INTRO:

First off let me do a short introduction of myself, I am Ben Wagoner, the founder and head coach of Animus Athletics. I am a graduate of the University of Georgia, with a Degree in Sport management, currently working as a health and wellness coach. I began coaching and programming in early 2016, after many trials and errors doing so for myself over the years. Spending countless hours researching different approaches and then figuring out which I found to work best in practice. It is my goal to provide the best programming and coaching I possibly can to grow my resume, clientele, and reputation working towards owning my own sport training facility in the future!

Through this training blog I plan on keeping weekly, I hope to share my personal training experiences to help others understand my thought process and rationale while i work towards my goals.

For context on my training before this blog begins. I competed in the USPA 2nd Annual Tennessee Open on January 13th and totaled 1109lbs/502.5kg by going 8/9 with 351/259/507 and i started my program following. I will also mention that I switched from conventional to sumo deadlifting at the start of this meet prep and this was my first meet and training block of sumo.

Now to Begin the Blog:

Week: "1"

Firstly I start this as "Week: "1"" and not "Week: 1" because I initially started week one two weeks ago following my meet but came down with the flu on Wednesday of the actual week 1. Therefore I rested up and recovered the rest of that week and came back the following Tuesday (my training week starts on Tuesday). I train six days a week with Monday being my rest day so i can align my heavy squat, bench and deadlift days on Saturday and Sunday so I don't have to be concerned about work interfering with my lifts.

As far as the training, my Week: "1" went as well as i could have hoped coming back off the flu. I lowered the volume from the planned week 1 to allow myself to acclimate back to training. Having said that my training was pretty uneventful; however, I did decide to give squatting highbar in flats a shot since I was forced to take a step back from the flu. The first week went well I would say though! I was able to maintain my squat positioning well, although taking it slow because of the changes.

Thank you for reading and follow along @bww.66kg on Instagram!!