A. Work up to heavy set of the following complex: high hang clean + hang clean + front squat.
B. 2×2 clean pulls (add 10-20% of weight from A).
C. 3 rounds, not for time:
5 single leg KB/DB deadlift (2 hand), heaviest possible
5 single arm KB/DB press (per arm)
10 pistols per leg
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I thought I’d write a short note about yesterday’s workout, and how for some people it might not have seemed “hard enough” or “long enough”. Basically what that should tell you is that we didn’t get the scaling quite right this time. If doing knee raises didn’t seem like much of a challenge… do something else next time, like hanging leg raises (straight legs), or try the full movement (i.e. toes-to-bar). If the kettlebell felt light… use a heavier weight next time. Sometimes it’s difficult as a coach or an athlete to assess what a given weight will feel like during a particular workout. Sometimes we get it wrong, but this is where your workout log comes in handy. Note your time and weight used, and how it felt, so you know for next time.
Just because a workout is short doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be tough. Different workout lengths are geared towards different energy systems, but the underlying theme is that you should be striving for intensity, regardless of the workout length. The actual degree of intensity may vary between workouts, but it should be high for that workout.
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In a vaguely related vein, this next bit has been floating around in my mind for a while now. The essence of it is this: take responsibility for your own fitness and health. An alternated title might be, “Do The Research”. I think that what we do in the gym will make you stronger, fitter, and more capable human beings. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t be doing this.
Sure, we make things easier for you by providing programming and coaching, but at the end of the day, you are the ones training your bodies and minds. If you have some residual tightness from a previous workout, spend some time working on it before the next workout. Spend some time at home working on mobility — every day. If you are working towards a skill, research it. Ask questions. Experiment. Try stuff out. Research some more. Figure out what works for you. What makes your body work the way it does? Not quite happy with your squat? Check out mobilitywod.com or the posters in the gym and find some stuff to work on. Athletes (yes, you are an athlete!) succeed because of their own personal motivation. Good coaching will help, but without some intrinsic motivation, success will not happen.
Going away on summer holidays? Figure out some workouts that can be done with minimal equipment (google “travel WODS”, for a start). Work on your squats, your handstands, pull-ups, locomotion drills, whatever. You can do a ton of stuff without any equipment at all.
Make sure your nutrition is dialed in. This is absolutely critical. The best gym habits in the world cannot overcome poor nutrition. My first recommendation for reading material for most people is usually the book, “Why We Get Fat”, by Gary Taubes. There is a slowly growing consensus that the nutritional guidelines that have been promoted in the last 20 to 30 years with regards to processed carbohydrates (flour, bread, grains, etc.) are flat out wrong. A full 80 percent of your body composition is determined by your nutrition, and the remaining 20 percent is a combination of exercise and genetics. Eat real food, not processed food.
And last but not least… just show up. That’s the hard part. Ask yourself whether you are making it in to the gym often enough to make progress. No matter how good a workout is, if it’s only happening once a week, it’s not enough. I’ve told most people this in person, but it’s worth reiterating. Working out twice a week is the bare minimum you need to make progress. I know some people have other training goals and programs and/or life gets in the way, but if you really want to get better at the movements of CrossFit and the movements of life in general, you need more exposure to them.
I’m not singling anyone out — far from it. These are just some ideas I’ve had kicking around in my head as a result of many interactions, and I think they are worth giving some thought.
Keep up the good work… and be patient! Put in the time, and the results will follow.
Very well said Colin! You’ve got a lot of good points there. Mobility in particular I need to keep up with at home, and I will defiantly be planning body weight workouts for August when we are on vacation!
Now for today’s workout..
A. Worked up to 85#’s in the high hang clean, hang clean and front squat complex
B. Clean Pulls 95#’s
C. This showed me how horrible my imbalances were today. I defiantly favor my right arm and left leg, I’ve gotta even these out!
Two Handed KB Deadlift was a pair of 44# KB’s (right side was really difficult,
But left side was good)
Single Arm DB Press- I started out with 35# which was good on the right side but my left arm couldn’t push anymore than 25# so I dropped my weight down to that for the three sets.
Pistols are getting better, I don’t feel as wobbly as before but I know I still have to work on them more often!
