Battling Ropes - Arms and Shoulders Conditioning

...because using 'normal' equipment is too maintstream.

Nah, but in all seriousness who like using dumbbells anymore when you can just swing around a 30lb rope? In this case its more a 25ish pounds of 1.5"x50' polyurethane punishment.

Which reminds me, quick shout out to http://www.contractorsrope.com/ for the awesome deals on ropes. If I had any place to recommend anyone to buy their new ropes I would definitely order from these guys. Not only are their prices cheaper but can't beat free shipping on orders of $300 or more. Saved about $60 bones just on that fact alone.

So, anyways, onto the workout-

This vid is me going through a quick circuit using the "Tabata Method" style of interval training.

Heres the skinny;
Each round is 20s of high intensity work with a very short 10s of rest in between.
The workout lasts a total of 8 rounds or 4 minutes in length.
You can do practically ANYTHING for the exercises but be warned there are some pretty exhausting ideas and workouts out there. Try squatting for example....bleack!

With this particular workout I just picked a bunch of random shoulder and arm movements with the rope that is looped around a weighted down box.

Back to picking up rocks

Its been awhile but my wrist is starting to cooperate again enough that I can get under some Atlas Stones and start training again. Ive learned a few things a long the way and definitly was more prepared for todays training session than in the past.

For starts I brought along some Slaters Brand tacky. Enough tape to roll my wrists. And a canister of WD-40 for remove the tack afterwards.

The tape is just protection for my forearms from getting torn apart. Everytime Ive left a few pieces of my arms behind on those rocks so this was a nice bonus. Unfortunately I need a better way to tape my left wrist. I still aint sure what I did to it but after the fact its still bothering me. Definitly more than before training.Although it didnt hurt at all during lifting but fast forward almost 5 hours and Im in some pain. Oh, hey, Icy Hot, whats going on?

Aight, I gotta say the tacky helps a HUGE amount. Had no idea it had that sort of impact on the initial lift. Then again if your hands/arms are half glued to the object then it all makes sense. In turn this helped my tech out quite a bit. Instead of being slow off the ground I was much faster and lapped easier. I got my arms over the stone and resulted in a higher elevation- before it was around 45" but today got all my lifts over 54". Plus was able to get more reps during conditioning work.

12 reps @ 240lb
circuit - 2 reps 240, 5 reps @ 165, 10 shoulders @110

conditioning;
165 for a minute on, minute off repeat 4 rounds.
110 for sets of 10 shouldering. alternating shoulders and bouncing off ground.

Finished the day with some speed bench and called it. Its game time.

Atlas Stone Conditioning - "Pick things up and put them down"

A little while ago Im strolling up to the track shed with a box in hand and a truck full of cement when a few inquiring minds simply asked -
"wtf?"
 "Relax everyone..."

I just recently acquired my Slaters Stone Molds to create some awesome pieces of equipment. Although my first time through making them wasn't the best, bunch of air bubbles and rough spots, they still are doing the trick very well. You can check out my experience here -First Time Stone Making.

I wrote up a small workout a few weeks ago as well. I got to admit I felt much stronger than compared to now- I blame Memorial Day weekend on that one. BBQ bloat is a rough recovery amongst other things....anyways on to the workout which I now have video this time.

Just a warning my tech is crap so dont look for helpful hints on stone lifting. You won't find it here.




The workout broke down like this-
3 rounds 1 minute stone loading over a bar.
10 sets of single load @240lbs
4 sets of 8 shouldering and lifting 115lb then moved to the 170lb stone second set.

Im definitly investing in some tack next week if I am going to continue doing this to myself. Grip is becoming an issue and dust is screwing that up more. Plus if you notice a few minutes in I suddenly have a wrist wrap on my left hand. I dont know what the hell I did but the damn thing is hurting good right now. Even a day later as Im writing this is hurts to open my fingers and spread them apart. Probably not a good sign.

But hey at least my finger is feeling better. Nail is drained out and its still attached...for now.