Herderdude Takes On The Strongest Man in Pittsburgh

herderdude

herderdude

Well-known member
What's up, guys. I was informed at my last meet about another meet on May 11. After searching for it, I found out that it was actually a strongman competition. I would have never guessed I'd have the opportunity to do this kind of thing, but I'm diving headfirst for this bad boy.

I'll be in the Junior Middleweight division, which is a top weight of 231.

I'll list the events along with my current maxes.

Log Press
180# for reps
My Max: 215x3

Farmer's Walk
180# for 100' with one 180 degree turn for time or distance
Mine: Slick 130# dbs for 40 or so feet. Gonna have to hope for good teeth on the implement.

Tire Flip
700# for 90' time or distance
My Best: 405ishx20, not timed (this was five years ago weighing 180)

Atlas Stone Carry
75# for 60' with one 180deg turn for time or distance.
Making stones this week to train.

Car Deadlift
Weight of car: ?? Can't be much. Every division is using the same car.
My Max: Hm. Never tried a car. Straps allowed here.

Goals:

Win the Log Press. I have a strong overhead press and I have a buffalo bar to train the log. If we can drive with our legs, it will really come down to my conditioning.

Improve my conditioning. I need to prowl, prowl, prowl. These events are for reps, time, distance. That is going to take much wind.

Finish the Farmer's walk. Nuff said. I'll train strapped and unstrapped to train the hands and the rest of the muscles used for the Farmer's.

Get good at Stones. These will build so much upper back it will be ridiculous. Stones might be the thing that causes me to bench 405.

Get video of me deadlifting a car. ;-)

Improve my biceps health. This is going to be a biggie for benching in the future and also for using the stones. I find it hard to believe the event involves a 75 lb stone. I carried a 100lb plate in my yard until I got bored.

Last, but not least, try to win the damn thing. I think these are reasonable goals, but you never know who or what mammoth creature will show up.

I'll be purchasing The Cube for Strongman to get some ideas on how to train, but I have some of my own.

Log Assistance: Press, push press, Z Press (named after legendary presser Zydrunas Savickas, sit on floor and press), Pin Press, Klokov Press, pullups, incline bench, facepulls, standing overhead triceps ext

Stones: BB Rows, Snatch Grip Deads, yoke marches, husefell carries

Farmers: bb static holds, strapped farmer's walks, shrugs, learn hook grip

Deadlift: work on rep work, work on touch and go deadlifting.

Tire Flip: Cleans, pull-throughs, incline press, finding a tire to flip.

Come on in, let's get strong and take an in-depth look into a discipline that does not get much coverage.
 
Damn, that was long. You don't have to read the whole thing at once, but take a look and make sure I didn't miss anything.
 
Sean1332 said:
700lb tire seems like a ****ing lot
Click to expand...

Yeah, the number is definitely intimidating. The tire I used might have been 455. It was for wrestling and our 125 pounder used it, too. He was no freakazoid, and he was probably five foot seven. It's a sort of clean and press. After awhile, it'll devolve into a struggle. It's definitely not all on you at once. The guys gunning for a spot in the national championships will be using it, too. Let me look up what all they'll be using.
 
Men's open light heavy (231), heavy (265), and super (unlimited) will log press 240 for reps, farmers 240, flip 700, stone carry 210, and deadlift the same car many, many times.
 
Welcome my brothas. Dan, welcome to the madness that is my log life. If you hadn't followed closely on the last one, I'll fill you in. Expect wild attire, very simple and often improvised home training, and lots of videos of a very good looking dude.
 
Little motivation. This is Big Z, for those of you who aren't familiar. 135kg (297#) clean and press for reps.

Invalid Link Removed
 
herderdude said:
Welcome my brothas. Dan, welcome to the madness that is my log life. If you hadn't followed closely on the last one, I'll fill you in. Expect wild attire, very simple and often improvised home training, and lots of videos of a very good looking dude.
Click to expand...

