Positive reinforcement

So I go to my quarterly meeting with the Allergist, and I see the Nurse Practitioner:

NP: So what is it that you do?
Me: I'm a patent Examiner
NP: Oh right right, I thought I knew that when I saw your chart but when I walked in I didn't recognize you.
Me: Really?
NP: Yeah, well, you look really different, there's a big change in your... *Flexes*
Me: Physique? *Sits up straighter and also flexes*
NP: Yes, you've changed a lot since last time.

It's always nice to hear I'm progressing.

Ab workout with running and climbing

So I finally got up this morning, it was a rough one for me, and I showed up 15 minutes late. Halfway there I knew I was going to be late, but I was going to no matter what. Here's the WOD:

3 rounds
3 rope climbs
50 GHD (I did one round of this, and then went down to "pack" level of 30)
800m run

Time was 21:13, a seemingly fast time looking at the other times. When I looked over the White Board with Jerry before the workout, I commented on the 50 GHD's and he commented on how it was a lot, and that I should be careful not to hurt myself. I felt like I was ok, so I went "elite" with the 50 GHD's.

This one was nice, albeit I had no time for warming up so the first set of rope climbs was rough. I went through the GHD's fairly easily, and then I tried really hard to push myself in running. Given that is was something like 28 degrees and I wasn't wearing the warmest of clothes, I had a lot of motivation to run as fast as I could.

During the second round, I was really starting to struggle with the GHD's (that I still love). At around rep 23, I had flashbacks to Jerry saying I should watch out so I don't hurt myself. Thinking I might push myself a little too hard if I did all 150, so I dropped down to pack level.

I'm kind of happy I didn't do the whole 150, because my stomach is already sore, and it hasn't been more than 13hours.

Done with the Holiday break

So I spent the past week in Chicago, and had decided that I should take some time off from working the shoulder so I didn't exercise at all, although I was hoping to pay Crossfit Arlington Heights a visit yesterday. My schedule didn't allow me to, but I'm ok with taking the week off given the circumstances.

However, I have very little self control when it comes to eating anything close to healthy when I'm surrounded by cookies and pie and all kinds of carbs. I was constantly full, always snacking.

Anyway, when I was leaving for Chicago last Tuesday I weighed 208, this Tuesday I weighed in at 216. So that's an 8 pound increase in one week, quite the feat. I'm not mad at myself, I'm not even really disappointed, because what good would that do. Instead, I'm looking forward to seeing how quickly I'll lose this weight just getting back on track.

Tomorrow I will see Olga for the fourth time, one step closer to having relaxed hip muscles. Every time I see her she notices marked improvement, so I know I'm not just spinning my wheels here.

Cleans and AMRAP workout

Tuesday's WOD:

3 Squat cleans every minute on the minute for 10min (around 80%)

rest 5 min

AMRAP 15 min of 6 Dips, 9 box jump(24"), 12 ghd Situp

So I came into CFOT in the morning, and showed up a little behind schedule, so I was unable to really warm up. Because of this, and because I haven't done a real squat clean for a while, I used 95#s. I really wish I had had a chance to do a proper warm up, because my 1 rep max is 195, and 80% of that is 165. However I still had plenty to work on.

I was still needing to work on pulling the bar straight up, still needed to work on preventing the bar from crashing down on me, and I still needed to work on landing in a proper squat position. All in all it wasn't heavy enough to really push me, but the second part of the workout fixed that problem.

The dips were really rough, and I started to feel my shoulder start to tingle. The box jumps were fairly easy, and the GHD's were not a real problem. I would like to take this opportunity to say that I LOVE GHD's, they work my core in a way never before. Just when you think there isn't an exercise that will quickly render you sore, you find something like the GHD.

Can't remember how many rounds I did, but I was very glad to do this before my week long stay in Chicago.

Snatch work and interval wod

Two parts, part A:



3 snatches a minute for 10 minutes



Today I did real snatches, ones where I recieve the bar in a squat position. Historically I've had a lot of problems with this, so I went light with 95#'s, treating it like a skill day.

The first couple were pretty rusty, and my hip didn't appreciate going all the way into the squat. However, I might have been going lower than necessary, as I have a tendency to do that. I really tried to dive under the bar, but not go as low as I can possibly go (which is like three inches below parallel). After the third or fourth set, I started to find the right position.

