There isn’t many things out there that are less fun than continentals for reps…That is one of those days that you get there work done that you need to and leave it alone until you need to do it again…
@brady888 That’s awesome about your first show! Definitely hit me up. I can be pretty creative when it comes to that stuff. Do you know what the events are?
Great to hear about the back volume experiment too. I need to do something like that in the off season.
@Koestrizer It’s technically been illegal in every show I’ve done, but I’ve never seen it enforced. That said, I like to play by the rules when I can, but in addition I tend to really lose my steam when I try to rest the axle on my belt. I might do it if push comes to shove, but right now it’s not too much of a hassle.
@Alpha I really appreciate your comment dude. It’s hard to hang it up, but sometimes I know that I need to. I gave it my all, but it wasn’t enough that day.
And yeah, I can safely say that I’d rather have a wisdom tooth pulled than do these, haha.
Weighed in at 191.0. Weight just keeps dropping. Really tried to focus on upping my cals today. See what happens.
Events are wheelbarrow rickshaw carry for time, circus dumbbell clean and press for reps, tire deadlift for reps, husafall stone carry for distance, and stones over 52" for time.
That won’t be too bad to jerry rig. If you get the itch, I did a write-up on building a circus dumbbell using some home depot buckets and plumbing pipe. It’s incredibly dangerous, but that’s how I roll, haha.
Yoke warm-ups
2x50’ empty
2x50’ 320lbs
410lb Yoke/backwards prowler drag w/182lb keg medley 50’
4 rounds
Notes: Seems like I got over whatever funk I was under on Wednesday. Been eating big and getting mad and it seems to have paid off. The prowler drags were the fastest they’ve been, and the yoke was moving smooth. Rediscovered the value of short steps. I was taking long strides before and it was slowing me down. It’s so counter-intuitive, but shorter steps are faster steps. I DO need to warm-up if I really want to hit my stride, as my first run is still a little shaky. Gotta remember that for the show.
General notes: Woke up at 191.4. Cheat meal was 5 slices of thin crust pizza at a local place. Was actually gearing up for a half pound cinnamon roll, but the place I was going to eat at closed down early today. That is SO much emotional turmoil for someone on a cheat meal, haha.
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My idea for both stones and husafell was to use a plate loaded ez Bar and awkwardly “zercher” it off the ground to standing or wander around with it in the crook of my arms. I am assuming the stones will be the hardest part as I have never touched a stone before. Any ideas for how to train the movement? I may get 1-3 days with stones if I commute a bit.
Any chance you can get a sandbag? Though not a direct carryover, picking it up and loading it trains very similar muscles/movements to the stone. A keg would work well too.
If you don’t have any of those but have some bumpers, you can use a loading pin (or DIY one out of plumbing pipe) and do the stone trainer
I’ve never done a husafell, but I imagine all of the above would work for that too. As long as you get strong and good at enduring life sucking, you’ll do well, haha.
AM WORKOUT
(2) Axle Mat Pulls
5x123
5x156
5x226
1x316 (mixed grip)
1x406 (mixed grip)
1x456 (mixed grip)
10x516 (rest pause, touch and go, straps)
12x426 (dead stop, straps)
52 second DOH hold of 226
Notes: I was feeling pretty wrecked coming in. Reps were real slow on the touch and go. Knee is swollen up too; most likely from rain again. My bad day strength isn’t too far off from my good day strength, so I’ve done a good job of closing the gap.
GHR sit-ups 25lb plate behind head
3x8
1x7
Buffalo bar squats
5xBar
5x100
5x140
3x190
1x230
1x280
1x320
1x370
1x410
40x230 (lifetime PR, pre and post injury)
Notes: Heavy weights just weren’t feeling like a good idea. I’m thinking I might alternate based on conditioning work. Light on yoke weeks, heavy on carry weeks. That said, the 40 rep set was no joke, and I was wiped out while it was done. Right around rep 24 I knew it was a terrible idea. The best I’ve ever done prior was 225 for 40, and that was with more questionable depth. I wish I had recorded this,but it really was just a gameday audible decision. Good to know I still got some PRs in me.
General notes: Woke up at 191.2. Still gotta up the cals.
I may have found a somewhat gym with stones, and I’m very excited. I may put together a sandbag though for more consistent training, that is a great idea.
The contest is March 18th. How would you break up training? Since my base strength is decent (well, except for my overhead but I’m working on that) should I focus more on specificity/event-like training?
The ones I would have easy and consistent access to would be a trap bar (for thr wheelbarrow/rickshaw carry) dumbbells up to contest weight (for the clean and press), and barbells (either for the 17" deadlifts or zercher style lifts and carries to mimic husafells and stone loading).
