Squatting and lifting and getting up again...

On Tuesday we did a warm up with Mini-Cindy, so the night took off with 10 minutes of 5 pullups, 10 pushups and 15 squats.  I managed to run through this, and don't think I did too-too shabby.  Not a world record by any means, but I did get in a total of 6 full rounds plus the pullups and 7 pushups of the 7th round. PHEW! That's a warmup that'll bust your ass! We then moved onto practice of the Handstand push up and Pistols.  We did a couple rounds - for the HSPU's final round we were to go to a level that was challenging but do-able for 5.  I went a big Green and blue.    In retrospect, I probably should have gone with double blues.  It's strange though, I was green and green last time we HSPU's - of course, we had tireflips and front squats thrown in...so I guess that isn't really the same thing.

Wednesday we did Back Squats - 5/5/5/5/5.  I don't know that I really even want to write down the scores.  My squats are off... I'll just leave it at that.  Of course, I'm not leaving it at that.....
I have to record, even my sad days.  I did 145/165/175/175/165   I just couldn't get them looking good.  My knees were all akimbo, but I think I was doing better at not relaxing at the bottom.  Just not the best squat day overall.

Thursday -Turkish Get-up for weight.  My Turkish Get-up Mo-jo has got up and run!  I thought this was going to be my 75lb barbell night.  Alas, the evil demons that destroy balance were all at play.  I started with the 45 lb barbell.  Then 65.  Then I tried the 75....and my wrists wouldn't hold it steady.  It wasn't necessarily the TGU part that gave me a rough time - it was the bar balancing.  So, I went to the cannonball balancing overhead for the last one.  It was the 32kg kettlebell, and I did that no problem..  Although the boys tried to talk me into the 80lb KB...I must admit, I may have been able to do it, but just looking at that sucker got into my head - there was no way in hell.  I had brief, flashing images of a face devastated by a kettlebell bigger than my head.   So, I wussed.

Saturday was Deadlifts.  Sets of 5.  I did  185/215/235/255/285...Holy crap - I just did 285 for 5?? Okay -lets try for 310 for 3.  BAHAHAHAHA! That was a bit ambitious - actually, I think I just had nothing in me.  I didn't even get it up for one.  Ah well, I think next time it will be there, as long as I don't do 5 at a ridiculously heavy weight just prior.

Tonight was back squats 5/5/5, front squats 3/3/3.  Back squats I did 165, 185, 195.  Apparently, my knee buckling wasn't really apparent until the 195 - so that's an improvement over last time.  Front squats - I totally sandbagged the first round at 95lbs.  I then faced the fact that I was indeed not pulling my weight...so I went to 145.   ....and 155 I got in two, then failed the third....went back and got it, but it was ugly.  Front squat = Not so good.

I have adjusted my goals though.  Rather than a number - my goal before the next competition is:
Squat - 1.5 times bodyweight
Benchpress - bodyweight
Deadlift - 2 times bodyweight.


Currently my squat is about 1-1/8 bodyweight, bench- 3/4 bodyweight, and Deadlift 1.5 x bodyweight.  So, I'm kind of almost there, just need the weights to go up a bit and the other weight to go down.

lift, and press, and squat and hoist...

Thursday 5,000 lbs floor-to-overhead - I debated on this one whether to completely toss aside the time element and increase the level of difficulty by doing full squat cleans and overhead presses.  My initial thought was at 85 lbs - but in reality, I was pretty sure there was no way I was getting in 59 strict presses at 85 lbs.    Then I thought maybe I would go the 65 lbs route, but I did a couple full squat cleans, and I was not feeling the squat clean love.  After all the debate in my head,  I ended up doing 50 power clean & jerks at 100 lbs.  Time was not spectular, but not terrible.  I finished in 12:31 - about a minute longer than when I did 59 at 85 lbs.

Friday was squats/box squats for Gettin' stronger.  I haven't a clue what I did.  I lifted, and it was heavy, somehow, for some reason, that's about all I remember.  I think I ended with 5 reps at 185, but I can't really tell ya for sure!  Because I had just taken a week off, I decided to stay so that I could get a weeks worth of workouts in about 36 hours.  The regular workout was one straight from the twisted mind of our dear coach, Jonathan.  This Crossfit beauty was:
200 m run
25 pullups
50 kb swings (16 kg)
25 dips
50 lunges
25 knees-to-elbows
50 situps
25 Wallball shots (16 lbs)
50 box jumps (16")
Everyone starts with the run, from there, it can be done in any order.  We started with the run, or in my case, the wog.  After that it was box jumps, 50 box jumps is a plethora of them, in case you didn't realize it....  After box jumps  I went to sit ups.  I figured it would be a decent place to catch my breath.  After the situps it's all kind of a blur - I know at one point I was thinking I would do all the 50's, then I looked, and the dawning realization came to me.  This was a bad idea.  There is alot of really hard stuff in the 25 category! So I mixed it up.  Not sure what order I did them, I know I started with box jumps, and ended with the Kettlebell swings.  The middle is a blur... My end time was 22:something.  When I went to write it up, I had the initial thought that "oh goodie, the only thing modified was my pullups"...Ummm -no.  I forgot the blue banded dips, the KTE's which were nothing but jump, and of course the pullups which are perpetually a blue mark for me.

