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Ritual Barbell Podcast
Short, digestible conversations about getting stronger in the gym, and living better because of it.
Ritual Barbell is a small, community-driven, strength gym on the east side of Madison, WI. No mirrors. No TVs. Just a decade of serious, thoughtful coaching and a group of people genuinely motivated to build a better life through a high quality dynamic training program.
Gym owner & head coach Shawn, and coach Mark break down some specifics of the program, answer real questions from the gym whiteboard, and try to cut through the noise around fitness culture, all so you can train smart, recover well, and enjoy the whole process. Whether you're a first-timer finding your footing at the gym, or a seasoned lifter chasing your next PR, there's could be something here for you.
Strength for life. Not for show.
Ritual Barbell Podcast
Test Week Mindset
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Testing week is the most honest mirror in strength training. The bar doesn’t care how motivated we feel, it only reflects what we practiced and how well we manage our nerves, our setup, and our technique under pressure. We share what we’re seeing during max-out week at Ritual Barbell, why even longtime lifters still get the jitters, and how a missed lift is often a small breakdown you can fix fast rather than a sign you’re “not strong.”
From there we zoom in on the base program and what helps new lifters progress quickly: follow the plan, but don’t follow it silently. We talk about asking better questions, listening to your body, and drawing a clear line between normal training sensation and pain. If something keeps pissing off your back, knee, or shoulder, that’s not toughness, it’s a coaching moment. The fastest path to better strength gains and injury prevention is speaking up early, adjusting what needs adjusting, and building clean reps that actually carry forward.
We also explain why deload week is a key part of fatigue management. Fatigue masks fitness, and if you never downshift, you never get to express what you built. A good deload is active recovery that keeps your technique sharp while your joints and tissues catch up. Finally, we preview the next training block with more strongman work: sleds, sandbags, carries, rope pulls, grip, and the kind of functional strength that feels “farm strong” and shows up in real life, especially as we age.
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Welcome And Testing Week Energy
SPEAKER_01Welcome back to the Ritual Barbell Podcast. This is Sean.
SPEAKER_00Hey everybody. This is Coach Mark from Ritual Barbell. It's good to have you here. Today is Wednesday, September 2nd of 2026, and we're in the middle of uh testing week. What have you been seeing at in testing week, Sean?
SPEAKER_01Lots of good. Um you know, it for some people it's their first test week. For some people it's their fucking 30th, right? Um everyone still gets the jitters for the most part because it's tough, right? And you gotta have your mind right getting into it. But um, you know, it's kind of I would say par for course in that maybe three quarters of people are making their lifts, and some people are just, you know, maybe just a little bit off, or technique falters a little bit and we lose the lift. It's it's just part of test week, right? But for the most part, things are going well. Um going back to you know, the previous podcast, even people who maybe weren't around as much this summer uh are tying or sometimes even beating previous PRs. So yeah, good old test week.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it I I'm seeing the same two, a few great lifts and people reaching out and encouraging each other. And and I, you know, I think I well, we were talking before we started pushing record, but sometimes I feel not sorry for the people that are brand new or in the base program. Right. But yeah, we get we get pretty loud and start yelling and stuff during uh uh test week or max out week. Um, so yeah, if you're new to the program or fresh to the gym, don't let that freak you out.
SPEAKER_01Uh that's really a different energy.
SPEAKER_00It is, yeah. It's awesome. But I'm thinking back like three years ago when I first like, what the heck is going on in this place? It's like everybody, but maybe this is a good place to start for the people that are maybe new to the gym or newer to the gym, uh, maybe just listen to their first podcast. But
Base Program Gains And Expectations
SPEAKER_00I guess you spoke about getting to know the base program, and we talked about it a couple episodes ago, about how it's really good for gains. You know, I'm thinking of a couple people that are making good gains in their squats and that are in the base program, but it's a great program to build up from and continue to make gains or uh on your lifts. But tell me what else you're seeing or what you'd like people to know that are on the base program um from that vantage point.
