Cole Dano Training Notes

I keep most of my logs with pen and paper, but will try and paint the broad strokes here. Adding personal observations and questions as well.

Currently -

Sun / Weds

SL / MN / SLS

Mon / Thu

FL / PL / HBP / RC

FL

w/u

HBH 60s or HBR 60r (alternating)

Single Bar Inverted Hang 30s

work

Kip Extension

finish

BdyL 5r

PL

w/u

Plank or PB Support 60s (alternating)

work

PL scissors

finish

PLL 30s

SL

w/u

ABH or ABR 60s (alternating)

Elevated HeS RLL 5r

Arch Up Variation 5r

work

Circular HLL

MN

w/u

V-Ups 15r

work

Single Leg HLL

finish

HLL 3r (depending on feeling)

HBP

w/u

XR Push Ups 5r - 10r (regular or bulgarian)

work

PB Dips (these are rough due to worn left elbow joint, going slowly here)

finish

Single Bar Dips (regular grip) 5r

RC

w/u

Row variation 5r - 10r

Work

Pull Ups (reworking the best way to do pull ups after elbow surgery - wider grip preferred right now)

finish

L-Sit Chin Ups 5r total

SLS

Last year or so

Front Squats 2 sets / Back Squats 3 sets

Last three months

w/u

Light C&P or Snatch variations

High Volume Day

weekly progressing ladder

wk 1 5x6r

wk 2 5x7r

wk 3 5x8r

wk 4 5x5r

weight 1 front squats

weight 2 back squats

alternated with

Heavy Day

5 singles

2 front Squat 3 Back Squat

will soon switch to

High Volume Barbell alternate with SLS progression as I feel this will help some Right Left imbalances and have more carry over to tumbling for me. I just hate SLS for some reason, time to get past it!

Upper back blew (again) Friday morning. Took it easy over the weekend.

Sun

Notes:

Circular HLL hitting 4x4r pretty mediocre.

Single Leg HLL also

Restarting SLS progression, with neg SLS, feels very good after doing barbell squats exclusively the past year. But also pretty awkward. This will improve.

Mon

Notes:

Began Kip Extensions

Roll in entry and lower from hips up.

First rep was immediate drop

Had to severely limit ROM to just past mid-thigh. Every rep was better, had similar trouble first weeks of Inverted hang.

Dips

First strong and pain free dip since surgery, Found the groove as well, todays highlight.

Pull Ups

Also getting stronger, need to use slightly wider grip than before.

Skill -

Back Rolls coming back

Straddle to HS Roll

Pike to HS Roll

Headspring and handspring to Resi.

Headspring went right away

Hand spring took a few tries. Did about 10 attempts, made 3.

Diet -

Due to this being the third or fourth time I've had upper back cramps, I removed the electrolyte powder I've been using in my workout drink, and started taking the Mg and Zn tablets again. Seems to be the only thing that works. Took them pre-workout, felt mostly good.

If you have not considered it, try to avoid taking the Mg and Zinc with any calcium sources...

Nic Branson said:

If you have not considered it, try to avoid taking the Mg and Zinc with any calcium sources...

Never even thought of it Nic! Can you elaborate? In the past I've almost always taken it with Milk. With this new protocol, the pre workout drink has whey. Calcium isn't listed on the label at least. I understand whey can have a small amount of Calcium.

They compete for absorption. In this particular case the body will always prioritize calcium over the others. I would avoid the whey at the same time also to start to see how sensitive your system is.

Nic Branson said:

They compete for absorption. In this particular case the body will always prioritize calcium over the others. I would avoid the whey at the same time also to start to see how sensitive your system is.

They are all bivalent, meaning an oxidation state of +2.

Every mineral with this characteristic (Ferrous iron, which is the most absorbable; calcium; magnesium; most forms of zinc; etc) will compete for something like 1/4 inch of intestinal surface area for absorption, which is why I believe the standard dose limitation is something like 600mg total.