Well, that last statement is debatable.

But, I agree with the other points.
 
If I have the money available, I may take my new Inzer Rage for a spin on the 11th as well. The strongman is at 9am and there is a pro-am bench press competition at 2pm. If I'm totally comfortable making 220 and opening over 4, I'll consider it. I think that'd be a pretty awesome thing to do.
 
I was going to say they have a Cube for Strongmen but see you mentioned that. Sounds really cool actually. I plan to try that training program one day just for a cool change of pace, but I doubt I'll ever actually do a strongman comp.

Either way in for the journey here.
 
bolt10 said:
I was going to say they have a Cube for Strongmen but see you mentioned that. Sounds really cool actually. I plan to try that training program one day just for a cool change of pace, but I doubt I'll ever actually do a strongman comp.

Either way in for the journey here.
Click to expand...

Welcome aboard! I think this will help me become a stronger person overall. I expect to have a slightly lower total coming out, but to recover and then pass it up in a hurry.
 
Squat test day to finish off my Cube. I'll upload my three attempts and you guys can do your best USAPL judge impression. I'm opening 435, second will probably be 475, and third will be 505-515.
 
Crushed 435 and messed up the filming process. The rack is high and so I had my spotters take it off and give it to me. After they let go of the weight, I was walking it out like I was walking backwards downhill. Luckily my guys took it off of me before it got out of hand. I'll test it later.
 
So after the squat workout fail, we finally got my Rage on my carcass. That is a serious piece of equipment. I could easily open with 405, if I could get a touch. I locked up at about two boards, but I smoked that. Hard to arch, impossible to retract my scauplae, et cetera. The groove is pretty forgiving, so that's cool. It's time to quit ****ing around and get my strongman on.

Tomorrow's workout will be buffalo bar clean and presses, incline presses, Z Presses, Klokov presses, pullups, lat pulldowns, high pulley rows, and facepulls. Prowler work weather permitting as well.
 
4/10 Log Press

Buffalo Bar Clean and Press
60x15
110x13
160x3 (one clean)
210xF (No clean)
160x5
Invalid Link Removed
Handles are too close together. Bicep pain was INTENSE.

Incline Press (60 degree Incline, taken to the chest)
225x5x2

Z Press
Barx8
115x8x2
155x4
Invalid Link Removed

Klokovs
85x5x2

Overhead Tri Ext.
105x12x3

Bicep pain was tough to work through. Conditioning was 5 hours of logging. The log is going to have parallel handles much further apart. I think the lack of incline pressing is what led to my decreased overhead strength. Having a bench supporting you leads to big overload. Z Presses are a different exercise at each weight used. My pressing will come on in a hurry. Conditioning needs to improve, though.
 
Oh yeah, I had the little brother put on the shirt and stretch it out. So here's him doing 315 in a loose shirt.

Invalid Link Removed
 
Note to self: lots of external rotation needed tomorrow to offset the pressing from today.
 
Beast. You have monster delts.

Question: I was under the assumption that the Buffalo Bar was just a curved squat bar..
 
Dude, I thought it was the parallel grip bar. I really didn't know. I'm reading Cube for Strongman now. I may be getting a two month membership to a nearby local gym so I can use the log twice a week.
 
Cube for Strongman: Extremely similar to Lilly's Cube. There are your three days: Squat, Deadlift, Overhead. Day four is Event Day. Three lifts are rotated Reps, Speed, Max. Two agility days, as athleticism is important in Strongman (think of your loaded carries).

Since I know my events, I will be training my events on Saturdays or Sundays. Until I have stones and a tire I will be using plate carries and Zercher lifts to simulate those events. Stones are coming soon though, the boss is very excited to make them.
 
There should be a law against 18 year olds getting tattoos. You can only imagine what I've heard about it. "Dude, you wouldn't have had such a hard time making weight if you'd just take that barbell off of your back!" The way I see it, I'll always have motivation to keep on my training.
 
