Upper body was definitely sore from yesterday's ruck march. Also, I have a small blister on the ball of my left foot, and a small abrasion on top of a toe on my right foot. Hopefully those will be gone by Saturday.
Got to the gym around 1:45.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
Unknown 063
2 Rounds:
2min max rep push ups
2min max rep sit ups
2min max rep 2ct flutterkicks
2min max rep squats
First time trying this one. Thought it would be a little easier on my legs, since I want them to be fresh for Saturday's race. Pretty simple. Just went max effort for 2min. I did 85/70 for push ups, 96/75 for sit ups, 110/104 for flutterkicks, and 76/76 for squats.
Second:
Did a few sets of random ab stuff. Reverse crunches, leg levers, side bends, and scissors.
Third:
Weighted exercises. Pull ups first. Did 5 rounds of 5 reps holding a 50lbs dumbbell between my ankles. Then went to the dip bar, same thing, 5 rounds of 5 reps with 50lbs of plates hanging from my waist.
Fourth:
I did one round of the runner's core workout.
Fifth:
Still wanted a little run, preferably with some speed. So I headed upstairs to the treadmill. Ran 2x400m averaging 5:17/mi pace, then another 2x400m averaging 5:04/mi pace. Rested for 1:30 between intervals.
Thursday, October 31, 2013
Wednesday, October 30, 2013
Wednesday
Upper body was pretty sore waking up this morning. Shoulders and back were definitely worked yesterday.
Ran a few errands in the morning. Turned in two job applications to law enforcement agencies. We'll see if anything comes from those.
Decided I still wanted to get a work out in, and since I haven't done one in a while, I decided on rucking marching. Headed out to the forest around 2pm.
Did around 6mi on trails with a 45lbs pack and while carrying my 10lbs "faux rifle." Finished it in 1:36:13.
Everything felt fine, buuut, around mile 4 I noticed I was feeling the formation of a blister on the ball of my left foot, and the abrasion on top of my right toes. Got home. Bottom of the left foot looks ok, hopefully it was just sore and it will be fine in a day or so. The top of one of my toes on the right foot was a little abraded, I think it will be ok. Fingers crossed everything is good by Saturday morning.
Ran a few errands in the morning. Turned in two job applications to law enforcement agencies. We'll see if anything comes from those.
Decided I still wanted to get a work out in, and since I haven't done one in a while, I decided on rucking marching. Headed out to the forest around 2pm.
Did around 6mi on trails with a 45lbs pack and while carrying my 10lbs "faux rifle." Finished it in 1:36:13.
Everything felt fine, buuut, around mile 4 I noticed I was feeling the formation of a blister on the ball of my left foot, and the abrasion on top of my right toes. Got home. Bottom of the left foot looks ok, hopefully it was just sore and it will be fine in a day or so. The top of one of my toes on the right foot was a little abraded, I think it will be ok. Fingers crossed everything is good by Saturday morning.
Tuesday
Quads and upper body was a little sore from the previous day. Specifically, lower back. I don't think it enjoyed those last couple reps of 135lbs thrusters.
Got to the gym at the usual time, somewhere around 1:45ish.
Because I would be rowing for a workout today, I warmed up with 5:00 on the elliptical before 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
CrossFit 131023
AMRAP in 15min:
Row 250 (10/10 resistance)
25 Push ups
First time trying this, although I've done one with the same exercises but as many rounds in 20min instead of 15. Still pretty tough. One of those rowing wods where I nearly fall off the machine at the end. I don't know if this screwed me, but I tried to set a PR for 250m in the first round. I think it made the rest of the rows uncomfortable. Averaged 50-55 seconds for each row, not sure how much for each set of push ups. I did the first 4 sets of push ups unbroken, but then had to start breaking them into 12/6/4/3. Finished with 7 full rounds completed, and I had finished the 250m row and I was 13 push ups into the 8th round.
Second:
Runner's core wod. Core muscles were still feeling it from yesterday and the rowing earlier, so this was not as fun.
Third:
Shoulders. Started with standing barbell military press, then a recovery set of agility and balance drills, then a max rep set of crunches and seated V-ups. Then back to shoulders with shrugs, followed by another recovery set of agility and balance drills, and a max rep set of flutter kicks and scissors with a 45lbs plate on my chest. Then finished up with the shoulder range of motion wod.
