CFR: Rockin' Robin

Warm-up 

30-20-10 of:
Bell swings
Sit-ups

Not for time.  I did each set unbroken.



WOD

"Rockin' Robin"

Three rounds for time of:
1 rope climb from seated
10 clean and jerks (135lbs)
100 double unders

I finished in 15:40

Judging from the other times on the board from today, I'm happy with this.     Most times were 20-plus minutes,  I wonder if that was due to some congestion at the climbing ropes? Or maybe they did a different WOD.

I didn't feel like I was going that fast.  Actually, I deliberately didn't blast through my clean and jerks on the first round, not wanting to burn myself out for the DUs and the rope climbs.

I finished the first round in about 4:00.

The second round was tougher.  I almost failed on the rope climb.  The clean and jerks felt like they took forever, and I think I had a couple of premature fuck-ups on the double unders. It took me more than 6:00 to complete the round.

I took a good 30-plus second rest before attempting the third rope climb.  I didn't want to climb halfway up and then fail, wasting energy and time.

The third rope climb went easier than the second.  The clean and jerks seemed to go faster, after Leya told me to not bother with the split jerk and just do a push jerk instead.  She also gave me a good tip about my breathing.  Basically, I was treating the 135lbs like it was 175lbs and it was slowing me down.

The double unders were okay.  I think I did them in sets of 36-34-30.

Burpees, Pull-ups and Sit-ups, with a dash of Thrusters

It had been a while since I made it to CFR on a Saturday morning.  At 11a.m everyone was going to be doing 14.5, but the 10am session had a slightly different WOD:

21-18-15-12-9-6-3 reps of:
-Burpees
-Pull-ups
-Sit-ups

Between each set, do five thrusters with 95lbs. 

I finished this in 18:34.



I did a muscle-up before the WOD.  I had to work to get up there.  I think I could be kipping and pulling harder.  Lifetime total is now 15.   

A Bucketful of Fail

Made it to another 6 a.m. class. 

A.Snatch Complex

Snatch push press + OHS + snatch balance, x2(reps) x3(sets), 65-75% of Snatch

I used 115, which falls nicely between 65 and 75 per cent of my max snatch of 165.   But it was probably too much for me to use today. 

First set - made it through until the snatch balance on the second rep. 

Second set - I think I dropped it on the overhead squat in the first rep. 

Third set - Completed

Fourth set - made it through until the snatch balance on the second rep. 

A bucketful of fail. 

I was a little pissed off about this right after it happened. Then I had to move on to the other parts of the WOD, so I didn't really think about it again until I was home in the shower.  I started to get mad again. 

Then I gave my head a shake and remembered that if I don't fail every now and then, then I'm probably not pushing myself as hard as I should.  It's actually probably a good thing that I failed. 

Hey you can just call me Little Johnny Brightside.

 

B. Weighted pull up 2-2-2-2

25-35-45-57.5(FAIL)

I was trying to break the 55lb PR I set recently.  I didn't have a lot of confidence, though, as 45 was a struggle.  I got one rep at 57.5, if you're feeling generous.  

C. “If Annie and Karen were sisters…”

AMRAP in 20mins:

30 Double-Unders

20 Situps

10 Wall Ball 20/14lb

  Not a lot of surprises on this one.  Because the reps in each exercise were pretty reasonable, there wasn't a lot of excessive resting.     

My DUs were fairly good.  I think there were only a couple of the rounds where I didn't do 30 straight, which is better than I would have expected.   

Sit-ups got tough.  Once that happened, I broke sets up into three-ish.   

Wall balls were done in sets of 10.   

Thanks to a strong push in the last round, I was able to finish my 10th round and get another five DUs in before the clock stopped. 

10 rounds plus five double unders 

  .

Hero WOD "Jorge"

“Jorge” For time:

Dammit.  I thought this was ubered with GHD sit-ups, and Rx'd with regular sit-ups.  According to the main site, the Rx'd version includes GHD sit-ups.

