Yesterday I did a 70-second dead hang from the pull-up bars at lunch. I feel my endurance increasing and a minute is no longer challenging. Worth noting that these bars are a lot thicker than the bar I do pull-ups with at home. Harder to grip but feels easier on the elbows, which is a good combination.
At home:
5 minute shadowboxing round with oxygen-restriction mask
3x 5-minute rounds on the heavy bag with 30 seconds of rest, last round with headgear and mouthpiece
Wanted to give my shoulders a break, so instead of doing more push-ups or other ways to pre-exhaust my arms for heavy bag rounds, I increased the rounds to 5 minutes for an added challenge. The shadowboxing round with the mask was especially hard, but by staying relaxed I was able to keep active and not die from suffocation. First time I’ve lasted more than a minute with the mask at full breath restriction, let alone 5 minutes.
I have to say that it’s great my shoulders are feeling better, but having the right one hurt has done wonders for my right hook. I’ve been forced to practice moving my whole body into it in order to throw it without any shoulder pain and it’s a much stronger punch now.
I’ve also been reading Angelo Dundee’s (trainer to Muhammad Ali, Sugar Ray Leonard, and 90’s George Foreman among others) autobiography, My View From the Corner and it’s a 10/10. Lots of fascinating stories and perspectives.
Dundee was quite the trainer. I just watched Big George Foreman with my history class. They dug it. The actual footage from the Holyfield vs. Foreman fight made them sit up. I might show them clips from that today. I am going to read the above book. Thank you for posting it.
@Friedrich That’s really cool and thanks for reminding me to watch that movie. I would have loved to have your history class in school.
Incline axle bench press
160 x 8
180 x 8
200 x 8
Super-set with facepulls: 3 x 8
Incline crazy bells
120 x 3 x 10
Super-set with lying dumbbell rows
115s x 3 x 8
Seated alternating dumbbell curls
50s x 2 x 16
35s x 16
Testing the waters with my shoulder on the incline bench. A little bit of pain, enough to keep me from going further, but much improved. Was surprised at how light 200 felt despite that.
The crazy bells need to be a regular in my shoulder recovery. I was able to struggle hard on some of the last reps without any pain and the pump was incredible. Felt very restorative.
Squats
470 x 3
Drop-sets of 410x5, 320x8, 230x8, 140x8
Went right to the reverse hyper to do leg curls without any rest:
Single leg curls
290 x 2 x 15
After first set of curls:
2-min round on the heavy bag
After second set of curls:
5-min round on the heavy bag with headgear and mouthpiece
Wanted to take advantage of being spent from the squats and use the fatigue for boxing training, but I wasn’t nearly as wiped from the squats as usual.
Funny moment is my younger brother and sister visiting for my dad’s birthday to memorialize him and right after I did 470, my sister came down to ask if I wanted to come with them to our aunt’s house. Her eyes went wide at the loaded barbell and she philosophically asked aloud “What the fuck?!”
My left IT band was bothering me in the squat warm-ups and I had to consider whether I should try 470, but when I belted up and went for it, I was shocked at how light the weight felt. Still, I should be aware that it’s not healed yet. I’d spent much of my work day driving and it was starting to bug me in the car after an extended period of time, which I believe is why it hurt today in the gym more than it has lately.
My left hand was also in a little pain yesterday from daily dead hangs with the thick pull-up bar, so I skipped them yesterday. I have a bucket of sand to stick my hand into and expand my fingers for hand health, a tip I got from Marty Gallagher over a decade ago, that I will rehab it with, along with broccoli band hand expansions.
I messed around with 2 press workouts over the weekend. On Saturday, I felt physically fatigued coming into the workout and worked-up to log clean and pressing 200 lbs after a couple of misses. Couldn’t even clean it at first, then got it up for a grindy single that I had to immediately put back down to keep from blacking out. After a mental pep talk, I went up to the log with more conviction and did a stronger set of 2, popping the weight overhead without issue. I was just really out of it that day, and the Friday before that as well despite it being a rest day, so it felt good to end with some strong reps. Did a 5-minute heavy bag round right after and called it there, as I had a family dinner I didn’t want to miss.
