Off-season training

[Alan H]

Had an awesome practice today with the OC Highlanders so I thought I'd share:

11/13/2011

Throwing Practice with OC Highlanders

Open Stone
8x Standing Throws
5x Reverses
12x Full Spin Throws

LWFD
15x Throws

HWFD (56#)
5x Throws

Light Scottish Hammer
12x Throws

Great practice today! This was the first time I've been able to make it to a practice in a few months, due to my kid's soccer schedule. I was a little sore from the 20-rep squats on Friday, and it really showed today. After the practice, I'm exhausted & very sore! Going to eat & watch football for the rest of the day so I can recover!

Open Stone throws were mid 30's, a bit disappointing. The LWFD is coming along nicely, I was consistently around 48-49'. 47 is my current PR, so that's great. For HWFD I threw the 56# weight for the 1st time. Damn, that was really hard. I threw it 18-19'. Needs lots of work for me to get comfortable with it. Hammer is improving the most. I was consistently throwing around 78' today, my current PR is 67'.

I'm really expecting some big improvements between now & Long Beach Games in February!

Looking at a 10+foot improvment in hammer? NICE!!

Yeah, big difference between 56 HWFD and 42 HWFD, huh?

[eclarkhb]

Looking at a 10+foot improvment in hammer? NICE!!

Yeah, big difference between 56 HWFD and 42 HWFD, huh?

Thanks man! And yeah, the 56-lb weight is HEAVY. I need to gain some weight.

[Alan H]

Squat Day ...again, already?

Stretch cage, the usual
Stationary Bicycle ... 4min
Back squat... 8 x bar / 2 x 6 x 135 / 6 x 185 / 2 x 4 x 225 / 2 x2 x 275 up the volume, and increase the weight at the top end. Nice.
Core 1 ... hanging leg lifts - 15, 10
hamstring curls ... 2 x 10 x 145 "on the stack"
Core 2 ... incline bench situps 13 x 10 lbs on my chest...HA! fried
Elliptical 'cause I'm bored with rowing for now... 13/13 8 minutes

I'm definitely feeling some effects of the stronger, tighter lower back muscles in terms of hints of pain and tingling in my feet and "sensations" down my sciatic nerve. I think I need to back off a bit. I'll probably ease off on the deadlifts, or alternate them with Zercher squats.

[Alan H]

Push and Pull day, with extras... I recruited three ladies from the University Rugby Team to come out and throw. So now I should do a winter throws day for yucks, to give them a chance to heave the stuff around.

Stretch Cage - foam roller happiness on me buttocks
Overhead press ... 10 x bar/ 10 x 95 / 6 x 135 / 3 x 155 / 2 x 155
Lat Pull downs... because the rugby girlz was doing 'em @ 105 for "lots of" reps.... 8 x 190 / 6 x 190 / 6 x 175 (actually this is on my program for today, anyway)

Core 1 ... Hungarian Core Blasters ... 10 x 80 / 2 x 10 x 90
Then general chitchat to revoer for...

High pulls ... 2 x 4 x 115 / 2 x 4 x 135
tricpes pull downs... 2 x 8 x 80
curl bar curls NOT in the squat rack ... 2 x 8 x 95.

[eclarkhb]

... I recruited three ladies from the University Rugby Team....

So I decided to take a tip from Alan & recruit some ladies to train with. Unfortunately there's not a big university close to my house, but I was pleasantly surprised to find a "Pole Dancing School" a mere block and a half away. I think I'll stop by today and see if I can recruit some of the athletes to train with. Will let you know how it goes...

[eclarkhb]

11/18/2011

Some Random Thoughts on my Training...


Programming:

So the combination of The Juggernaut Method & 5/3/1 that I've been running for most of 2011 has been working well. I'm planning on testing for some new PRs at the end of December, but here's how I've done so far this year:

Bench: 2x255 -> 1x300 (+ 45 lbs)
Squat: 5x275 -> 1x365 (+ 90 lbs)
Deadlift: 1x405 -> 1x455 (+ 50 lbs)
Strict Press: 2x155 -> 1x195 (+ 40 lbs)
Push Press: 1x195 -> 1x225 (+ 30 lbs)

Not bad progress! I like the flexibility of the program, and the fact that it's really easy for me to substitute a different program (like add50) for bench. Or run the program, except do some type of different progression for deadlift for example. But when I look back on my progress this year, the times when I set big PRs & made the big gains, were when I ran something different for a specific lift.

