A Week of Workouts: 03/02/09 – 03/10/09

Ch-ch-ch-changes: I’m going to start posting workouts in a weekly digest as opposed to one post per workout. This will keep things nice and tidy, as I plan on writing more on general subjects.

Monday 03/02/09:

Back to Crossfit after a much-needed break. My shoulder is feeling better, but I can’t use that as an excuse to go full tilt boogie again. I’mm just injure myself more! Today was another benchmark workout, this time the first part of Crossfit Total. One rep max of:

• Deadlift
• Shoulder Press

The previous week I had set a personal record (PR) of 300lb even on my deadlift, a weight I considered enormous at the time. Nevertheless, I was pretty hellbent on shattering that record, considering that deadlifts are one of the few things that don’t really bother my shoulder! I made a number of attempts:

• 185 x 8 – 255 x 5 – 305 x 3 – 365 x 1 – 365fail – 370

Wow, beating my PR by almost 1/3. I wonder what my real ceiling is! I am pretty much overjoyed at my progress.

I didn’t very well want to leave the shoulder press blank on the progress sheet, so I decided to do some light weight:

• 45 x 5 – 95 x 3

So a fairly light weight for a PR of 95 on the shoulder press. It kills me, because I know I could have put up 135 easily.

The last part of the Total, the Back Squat, we will do Wednesday…

Tuesday, 03/03/09

As I have injured shoulders (type 1/2 ACJ sprain) I’m finding it necessary to take it easy for a while. the only thing that is absolutely intolerable is pushups. I can’t do them at all. Other things are possible but why risk it? Today I went to my Kung-Fu school and did a full body stretch routine using the Wharton active/isolated method.

Even when injured, there’s always something you can do.

Wednesday, 03/04/09

The shoulder is getting better. As much as I want to, I can’t use that as an excuse to start working it hard again! John was nice enough to modify the workout (which had shoulder presses and squat cleans in it) for my special needs (man that sounds bad!)

10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1 reps:

• Deadlift at 50% bodyweight (95 lb)
• Back squat at 50% bodyweight
• Also, 10 box jumps (24″ box) each round.

completed in 17:29. Not bad, fairly difficult! My lower back was incredibly sore during the deadlifts, but within 5 minutes of finishing, I was perfectly fine again. Once again, I think I have far more headroom in my performance than I am utilizing. In addition, I will now sub in the 24″ box whenever possible for box jumps.

Thursday, 03/05/09

More Crossfit fun! My shoulder is in that dangerous territory where it feels well enough to almost, kinda-sorta do stuff, but I know if I do I’ll jsut injure myself more. So John, the kind soul that he is, put together a workout that seemed more difficult than the recommended WOD (which was):

“JT”: 21-15-9 Reps:

• Handstand Pushups,
• Ring Dips
• Pushups

The substitute was less strength and more metabolic. Kudos to JDP for realizing the leg-strength focus on the previous day’s workout, and subbing in core/endurance work:

Three Rounds for Time:

• 500m Row
• 400m Run
• 30 GHD Situps

Done in 19:43. This was a fucking killer. The GHD situps are incredibly brutal things that work muscles in places I didn’t know I had places. Has it ever hurt your abs to fart? If not, you should try doing 90 GHD situps and experience the phenomonon first hand.

Friday, 03/06/09

My Friday class returns after a two week hiatus! It was a special class tonight, the first re-appearance of a benchmark primary workout. It was time to see if the exercise protocols I had enstated had caused a significant improvement in the performance of the students. The Benchmark workouts will be ones that I feel are gold-standard in terms of difficulty and practicality. The “Beinedämmerung” (Twilight of the Legs) is one of these. It’s a four-round version of Mountain Athlete’s “Leg Blaster” with some double-unders thrown in:

“Beinedämmerung” (Twilight of the Legs). Four Rounds for Time:

• 20 Squats
• 20 Lunges
• 20 Jump lunges
• 10 Jump squats
• 20 Double-unders (or 60 single-unders, or any combination thereof)

I believe my time on this was about 9:25 or so (I didnt write down the numbers as I was in a hurry; I’ll accomplish it this week). I shaved around 30 seconds off my previous time, which I was satisfied with. This is a very difficult workout!

What I truly was impressed with were all the folks in class that were shaving well over a minute off their times, and at the same time, increasing their range of motion and intensity. No one in my class “phones in” a workout, and I’m very proud of that fact!

Saturday, 03/07/09

Helped out as a volunteer at the Crossfit Central Fittest Games Challenge, and wished I could have competed.