2 Weeks of Squatting Every Day

I keep getting up earlier than usual and I’m not too happy about it. My upper body seems a little tight this morning from the 84 pull-ups. Didn’t rush out to the garage this morning since I have a lot more time to work with on Sunday mornings.

Switched it up with 100 Walking Lunges (20# vest) for my warm-up. It took me 4:30 to do them.

Coffee Squats

2 Front + 5 Back

  • 45#
  • 135#
  • 175#
  • 205#
  • 225#
  • 245#
  • 265#

Up 30 pounds over what I did last Sunday for this complex. This is the most weight I’ve had on the bar yet and it’s still well below the 295# I’ve done for this combo before.

That completes 14 days in a row at the squat rack. I’ll keep slowly increasing the weights and over the next two weeks I’ll hopefully be back to typical squatting loads. I’ve really been enjoying the morning squats as a way to kick off my day. Haven’t noticed any additional fatigue from them and don’t think they’ve been affecting my other training negatively. If anything they are probably helping. Don’t think I’ve mentioned the stretching routine recently, but I’ve been continuing to do it at least once a day, except when I do the 90 minute yoga workout.

Accessory

4 Sets

  • 10 Incline DB Bench Press (45°, 40-45-50-50# DBs)
  • 10 JM Press (45-65-65-65#)

Going to try adding in some bench press accessory work on the weekends to see if it’ll help getting to 300#. Holy Shit! The JM Press is no fucking joke. There are a couple of variations out there. I used what looked to be the hardest one and I’m pretty sure I got that right. Wow!

I hope that didn’t smoke me too much for today’s workout. Super Sunday at noon…

Warm-up

  • Crossover Symmetry Activation
  • 1,500m Row (6:36)
  • Bottom Squat Hold
  • C&J
    • 4×45#
    • 2×95#
    • 2×135#

Weightlifting

E2M 20:00

  • 2 C&J

Started with 155# and went up 10# each time, finishing at 245#. I think I wore the belt starting at 215#. Took my time with that last round, to make both reps. I squatted most of the reps but powered a few of the early ones when I wasn’t thinking. Last few rounds got rough. The cleans aren’t really a big deal for me, but I’m pumped to have made all of the jerks. We took about 5-10 minutes plus before starting the next part.

Conditioning

With a running clock, @ 0:00…
5:00 AMRAP

  • 5 MU
  • 10 Cleans (155#)

This is event 1 of the 2015 Masters Qualifier. Wanted to do some muscle-ups this weekend and this looked like a fun one to try. Was scared how this would go after all those heavy cleans, but it was just fine. I broke the MU into 3-2 every round and did relaxed singles for the cleans. Finished 2 rounds plus 5 muscle-ups and 2 cleans. It was fun doing some MU in a workout again.

I called on the group for some movements to make up the next two parts and then I came up with the rep schemes and how to split up the 4 movements.

@ 10:00…

  • 30 Wall Balls (20#, 10′)
  • 30 Push-ups
  • 30 Russian KBS (70#)

Wall balls and kettlebell swings were unbroken. I did the push-ups in 3 sets of 10. Finished in 2:50.

@ 20:00…

  • 150m Walking Lunges

I was excited when someone picked lunges and knew I had to put them solo. Finish the workout with a little Lunge University. 🙂 We went outside since it was a nice afternoon. I programmed it as 100 walking lunges, but after about 50 steps I went to chase Michelle down for extra credit since she was doing a lap. I don’t usually do them stepping through, but did to catch up and it’s so much faster doing them like that, but so much extra burn too. Finished in 4:03. I stopped counting the reps after deciding to go for the lap distance instead, but should have been about 150.

Midline

  • 60 Quarter Get-ups

Used a 53# KB and split this up into 10 reps per side at a time.

Knocked out Crossover Symmetry Plyometric before heading home. Kind of wanted to skip it, but was already feeling my shoulders smoked so I knew I should do it.

An hour or so later at home I am wrecked!

On the 4th Squat Day

That resting heart rate though!
That resting heart rate though!

Now my hamstrings are wrecked from yesterday. I was looking forward to walking normal today, but guess not. Out in the garage by 8am. Did 3:00 on the Air Dyne (1.35km).

Back Squats

  • 20×45#
  • 10×135#
  • 10×155#
  • 20×175#

Over the last couple of days I made so many adjustments to what I was going to squat this morning. Had mostly been air squats or goblet squats, but at the last minute I wanted a bar on my back. Still keeping things light. Was pretty stiff throughout that warm-up set of 20 with the empty bar. That’s 4 days of squatting in a row now.