If you're taking 100mg calcium, 20mg iron, and 30 mg zing, for example, you probably won't have any issues. If you throw in 400mg of magnesium and an extra 300mg of calcium... well, now you're going to have absorption issues.

The same minerals also get bound by phytic acid, which is why you don't want any bran that hasn't been treated with food-grade hydrogen peroxide (0.3% solution, which has to be prepared in the moment from a 30% food grade reagent) to be eaten with any source of bivalent minerals that you want to actually absorb.

All grains, including rice, have this acid but a 5 minute soak in 0.3% peroxide neutralizes it all. White rice will have a lot less, since the phytic acid is actually on the bran and the bran gets polished off.

For this reason, all husk fiber supplements should be taken separately from mineral sources.

http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.com/2 ... ility.html Is actually a reasonable article to read, if you're interested.

They don't mention the peroxide, strangely enough, but they may not know about that. That's the problem with reading research correctly but not truly knowing the chemistry, as I have found: you don't recognize simple solutions to what seems like a complex problem.

"Oh, there's an acid preventing mineral absorption? Neutralize it with something that evaporates away and leaves no salts behind. Like food grade hydrogen peroxide."

The stuff you find in stores uses heavy metals like tin to stabilize the solution, which is why I specifically mention food grade H2O2

Thanks for the replies guys. Josh, you keep earning that Encyclopaedia moniker!

Cole Dano said:

Thanks for the replies guys. Josh, you keep earning that Encyclopaedia moniker!

Gotta keep my rep!

Seriously though, I think that knowing these details makes it a lot easier to be in control of your diet.

----  Foundation Course ----

Now that the course is live, I will record some notes here.

My current goals

A: RC

- Get the last month of the pulling elements more solid. I tend to fail somewhere in the 4x4-5x5 area.

- N. Branson has suggested I get more pulling in by

1) Adding pull-ups between sets every practice session

- Started last week (for most elements week 3 template) adding doubles between all FLS or BAS sets other than RC work sets. Working RC element L-Pullup

- This week being deload adding only one rep.

- I am fairly confident that once this hurdle is overcome, the remaining pulling elements will go fairly easily.

B: HBP

Dips

- After holiday and finding elbow not liking dips again, have been taking them slow, purposefully moving back to first month template.

- Feeling better now, will most likely move to week 9 template next week.

- The following single bar dips will go fast,

- Korean not so sure yet,

- Russian I imagine will be a bit sticking point.

C: PL / SL

- Lumping these together as am working tuck PL and SL block both of which challenge my elbow.

- Have purposefully cut first goal in half i.e. am following a 15s template for both. Learned this by following 30s template and straining my elbow in the SL blocks.

- With Tuck PL, after starting the Foundation work a year or so ago, I didn't maintain this at all. This may have been a mistake, now it is difficult and am first working it off of yoga blocks. Then will move it to floor. Will be here awhile, not too surprised.

- Also have to see how Coach spells out the progression since I last saw it. There may be an element to go back to.

Weds - @TLK

Did HS work that I missed yesterday. deload 5x18s stwHS

Between sets added one pull-up and two dips. Dips on PB which felt much better than my wonky home set up. Still have to be careful about how I rotate my arm to initiate the dip without bone on bone pain. This consistently has improved with more sets.

Skill played with cartwheel, getting it straighter, had quick progress. Also Front Handspring to Resi came back very quickly, this was first attempt since holiday.

All in all notice that the recovery time of the holiday did me worlds of good. Have more power and confidence than before, very unexpected. finding that for me with skills, less is more. Need to not get too fatigued or beat up.

Cole Dano said:

Weds - @TLK

 

 less is more. Need to not get too fatigued or beat up.

Somtimes I wonder if "less is more" (slower recovery?) applies more to people in our age. Every now and then I wonder if I overtrain? But again i enjoy it so much! 

