Core Training

Thursday, December 3rd workout - Remembering the diagnosis.

Warmup

Shoulder mobility - stretching, foam rolling, dislocates

When I attended Kelly Starrett's excellent workshop at CF Boston in September, I was held up as an example of someone with bad shoulder mobility. He had me trying doing an overhead squat, and he kept telling me to stop cheating. I quite simply could not hold the bar overhead without arching my back. His prescription 5-10 minutes of shoulder mobility work before doing any overhead work. Sometimes even that is not enough lately. Hopefully, things will improve as I build a routine incorporating kipping pullups, mobility work, OHS, and the like.

5 rounds:

3 x 25# pullups
3 MU row-transition

3 sets each:

10-second tuck L-sit on rings
3 press to headstand

Even when I'm not getting in a full workout, I've been trying to squeeze in a little gymnastics training. Perhaps it would have been better if I hadn't crammed it between my shoulder mobility work and overhead lifting.

Heavy Stuff
Press 5x3 85-95-105-115-115f

As soon as I finished thee fourth set, I knew I'd commited the classic alignment fault, because I could suddenly feel tenderness in my L1-T12 disc. I know the feeling from injuring it by catching some jerks with a hinge at that L-T joint. (Kelly Starret expands on this here.) This was just enough tenderness that I knew I lost tightness in the core trying to compensate for my limited shoulder mobility.

Metcon
Half Cindy

AMRAP 10:

5 pullups
10 pushups
15 squats

8 rounds -> 9 pullups; 10:20 for 10 rounds

Pushups failed me, like usual, only quicker this time.


Saturaday, December 5th workout - The Start of the Cure

Warmup
10 minutes carrying wood
5 minutes jump rope - no more than 6 consecutive DUs
Shoulder mobility work

5 rounds:

3 HSPU
10-second frog stand

I do the HSPUs with my belly to the wall, so I'm less likely to hinge my spine. If my back is to the wall, I'll arch to keep my center of gravity against the wall. This way I'm encouraged to hollow myself, although you can see that it's not a perfect system. By my fifth set, my form was starting to suffer:



You can see the two problems working against each other here, limited shoulder mobility putting me at a less-than vertical body angle and a softening of the back to make my torso angle even less vertical. This is the classic upstream-downstream mobility issue that Kelly Starrett harped on in his Chasing Performance seminar - a mobility restriction in one part of the body leads to an even worse form issue elsewhere. (This is an amazingly useful analysis tool for a coach.) The solution is even more dedication to shoulder mobility (daily perhaps), and a corresponding effort to strengthen my core, not by situps and back extensions, rather by doing exercises that force me to work to hold my spine straight.

Heavy Stuff
Deadlift 3x5 - 225-275-310

That was harder than I remember, but my form was halfway decent.

Suitcase DL 3x3 each 95-115-135

KB Complex, 12K

One minute each:

One-arm swing, right 31
Figure 8 forward 20
One-arm swing, left 33
Figure 8 backwards, 12 (That was silly.)
Clean and press, right 20
Halo, cross chop, alternate sides 22
Clean and press, left 17

Total reps = 175

Some folks like the pump they get after a day of bench press and curls (guess it looks good in the mirror), but I like the pump after a day of deadlifts. Walking around with a tight trunk just makes me feel strong. I won't be doing heavy deads every week, but I'll mix them in with snatch-grip DLs, unilateral DB/KB work, and the like. I've got hips that even after a few months off can move hundreds of pounds, but I spent those months slouched in front of a computer at work, so my spinal erectors got weak much faster. That's an imbalance I won't allow to get the best of me. The same goes for my mobility work. It's time to stretch.

Back to Basics

As I hinted in my last post, I've had some thinking to do - about how I want to approach my workouts and why I want to torture myself workout in the first place. I had some pretty concrete goals at the beginning of the year. I was in full-on CrossFit-for-CrossFit's-sake mode, training for the Games and shooting for some nice round numbers on my lifts. I had 20 - count them - 20 individual performance goals for 2009 (plus an equal number of intermediate goals). Having taken 3 months more-or-less off, it's safe to say that those goals haven't felt threatened much. (I met exactly one - in March, when I was not only in some of the best shape of my life but was well rested on account of getting too busy at work.)

