Let me warm that up for you...

It's been tough to get training in this week, but I managed to get some in today. I was initially going to deadlift, but Jess talked me out of it in favor of squatting. I just ME squatted on Saturday, but after that session we found out that AAU's Raw rules means really raw- no wrist wraps, no knee sleeves. I haven't ME squatted without knee support in a looooong time, so I thought it would be wise to try it out. Thankfully, I had nothing to worry about.

A1. Mobility

Leg swings
Squat Pulls
Glute Ham Bridges
X-Band Walks

B1. Squat

5 x 135#
3 x 225#
2 x 275#
1 x 315#
1 x 335#

I think once I got past the mental block of not having knee sleeves (let's face it, Rehbands are just glorified leg warmers), I felt fine.

C1. Band-Assisted Pullups

4 x 6 x bw + medium band

C2. Blast Strap Ab Fallouts

4 x 6 x bw

D1. Prehabs

Internal/External Rotations 3 x 8 x small band
Step-Unders 3 x 8

Overall a good session. Capped it off by grilling for the first time this year. Lemon chicken that Jess prepared, with Taboule and Carrots that Jess cooked up. Yum.


11 days till I compete in Vegas, which also means 11 days till we eat at Craftsteak and do some Wagyu Beef eatin'. In the immortal words of Bart Scott, "CAN'T WAIT."

Old and creaky

I totally forgot to writeup my workout from Tuesday. Long story short, I benched well, did some massive push pressing, and once I was done with that, my neck/shoulder spasmed and I had to stop. I spent the week nursing that, and today I felt well enough to ME squat. It's a bit freaky- I've never had a spasm occur that close to a training session, let alone during one. They usually come at times of rest. I am pretty certain it's related to sitting in an office chair all day- if I sit in a baby squat, the pain virtually disappears and I have full mobility. I'm gonna make an appointment with the spine specialist on Monday.

A1. Mobility/Prehab

Leg Swings
Squat Pulls
Glute/Ham bridges
Step Unders
Band Scapular Contraction
External Shoulder Rotations
Neck Rotations

B1. Squat

8 x 135#
5 x 225#
1 x 275#
1 x 315#
0 x 345# I had this. I just dipped forward at my sticking point. Dumb.
1 x 325# This close to the meet i needed to at least get something up.

2 weeks out from the meet, not too bad for squatting. Even though I missed 345#, I am confident I'll get more than that at the meet.

C1. SSB Good Mornings

3 x 6 x 225# This was going to be 4 x 6, but I was pretty done at this point and didn't want to push anything with my shoulder/neck spasm.

D1. Walk Hyper Dog

Jess and I took Vino for a walk to cool down.

Overall a decent day. Not sure how I am going to structure this week yet for training. Gonna work on that tomorrow.

knock the rust off

Back to capoeira after not doing any sort of training for a month. Man that felt good. Oddly enough, i haven't gained as much weight as i thought i did, which is weird, but then i haven't realy been eating that much either. Ah well...NOW i'm ready to hit the gym again. Yes...yes.

It's weird, it's not even a case of i just don't want to train anymore, etc, any of that, it's more like once i stop training it's a fight to figure out how to get back. I know, i know, in a perfect world you'd never stop training because everything is awesome and even when it's not, you make time to train because you love training and it's what gets you through, etc etc, and i'm not mocking that mindset at all, just pointing out that sometimes things aren't just so. I'm not bitching or passing the buck, more just illustrating, framing, that sorta thing.

So i need a goal. I mean something more focused than "Get strong as Fuck". That's just a given. I think i want to finesse "Get strong as Fuck" down to "Get powerful as Fuck", which is definitely more specific. It's kinda like a return to zero for me, i started weight training in high school as a supplement to sports, and before i got into powerlifting, i was weightlifting to supplement martial arts.

Yep, so that's that. Nothing important, just felt like i had to write words. So, WORDS.

So Wheres You Been?

An excellent question! It's been quite an interesting last few weeks, so let's start back then.

2 weeks ago was my last training session before heading to San Francisco for a conference. Upon my return, my wife and I were slated to compete in the Washington State USAPL Championships.

Well, when I landed in Seattle on Friday, I was supposed to take a shuttle to Olympia, WA to meet my wife at the hotel. She was going to compete in the AM, and I was slated to compete on Sunday. Unfortunately, within an hour of getting of the plane, my right leg swelled up to the point of being immobile. We decided it was not a good idea for me to compete, and my wife gave up her spot at the meet to come home and help me out.

I tweeted about my symptoms, and almost immediately received messages from my parents as well as some other good friends (including Bob Wanamaker, who has been an invaluable friend and resource for strength training) expressing concern that I may have a blood clot. I had just assumed it was from walking around all week. After my parents made my wife promise to take me to the doctor, we went in. After hearing my symptoms (and seeing the doctor's eyes widen more and more as I listed them), they sent me immediately to get a venous ultrasound. After a couple of hours they found no clots, offering explanations varying from having had a clot that resolved itself to compartment syndrome to just me being a wuss from walking around so much the previous week. I'll take being a wuss no problem here.

I kept an eye on it all week and the symptoms are now happily all gone. Since we missed last week's meet, we wanted to get one in before USAPL Raw Nationals in August. We managed to find an AAU meet in Las Vegas of all places, in 3 weeks, and made travel plans today (as well as reservations to Craftsteak, ooooh yes.)

With 3 weeks till the meet and only 2 real weeks to train, and coming off this weird injury, I naturally decided today would be a great day to deadlift! And so deadlift I did:

A1. Mobility

Leg Swings

Squat Pulls

Glute-Ham Bridges

B1. Deadlift

5 x 135#

4 x 225#

2 x 275#

1 x 315#

1 x 365#

1 x 385#

Felt pretty good for such a long layoff.

C1. SSB Squat Box Squats

3 x 8 x 225#

D1. One-Armed Rows

4 x 6 x 90#

I had planned on doing some one-armed OH pressing here, but I was pretty spent and decided not to push it. I did some hip and shoulder prehab and called it quits.

Here's to hoping I stay healthy for this meet in 3 weeks. Although if I'm not, we're going to Vegas anyways. :)