February 21, 2026 – Week 1, Day 3

Dynamic Warm Up

18” Monster Texas Squat Bar Box Squats (4 second eccentrics)
66x6
110x5
154x4
198x3
242.5x2
287x4
287x4
287x4
287x4
287x4

Circus Dumbbell Clean and Presses (left side only)
49x5
85x3
108x2
EMOM
130x2
130x2
130x2
130x2
130x2
130x2
130x2
130x2

Sandbag Carries (turns at 60’, turf, 60-90 seconds rest)
200x120’
200x120’
200x120’
200x120’
200x120’

Standing Arm Over Arm Pulls (turf, uphill)
270x60’
270x60’
270x60’
270x60’

Reverse Hyper Extensions
0x3
20x2
30x12
40x12
50x12

Pulldowns (drop sets)
150x10/120x10/90x20
150x10/120x10/90x20

Stretching

Comments: Not the best sleep amount the past few days but with reverting back to the preferred work option schedule, that should hopefully be back on track for at least the next four weeks. Traffic issue was manageable for the rest of the week and it should be all resolved (for the current issue) by the time I need to be worrying about it. Potentially getting more snow but with it being warmer out, it will likely not stick around if it does accumulate. My intent with training today was to get up at my normal work time (not the earlier work time) and get ready to go and rather than try and do all of it the night before. I did feel like I was going to be rested enough when I woke up for the early work time but then I guess I got tired again in the following hour and slept for an additional 70 minutes past that time. Oh well. Training wasn’t going to be as bad I felt compared to prep for last competition with doing 4 of the 5 events on one day. Drive out wasn’t bad. Some people at the gym for strongman stuff and got some congrats for my result at the show. But I’m already on to the next one. I didn’t end up starting my own training for a bit after I arrived as helping my one friend doing the Arnold in two weeks with the more irksome to setup events (and one I would be doing something similar to). I didn’t have anywhere to be. I mentioned what I had planned for training today and another friend felt like that was too much this soon after competing and for my age in their unsolicited opinion (and they indicated it was such). I get it, it is a lot but I was bored out of my mind with the week off and I’ve seen the results on my ability to recover and keep pushing with this training. Granted, I do feel that stuff needs to be pulled back sooner for the deload for the competition and that has been discussed with Ms. Funk as it is a learning experience with coach and athlete figuring out what works and such. Especially when its remote. Anyways, I was able to start my session. I’ve not had the chance to do walks with the work schedule but hopefully I can now back on the telework option. So I was expecting some soreness/stiffness in my lower body. Soreness still present in the stuff worked on Day 1 and now stuff from Day 2 which was mostly my upper back, hamstrings and outer quads. Surprisingly, my right calf didn’t need any real work done with soft tissue. My left one though needed it like usual. Other than the right calf not needing it, everything else did. Neck rehab stuff was fine and dandy. Felt good to get some stuff stretched and moving. Lower body stretching was needed. I was not sure how the dead hang would go as my left forearm has felt a little tight/tender since I got back to training from the week off. But it felt fine for the most part. So as typical of this day once the warming up is done is some kind of squat. I was bit surprised with the choice, not because of the style or tempo but because it was just going to be with a barbell. It could be over 6yrs since I’ve done a back squat of any kind with a barbell. It has been with some kind of specialty bar. I think because the other bars tend to make it harder on the upper back and that barbell can put stress/strain on the shoulders and wrists with positioning. So box squats with a barbell and lowering to a 4 seconds count to a parallel box. My assumption here with wider stance as it seemed emphasis was the hips and to “explode” off the box. I elected to use the monolift again and my intent was to just use a barbell. But by the monolift were the squat bars. One was a 25kgs squat bar and the other a 30kgs monster squat bar. Longer, thicker and stiffer than the regular barbells. I decided just for the heck of it and novelty that I’d use the monster squat bar and for further distraction/fun, just use kilogram plates here. I didn’t expect that 18” box height would be my parallel box and with the kilo jumps, I ended up going a tad heavier than I was planning. Low bar squat position hasn’t been done by me in a while and I ended up wearing my wrist wraps so that my wrists weren’t feeling terrible here. I look really weird when I squat. I got immediate muscle soreness in my inner thighs on these and I was a little worried that I potentially would or did strain something in the inner thigh muscles but I seemed to make it out of these unscathed. From there I moved on to circus dumbbell. One of the reasons for picking this show (speaking of which, the west coast one sold out and the southeast got cancelled) was that this had circus dumbbell a little heavier than what I had for the last show so I could keep on trucking from that rather than having to switch to something else with a somewhat short turnover in training time. Contest is 160lbs for reps in a minute. No run up like last show. This was to just get some good reps in and knock some rust off. I did my abbreviated warm up I adopted for this and