Saturday was 2 hours of Bench - sets of 5.  I started big, although, I should have been able to do it no problem, my bench was a bit on the weak side. I started at 135 - only got in 4, then went down, to 115, 120, 125, 130.  Afterwards we did some narrow grip benching - which is odd. I ended at 115, which seemed to be about the right weight for me.  I'm not sure why my bench feels perpetually off, but it's been a really long time - probably close to a year since I've felt a really good bench press day.

Tonight was Deadlift - 5/4/3/2/1    Deadlifts felt heavy tonight.  Shocking, I know.   I started at 225 for 5, then 245 for 4, 265 for 3, then I went to 275 for 2, and my head popped in.  The little game my brain plays with me at 275....I couldn't do it, I would get it off the floor, then feel the slightest hint of my back rounding, and down the weight goes.  I ended up throwing on a weight belt and lifted it no problem.  It was ridiculous!!  However, I think I may have to belt up at the 270/275 weight for a while, until I get over this mental block.  I belted in, and did 1 rep at 300.  Not easy, but really, not that difficult.  Like I said the 275 mental block is ridiculous, and I know it.   I really need to work the DL's a bit harder if I'm going to be using a belt.  In my head, I should be able to do 350 right now if I really tried.  I really want 400 by the next time I compete.  If little tiny Heena can do it, so can I!!-

whoops - never posted...

It dawned on me after Wednesday's workout that since the competition, I don't think I've been putting my all into things quite as much as I should be.  I don't think I've necessarily been sandbagging, I think I've simply let alot of things get in my head.  The back strain, and whole slew of other mental BS that is my issue that I need to get over.
However, I had not quite come to this conclusion when we did Wednesday's workout, and it suffered in large part due to the mental crap...and possibly it was also just a bad lift day.  The push part of this is Bench press - 3 rounds of 3 reps for weight.  I did 135 / 145x1 /140x2 - pure suckage when you consider my 1 rep max is 155.  LAME!!   Deadlift, I did 225/255/275.  275 is the weight that mentally says "Bite me!" ...but I got 3 in.  Again - with a 1 rep PR of 308 - these should be higher.  I think that's what struck me on my way home - I feel like I've stopped "going for it". 

Thurs - Stations # 2, which is Pullups, Wallball (16#), Slamball (16#), Sit ups and Box jumps.   3 rounds, 1 minute at each station.  Pullups I did in one blue band, with all the band set up, it was just going to be easiest, and I think it equates about the same as red+mini.  I did test though to be sure I could do a dead hang in it before the workout - rules is rules don't ya know!  I knew I scored pretty high last time, at 275, so I was gonna have to push it.
Round 1- 100  - what?  I have never scored 100 in a round before....ever.  This was something new...
Round 2 - 102 - again, 100??....AND I  went up in round 2?? I think this is another first!
Round 3 - 91 - ok - this time, I held true to my usual form.  But 91 ain't shabby!!
My total score was 293...7 measly reps away from 300.  DRATS! That would have been beautiful! But I think I did pretty darn good anyway!  Nice improvement, and I did go for it on this one.  Of course, I wouldn't have come close without the situps.....The situps took me there.