Would I be better off with 2 event days a week, 1 really hard event day a week, maybe a small “finisher” similar to an event at the end of each training session, or anything else that you think would be beneficial?
My current training split/frequency is 2-3 “upper” days a week and 2-3 “lower” days a week, training 5 (sometimes 6) days a week. Current loading is working up with a main movement to a 1-6 rep max, then 80% of that for volume. Then an accessory movement for a ton of volume, usually in a DUP type timed format. Then either conditioning or giant sets involving the muscle groups trained.
So, keeping in mind I’m just a local scrub and more strong than I am good, here is how I would approach it.
I don’t like events days. Just never really fit them in my schedule. It’s one of those situations where, if I can find 3-4 hours in one day to do a bunch of training, I most likely screwed up the rest of my schedule somewhere else. Because of that, I’ll fit events into my gym lift schedule, and have 1-2 days dedicated to conditioning.
This far out of the competition, you can start bringing in some specificity, but work would still be kept general. I don’t really ever tend to prep specifically for a show until about 2-3 months out.
For circus DB press, along with needing to bring up your overhead strength and stability, you need to improve your leg drive. A good circus dumbbell press is more like a jerk. That said, I have a terrible CDB press, but even if you can’t jerk the weight, leg drive goes far.
I can only get away with pressing overhead once a week. Any more than that, and I can manage for about 2 months before I develop an impingement that takes about 4 months to fix. So I’d have 1 day a week dedicated to overhead pressing, and I’d train it in a 3 week wave like this
Week 1: Circus Dumbbell for reps (clean each rep, aim for 8-10 reps with your dominant hand in one set. Perform 2-3 sets total. Perform a matching amount of sets for as many reps as you can with non-dominant hand)
Week 2: Axle/straight bar clean and press (clean once) for 8-12 reps for the top set. Perform another set of the same rep for as many reps as possible.
Week 3: Axle/straight bar press out of racks for 4-6 reps. Do a backoff set of strict press for same amount of reps.
Unless specified as strict, perform all of those with leg drive. The goal is to learn leg drive.
When you’re about 2 months out from the contest, I’d switch it to this
Week 1: Circus Dumbbell for reps (clean each rep, aim for 8-10 reps with your dominant hand in one set. Perform 2-3 sets total. Perform a matching amount of sets for as many reps as you can with non-dominant hand)
Week 2: Axle/straight bar clean and press (clean once) for 8-12 reps for the top set. Perform another set of the same rep for as many reps as possible.
Week 3: Circus dumbbell for reps (clean once), go for 6-10, 2-3 sets, same protocol as week 1 for non-dominant hand
My second pressing day of the week is bench, and then for assistance work, I’d go with dumbbell incline benching. This will help build up the stability of the muscles required for DB pressing and keep up the static strength while still not taxing my shoulders too much. A good approach is to use mechanical advantage dropsets; start at the highest incline you can, get 8-10 reps, and then next set drop the bench down a click and do the same. Repeat until you end up flat benching.
For deadlift, I use ROM progression, and I think it’s a great approach to pretty much any strongman event. You get strong at multiple angles. I can expand on that if you’d like.
For your two carry events, you’re going to need to avoid the trap all powerlifters to strongman run into of wanting to move heavy weight slow. It won’t do anything for you. This is why I’ve been shying away from the zercher carries. Those are helpful if you’re actually training for a zercher carry event, but in that case you’d want to use a yoke, since you can move fast with that. A barbell/EZ bar tends to require too much balancing, and it prevents one from really building up footspeed. Something more compact you can actually carry, like a sandbag or keg, will teach you how to pick up and move your feet. Even with it being a max distance event, footspeed is going to be important, because you basically need to outrun your fatigue. The faster you can move, the further you can move before you drop.
I would personally just combine the trap bar carries and huss carries into one big dumb stupid medley on a conditioning day. Sprint competition distance with the trap bar as heavy as you can while maintaining your footspeed, then grab your stone and go for max distance. Do 3-5 rounds, making it more challenging in some way each week. Mental toughness is HUGE for this.
Those are some ideas for now. Let me know if I can flesh it out any.
Yesterday
30 minute pavement run
Notes; Still not tracking distance here. With how much the rest of my training seems to be beating me up, I’m transitioning to using this more as a restorative conditioning day. I still try to run as fast as I can through the 30 minutes, but I imagine the treadmill would make me move quicker. Wind was very strong today; running against it was a struggle, especially the day after 40 rep squats.
Woke up at 192.4 this morning.
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Oh yeah, also, for those that have been following along, it’s been exactly 1 year since my injury.
And in case you forgot
Thanks for all of those that have followed along and supported me through the way. We’re not stopping, because I can’t be stopped.
