Record Of Strength

[austinslater]

I think your workout looks pretty good and I set mine up pretty similar. I hit crush, forearms same as you do alternating an extension and a flexion movment. then whatever you want to after that like pinch, high rep stuff etc.

Austin

[foggymountainmuscle]

07-23-05

I went to a strongman competition at a county fair. 30 competitors overal,Nothing NAS Inc. affiliated though. I got 4th in the lightweights, kinda dissapointed, but I got 20$. They had a tractor pull, with rope, which I was suprised to find out I could not finish, a hay bail toss, which I did so so on, with 13'7", a sled pull uphill, a pull not a drag, an arm over arm type deal, which I did great on, and a medley with a 100lbs. farmers walk, sled drag, and tire flip. Took eight flips with the tire, I really ran out of gas by the time I finished, but if I have the endurance to make it through that, I like my chances at nationals.

And sadly like a few competitions I have been to, not so strict ones, they pulled some major bullshit. Like the guys who ran the contest, they competed in the events, but they weren't going to claim prise money, so technically they weren't entered, but they were taking points! Taking points away from other competitors too, I might add. No telling how that screwed things up. Then on the last event, guys were grabbing the sled down low, so it was mostly off the ground, cutting the drag in half! (it was a light sled in the grass, suprisingly difficult with such a light weight) And they were fine with this! Then this one kid, I know he was young and struggling with the event, and everyone wanted to see him finish, but some of the competitors told him to drag the farmer impliments, and then to carry them one at a time. So he did... I'm all for encouragement and self achievement, but I am strictly anti-bullshit. That is not how these events work, regaurdless if the judge is too ignorant or blind to realize it. It's degrading to the sport. What if I walked in on a basketball game and just started goal tending and traveling, I would get benched, yelled at, or kicked out, and if I told people that's how I'd play, they'd say I was ignorant and would refuse to go along with it, why is it any different with strongman?

Anyway I'm going on a bike ride today to get some blood into my legs and I hope to have one more upper body and one more lower body workout before nationals this Saturday.

[danegarreau]

You gotta expect something like that at a non sactioned meet.

[foggymountainmuscle]

I am off to St. Louis for nationals in a short while. As far as I know there is only one other light weight teen competing. I aim to come back with the championship.

[smitty]

good luck buddy! kick some ass

[danegarreau]

Results? How did you do?

[foggymountainmuscle]

Yesterday, I got 2nd place, but there were only 2 competitors in the LW Teen devision. We were pretty evenly matched. We tied on the log press, 170lbs. with 7 reps, and no they did not time to see who did 7 first. He beat me on the second event, the yoke and farmers. I did fine with the yoke, but couldn't quite finish the farmers, my legs were fried from the yoke. I knew he had a faster time and if I were to muster all the effort I had to pick up the farmers again it would be a waste. He beat me on the next event, the sled drag and power stair, but get this: the floor was smooth concrete, everyone was slipping and I could get zero traction. People were falling and sliding out from under their feat, they are lucky no one was hurt. They had a wet towel for us to use. Some guy helping with the contest says they use that all the time and it works fine, but I ain't 260 some lbs. and I say that it was some bullshit. They could have done it on the pavement outside. The other kid had mountain climber shoes and got decent traction, but even he slipped. I ain't saying I would have beat him, but I will say that we will never know. I ended up yanking the sled with my arms to move it and ran out of time. The next event was a deadlift medly, which wasn't very heavy, and I couldn't tell you the weights but they were all light, each one I blew past while the other kid took just a little more muster on each pull. The last event was the stones, the platform was about 5' high. I got all but the last stone, the last stone being heavier than what was originally planed. He beat my time by 4 seconds, which I couldn't believe it because he fumbled the 4th stone. But that's what it came down to, the last event.

So I'm kinda happy, and kinda dissapointed. I had a good showing, but at the same time that was the 4th strongman competition in a row I've competed in that left a sour taste in my mouth. The other LW teen was Chris Lee. He lives in Washington and trains with Jesse Marundie. I think I faired pretty darn good considering his level of event training vs. my shed improv. training.

[danegarreau]

You did a good job regardless Foggy. On the sled drag, I have heard the best kind of shoes are football turf shoes, and the trick to not falling over is to not lean back so far, it makes it harder, but that is what you gotta do.