SPEAKER_01I would say for the most part, just listen to the coach and follow the plan, right? Um, because there's there's a lot of little things in the base program that maybe aren't immediately obvious. Um, and a lot of that you figure out through experience. Um but on the flip side of that, like don't just follow it blindly. You know, it's cool to have questions. I love answering questions. Um and listen to your body as you do the exercises too, right? Because it it can be easy to be like, oh, well, this is supposed to be a good lift. And it's if I just keep hitting it, it's gonna be a good lift for me. But every time I do it, my back's pissed off. I mean, if that's the case, talk to a coach about it, because that's not that's not how any of them should be, right? They should all feel good when you do them. Not easy necessarily, but they should feel good, right? Um there shouldn't be like a consistent pain with anything. So if you are feeling that, especially on level one, like don't feel like you're not doing something. I mean, maybe you are not doing something right, but it's not really your fault, right? It's just you need some tweaking. That's why we're you're here, that's why we're coaching, right? Um, that's why you got the coach, because we've got a level of experience that you don't, and we can see things that you can't. Um and lean into us when you're just like, yeah, I don't know. I just I'm not sure I'm getting what I need to out of this lift, or I'm not sure if this is the way it's supposed to feel, or whatever that is, right? Don't be shy. You're here for a reason.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes
Pain Vs Soreness And Asking Help
SPEAKER_00it can be harder than they expected or want. And we again talked before we got on recording, but you mentioned something around sometimes people come in on the bass program and not that they're quiet, but they might kind of avoid the pain or tuning in to that felt sense of lifting. And you mentioned it right there, like feel like well, how is it feeling? Um, talk to me about people on the bass program or even in any program about getting around the pain and asking for help. I guess there's some, at least for me, there's a little pride in that. Yeah. But you know, I'm wondering, like, somebody who maybe's on the bass program or maybe struggling with a little pain, what would you say to them right now, like as far as asking for help and reaching out?
SPEAKER_01You know, it might feel like it's gonna slow you down if you were to drop doing that or, you know, take some weight off to get it right. But it's much better to spend four weeks in the beginning figuring it out and getting it really dialed in, maybe keeping it a little bit lighter and setting ourselves up really well for months of good gains, than it is to sit there and beat your head against it and keep trying to work through it for months at a time and not end up any actually getting anywhere, and rather just more so spinning your wheels because you get set back because it's consistent injury or it just doesn't feel good enough to continue to go up or whatever. Um, because I think that's another big thing with newer lifters, is uh and like psychologically it makes a lot of sense, right? But people uh have a hard time wanting to make things easier, right? You know, it's like, oh, I worked so hard to get it to a hundred pounds, I don't want to bring it back to 70 pounds just so that I can, you know, do it perfect or whatever. And I I'll say too that that's like not always the right answer either, because there is a lot to be had in the struggle. It's really it's case by case for sure, unless it's pain. Pain, pain is always something we don't want, right?
SPEAKER_00Talk to talk to me about that pain. At least I guess uh I'll ask you because I say to people like, is it sharp pain? Are you feeling any clicking? Obviously, any you know, apparent weakness. Um, but but tell us what you mean by pain when we're listening to the question.
SPEAKER_01Because I mean there's gonna be sensation and that sometimes you feel sensation and it can be processed as pain, like especially people who are sensitive about low backs and things like that. Yeah. So it's a really good distinction to make because just because something's active or under stress or fatigued isn't necessarily the same thing as pain. And it's hard to sparse that a lot of times if you're not um used to pushing your body like that, right? Um, the pain that I mean is much more to your point, like the stabbing, the aching, the pinching. Um, you know, especially if it's something. Well, I shouldn't say especially because it's both if it's acute or chronic, right? If it's like immediate in the moment, or if it's just something that lingers day over day over day over a week over a month, whatever, right? Um and like, you know, sometimes that's not even in the gym. You know, it's it's not uncommon that you might do something at the gym and not feel it immediately, but then you know, the next morning or whatever, you're like, ah, fuck, what's up with my knee, or you know, whatever, right? Um, any any of those situations, I would say if you're not sure, just ask, right? Yeah, I mean, you think of the class um much more like a university class or a high school class, right? We're we're the teachers and we're here to help you through this shit because it's tough to figure it out in the beginning, and you're gonna get to where you want to be a lot faster if you just lean on the people with the experience, right? And that's why we're in the class, right?
