Today was a pretty good day. I didn't get my morning run in, but I did get in a 30ish minute bike ride to class. I had an interesting time at crossfit this afternoon. First of all, the strength workout was weighted squats. My one rep max is 125 lb. and todays workout required that I do two sets of 5 with 75 lbs. on the first set and 85 lbs. on the second set. Then I was supposed to do a fail set with 95 pounds (a fail set is, as it's name implies, a set where you keep doing reps until you feel like you are going to fail on the nex rep). For some reason I could not do my sets. I mean I could do them, but they felt terrible. I was having trouble getting low enough and my weight kept shifting to the front of my feet. I gave up after two sets, took off a lot of the weight and tried to work on form. Even with a lot less weight I felt sloppy, so I stopped to avoid injury or bad habit formation. It was really strange. I think I'm just really tight from yesterday's workout.
Then there was the WOD. The WOD was:
21-15-9
Front Rack Lunges (same as the video only we step forward instead of backward)
Pull ups (I had to use a band)
Time: 8:18
That is a terrible time! I got it for two reasons. First, nearing the end of my first set of lunges (the set of 21) I fell backwards into the rack. When you do a lunge, it's important to keep your back straight while lowering your knee to the ground and bringing it back up. Once your knee is as straight as it's going to get and you are standing up right, you bring your feet back together. Because I was getting tired, I guess, I stepped back as I was standing up. This caused me to lose my center of gravity while my mass shifted backwards. The result is a big and awkwardly located bruise. The second reason for the terrible time is much simpler. I suck at pull ups.
In other news, I have a half marathon coming up this weekend. I'm kind of freaked out because I haven't been running that much lately. Also my exercise routine has been stop and go. We'll see how it goes. My thought is that I'll be quite pleased if I finish around 2:30 and satisfied so long as I'm under 3 hours. If I'm over 3 hours, I'm going to be quite unhappy with myself.
Also, I'm thinking of deferring my marathon registration for a year. Time is flying by and I don't feel I have probably acclimated my legs to that kind of distance running. A lot of this decision will be based on my performance this weekend. I have until the Friday following this race to decide.
Showing posts with label WOD. Show all posts
Showing posts with label WOD. Show all posts
Tuesday, September 4, 2012
Monday, September 3, 2012
Labor Day
Today's workout punched me in the face. It's a new crossfit.com workout called "Wood." Let me stop you before the bad jokes start flowing because it was named after a member of the Australian special forces, Brett Wood, who was killed by an IED in Afghanistan. The workout was the the following:
5 RFT (rounds for time)
400m run
10 burpee box jumps
10 SDHP (50 lbs.)
10 Thrusters (50 lbs.)
1 minute rest
Time to complete: 36:33
Apart from the recent triathlon, this was the most grueling thing I've done in recent memory. I've been done for the better part of an hour and I still feel like I just finished. I wish I could put a timer on how long it has taken me to write this post as I have to keep stopping because my arms are shaking so much. I'm supposed to go on a bike ride with my fella in a few hours, we'll see if that happens!
EDIT: I made it through a 9.5 mile bike ride. It was mostly trail and there were a few hills. I kinda wish we had kept going. :)
Tomorrow: AM run, PM crossfit.
5 RFT (rounds for time)
400m run
10 burpee box jumps
10 SDHP (50 lbs.)
10 Thrusters (50 lbs.)
1 minute rest
Time to complete: 36:33
Apart from the recent triathlon, this was the most grueling thing I've done in recent memory. I've been done for the better part of an hour and I still feel like I just finished. I wish I could put a timer on how long it has taken me to write this post as I have to keep stopping because my arms are shaking so much. I'm supposed to go on a bike ride with my fella in a few hours, we'll see if that happens!
EDIT: I made it through a 9.5 mile bike ride. It was mostly trail and there were a few hills. I kinda wish we had kept going. :)
Tomorrow: AM run, PM crossfit.
Monday, August 27, 2012
The first day of classes
So I'm seriously starting to freak out about the races I have coming up because I have not been working out nearly as much as I should be. Races are a blessing and a curse because they are so much fun, but the lead time can be stressful (a blessing in disguise, I suppose, because it gets my butt off the couch).
Anyways, due to my schedule it's looking like I'm going to have to go the gym at 8 AM on MWF. I have an 8 AM class on Tuesday/Thursday so it would be nice to maintain a consistent schedule (we'll see if I can pull it off). I've also decided to bike to and from school as much as I can. This morning was day one and my bike basket broke and my bike chain slipped. Not only did it add several minutes to my bike time (making me almost late to the gym), but my stuff spilled into the street and a nice gentleman had to help me pick it up. I was very thankful for that kind stranger. Anyways, the ride to the gym took about half an hour and the ride home took around 24 minutes. We'll see if I can get that time below 20 (no I'm not competitive!).