Today - a new one.  It's like a bright shiny new toy! Only this one wasn't so fun.  It was an ass-kicker through and through.   8 tire flips / 6 Handstand pushups / 4 front squats (125#), now here's the real kicker - 5 rounds for time, 20 minute cutoff. It was me and Jonathan.  I wanted to use the upside-down-rubber-band contraption (using green and green), we tried it - CRAP! I could not kick up into the handstand without assistance (I need to work on that, in a big way!!)  So I went first, using the girl tire (the big girl tire, not the little girl tire).  Ironically, the tireflips were the easiest part - they winded the hell out of me, and I will have bruises from the 40 flips..but in this whole thing - they were the easiest and least painful!  Let me just say this about handstand pushups after doing 8 tireflips - if it's possible to catch your breath upside down, I haven't figured out how to do it.  Short of breath, upside down, trying to breath and do a handstand pushup - just an ugly combination.    I ended up getting through them all - but they weren't pretty, I thought I was gonna collapse at several junctures, and my range of motion was rather pathetic - especially at the end.  From the handstand pushups - we go to the front squats.  125 should be heavy - but it's pretty far from my PR, so it shouldn't be too much of an issue. What I did not take into consideration was the toll the tire flips took on my legs and the HSPU's took on my arms.  To say the front squats were painful would not be an exaggeration.  Legs, really didn't want to squat, and arms, really did not want to go up.  The sad part, we were only doing 4 of them, but it felt like 14.  I swear I almost dropped the bar several time, in the last round, there's not doubt, it was sliding off the sweat.  In the end, I DID actually complete all 5 rounds under the time limit - barely under, but it was under. My final time was 19:56.  Despite it's misery, I have to admit, I really like the heavy metcons, I think they are doing their magic, if I just let them, and get out of my head.
Oh one other thing took me by surprise, so I just have to comment on it!  I was reading all my various usual stops...on one of them, the writer has been doing Crossfit for 2 years, and just did her first snatches with a barbell.  I found that very odd, but it makes me uber-glad that my gym doesn't fear the barbell, sheesh how boring to do all of these with KB's and dumbbells all the time!! I would hate that!

workin' with some ripped hands!

Deadlifts - 3/3/3/3/3 
With my newly ripped, but not all the way callous, I wasn't sure what my grip would do.  I wrapped my hand to be safe though.  I started light, because the deadlifts were feeling heavy, but I did have  the intention of going up quick.  I started at 225, which was heavy, but fine.  Then 245, ok...still heavy, but ok.  265 - this one hurt the paws, and felt heavy.  Next round I went with 275.  I got in 1.  Partly because of my hands, but another part of me has a bit of a block on the 275 number.  275 is the number I was going for (I think) when I pulled my back muscle. Last round, I strapped on a weight belt, for that mental crutch, and sure enough - pulled the 275 three times. 

Saturday - Fight Gone Bad.  This was the real one, the charity event,  the full monty!  FGB is  5 stations, 3 rounds, 1 minute each, and 1 minute between rounds.  Stations are wall ball(14#), SDLHP (55#), Box Jump (20"), Push Press (55#), row.  We went to Foothills Crossfit, across town.  It was relatively early in the morning, but not bad.  There were about 25 people or so who showed up.  It was going to be a good day.    Off the bat, we had a quick training on the rower, none of us had really used one.  Then off to the warmup from hell - it was alot of running and weird running type things.  Just before the warmup, I did something to my right calf, not sure if it was a charlie horse, or a big knot - but it wasn't quite happy.  I wasn't going to let that get in the way.  We paired up, and Patty went first.  She did awesome, but let the box jump get to her.  I so wanted to help her get up the there, but I just didn't know how.  After that first attempt, my main job was to get her mind off of it.  When she had completed all three rounds, it was my turn.   I was going to start at wallball, so I could just progress down the line, but that station had already been taken.  Next option - I decided to start with the row, since that takes longest to get into - I could be prepared as time started.  That was the plan.
I started with rowing -took off like a banshee, and it felt good, I felt strong, and holy moly, I was rowing away the calories.  Of course, I was good for a minute MAX! When time was called, I was done. I had hit 20 on the row! YAY!   Next came wallball, I thought I would have no issue with these, since I'm used to using the 16 lb ball, and I think I usually get in about 15-20 per round.  I was wrong.   The main issue was 1. getting out of the rowing machine!! It was a contraption that locks you in...and it's not the easiest to get out of   2. To get to the wall ball position, you had to run to the other side of the gym.  By the time you got to the wallball station a good 20-30 seconds had passed.  So, I didn't get much time in to work the wall balls - I did manage to get 12 in.  Next stop, SDLHP - I got in 20, I did them in two sets of 10.  By this time, I was out of breath....sucking wind.  Then onto box jumps.   It takes alot of energy to jump on a 20" box....I got in 8. Not great.  Push press, again, I did in two sets of 10, for a score of 20.   Rest - 1 minute is a very, very short time. 
Round 2 - Rowing only lasted about 45 seconds, so I got in 15, a sad 8 on the wallball, 17 on the high pull, 6 for the box jump, and 20 on the push press.  The scores were going on a downhill slide! 
round 3 - Rowing lasted about 30 seconds, I got in 10, SDLHP - 18, Box jump  7, Push press - 17.  My final tally was 210, which is not bad. I'll take it.

ouch, ouch, fun, fun!!

Renegade Rows - 7 sets of 10, 3 count.    Sometimes, its a bit of a curse being a bit on the stronger side.  I looked at what I did previously on this, and basically muttered several not so nice words under my breath.  I had to do at least as well.  I did 20 lb, 25 lb, 12 kg kettlebell, 30 lb, I tried the 16kg kettlebell - failed miserably, it was actually rather humorous, then went and finished off with the 25 lb dumbbells.  After that, I did the remaining sets at 35 lbs.  In the end, it was the exact same weights as last time, just different order.

