Welcome Christmas WOD: Friskis & Svettis

Tomorrow the countdown to Christmas starts! I celebrated early this morning by doing a Christmas inspired WOD I found at Kill Fat Me: 12 days of Christmas…

Warmup

100 double unders for time: 3:25.

Felt more solid in the second half than I did this Monday, but still flagging. Unbelievably tiring.

Strength

Planned to do heavy squat cleans. Did a few warmup sets on 45kg and 55kg, then I suddenly lost my will to live… It just felt so heavy! Spark went completely AWOL. Stripped the bar and went for the WOD instead, which was a good thing considering the time it took to complete…

WOD

Promised myself to look for my spark and found it at the 9th round! The lazy bastard was hiding behind my lizard brain all along.

This WOD is like the song. You first do 1 Wall Ball. Then you do 2 Tuck Jumps, 1 Wall Ball. Then you do 3 Push Press, 2 Tuck Jumps, 1 Wall Ball… Until done.

12 days of Christmas, for time:

12 Turkish get ups (7kg dumbbell)

11 Toes 2 bar

10 Double unders

9 Sit ups

8 Push ups

7 Goblet squats (16kg kettlebell)

6 KB swings (16kg)

5 Burpees

4 Pull ups 

3 Push presses (25kg)

2 Tuck jumps

1 Wall ball 

Frak. Me. That was tiring. Total time: 41:59!

I did go easy on the weights, especially on the push press, but hey.

Things that worked well:

• Pull ups - not a problem doing those 4s throughout.
• KB swings - I really feel good doing these now. Technique massively improved.
• Push ups - raced through them.
• Double unders - all rounds unbroken, no stumbling!
• Toes 2 bar - all (both…) rounds unbroken.

Not so well:

• Wall ball - worked well, but I almost caved the ceiling in as that ball was so light! Control!
• Burpees - kill me.
• Turkish get ups - started on 14kg, couldn’t do it! Piss poor performance.

Very happy with myself that I finished. It can only get faster from here.

Skills practice: Friskis & Svettis

Went to the gym this morning to do some skills practice.

Feeling quite tired today as I stayed up last night to watch Revolver, a Guy Ritchie movie with Jason Statham. Started out really promising, beautifully shot throughout as always, but towards the end of it I really regretted spending two hours of my life on it and getting to bed after midnight… Avoid.

I like the quotes it’s built around though:

The greatest enemy will hide in the last place you will ever look.
- Julius Caesar

The only way to get smarter is by playing a smarter opponent.
- Fundamentals of Chess

First rule of business, protect your investment.
- Etiquette of the Banker

There is no avoiding war, it can only be postponed to the advantage of your enemy.
- Niccolo Machiavelli

Warmup

100 double unders for time: 5+ minutes! Atrocious!

Kept snagging the rope on my left foot and leg, on the first rep. Almost screamed by the end of it… I guess the 320 DUs I did already this week have taken their toll, my calves feel quite stiff and my shoulders are really tired.

Skill

Hand stands. Practiced kicking up to the wall and just standing there for a while. Feeling my balance, trying to find a good posture in an upside down dish position. Tiring, but I feel more confident now than before.

I keep falling out from the wall after a few seconds, and I am unable to figure out how to correct my position again. The upside down perspective really confuses me still.

Had this plan that I would start practicing pulling my knees to my chest to set up for a kipping HSPU, but clearly need to just practice balance and shoulder strength more.

Rope tricks. When I got bored with the hand stands I went back to my jump rope to see if I could figure out a few tricks that I’d like to be able to do. To my great surprise, I immediately managed to do the thing where you put both hands to the same side and swing the rope around, cross over to the other side, and then back to skipping singles.

Encouraged by that I tried figuring out how to jump with my arms crossing in front of me, and after a few attempts I realised that as long as I pull my legs up a bit I can do that too! Crazy.

Then, inspired by a video that Andrew recently posted on the CrossFit London blog I tried some variations on footwork. Skipping while jumping my feet out in a wide stance, back to narrow worked ok. Skipping while scissoring the legs forwards and backwards, much harder. A bit like patting yourself on the head with the left hand while rubbing your tummy with the right.

After that, I was just tired. Feeling a bit worse for wear after yesterday’s WOD and all these double unders I have been doing. Stretched a bit, including working on my shoulder flexibility with a rubber band, went home.

Since I was at the gym a bit later today (08:00) the sun was actually (almost) up as I walked home. Took the route along the river, nice. It really does get dreary here in the winter, with sun not coming out until 08:30 and setting again by 14:30…

Strength and WOD: Friskis & Svettis

Today I did strength and a WOD that they did back at the box last week.

Warmup

100 double unders for time: 3:53.

Not happy with that time, that’s a full 30 seconds worse than yesterday! Again, did well in the first half and then started flaking out. Clearly need to improve my stamina! After doing these I am gasping, and my shoulders are so tired.