Accessory

  • 100 Walking Lunges
  • 2:00 rest
  • 100 Walking Lunges (20# vest)

Took me 4:03 for the first 100 and 9:49 total. I guess I wanted to get it over with since the weighted ones were faster.

Closed out with Crossover Symmetry Plyometric and 15 minutes of back, hip, and leg stretches.

Legs – Oww

Legs are so sore! Don’t take 2 months off from the squat rack. Went in for the 9am class.

Warm-up

Didn’t really do much. Some bottom squat holds but that’s about it.

Strength

Pause Front Squats (2s in the hole)

  • 10×45#
  • 5×95#
  • 5×125#
  • 5×145#
  • 5×175#
  • 5×195#

Didn’t really feel the soreness once I got moving. Didn’t notice any pain in my quad either, which is the real test. Decided to do pauses since I wasn’t going heavy. Still felt plenty heavy though.

Conditioning

10:00 EMOM

  • 5 Box Jumps (30″)
  • 3 C&J (115#)

Went high on the box since it wasn’t many reps and I was going to go light on the clean and jerks. Didn’t rebound any of the jumps, but cycled pretty fast. Was able to fly through the C&J by bringing straight to the ground. Took about 20 second each round once I got the rhythm of the TnG working. Was good to pick up a bar!

5 Rounds

  • 25m Prowler Sprint – High (90# sled + 90#)
  • 25m Prowler Sprint – Low (90# sled + 90#)

Yuck! Walked 200m after and then did Crossover Symmetry Plyometric.

Accessory

Reverse Hyper

  • 15×210#
  • 15×260#
  • 15×300#

Stuck around and did a round of back/hip stretches too after having done so much leg work.

In the afternoon, I went out to the garage and did 250 walking lunges in 9:20. I did laps around the garage today, which was 16 per lap. I’ll do another round of stretches tonight.

Back and Forth

Still feeling those plyo lunges in my buttocks. Out in the garage at noon. Started with Crossover Symmetry Activation.

Warm-up

1,500m Ski Erg – 6:52.4

Conditioning

  • Buy-in: 150 Walking Lunges
  • 3 Rounds
    • 50 Lateral Bar Hops
    • 25 GHD Sit-ups
    • 25 Back Extensions
  • Cash-out: 150 Walking Lunges

Was hoping to do this down my street but it was raining out, so I was limited to the garage. Was able to do 5 steps each way. Only stepped through into the next lunge on the 30 at the end, but all were unbroken other than stopping to grab my hoodie after 15 reps in the cash-out. I did the 2nd and 3rd rounds of GHDs as 15-10 and the second round of back extensions the same. I tripped in my first 10 bar hops because my legs felt like jello from the lunges. Took me 21:17 to finish.

Did 10 minutes on the Air Dyne (AD2) to help flush out the legs after all of those lunges and went 4.26km. Did Crossover Symmetry Iron Scap too. Will do a set of back stretches tonight.

Final 2015 CrossFit Games Open Numbers

The score validation deadline passed last night, so final rankings are in. I’m the 13,195th man alive! 😎 There were 141,884 men who submitted at least one score, putting me in the top 9.3%. Easily beats my goal of top 14%. My placing is higher than 2014 and there were more participants this year. I guess you can say I’m fitter.

I’m really happy overall with my performance in the workouts. 15.2 was a disappointment since it was worse than my score in 14.2, but the other scores made up for it. I’m excited to try 15.1 and 15.3 again in the next few months because there are some things I’d do different.

Now I’m enjoying not having the pressure of the Open workout each week and just going with the flow. Putting a lot of effort into rehabbing these injuries.

first-run-2015-shoesAnother decent day temperature wise, so I decided to go out for a run. Did Crossover Symmetry Activation first though.

  • 1.5 Mile Run (15:28)
  • 125 Walking Lunges (4:40)
  • 0.45 Mile Run (5:43)
  • 125 Walking Lunges (4:34)
  • 1.37 Mile Run (16:22)

The entire thing was a total of 3.51 miles and took 45:47. The times and distances above are estimates I pulled out of the RunKeeper log, which I kept running as just one workout. I had planned to put in some walking lunges but didn’t know how many until I got into it. I came back to feet together on every step instead of stepping through into the next lunge. Was a little slower per step, but allowed me to do each set unbroken compared to yesterday where I had to take a lot of short breaks. Felt great to be outside!

When I got home I did a little core work.

4 Rounds

  • 30s Hollow Rocks
  • 30s Rest

Then a round of Crossover Symmetry Iron Scap. I’ll do some back stretching tonight.

