Bodyweight WOD

I thought the WOD today would be something I could quickly fit in between coaching and my chiropractor appointment. I took me nearly 5 minutes more than I would've liked. Too slow on pullups, and I just basically suck at pushups. Alot. This does not bode well for doing Murph in two weeks...

WOD:
1000m row
air squat x 80
sit up x 60
push up x 40
pull up x 20

Results: ~17:00

Words from Stephanie, WOD by Christine

A reminder:

"Even though I have set these goals, they are not why I Crossfit. I Crossfit because I love my body. I Crossfit because it helps me to experience the present moment (my meditation). I have goals, but in every workout I am committed to loving and accepting my body's current abilities. I believe with every part of me, that the only way to truly attain "what we want" is by accepting and taking joy in what we already have."
- Stephanie

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Something that I've read about 3 times, but don't have a coherent response to yet. But very thought-provoking...

What's Eating You?

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Yesterday we did a WOD that was created by one of our members. She has been CrossFitting for several months, and back in March participated in our Paleo challenge. She saw *amazing* results from changing her diet -- she's lost over 20 pounds and 2 clothing sizes, and her performance in the gym is absolutely taking off. Way to go Christine! The thought of the smile on her face as she told me about her new summer sundresses is what pushed me through this WOD. She worked hard and she so deserves her success, health and happiness. :)

"Our Christine"
For time:
1000m row
then
10 rounds:
10 pullups
10 situps
10 pushups

Results: ~38 minutes; only finished 8 rounds

4:14 again on the 1k row. I'm satisfied with that.

I've had some pesky palm issues with my hands, so I decided to hang from my fingers for the pullups. Well, that worked until round 7 when I started tearing the skin off the middle of my fingers. So I switched to palm grip, and by the end of the 10 pullups in round 8 I had ripped off a huge chunk of my right hand, and reopened two other hot spots. So, I was done.

I love you Christine, and I wanted to finish your WOD! My arms had 20 more pullups left in them, but my hands did not.

The good news is that I was kipping up to and over the bar just about every time. There were a few ugly pullups, but they were absolutely in the minority. That was my main goal for the WOD and I'm glad I achieved it.

In relaying the events of my workout to my husband, I realized that my pushups have really been getting awesome. I know I have been down on myself about pullups, and I think that's because they are so symbolic to me. If I can do pullups, I am *absolutely* strong and I can conquer anything. Losing them made me feel vulnerable, I think? Anyway, pushups are badass too, so I embrace them as my new strength until I get fully back on my feet with the pullups. :)

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Leaving in a few minutes to take a trip north and spend some time with my family. MUCH NEEDED time with my family. I also get to see one of my best friends graduate from Penn State with his doctorate. I am so freakin' proud of him. :)

Jackie

"Jackie"
1000m row
50 thrusters (45/25)
30 pullups

Results:  18:10

HORRIBLE doesn't even begin to describe the trainwreck of this WOD for me. Previous times for this WOD were 14 minutes and 10 minutes, using a blue band for pullups.

I know if I had done this WOD in March or April it would've been more like 12 minutes. Regressing, instead of progressing, is such a fucking bummer.

It's mainly a crappy kip (which for me comes from a crappy attitude) that killed my pullups today. I was 3/4 kipping, 1/4 deadhanging. Not effective at all.

We're supposed to be doing lots of "girls' this month at the box. Should be a mother fucking train wreck...

Trying to get back in the saddle

Ah, an unplanned hiatus... Those are never good.

I've gained back about 5-7 pounds, and based on pullups yesterday, I am back to sucking at those (i.e. lots of singles with 3/4 kip and 1/4 dead hang to finish).

Gah.

This past week was just about getting my ass into the gym; not about performance or skills or anything. Just showing up. Back to the basics, because I am struggling with my headspace right now.

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Saturday, April 24

Went out of town with husband last weekend, and we hit up a little WOD I wrote up in the hotel gym. They had a cable crossover machine with pullup "handles" attached and a tile removed from the ceiling for head clearance -- that was a nice surprise. After a week off, and two weeks of eating total crap, I felt pukey the entire time. But it was very good for me to get my body moving, I'm glad that my husband has such wonderful abilities to motivate me to want to exercise. :)

5 rounds for time:
5 pullups
10 squats
10 situps
10 pushups
10 lunges (each leg)
handstand hold (20 seconds)

Results: ~22 minutes

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Tuesday, April 27

In a word, horrible. I had a bad attitude, and I was sluggish and sucked at ring dips. I hate having to use the freaking band, even the tiny one. Gotta get these ring dips conquered so I can move the fuck on.