Just speaking for myself, I've noticed that activities that require speed and power fatigue me, as much as I'd like to work them all day long. I'm starting to learn to notice when performance drops and realise at that point it's a question of diminishing returns.

I could go all day when I was younger, but if I'd known what I do now, would have given myself more recovery time.

It also seems that the time off gives my brain more of a chance to process skills, so they seem to improve on their own to some extent. That really seemed to happen after my holiday.

Definitely found a couple of weak links in Foundation One.

Chin hangs are not near one minute.

PPP not near 5x10r.

I'm going to continue what I've already set out to do, then make a detour to make these up.

I.e.

- get through the next pull up variation while working general volume

- get though the next few dip variations stoping at Korean; here I will make up the PPP.

the main issue there is it's very heavy on my elbow, a good deal of grinding which I don't have on the dips. Since the arm shape is similar to Korean, I think that's the best place to stop and asses what this elbow will allow.

Test it elevated so there is not as much stress on the elbow. Could just need to smooth out alittle and some lighter volume will assist in that.

After a dreadful workout on Monday, where I gassed early. Came back today and did 4x5r dips + 4r (failed on 5) took a break and did some bar swings came back after about 4 minutes and hit 5r on dips. The fantastic thing here is I'm not feeling it whatsoever in my elbow. So that's a big deal.

Also did well on L-Pull ups, at 5x3r, once we get into that last quad (week 9) things get dicy.

Also noted that on the last quad, I need to tone down the warm up a notch so as not to gas out.

Nic I'm convinced that your having me do more pull ups between sets has really helped. In fact I didn't do it last week, due to illness and Monday was horrible. Did it yesterday, and pulling came back up toady. This stuff is fascinating. Was also able to maintain the feet high and fully lower on some reps. 

This is another case of, will repeat this one more cycle. I'm pretty sure that beating this will make the rest of the pulls a breeze. 

Then come those damn MPPs.

Good to hear. There is a method to my madness. One step at a time

Interesting. I notice that, for me, doing hinge rows is the best thing I've done for strength in a long time. Similar to the pull ups, but I do a huge amount of active pronation and internal rotation, and there's not much weight on my feet, so this is almost like an assisted FL to MU. This is really helping a lot with my shoulder.

I always do a set of these even on off days now, OR a set of pull ups. Not to fatigue or anything, but it really helps with overall strength, for me.

Glad to hear your elbow seems to be doing better!

I am also doing weighted bar pronation and supination while I build a cam-type pronator/supinator. My pronator and supinator weakness/injury/pain/inactivity or whatever has been messing with my shoulder and elbow, and correcting this has been pretty valuable.

The first four HS1 mobilitiy drills are a circuit for me inbetween sets, and they are also making an enormously massive difference in my shoulder so far. Will be interesting to see how this continues to develop.

Started New Cycle Yesterday -

Made the following adjustments

Elbow has gotten stronger / less crackly in PPP, so I started to work on it ahead of schedule.

- The cycle of doing dips was well worth it, I'm sure this is the reason PPP is now possible

- PPP is hard to do correctly. I realise in the past I'd done them with my wrists below the elbows not behind.

- Regretting suggesting to Coach to make this a 10r element - more karma

- However, in the past, this would have been completely impossible for me to do even one rep, something is working

- Not 100% sure if PPP is fair as PE3 considering PE4/PE5 are silly easy in comparison

- One of my guys can do Korean and Russian Dips but PPP crushes him. We had to go back to PushUps and rebuild yesterday. Though admittedly he has a few PU form issues that we need to fix, so getting him to see that was a very good thing.

Vertical Body Lever

- Have up to last week been doing a lot of experimenting with how to set this up

- Found set up that works and only supports upper back

- After having done BdyL successfully on the floor the new set up is considerably harder, particularly since I'm now able to go full ROM

- Chose to back this down to Vertical Body Lever Negatives

Tuck PL

- I'm really frustrated here, my one mistake in adopting the F program was not to maintain this.

