Yes, it’s worth it

Awesome post, couldn't have said it better myself...

"In case you were wondering, yes, it’s worth it.  It always is."

8/30 - oly lifting! heavy cleans! c2b...

I was still (barely) able to walk after the 75(!) ohs from ‘Nancy’ so once again made it to the box.  I was surprisingly less sore from the ohs than I was from the 50 front squats on Monday – that being said I still didn’t want to see squats on the board.

From Tash’s facebook posts on ripped hands I knew we’d likely be doing pull-ups even as she tried to throw us off mentioning KB swings and then 100m runs (you’re not that sneaky Tash). Anyway, before I get to all the details of the WOD let’s first get into the warm-up.  Once again we had Coach Tim (it’s been the Tim and Jack show most of the week as Match and Kirst were away in Broome – they’ve done the programming too, more on that later though).

Warmup
300m run
‘fun gone bad’
2 rounds/ 30 seconds at each*
ohs
situps
boxjumps
front squats
pushups
rest

‘Fun gone bad’ is the wod done at Cooee on the very first night of fundamentals.  To this day it’s still the hardest wod I can remember (though crying doing rope climbs is right up there too).  I think the reason it feels so hard is that it’s your first introduction to crossfit and you don’t realize how much you can push yourself over 5 body weight movements.  *in the fundamentals WOD you do each movement for 1 minute (simulating fight gone bad) with one minute rest and then you go again (though they don’t tell you this until after the first round is over and you’ve almost died).  Anyway, it was our warmup and it still hurt all the same.  Ha.  I think I managed 118 reps for the first round then lost count in the middle of the box jumps on round two.  We hadn’t even started the real work portion of the day yet and I was already hating on Coach Tim (in that friendly I hate you for making us do this but I will love doing it for some insane reason kind of way).  I also knew Tim had  a hand in programming and while I assumed that he and Jack came up with the WOD together I knew only Tim would include chest to bar pull-ups – turns out the entire WOD was programmed by Tim (mean! But also good!)

Strength
10 mins to work up to a heavy squat clean + push jerk + split jerk
20-30-40-45-50-52.5(f)

I was really hoping for snatches since we did a few yesterday to get the bar overhead for the ohs but clean and jerks were just as good.  I haven’t done any technical oly lifting in ages so this was fun.  My technique felt solid throughout.  Even on the heavier cleans I maintained form, really focusing on my hip drive and quick elbows rather than my feet going wide.  This continued through the WOD too which made me really happy.  The push jerk is where I failed on 52.5kg.  I’m not sure it was entirely the weight but more the confidence.  I cleaned it fairly easily (surprisingly) and then dropped it from about my shoulder height which to me indicates that I could have gotten under in but was afraid of it.  Next time for sure.  50kg felt solid so I know I have more in me.

One thing I noticed (and maybe it’s just me) but when being coached today it was different – I needed more quiet or at least no one saying pick it up, go now and I feel that this was because it was more of a technical lift that required concentration.  I needed the focus inside my own head rather than from an external source.  The ‘go now’ needed to be when I was ready not when I was told if that makes any sense.  And it’s totally different from when squatting, etc. where the movement is conditioned into us and is pretty straight forward but when throwing large weights overhead I need to retreat into my own head and this was the first time I noticed it.

WOD
5 rounds (13 minute cutoff)
5 clean & jerk (45/70kg)
10 chest to bar  pull-ups

