It's Your Birthday

For time: 

40 Double-Unders
40 Air Squats
40 Toes-to-Bar
40 Air Squats
40 Handstand Push-ups

40 Air Squats
40 Toes-to-Bar
40 Air Squats
40 Double-Unders

Results

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Happy birthday Teri!

Coffee Crew

The birthday WOD. It can be brutal or just tough, but either way is a good, challenging workout. It usually has something you love or are good at and something you hate or is a goat. For those who are new here’s some guidelines. We will program a birthday workout for you as long as you request one in advance. When you do I need the following: days you are in the gym for the week around your birthday, age and/or birthday (for numbers to help with rep schemes), and exercises you both like and dislike. From that we will make a workout or pick a known workout that fits.

Bday WOD

Events:

Sunday 12/16: We have two teams of four men and women each competing at the Gorilla Games at the Meydenbauer Center in Bellevue. Cost is $10 for spectators and kids are free. The Games will run from 7am-4pm (at least). Come join me to help cheer on your fellow SRCF peeps!

Monday 12/24: SRCF Christmas Eve workout “12 WOD’s of Christmas”. Sign-ups will be posted for a few waves. Stay tuned for the Holiday week class schedule.

Notes:

Congrats to Deb and son Zach who tackled the Cystic Fibrosis 2012 Stair Climb last week to help raise $2225 for charity. This is Deb’s 13th year in running the stairs!

Homework. Take this quick test! Remember “knees out, hips back, armpits forward”.

Is It Your Shoulders? Quick Test.” MobilityWOD.com

"Ralph"

Main Class:

For time (Teams of 2): 

40 Dumbbell Manmakers (40#/25#)
600m Run 
80 Deadlifts (250#/165#) 
400m Run 
120 Over Box Jumps (24″/20″)
200m Run 

* Partner up. Alternate reps but team must complete each run together. 
** One pair of DB’s, one bar, one box.

Advanced RX Class:

Strength WOD:

1-1-1-1-1
2 Position Snatch (Floor/Mid Thigh)

Conditioning:

“Ralph”

4 Rounds for time:

8 Deadlifts (250#/165#)
16 Burpees 
3 Rope Climbs (15′) 
600m Run

Results

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Up and Over

“British Army Second Lieutenant Ralph Johnson, 24, of South Africa, assigned to the Household Cavalry Regiment, based in Windsor, England, was killed on August 1, 2006, in Helmand province, Afghanistan, when insurgents attacked his vehicle with an improvised explosive device.”

Good teamwork and hard work all around today. From manmakers to 2 position snatches both classes learned something new.

WOD Demo with Overland Park CrossFit – video [wmv] [mov] [HD mov]

Manmaking Pull_Lynn

Notes:

Congrats to Michelle “Mums” for notching her 200th WOD in her log today!

This co-ed team workout challenge below from CrossFit HQ at the original Games site looks like a blast!

Announcing the Ranch Big Bob Winter Challenge: games.crossfit.com

“The Ranch Big Bob Winter Challenge invites teams of four to go to The Ranch in Aromas, Calif., to complete a team workout at the legendary home of the first three CrossFit Games. 

To set the standard, a firebreathing team of CrossFit seminar trainers consisting of Jason KhalipaNeal MaddoxKatie Hogan, and Sarah Hopping finished the workout in 25:49.”

Manmaker Sequence:

Manmaker_1Manmaker_2Manmaker_3Manmaker_4

Upstream

For time: 

30 Handstand Push-ups
40 Pull-ups
50 Kettlebell Swings (53#/35#)

60 Sit-ups (AbMat)
70 Burpees

Results

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Curt ready to KB Press:

KB Press_Curt

It’s been a year since we did this last. It’s like swimming upstream. I think we will have to do this one in reverse order soon. 

5 Ways To Stay Motivated” by CrossFit Lisbeth

We think dogs kind of belong in a CrossFit gym. Read:

Athena – and Friends” by Michael Brian, CrossFit Journal article [pdf]

Skills and Drills

For time:

1000m Row
20 Pistols
1 Muscle Up
18 Pistols
2 Muscle Ups
16 Pistols
3 Muscle Ups
14 Pistols
4 Muscle Ups
12 Pistols
5 Muscle Ups

Results

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Muscle Up

Two advanced skills today with many ways to scale them. Working on your muscle-up? Learning a pistol? How long have you really worked on it?  It takes practice and mastering all the basics to get either of them. Stay disciplined and consistent and you will improve. Now imagine if you took 3 years just to get a single under. Read the link below. 

Simply amazing and inspiring. Blind but determined. Buying Into CrossFit Sight Unseen – CrossFit Community

Coaching Tip: If balance at the bottom of the pistol position is a problem, try a counterbalance by holding a 10# bumper plate. You can do this on the floor or modify off a box. Think: “drive the car”.

