In December 2016, on my last heavy deadlift session before competing in Victoria's Strongest Man in January, I injured my back. Although the damage wasn't too serious, it was enough that I had to pull out of the competition.
At first, the rehab protocol was simply to do 50-100 reps of hyperextensions and reverse hyperextensions as part of my warm-up. During this time I didn't squat or deadlift anything over about 60% of my max. This felt like it was working for a couple of months, and then I hurt my back in the same way again, but this time while doing a speed squat session.
This was frustrating, considering that I thought I was doing the "right thing" this time around.
I changed my rehab protocol to instead focus on a lot of direct ab work - something I've neglected a lot in the past - and regular stretching of the hip region and other areas in close proximity. The ab work work was just some ab wheel work to begin with, and then I started doing 100 reps of light pulldown abs as part of my warm-up protocol along with the ab wheel work.
This time, things have started to get better; I've been able to squat up to ~180kg again and deadlift in the 200-240kg range again, although not for the higher volume I was used to before the injury. There has been some slight discomfort and tightness, but some stretching and mobility work has sorted it out.
I then, more recently, added the lower-back rehab work from earlier in the year back in; 100 reps of hyperextensions in my warm-up protocol on top of the ab work I'm already doing.
This has been working well and I'm back on track to squat and pull some heavier numbers by the end of the year. Just in time for the next Victoria's Strongest Man competition in January 2018.
When I first started strength training, I didn't own a pair of straps, so I did all of my pulling work (deadlifts, rows, pull-ups, etc) without straps. Because of this, I never had grip problems. So when I started using my straps a lot more often a couple of years ago, very slowly my grip strength started to suffer, and I barely noticed it was happening.
Fast-forward to the start of this year and any moderately heavy farmer's walk was held back by my grip (my solution was to put my straps on and continue, making the problem worse) and the top sets of all my deadlift days were getting cut short because my left hand would start to open up after a few reps (and my solution, again, was to put straps on and continue, making the problem worse).
The solution was pretty clear; stop using straps in training.
It's been a slow and humbling process and it's taken a while, but finally my deadlift sets are being held back by other issues now and I can comfortably farmer's walk with competition weights without worrying about my hands opening up for the last few steps.
Back in 2011, I ran 5/3/1 for a few cycles, shortly after finishing up a linear periodisation program back when I first started strength training. I made great progress for a year on the original 5/3/1 template, and then, for some reason (fun, mostly), I swapped to other programs (mostly my own, because I knew everything apparently) where I made mediocre progress for a couple of years. The only decent progress I made in this period was actually a program somebody else gave me.
And then, at the end of 2014, I realised that I didn't, in fact, know everything, and wound up back on 5/3/1, using Chase Karnes' 5/3/1 for Strongman template, and lo and behold, after a couple of cycles I got stronger again, built a little more muscle and felt much better for it. So for the past year, I've been training on some kind of 5/3/1 template.
It's an upper/lower split, which was how I was training at the time.
Doing two main upper-body lifts on the upper-body day and two main lower-body lifts on the lower-body day gave me a really nice volume boost, which translated into some quick, early strength and mass gains since most weeks I can only train twice a week and only doing one main upper/lower lift per week wasn't enough volume for that.
Events are trained on their own day, rather than amongst regular training days. I know the norm is to have a separate events training day, but I had been training with an event tacked onto the end of my regular training days for a while up to this point, which had the downside of training days taking at least 2 hours.
Eight weeks of this template saw me through to my first competition of the year, which went pretty well.
Joker Sets, First-Set-Last Volume and Deadlifting Again
After getting my hands on Beyond 5/3/1, I experimented with joker sets and first-set-last volume work.
One of the reasons I'd previously moved on from the original 5/3/1 template was because I hated never really getting to test out where I was at with heavier weights, and I absolutely despised the Boring But Big volume work. So these two additions seemed perfect.
Having previously had success with paused overhead presses and with the general recommendation in my strength trainee circles that paused variations were awesome, I added in paused first-set-last volume work first; 5 sets of 5 after the regular 5/3/1 sets.
After a cycle of paused volume work, I added in the joker sets, after the regular 5/3/1 sets but before the volume work. I cut the volume work down to 3 sets and really pushed the joker sets. A cycle of this saw me through to my second competition of the year.
At this point, my pressing strength had never felt stronger; it was around this time of the year that I strict pressed 100kg for a solid double for an all-time PR, and was regularly strict pressing 100kg for a single most weeks.