I did regular sit-ups. 
30 sit-ups
15 Squat cleans – 155/105lb
24 sit-ups
12 Squat cleans
18 sit-ups
9 Squat cleans
12 sit-ups
6 Squat cleans
6 sit-ups
3 Squat cleans


14:51

Doing a relatively high number of somewhat heavy squat cleans isn't easy for me, but I think I could have shortened my breaks and finished this sooner.  I should have also double-clipped the plates on the bar. 

Weighted PLUs, HSPU clusters, "Venti"

A. Weighted Pullups 3-3-3


20, 30, 35, 40



B. Handstand PushUp clusters:

4 on the minute for 10 minutes (can uber with hands on plates)

I ubered this for six minutes, but in the seventh, my arms, , gave outwith little warning.  I could have tried doing normal HSPUs, but I wasn't sure if it was a minor injury or just fatigue.  I felt unsafe continuing to go upside down, and took a DNF instead. 



C. “Venti”

3 rounds:
500m Row
20 KB high pulls  (RX'd was using a 35lb kettlebell, but I grabbed a 45lb KB and didn't realize it until I was well into round one)
20 KB push press (10 per side)
20 Abmat situps

12:45. 

The push press, particularly with my left arm, was the hardest part. 

Are you ready for some football?

CrossFit Football game

• Touchdown (6pt): 80 Squats, 40 Kettlebell Swings, 30 Pull-Ups, 20 Burpees
• Convert after TD (1pt): 50 Double-Unders (or 125 Single-Unders) 
• Field Goal (3pt): 20 DB Thrusters (2x45lb), 30 Sit-ups, 20 Box Jumps (20″)

Two 15 minute halves with 3 minute half-time. Work is divided between teams of 2, only one person works at a time. Skipping is not divided, both must complete.

 I teamed with Nathan (Team name: "Nat-Ty By Nature") and we split the work evenly. 

First half: FG, TD, FG, FG = 16

Second half: four FGs = 12 

Total score 28. 

We were three box jumps away from another field goal.  We barely fell short, just like the Riders. 

I think the best strategy for this is to go for field goals.  The DB thrusters do suck total donkey scrotum, but you and your partner can do alternating sets of 5 and that makes it bearable. 

You might want to do one TD when you're fresh, but when you're tired, those double unders will be a total time-killer unless you and your partner are total DU ninjas. 

I had done a slightly easier version of this before and scored a 26... but it sounds like I was a bit hungover at the time. 

I'll take that Annie time

A. Back Squats 70-75% 3×3

Supposed to use 75 per cent of a one-rep max. I haven't done a one-rep max in a while, so I estimated it at 290lbs, though it's entirely possible I could break 300 now`.

So I did three sets of 215x3.

B. Weighted Pull-ups 3-3-3 (or work on deadhangs)
20-35-40F (got up twice, not even close on the third)


C. Benchmark girl “Annie”
50-40-30-20-10 reps of
Double-Unders and
Abmat Situps (NOT anchored)

8:04 rx'd That's 49 seconds faster than my previous PR. I'm pretty happy with that. I botched my start on the first set of double-unders, and when I finally got going, I did sets of 35 and 15. All the other sets of DUs were unbroken. My sit-ups were not. If I did sit-ups more consistently, I could shave some time off this.

Muscle-Ups & CLOC #5

A. Skill: Muscle-up + 2 second L-sit x10 reps (not for time)
If you can’t do MU, do transition + 2 second L-sit x 15 reps

Yup. Still can't do a muscle-up.

B. CF Ladies of Canada #5
As many rounds as possible in 10 minutes of
10 Deadlift – 165/115lb (Maintain good form)
15 Anchored Situps – shoulders all the way back, touch front of DBs
5 Pull-ups (use bands as needed)

I counted 6 rounds plus 10 DL and 3 sit-ups. Jacob thinks I got one more round than that. Then again, he's a relentless optimist.

BONUS

I convinced Jacob to join me in doing the Competition Team EXTRA, which was...

