Thursday December 29th

SWOD- Snatch Complex
1 Snatch Grip DL
1 Power Snatch
1 Squat Snatch
2 OHS

7 times, work up as heavy as possible.

Cash Out - Tabata Burpees

Didn't really have it today.. This was my 4th day in a row but I wanted to try this complex because its effectively what I would have programmed for myself last week on goat day.. I knew I would be entirely limited by whether or not my squat snatch was working today.. which it was not.. just was not hitting my balance point at the bottom and receiving the bar overhead properly.

I hit 65,75,85 easily just to get loose.. Got 95 then 105.. tried to get 115 multiple times and just kept fucking up.. I got frustrated eventually, just was not there today..

Tabata burpees were fun though.. got 70 burpees in the 8 rounds..

Need to rest tomorrow and work some shoulder mobility.. that was the limiting thing today.. my shoulders never felt like they were sticking overhead, always was coming forward, even on the light overhead squats. Blerg.

Wednesday December 28th

WOD - Afro Pick
Row 300m
10-8-6-4-2 Pull up
2-4-6-8-10 T2B
Row 300m

Time - 6:31 Rx

I enjoyed this workout except for the last set of 10 T2B.. I had done everything to that point with very few breaks (all unbroken pull ups) and had a nice time going.. but the last set of 10 I basically did all singles which was shitty and ruined any score I had going. The sandwiched rows were a nice way to get the heart rate and intensity going at the end because 300 is just enough that you can sprint the whole thing, but long enough that it sucks when its over..

Need to start working out with the FCFers again soon, been lone-wolfing it too much this week while I have been coaching 'round the clock and I can definitely feel that intensity dropping off a cliff. I am much more inclined to "just finish and get it over with" when I am by myself, whereas if there is anyone else in the room, I try to win and ignore if I need a big rest or not.

Tuesday December 27th

WOD- Ladderbeth
1 Squat Clean 135#, 1 Ring Dip
2 SqC, 2 RD.. etc..
10 minute running clock, climb the ladder as high as possible.

Score- 8 Rounds, 5 squat cleans..

I completely went through the motions on this one without any great intensity. I was trying to just barely squeeze it in before the 6PM class and get some squat clean work in.. since they suck..

I definitely had more, just rest too much on the big sets (7,8,9) on the SqCs.. Oh well..
This style workout is funny because I almost hadn't even broken a sweet on round 4.. but then by round 6 I was about to die.. happens really really quickly on ladders..

Monday December 26th

Knee has been weird the last couple days so I am staying away from squatting and Deadlifts.

Made this up even though the Mike & Ike WOD looked really fun.. Oh well..

5 Rounds
15 Pull Ups
30 Double Unders
7 Press @ 105#


Time - 11 something ( I need to get better at remembering times this week, I am totally falling off the wagon when I work out alone)

Toughest part was by far the presses once they got heavy.. Its hard to "will" the weight up there once you have gassed out the triceps at all.. Something to work on..
Volume Presses and ring dips and push ups are definitely going to be part of my new years regimen.. Those are things that I am good at to a point, but once they "go".. they are gonezo.. I want to increase my work capacity will all the overhead arms stuff..

Sunday December 25th CHRISTMAS

Christmas rest day..

Presents, candy, family craziness.. you know how it goes..

Ready for a fun week.. and happy the NBA finally started up again today.

Saturday Christmas Eve

WOD- 12 Days of CrossFit
1 HSPU
2 Front Squats 115
3 Burpees
4 Pull Ups
5 KB Swings
6 Push Press
7 K2E
8 Squats
9 Wall Balls
10 Box Jumps 24"
11 Cal Row
12 KB Snatch

25 minutes and change..

Fun WOD.. Saw the whole 9 am class do it and had to give it a shot.. too fun to pass up..

Worst part was the push press.. the rest I was able to do pretty much without trouble.. and I guess the left hand KB Snatches sucked too..

Friday December 23rd

WOD- "The Outlaw Torn"

5 RFT

10 SDLHP 95

10 Box Jumps 24"

10 Power Snatch

1 Rope Climb

Time: 12- something

I forget the seconds.. sue me.

I really wish I had done this with a group.. this sucked ass by myself.. yuck..
Power snatches proved to be the most tiring part by far.. the rest was manageable for the most part.. The rope climbs were sort of just an EFF YOU at the end of every round.. arms got pretty fatigued by the end..
Overall cool WOD.. good barbell and engine mix..

Thursday December 22nd

Rest day

Today was one of those days where I kept trying to talk myself into getting a WOD in.. and never really felt good enough to bother.
Ended up just coaching the evening classes instead and watching everyone rock their Goats was good enough for me.

Wednesday December 21st

Resting like whoa..

I feel like garbage today (not in a sick way, in a "not a chance on God's earth I am working out today" way)..

Everything is sore.. I think my nose, ears and teeth are the only body parts that do not hurt right now..

Tuesday December 20th

WOD - 2x 500m row, 2x 400m sprint

Results:
Row 1: 1:29.5 PR
Run 1: 1:13
Run 2: 1:17
Row 2: 1:37

I'll be honest.. I went for broke on the first row and left pretty much nada in the tank for the rest of the session.. That was my first time ever breaking the 1:30 barrier on a 500 so I was really excited.. literally fell off the rower afterward.. Friggin awesome..

My best 400m run previously is 1:00 flat back in the summer time, so clearly I was hot-dogging it today.. I mean, I tried, but there was just not a whole lot happening with the lungs and legs.. maybe those 330 air squats last night tired me out or something.. who knows..

Definite rest day tomorrow, I feel like trash.

Monday December 19th

SWOD - Power clean.. work up to a heavy single in 15 min..

I sort of rushed this a bit I'll admit.. I was hoping to get near a PR but it was not in the cards today..
I did 135 for reps, then hit 155, 185, 205, 225..

