Still sick. Made a disgusting smoothie upon waking up of spinach, garlic, ginger, strawberries, cucumber, and whey protein and it seriously made my throat feel better the rest of the day. Actually managed to do a little foam rolling and yoga tonight, keep that up. My back felt good from it.

Yesterday.

Mat pulls, 9
495 x 8
Trained sick, but did well. High reps are still a relative weak point.

SSB squats
335 x 5, 5, 5
Hise shrugs x 20
Pain in right lat, lower left back, and left knee, haha. Belted up for second set and felt fine. It's just plain wrong when people outright say belts don't protect the back. I don't think one should purchase a belt for that purpose or that it's anything more than a Band-Aid on a bigger issue. I have also read Dr. Stuart McGill writing that to maximize the effectiveness of a belt, less-than-ideal form is required by way of rounding the lumbar. But a thick brace still clearly shields the back from some load bearing and that can make a difference between pain and gain if I gotta finish my sets.

Neck crunches
After some fooling around with my water bottle strap on a dumbbell handle I finally figured out that a simple plate works best for what I have.

Night workout: 5x5 with the Crush gripper and some abs