Front squats are fun!!

This post's title comes from some whiteboard grafitti at CrossFit Regina left by an unknown optimist.

A. Front squats: 3-2-1-1-1

205x3
225x2
235x1
245x1
255x1 (FAIL)


B. Run 1,200m

I didn't feel very fast this morning.  5:10

Push Press/Double Unders then Russian Twists/Plank Hold

A. Five rounds for time: 25 Push Press 75lb and 50 Double Unders

13:54 

I probably could have upped my intensity on this one a bit and finished a bit faster. 


B. Core work = NOT for time:

3 rounds of: 25 Russian Twists with 35/25lb dumbbell, 1 min Plank hold

Done.  No fun, whatsoever. 

Spring Fling 2012

Official results


WOD 1: "JETHRO" (aka TYLER LOVES SNATCH)

Five minutes to a max single Snatch/Overhead Squat, rest one minute, five minutes to a max single rep of "The Bear."

I had no illusions of destroying the field on this.  My overhead squat is fairly good, but my snatch is mediocre. 

I had a lot of time to warm up for WOD 1 since I was in one of the later heats, so I did a lot of 135lb snatches. I decided to start a bit heavier than that in the competition. I think I started with 140, then went to 155. After practicing this week, I wasn't counting on snatching more than 150, but at this point I was having fun and decided to go for 160, which would tie my PR. Since the competition allowed for a lot of leeway when it came to pressing out, I got that.

At this point I still had a fair amount of time on the clock, so I thought I might as well go for 165. I got 165 (Snatch PR) with about 30 seconds left in the five-minute period.

I believe I started the Bear with 155. I'm not sure if I did any other weights before putting 180 on the bar.

I was able to do 180 with a lot of time left, so I thought "What the heck?" and put 205 on the bar.  (Spoiler alert: this is a dumb approach to take during competitions)I cleaned it, front squatted it, jerked it, back squatted it. I rested for a bit with the weight across my shoulders, and attempted a jerk. I let out a decidedly non-gangsta screech and failed the lift.

In retrospect, I should have gone a bit lighter... like, maybe 195. I am not complaining about how I did on this one, though. I was planning on only doing 150 on the snatch and 165 on the Bear, so I beat my total by 30lbs and got a new PR to boot.

With my total of 345lbs I got 14th out of 20 on WOD 1.

WOD 2.1: SHOTPUT (aka "FUUUUUUUUUCK")

I knew this would suck for me, and it did.

My two throws were very close to each other and far short of just about everyone else's. 

 thought they were 7.51 and 7.53m, but the official records use my 7.51 as the throw that counted, so I could remember wrong. If I'm not wrong, I would have placed18th, instead of the 19th spot that I was credited for since a dude from Winnipeg got 7.52.

WOD 2.2: 800 METRE RUN (aka TYLER AIN'T AS FAST AS HE THOUGHT HE WAS)

I thought I would do relatively well at this, but -- as it turns out -- pretty much all the dudes in Div 1 were fast and strong. Fuckers. They should pick one or the other.

My time of 2:55 (a PR, I might add) was only good for 17th place out of 20. That was a pretty jarring reality check for me once I learned that little piece of news. 

Still, this WOD was responsible for one of my favorite memories of the day:

Jarrett and I were in the same heat, along with Shawn and Big Nick S. Jarrett and I started out fast and I overtook him around 100 metres into the run. Still, I knew he was pretty close behind me because I could hear him. That's the worst feeling.

I should also mention that Jarrett has a nagging groin injury that helped keep him to my speed.

On the second lap of the 400m track, I avoided some puddles and, in doing so, gave up the inside track to Jarrett. He pulled up beside me and edged ahead as we were coming around the final turn. I put everything I had into catching up to him and we were neck and neck down the final stretch, each doing everything we could to beat the other.

He beat me by a nose (the official record says  his time was 2:54 but there was far less than a second between us). I was disappointed that I lost to him for the next three minutes.

Then I realized something: Jarrett was competing in Division 2. It didn't matter if he beat me.