[foggymountainmuscle]

Training summary:

Well I haven't been detailed at all in my workouts over the summer, much of my computer time is taken up by a game that I like to play and often stuff like checking my email and posting on the gripboard is pushed to the side.

I'm starting to think that there is great value in those grudging workouts that you feel too tired to do. I have done alot of workouts on work days and force myself to do them and have gotten great results. Reaching the same weight when you are half dead, is a PR in it's own little way, but the consistancy of the training, made possible by these seemingly plotting workout sessions is the foundation of progress and success. Since my last contest I have started doing strongman events back to back in training, kinda medly style. After my legs got worn out from a yoke, I had too difficult a time with the farmers, and I about died in the competition before last getting that tire over the line after the farmers walk and sled drag. So I did a workout of farmers, 1 drop, then two tire flips, nest two sets I did 2 drops and 2 flips. The tire I could do for 5 reps under a minute turned into a near max effort. Ever since my asthma attack at the competition in Fenton, MI I have been taken my cardio more seriously. I jump rope on and off, and do a little calethedic routine of Hindu squats, jumping jacks, push ups, and v-ups.

I bought John Brookfield's cable training book from IM, along with the appolons axle, and I am now doing cable training with this weider set I got years and years ago. The springs are actually pretty stiff. I think I'll ask for the IM set for my birthday though so I can do more of the exercises without risking skin leasions and so the springs don't pinch together. I'm really sold on the cables now. I was doing these front squats for 3 sets of 10 reps, each foot. My back got so tight I had to do alot of stretching, all the way from the top of my shoulder blades to the bottom of my butt, great work! I also think these cables will get my rear shoulders in balance with my other shoulder heads and give my rotator cuffs some real work instead of those super easy twist for 10 million reps crap I hear about in body building magazines.

And my mid section is more cut up than ever as I develope more stuff to put in part II of my core strength article.

[foggymountainmuscle]

I did a grip workout yesterday. I got my PDA 280 down to 1/16" of an inch, DANG! Oh well, it will come soon. I did some negatives on my ISG, then did some blob training. I also did some core work.

The day before yesterday however I did something very cool: I drove a 60d nail thorugh a piece of wood with my hand. The wood was 3/8" thick or so, it was pretty neat. Gave my wrist a few days of rest though because they were sore from all the attempts. I succeeded a few more times but I jammed alot of dends into that poor piece of wood.

[Blarg]

Grats on the nail-driving!

I think cables are cool too, and don't like the springs for the pinching either. I'm getting the same sort of thing going with stretchbands; I use them for deadlifts, squats, curls, tricep extensions, thumb work, wrist curls, neck work -- they're really versatile and fun, and can definitely be a very hard work-out.

[foggymountainmuscle]

Boy am I sore from yesterday's workout! Really, really, painfully sore. So sore walking makes me wence. I wanted to do a squat workout but I the gym wasn't open, so I took my kettlebell outside and did pistols. I did some warmups with snatches, side bends, flips and no weight pistols. Then I did 3 sets of pistols with the 44lbs. kettlebell, first set for 6 reps, second for 7, and 3rd set for 8. It was pretty cardio intensive as well. I felt like a piece of crap aftewards but I was proud that I pushed through to meet the number of reps I wanted with that last set. These pistols really hit the glutes hard, most likely because it works them to their full range, starting in a very stretched position.

Later that night I did a strongman performance for the talent show (part of the welcome week at my college). I tore a deck, bent a nail with my teeth, bent two nails at once, some sledge levering, and I bent one of my 120d spikes I got from Tractor supply, a PR because they are much harder than spikes I have bent in the past and this was the first one I bent into a full U.

[smitty]

Can't wait for the article!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[foggymountainmuscle]

Last night I got to try out the college gym. Instead of a pull-up bar they had these handles with adjustable widths, and they freely revolved both on the handle itself and the pivot where it attaches to the rack. Kinda weird if you ask me. I started off with dips, I did a few warmup sets and then tried to get 5 reps with an extra 115lbs. in weight, I only got 4 and I couldn't do a full set after that either. I did a forced set for the next attempt, getting 2 reps then eeking out a few more. I don't think I'm as good as I was before, but I expected a bit of a backslide on my gym lifts over the summer, but I am confident my overall strength has improved so I don't expect to be in this slump for long. I did some work on a one handed pull-up. I did triples, using a piece of rope on my free hand to assist me. I just took a lower grip on each set. I ended on a single after attempting the feat with no assistance and... not even close. In the future I will try training this with a neutral grip, and also try the use of bands. After this I did some table curls, 4 reps at 65, and 2 reps at 70 each hand. I ended with some bench lockouts, since the gym setup doesn't make dip lockouts too practical. I worked up to 405lbs. and did some reps, holding the lockout for about 10 seconds and I stopped when I couldn't push it up anymore.