21-15-9 for time of:
DB thrusters (35lbs/25)
ring dips
double unders

Results: ~20 minutes

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Wednesday, April 28

I used two abmats for my handstand pushups. After the total debacle the day before, where I finished about 5-10 minutes after everyone else, I decided to scale the HSPU to 10ish per round during the first round. When I got to 11, I just kept failing attempts. So I freaking moved on, and got the freaking WOD done. Not my usual style, but this week was seriously ONLY about showing up and moving.

3 rounds for time of:
15 med ball cleans (20lbs/14)
15 handstand push ups
400m run

Results: ~20 minutes

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Thursday, April 29

I coached this one in the morning, and then came back to WOD with the group that night. I'm glad I did, because the press turned out better than I expected. Plus I shared a bar with 2 dudes, and went heavier than one of them -- it's the little things that make my inner feminist happy. :-D

Press
1-1-1-1-1-1-1
75-85-90-95-95m-85-75

My first 95 went up s-l-o-w-l-y and it was ugly, but I got that bitch locked the fuck out. Booyeah! PR by 10 pounds, hollah! My second attempt at 95 unfortunately did not go anywhere -- guess I only had one in me. But I'm happy because my old PR of 85, and also 90, both went up nicely, very solid. I am convinced doing unscaled pullups is what is making all the difference in my overhead strength. There's some kind of synergy there, where gains in each area helps move the other along.

Then it was metcon time.

Complete the following for time:
1000m row
40 kettlebell swings (24k/16)
25 pull ups
20 kettlebell swings
15 pull ups

Results: 19:45 total time; 4:14 row

That is a sad 1k row time, geesh. But oh well, at least I have a bench mark now -- I didn't have a 1k time written down anywhere.

My pullups in this WOD were so damn ugly, like I said at the beginning of this post. I tore the shit out of my hands with going on and off the bar so damn much doing singles. ARGH! I wanted to punch a hole in the wall I was so angry and frustrated. This was supposed to be a metcon, not some kind of grind-it-out-WOD. Good lord... I just have to keep telling myself that this is what happens when you eat shit, gain weight and take a week off and do nothing.

Not to mention that what I ate on Thursday before the WOD was ridiculous and totally uncalled for... But bad food choices are a topic for another post another day...

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Friday, April 30

Coached at 0630, then a fellow trainer who was hanging around offered for me to do the WOD at 0830 while he coached. No problemo, I needed a kick in the ass to get my workout in today.

5 rounds for time of:
7 front squats* (155lbs/95)
150m run
*wt will come from the ground

Results:  10:04

I could've done this one faster, but overall I was OK with how I did. Did all sets of squats unbroken, though I did take time to rest between the runs and squats to make sure I had enough juice to pump out all the sqauts.

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And that brings us to today, how nice. Time to go through and put a shit ton of labels on this post and publish it...

Dirty South Chipper

Today's WOD came from the 2009 Dirty South (South Eastern Region) Regional Qualifier.

WOD:

For time:
1000 Meter Row
25 OHS (135/115/75)
150 Meter Run
50 Kettlebell Swings (24k/16k)
150 Meter Run
25 Burpees
150 Meter Run

Results: 18:01 -- 55# OHS, 16k kb

I meant to remember my time for the row, but did not succeed. I think I could've gone faster on it, but honestly I was scared about not having anything left for the OHS. I actually intended to use 60#, but after I snatched it up (prob ugly) I only got 3 1/2 before I dropped it. So I took off the 2.5's and just did 55. It's amazing how much difference 5# makes on those.

I stuck with my decision to start doing OHS from the ground during metcons / chippers (started that at Ultimate in early Jan). Can't remember how I broke down my 25 reps into sets...

Kettlebell swings rocked. I got 30 in a row, then 8 (weird issue @ top of the swing, dropped the bell) and then 12. Very happy with those.

Burpees -- did all proper pushups, but probably could've done them faster.

All in all, I was happy. I'm stinky now, so I must've done a good job. :)

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We're talking about doing a Paleo challenge for our box during the month of February. I hope we model it after this system at CrossFit Delaware Valley. It just sounds like such a good plan...

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Mandy wanted me to post my pullup video to the box's Facebook, so I decided to take a minute to put together a single video with all 3 kipping videos in it, to demonstrate my progress.

Kipping Pullup Progress - Nov 09 to Jan 10 from c wiss on Vimeo.

Strange night

Tonight was one of those nights I just did the workout to complete it. It was a test of mental strength -- the finish time was just an afterthought.