Furthermore, I finished a lot faster than I would have if I wasn't trying to catch him, and I did finish just one second ahead of the guy in 18th place, so I have Jarrett (and his groin) to thank for that.



WOD 3: "LIVE WITH ROYCE" (aka TYLER FUCKING BLOWS IT)

Three rounds of a 400m run with a 65lb sandbag and 15 chin OVER bar pull-ups.

This event was responsible for another great moment that I will remember for a long time.  And it had absolutely nothing to do with me. 

The youngest competitor of the day, a 12-year-old kid named Mack from Yorkton's CrossFit Function, was finishing up the Div 3 version of the workout.  And, like what happened with Brad Flood's box jumps in 2010, the entire crowd was cheering him on as he finished and staggered into a hug from his mom, who was also competing. 

Here's a video of his last five pull-ups.  I saw this live and watched the video a couple of times, and I seriously get a little choked up every single time.



I would say my own personal memories of this WOD are not quite as fond.  This was the worst one for me, both in terms of how hard it hit me and how I failed to live up to my own expectations.

Going into it I actually thought I'd do okay. But, as it turns out, 65lbs is a lot of goddamn weight to carry for 400m.

What's worse is the fact that whatever I did diet-wise during the day, snacking on dried mango and a bit of beef jerky, didn't work and I started getting a cramp in my stomach on the first run. It didn't hinder me much on the first one, and probably not that much on the second, but I really felt it on the third.  On the second and third runs, I did have to take some walking breaks.  I also had some interesting conversations with myself.

By the time I got to the pull-up bar on the last round, I would guess I only had about 35 seconds left.  I pounded them out as fast as I could, but  I got a DNFF. I was two pull-ups short, which was good for 18th place.

Another thing that hurt was the pull-ups. The standard was that we had to get our chin through the vertical plane of the bar, so it could be seen on the other side (at least, that's how my judge interpreted it).

Frankly, I think this was a mistake to include this standard.

Chin over bar a hard enough thing to do without hurting yourself, and the CrossFit Regina pull-up apparatus ("Royce") is not completely stable. It wiggles and shakes a little when there are people swinging on it.  So, when you've got a bunch of other CrossFit psychos furiously banging out pull ups, it's easy to take a bar to the throat when you're attempting to satisfy a finicky judge.

I got called for a bunch of no-reps in the first round, at least five and maybe as many as seven. So on rounds two and three I made sure to get as much as my face over that bar as possible. As a result, there a couple of times I really slammed my throat on the bar, and one time I grazed my chin on it.

It actually bothered me quite a bit later on in the day, and I had trouble swallowing for hours afterward.

It's really my only problem with the entire event, but I would recommend to Aaron and Robin that they program either regular pull-ups or chest-to-bar instead of chin-over-bar in future events. Personally, that's the last time I'm going to do the chin-over-bar version, no matter what the WOD calls for.

Beyond my minor quibble with the pull-up standard, I thought this was a good, tough event that really tested a competitor's heart and fitness, which is all you can ask of a CrossFit WOD.

WOD 4: CLASSIC CROSSFIT (aka TYLER'S LAST CHANCE)

One minute at each of the following stations:

Wall ball

24" box jump

70lb bell swings

Double unders

Speed burpees

Going into this WOD, I was sitting in dead last in Div 1. I actually predicted this on the CFR website earlier in the week, but I gotta admit I was really hoping to at least beat a couple of guys.  I know I preach "If you wanna be a big dog, you gotta run with the big dogs" but it's still pretty hard on my fragile ego to be running at the absolute back of the pack. 

However, before WOD 4 I was in last place by three points, which meant I had to get at least 17th out of 20, and hope the dude in 19 got last if I wanted to beat even one guy.

My strategy on WOD 4 hinged on doing well on the double unders and hoping that there were some dudes who couldn't do them very good at all. I figured everyone would be pretty close on the box jumps, WB, and burpees.

