Week 8 A Little Rough....

Active recovery is something most people neglect but should be paying attention to. Jim Wendler writes briefly on the subject but I think active recovery is customized to each individual and what they find works thru trial and error. For me it all depends on what type of workout I just finished. With deadlift workouts I like to do some active recovery right after I'm done the workout. This is normally a round robin of  hyper extensions, dead hangs from the bar and kettle bell swings. All done at a warm down pace, light weights and not to failure. Essentially working the major muscles you just annihilated and helping to decompress the spine after stressing it just slightly :). Static stretching of the muscles can also be a good idea but it all comes down to how much time you have to dedicate to this portion of your workout. Walks are also another good way to help your body recover but you may find you need to add in stations as you walk like stopping and doing a set of push ups, walking lunges, short distance jogs. Something that breaks the repetitive pattern of just walking and targets muscle groups you want to aid recovery with.
Blow by blow of how each day of training went this week.
Day 1 shoulders had my only accessory work of the week, which was upper back. Stuck with sets of 3 reps as I hit the heavier sets and worked up to a 9RPE weight, which was 10 lbs lighter than last week. 
Day 2 was squats working the 2 rep range as I got into my heavier weights. Managed a 405 x 2 at 9RPE, which is my best squat ever in training. Did 5 sets of back off sets or first set last whatever you want to call them. Basically called a weight for myself I felt at the time I could manage 5 sets of 3 reps with, ended up being 335. It was rough on my lower back but I pulled thru. Nothing else for day 2 just lots of squats.
Day 3 Leading up to day 3 I was out of town with work so it was a rough two nights of little sleep and lots of stress. I was a walking zombie going into the gym and trying to pull out a heavy ass bench session on Friday. That went over like a lead balloon. Worked up to 315 for 3 at 9RPE and the plan was sets of 305 for 3 reps after that but my strength went south fast. Did some lighter pin presses and then instead of a static hold at the end, I did two sets of isometric holds at mid height. Basically push the barbell against the safety bars as hard as possible for 8 seconds.
Day 4 was back to sumo deadlifts which felt good but my lower back was giving me some grieve. Took video of all my max attempts as I was playing around with my setup once again. Worked up to 495 which moved really well of the floor. My lower back and left hip flexor where complaining so I called it and did some active recovery like hyper extensions and dead hangs. No more heavy attempts now for this lift, the next ones will be saved for competition day. Just some light work next week.
This week coming is my last week of serious training and will contain zero accessory work. I'm even going to drop the shoulder day and just do 3 training days. Squats I'm going to feel my way thru that workout. After my heavy volume session this week I'll probably do no back down sets just a standard 5/3/1 with maybe a few extra sets of 1 rep. Bench will be no max attempts but will move ahead with heavy sets of 3 with hopefully 305 or 315 on the bar for all sets. Deadlift will be light and just working on setup with a pause of the floor.