During this training block, I started training my deadlift again, since I'd had some lower-back issues from a leftover injury that put my deadlift out of action for a while, but I didn't want to program the deadlift with 5/3/1 and really hammer it just yet, so I kept it to sets of no more than 3 reps at no heavier than 80% and followed it up with a lot of prehab work (hyperextensions mostly). Partial pulls from the knees felt fine though, for those days when I had to scratch a really heavy itch.
More Volume Variations
At this point I was totally sold on joker sets and first-set-last volume; it kept training interesting and I walked out of the gym feeling like I'd done some good work.
For this training block I alternated the movements that I used for the volume work each 5/3/1 cycle, e.g. after my strict press 5/3/1 and joker sets, I did my volume work with either paused strict presses, or I incline benched, since incline benching had translated pretty well to my overhead strength before.
Bodybuilding work also got a massive push after the volume work. There's never enough muscle and I'm way behind the strongmen that I compete against on this front.
My lower-back felt good at this point and my deadlift was feeling solid, so I ran a Mag/Ort peaking cycle. I stopped squatting so that my legs were always ready for the Mag/Ort onslaught. In hindsight, I wish I'd kept squatting, but the 8-week Mag/Ort cycle went well and I finished up with an all-time 2RM of 235kg.
The end of that 8-week block saw me through to my third and final strongman competition for the year.
Full Body, Full 5/3/1
After the last competition, I wasn't too happy with my performance and I'd stopped feeling athletic. I was stronger though, so at least I had that going for me. But I looked fat and I felt slow. My food intake had been pretty terrible (high calorie, low quality). So the first step was to clean up my diet and then sort out my training.
When this article (sort by "oldest first") popped up on T-Nation a few years ago, a full-body 5/3/1 template where I squatted every gym day was something I wanted to try, because squatting is awesome, but for one reason or another, I never did it. Wendler modified the full-body template and added a couple of variations to the Beyond 5/3/1 book and that's where my current training template has come from and I'm just finishing up my second cycle now.
I'm squatting again, I'm benching again, my deadlift is programmed with 5/3/1 again and my strict overhead press just keeps on truckin'. I'm enjoying squatting every time I walk into the gym.
I'm still using joker sets, and I'm still doing first-set-last volume, although a little different to earlier in the year:
The squat and deadlift get one first-set-last rep-out
The bench press and overhead press get a rest-pause first-set-last set
Programming the drop sets with these parameters has the added benefit of some conditioning upkeep and a huge pump.
Going into the new year, as I prep to qualify for, and compete in, the Australian Arnold Amateur Strongman competition, I'll tweak this template a little bit, but maintain the full-body principles.
I'm happy to be back on 5/3/1. Training hasn't felt this good in a while.
Nearly two weeks ago, I competed at Round One of the 2015 Victorian Strongman Grand Prix at StrongMelbourne. I did a write-up of the events and how I went on my strongman-focused tumblr account. tl;dr I came 3rd in the heavyweight division, video below:
Hindsight is a wonderful and terrible thing. And that's what this blog post is going to be; a list of all the things I did right and wrong, the things I'd changed and the things I wouldn't change in the lead up to what was my fourth strongman competition. Hopefully these lessons can be carried forward.
Practice the Events
This is a pretty obvious one. The big problem I had when trying to train the events was that my regular strongman gym, Definition Fitness Centre, didn't have a lot of the equipment to practice with, and some of the equipment wasn't even built when the competition was announced, so there wasn't a lot that I could do about that.
A week before the competition, I only got one practice session in at StrongMelbourne with the actual implements, and I probably should've gotten in at least one or two more training days in there in the earlier weeks.
Why is this so crucial: if I hadn't have practiced the sandbag loading race, figuring out what the best way to setup and pick up the sandbags was for me, I would've screwed the event up entirely. Also, a 260kg frame carry is very different to a 130kg per hand farmer's walk.
Dig Deeper
This is a recurring problem for me, and it's obvious when rewatching myself on video; I don't have a sense of urgency during an event. I look too casual. I'm not aggressive. I'm not angry. I don't look like I actually realise that I'm in a competition trying to beat other people. This is in stark contrast to when I play basketball - something I've done for 20 years now - where I'm very aggressive.
