Coming off of Nationals I'm happy in my performance. I had no glaring weaknesses and I brought my best that day. I really enjoyed this past year of training. Last July I took my first actual layoff from strongman events and essentially an "off-season" to train like a bodybuilder with slight strength emphasis. I followed that phase up with a strength then peaking phase to compete at USS Hope for the Holidays on Max Log/Max Deadlift. Starting January I began my earlier prep for Nationals by adding events back in and just learning to move again. I didn't get very specific with events until closer to Nationals. I really enjoyed the past year of training and no doubt brought my best performance to date.
This year I plan to do a similar approach, but slightly different. I'll be starting a 12 week hypertrophy phase that's based off of John Meadow's Mountain Dog Training modified with a slight strength emphasis. I'll follow that up and probably hit a strength phase with some hypertrophy work still included this fall. Then compete at USS Hope for the Holidays this December. After that I'd like to compete sometime in the late winter or spring a strongman competition somewhere (waiting to see what's scheduled). Then follow that up with USS Nationals in June in Detroit.
I actually am planning to stay around this 215-220# bodyweight this whole next year. This will be the first time in a long time I haven't been eating to gain weight or lose weight. Just looking for a nice, slow body recomposition. Looking to bring a slightly bigger and even stronger version of myself next year.
I'll be training 4 days a week using the following split:
Day 1: Chest, Biceps
Day 2: Quads. Hamstrings
Day 3: Shoulders, Triceps
Day 4: Traps, Back
Nutrition won't be much different than this, except I have lowered the carbs some after Nationals. Pretty much because I needed a break from eating so damn much. Plus I took a week of and didn't train. (click below)
I'm looking forward to getting back to some bodybuilding training. It's a nice change of pace and mental break from pushing so hard for strength. That's a mental drain after a while. I found last year that 12 weeks of hypertrophy week a year has only positive results for myself. Looking forward to this next year of training. I believe this is my 18th year of training come July.