"Dirty Thirty"

For Time:

30 Box jumps (24″/20″)

30 Jumping Pull-ups

30 KB Swings (53#/35#)

30 Walking Lunges

30 Knees to Elbows

30 Push Press (45#/33#)

30 Back Extensions (or Good Mornings 45#/33#)

30 Wallball (20#/14#)

30 Burpees

30 Double-Unders

Results

View this photo 

Dirty Thirty Crew:

Push Press_Willy

  
Dirty Thirty_Don and Mark Gloria_Jumping PU

Sorry to the 7pm class for forgetting to write the scaling/RX movements on the whiteboard. I trust that you all wrote it in your WOD books.

SnoRage dropped in to The Compound tonight for the Dirty Thirty with Travis, Jeremy, and Kim. Good times! Check out their post here.

Notes:

Feeling like an Iron Chef? Or maybe a Paleo Chef? Check out this recipe. If you make it then let us know what you think!

  • Poached Eggs, Prosciutto, Asparagus and Kholrabi Rosti – by Martha Burton video [wmv] [mov
  • Recipe [pdf]

Watch the final Masters event of the 2010 CF Games competition:

Masters Men [wmv] [mov]

Masters Women [wmv] [mov]

"Maria"

Happy birthday Maria!

8 Rounds for Time:

9 Kettlebell Swings (53#/35#)
9 Kettlebell Sumo Deadlift High Pull (53#/35#)

9 Box Jumps (24″/20″)

* Degree of difficulty: Use a heavier kettlebell

Results

View this photo 

Maria celebrating with some birthday swings:

Maria_bday WOD 

Who doesn’t love a birthday WOD? You get to be creative while making a tough WOD all while meeting the challenge of working within certain numbers (age or birthdate). If I hear that the WOD was tougher than expected, or looked easy on the whiteboard, then I know it was effective. This was one of those WOD’s. Great to see Maria choose to come in on her birthday and work hard with the 5pm crew!

We also had a group of CF’ers from Ellensburg drop in last night on their road trip to different boxes in the region. Props to Justin, Ashley, Brenden, and Marshall for coming by and doing their second WOD at our box!

Notes:

We are working on rolling out schedule changes to add a 7:30am class (1-2 days per week) and a 6pm (2 days per week) very soon. Also we are finalizing pricing changes for September for unlimited and couples. Stay tuned.

Want a Paleo Cookbook? I have not used these but they look pretty cool in the description so thought it would be worth throwing out there. Second Edition Paleo Cookbooks

Sign up for the Railroad Days Race if you are in and let us know! Kids 1k, 5k or 10k races on 8/21. Info on the right.

Command Maintenance

Recovery

Back when I was in the Army we had a practice every week when we were in garrison (meaning “not in the field or deployed”) called Command Maintenance. This practice was not really fun, it was not necessarily looked forward to, and sometimes not taken anywhere near serious enough. As an Armor unit, we had vehicles. We had M1A1 Abrams, Humvees, various types of trucks, fuelers, ammo haulers, light tracks, tow vehicles, etc. Those vehicles were worked hard. They often were driven hard enough that even though the majority of them had faults and “deadlines” we still used them because we had to. In fact one of my unit’s motto was “Ride ’em hard, put ’em away wet!” 

We trained hard like most units did and we certainly rode ’em hard. What was most important though was that we allocated time and made it mandatory to focus a day on repair, recovery, and maintenance. We spent all day in the motor-pool cleaning, inspecting, swapping parts, checking inventories, and going through repairs to fix and improve our vehicles and our readiness. The ones who took it seriously were the ones that made sure they followed the checklists (no matter how repetitive), they lubed, greased, topped off, and wrote up every single part needed to get on order. Hell the best even came up with ways to get deals made for parts or get bumped in priority with the mechanics. The ones who didn’t take it seriously? Well their vehicles were crap. Typically they had lots of faults, broke often in the field, and were unofficially cannibalized for parts when they were deadlined for a major fault, thus setting them back weeks from training on their own vehicle. Those vehicles usually had the crews that were not as loyal to their vehicle, and it showed. 

What’s the point of this? 

The point is that like my unit did with using and abusing our vehicles, each of us do with our bodies week in and out of the box. We work out hard and play hard. Our bodies scream for a rest day sometimes but we keep going. I encourage all of us each week to take one day to do some “command maintenance”. Rest and sleep in. Make it quality sleep. Eat clean (or if you are hyper vigilant on your diet, then have a solid cheat). Prep some great quality food for the week. Stretch, roll, or work out some kinks. Relax your brain and decrease your stress. Use ice or heat appropriately with ice packs, contrast showers, ice baths, or heat pads, heating pads, or a hot tub (by the way if you have a hot tub we expect an invite). Get a massage or go for a long walk to clear your mind. Read or learn something, set new goals or review ones accomplished. Most importantly, schedule some quality time with family, loved ones or friends. All of these activities will directly impact how you feel, prepare for, and perform during the week. Your body and your mind will repair itself and thank you for it. And you can “ride it hard and put it away wet” the very next week.

