11-08-30: Nicole

Elm City CrossFit WoD for Tuesday, August 30th, 2011

Pull-ups. (crossfit.com)

When this guy tells you to run, you'd best get running. (elmcitycrossfit.com)

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Benchmark WoD: "Nicole" - 20min AMRAP

• 400m Run
• Max Rep Pull-ups

Score is # of pull-up successfully completed
NOTE: Protect your hands: if you rip your WOD is terminated!

A pretty simple WoD... each round, you run a 400m (2x around the ECC parking lot), then do as many pull-ups as you can in a single set. If your hands come off the bar, or you're stuck resting at the bottom of the band, your round is done, and you're back on the run.

I felt pretty good on the runs, all 6 of them, though good is relative. I didn't feel like I was going to die, which for me is a great improvement. See my most recent post for reasons why I still think running sucks. Or at least, I still suck at it.

Pull-ups were even worse, but these have always been an issue for me. Part of it is being a big dude, but considering Coach Joe worked out with us today, and he's easily got a dozen pounds on me (pure muscle, mind you), AND he knocked out almost my entire total of pull-ups in his FIRST round, clearly the "big dude" hypothesis of sucking at pull-ups is out the window. Man, was THAT ever a convoluted sentence. Sorry. It's just a matter of working more on the pulling movements. Everyone manages to focus on pushing movements when they work out on their own (see my many years of weight lifting (on and off) doing ALL pressing movements.)


Total pull-ups: 47

11-05-02: "Filthy Fifty (Modified)"

CrossFit Garden City WoD for April 25, 2011

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Warmup:
3 rounds of:

• 10 overhead squats
• 2 minutes double-under practice

Workout Prep:

• 6-8 Reps of each movement in WOD

Benchmark Workout! "Filthy 50 (Modified)"

• 50 Box Jumps (24"/18")
• 50 Jumping Pullups
• 50 Overhead KB Swings (16kg/12kg)
• 50 Steps, Walking Lunge
• 50 Knees to Elbows
• 50 Push Presses (45#/35#)
• 50 Hip Extensions
• 50 Wall Balls (20#/14#)
• 50 Burpees
• 50 Double Unders

Scaling/Notes:
WOD: Scale to 30 reps of each movement if 50 will take longer than 40 minutes.

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In my previous workout (Deadlifts and vertical jumps), I managed to tweak something in the bottom of my left foot that's been annoying me for days. Though it was feeling a bit better today, I decided to NOT run the risk of re-aggravating it, or worse, taking a small bruise and turning it into something worse. So, I dropped the box jumps and burpees... which is good, because keeping the burpees in would have killed me. Though some of the exercises weren't utterly impossible for 50 reps, some were just deadly. The only exercise I was able to keep unbroken was the lunges. Everything else was a slog. Given that, I probably should have done the scaled version (30 reps each), but stupidly chose not too...

I really slowed down after the hip extensions, as my back was just screaming at me (in soreness and tightness, not an actual spinal injury), making little things like wall-balls (best done with a nice, tight core) sort of agonizing and awful. I probably rested an easy 6-8 minutes in the wall balls alone! It was actually a relief to get to the double-unders... though I struggled to even get a single bounce going for 3-4 attempts, and made do with single double-unders for the first 7 before finally firing off a set of 20. After that, the rest was easy.

I ended up making a full body sweat angel on the floor after this one, after shedding it all over the weight room first!

Not mine... but pretty damn good!

Total Time: 44:30

11-04-13: "Karen"

CrossFit Garden City WoD for April 4th, 2011

Wall balls. Full squat (not well shown in this pic), then use the squat to propel the ball up to your target. It is NOT just an upper body exercise, its a full body ass-kicking. (CrossFit 908)

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Warmup:

• 3 sets of 10 OH Squats, 2 min double-under Practice

Benchmark! "Karen"

• 150 Wall Ball

Accessory:
3 sets:

• A1. GH Raises (40X0) x 6-8 reps
• A2. DB External Rotations (4010) x 6-8 reps

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I forgot how much "Karen" can hurt. I've done it at least twice in my short time CrossFitting, and I always forget how most of these workouts are self-scaling: The harder you can throw yourself at it, the harder it will be. So whether you struggle through for 20 minutes or hit 14:30 (or even a competitive time, like 5 minutes!), you're still gonna get your ass kicked.

Total Time: 14:30

Honestly, I was just happy to beat 15 minutes, so it was all good.

The accessory exercises were actually more interesting. This workout marked the first time I successfully performed an actual glute-ham raise (from all the way down to ALL the way up, not just up to parallel.) The secret seemed to be making the foot-pads even closer to the main pad. I didn't try it again where I usually have the GHD set-up, but it was good to know. The external rotations really quickly became evil little things, especially at the tempo indicated. I felt all new parts of my back lighting up in agony...nice!

11-03-14: "Diane" and ring work

CrossFit Garden City WoD for March 7th, 2011

Warmup:
Dynamic Warmup

Benchmark! - "Diane"
21-15-9 reps of:

• Deadlift (225/155)
  
• Handstand Pushups
  

Scaling:
Deadlift - Men: 185, 155 or 135, Women: 125, 110 or 95
HSPU: Scale reps, Shortened ROM (1,2,3 AbMats) or Regular Pushups

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Jolie Gentry lifting my 1RM deadlift. Strong really IS the new skinny. (games.crossfit.com)

I betcha this pic is from an affiliate doing "Diane!" People inverted on a wall, heavy bars waiting for them... "Diane!" (crossfitlorton.com)

pics

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Named workouts scare the heck out of me. Especially those with women's names. Maybe its the fact that, usually (or at least *sometimes*), they kind of look easy on paper.  Sure, there are the hour long hero workouts that, no matter what, are going to grind you down through sheer volume ("Murph" springs to mind). A lot of the CrossFit Girls seem to be more 'kick the tires, light the fires' sorts of workouts: fast and brutal. Well, ok, if you're me, then kinda fast, at least at first, then brutal for a very long time. Today was no exception.

I was pleased with my mature decision to scale the weight. My first thought was to go full bore, since 225# is well-below my current (and likely inaccurate) 1RM of 285#. However, I realized that 225# was prescribed for those who have way heavier 1RMs, and that it really represents more like a 50-60% weight for them. Accordingly, I dropped to the highest scaled weight, and hoped that would be enough.

I kicked around the option of doing some form of pike push-ups, or elevated feet, or something kinda basic, but ultimately chose to go with handstand push-ups, but knew going in that my ROM start out close to ideal, but quickly fade to mere inches. All in all, I figured that the time in the handstand (wall assist!) would be even more awful that full(er) ROM push-ups of another variety. I believe I was proven correct.

I failed to keep all three rounds of deadlifts unbroken, having to rest my exploding lungs in both of the first two rounds. I hated doing it during the first, but would have died in the second, so that one didn't sting as badly. The handstand push-ups were pure murder, so the first round was divided into 3 sub-sets of 7, while the second round was 3 subsets of 5. The final round of deadlifts I kept unbroken, while the final handstand push-ups included a seventh rep that was total garbage. After resetting, I repeated that rep and finished out as strong as possible. Read: not very. ;)

Total time: 12:45ish

After resting for a good 15-20 minutes, and doing a little more jump-rope, which led directly to cramping in my left foot, I pulled out the gymnastic rings, and started to play around with those. Yesterdays Gymnastics WoD featured false grip progressions, so I worked on those. I also did some knee raises-to-L-sit holds, as well as dips and a few pull-ups. I still have almost NOTHING in the way of a false grip, but I'm determined to get it. Highlight of ring-work was having a know-it-all freshman, who was earlier trying to show off his "mad push-up skills" (I didn't have the heart to direct him to the awesome CrossFit push-up video), attempt to get on the rings. he looked as bad as I did MY first time! :S Hell, I was at least able to kind of hold the control position...even if my hands were shaking badly!

11-03-09: Hang Power Snatches and "Randy"

CrossFit Garden City WoD for March 4th, 2011
Warmup:
Jump-Rope
Burgener Warmup
Strength:
Hang Power Snatch3-3-3-3-3
Bar does not touch the ground until the completion of the third rep each set.
All reps should be fast and clean. NO FAILED REPS.
Conditioning:
"Randy"
- 75 Power Snatches for time (75#)
Accessory:
GHD Hip Extensions x 50
Break up reps into as many sets as needed

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Upshot to the various "full snatch" variants is that, at least up through this point, they are all identical. How he lands and receives the bar will define whether this is a squat snatch, split snatch, or power snatch. (CrossFit South West Sydney)

Seize the iron. Indeed! (Underground Shack)

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Knowing I would need my lungs soon enough, I went into this workout looking for a quick warm-up, so when I opted for jump-rope, I just wanted to do a bit of practice on double-unders. My goal was to get at least 5 in a row. Upon seeing that I was still back at square one or two, I ended up being happy with three in a row.