In the Sun!

Headed to the gym around 5. Finally a nice day where I could be outside! Time to soak up some vitamin D. 😎

Conditioning

I put 90# on the 25# Sled Drag and did 8 laps around the back parking lot, which was 0.95 miles in 17:50 according to RunKeeper. Then I rested for 5-10 minutes and did 200 walking lunges around the parking lot. Originally I planned to do one lap which is roughly 200m, but I only needed 20 more steps for 2 hundy, so I went for it. Ended up being about 0.15 miles and took me 6:50.

Without squatting heavy I’ve been wanting to add in more lunges and I was convinced to put in some volume after listening to the Barbell Shrugged episode with musclepharmpres. I don’t plan to do 400m of #LungeUniversity every day just like I don’t plan to squat every day either, but I think some added lunge volume can really help me. I’ve already been adding in some lunges the last couple of Sundays. Going for such a long distance was a challenge and I had to stop a lot for a few seconds, but never took any long breaks. Will slowly work up to a quarter of a mile.

Accessory

5 Sets

  • 6 Back Extensions (51X5 Tempo)
  • 10x Reverse Hypers

I used 210, 240, 260, 280, and 300# on the RH. Talk about a pump from those tempo back extensions since the 5 second hold at the top is followed up by a 5 second descent. Then reverse hyper right after? Wow. I the two movements back-to-back then took a few minutes between each set.

Warmed up my shoulders with Crossover Symmetry Activation before hitting week 7 of No B.S. Bench.

Bench Press

  • 10×45#
  • 5×95#
  • 5×135#
  • 3×185#
  • 3×205#
  • 3x5x220#
  • AMRAP 195#

I went 5# over the recommendation again since the 5# over for the 3×3 was easy. Today was a lot tougher though. Not in danger of missing, but I could feel the last rep on each set. The AMRAP set felt really tough though. Wasn’t sure I was going to beat 3 weeks ago, but I did by a single rep, getting 16.

Hit Crossover Symmetry Recovery before heading home. Did a series of my back stretches later on.

Low Key Sunday

Yep, still sore. Hurts to much of any pressure on my quads. Did a round of the stretching in the morning, then to the gym for Super Sunday at noon.

Warm-up

  • 3 Rounds NFT
    • 15 Reverse Hypers (210#)
    • 250m Row
  • Crossover Symmetry Activation
  • Bottom Squat Holds

Conditioning

3 Rounds

  • 1:00 Walking Lunges
  • 30s Rest
  • 1:00 Burpee Broad Jumps
  • 30s Rest

Pretty easy day. Still didn’t want to do anything nuts while still recovering from 15.5. Lunges actually felt good to work the quads some. Did 149 total reps.

Gymnastics

E2M 30:00

  • 10 Ring Push-ups
  • 10 V-ups

I did both movements back-to-back and was able to do all of the sets of both unbroken.

Midline

3 Rounds – Partner MB Pass Complex

  • 10 Chest MB Passes
  • 10 OH MB Passes
  • 10/10 Side MB Passes
  • 10 Up MB Passes

Knocked out Crossover Symmetry Plyometrics and did some extra stretching. I’ll do another round of the back stretches tonight.

15.4 + Super Sunday

Feeling good after not beating up my body since tweaking my back on Wednesday. We had some people coming in from another local gym to do 15.4, so got in at 11 to get it done before Super Sunday started.

Warm-up

  • 1,000m Row
  • Crossover Symmetry Activation
  • Bottom Squat Hold
  • Roll back
  • PVC Pass-thrus
  • Cleans
    • 5×45#
    • 5×95#
    • 3×135#
    • 3×185#

2015 CrossFit Games Open Workout 15.4

8:00 AMRAP

  • 3 HSPU
  • 3 Cleans (185#)
  • 6 HSPU
  • 3 Cleans (185#)
  • 9 HSPU
  • 3 Cleans (185#)
  • 12 HSPU
  • 6 Cleans (185#)
  • 15 HSPU
  • 6 Cleans (185#)
  • 18 HSPU
  • 6 Cleans (185#)
  • 21 HSPU
  • 9 Cleans (185#)
  • Etc., adding 3 reps to the handstand push-up each round, and 3 reps to the clean every 3 rounds.

