Tag: Box Jump

Teams of 2

Yesterday morning I walked 18 holes of golf and qualified for the Saginaw District Golf Association Invitational Tournament. It got up into the mid or high 90 and was a long day. Perfect timing for a CrossFit rest day! Feeling good and back at it today. When I woke up I knocked out one set of max rep push-ups and decided the Armstrong Pull-up Program just isn’t worth the time. It’s so boring compared to WODs, so I’m done with it.

Matt, the owner of the gym, attended a CrossFit Level 1 Certification over the weekend and will next be working on getting Survival Fitness affiliated as an official CrossFit box next. Pretty exciting stuff. He learned a lot and you could already see it in the way he ran today’s class. I don’t mean anything bad about previous classes by saying that, I just felt like he had more confidence in his teaching of certain movements and pointing out some of our technique issues. It’ll make us all better.

Warm-up

  • 1m Bottom Squat Hold
  • 1m Mountain Climbers
  • 1m Bottom Squat Hold
  • 1m PVC Pass-thrus
  • 1m Bottom Squat Hold
  • 1m Lateral hops (30s each leg)
  • 1m Bottom Squat Hold
  • 1m Bicycles
  • 1m Bottom Squat Hold
  • 1m Jumping Jacks

We’ve been doing a lot of these bottom squat holds and I think it’s helping to open up my hips more. Matt pointed out that I had too much of a round in my back though, so I have to fight for a better position.

WOD

Teams of 2 (45:00 limit)

  • 200 Air Squats
  • 100 T2B
  • 150 Burpees
  • 500m Run holding a 20# MB (both people run at the same time and at the pace of the slowest)
  • 150 Box Jumps (24″)
  • 100 Pull-ups
  • 200 Walking Lunge Steps
  • 200 SDLHP (barbell loaded to 95#)

Only 1 person is working at a time except during the run. The goal is to keep a high intensity and hand off to your partner when you start to slow down. The hand off is hard to do, even when you know you are starting to slow, because you want to keep knocking out reps. I attended the 8pm class, which is the last class of the day and no team had completed the WOD all day. The closest anyone got was 49 reps left by a team of 2 of the fittest women at Survival Fitness. I was paired up with Brent, which was a good pairing because we are both near the top of the men at SF. We flew along pretty good, but the pull-ups slowed us down and then the SDLHP were absolutely brutal. I’m sure I’ll be feeling those tomorrow. We pushed it hard through the entire 45 minutes and fell 33 reps shy of completing the WOD, but set the record for the day. With a little better strategy I think we could have finished. Next time!

 

CrossFit for Hope

I was feeling pretty rough as I got out of bed this morning, due to last night’s epic workout. I loosed up after I started moving around the house though. I didn’t do the push-ups for the Armstrong Pull-up Program first thing in the morning because I wanted to save everything I had for the WOD. Went in to the 10am class instead of 11 because it’s supposed to get really hot and humid today.

If you want to donate (everything goes to St. Jude Children’s Hospital), head over to my sponsorship page. Every extra $ helps out the kids and furthers cancer research.

Warm-up

  • 1m Deep Squat Hold
  • 1m PVC Deadlift
  • 1m Deep Squat Hold
  • 1m PVC Clean
  • 1m Deep Squat Hold
  • 1m PVC Shoulder Pass-thrus
  • 1m Deep Squat Hold
  • 1m PVC Snatch

This was a nice warm-up to loosen up for the movements and I’m glad it wasn’t a high cardio one, which saved energy for the actual WOD.

WOD

“Hope”
3 rounds

  • Burpees
  • Power snatch (75#)
  • Box jump (24″) *Rebounding off the top is allowed
  • Thruster (75#)
  • Chest to bar Pull-ups

“Hope” has the same format as Fight Gone Bad. In this workout you move from each of five stations after a minute. This is a five-minute round from which a one-minute break is allowed before repeating. The clock does not reset or stop between exercises. On call of “rotate,” the athlete/s must move to next station immediately for good score. One point is given for each rep.

