January/February workout plan

[Alan H]

Here's my January/February gym workout schedule for the Games. The focus is on general strength, but really.....acceleration and "spring". I've had my butt handed to me too many times over the past three years in events where the deciding factor as been my lack of speed and acceleration. Gotta work on that!

http://cmgm.stanford.edu/~ahebert/CH...Febworkout.htm

I throw T&F...meaning shot put, discus and some wire hammer whenever I can on weekends, in addition to what you see, there. Starting March 8th, the gym work drops to 1x a week, focusing on lighter weights and fast motions... and I start throwing 2 x a week. Once June arrives, I will re-evalutate whether I can continue throwing 2x a week.

NC refers to a trip, regrettably short, that I am making to North Carolina to work with Mike and Mindy Pockoski. Mindy is a former womens world champion and still shares the womens world record for weight over bar. Mike is the 2010 Mens World Hammer Champion and finished 2010 rated #2 in the world on the NASGA rating system. I so much wish I could spend another couple of days in North Carolina to visit with friends, but I just don't have the vacation time.

I plan to work on shot/stones...discus...Scottish Hammer....and weights for distance while I'm there. WOB and caber will have to come another day.

[OftKilted]

If you haven't had the chance to read it, I might recommend "The four hour body" by Tim Ferris

Best wishes in your training!

[KenB]

The only thing that appears to be missing is "stretching". Strength training should be accompanied with flexibility and balance training, IMHO.
Regardless, best of luck with the training and the competitive season.

[Alan H]

An excellent point about stretching! In fact, I preface every single gym session with about 10 minutes in the "stretch cage". I credit the fact that my right knee and VMO are not screaming this off-season to that fact. I should probably incorporate that in the spreadsheet so that others can see it as well.

---

*done*! Thanks!

Also, based on some information from Adriane Blewitt, I reconsidered, and changed my bench press to incline bench press. The angle is more appropriate for shot/stone crossover.

[KiltedDixon]

Hey Alan,

I admire your program. You are getting a lot done.
I started training and competing in the Highland Games back in March.
I am still trying to figure out how to weight train and throw
during any given week. Thanks for your posts.

[Alan H]

Thanks, kilteddixon! Read about 01d dude's workout in an earlier post in this thread as well. His program is different, but it works, too. You need to find what works for you and go with it...occasionally branching out of your comfort zone so you don't get stale.

For example.....

I put skullcrushers in there for some variety. I tried them tonight, even got some help with them to make sure I wasn't doing something stupid. BAD. Really BAD. This does not feel good. I'm pretty sure that if I do these, I'm going to get hurt, and fast. So skullcrushers are coming out to be replaced with bench dips with weight on my lap. I've done those in the past, just not recently and they work well for me.

[Alan H]

I got a comment that there wasn't enough "push" in the upper body so I swapped out a "pull" exercise and replaced it with a "push"....basically I took out face pulls and put in elevated feet (I put my feet on a 24 inch pylo box and my hands on wobble boards) push-ups. It's low tech, but I don't care. I'll probably just do a few face pulls here and there, as I have time anyway.

OK, I think I've got myself a program!

[Skipper1]

Hi -IMy son (age 23)and I (age 55) are interested in the games but I can't seem to find any contacts here in Victoria, BC. I see several competitors here and wonder if you have any advice on who to get in touch with to see about training and competing?

[McBird]

I've followed X-Marks for quite a while and bought a few things here - but never bothered to check for an HG Athletics thread. Good stuff!

I started throwing just a little less than three years ago here in the midwest (Ohio) in hopes that competition would keep me focused on staying in shape.

A large number of us here in the GLSAA (Great Lakes Scottish Athletic Association) have gotten hooked on Westside - after a clinic with Kerry Overfelt and Mark Valenti. The combination of acceleration/speed (dynamic effort) and strength (max effort) really works well for Heavy Athletics. Given that Westside was developed by Lou Simmons primarly for the powerlifting game, a lot of us have our own "hybrid" forms. I've started blending in odd lifts (beer kegs and sand bags) mainly to help my caber and to keep my in some kind of form if someone runs a blended game of highland athletics and strongman.

At 43 years old - and never having been successful as any kind of athlete from the time I was 12 years old - following Westside has gotten me to just short of a 500 lb deadlift, 400 lb squat and 250 lb bench (best I ever benched in my life was 165 lbs when I was like 18 years old). And - I added 18 feet to my light hammer and almost 3 feet to my open stone this past year (hammer was helped by form, stone was all strength as I used to T&F shot put).

Richard

Throw hard and aim for the parking lot!

[Alan H]

I've followed X-Marks for quite a while and bought a few things here - but never bothered to check for an HG Athletics thread. Good stuff!

I started throwing just a little less than three years ago here in the midwest (Ohio) in hopes that competition would keep me focused on staying in shape.

A large number of us here in the GLSAA (Great Lakes Scottish Athletic Association) have gotten hooked on Westside - after a clinic with Kerry Overfelt and Mark Valenti. The combination of acceleration/speed (dynamic effort) and strength (max effort) really works well for Heavy Athletics. Given that Westside was developed by Lou Simmons primarly for the powerlifting game, a lot of us have our own "hybrid" forms. I've started blending in odd lifts (beer kegs and sand bags) mainly to help my caber and to keep my in some kind of form if someone runs a blended game of highland athletics and strongman.

At 43 years old - and never having been successful as any kind of athlete from the time I was 12 years old - following Westside has gotten me to just short of a 500 lb deadlift, 400 lb squat and 250 lb bench (best I ever benched in my life was 165 lbs when I was like 18 years old). And - I added 18 feet to my light hammer and almost 3 feet to my open stone this past year (hammer was helped by form, stone was all strength as I used to T&F shot put).

Richard

Throw hard and aim for the parking lot!

KO and MV are huge throwers and *Very* strong guys. Great stuff. I have not heard of the Westside program, I will absolutely go check it out.

Last year at Pleasanton the 50-59 class had our proverbial hindquarters handed to us by Mike Baab. The only person who was even close to Mike in anything was our local dude, Kel Mulrey in the hammer. They both went over 100 feet in the light hammer. Mike doesn't write about his workouts a lot, but he has given some big clues. Basically, he's said that prepping for setting a few 50-59 world records, he never lifted anything over 300 pounds....he plays basketball once a week, and he jumps around a lot.

Now Mike is a former NFL player, so he's gifted with a mess of natural talent. There's that indisputable fact... then again, since I will probably never squat over 300, and my incline bench max looks to be about 150 right now, I think that instead of going the "get seriously strong" route, I need to go the "get technically good, and be really quick" route. Thus the track intervals, bunny hops on stadium steps, pylo box jumps and jump rope.

Both will pay off with improvements in distance, for sure, though..