Deadlift - 15 sets of 3.  The main point of this was go as high as you can while still maintaining good form.  I started at 215, 225, 235, 245, 265 - did this one for 2 rounds, then went to 270, did that for 1 round, 2nd round...I did 2.  Why did I only do 2??  Well, I can't remember clearly exactly what happened, if it occurred on the up part or the down part of the lift. I think, I felt myself rounding over, and tried to fix it by pulling back....and that's when it happened.  One of the funkiest sensations ever.  I felt my back muscle pull......it wasn't painful, but it was bizarre.  That was it, I wasn't going to finish the last one of that set.  I needed to move around and make sure I didn't do anything really bad.  Nope, wiggling and moving was fine..I could foresee some back pain in my future though.    I dropped the weight and did the remainder at 235.  Afterwards we went to play in the park, messing around on the playground- the playgrounds are much better than the ones I grew up with!!  It was a fun, fun time!

I took Monday off - turns out, I probably did pull or strain my back muscles - Melissa said the mid back section was a bit of a knotted mess (not exactly her term...).    She worked miracles and today all is good - a tiny bit of stiffness, but about 95% back to feeling normal.
Today we did Functional focus - tire flippin' Yoke walkin, car pushin'.
What pray tell is Yoke walking?  Check out the pic of Patty up above. Yep, it's carrying around a bunch of hanging weight on your back.  The final "timed event" was Yoke walking, tire flipping (3 up, 3 back), and pushing Patty's jeep up and back.  I used the 24 kg kettlebells (53 lbs each), the 60 lb bar, and the chains which I think were around 15 lbs each.  So, I think my total weight was somewhere around 200 lbs. The hard part was the weights on the chains making you walk around like a drunken sailor.  After that, came 6 tire flips with the girl tire, then pushing Patty's car.  Pushing her car on the slight uphill grade made your thighs burn.  The downhill, was not so bad.  I finished with a time of 3:02...and some major oogly legs.

The bean concept -I just don't get it!

I'm trying to get my head around a concept that makes absolutely - zero sense to me.  It's part of the whole "Paleo"eating thing. I get most of it, and it makes sense...all except the legume thing.  Legumes and beans are bad.  I don't get that. I understand cookies, cake, and ice cream (wah!) being bad (yes, I know, not a real difficult concept), I even understand the bread, rice, pasta, and potatoes being bad.  I'll even go so far as to say, I understand why dairy would be in that category...not that I necessarily agree, but at least I understand it.

But really, beans??  So green beans are the enemy?? - ok, maybe not enemy, but a bit of a foe.  I'm not certain I'll ever be able to get my head around that one - and I'm not sure I'll ever want to.  Taking bread, pasta, rice, cookies, candy, cake, ice cream etc, out of a diet is hard enough, but then to take beans out?? No.  just no.  You just can't convince me that green beans, and black beans are the devils candy....just not gonna happen.

Now onto the last week or so.  I've got to get better at this whole keeping track thing, because going off memory, is not so good.

Last Friday, we did 5 minutes each of Turkish Getups (16kg), Cleans (95#) and Handstand pushups for reps.  With a 2 minute rest in between.

We've only done this one once before, but I remember REALLY liking it.  That like, proved true the second time around. In fact I was downright geeked after this one.  I feel like I kicked some good old fashioned ass on it.

On the TGU's I got in 19.  Way up from the 13 I did the last time.

Cleans - 29, again, way the hell up from the 18 I did the first time - although, I will say - the first time I did squat cleans, this time, power cleans.  There is a huge difference between the two.

Handstand pushups - These were done hook feet, but I was really working on full range of motion - I may have been 1/2 inch off the ground on some of them, but I know the range was a heck of alot better than it has been in the past.  I got in 35, up from 27. 

To say I was stoked when I left was an understatement.  I actually felt like I totally kicked ass on a workout, and I haven't felt like I have done that in a while.  

Saturday, we worked on Bench and DL's.  My bench was not so good.   We won't even go there. Deadlifts, I worked on my "breakthrough", and I think most of it carried over, except when we got to the uber-heavy weight.  I was able to do a set of 4 at 275.  Then went for a 1 rep PR.  HA! Not so much.  I tried 305. Getting it off the floor is the easy part...it's the part when the bar is between your ankle and knee cap that I tend to lose it.  Oh well, next time I just might be able to do it. I was probably a bit worn out by the time we got there.  I will say this, when we got to the park to "play"   ...me=toast.  I had a completely empty gas tank.  Note to self - bring food next time!