Missed on the 225 twice between finally getting it.. My form was kinda meh on it.. I wasn't squatting under it quick enough..

WOD- "Cindy"

AMRAP 20

5 Pull Ups

10 Push Ups

15 Squats

Score - 22 Rounds + 5 PLU

I was really happy about this.. last time I did this WOD I was about 5 lbs lighter (summer time heat, super strict Paleo for like a month, I was skinny as shit).. and I got 21 Rounds + 5 PLU.. so I was able to add a whole extra round in there which was great.. Push ups still were the limiting factor, I can do pull ups in sets of 5 and air squats all day til April, but the push ups felt pretty good considering I have not been incorporating them into my training very much recently.. I still want to do more of them though..

Something as simple as "do 40 push ups before you hop in the shower" would be really easy to implement just to get some reps in every day.. maybe I'll do that.

Sunday December 18th

WOD- Tabata Annie

50-40-30-20-10 - Double Unders & Sit ups in Tabata style clock.. 20 seconds to get as far as you can, then 10 sec rest, keep going until you are done with the 150 reps of each..

I did not keep track of rounds to be honest.. I just lost count switching around.. shit happens..

My first set I did 48 DUs in 20 seconds with is lightning fast.. That's on pace for like 250+ in 2 minutes.. usually 200 is the gold standard for that..


Mini - SWOD
Afterward I worked on Squat Snatches for a while, still struggle with these mightily.. Shoulder mobility work is a must after messing around with these for a while.. I need to find that "slot" where the bar feels comfy overhead and I can stare straight ahead, not straight down..
Once these get over like 125 lbs, it becomes a major struggle for me.. because it is all form and balance, not really brute strength at all.. frustrating.. but fun to practice..

Saturday December 17th

Rest day..

Friday December 16th

WOD - 4 Rounds:
2 minute running clock... 200m row.. then max rep Kettlebell Swings in remaining time..
Total- 125

Quickie update.. this was a good mental WOD.. I felt great in the first 2 rounds and my grip sort of went to shit in the last two rounds..
I went with 40, 29, 29, 27 reps.. the last two I almost let go of the damn thing.. Rowing felt really solid though.. 200 is not a distance I usually struggle with.. its like.. 20 pulls with pace..

Thursday December 15th

WOD- "The Filthy Fifty"

50 Reps each of:

Box Jumps 24"

Jumping Pull ups

KB Swings 1 pood

Walking Lunges

K2E

Push Press

Back Extensions

Wall Balls

Burpees

Double Unders

So after tightening up last night and feeling shitty I woke up and felt worse, I knew I was not lifting anything heavy today or going full depth on any squats with any success..

I coached the morning classes and ended up feeling a smidge better by 9 am and decided to hop in with that class and see how the warm up went.. I really was not entirely into it even from the beginning.. My head was just blah..

I gutted through the stuff that I am good at.. got stuck on the K2E for a long while.. cranked through a few more.. got to the burpees and totally gassed out.. I legit did 10 burpees and just wanted to walk off the floor.. I should have finished around 20 minutes or 21 minutes, but ended up with 23:33 all said and done..

This is technically a PR but I know I can do a lot better on this if I went really hard from the beginning and was in a met-con mood..

Wednesday December 14th

SWOD- Floor Press 3x3

Hopped right into these after a solid warm up.. hoping to do squats afterward..
I warmed up with sets at 135, 155, 175 to get loose and then my working sets were:
185, 200, 210.. Last rep on the 210 was a little iffy, I had some of the leg kick desperate flailing happening.. but this was technically the most I have put up for a 3 set.. pretty happy about this..

I ended up running out of time to squat before classes, so I thought I would do it afterward without issue..
I had warmed up beforehand and something about standing on my feet for 2 hours coaching afterward totally ruined my legs, they tightened up soooo much..

I foam rolled and did exactly 1 rep at 135 and felt my knee tighten up at the bottom and just said "nope, not happening today".. went right now..

Need to get something heavy in this week though for the posterior chain.. maybe deadlifts on Friday.. hmm..

Tuesday December 13th

Resting like whoa..


These bad boys come out tomorrow.. they shall be mine..

Monday December 12th

SWOD - Farmers Walk x3 (as heavy as you can)
I had done this a LONG time ago with BW in my hands (1/2 BW per dumbbell) and did respectably well with it.
I did one with 90's in each hand and got 4 room lengths + 20 yard (calling each room length ~30 yards it was about 140 yards).. Not too shabby, a football field and a half..
I upped it to 100's in each hand to try that out and got 3 lengths + 20 yards, about 100+ yards total.. I was happy with this..

I want to implement some more weighted carries into my training, they are good for brute strength and mental toughness.. The body is basically broken down into 5 "work mechanisms" it can perform.. Squat, Press, Pull, Hinge, and Weighted carry.. We beat the bag out of the first 4 in CrossFit, but don't do enough of the last.. Mental note taken..

WOD - "Nancy"

5 RFT

400m Run

15 OHS 95#

Time 15:53 Rx'd

BARF. I hated every second of this. Good GOAT WOD for me. High rep OHS and running is a magical potion of awfulness.. I am unsure if every single rep of my OHS would have counted, some of the depths were questionable, but my legs were so smoked at the end and I stopped focusing as much on depth as much as I had to just on my stability to stay upright, just wanted to keep going forward..
If you asked me to do 75 OHS with 95# a year ago I may have gotten through 20 without crying.. I consider this an accomplishment as much as this is a challenge for me.
Still plenty of work to do.

Weekend December 9-11

Friday - Rest Day.. needed it..