I went through the Burgener warm-up twice, once with the bar empty (35#), then with 10# put on, to mimic the warm-up with an Olympic bar. After taking the time to correct some freshmen on their 'concentration curl' technique (if you're going to waste your time with an exercise, at least do it correctly, I guess...), I got chalked up and prepped to do some hang power snatches. I quickly discovered a huge flaw in my technique: though I was starting the motion with the violent hip opening to get the bar moving, I wasn't really jumping with the bar all that hard, which definitely keeps it moving up. Instead, I would pop the hip open, and guide the bar up the rest of the way, rather than working to keep it from flying away. Basically, I was missing a lot of the explosive pop that will make it easier to lift heavier weights.

Hang Power Clean (for 3 reps): 85# / 105# / 115# / 125# / 135#

While the first few sets were pretty easy, by the last two, I could see that my speed was uneven from side to side. With each snatch at 125#, I could see that rather than firing the bar up from my hips, I was actually pressing it out to full extension, but only on my left side. For the final set, I focused much more on the hip drive and the jump with the bar to propel it, and while that made the overall move that much faster, I still had the same problem with the left hand being forced to drive the bar the rest of the way up, which is a press, NOT a snatch.

After unloading the bar for "Randy," I tried to focus on resetting myself completely, and not hopping back into the workout with resting substantially enough. Easier said than done, since the gym was crawling in students, all too unmotivated to bother really working out. In his book, Starting Strength, Coach Rippetoe takes such student "athletes" to task (as well as everyone else who does this):

No one should ever arrive to train not knowing exactly what to do. Wandering around the gym, deciding what looks like fun, doing it until the fun stops, and then doing something else is NOT training.

So, with kids milling around, some actually doing stuff, and my precious floor space under attack, I grabbed the bar and started carving out my zone of death. Despite the relatively light weight, I still ended up having to break the 75 power snatches into smaller sub-sets, as follows: 20 - 10 - 15 - 10 - 10 - 10. Between each subset, i tried to rest as little as possible, but each time, I could easily watch the timer continuing to count...

The upshot was that the final 20 reps or so, I started feeling the jump become a part of the overall power snatch technique. As all the bits that had been allowing me to complete each rep with less than ideal form became fatigued, the PROPER muscles had to take over. I definitely started to feel what the movement should feel like as the bar actually seemed to become lighter, always a nice trick 45-50 reps into a benchmark! Finally finished up at about 7:45.

"Randy" - Total Time: 7:45

Finished up with the prescribed 50 GHD hip extensions, done in sets of 10, followed by a few minutes cool-down on the exercise bike.

11-03-04: "Helen"

CrossFit Garden City WoD for March 1, 2011

Warmup:
Dynamic Warmup (including Jumps)
Burgener Warm-Up x2

Benchmark!: "Helen"
3 rounds for time of:

• Run 400 meters
• 21 KB Swings - 55# Dumbbell
• 12 Pullups (band assist)

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Hell-In. Note the bars just waiting for those gentlemen to come by and see them AFTER they've run 2800m, done 126 kettle-bell swings, and 72 pull-ups. Much as I fantasize about competing in the games one day, the mere thought of this workout is enough to bring a visit from Pukie the Clown. (games.crossfit.com)

Kristin Clever and Annie Thorisdottir go head to head on the kettlebells. (games.crossfit.com)

Graham Holmberg (2010 Games Male Champion) cranks out pull-ups. I don't *think* this is actually from Hell-In, since he seems to be back in the main stadium, but it still works. He's way better at pull-ups than I am. For Real. (games.crossfit.com)

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Don't do benchmarks when you're tired, in the middle of a head-cold, and poorly fueled.  This wasn't a workout, and I don't expect to see any physical changes as a result of plowing through it. If anything, it was a mental victory, just for pushing through it, but overall, I should have taken today as a rest day. I felt like crap and paid for it.

That said, I did actually PR on it, but considering I last did it a year ago, when I was not nearly as fit, and in the middle of my full on knee agony, its not really *that* much of an accomplishment. I knocked a minute off, but if I was feeling better, I'm sure I could have carved off 5-6 minutes. Not that impressive on a crappy time, but still an improvement. As it is, I've left a time for me to destroy the NEXT time Helen comes up.

Total Time: 17m (PR by 1:00)

By way of comparison, check out the videos from the CrossFit 2010 Games, wherein "Helen" was converted into "Hell-in."  The first round involved running triple the distance (1200m), triple the swings (63) and triple the pull-ups (36). The second round was double everything (800m, 42 swings, 24 pull-ups) and the third round was back to the original distance/rep scheme (400m, 21 swings, 12 pull-ups). Basically, a double-"Helen." After that, the competitors had 90 seconds (I believe) to put as heavy a weight as possible overhead. Always fun in a state of utter exhaustion!

Mens Heat 3 of Hell-In [mov] [wmv]
Women's Final Heat of Hell-In [mov] [wmv]

11-02-16: Overhead Squats, "Annie!" (Double-Unders and AbMat Sit-Ups)

CrossFit Garden City WoD for February 4, 2011

Warmup:
3 sets of 10 OH Squats/1 min DU practice
Strength:
Overhead Squat (3211 tempo)
5-5-5-5-5
Beginners or those with limited mobility/poor OH Squat mechanics - stay LIGHT and focus on good position, depth and tempo. Use PVC, training bar or light barbell and complete 50 repetitions.
Benchmark!: "Annie"
50-40-30-20-10  25-20-15-10-5 reps of:

• Double Unders
• Situps (Anchored, AbMat)

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Note the full grip on the bar. For my lighter sets, the grip was open, with the bar really sitting on my fingers. I have pretty good grip strength, but at higher weights, that would just be silly. And so amazingly stupid that I would totally deserve whatever fate befell me. (board.crossfit.com)

No, its not a blurry photo... the rope is just moving THAT DAMN FAST. My legs are still shot from this about 36 hours later as I'm finally finishing this post. Knees? Crackly and sore. Right calf? Feels like I have a baseball rammed in it. (crossfit.com)

AbMat sit-ups. Notice the awesome low back arch.  These things are golden. (CrossFit Milford)

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Did this one while overseeing a track/baseball workout that included some CrossFit style elements. Warmed-up using the jump-rope for the overhead squat form, then practicing double-unders. Sadly, I had almost NO double-unders...not good for the benchmark! Was it doing it in the much larger Lower Gym, with its oddly hard floor? Or just doing them in front of a slightly different group of students than usually gets to see me struggle with them? No idea. It definitely sucked though.

Since I've struggled with form, but have had some modest success, I decided to walk the line between the Rx'ed workout and the scaling. I would do the 5x5 work sets, but using light and increasing weights, rather than just empty bar or jump-rope unweighted for 50 reps. I started light, first with the empty bar (35#), then with two 2.5# plates on it (I wasn't paying attention, and assumed they were 5#), totaling 40#. These two sets weren't done exactly to the the 3211 tempo (down for 3 seconds, hold at the bottom for 2, then back up in 1 second (not max speed), hold at the top for 1 second, repeat), so I opted to start my work sets at 40#, paying super close attention to the tempo. I definitely need a slightly longer bar (ours is a 5' long beginner's/women's/practice bar, with a notably shorter grip-width as well. for the empty bar warm-ups, I actually had the best success with my pinky and ring fingers up and over the weight collar! Can't really do THAT with weights on the bar!

With the lighter weights, I was able to carry the bar back on my fingers, arm bent back at the wrist. This served to place the weight a few crucial inches further back, keeping the weight over my center of balance. Obviously, this is a *terrible* way to do it while working with heavier weights! However, at these weights, it really wasn't too much of an issue... other than training improper technique and neural patterns and muscle recruitments! With that in mind, I definitely fought to maintain a proper grip, especially as the weights crept up.
I did well through every set, until the final one, when a combination of arm/shoulder fatigue and my struggle to keep the weight well gripped caused me to fail forwards at the bottom of the 4th rep. I repeated the rep and tried to finish strong, but on coming out of the squat, found myself coming up and forwards, up on my toes, revealing my balance was completely shot in the bottom.

Overhead Squats x 5: 40# / 45# / 50# / 55# / 60# with one fail


Annie was just a total disaster. I forgot to start the clock running for the first set of double-unders, which took frickin' forever anyways. I barely managed to string any together, so it took forever to get the count up, and all the extra frantic single-bouncing between double-unders didn't help. Nor did repeatedly whipping myself with the jump-rope by accident, leaving welts and bloody knuckles on my right hand. Fun. However, the worst bit was the growing ache in my knees... which is still raging today. Joy of joys.

Ab-mat sit-ups are downright fun and easy comparatively.

1/2 Annie: 12:30 not including first round of double-unders, so closer to 20. Seriously.

11-01-21: Angie!

CrossFit benchmark WoD: Angie
"Angie"

• 100 80 Pull-ups
• 100 80 Push-ups
• 100 80 Sit-ups
• 100 80 Squats

As Rxed, For Time :Complete all reps of each exercise before moving to the next.

