Taking this week as a deload. Normally I’d be going into the 2nd part of a 6-week cycle, but given the shoulder/arm issues I figured a deload week would be wise. I want to finish the year on a good note.

That said, squatting today went well. While I still have a ways to go to get the level of mobility needed for false grip and truly straight wrists, I continue to work towards it. Even tho I don’t have that ideal setup yet, I push myself into it as far as I can to work on the stretch. What I noticed today is while my wrists were still somewhat bent, I’m getting more of an angle where my elbows are behind me — think arms more parallel to the ground than perpendicular. Is this ideal? I see so many different takes on “ideal squat form” that who knows. But what I CAN say is this is doing one thing I want, which is ensuring the bar weight is NOT being supported by my arms; there’s no way I could press the weight off me. The arms/hands for sure are keeping the bar in place on my back, but are not truly supporting the weight.

As a result, I felt NO aggrevation of the shoulder/arm issues today. Granted the weights were light and usually the pain doesn’t show up until later, but sometimes it shows up when things are light because I’m hitting things just right – well, really just wrong. 😉 So, this is good! I’ll continue to work on the mobility aspects, but in the meantime I’ll take “reduction of pressure” as a good thing too. I mean, ultimately that is how things should be when I get the proper grip, y’know? Just not as acute.

What will be more telling will be tomorrow’s bench session. It’ll be light, but the past couple bench sessions have aggrevated things right from the get go, so we’ll see.

5/3/1-based program

• Squats
  • bar x whatever
  • 135 x 5
  • 135 x 5
  • 160 x 5
  • 160 x 5
  • 195 x 5
  • 195 x 5
• Romanian Deadlift
  • 165 x 10
  • 165 x 10
• Hyperextensions
  • BW x 12
  • BW x 12
• Crunches
  • BW x 15
  • BW x 15
• Standing Calf Raises
  • 80 x 12
  • 80 x 12