During the sandbag loading event, the first two sandbags were carried and loaded pretty easily, and I was happy with my performance up to that point. But on the last sandbag, I hesitated before picking it up, and again after lapping the sandbag before finally walking with it and loading it. Those couple of seconds cost me second place in that event, and, all else being equal, second place overall on count-backs. This is a mistake I need to stop making.
Overhead Strength Was Great
The overhead strength training I did for this competition was fantastic. I've never felt so strong overhead before, and I credit the lesson I learned again earlier this year for the progress I've made.
I didn't practice the overhead medley at all - just the individual implements separately - and if I had practiced the full medley (or something similar to it), I probably would've figured out that my belt was going to cause breathing problems by the time I got to the axle. So my mistake with this event more so reiterates the first point: Practice the Events.
Sometimes just being strong enough isn't enough.
Conditioning Was Great, But Not Excellent
Conditioning is something I've put a lot of time into in the past year, and it has improved by leaps and bounds. Having said that, it needs to be better. Or more accurately: it needs to be more specific. I can push a prowler for 15-20 minutes, snatch a kettlebell for 5 straight minutes and clean+press an axle every minute on the minute for 15 minutes with the best of them, but nothing gets you better conditioned for sandbag carries like actually carrying sandbags.
I don't know when my next competition will be, but I've got plenty to work on before then.
For the last couple of days I've been repeating those words in my head again and again and again. About a year ago I was doing the same thing.
On January 25 2014, I was training events with a couple of other strongmen, and I got stapled on the log press by 115kg five times. I could clean it just fine, but no matter how psyched up I got, and no matter how angry I got, I couldn't press it out. At that point, I had been training the push press almost exclusively for my pressing movements. Saad, a very strong presser around here, told me afterwards to stop push pressing and do more strict pressing.
Just over a month later, on February 26 2014, I pressed a 120kg log, the heaviest weight I had held over my head at that point, without a belt or wrist wraps or weightlifting shoes.
That was the day I realised: the push press does NOT carry over to the log press.
For a solid month, I pressed only once a week, with heavy log pressing for sets of 2-3 reps followed up by either strict overhead presses or incline bench presses for sets of 5 reps and some heavy upper-back work, either in the form of barbell or dumbbell rows.
But later in the year, I seemed I had forgotten all of that. For the past few months I've been training the push press and push jerk as my only overhead movements, but I was still benching, which I had hoped would help maintain some of my strict pressing strength.
A couple of weeks ago I used the log again, for the first time since April 2014, and it went okay. Not great, but not bad. But then, a couple of days ago, I decided to take a max on the log again, just to see where I was at before I start my next training cycle. I was hoping to get a top-set of 2-3 reps of somewhere around 110kg. I doubled 105kg a couple of weeks prior, so I figured I could at least double 110kg.
Welp, the first attempt at 110kg, with a belt, weightlifting shoes and wrist wraps on, I missed the press woefully. And then I took the belt off, got super angry, and with a bit of knee rebend, I grinded out 110kg on the second attempt.
It sucked. I sucked.
Immediately I knew what I had done wrong; I stopped strict pressing. So I followed up my terrible performance with 5 sets of 5 on the overhead press as punishment.
So here I am again, about to embark on two months of solid overhead training in preparation for the state qualifiers for the Australian Log Lifting Championships. At least this time I know how to get my log pressing strength back up.
The original idea was quick workouts with a lot of bang-for-buck for when I'm short of time or for when I can only get to the gym once a week, if at all,, so following some kind of program isn't really worth the time. Well, I've been going through one of those periods recently, which will continue until January, so here's a few more!
Push Press Volume and Farmer's Walks
In these sessions, most of my time is spent doing push presses. And there's really no rules as far as how much volume to do. Last time I did this I worked up to a very heavy single, then did a few drop sets of triples, and then dropped the weight a bit more to do a max-effort rep-out and then I worked back up to a heavy single, attempting to hit the original heavy single from the start of the workout (I missed it).
The rest of my energy is spent doing farmer's walks. Farmer's walks are an awesome conditioner and will help build and strengthen the upper-back and traps, which means I can combine my upper-back and my conditioning work together. I mean, it may not be perfectly ideal, but it'll get the job done. Heavy, light, short, long, sprints or waddles... it doesn't really matter how you do them. Just do them. At the moment I prefer to do 8-10 short sprints (around 20m) and/or 2-3 longer walks (at least 50m) to finish it off.
Squat, Bench, DB Rows
The holy trinity of strength training? When I haven't trained for an extended period of time (I'm talking weeks or months), this is the thing I do the first time I step into the gym again.