Since I had to cut that workout short, I returned the next day and worked up to axle push-pressing from the rack 220x2 after a couple of missed attempts, followed by Arnold pressing the 80 lb dumbbells for 3 sets of 8, super-setting that with chin-ups, and ending with skullcrushers and curls.
I still felt fatigued yesterday and had a headache. Better management of my recovery is in order, and one of the best things I can do right now is put programming into someone else’s hands. I have a 3-day strongman training program from EliteFTS that uses 5/3/1 percentages I’m going to run, and write my boxing and roadwork workouts around that.
Just did day one and it went very well. Will post a write-up tomorrow.
Boxing yesterday was very good. Drilled partner combos that focused on pivots. Pivoting while under pressure will help me contend with the aggressive sparring of Gabriel next Tuesday.
Log clean once and strict press
137.5 x 5
157.5 x 5
177.5 x 6
Super-set with band pull-aparts: 3 x 15
SSB front squats
230 x 5
262.5 x 5
300 x 5
Super-set with pull-ups: 15, 15, 12
Incline dumbbell press
80s x 5 x 10
Super-set with lying dumbbell rows
80s x 5 x 10
Sandbag carries
200 lbs x 40 sec, 40 sec
Keg carry
160 lbs x 1 min
Day 1 of the program. Chose good starting weights. Left shoulder is completely healed, but right was bothering me a little on the strict press. Shut-down an attempted 7th rep to not grind hard with it, but the pain has improved and I feel like I can still heal while log pressing. I happen to have microplates so I went ahead and used them to adhere to the percentages as close as possible.
Front squats might have been too light but that’s a good problem to have. I haven’t front squatted 300 lbs in over 15 years and it took me awhile back then to work-up to 315. Kicker is I’m much stronger now.
Was going to attach 10 lb plates to make my dumbbells 90 lbs, but light weight can really sneak up on you for 5 sets of 10. The 80s were a good weight to start with; the final few reps of the last 2 sets became challenging enough.
Weighted carries were the only program deviation. Only had time to do 3 sets, and the 200 lb bag was feeling heavy for 1 minute at the end of the workout until I discovered the art of lapping it to get a better grip. Will clean this up next time and do 5 sets of 1 minute carries.
The whole session took about an hour and a half, but there was a lot of set-up time carrying weights and the log from the garage to the yard (garage roof is too low to overhead the log), setting up for squats, and moving things around to protect them from the incoming rain that night/the next day. Will set-up in advance next time.
This morning at work a driver dropped off a trailer and had trouble parking it straight so I told him it’s fine and did it myself by deadlifting it into position.
Despite being a decent back workout with all the positioning, the general state of my back is now healthy enough that I was able to handle today’s clean and deadlift workout when I got home.
Power cleans
145 x 5
170 x 0, 0, 5
190 x 5
Deadlifts
375 x 5
435 x 0, 5
485 x 5
Dips
Bodyweight x 10
50x 10, 10
65 x 10, 10
Super-set with wide pull-ups
5 x 10
Leg curls
290 x 5 x 10
Super-set with seated curls
35s x 10, 10
15s x 10, 10
35s x 10
A couple of false sputtered rep attempts on the cleans (didn’t lean back enough to catch the weight) and deadlifts (gunshy about my back so I put on a belt). Missing a rep of 435 had me chuckling and shaking my head as I walked away because I knew I was going to destroy 485 in a few minutes with room to spare.
Didn’t realize I’d already log pressed 3x5 with 190 a few weeks ago, but at least the log was snapping up faster than before. Technique is improving. Lost the log a couple of reps from standing too narrow and squatting too deep with it, and then had much stronger cleans by standing wider.
Times on the medley were affected by the sled getting stuck at my garage entrance and having to walk it over the lip to get it back inside to the starting point. On the final set, I just decided to leave the sled out and push it from there instead of starting in the garage. The 80 dumbbell I had on it also kept rolling off. All stuff I can dial in with time and experience.
Time was an issue and could only afford 1 set of the sandbag loading, but it was a good way to end things. I’ve never picked my sandbag up from the floor before, but it was pretty easy.