Three minutes of sandbag shouldering (90lbs). Basically, fill a duffel bag with two 45lb sandbags, and transfer it from shoulder to shoulder, pressing it out each time.

I got 24 reps in three minutes, but I was only in "75% serious / 25% fucking around" mode.

C. Mobility = share your favorite with the group

Front Squats and "Deuces"

A. Strength
Front Squat (start at 70% of 1 Rep Max)
5-5-5

I started at 175, which is slightly more than 70% of my one-rep max of 245.

Set 1: 175lb
Set 2: 205(old PR, according to my shoddy recordkeeping anyway)
Set 3: 225 (new PR)

I was actually a bit nervous on the 225, which is my PR for 3's, and almost psyched myself out. But it went up.


B. Metcon
“Deuces” - For Time
- 2 minutes of Lunges
- 2 minutes of Toes 2 Bar
- 2 minutes of Situps
- 2 minutes of Burpees
- 2 minutes of Squats
Coaches Note: Continuous clock with no clock stoppage between exercise transitions. Add up all reps from each exercise for total score.


I scored 257.

I think I got:
78 lunges,
29 T2B
63 sit-ups
27 burpees
60 squats

Those numbers might not be my exact scores, but it does add up to 257.

"Deck of Cards"

We did the traditional version of Deck of Cards for the Saturday group WOD:

-Push-ups (Diamonds)
-Pull-ups (Hearts)
-Situps (Clubs)
-Squats (Spades)

Jokers were burpees, and you double the value of the following card after a joker.

There were enough pull-ups in this WOD to make my sissy hands pissed at me for a bit.

My team, "Canadian Western Sexhibition" finished this in 22:50.

"Gates of Fire 2"

For time:
50 Situps
50 Pushups
25 Front Squats (65/45)
25 Back Squats (65/45)
25 Overhead Squats (65/45)
25 Front Squats (65/45)
50 Pullups
50 Situps

Took me 15:11, which isn't the fastest I've ever done it, but it's close.

***


Overheard at the Gym:

"I feel weird complimenting a girl on her snatch with her dad RIGHT THERE."

"He likes it, too."

"Angie"

100 pull-ups
100 push-ups
100 sit-ups
100 air squats

Took me 25:55. That's more than three minutes worse than my best ever time, but I'm not going to piss and moan about it. I was just happy to have gotten to CrossFit for 6 a.m.

Afterwards, in the shower, my body decided to have little talk with me:

"Okay, you dumb bastard, listen up. Do you notice that you're having difficulty raising your arms above your head to shampoo? Yeah, well, that's only the start of what I've got in store for you. By this afternoon, you won't be able to walk stairs without whimpering. Payback's a bitch, asshole. You have been feeding me crap for the last couple of weeks, you're still getting over a cold, you skip the gym for a week and you haven't been giving me enough sleep. You stayed up past two fucking a.m. the other night playing Plants Vs. Zombies, for fuck's sake. And then, THEN, you expect me to go to the gym at 6am and do fucking ANGIE? You dumb shit."

Front Squats and a Chipper

So I sort of gave up setting my alarm for 6, but I thought I might naturally wake up in time to go to CFR this morning because I got into bed fairly early. Problem was, my darling wife had an iced coffee right before bed and wasn't sleepy. So I didn't get to sleep until well after midnight.

Then, at some point in the early morning hours, the Boy (age 4) crawls into bed beside me with a stuffed up nose and proceeds to loudly snore RIGHT IN MY EAR. I woke up around 5:50, and had a brief internal chat with myself about whether to get up to go to the gym.

"C'mon, you will feel better after working out."

"One more hour of sleep would be awesome."

"Like you're going to get any sleep with that chainsaw in your ear."

"But I'm tired."

"You're being a pussy."

"I'm okay with being a pussy."

"The Bridge City Beatdown is less than a month away. You should probably do a few workouts before then, you flabby, bereft-of-disciplinefuck."