Saturday - Weighted Vest Run.. went for about 2 miles at a good clip.. I only have to stop once every little bit (usually at stop lights and such to stretch my lower back.. it gets super tight with the extra pounds on)

Sunday-
WOD
AMRAP 12
5 Deadlift 225#
25 DUs
5 Press 100# (strict as long as possible)

I got 8 or 9 rounds, I forget and lost count.. I had like 4 rounds and change in 6 minutes, so it was either 8 or 9..
I did not have to push press until the last 2 rounds, the others I was able to knock out strict..
Deadlifts felt great, very easy.. definitely improving here after a brief lapse in deadlifting.. Good times..

Thursday December 8th

I went over to CCF in Cambridge tonight to visit Khaki and hit a WOD. I was excited to go because this group had just moved from the basement of a church into a real facility and I have not worked out with new people in a while, always fun to mix things up to get out of your comfort zone.

SWOD - Back Squat 3x3

I have been squatting a lot this week.. front squats, wall balls, etc.. but I figured one more day with this short rep scheme would not hurt me. Fortunately I was correct.. We warmed up and stretched out really well and I was ready to try to move some actual weights around today.
I loosened up with 135 and 185 for reps and then did 205x3, 215x3, 225x3. This is the most weight I have squatted in legitimately 5 months, so I was pretty stoked.. (Even though this used to be my warm up weight, sigh).. Also, the kid I was partnered with was doing 300x3 for his last set which caused my wang to shrink about 2 inches instead of being able to bask in my achievement..

Good shit though. Movin on up.. I think my last 3RM attempt I was able to get 265 (in June?).. so let's throw a time on it and say I hope to be back to that by the end of January, I think that is in play.. Boom, done..
Just in time for the Open..

WOD

3RFT

Row 250m

5 HSPU

5 Pull Ups

10 Box Jumps 24"

Time - 5:01 Rx'd

Good quick one, I was able to go unbroken on all but the last set of HSPUs which I did 3, then 2 cuz I lost my balance on the way up.. dumb.. 

Well.. so much for "outside my comfort zone".. this is about as "fastball down the middle" as it gets for me for visiting a brand new place.. Great crowd at the class though, full of diversity... There was a girl repping out butterfly pull ups and walking 20 feet on her hands and on the other side of the spectrum there was a dude learning to squat for the very first time.. 

Thanks Khaki, I will definitely be back to visit again.

Wednesday December 7th

WOD - "Go Balls Deep"

50 Wall Balls

50 Ball Slams

Run 400m

25 Wall Balls

25 Ball Slams

Run 200m

Time - 7:49

Good burner, surprisingly tough on the second set of ball slams and running, I was gasping for breath a lot more than I thought I would be since I am usually pretty proficient with Wall Balls and keeping a good rhythm..

Wet ground definitely was interesting on the way back in from the rain.. footing was all over the place..

Probably should have rowed instead, but fuck it.. unknown and unknowable..

Didn't have time to do presses today.. Ended up hitting this after the 6:30 pm..

Unreal classes coaching-wise tonight.. HUGE energy from both groups of 12+ people.. Effing LOVE it.

KillinIt.com BABY

Tuesday December 6th

Skill work - Muscle ups

I ended up doing more of this work after class to practice, went really well.. Some new shoulder stretches I have been doing have helped with some of the pain and tension in my shoulder girdle and it definitely helped me today with these.. (they are usually hyper taxing on my joints)
I did like 30 after class with a few strings of 4 without a problem and some without even getting a false grip..
Progress..

WOD - EMOTM 12
2 Front Squats @ 185#

This was glorified CrossFit style strength work, not a whole lot of metabolic component to it, just strength and form. I think I could have gone a tiny bit heavier but this was just about as well as I expected to do today on front squats.. 24 squats in 12 minutes is a pretty good clip for me, I usually rest a shit ton when I do heavy squats in warm ups and stuff so this was good practice for my legs to find that strength even when I am a bit fatigued.
Having to power clean it up every time did not help my cause.. (but I did enjoy that wrinkle)

Monday December 5th

Bacon Love.

Rest Day.. Pretty sore when I rolled out of bed this morning.. just taking it easy today..

Sunday December 4th

SWOD
EMOTM 12 (every minute on the minute)
2 Deadlifts @ 300


I wanted to get in and blow of some steam tonight so I figured heavy deadlifts would be a good way to round out the last 3 days of heavily bodyweight and running based training.
Did not fail any reps, probably could have gone a smidge heavier, but this was a good confidence building workout.

Saturday December 3rd

WOD- Ninjas in Training

Partner WOD

50 Chinese sit ups

then  

(One person works, other completes a 400m run)

50 Burpee Pull ups

100 Air Squats

50 Renegade Rows 45#

100 Pistols (used a plate below the heel)

50 Muscle Ups 

then 

50 Chinese Sit ups

Fun workout, time was somewhere around a half hour? Didn't bother to write it down.

I felt pretty good running throughout this workout, faster than my normal pace I set.. Most of the work was just "grind it out" kind of stuff. Pistols were a little ugly at time and I only managed to do 9 Muscle Ups I think and Will ended up doing 41 jumping MUs to counter it, but whatever.. all in good fun. 

Great class this morning. Lots of energy.

Friday December 2nd

WOD- HOOOLLLLDDD!!!

Min 1: Plank

Min 2: AMRAP Push Ups

Min 3: Squat Hold

Min 4: AMRAP Squat jumps

Min 5: Tuck Hold

Min 6: AMRAP Pull Ups

Min 7: Handstand Hold

Min 8: AMRAP Wall Walks

Rest 2 min, repeat

Total = 212 Reps

Fun one, this was a lot harder than second time around than I thought it would be after a long rest.

The Push ups were not too bad, squat jumps were sort of funny because you could do a whole bunch of them but my legs burrrrrrned so bad after the hold the first few reps ignited some very funny faces..

