Thursday 27.12: back squat, pair metcon

Thursday. Back squat 5-5-5-5-3-2 (max PR 135kg). Pair metcon 8 rounds of 10 k2e + box jumps. Time 8.16.

The whole gang at the Box: me, Pauliina, Toni and my brother Sami, nice! Good feeling and ready to lift weights. We took some rowing for starters, then double unders, warming up hamstrings, lower back and hip area. Toni successfully continued to practice his kipping pull-ups, they look much better nowadays and he's able to do a few reps in a row, assisted with a rubber band. I'm confident he's gonna get rid of that band soon and go for genuine kipping pull-ups. I must say he is a determined athlete. Once he has decided to learn something new, he will keep on pursuing that until he reaches his goal.

Strength. Back squat 5-5-5-5-3-2 (100, 110, 120, 125, 130, PR 135kg). Huh, that was not my goal today but once it felt so good, I had to keep on adding plates on the bar and take a new personal record of 135kg :) My goal was to go for 5 rep sets up to maybe 125 kilos but it simply didn't feel that heavy so I had to push through. My warm-up for these squats was good and more concentrated in getting those specific muscles ready that are needed for squats: my hip area, hamstrings, lower back, abs.

This time I believe the depth of my squats was way better than last time, the day before Christmas eve. I'm happy with these. And it was time to break my record, which dates back to 2nd December. It feels like an eternity but it's been only three weeks :) I did that PR in Stockholm. Today I did fives up to 125kg and then 3 reps for 130 and for 135kg my bro secured my lifts from behind. He maybe assisted a bit in the first lift but in the second I took it up myself so I can proudly say I did a new PR :) The last lifts were not easy but I got my head in the game and was able to come up from under the pile of all those plates.

Back squat, 130kg

Back squat, 135kg

Sami went to 140kg and attempted a new PR of 150kg, which this time failed to come up. Current max is at 145kg. Toni also broke his record yesterday with 10kg when going after 120kg.

Metcon. Pair wod with Sami, my brother. Time 8.16.

• 8 rounds
• 10 knees-to-elbows
• 10 box jumps, 64cm

At the end we took a pair wod with Sami consisting of two movements: knees-to-elbows and 64cm box jumps. I started with the K2Es and Sami with the boxes. We did them with pretty much the same pace so this was a good workout to be done with him. Total of 80 reps each movement. Box jumps wasn't the issue for neither of us but the knees-to-elbows became difficult as my groins started to fire up and go numb. For the first maybe 4 rounds I went unbroken, then it had to be divided. Sami had the same problems with K2Es. I think we were equally equipped with strength and skills in this workout and we timed the final reps at 8.16. I focused on raising my knees all the way to my elbows and not doing half reps during the workout.

A little playing in the end

Toni's workout. Time 13.12

• 3 rounds of
• 9 deadlifts
• 50 double unders
• 15 box jumps

Toni skipped strength workouts today and put all effort in completing a deadlift centered metcon. This was a good call and follows Toni's ideology of not every time lifting heavy weights. I believe his plan is to do strength plus metcon on one day and then only a metcon on the second day, following this rhythm few times a week: every other day is a strength based workout. This is how he is going to pay more attention to his metabolic conditioning. Good call!