[Adam Bishop]

Pretty standard press session yesterday. The weather was good so I log pressed outside as it’s important to practice looking up at the sky during the log press ready for WSM. It’s amazing how much it affects your balance.

I stuck to strict presses as my knee and TFL are still a little hot from the weekend. Big push to settle them down ready for this weekends training.

Log Strict Press – up to 153×1
Circus DB – 10 singles at 80kg

[Adam Bishop]

Back into training with some of the more dynamic events for WSM. Back is still a little tender so nothing too crazy.

Bag toss – worked up to 30kg for a single then a couple of runs of 20/20/25/27kg
Sandbag runs – 100kg for 18m plus a 18m sprint back EMOMx8
Truck push – 3x25m uphill with the handbrake on 2 clicks

Good to get back into it. Log press and DB tomorrow

[Adam Bishop]

Hi Cooper. I actually prefer to take my breath at the top of each lift as I find it easier to get my air in and brace in an upright position – much like you would do in a squat. Obviously for a SLDL you will have to take your first breath at the bottom but from there on I like to take a breath at the top and hold it for the duration of the lift.

I find this way I keep to a constant rhythm in my deadlift for reps and don’t struggle with breathing or gas out.

[Adam Bishop]

No suit on the deadlift and noone mentioned it. Will you be wearing one at worlds?

Great performance considering its not your goal

Yeah that’s correct no suit for a couple of reasons:

I’ve been training raw to build strength for later in the season for a big big pull. Things need to be periodised to get the most out of the suit.

I believe my deadlift for reps is actually better without the suit – most of my best performances have been raw in the past actually.

Suits take a lot of time and energy to get into and the other guys suffered for it. They restrict your breathing and we do not have a lot of time to warm up between events. In fact my warm ups sets went 120×1 220×1 270×1 310×1 and was it.

I’ll be pulling raw for WSM then around July I’ll be introducing the suit in prep for the World deadlift championships in September

[Adam Bishop]

Looking forward to following this log Kiera! Get that 300 pull nailed!

[Adam Bishop]

Europe’s Strongest Man 2023

Went into this comp feeling good but a little fatigued from this weeks training – this was planned though as I aim to peak for WSM in two weeks time.

Log ladder was the first event and it don’t go to plan, I missed the 160kg press which cost me big points. A couple of things to iron out before WSM not noting to lose sleep over

I had good performances in the loading and the conans wheel and I won the 350 deadlift with 9 reps. A 10th rep was there but I decided against going for it as it would make things harder to recover from. Finished up with a mediocre stone run due to tacky issues but everything felt ok.

Made it through the comp with no injuries and some money in my pocket for placing 5th.

I move into my final taper towards WSM now so back on the farm tomorrow for some focused events.

[Adam Bishop]

Made it over to the athlete hotel in Leeds and got the usual meeting going over the rules for tomorrow. Also got the tv interviews and promo photos done.

Then we headed out for an athletes dinner and now it’s time to get some sleep. Tomorrow we contest the title of Europes strongest man

[Adam Bishop]

It would be useful to see a video or even a screenshot when your form seems to break.

There are some good cues for engaging your lats and upper back to lock in a neutral spine.

The fact that you can’t hold position on an RDL would lead me to believe that you do have some weaker muscles in the upper back. My go to lifts in this situation would be pendlay/deadstop bent over rows and dB chest supported rows – both with an 1-2second isometric hold against the chest.

[Adam Bishop]

On the road today up to just outside Leeds. Me, the mrs and the dogs have booked a little place to stay for the next couple of nights.

I’ll still head over to the athlete hotel tomorrow for the interviews, meetings and meals but it’s good to have a little base up here and gives me another day to loosen up after a long drive.

[Adam Bishop]

A proper rest day today, did pretty much fuck all. Walked the dogs for 45min and got all my walks in. Watched a lot of TV and generally relaxed and didn’t think about lifting or strongman.

Got stuff to sort tomorrow ready for the trip up to Leeds tomorrow afternoon. We have an air B&B booked for tomorrow night then I’ll head over to the athlete hotel for the meeting and evening meal on the Friday.

[Adam Bishop]

Final session before Europes strongest man this weekend and it was a very simple one. Get the log press feeling solid up to 163kg and keep working on the circus DB press with my left arm.

Achieved both goals very well and it’s given me confidence for the weekend. Goal is to get the 102/140/160 logs nailed in a fast time and leave the 170 and 180.

As you can tell I am timing my peak for WSM in 2.5 weeks so ESM is very much a training day for me where I’ve got goals I need to hit on each event

[Adam Bishop]

Thanks for taking the time to reply champ, wow that’s a lot of ‘clean’ food to put away but at 150kgs you’re going to need a lot of calories to maintain that bodyweight and to fuel your workouts.