WOW! This is the toughest WOD I’ve ever done and I didn’t hold anything back. My goal was to get 150 reps, which I had before the 2nd round was over! I managed a total of 235 reps with rounds of 82, 74, and 78, doing everything Rx. Pace and consistency were a key in this WOD. If you started out too fast, you’d wipe yourself out for the movements late in your round or even worse for the 2nd and 3rd rounds. I couldn’t be happier with my performance. During the next class Casey, the stud of Survival Fitness, got 255 reps, so I’m even happier with my rep total. Another Casey, who I paired up with, started out way too fast, but held in there for 211 reps. As far as I know, no other guys did it Rx. I don’t know if any of the women did it Rx, but I would assume Michelle did for 176 reps.

Here I am at the end of the snatch station in round 3.

Since we paired up and did 2 heats, after I was done I counted for my partner, Casey (CA). During the 3rd round my hands started to tingle and it progressively spread up my arms and eventually through most of my body down into my feet. As soon as their heat was over, I refilled my water bottle and started slamming water. I didn’t think I could be too dehydrated at this point, but after watching someone go into shock on Deadliest Catch from dehydration I didn’t want to take any chances. I was getting a little dizzy, so I sat down for a while. I’m glad there was another class right after, because it would not have been smart for me to go home, where I’d be alone if something happened to me. I think I was feeling the effects of pushing my body beyond its limits, which hasn’t happened in a long time. As I rested, I recovered and was able to help clean up the equipment when the 2nd class finished. I was fine to go home on my own at that point. A little scary though, to be honest.

I think I’m going to skip the push-ups for the Armstrong program today, but will try to get the pull-ups done tonight.

2 Hours of CrossFit

Was up early this morning to play a practice round in preparation for the Saginaw District Golf Tournament Qualifier, which is this Sunday. Yes, I knocked out the Armstrong push-ups bright and early to start my day.

My pair of Reebok CrossFit Nano 2.0 arrived today in time to use them for my workout. I’m very pleased with them as a CrossFit shoe.

I attended the 4:15 class and planned on staying after for open gym to work on a bunch of stuff and beat up my body.

Warm-up

  • 100-75-50-25 Squats
  • 50-40-30-20 HR Push-ups

I’m not sure you can really call this a warm-up, because it took longer than the WOD. I finished in 17:22.

WOD

21-15-9

  • Goblet Squats (88# KB)
  • Burpees
  • Pull-ups
  • Sit-ups

I went as heavy as I could for the goblet squats by using the largest KB in the gym and for each round I broke them up into 2 sets. They completely wiped me out for burpees, which I did extremely slow compared to my normal pace. My time was 12:45.

Finisher

Death by Box Jumps

  • 1st minute: 2 box jumps
  • 2nd minute: 4 box jumps
  • … increas by 2 each minute

Go big or go home right? I used the 32″ box for the first time, which wasn’t too bad. I just had to take my time a little more and make sure I got a good jump in. I made it up to the round of 14, which I finished a few seconds before the minute was over. I knew I wouldn’t be able to make 16 with such a short rest, so I shut it down there. Using the bigger boxes more often will make the 24″ box seem so easy.

After class I rested for a bit as some people started showing up for open gym.

WOD #2

Mini “Diane”
12-9-6

  • Deadlifts (225#)
  • HSPUs

I did strict HSPUs as long as I could, then added a kip, then added an AbMat, then added a kip with the AbMat. My time was 4:49. When I think how fast the elite men and women are doing a “Diane” compared to my mini, it’s sick. They’re in a different solar system.

Strength

Back Squats

  • 3x 175#
  • 3x 195#
  • 3x 195#
  • 3x 195#

I was feeling pretty beat after 250 air squats and the goblet squats, but it was nice to get in some moderate weight squatting for the week.

After that I decided to knock out my Armstrong Pull-ups for the day. It was 3 sets with a normal grip, 3 sets with a close (hands 0-4 inches apart) chin-up grip, and 3 sets with a wide grip. Each set was 3 reps with 60 seconds of rest in between sets. The pull-ups felt really good today.

Then I pulled out the jump rope and did some DUs. With the new rope it was nothing to knock out 10+ in a row on each attempt. It spins so effortlessly. Somehow somebody brought up muscle ups, so I tried a few on the bar. I almost had it a couple of times and I’m confident I can get it next time when I haven’t worked out for 2 hours already. 🙂

I’m fucking beat, but it was all worth it. Time to relax for the night. Tomorrow is CrossFit for Hope, which looks like a killer WOD. I’m looking forward to the snatches, which I haven’t done in quite some time.

