I’ll be migrating my blog soon to another website… and separating out a few things… stay tuned!
btw, since I’m starting to get serious again, I’m going to start tracking my food and workouts again… separately though, so I don’t have tons of unnecessary clutter on this blog…
migrated – to http://www.amlap20.com/tracking – decided to get back on to tracking my training and food, since I’m now starting my recovery back from my shoulder injury 
(Cliff notes at the end)
Over the last 2.5 months, I’ve lost a little of my edge and slipped into a bit of complacency. Why? a few reasons… I was getting burned out from interning in the AM, interning after work, and working out after interning… so I cut it back to just interning after work and lifting afterwards. I took my nutrition a lot less serious after the closing of the paleo challenge, and my performance dipped slightly with it. I lacked a goal or focus to keep me sharp outside of just wanting to be generally fitter… I had to give my back about a week off b/c it was not feeling well – then I got sick for a week, and was literally kept out of work and was stuck in bed for a week, which set me even further back… I was still training relatively hard, and eating decent, but… nothing like before. I was in a routine, and not pushing the limits as much as I should have been. Then a few things happened…
It started with not hitting a PR while doing Nancy at the track… Brian F was right on my ass going into the last round – and I ended up missing my PR by 1 second. Then Dan Z absolutely obliterrated my Isabel time. I mean crushed it. He took almost a minute and a half off my time. I’m not trying to say that I am better than them and that they shouldn’t be even close to me – but rather that I need to stay sharp or my peers will all leave me in the dust.
Then I noticed one morning that my lack of eating discipline had gotten me softer around the edges. Yes, part of me is guilty of going to the gym b/c I want to go look naked. So sue me. So I started cleaning up my diet again – and started upping the vegetable intake while decreasing the fruit intake so that I’d be consuming less fructose and sugars, and getting more vegetables. I could almost see an immediate difference.
The kicker was the announcement for the crossfit games. I realize that I’m not going to the games as an individual. On top of being at a disadvantage because I sit behind a desk all day, I also realize that I am not athletically gifted, overly strong, fast, or powerful, and that I am generally not a freak of nature (and I mean that in the most F*CKING awesome way – with a touch of jealousy) like those who will be competing individually. Doesn’t mean I don’t want to go to sectionals and try to make regionals… and doesn’t mean that I don’t want to go to the Affiliate Cup. Last year left a bad taste in my mouth, and I can’t wait to get out there and compete. But first…
I have to make our team. Over the past year, a lot of things at the academy have changed. We have new members that are top performers. Top performers and those close to the top from last year have all subsequently improved. Weaknesses have been determined and subsequently worked on. As an academy, our level of performance has increased, and thus competition at the top of the boards has increased. However, I have not fixed all my weaknesses. I know what they are. I still can’t get a muscle-up. I’m still deficient strength-wise compared to MANY of our athletes. I am not a strong runner, or with anything of endurance for that matter. I can only do so many HSPU’s and RD’s. I have a hard time w/ hanging knees to elbows. My deadlift sucks. I can’t double-under properly. Should I continue?
Those around me seem to have much more confidence in me making the team than I do. Don’t get me wrong, I am not insecure about my work capacity, merely I have the utmost respect for those who I will be competing against at the academy. What does that mean? it’s time to get focused. Nutrition will be dialed in (daily and PWO). Goat skills will be appropriately worked on pre and post workout. I will continue to try to work on my rest, and go back to limited alcohol consumption. New limits for my mind and body will be set. It’s time to get some.
(Cliff notes – I slacked off, but now it’s time to get serious. It feels good to rant and get that off my chest, so if you read it, cool. if not, no worries.)
So this past Saturday marked the completion of the first strength cycle that the USAW team went through. At the end of it, I found PR’s all over the place – and I also found a new respect for rest and sleep. Almost the entire Bulgarian and Strength cycle, I’ve been operating on a lack of sleep due to early morning interning and late night lifting. That combined with a complete lack of rest days (the academy / USAW ‘rest’ days happened to be bball league days) left me utterly destroyed by the end of the 3rd week. The 4th week had a solid monday, and the rest of the week was either rest days, or days where I scaled back on the lifts/efforts. I tried to get more sleep, skipped one or two of the AM interning sessions, and tried to hit it hard on Saturday during the max testing to close it out. Here are some maxes that I put up Saturday, or the Saturday before… and the corresponding pre-strength cycle weights.
Back Squat – 285lbs to 300lbs (300 AFTER max Snatch and C&J attempts)
Overhead Squat – 185lbs to 215lbs (215 AFTER max Snatch and C&J attempts)
C&J – 220lbs to 230lbs
Snatch – 175lbs to 185lbs (would have had 190 if I got another attempt or two)
I probably should test out some more, but I’d say that’s pretty solid for 4 weeks of work. Granted, I’m sure some of that was technique based, but improvement is improvement. I don’t know how my metcon has held up outside of the 1 second, explosive lifts, but we will find out shortly.
