VolkeFit: Thrilling Thursday

A.Seated box jumps
10 reps, three sets

B. EMOM for 10 minutes
odd: 5 burpees
even: 10 KB swings (60 lb)


C. For time (15 min time cap):
50 cal row
25 burpee box jump overs (20") - These kill my soul.
15 back squats @ 185 lb

I did the squats in sets of 8 and 7.  

Time was 8:26

Garage with Nick: Leg Day

Nick messed up his shoulder.

For time:

50 air squats
40 sit-ups
30 mountain climbers (L+R= 1)
20 lunges
10 box jumps

We both did t5his in around 4 minutes
.

We followed that up with planking 30s on/30s off for 10 minutes.

B-Squad: Life lessons

"Son, when a pretty lady asks if you want to do yoga with her, you always say yes."

"DAD!! I'M ONLY NINE!!"

"Yeah, but I could get hit by a bus tomorrow and I would have died never having told you that."

-Actual conversation with my son today at B-Squad.

Another Saturday B-Squad grinder:

10 rounds of:

-10 pull-ups
-10 wall ball shots (no full squat and the ball doesn't have to reach the 10-foot line)  I didn't realize this until after the 3rd round, when I had already done 3 sets of full wall balls. Learning that was the best news ever.)
-10 knee raises  (could have done T2B but would have torn my hands to shit and disabled my shoulder.  I don't know if anyone else who did the WOD did ten full rounds of T2B but if there were, they are more badass than me.)
-10m broad jump.

The pull-ups were the toughest part of this.  Everything else was okay.  22:24


The Boy did a five-round version replacing the pull-ups with 5 ring rows and the knee raises with sit-ups.

He followed that up with rowing and skipping.

Regina Boxing Club: Friday Fun-Pain

A. In seven minutes, do 21-15-9 of:
-Squat jumps
-Squat thrusts
-Push-ups

Skip for time remaining.  I was, surprisingly to me, the third one done in the small noon-hour group.  (Arrogantly, I expected to be first.)   I tried to count my skips.  I think I got to 240.


B. In seven minutes, do 201-15-9 of:
-Jumping lunges
-Horizontal jumping jacks
-Plank walk-up

Skip for time remaining.  This time there was less time remaining, maybe a minute.   I was really fast on the plank-walk-ups but slow on the other stuff.  Still, I was the second one to get to the skips this time, but my skipping was way worse this time as I was spent.   I may have got to 100 skips.


Then there was the bag work.   I like to punch stuff.  

This was plenty enough work for me to justify coming home and spending my EDO afternoon on the couch playing Grand Theft Auto 4.

VolkeFit: E2MO2M and Clean/Push Press/Ring Push-Up

A. Every two minutes for 5 rounds:
10 knee-to-elbows
3 power snatches @ 95 lb

Done.

B. For time, 12-9-6-3 of
Hang power clean @ 115 lb
Push press @ 115 lb
Ring push-ups

6:58.  Probably should have been faster.

Garage with Nick: I get so Emom-tional, baby

With a (surprisingly) slight hangover from a wedding the night before, I headed to Nick's garage with some toys.

EMOM #1

16 minutes - alternating every minute:
1. 10 sandbag squats
2. 8 burpees


EMOM#2

14 minutes - alternating every minute:
1. 15 Russian KB swings (53 lb)
2.  10 box jumps (24")


For whatever reason, I felt terrific after this workout and it eliminated the last bits of my hangover.   YEAH EXERCISE!!!

Sundays have fast become my favourite workout of the week.  I get to hang out with Nick, who is an all-around great dude.   It's fun coming up with new workouts to introduce to him.  And the time is perfect.   On Sunday mornings I wouldn't be accomplishing anything anyway, so I don't have a feeling like I'm stealing time from my kids or my real world responsibilities which can be the case with a workout on a weekday evening.  

Starting the day off with a workout always improves my outlook for the rest of the day.  I wish I could get my act together enough to do it during the week, but that ain't gonna happen as long as I have to work and get my kids to school in the morning.

Regina Boxing Club: Roll the Dice, Pay the Price

Coach Pat was going to Vegas the next day, so we did a 20 minute workout with exercises determined by the roll of a couple of oversized dice.