However, I was still a little unstable when coming up with the bar. Andrea pointed out that after recieving the bar I should wait a second, stabalize, and then stand up. I started doing this and while the extra core strength effort really sucks the life out of you, it is effective.

Near the end I think I really started to catch the bar in active shoulder after flipping out my hands. Usually I feel like moving my hands around the bar takes a little bit, and in the process I move the bar around my hand, instead of moving my hand around the bar. Well, for the last couple of set I was really starting to get a nice snap out of flipping out my wrists, and I could tell I wasn't pushing or pulling the bar forwards or backwards. At the end I really felt like I've improved on the snatch, even a year after I attended the Olympic lift certification class.

The second part, an interval wod, was hell.

3-5 rounds

350m row
25 push ups
15 pull ups

The 25 push ups were deadly, I don't know why but those random sets of push ups I'm doing don't seem to help too much. Also, I'm afraid that my shoulder is starting to feel that twinge of pain that is tendonitis. I'm an idiot and ignored the pain (since it is so slight) and pushed through. On the third set Andrea started setting goals for me, like "Now do 5 push ups" then "rest for three breaths". I was dead tired on the third set, but Andrea's breaking the wod down was extremely helpful.

Appearently, doing sub-max reps and resting a bit will get your farther faster than doing max reps. For example, if I do pushups until failure (say 19), I'll be so exhausted that banging out those last six will take forever. However, if I broke it up into 5 sets of 5, I won't push my body to the breaking point, will recover faster, and will accomplish the goal of 25 push ups in less time.

I'm a little concerned about the shoulder, but I have a week of rest/holiday ahead, not to mention I will meet up with Olga tomorrow, so she can work on my shoulder for a bit.

Saturday, SNOW DAY!!

There was supposed to be the hopper final this weekend, but due to 20" of snow in one day there was NOTHING BUT FUN!! Never really experienced snow, and definitely nothing like this. Made a giant snowman, dude's about as tall as I am, and that itself was a workout.

Moving 7000 lbs

So today was moving 7000#s over one's head for time.

I was going to try to lift 135#s for 52 reps, but I talked to Mellisa and she recommended I go for 74 reps of 95#s. I think this was a better strategy, as I was able to go touch-and-go for the first 15. I was over half way done when it hit 5 minutes. However, I had to slow down considerably after that and finished it up in 11:43 (or something like that).

This was very easy with regards to my glutes, hams, and traps. But what really slowed me down was my lack of breath and my quads. My quads were really barking at me for the clean and screamed at me for the jerk.

I loved this workout, it was awesome. There were some crossfitters who managed this in under 7 minutes, but it's a goal to strive for, right?

Jumping Burbees met-con WOD

So Thursday was a met-con day, typically not my strength, and I think I landed one of the slowest times, again.

5 rounds
250m row
20 jumping burbees (@8" jump)
15 GHD's

Time was 27:42, and I was starting to get a little frustrated at the end. Everything was fine but the burbees (of course), but I felt like I was really starting to get a nice, smooth rhythm. However, I had to pause inbetween breaks a lot longer than I'd like to admit. This time it wasn't the pushup aspect, it felt more like it was my core. Something non-specific was really tired, and I was having a tough time telling it to shut up, that I could do this. I kept trying to tell myself what I would tell others, that I could do this and that I didn't need to rest, but I still found myself standing there with my hands on my hips. I went through the row fairly quickly, and the GHD's didn't prove to be much of an issue, just the burpees.

...Tried doing some PVC overhead squats, and it felt very strange. It was strange because I didn't experience the pain in my hip like I normally do. Very happy about this.

Just got back from the Chiropractor

Dr. Bills commented on how much looser my hips are feeling. However, my right hip abducters (sp?) were tight enough to warrant a started "Whoa" from the doc. I don't think Olga has worked on these, so I will try to remember this for next time. Regardless, doc commented that my flexibility and the tightness of my muscles have greatly improved. Given that this is only have two weeks, it's very, very positive feedback.

He also commented that my left shoulder was all kinds of jacked up, but he put everything back in place so everything should be good now. It wasn't tendonitis but the collerbone and ribs were out of alignment.