SPEAKER_00I like that kind of going to university, right? And it doesn't you don't need to be uh I think I wrote it on the board a few weeks back, but you know, progress isn't linear, it's cumulative. Yeah. And think of it that way instead of like going through the semester and having to get every quiz right or every test right. One last tap on that, and I guess it kind of ties to the base program and even the other levels, but you talked about how people might hold back on sharing that pain, that frustration, uh maybe the mental fatigue. You mentioned like not waiting until it's too late, and then you just kind of leave the gym and kind of give up lifting, or you even said, Oh, lifting's not for me. And you kind of laughed when you said it earlier. But tell me about that person. Uh, what would you say if they kind of have that in their mind? Like, I don't know if this is for me. I I'm having a little pain. I don't want to, you know, it's not that big of a pain. I don't want to ask Sean or the coaches about it. Tell me what you would say to them if uh they were listening right now.
SPEAKER_01Don't ever feel like you're bugging us. Don't because I mean that's especially for me, that's the kind of stuff that keeps me interested in the coaching. If I just showed up and ran the fucking program every day, I'd be so bored. If everyone was just perfect and they can just do the moves that I wouldn't have to work on anything. Yep. Be like, what am I doing with my life? Right. I guess I guess I figured it out because everyone's doing perfect.
SPEAKER_00But yeah, I don't need to be here anymore, right?
SPEAKER_01No, it's like it's the unique stuff, it's the special cases that like get me going because I want to have to think about it. I like working through those puzzles, right? That's why I have the job that I have. Um, so whatever it is, even if I don't know the answer, I'm gonna do my best to figure it out for you, right? And honestly, that's another good case for me, is like if if I don't immediately know the answer, cool, I have something new to learn, right? I have something new that I can look into and figure out and add to my repertoire and help other people in the future with, right? Um, because I mean some of this stuff is unique. It doesn't happen that often though, where it's like I only see this one time ever. It's usually something I've dealt with before or I will deal with again, inevitably, right?
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So um, yeah, don't speak up, don't keep it to yourself. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Don't be shy.
SPEAKER_01We're here to help.
SPEAKER_00And I think that's one thing, you know, I've taken I've had a lot of different gym memberships in my many years of life, but the one unique thing about uh ritual barbell is that like bring tell us about your injuries, tell us if you're going to PT, tell us if you got a race coming up or if you're really going after like a marathon or something else, because you know, Sean has always uh been open to that. I know I've done my Spartan races and some other races in the past, so yeah, bring it, bring it, uh, what you're working on. Gosh, the time flies.
Why Deload Week Matters
SPEAKER_00I guess in the last few minutes, uh last few minutes here, and we can go a little longer today, but the last few minutes, I just wanted to talk about the next block. And maybe even before we get into that, tell me. Uh, I know why I like D-Load Week. It's just after this week of heavy lifting and kind of maxing out the last with this, you know, the heavy singles and walkouts, and obviously the test week. But tell me why D-Load Week is important for you as the head coach.
SPEAKER_01A lot of the program revolves around fatigue management, um, because fatigue masks fitness. And we can't express that fitness if we have too much fatigue. So the D load is really just there to give your body some space to recover, right? Especially a max week like this, whether you're on level two doing the rep maxes or if you're doing like a true one rep max at level three, level four, it's stressful, right? It's it's a lot of poundage, it's a lot to put through your joints, and um you you'll just be better served with a little bit of time afterward. Uh, it's very much just like a little bit of off season after a hard competitive season, right? Um and it's important to do that. I mean, you're not always gonna do them. Shit comes up, sometimes you got a vacation. I oftentimes plan the delo weeks around times people are gonna have vacations, so that holidays and whatnot. Things just flow a little bit better. But if you can make the D-load week, do it because it keeps the momentum, it keeps you in the groove, it keeps your technique sharp, and it's also essentially active recovery, which is always gonna be better for you than just doing nothing, right? Um, it's gonna restore tissue better than doing nothing is, right? And it's gonna make the next week when we start the next block feel that much easier, be that much less of a hurdle, get less sore from that week because you stayed in the groove and you continue to do the movements to the delo week, right? So it's um it's an easy week, but it's not a week that you just want to throw out because it's an easy week, it's an important week.