Tuesday - Box Squats  3-3-3-3-3-3-3
These are basically squats, but you actually sit, and kind of rock 'em forward.  Kind of funky.

I did these 135/155/165/185/195/185/165.  Not spectacular, but not bad, we were working on form.

Tonight - 4 rounds x 25 reps each of Wallball/Slamball.

This is such a pure and innocent sounding one.  It's not.  It's evil.  I tried to keep pace with Jimmie tonight - it worked fairly well, until about the last round, then I about croaked.  This one takes the wind out of you, like nothing else.  I ended up finishing better than last time - taking off about 1:10, with a time of 11:12.  I said I would go up in weight if I got my time under 10 minutes.  So, I guess that means, I'm staying with the 16 lb balls next time..  

That's it, came home feeling pretty good.  Then read that beans were bad, and have been slightly obsessed in my puzzlement since then.   If beans are bad, there's just no justice in this world.

Drats...AHA...and everything in between!

Monday - CrossFit Total...

or for me, now known as "what the bleepity bleep bleep just happened??"
I'm not certain if I need a week or two to psych up for this or what, but the last couple times we've done this it's just been sad.
Back Squat - last two previous attempts - got the 235. Today. Tried.....twice.....and never got it up. From what people say, I was going alot lower than I normally go.  Well, duh, it's easy to squat lower than low with 200+ on your back!! - it's the getting up that's hard, and apparently out of my reach on Monday.
Shoulder Press - I'm pretty sure I messed myself up on this one. I did a warm up at 95, then went to 105, and couldn't get that up to save my life! Because of that pathetic showing, I did the first lift at 95 again. No problem. 2nd lift I went to 105 - but as I was putting the weights on, I believe I saw what the problem was. I think in my warm up, I grabbed the wrong plates, and was going for 115, not 105. 115 is my 1 rep max - that I hit once, and only once. The reality is, I could be mistaken and this could be some lameass excuse for patheticism (not really a word, but it sounds good), but I believe I screwed up the weights in the warmup, which threw me off completely.
Deadlift - After the awesome successes I'd had in the first two lifts, I started relatively light, at 255. Actually, that didn't feel too bad. 2nd lift - I went for 285, slightly higher than the 275 I've gotten a couple times before, but a tad bit lighter than that one tiny 300 moment from 6 months ago. Well, it didn't really go anywhere.   I'll expound a bit moore on this in the Deadlift Functional focus information on Thursday.

Tuesday - Fran   21, 15, 9 reps, 64# Thrusters, Pullups.
Crud - I don't remember what I did timewise on this - I believe it was 8:47 or so.  The thrusters actually felt good - first set I broke it up into 15/6, then 8 /7, then the last 9 were unbroken.  Naturally, the pullups took the most time, but I did 'em kipping in the red bands.  Overall, Fran felt pretty good, but I can't really remember anything special about this day.  There have just been too many other highs and lows this week I guess...

Wednesday - Functional Focus: Deadlift

I had a total "AHA!" moment.  Now, hopefully, I can keep that going next time we do DL's.  In the back of my mind, for quite some time now, I've been thinking that I'm pulling too much with my back on the deadlift.  My guess was that it was because I was using the narrow stance, rather than the sumo.  However, on Tuesday, I had my first massage with Melissa, and she was working out my lower back kinks and knots.  She thought maybe I was doing something wrong, causing me to use my back rather than glutes...which kind of confirmed my thinking.  So, it was kind of ironic that the next day we did functional focus on deadlifts.  We started with 1 round at light warmup weight (135), just looking for the perfect form.  Suddenly, out of nowhere comes the video camera.   We do another round, only this time, it's being filmed - and we get the joy of watching.  Ok, first of all, let's take a gratuitous moment, and just say - HOLY SCHMITZOID!!!........please tell me I am not that roly-poly in the video!! UGH!  I am much cuter and far more buff in my head than on film!!

Ok - gratuitous moment over...other than that, I did notice in the video that my butt was higher up in the air than it felt, and I saw the rocking motion that I have.  The next round we added some weight, brought it to 185.   This time, I really concentrated more on getting my hips lower, but back staying mostly in one position and putting everything through my legs.  I know it sounds strange, but in that set of 5, 4 were closer, and I think 1 of them actually felt the way it was supposed to.   Which, is completely different than I'd been doing them.  Kind of surprising that a small change, actually made it feel right, the way you know it should.   Next we did Deadlift from the hang.  Started much higher this time.  We did alot of these, last set was at 305 for me.  Let me clarify - it was a set of 5 at 305.  Jonathan "wanted me to remember what 300 felt like".   Shoo-dog did I remember, 300 feels freakin' heavy!    I felt pretty darn good on these when I left though, like I've had a break through or something.  We'll see when we do 'em again if this is the case, but I'm going with that mantra for now.