I prefer to squat narrow and deep with a high-bar position, I prefer bench with a close grip, and I much prefer dumbbell rows over any other kind of upper-back work. Done for high volume, these three are my go-to mass-builders and a solid way to kick off a high-volume training block.
It seems weird, given that I usually prefer any kind of overhead pressing to bench pressing, but I just feel like the bench fits better here.
Kettlebell Snatches
Whether I only have a few minutes to get some conditioning in at the end of a training session, or if I can't get to the gym at all and need to do get some solid work done in the backyard at home, I can always depend on the cannonball with a handle, i.e. a kettlebell.
After reading about the Secret Service Snatch Test in Pavel's book Enter The Kettlebell, I've been doing 2-5 minute continuous snatch-fests with my 20kg kettlebell as a way to build my conditioning, and it has worked pretty damn well, anecdotally. One day I'd love to work up to 10 continuous minutes with a 24kg bell.
It's actually really convenient for something to do at home while dinner's slowly cooking in the oven or on the stove.
Usually when asked by friends what piece of gym equipment they should buy to "get fit" at home, a kettlebell (and Pavel's book) is my first recommendation.
That's about all the reason I need to do conditioning, yet somehow I forget this simple fact, and when I start doing it again (like I have 2-3 times a week since my last competition), I wonder why the hell I stopped in the first place.
I get bored easily. I don't like setting up conditioning medleys, because it takes me 10 minutes to get the tire through the gym and outside and to get the prowler set up, 15-20 minutes to do my conditioning, and then another 10 minutes, if not more, to pack it all up. I also hate hate hate anything long and slow, like jogging on a treadmill. As someone who generally spends around an hour in the gym, knowing that I'll either spend half of that for conditioning, or blow out my gym time by an extra half hour, is an easy way to guarantee that I won't do it.
So what are my options? When thinking of conditioning, I want to keep as specific to strongman (and the energy systems used in strongman) as possible, and I wanted to spend the least amount of time possible to get some effective work done, but I also wanted a really quick and simple way to get some hard conditioning in that only takes a few minutes. I came up with a shortlist:
Kettlebells. Pick one up, carry it to a platform, do 5 continuous minutes of snatches, put it away and go home. This is my go-to option when I'm really running thin on time.
Prowler. All I have to do is carry it outside, load up a few plates, and start pushing. 10-12 minutes on the prowler and I'm sucking wind.
Every Minute on the Minute. If I'm training the axle, log or stones that day, I'll do 1-2 reps every minute on the minute for 10-12 minutes after the work sets. The equipment is usually already setup. I've only recently started doing this.
Complexes. String a few big movements together, do a few sets, keep the rest periods short, and in 10 minutes I can be on the floor ready to die. I don't like pushing weight on these too much because I feel really beat up the next day.
The thing I like about these options is it's really easy to account for good and bad days; use a different weight kettlebell, modify the distance and/or weight on the prowler, adjust reps with EMOM work, adjust the exercises/reps/weight on the complexes. Rest periods can also be adjusted. Lots of ways to either turn it up or dial it back.
The result of doing this 2-3 times a week for the past couple of months? I feel awesome. When I play basketball on Sunday nights, I can run the full game at full speed. My training capacity in the gym is a lot better, whereas before I'd be ready to go home mid-way through my assistance work. I have better energy throughout the day. I sleep better. And I look a little better.
A while ago I posted about some of my "go to" workouts; what I do in the gym when I have no plan or limited time in the gym for some reason. Here are a few new ones.
Axle Clean+Jerk and Farmer's Walks
I like this combo on an events training day when I'm on my own, and the thing I like most about it is that it's easy to setup; the axle is just another bar to use on a platform, and farmer's bars are easier to carry than the monstrosity of a yoke we have at my gym. Both of these are common events in amateur competition around here too, so it's no waste of time. Of course, it's easy to replace the axle with the log or monster DB, but I find the axle keeps me feeling fast/explosive due to it being easier to get a good jerk in, compared to the log.
Each rep on the axle is cleaned, as my continental clean is a bit less than what I can get over my head. Doubles and triples are the name of the game here.
