A1. Incline curls 10, 10, 10, 10 – :03 second lowering/eccentric load; rest 0 A2. Seated hammer curls 20, 20, 20, 20; rest 0 A3. Standard EZ bar curl 20, 20, 20, 20; rest 2mins B1. Bench dips 20 x 3; rest 0 B2. Banded press downs 20, 20, 20; rest 0 – pause for two deep nasal breaths at the top of every 5th rep B3. Triceps push-ups max effort/push to failure; rest 2mins C1. EZ bar close grip curls 15, 15, 15; rest 0 – try to stay at the same weight for all 3 movements C2. EZ bar drag curls 15, 15, 15; rest 0 C3. EZ bar overhead triceps exts. 20, 20, 20; rest 1 + 7 n 7 for 7 7 Hang power cleans & push press 7 walk out burpees without the pushup
On Monday I accepted an offer to begin teaching, part-time, for Chegg/Thinkful.com in their Cyber Security program. I’m really looking forward to helping the next wave of cyber sec professionals. It’ll be another great way to help keep up with current trends, continue to reinforce the fundamentals, and also share past and present experiences with a wide swath of new IT pros. Who knows, before long I just might be able to start posting videos of training and teaching again.
Current affairs:
The bravest are surely those who have the clearest vision of what is before them, glory and danger alike, and yet notwithstanding, go out to meet it.
When I first wrote this, I wasn’t chasing promotions or algorithms. I was just trying to keep showing up to train, to learn, to get a little better each day. Back then, “rep after rep” was more than a training mantra. It was a way to stay grounded when progress felt invisible.
The hardest part wasn’t physical. It was the repetition, the daily grind that felt endless. Whether I was refining form under the barbell or troubleshooting code that refused to run, the challenge was the same: staying patient when nothing seemed to move forward.
Some days you make the lift. Some days the lift makes you. But the point is always to come back tomorrow.
At some point, I stopped expecting each session, physical or mental, to feel like a breakthrough. The breakthrough was the habit itself. The more I showed up, the more the process began to reveal patterns: what worked, what didn’t, and how small adjustments compound over time.
In strength and in cybersecurity, consistency is the quiet multiplier. Each drill, each review, each run-through, one more rep toward mastery.
That same mindset carries through everything I do now — training teams, hardening systems, or writing content. I don’t chase perfect outcomes anymore. I look for steady iterations. A little tighter form. A cleaner line of code. A stronger policy.
That’s how resilience is built, not simply through intensity, but through consistency.
Progress doesn’t shout. It stacks. And one day, you realize the work that used to test you has become the warm-up.
Training for the day:
7 mins of:
7 Banded Sumos
7 Banded bodyweight squats w/moderate band
7 Calf raises
+
A. Back Squat 10, 10,10,10; rest 2/2:30 – 10 RM-ish
B1. Heels elevated air squats x 10 x 3; rest :10
B2. RDL w/an empty bar, sweep away — lumbar focus x 15 x 3; rest 1
C. SL RDL stability, unloaded x 10 x 3; — 5 per leg; rest 1
+
10min alt EMOM:
20 Step-ups – 10 per
15 push-ups
Martial skill work — 5 x 5 min rounds of Z2-Z4 striking, upper push/pull bodyweight movements in trapping/grappling range, and take down defense/sprawling/working underhook escapes et cetera.
Today in my world of Linux and pentesting I worked on building out an Active Directory Lab and worked on the initial attack vectors when attacking an AD based system. Things like LLMNR Poisoning, Capturing NTLMv2 Hashes with Responder, Password Cracking with Hashcat, LLMNR Poisoning Defense, SMB Relay Attacks, Discovering Hosts with SMB Signing Disabled, Start SMB Relay Attack Defenses, & Gaining Shell Access.
Training: A1. Seated Arnold rotations x 20, 20, 20; rest :30 A2. Banded triceps press down 20, 20, 20; rest 1 B1. SA DB row x 10-12 reps x 3; @31X1 on the first 5 reps rest :10 secs b/t arms B2. Snatch grip BTN press w/an empty bar x 15 x 3; rest 1 C1. Assisted pullups using barbell and feet in pullup cage x 6-8 x 3; rest :0 C2. DB push press 15, 15, 15; rest 1 D1. DB shrugs 30, 30, 30, 30; rest :30 D2. Banded upright row 25, 25, 25, 25; rest 90
5 sets of :30secs of work/:30 secs of rest :30secs KBS – 2pd. :30secs rest :30 secs pushups :30secs rest :30 secs DB RDL – 55/h :30secs rest :30secs 24” box step-ups :30secs rest
Today’s professional training covered Linux User Accounts and Groups along with Managing File Ownership and Permission. Then in network penetration we covered privilege using Sudo + about hour of training over at tryhackme.
Warm-up – 10 mins of: 5 air squats 10 banded shoulder pass-throughs 15 banded good mornings 30 Shoulder ROT/stability – 10 to horizontally to the chest, 10 semi-vertically front/down to clavicles, 10 BTN, then…
7 sets of: 6 goblet reverse lunges per leg 3 goblet step-ups per leg 3 goblet squats 6 SA KB Press per arm 6 SA KB Row per arm 6 SA KB Swing per arm
Martial skill work
45 mins of JKD and Wing Chun striking + short-range kicking and counter wrestling
Today’s studies included: Linux: working toward mastery of the CLI & searching and extracting data from files and archiving. I also focused my practical network penetration testing studies to privilege escalation in a Linux environment.
Matt Shannon, Security Pro 