Thursday: Annie    50-40-30-20- 10-rep rounds of: double unders/situps.
I like Annie, despite the elusiveness of a good double under run.  I sucked 'em up the first two rounds.  Took forever.  Then my shoe was untied for the 30's so I kicked 'em off.  I think the desire to avoid the rope smacking into my toes, made me a bit more agile.  Just a bit - not a ton, but that bit helped some.   I ended much better than I started.  End time was 15:27 - some 30+ seconds longer than last time.  I've decided that Annie's time is all dependent on how ya feel doing the DU's. 

That's it so far - a week of lows and highs, and everything in between!

Deadlifting a Turkish Whore!

Deadlift - Functional Focus:

This was interesting.  We did reverse deadlift, which I have never done before.  We didn't go super heavy just focused on form.  After a couple sets of these, we went onto regular deadlifts, but using the opposite stance that we normally do, which for me, would be Sumo stance.  Can't say that I like it much.  Which is ironic because Sumo is how I originally learned to deadlift.  I changed my stance once I hit about 225 or so, and have never looked back.   Well, this was a revisit to Sumo-land,  and just not so good.  Given the choice, I'll go regular stance, thank you!

Turkish Get-up 1-1-1/Front Squat 1-1-1:

I don't think we've done TGU's for weight in a while, so I was a bit curious about how I would do.  That, plus my shoulders have been a bit twingy and off since Lucifer's Lunges and the 45 dips that Friday.  Nothing major, just not 100%.  I started at 50 with the barbell. That was fine, my left shoulder seemed a bit weaker than usual, but not bad.  Went to 60, again, definitely harder with the left hand than with the right.  Last set, I went to 70, hoping to match my previous PR.  It was definitely more difficult - but got the left one. Did the right. Once I got to the top, the barbell was trying to twist and turn on me, as I was descending, so I ended up having to try to muscle it into position with my wrist and forearm - not an easy task!!  I ended up doing the whole thing - but my arm kind of collapsed as I going into the final lay back position.  It may not have ended pretty, but I'm still counting it.  As I was writing up my score, I realized that I hadn't hit 70 before - that had only been successful on one arm - so in reality - I had just hit a new PR! YAY ME!

Front Squats after TGU's. Not so good.  We were a bit rushed for time - since the TGU's took most of the hour.  I started light, I admit it.  125.  Not a problem.  Then, silly me, watched Z, who I had been matching on the weight thing all night, easily squat 165.  He's not a big guy, my thighs are twice the size of his, so 165 should, in theory be no problem.  Not to mention the fact that I have done it before.  Well - I think the 40 lb jump may have been a bit too much after the heavy TGUs.  I plopped down like a lump.  Last round, I went way back down - going with the thought that the important thing is to get it.  So - light at 135.  No problem. Not the most impressive night for Front Squats, but the TGU's were cool!

Kelly - 400m run/30 box jump 16"/30 WB 16# - 5 rounds - 30 minute cutoff.

Kelly is an evil whore.  All I'm gonna say.  This one is pure torture.

No excuses - no nothing.  I did the exact same as last time - didn't finish before the cutoff. I got in 3 rounds plus the run and Box Jumps.  30:50 - about a minute quicker.

Physical effects of this one: let's see  lower right back pain, by the box jumps of round 2 or so(the usual place I get it when running, still can't figure out why), round 3 major foot cramps in the arches of my feet (if you've had this pain before, you know it's terrible.) I haven't had it much with CF, but it struck today!  Lack of oxygen - to the point the hair follicles on my head were all tingly and goose bumpy.  I think that's about it.   I have a sad, sad stamina.  I've never had much tolerance for lack of oxygen, but I should have a better lung capacity by now....at least I think I should!  UGH! Frustrating!  The rest of it, just comes with the territory.  So - yes, better than last time, but not really anything to brag about,

UGH! with a bit of pain and frustration thrown in

Again, I fall behind.    So, here's a plethora of days.

Thursday - Back Squats - 5/5/5/5/5

I feel like I haven't done back squats in forever.  My knees aren't achey at all, they haven't snap, crackled or popped in weeks.  So, I was kind of looking forward to these, but also wondering how they would feel.  Silly question.  Heavy.   That's the answer.

165 - was ok

175 - ok - but my knees were going wonky, yes, that is a technical term!

185 - heavy - I banded my knees to try to stop the wonkiness.  Not sure if it worked or not...

195 - really heavy....super heavy...uber heavy..still had the banded knees. 

195 - ok this set - was really heavy - but not as heavy as set 4....not sure how that happened.