the plan was 130lbs for 8x2 done EMOM. Despite my right knee feeling a little stiff (it was a lot stiff after Wednesday and thankfully no issues on the box squats), things were moving good with warming up. It took me two sets with 130lbs before I got things figured out with the movement and not rushing it and such. I had to shake my head after the first double as that was pretty garbage and I had to wait a beat on the second set that first rep before it felt right. But after that it was pretty automatic. Last three sets a song came on that I tend to get excited to and those were the easiest reps. I did a little walking around after the last rep of the last set. It is good to see this was feeling good albeit with light weight. Put that stuff away and got things setup for the next thing. Sandbag carries. Show is 300lbs for 120’ with turn at 60’. I’m not the fastest with implements in a carry so this was light and for several sets with short rest (relatively). IE 200lbs for 5 sets of 120 with 80-90 seconds rest. Not yet time to use outdoor stuff at the gym so this was on the turf but I started with the sandbag on stall mats so that I didn’t have to worry about scraping my knuckles on the pick each time. I re-chalked after each run and ended up taking longer rests for the first two runs and then shorter rests at the end. I felt good the first three runs but could tell I was fatiguing in the last two runs. At this point was when I felt I could pop in a rice Krispie treat as I had some setting up to do for the last event and the following accessory work. Need a little boost and didn’t want to just wait until I was done for sustenance as it was going to be a tad later in the day than I was originally planning. Standing arm over arm pulls since that will be an event. Kind of a crapshoot with figuring out what will be the case until you get there. But indication is 50-60’. I’ve only had this event once and it was part of a medley and it was brutal training it and then show it was underwhelming as course was drastically shortened and the convention floor made the 250kgs or so weight a joke (when struggling with 365lbs on turf). I’m assuming show will be on either blacktop/concrete if outside or on something like a basketball court if inside. But that’s not here or now. What I got is turf at the moment with weather so turf it will be. Doing arm over arm pulls on surfaces with high friction and no momentum is exhausting and I take pretty long rests to recover. Plan being 4x60’ at about RPE 8. I just guessed what that would be and I think I got it about right. Form is weird with this one as the closer it gets, the angle changes and what was working early on seems to not be as good a choice. I’m not sure why the up and down motion feels right here. I was getting better as I went on these but fatigue got the better of me by the end and I was missing the rope at times. Going uphill on these so I can’t really imagine that contest will be tougher than this unless really shitty conditions. This took bit of time to put away and that was helpful so that I could recover and get some fluids in before the last two things. I’ve not done a reverse hyper in over 9yrs. I think I’ve just done them wrong in the past and last time I tried them was coming back from my 2016 back injury and it seemed to irritate things (and I wasn’t even using much weight). But I’d figure I’d give them a try and try to do them in way that felt right. So no weight to really light weight. I also think I may be little too tall for the one at the gym. Took a bit to feel comfortable but 30lbs ended up not being so bad so I figured I’d add weight. Somehow, 10lbs added was having them not feel so great and I was trying to adjust during the set. The traction/shearing is not ideal and trying to have it feel in the muscles and not the wherever. 50lbs on the thing did feel better than 40lbs. Pretty obvious I lack strength in this movement but I think if light and progress slow that I can rectify that. Last thing was listed as optional if I had time. Look, I got all the time in the world most days and especially on my last day of the training week. I will make the time for it. This was something that was in training briefly leading up to worlds being pulldown drop sets. Those had been with neutral grip and doing 3x10 and 3x12 respectively for the 2 weeks in the program. This time a little different in that regular grip and the last set was to be for max reps. I went with the same weights I did then since I’ve not done pulldowns in over 6 months and my pull ups are not where they had been due to lack of doing them. First set started off fine enough. I don’t think I took a set rest when I did these last (just recall less than 15 seconds) but I decided with the last set being for max reps that I should do something more consistent. So 15 seconds rest after the first one and then 20 seconds before the max rep set. I do think I could’ve kept going with the 90lbs but I felt like I was going to be missing a rep shortly. Second set was rougher going with the other sets taking a bit more effort to get the reps and I was thinking that I’d not get to 20 reps on the max rep set with how my upper back and arms were fatiguing. But I guess I felt the symmetry was more important and made it to 20 reps. Again, not sure if that was max but it was a lot of reps and I’m ok with that after a long training session. Finally got to drink my shake and eat a sandwich before cleaning up to head home to then stretch.