Farmer's walks are a great finisher. Moving events are one of my bigger weaknesses, so whether I decide to go heavy and hard, or scale back the weight and go for speed or volume, these are never the wrong answer. When my grip is fried and I struggle to hold onto the implements for the set distance, I'll whack on my straps and keep going; this is the mental-strength builder. Because the straps will continue to hold onto the handles long after my grip is done, I'll only finish/fail when my traps, upper-back and abs are screaming in agony.
The hard part is bringing all the weights back inside after I'm done ;)
Atlas Stones and Beltless Front Squats
Nothing much to say here. Stones are done heavy and hard over a low bar, or lighter and explosive over a high bar. The beltless front squats are a nice compliment to the stones, or any other event where the weight is out in front of me, more so if I pause for a couple of seconds in the hole. Sets of 2-4 reps seem to work best for me.
Main Lift and Complexes
Back in January, my gym had reduced hours for a few weeks, and it worked out that I was only gonna have about an hour at absolute max to train, depending on what time I got home from work, so what followed 20-30 minutes of work with the main lift (which was either squats or push presses) was 20-30 minutes of complexes. The complex I was using at the time was: row, RDL, front squat, strict press, back squat, behind-the-beck push press, but any complex will work. I would end up doing 3-4 sets of 5 with around 60kg, and the last set of complexes usually ended with me laying on the platform for a further 10 minutes before carrying myself to the car.
Complexes are a painful experience, but there's no denying their effectiveness when short of time.
Squats and Sled/Prowler
An easy go to for me. Squats are awesome because they're squats, a heavy prowler is great unilateral strength work and a lighter prowler is awesome conditioning. The bang-for-buck ratio is huge here. The quad-death from backwards sled drags is nuts.
Done. Hopefully I can post more of these later in the year.
Before my next strongman competition was announced, I wasn't doing any strongman training at all except for a little bit of light atlas stone work if I had time. Instead, I was pushing my gym lifts using a Texas Method setup. Why? Because my gym numbers are undoubtedly still intermediate and I decided there was no reason why I couldn't push new PRs on a weekly basis. The other reason was that I had just started back squatting again (after a shoulder injury left me front squatting last year and for a while before that too) and my back squat was low enough that going to a monthly progression would've been an incredibly stupid idea. Then a competition was announced...
Firstly, a very simplified explanation about the Texas Method:
Lift 2-3 days a week.
High volume early in the week.
Light day in the middle of the week. Somewhat optional.
Work up to a new 5RM at the end of the week.
The idea is that the volume day earlier in the week pushes the heavy day each week, given your recovery, and thus your adaptation, is optimal. For much more information, buy the books from 70's Big.
What's the problem with trying to push your gym lifts with the Texas Method and train strongman events at the same time? Events days often end up being fairly high volume and beat your body up more than gym lifts.
So can you do volume day and events on the same day? Only if you're insane, or very new to strongman. I can't think of anything more painful than doing 5x5 (or even 3x5) squats and then doing yoke walks or farmer's walks and finishing up with some stones. But if you keep the volume and events days separate, you risk not being properly rested to hit a new PR on your heavy day. And doing volume and events one day after the other also sounds like a horrible, masochistic idea.
If events days are high volume, can we use that volume to push the heavy day and forgo having to do 5x5 squats and bench? Theoretically it sounds like it could work, and it might work for some people, but I couldn't get volume on the yoke walk to adequately feed into my heavy squats, and my squat is low enough that I would think it should go up from even a little stimulus. This may have just been a consequence of getting back into squats are a long lay-off, but either way, this wasn't gonna work for me.
So what can you do?
Something that does work is programming an overhead lift with the Texas Method; volume upper on Monday (plus accessories), light upper later in the week, and a new PR on either the log or axle on events day (Saturday). Incline bench and strict overhead presses translate pretty well to the log.
What about the deadlift? Theoretically you could do volume squats (or RDLs) on Monday and hit a PR on your deads on Saturday before doing events, but are you going to be adequately recovered from yoke/farmers/tire/stones/whatever from Saturday to do your volume squatting on Monday? If you move the volume day to Tuesday, or maybe even Wednesday, it could work.
So clearly the issue is with recovery. Volume squatting and strongman events can be hard to recover from, but if you're confident that your recovery practices can facilitate that, then it's possible.
But should you? Let's get philosophical for a minute...
By trying to push your gym lifts and your events training at the same time, you're trying to serve two masters at once, something many strength training coaches and athletes advise against, especially as you get more intermediate/advanced in your training. So maybe it would be best to just use a low volume program, like 5/3/1, to push your gym lifts during the week, and save most of your energy for events training. You're training for a strongman competition after all, and your gym lifts are really just GPP for the events; there is no max bench event! After the competition, or in the off-season if you have one, you can push your gym lifts while backing off from events training.