The workout today was pretty awesome. We started with a crossfit warmup, which I won't go into, and then overhead press (5 x 40 pounds, 5 x 45 pounds, and 6 x55 pounds). My trainer gave me some excellent tips to improve my overhead press. As I got tired, my back started to arch so he told tighten my abs and squeeze my butt. He said something like "protect yourself like a prisoner in a shower." A bit crass, but it definitely helped. After that, we worked on form for the olympic squat (aptly timed, given some of the more recent posts). It's amazing how much form really matters. I love my gym because we focus on different aspects of form each week. Little things like grip, bar placement, and timing. It seriously makes a difference.
Then came the workout. The workout was in two parts. The first part was the baseline. The baseline consists of a 400m run, 40 air squats, 30 situps, 20 pushups and 10 pullups for time. My previous time was 5:32 and I got it down to just over 4:50. a 40 second improvement! I was happy with that, though I felt like crap. The second part was one minute each of burpees, sumo deadlift high pulls, american swings (16 pound kettlebell), push press (45 pound bar), and double unders for max reps. I lost count of how many reps I did at about the halfway point, but it was a killer workout.
We closed with 3x10 overhead press at half maximum and 3x10 sets of up GHD sit ups. It was a good day at the gym! :)
I'm going to try and run 13 miles this weekend and I'm planning to run 7.8 on Thursday with a group of people. I'll try to squeeze some other runs in as well. We'll see!
Anyways, due to my schedule it's looking like I'm going to have to go the gym at 8 AM on MWF. I have an 8 AM class on Tuesday/Thursday so it would be nice to maintain a consistent schedule (we'll see if I can pull it off). I've also decided to bike to and from school as much as I can. This morning was day one and my bike basket broke and my bike chain slipped. Not only did it add several minutes to my bike time (making me almost late to the gym), but my stuff spilled into the street and a nice gentleman had to help me pick it up. I was very thankful for that kind stranger. Anyways, the ride to the gym took about half an hour and the ride home took around 24 minutes. We'll see if I can get that time below 20 (no I'm not competitive!).
The workout today was pretty awesome. We started with a crossfit warmup, which I won't go into, and then overhead press (5 x 40 pounds, 5 x 45 pounds, and 6 x55 pounds). My trainer gave me some excellent tips to improve my overhead press. As I got tired, my back started to arch so he told tighten my abs and squeeze my butt. He said something like "protect yourself like a prisoner in a shower." A bit crass, but it definitely helped. After that, we worked on form for the olympic squat (aptly timed, given some of the more recent posts). It's amazing how much form really matters. I love my gym because we focus on different aspects of form each week. Little things like grip, bar placement, and timing. It seriously makes a difference.
Then came the workout. The workout was in two parts. The first part was the baseline. The baseline consists of a 400m run, 40 air squats, 30 situps, 20 pushups and 10 pullups for time. My previous time was 5:32 and I got it down to just over 4:50. a 40 second improvement! I was happy with that, though I felt like crap. The second part was one minute each of burpees, sumo deadlift high pulls, american swings (16 pound kettlebell), push press (45 pound bar), and double unders for max reps. I lost count of how many reps I did at about the halfway point, but it was a killer workout.
We closed with 3x10 overhead press at half maximum and 3x10 sets of up GHD sit ups. It was a good day at the gym! :)
I'm going to try and run 13 miles this weekend and I'm planning to run 7.8 on Thursday with a group of people. I'll try to squeeze some other runs in as well. We'll see!
Wednesday, August 15, 2012
Just another manic Wednesday
Today's workout:
my warm up - mile run
50 wallballs (14 pounds)
40 hollow body rocks (arms by my side)
30 burpees (I f-ing hate burpees)
20 tuck crunch
10 sit to stand
Time: 9:27
Skill: 2 max false grip holds (I should have done better with this but it took me too long to figure it out)
I really liked this WOD because it was mostly core, which is one of my strengths. I kept up with everyone through the wall balls and rocks, fell a little behind on the burpees and then blasted by on the tuck crunches and sit to stands. I was generally pleased with my performance.
Lately, we have been doing quite a lot of hollow body gymnastics work at the gym which it has been incredibly helpful for me. Working on hallow body really helps you to get in the habit of engaging core muscles that need to be engaged during various movements. For example, the kip portion of a kipping pull up requires you to engage your abs at the appropriate time in order to be effective. After today's WOD I did some work on my kipping pull-up and was able to, for the first time, do two or three at a time repeatedly. I'm really excited about this because I've never been able to complete pull-ups without using a band for assistance. During future workouts, I might start trying to do the pull-ups, or some of the pull-ups, without bands. I feel confident that, with practice, I'll be able to string more of them together without stopping!!
I am a little frustrated with myself for not doing a 3 -5 mile run today. Doing the one miler was kind of rough. I think my body was too sore and my back was too sore from the WOD yesterday to really propel myself effectively. The nice thing about crossfit is that, even if you don't run, you did still something that was pretty damn difficult!!