[pdoire]

I  I did some negatives on my ISG, then did some blob training.  I also did some core work. 

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I haven't looked at this log in months...I was away....I remember when you were contemplating the purchase of the ISG.

Glad to see you are putting it to good use!!

[foggymountainmuscle]

I like using the ISG for warmups, active recovery, and negatives. My crush right now is focusing on closing the PDA 280, after I do that I plan to use it much more.

[foggymountainmuscle]

09-03-05

Lower arm

I brought my new thickbar to the gym today, which I tought would be open much longer but wasn't so I only got to lift for 10 minutes. I did work up to a PR of ... 264lbs. which is alot more than I thought it was at the time; I only recently added it up in my head. After that I had to leave so I went back to my room, did a little bending and showed a person some tips while getting a PR on some 1/4" square. I went outside to my car and got my 35lbs. blob and did alot of lifts, the best ones on the slickest point with the most flare. Must have done around 15 lifts, high pulls, cleans, holds, and lifts per hand. I did some extensor work by putting my hex 75 blob on the back of my fingers, and did a long hold for 2 sets. Then I went back to my room to do some sledge hammering, hitting parts of the twisting motion that you don't hit when you do the standard twisting exercise.

09-02-05

Neck and Core

I got to do some serious work witht the ab wheel that you tie to your feet. They have in the aerobic room of my gym. Pretty nice piece of equipment. I did some deep full range reps, reps that test even the limits of my flexibilty with it strapped to my feet. My first set I had a tough time doing 8 reps, but I must have broken through some pain barrier because I hit 10 next set with quite a bit left in me, but since this was a new exercise I didn't feel I needed to go until near death to incure growth. The aerobic room also had a set up to do landmines. I did 10 reps each side with 45lbs on the bar, then another 10 each side with 55lbs. Seemed pretty good but I'm thinking next time I'll try them heavier, are they suposed to be a heavy exercise? I feel like I would be good for 75lbs. for a few reps each side but I haven't heard of anyone using that weight for this exercise.

[foggymountainmuscle]

09-06-05

Upper Body-Cables

I did a cable upper body workout, and it was tough. 3 sets of following: Chest press, bow pulls, tricep extensions, cross chest pull outs (diagonal), and bicep curls. I used 2 cables for everything except the cross chest pulls which was only one cable. For all the sets I tried to increase the amount of reps each time, didn't always work. I got 10 reps first set, 8 second set (shoulder was hurting), then 12 for the last set (shoulder felt better). I only did 5 reps of the bow pulls, then 8, then 9. I got 10 reps for the first two sets of tricep extensions, but could only eek out 8 the last set, and pain was horrible. For the first set of the cross chest pulls I got 14 reps, then 16, and last set I could only get 12 with a balls out, grinding effort. Finally I got 10 reps for the first two sets and 12 reps for the last set on the bicep curls. All of it burned pretty darn bad but I kept up the pase and carefully chose the order of the exercises so as not to work an exhausted muscle to death.

My arms were 16" after this workout and my shoulders felt huge. I think these cables are adding some real power to my upper body. I can't wait to show up some dude who thinks he's the bench king with cable chest presses. I'm also thinking of rigging up a setup in order to use the cables as part of my one handed pull-up training.

[foggymountainmuscle]

09-08-05

Lower Arm

Narrow pinch: I used a 10Kg Elieko bumper plate for the grip, and added weight with a loading pin, doing multiple singles at each weight. I started light with 75lbs., jumped up to 125, and slowly worked my way up to a PR that I estimate to be 138lbs. Full deadlifts. I cooled down with about 55lbs. in one hand switching back and forth. Some of the wrestlers in the gym that were working out tried to take a crack at my bigger pinch weights, none could lift them.