"But it's so warm under the blanket."

"Hey, you never regret working out. You ALWAYS regret missing a workout."

"Grrrr. Fine. Okay. I'll do it."


A. Strength = Front Squats 5-5-5

155-185-205(2) Couldn't match my previous best. But Christian said, "Nobody should be setting PRs at 6 in the morning.

B. Metcon = Dot Com Chipper from 110322
For time:
70 (Speed) Burpees
60 Situps
50 Kettlebell Swings – 55/35lb
40 Pull-ups
30 Handstand Push-ups

25:29

This was a pretty tough chipper.

***

Never stop dreaming.




***

"Dear CrossFitter: Be kinder to yourself."

Something to think about. Hell, we don't need to take this so seriously that it makes us SAD when we don't meet our lofty expectations of ourselves.

.

Two-a-day Saturday

A lot of folks were doing two workouts on Saturday. Most of the ComTeam opted for the 9 and 11 a.m. workouts, but I couldn't stay that long, so I did 9 and 10.

9 a.m.: "The Newport Crippler"

For time
30 bodyweight back squats (used 185lbs)
Run one mile.

I did it in 10:03. It's not a bad time at all, but, honestly, that extra three seconds pisses me off SO BAD. And I wouldn't have done even that good, except Leya (who started a full minute after me) was breathing down my neck on the last part of the run.

For the squats, I did them in sets of 15-10-5, although I took a good rest with the bar on my shoulders in the first 15.

10 a.m. "Summer in the City" chipper:

For time
400m run
20 wall ball
30 burpees
40 pull-ups
50 bell swings (35 lbs)
60 sit-ups
70 box jumps 24"
400 m run

I partnered with Nathan. We split the work, except for the runs, which we do together. For the other stuff, only one partner works at a time.

Took us 14:30

"Gates of Fire 2"

For time:
50 Situps
50 Push-ups
25 Front Squats
25 Back Squats
25 Overhead Squats
25 Front Squats
50 Pull-ups
50 Situps

Rx'd weight for the squats for dudes is 65lbs.

Time was 14:40... unless I miscounted on the sit-ups, in which case I did it in 15:12. But I'm pretty sure it's 14:40. It's more than a two-minute improvement from the last time I did it, and that's probably the first WOD where I've seen tangible benefits from all the strength work I did.

Back in September, it sounds like I was slowed down a bit by the results of the previous day's workout. Today, I was actually wondering if I should even go, as my shoulder is a bit tender. In the end, I decided to go for it rather than gorge myself on the delicious Indian buffet at Spices of Punjab.

The good: Squats. Oh, and I did 15 pull-ups straight to get off to a good start for the set of 50. It was mostly sets of five after that.

The not-so-good: Push-ups. But you already knew that.

"Angie"

100 Pull-ups
100 Push-ups
100 Sit-ups
100 Squats

The last time I did this, it took me 22:20-something. Today, I was about a minute slower with a time of 23:24. It's sort of disappointing, but could be chalked up to a number of things:

-I'm heavier than in November, which is more weight to pull over the band or push off the ground
-decreased metcon capacity due to strength training focus
-less-than-ideal nutrition over the last couple of days
-a shitty night's sleep last night
-stress

I actually don't feel bad about my efforts today. I don't think I took a lot of breaks or half-assed it, and I got a new PR for consecutive pull-ups (32). Although, now that I think about it, I should have held on and done a couple more, since it's my 34th birthday. Dumbass.

Deck of Cards Saturday

The one thing about doing this Strength programming is that I "miss out" on all the "fun" of doing the WODs that everyone else at CrossFit Regina are doing. And there have been some nasty looking WODs lately.

It's weird, but after a month of not suffering in the same way as everyone else at CrossFit Regina - even though it's my choice to do my own thing for a little while - I kind of feel left out.

(This is the part where Tracey would tell me that I'm being such a girl. Good thing she doesn't read this blog.)