Pull Ups were fine because I never really went for any big sets or approached the "red line".. I just sort of went in quick sets of 4 or 5 with a tiny rest and kept going.

Wall walks brought back some PTSD from the Spiderman WOD at Southie, my shoulders were totally smoked from both handstand holds and I only managed 5 reps of the WWs each segment. Yeesh.

Thursday December 1

Rest day..

Trying out 5 Napkin Burger tonight.. Shit's supposed to be famously amazing.

On my cheat meals my 2 go-tos tend to be either specialty burgers or mint oreo ice cream..
I feel like I get the most guilty pleasure and the least actual illness out of them..

Legit now if I eat like a bunch of pizza or pasta, I think I will throw up and die.. Burgers and ice cream are "just enough sorta kinda meat/dairy" that my system doesn't totally go into shut down mode after them.

Wednesday November 30th

SWOD - Split Jerk 1-1-1-1-1-1-1

Lots of mobility on my warm up today, trying to get the shoulders and hips nice and loose, but it was a little hurried to get my lifts in before the 5:30 class.

I started out with some reps for form at 95, one at a time. Just drilling my footwork.
Did some more reps at 135 for form with a little more oomph to them..

Getting into my working sets I ended up going:
155, 175, 185, 195, 205, 215 (fail), 215

So much of these are about my first move on my dip, I can almost tell if I am going to make it or not in the first millisecond of the movement.. I missed on 215 because I did the dreaded "dip down into a 1/8 squat, hang out for a second too long, then decided to come back up with shitty explosiveness"...
The second attempt I regained my focus and stuck it. I think I may have had a little bit more in me, but this did tie my previous PR and I have not done these in a LONG time..

225 clean and jerk is staring me in the face.. One of these time you little motherfucker..
I want it.

Tuesday November 29th

SWOD- Double under skill work

Nothing fancy here, just drilled DUs for 10 minutes off an on. Hit one big set of 78.. Getting better all the time.
I have found that if I just focus on the "jump straight up and down" aspect, my hands sort of just do the work blindly without even having think about it.. my jumps are just timed based on noise, not movement.. its weird..

WOD- "Jackie"

Row 1000m

50 Thrusters 45#

30 Pull ups

Time - 7:12

This was a new PR for me (by 46 seconds) but I feel like I even left a lot on the table here.
I tried to pull a smooth 1:46-1:50 or so on the row the whole time so I didn't gas out, finished in the 3:30s somewhere. On the thrusters, Nick and Sean jumped out ahead of me so I just told myself "you are not allowed to drop the bar until they have dropped it twice so that you can catch up".. As it turned out I ended up doing the first 40 in a row, dropped it for a second to shake out my hands, then finished the last 10.
Pull ups went sort of shitty. I was hoping to knock out like 15-20 on the first big set and then crawl to the finish line with 3s or so. But I got on the bar and only managed 7 before my forearms started burning and my hips were gassed from all the thrusters (for kipping).
I went something like 7,5,5,3,3,3,4.. all over the map.. no clean good sets, just shaking around like a fish on the line battling.

Next time the goal is sub 7 minutes and a lot better sets on the pull ups..

Monday November 28th

SWOD - Box Squat -8x2 @ 75% (chose 205#)

So I really have no idea what my 1RM is for squats anymore since I haven't done it in a while, so I made a guess to work with 205 today. Looking back I wish I had gone a little heavier, but this drill and rep scheme is for speed, not for raw strength.

I find that with squats I can tell how the day is going to go just by how heavy the bar feels when I first step away from the rack with it on my back/shoulders. For some reason, it felt really light today.. This pleased me.
Got through all 8 doubles with good hip explosiveness and solid power getting out of the "hole" from the box.
Best squats have felt in months.

WOD - "Giddy Up"

4 Rounds

5 TGU RH (1.5 pood)

5 TGU LH

10 T2B

Time 14:00 Rx'd

I programmed this one because frankly I have never seen Turkish get ups in a WOD and wanted to do it, and these are an awesome drill in general because they help with shoulder stability and overcoming one-side dominance.

I managed to go unbroken on the right hand throughout and only had to break once on the left side during the 3rd round because I thought I was going to drop it on my face on the descent. These are funny (much like lunges) in that you can't really do them all that fast, and the heart rate isn't jacked up like sprinting but you sweat like a complete beast since you have to stay so tense and so focused the whole time..

Thanksgiving Week 2011

Quick recap of Thanksgiving week, turned out to be very busy so I never got a chance to blog it up..

Tuesday
Weighted Pull ups 5x3.. Good stuff.. got up to a set with 58 lbs on the belt.
Lock & Load - 6:21 Rx'd.. Stopped twice on the KB swings for no reason whatsoever.. I just didn't put my all into this WOD for some reason.

Wednesday -
"Jack Bauer" - 11:52 Rx'd
Loved this WOD, Power cleans took a lot longer than I thought they were going to. Last 400m felt like it took about 3 minutes longer than the first one.. legs were mush.
Skipped DLs, my back was pretty tight.

Thursday -
WOD - AMRAP 24 hours, Eat Turkey

Friday - (At YMCA in Albany)
Squats 5x5.. Got up to a set at 210# which is improvement.. still need to get heavier every week..
Double Under practice.. Got multiple (like 8) strings of at least 35 (a couple over 50 too).. really happy with that.. Felt good.. shoulders were gassed though..

Sat & Sun - My knee and shoulders were bothering me a little all week and I knew I needed to rest them so this weekend of over-indulgence on sweets and other things delicious was complemented with a ton of sleep and rest.. Should have done some more mobility stuff, but hindsight is 20/20.. This was me just straight up listening to my body and not doing anything for a couple days.

Excited for this week of programming.. I programmed this myself so I am happy to partake with the rest of the members and see how it goes.

