Training Update, Videos, and Challenges

Monday

Fat Bar Push Press: 174x5, 160x5, 145x5x3

Wednesday

Body Weight (195) Front/Back Squat Challenge: 17/10, 10/10

Good Mornings: 5x5

Friday

Trap Bar Speed Dead Lift: 305x3x8

Gunz

Quarter Mile Farmers Walk: Hundies in each hand.  It took me 6:14 to complete.

High rep squats smoked me.  I was surprised at how many reps I did on the front squat and how few I did on the back squat.  When I made the switch and sat back into the first back squat I could feel my quads trying to do everything.  That was a weird feeling.  By rep 6 on the back squat I could feel my spinal erectors starting to go.  I stayed smart and shut it down there.  No point in getting injured.

On Tuesdays and Thursdays I’m going to start adding in some quick workouts.  On Tuesday I did some single arm dead lifts and then prowlers with rope inverted rows.  Nothing too intense or time consuming.  It took me about 30 minutes total to complete.

I love spring.  It’s by-far my favorite season.  Even though we didn’t really get a winter I’m ready for it to be warm again.  The best part is that once it gets into the 50’s it feels like it’s 70.  I just hope it stays this way.  If it snows in April I’m going to be pissed.

I’m getting pretty excited for St. Patty’s Day this year.  Normally I prefer to keep it low key since it’s usually during the week and for the most part it’s amateur hour at the bars.  But this year a bunch of friends got a drink/food special in Chicago.  I’ve challenged Eric to a corned beef eating contest.  I know I’m going to lose; I just want to see what kind of damage he can do.  I hope they have Jameson at this thing too.

A couple of my clients hit dead lift PRs this week.  Shannon, who owns a kettlebell studio, pulled 223 (metrics and shit), Matt pulled 406, and Joe hoisted 508.  I was so proud.  They’ve been following a program that I wrote up for them and it seems to be going well.  There are a few tweaks that I’m going to make to it but for the most part that shit is bananas.

The Farmer’s Walk Challenge crushed me.  Carrying half your bodyweight in each hand for a quarter mile is a lot harder than it sounds.  My hands and forearms were pretty useless after this and I even used straps. Try it.  Let me know how it goes.

The more that I think about it, when it comes to training athletes, and even adults for that matter, the speed of movement is just as important as the weight on the bar.  There is a time and place for an athlete to strain against a weight and come out on top, but those times should be few and far between.  Most sports are played in a fast reactive manner and I think a majority of their work in the weight room should be the same.  Most will say that the intent to accelerate is just as good as actually accelerating it, but what population are we talking about?  Power lifters with a decade or more under the bar or 16 year-old kids with a very low training age? 

Those that have been training a long time know their bodies and can understand the biofeedback.  Those that don’t have a lot of under the bar experience don’t know the difference between slow and the intent to be fast.  They just know they stood up with the bar.  And more than likely those that haven’t built the muscle maturity that comes with years of training are going to lose some kind of posture when attempting to accelerate a heavy load because they think it needs to be fast, not just attempted fast.  I don’t know.  I’m more or less just thinking out loud.  On a computer. 


I hope everyone has a great weekend!