Notes:

Hot or Cold… What’s the Right Choice?” by CrossFit Invictus

Behind the Games: Pt. 2 Preview Video [wmv] [mov]

M and I after a WOD today with a great friend Derek who is in town visiting us (he’s also a coach from CrossFit Morristown):

Three Amigos

Row, Run, Jump

For Time:

1000m Row
1 Mile Run

50 Double-Unders

Results

View this photo

Jana, Lucy and Pat row, run and jump:

Row Run Jump

First off I want to point out that yesterday Tara got her first callous tear on her hand after completing 35 RX pull-ups during the WOD! Great accomplishment on the pull-ups and keep working towards ditching the band!

Keep the inputs on the schedule options coming! See yesterday’s post and please post to comments. We are gonna tally these and look at what to implement ASAP. Early consensus is to leave the 6am as is for now and add a 7:30am and 6pm class 1-2 times a week. The move to a 9am class will be for sure once our daughter starts school in a month.

Tomorrow’s “go time” is 10am. It will be a team WOD so prepare to pair up and get work done! After the WOD for those interested I will give some POSE running instruction, run some drills and then have you all practice. 

Notes:

The Inaugural CrossFit/USAW Open is this October 1st-3rd in Colorado Springs. This is the first competition event between CrossFit and USA Weightlifting and will feature a sanctioned weightlifting meet of 1RM Snatch, 1RM Clean and Jerk and a CF Triplet that is an AMRAP of squat cleans, pull-ups and double-unders. Competitors will be scored on total load (kg’s) plus reps in the triplet. Many CF’ers are signing up and a few of the top CF’ers from the Games are expected to compete. 

SnoRidge will be represented very well by our very own Sean! I’ll be helping him train and accompanying him to the Cheyenne Mountain Resort to help cheer and watch him display awesomeness on a regular basis. Wish him luck and be sure to remind him to practice his jerks and snatches daily.

Ever done the benchmark WOD “Isabel”? 30 reps for time of power or full (squat) snatch. Most choose power. Load is 135 lbs. for men and 95 lbs. for women. How long would that take you? For most it’s easily a few minutes if not upwards of ten or more. How about 56 seconds?

Dave Lipson “Isabel” [wmv] [mov]

Hang It Up

Strength WOD:

Hang Power Snatch

1/1/1/1/1

Checkout WOD immediately after:

3 Rounds for Time: 

20 Hang Power Snatch (75#/55#)
20 Overhead Barbell Walking Lunge (75#/55#)
200m Run

Results 

View this photo

Jana and Scott get extended:

Extension_Jana Extension_Scott

Girl Power:

Walking the Barbell

Tough warm-up, strength focus, then technique time with the hang snatch. This checkout was tougher than it looks. Moe certainly thought so (see the results pic for her quote on the Whiteboard). Spending time staying a little lighter proved valuable for many to break the “muscle-snatch” habit. Learning the Burgener warm-up is another key. Practice with PVC, stick or bar and groove the movements!

For those of us who were at the 5pm class; you got to see something really cool and rare for a CF gym. You got to see someone squat snatching more than their bodyweight. Sean displayed great form and technique pulling under the bar super quick to end up 20 pounds over his bodyweight. Doing it cleanly was even more impressive. 

Congrats to Sean who snatched 195 lbs.!

Sean_Snatch PR 195

Notes:

Food for thought: Ever miss a rep in a WOD? Lose track of where you are? Or get so consumed with finishing that you honestly forget an entire movement or set? It happens to the best of us. Not intentionally, but it happens. The question is what do you do? How do you handle it? Would you knowingly count something that you know shouldn’t have? Would you ignore that the whole purpose of the daily workout is to get fitter, to do all the reps as prescribed? Well fortunately, I think the overwhleming majority of CrossFitters would handle it with integrity. And so does this author.

Read “Self-Reported Versus Rigourously Judged WOD Results

Also read CrossFit Redmond’s short but well put post on the same topic “Not Counting Reps

Fun video: Check out this ninja from San Fran CF! I would kill for 1/4 of his skills!

   

Two for One

21-15-9 Reps for time:

Sumo Deadlift High Pull (95#/65#)
Squat Clean (95#/65#)

Extra Credit: Rest 90 seconds after completion of Sumo/Squat couplet then complete max reps of OH Squats in single attempt using the same bar

Results


View this photo

I had a picture of Jorge that I was gonna use except he was wearing manpri’s and that’s just a no-no…

Rona sumo’s and Amanda squats:


Rona_SDHP Amanda_OH Squat

Squat Clean with Justin:


Squat Clean_Justin - 1 Squat Clean_Justin - 2 Squat Clean_Justin - 3

Recent main site WOD Demo video by CrossFit Again Faster [wmv] [mov]

Row, Row, Row Your Boat

4 Rounds for Time: 

500m Row
400m Run

Results 

View this photo 

Ready Line:

Rowers Ready

CrossFit Crashes the C.R.A.S.H. B.s This is from February but applicable as we rowed a bit today (Pat is required to read this). The Crash B’s are the World Indoor Rowing Championships and two of the Top CF’ers from the 2009 Games accepted the invitation to go and compete against the world’s best rowers to see how they would fare. They certainly fared very well. Next year’s Crash B’s are in February and in Boston. Seeing how we have a certain beast in the 40-49 year old age bracket who likes to row 10k’s as a hobby, and that we have a former rower or two at the ready to coach; I am thinking we need to get someone (cough, cough… Pat) signed up to compete next year! 