3/5 Rx

I didn’t finish this WOD and I’m okay with that.  I went heavier on the CJ’s and maintained good form though was only doing single reps all the way through.  Right from the start I was doing split jerks but I felt solid and didn’t miss any lifts even though the weight is nearing my max.  The c2b pull-ups were what got me.  I’ve struggled with c2b ever since the open wod where I did them for the first time.  I can get them but it usually requires a second pull to complete or a really big kip which in turn tears my hands (and oh, I did!).  Throughout the wod I was doing sets of 2 c2b with mixed grip and it was as hard as the heavy lifts were.  In my head as much as I was pushing I knew I’d be happy with completing three rounds in the 13 minute cutoff.  I did just that and finished the last 5 cj’s.  On the last set of c2b I was swinging pretty good rather than wasting energy with a second pull though I managed to rip both hands in the process.  The first one (left hand) tore and stung (and made me curse) but wasn’t too bad when I kept going.  On the last two c2b I ripped my right hand and it didn’t feel too bad but right away started bleeding – a lot.  I still continued with the cj’s though and it wasn’t at all pretty.  A little disinfectant after to clean the bar though and then tearing up which washing my hand and all was good.  Glad I have the weekend to heal though I should have known better anyway, my callouses had callouses so it’s not much of a surprise that they tore.  Oops! Ouch!

I need to find the time to work more on my heavy lifting.  I’d like to see where I’m at now with both my heavy snatch and cj.  I think I’ve improved a lot since the oly lifting sessions we did with Luke in the fall but it’s a matter of access to the equipment with enough time to just focus on technique and to rest between sets.

Finished up the evening with some mobility and chatting with Ang – about all the yummy goodies we’re going to make during the Whole Life challenge.  It should be good.  Info session tonight for anyone who might be interested in giving it a go – 6pm at Cooee.

Friday Funnies...

This cracks me up every time...

Still a goal I'm (trying to) work on...

Love gymnastics movements...

8/29 - more squats...

We had Coach Jack last night!!  Excitement only because I haven’t seen him since before I left for Canada – he’s been coaching mornings and I’ve been at the night sessions.  It was good to catch up and also to mix it up a bit.  And yes, even though Jack and Tim are twins I knew immediately that it was Jack and not Tim (funny stories there).

We had a small class tonight which was great.  I think many were probably still hurting over the squats from Monday.  I know I was.  I was in agony.  My coworkers spent all day laughing at me every time I had to walk anywhere.  It wasn’t pretty, my hamstrings weren’t my friends.  So in the morning when Tim told me we were doing benchmark ‘Nancy’ for the WOD I started to wonder how exactly I was going to do it.  Really.

Warmup

Run 200m

Skipping

15 ohs with skipping rope

100 skips

15 ohs with skipping rope

Across width of room do:

High knee stretch

Quad stretch/ reach for the ceiling

Inch worm

High kicks

My body barely worked for any of this warmup.  I’m not even joking.  I did a bit of rolling out before class but even that made me want to cry.  Every movement made my hamstrings scream.  

Strength
8 mins to get 2 RM turkish get-ups (left & right)
10kg

I didn’t really put much effort in here rather I was trying to convince my body that working out would be okay.  I was happy though with my form on these, the movement requires a lot of thinking – there’s a lot of steps to go through – but it seemed to go well.

With an empty bar do 15 ohs then load bar for WOD – again, this killed.  I was still determined however to Rx the WOD (mostly because it was a benchmark).  I knew I’d (probably) get through it just perhaps not in the 18 minute cut-off or with big sets of OHS.

WOD
“Nancy”
5 rounds
400m run
15 OHS (30/45kg)

17:50 Rx.5

This one started off very weird.  I led the entire first 400m run.  Like I said, weird.  I don’t have a fast of faster speed of running.  I pretty much have one speed and it’s barely definable as fast.  Hun and Glen were each a step behind me but wouldn’t pass which on any other day would have been the case from the start.  In a way it felt like they were letting me pace them but again, weird.  I kept a steady pace but nothing insane but yet still came out in front. 

For all the OHS I managed to complete them in two sets of 10 and 5 each.  I was happy that I was able to maintain that throughout even when the 10th rep was starting to get a little shaky in the later rounds.  I felt solid in the power snatch each time though once overhead I found my wrists were the weak point, they most definitely hurt after it was done.  The first round really killed my legs but it seemed the more reps I did the more my legs responded.  The additional blood flow I think helped to clear some of the soreness from Monday’s wod.  The runs were just steady, two 200m laps.  A few times my legs almost buckled at the corners but that just made me laugh and carry on.  On the second to last run with about 4 minutes left I told Coach Jack that I was going to finish – thinking that I would miss the cut-off time but keep going anyway.   