I plan on going to a hybrid of several of the academy programs. I’d like to spend 4 weeks or so knocking out ALL or as many of the benchmark ladies and warriors as possible, while mixing in sprints once a week, and o-lifting every now and then. I haven’t settled on a particular schedule yet, but perhaps 1x a week of sprints, 2x a week of o-lift, 2x a week of benchmarks? we will see…
now if only I could get a muscle-up.
and I am noticeably sore-er than after a typically 3-day on stretch. None of it is new, just it’s all a little more than I’m accustomed to. Especially my triceps, which feel like i tried to do 100 bodyweight tricep extensions for time or something stupid like that.
Got Loo and my brother to join the USAW team – can’t wait for them to really start to make progress. Loo hurt his back a week ago jerking weight off the ground on his max clean attempt, and as of this morning, is still bothered by it. Hopefully some rest and ice will do him good, and he can jump back on w/ us next week.
So the o-cert was a blast. Meeting and working with Coach Burgener, Coach Takano, Fred Lowe, Trish, Erin, Ashley & Stephan – it was very informative watching them critique and work on other people’s form. Not that I was perfect or anything, but for the majority of the basics, I was solid. It was a certification to teach o-lift, so it was great in the sense that I got a feel for looking at gross form faults. What will continue to help is that this weekend is the Crossfit NLP developmental meet. Will probably see Bob Takano and Pat Colin-Carroll there. A lot of O-lift as of late… hopefully I can hit some new PR’s again =)
I wonder who exactly is going to be at the meet, and who I can convince to give up a chunk of their sunday to come with…
BTW!!!!! – all stats are going to be mirrored on beyondthewhiteboard.com – i’ve been given admin priveleges and will be updating the site with TCA’s WODs on an ongoing basis. As far as nutrition goes – I’m still doing paleo at 1/2 to 2/3 the carbs, subbing in 3x fat for each carb deleted. I’m still getting leaner, and my body seems to be getting used to utilizing fat as a fuel source. I am eating a LOT of fat nowadays… almonds, cashews, mac nuts, pecans, walnuts, pepitas, avocados, olives, etc… I also seem to be noticing that I’m becoming noticeably more insulin sensitive… interesting…!
So tonight I’m heading down to San Diego for the Crossfit Olympic Weightlifting certification with Coach Mike Burgener. After doing the 1 day clinic with Sage, I can’t wait to see what I can learn from the man himself. It will be a great weekend, and I will likely come back sore and destroyed. I hope to get some good insight on technique that I can use to help everyone I train with on our USAW team. Excited? you bet.
Starting Monday after I get back – we’re actually moving away from the Bulgarian Cycle and will be doing a lot more strength work. We will be starting a 4 week strength cycle that incorporates some high heart rate post-practice mini-wods. It’s exactly what I’m looking for, and should be a blast to go through it. The one ‘downside’ is that my Fridays are programmed, which means no Happy Hour. It’s frustrating to see my times get caught, whether they’re older or newer, b/c I always feel like I can do better and reclaim or come close to reclaiming my spot wherever it was on the board. However, for the next 4 weeks, it’s pure strength cycle. The intention is to come back with a vengeance, and smash all my old times anyways.
So on the monday after my birthday, a few of us started a gluten free paleo challenge, with consequences so dire that we would understand, even in completely drunken stupor, that gluten shouldn’t be touched until Halloween, the day which we will eat and drink like gods. Poor, beer drinking gods. It was originally Pat (Voltron), Danae, Chris L (the Loo) and myself… and has spread to include Katya, San Nicolas, Jose, Shelly, Kristanna, Shannon, Perla, Babs, and… I know I’m missing others.
The rules are:
- no gluten until halloween. period.
- dairy once every other week is allowed during the week’s cheat meal
- one cheat meal a week to include severe disproportioning or sugar
- alcohol is allowed in the form of liquor, wine or gluten free beer (GFB), but
only if it’s counted against your carbs – which you should be monitoring
to make sure that overall, you stay relatively balanced
Punishment is – 30 min of six-count burpees, with the non-cheaters counting the numbers. I will post a video of a six-count burpee and what it entails later. It will be continuous and on video. If the cheater can’t continue, we will allow up to a five-minute break in which the clock stops before resuming the remainder of the 30 minutes.
If you’re interested in joining, but want to know more about the diets – Pat’s name (above) contains a link to his blog, under which he posted some useful links related to paleo and the detriments of gluten.
wow – so it’s been a month since i’ve updated my blog… things have changed in the last month – nothing insane, but changed nonetheless. Where to start…
OVERTRAINING – The last week of July, the academy began a 2 week period in which everyone was to do max testing to switch over to a Relative Intensity program. After the first week, I was noticeably more tired and exhausted than ever before, and waking up became a chore, working out had gotten into my head b/c I was clearly weaker than I should have been. My thought on that? overtraining. It had been a full 4 or 5 months since I had 2 days in a row of rest with the exception of the crossfit games (I had that saturday and sunday off), though I was right back at it on Monday morning. Figuring that we were doing maxes and I knew pretty much all of them or what they should have been, I decided it would be a perfect time to take a break for a week and get some more rest and stay dialed in on my nutrition.