Joe and company pulling hard while Moe coaches:

Row Hard

Two CrossFit Journal reads:

Read Fittest On Earth for a recap and interviews with the men’s and women’s individual winners.

Read Sights of the Games for a short collection of moments and background info on many of the athletes.

Notes:

Reminder! Class is 10am tomorrow. Waves will be run if it’s crowded and we will pair up to have a counter for each of you.

Hour of Power

Strength WOD:

Power Clean
1/1/1/1/1

Checkout WOD immediately after:

4 Rounds for Time: 

7 Power Clean (50% of 1RM)
10 Lateral Jump Burpees

Results (SC denotes Squat Clean)

View this photo 

Mark PR’s:

Pwr Clean_Mark B

Fun with Lateral Burpees:

Lateral Burpee_Sangeeta Lateral Burpee_Sean

Today was an emphasis on the clean, specifically the power clean. This movement is essential to learn and improve as it’s integral to so many movements in CrossFit that we do. A good clean lays the foundation for progressing through so many other more advanced skills or movements, as it’s the easiest way to get weight from the ground up to a rack position to press or squat with it.

Attention: Watch this video on the power clean from Jon Gilson of Again Faster for some great tips on set-up, technique and coaching tips. Believe me all of us can take something valuable from this video to improve our clean:

   

The Power Clean from Patrick Cummings on Vimeo.

Notes:

Justin and Ashley (CF’ers from Central Washington) dropped in today for some cleans. Great to have them in and props to Justin for a 235 Squat Clean!

Saturday class schedule change alert: One formal time at 1000; waves if needed. There will be no 11am slot! This is for the next couple weeks due to everyone’s summer plans and light attendance at 11am.

Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes….

Knees and toes!

From the 2010 CrossFit Games WOD Event 6b


Toes to bar Games

3 Rounds for Time:

30 Toes-to-Bar
21 Ground to Overhead (95#/65#)

Results


View this photo

 Exchange of the day: Between Amanda and me during the toes-to-bar instruction: 

Amanda: “Wait, I have a question.” Me “Shoot”. Amanda: “Is that really a squatch on your shirt riding a unicorn?” Me: “No he’s killing a unicorn.”

Jorge and the toes-to-bar (or ankles to bar!):


Toes-to-bar_Jorge - 1 Toes-to-bar_Jorge - 2
Toes-to-bar_Jorge - 3 Toes-to-bar_Jorge - 4

What do you eat for breakfast? Read “Breakfast of Champions

The 2010 CrossFit Games CrossFit Journal commercial [wmv] [mov]

Notes:

Saturday class schedule change alert: One formal time at 1000; waves if needed. There will be no 11am slot! This is for the next couple weeks due to everyone’s summer plans and light attendance at 11am.

Upcoming events: Look on the right side of the site and check out the many events this summer to sign up for with your fellow Squatches!

Happy Birthday Steph and Marc!

For time:

Run 400 meters
7 Overhead Squats (95#/65#)
26 Ring-Dips
Run 400 meters
7 Overhead Squats 
26 Push-ups (Hands must release from floor)
Run 400 meters
7 Overhead Squats 
26 Ring-Dips
Run 400 meters
7 Overhead Squats 
26 Push-ups (Hands must release from floor)

Results
View this photo

 Steph and Marc raise the roof for their birthday WOD:

Steph OH Squat Marc OH Squat

Off to the races:

PM Crew

What is CrossFit? This video gets me fired up. Fired up to train, coach, and simply walk into the box and be around clients, friends, and family. It gets me thinking too.

   

What is CrossFit to me? It’s my way of embracing life. Seizing the day. It’s taking on a challenge and struggling to push both mentally and physically to see it through. It’s self-improvement, self-motivation and self-satisfaction. CrossFit is setting the example for my kid, my family, my friends, and my community. It’s evidence based fitness both of mind and body. It’s also hard and intimidating. CrossFit is butterflies in your stomach, mind screaming “quit” and then “don’t quit”. It’s almost never wanting to do the WOD until you hear “3-2-1 Go” and then loving that you did the WOD when it’s over. It’s bumper plates, big lifts, tall socks, board shorts and no shirt. Tire flips, rope climbs, handstands and being a big kid whenever you want. It’s epic, awesome and badass every single day. It is workouts that really are workouts. CrossFit is coaching, training, cheering, good games, and good times. It’s eating right, hating to rest, and chomping to get back to that next dreaded workout. It’s marriage counseling. It’s setting PR’s, learning new skills and newfound confidence, and then getting better at whatever you use your fitness to go do. It’s turning weaknesses into strengths. It’s helping my loved ones live a few more healthy and productive years. CrossFit is a vehicle which you can use to change your life, and we have been lucky enough to witness it daily in our box. Most of all, it’s simply FUN.

So what is CrossFit to you?