When I came back in from my last run I saw just under 17 minutes on the clock and knew I had to push it to make the cut-off.  I immediately picked up the bar and struggled through 10 reps (barely) and then put it down, stared at the clock and knew that I had to give myself about 30 seconds for the last 5 reps just to be sure.  And I did.  After a few deep breaths I picked it back up and finished it off.  I surprised myself at how fast I managed to do this wod, especially when comparing it to times from earlier in the day along with how my legs were feeling when I showed up.  As the workout progressed though my legs felt better though they hurt again today even after a night spent sleeping in my compression tights (they were almost part of my work attire today!).  125 (heavy) squats in 3 days is substantial.  Hopefully there aren’t any tonight as I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t survive.

8/27 - WODing and personal reflections...

After a weekend of doing a whole lot of nothing – well, there were some epic and fun walks I guess – it was back to Crossfit tonight.  The WOD on the board looked tough but not killer and yet it almost did kill me but we’ll get to that.  First it was another creative warm up from Coach Tim.

Warmup

Run to the back fence

Shuttle run for 5 of the car parking lines (I swear he really wanted to make us do all of them – there’s about 30)

10 KB Russian swings

Lunge half the box with KB locked out overhead (one arm)

10 KB goblet squats

Lunge half the box with KB locked out overhead (other arm)

10 KB cleans (5 each arm)

Leg swings, shoulder swings, etc. to get joints ready for WOD

Strength
5-5-5-5-5 Push press
20-30-35-40(PR)

This was pretty hard for me because as soon as I did I want to jerk the bar (even if it’s just a little) rather than just pressing it.  I am struggling with the line between strict pressing and jerking.  I managed 40kg which is pretty good as my previous PR was 34kg back in March – though my strict press is now up to 35kg (Aug 3/2012) so I was thinking I could manage more than 40 but just wasn’t feeling it – especially for 5 reps.

WOD
20-15-10-5
Front squat (40/60kg)
Toes to bar

12:02 Rx.5 (totally taking credit for that .5kg)

Everything about this WOD was hard.  At the end Coach Tim did comment about how it was 50 reps but the thing was the first squat hurt as much as the last one did.  As did the toes to bar.  There was just something off about me that just made it hard – 40kg is heavy(ish) but still pretty far from my max of 65kg so it shouldn’t have been as much of a struggle but it was.  I made it through the WOD – the first set I did 10 reps then 5-5 and from there on out managed only 5 reps at a time.  On the t2b I did 5 max. at a time though that has to do with the fact that I can’t link them directly together (I need an extra swing in the middle).  But even when I had to jump back up to do more reps on the t2b I just stared at the bar and didn’t want to go anywhere near it.  My back has been really tight lately – or rather half of my back has – just one side and Angie said it might have to do with some imbalance in my body so that I put more strain on one side than the other.  I’m been focused on rolling it out as much as I can but it still really aches (through my quad at times too) so I need to work on that – maybe it’s time to book another massage.  I finished though… I guess that was the only thing to take out of the day, even though I just wanted to curl up and cry I didn’t.  It’s more than that though, physically I’m hurting but not so much as to make me want to cry mid-WOD (or again in the car on the way home)… I wasn’t sure what was going on with me last night…

Personal reflections below… a warning to stop reading if you only care about the workouts…

I had plenty of time to think on my way home and started to realize that I’ve been a bit frustrated lately mentally and it’s just building.  The new job while full of potential and some great people has been a bit of a struggle as one of the guys who I’m supposed to be working with and then taking over for when he retires (again) just isn’t letting me get involved no matter what approach is taken (I’ve tried many different ways to get involved) or by whom (my boss has spoken with him several times and I think is just as frustrated at the situation).  I feel like a kid just out of school with very little experience rather than someone with a ton.  So there’s that. 

