Wolf's Log: From Cub to Direwolf

[Ryan Arnold]

Ugh that sucks. I'm thankful to have never been bit by a dog. Does not seem like a fun experience

[Michael Wolf]

Ugh that sucks. I'm thankful to have never been bit by a dog. Does not seem like a fun experience

It wasn't. Maybe I have a high pain tolerance, but it hurt less than you'd expect, both during and after. More of a sting than real deep, mind-numbing pain. But dealing with it is a real pain in the ass, and he got in there good and deep. It's healed up significantly, but 11 days later and the deepest part still isn't closed up yet so I still have to dress it. Annoying.

[Michael Wolf]

Bench Press
275x5, 315x5, 355x2, 385x1
Notes: All just building tolerance back up after missing those days due to the dog bite. I was tempted to do another back off set of 5, but didn't - no need to rush. I added tonnage, volume, intensity, and average intensity here - albeit not a lot of any one of them, but adding all 4 at the same time, I just went up moderately. There's time.

Deadlift: 2" blocks - beltless
545x1 @7
405x5 double overhand
Notes: I was a little worried the deadlift would catch the bottom edge of the giant band-aid I had on under my socks and roll it up, but all went fine. 545 still felt effects of having missed 2-3 deadlift workouts, but wasn't slow by any stretch. Backoff was easy.

Lat Pulldown: Medium Neutral Grip
135x8, 160x8x2
Notes:First time using my new multi-grip lat pulldown attachment from Black Widow. I like it. I previously had a triangle grip handle that I got at my old gym's going out of business sale, and it was adequate, but this allows for both more ROM and 3 grip width options. It's well made and looks nice. Based on my one use, I recommend.

[Yngvi]

Long story shot: I got bit by a neighbor's dog, pretty bad, on my left leg (outer calf up close to the knee) last Weds....

More than ever, I am convinced there is some sort of physiological abnormality underlying all of these injuries.

[Michael Wolf]

More than ever, I am convinced there is some sort of physiological abnormality underlying all of these injuries.

It's called Wolf's Disease. The silent pandemic.

[Michael Wolf]

Visited the fam out east for passover over the weekend and into this week, which was great as I hadn't seen them in ages. Trained twice, Friday and Tuesday. The gym is primarily a boxing gym, but has a good strength and conditioning section considering - not to powerlifting/SS ideal standards, but fine for a couple of workouts while traveling.

Bench Press
315x5, 345x5, 365x5
Notes: Did this beltless and wrapless, and it moved fast - I hadn't done 365x5 I don't think since Nov or Dec, and also was dealing with the substandard benches and barbell, but it still moved fast. Happy with it.

Deadlift: 3" belt, straps
585x5 - PR
Notes: Used straps bc no chalk available, and the bars weren't great in terms of knurling either. They also only had 3 iron 45 plates, rest were thick bumpers, so I ran out of room on the bar, the collars sat half on and half off, and after rep 3, the end plate fell off and I had to replace it. Still, I count it as 585x5, which is technically a PR, albeit a PRINO.

I first did 585x4 almost 7 years ago - even then, while hard, I probably had been able to get a 5th if I'd needed to:



One of the lessons I've learned about my overly sensitive back is that it doesn't like near maximal pulls very much, so I haven't pushed 5RMs at all in the recent years, and just let my 1RM go up via good steady submaximal work accumulated, with less frequent heavy but still submaximal 1-3 rep sets. Otherwise I tweak my back even more often.

So while this was absolutely a PR in name only, I had technically never done it before and it was fun to get on the books. I was especially happy with how well it moved considering I had woken up at 3:30am after only 4 hours sleep, traveled all day, and hardly eaten prior to this.

I think 635x5 might happen during this training cycle, which would be cool.

Here's the 585 set, slightly sped up to fit into the 1 minute limit, due to the plates falling off and dealing with all that.

Then I wrapped up with:

DB Press
60x8, 70x8, 80x8 - EZPZ, just re-introducing multiple press slots in one workout / moving back to 4 then 5 (then maybe 6) press slots per week.

Lat Pulldowns - 3x8 at whatever weight the machine made mderately challenging

[Michael Wolf]

Back at the boxing gym for round 2!

Squat: 4" belt + sleeves
365x5, 405x5, 455x5 @7
Notes: I'm amazed at how well 455 moved even with the travel, lack of consistency between dog bite & travel, my general reduction in squat frequency (even from 1x week to like 1x every 2-4 weeks) over the last few months. Bodes well for my chase for 600+, as long as my knees hold out. I think realistically 650 isn't impossible this year if my knees cooperate enough to squat at least once every 2 weeks most of the time. If not, then who knows.

Press: 4" belt starting at 225, wraps for 245
205x5, 225x5, 245x5 @7.5
Notes: Bar was all over my chin-mask on these, kind of distracting. Anyway, real happy with bar speed at both 245 and 455. Both are years past being PRs, but only now/recently have they moved from hard, serious work sets to ones I can do at fairly low RPEs even while traveling and on somewhat inconsistent training. This all bodes well for my somewhat ambitious goals both for this training cycle and for 2021 in general.

