and pretty much had to do that for every rep that first set. But after that it wasn’t so bad and I was able to mostly string the reps together and not have to spend as much time with getting comfortable to squat from the unrack. Squats seem to be one of those weird ones where if I’m doing sets, that if I survive the first one, I’m getting the other sets done and probably easier by the end of it. Essentially 100lbs added to squats since start of this off season after not doing them really for a good long while (as far as back squats). Pressing from there. Not circus dumbbell like last week this time but also not axle. Log pressing. I’ve not done a log clean and press since June of 2024. I’ve done strict presses out of the rack. Log and circus dumbbell tend to go well together as far as one hitting what the other misses but being the same support. Circus dumbbell every week tends to beat me up and I’ll have real lows on some weeks. I was not expecting the same fits like a glove moment here with log compared to circus dumbbell despite it being longer away from the implement. It has been even longer from me doing clean and press every rep in a set I think. I was going to be seeing if I could handle log cleans with different equipment. For the longest time, I’ve used my oly shoes for log and worn my pronged belt. I’ve stopped wearing the oly shoes as my knees were killing me on overhead since the start of this year and I was having issues with my pressing. Pressing is down but I’ve seemed to be handling pressing with leg drive again. No issues with cleans and such on axle and dumbbell. But log is a different story. I’ve tried to just to lap the log like I usually do wearing other shoes and the balance felt off and didn’t feel comfortable. I was also going to wear my ply belt that doesn’t stick out as much here as well. Especially since I’m not using those on my other overheads now. I did bring that other gear in case this was just not working out. But starting from scratch essentially. So plan was to work up to 4x4-3 at about RPE 8. I weighed the log at the gym (as I can’t trust the written numbers there lol) and it was a little heavier than listed and since I didn’t want to be focusing so much on the number being lifted (since I knew I was going to be likely well off my best) I added a little weight to it so it was 40kgs empty and then used the 5-10kgs plates to load it up. I’d have a general idea of what I was lifting but not know exactly with the kilos. Right away, the lap and stability felt off and my knees were really achy on the press that first set. I did more reps than I had initially intended to do warming up with the clean every rep to get used to things again. I had planned less reps and bigger jumps but that seemed not the best option here. I feel like I did get used to things and it was more just not being used to log rather than the movement not feeling the same. So 10kgs jumps and doing reps so that I got an idea of things. Not like with axle where I’ve done that enough and recently that I can save it on warm ups. I felt that 100kgs was where I should be to do work. Things did not start out well as I went for that first rep and it went out in front of me and I missed it. Rather than fight it and try go continue the set, I treated it as partial attempt warm up and walked it off to collect myself before going at it for “real”. I know I have this in me after the previous set and I know this was just a misgroove. Going for the first actual set, the first rep went up fine enough. But I was nervous and didn’t want to have another missed attempt and I took these like singles. It was not encouraging to pick up the pace with the second rep and then third rep getting tougher on the press. I hesitated after the third rep and decided that I’m doing just triples today as I could be pushing it with trying to do 4 reps per set and leaving 2RIR. Especially after seeing how easy it was to misgroove a press here. Second set I had to wait a bit as I didn’t have it settled in the rack attempting the first press but it did go up smooth. Same with second minus having to wait for it to be settled. Third rep was a little tougher but this felt like a better set overall. So feeling a little better and attempted to keep my hands on the log the entire set for the next one as that would be the ideal pacing if doing in contest. First rep was good, second rep I had to catch balance a little with the back foot so that had me slow down and take an extra beat going for the third rep. Which I think also made me feel like that a little heavier on the pick than I’d have liked. But still go the rep here. Last set I got a little forward on that first rep but finished it out. Kept my hands on the log and didn’t take as long to get myself from one rep to the next. It is a good thing that log isn’t coming up for my next competition (I mean it is but I wasn’t planning on going at it with the optional press event) as it needs work and I probably need to keep it in the rotation going forward at least with offseason type stuff. Yoke after that. I had thought that the 8 sets of 50’ EMOM style had been pretty tiring. So why not add another 2 sets to that? So that was the thing. These had felt pretty exhausting by like 3 sets in last time so I was hoping that I wasn’t going to be that this time. Same weight and same warming up although I feel like I was a little more deliberate with lighter weights. Working on that slight split stance start. I did not feel like I had to get faster as I went due to the fatigue. I was feeling like I was running pretty efficient from the start. I was a little anxious about the ankle/heel but that didn’t seem to be a factor. I do think I had runs this time around that were faster than last week’s best. I was getting pretty sweaty here. I’m sticking with the ply belt over the prong belt as I feel like this will let me move a little better with breathing when it comes to having to carry a sandbag in the event (especially one shaped like a husafel). Last setw as definitely my slowest of the runs but talking about a less than 1 second variance I think from my fastest and slowest runs of these. This was good work. A change to the last weighted exercise setup for the session. The superset that became a triset is now a superset again. But the one being sent home was the incline crush presses. Not sure if this is just a short stint or if this change is with the increased weights on pressing. So that leaves us with the split squat pulses and ab wheel. Same weights for both but more reps (time in the case of the split squats pulses). I set things up so that I could essentially crawl from one thing to the next without standing up lol. I didn’t want my knees to be feeling like last week at the start jumping in, especially not with how achy they were this week. So I spent time trying to get that ready. It was a rough but I think feeling somewhat better. Oddly enough, the left side felt better this time around compared to the right from last week. Probably because right knee achy. These didn’t feel so exhausting while doing them but the moment I put the weights down, the fatigue hits all at once. And my darn lower abs are still sore from the ab wheel stuff a week ago so it was just adding more gas to the first there with more reps. But hopefully if these continue, I’ve been adequately inoculated. Rowing to once again finish up the session. I was not expecting the distance to increase by 500m from last time. That had been pretty rough for me and feeling quite sore in the hip flexors. But most endurance things tend to suck at first and then continue to suck but not as much. I made sure that I didn’t have issues with the foot straps like last time. I feel like I had a better expectation of how long this would take and the effort required. I just barely beat my 1000m time from last week and did managed to get 1500m done in under 6 minutes. My hips were feeling these again but not as much. Honestly, my tibilais felt the most worked this time around. Finally able to cool off and drink stuff. Put stuff away and drove back home to stretch. I don’t have the luxury of a three day weekend this time around.