What a difference it made. On that wednesday, just messing around while interning, I grabbed a 155lb bar w/o warming up and snatched it no problem. I think that and working on handstands were the only things that I did the entire week up until Friday. That Friday morning, I did Elizabeth (which I had done the previous Friday) to see what one week of rest would net me. I went from 10:xx to 8:52 i believe… SOLID. And I felt better, more energized, etc, etc. It was a short but valuable lesson: listen to your body, and GET YOUR REST!!
TCA USAW team – The academy now has an officially sanctioned USAW olympic weightlifting team. I’ve decided to join despite the rest of my commitments to basketball, crossfit, an occasional sprint workout, and still wanting to ride my bike every now and then. I could really use 36 hour days at this point. Anyways, there were a few requirements, all of which I met, but now the previous o-lift classes are all now dedicated weightlifting team practices. The first competition is Sunday, August 23rd. That’s my first competition as well, we’ll see how it goes.
Sage Burgener seminar – I, along with 11 other academy members, spent 7 hours with Sage on Sunday the 16th going over O-lift technique. It was a ton of information, and invaluable refinement of my technique. Immediately, I PR’d on my snatch and c&j, even at the end of a full day of PVC work. Amazing. I think I could still do more, but I’ll wait until the next time we do testing at O-lift, or at the competition…
BOD POD – signed up for the bod pod at CFLV and did it on the 15th of August – measured in at a (fasted) 168.7lbs, 10.5% or 17.7lbs of bodyfat. Being that I hadn’t done a bod pod test yet, it was more of a benchmark than a result type of thing (prior caliper test at 13% back in… May? June?). We’ll see where I am the next time the pod comes around
WESTWOOD REC – we are starting up again at Westwood Rec on thursday evenings… it’ll be fun to get back out on the west side to hoop again. Slightly different squad with one of the guys in the surety interesting, but it’ll be fun. It’ll also give me an excuse to go out that way to eat and get some CCC.
Future events:
Aug 22 : Hooverball Tournament (Santa Monica)
Aug 23 : USAW meet (TCA)
Sept 5-6 : Crossfit Olympic Weightlifting Cert (Univ. of SD)
Sept 19 : KStar Mobility Seminar & Pink Martini concert (?)
Sept 26-27 : USAW Club Coach Cert
I need to update my calendar and all the widgets on the side…
So saturday of last week was my 1 year at TCA (7/18/9) – it feels like it hasn’t been that long, but the changes from me then to me now are shocking. I am much leaner, faster, stronger, more flexible, i have more endurance, etc, etc. The list goes on. Thanks Eric & Vanessa for putting up with me the past year, hah! And thanks for letting me do the programming this week. I hope there aren’t too many complaints…!
Monday – 6am Christine – 8:17 – PR by 45 seconds (previous of 9:02). I was completely gassed by the end, but my only stops were 2x in the middle of my last box jumps… and only for 2-3 seconds at most. I rowed at 1:50, 1:50 and 1:55 roughly – it’s starting to get to the point where I need to transition and row quicker in order to continue to make up time… feels great!! Today is day II of gluten free paleo zone at 50% carbs – with 50% of the 50% coming in the post workout meal. So far so good – I also tried not eating before the 6am wod, seems to be ok…
Tuesday: AMRAP 10 (7 Clean + Overheads, 10 Burpees) – 4 rounds, 7 cleans, 1 burpee. This workout was harder than expected – I was completely dripping by the end of it. I’m just glad my hamstrings didn’t cramp up, as they had started to give me issues monday night. Tomorrow definitely = rest day.
Wednesday: basketball – dumbass coordinator sent us the wrong schedule. we had a bye this week that we didn’t find out about until we were all there.
Thursday: 6am – last WOD that I programmed - 6 rounds, part of 7 (I think I counted wrong before…). WOD was: AMRAP 15 min (10 wall balls, 10 KB swings [2 pood], 200m run). I.F.’d last night from 7pm (last meal) until 7am (PWO). I know it’s not THAT much of a fast, but I plan to stretch it out in the coming days, starting at 2x/week, then to 3x/week. A lot of this has to do with scheduling, but if i’m up and workign out at 6am w/ a PWO meal at 7am… that would mean my last meal has to start pushing 4pm!! I ate my last meal today at 430P, no food until something light right before tmr morning!
Friday: 6AM FGB: 329! woohoo!! didn’t break 330 like Nathan thought I could, but for coming off my first fast and my body not knowing why I’m starving it – i’m ok w/ that. I can probably make up a little on the push press and maybe a couple calories and a couple more SDHP’s… I’d like to get to the point where in order to get a higher score I have to move FASTER instead of take less breaks. Will I get to 5 min on, 1 min off x 3 without stopping anytime soon? not sure. Score was (121, 105, 103). Will post breakdown from there later.
Saturday: 9am – Stadium team WOD: in order (for me, incl. rest) – 30 wall balls, 30 KB swings, 300m row, rest, 30 box jumps, 30 push press, 30 deadlifts: 22:40
