Leap Day = Atlas Stone PR Day!

Apparently Leap Day is for PRs in this house- Jessica PR'd her geared squat today and something kicked in after a bad day at work (my own fault), causing me to go effing BEAST MODE on my Atlas stone.

A1. Atlas Stone Over 48" Bar

3 x 5 x 175# 53s, 41s, 37s

Previous PR was 3 x 3 x 175#. Maybe it was the homemade chicken parm and penne that I ate 30 minutes prior...


No more words, just video:

the first will just laugh

        Posting up two days worth of workouts since i didn't make a post yesterday.  Totally meant to, just had to get a presentation in order for this morning.  It was a fun presentation for me at least, being in GDC mode and taking stock of how I carry myself is always fun.  I take every opportunity to speak to groups of any size in the days leading up to GDC, and it is literally days at this point.  I never sweat the content of my talks, but the delivery is crazy.  I want people to be engaged, I want people to have fun, and I want people to at least take one major point with them, so anything I can do to make my content more memorable is fine by me...


But dude, seriously? A bear costume..?
        So I've found that a 5x5x5 dumbbell workout can be done in 30 minutes, provided rest periods are kept solid.  That's 5x5 for 5 stations.  Tomorrow i want to toss in a bodyweight set and a power set, so we'll see if I can keep it to the 30 minutes, having 15 on the backend to do some bagwork is great.  I feel like my strikes are getting more solid per session, and my adds hurt less now that I've gotten some kick tech back.  My fight got moved:( but I'll take the time for some additional conditioning and training.  Wrestling starts up tomorrow, so I'm jazzed about that.  Wrestling is a whole different kind of grappling, looking forward to really working the explosives.

(Yesterday)

• Dumbbell Bench: 60 5x5
• Dumbbell Incline: 50 5x5
• Dumbbell Shoulders: 40 5x5
• Lateral Raise: 25 5x5
• Dumbbell Row: 80 5x5

(Today)
Warmup:

• A1. Jump Rope: 2x3min
• A2. Shadowbox: 2x1min

Main:

• B1. Double Unders: 3min
• B2. Box Jumps: 3min
• B3. One Arm KB Swings: 3min
• B4. Heavy Bag Punch: 3min
• B5. Heavy Bag Kick: 3min
• B6. Ground n Pound: 3min

Blastout:
Blackjack!

• C1. Pushup: x1
• C2. BW Squat: x2
• ...
• C20. BW Squat: x20
• C21. Pushup: x21

        Sweet jeebus I've missed Crosspit, tho it's only been a week and some change.  The high intensity stuff is the highlight of my week, i imagine once i get to kickboxing and mma i'll get more of that.  Still feeling my way through the new job, and though it affords me a greater degree of flexibility, still want to get my head around everything first before I settle on a final schedule.  

Life is good.

Today's TrainingTune: Next To Last - Mindless Faith

More free time...

So I started out a couple weeks back crunching all my workouts into Friday night, Sat and Sun mornings due to cancelling my gym membership near the studio due to a feeling of 'impending doom' as tends to fall over an office that ends up with 3 cancelled projects in a few weeks time...all of them falling in the realm of character work.  Well my feelings of impending doom hailed true yesterday when I was cut from the studio - sad I know, but don't fret, I'm a bouncy fella and will spring up in a new place shortly I'm sure.

So with that it does mean I get to see my family more during the week, force myself into crunch time to polish up the demo reel and spread my workouts back over the coarse of the week instead of 3 days and sometimes doubling up.

With the new rotation being drop sets I will definitely say I am just straight up burnt out come Sunday night.  These workouts are just brutal and tiring.

The last workout was just Chest as I was just too tired to do Legs as well.

I present you with Chest-taculous pain!