Overall - not bad.  Not fantastic, but not too bad.

Friday - a new one:  21-15-9-rep rounds of:

Dips -  I did with the red band assist.   I did learn - do not stop, keep on dipping until you can't dip anymore. Once you stop, the next one is 12 times harder, even if you pause before complete depletion.

Box Jumps 20" box - I jumped up, but stepped down - my ankle has been feeling good, and I didn't have the best bouncing shoes on, so I didn't want to risk aggravating it again.  But stepping down is completely legit - not as fast, but still counts.

Pullups - Again - red band assist.  Someday I'll be able to do these freakin' things!

Deadlift - 155# - These were fine - no problemo.

I ended up finishing with a sad, sad time of 21:36 or so.  Primarily because of the dips.  Once you stop to refresh your arms a bit - it's a slow progression of one or two at a time.  

The time didn't make me happy.  Definitely not as good as I wanted.

Saturday - another new one - timed stations, based on the person doing the plate push.

I started with Ring Rows.   I think the most I got in was about 8 or 9 because Rich flew through the plate push.

I then moved to the plate push.  This is where you have to push a weight across the floor.  Hands on the weight (35#), feet on the ground...ass in the air.  Although if your ass is too high, the plate doesn't move.  Sounds simple enough.  but I personally ended up on my knees a couple times. I never stopped. Just dropped.  Then hoisted back up again!

Supermans - after the plate pushes, it took me a bit to get my breath and work the supermans, but got in quite a few.

Kettlebell swings 12kg - I could have cranked these out, but Jimmy flew up and down on the plate drag so I had a mere 30-45 seconds to get in as many as I could.

Pop presses - weird jumping jack things.  Fortunately I was able to get quite a few in, despite Lisa moving swiftly on the plate push.

Overall - I scored about ..306???  I think I broke 300....barely.   Not stellar - but not horrible.

Tonight was frustration central.  3 attempts at a 1 rep max Snatch and Clean and Jerk - for an Oly Lift total.

My snatches were wretched.  I seem to be only able to do them, and do them well if we have to do 75 of them.  When it comes to singles - form goes to hell.  

On  the snatches I did:

75 - pulled too soon

85 - pulled too soon -moved too slow

back down to 65 - still pulled a bit too soon.

Can you say "ARGHH!!!!!!"

Onto Clean and Jerks.  For me - the easy part of these is the jerk. I can jerk a whole lot more weight than I can effectively clean.  Because I've been "greasing the groove" this week with 95 lbs.  I started there.  I should, in theory, be able to clean the 95 lbs, as I've been doing and jerk it on up.  Not sure how that first round looked, but it went.  Next round went up to 105.  This was a mess.   No other way to describe it.  I got the bar up on both, but to say it wasn't pretty would be a vast understatement.  I knew this, and didn't even have to see it!  Third round I stayed at 105.   Apparently, this was my best clean of the night.  So, I guess my scor would be.....190?  I completely forgot to write up the clean and jerk score.  

Like the pullup, someday, I'll get these suckers.

Mish-Mash

Kind of a mishmash of stuff the last coupla days.
Thursday was a brand spankin' new thing. It sounds rather horrible, but it really wasn't bad:
- 5 minutes turkish getups for reps (16 kg)
- rest 2 minutes
- 5 minutes cleans for reps (95#)
- rest 2 minutes
- 5 minutes Handstand pushups for reps

Whether this workout was meant this way, or not, I'm not certain, but what I really liked about it, is that it was the right amount of balance between cranking out the reps, and focusing on form. This was not designed to go nonstop for 5 minutes.
The TGU's were no problem, I ended up getting in 13, this was actually alot less than I thought I would get, I guess they take longer to do one than I realize. I had a momentary pause, but never really took a break.

Can't really say that for the cleans. I went for the full pop, 95# on them. There was definitely rest in between. You had your choice whether to do full squat cleans or power cleans. I went with the full squat - for the added leg work?? Not sure why, it just happened that way. I got in 18, which I was ok with, because I felt overall my form wasn't really shabby on them. A couple were not so good, but overall, they felt better than they had in a while.

Handstand pushups, I did with Hooked feet on the bar - on average, probably 1/2 range of motion - some were more, some were less. I think I got in 27 or so of these. After the other two, it was a bit woozy-ing to be upside down, and my head was dripping like a waterfall! Overall, I probably could have gone at this a bit harder, especially on the cleans. But I did want to actually do as many of them correctly as I could - and still get up from the squat. Towards the end...there was some definite leg burn going on.


