10-10-27: Squat snatches, dips and knees-to-elbows

CrossFit WoD for Wednesday October 27th, 2010
Complete as many rounds as possible 20 minutes of:

• 95# 75# Squat snatch, 10 reps (great video for technique and pointers)
• 10 Ring dips (shoulders dip below elbows at bottom, full extension at the top)
• 10 Knees to elbows (full hang at bottom, knees up to elbows at top...a sit-up on steroids laced with angel dust...)

Austin Malleolo 10 rounds + 2 snatch, Dave Lipson 9 rounds, Karianne Dickson 8 rounds + 4 dips (65lbs).
Austin Malleolo on today's WOD - video [wmv] [mov]

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Eva T. demonstrating the difference in height for receiving the bar in the squat and split snatches. (crossfit.com)

Greg A. showing what the dips *should* have looked like (ie. with rings...) (crossfit.com)

Eva T. demonstrating knees-to-elbows. Full body pain right there. (crossfit.com)

Another shared session with the students.  Unfortunately for me, the best place for doing the knees-2-elbows is on the frame of the evil Smith machine, but it was in constant use for not-squats and not-bench-presses.  I've tried discussing ideas like range of motion with them, apparently to no avail yet.  I'll keep trying. If we had more freeweights, I might even try harder to make them give up their precious Smith machine altogether, but since we have only the one bar, and I like to use it... I don't try too hard. :S

Since one of the fine lads (actually one of the better weight-lifters) was using almost all the weights for squats of nearly full depth, I was left to scrounge up a few 10# plates to throw on my 35# bar. 4 of them later, I had my 75# snatch bar.  I actually wanted more, but it turned out that 75# was more than enough.  Though my legs, back and arms all took a beating on this workout, it turns out it really targeted the crap out of my grip, and a heavier weight would have been nearly impossible after about the 3rd round.

I ended up experimenting with different bar reception positions, and learned that my favorite is actually the split snatch...probably from watching Josh Everett do a crap-ton of them in the CrossFit Games 2008 movie.  I didn't realize at the time what Eva T.'s picture above reveals: a split snatch has a higher receiving position, which means that with heavier weights, you actually need to do a LOT more work to get the bar up the extra few inches into a solid catch.  At 75#, I could pretty much power snatch it, so the few inches weren't an issue. It'll be something to look out for on a heavier squat workout, though.  I have still have a lot of work to do on my squat snatch positioning and comfort in and out of the bottom position, but the middle of a MetCon is no place to worry too much about that!

The dips were done on our hideous excuse for a gravitron (aka The Nut-Buster), which actually weren't too bad. I can never seem to get the width of the bars where I want them. Somewhere, a tiny violin is playing the world's saddest song for me. I then did the K2Es on the same torture device, facing out.  This presents several difficulties:

• If you lean back at all when your legs come up, you crack your head on the bottom of the monstrous pull-up arm assembly.
• When you drop your legs, your momentum will carry SOME part of your body into the nut-busters, so you have to choose carefully between the buttocks, your kidneys, or your floating ribs. I opted for buttocks.
• There's not really any clearance in front of you, so if anyone is walking by, you need to wait, dangling...feeling your grip start to slip... fun times.
• Having chosen a buttocks strike, you also end up with a "false" proprioceptive feedback source helping you to stop the descent of your legs, and giving what definitely felt like a stretch reflex into the next K2E, which has got to be some sort of cheating.

So, pounded through two rounds nearly non-stop, but then had to keep resetting on every exercise due to a completely shot grip.  Especially bad were the K2Es. I could have kept going ab/core-wise, but I just couldn't hang from the bar anymore!


Total rounds: 4 + 8 squat snatches.

Finished with several minutes of exercise bike to cool down, then several minutes of playing around with a fairly light med-ball to work some blood back into my forearms.