Okay, so, we’ve decided to put together a little patio/outdoor deck area in the backyard, and we ordered flooring stuff from Home Depot.
Their delivery situation couldn’t be more convoluted - one manager says it’s free if you spend over a certain amount, cashier says no, it’s always a flat-rate; pay extra to have a 4-hour delivery window, no extra fee for a 14-hour window; pay extra for the driver to bring the stuff exactly where it’ll end up, no extra fee for curbside drop-off.
We ended up going super-basic (and, okay, cheapest). Curbside drop-off sometime between 6am and 8pm. Dude ends up getting here 8:30 in the morning and unloads the stuff a little up the driveway off to the side.
Long story short (too late), kiddo and I end up moving the 12 bags of sand, 12 bags of filler rocks, and 54 concrete slabs from the front yard 100ish feet into the backyard. All 3,132 total pounds of it.
Took about a half-hour. Little dude was taking one or two things at a time, which meant I had to take three or four at a time to maintain the hierarchy. I pretty much used a Zercher-bear hug-Husafell carry hybrid as the most functional and efficient way to get it done, and my arms and mid-back feel like they did a half-hour loaded carry session.
I don’t really like the idea of deliberately turning real-life stuff into “exercise”, like wearing a weighted vest to mow the lawn or whatever (also why I just had a shake afterwards, not during, cuz that’d be silly), but this was legit activity of a non-insignificant effort, so I moved the planned upper body lifting session from yesterday to today.
For training, I (finally) decided to stop freewheeling it and stick to a plan for a while. Picked up Pat McNamara’s CST program. After seeing dudes do well with “tactical”-type setups and leaning more towards general badassery rather than specific strength or size goals, I figured I’d give this one a go after following PatMac stuff for a while.
It’s not a specific routine, more a template and principles. 4 training days, each with a different focus - speed/quickness, power, strength, and hypertrophy. Workouts emphasizing a circuit setup with quality reps for time, not simply AMRAP. Daily abs, twice a week neck, big focus on transverse movements (rotation), and a variety of bag work (it is, after all, Combat Strength Training).
The e-book itself is pretty lean, no pun intended, just about 35 pages of content but loaded with quality one-liners, and a solid, easy to grasp message. If you like Wendler’s writing style, you’ll dig it. Overall, it’s nothing fancy or particularly new, just the methodology and overall approach put together to make sure, as PatMac says, “If you had cloned yourself yesterday, could you kick your clone’s ass tomorrow?”
A1) Landmine push press (a.k.a. punch to the jaw) 3x1min
A2) Punch to the nuts 3x1min
A3) Full contact twist 3x1min
A4) Single-leg broad jump 3x1min
A5) Heavy bag 3x1min
A6) Sit-up wall ball 3x1min
A7) One-arm dumbbell snatch 3x1min
A8) Sledgehammer golf swing on tire 3x1min
Power day in the plan. Again/still/always, the idea is quality reps within the time limit, not AMRAP. For example, the push press was 5-8 reps per arm in the minute, the broad jump and DB snatch were each 3-4 reps per leg/arm in a minute, heavy bag was 8-10 hard hooks per side. Keeping the focus on explosive power output, not simply fatigue. Feels good so far.
Punch to the nuts, to get ahead of any questions, is taken straight from the manual. Basically a one-arm suspended press from a hip bridge position. Took a second to figure out, but felt very much like working from the bottom position in BJJ:
Not noted is the daily ab work, quick and simple 50 total reps of [insert ab exercise of choice] split throughout the day. Hanging leg raise on the doorway chin bar, basic crunch, straight-leg sit-up, whatever.
Mrs. actually got me this combo pack for Easter. One of the kiddos’ girlfriends said she’d never had a Cadbury egg, so I said try one. She said “You don’t mind?” I said, “There are eight and I don’t need to eat them all.”
I feel like I made the right decision and the wrong decision at the same time.
A1) Top squat 5x4-5
A2) Weighted NG chin-up 5x4-5
A3) Tall kneeling press 5x4-6
A4) Deadlift farmer’s walk 5x5 reps DL, walk 50ish feet after last rep
A5) One-arm flat DB press 5x3-4
Strength day. The manual suggests classic 5x5 in the usual circuit format, just without the time element. I went with the same intention, 5x3-5 as a strength circuit. Next time, I’ll need to split things up into two separate circuits, only because setting up five stations for heavy work used literally every plate in my gym.
Could’ve gone a little heavier on the 4-6 rep presses and the DL walks, but I simply didn’t have any more weights to add on. #AchievementUnlocked (nevermind that it took two barbells, two farmer’s handles, a dumbbell, and a dip belt. Shhhh.)
(Sorry for the delay in replying. I tend not to get online over the weekend.)
I wouldn’t say I really have a single preferred method, either personally or in coaching. There are tons of different tools to get any given job done and the best will be determined by a bunch of variables - available training time, goal (obviously), available equipment, injury history, etc.
I do have a soft spot and appreciation for legit old school methods (as I covered here and elsewhere). 5x5 has thrived and survived for 60+ years, so it’s undoubtedly a solid program and a reliable go-to but, left to my own devices and speaking generally, I’d probably tend more towards some kind of EMOM approach or other setup that squeeze a lot of work out of just one or two lifts per session.
10x3 and EDT would rank high on that list, too. Though EDT doesn’t work as well as a one-off standalone session because the progression is what drives progress on it.
So like, if you walk into the gym, do 15 minutes of EMOM squat doubles, and then leave, that’s gonna feel like a solid workout. If you walk in, squat for 5x5, then leave, you’ll probably feel like you did bare minimum and wish you added something else.
Ha. Man, and it was such a deliberate decision on my part, too. I saw him grab the first two slates and I just took a sigh and knew what I was in for, then I got to work.
Over the next day or two, he was saying his low back was sore, “but not hurt sore, just like muscle soreness, like after deadlifting.” Dude’s a real trooper.
Putting the ‘combat’ in Combat Strength Training, I managed to punch myself in the face during the session and slam my finger in a window shortly afterwards. Genius.