I am sort of in a weird spot right now for CrossFitting because I do not have any competitions on the horizon, so I am really just going to take it day by day and try to:
- Get Stronger all over
- Improve my mobility (shoulders and hips have been a real problem recently)
- Get Faster
- Cross Goats off the list bit by bit..

Monday November 21st

Rob Orlando, so hot right now...

Test Trials

Max distance Broad Jump - 99, 101, 100"

Max Height Vertical- 23", 25", 25"

I settled right around my max outputs on both of these quickly. My previous max vert was 23" so it was cool to see myself tack a little bit onto that, and my broad jump has always been right around 100.. haven't added much to that, oh well..

SWOD- Thrusters 1-1-1-1-1-1

Single heavy thrusters, love it. I have not done these for max weight in a long while so this was going to be a fun test. I believe my last max out was 185 so I was hoping to beat that if the day progressed well..

I started out with some reps at 95 and 135 to get loose then got into the singles, working my way up slowly.

I managed to easily hoist up 155,165,175 without issue.

My last 3 reps were definitely right around my limit and I was able to get 185,195, and then I went for broke and tried 200. 

The 200 rep was a little ugly, I lost all my speed getting out of the hole and basically pressed out the 200 once it was over my forehead, but it still would have counted I think.

Nice PR on that, felt strong today, will def be sore tomorrow. These smoke my core.

After classes I was dicking around and thought I would do some more tabata double unders as they have been a fun practice for me recently to get my numbers up there. 

Low and behold, before I even turned on the clock I just decided to practice a couple sets first and I repped out 89 Double Unders, 20 over my previous PR.. BOOM..

No one was around to watch but I was uber-excited, as my 69 DUs had stood for like 4 months and I hadn't come close to hitting it in forever. Tabata DU cash out is here to stay, it is definitely helping me on these.

Sat-Sun November 19-20th

Rest weekend.
Lots of touristy things with Nora and her parents while they were in town.

After 4 days in a row my body was really ready to sleep a lot and just lay low..

Excited to get back at it on Monday with some heavy ass thrusters though.. Bring it.

Friday November 18th

SWOD - 3x10 Push Ups
No biggie, just getting the shoulders loosened up.

WOD-

4 RFT

10 Wall Balls 20#

10 Box Jumps 30" (full stand on box)

Time - 3:21 Rx'd

Good little sprint WOD, needed one of these after yesterday's hell.

It was cool to use the new wall ball targets we painted, they look awesome.

30" box jumps I cannot quite do the quick recovery jump on yet, I am working up to it.. I sort of just jump off, let my heels touch for a second, then go again. No real break to speak of, but it is not as fast as I could be if I could learn the quick hop.

Still practicing the full comp standards on these to open fully and stand at the top. Its doable but I just need to re-train myself.

After Party

Max L-sit x3 on rings

Tabata Double Unders

L-sits were ok today.. still getting the hip flexor and core strength to hold it for any appreciable amount of time.

Tabata DUs I did on a whim to practice again. Low -22, High -28... better than the other day..

I want to be able to get 30 per round. Good goal. Get er done.

Thursday November 17th

SWOD - Deadlift 3x5 (+1x1)

I opted for deadlifts instead of pistols today because I need to get back to them more, raw strength has been down as of recent.
I warmed up pretty well and got loose then did 135x10, 225x8.. I counted the next few as my working sets and did 275x5 (easy), 295x5 (little tough), 315x5 (gassed me).. then I was going to attempt 325x5 but I picked it up once and was just like "annnnnnnnnd that is a day".. so 325x1 to finish was good enough for me.

WOD - "Anarchy"

5 RFT

10 Kb Snatch 1.5 RH

20 yd OH Walking Lunge (RH)

10 KB Snatch LH

20 yd OH Walking Lunge (LH)

Time - 19:00 Rx'd

This was one of the strangest WODs I have done in so long. First off, I should not have done it alone, I was taking like full 45 second pity breaks for myself in the midst of it because it was so daunting to pick up the KB for the next lunges. Having people around would have helped a lot.

This was so weird because none of it was particularly fast and intense like normal CrossFit, it was just very heavy and very slow, stability ridden movements.

I struggle with left shoulder stability a bit so the LH snatches were a pain in the butt, the RH was mostly fine.

The OH Lunges I was able to do without any breaks in the middle, but I definitely rested a lot more than I should have needed to. It feels like you should be able to scoot 20 yards really fast but then you start lunging and your life "OM effing G, this is going to take forever and I have this 53 lb kettlebell right above my noggin"..

Grueling WOD, worse than anything that I did all weekend at the Garage Games.. Yikes..

Wednesday November 16th

Was going to do strength stuff today, but I decided "fuck it" the WOD looked like a fun combo.
It was pouring outside so I opted for the rowing instead of running.

WOD - "Hearts on Fire"

AMRAP 12

25 Double Unders

250m Row

Score - 7 Rds, 25 DUs, 100m row

This one looked tame and was not.. The first 3 rounds or so were no problem, but the row became progressively more difficult to sprint at.. The DUs were all over the place.. a couple of the segments I hit all 25 in like 10 seconds, easy money.. A couple toward the end I was tripping on shoelaces, ropes, small children, and my profanity..

Glad to be back to some 1-a-day workouts to let my body cool down a little from the competitive training volume.

After party
Tabata Double unders

I got frustrated from messing up so much that I did tabata double unders as a kick in pants end of the night mini WOD.. Low score was 16, high was 25.. I should be able to get in the 20s every single time no matter what.. BLERG..

Tuesday November 15th

I was still a little sore from the weekend, but considerably less than I expected to be.

I wanted to hit the benchmark Paleo Lent WOD before it got too far into the challenge. I figured this was a quick sprint with nothing heavy so my soreness would not play into it very much.