The other problem is that it's just too difficult to think about and is likely to change from competition to competition depending on whether there are max weight events, max reps events, longer distances, shorter distances, medleys, 2-day comps and every other variable that can be tweaked for a strongman competition. Whether or not the weights are heavy or light for you is also going to change things.
This was originally posted on my tumblr, but I decided to put it here.
I was chatting to a guy at the gym the other day about what our “go to" workouts are for those days where you walk in with no plan other than “I’m benching today", or when you don’t have enough time to do what you had originally planned, but still want to get something done that could be considered good training.
These are a few of mine.
Max Out, Back Off
This is my usual “go to" for benching and overhead pressing and is something I took from the Iron Sport Strength Method; max out, and then drop the weight to 80% and do three AMRAP sets.
The only “twist" I put on this is that on the last AMRAP set, I must hit more reps than on the second AMRAP set. I’m usually a bit lazy on the second set, so this is my punishment.
Maxing out can be for a 1RM, 3RM or 5RM.
Assistance work is always pretty standard; lots of DB rows and maybe some direct triceps and biceps work if there’s time.
5x5
I started lifting on a 5x5 program, and probably stopped using it sooner than I should have. None the less, occasionally I’ll look at what I’ve done around the 6-8RM mark and have at it.
Leaves me good and sore for a couple of days.
Front Squats and Deadlifts
I like this combo a lot. The front squats aren’t hard to recover from, and doing them first seems to prime me for deadlifts.
There isn’t much to it; I usually do the front squats for triples, and the deadlifts for sets of 3-5.
If I do anything else after this, it’s usually kettlebell swings until I’m nearly dead.
And that’s all I can think of off the top of my head at the moment!
Yesterday I competed in my first strongman competition at Definition 352 in Doncaster, Melbourne. It was a long day, with about 20 athletes competing across 4 men's divisions and 2 women's divisions.
I was one of 4 heavyweights.
Sled drag. Drag 100kg for 10m on a flat, deload 25kg, drag 15m up an incline, deload 25kg, drag 15m up an incline. I was a little worried about this one. When I trained for it, we dragged the 100kg up an incline aswell, and it was slooooow to move for all of us. Since they changed it to be flat for the heaviest weight, it made it a lot easier. Came 3rd.
Deadlifts. 75 seconds for biggest total tonnage. 3 regular bars loaded with 175kg, 200kg and 225kg. All the heavyweights opted to just rep out the lightest bar. These were supposed to be dead-stop deadlifts, but ended up being touch-n-go, which I'm not used to at all. I still managed 15 reps with the 175kg bar to take 3rd place.
2" Axle Clean and Press. 75 seconds AMRAP with 90kg, each rep cleaned. This was the event I felt the most prepared for, since I was doing reps on the axle every week, sometimes twice a week. In training, I managed 8 reps when I was fresh, and 6 reps when I was slightly fatigued, so I wanted 6 reps for this, and if I'd gotten it, I would've taken 2nd in the event. But the bar was a lot more slippery from all of the previous competitors, and lost concentration and dropped my last clean and ended up with 5 reps for equal 2nd place.
Medley. Prowler +100kg for 20m, 60kg keg carry for 20m, 200kg tire flip for 10m. The prowler was super fast, the keg carry wasn't too bad either, but man did my tire flips suck. I missed the first flip due to nerves, and had shit drops on 3 or 4 of my subsequent flips. Although I got a little practice with the tires, it wasn't enough and it cost me. Came 4th in this event.
Atlas stones. 75kg, 80kg, 101kg, 120kg, 130kg over a 1.2m bar in 75 seconds. I had done a bit of practice with these in the lead up, and a couple of weeks ago managed to get the 120kg stone over a 1m high bar without tacky, but man it gassed me. However this time I had tacky, which was my first time using it. My goal for this was to get the 120kg stone over the bar, and at least lap the 130kg stone. Well I got the 120kg stone over in epic, grindy fashion, but could only break the 130kg stone off the floor by mere centimetres. Came 3rd in this due to slower time.
Overall I came 3rd out of 4 heavyweights. I was the shortest and lightest heavyweight there, and the only one in his first competition, so I'm super happy with how I did, and I'm incredibly happy with how the competition was run. George Mariolis and the Definition 352 crew did a great job running, judging and scoring the competition and I'm proud to be associated with them!