Chipper:

• 1000m row
• 50 pull ups
• 25 kettle swings (24k/16)
• 25 double unders
• 20 kettle swings
• 20 double unders
• 15 kettle swings
• 15 double unders

Results: 27:15 -- 4 unassisted kipping pullups, rest on tiny band; 16kg kb; all DUs- WOOT!

My row was fantastic, just over 4 minutes. My brain intended to write down my finish time on the board, but what I wrote down was my last pace measurement? WTF? I have no idea. So I wrote "2:04" on the whiteboard. Wonder what the coach thought of that? hehe

I was very happy that I did all double unders. Those are one of my "I can't" movements, but I think I really did well with them tonight. I need to work on doing consecutive double unders now that I'm pretty good at doing them by ones.

Pullups were pretty great when I remind myself how far I've come. Yeah, they took me alot longer, but I am ::thisclose:: to doing them all unassisted. I can't wait for the day when I can do WODs with pullups Rx. That will make me so proud. And Fran Rx. That will blow my mind.

Jackie - 2nd round

WOD:

For time:

• 1000m row
• 50 thrusters (45/25)
• 30 pullups

Results: 10:19

Previous results: 14:14 according to the spreadsheet in the gym, 14:21 according to what I wrote down

It looks like I brought my time down quite a bit, but a big part of my first time was switching from one band to the other in the middle of everything. I thought I could use the white band, but couldn't get any pullups with it, so I had to switch to the blue. I had the blue set up and ready to go this time.

That said, I know my row was faster. Also, I was able to do big sets of thrusters: 25-10-15. I was pretty freaking proud of those, let me tell you.

Gross moment of the day: I spit into the front of my sports bra 3 times. I just had to spit! And I had nowhere else to do it! This is why I have to go to a CrossFit gym where no one cares instead of a "nice" gym. :-D

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I worked on my headstands after the WOD. Right now I start off in "tripod" position, with hands and forehead on the mat, and knees balanced on my elbows. Then I work on slowly raising my legs and keeping balanced. I got up into a full headstand today, with my legs straight, which rocked. I'm doing a ton better with these. I did a few self-spotted handstand pushups after that. And finally I did 3 kipping pullup attempts, and on my last one I just about got chin up to the bar in one fluid motion! Woot! I need to start attempting dead hangs as well -- I'm good on the 2nd half of the motion, but not sure I can get started from a hang with just my arms and shoulders.

Crappy 5k, Jackie

Well, Saturday we did our run, and I can't believe how much I sucked. I am so bummed, and kind of embarrassed, but I will post my results just so I can have the satisfaction of improving...

Chip time: 30:46

Gun time: 32:12

Pace: 10:22 min/mile

My Nike+ has been telling me that I'm running a nearly 9 min/mile pace, but apparently it has been lying to me. I didn't think calibration was really necessary, but now I'm seeing the error of my ways. I will hit the track on base today or tomorrow and run exactly a mile so I can get the calibration set and know exactly how slow I still am.

I just wasn't focusing during the race. My stride was short and I felt choppy. Blah. Husbeetle rocked it with an overall pace of 8:10, and he finished under 2 hours. He makes me proud. :)

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WOD was "Jackie".

For time.

• 1000m row
• 50 thrusters (45/25)
• 30 pullups

Results: 14:21 (blue band on pullups)

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Can I just say that I feel like I totally missed the boat on this workout?

The row went well, I did the first 250m pretty fast, and then settled in at about a 2:20 pace, which is normal for me.

Maybe I didn't row fast enough, because it wasn't my legs that were wobbly during the thrusters, it was my arms. I did 20-10-10-10. The last 10 were a bitch. I'm glad I chose to do 25 pounds, or I would've had to slow down a lot on those, and I was going for a fast, intense workout.

Pullups... I intended to use the white/beige band, but when I got up on the bar, I couldn't even get up for one pullup. I got down, rested, tried again, same result. So I had to waste the time of putting the blue band in place. I should've had it set up as a backup, lesson learned.

By the time I finished all my dicking around getting the pullups done, the intensity was totally gone.

I really thought I should've felt this one all over, but my legs still feel almost fresh. My arms are brutalized, though. My hand made it through OK, just a little ripping of the scabs from last week, I was really happy about that.

I'm looking forward to repeating this WOD in a month, and seeing improvement. I think if I can get my rowing down around 2:10 pace, that would rock. And of course longer sets of the thrusters, maybe two sets of 25 if I can gut it out. 10-5-5-5-5 on pullups would be awesome. We shall see.