Paleo Lent Benchmark WOD

Row 500m

50 Air Squats

40 Sit Ups

30 Push Ups with HR

20 Pull Ups

10 Deadlifts @ BW

Time- 5:32

This felt really good.. My body has been well-trained for the volume of competition so this 5 minute sprint felt excellent.. I recovered really quickly.  My only real "break" was when I sort of messed up my pull ups rhythm and had to reset my hands so my kip could get going. I ended up butterflying from like 5 up to rep 18 so these cruised and then I hit the deadlifts very quickly.

I think the only ways I am going to shave noticeable time off of this in 40 days is by bombing the row instead of gaming it and learning to butterfly all of the pull ups.. This gives me incentive to finally get that form down.

Monday November 14th

Resting today.. fairly sore all over from the weekend..

I was incredibly inspired by some of the things they had at CF Southie so I want to replicate some of my favorites.

I am going to make a stencil to spray pant logo wall ball targets on the wall and onto the plyo boxes..

And I want to actually measure once and for all the 200 & 400m runs for our building around the corner down the alleyway and spray paint the ground.. I am sort of tired of athletes running straight out the door into oncoming parking lot traffic.. Just seems senseless by comparison to taking a hard right and hugging along the building... Old ladies pushing shopping carts is a lot less dangerous than old ladies driving Buicks at nighttime.

The Garage Games - Saturday & Sunday Nov 12-13th

Before I even get into it, I cannot thank CrossFit Southie's owners, coaches, volunteers & judges enough.. Legit a perfectly run event.. Nothing but good things to say from my end.

As was expected, I was ridiculously nervous. I have trained hard but there is always one more thing you wish you worked on before something like this. I really just wanted to get the first workout out of the way to let myself calm down. I knew once I had gotten my heart rate up at all my nerves would dissipate and I would be able to remind myself "it's another WOD, I do them almost every day"..

Kicking it off..
Day 1.

WOD1- "Whitey Bulger"

5 min running clock

500m row

20 lateral bar hop burpees

AMRAP Squat Cleans 135# in remaining time

Score - 17 reps
 

This was the workout I purposely did not practice because I figured it was mostly a sprint and there was not a whole lot that over-strategizing it would change. I knew I wanted to game the row somewhat and cruise the burpees, and then just see what happened on the SqCleans... But unfortunately nerves took over and of course I overdid it.. I was able to pace the row almost to a tee the way I wanted it.. I kept at about a 1:42 the whole time, really smooth and slow pulls.. perfect..

Then came the burpees.. I sort of figured out the "trick" to this since there is no hip open rule on the burpees.. You could basically hop from a squat position if you kept your balance and landed with two feet and avoid having to stand up at all.. I did the burpees faster than anyone else in my heat and stood up from the last one and all I could think was "You idiot, you just blew your load early"... My original goal was to get 10 unbroken on the first go-'round but that went out the window in about 3 seconds.. I ended up doing my reps in the scheme of 3-3-3-3-3-2 with some rests in between.. I definitely could have done better on this.. I easily left 3 reps out on the table by going so fast on the burpees and cashing my legs. Dumbass.

Side Note: My adrenaline got so jacked up during this that I had to go back to my car, lay in the back seat with an ice pack on my head for 30 minutes.. I felt like I was going to throw up, pass out and die all at the same time.. Just could not recover.. Finally I got some peanut butter, banana, and water in me and started to feel better just in time to warm up for the next workout..

WOD2 - "SnatchBalls"

AMRAP 7

7 Power Snatch 95#

10 Wall Balls

Score - 6 Rounds, 5 reps   (107 total)

Well, my goal was a combination of "beat your score from practice" and "get close to 7 rounds".. I managed to sort of do both of those. It felt really similar to the first time I did it in that the first 4 rounds were absolute cake.. everything unbroken, very little rest, and I think I only no-repped 1 wall ball.

Then from the 5th round on the snatches just started to feel infinitely heavier and slowed me all down.. I got all the wall balls without breaks but I ended up doing like 5/2 splits on the last few snatch sets just from fatigue.

Wish I had done this one first, but it is what it is. I think my ceiling on this was 7 rounds, and the floor was 6, so I got right about where I should have ended up on average.

Long rest before the last WOD.. 3.5 hours..

WOD3- "Spiderman"

5 RFT

20 Box Jumps (full stand up)

15 Pull Ups

5 Wall Walks

Time - 12:30

I did so much better on this than I expected to do. When I practiced it I sort of did the box jumps obnoxiously slow just to practice the "games standard".. and the wall walks are really annoying to do on your own.. One of my friends I spoke with about these said it best: "You almost never fail a rep on the wall walk, its just a matter of starting them instead of laying on the floor having a pity party for yourself"..

Could not have said it better.

The 2 biggest things that played well for me were

1) The pull up bar being the right size made it SO MUCH EASIER to rep out.. I did the first 3 rounds of 15 no problem... and then only had to break the last 2 into 11/4 and then 10/5.. made up a lot of time there.

2) My judge was excellent. This is something I sort of took for granted all day, but the dude I had for this last workout helped my pacing so so much. The box jumps and pull ups I was able to get with little breaks but the wall walks I definitely needed help getting going. Toward the end when he realized I was totally spent, he would just say "5-4-3-2-1, go".. and out of pure instinct and years of being yelled at by coaches I would just start it up again.. I was happy to get under the cap on this one, it was a grueling workout. Sweat piles everywhere..

End of day 1... sitting in 31st place out of 109 male Rx'd competitors..

(Are you kidding me? I was going to be ecstatic to not be in last heading into this thing.. top third? wow.. so unexpected)

Day 2..

WOD- "GI JOE"

Run 400m with 35 lb sandbag

20 OHS 95#

20 T2B

Run 200m

100 Double Unders

Run 200m

20 T2B

20 OHS 95#

Run 400m

Time - 17:01

This is pretty much the exact WOD I would choose for myself on GOAT day except maybe some pistols sprinkled in there as an extra "eff you"..

