Exercise Log 5.25.14 (Dev Day + Boyce Park Nature Hike)

Today is developmental day, and quite a fun one at that. My priority on dev day from now on is shoulder rehab, so I’m focusing on strengthening the shoulder muscles particularly the posterior delts and upper back. I’ve been trying corrective posture, stretching and diminishing my weight levels in front presses… hoping all this cumulatively works out to healthy shoulders in a few months time.

That said, the last time I was at my gym (which is still fairly new) I spotted a tire hanging out on the opposite side of the gym. Never one to pass up something new and fun, I added tire flips to the routine. Also found me a weight sled… me-oh-my-oh!

First, did the exercises I felt required the most focus and energy.

Tire Flips: There were actually several tires when I got there, and they were different sizes. I quickly realized only the largest tire could be flipped with the technique shown in the video below. The other tires were not wide enough to grip and use leg drive to get the tire up off the ground, they had to be basically deadlifted up. I think tires are kind of crappy to deadlift to flip, they are too low to the ground to grab. A larger tire is tall enough to lean right against it and use the legs properly. But of course, it’s heavy as crap. After practice, I decided to do 3 sets of 6 flips and felt it was real good exercise with my current conditioning.

Found me a new training partner!

Chris from Strength Camp shows the basic mechanics of flipping a tire.

After that I spotted with my eagle eye something in the corner…

Look what I found!

Prowler Sled: I’d provide another link to an instructional video but this one is fairly simple. You load it up with weight and push it. Pushing it to the end of the hall (maybe 50ft, not an exact estimate) with the poles that hold the weight then switching to the lower front handles to push it back. 4 sets back and forth with 180lbs loaded (not sure how much the sled itself weighs).

Alright now the boring accessory list, first starting with rear delts to improve their strength…

Rear Delt Flys (Machine): 4 sets of 8 reps @ 70lbs with slow tempo.

Reverse Incline Bench Dumbbell Rows: Not sure if there is a more technical term for these, but I simply sat face down on an incline bench and rowed dumbbells up. Felt like it was a great exercise. 4 sets of 10 reps @ 25lbs, focused on arching my back slightly and doing slow tempo with good form.

Reverse Dumbbell Flys: Did a standard leaning forward dumbbell fly with my head leaning on a barrier to stabilize myself and help me isolate the rear delts. 4 sets of 6 reps @ 35lbs.

1-Armed Shoulder Flys / Shoulder Rehab: Using the technique with the following video I did some one armed shoulder flys, and inbetween sets I did some extensive shoulder stretches with rotator cuff exercises. 3 sets of 10 flys @ 35lbs / shoulder stretches & 10 reps of rotator cuff exercises (2.5lb weight, slow tempo).

This exercise was great for a strength focus and will definitely use it again, went conservative on the weight though as it was my first time.

For cardio today I spent 15 minutes working on the speed bag and boxing bag after watching a couple instructional videos about how to use those two things properly. They were very helpful and made me feel like I was actually doing something focused. Check these videos out for the helpful info…

This video from Adolfo Diaz showing the timing matters of knocking the speed bag around, found this video very helpful to learn the pace but got a lot of work to do.

Jason Van Veldhuysen of Precision Striking has this video illustrating beginner mistakes with heavy bag work, found it a good way to frame the way to approach it from never having done it before.

Not becoming a boxer or anything but hey, it’s a new thing to learn!

So after all this I took a gorgeous 3-mile lazy hike through Boyce park, to further appreciate the great weather. Why not appreciate some random photos I took before you go?

Click the arrows to pan through the gallery of photos.