Friday was Functional Focus Day!! Woo hoo! I love FF days! When I showed up it was me and the boys. The big boys - the "A" game boys. The Top Dudes of DEFY! As we were warming up we were chatting about yesterday's workout, most of the boys take Thursday off, so none of them got to do the workout up above. They all had kind of a sad little puppy dog look to them about it, and it was readily apparent that several of them would prefer to do yesterdays workout than todays functional focus. Well, when Jonathan looked at me and asked if I would be up for repeating yesterday's workout, who was I to deny them??? I said sure. I knew the TGU's and cleans were not going to be a problem, ironically it was the HSPU's that I wasn't sure about. On the second or third verification from J that this would be ok instead of Functional Focus, I said, how about if the boys do the workout, and I'll kind of do my own thing. The FF was based on Cindy. So instead of 5 minutes of TGUs, cleans, and HSPUs. I did 5 minutes of pullups/pushups and squats - not for numbers but focusing on better form.

Pullups, of course sucked. Although I have decided I'm going to try a different method on these. I'm working both grips. I am in the red bands until I can get at least 7 nonstop deadhang, feet never touching the ground with both grips. Once I can do that, I will move to the minis. In my mind, if I can do 7 nonstop deadhang in reds, I should be able to do 2 or 3 in the minis. Once I reach 7 in the minis, I should, in theory be able to do at least one true dead hang. This could be more of my pullup BS thinking, but I'm going with it for now. Testing this one out.
Pushups - I worked on form, and I think it's getting better. I tried to keep my elbows in, shoulder blades squeezing together, and I don't think I did bad on those.
Squats - were fine, I did air, and overhead and front with pcv pipe. Front squats with the PVC are weird. All I'm gonna say...the pipe is too light to truly get the correct feel.

Deadlifts 3-3-3-3-3. Today was not my deadlift day. I started at 245 (I meant to start at 255, but encountered some really bad math on my part!), then 255. Apparently last time I did 3's on these I went as high as 270. So for the 3rd round I tried 275. Got 1 in. Tried it again the 4th round. Nope. Got the bar off the floor - supposedly the hardest part...but after that, it wasn't moving. Big strike out round 4. Last round I went down to 255. Thinking I took 20 lbs off, this should not be a problem. I got in the 3 reps, but they were sad and ugly....and heavy. There were a couple things going on that probably affected my performance, which, I won't necessarily get into - but definitely affected my focus on doing the actual lift itself. I'll leave it at that. I don't feel like I've had a really good DL day in a while - actually since last time I broke through to the 255 PR - many months ago. That day, the DL's felt unlike they ever had before, or have since. I'm not sure what I did that day, but I'm ready for one of those again in the DL arena.

I figure the Hawaii effects must have run their course by now, so now, no excuses - time to kick it up a notch.

AHA!....snaking Deadlifts.

Today, I believe I had a bit of an "AHA!" moment.  I'm not sure where it came from, or how it actually occurred to me, but I may have resolved a bit of my knee issues.  My knees have been a bit on the sore side the last couple of months, the closest timeframe I can pinpoint the start of it is when I started working on breaking parallel.  I've been thinking that my knees are going wonky when we do heavy weighted squats (which, I know is true, and am trying to concentrate on), but we don't do super heavy squats THAT often, so the soreness really shouldn't be ongoing.  Well, today, in warmup (warmups have been 2 sets of 5 front squats/OH squat 30-45 lb bar depending on the day) I was 2 possibly 3 into my first set of 5, in my head, still wondering why the first set has been so uncomfortable/painful lately....and then, out of nowhere - I had a thought.  A brilliant thought.  I believe my issue is that somewhere along the lines of: while squatting on autopilot concentrating on weight, I've been starting the squat at the knee and not at the hip.  The last two I tried of this set were much better, didn't hurt.  I believe I have this puzzle solved, but next week will be the test.

Today were deadlifts - 1/1/1/1/1/1/1.  After getting almost no sleep last night (I'm chalking that up to the 1/2 can of Coke Zero that I had last night - thank you caffeine!), I wasn't really sure how I would do.  My PR for deadlift is 300 - but it was not a pretty 300 - pure snaking the whole way up.  I started today at 255. Good.  275. OK.  285 - the snake came back in a big way. 

At this point, I knew I wasn't going for any PR's.  I've decided that next time I hit 300 - it's going to be a pretty 300. End result: I need to work on making sure I've got the form down,  with weights that high, it's too easy to really hurt yourself, and that is not my goal.  So, I dropped back down to 275 - still a bit on the snakey side. Dropped again to 265 - this one was good.  Back to 270 - ok -with a hint o' snake.  Last rep I went back to the beginning at 255, and that was good.  So - I'll keep working on these, so that the next time I pull the 300, I can say it with pride as opposed to the  "yeah, but it wasn't pretty" caveat that I've been using.