Four-Time World’s Strongest Man Brian Shaw recently shared what his high-volume training session looks like as he kicked off the preparation for 2022 World’s Strongest Man. Shaw will attempt to improve on his runner-up finish and earn the record fifth WSM title in 2022. Shaw’s attempt to win the inaugural Strongman contest at the 2021 Rogue Invitational failed due to an unfortunate hamstring injury but the 40-year-old got an A2M treatment back in November to get back in action.
Heading into 2022, Brian Shaw has made some changes to his preparation and got 2015 NFL Strength & Conditioning Coach of the Year, Joe Kenn on board as his strength coach. Shaw revealed that he worked with Kenn at the very beginning of his career and attributed a lot of his success in strongman sports to things learned from him. Brian Shaw shared the programming session on his YouTube channel as he started the contest prep for 2022 World’s Strongest Man. The workout consisted of supersets and medleys of arm workouts with very short rest periods between the sets.
Brian Shaw’s high-volume strongman workout
Warm-up
Brian Shaw started the workout with 4 sets each of the following three movements:
- Triceps overhead band extensions
- Band Pull-downs
- Flex fitness converging chest press
Every set consisted of 25 reps and the purpose of the workout was to get the blood flowing for the high-volume arms workout that followed.
Superset of dumbbell rows and elevator press
What followed was a superset of inclined dumbbell rows and five different variations of dumbbell rows which Brian Shaw calls an Elevator press. The workout was sequenced in such a way that Shaw had to complete one set of dumbbell rows followed by a set of dumbbell press variations and repeat the order starting from shoulder press all the way to flat dumbbell bench press.
Inclined dumbbell rows and Elevator press superset
- Shoulder Press – 1 set
- Dumbbell rows (Inclined) – 1 set
- High inclined dumbbell bench press – 1 set
- Dumbbell rows (Inclined) – 1 set
- Inclined dumbbell bench press – 1 set
- Dumbbell rows (Inclined) – 1 set
- Low inclined dumbbell bench press – 1 set
- Dumbbell rows (Inclined) – 1 set
- Flat dumbbell bench press – 1 set
- Dumbbell rows (Inclined) – 1 set
Each set consisted of 15 reps. Shaw went through the workout with moderate weights since the purpose of the workout was to build a massive volume base going forward for the 2022 World’s Strongest Man.
Single-arm medley
Brian Shaw then proceeded to perform a medley of arm workouts that consisted of six different isolation exercises that included:
- Single-arm cable lateral raise
- Single-arm standing dumbbell overhead press
- Seated single arm shrug
- Single-arm rope triceps overhead extensions
- Single-arm dumbbell curls
Brian Shaw wrapped up the day with four rounds of the medley in which each set consisted of 15 reps. Towards the end of the video, Shaw admitted that the high-volume workouts did not conform to his usual training methods.
“This volume has definitely been kicking my butt. I’m… a little bit not used to that. It’s taken me outside of my comfort zone here a little bit. But sometimes when you want to get better, you need to go outside of your comfort zone.”
While speaking about his association with Joe Kenn, Brian Shaw stated that Kenn has brought a new perspective to identify weak points in Brian Shaw’s game.
“He kind of set me on the right path. I’ve done my program in training pretty much through my entire career and it’s kind of coming full circle back to where he is bringing his knowledge and he is bringing a different eye into my training and helping me to identify weak points – areas that I need to improve and I’m very, very thankful for that,” Brian Shaw stated.
About Brian Shaw
Brian Shaw is an American Strongman that started his career in the sport from the 2005 Denver’s Strongest Man. During his 16-year journey, Shaw has won 27 strongman contests. However, he is best known for becoming the World’s Strongest Man a record four times (2011, 2013, 2015, and 2016). Mariusz Pudzianowski is the only strongman to win the contest five times (2002,2003, 2005, 2007, and 2008). Apart from this, the Shaw has won the Arnold Strongman Classic three times in 2011, 2015, and 2017.
Following unsatisfactory finishes at the 2019 and 2020 World’s Strongest Man, Shaw witnessed a career resurgence with a runner-up finish at the 2021 World’s Strongest Man. He last competed at the inaugural strongman contest at the 2021 Rogue Invitational where he finished seventh after suffering a hamstring injury during the elephant bar deadlift event.
Courtesy of Brian Shaw’s YouTube channel, you can watch the full workout video here:
Stoltman Brothers guys are the really Champs-take it from me!