Low Cable Cross
17.5  x  20  12.5 x 20  7.5 x 20
25 x 15  20 x 12  15 x 15
30 x 8  25 x 8  20 x 12

Iso-lateral Press - too soon for this, the shoulder did not like it at all so we moved onto more cross-type exercises
160 x 8  140 x 4  70 x6

Pec Fly
120 x 12  75 x 12  40 x 16
165 x 12  120 x10  75 x 12
165 x 12  120 x 8  75 x 12 (shoulder was still bugging me a bit, didn't want to push it)

Incline Dumbbell Fly SUPERSET with Dumbbell Shrugs (weight is single dumbbell) and Upright Rows (3 exercise superset)
IDF - 32.5 x 15  27.5 x 12  22.5 x 12
DBS - 80#'s hold 15s, hold 15s, - 13 reps for 15 total
UR - 60 x 15
IDF - 40 x 8  35 x 8  30 x 8
DBS - 95# - hold 15s, hold 15s, - 8 reps for 10 total
UR - 60 x 12
IDF - 45 x 8  35 x 6  30 x 8
DBS - 100# - hold 10 - 9 reps for 10 total
UR - 60 x 12

I think it's time for an iPod as the music they were playing overhead was HORRIBLE!!!

Fat and Clean

Took it light tonight to keep stress off of my pinched nerve, so I did me some fat grip cleans, fat man pullups and thick grip plate holds. Neck held up fine throughout, thankfully!

A1. 2.5" Grip Cleans

2 x 8 x 45#

3 x 65#

2 x 85#

1 x 105#

1 x 125#

0 x 135# grip failed

These were probably the deepest I've ever gotten on cleans, so I am happy with the work even though I couldn't get the 135#. Definitely not near what I've been able to do in the past, but I'm getting more explosive and that's the point of doing this stuff!

B1. Weighted Fat Man Pullups

2 x 8 x bw

3 x 8 x bw + two 20# chains

Was supposed to do regular pullups but didn't want to risk it with the pinched nerve, so I threw the chains on and did these. A lot harder than I had anticipated.

C1. 3" Front Plate Holds

30s x 30#

30s x 40#

20s x 40#

Abdominals!

Videoooeoeoeoeoeooo:

Neither Rain, Nor Sleet, Nor Busted Toilet Valve

This week has been hectic due to a flooded house on top of extra days commuting, but here it is.

POST FLOOD WEIGHTS

FEB 17 2012

Second day with our new JiuJitsu coach. I really should have skipped to finish drying out my house, but since I knew one of our guys was going to miss, I didn’t want the team to make a bad impression. My house flooded Wednesday night/Thursday morning due to a toilet valve malfunction and I’m now trying to clean out all the water and get everything dried out before it mildews and mold sets in.

In JJ, Coach M had us show him how we do the arm bar, and then showed us the way he likes to do it with the cross grip instead of the way we tend to cup the elbow and such. Overall, very similar in principle with some variations that we can use. We drilled arm bars and sweeps, and then did some guard pass drills. Each of us would do 3 minutes on top and 6 minutes on bottom. Bottom guy trying to sweep or submit, top guy trying to pass or submit.

After that, we switched to rolling and started standing (finally…I never liked starting from knees). We did 3 x 5 minute rounds. I worked too hard and got caught too many times, but it was better than last time. Slowly getting my grappling chops back.

I skipped sprints to go home and work on the house. I met the guys with E at 7:00pm for weights. Here was the night.

• Front Squats
• 45 x 8
• 65 x 6
• 95 x 5
• 135 x 5
• 155 x 5
• 165 x 5
• 165 x 3
• Bench Press
• 45 x 8
• 65 x 6
• 95 x 5
• 145 x 5
• 195 x 5
• 215 x 4
• Deadlift
• 135 x 5
• 185 x 5
• 225 x 5
• Clean and Press
• 135 x 5
• 135 x 5

I know. Weird workout sets and such, but tis has been a weird week already and we were running out of time in the gym before they closed.