Do You Like Butterflies?

This morning it was back on the Armstrong Pull-up Program after the prescribed two days off, so I banged out my 3 sets of push-ups in the morning. Walked 18 holes of golf and then worked, so I attended the 8pm class for the first time. It was a fun partner WOD.

Warm-up

2 rounds

  • 1m Plank Step-outs
  • 1m Standing Bicycle/Steam Engine
  • 1m Side Bends (35# KB)
  • 1m Russian Twist (35# KB)
  • 1m Superman Plank
  • 1m Rest

The plank step-outs and Superman planks were both new to me. I could feel both of them working right away.

WOD

We partnered up and did a ladder with 2 exercises, wall balls (20# MB) and box jumps (24″). I was teamed up with Jason, who has lost over 60 pounds since he started about 3 months ago. Amazing! Jason did 25 wall balls, while I did 25 box jumps. When we both completed our reps, we swapped exercises, but were now on 24 reps. So each time we switched, we decreased a rep. In the end I did more box jumps and Jason did more wall balls, but I think it was only a difference of 13 reps. My goal was to complete all of my sets unbroken, which I was able to do. Jason did an awesome job and we ended up setting the best time for the day with 20:09. I know you’re not supposed to compare yourself too much to everyone else, but that’s still one hell of a feeling and I can’t help by try to win everything I do.

Skills

After the WOD, I alternated between doing 10 pistols (switching legs each rep) and working on the butterfly kipping pull-up. As the sets went on, my pistols got better and better. It’s all about finding the balance points when I do them. As far as the butterfly pull-ups go, they are a work-in-progress. I started to feel some of the cycling, and got 2 in a row towards the end.

As soon as I got home I knocked out 5 max rep sets of strict pull-ups with 90 seconds of rest in between for the Armstrong program. After just doing a bunch of pull-up work at Survival Fitness, I didn’t get too many.

Fifties on Sunday

Yesterday while watching golf, I downloaded a bunch of Survival Fitness videos from Facebook and compiled them into a movie.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_wUDCe7vj8

My body is pretty freaking sore all over. I haven’t felt like this in a couple of months, so I can tell the WODs have been great and the extra work I’m putting in is paying off . Yesterday I mentioned my tailbone was really sore. Well, it’s more than that. I have two quarter-sized floor burn marks on the sides of my tailbone. No wonder in hurts to sit down! Sorry, no pictures. 😉

Do you ever get bruises in CrossFit and have no idea where they came from? I have one under my right arm and a matching one under my armpit almost all the way to my back. Weird.

I did the push-ups of Armstrong Pull-up Program when I got out of bed this morning. It’s a nice way to start the day. I went in to the noon class today and it was packed with 20 people. Since class was so big we had to skip around during the movements, but it all worked out.

Warm-up

5 rounds

  • 1m Deep Squat Hold
  • 1m Mountain Climbers

I was stiffer than usual from the squat holds and 1 minute is a long time to do mountain climbers in a row, so I had to take 2-3 short breaks for them each round.

WOD

50 of each

  • DUs
  • Burpees
  • MB Snatches (20#)
  • Push Presses (30# DBs)
  • Wall Balls (20#)
  • K2E
  • Walking Lunges
  • KBS (53#)
  • Jumping Pull-ups
  • Box Jumps (24″)

It was ordered different on the board, but this is the order I ended up doing. I finished in 32:01. Most people did tuck jumps, but I was able to string together a few DUs before we started, so I went with DUs and completed them in 4 sets. I think I need to start practicing them again.

Later tonight I’ll do the nightly pull-ups and then it’s 2 days off from Armstrong Pull-ups. Tomorrow will also be a day off from CrossFit, which I’m really looking forward to. I will get out and walk 18 holes of golf.

Update: I just couldn’t stand sitting around later in the evening even though I went out and walked 9 holes of golf after lunch. I had to lace up the shoes and go out for a run, so I did a 5 minute warm-up, Tabata sprints, and a 5 minute cool down. In 14:14 I covered a total of 1.73 miles.