Scaling: Sub-sets of 10 each to make it even remotely possible.
Jumping-Chest-to-Bar Pull-ups instead of real ones, because that's nearly an infinite number of pull-ups, at least for me...

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If someone tells you pull-ups are good for isolating muscles in the back, try not to laugh at their utter incomprehension of what a full-body monster pull-ups CAN be. (crossfit.com)

All the way down, all the way up. Repeat as needed. (crossfit.com)

Abmat allowing proper lumbar curvature throughout the entire ROM of a sit-up, making it both more effective AND (at least in my mind) easier, because the initial ab contraction doesn't just fire your lower back into the floor. Because your back is supported, that initial contraction actually works towards elevating your torso! Just like what a sit-up is supposed to do! Yay Abmat! (abmat.com) (Note, I am NOT a paid sponsor, but if the abmat folks want to sponsor me, I'll do it!)

It's ok if your hip crease doesn't drop below the top of your knees. You just can't count the rep, and have to keep trying until you DO break parallel. For as long as it takes.  Come on, the toddler can do it! Why can't you? (For what its worth, watch almost ANY toddler, and you will see nearly perfect squat mechanics, perfect running form, everything. It's AWESOME!) (crossfit.com)

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I ended up doing this workout at the end of the workday on Friday, having missed my window to get it in during my lunch hour. The number of complications this created was large, but the biggest were these: I had eaten lunch recently, and I usually workout on a nearly empty (read: pre-lunch) stomach, and I had pretty much written off working out, so I had very little time to try to psych myself back up when the opportunity presented itself. But, I grabbed my crap, headed down to the gym, cranked up the Amon Amarth, and went to work!

Some quick intense jump-rope and active stretching, then onto the workout. I grabbed a dumbbell to anchor my feet on the sit-ups, my AbMat for its first WoD use, and set myself up under the ever multi-tasking Smith machine (for the jumping chest-to-bar pullups, a scaling borrowed from the fine folks over at CrossFit Garden City). Then, viking metal cranking, I started knocking out sets of 10 of each exercise.  One other change (not reflected above) was that I did each exercise in the wrong order, having written down the workout from memory.  Rather than pull-ups, followed by push-ups, sit-ups and finally squats, I did them as followed: 10 squats, 10 push-ups, 10 jumping c2b pull-ups, 10 sit-ups, with the driving factor being not doing the squats the jumping c2bs back to back.

Two rounds in, I just wanted to die. Two rounds later, I knew I was going to die. In the fifth round, I started having to stop occasionally to let my stomach settle, since lunch was still floating around and starting to make itself known.  I didn't want to meet Pukie the Clown until it was because of my awesome intensity, not just my bad scheduling.

So, with some pasta and sausage and chicken with red sauce making its way around my guts, I continued working through sets.  By the time I hit the 7th set, I had to break up the sit-ups and push-ups.  Jumping pull-ups had already started being broken up in the 4th or 5th rounds, but really only because my form was starting to fall apart, especially on the negatives and landings. Better to take a breath and keep from re-tweaking my knees doing pull-ups (just TRY explaining that one to someone).

By the end of the 8th set, I was pretty much done. Had I pushed through the final 20 reps of each exercise, I certainly would have ended up booting, and probably still not completed the full workout. However, I also misread/misremembered the recommended scaling from CF GC, and thought that they wanted you to shoot for between 15-20 minutes for the workout, scaled as necessary. I finished round 8 at 19 minutes even, and figured that was perfect.  Having just reread their workout, it actually reads that we should have been shooting for 20-25 minutes... ie, I was right on track, or at least could have fit in one more round, if not both.

This highlights an unfortunate reality I failed to take into account when tackling this workout: if you don't plan ahead for what you want to accomplish specifically, you will end up doing less every time. At least, I will. Granted, CF GC's scaling recommended doing maybe 50-75 reps of each exercise to stay within the timeframe, so I did MORE than that... but in terms of the overall time period, I actually ended up cutting it short. Lesson learned, the hard way.

Music for the workout:
Amon Amarth - With Oden on Our Side - 2006
Valhalla Awaits Me - Live at Summerbreeze 2007

Runes to My Memory - official video

Asator
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03mNIlsSbW0 (Embedding disabled by request, so I'm sure you won't follow the link. Heh.  Lord the Rings footage set to Amon Amarth. Love it!!
Hermod's Ride to Hel - Loke's Treachery Part 1

Gods of War Arise (Call of Duty games used as footage = awesome!)

With Oden on Our Side

Cry of the Black Birds