Boxing on Tuesday was a typical technical partner combo day. Paired up with another beginner who wasn’t good at holding pads yet, but I keep attending this class because the coach is good about polishing up technique. We practiced a Mike Tyson favorite that I’d already been training on my own before: jab, right straight to the body, and a rising left hook. Got reminded to throw the left hook as I’m starting to rise from a crouched position, rather than throw it too late.
Strongman workout yesterday crashed and burned. The program calls for getting creative with a press medley. Although 2 lifts hardly make a medley, I opted to mimic what I’d be doing in the comp: log clean and press a rep, followed by a 100 lb dumbbell press (substituting the dumbbell for lack of a 105 lb kettlebell), alternating for as many reps as possible.
The comp calls for a 225 lb log for my weight class, but I couldn’t even rep 205 more than once in a set. Did 3 total sets of paired singles:
205 lb log clean and press x 1
100 lb dumbbell clean and press x 1
Log pressing in general hurts my right shoulder. I’m working with the Titan 12" log and its size puts the beginning portion of the press rather far out in front of me, which is the portion that hurts (even with leg drive). Once it’s halfway up and getting directly over my head the pain is gone, but I feel like I’m not able to fire at full power off my chest to get a powerful press.
Shoulder pain is the main reason I haven’t committed to the comp and signed my name yet, but I’ve found that I’m really enjoying getting back into strongman training again. My gameplan right now is to lower the weights and build my log press up more gradually. If shoulder pain continues, I’ll continue training in strongman regardless of entering this particular show or not, but change the press to something that doesn’t hurt.
I’m due for a weigh-in soon, but body composition has undergone a noticeable change. Abs are showing more and arm vascularity is really noticeable even just typing at my computer right now.
@T3hPwnisher That absolutely nails it. Realizing recently I haven’t done a strongman competition since tearing my bicep in 2017 makes me want to do one more.
Yesterday I did some home boxing training:
5 min round shadowboxing with breath mask
2 rounds, 5 min each of heavy bag work, 1st round with breath mask
Tonight:
3 rounds, 5 min each heavy bag work, 1st and 3rd rounds with breath mask
1 minute dead hang
About to go on a cool down jog afterwards now with the girlfriend.
And holy shit, RIP George Foreman. I found out the news from Mike Tyson posting on X.
Axle clean once and strict press
125 x 5
145 x 5
165 x 8
Super-set with Band pull-aparts: 3 x 15
SSB front squats
250 x 5
290 x 5
330 x 5
Super-set with pull-ups: 15, 15, 15
Incline dumbbell press
80s x 10, 10, 10, 10, 10
Super-set with dumbbell rows
115 x 10, 10, 10, 10, 10
200 lb sandbag carries
3 rounds of 1 minute
160 lb keg carries
2 rounds of 1 minute
Lowered the weight and changed the equipment from log to axle press. Still some shoulder pain, but mostly near the end of the set. On the 8th rep, the the bar speed started to slow down enough to make the pain more pronounced so I stopped there despite having more reps in me. I’m interested in seeing if I’ll have to change the exercise again, but I’m game for the experimentation. Dumbbell pressing doesn’t hurt at all.
My arms have been looking big and vascular lately, but despite a marked change in my diet and not looking as chubby in my midsection, I’ve only lost 1 or 2 lbs and weighed 206 over the weekend. That’s totally fine, the scale number is secondary to the mirror.
Took a few pictures after getting a big arm pump from the weighted carries.
Deadlifts
415 x 5
470 x 3
525 x 2
415 x 10 (1 min AMRAP)
Wide pull-ups: 5 x 10
Super-set with weighted dips
55 x 3 x 10
65 x 2 x 10
Lying leg curls
340 x 5 x 10
Super-set with curls
55 lb dumbbells x 10
35 lb dumbbells x 2 x 10
Swiss bar: 2 x 10
Felt strong on everything. I’m having fun with power cleans. I’ve never done them seriously since getting bumper plates and crash pads. I can remember getting into them for the first time after signing up for my first contest ever, a power clean competition in 2011, and straining my back trying to drop the barbell quietly at 24 Hour Fitness in the lead-up to the event.
The form on these were still pretty ugly and done with brute strength, but there were a few reps where I felt the arm swivel happening when catching the bar, which was cool. Never felt that so automatically before.