Kelly

After the turnout for “Murph” yesterday, I can’t stop thinking about how great of a community this is to belong to.

I’m a little sore today, but not bad considering that’s 4 days in a row. Since I won’t be able to WOD tomorrow, I had to push to 5 in a row today.

I’m 2 weeks into the strict Paleo diet as part of the challenge at the box. A few croutons and a small amount of shredded cheese on a salad are still the only “cheats” I’ve had. I’m down 8 pounds (172# this morning) and 1.5% body fat. At times, you can see a 6-pack as shown by the picture in yesterday’s post. I can’t believe how much my body has changed in the last two weeks and how much better I’m performing in the workouts. I figured it would take at least a couple of months to get to the 6-pack stages.

I’m increasing my food consumption in an attempt to speed up muscle growth, because I don’t want to lose any more weight; I want to turn some fat pounds into muscle pounds. A lean 175-180 would be ideal. We’ll see how this goes for the next week.

Warm-up

  • 75-50-25 Squats
  • 30-40-50 KBS (Russian)

I used the 62# KB for the swings and finished in 10:05.

Remember Kelly Kapowski?

WOD

“Kelly”
5 rounds

  • 400m Run
  • 30 Box Jumps
  • 30 Wall Balls

I love box jumps, so this is my kind of WOD. It’s always fun doing one of the benchmark girls or heroes so you have something to look back on if you do it again.

I used a 24″ box for jumps and a 20# MB for wall balls. Our 400m loop is more like 500 according to Google Maps Pedometer, so we’re working extra hard. 🙂 I did all of the box jumps unbroken each round and started with a set of 15-20 for the wall balls each time to keep my intensity up. Tried to do most of my resting during transitions from move to move with a few seconds of sitting down to drink some water. Finished in 32:22.

Squat endurance was my weak point in the benchmark for the challenge, but it’s getting better and better. Squats and wall balls felt pretty good today, especially since that’s 5 days in a row that have included a lot of squats.

Embrace the Suck

The men and women that decimate your times are not superhuman. They’re not particularly genetically gifted. Hell, most of the top CrossFitters in the world would get absolutely pummeled in your standard game of rugby, buried by larger athletes begat by larger parents.

What differentiates these individuals is not a gift, but an unreasonable desire to push self-imposed suck beyond its logical limits. What comes out the other side becomes legendary.

“Dedication” by Jon Gilson, Again Faster Equipment

I need to get better at pushing through the suck if I want to get stronger and improve my endurance faster than my current pace of improvement. I know I can do it. Gotta get the mind right.

My buddy Mo came in to the 11am class with me. I’ve been trying to convince him to try a CrossFit box near him for over 6 months. After 2 days of WODs, he finally understands. You can tell people about it all day long, but they’ll never really understand until they experience the intensity for themselves.

Warm-up

5 rounds

  • Lunges
  • PVC OHS

After doing all of the plyo lunges and air squats yesterday in the gym, this warm-up wasn’t exactly a welcome sight. I do need the work, so that’s a plus I guess.

WOD

  • 50 K2E
  • 100 Wall Balls
  • 50 T2B
  • 100 Box Jumps
  • 50 V-ups
  • 100 Burpees
  • 50 Pull-ups

How’s that for a chipper? I was worried about 150 reps hanging from the bar, especially with “Murph” tomorrow. I have some mini-rips, but no major ones, and looks like one small blood blister under a callus. I’ll have to really clean these calluses up tomorrow so they don’t bother me for the 100 pull-ups. The nice thing is that I’ll break them up into “Cindy” rounds so will only be knocking out 5 at a time.

Going back to the quote at the top, I tried to push through the pain as much as I could today. I was able to get 3 sets of 25 burpees, when I’d normally break that up a lot more and take more breaks. Keep getting better each day! We had a 40 minute time limit on the WOD and I was the only person in class to finish with a time of 39:05.

What a great way to start a Sunday!

Prowler Sprints

I wasn’t feeling all that motivated today when I was deciding which class to attend tonight. I’m not sure if the busy day with multiple WODs yesterday or walking 18 holes of golf this morning took a lot out of me. I ended up going to the 5:30pm class and felt fine once I got moving.