- It's essentially totally lost

- Am going to go back to Elevated PLL on EggBall and really push them

- Will play with TuckPL at end of PL session

Good news was Week 9 of L pull ups went better than expected

- first two sets went well

- second two, gassed after two reps, but was still able to stay on the bar and do two more with crap form

Ending Quad Three -

This week/cycle has been surprisingly good, with what feels like solid progress in most elements.

Highlights -

FL / Neg Very BdyL

This took me a while to find, started doing the full variation but from the floor. Finally figured out has to use pads and the rail on the yoga wall to do so my lower back never touches anything, and all the way down. Coming up was not an option so moved to neg.

Very strong today

PL / ePLL

Realised TuckPL was just gone, reverted back to ePLL from week 1 good move

After sets play with Tuck PL some success, which was better than earlier

SL / SL Blocks

Getting comfortable, no longer cause horrible elbow cramps. Still feel like I'm not quite getting the position

MN / NegHLL

Again hit a major breakthrough. These were just awful for quite some time, at least a couple of cycles. Suddenly the got easy, though I can improve the tempo.

This was week 11 and managed to hit the bar with my toes most every rep and all reps were strong.

NEXT CYCLE: repeat from week 5 and improve tempo

SLS / NegSLS

Again these just sucked at first. Repeated this cycle from beginning and about half way through, finally got control of the movement.

NEXT CYCLE: Rocking SLS

HBP / PPP

Started very weak and originally worked from a 5r template. (Now at week 3)

After a couple weeks I found the movement and scaled up to the 10r template

RC / L Pull Ups

Very wonky at beginning of cycle, couldn't do full ROM nor keep legs up at the bottom of reps. Used a slight kip to initiate many reps

Midway through cycle got better leg control, but only partial ROM

Today got full ROM and felt I understood the movement

Reps are not hitting 5x5 but 4-3x5 with full ROM was still very gratifying.

NEXT CYCLE: Continue from Week 5 (unless advised otherwise)

Congraulations to your progress! Lately I've been feeling a bit worn out. Have hade alot of stress at work:( I was getting this shoulder pain that would go away! When I train! Then it would get back especially in the mornings (lying still). Anyway everything should get better now when the weather is finally! Getting a bit warmer. My wife (Australian) calls it the god forsaken country

Anyway I was gonna ask you if you like to tell me what the next progression after sidelever blocks are? And the same thing what comes after reverse plank?

Hope spring is on it's way in Finland!

Mats

HI Mats -

Yes it's only one coat weather here now, and sunny.

I'm still nowhere near as strong as you, but going keep chasing you anyway. :=

Coach showed after SL Blocks,  SL Twists - from the block position turn out sideways. 5x5r

Please remind me where you are doing Rev Plk

If it's the first MN specific element then Bent Middle Spilt Hold is next

My bad it's not the first MN specific element, it comes after L and Straddle L work

Ok thanks alot! I remember side lever twists as a mobility movement in between the sidelever blocks (with one foot on the stallbar) but I'm probably wrong. It's probably sidelever twists with no foot on stallbar. Thanks. And of course it sounds logical that after reverse plank, it should be L-sit, advanced L-sit and then straddled L.

I love deload week. It seems to be the most likely time for some sort of 'discovery' or leap forward.

- SL Blocks have been to now more of just trying to figure out the movement.

I couldn't really figure out the position and both sides were very different.

Realised my left lat/trap is just not functioning. The H1 dislocate work has also been bringing that to light.

Today in I used the left lat and found a stable position where I could float in the air with out using the wall (too much)

Repeating on the right could easily float, but put more stress on the elbow.

- Next cycle: Start SL Block from day one with this in mind.

Cole Dano said:

 

I couldn't really figure out the position and both sides were very different.

 

 

Felt the same but after 12 weeks I think its evened out, not to 100% but nicely.