I knew this was going to be a marathon, not a sprint, and I also knew I was going to have to conserve energy for the OHS since I would need all the focus in the world to get through those with a judge's eye on me.

The first 400 went really quick, just kept a nice pace on the jog, nothing crazy.

First set of OHS went surprisingly well.. I got through 16 reps then 4 after a quick break. Really solid for me.

T2B I got like 11 reps kipping quickly, then 5, then 4.. Not great, but it did not hurt me too much..

The 200's felt like easy money compared to the 400, I just found a pace and stuck with it to save my legs for the last OHS set.

I thought the double unders would be my huge time-waster on this workout if I had an incident like at our throwdown where I just couldn't get them going.. Did not turn out to be the case today as I got through the first 30 with some straggling sets, then I hit a 40 set and a 30 set and finished up.. This felt awesome.. huge gleaming smile across my face when I went out for the 2nd 200 sandbag run..

T2B went to hell a little on the second set, core was tired and couldn't kip as well and I got a nice blood blister in my hand that was hindering my grip... Oh well..

OHS were shitty as expected on the last set.. I went with something like 6-8-6 with a bunch of no reps called in there for not coming open at the top (which was making my lose balance cuz I suck)..

The last 400 felt like it took an eternity.. I had to walk a bit which I regret but at the time I just could not get a breath and thought I might boot all over the running course..

Katri ran the turn around with me and I was able to jog in the last 150m or so.. But good god that was a challenging workout for me.. 

I figured I would drop a lot of spots from that one, but I only ended up depleting a bit.. from 31st down to 37th as my final standing, out of 109 male Rx'd... pretty cool..

I am really psyched that I got my first comp under my belt.. Definitely looking forward to competing some more down the road when I get some different goats crossed off the list and some more raw strength built up..

I ate fried pickles, a prime rib burger, and a pint of Ben&Jerry's Mint Oreo after this competition.. If I am going to be that sore, I am going to stuff my face with amazing crap while I am in that state.. NOM..

Thursday & Friday November 10-11

Resting like its my job... SOOO AMPED for this weekend.. I can barely sit still..

Thank you to all those who serve, have serve and will serve. Our debt to you could not be repaid if we tried.

Wednesday November 9th

They released 1000 pairs of these on the Reebok site last night.. Sole Boner..

Much needed rest day today.. 

Plan for tomorrow is to do a bunch of mobility type stuff, practice some double unders and T2B, and attempt to untighten my right shoulder.

Then flat out rest and do nothing on Friday..

This is gonna be fun.

Tuesday November 8th

SWOD- Press Progression 1-3-5 x3

My shoulder has been a little iffy lately and I want everything healed up before the weekend so I did not even remotely push the limits on this, I just went comfortable and worked form to get loose and get some blood flow, nothing crazy.
I went with 95,115,115 for my 3 sets, which is about 25-30 lbs less than I am capable. Good warm up though.

WOD- "Whip"

AMRAP 21

11 Push Ups

5 reps, 155# Squat Clean

10 Box Jumps 24"

9 Rounds, 11 PU's, 2 Sq Cleans

Great workout. The atmosphere at the 6PM was through the roof, I was so jacked up to be there. Sean, Blake's brother, graced FCF with his presence which I thought was awesome. We had so many people we actually had to share an Rx'd barbell, which is nuts. Definitely the most full class I have WODed with in months.

This was a great replacement for the workout I was going to do today, the 2nd Southie GG WOD with rowing, burpees, amrap squat cleans @135.

I figured practicing these at 155# for 21 minutes while totally exhausted was a great precursor to having just a ~2 minute all-out session with 135# Saturday.

I am thinking my goal is to game the 500m row a little (go for like a 1:44 or so instead of a 1:32 that I would need to go balls out for), just pace the burpees and stay nice and low (since there is no hip open rule), and then go after the barbell and completely unleash the dogs of war.

I am confident I can get 10 reps in a row when I get on the bar and I just need to tell myself that repping those out is much easier than doing singles and needing to recover and catch the thing on the ground every time.

I am getting really nervous/excited. If you could not tell by my over-analysis and ranting.

Monday November 7th

GG WOD3 - "Spiderman"

5 RFT

20 Box Jumps (full stand up on box)

15 Pull ups

5 Wall Walks

Time- 16 minutes ish

I kept time poorly on this one.. the clock died around 7 minutes and I restarted it and finished around 9 somehting, so the time is just an estimate..

I imagine they are going to cap this one at 15 minutes, so I am going to have to bust ass to get in under the cap.

I slowed this one up on purpose just to sort of get a feel for what would be the "worst part"..

As expected the wall walks are by far the worst part, they make my head spin, blood rush, and sweat pour.. sucks asss. The box jumps are annoyingly slow when you do the "full stand up hip open on top" standard, but it is what it is, it shows control of the movement so I get that, and it makes judging easier..

Pull ups I did the first two rounds without breaking and the last 3 I did sets of like 10/5 or 9/6.. which is about normal for me. Mostly it comes down to grip and keeping the kip rhythm.

I think my plan for this on Saturday is to try to do more of the box jumps with the recovery jump, not a break in between each, and to take 2-3 breaths between every wall walk no matter how tired I am.. It is only 5 of them at any one time, but its a movement that you are much better off doing quickly.. If your first step up the wall is small, you are fucked.

I do not picture this one being my best WOD of the day because I will already be tired from the previous 2 and this just isn't a wheelhouse WOD for anyone..slow box jumps, high rep pull ups, and shitty awful wall walks.. This one I will just have to gut out and minimize breaks, its gonna be very tough no matter how I slice it up on game day.