SPEAKER_00Uh yeah, get to the gym, do some active recovery. I liked what you said. Fatigue masks fitness.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00I'm thinking of people that probably go too hard or they look at D-Load Week and they're like, all right, well, I can fit my, you know, 10 miles and uh out running or doing more in other areas. One I see often, go ahead.
SPEAKER_01Oh, I was gonna say is like, you know, we'll do the D load week and all the weights that are prescribed come down, but you know, someone might still be like, I'm just gonna fucking get these dumbbell rows, and they just are going at it on the dumbbell rows and still making them hard. It's like, well, this is your opportunity, man. You don't have to do that. And if you actually bring the stimulus down a little bit, you'll resensitize a little bit and actually get more going into the next week, right? Um, because the law of diminishing returns applies in training as much as any other physiological process, and the more you continue to push something, the the less that stimulus is going to actually change anything, if that makes sense. Which is why we can start a new block at low weights and still get something out of it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I like it. Yeah, we can use that. Well, and I've heard you say this, I guess I'm thinking of myself so much because it feels like I want to push through that D load week. And I'm thinking of like the time between reps or sets and making sure I give myself that space because sometimes, well, as a coach, I'll try to get in the hour before I coach and just pound out the workout. But it sounds like slowing down, just honoring the body, and at least back to what you're talking about at the top, like just focus on your technique. And I always say to others, and I work on it myself, is like bracing the core. Like maybe it's just like you really focus on bracing the core and all your lifts, or maybe it's like footwork, like experimenting or making sure that your hips and your legs and your feet are really connected to the ground. So, anyways, um, that's kind of what I'm hearing. Slow down, pay attention to that technique, and let it be an active recovery.
SPEAKER_01And like it doesn't have to be slow, slow, right? It's like it's very typical someone's gonna finish uh, you know, each workout in a D-Load week in like 40 minutes as opposed to 60, you know. Um, but to your point about the technique, you know, when we do test week, we start to really see where people break down and what pieces they might need to be working on of the next block, and you can start doing that right away on D-Load Week, right?
SPEAKER_00Nice. Cool. Yeah, again, time goes so fast when we're recording these. I guess I I wanted to touch in the last uh a few minutes here is touch on the next block. You know, people
Next Block Strongman And Farm Strong
SPEAKER_00are in the middle of test week. So what uh is the mad scientist Sean cooking up in the basement? Uh what are we what should we be looking forward to going into fall here or at least the next uh couple months?
SPEAKER_01It's gonna be um leaning more heavily into strongman. You know, we did a lot of strongman this summer, but this summer was really catch-all, where you know, we did a lot of the gymnastics, we did a lot of, especially I should say particularly for people on the four-day programs. We were doing a lot of agility work. We were doing a lot of what I would consider like work on athleticism in uh particularly that Monday workout for the four-day program. Um, so it's it was just kind of like a little bit of everything all at once this summer. And going into fall, we're gonna lean more heavily into the strongman side of things and turn up the volume a little bit in terms of reps. Um, so it's gonna be higher reps, lower weights, and um, we're gonna have a different kind of test at the end of this one. One that uh our our veterans have done before, but I don't think we're gonna do a one we're at max this time around. I think I'm gonna save that one for the end of the next block.
SPEAKER_00Okay. So this next block will probably end in that November, late October area.
SPEAKER_01The last week will be just before Thanksgiving, and then the week of Thanksgiving will be um our deload week.
SPEAKER_00Got it. Give me like 30 seconds on strongman. What I I I know what you mean uh after having gone through it, but like if somebody who's kind of newer or they just want to reboot on what that means for you as the coach, if you does that make sense, yeah, for sure.
SPEAKER_01The strongman work is a lot of the like real world strength, I would say, when it comes to moving other shit. Um, you know, this is where it's like sleds, sandbags, um, cattlebells tend to fall in this category for me. Depending on how you use the medicine ball, it can fall into that category as well, right? A lot of the heavy carries and things like that.
SPEAKER_00Um what about the ropes, like the battle ropes and stuff like that?
