Oh yeah, good luck, RJ! It definitely is probably more suited to you than pure sprinting. Might want to try building or constructing a sled like the push sled because one of the main selection factors on which sled you’re going to get into is your push time.
October 22nd, 2009
Upper Body Focus
Condition:
Ugh. Going on 20 hours of sleep for the past 5 nights combined. I feel great though. Enthusiasm is high.
Warm Up:
Some push ups and chin ups
Some ab coordination work
Workout:
A1) Push Ups w/Extra ROM (hands on cinder blocks, feet on a step)
3 sets x (8, 8, 5) reps @ BW+75 lbs, rest varied
A2) Different Types of Chin Ups, Pull Ups, and Whatever
3 sets x Failure @ (90 lbs for one set, 45 lbs for two), rest varied
Cool Down:
Some more ab coordination work
Shoulder prehab
Notes:
Not too bad today. I added weight on the push ups (I weighed myself at the bottom of a rep and got 235 lbs), and my chin ups went well. 90 x 6 is a new PR. 7 might have been in the cards, but I didn’t push it. I’ll get it soon.
Here’s a video of my top set of chins.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SziLMevvgRs
Fogelson,thanks buddy. I may have to construct a sled. Shouldn’t be too hard. And I wouldn’t worry too much about the clean. I cleaned 225 lbs to reset the bar after I failed on my last squat session (the 10th rep with 315) and even though I was tired, the bar moved like it was unloaded. I don’t think 285 or so would be too hard with a couple of weeks practice at the form. Maybe I’ll do cleans next session. Kind of hard without bumpers though.
Try 285 and tell me if you think the same. Put some mats or something on the ground and just take a step or two forward once you’ve cleaned 285 and drop it onto those. Or even just rack it. If you’re only doing 1 rep, it shouldn’t be an issue. 225 is a looooooot different than 285. This is coming from someone who does reps @ 275.
Oh, I know it’s a lot different, but I could barely stand upright and I still nearly busted my teeth with the bar. I couldn’t do 285 now, but within a couple weeks, I don’t think it would be outrageous.
I agree, I could drop all ol’s for 6-8 months and hit 275-295 within 2-3 weeks of training.
You’ve also cleaned >300lbs. RJ hasn’t cleaned 255lbs IIRC. There will be plenty of people at testing (if the top people are there) that can clean 150kg, albeit a full clean or nearly so.
Doooooooo it.
AnyOne have an indepth review of the book? Or are you providing a preview RJ?
You don’t think if he got his squat up to 400-500lbs he wouldn’t be able to power clean 275 in 4 weeks?
If he got up to 500lbs, sure. I don’t think him being able to do 405 on the squat is going to get him 285 on pc in 4 weeks. If he is doing some other sort of comparable power work and he can get tech in line, perhaps, but quite doubtful IMO. He’d need to be doing at least 445-465 IMO to get 285 in that short of a time w/o having done it before or doing it now.
RB, rep calculators have me at 410 lbs for the squat (315 x 9 reps) and that’s with a close stance. I agree. 275 shouldn’t be hard after a few weeks. All I know is that I’ve never really cleaned before, but when my squat was ~50 lbs lower I snatched 202 lbs.
Trackfan, there’s no in depth review. Tom White said it pretty well on the testimonials, but no one has given it a full review yet.
I will tell you that it’s worth the price though. I know how that sounds coming from the guy selling it, but I’m being honest.
A buddy of mine flew down for the trials and had great success. Its funny because he is a small guy (170) and relatively small lifts, probably 285 front squat, maybe 225 clean, decent vertical (36"-38") but had the best speed out of all the recruits (6.64 the way they tested it).
His pb in the 60m was 7.14s, but the way they tested 60m he ran it in 6.64. None of the new recruits could break 7.
The interesting thing is that when testing their pushing speed with the various sleds, he had the fastest 30kg sled push out of the recruits and tied the guy that cleans 180kg for fastest 60kg sled push. I asked him how he could do that and he said once you build momentum on the sled, even though he’s slower at the beginning, that he’s the only fast enough to keep up with it.
I would say having the speed and building strength on top is a great asset. And if you’re one of the guys that doesn’t have all the speed you need the big numbers in the lift. Front squat is what they use in their testing.
Back when I was squatting ~405 for 2, I could clean 275#, but it was difficult and not particularly pretty. Don’t think I could have gotten 285 even if I had tried. I didn’t because I found that dropping the weight a bit and focusing on accelerating the bar was a better route than going for pure numbers.
They use different tests @ the Canadian federation and the American. They are pretty similar overall, but they most definitely have tested the back squat for selection as recently as this year.
The US fed uses the back squat. I would be surprised to see a 170 lbs. brakeman, teams want to max out the weight limit with bodyweight.
From my conversations with the team chiro for USA bobsled and a former athlete himself, he basically said to look at training as if you had 8 months a year to train and the only thing you would be tested on is pushing an unweighted Prowler for 30 meters. That kind of puts things in perspective.
Eros has some experience at the Europa Cup level I believe, maybe he can chime in.
Here I am Thomas…( recovered fully???I hope so!)…RJ, check the archives…there are some interesting threads regarding Bobsled training.1 thing is sure…technique matters…it is not just x squat + y 30m + z clean to give you a good time.
In 2 man is far easier, but still, the push start has many peculiarities…do you have a place to practice dryland push?
Transferring power and speed to the sled is a key, this is why a strong upper body is important ( and close grip bench was tested in canada …us maybe normal grip?)
If you are a brakeman, you start from a bent leg, fixed knee position, so, training with block cleans, halting squats, box squat, concentric rack squats, is of paramount importance.
The training of the europeas, is usually loaded with different bounds, alternate and frog hops, and it shows in the amazing testing results they have!
Multi throws…I find they are special, particularly with heavy shot, in blending all the qualities for a good start. ( BLF for exaple is very similar to the start of a brakeman)
When I was training at home and not on the ice I devised a training equipment using gymnastic mats, 15 inches height, 7 feet lenght, to simulate the first push .
Running…sled pulls are useful, hills too…you cannot go wrong with a HI LO set up, without SE…top speed has a role, so work on it, esp. on 4 man if you are a brakeman.
If you have any question, I’ll try to give you some hints…
Regarding testing…sometimes they do not prove anything…
I had faster push times of people out cleaning me by 30kg, out running me by 3 tenths , and overall bigger and stronger…good luck…
The first time you’ll run downhill on a bobsled, you’ll felle like being in a washing machine.
Is it really that frightening? Everyone makes it seem like 10x worse than any roller coaster you’ve ever been on.
Frightening…no…but very very exciting…off course it depends on the track, and on the driver.
On some tracks,like IGLS, there are no high G-forces turns, overall very flat…and easy for the driver, even if he is unexperienced.
In Some tracks…like Cortina, Winterberg and others…you have very tight high speed turns…reaching 6g of acceleration…
and that for sure you cannot experience otherwise…( excpet if you are a jet fighter’s pilot)
Also…if you driver is not a very skilled one, every time the sled bounces on the ice…you’ll experience some very painful contacts with sled frame and your hips, thights, shoulders…At driving school, I saw people unable to run for 2 weeks after some…not perfect downhills:)
Finally picking a sport where the alaskan weather works to your advantage?
I hope training goes well and things work out for you. Definately keep the journal going. You always have an interesting view on things. So do you have a general outline of the training you plan to do yet?