October 31, 2026 – Week 9, Day 3

Dynamic Warm Up

Paused Behind The Neck Strict Presses (3 seconds behind head)/Half Kneeling Single Arm Band Lat Pulldowns
45x10/lbx15—15
45x10/lbx15--15

12” Log Push Presses (beltless)
88x5
110x3
132x2
154x1
176x3
176x3
176x3
176x3
176x3

Front Squats (beltless)
5-1-0-0 tempo
45x7
3-1-0-0 tempo
89x3
133x3
177x2
221x2
265.5x3
271x3
276.5x3
282x3

Reverse Band Hack Squats (lb’s)
+90x5
+140x5
+190x5
+240x5
+290x15
+300x15

Sandbag Carries (turns at 50’)
255x100’
255x100’
255x100’
255x100’

Paused Snatch Grip Back Extensions (3 seconds)/Belt Squat Donkey Calf Raises
110x8/bw+180x20
110x8/bw+180x17

Stretching

Comments: I accept that myself will always been stressed out by new things, even if I want to do them. Thursday I did my soft tissue work and walking as Friday I took off work for the wedding I was invited to that was right near Philadelphia in the evening. There are just some things that as a 41yr old with autism that are new things not done with help/assistance. Booking my hotel room is oddly enough one of those things (which thankfully was painless but expensive). I was stressed and had to take allergy meds and I almost had a “meltdown” in the parking lot trying to park but I’ve thankfully learned a thing or two being me for over 4 decades (and coping stuff from therapy) that I cancelled that self-destruct sequence and nothing went wrong. Ok, so I forgot toothpaste but that’s it. I’m also not a fan of the Schuylkill Express Way (which has to be named ironically). Leaving in the morning to drive to Lancaster then to train. I knew that with travel and stress and sleeping in a different bed that I had to be prepared for possibly subpar or altered training. Driving away from Philadelphia better than driving to it. There were people there when I arrived and people after I left. As if I didn’t get my ears talked off at the wedding the day before, I apparently had to talk off the ears of those present. Eventually I got to doing foam rolling. My right side legs needed more attention than my left side, which has been the case for some time. The tops of my calves with the trigger points needing a good bit today to get things to calm down on me. Right hamstring needed about double the left and about the same with the quads here. Upper back thankfully didn’t need that much today. Neck rehab stuff was ok. I didn’t feel that tight or tense. Had felt a little of that with travel but did manage to get my neck to calm down before I went to bed the night before. Glute activation fine and lower body mobility also fine and dead hang was fine (actually felt quite good). On to training. A bit of change to the warming up as this was switched to be more focused on just the pressing for the day. I may adjust this going forward to include something for the lower body. Superset of paused btn presses and half kneeling single arm lat work. Light stuff but working on getting position points and muscles/movements on point. Open up the chest and get the lats pumped and stretched. Which then leads to the event training with log press. It has been over 2 months. Aim was to still be light with the leg drive pressing as switching from more incline focus to log press focus. I also didn’t want to bother with cleans until I finished up with back extensions. Took a bit to setup something to do them from jerk blocks/crash pads. I don’t plan on doing these heavy from here as not a comfortable position. The other option was cumbersome and not something I like using either. 65% for 5x3 with about 90 seconds rest. No support gear (I meant to do wrist wraps but didn’t pack them). Unrack on these was awkward and just finding balance point to be stable for initiating the press was tricky but pressing felt easy. I don’t recall this log being this banged up the last I recall using it. I went with kilogram jumps and I was only to work up to 165lbs but went with 10kgs jumps here. I did some dip drives to get the lower body pattern working here. I feel like more something I need to do with unrack on log vs if it was cleaned (not an issue with axle or barbell). Plan next week is same but another set to keep getting familiarized again. From there, onto front squats. Last week of beltless and tempo emphasis (switching to paused and belt). I wasn’t sure with how my right knee was feeling how things would go here. It had thankfully not been an issue on log (tend to be when doing out of rack and not with a clean). I ended up doing longer eccentrics and more reps with just the bar to make sure things were feeling good and to get my knees warmed up (hence thinking maybe I add something to the warming up). The plan for this session was to work up to 4x3 with 5kgs more than last time. But really I’d like to push more but I couldn’t think of a way to have it be closer to 10kgs and go from the 20kgs jumps I was doing. So I decided that if the first set felt fine that I’d add 2.5kgs per set so that I’d top off over 280lbs at the end. The added weight was noticed by the end for sure but good to be doing over bodyweight for reps without any belt on these. No clue how much adding a belt will do here. Reverse band hack squats next. Initially I was planning to drop these after last week but felt it was perhaps important to push these a little further but cut back on them still. So work up in 5’s to 2x15 with decent reps in the tank. I did smaller jumps than usual to make sure knees were good to go on these. I probably could’ve done 300lbs for both sets but I wanted to be safe rather than sorry. One more week of the same then. Sandbags after that. I had deviated that last time I was doing the carries with doing 2x200’ instead of 2x100-150’. This time I stuck to doing 4x100’. Not yet switching to the shorter course length for show. Aim was to do 255lbs with 90 seconds rest here so just pump these out. I was expecting my knees to be the factor on these but turns out these got my hamstrings hard. Apparently the paused rdls hit that same spot haha. I alternated sides with tilting the bag to pick and lap. I’m pleased with how that aspect had been feeling. But I know I need to be moving quicker. Perhaps that will be the case when I’m not prefatiguing with heavy front squats and hack squats. The last thing had some modifications. Initially to be a triset of back extensions, calf raises and tib raises. But I did want to finally go home and not differ my protein shake another week. But more so that I was thinking I needed to pull back on the ankle stuff as maybe not recovering from the intensity. I only really kept in the donkey calf raises here as I can kind of bastardize them to get some ankle/triple extension going on. This would be the last session of the snatch grip back extensions since going to be doing log clean and press shortly (and doing block pulls now). First set of the back extensions was fine. The belt squat donkey calf raises I had my hand towels to pad the right side but I didn’t have it in the right spot and I had to stop the set to adjust before finishing out. Stupid nerve pinching. The second set the nerves in my ankles decided to flair up when they had not on the first set so that wasn’t pleasant on the back extensions (why I generally wear knee sleeves on them). No issues with the nerve issue on the raises but I wasn’t recovering good and the rep quality was poor so shut it down. Down the shake as I put stuff away and finally home to stretch and decompress. I way already planning for late dinner. Clocks move back an hour so Sunday will be a day to get things sorted out and taking off Monday to give me a little more time to adjust.