My goal was to get through the 15 HSPU and 6 cleans. Didn’t want to do more than 3 handstand push-ups in a row and all singles in the cleans. I was feeling good on the set of 6 so went 4-2 which was dumb because it doesn’t save any time. Reminded myself after that to stick to 3s, but that even got pretty hard in the round of 12. My tiebreak time after the 9-3 round was 2:20, way ahead of schedule. My HSPU started to die in that set of 12. Got a few no reps over that next part of the workout and was down to doubles and singles. Just couldn’t press out anymore. Cleans were no problem. I didn’t have much time at the end, but just enough to bust through the 6 cleans to hit my goal with 1 second to spare. 66 reps and I’ll take it. Not hard at all on the lungs until the end when I had to bust through the cleans. All about managing the muscle fatigue in this workout for me.

Was a little crazy in the gym this morning so got a later than normal start for the regular workout.

20:00 AMRAP

  • 20 Box Jumps (24″)
  • 20 Burpees
  • 20 Sit-ups
  • 20 Walking Lunges
  • 20 Push-ups

With a lot of people, we set up stations and shared equipment, so some time was spent walking from one area to the next. Tried to keep a pretty casual pace and just keep moving. Did my first round in about 4:40, then it got a little slower the next two rounds. Picked up the pace in the fourth round and managed to get it done with a few seconds left, but was too far away from the boxes. My push-ups even felt good after all the HSPU. I did all sets of 10 until the last round when I did 14-6.

6 Sets

  • 30s Bottom Ring Dip Holds
  • 100′ Farmer’s Carry (62# + 70# KBs)

Didn’t really know how the holds would go since it was the first time trying them. My lift arm started to go numb actually from the ring hold in the last 2 sets. I was able to strict press out of the dip on the first 5, but just didn’t have enough left on the last one.

5x

  • 250m Row
  • ~2:00 Rest

My times were 45.1, 45.4, 46.2, 45.1, and 44.4.

A lot of work overall, but nothing that really destroys you.

Solo Session

My abs are sore from deadlifts and “Annie” on Tuesday, otherwise feeling good. Trained at 10am, but all alone today.

Warm-up

  • 600m Run
  • PVC Pass-thrus
  • 3:00 Air Dyne
  • Bottom Squat Hold

Strength

5/3/1 Back Squats – Cycle 1 Week 3

  • 5 @ 115# (40% of Training Max – warm)
  • 5 @ 145# (50% – warm)
  • 3 @ 175# (60% – warm)
  • 5 @ 220# (75%)
  • 3 @ 250# (85%)
  • 1+ @ 280# (95%)

Squats felt better than Saturday. Recovery is crucial and hit the legs way too much last week. I stopped after 3 reps at 280# because the last one was a slow rep and I didn’t want to push it with nobody else there to spot or help me if something happened. On that last set it was the first time I’ve ever felt my hamstrings engage like that. Pretty cool! The 3 @ 280# puts my estimated max at 307.5#, which is low but I’m ok with that for this week, considering the situation.

5 Rounds NFT

  • 8 Font Rack Walking Lunges (155#)
  • 5 RDLs (205#)
  • 5 Strict Chin-ups

Felt really good. On my chin-ups I really tried to accelerate during the 2nd half and got my chin way above the bar.

20130801-121042.jpg

Olympic Lifting

10:00 of Snatch Position Work with 45# training bar

It didn’t feel as good as yesterday overall, but I did get some really good hip pops in there. My timing seemed really off. Maybe it had to do with my legs being fatigued from the strength work.

WOD

4 Rounds

  • 500m Row
  • 2:00 Rest

Went all out on the first 500 and set a new PR with 1:34.4. Obviously couldn’t maintain that but kept consistent on the next 3 with 1:44.9, 1:45.5, and 1:44.6. I need more of this stuff because I was really dying. Jason Khalipa rowed a 6:31 2k in the Games and I couldn’t even hit that with two minutes of rest between each 500m.

20130801-121050.jpg

While tearing out a stump, the landscaping crew snapped an AT&T line that went right though the stump. So without Internet, I headed back to the box at 6pm for open gym. Warmed up with about 3:00 on the Air Dyne.

OHS

  • 5 @ 95#
  • 4 @ 135#
  • 3 @ 155#
  • F @ 180#
  • F @ 180#

I was actually going to do 5 with 135# but lost it in the bottom of the last rep. I should have known right there it wasn’t going to be good. My abs are still wrecked from the deadlifts and “Annie” so I think that may have been a big part of it. This is 2 OHS sessions in a row that have been terrible though, with the last one being while I was still recovering from the Tough Mudder Crud.

Did a 1.02 mile sled drag with 115# in 26:14. Switched directions 3 times I think and took a minute or so to help Ellen strap up a sled.