I'm starting this cycle from a very different place. After a summer of playing with the kids, an autumn of Too Much Work, and recently a bout with the H1N1 flu, I'll be building from a conditioning base of not much better than zero. As such, it's too early to worry about how big I can get my squat this winter or how fast I can row 2,000m. First, I need to simply get in the habit of working out regularly and trying to regain lost capacities. It's not as much fun starting over as it is doing something new, when progress comes easily and each workout sparkles with the excitement of new accomplishments. Right now, however, it's time to swallow my pride and put up some sad-looking numbers and let the cold light of objectivity guide my training.

Training for the Qualifiers burned me out on CrossFit for CrossFit sake. It would be one thing if I were training at an affiliate where I had people to push me through each workout, but not being a mainpager, running out to the garage each night and punishing myself to trim a couple seconds or add a couple pounds had lost it's appeal. Still, laying around on the couch at night wasn't exactly the best programming I've come up with either.

In need of a goal, I decided I'd train for the ski season. Skiing is by far my favorite sport, and it was a day of ski touring in the White Mountains that convinced me to take up CrossFit in the first place. Therefore, it seems the perfect object for my current training. To make it more interesting for me, I'm entering a weekly race series (giant slalom) and will enter a couple of randoneering races (climbing and descending a mountain - usually multiple times). I've never ever raced gates before and my alpine ski touring has not been a timed venture, so I don't have a great benchmark for performance, but having quantitative measures of performance will raise the stakes on my training and force me to be objective about my strengths and weaknesses for my chosen sport. Programming objectively for a sport rather than to get better at working out will be a new challenge for me, and I'm looking forward to it.

For downhill racing, squats are king. I became a better skier over the summer when I did Starting Strength, simply by virtue of being stronger in a deep squat. Obviously, then, squats will be a part of the new program, but what else do I include? Backcountry skiing is primarily an endurance sport - cardiorespiratory endurance and muscular stamina. When alpine touring, I have ~9 pounds strapped to each foot and 10-30 pounds on my back. That adds up over the course of day. There are programs out there that cater to backcountry skiers (e.g., Rob Shaull's mountain athlete site), but those are designed for the long, slow haul of mountaineering. I'm not about to load up on hour-long chippers every day to develop improved slogging ability. That would only rob me of explosiveness and pure strength I want for the downhill (and for the All-Important Stupid Human Tricks that make being fit fun).

Still, I'll be doing more of the dreaded AMRAP 20 thing. When I'm in the gym, I vastly prefer programs like Greg Everett's Cathletics program that combine olympic lifting and short, sharp metcons. Those kind of workouts still have their place, because downhill skiing places tremendous demands on explosiveness, agility, and anaerobic work capacity. Long metcons are not my favorite for general fitness, but they fit my needs for now. They'll include power endurance workouts, workouts that simultaneously tax core strength and work capacity (think DLs and running), and sport-specific aerobic sufferfests (timed ascents at my local ski area).

More immediately, however, I need to work the basics. I need to get comfortable lifting heavy weights again; I need to rebuild my gymnastics capacities, and I need to diligently improve my mobility, both to recover from recent and old injuries and to fight off the decline of old age. This weekend was dedicated primarily to the first of those. To accomplish the latter, I'm going to have to get creative and be diligent in using my time away from the gym.

Saturday, November 21, 2009

Coming off the flu and not wanting a Fran cough to cause a relapse, I started off with a pure strength workout. The weights weren't great, but I have to start somewhere.

Warmup
3 rounds swinging Cindy:

5 Chinups
10 Pushups
15 squats
20 KB swings, 12K

RDL 45x5

Heavy Stuff
Deadlift 135x5, 185x3, 225x2, 275x3, 300xx, 310x3

Max strict dips 8

November 22, 2009

I just said that I'm not a mainpager, but today's workout was just the ticket - a squat-centric workout with an aerobic component, but long enough and heavy enough that I could pace myself without taking my flu-abused lungs into the sort of deep respiratory distress that a shorter, lighter metcon would produce.

Warmup
CFCC Mobility drills
Hip mobility

Strict CFWU

10 DH pullups
8 strict dips
6 strict KTE

10 mountain climbers
3 burpees

Metcon
AMRAP 20:

25 burpees
15 Back squat, 173# (BW)

3 rounds + 25 burpees

Felt pretty bad about this performance as I slogged through it. I carefully worked my way through the squats, concentrating on holding a tight core after a sloppy first squat in round two. I sometimes dogged it on the burpees, but I still felt well spent afterwards. For a post flu metcon, simply lasting 20 minutes is a good enough performance for me, and the soreness I feel today seems about right for where I am in the workout cycle.

Now the part that's been the hardest for me lately - keeping it up during the week.

Affiliate hopping

One of the advantages of having to travel for work (even if it isn't that far) is that I get to bop about New England visiting different affiliates. The travel really only started recently, and I'm just getting caught on to the possibilities for expanding my garage CF perspective. Meetings in Boston and Hartford on consecutive days got me to Revolution CrossFit in Boston and CrossFit Persevere in Glastonbury. These two affiliates couldn't be more different.

RevFit is a globo gym with the shiniest of fitness machines and a CrossFit room. Some marketing guru named it "The Pit" since I was last there, although it only feels that way if you close the garage door to the room and let the sweat build-up. It's got your full array of CF trappings, bars, bumpers, nice pullup bars, rings, KBs, rowers, Dynamax balls, jump boxes, etc. The one thing missing from RevFit - a CrossFit trainer providing feedback. There's just a group of athletes who mostly follow the mainpage WOD, except on Thursdays when a trainer does lead a workout or during an fundamentals class, when all the regulars get kicked out of the pit and exiled to the land of chrome gym furniture to complete their workouts. Last night was just such a night. It's not the gym's fault. We were strength training and happily shooting the shit while we rested between sets and didn't get to our metcon before they began their fundamentals class. Thus, our metcon was done in an open space amidst the chrome-plated furniture of Globoland. We lined up three barbells and did our burpees right in front of the person DLing behind us (watch those fingers, kids).

Most of the RevFit regulars were languishing on the IR. Laura was still recovering from her marathon and limited to upper-body work; Sharon was visibly pained by a neck ailment; and Chris was suffering a nasty cold. Thankfully, Renee was going strong, and Samantha Aurelio was also visiting from out of town, so we got in a good workout together. They did a modified CrossFit Football WOD, and I did most of it plus some ring work.

Sam showed off her one-armed handstand, which got me inspired to try some gymnastics stuff. My press handstand was working well, although I've still got some work to do to hold that freestanding handstand consistently. Apparently the oly work has helped my flexibility, because I sure as heck haven't been doing passive stretching). My front and back lever progressions were suprisingly good, too, given that all I've been working with any regularity is skin the cats, L-hangs, and MU progressions. (It's always good to have your skilz working when it's time to show-off. ) The most impressive showing-off, however, was Sam's ATG squat. She quietly added 5# to her 5RM, while retaining rock solid form throughout. She easily has another 10# in her.

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RevFit Workout - Monday, June 15, 2009

Warmup
Hip and shoulder mobility
10 C2B pullups
5 L-pullups
10 ring dips

Skill work
5 Skin the cat to hollow hang to L-sit
2 failed MUs
1-arm handstands against wall
2 press handstands (first strict straight-arm press HS in a long time )
pike back lever - 5 seconds x2
one-leg-extended front lever - 5 seconds, 3 seconds

Heavy stuff
Press 45x5, 70x5, 95x3, 115x3, 120x3, 125x2+f, 122.5x3, 122.5x1 (burned out from too much ring work between sets)

125 is my prior 3RM, so this isn't bad. Overhead strength still needs attention, given the low numbers overall, but my loss of strength is not as grim as I thought.

Metcon
5 rounds:

5 Deadlift, 275#
10 burpees

7:05

Last time out was 6:26, so this isn't great. I should have checked my log-book before starting, and maybe I could have pushed closer. Metcon probably isn't good enough to take 40 seconds off, but 20 was certainly doable, even though I was thoroughly gassed here.

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In contrast to RevFit, CrossFit Persevere is a spartan setup - no showers (yet), no shiny chrome machinery, no internet/juice-bar cafe, no after-work crowds either on this particular day. They do have a sweet, new pullup bar, on which to do flying pullups, however, climbing one bar to the next four times until you've gone from 8 to 15 feet above the ground. (I stuck to the lower two rungs, thankyouverymuch).

Where RevFit had an array of globogoers gawking at the three of us doing DLs for time (I'm sure the 275# thump helped draw attention), CFP had two coaches there to encourage (i.e., yell at) me to fight through the pain and complete my WOD. Kim Malz, aka fitmom, is co-owner of CFP. She has a tremendous energy that is reflected in her athletes and her performance. Kim qualified for the CF Games in Aromas, less than two years after her cancer diagnosis. As inspiring as that story is, you should have seen her work her way from 24th overall at the Qualifiers to 5th, by charging through the brutal final workout. The kind of fighting spirit she showed in the workout clearly goes a long way in life. It's hard to wimp out on a workout with that kind of example cheering you on.

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CrossFit Persevere Workout - Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Warmup
Pullups
Hip mobility
2 muscle ups (felt good enough that I put them in a metcon for the first time ever)
Burgener clean warmup

Metcon
Nasty girls

3 rounds:

50 squats
7 muscle ups (switched to jumping MUs after one round plus 2 reps & 5 failed reps)
10 hang power cleans, 135#

12:57

Felt good to finally use muscle ups in a metcon. The 11 MUs are by far the most muscle ups I've done in one session. How it is I go from zero MUs one day to 11 the next escapes me entirely. I'll just keep working these and hope they don't go away again.

Weekends are supposed to be fun

It's summer - time to get my workouts in outdoors; time to throw things around the yard; time to head out to the mountains; time to play with tires and sleds. Sunday, it was the tires, and as much as it hurt, this was decidedly fun, and a good workout, too.

Warmup
Hip mobility work
Good mornings, 45x10
10 ft2bar

Heavy stuff
Deadlift 135x5x2, 185x3, 225x2, 275x1, 305x1, 315x5

Needed to get used to lifting heavy again. It's been 7 weeks since I picked up over 300#, and I definitely needed that extra warmup set at 135# to get things working right. By the time I got to my work set, however, they felt solid. Looking forward to restarting linear progression on the DL.

Metcon
3 rounds:

6 tire flip and jump through
200m run
20 wall ball, 25# to 10 feet

9:13

Tire-flipping fun from Patrick Haskell on Vimeo.

Embrace the suck

A few days ago, somebody on the boards posted a question about how you master the mental game of CrossFit. That is, how do you dig down halfway through a brutal metocn and convince yourself to do the very thing that all your instincts are screaming at you to stop doing? There were plenty of good replies to this question, but the phrase that occurred to me (and it's one that I've never really liked) is "Embrace the suck." For some reason I never liked the sound of the phrase before, but when I thought about it I realized that it is exactly the mindset I need to push through an upleasant challenge, a particularly nasty WOD.

When you get right down to it, you need to be willing to accept discomfort, to relish that discomfort, to know that the pain you experience at the moment will bring you strength later. It won't bring you comfort. Sure, it may make the physical and psychological challenges of your day-to-day life easier to bear, but it won't make the next workout any easier. Learning to push yourself through discomfort only makes things worse. You get stronger, yes, but by pushing harder, the pain increases. It's a vicious cycle. The more you suffer, the stronger you get, the more it sucks the next time. You'll get stronger, but don't expect it to get any easier. It will just hurt that much more. To make the next step as a CF athlete, I need to learn to love that pain - to recognize it as future strength and hold onto it rather than turn away; I need to Embrace the Suck.

The cruel irony was that yesterday's workout was one of those challenges that was bound to make me question that entire philosophy. Whatever Evil Genius first decided to pair running and DLs can go fuck himself. Heavy DLs screw the back up tight and encourage the body to develop an antiPose stride, where you struggle to simply lean forward slightly. I knew that as soon as I went out for the second run, I'd be in that sort of discomfort that comes from getting your core squeezed mercilessly by itself. Fuck embracing the pain; the pain was embracing me. I knew this would be the challenge of this WOD coming into it. I knew that I had to push through, but when it comes to heavy DLs, pushing through needs to be done with a measure of caution.

I've never been a fan of DLs in a metcon. Maximizing power output is too easily done at the expense of proper form and loss of form on heavy DLs is a recipe for injury. However, after working the DL almost weekly for over a year, I've got the form locked in pretty well and can tell when I'm starting to slip. If Coach G. is going to program DLs on the mainpage with regularity and they're thus likely to show up at the Qualifiers, I need to figure out a way to get efficient at doing them with solid form. I'm not sure I didn't err on the side of caution yesterday (breaking the DLs into sets of 2 and 3 for the most part), but it was a good effort toward pushing through the discomfort and keep putting out the work I know I can produce. As I get accustomed to this particular flavor of pain, I hope I can up my power output on workouts like this. (Of course, there are many flavors of suck I need to learn to embrace more fully, but that's where that Constantly Varied bit comes in. More on programming soon.)

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Warmup
Agility drills
Barbell TGU x 3 each
OHS 45x15

Skill work
Muscle up progressions
4 MU singles

Finally getting the hang of this as a controlled movement. Hope to give the 30 MU for time WOD a go before the Qualifiers.

Metcon
3 rounds:

Run 400m
10 DL, 260# (1.5 x BW)
20 Box jumps 30"

19:07

Holy hamstrings

Got up this morning and thought I had no chance of having a good workout today. Slept a solid 8.5 hours (for the first time in ages) but it was a gray, rainy day, I felt sluggish, and my hamstrings were downright angry. Yesterday's workout was a tough one, but I didn't expect to feel it this much. I could tell something was off warming up. Double unders weren't happening and even the basic bounce was causing me difficulty at first.

As I finished the warmup, however, I figured out the cause of my malaise. I had pizza and beer for dinner last night. I was at a niece's birthday party and wasn't prepared for the carb fest. That was the first pizza dinner I'd had since at least November, maybe as far back as August, and my energy levels were all screwed up as a result. Knowing this was oddly reassuring. I told myself that I was stronger than I felt, and brought a little extra attitude to my workout. It didn't cure everything, but it gave me the confidence that if I warmed up to it, I could pull some heavy deads.
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Warmup
Jump rope 5:00
Boz OHS
TGU-windmill, 45x3

Heavy stuff
Deadlift 45x5, 135x5, 185x3, 225x2, 275x1, 295x1, 305x5, 320x5 (new 5RM)

Metcon
Josh

21-15-9

95# OHS
2 pullups

8:12

Core work
Getup-situp 20x5 each, 30x5 each
SLRR 30x5 each, 40x5 each

My pullups sucked and were broken to hell and back, but I managed the OHS unbroken, which felt good. Maybe I could have gone faster on the pullups, but I felt like I was on the edge of muscular failure the whole time and thought that would kill my metcon. Guess I should have pushed a little harder, but given how I felt coming in, this was a good showing.

Gone Skiing

Haven't been in the gym for almost a week. Landed a big job last Thursday, and all semblance of normalcy has disappeared from my life and training. As an added bonus, it's a fast burn project with a completion date about a week after the Games qualifiers. Ah well, it sure gives me a reason to stay on top of my stuff. However, if this first week is any indication, my training is bound to suffer.

My family and seven of our friends rented a ski condo for the weekend. This is one of those things you plan months in advance and hope the weather works out. With ski conditions the best they'd been in years on Tuesday, we were hopeful, but Friday's rain and the weekend refreeze did us in. Still, the sun was shining Saturday and we could see Mount Washington clear as a bell from Sugarbush, about 80 miles away. Knowing what the day was going to be like, a bunch of us broke out the files and sharpening stones the night before and got our skis ready for the formica skiing surface. The order of the day was scary fast skiing on the sunny side of the mountain, not a great workout, but definitely some solid technique practice, since losing an edge at those speeds in those conditions would likely mean a trip to the emergency room. It was good fun, but one day of it was enough. The rest of the time was spent relaxing, eating well, eating not so well, and bulding a pile of bottles for the redemption center.

Had plans to make amends with some backcountry skiing in the foot of snow that fell overnight when I got home, but work and a sick family kept me closer to home yesterday. Today, I finally got back into the gym, courtesy of CF Central CT's convenient location near the office I was visiting today and tomorrow. They had a max DL day going, but some guys were following the CFSB, so they had no issue with me following my own programming and hitting the mini-metcon they also had programmed.

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Warmup
Jump rope 3:00, 7 consecutive DUs
Shoulder triplet mobility drill
TGU-Windmill drill 20K x 3
10 pullups
10-sec static hold
10 dips

Skillwork

2:00 handstand practice - a couple stable 5-second holds

Heavy Stuff

Deadlift 135x5, 185x3, 225x2, 275x1, 305x3, 320x3, 335x3 (new 3RM), 250x20 (PR)

Metcon

3 rounds:

10 burpees, Burgener-style
20 box jumps, 20"

5:01

Deadlifts felt remarkably easy, considering the double PBs. I guess hitting DLs after 6 days off leaves a lot more in the tank than a day after 20 box squats. Metcon was weird with the strict burpees, especially after the deadlifts. Ended up being more about muscular fatigue (and missed box jumps) than by the lungs. Good to get back after it.

The slippery slope

As I said yesterday, I've been on a mission to Just Eat. I'd been making good food choices for the most part, although sometimes indulging in some Breyer's at the end of the day. Last weekend was Valentines Day, and Margaret and I went down to my folk's house so we could get some babysitting for one of our three yearly dates. Living in the Stix and having grown up the next town over from Newport, RI also makes the night out a little nicer, as there are plenty of really nice restaurants.

I tried to be good, ordering a cheese platter to share as an appetizer, and a steak with roasted vegetables for an entree. Of course, the cheese platter came with french bread, candied dates, and other treats, but at least they were in small proportions. Add some strawberries and dark chocolate and a few drinks and a bowl of ice cream each night of the weekend and by Monday, I was in full-on carb-craving mode.

The funny thing is, I've never had that much of a sweet tooth. Sure, I could polish off some gummy bears real quick if they were around, but the things that show up on a daily basis in the home and office - cookies, doughnuts, milk chocolate, etc. - don't hold that much appeal. However, after cleaning up my diet and then having a weekend of treats, the next couple of days were tough. I'd have my customary snacks - almonds, olives, or cheese - and I just wouldn't be satisfied. It wasn't until I had some dried fruit that a snack would feel complete. An evening ice cream a couple more times, and I was in the same place the next day.

Nicole Carrol was right. Carbs are like crack. Have a little, you want more, and after my slightly carby days, suddenly the cookies, chocolates, gummy candies, and assorted treats belonging to my not-yet-paleo family started to look mighty tempting. This was the signal to me that I better spend a few days eating on the strict. Last night, when the ice cream craving came, I threw it off with some green beans with garlic and olive oil. Not exactly the same thing, but when I added a glass of milk and some almonds, things worked out OK. Of course, the house is now almost barren of healthy foods. So it's off to the grocery to spend far too much money, but if I want to eat clean while on this mission to Eat More, I'm going to have to buy what looks like far too much food. I'm betting I'll eat it.

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Had some fun with the warmup and gymnastics skills today. The agility drills yesterday were fun, too. (Those will be part of the regular mix as far as monostructural warmup activities go.) Today, the gymnastics practice I've been doing started to pay-off with some old skills coming back to me. Fun stuff. (Did I mention that already?) Good thing, too, because the rest of the workout meant business.

Warmup/Skill work
Jump rope 5:00 - max of 9 consecutive DUs
Shoulder rolls

Handstand practice

2 straddle presses off a 10" mat
Hand walks 18, 29, 26 feet

TGU-Windmill drill 35 x 4 each
RRs 35 x 8 each (alternating)

Heavy stuff
Deadlift 45x5, 135x5, 185x3, 225x2, 275x1, 300x3, 315x3, 330x3 (new 3RM), 250x16

Metcon
7 rounds:

10 SDLHP, 95#
10 ring dips

7:23

Funny how it goes sometimes. Those warmup DL sets felt brutally heavy, but I managed to pull the three sets of three with pretty good form and tackled my first ever set of 15+ DLs and still finished strong with the metcon. I might have been able to keep going on the long set of DLs, but it didn't seem it at the time. Those DLs hurt from the 7th rep on. Next time, I'll hang in there for all 20 (I hope). The high-rep set is a great training tool. There's no excuse about pacing yourself, like I've used in Diane. I have to just hold onto that bar, gather myself, and pull another rep.

We're firmly into CFSB mode now. I like what it demands of me, but I'm going to have to be really strict with my recovery, if I want to make it work over the long haul.

