Sat, 10 Sept 16

Block 6, Wave 3 - Event Training

Thanks once again to circumstances related to PT school, I was unable to attend the Wendler UGSS at EliteFTS World HQ in Ohio, another awesome event that I had been planning on for weeks/months that I got the shaft on.  Rather than crack open a bottle of Maker's Mark and try to drown my sorrows, I made the best of a frustrating situation and traveled across the bridge to Colosseum Gym to train events for Maryland's Strongest Man.  I was somewhat worried that this might be a wasted trip since my knee is not back to 100% yet, but it turned out to be a good day overall.

Yoke

2x60' x 250

60' x 340

60' x 430

60' x 520

60' x 610 - My setup was loose as a goose on this run and I was all over the place as a result and had to drop and repick the yoke to prevent stupidity.

60' x 660 - This was actually an accident.  I had planned to repeat 610 since it had been shaky, but ended up doing this instead and it went much better than the 610 did.  It felt so good that I wanted to go up to 710 for my last run, but 660 is about 200 lbs more than I have done since injuring my knee and is solid progress so thanks to some helpful input from Nick to not be a dumb dumb, I went back down and repeated 610 for my last run.

60' x 610 - This actually turned out to be my best run of the day.

Keg Carry and Load (to 39")

3x{1x200, 1x250, 1x275} - First run was slow and steady to test out how it felt.  It felt good.  Second two runs were about 1/2 to 3/4 speed.  I managed to split open my thumb on the second run, even though I was wearing gloves, but a quick tape job kept me from painting the walls with my blood and the third run was the best.  Now I just need to train this with much heavier kegs.

Atlas Stones

0x250 - First try on the plate loaded atlas stone.  I literally slid right off and could not get any sort of friction.

3x250 to 44" - I put my gloves back on and was able to do a few reps to a low platform.  Too bad gloves are not allowed in the competition and the height is much higher.

1x285 to 44" - Barely able to pick and stone slid all over me when I tried to load it.

1x285 to 52" - I looked like a drunk monkey trying to fornicate with a doorknob.  The "textured" coating on the plate loaded atlas stone does nothing to mitigate slipping on skin and clothes.  Maybe if you are bone dry and haven't sweat a drop yet it might be a different story, but as that was not the case, this was idiotic.

5x150 to 52" - This felt like picking up a stability ball.  Way too light and dumb.

5x200 to 52"

5x250 to 52" - These last 2 sets with the plate loaded atlas stone were better since my arms and shirt had mostly dried off during the hour and half that it took just to do this.  Why so long?  Because changing weights on this thing makes the down time ridiculous and it is so prohibitive that when someone wants to do a different weight, it is sadly better to just sit and wait for everyone else to go because of the process involved.  While the idea of an adjustable weight atlas stone is nice in theory, the reality falls short of the goal of improving ease of use in my personal opinion.  Add on to that the rather expensive price point and you have a piece of equipment that seems to be only relevant if you have loads of extra cash lying around to buy half a dozen or more to have different weights on hand (though that would compound the weight changing problems and require a lot of extra plates) or at larger gyms and training facilities whose goal is to have all of the different strongman equipment needed to train for any competition.

Atlas Stone Shouldering

2x210

4x210 - Nick and I needed to train with real atlas stones a little bit after the nonsense of the plate loaded atlas stone so we did some shouldering in preparation for the highlander competition we are doing at Brute Strength Gym in November.