A Warrior's Thougts on the Martial Arts

Today was strength day. To be precise, we had our "max-squat day". Now that's a good one. Interrestingly, there was no problem with the grip-strength today. On a negative note I missed some reps on the barbell rows as we upped the weight quite drastically. Today's stats: Squat, 1RM: 130Kg Bench Press, 4x8, 60Kg Deadlift, 4x8, 90Kg Bent-over barbell rows, 4x8, 45kg (failed on 3 reps here) Military press, 4x8, 35kg I'm positive I can go to 140kg on the 1RM on the next "max squat day", as I wasn't exactly at my limits today. For safety reasons, however, I decided not to go heavier than 130 on my first heavy squats in more than 6 months. For the warmup we did every "Movement Prep" exercise that can be found in Mark Verstegens "Core Performance" program. That stuff really does prepare you for strength training. The second workout - the interval swimming - I missed out of pure confusion. When we went to venice, I removed everything from...

So today I started the 2nd week of my 9-week program. Unfortunately, things have deteriorated for me again. You see, me girl and I, we was at Venice on Saturday, to enjoy Carnival there. The implication, of course, was an 8-hour march through the city. As you can imagine, my ankle didn't like that very much. For me, that means another change in my program. Since the rope-skipping is just too hard on my ankle, I'll be replacing that with Movement Prep / Prehab exercise from Mark Verstegens "Core Performance" program. I've yet to figure out the exact routine I'll be doing, but it'll most certainly revolve around programming proper biomechanics and stretching the lower back (as that's the one body part I tend to neglect with my mobility/flexibility work). Of course, adapting the program every week might look bad in regard to the results, but then that's something that comes with creating an individual program. Out-of the box programs, on the other han...

Just returned from my strength training session. There's a good thing and a bad thing: Good thing: I'm currently free of pain. Bad thing: As soon as feeling returns to my body, it'll be agonizing. The routine was the same as last time, only today we upped the weights a bit. Also, today was "bench" day, so we re-estimated the 1RM for the bench press and did 4x8 on the dealift and the squat. Those two exercises are propably the most useful one can do, but combined in the same workout, they're murderous. We wramed up by doing some movement-prep exercises from Mark Verstegens "Core Performance" book. I have to admit I was positively surprised by the effect. I felt loose yet stable and properly prepared. We did: Hip crossover, 10l/10r Scorpion, 10l/10r Calf strentch, 10l/10r Hand walk, 5 Inverted hamstring, 5l/5r Backward lunge with a twist, 5l/5r Drop lunge, 5l/5r Today's stats: Bench press, 1RM: 95kg (I was disappointed) Deadlift, 4x8, 90kg Militar...