I want to improve my finger tip strength so I did one handed eagle loop deadlifts with only the first bone of my fingers in the slots. I did reps with lower weights but it all felt more painful than actual strength until I got up to 130lbs. 2 sets of five at that weight, and since I felt it didn't work my index fingers very much, I dropped it down to 50lbs. and lifted the weight with both my index fingers, still just the finger tips.

Working on my quest to do a pullup with the outer limit loops I hooked them onto the pull down machine in the gym. I did a few reps at the lowest weight, trying to find a good setting. I did 6 reps with 24lbs., one hand, (keep in mind the hand is always under tension). I did this for another set, and then jumped the weight up 60lbs. with two hands for four good reps. Very deep burn, very intense lift. This may sound like a long ways away from a pullup but my plans involve a little less difficult set up than what I was working with.

I finished with Zottoman curls, doing 5 reps with 35lbs., then 2 sets of 5 (only getting 4 on the last one) with 40lbs. Great exercise, I like them. Inbetween sets of Zottomans I was doing finger walks on my loading pin with an extra 5.5lbs. and reverse finger walks with an extra 2.5lbs.

[foggymountainmuscle]

I did a workout yesterday, but you won't know what I did until I put it in my next core strength article.

[foggymountainmuscle]

09-11-05

Lower Body

I knew I'd be pretty sore after this workout, since I haven't squatted in a while, and I was, but not as bad as I thought I would be. I started off with rockbottom front squats. I did warmups at 130, and 220lbs. It was a metric set so I'll just say the weight in Kg. I did my working sets at 120Kg, got 5 reps first two sets, and set a goal to make 3 reps on the last set because that 5th rep on the seconset was on the edge of impossible. I then did 1/3 front squats out of the rack. 5 reps at 140Kg, 3 reps at 162.5Kg, and 2 reps at 185Kg. I got the bruises on my collar bones to prove it. I then did some jump roping on one foot for my calfs, which was only about 20 reps for 2 sets in addition to some regular jump roping. Difficult none the less though.

I did a 3 set of 5 of my reverse neck bridge mountain climbers. I made sure the last set was extra slow. I ended the workout with some teeth lifts. Warming up with 50lbs. and 75lbs. and did 2 sets of 5 reps with 85lbs. Good workout.

[foggymountainmuscle]

09-12-05

Lower arm

I started with V-bar, I did some warm-ups and this time instead of going for a max, I did a 5x5. I did my last 3 sets with 185lbs. + the 5lbs. bar. I got 5 the first set, 4 the second set, and 5 the last set. It hurt as you can imagine. I held on to the bar fairly long too, until it twisted out of my hand. Good lift and I'm glad I pushed myself through the pain. For pinch I wanted to try to work with 4 10s but the plates at the gym where too wide with fat rims that made them difficult. I treed pinching 2 15kgbumpers, but they were too much. I decided to try working on 3 25s by using 2 10Kg plates with a big, but light 10lbs. bumper plate sandwhich betweened them. I could break it off the ground but no deadlift. So did varying sets of negatives, 2 full sets of 5 for each hand plus more singles here and there. Using my thickbar I did some behind the back wrist curls, for 5 reps a set. First with 57lbs, then 62, then 67. The weights were in Kg so that's why the numbers are strange. I then did reverse curls with 57lbs. on the thickbar for 3 sets of 5, plus warmups, but didn't get all 5 reps in the last two sets and had to do some forced reps.

09-13-05

Upper Body

I was planning on doing bentpress, but the wrestling team was using the Olympic plateforms, so I worked on my one arm pullup training by attaching my Olympic loading pin to the lat pull down machine. This thing was tough because the warmup was a reasonable effort at 60 and 72 for 5 reps. Man the weight increases where way too much on that machine with no extra intermitten weight to add to in in the whole gym. I did my working set with 86lbs. for 5 reps. I did that for another set, then did 3 reps at 96lbs. Just couldn't quite get a single at 108.

Then I got an opening for a plateform. Using my thickbar to bentpress I started at 57lbs. and worked my way up to 111lbs. with my right and 106lbs. with my left about 10 pounds at a time. I finished with floor presses, warming up with 111, and doing a set of 4, a set of 2, and a single at 192.