Fourth:
Changed into my VFF and headed out to the soccer fields. Ran 4 barefoot laps around the field at about 6:45/mi pace, totaling about 1.5mi. Then did my form drills back and forth across a 30m field.
Got to the gym at the usual time, somewhere around 1:45ish.
Because I would be rowing for a workout today, I warmed up with 5:00 on the elliptical before 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
CrossFit 131023
AMRAP in 15min:
Row 250 (10/10 resistance)
25 Push ups
First time trying this, although I've done one with the same exercises but as many rounds in 20min instead of 15. Still pretty tough. One of those rowing wods where I nearly fall off the machine at the end. I don't know if this screwed me, but I tried to set a PR for 250m in the first round. I think it made the rest of the rows uncomfortable. Averaged 50-55 seconds for each row, not sure how much for each set of push ups. I did the first 4 sets of push ups unbroken, but then had to start breaking them into 12/6/4/3. Finished with 7 full rounds completed, and I had finished the 250m row and I was 13 push ups into the 8th round.
Second:
Runner's core wod. Core muscles were still feeling it from yesterday and the rowing earlier, so this was not as fun.
Third:
Shoulders. Started with standing barbell military press, then a recovery set of agility and balance drills, then a max rep set of crunches and seated V-ups. Then back to shoulders with shrugs, followed by another recovery set of agility and balance drills, and a max rep set of flutter kicks and scissors with a 45lbs plate on my chest. Then finished up with the shoulder range of motion wod.
Fourth:
Changed into my VFF and headed out to the soccer fields. Ran 4 barefoot laps around the field at about 6:45/mi pace, totaling about 1.5mi. Then did my form drills back and forth across a 30m field.
Tuesday, October 29, 2013
Virginia Trip Pt 2 - GoRuck Nasty Obstacle Course
Here's my AAR for the GoRuck Nasty 001 obstacle course race on 21 Sept 2013.
Nasty is a 5-6mi race with 20-25 obstacles along the way. It was held at the Massanutten ski resort in the Shenandoah Mountains in Virginia. The obstacles are based on designs from the Special Forces Obstacle Course at Ft Bragg and the BUDS Obstacle Course at Naval Amphibious Base Coronado. The course was planned, organized, run, and monitored by former and active duty military special operations soldiers. Most from Army Special Forces but a few others from Marine Force Recon/MARSOC and one or two from the Naval Special Warfare community. Roughly 3000 people registered. They were broken into starting waves that began at 0700 and went until 2pm, every 10min or so. My brother and I were in the 1020 wave.
My dad drove us to the race. It was definitely in the mountains, my ears popped several times just in the car. Parked, checked in and picked up our packets. Like I said, the course is on a ski resort. Its designed so that the staging area was the large open area at the base of the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd slopes. The 4th and 5th slope and the chair lift slope were a short walk away.
For apparel, I wore a black synthetic running shirt, compression undershorts, a pair of old soccer shorts, thin toe-socks, a pair of thin calf socks over those, both my red and black pairs of calf sleeves, and my new Peregrine trail shoes. When we check in, they told us that gloves are highly recommended. Thanks for the heads up GoRuck!
I should also say, the map above is a little distorted. First, its upside-down, North is down in the map. Second, the obstacles aren't in order. Third, there are obstacles on there that don't exist.
Here is more accurate map using Google Pedometer. The green dot in the upper right is the start, the red dot in the middle is the finish. The numbers are mile markers. The yellow dots are actual obstacles. I didn't add yellow dots for the obstacles that were just climbing a hill.
Kirt and I got in line and started a little early with the 1000 wave, oops. There were maybe 15-20 other people ranging from younger to older, men and women. We had a group of 10 or so guys wearing the same t-shirt and pants who we found out were from a local SWAT team.
Started up the first slope. First obstacle was a 10-15m low crawl underneath a grid of boards. Jogged a short distance and got in line for a 15ft cargo net climb. Waited maybe a couple min before we could get on it. I had a little trouble getting a good grip to roll over the top but other than that it wasn't a big deal. After another short distance were a couple 8ft walls you had to climb over. They had a small ledge in it for people to use but it was quicker for Kirt and I to just muscle-up over them. At the top of the slope was a rope swing. You had to jump up and grab onto the rope, swing across a 10ft space, and land on a waist high ledge on your feet. Pretty easy as long as you grabbed high up the rope. Jogged halfway down the slope and another wall, this time maybe chest high. Pretty easy to jump and push up and over it.
