Lexen Xtreme Training Tips

Full gym today, with all 3 monolifts going.

Squat
Group 1: Volgelpohl, Wenning, Fought, and some new guy named Greg Panora or something like that.
These guys used the shortened monster chains and took doubles onto a box, working on stability, tightness, and staying under control.  Working sets were 2 plates and 3 55lb chains per side.  We do these every once in awhile, finally got some video to show what I’m talking about.  Notice how under control Greg is during descent and when coming up, including Matt having him pause for a 3 count at the top.   This keeps the chains from swinging and knocking you on your ass.   Jeremiah, who is a very fast descender, had a lot of trouble with these the first time he did them until he adjusted.  We find them to be very effective for stability as a nice contrast to squatting against bands, where you’re pretty much locked into a groove, so we rotate these in once in awhile.

Group 2: Dague, Strong, Chewy, Schwab, Johnston
Circa Max Week 1 for these guys, which meant 2 pairs of brand new blue bands, which adds 440 lbs or so  in tension at the top.  Dague, being the old guy of the group, took longer to warmup, so who knows how many warmup sets he counted as work sets, but he finished with 335 + the bands.   Nate Strong, still only a few weeks past the Pro-Am, is back at it and looking strong, taking 335 + the bands for 5 sets of doubles.  Chewy took 7 sets at 335 + bands, while Johnston and Schwab took 7 work sets with 385 + bands for doubles then finished with 425 + bands for a single.  Next week we add MORE band tension with the same bar weight.

Group 3: Henry, Gretsky, Fleming, Gualtieri, Murph
I unfortunately don’t have many details of what they did, but they went with lightened method of box squatting with monster mini-bands hanging from the top, for sets of doubles.  This allows us to work on form and deload the weight in the hole while still getting some heavy-ish work in at the top.

Deadlift
Group 1 finished earlier than the other groups, so they got a jump and did pin pulls from pin 3, with Fought, Wenning, and Panora working into the upper 700′s and cracking 800 with the last set.

Group 2 went with speed pulls from the floor against doubled mini-bands, 5 work sets of triples.

Group 3 worked up to a near max with plates elevated onto 4 mats

Accessory work
As usual, most broke off into smaller groups for accessory work, with most doing reverse hypers and some abdominal work.

Group 1-Bandy, BOBBY!!, Christian:

This group did low box squats working up to singles with 2 hanging chains on each side, ending with 330 plus 220 lbs of chains. They then hit some speed pulls with 225 plus doubled minis for multiple singles. They finished with reverse hypers and ab work.

Group 2-Burke, McLovin, Halter:

This group also did low box squats with the hanging chains as well, working up to 380 lbs of bar weight with 220 lbs of hanging chains for 5 sets of doubles. They then pulled against the doubles minis for a heavy single. Halter got 405 but couldn’t get his hips in with 455. Burke made 455 and McLovin made 455 but missed 495 at his knees.

Group 3-Cody, TPH, Pud, Mike:

This group also did box squats with hanging chains. TPH did 380 plus 110 lbs of chains for a raw double, Pud did 235 plus the chains for raw triples, Cody worked up to 385 plus the chains for a single but missed 425. Mike did 385 plus the chains for a single. This group then did some pin 4 rack pulls but I don’t know what they finished with.

We haven’t posted much about our weekday training since work schedules and family lives end up creating a lot of different groups, usually doing different things, and recently all on different meet training cycles.  We have a core set of movements we typically will rotate, focusing on lower back muscle work such as good mornings, and the squat and deadlift assistance movements, while occasionally rotating in speed squats and speed pulls.  Usually in the afternoons we will do similar to what the morning guys did, or as much as they’ll tell us they did.

Today’s work:

Speed box squats
We used the giant cambered bar along with a set of blue bands, 8 sets of triples, with the afternoon guys varying their works sets between 2 plates and 3 plates + the blues.  Raw dog

Speed pulls with thick bar

Good Mornings on belt squat machine
This was apparently a Chuck invention in the morning.  We connected some chains and hooks onto the belt squat machine cable, then put ab straps around our shoulders and did 3 sets of good mornings with 4 plates.  The ab straps were a little awkward, but got some good work into the lower back, especially after the band squats.

Some of the guys then broke off and did either 45 degree back raises holding the medium sand bag, or single leg reverse hypers.  Most of us then finished with static barbell holds and ab work.

Light turnout in the gym today, so it was a pretty quick day.

Squat

Most of the groups were working on squat stability by using the short monster chains, including Wenning and Vogelpohl still recovering from the Pro-Am and Chuck Fought working his way back into the training after his sabbatical for injury, strongman, marathon training, short track speed skating, 6 months in a monastery, sailing around the world, and whatever other things the experts at Outlaws say he was doing.

The remaining group consists of most of the guys getting ready for the Iron House Classic, which includes Johnston, Dague, Schwab, and today were joined by Strong and Deimert.  These guys squatted into hanging chains which were set at parallel.  Breakdown of our sets today:
155 x 10
245 x 5
335 x 3
425 x 2
515 x 2 (Strong going raw and Deimert stopped here)
605 x 2 (Dague ended here with a single)
695 x 2
785 x 2 (Johnston doubled, Schwab singled)

Deadlift
Wenning, Fought, and Meyers pulled from pin 4 against doubled mini-bands, worked up to 5 plates + the bands for sets of 5 with double-overhand grip.

Johnston, Dague, Schwab, and Deimert did speed pulls with plates elevated around 4 inches, sets of 3 up to 5 plates.

Most finished with reverse hypers, ab work, and some dumbbell shrugs.

My two long time training partners had a decent day, both hitting PR squats and totals. Lynn’s been chasing an 800 squat for a long time so glad to see he finally got that monkey off his back. His bench, well, it is what it is. His deadlift, well, it is what it is.

Tim Sansbury-198 lb wt class-43 years old
Squat: 650
              700
              730- 30 lb PR    Whooooooo…………..AH   ”GB727″

Bench: 400
               440
               455-miss

Deadlift: 540
                   570
                   600-miss

1740 Elite total

Lynn Halter-275 lb wt class-43 yrs old
Squat: 705
              750
              800- 25 lb PR

Bench: 405
               445-miss
               445-miss

Dead: 525
             550-miss
             550

1755 Total

Most of the kids had a decent day. Cody Underwood at 220 I think did 610-400-495. BOBBY Scott at 198 did 550 ? 335 and 515. Carter James Pillflat at 148 went 425-255 and I’m not sure about his dead but it was over 400. 17 yr old TPH Esterline bombed with a 745 squat. He kept folding over trying to reach depth but he took the bomb in stride. Many grown-ups would a throw temper tantrum and cry like a bitch but TPH took it like a man and helped the rest of his crew during the rest of the meet.