12-03-03: CrossFit Open WoD 12.2: Too Many Snatches

CrossFit Open WoD 12.2: Too Many Snatches

Camille Leblanc-Bazinet snatches with a full depth squat (ie, awesome) (or overhead squats... stupid still frame... and stupid me for not bothering to do any research into that question.) CrossFit Games

Dave Lipson and Josh Everett go head to head, 30 snatches for time at 135#.  in a little workout called 'Isabel.' See below for how such workouts are viewed OUTSIDE the CrossFit community. And from within it. Still, very impressive feats!

That's more weight than I can deadlift. Seriously.

Note the speed on the bar in the second frame, and the depth of the squat in the third. Both things I need to work on.

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As many reps as possible in 10 minutes, following the sequence:

• 75# Snatch, 30 reps
• 135# Snatch, 30 reps
• 165# Snatch, 30 reps
• 210# Snatch, as many reps as possible

OK. If there's one thing Olympic lifters have good cause to grouse about with CrossFit, its the use of those Olympic lifts in workouts that guarantee that form breakdown will be real, and the cost could be severe. Its nice to see HQ putting absolutely NO stock in those reservations, and actually creating a workout that highlights that issue. Sweet.

Going into this workout, my plan was to hit between 30 and 60 reps, with the stretch goal of getting into the 60s. Why those ranges? Well, my one rep max on a strict snatch (with a full depth squat at the catch overhead) is only 125#, so right off the bat, those 135# reps were going to be near my capacity (I can power and muscle snatch way more than I can squat snatch right now, something I hope to reverse as my skill and experience with the full lift increase). So, I knew that 30 reps of a weight that I consider to be "really heavy" were not going to go quickly or easily. I did want an attempt or two at the next weight up (165#), but also knew that making those attempts while completely gassed from the previous 60 reps was going to be iffy.  Turns out I didn't even need to worry.

The first set at 75# was nice and easy, and pretty quick. Though I think I could have kept all thirty reps unbroken, I opted to stop for a breath after 20. I didn't want to charge so hard through the "easy" reps that I gassed myself out too early. After banging out another quick 10 reps, it was time to change weights, pulling off the 25# plates and putting on 45# in their place. Suddenly, it was a whole new workout. I was no longer able to just fling the weight up and stand up under it as it kept going up. Now the bar was stopping a lot lower, and though I was still not doing ANY sort of job squatting under it (aka "using "proper" technique"), I had to work a LOT harder to get control of the bar.
ECC CrossFit Open WOD 12.2_Athletes from Larry Jones on Vimeo.

I'm the guy in the bandanna who starts out to the far right. As should be abundantly clear, my technique by that point in the day was utter garbage. I can only imagine the number of burpees Coach Burgener would assign if he was there for that pile of crap. That said, I was way outside of my comfort zone, gassed, and just willing the bar overhead by that point. All told, I did as well as I thought I would, I hit my goal, and that's all I can ask for. If I were more comfortable working while exhausted (a key ability in the CrossFit Games), I could have nailed a few more reps, but as it was, I was taking the time I needed to feel that I would be safe under the bar, and more, that the people around me would be safe. Having watching one nearly disastrous bar dump from almost-overhead in an earlier heat, I was keenly aware of my shortcomings in the snatch, and didn't really feel like having those issues injure me or anyone else. By the final minute, I was done. I made three failed attempts, with the first two stopping more or less at the top of the deadlift position, arms extended, legs extended... no way to raise the weight at all. I was just too tired to transition from the yellow light, slow, deadlifty part of the movement into the green light, GO!, explosion part that drives the weight overhead. After taking about 10-15 seconds to really recover, I tried to get to 50 reps, and got the bar to about face height, but again, just couldn't manage to get *under* it. Time expired, and I was at 49 reps, exactly where I planned to be. Not too shabby!

Weight	Reps
75#	30
135#	19
165#	0
210#	0
Total Reps	49

11-12-21: Power snatches, kettlebell swings, jerks and squats

Elm City CrossFit WoD for Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Power snatches. The first few reps of Grace usually look pretty good, then its pretty much train-wreck time after that. Still, watching Dave Lipson and Josh Everett bang through it is pretty impressive. (crossfit.com)

Kettlebell swings. American-style go up over the head, rather than just shoulder-height. (CrossFit CFT)

I don't need this or this. Just this ashtray... And this paddle game. - The ashtray and the paddle game and that's all I need... And this remote control. - The ashtray, the paddle game, and the remote control, and that's all I need... And these matches. - The ashtray, and these matches, and the remote control, and the paddle ball... And this lamp. - The ashtray, this paddle game, and the remote control, and the lamp, and that's all *I* need. And that's *all* I need too. I don't need one other thing, not one... I need this. - The paddle game and the chair, and the remote control, and the matches for sure. Well what are you looking at? What do you think I'm some kind of a jerk or something! - And this. That's all I need.

Back squat to acceptable depth: Hip crease below the tops of the knees. Note the back arch protecting the spine from the load. The nerd in me wants to know what the different colors mean as far as weights. (Crossfit Multikeo)

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WoD: For Time

• 9-15-11
  
  • Power Snatch @ ¾ BW
  • Kettlebell Swings
• ~5 min Rec~
• 11-15-9
  
  • Jerk
  • Back Squat

Scheduling fail: I didn't make it to the gym today... but I was pretty proud of the work I already did on this the night before. Having seen the tail end of the final class of the day making their way through this... holy crapnuts. I think I need to hit this one on a make-up/amnesty day. Jeebus.

(And seriously, tell me the Jerk reference isn't classic, if completely out of place. SOPA or whatever the hell the internet censorship law is will destroy me AND this sorry excuse for a blog...)

11-10-28: Handstand Push-Ups and Power Snatches

Elm City CrossFit WoD for Friday, October 28th, 2011

Where was THIS a year or so ago? Big thanks to the fine men and women at CrossFit Camp Dubs: Forging Elite Warriors in the Mountains of Afghanistan.

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WoD: 10 Rounds or 25m AMRAP

• 10 Handstand Push-Ups- Band-assist
• 3 Power Snatches 155# 115#

Well, it was bound to happen. After feeling pretty good setting new strength PRs over the last few weeks, I needed the amazing ability of CrossFit to suddenly and abruptly keep my ego in check. Yup, a lengthy couplet chock-full of two movements I sort of suck at...I used to think I was ok at power snatches, at least prior to starting at Elm City. Now I've had the chance to be coached and had my technique looked at by someone else, and have a much better grasp on all the things I need to work on. They are legion.

Handstand push-ups have recently become near impossible again, since I graduated to doing them with assistance bands from the pull-up bar. Hell, its not even the HSPU's themselves... its getting myself kicked up into the correct position in the first freaking place. Well, I got a bit of practice today, that's for damn sure.

Today was a lovely workout, where there were only two of us (my assumption is that everyone else was saving themselves for tomorrow's Barbells for Boobs sponsored "Grace" (30 Clean & Jerks for time) being hosted locally at CrossFit New Haven.) which led to LOTS of personalized training and feedback. We blew through the first round in 90 seconds, and set that as the pace we should maintain. Sounded good on paper. Round two took quite a bit longer, and after that all bets were pretty much off. The second or third round, I could barely kick up into the bands. My power snatch form was unsteady throughout, which was VERY frustrating.

When we started the workout, there was no 25 minute cap, and no AMRAP element, just the goal of ten rounds, to ensure a proper focus on form, especially on the snatches, where a workout like "Grace" will tend to devastate form, leading those in the real Olympic community to hate CrossFit. Rightfully so. In musical terms (you did see the banner at the top of the blog, right?), its the equivalent of someone trying to play a Charlie Parker solo by wiggling their fingers as fast as they can go. Sure, they played a lot of notes, but chances are NONE of them were right, and it didn't sound *anything* like Bird. So, the goal was to avoid that, and where necessary, time was taken to stop and coach the power snatch.

My eye opener came when Coach Vin shot a video of one of my reps. Mid workout, he had me stop to watch. I'll be damned. The amount of crap I do wrong is frackin' JAW-DROPPING. Most heinous, I do the stripper move. Despite focusing on the start of the lift being a deadlift, apparently the sheer terror of what follows after the deadlift portion makes me completely crap the bed. The first thing to move up is my ass, like I'm sliding it up a stripper pole. (I wonder how many hits that phrase is gonna give me from Google searches...)

At some point, we were asked where we were in the workout. Kara had stormed into her 8th round, moving like a champ. I gasped out that I had just finished my fifth round. Next thing I knew, Vin had written the slight variation of "25m AMRAP" on the whiteboard. Again, form shouldn't suffer, but he apparently didn't want my corpse screwing everything up for the next class coming in at 6:30am. I continued trying to to work on my power snatch form as well as I could, and was finding somewhat more luck with the band-assist HSPUs. By the time the timer was up, I had amassed 7 full rounds and 4 HSPUs. Not bad, since I seriously thought I was going to pass out just about every time I came down from the HSPUs and in between power snatches after about the third round. That can be the one HUGE problem with working out first thing in the morning on an empty stomach. No gas in the tank can mean just exactly that.

11-09-21: Snatches and skill work

Elm City CrossFit WoD for Wednesday, September 21st, 2011

Definitely click through to the original webpage to Enolympiate this picture. The weight starts on the floor, gets deadlifted to just above the knee, then the hips, knees and ankles all open up as forcefully as possible, launching the bar, rendering it weightless for the split second it takes to get under it, catch it, and stand up with it. Sounds really easy, right? (Wayne Joseph's Blog)

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Max: Snatch - 20min total time
 -squat or power
Sellout: Skill Work

-band-assist hand-stand push-ups

Ah, the Olympic Lifts. They look so graceful when done well, and so amazingly awful when not. I tend to fall into the second category, because I'm usually way too inside my own head, thinking way too much at each step of the movement. And if you're thinking early (bar against the body, slow, yellow light, against the body, cleared the knee, green light, speed up, go go go, whip it up, shrug to redirect, elbows high and outside, snap the feet out to the receiving position, bar close to the body, pull your head out of the way, drop drop drop you ass, get under the bar, about to catch the weight, how does my wrist feel, going to take the weight, am I balanced, are my feet in the right position, am I deep enough, is the bar over the center of balance, can I help it if its not, omigod omigod omigod omigod.... etc etc etc.)  I have to imagine that, with much more practice and comfort, at least 2/3rds of that running monologue can be eliminated, or at least silenced! Some of it is good, especially the pointers and cues that lead to perfect lifts. However, the questions and fears are no good, and need to be silenced.

After a good technique demo with weighted pvc pipes, we moved onto our bars. After a few power snatches with the empty bar (minimal squat depth on the catch), I started working up in weight. 65#, no real issues, though still not feeling overly comfortable. 95#, no real issues. 115#, same. 135#, and I was struggling to continue just power snatching the bar, but I just could NOT get my ass moving back down under the bar. I spent some time watching other Elm City athletes hitting it, trying to figure out if my road block was mental or physical or what. I actually didn't ever solve the question during this workout. I did manage to successfully snatch the 135#, but I need to check to see if that's a PR or not. It might not be, though its probably the best lift with the best form I've had, even if there is room for tons of improvement.

After the fact, I ended up watching the olympic lifting video Elm City posted on the workout page (first link at the top of this posting), and I remembered that I used to watch a TON of videos BEFORE attempting workouts, with more of the techniques and approaches visually imprinted on my brain. That always seems to help... I may not be able to put into words exactly what I'm seeing, but I can tell if I'm replicating it or not. I may also not be able to explain HOW I'm not doing it the same, but the overall knowledge and awareness is there. Lesson learned: I need to do my homework BEFORE working out from now on.

Heaviest power snatch: 135#

Skill work: More band-assist hand-stand push-ups. One of my goals is to get more comfortable inverted. Kicking up into the handstand is still vaguely terrifying to me, so I'm hoping that through sheer repetition, it becomes both mundane and boring. I may suck at running, but it doesn't actually scare me. I want being in a handstand, whether band-assisted, wall-assisted, or free-standing, to feel equally "boring." 

11-09-02: Overhead squats

Elm City CrossFit WoD for Friday, September 2, 2011

The overhead squat. This is pretty much the make-or-break squat movement. Ability here will translate directly into snatch performance (in all of its variations), and problems here will manifest themselves clearly, as well. (crossfit.com)

Power snatch . While this move doesn't require the deep squat of a regular snatch, there should be at least some leg bend to cushion and control the catch. There should be a fairly smooth transition from power to regular (aka 'squat snatch,' for people who don't realize that's redundant) snatches, with the ability to catch the bar at any given height. (crossfitfortmyers.com)

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Strength: 3 x 8

• Overhead Squat @ 75%

WoD: 4min AMRAP

• 5 Power Snatch
• 2 Overhead squats

Still struggling with my manky wrist/forearm issues, this workout was a miserable chore. Worked with 65#, but even that was killing my right forearm, in terms of muscle tightness and resulting wrist pains. Total suckage. I ended up also struggling with my knees tracking in as I reached the bottom of the squat, but I honestly think I was just so distracted by my arm that I just couldn't give the rest of my body the attention it needs in what is still an advanced movement for me.

The WoD was ok, if only because there were just fewer overhead squats to worry about. The power snatches were easy enough at that weight, so they weren't much of an issue. 

Total rounds: 5-6? (I forget, will check my book)

10-06-07: "Randy"

CrossFit WoD for Thursday, June 3rd, 2010

"Randy"

75 pound Power snatch, 75 reps for time.

Broken up into rounds sets of 15 reps, taking minimal rest times, managed to kind of storm through this.  75# is thankfully pretty light for me, so form didn't need to be perfect (I noticed as the reps stacked up that my form at the start of the first pull was deteriorating, with my back losing its nice, tight arch. However, for yanking 75# off the floor, it wasn't that big a deal... for now. Definitely need to eradicate that habit in the long view.

Started with 7 minute warm-up on the exercise bike, followed by active stretching.

Total time for WoD: 6:40. 

11-07-25: Power snatch, reverse lunge, push jerk triplet

Elm City Crossfit WoD for July 25th, 2011

Spencer Hendel makes at least 185# look easy. If those are 35# on the ends, its 205#. If there are smaller plates on there, its even more. Bastage. (crossfit.com)

WOD: 2x 6min AMRAP

• 2 Power Snatches 95# 85#
  
• 2 Overhead Reverse Lunge (or high-bar backsquat position) - each leg
  
• 2 Overhead Squat (or push-jerk from the back of the neck position)
  

1min Rest @ 6min mark

Total score: 11 rounds even.

Way more time spent staring at the bar, trying to make the spots in front of my eyes go away, than I care to admit. First two rounds were as Rx'ed, until I failed on the final overhead squat. After that, I switched to the high-bar back-squat position for the lunges and replaced the overhead squats with push jerks.  All in all, a smoker of a workout. Full body devastation, baby!

11-01-25: Hang snatches and running

CrossFit Garden City WoD for Thursday, January 20th, 2011
Warmup:
Burgener Warmup (PVC)
 - 3 sets of 3 reps of the following:

• Down, Up, Shrug
• Down, Up, High Pull
• Muscle Snatch
• Snatch Drops
• Hang Snatch

Skill: Hang Snatch
Spend 15 minutes practicing with PVC, Training Bar, Barbell, or lightly loaded barbell. Focus on jumping and landing in deepest squat position while maintaining position/stability in receiving position.


Training:

4 rounds:

• 400 meter run
• 12 Hang Snatches (95, 65) 45#

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Shows the basic motion a bit after the start (the bar starts at mid-thigh, drops bit as you unlock your hips, then rises up to the position in the first picture as you re-open your hips to start driving the bar up.)  See that final pic, with the beautiful deep squat? Turns out that's RELLY f'ing hard. Seriously.

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One thing CrossFitters try to be honest about is their "goats."  Simply put, "What do you suck at?"  For me, its definitely the olympic lifts and their variations. As well as several other skills. That's an inevitable outcome of doing this on my own, without coaching. Most of the skill-based movements NEED an outside set of eyes watching form and function... no matter how many mirrors there are, you can't watch your own back.

Another goat is the olympic rings, which is why I've been working them so hard lately. After warming up, I hopped on the rings, and starting working on my ring dips, getting as far as a triple! I love seeing progress... I may not be very far along yet, but that means each achievement looks HYOOOGE! Going from 10 to 11 won't feel nearly as awesome, I bet.  I also tried a few L-Sits.

I don't think I've ever done ANYTHING that lit up my abs as fast as this did. Planche holds take a good 5-10 seconds to let you know how much they can suck. This was nearly instantaneous. (crossfitla.com)

Boy, these suck!