At the base of the hill, we made the turn and started up the second slope. The first obstacle was just a large mound of dirt to run up and over. Then it was supposed to be one of the harder obstacles called The Dirty Name. Its three horizontal logs, one at knee height, the next at head height, and the last above finger tip height. There is maybe 2-3 feet separating each. You're supposed to jump from one to the next. Minutes before we got to it, someone had fallen off the highest log, landed on his wrist, bone popped out, and then he was knocked unconscious after hitting his head on a sandbag. They closed the obstacle for the rest of the day. Ran around it and then had another couple walls that were 8ft tall to climb over. I think there was another obstacle after that before we turned around at the top of the hill but I can't remember it. Then running back down the hill, there was a 25m stretch of mud to run through, with one of the instructors spraying everyone with a cold fire hose. Made the turn at the bottom of the hill and started the third slope.
The third slope started with a smaller version of the Dirty Name. Thankfully there wasn't a line for this one. It only had two logs, one at waist height and one a little above head height. Seemed a bit safer and more manageable so I gave it a try. Stood on the lower log and jumped to the higher, but landed too high on my chest, so even with my arms grabbing on top, there wouldn't have been any way to pull myself up. Didn't help that both logs were slick from water and mud. Dropped off onto my feet. Tried again but with a bigger jump trying to land more on my stomach. Ow. Landed on my stomach with my arms over the log. Had to kip a little before I could get on top and then roll over and drop off the other side. Did not feel awesome landing on a log on my midsection twice. Ran a short distance up the hill to get into a big line for a 50m underground tunnel crawl. It was looking like a 30-45min wait, so we opted to bear crawl 50m instead of waiting. Another short run, then we immediately started another tunnel crawl, but in a tunnel big enough to bear crawl through. Much longer though, probably more than 75m long. A little weird being in total darkness but you just keep moving and eventually you crawl out of it. Another short run, then back in line for the monkey bars obstacle. Waited maybe 20min before we got to try it. It was a 15m stretch of monkey bars with a foot or two of water underneath. You had to jump 3-4ft across the water to get to the first bar, so people were having issues with that. Kirt and I made it look easy though. All the way across with no problems, and pretty quickly too.
Short jog around the first water station and then the start of the fourth hill. Maybe 200m up the hill we got into a huge line, long enough where we couldn't really see what the obstacle was. Waited probably 50min before we got to the front. It was two pyramids of logs, each maybe 6ft high, and maybe 15m from each other. There was a thick rope tied around the top of each log. The idea being that you climb up the pyramid, climb onto the rope, pull yourself across the rope to the other pyramid, climb onto the pyramid and jump off. Except that in practice, they were letting 4 or 5 people on the same rope, and there wasn't enough tension in it, so you would get to the middle and literally be crawling on the ground. Kirt got all the way across but when he transitioned off the rope and onto the log, the rope shook and I dropped off 6in onto the ground. So basically a 50min wait to fall off a rope after 30 seconds. Back to tackling the slope. No running up this one, very long and pretty steep. Calves started to feel it. Finally got to the top, quick water station and then an obstacle. Quick line, maybe 1 or 2min. The obstacle was a series of five letter "X's" made of 4x4 beams. You had to get over them by jumping and pulling yourself up. A little awkward but not all that hard. It was at the top of the hill, so we made the turn and jogged down the next slope.
Jogging down a very steep slope is very hard by the way. Very taxing on your quads and because it wasn't designed to be run on bare, there were lots of rocks and holes, so we were constantly bouncing. Really think my trail running background helped here as I didn't have any issues. Made it down the slope, then turned left through a treeline and yay, another gigantic hill to climb. This one nearly as long and just as steep as the previous. Got to the top of it and found another obstacle. This one had the biggest line yet though. The obstacle started with a 15-20ft rope climb, you then had to transition from the rope to the horizontal log that the rope was tied to, from there you had to scoot onto and down another log that was attached perpendicular and running at a slight down angle, from there you then had to climb onto a horizontal metal ladder running at a slight down angle, and then jump down maybe 10 feet onto a padded mat. Couple things. They only had two safety mats, one near the ropes at the beginning, and the other at the end. Neither of which would really help any if you fell from the highest and most dangerous points on the obstacle. I got in line and Kirt walked to the front to check it out up close. When he came back, he said we were looking at a 1.5 to 2 hour wait. The guys just getting to the obstacle had started in the 0830 wave. Nope, not going to wait 2 hours. We heard randomly from someone that it was a 50 burpee penalty to skip it, fine, I'll do 50 burpees for not waiting 2 hours. Also noticed Dad was there, he had taken a couple ski lifts up and saw us. We did the burpees, said hey to Dad then made the turn and headed back down the slope.
