Today is Thursday, which is my Friday and every one of my weekends is a 4-day weekend. Yeah I know, must be nice huh? It is nice.

Damn it was nice to be back into some good ol’ regular programming this week. Although, I did a little bit of extra work Sunday and Monday, which is what I’m going to tell you about first. By the time Sunday rolled around, I couldn’t sit still any longer. Most of last week I was sick and when that is combined with a deload week, it turns out to be the perfect recipe for heavy barbell withdrawal. On Sunday I worked up to a moderately heavy Squat single and did some not-super-crazy airdyne intervals. Here are my Squats from the little extra credit sesh (not super eventful) where I worked up to a single at 280-lbs and then did some EMOM (every minute on the minute) Squats at 255-lbs:

Ok, so now for Monday. I’m going to begin with some background information. Last Christmas, I received my first pair of real-deal weightlifting shoes (Nike Romaleos 2) along with Rehband knee sleeves. On my first or second day in the gym after getting these toys, I PRed my Squat by like 40-pounds or something obscene like that.. I think it went from 265 to 305. I didn’t take video of the 305, so I have no idea what it looked like, besides that I do know it was to full-depth. But honestly, even when I watch videos of myself squatting from the last 6 months, I can tell that I’ve made leaps in my technique. Anyway, that was about 9 months ago. Since then, I had never squatted more than 300-pounds. In fact, I had never even gotten that big 3-0-0 again. This spring, 295-pounds went up once or twice pretty comfortably, and I tried to sneak up on 300 with fractional plates a time or two with no success. There were a few weeks before CrossFit Regionals and Raw Nationals that I maxed my Squat every Friday with the purpose of getting me more Time Under Tension (TUT) and boosting my confidence… That didn’t happen. I continually failed to get that magical 300, let alone 305, so we changed things up. In April at the Alaska State Powerlifting Championship, I put up a 297-pound squat and that was the closest I ever got. Until Monday.

My coach programmed a 5×5 Squat at 70% (210-lbs), 8×1 Deadlift at 80% (280-lbs), and accessory work. I did all of that stuff between 3 and 5 PM and then coached from 5 until 8 PM. After coaching, I decided to Squat more – my plan: work up to a heavy single. Maybe, just MAYBE, go for 302-lbs. When I stood up with 302-pounds on my back and it felt like something I do on a daily basis, I knew I had more in me. Here’s the wonderful 307-pound PR video:

I feel really good about how that Squat looks. Obviously it isn’t perfect, but I know that lift is absolutely repeatable and that, most importantly, I have more in me.

Lastly, here is my training session from yesterday (again, really nothing exciting).

“Be patient and tough; someday this pain will be useful to you.” – Ovid