...I can't help but notice the fight to become and stay healthy is super expensive. I don't enjoy spending money, I inherited some of my fathers frugality (the man simply does not fing any joy in buying new things), but I'm not buying some tangible thing, I'm buying my health. Instead of getting some temporary high from buying a big screen TV or new clothes, this is something that will last me the rest of my life, and truely improve the quality of it. I'm very, very thankful that I'm in a position to both attend and afford crossfit, as well as the treatments for the various ailments that come along my way. I feel like I'm healthy and experienced enough now to warrant giving back to the community, so my new year's resolution is to find a level I cert and attend it.

Another inadvertent Rest day

Last night the power went out for a brief period of time, so I had to reset the clock and the alarm. Given that I had a 9:00 appointment with Olga, I figured I should make the 6:45 class. However, I woke up on my own at 7:30, realizing that I had mixed up the am with the pm. A little deflated, I got over it and went over to Olga's. She felt like she was able to get more movement/release in my right hip. Can't really do anything today, but looking forward to tomorrow.

Deadlifts, Jumping lunges, and running, oh my!

This was a super tough leg workout, because it involved such a high rep of a heavy deadlift I thought to play it somewhat safe, to go for high intensity and lower weight. Thus I went "pack" with 225

15 Deadlifts (225#)
45 jumping lunges
400m run
12 Deadlifts
36 jumping lunges
400m run
9 Deadlifts
27 jumping lunges
400m run

My time was 17:13. I went through the deadlift with little problem, I decided to try to go touch and go, only being really successful on the last set. The jumping lunges were tough, but I really tried to push through. ...I think this really felt like an exercise that will become easier once I fix my hip. My running sucks, but I feel like I'm improving. For example, now when I lean forward I don't feel my lower back getting tight. I'm trying to keep my stomach engaged more throughout the run and I feel like this is helping out. However, I just simply can't figure out how to get faster. Damnit.

Strict press 1 rep max PR and double under PR

Was very surprised, but today I managed another large gain on the strict press.

Strict press: 1 rep
Rep out at 70%

On the fourth round I hit my old PR of 125, but I hit it pretty easily, so I upped it to 130. Racked the weight, sucked in a big breath, flexed the abs/gluts/quads, and pressed it out without slowing down. So that's a 5 pound improvement in less then a month over last time.

Tried 135 but only got it up like three inches.

Dropped it down to 85 and banged out 17 reps, quite dramatic the difference 50#s can make.

Did 3 rounds of the conditioner:
10 dips
30 double unders

I got 9 dips in a row, but when I got to the DU's I hit three, hit my foot, and then banged out 21! That's a five rep improvement. However, I still suck at dips. I feel like I've lost a lot of strength from recovering from the shoulder tendonitis.

If seeing this type of improvement is typical after teaching my shoulder muscles to relax (aka getting rid of the huge knots in my back), I can not wait to see what happens to squats once my hip muscles learn to relax. Maybe I'll get a 300+ fgb score next year. Speaking of that I meet Olga the masseuse this Wednesday again, can't wait.

So excited.

Interval work including wall balls

I didn't think today's wod would kill me like it did. But it did:

300m Row,
25 KB Swing (53#),
20 Wall Ball,
15 burpees
Rest 2 minutes between each interval repeat for 3-5 intervals

I have no endurance whatsoever. Although the number of seconds escape me, my time went something like this:
Round 1: 4:XX
Round 2: 6:XX
Round 3: 7:XX
Round 4: 16:XX

Sixteen minutes?!?!?! Let me rehash the last round. The row was ok, I managed only a 1:50/500m speed but it wasn't exhausting. The KB swings were extremely hard on my grip and my abs. It was taking a lot out of me to keep my core tight, and my back was starting to feel the strain as it tightened up. I had to break it up 10-5-10, which is sad since i did the first two rounds unbroken. Then I had to do my nemesis: the wall ball. This one was extremely tough, and I started to feel that old familiar tingling pain in my left shoulder from the tendonitis. I did four, then two, then four again. I had to rest for a little bit, trying to breathe deep and prepare myself to go all out and just nail the last 10.

The whole time I was doing this last round I kept trying to tell myself, "You can do this! You can rest later! You're stronger than this!" I'm trying to become my own mental coach, so I tell myself what I would tell some one else.

So I pick up that ball, and I think I did five and then quit. I waited only a second, picked it back up, and then finished it.

