Friday Fights, META, and Active Recovery

This is the last “regular week” of my strength block before slicing the volume and going heavy! Friday night I was invited to watch some local fights ringside, which lead to many drinks and stories about “the good old days” being shared.

Summary:

This week was kind of all over the place. Mobility went missing, lifts are creeping towards PRs, Friday night was wild and I definitely drank too much and slept too little.

Nevertheless, I still showed up to Saturday morning open mat. I also managed to remain steadfast in both teaching and training focused on rear naked chokes when it came to grappling. That trend will continue for another couple weeks. As I’ve mentioned before I really want to hone in on a few months of “META only” — “most effective techniques available.”

Intuitively I needed a “active rest” day on Sunday, so there are 4 sessions left in my strength program that will take a little over a week to complete. However, knowing they won’t get finished this week as planned, takes some pressure off and I might as well be well rested and throw in some PR attempts.

Overview:

Training Block: General Fitness, Strength

Phase: Intensity, Week 3

Weekly Intention:

• Fitness: Continue to limit sessions to 45 min and “never miss a rep.”

• Grappling: Continue deep dive on RNC and back attacks.

The Journal:

What worked well:

Having put a 45-minute limit on my strength sessions, I’ve had to be more intentional about intra-session recovery. That is, I can’t just wander around passively between sets, maybe getting amped up by the stereo, or jabbering to teammates. I have to put at least some effort and intentionality on sitting down, lowering my heart rate, and controlling my breathing.

I’m also getting close to several PRs, so I should be primed for a good showing in these final 4 sessions.

Where do I need to improve:

The 7-day training cycle is a weird thing. A “week” is an interval for how we structure most of our lives. However, as I’ve written about before, sometimes training (and not-training) stressors compound in peculiar ways.

On Sunday this week, my “active recovery” was a brisk walk with the dogs. I was supposed to lift (per my program outline). However, the results would have been lackluster and further postponed good recovery.

While I made the “smart” decision this week, I’m looking forward to being more intentional bout following the Morpheus zone guidelines in the future and seeing how / if that boosts performance though “hard” / “high performance” days will likely be much less frequent.

Plan for next week:

I have one more “regular” dead lift session that hopefully my callouses have healed enough for this week. Then I’ve got three “de-load” — which are actually heavy load, but decreased volume — sessions; one for movement structure.

That will carry me slightly over into next week, but having an extra half-week off will likely be a great help to polish up some mobility and let any nagging tendinitis clear up while I do some writing, planning, and analyzing for the next training block.

The Log:

Wednesday: 45-minute limit

Warm:
Echo Bike x 10 min (< 150 bpm)

Work:
5 x 2 Front Squat

Support:
3 x 10 Banded Adductor Squat

Results:
98 calories
235, 245, 255, 265, 280# (256 avg.)
Bodyweight

Thursday: 45-minute limit

Warm:
Echo Bike x 10 min (< 150 bpm)

Work:
5 x 2 Strict Press

Support:
3 x 10 DB Bench

Results:
93 calories
145, 150, 155, 155, 155# (152 avg.)
15#

What I’m Studying: