Easy Like a Sunday Morning

Feeling great after a solid night’s rest and taking it easy all day yesterday.

Warm-up

5 Rounds

  • 1m MB Cleans (20# MB)
  • 1m Inch Worms
  • 1m Jump Rope
  • 1m Figure 8s (20# KB, 25# KB in round 5)
  • 1m Hand-to-hand KBS (39# KB)
  • 1m Rest

The goal is to keep a decent pace, but not any real high intensity. It was easy.

WOD

7 Rounds

  • 24 OH Lunges (20# MB, 12 each leg)
  • 10 Burpees
  • 8 T2B

I really enjoyed this one. It was a WOD where I could go-go-go. Holding the medicine ball overhead was the toughest part of this. In rounds 3 and 4 I split up the lunges into 16 and 8. Other than that, everything was unbroken. I did take a few second breather in between each round as I moved a popsicle stick for counting. Finished in 14:48.

I Should Be Resting

Tired. Was falling asleep with the laptop on top of me in my chair, but went in for open gym.

Bench Press

Starting a new cycle with Kevin, so it was a 5×5 today. Did 8 at 135# and then 5 reps at each of 155#, 175#, 185#, 195#, and 205#. I was not feeling the lifts and last cycle I only hit 2 at 205#, so I was thrilled to get all 5 today.

Heaving Snatch Balance

I wanted to get above my snatch max, but probably took too small of jumps, which tired me out. Went 75#, 85#, 95#, 105#, 115#, 125#, 135#, 145#, missed at 155#, 155#, and a miss at 160#. The plan was to get in 10-15 singles and that was 11. Was pretty fatigued at that point, so stopped before getting hurt.

Double Unders

I made an attempt at the “Flight Simulator” which is an unbroken DU ladder WOD. You have to hit 5 unbroken DUs, stop, then 10 unbroken DUs, stop, and so on all the way up to 50, then back down the ladder. Each ladder jump is 5 reps. I made it up to 35 before I decided to come back down. I was failing too many times on the attempts at 30 and 35. Coming back down went so much faster than going up. My time was 14:51 for the 35 Flight Sim. I’ll take it since I hadn’t even been able to make it up to 25 in a mini flight sim before.

How About Some Deadlifts?

Was thinking maybe I’d take the day off, but felt good when I woke up, so went to 9am.

Warm-up

5 Rounds

  • 20 Russian KBS (30# KB)
  • 6 Burpees

The swings were so easy so I concentrated completely on the hip drive.

Strength

5×3 Deficit (3″) Deadlifts

Warmed up with 10 @ 135# and then used 225#, 295#, 325#, 345#, and 365# for my working sets. Solid.

WOD

12:00 EMOM

  • 5 Deadlifts (255# – use 70% of 3RM)
  • 7 V-ups

Holy shit did that 255# get heavy. It was hard to get the first rep going in the last 4 or 5 rounds. Powered through the v-ups without much trouble, but took my time on them in the final minute.

255lb-deadlifts

Finisher

30-20-10

  • Box Jumps (24″)
  • HR Push-ups

Didn’t take more than a minute or two of rest after the WOD and “jumped” right into this. Started out without rebounding, but then saw Cora rebounding so I had to step it up. Couldn’t let her beat me in my strength, especially since she probably has the upper hand in the push-ups.

DB WOD

In for the 9am because I have a massage at noon and want to rest after that. Back is tight from the last couple of days.

Warm-up

3 Rounds

  • 20 PVC Pass-thrus
  • 15 Jump Squats
  • 10 Zombie Kicks
  • 5 Burpees

Strength

5×3 Shoulder Press

  • 10 @ 45#
  • 3 @ 95#
  • 3 @ 115#
  • 3 @ 125#
  • 3 @ 135#
  • 3 @ 145#

I did 3 reps at 145# a couple of months ago, but I’ll take it after doing HSPU last night. Some days you have to just take what you can get because it’s better than going for 150# and not getting any reps. It took me a long time to realize this.

Accessory

3 Sets

  • MAX Ring Dips
  • 90s Rest

These felt good today. The weighted dips Kevin and I have been doing really helped out I think. I did 16, 12, and 10 in my sets. All reps were strict with no kipping.

WOD

21-15-9

  • Modified DB Curtis P’s (hang clean, lunge, lunge, push press)
  • Manmakers (DB push-up, row, row)

It was a good change of pace to do a WOD dominated by DBs. The push presses were easily the worst part of this for me. I had to take my breaks mostly because I couldn’t press out any more reps. Finished in 19:44, using 40# DBs.

Update
Decided to try my first 2k row at night. Didn’t quite know what to expect and started too fast. It pretty much sucked after the first 500m. Final time was 7:38 so I’ll have something to shoot for next time.

20121205-181402.jpg

OLY and Solo Garage

My lower back is a bit sore from the RDLs yesterday so maybe since we were doing them fast I wasn’t doing them quite right. This is the first Tuesday in a long time where my legs aren’t killing me in some way from squat Monday.

Went to the OLY class at 6pm and worked on snatches for the entire hour by doing a full snatch and then a hang snatch. Hang snatches are so much harder, but really force you to be explosive. I worked up to 145# and couldn’t get the hang snatch, so dropped back down to 95 and worked back up again. Didn’t even attempt the hang snatch at 145# the second time around, but did bump up to 155# and tried a couple of full snatches. I’ve hit a 155# power snatch in competition, but never really tried to drop under one in the snatch. Missed both tries, but was pretty close on the second one. Not too disappointed though especially after doing an hour of snatches already.

I got home and did a WOD in the garage because I didn’t want to do a full hour-long class.

5 Rounds

  • 2m Work
    • 200m Row
    • 5 HSPU
    • MAX Hang Power Cleans (135#)
  • 2m Rest

20121204-202010.jpg

That was a fun one. Kept up a fast pace on the rows with consistent times through every round. Got all of the handstand push-ups, but struggled with #5 in the fourth round because I stopped when my head hit the ground for some reason and then it was a little tough to get going. I got done with the HSPU right around 1 minute each time, so once I setup on the bar had 50 or 55 seconds for the cleans. The last few reps of each round were a real struggle.

I really like coming up with new combinations and structures for WODs. Keeps things interesting and fun.

Triple Max Front Squat

Went to the 7pm class because I had work to do this morning and waited for my iPhone 5 to be delivered tonight in case it needed a signature. Feeling good after a complete rest day yesterday.

Warm-up

4 Rounds

  • 15s PVC Pass-thrus
  • 15s PVC OHS
  • 15s Zombie Kicks
  • 15s Lateral Jumps

Strength

5×3 Front Squats

These felt great today. Started off with 6 @ 135# and then 3 reps at each of 155#, 185#, 205#, 225#, and 235#. Had some left in the tank too, but I didn’t want to fail and that was already my 6th set. My previous 1RM is 235# so hitting it for 3 reps today was a good place to stop.

WOD

20:00 EMOTM, do as much of the following in the first 30 seconds

  • 5 Romanian Deadlifts (185#)
  • 5 C2B Pull-ups
  • 5 Burpees

In the first minute I got 4 burpees, then 3 in the next minute, then 4, then 2 I think. After that, there were no more burpees until the final minute where we worked the entire minute and I barely got everything done. I kept doing my pull-ups as chest to bar throughout the WOD, but it wasn’t too long before I was only getting 4 pull-ups each minute. Only once did I just get 3, so that was somewhere around 90 C2B Pull-ups and 100 RDLs. This was much harder than it looked.

Explosion

Kevin talked me into staying after a bit to do some explosive stuff. We did 6 or 7 sets of explosive push-ups up on to plates by doing sets of 2s. The highest we got up to was 19.5″.

Then we started trying some kneeling snatches with his 15# training bar. I landed some, then went up to 25# for a few. Finally tried 35#, missed the first, and then nailed the second attempt. Next it was some kneeling jumps up on to stacked mats. We maybe got up to 8 or 10 inches.

Jill’s 29th

I was planning to take a rest day. Kevin asked if I wanted to help come up with WOD, so he made up the warm-up and I did the WOD. After coming up with it, I knew it looked like fun and I had to give it a try. Matt came in and partnered up with me in the 11am class.

Warm-up

10-20-30-20-10

  • Russian Twists (30# KB)
  • AbMat Sit-ups
  • Weighted V-ups (20# DB)

This sucked! My midline got a good workout last night with the GHD sit-ups and pullovers, so finishing these was a struggle. Took 13 or 14 minutes.

WOD

Since it was Jill’s birthday, everything was based on her age and birthdate.

1983s (33:03) AMRAP
* Partners with one person working at a time

  • 29 Hollow Rocks
  • 29 Pull-ups
  • 29 DB Snatches (45# DB)
  • 29 Wall Balls (20# MB, 10′ target)
  • 12 Curb Runs (100m)
  • 1 High Five

We split things up pretty evenly and kept a great pace. This was the best I’ve ever done on pull-ups. I did 14-14-14-15-16 of the pull-ups and all rounds I did unbroken. The most kipping pull-ups I’d done in a row was 15 before today. We ended up with the best score of the day by getting 4 full rounds and all the way through to 21 of the wall balls. When I made up the WOD I wasn’t thinking the run would be such a big portion of it, but it was probably about half of our time for each round.

Open Gym Friday

It’s been awhile since I did an open gym session at Survival Fitness. First I started with a WOD they did on Wednesday, which I had missed out on.

21-15-9

  • Box Jumps (24″)
  • HR Push-ups
  • T2B

The box jumps were easy and all done unbroken with rebounding off the ground. Hand release push-ups went better than expected, but I had to take some breaks in the rounds of 15 and 9. I set a new PR with 21 unbroken toes to bar, but that ended up hurting me. I couldn’t string them together very well for the next 2 rounds because my hips wouldn’t snap shut. They were one at a time in the round of 9. Finished in a time of 5:07, but was hoping to go sub 5. Great little WOD though.

8:00 AMRAP

  • 20 Push Presses (75#)
  • 20 OHS (75#)

I got 2 full rounds plus 20 push presses and 11 overhead squats, which is 3 reps shy of when I did it a couple of months ago in San Diego. I screwed up in round 2 though and for some reason started doing back squats, so lost valuable time and reps there. This is a great shoulder burner.

8 Rounds

  • 10 GHD Sit-ups
  • 10 Pullovers (45# DB)
  • 20 DUs

Didn’t do this for time, more to get in some midline work and some random DU practice.

Sixth Double Day

Today is the 6th day in a row where I’ve done two workouts. I’m actually feeling good though and have been smart about them for the most part.

Went to OLY class at 6pm and worked on the clean and jerk by doing singles of:

  • Clean Deadlift
  • Hang Clean
  • Jerk

I worked my way up in weight doing at least 2 or 3 before increasing the load. After one at 195# I stopped doing the jerks because they were starting to bother my shoulders. I got up to a 205# for a couple of singles and stopped there. Have never done hang cleans even close to that heavy, but they felt good and really forced me to work on getting under the bar quick to receive it in the squat.

Stayed right after for the 7pm class.

Warm-up

10->1

  • Russian KBS (40# KB)
  • Star Jumps

Strength

5×5 Deficit Deadlifts off 8 foam mats, which is about 3″

  • 5 @ 225#
  • 5 @ 275#
  • 5 @ 305#
  • 5 @ 325#
  • 5 @ 345#

Felt kind of heavy today, but that’s 20 pounds heavier than a 5×3 a couple of months ago, so I guess that feeling should be expected!

WOD

5 Rounds

  • 3:00 AMRAP
    • 3 Power Cleans (115#)
    • 6 Chest to Deck Push-ups
    • 9 Air Squats
  • 1m Rest

I finished 21 rounds + the 3 cleans, 6 push-ups, and 3 of the air squats. I’ll take it after doing an hour of clean and jerks just before. Glad I didn’t try to Rx this at 135# because it would have been bad. Using 115# allowed me to focus on keeping a good back position and cycling the reps without dropping the bar after each rep. The push-ups weren’t a problem, but my squats were kind of slow after the first couple of rounds.