Then there were the burpees. I was trying to do good form, but my shoulder at this point is really starting to protest. I start out trying to bang them out three at a time, and I think these were the slowest burpees ever. The pain in my shoulder really weakened me, it wasn't responding like I wanted it to, and I really couldn't push it. When I finally finished the last one I saw the time was 34:XX, and I had started out at something like 17:XX.

I'm a little frustrated that the shoulder pain is back, it's been so long since I've experienced this I almost forgot what it feels like. Guess I will have to ice and massage, the usual stuff. This pain is a little different than what I was experiencing before feels a little more precise and in the front of the shoulder, not sure what's going on but I'll make sure to mention it to Dr. Bills when I see him next week.

I think I might now know why I hate wall balls and can't seem to really improve upon them. If my hip muscles are as tight as everyone tells me they are, then it's no wonder I can't improve. Like my shoulder, if my hip muscles are always tight I can't really control them. If they're always flexing, then I when I work out I can't flex them any more then what's currently going on. If I can't push them, then they can't improve. I've noticed steady increases in my strict press once I took care of my shoulder, so now I hope that dealing with my hips will lead to unprecedented gains in wall balls and other squat intensive movements. When you think about it, that's a lot of movements. Perhaps the world is about to see Adam break through PR's like he's never done before? It's exciting to think so.

OHS, running, pull-ups and Box Jumps

Today's wod reminded me of the first wod at the Atlantic hopper:

400m run

15, 12, 9
overhead squat
box jumps
pull ups

400m run

My time was 16:19. This was a really, really tough workout for me. However, I did finish the first 4o0m run in 1:38, before anyone else. I attempted the OHS at the elite weight of 115#, but after the second rep I lost my balance/core tension. So I dropped down to 95# and finished it out.

It felt like I was OHSing for the first time, it was so strange and exhausting. My hips felt... wierd, like they were doing something they weren't used to. I took waaay too many breaks here. More than once I thought to myself "what is your deal Adam?" I guess the endurance of my core is crap, because the OHS really requires core strength.

I hope we do more WOD's with OHS, because I need to do a lot of work on them.

Possibly a light at the end of the tunnel of hip pain

Finding a way to relieve the pain pain in my hip has been been quite the journey, one that almost sounds like an episode of House, MD (although I was never dieing at any point). Because I'm not sure if I've been very clear on my plight for a cure, I've decided to write up a summary of my dealings with this problem:

Part One: Hip feels like it's on fire.

June 27, 2008: Started crossfitting, and soon after my right hip started to feel pain, like it was on fire.

July: Saw Dr. Bruno, an Orthopod, for my hip, and he wasn't sure what was going on but had some physical therapists work with me. This involved stretching and weight exercises as well as TEMS and ultrasound therapy. Nothing was really working though.

August: After researching the crossfit forums, I realize I need to see a DO, and I have the therapist confirm that my pelvis and hip are twisted, causing the illiopsoas to stretch unnaturally resulting in severe inflammation. This inflammation is what is causing the sensation of my hip being on fire. Dr. Craddock also tells me the twisting of the pelvic muscles is why my hip clicks when I raise and lower my knee (a problem I've had since I can remember).

August 26: I meet a DO, Dr. Craddock, for the first time, he resets my hip and the pain goes away almost immediately.

August '08 - June '09: I receive regular treatments from Dr. Craddock, but after two months of no longer experiencing the inflammation of the illiopsoas I notice there is still a lingering, deep throbbing pain. This pain doesn't feel like fire, and is much easier to ignore. I figure it's still the illiopsoas, that it just needs some time to get used to being un stretched. However, this pain doesn't really go away.

February '09: I see a massage therapist and tell her about all of my various ailments, although I find her massage relaxing I do not find it therapeutic.

Part two: Maybe it's a torn labrum?

July '09 part 1: I casually mention to Dr. Craddock that my hip still clicks when I raise and lower my right knee. For a brief moment he seems a little confused by this because all the muscles are in the right place. After a second he then says I may have a torn labrum in my hip, and this might be causing the clicking and the residual pain.

July '09 part 2: I see Dr. Bruno again and he reccomends an MRI, but without contrast. He gets the results and tells me I have a torn laburm, but he's not sure since he deals mostly with old people. He then sends me to another Orthopod, Dr. Johnson, who deals with sports medicine.