Here were some of the exercises (I may not remember all of them, although some were assigned to more than one number.)

-5 "urpees" (push-up-less burpees)
-3 laps around the gym (a nice reprieve)
-15 mountain climbers (L+R=1.  These were on a "7" so we got a lot of them)
-10 push-ups
-10 star jumps
-5 horizontal jumping jack/squat thrusts
-15 squat thrusts


Following that, we did some bag work, and a little post workout video study with Coach George revealed that I had no idea what I was doing when it came to throwing a left hook.

We finished off with some truly hellish core work.  Goddamn planks.

Basement: 10 x 500m row

I was going to let off some steam by doing a squatty/pull-uppy/ball-slammy garage workout right after getting home from work, but circumstances prevented it.   

It worked out for the best.  I had some wrestling PVR'd and doing the row allowed me to watch some of it.  I might have gone for 15 rounds, but my darling Wife had made me a delicious shaved beef sandwich and I had held off supper until that point.  

For the first nine rounds, I kept it casual, around the 2:05-2:15/500m pace.   

For the tenth round, I went all out and got a 1:43 time.   That wasn't bad, considering the damper was set to 6, not 9, and I probably went a bit fast out of the gate.  

VolkeFit

Warm-up
Row 40 cal at 65%
25 box jumps
15 squats of 155 lb

Untimed.  There was a bit of rest between each thing.

Main event
For time (15 minute time cap):
200 double unders
50 single arm DB snatch (45 lb)
200 double unders

13:08

Garage with Nick: Tag Teaming "Cindy"

We warmed up by playing catch with the 20-lb slamball, throwing it wall ball-like (starting with a full-squat, exploding up with a two-handed toss) over the pull-up bar.

Then it was time to introduce Nick to "Cindy." He had read about her on the internet, so he was aware of her nasty reputation.

He seemed somewhat reassured when I told him we would be tag-teaming.  Cindy is easier to handle when you take turns with a partner.

For 20 minutes, we alternated rounds of:

-5 pull-ups
-10 push-ups
-15 air squats

In the 20 minutes, we got 18* rounds, plus 2 pull-ups.



*We think.  At some point, we stopped keeping track.

B-Squad: Dying Pigeon

On the way to the gym, we saw a pigeon that was writhing around on the ground and was clearly going to die.    I chose not to see that as a bad omen for what the workout would be like.


6 rounds:
-250m run (three times around the gym
-20 bell swings (55 lb)
-10m broad jump
-10m backward sled drag (45 lb)
-20 jumping squats

It took me 22:45.  This was surprisingly tough.

Basement: YouTube Yoga

This is the one I did.  

There were actually a couple of poses that were challenging enough that I took a brief break during them.

Regina Boxing Club: Eye of the Tyler

Probably the worst title for a blog post ever.

First time doing a workout at the Regina Boxing Club, other than a "Parents Night" thing a while back.

This was HARD.

Warmed up by running around the gym, doing high knees, buttkickers, side to sides and stuff.

Then it was time for the Circuit.

This was savage.

20 minutes:

10 squats
20 alternate v-sits (l/r = 2)
30 mountain climbers (l/r = 1)
40 skips

10 burpees
20 sit-ups
30 lunges (l/r = 2)
40 skips

10 push-ups
20 bicycle crunches (l/r = 1)
30 horizontal jumping jacks
40 skips

Repeat as needed.

I got through this thing 2 times, I think, and got to the burpees on the third way through it. 

Then it was time for some interval bag work.  That was fun, but hard.  Maybe more hard than fun, really.  Starting with 1-2 and working up to four-punch combinations.  During this segment, Coach Pat Fiacco pulled people off one-by-one to hit pads.

I am really bad at hitting pads.

We finished off with some goddamn planks.  Holy shit, I'm bad at planks.  Or at least I was tonight because I was wrecked from all the work I'd already done.

On a side note, I've been making a conscious effort to drink a LOT more water recently.   Most of it came pouring out of me (as sweat) during this workout.

Basement: Tyler tries yoga... and is pretty bad at it

I've had this feeling in the back of my mind for some time that I should do yoga.