After several runs through the Burgener Warm-Up, I started experimenting on running it with increased weights. So far so good, so I transitioned into the skill practice on the full Hang Snatch. Once I started including the squat landing, I discovered an inability to keep my final stance from being too wide, with toes splayed too far out. In that position, trying to catch the bar in a full squat position would inevitably cause my balance to shift forward, causing my knees to cave in. While this didn't keep me from completing the lift, I could tell right away that this was putting an insane amount of stress on my knees. Not what I want to feel.  Ever. I practiced keeping my feet closer in, in what I consider to be my overhead squat stance, which *ideally* (i think) is identical to the catch position for the snatch (notes on snatch technique here, courtesy the fine folks at CrossFit New England). I had at best mixed results. Plus, when I focused too much on my footwork, my control of the bar path went straight to crap. Like I said, a coach would have been a wonderful thing. I tried a few with 85# on the bar, but had even more wide-stance/knee torque issues, so I decided to keep it light.  PVD would have been ideal, but I opted for the empty bar (35#), which is the lightest thing we have. Speaking of, I finally remembered to take a video of the gym:

As you can see, its not great, but I could certainly be doing a lot worse, especially for free. However, when we get our way, most of the machines are going to be on Craigslist, and we're going to have a lot more room for power racks and pull-up bars and actual barbells. Woohoo! If they give us the budget... sigh.

At the end of the 15 minutes, as I was starting to feel a little better about my hang snatch footwork, I got the treadmill up and running, and got ready to hit the Training portion of the workout. I honestly can't remember the last time I did any running, which is ALWAYS a good sign that its probably going to hurt. I was happily surprised in some ways.  I managed to do each of the 400m runs unbroken (usually by the 3rd or 4th, I completely gas out halfway through) AND I upped the speed for each one. At least that way I was suffering for slightly less time... not that it ever really felt it.

After the run, I made my way to the bar and knocked out 12 hang snatches of various quality. Some seemed perfect, including a nice squat depth and everything. Some had the worst of the foot-placement issues leading to the worst of the knee torques. Second round of running and hang snatches felt much the same.

For the third round, after the run, I was feeling a little gun shy, which manifested in two hang power snatches in a row (no squat motion at all).  I ended up finishing out the set that way, but it kinda bugged me. I was missing something (not just the squat.) There was a way to scale this, I knew it....

Final run, fastest speed yet.  Lungs of fire. Legs of jelly. Back to the bar. Standing over it, I came to a decision: since my form was so shaky as to be unusable, this wasn't exactly a well-performed WoD for time anymore. So I could change it up a little to get in the work I clearly needed. A solution presented itself: Hang power snatch, followed by an overhead squat. Just break the motion into the two constituent movements, and give each the attention it needed. I toyed with doing all twelve of one, then the other, but decided to keep them together. That way, each squat would depend on the foot position from the power snatch, keeping that part of it intact. Otherwise, I could just find a single good foot position, bang out twelve overhead squats without having to worry about it, and gotten no skill practice at all!

Overall, I felt good about the run (though I have calves of concrete today), but it was the snatches that really threw me off. Today, my knees are aching... so not good. More work, and hopefully some good coaching in the near future. I mean, it literally can NOT hurt, from where I am right now! ;)

10-12-09: Power Snatches, Wall-balls, K2Es

CrossFit WoD for Monday December 6, 2010

21-18-15-12-9 rep rounds of:

• 115# (105# for the final 10 reps) Power snatch
• Wallball shots, 20# ball
• Knees to elbows (new favorite CrossFit vid... not sure how I never saw that one before!)

Crystal McReynolds 14:01 (75lbs, 14lb ball), Austin Malleolo 14:05, Carey Kepler 14:08 (75lbs, 14lb ball), JC Nessa 15:24, Kevin Montoya15:34, Mat Frankel 16:24, Lance Cantu 17:11, Heather Bergeron18:55 (85lbs, 16lb ball), Stacey Kroon 19:23 (85lbs, 16lb ball),Kristan Clever 19:47 (85lbs, 16lb ball), Laurie Galassi 19:48 (78lbs, 14lb ball), Mel Ockerby 19:49 (85lbs, 14lb ball).

