This Past Week (6/13-6/19)

This past week was a great training week for me. On Sunday I played basketball for the first time since the end of the season, roughly two and a half months ago. It was great to get that type of aerobic workout again, and while my skills weren't up to par I had a lot of fun running up and down and doing something competitive.

Monday I finished Week 1 of SMS 8 and I had the chance to train at my high school weight room. This final day went very well as I hit all of weights I had aimed to. Later that afternoon I performed a plyo workout so I could keep my conditioning up.

Tuesday I deadlifted again, and while it had only been three days since my last deadlift session, the timing of the rest of the week worked out such that this would be the only day I could get in to deadlift. If the YMCA wouldn't get pissed when I used the platform for the purpose it was designed to be used for or used chalk when I lifted then this wouldn't have been an issue. However, this is not the case, so I had to rearrange my schedule to make sure I could get my lifts in.

Wednesday morning I went in to bench. I got through my med ball warmup and the warmup sets on the bench feeling alright, but when it came time to hit my working sets, which were singles on this day, I got stuck just off of my chest at a very manageable weight and had an intense pressure in my head. After fighting to rack the bar, I dropped 10 pounds and tried again, only to get stuck once again and become unable to lock out a weight that I haven't missed in almost a year. This is when I decided that today just wasn't a day to lift and so I left the gym to recover. I went home and mowed the lawn again and felt great after that. I am not sure what happened on this day, but I feel like the weights I have been using for my working sets may be too high, even though I have been able to hit them. This was a learning experience for me and I am now applying these lessons to my sessions and am feeling much better. I also played basketball Wednesday night and felt great during that run.

Thursday I squatted and had my leg lift, which went significantly better than the previous day's training session. Friday was the final day of Week 2 of SMS 8 and, just like the previous day, the ability to cut back my weight on my working sets and go for high quality reps led to an incredible lift. After Friday's lift I felt the best that I have post-workout since the beginning of SMS 7.

I also read the book "Rock Iron Steel: The Book of Strength" by Steve Justa this past week. It was a very interesting read and gave me a lot of good ideas on how to mix up my training. I recommend this book to anybody who is looking for a different means of strength and endurance training.

That's all for this past week. Now it's time to go live this one.

Get big or die tryin'.