So I'm wondering if I should consider some different type of programming overall? Maybe I could make bigger gains more often in 2012 if I switched it up a bit. Not sure yet, but it's something to think about. I may run a 12-week experiment starting in January. Otherwise the plan is to run TJM basically as written, starting with a 10s phase in January.

Also, I'll be 40 next year, and I really want to maximize the gains I can make while I'm still able to make relatively easy gains. In a few years it's going to be a lot tougher to add strength.

Conditioning and Additional Work

I haven't been doing much conditioning for the past few months, and I think I'll continue that plan through the winter. I will occasionally include some short runs/jogs just for GPP, but nothing significant.

However, I do really enjoy the sprinting / plyos / jumping work that I've been doing. I plan to continue doing this once or twice a week. I'm not focused on conditioning, just speed & power. I think this work is helping my recovery, my GPP, my overall athleticism & hopefully it has some positive carryover in the weight room & for throwing as well.

Diet

I started tracking what I'm eating, but I'm not really dieting with a goal of losing weight. I'm tracking to make sure I'm getting enough protein. I'm also limiting my carbs some, but trying to eat enough veggies, fruit & meat to keep the calorie intake high enough to maintain or gain weight. It's sort of an experiment, we'll see how it goes through the holidays - I may shitcan the experiment in a few weeks & just go back to eating as much as I can. TBD...

Goals

I have a lot of "hobbies" so sometimes its' tough to prioritize my goals. At a high-level, here's the goals for the next 3-4 months, in order of priority:

1) Get stronger
2) Consistency with Brazilian Jiu-jitsu training
3) Improve Throwing technique for Highland Games

Any thoughts or comments are welcome...

[Alan H]

So I decided to take a tip from Alan & recruit some ladies to train with. Unfortunately there's not a big university close to my house, but I was pleasantly surprised to find a "Pole Dancing School" a mere block and a half away. I think I'll stop by today and see if I can recruit some of the athletes to train with. Will let you know how it goes...

You know, GGGP is a "silent partner" in that business, I hear....

[Alan H]

ecklarkb ... try some incline bench. Most of the throwers guys and also Adriane Blewitt...who ought to know, considering.... tell me that incline crosses over to throwing better than flat bench.

Your squats are big. Not HUGE but big, plenty big enough to throw far. As a very general goal, maybe gun for a 5-8% increase in weights across the board in your lifts and THROW A LOT.

[GoodGirlGonePlaid]

So I decided to take a tip from Alan & recruit some ladies to train with. Unfortunately there's not a big university close to my house, but I was pleasantly surprised to find a "Pole Dancing School" a mere block and a half away. I think I'll stop by today and see if I can recruit some of the athletes to train with. Will let you know how it goes...

They'd probably be pretty good, actually!

[Alan H]

Deadlift Day

I've been thinking about alternating DL's with Zercher Squats in my routine because of the lower back compression issue. I've been back from this workout for about an hour now, no issues yet. We'll see.

I gave two units of blood two days ago, and was just a little bit dizzy after a set during this workout, so I kept the pace on the slow side with lots of recovery.

This was kind of a biggie...

Stretch Cage...the usual
Station bike warmup ... 4 min
Deadlifts ... 2 x 6 x 185 / 2 x 4 225 / 4 x 275 ...then decided to go for it, see if I could crack the magic number. Answer: I CAN. 2 x 300, and honestly, it was pretty easy.

core 1 ... incline situps; 10 lb plate x 17
caore 2 ... hammer wind ab crushers .. 2 x 8 x 12 lb ball

Zercher squats ... 6 x 135 then decided to keep reps low and see how high I could go. 4 x 160 / 2 x 185 / 2 x 205 and there was a bit more in the tank but that's enough .. In the future I'll do sets at about 165-175 for a while.

Elliptical - easy 8 minutes

I'm kind of stoked to have gotten past the 300 mental threshold in DL's. Every one of those is another 16th of an inch in WOB.