What I definitely need to keep in mind in the second half is speed of wrist rotation. Speed, speed, speed.

Skill

Tried practicing kipping pull ups, but my calluses gave me such grief on the pull up bar at this place that I just couldn’t bring me to it. The bar is wrapped with tape that has started fraying, so instead of improving the grip it just has all these ridges and edges pushing on my sore spots. Fail.

Strength

Deadlifts:
WU 60kg 2x5
70kg 1 x 5
80kg 1x5
90kg 1x3
95kg 2x3
80kg AMRAP - 20 reps 

WOD

4 rounds for time:
15 toes 2 bar
30 double unders

Dreaded this a bit considering my 100 DUs warmup, but it went well! While I didn’t enjoy a single second of these 11:36, I managed to do almost the entire last round of DUs unbroken! 28 reps in a row before I stumbled.

The toes 2 bar were absolutely horrendous. Did first round unbroken, then had to break them down in 5s with a 15 second rest between each. Must admit I cheated a bit on the very last 5…

My forearms were completely numb after this. Hard like wood. Holding on to that pull up bar, with the fraying tape, sucks.

Skill session: Friskis & Svettis

Back in Ängelholm, Sweden, so training this week is all on my own going to the Friskis & Svettis gym.

My London gym recently decided to change the class structure around, dividing students in Level 1 to 3. Level 1 being “beginners”, Level 2 being “classic CrossFit practice”, and Level 3 being “CrossFit+”. Andrew explained the difference between 2 and 3 as whether or not you do CrossFit as complement to some other sport, or just want to dedicate all your training time to CrossFit.

Since Andrew kindly let me join the Level 3 classes I feel a strong obligation to rapidly improve most of all my hand stand push ups, kipping pull ups, and double unders.

Double unders I am doing quite alright with, but my kipping pull ups suck, and I don’t have a single HSPU. So this week in Sweden is all about skills practice.

Warmup

100 double unders for time: 3:26.

First 50 went fine, last 50 were a bit all over the place…

Skill

Hand stand practice. Lots of it. Decided to do a few kick ups, and film myself, to see what I actually look like. I know that I keep arching my back, and my shoulders aren’t flexible enough, but what does that mean? It means something like this: negative hand stand push up from the side.

Since I started practicing these my kick up and balance have definitely improved. It is obvious that I am not tightening up my core properly though. Tried lying on the ground and assuming the “dish” position (on the back, arms and legs stretched out and a little bit off the ground), but I find it stupidly hard to get that same feeling when standing on my hands.

Tried to keep in mind to push my shoulders up, keep my arms absolutely straight, and push my head out between my shoulders. Like when doing push press. Feel I am getting better at that part.

However, as is clearly visible when I am lowering myself down I need to remember to keep my arms more like when push pressing: don’t let the elbows drop out to the sides!

After half an hour of hand standing I then went over to a box and did a few push ups with my feet on the box and upper body as vertical as possible. I find that easy, I really should be able to get at least one hand stand push up in there.

Progress is being made, I’ll keep practicing this all week. Tomorrow is WOD time.

CrossFit Session: Kat is back

Kat is back from her 2 week break, and brought a few punishing WODs with her it seems.

Warmup

In pairs, wall balls over the pull up bars, one catches the other’s throw. 50 total.

Skill / Strength

Deadlift. 2 warmup sets of 3 reps, then 5 sets of 3 up to max.

Ended on 105kg, new PB.

WOD

12 minutes AMRAP of:
10 thrusters (35kg)
30 DUs

Since my right calf is still messed up from the cramp on Tuesday Kat regressed my DUs to ring rowing, 15 reps.

Finished 5 rounds.

CrossFit Session

Despite slight hangover from last night’s birthday dinner at Pollen Street Social, too little sleep all week, never ending depressing rain… …I did my heaviest ever deadlift today. 100kg, twice, solid!

Warmup

Hip stretches, ouch.

Strength

Deadlifts: 7 x 2, increasing weight. Started on 40kg, did last 2 rounds on 100kg.

Pre WOD WOD

3 x max dead hand pull ups, 1 min rest between.

I actually have 3 strict ones in me now!

WOD

15 min AMRAP of:
6 push ups
12 kettlebell swings (16kg)
18 goblet squats (holding KB to chest)
400 m run

I completed 4 rounds! Proud.

Post WOD WOD

5 min double under challenge / practice.

Finally figure out why I’ve been doing wrong! I’ve been bouncing on my toes, heels need to go down to ground for every jump. Then the rhythm is there, and with proper wrist action it gets easy to get the rope under twice.

Did a total of 9 unbroken! Total I think I did 40 or so DUs during the 5 mins.

Awesome day! So happy I didn’t give in to the last devil on my shoulder that’s been whispering all day in my ear to skip the class tonight…