SPEAKER_01So I wouldn't say that um like using battle ropes in the wave style is necessarily like a strongman thing, okay. Um, but I do like rope pulls because um, well, I mean, this it's a couple things. It's a good pulling exercise in general, and it works you differently than something like a dumbbell row or a chin-up is gonna do. I love that with a rope, uh, you've got that much thicker grip, right? And like grip is a big piece of strongman as a sport, right? You gotta have a good grip because you got thick bars, you got axle bars, right? They're not the standard barbells we have for most things. Um so in the things like farmers carries, shit like that, you know, there's a lot of grip work in strongman. And uh, I mean, uh again, that's another important part for life. And when I think of strongman, I really think of like farm strong, right? Like you again, the kind of strength you'd get from doing farm work your whole life, or that you could apply to going to a farm and helping out, right? Um like I don't want to go off on a tangent too much because I know we're basically out of time, but I worked on a farm when I was in college and I was like, Yeah, I'm fucking strong, right? I can do all this weight on my barbell lifts. And I had this string bean of uh a boss who was he was like six, six, so he wasn't light necessarily, but he was thin. And um, I was I was hitting something with a hammer one time and I was taking my time with it. I thought I was doing well, and then he comes over, he's like, no, no, no, no, and he puts his whole fucking body into it, and like the the what I was trying to do, he did it in like three strikes because he put his whole body into it and he wasn't just like trying to use his muscle, right? He was like using the technique of it. So, like the idea of Farmstrong, like when you think about picking up a heavy ass sandbag and putting it on your shoulder, right? It's not like oh, I'm gonna work this muscle group, it's just like you move the fucking thing, right? You use your whole body, right? You want to talk about a compound movement, that's a compound movement, right?
SPEAKER_00Oh gosh, yeah, there's so much there. I feel like we could talk another 40 minutes on that, but I love that. Yeah, it's what we do in the gym, or at least your program, and I've found that obviously working out by myself for years and trying to follow other programs. There's something just about that functional strength with the primal movements we do, obviously with the stretching uh techniques you have. And then, yeah, kind of going into the strongman kind of unit for this next segment for people on the upper levels. Um, I don't know, at least for me, hearing about it like makes me excited to continue to do that. As I age, I feel, in fact, I was writing that in my journal the other morning. Like, I feel stronger in my 50s. I could have kicked my 30-year-old's ass, uh, literally, obviously, because I was a parent and maybe uh a little too sedentary, but it is like that functional strength, that feeling that you can bend over and pick up a dime without doing the whole grunt, like the old person grunt. Uh so yeah, that's attractive to me, especially as I as I age. But well, cool.
Community Updates And Closing
SPEAKER_00I think that's good enough for now for this episode. So we'll we'll kind of maybe riff out on this a little bit and to kind of maybe put a uh ending point or a period on this episode. Keep sharing. There's there's a couple of fresh questions on the marker board. Um, I want to get like a QR code and put it up on the marker board too, so people can just scan that and get to the website for the podcast. And I know we had a couple other people talk about that they'd like the podcast on their app. We'll look into that. And I believe there's somebody else asking about getting the video out on YouTube. So we'll look into that. But otherwise, uh, you get what you get right now and keep tuning in and keep asking questions, and then you can definitely ask the coaches during the session, and kind of like Sean was implying in the middle, like if you do have pain um and you're trying to get around it by yourself, that's really the wrong approach. And that's something that we see people leave the gym for because they maybe again not too shy, but they think they're unique. I think, at least, you know, again, as the old as an old guy, all pain is good good because it just means that there's an area that needs work, um, that there's a deficiency in an area. It's a signal. It's a signal, yeah, instead of uh a personal flaw. So yeah, I would just encourage that, keep that mindset and to speak up. Um and yeah, remember it's cumulative, it's not linear when you're kind of working through the program. So anything else uh to finish up the episode, Sean? Nah, I think that's good. If I start saying something else, I'm gonna talk too long. Well, we appreciate you listening out here. We have tons of listens uh uh on uh data that we're seeing. So keep uh keep tuning in. Let us know how we can help you. Uh have a good day. Thanks for listening. Bye, everybody.