July '09 part 3: Dr. Johnson determines I have fermoral acetabular impingement (FAI), but is unsure about the labrum because the MRI does not have contrast. I believe the pain I am experiencing is in my hip joint, as it feels incredibly deep. It's around this time when I come across prolotherapy for torn labrums. Dr. Johnson says that if theses treatments don't work there is arthroscopic surgery for this condition.

August: I meet up with the prolotherapist Dr. Wagner, and he says he needs an MRI with contrast in order to do anything.

September: I see Dr. Wagner again, and after the MRI he tells me that I do not have a torn labrum, only FAI and that he can not do anything for me. So I'm back to square one. Or is it two? I'm confused now with all these doctors and procedures.

Part three: No, it's tight hip capsules.

September: I go back to Dr. Johnson, preparing myself to have surgery. He comments that there probably is a small, small tear in my hip labrum, but it is the FAI that is causing the pain. He suggests trying Euflexxa injections to lubricate the hip joint and render me asymptomatic.

November part 1: The meds finally arrive and I get my first injection of Euflexxa, where they take a needle, pierce the hip capsule, and then inject the viscous solution. During the procedure I find out that I have extremely tight hip capsules, which Dr. Johnson notes may be the cause for my FAI. After the procedure, thanks to the numbing agents I receive during the procedure I do not feel any pain in my hip, and Dr. Johnson takes this, as well as my description of the pain, as a sign that the pain is indeed in the joint and not muscular. However, as the meds wear off the pain returns. ...I have a feeling that this new piece of the puzzle is important.

November part 2: I meet up with the chiropractor Dr. Bills for back and shoulder pain, but then mention the tight hip capsules, he then works on them and they suddenly feel a whole lot better. This indicates it is muscular and not a joint problem. This gives me a lot of hope.

November part 3: second Euflexxa injection. Still have pain in the hip.

November part 4: I talk to Dr. Craddock, and he recommends Rolfing, a deep tissue massage. I find one and book three appointments.

November part 5: I mention this to Andrea and she recommends Olga, her massage therapist. I cancel my appointments with the Rolfer and make one with Olga.

Conclusion: There is hope still

So yesterday I saw Olga, and she worked me over thoroughly, and unlike the previous time I got a massage I felt like this was extremely therapeutic. She worked extensively on my hip/leg muscles, and it was an incredible sensation. I told her to go as hard as she could, and the pain was indescribable. It was like my muscles were bubble wrap, and she was a rolling pin. As she slowly dragged her elbow up and down my muscles, I had this sensation like some combination of popping or sparking in muscles I never even knew existed. She commented that my muscles were extremely tight, but they were releasing quite nicely. She worked both my right and left hip.

While she was able to get my left hip to release, she said she was unable to get my right hip to release. She also commented that because this is a chronic problem it will take a while to fix it. I've scheduled an appointment with her next week, and I really hope that next week will be the week the muscles learn to relax. Unfortunately, she told me not to workout after the massage, so I had to forgo the wod.

Today I saw Dr. Bills again, this time exclusively for the hip. As he worked on them, I asked if he noticed any difference, and he said they felt a LOT better, that he couldn't feel as much "gristle" in them as he did last time.

This makes me very happy. It has been a long, long journey, but it seems like I've finally figure it out: Tight hip capsules twisted my pelvis causing the inflammation of the illiopsoas, but the tight muscles also jam my femur into the hip socket, creating the FAI.

I know I've said this before, but I'm very excited by the thought of no longer being in pain. Hopefully there will be no more curveballs, and this will finally kill the throbbing ache that I experience everyday. I write this so that others out there who may have hip pain or any other type of ailment may have hope and learn from my experiences. If I help at least one person out there, then I am a happy man.

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Front Squat 1 rep max

This one was a little frustrating:

Find your 1 rep Front squat max.

On the second rep I tied my 1 rep max of 225 from almost three months ago without any problem, and then I went to 245 (which i thought I could've done last time). On the first attempt I went down way too quickly and got stuck at the bottom. On the second attempt I went down slowly enough, and then tried to drive out of the hole. What ended up happening is me going up maybe half an inch and then freezing. On the last attempt I lowered the weight to 235, and I went up from the bottom maybe two inches, but then I once again froze, and after what felt like an eternity of pushing I dumped the weight for the last time.