Because I remember how bad the 70lb bell swings were in the final WOD from my first competition in Saskatoon, my plan was to rest that entire minute and enter the DU minute as fresh as possible. I figured, I could kill myself to get 15 swings, or I could rest and get another 20-30 reps in DUs. As it turned out, since my judge Trevor (of CrossFit Function) was yelling at me (he's actually a super nice guy), I did pick up the bell and do 10 swings, but I stopped well before the minute was done.

The DUs didn't go quite as well as I wanted, but I did manage to get an even 50 in them. I had time for some more but I kept tripping up on the rope.  

It was pretty amazing to see Nolan, who placed first in this event and second overall, do a minute straight of double unders.  This came after he did a minute straight (NO breaks) of wall balls, and another minute straight of box jumps.  He took a brief breather on the bell swings, but he probably still got at least 20  of them.

If Nolan weren't such an incredibly great guy, I would totally resent how awesome he is at CrossFit.  He is my CrossFit hero.

In the end, I got 13th place on WOD 4 with a score of 123.

My math actually had me at 126, which would have been good for 10th in the WOD, but I could be remembering my round totals wrong. I only saw the tally sheet briefly when Trevor had me sign it, and I WAS pretty destroyed by the WOD at the moment. (I should note that even if I WAS victim of erroneous math on the final WOD and the shot put -- and I very likely wasn't and am just remembering wrong -- it wouldn't have resulted in me finishing any higher than I did overall, since I was 11 points away from the next guy).

At the end of the day, I ended up in 19th place overall.

This was an extremely well-organized and well-designed competition and, despite my bitching and moaning about my own lack of success during the day, these events always remind me why I dig CrossFit so much.

Congrats to Robin and Aaron and all the volunteers and judges for making the day go so smoothly.   I look forward to another bottom three finish next year.

More Spring Fling practice

I spent a little time at 6am working on snatches, the Bear, shot put and reminding myself how to do double unders

Spring Fling practice

I basically just worked on a little bit of the snatch/OHS and Bear weights to figure out what I should go for in the competition.

Spring Fling Workouts released

The workouts for this Saturday's Spring Fling have been released and I think the CrossFit Regina crew have done a good job coming up with a good mix of events. 

Here's what I'll be doing this Saturday:

WOD1) “JETHRO”


Barbell Complex x2, at CFR

Part 1) 5 min to max Snatch + Overhead Squat

1 min rest

Part 2) 5 min to Max Bear single

Score 1 = total pounds of best of each

Standards:
 Start with an empty bar, athlete does all weight changes themselves, as many attempts as you wish during the 5 minutes, weights may decrease if you miss.


Part 1) Snatch may be power, squat, split, press outs allowed. However you snatch, you must still complete one OHS after. For example, if you squat snatch the weight, you must still add an OHS.


Part 2) One rep of “The Bear” is Power Clean + Front Squat + Push Press from front + Back Squat + Push Press from behind the neck. All standard Bear rules apply.


WOD2) Classic Track & Field

2 Track & Field events, at Usher Track.  I went to Usher Collegiate, but it wasn't the site of any athletic triumphs for me.  I can't see that changing on Saturday. 

Part 1) Max Shot Put – 2 attempts

1 min rest

Part 2) 800m Run

Score 2 = best meter distance for shot put

Score 3 = time for 800m Run




StandardsPart 1) Standard Shot Put weights: Div 1 & 2 men = 16lb, Div 3 men = 12lb, All women = 8.8lb
Part 2) 2 laps around track for time



WOD3) “LIVE WITH ROYCE”
At Usher Track

3 rounds for time of:

400m Run with Sandbag

15/10 Pull-ups

12 min time limit

Score 4 = total time (plus one second for every rep not completed, in this case every 100m = one rep)

Standards:
Div 1 men = 65lb sandbag
Div 1 men & women = COVP (chin over vertical plane = chin over bar), 15 reps


WOD4) Classic CrossFit

Back at CFR

1 min at each station:
Wall Ball
Box Jumps
KB Swings – heavy
Double-Unders
Speed Burpees