Hell yeah dude! Bonus points: Nobody knows you have it until you're on the beach or in your singlet. Lots of looks this weekend and throughout my college wrestling career.
 
I'm telling you guys: Big delts= Big Bench. I have always been strong overhead: 100x6 on seated low back bench DB Press, 245 for a single with a 80 degree incline, 245x8 45 degree incline. Don't neglect incline work. I think it can be a huge boon to benching strength by increasing ROM. I'll be using Blast shirted bench as assistance work for my overheads, going back to a flatter back and more flared elbows. Should carry over quite nicely.
 
4/11 Deadlift

Tandem Speed Pulls
365x1x8 30s rest

Pretty good for a stiff bar and rubber plates grabbing a rubber floor.

Sumo Zercher Lifts from 5" Blocks (no real squat at the top, more of a GM)
135x5 added green band
135x5 band pulling back
135x5 band pulling forward
185x5
235x5
305x1 long grind three inches off of the block, dropped my hips under the bar and finished pretty fast. Wish you guys could see this brutal mess. Reset after each rep and made the setup as fast as possible, simulating tire.

Pull-Throughs
100x10x5

Chins
BWx6x3

High Pulley Rows
100x20x3

Facepulls w/ external rotation
50x10x3 long hold at top

EZ Bar Curl
75x10x5

Zerchers caused me to use straps the rest of the day. Forearms simply would not cooperate. I could tell even in the bicep curls, which I strapped up for. People were looking at me and Lamonster like we grew another head out of our forehead doing the Zerchers. I highly recommend them for hip strength. I'd say it's analogous to an 8" deficit deadlift. Just set the bar as low as your mobility safely allows' hold it in the crook of your arms and stand with it.

It should look something like what Mark Bell does in this video Invalid Link Removed except the bar was a couple inches lower and my chest was much lower. I felt like King Kong doing those, but now Mark makes me feel like Diddy Kong.

Found a tire at the local tire place. It's far too small, so I'm looking into ways to make that heavier and not mess with the integrity of the movement. Off to prowl and flip!
 
That's what I'm thinking. I'm just worried that one flip would make it fall. That tire has a twin at the tire shop. I'm thinking I could bolt them together and put plates in between the tires, with the bolts going through the holes in my standard plates.
 
You know what Joe tells me in situations like this? Stop being a puss C.
 
Went for about a half hour. Did stuff like this.

Invalid Link Removed
 
To be more specific, we did that tire medley, then

Flip for 75s

Battle tires for 75s

And had Jordan sit on the tire and flipped it maybe ten times. It's like opposite of accomodating resistance. I was able to do it. Bigger tire in the works still.
 
Picking up bigger tire today. Also, I found my next power meet. Full power about an hour and fifteen minutes away, the Kumite Classic in Monroeville, PA on May 24-25. I really want to establish a total ASAP. Looks like I will not be benching shirted during this training cycle, and I will be benching a lot. Just not ME, which I'm okay with.
 
Pulled up on the place, took the second biggest tire they had. Took an hour to torch out the rim when we decided the sawzall wasn't cutting fast enough. The RIM weighed 650. Looked up the tire on Goodyear's website, it weighs 1057# new. It probably weighs a grand now. I managed to get it maybe 3" off of the ground. We're going to cut out the center until it weighs 7. The ****ing side wall is five inches thick at least! Great tire, for free.
 
These are with the rim still in it. By the time we got it back to my boss's house, it was dark.

Invalid Link Removed



Invalid Link Removed
 
Unbelievably massive. After a half hour of sawzall, we had gotten halfway around it. We'll use a circular saw next. :-)
 
GPP today was cutting and loading about 3 cord of wood. Then we put the chainsaw to a better use and cut a foot and a half of sidewall off of each side. Tire now weighs 840. Tomorrow is Events day and we'll be making Atlas stones. I love that my boss has set aside all of his duties to help me with these implements, for the sheer fact that he thinks this stuff is cool.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top