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I was able to jog with an ez Bar this morning, it was just very uncomfortable. I will get a sandbag, because I’m sure I need the “squeezing” aspect as much as the carrying itself. Thanks for the ideas!
No problem dude. Always happy to brainstorm.
Medley
100lb keg 50’
Run back 50’
182lb keg 50’
Run back 50’
Run back to keg
182lb keg 50’
Backwards prowler w/182lb keg drag 50’
4 rounds of the above
Notes: It doesn’t get better, but I get meaner and more evil, so that’s something. The drag is really getting better; I’m learning how to fall backwards while pushing with my quads at the same time. I’m not happy with my footspeed with the 182lb keg. I’m wondering it’s just a product of fatigue after the first keg, because that flies right off the start. Soon I’ll be leading with the 182, so I’ll be able to see.
It was the first day of snow for the year here. It had all melted by the time I got out to train, but was still below freezing. Felt great to be back in my element.
General notes: Woke up at 194.4. Had company over the night before and ate well, and then my kid got a stomach bug in the middle of the night so I spent the night on the floor in their room in case they needed me, so routine got a little jacked up. Did my Friday workout tonight, and then will rock 3 early mornings in a row and possibly cap it with a 2 a day.
AM WORKOUT
Axle strict press
5xAxle
5x66
5x136
5x161
3x181
5x201
8x161 (continental)
4x186 (continental and push press)
Notes: Tweaked my neck on the last set of 161. Actually heard it crunch. I should get back into neck training; it should prevent this. After that, I lost my ability to really grind any reps, so I cut the push presses short.
Dips (upright)
140 reps
Notes: 2 sets of 70 with rest pausing. These were rough on the neck.
Axle curls
1x135
BACKWORK (performed in between sets of everything else)
Lat pulldown 180
5x8
Band pull aparts
5x20
Axle rows 186
3x10
Notes: Wasn’t really able to go hard on the rows with my neck jacked up, but everything else worked well.
General notes: Woke up at 192.2. Legs are feeling a little better after the 40 rep squats. The conditioning probably helped get some blood into them.
Exactly how I feel lately. I didn’t get better physically at dealing with adversity, I just became more astute and hardened mentally to deal with the punches as they come. Love it.
Keep being a juggernaut, you fucking juggernaut.
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Appreciate it dude. Us lunatics have to stick together, haha.
PM WORKOUT
CoC #1 hold for time
2x50 seconds
Notes: Been slacking on this, which is stupid. I need to get my grip strong for the Hercules hold. From all I’ve heard, it’s the grip that gives out before the body, so I’m working on crush holds for time to see how that works out for me.
SUPER EARLY AM WORKOUT
Extreme abdominal crunches from the inside
7xAMRAP
Notes: That’s my cute way of saying I got a stomach flu. If it had to happen, I’m glad it’s this far from the show. I’m hitting up the Gatorade and calories to recover as much s I can.
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Oh shit. I laughed but then felt bad. Then I realized you’d just laugh at yourself throwing up if you were out of your own body watching it happen!
Don’t get worse! I feel myself becoming more susceptible too as the weather gets shittier.
No worries dude; I gotta be able to laugh at myself in times like these. Really, the most amusing thing is that I’ve gotten “good” at having the stomach flu. I know I’m going to be puking all night, so instead of getting into bed and getting out a whole bunch, I just hung out by the toilet with my smart phone and killed time between puking.
And I got to beat a level in Sugar Smash doing that, so I mean, I got that going for me.
I am excited for my cheat meal this week. I have to make up for lost ground, haha.
About two months ago I finally took your advice and started using straps on my deadlift and adding in grip work.
My third cycle (5/3/1 principles) since doing it and I’ve hit 3 huge PRs on my deadlift. I also went from not being able to close the CoC1 at all to getting it for 3 easy reps. Thank you for the advice!
I was attempting behind the neck push presses once, and when the bar landed there was a nasty crunch. I couldn’t turn my head for almost a week. Was yours from impact or during a rep?
@Roran That’s outstanding news dude! Closing those grippers is addictive. Can’t wait to hear when you close the 2. Congrats on the deads moving as well.
@brady888 Naw, nothing that dramatic for me. I have a recurring neck twinge that happens on the concentric. Basically, I lose focus and move my head/neck in the middle of a rep while the bar is overhead, which compromises my neck and causes something to twinge/pop. Realistically, I think I have a few herniated discs in my neck, but I’ve never got an MRI there to say for sure. What you went through sounds pretty intense.
Woke up at 188.4. That’s actually a 1lb gain from yesterday. Slowly building back up. Gonna try my EMOM continental work tonight and see what happens.