One point for every rep completed

Score 5 = Total reps completed

Standards:
Wall Ball – Full squat at bottom, ball must hit wall at required line or above.
Div 1 men 20lb ball to 10′ line, Div 1 women 14lb ball to 10′ line

Box Jump – both feet on box with feet horizontal to ground (ie heels can’t hang over), fully extend hips at top, must jump up, may jump or step down.
Div 1 men & women 24″ box

Kettlebell Swings – CrossFit style overhead (bottom of bell faces ceiling, judge must see ear from side)
Div 1 men 70lb, Div 1 women 55lb

Double-Unders – rope must pass under feet twice with one jump, you may use your own rope

Burpees – Speed burpees, chest touches floor, jump up with full hip extension and “punch ceiling” with straight arms, judge must see ear from side, feet must jump back and forth.


Athletes ranked according to placing, 1st place = 1 point, 2nd place = 2 points, etc. 5 total scores. Athlete with lowest # of points at the end of the day is the winner.

Back Squats and "Allsorts"

A. Back Squats @80%1RM 3×5

I used 245, which was really, really hard for me today. 

B.   Allsorts

For time:
250M Row
15 Kettlebell Swings 70/55lb (overhead)
25 Burpees
15 Kettlebell Swings
250M Row

This was unpleasant, but at least it was short.  5:01. 

.

800m runs, Cleans/WB, Burpee surprise

The gym was originally going to be closed today but some bellyaching from me and others resulted in Leya opening it up.

That was the good news.

The bad news was the fact that the WOD she selected was some nightmare Hero WOD involving a bunch of back squats and a total of 15 bloody rope climbs.

While I have preached in the past about people who trade WODs, I did just that today. I justified it because my sissy hands were still a little raw from the pull-ups in Saturday's Tabata Angie. I tried doing one rope climb in the warm-up and couldn't reach the top.

So I did the Thursday WOD instead:

A. 800m Run for time

I did it in 3:19. I just checked the benchmarks on the side to see what my best ever time for an 800m run is and I have a time recorded from 2009 of 2:57.

I can only assume that I was being chased by a puma at the time because holy crap that seems unattainable right now. I was probably a good 15 lbs lighter back then.


B. Dot Com 120517 5 rounds for time of 10 Power Cleans – 135/95lb 15 Wall Ball – 20/14lb

11:26


C. 800m Run for time (400m route x2)

3:29

Before the run Leya told me that there was a surprise: for every second you were slower on the second 800m run, there was a one-burpee penalty. I'm actually surprised my second time was that close. I was worn out from Part B and my left shoe felt like it was about ready to come untied. Not a bad Sunday, though.


Bonus: 10 burpees, not for time.

.

Tabata "Angie"

Using 20 second work intervals with 10 sec rest breaks, complete:
100 pull-ups
100 push-ups
100 sit-ups
100 squats

This was tough, obviously, but I actually liked doing this better than regular Tabata.

It took me 23:14.

The push-ups were the worst. After doing 15 and 10 in the first two intervals, I mostly did sets of 6 for the rest of it.

Pull-ups, I think I was consistently getting 7 or 8 each interval toward the end.

Sit-ups, 10 per interval.

Squats, maybe 12-15.  I was joined by the Boy on some of them, and Robin captured it on video. 



He's talking during his squats, so he obviously should be working harder.  In fairness, I should point out that he's actually doing weighted squats.  There are toys in that backpack. 

Mauled by "The Bear"

A. “The Bear”:
5 rounds of 7 reps of the barbell complex: Power Clean, Front Squat, Push Press, Back Squat, Push Press

Once through the barbell sequence = 1 rep, 7 reps per round. Add weight for the next round. Touch and go on the ground only once you start but you can find spots of rest where you can during the sequence.

My previous best for "The Bear" was 120, but I've felt for a long time I could do a bit more than that.  However, by the fifth set, I'm usually destroyed.  My plan was to go heavy in my third and fourth sets.