For starters, I'm about as flexible as an inanimate carbon rod.

Plus, I know I should be trying new things more often.   And maybe yoga would help me calm the hell down or achieve inner peace or make me a better person somehow.  

But with going to B-Squad and Fitness by Design (aka VolkeFit) and also starting going once a week to boxing fitness classes at the Regina Boxing Club (wife had a punchcard with nine visits left she can't use, and Son already attends kids classes there, so it made sense for me to try it)  and regular Sunday garage workouts with Nick, that doesn't leave a lot of time (or money) to go to a yoga studio.  

Enter YouTube.   Specifically,  YouTube yoga queen Adriene.  

I searched "Yoga for Beginners," and that's how I found her.  She's got a ton of videos online, some specifically targeted for beginners.  

I picked this one and was off to the races.  

She, uh, seems nice.  She's pretty laid back (I guess you probably can't be too intense if you teach yoga) and has a very conversational teaching style, but she doesn't take it too seriously and is even a little goofy at times.  I like her.  I probably mentioned that one too many times to my Wife who is now accusing me of crushing on her.   

As far as me actually doing the yoga, it was a pretty basic routine, from what I understand.  Not that it was easy for me.   It's not necessarily easy following someone along on a TV.  Adriene would do a pose and I'd do it, but then I'd want to look to see if I was getting it right (I wasn't), which naturally takes me out of the pose.  

Fortunately, Adriene doesn't judge me and there are no other students around to make me feel self-conscious about how terrible I am at this stuff. 

I'm sure I would benefit from a real live instructor correcting my form, but that's a sacrifice I'm prepared to make for the convenience and lack of shame doing yoga by YouTube provides.  

I'm going to try to do this on a semi-regular basis. 

Basement: Monday Night RAW Rows

10 x 500m rows, resting one minute in between.  Medium pace.

I kept them between 1:55 and 2:15/500m.   I was going a little quick in the earlier ones, probably more out of habit than anything.

I'm going to work up to doing 20 x 500m, but I need to have an hour to kill.

Garage with Nick: Helen and EMOM

My longtime friend Nick took me up on my invitation to do weekly Sunday morning workouts.
 
Like me, he's a dad of young kids and getting to the gym consistently can be a challenge.  Sunday mornings seems like a good time to sneak in a workout without being too disruptive to all the other demands on our time.

Nick isn't a newbie to fitness, by any means.  He's lifted weights (off and on, I think) as long as I've known him and has run marathons in the past.  As an athlete, he's definitely a cut above me.  When we played Frisbee, he was always way faster.*   When we were teenagers, if we ever wrestled, he'd ragdoll my overweight body around with shocking ease.  (I preferred to tap out his scrawnier brother, Jim.)

Nick hasn't done a ton of CrossFit-style stuff, though, so I thought this would be a nice change of pace for him.

For his first outing, I introduced him to a classic CrossFit WOD:

A. "Helen"
3 rounds, for time:
-400m run (or, in our case, around my block which may be a bit farther)
-21 bell swings (I used my 28kg KB, and let Nick use my 24kg)
12 pull-ups  (Nick had yet to be introduced to the wonderful cheat code known as kipping, so he did 6 deadhang pull-ups, instead)

This took me 15:30, which is considerably slower than my best ever Helen time.  Like, 5-6 minutes slower.   It was probably the slightly heavier kettlebell.  Yeah.  That's it.

This was rough, but I guess that's the point.


B. 12-minute EMOM, in alternating minutes:
1. 20 double unders (Nick did 30 seconds of single skips, which is actually harder)
2. 10 sandbag squats.

We got through this.  Next time we could up the work a bit more, but it was a good start.

And Nick texted me to tell me he was pretty sore the next day.  So was I.



*(and more skilled and more handsome and with better hair) 

VolkeFit: BurpThrust and SkipRow

A."BurpThrust"
Every 2 minutes for 10 rounds:
-3 burpees
-3 trhusters (115 lb)


B. "SkipRow"

50 cal row
50 double unders
40 cal row
75 DU
30 cal row
100 DU
20 cal row
125 DU
10 cal row

20:20