I take these attempts with mixed feelings because my core was strong throughout; I never caved and my elbows were up the entire time. Chriss even used my attempt as an example of keeping the core tight no matter what.

However, this means that the failure was due to a lack of strength in my legs, and that's something I'm not used to happening. ...I still feel that my legs have the strength so what's going on here is yet another mental block. Although I really, really feel my hamstrings engage when I squat, I almost never feel my glutes engage. Maybe I don't notice it because I'm focusing on the hamstrings, or maybe I just haven't figure out how to engage them yet.

Regardless, I feel like I really need to work on the front squat with regards to my approach. I need to be more violent, when I hit bottom I really need to just explode up with such great force that nothing will keep me down.

I am a little bummed that I did not get a PR, but this was a valuable learning experience and I will apply it to the next time we do this lift. I also have Oly shoes on my christmas list, so hopefully next time we do this I will have some proper lifting shoes.

Afterwards my hip started to feel a little more pain, which makes sense. Tomorrow I will meet up with a masseuse who is supposed to be well versed in Rolfing [EDIT: deep tissue massage] if not accredited in structural integration. Given that she charges about half as much as the only accredited Rolfer in the area, I'll try her out first and see what happens.

Rope climb and C&J, Double under PR!!!!

A heavy metcon, yay!

5 rounds

1 rope climb
5 clean & Jerk (I did Elite at 165)
30 Double unders


My time here was 26:10, but I'm honestly not sure if I did 5 or 6 rounds. I started out on the DU's and after one failed attempt I nailed 16 of them! I messed up because I was so amazed at myself at rep 15 that I lost my rhythm. After that though, I started to bang out more 6+ DU's in a row.


On the second round I could not climb the rope to save my life. I couldn't figure out where to put my feet so I could stand up. After three tries I just moved on, but on the following rouds I had almost no problem climbing. Go figure.


I attempted the new core position with the first few C&J's, but it was so heavy that I simply forgot about keeping my abs flexed and went back to just holding in a big breath. I feel like I took too much of a rest between reps on this one, need to keep that intensity needed if I want to perform better for the next crossfit competition.

Annie, getting my guns

So it's first friday and I'm now sore from Jerry's b-day and the air squats. Not really wanting to do a wod that had any heavy lifting, I thought Annie would be great as an opportunity to work on my double unders.

Annie

50-40-30-20-10

Double unders

Ab-mat situps

I did it with Alyssa, and in the beginning I looked over at her and saw how she did them, and for some reason something clicked in my head. I then did three singles, and tried a du. Failed and whipped the tops of my feet. Tried again, and I got two in a row. Then I tried it again, and got nine in a row! I went from a PR of alternating single to double to single maybe six times to doing nine DU's in a row. After that I had a hard time getting more than 3-5 at a time, but these were straight DU and I was starting to find my rhythm. There were still painful parts, still got a lot of lashings on the top of my feet from messing up. Coach Burgener has talked about motivational consequences, using burbees as a "reward" for unwanted behavior. You would think the consequence of whipping my foot for messing up a DU would be a great motivation, so either I'm learning these very quickly, or I'm just a masochist.

Due to my slow DU's, my annie time is 17:2. Lots of room to improve here, but I'm really excited about the Double under PR!!!

Air Squats and running

Well, I really must not have pushed myself on Jerry's b-day because when I cam into the box I felt pretty good, not sore or disabled like some. It was an active recovery day with bodyweight exercises:


4 rounds
50 air squats
400m run


My time was 15:58, and I think the real reason here was my running was not fast. This is the same issue I had when we did a similar wod back in October. Three years ago when I weighed 170 I had all kinds of speed and endurance. I probably would've given Steck a run for his money on this wod. However, I don't know if I ever want to go back down to that weight. Obvserving the 4 block meal, 2 block snack pretty religiously has me currently at 205, and even though I'm 35 pounds heavier now I don't think my lightweight self would've had the strength to do any weight lifting wod as Rx'd. At first when I thought about this I thought I needed to find some balance of strength and speed, but maybe the real issue here is endurance. I seem to be fairly fast for the first round, but after that I slow down considerably. That, in turn, makes me think it is once again a mental issue. I don't think my problem is really self-confidence, but rather I have a tought time focusing on pushing myself when I go out and run a 400m sprint. Perhaps I should start bringing an ipod for all the wods, as the music seems to help me focus on the exercise.