Tuesday, August 14, 2012
Tuesday night WOD
Today's workout was rough. First of all, I went in intending to increase my deadlift one rep max from 200 to atleast 215. I was fine lifting 205, but nearly broke my back trying to lift 215. Needless to say, it didn't happen for me tonight. My trainer pointed out, and I agree, that I started the lift with my chest two far forward which doomed me from the start. He argued that I would have had no problem lifting the weight if I had been lifting properly. He's probably right, but my back was sore and I was in an early onset bad mood.
Once that was finished, I had to do tonight's WOD (workout of the day). It was a 21/15/9 (on the first round you do each exercise 21 times, second round you do each exercise 15 times, etc.) consisting of hollow body push ups, bar facing burpees and 45 lb clean squats (85 lbs. was recommended but I was a wimp). Hollow body push ups are like regular push ups except you end in a hollow body position where your back is arched and your abs are engaged. What we did was very similar to this video only we started with a regular plank and pushed up into the hollow body position (he is in the hollow body position throughout the entire movement). Also note that crossfit push ups are a bit different, and in my opinion much more difficult, than a regular push up (This video shows several different types of push ups, the one we traditionally do is the one with the hands and elbows in tight, it's shown about 21 seconds into the video). The second exercise was a bar facing burpee (the ones in this video look terrible but you get the idea). These are just regular burpees only you jump over a bar after each one. The final exercise in the set was a squat clean. I was frustrated because my trainer insisted on modifying it after my interesting deadlift performance. At first he wouldn't let me do the squat, but I refused to omit that because my squats are only starting to get good. I really wanted the practice, so he decided I shouldn't start from the floor. That was fine with me.
There was a 25 minute cap and I finished in just over 22 minutes. I was kind of pissed that it took me that long, but out of five people only three finished. Also, I was the only girl in the group and I finished second so I guess that's something to be proud of.
As for running, I didn't do any of that today and I should have. I conquered an 11 mile run this past weekend and I plan to undertake a 13 miler this Saturday. That being said, I haven't decided how to lay out my mileage for the balance of the week. I'm thinking a longer run tomorrow (maybe 8 miles), a track workout on Thursday, and a shorter/easier run on Friday (3 - 5 miles). I want to keep my weekly mileage above 20 and steadily progress towards 30 as I train for the marathon in October. I've been reading a book on marathon training which has some interesting suggestions regarding weekly mileage. Among other things, the author argues that an individual can easily train for a marathon without exceeding 30 miles per week. Hopefully he is right because I don't see myself going much over that. He also argues that the longest training run should not exceed 20 miles. I'll create a second post with more information about my ever evolving training plan.
Once that was finished, I had to do tonight's WOD (workout of the day). It was a 21/15/9 (on the first round you do each exercise 21 times, second round you do each exercise 15 times, etc.) consisting of hollow body push ups, bar facing burpees and 45 lb clean squats (85 lbs. was recommended but I was a wimp). Hollow body push ups are like regular push ups except you end in a hollow body position where your back is arched and your abs are engaged. What we did was very similar to this video only we started with a regular plank and pushed up into the hollow body position (he is in the hollow body position throughout the entire movement). Also note that crossfit push ups are a bit different, and in my opinion much more difficult, than a regular push up (This video shows several different types of push ups, the one we traditionally do is the one with the hands and elbows in tight, it's shown about 21 seconds into the video). The second exercise was a bar facing burpee (the ones in this video look terrible but you get the idea). These are just regular burpees only you jump over a bar after each one. The final exercise in the set was a squat clean. I was frustrated because my trainer insisted on modifying it after my interesting deadlift performance. At first he wouldn't let me do the squat, but I refused to omit that because my squats are only starting to get good. I really wanted the practice, so he decided I shouldn't start from the floor. That was fine with me.
There was a 25 minute cap and I finished in just over 22 minutes. I was kind of pissed that it took me that long, but out of five people only three finished. Also, I was the only girl in the group and I finished second so I guess that's something to be proud of.
As for running, I didn't do any of that today and I should have. I conquered an 11 mile run this past weekend and I plan to undertake a 13 miler this Saturday. That being said, I haven't decided how to lay out my mileage for the balance of the week. I'm thinking a longer run tomorrow (maybe 8 miles), a track workout on Thursday, and a shorter/easier run on Friday (3 - 5 miles). I want to keep my weekly mileage above 20 and steadily progress towards 30 as I train for the marathon in October. I've been reading a book on marathon training which has some interesting suggestions regarding weekly mileage. Among other things, the author argues that an individual can easily train for a marathon without exceeding 30 miles per week. Hopefully he is right because I don't see myself going much over that. He also argues that the longest training run should not exceed 20 miles. I'll create a second post with more information about my ever evolving training plan.
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