I had some planks planned as a finisher, but when I got home we took the kids outside for an hour, and once the cold got into me I knew I better spend the rest of the day resting, eating, and otherwise recovering.

Herding the goats

Preparing for the Games means I have to evaluate myself objectively as a Crossfitter. How well do I perform across broad time and modal domains? I've been at this long enough to know What I'm Good At and What I Suck At. The difference now is that if I don't want to fall on my face in May, I have to program those exercises/workouts that I would least want to see come out of the hopper at the Qualifiers, those things that KStar and Boz at Crossfit San Fransisco would call my goats. Knowing that, I sat down with my workout log and compiled a proper list of Goats, and sure enough, I've got a fucking herd, and they're nasty little buggers.

My list of goats (in no particular order) looks like this:

• Metcons of 15 minutes or more
  
• High rep deadlifts and olympic lifts
  
• Muscular stamina in general
  
• Pressing exercises (Shoulder press, bench press, HSPU, pushups)
  
• Jerks and push presses (my dip-drive is a disaster, when things get heavy or hurried)
  
• Snatch
  
• Double unders
  
• Muscle-ups
  
• GHD situps (and regular situps aren't exactly a strength)
  
• Rowing beyond 2,000m (I've never done it, and it's because I know just how much it will hurt)
  
• Running 5K or more (ridiculous since I used to be a runner with a sub-5-minute mile, but my 5K is currently 24+)
  
• Burpees (just because they're burpees and they suck)

Quite a list there. I've got plenty of things to program, high rep DLs, presses, long runs and rows, Annie, Angie, Diane, Elizabeth, Grace. The list goes on. It's like a who's who of CF Girls. The problem is for some of these goats, I haven't a clue how to shepherd them in from the fields. Muscular stamina and cardiovascular endurance and even pressing strength can be developed through hard work, but I need some serious help with double unders, jerks, and muscle-ups. They need practice-practice-practice before I can even work to develop capacity. Those three skills are still on the front end of the technique-consistency-intensity recipe. Those goats need feeding, and they need it now, or I'm liable to be caught with my pants down in May.

This means that unlike the firebreathers getting ready for the Games by piling on PR after PR on major lifts and the Girls,
I need to be focused on the fundamentals. This means I get to stare down a goat every day. Today, the goal is building endurance for heavy deadlifts while maintaining proper form, using a density-training protocol. I went heavy last week and stopped just shy of matching two PRs, because my form was going to shit. My first weakness in the DL is one of inadequate spinal stability. That weakness affects my high-rep DLs, my olympic lifts, and is a mean, old goat ready to gore me and leave me injured if I don't keep an eye on it. As an added bonus, I get to play with double unders, too.

Warmup
Jump rope 2:00
Alt. single/DU 1:00 - 25 DUs
Max consecutive DUs - 4 (1:00 was not enough time for max test)
DUs (in sets of consecutive DUs) 1:00 - 16
Star-pattern squat sequence 35x2 each
TGU-windmill drill 35x3 each
RRs 35x8 (alternating)

Heavy stuff
Deadlift 135x5, 185x5, 5x (225, 230, 235, 240, 245, 250)*

* Density style - every two minutes on the minute until form goes soft.

Form went early on this one. Saturday's good mornings were still being felt (and how).

Metcon
20-14-8

70# DB swing**
plyo pushup (one hand on medicine ball - switch halfway)
C2bar pullups

9:50

** Subbed 30-21-12 55# DB swings to preserve my back.

Did an extra second set of pushups during the last round, because I wasn't happy with ROM. Missed four C2Bs and had to redo those.

Even more fun was discovering as I was finishing up my first round of plyo pushups that the old guy doing crunches on the cable machine (where my pullup bar is) had one more set to do. I quickly jumped on the temporarily free power rack to do my C2Bs. Unfortunately, I'd never done a C2B pullup on it, so when I pulled, my chest hit the bar as my head simultaneously struck the ceiling. I've got a lovely pimple in the middle of my forehead now. Classic.

Core work
Max toes to bar - 12 (PR is 17)
Rolling plank 5:00 (1:00 on front, right side, front, left side, front)

And yes, that was a brutal finisher.