Jerry's B-day workout!!

So Wednesday was Jerry's Birthday! Since he turned 43 this is the WOD:

2 Power Cleans every minute on the minute for 43 minutes, choose a weight that will be very heavy for you.

Now my 1 rep max is at 195, and when I was warming up I could feel the rust in my form making things difficult, so I chose what I thought was a heavy weight: 165. Just in case it turned out to be too easy, I had two 5# plates to make it 175. After the first 5 or so sets, the rust really began to wear off, and I started to really work on my form. I worked on keeping my core tight and making sure my back was in the right position. I knew that it wouldn't be my quads or traps that would fail me first, I knew that it would be tightness in my lower back, tightness that always feels like it's about to do something really, really bad.

As the minutes and reps pass by, I started to realize that when I suck in a breath to keep core tension I might actually be relaxing one group of my ab muscles. It's difficult to describe. I suck in my breath and keep tension, but it feels like I'm relaxing one of my core muscles to allow my diaphragm to open up. If I keep all of my muscles tight, then it pushes the air up into my chest a little bit, and I know that's not suppose to happen. I talked to Danny about it, but he wasn't sure which was correct either. I'm going to try to keep core tension while keeping my abs engaged because perhaps there is an imbalance going on that causes that discomfort/tightness in my lower back.

Back to the wod, I didn't fail on any attempt, and over time I didn't feel like my form degraded. I decided to put on the extra 10 pounds for the last 10 reps, and I really didn't have any problem with that either (although my back was starting to tighten up). Looking at the pictures, seeing Jerry work is pretty impressive, you can see the intensity in his face. ...When I saw this picture I instantly thought he looked like one of those Kibuki Maskes, you be the judge.

When I look at pics of myself, I see how... calm I am? I think that's the proper word. I really try to focus on only the muscles needed for the lift, but maybe I need to figure out a way to psych my self up, I don't know.

Tuesday come and gone.

Coming back from home, I didn't have the opportunity to crossfit. Felt a little useless, like I wasted the day. However crying about it isn't going to do anything so onward to the next day.

Back on the Wagon via Crossfit Richardson

It's been almost a full week of not xfitting, of a diet of pecan pie and turkey and stuffing and sweet potatoes, and I feel... fine?

I do feel a bit lazy, the idea of not crossfitting for six days straight does not sit well with me, but diet wise I don't feel any guilt or real regret. Of course, I think this is because I haven't noticed a real change in my physique. This reminds me of the cycle I used to go through with exercise and diet: I'd watch what I'd eat and then start to see results, and then think I could keep seeing results and not have to watch what I ate, which would then negatively affect me. Thankfully, now that I am back home I'm back to zoning, but I think I may change up my diet to remove dairy from my diet. I don't know if it will do anything, but it's worth a shot. ...It will be very, very difficult to do this, because sometimes cheese is my main source of protein. Looks like I'll have to figure out another way to get protein.

This rest has also allowed me to refocus on the pain in my hip, and it is getting harder to push through the pain, and Monday's workout over at Crossfit Richardson was a great example.

Wod:

5x3 front squat

10 minute "Cindy"

I only hit 205 with the front squat, which is ok given my two rep max is 215. But the thing is when I loaded the bar with 215 I just mentally didn't have it. I racked the weight and stood up, and it just felt too heavy. I'm pretty upset with myself because I didn't try, I just let myself off the hook. It was a lot easier to just quit at CFR than CFOT because there was much more of a "do it by yourself" vibe that day. For example, there is no group warm up, John posts it on the board and then we do it on our own. I wasn't doing it with anyone, so there wasn't anyone to prod me, to hold me accountable. ..I don't say this as an excuse, but rather an illistration of how a strong crossfit community can make strong crossfitters. Always appreciative of what I have here at CFOT.

The 10 minute Cindy really made me feel weak with my chest. Maybe I've gained 10 pounds over the holiday, but I only managed to eek out 7 rounds, and my shoulders were toast. I can not wait for them to catch up with the rest of my body, because I feel like once I become in pushups my met-con times will lower significantly.