Pistol with Counterbalance

"Gwen"

Strength WOD:

5/5/5
Clean and Jerk

* Strength Warm-Up for “Gwen”: 10 Min. max to prep unbroken C&J for 5 reps each.

Conditioning WOD:

For Load:

15-12-9 reps of 
Clean and Jerk

Rules:

  1. Choose a weight
  2. Touch and Go only at the floor; no dumping (Rest only off the ground)
  3. No Re-grip allowed
  4. Rest as needed in between sets 
  5. Use same load each set to be RX’d

Results

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Re Grip_Hailly Re Grip_Spencer


Split Jerk_Hailly PJ_Spencer

This WOD was an early mainstay in CrossFit prior to Grace or Isabel. It became “Gwen” and has always been a workout where the goal is to pick a load, stay unbroken and touch and go off the floor. It’s a much different training effect when you are forced to hold onto that bar or suffer a “foul”. This is harder than Grace. It’s common to start with a weight that is too heavy or hard to hold and going unbroken forces you to miss a lift and drop it. The benefit of a strength training workout like this is you learn your upper limits and test your technique. 

“Fixing the Push Press” with Lily Crosgrove – video [wmv] [mov] [HD mov]

Kristan Clever at the USAW American Open – video

Archive CF footage of the 2009 Games Champ: Mikko Salo: Death by Clean and Jerk

Back Down

Strength WOD:

20 Minutes to find a 3RM:
Back Squat

Conditioning WOD:

15-12-9-6-3 reps of each of the following for time:
Back Squat (115#/75#)
Burpees

* Alternate Back Squat and Burpees. Must clean or snatch bar from ground.

Results 

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Rack It

<Rant Alert>

It’s about that time where the neat freak in me surfaces and I start getting in the mood to enforcing the burpee penalty rules in the gym. If you’re new to the gym please familiarize yourself with the rules on the whiteboard and follow them. One of the rules that lately has been getting ignored is putting things back where they belong and cleaning up. In our gym we are very particular about where things go, not only just to maximize space for you to workout and for us to coach. We also care because we want our equipment to last, want it to stay clean, and want it to be easy for everyone to find when they need something. That means bands go back on the peg board by their color after you attach it to the pull-up cage, weights get stacked numbers up in the correct pile, collars go back in the bucket, jump ropes go on the wall, and trash goes IN THE TRASH. After you workout please take the time to wipe down all of your equipment. This will help us all from getting the Ebola virus in a month or two. The list is actually much longer but you probably get my point.

One other point, even though the wall may have a hole in it from a previous accident, it does not mean we want you to help by making it bigger. Making said drywall hole grow bigger each day because you are too tired to place a 35# bumper on the stack is grounds for some motivational consequences. 

Thanks in advance for the cooperation and please help the new folks out by educating them when you see someone forgetting to put things back. If this post doesn’t help I will start having each class end with singing the “clean up song”.

Jim Mc_Back Squat Chris H_Back Squat

Notes:

Fixing the Jerk” with Coach Burgener, CrossFit Journal video [wmv] [mov] [HD mov]

Popeye

AMRAP (As Many Rounds As Possible) in 20 Minutes: 

5 Chest-to-Bar Pull-ups
10 Wall Balls (20’/14′)
15 Kettlebell Swings (53#/35#)

Results

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American KB Swing

Today’s WOD was a main site workout from CrossFit.com that we haven’t done since May of 2011. This one leaves you with “popeye” foreamrs and no where to rest or recover but is manageable enough that you should be able to keep working. Remember chest hits bar, ball hits target, squat hits depth and swings are bell to sky, strong overhead with a tight midline every time! 

Notes:

On Friday Deb, Eloy, and Aaron W. all took and passed the SRCF Advanced Skills test. This test is the pre-requisite to entering the Advanced RX class on Saturday. Congrats to all them! If you are wondering what the test is all about ask your fellow veteran squatchers and look at the older version here (it has been slightly revised since 2010). It’s a test that we recommend you only take once you feel ready but can prepare for it any and every time you are in the box.

U.S. Marines officially change their physical fitness test to include pull-ups for women.

Two things about this surprise me.

  1. It took the Marines this long. 
  2. The rest of our Armed Forces still don’t require them for men or women (or train them). 

    * Note: The passing standard for a female Marine is only 3 strict pull-ups

For those working on pull-ups here’s a ton of good resources. Do your homework and work on them.