455x5 squat and 245x5 press on IG

DB Bench
100x10x2 - EZPZ, dumbbells maxed out at 100.
Lat Pulldown
3x8 @ slightly heavier than Friday

[Michael Wolf]

Feeling tired so just did a quick and easy workout. It looks like my schedule is normalizing + the dog bite is sufficiently healed that it won't affect training at all - so I can start the cycle I planned to start 3 weeks ago now. The Q is, do I push everything out 3 weeks or just shorten it? I planned for an early June peak because it just gets SO DAMN HOT here after that, that maxing out and the hard training immediately prior would be brutal. But I don't want to do only a 9 week cycle, as I think I have a decent shot at some real good numbers if I have 3 whole months. Decisions, decisions. We'll see.

CGBP: no wraps or belt
375x3, 415x1, 375x3 - all PRs for close grip
315x5 backoff
Notes: PRinos, but still fun to hit. I have used CGBP a lot since 2015 or so, but almost exclusively on lighter days as purposely easy work, never pushed even close to limits. So I probably could've done these as early as 2017 (albeit not easily back then), but still nice to actually do em. Backoff was a joke. 315 is my new 275, which had been where I started counting bench sets as "work, albeit light easy work, and not just a warmup" for a while now. Some years. But realistically that's not true anymore, unless I'm ramping back up from a layoff. When I'm training normally, 315 is really a baseline starting point for work at 5 reps or less now. Even close grip, and even with somewhat uneven training lately, I could've easily done this for 10.

Power Clean
135x3, 185x3, 205x3, 225x3x2, 245x3
Notes: Was feeling sluggish so stopped here.

Close Grip Bench PRs and 245x3 clean on IG

Overall despite another life setback, I am starting this cycle in a pretty good place. 400+ bench, 585x5 deadlift, and 455x5 squat all at very submax bar speeds. Never been this strong at the start of a block, even in late 2018 when I began the block that led to a 315 press, 701 DL, 475 bench, and 573 squat without any squatting whatsoever during the cycle.

[Michael Wolf]

Had a friend over for this one, so that made things fun, but also much longer with all our chatter.

Press
265x1 - 4" belt
205x7, 195x7, 185x7
Notes: 265 moved pretty quick but felt heavy in my hands; all I needed to do was hit a moderately heavy single before some volume, so that was fine for the day. Easy backoffs.

Sumo DL + Snatch Grip DL: 4" Blocks - beltless, straps
405x4 each
445x4 each
Notes: Pretty uneventful. Sumo actually felt better than snatch grip, go figure.

DB Bench Press
125x8, 135x8 - PR (but super easy still)
Notes: Got my dumbbell trays in, so I can unrack heavy DBs for pressing like a barbell. Previously was limited by the small edge of the loadable DB handle, not able to flip up as much weight as a big knob or hex DB. And my old gym only had up to 120, so had never done this before. It was easy, and fun to use the new toy. But got some work in.

135x8 DB Bench + 445 Sumo & Snatch Grip DLs on IG

Lat Pulldown: Medium Neutral Grip
160x8, 185x8x2

[Michael Wolf]

Officially signed up for a July meet. I wanted to do one in June, but there just weren't any realistic ones available that weren't already sold out. So my block timing will be a bit off my original plan, but I'll adapt. Switching to 4 day split now - may keep this throughout prep, may change things up if I feel I need a 3rd day of upper body work as I have done in the past. We'll see.

As far as expectations, I haven't competed in PL since 2015. I was supposed to do a meet last march but didn't end up doing it. My PR total is 1585 in 2014; if I only hit my planned openers on this one, I will beat that by a wide margin here, barring unforeseen circumstances #jinx


Bench
345x5, 380x5 @7.5-8, 335x5
Notes: 380 was solid; I've done it faster, but this is as strong as I've been at the START of a meet prep/peaking block, especially one in which I have so long before showtime. Very excited to see where things end up here. 500 is still the goal for 2021; I won't force it to happen by July if it's not ready, but that's obviously what I'm hoping for.

DB Standing Press
55x8, 75x8, 85x8x2
Notes: Ramping up volume and intensity on these - add 5 lbs to the middle and top sets, and did 2 top sets instead of just the one. I will make these a bit harder, then switch to 3 of the 4 pressing slots being barbell instead of 2/2 (which is only slightly more real work than the 3 barbell/no dumbbell I've been doing in the very off season 3 day total body program the last few months), and then probably move to 3 barbell/2 non barbell or sometimes 3/2 and sometimes 4/1. Will see if I need 6 slots like I have used before; my thinking now is that less might be more given the proclivity of my left pec to get irritated with a lot of work.

Lat Pulldown: Tempo 1-0-1, Wide Grip Neutral
3x10 @135
Notes: Tempo made it challenging.

DB Curls
45x8x2 - just getting used to doing curls again, haven't done for a while.