Colin, you make a lot of good points! If I could speak for myself, the workouts that I find “too easy” are the ones where I deliberated between do I really want to challenge myself or do I want to finish better than last. I realize that the workouts are not races against the others in the group, but they are a matter of can I keep good form under the stress of a timed workout. That is a work in progress for me. (And I don’t mind being encouraged to challenge myself more if it seems that I am not working as hard as I should be!)
A. 75 lbs. I felt sloppy today, compared to the cleans we did last week.
B. 95 lbs.
C. A good thing about being the only person in this class is that I felt free to say that these pistols are just not working for me, and we could work on something that works better for me. Feeling more comfortable with the single leg deadlifts. Love the shoulder presses.
I left today with the biggest smile on my face for the following reasons:
1. I have to thank Kelly for achieving her T2B. If she didnt try I wouldn’t have felt the competition in me to give it a shot. Sure enough I did it! I did my first T2B. I have to work on technique but I achieved something that I felt would have taken me a year or more to get. I am very critical and hard on myself so I am taking this moment to be extremely proud!
2. My other accomplishment today was doing 4 double unders consecutively. If your like jay and wondering why I didn’t do 5. My answer to you is ” look at my shins”.
Like Colin said in the above paragraphs if you put in the effort you will see results. For me half the battle at the beginning was just getting there but I “sucked it up buttercup” and now I have a routine that works for me and my schedule.
For those non members yet that hopefully check out this blog, If your thinking well I just don’t have time to work out and I can’t fit it in my schedule. I would like to take this opportunity to say that Crossfit Steinbach has all sorts of people that come work out from stay at home moms, farmers, teachers, nurses, corrections officers, paramedics and police officers. All of us have different schedules but we suck it up and show up even if we just finished a rough nightshift at work and come in for the noon class we find a way to get it done. The results you see are so amazing and worth it. (see my above accomplishments)
Now for my workout results:
A: stopped at 95# Colin said to go higher but I was running out of time. Finally getting the hang of these though
B: 115#
C: I used 35# KB for the DL and 25# dumbbells for single arm DB press. I still struggle with the pistols and am still using the second tallest box.
Have a good Wednesday!
Woo Hoo!!!! Way to go! We’ll have to work on getting many in a row together! Yay!
A) 180# which was my target for today. Failed on a couple of earlier attempts, made some corrections and everything turned out all right
B) 215# fun
C) used 55kbs, nice to work on strict movements. Especially the ones I struggle with
Today was my rest day, but of course I HAD to check out the comments! A lot of inspiring words here – thanks for sharing!
This felt like a productive day, both from a coaching perspective and from a workout perspective, and it’s good to see the progress people are making. We had people finding toes-to-bar, hip extension, squat depth, strength discrepancies… the whole gamut.
Thanks to those who commented up above, and thanks for contributing to our little community.
On to the boring stuff:
A. Clean complex – I worked up to 195, which felt pretty solid, although my right elbow was a little slow in the catch.
B. 225 for the clean pulls. Some day I’ll actually clean this.
C. Thought I’d challenge myself and do the 80# and 60# KBs for the SL DLs, and I weighted the pistols with 15, 25, and then 35# for the last set. I used the 44# KB for the press. I got 5 reps on the right and only 4 somewhat dodgy reps on the left with 50#, so I dropped back to 44#. Fun stuff.
A) very happy with this – # – Yep, I did accessory work with my 1RM clean PR. Pretty impressive, to me, at least. Apparently I likely have a new PR I don’t know about yet. Another thing that I thought I did well today was getting under the bar fast. It is something I really struggle with, mostly, I think, because I have confidence issues trusting my dodgy knee that I can load it fast in the bottom of a squat.
B) 175#
C) Used 44# KB for the single leg deadlifts. Last time we did this I tried 55# but I’m not quite there yet. Yet another thing I struggle with is my core stability with deadlifts so these definitely help. 35# for the press. I’m fairly even with both arms.
Stood on the 20″ box for my pistols. I can do a few with my left leg but my right knee doesn’t have the ROM required.
A) 87.5# These felt pretty good today.
B) 97.5#
C) Still stuck at 25# for the single leg DL because of my wonky right leg. Used 20# for first set of single arm DB press, then increased to 25# – a good challenge of my core stability. Used bench for pistols -again, more challenging for my right leg.
Congrats to all on their achievements today!