I did 95, 115, 125(PR), 130(PR), and finished with 95.  That final set of 95 was pretty damn hard.  I had mentally checked out by then, after getting a 10lb PR. 


B. 400m Run with Sandbag – 45/20lb 2 minute rest, Repeat

After killing myself on the Bear, this was awful, even if the rest between was longer than two minutes. 

1:55 and 1:57

.

6a.m. unmet expectations: OHS then "A Bell, a Box and a Run

A. Max Overhead Squat 3-2-1-1-1

Ended up at 190 (PR) for the max single. I failed the first time I tried it. (I got the weight down and up, but I dropped it as soon as I straightened up, so the lift would have been disallowed in competition.)

Even though I got a PR, I was hoping to get a bit more. My PR for 3's on this is 185, so I should have a bit heavier single. Actually getting the weight overhead was a bit of an issue. On a lighter rep, I actually grazed the back of my skull with the bar when jerking it. It didn't hurt me, but it was kind of embarrassing.


B. “A Bell, a Box and a Run”
10 minute AMRAP of:
10 Kettlebell Swings – 55/35lb
10 Box Jumps – 20″
200m Run (to large grey power box and back)

Four rounds, plus 10 swings, 10 box jumps and about 70m on the run.

Partner Manion

Partner “Manion”

Seven rounds for time of:
Run 400 meters together
15 back squats each, working one at a time, 135lb

31:23

I started out with Steve (Team "WOD This Way" reunited) but he pulled out in round 3 due to injury. I finished up with Nathan and Uncles, working the same time as Nathan.

I felt this one for the next couple of days.

.

Humbled

A. Row 1200m

4:16. I was feeling pretty darn good about myself about that one, until...

B. 5 rds for time:
10 (2 bell swings+1 goblet squat) 55/35lb
10 pushups
18:30ish. This was awful, and not just the usual kind of CrossFit awful. I don't know if I was spent from the row or what, but I was THISCLOSE to taking a DNF by the second round. For some reason, this WOD just seemed so hard. It seemed to just suck the life out of me. I may have had the single slowest rx'd time of the whole day. Most people were four to six minutes faster than me. I hated this workout, I hated myself and my lack of spirit, willpower, endurance.


C. Row 1200m

4:41.3 After the debacle in part B. I just wanted to get through this and do it in under five minutes.

Then, I just wanted to go home and wallow in my own suckitude.

.

Running, HSPU, DHPLU

Got to CFR late for the lunch-hour workout, so didn't have time to do the Turkish Get-Ups that were part of the day's routine. It's too bad, because TGUs are something I definitely could improve upon.

In fact, I've noticed that the more "manly" I consider a CrossFit exercise to be, the more likely I am to be mediocre or bad at it. TGUs, deadlifts, tire-flipping, sandbag loading... So, yeah, I'm a big fucking puss.

I did the second part of the WOD, which was:

4x400m run

Rds 1&3 end with max handstand pushups

Rds 2&4 end with max dead hang pullups
Round 1. 1:27 run, 10 kipping HSPU
Round 2. 1:30 run, 7 DHPLU
Round 3. 1:38 run, 11 kipping HSPU
Round 4. 1:35 run, 6 DHPLU

Weekend of Leg Death, Part 2: "The Chief"

“The Chief”

Max rounds in 3 minutes of:
135 pound Power cleans, 3 reps
6 Push-ups
9 Squats

Rest 1 minute. Repeat for a total of 5 cycles.

I got a total of 18 complete rounds, but had enough left-over reps to bring the total up to 20 rounds, plus 5 reps.

Weekend of Leg Death, Part 1: Hero WOD "Klepto"

“Klepto”
4 rounds for time:
27 Box Jumps 24″
20 Burpees
11 Squat cleans 145 lbs
26:23 rx'd.
Four rounds doesn't seem like much, but that is a lot of box jumps.

I actually sort of like WODs that have a lot of medium-weight cleans, because it makes me feel like I'm accomplishing a lot. It was sort of humbling to watch Anne-Marie, who is quite petite, busting out those box jumps like they were nothing.

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