NO RUN AND SOME FUN FLOW

FEB 21 2012

Today I was beat. The combination of days of post-flooding clean-up, training, extra days in Sarasota commuting, and the usual training lead me to want to sleep for the extra hour this morning. I skipped my normal run with M and went in to training at 9:00am. Today, we were dealing with the possible loss of a teammate, and we spent some time talking about that. After that, we hit  the training. Back and forth up and down the floor. Flow drilling with changes. One guy fighting forward, the other backward. Slowly adding in kicks, and working more angles, without any specific combinations. Just exploring and reacting. Experimenting on one another like well-punished lab rats. I worked with A. He adapts and improvises quickly, and I was having a lot of fun working with him as we each tried to bait the other with repetition and difference. Repeat a pattern, study the reactions, then change it up exploiting any perceived openings.

After long rounds of this, we started working on grappling control drills. Tugging, pushing, smashing heads, using the head as a weapon. Then switch to striking, then back to grappling. A and I started sneaking in shots and mixing the two where we saw clear opportunities to keep one another on our toes. This was fun. I’ll be sore tomorrow.

NEW WRESTLING COACH

FEB 22 2012

This morning the team had our 8:00am Jiu-Jitsu session with M and our new wrestling coach (big E) came in to meet M and work with us a bit. We drilled BJJ for about 20 minutes first. We worked on the arm bar M had showed us last week. We then started working his triangle and a fight position from which he likes to do a lot of work for MMA. Big E then jumped in and we drilled  a double-leg and a snatch single. We also worked on a couple defenses including a really nice kick out. After that, we went to grappling drills. One of us would be given the single and try to finish it and the other would try to escape or reverse. Good stuff. Near the end, I strained a hamstring and spent the last round stretching it out.

After we finished up, we headed to the park for light sprint day. I did the sprints after stretching more. I went lighter (not pulling hard with the hamstrings), but still finishing ahead of A. We did 3 rounds. Felt good afterward. But HUNGRY.

A Little SSB Action

Wanted to some geared deadlifting today, but the pinched nerve in my neck is still not feeling great, so I decided to take some stress off of it by switching to the safety squat bar. I think it was a wise decision.

A1. SSB Squat

2 x 8 x 85#

8 x 135#

5 x 175#

3 x 225#

2 x 275#

3 x 2 x 315#

2 x 1 x 315# 

Was supposed to be four doubles at 315#, but I can't complain. They were all deep enough at least, and my endurance is starting to come back. I'm hoping to triple 315# soon and go from there.

B1. SSB Good Morning

3 x 8 x 175# 

OK, maybe not so smart to put pressure on my neck. Oh well.

C1. 3" Pinch Grip

5 x 5s x 45# per hand

Man, I used to be able to do these for 30 seconds at a pop. I clearly have a lot of work to do to get back real grip strength. The video is embarrassing, especially for how damn whiny I was, but it goes up for posterity...

Videooooos! The bar in front of me during the squats was Jessica's deadlift session. She pulled 345# and made it look easy today!

Pinched, er, Push Presses...

Decided that I needed to work on some thicker grip OH pressing, so I started this week with that. My god, I love Fat Gripz but once I got to higher weight I was wishing we had a real fat/axle bar...

A1. 2.5" Grip (Simulated Axle/Fat Gripz) Push Press

2 x 8 x 45#

5 x 95#

3 x 135#

2 x 155#

1 x 175#

1 x 195#

1 x 215# dumped the bar here and was done :/

Used Fat Gripz to get a 2.5" grip for a simulated axle grip push press. Dumping the bar pinched a nerve in my neck that didn't flare up until I was done with training. I like my heating pad.

Teh Videos:

B1. Pullups

4 x 6 x bw w/medium band

  

B2. Blast Strap Ab Fallouts

4 x 8 x bw

Aside from dumping the bar a good session. The pinched nerve afterwards sucks, but we have enough tools to work it out that I'll be fine tomorrow.