Using the thickbar, which weighs 33lbs. is like using a regular bar where the metric weights correspond to their equivelent, heavier English weights. For example 2 20Kg plates on each side with a bar the weighed 33 pounds felt just as difficult, if not more so than 2 45lbs. plates on each side with a normal 45lbs. bar.

[foggymountainmuscle]

09-16-05

Lower Body

I did some deep straddle one arm deadlifts today using my R-ring and loading pin. I stood up on two moveable benches that weren't being used. No on seemed to care. I warmed up with 95, 185, and then put up 275lbs. The tape I had on one part of the ring started to fall off, so I peeled it off. I tried to use it without the tape but it hurt so bad I couldn't hold on to it for long, so I just adjusted my grip to a spot that had tape all around it, and it protected my hands pretty good. The R-ring always hurts like hell, but at least it was bearable. I found myself having to work up on these sets, first set I only got 3, second set I went to 4 and could have done more but didn't want to only get 3 the last set. Last set I made sure I got 5. Now this was per side, so it wasn't just 3 working sets, it was 6. Looked like my fingers had been raked over by gravel. They had a few of those teetering boards out, so I decided to give them a try. I got the hang of it after a while, pretty neat. I think I'll try doing some presses and deadlifts on these in the future. I did some one legged calf raises, because there really is no good place to do the two footed version with a barbell on your back. I took a 100lbs. weight in one hand, and did one legged calf raises for 3 sets of 5 off the back of this bench. Pretty tough, tougher than what I thought it would be. At the end I just did some messing around on the power wheel in the aerobic work area in the next room

I was kinda suprised at myself I was getting genuinly upset towards the end of the workout. The baseball team was in there, and just like the football and wrestling teams they were using baby weights and were focusing on each other's asses more than on the weights they were lifting. I watched college students lift with weights that I was using in 6th grade. I really wanted to say something to every one of them. It was absolutely appauling. If I was the coach I would have tossed them all a tube of vagisil and told them to come back when their vaginas weren't so swollen.

[foggymountainmuscle]

09-19-05

Not a very long workout, just two exercises. I decided to try out the plow lift, using my thickbar. Man this lift is draining, good conditioner. I did sets of 4, 2 each side, starting with no weight, then 10Kg on the bar, then 12.5Kg on the bar, then a single with 13.75Kg on the bar. I bruised my first knuckle on my index finger of my right hand from digging into the bar so much. I then did some continental clean and jerks with the thickbar still, which landing the continentals pinched the skin on my abdomin awfully bad, even after I put a towel under my shirt to help protect me. I did doubles with 115lbs, 155lbs, 175lbs., and a single at 200. Not bad, not too difficult. Felt good to do some real jerks after not having a plateform to work on for quite a while. I feel like I could do my old PR of 250 on the overhead axle and then some. I'm still not quite recovered from those one armed deadlifts I did, so I went with this semi brief totay body workout.

[foggymountainmuscle]

There was a grip workout I did before my last post, which I will only highlight here: Failed to close my PDA 280, trained my crush on the ISG upright to work the upper fingers in crushing more, and was still able to lift my 35 blob and 75lbs hex weight heads for a number of singles after all the crushing.

09-20-05

Upper body

One of my goals, straight out of Dinosaur Training is to do 15 reps in the dumbell clean and press with 75lbs. dumbells. Well today I did that with 60lbs. dumbells. Great conditioner, but boy did I feel like shit for the remander of the workout. I then did a set of 5 with 70lbs. in the dumbell clean and press, and had to pause to get the 5th rep. Wipe out after the first exercise. The next exercise I did was plate crushing bent over rows, using 2 10kg disc with a 10lbs. bumper inbetween them. I press into the sides of the plates. I got the first set okay, but the second set was tough and I didn't finish the last set. Pretty good work. I wanted to do one handed hanging leg raises but the basketball team was in the way of the racks and plateforms so I went into the aerobic room and did 4 dragon flags... which wiped out my abs so bad my attempts at some other core work proved to be so draining as to be counter productive, which suprised me. I got some neck training in. I did bridges where I moved my head side to side over and over again and I also added weight while bridging from flat for the back of my neck. I triend Rick Walker's barbell neck exercise for the front of my neck where you put the barbell on your forehead and curl your head up. I got 2 sets of 10, I'll add more weight next time. Good workout, but drudging and draining too.