Anyway, to alleviate my feelings of CrossFit loner-ism (can you tell I write things for a living?), I'm trying to hit at least one WOD a week and it's probably going to be Saturdays for the most part. Hopefully, I'll be able to retain a bit of metcon capacity, too. This past Saturday, the 10a.m. WOD was the good ol' "Deck of Cards."

Pretty simple:

Do the number of reps that the card's value represents. (Aces = 11, duh)
Hearts = Pull-ups
Diamonds = Push-ups
Spades = Squats
Clubs = Sit-ups
Jokers = 20 Burpees, and you double the reps on the card that comes next.

I was invited into a group of four with the Competition Team members Christian, Kim F., and Kat. They had all just finished the 9a.m. workout involving some kind of Tabata-related torture, so I had nothing to complain about. But Christian still was the first one done on every rep.

I can still feel it in my shoulders a couple of days later.

"Letters to the Editor"

Not sure why it's called that. I was finally able to make a 6am workout, though I was a few minutes late. I did this the day after everyone else, because the WOD today was back squats and power cleans and jerks, which I did yesterday (minus the jerks) as part of the Strength workout.

Chipper for time:

50 sit-ups
50 medicine ball cleans (harder than I thought)
25 deadhang pull-ups (yuck)
25 kipping pull-ups
50 medicine ball cleans
50 sit-ups

The cleans came quicker on the second round, I think, mostly because I was trying to match the Janimal's time from yesterday.

Time was 16:39.

.

"Angie"

For time:

100 pull-ups
100 push-ups
100 sit-ups
100 squats

I'm sure I've done Angie before, but I can't find when. Last month, we did "Age Adjusted Angie" - which for 33-year-old me was basically two-thirds of the full version - and it took me 14:something.

100 pull-ups in a row isn't fun. It's pretty tough on the hands. I was spending far too much time late in this round just trying to convince myself to grab the fricking bar again. I jumped up to the 8-foot bar for the first 45 or so, then moved to the 7-footer. I wonder if I stepped up like the guys in the video below, if it would allow me to get a better grip and bang more out? Perhaps I will try that the next time I have a WOD that calls for a ton of pull-ups.

100 push-ups reminded me that I need to work on doing push-ups more. I did 20 consecutive off the start, and then the sets quickly became 4s and 3s.

I feel like I've actually gotten worse on sit-ups and squats.

Time was 22:25. I was harbouring delusions of a sub-20 time, but it was not to be.

Here's a video of some guys doing Angie.

"Partner Pumpkin Pie" and adventures in Vaseline with D3

"Partner Pumpkin Pie"

With a partner, perform the following:

AMRAP in 25 minutes:
50 Wall Ball – 20/14lb
40 Double-Unders
30 Bell Swings – 55/35lb
20 Push-ups
10 Pull-ups

I partnered with BrianB and we got 5 rounds, plus 30 WB. This was pretty tough, mostly because BrianB was done his share of the reps so fast I didn't get much of a break in between. At least I was courteous enough to take my time with my share.

Afterward, the bonus was do do five minutes of situps. I just knew this was gonna suck. BrianB, with his ridiculous abs and cardio, never stopped, kept a nice steady pace, and actually sped up in the last 30 seconds, and got 178.

Then it was my turn. Because I didn't want to get "monkey butt" from so many sit-ups, I headed over to my bag to get some Vaseline to put on my ass. D3 asked me if he could have some, too.

"Sure," I said. "But you have to get all you need with the first scoop." D3 is one of my favourite guys at CrossFit Regina, but I'm just trying to keep my Vaseline free of assy contamination. (The same "one-scoop" rule applies to myself).

We each took a scoop and ducked into the bathroom to apply it. To ourselves, of course. Get your mind out of the gutter.

Y'know, before I joined CrossFit, I probably would have thought it was weird to go into a public bathroom with another dude and emerge with Vaseline on my ass.

By the way, I got 120 sit-ups in five minutes. Not great, but at least my ass doesn't hurt.