A big thank you to my lovely girlfriend, Cherie, for supporting me for the past couple of months while I trained and ate as well as I could. Thanks to Definition 352 for putting on a good show, and thanks to my friends and family who showed up to support me!
I can't wait to do more competitions in the near future!
I'll upload some videos somewhere once I get them all together. They're all spanned across a couple of friends' phones.
A couple of weeks ago I went and did my Strength Quest grading at Definition 352 in Doncaster. Strength Quest is Australia's new system for strongman. The idea is that, to enter a competition, there will be a minimum grade required. You achieve your grade based on your performance in the yoke, log clean and press, deadlift and farmer's walk. I decided to attempt C grade as a heavyweight.
First up was the yoke walk. I needed to walk 300kg for 15m. Having only first walked a yoke two weeks before that, and with only 230kg, I knew this was going to be my hardest event, and it proved to be. Getting my first couple of steps sucked and I dropped it soon after. On the second pick, I finally got some momentum and moved about 7-8m before dropping it again. In the end, after a couple more drops, I stopped at 10.5m, saving my energy for the other events.
I would've liked to get the full 15m, but given that it was only my second time doing yoke walks, and I only needed 1.5m to get my grade, I was very happy with my result. I asked a couple of the other guys how to improve and I've got a few things to add to my training to get better now!
Next up was the log. I needed 100kg. I love pressing and I do all kinds of pressing multiple times a week, so this was an easy get. 100kg flew up!
By this point, it had been a few hours since I ate breakfast and I was starving, so I ate a peanut butter + jam sandwich. I swear it was the best damn sandwich I've ever had! This was also a good time to get a bit of foam rolling in.
The deadlift was next and 210kg was the target. I deadlift every week and have pulled 210kg many times before, so this was also an easy get.
Last was the farmer's walk. I needed to carry 100kg per hand for 25m. Again, having only done farmer's walks with proper farmer's bars two weeks before, I was a little worried about making the distance, but I was fine! Although I felt a little slow, I managed to walk the full 25m without needing to re-pick the weight, so I'm a lot more confident about this event now, and actually enjoyed it more than the first time around. A pair of farmer's bars are very high on the list to buy now.
I'm pretty confident that, with a bit of planning, I can hit the numbers for B grade by the end of the year.
One of the things I loved about the day was the amount of cheering everyone was doing. Everyone wanted everyone else to hit their numbers. Everyone gave everyone else advice on how to approach a tough event. Everyone congratulated everyone else when they hit a PR. Everyone was supportive of everyone else. And that's something I can get used to!
All up, it turned out to be an awesome experience. George Mariolis put on a great day at Definition 352 and I met a bunch of new people who were all super nice and very willing to talk about anything. I'm looking forward to more!
I recently spent around 10 days house sitting with my girlfriend, Cherie, for her brother-in-law's parents. Given that I usually lift weights at home and not at a gym, I wanted to take a couple of pieces of equipment with me so I could get some work done. I wasn't looking to break any new ground or anything, but I wanted to keep myself busy and not feel like I was being lazy.
The equipment I took with me:
20kg kettlebell
Adjustable dumbbell with 40kg of plates (2x10kg, 4x5kg)
FatGripz
Chalk
The only thing I would change is bringing more plates. Last time I tried to press a 40kg dumbbell, without FatGripz, I nearly dropped it and left a dent in my dad's car which would've resulted in me getting a boot in the ass. This time I was pressing it with relative ease.
I wanted the workouts to be very simple:
Heavy-ish, low volume, 1-2 exercises at most. Mostly technique work with the dumbbell.
Hard conditioning. Just to gas myself given the low volume lifting.
Next time I would add some kind of bodyweight/gymnastics training to this.
Fat dumbbell clean and press 6x3 @ 30kg, 4x1 @ 40kg. Bear carries as above.
Fat dumbbell clean and press AMRAP sets at 60, 75 and 90 seconds. Bear carries as above.
Turkish get-up 4x4 @ 20kg. Sprint 10 lengths of 20-30m, record time, repeat for 3-5 sets, etc...
This was a good opportunity to do some technique work for some strongman movements that I want to nail and don't usually prioritise at home. I hit all the reps I wanted to hit, and walked away feeling like I got some work done, and that's all I care about.