We jogged down the slope, and got maybe 3/4 of the way down before we got to another obstacle. This would be awful. Probably 100m of low crawling underneath barbed wire, on gravel/dirt, on a steep downhill. It was agonizing. I was mainly using legs, so my legs were torched. Kirt mainly used arms, so his upper body was smoked. He tore his shirt, I nearly tore my race bib off my shorts. Arms and legs scraped up. We were slowed down when a girl in front of us got her hair caught in the wire. Luckily one of her friends we nearby, crawled over and helped get it untangled. Did not look fun. I had a couple barbs poke into my head and back but otherwise I was fine. Crawled out, jogged maybe 50m down the hill and around the corner to the base of the final slope, which followed underneath a chair lift.
At the base of this last hill, there was an instructor standing there in front of 2 large peg-boards with a bunch of small American flags sticking out. He called a big group of us together and gave us a speech about how this next hill was the "Memorial Climb" and how we were supposed to each carry one of the flags from the bottom to the top and think about the men and women who have been KIA in OEF/OIF. He brought up that only a few weeks before, a Green Beret that several of the GoRuck instructors knew had been killed in Afghanistan. So we all grabbed a flag and headed up. It was the steepest hill of the course. Even though it was maybe only 800m long, it felt much longer. Kirt and I set a good pace, we'd pause for a quick breather every 50m or so. The incline was steep enough that if I stopped moving, I would start to slide back down the hill (this is with new aggressive trail running shoes on, which don't ever slide). We got maybe 3/4 of the way up when we got to a cluster of people. Going around them we noticed they were grouped around a guy who was probably over 60 years old and a good 100lbs overweight, sitting down looking like he was about to have a heart attack. Got to the top of the hill, placed the flags we were carrying into another peg-board, then had another instructor call us together. He said the next "obstacle" was the "Mogadishu Mile." We were supposed to stick together as a team and head down the gravel road. The name comes from the last part of the Battle of Mogadishu in Somalia in Oct 1993. Two Blackhawk helicopters were shot down during an operation to extract several high ranking Somali warlords. A group of Rangers and Delta operators that went to secure one of the crash sites then had to run a mile through Mogadishu carrying their wounded and dead teammates all while being engaged by the thousands of militia in the city. GoRuck's version of this was for us to walk down a gravel road for a mile. Yep. That was it.
Got to the bottom of the gravel road, which wound its way down the mountain, and found another obstacle. This was a balance beam obstacle. It had maybe a 30min line which didn't seem so bad after seeing a close to 2hr line earlier. While waiting in line, one of the GoRuck instructors was walking up and down the line and mentioned to us that obstacles in Nasty were harder than what he had to do in the Nasty Nick course at Ft Bragg. Hm, good to know. So we get up to the front. The obstacle is getting across 3 telephone pole logs. Each log has a slight up-angle, so you get progressively higher off the ground. You start maybe a foot off the ground and finish 6 feet off the ground. Not high, but if you have crappy balance this will screw with you. The logs were not secured in place, so there was a system of people wedging the logs in place so they wouldn't rock while someone walked across them. Kirt and I got across then jogged 200m to the next obstacle.
Next obstacle was a couple of high walls that you had to climb over. These were at an angle coming at you, so it made it tough for some people. But Kirt and I didn't have any issue just doing a muscle up over them. Maybe a 100m jog to the next obstacle.
Next obstacle was The Weaver. This was a series of horizontal 4x4 posts creating a pyramid, starting waist height and going up to probably 20ft off the ground. The object is to go over the first post, then under the next, then over, under, and so on. I got up the pyramid, got to the top, then realized I had no earthly idea how you safely do over/under doing down the slope. I decided I did not want to learn on the fly and possibly drop 20ft onto dirt so I just scooted down the top on my butt and jumped off. Another 100m job to the next obstacle.
This was the Confidence Climb. Probably 30-40 feet straight up a wooden ladder, go over the top, then come back down. Oh by the way, it had been raining for the last hour, so everything was wet. And it had a 15-20min line. Kirt and I decided to skip this one.