It must be really beneficial to your overall goals now that you can focus on eating around the clock full time. I can imagine working at Quins somewhat limited your ability to sit down and eat meals and you maybe had to opt for drinking your calories?

Also, thank you for sharing your views on DL/Squat on the same day x 2 a week. I recognise that there are lots of variables at play and without going into specifics it’s difficult to answer but there are some really good points for me to think on.

I don’t expect you to follow this up but for wider context I’ve come from a strongman/rugby background and have taken up BJJ 7 months ago. I’m just trying to find the balance between high pressure day job x family x BJJ x gym…shoulders are knackered but can still squat and DL so was considering just focusing on these movements – I’ll work it out in the end.

Keep up the great work, you come across as a real genuine guy on the TV and I think that’s why you have such a good fanbase #TeamBish

Thanks for the kind words Matt, I appreciate it.

I see myself as a professional athlete so I eat like a professional athlete. I’m fuelling my body for peak performance and I think that junk foods cause more issues than benefit. Of course I will have the occasional “cheat meal” but I very much like to keep myself eating decent food. The benefit of being a strongman in the open class is that I can make my food taste good and not worry about having to get lean lean haha.

For sure when I was at Quins it was very much a struggle to get my food in. I would get time to sit down and eat my first meal of the day at my desk at around 0630/0700 then most of my other meals during the day were either blended shakes or quick to eat meals. Me be king shakes in the Quins gym or on the bench at games became a bit of an ongoing joke with the players haha.

Going full time gave me the time to cook my meals and sit down and actually enjoy them.

[Adam Bishop]

Hi Adam,

Really enjoying following this thread.

Would you be able to outline your current diet? Does it ramp up as you get closer to competition or does it stay fairly consistent throughout?

Would also appreciate your views on training squats & deadlifts the same day x 2 a week? On one day one movement would be heavy and one would be dynamic and then alternate for the 2nd session.

All the best.

Matt

As for the deadlift squat question. I would say it depends on a couple of factors:

Training age
Strength level
Relative strength levels of the two lifts
Life stressors
Gender

While yes you can do that I would say that for a stronger individual they will struggle to recover between heavy sessions when training the squat and deadlift multiple times per week. For a more experienced trainer I also believe that it is difficult to improve your squat and deadlift concurrently so some programming priorities need to occur there.

For the vast majority of trainers I recommend pulling and squatting once per week on different days. Ask yourself are you getting everything you can out of each squat and deadlift session? I would always prioritise a single session per week with more volume then multiple sessions in a week

[Adam Bishop]

Hi Adam,

Really enjoying following this thread.

Would you be able to outline your current diet? Does it ramp up as you get closer to competition or does it stay fairly consistent throughout?

Would also appreciate your views on training squats & deadlifts the same day x 2 a week? On one day one movement would be heavy and one would be dynamic and then alternate for the 2nd session.

All the best.

Matt

Hi Matt

Yep no problem I’ll start off with my diet:

TRAINING DAYS
M1 – 10 whole eggs with spinach
M2 – 250g beef mince, 150g pasta
Intra – 120g sustain and 40g peak aminos
Post – 250g beef mince, 150g (dry weight) rice, 120g oats, large banana, 30g honey and 100g pineapple
M5 – 300g chicken breast, 150g pasta 100g pineapple
M6 – 6 whole eggs

NON TRAINING DAYS
Basically the same as above minus the intra and the oats, honey and banana in the pwo meal.

Since finding out the events for WSM the goal has been to maintain my current bodyweight of 150kg so there has not been a need to push my food really high. It’s important to match your body to the task/events you’re required to do so for me I wanted to stay around 150 to be more mobile and have better recovery abilities.

I’ve also recently has some digestive issues with whey (probably after 20 years of lots of protein shakes) hence my shift to more solid food.

I don’t change anything in the build up to the competition diet wise. I keep things the same as long as my bodyweight remains stable. Ramping food in the build up to a show is a recipe for disaster causing digestive issues, lethargy and a drop in cardiovascular performance.

[Adam Bishop]

Heavy session to start the week leading up to Europes strongest man. Deadlifts are now at peak strength levels once again as is my stone lifting. Very happy with where I’m at as we build into the final 3 weeks before WSM.

Deadlift – 400×3
Shield Walk – 167x40m
Atlas Stones – 180×5

Body is a little beat up today after this yesterday but I’ll get loosened off ready for pressing later today.

My split is very much designed to prepare me for the nature of WSM which is two days of competition, a rest day then 2 more days. I would say that ideally I would have a rest day between my pull and press sessions but I decided it’s more important to physically prepare my body for the WSM format.