Building on that though (as it’s just a fraction of my day) is that there are a few people in my life who I’m finding frustrating lately or rather  I’m just expecting too much I suppose – these friends are starting to make me feel like I’m just not good enough somehow which in turn makes some of the jokes sting more than intended and the cycle perpetuates.  I realize too this is about me rather than them.  That there is something I’m missing, something I need  that makes me expect something from them even when I know better than to do that.  I’m also starting to realize that it’s all on me, that I need to figure it out  what’s going on in my head (and believe me, there’s much more than I’m going to talk about here) and more specifically what I need to do about it – for me.  Selfishly, me.  My life.  Sadly, the best way that I see to deal with these frustrating people is to just let go, I don’t have the space in my life for these people who don’t support me or who can’t find any time to hang out.  I’m better off focusing my energy on the ones who do and can and there are plenty of them.  I’m surrounded by them and rather than focusing on the frustration and trying to find away to ‘fix’ that, my lesson right now is to let it go.  Relinquish the need to try and figure it out, to make it work because it shouldn’t be hard, it shouldn’t be frustrating and more importantly it should just be fun.  Life is just too short for anything but.  So my focus, for now is on me, on relishing the love and support that does surround me (and thanks to my lovely friends for the reminders lately) and on letting go of those that don’t…

8/23 - Tire jumps!!

Once again we had Coach Tim and once again we had a creative(ish) warmup…
Since we weren’t going to get enough tire jumps in the actual WOD we started with a  150m run to the tires and then did 30 jumps before running back into the box.  It was on the jumps that I realized that my legs actually were sore from all the squatting on Tuesday night – I didn’t realize it before then even as Glen and Angie mentioned that they were.

For the length of the box we then did high knees/ grab your knee each step to stretch, lazy spidermans, high leg kicks and lunge/twists.  Then there was some squatting and shoulder rotations to get us all loosened up.

WOD
21-18-15
KB swings
Sit-ups
300m run / tyre-box jumps half way
11:26 22kg KB

Rest 3 mins

12-8-4
Burpees
Single-arm KB swings or KB snatches
300m run / tyre-box jumps

8:40 10kg KB

I got an extra 34 seconds of rest for having finished before the 12 minute cut-off.  We all started the second WOD together so that was a bit of a bonus.  On the board the WOD looked harmless enough as it didn’t include the 300m run – basically you had to do tire jumps and the tires were at the back of the building which meant 150m run to get there, jumps and then 150m run back – this sucked, a lot… especially for the last 4 jumps, such a long way to go for such a small number of reps.  Was a good change though – although the tires are equivalent in height to a 20” box they require a lot more concentration.  At one point in the set of 18 I think I jumped and one foot hit the tire and the other feel into the little groove area and slipped right through – it wasn’t pretty but I got right back at them even having almost face planted.

The KB swings at 22kg were hard and heavy but I managed to mentally push myself fully through the first two rounds – I lost momentum on the first round mostly because I almost swung over my head so I had to ‘restart’ but didn’t actually rest during the break.  On the last round I stopped after 7 reps partly because my grip was going and I felt like the KB was slipping and partly (mostly?) out of fatigue.  The sit-ups were steady and no big deal.  The runs and tire jumps kept it interesting.

Part two was hard.  Starting on burpees was just mean but as always it was all about utilizing gravity to hit the floor and keeping a steady pace throughout.  I did KB snatches on this one and since I’m still not comfortable with the movement I used a light weight.  I need to practice my form on this and figure out the ‘punch’ at the top to be effective.  It was good to work on them though.  Again, the run and tire jumps kept it interesting.  I tried throughout this workout to get right onto at least the first rep of the next movement and then rest after if necessary – it’s a trick that Coach Match taught me during the open competition and it’s a good one.  Just start getting the reps done as soon as you can though with the KB swings I did take a few breathers knowing I was going to push through one continuous set.

Happy for a rest weekend.  Good luck to everyone doing City to Surf, I’m (hopefully) going to be out surfing on my ski.

Also, thanks to both Tim and Glen for writing my times on the board... in the first case because I was lying on the floor trying to breathe after the first WOD and in the second because I was just too short...

Thanks boys!