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WOD Demo at CrossFit Santa Cruz - video [wmv] [mov]
Austin Malleolo on today's WOD - video [wmv] [mov]
CrossFit New England on today's WOD - video [wmv] [mov]

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Natalie Burgener Woolfolk preps for a snatch attempt. And since her dad is Coach B, she'll probably hit it, too. (crossfitfootball.com)

Wall-balls. Depth of squat is important, hence the med ball as a guide. The target is another 3-4' above his hands, so that ball better be booking.  Best way to do that? Drive with the hips, baby. (crossfit.com)

Variations on the theme. Left is as prescribed, center is harder, right is easier. The amount of muscles this hits is hard to overstate.  Probably your toes don't get a good workout... probably. (crossfit.com)

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This was my last workout prior to (hopefully) getting my CrossFit Level 1 certification this weekend, and being all allowed to train others and stuff.  As such, I wanted it to be an ass-kicking that I would totally own. Instead, I got totally pwned by it.  Ah well, it happens.

First mistake: No scaling on the weight on the power snatch.  Now, I can power snatch 115# pretty easily, even with my probably craptastic form. However, that doesn't take into account the necessity of doing so 75 times during the course of the workout. Crap, it barely took into account doing it 21 times in a row to start this thing out!  Basically, this should have been 95# or even 85# for me to stand a chance... Did the first set, broken into about 4 sets. I think there were 10 unbroken, but I could have just been delirious and dreaming. After that, headed over to the wallball station.

UNBROKEN. I love wallballs. Probably means my med-ball is too light (the heaviest one lost its cover or something, so you can't tell how heavy it is), or I'm not throwing them high enough.  That said, its pretty heavy, and I throw it between 10-12' feet up on the wall. So, maybe the weight is low, but the height is enough, and I LOVE WALL-BALLS.  Especially now that I got rid of the chairs I was using to gauge the low end of the squat, and just started squatting as low as I can go.  Definitely lower than with the chair.

Knee-to-elbows.  In the picture caption, I mentioned that every muscle in the body gets worked, right?  Well, it turns out that 21 power snatches and 21 wall-balls have pretty much already annihilated lots of muscles, so the fact that this targets those and more makes them an evil addition to this triplet from hell. I think I got 12 unbroken, and from then on, I think 5 was my max at a time.  Given where I do them (frame of a 7' tall Smith machine) theres not really room to fully extend at the bottom. I did what I could for most of the first round, but found myself touching down with my feet after awhile, but I made damn sure I wasn't jumping up into the top position the whole way through, so while not ideal, it wasn't as bad as it could have been.

Round two was just a grueling slog through a ton of short mini-sets on each exercise... except for wall-ball! Stormed through 18 of those like I was just starting out.  My lungs nearly exploded when I was done, but hey, whatever.

Third round was even uglier. I mean ugly.  Basically, it nearly didn't happen, but I decided I had to at least begin to finish what I had started. Snatches were by now just ugly variations on a theme, though dropping 10# helped substantially, the wall-balls were awesome, and I could barely grip the bar to do the K2Es. By the time I finished the 3rd round, I was already at the 30 minute mark. I had to cut it there, since I workout at work, and taking another 30 minutes to finish the last two rounds probably wouldn't go over well with the people in charge. ;)

So, 30 minutes in, I gave myself a DNF. Final workout before certification. The ego has officially taken a beating.  Which is probably good, since I can't imagine walking into a CrossFit certification thinking I'm a big bad-ass would work out so well. Now I can just be polite, and learn a crap-ton of information! Woo

10-06-07: "Randy"

CrossFit WoD for Thursday, June 3rd, 2010

"Randy"

75 pound Power snatch, 75 reps for time.

Broken up into rounds sets of 15 reps, taking minimal rest times, managed to kind of storm through this.  75# is thankfully pretty light for me, so form didn't need to be perfect (I noticed as the reps stacked up that my form at the start of the first pull was deteriorating, with my back losing its nice, tight arch. However, for yanking 75# off the floor, it wasn't that big a deal... for now. Definitely need to eradicate that habit in the long view.

Started with 7 minute warm-up on the exercise bike, followed by active 
stretching.

Total time for WoD: 6:40.