Warm-up

3 rounds

  • 1m MB Russian Twists
  • 1m MB V-ups
  • 1m Plank
  • 1m Bicycles
  • 1m “Mystery”
  • 1m Rest

I used a 20# MB for Russian twists and V-ups. Each round, the “Mystery Move” changed; first we did side planks, then flutter kicks, and ended with prayer crunches. I was really feeling a burn during this ab circuit due to the leg lifts I did yesterday.

WOD

50 reps of each

  • Air Squats
  • Burpees
  • Box Jumps
  • KBS (Russian)
  • Close-grip HR Push-ups
  • Plyo Lunges
  • Pull-ups
  • Sit-ups

I used a 24″ box and a 53# KB. Since I flew through everything, I did full sit-ups to make it harder. I finished in 23:22 and then did 12 reps on the GHD as a bonus.

The close-grip HR push-ups were a bit awkward because you have to keep the hands far enough apart that you can lift them off the ground when your chest is laying down. Pull-ups felt really good and my kip is getting dialed in. I need to learn those butterfly pull-ups soon.

Strength

10 Sets

  • High grip Prowler sprint
  • Low grip Prowler sprint
  • Rest

Finally I got to use the Prowler! I probably won’t be too excited when I feel the effects tomorrow. Stayed after class a bit to finish these. The Prowler was loaded with 180# of weights so I’m guessing over 200# total. The distance was probably 25-30 yards each way. The high grip wasn’t too bad, but the low grip took everything I had to get the Prowler moving, was much slower pushing, and got harder each time. Here’s a video of Casey and I. I’m shown first pushing it back to our starting line.

Everybody Jump, Jump

My lower body was kind of sore today from all of the lunges yesterday and the first time pulling a sled. Was busy doing some stuff at work and almost missed class. Today was pretty much a 3 WOD day as you’ll see below. I still have some lingering stuff in my sinus area, but not enough to bother me. I think I have all my energy back too, since I walked 18 holes of golf earlier in the day.

Warm-up

  • 50-40-30-20-10 Squat Jumps
  • 25-20-15-10-5 Burpees

Finished in 10:22. That’s a lot of squat jumps!

WOD

12:00 AMRAP

  • 15 KBS (Russian)
  • 15 Box Jumps

Box jumps are one of me strengths and Russian swings don’t bother me much, so felt good going into this WOD. I stepped up my game and used 62# KB. Stuck with the normal 24in box for jumps since there were going to be so many. I completed 8 full rounds plus 13 swings.

Finisher

10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1

  • K2E
  • Tuck Jumps

I’m so much better with my kip on the K2E now. I knocked out the first 10 unbroken. Total time of 4:55.

Packed House

Biggest class I’ve attended, but Tuesday is usually pretty big because there is only a 5:30pm and a 7pm at night. I think we had 18 or 20 people there. It’s cool to see the box growing especially in the new space.

Warm-up

3 Rounds:

  • 200m Run
  • 50 Jumping Jacks
  • 50 High Knees
  • 50 Butt Kicks

Pretty easy warm-up, but it did its job and got the blood flowing.

WOD

15:00 AMRAP

  • 5 Box Jumps
  • 10 Wall Balls

I used a 28 inch box and a 20# MB. Started out strong going rep for rep with the fittest guy in the gym, but I couldn’t keep up and fell 2 rounds behind him by the end. I completed 15 rounds + 4 box jumps, so that’s an entire Karen in there.

AB WOD

5 Rounds:

  • 1m Russian Twists
  • 30s Side Plank on each side
  • 1m Ab Crunch
  • 1m Hand Plank
  • 1m Scissor Kicks
  • 1m Rest

I used a 30# KB for the Russian twists which was plenty with all of the other stuff in there. The ab crunches were probably the hardest but nothing was easy I guess. Had to take breaks during most everything except the side planks and only one short break during the hand planks.

Great workout today and probably the most I’ve sweated during a CrossFit workout since I started. I feel like I lost 5 pounds. It’s not even 60 degrees out, so I can’t imagine what it’s going to be like when it gets in the 80s or 90s with high humidity.