Sunday November 6th

Hit a couple things training today.
First, I wanted to try out one of the GG WODs which were announced last week. I am really happy there is nothing overly heavy or technical. Its mostly strict work capacity, which favors me a lot as compared to some huge strong guy who can C&J 300.

GG WOD1

Snatch Balls

AMRAP 7

7 Power Snatch 95#

10 Wall Balls

6 Rounds, 1 Snatch

I can do better on this. I think I can keep the pace of about 1 round per minute if I get the sand out of my vagina and get back on the bar. Also, I was really hard on myself and no-repped at least 5 wall balls, so that was good practice. Considering my ability level and inexperience competing, this is about as "in my wheelhouse" as it is going to get for me, so I better bring the noise on this one.. Fortunately it is the first workout so I can give it hell.

Next
4x500m Row.
Just for conditioning I rowed a bit after my workout.
I got 1:48, 1:47, 1:44, 1:42 on my sessions which was good. I got stronger as I went along because I was able to find my pace a lot earlier in the row which helped.


The other row-burpee-squat clean WOD I will probably not get to this week but that one is basically a complete sprint for 5 minutes.. 2ish minutes to row, 1 ish minute to bomb out some burpees, and then 2ish minutes to squat clean 135.. yuck.. that one might make me go to a bad place..

Saturday November 5th

Stayed up at a B&B in NH for the weekend, much needed relaxation. Slept in every day, fresh eggs benedict every morning.. Awesome.

Friday November 4th

Double dipped today..

Morning
SWOD - Front Squats
I went in with no particular rep scheme in mind, but ended up doing something like a 5,5,5,3,3,3. Which worked well for high volume.. still getting my squat legs back..

I went with 155,165 and 175 for sets of 5.. Then did 185 and 195 with success for 3.. I put 205 on the rack and did not rest long enough and ended up getting only one rep which I strained hard for.

I went back down the pyramid to get some extra reps and did 5 more at 155 and 10 more at 135..
Good squat session.

Afternoon.
WOD
AMRAP 12
2 Squat Snatch 85#
5 Broad Jumps
7 Ring Rows
10 Double Unders

I got 5 DUs short of 8 rounds.

I picked a really light weight for the squat snatches to drill some form and overhead stuff which I always need help on. The others I just paired together because I have not done them in a while. Broad Jumps and Ring rows were more tiring than expected, good stuff. Double Unders went okay, some sets went straight through, a couple I tripped up for no good reason other than hurrying.

Thursday November 3rd

UPDATE: Had to cancel this tonight, will go soon though, it is something I want to try.

Trying Yoga with KT tonight for the first time.

I am excited, something new and different..

This goes along with my recent mantra of "getting comfortable being uncomfortable".. Yoga and stretching in general are 100% outside my comfort zone, so I am diving right in..

Wednesday November 2nd

WOD1

4 Rounds of the following:

2 Minute Running clock:

200 m Run

In remaining time, AMRAP Wall Balls. 

Score is total # of wall balls.

Score - 130 Wall Balls

This was an awesome burner, loved it. I tried to gut out the run as fast as I could and get an immediate 15 wall balls once I came inside, then I sort of delegated the rest of my reps based on quick rests and how jello-ish my legs were.

I think my rounds were 40, 32, 30, 28. Once I get going I can usually rep out 15 or 20 every time, just gotta re-start myself a little faster sometimes.

Taught the 5:30 and 6:30 classes.. Both absolutely rocked out the thrusters and push-ups WOD.. 

Killin it.. I'm lovin it.

WOD2

Every Minute on the Minute (10 min)

1 Muscle Up

2 Power Cleans @ 185

This was a good skill practice WOD.. Not terribly taxing, but a good one. My shoulder felt "off" mid-way so I switched from muscle ups to "3 pull ups, 3 push ups" as a quick sub and continued with the power cleans, all of which were solid.. A couple of wide-ish landings, but no missed reps.

I need to warm up my shoulders and stabilize them a little better next time before doing muscle ups. Noted.

Tuesday November 1st

I tried to get some training in with 2 semi-separate sessions today.
1 strength component, rest an hour, then a WOD I had concocted.

SWOD - Deadlift 5x5
I planned to do 5 sets of 5 for some higher volume, but this changed slightly by the end when I became fatigued.
I did 135x10, 185x10, 225x8 for warm ups to get loose.. These all felt great.
For my working sets I did 275x5, 295x5, 305x5 (started to get some fatigue in my lower back around this point), 310x5.. I was going to try to do 315x5 but I ended up just doing 3 singles and then felt like I needed to take a rest, back was tightening up and I had already put in a lot of reps, so it was good to listen to the body and back off.
This was a step in the right direction though. 315 for double felt impossibly heavy last week or so, and 310 for 5 felt really good this week, even with a lot of fatigue built up. Happy to make a little progress on these, I will be back to form soon. Unfortunately probably not in time for the Garage Games, but what can ya do? Time goes fast.

WOD -
Row 500m
10 OHS 105#
10 KBS 2 pood
Row 400m
10 OHS/10KBS
...
(etc. down to 100 m)

So, full disclosure, this sort of fell apart for a multitude of reasons. Some of the folks doing the intro walked in and I had to introduce myself mid-WOD. During the 3rd round of KBS my hands felt like they were gonna slip and I did one rep with some lousy form and my lower back just twinged enough that I was like "Ok, not worth it". The deadlifts definitely took their toll, so I stopped the KBS after 26 total reps.
However, small victory.. I was able to do all 5 sets of 10 OHS unbroken with 105 lbs. For me, this is a nice step in the right direction because I am really terrible at these, especially with any weights over 100 lbs.

Time, who knows. I got distracted like 7 times so my guess is unreliable.
Need to stop training in the middle of a whole bunch of crap going on. My bad.