Pull-Up Instruction Series

Partner Complex

Main Class:

20 minute AMRAP (As Many Rounds As Possible) of:

Teams of 2: 

9 Deadlift (115#/75#)
6 Hang Power Clean (115#/75#) 
3 Push Press (115#/75#)

RX+ (135#/95#)

* Partner up. Partner 1 completes 1 round then switches with Partner 2. Alternate back and forth. Score total rounds.
** One bar per team

Teamwork

Advanced RX Class:

Skills:

10 minutes to Practice Handstands or Handstand Walks 

Strength WOD:

3-3-3-3-3
Power Clean

Conditioning:

7 Rounds for time:

3 Power Cleans (205#/145#)
4 Handstand Push-ups

Results

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Pull and Push

CrossFit Games Update (Some things change, some stay the same):

Read: Welcome to the 2013 Season

Watch: CrossFit Games History: 2007-2013

"MoBros"

“With great mustache comes great responsibility.” ~ Family Guy

“MOBROS” for time:

11 Muscle-Ups 
30 Overhead Squat (95#/65#)
30 Box Jumps (30″/24″)
800m Run
30 Overhead Barbell Walking Lunges (95#/65#)
30 Swings, Kettlebell (70#/53#)

* MU are full turnout at bottom (Sub 2 C2B Pull-ups for each MU) 
* One bar per athlete   
* Barbell OH Walking Lunges: Touch knee to ground on each lunge, support barbell in strong OH Position, sub Stationary OH Lunge or OH Reverse Lungs if needed (due to weather)
* Box Jumps: 2011 Games Standard: Stand up on box, open hips, no rebound

Results 

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MoBros the WOD:

MoBros WOD - Dustin MoBros WOD - Linds

MoBros WOD - Matt

Movember. This month is quickly becoming my favorite time in the gym. We shift from crazy Halloween costumes to a month dedicated purely to growing lip sweaters and torturing our ladies with our hairy but sometimes scary mugs of pure sexiness. It’s weeks of endless ribbing as each of the men race to see who can sport a Mo worthy of Tom Selleck, Ron Burgundy or Hulk Hogan. This whole thing is a festival of manliness that is also for a worthy cause, the fight against prostate cancer. This year we raised $600 as Team StacheSquatch. We have made it a tradition now here in the gym with what will now be an annual SRCF Movember exclusive t-shirt and the final day of the month ending with the MoBros WOD. Our ladies (aka MoSistas) even have supported the past two years with their own pink staches. This SRCF community event tops my list. Next year: “Same or better!”

A collage of MoBros, MoSistas, and NoMos:

MoBros and MoSistas - 1 
MoBros and MoSistas - 2

MoBros and MoSistas - 3 
MoBros and MoSistas - 6

MoBros and MoSistas - 5

The 35 Manliest Mustaches of All Time by The Art of Manliness 

Bear Claw

Strength WOD:

In 20 minutes, find your 3RM of the “Bear Complex”:

Each rep or complex consists of 1 of each of the 5 lifts in order. Complete 3 consecutive reps or complexes of the following sequence:

Power Clean
Front Squat
Push Press or Jerk
Back Squat
Push Press or Jerk

Rules:

  1. Bar must touch the ground each sequence but cannot rest on the ground or it terminates the set.
  2. Goal is to increase loads each round to complete “The Bear” with a 3 rep max load. 
  3. Rest as needed between sets; remember you have 20 minutes.
  4. No re-grip allowed.
  5. You must power clean the bar to full standing position before squatting the weight. (Deadlift to Hang Power Clean) is allowed. No squat cleans.

Conditioning WOD:

In 5 Minutes complete:
750m Row
Max Effort Double Unders in remaining time

* Score total DU

Results

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Bear_Aaron W Bear_Matt G

The Bear Complex is both a strength and potentially a conditioning workout. Through multiple sets of each complex at lighter weight it has a cardiorespiratory effect while at load it demands efficient technique and a plan of attack (receiving the barbell from overhead to the rack; should you thruster or push press/push jerk after the squat). Once it’s heavy the mental challenge of not letting go of the barbell makes you hang on, get efficient, and push through the complex. 

Bear_Michelle N and Deb

Coaching Tip: Receiving the barbell behind the neck 

  1. Complete the push press/jerk overhead and stand tall
  2. Lower the bar with the chest up (vertical dip; do not bend forward or lean back)
  3. As you receive the bar onto the trapezius muscles (not the neck) bend your knees to absorb the load
  4. Practice receiving the bar by bending the knees to absorb impact at all loads to build the habit

The Dumbbell Bear: CrossFit Journal

Bear_Seth and Bill

Notes:

This guide is spot on and what we apsire to be here at SRCF for each of you:

How To Find the Perfect CrossFit Box For You by CrossFit Rockwall

Chris Spealler won “Amanda” in 3:29 at the 2010 CrossFit Games. Speal completes Amanda 10 seconds faster (9-7-5 of Muscle Ups and Snatches @ 135#).