Then the last obstacle. This had probably a 45min-1hr line. You started by climbing a 15ft rope. Then transition to a platform. Then walk across horizontal 4x4 beams spaced 2ft apart (with no safety net underneath, just a long drop). After 10m of that, you climb a wooden ladder another 15ft, climb over the top, then climb onto a cargo net and descend to the bottom. Kirt and I skipped this one too. And then you had maybe a 600-800m run to the finish line. The End.
Problems I had with the race:
-The massive lines.
-They made their obstacles harder than the original obstacles they were based on.
-The order of the obstacles was terrible. Lets have 3 of the hardest obstacles all in a row at the very end! Great idea!
-Little to no considerations for safety.
Nasty is a 5-6mi race with 20-25 obstacles along the way. It was held at the Massanutten ski resort in the Shenandoah Mountains in Virginia. The obstacles are based on designs from the Special Forces Obstacle Course at Ft Bragg and the BUDS Obstacle Course at Naval Amphibious Base Coronado. The course was planned, organized, run, and monitored by former and active duty military special operations soldiers. Most from Army Special Forces but a few others from Marine Force Recon/MARSOC and one or two from the Naval Special Warfare community. Roughly 3000 people registered. They were broken into starting waves that began at 0700 and went until 2pm, every 10min or so. My brother and I were in the 1020 wave.
My dad drove us to the race. It was definitely in the mountains, my ears popped several times just in the car. Parked, checked in and picked up our packets. Like I said, the course is on a ski resort. Its designed so that the staging area was the large open area at the base of the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd slopes. The 4th and 5th slope and the chair lift slope were a short walk away.For apparel, I wore a black synthetic running shirt, compression undershorts, a pair of old soccer shorts, thin toe-socks, a pair of thin calf socks over those, both my red and black pairs of calf sleeves, and my new Peregrine trail shoes. When we check in, they told us that gloves are highly recommended. Thanks for the heads up GoRuck!
I should also say, the map above is a little distorted. First, its upside-down, North is down in the map. Second, the obstacles aren't in order. Third, there are obstacles on there that don't exist.
Here is more accurate map using Google Pedometer. The green dot in the upper right is the start, the red dot in the middle is the finish. The numbers are mile markers. The yellow dots are actual obstacles. I didn't add yellow dots for the obstacles that were just climbing a hill.
Kirt and I got in line and started a little early with the 1000 wave, oops. There were maybe 15-20 other people ranging from younger to older, men and women. We had a group of 10 or so guys wearing the same t-shirt and pants who we found out were from a local SWAT team.
Started up the first slope. First obstacle was a 10-15m low crawl underneath a grid of boards. Jogged a short distance and got in line for a 15ft cargo net climb. Waited maybe a couple min before we could get on it. I had a little trouble getting a good grip to roll over the top but other than that it wasn't a big deal. After another short distance were a couple 8ft walls you had to climb over. They had a small ledge in it for people to use but it was quicker for Kirt and I to just muscle-up over them. At the top of the slope was a rope swing. You had to jump up and grab onto the rope, swing across a 10ft space, and land on a waist high ledge on your feet. Pretty easy as long as you grabbed high up the rope. Jogged halfway down the slope and another wall, this time maybe chest high. Pretty easy to jump and push up and over it.
At the base of the hill, we made the turn and started up the second slope. The first obstacle was just a large mound of dirt to run up and over. Then it was supposed to be one of the harder obstacles called The Dirty Name. Its three horizontal logs, one at knee height, the next at head height, and the last above finger tip height. There is maybe 2-3 feet separating each. You're supposed to jump from one to the next. Minutes before we got to it, someone had fallen off the highest log, landed on his wrist, bone popped out, and then he was knocked unconscious after hitting his head on a sandbag. They closed the obstacle for the rest of the day. Ran around it and then had another couple walls that were 8ft tall to climb over. I think there was another obstacle after that before we turned around at the top of the hill but I can't remember it. Then running back down the hill, there was a 25m stretch of mud to run through, with one of the instructors spraying everyone with a cold fire hose. Made the turn at the bottom of the hill and started the third slope.
The third slope started with a smaller version of the Dirty Name. Thankfully there wasn't a line for this one. It only had two logs, one at waist height and one a little above head height. Seemed a bit safer and more manageable so I gave it a try. Stood on the lower log and jumped to the higher, but landed too high on my chest, so even with my arms grabbing on top, there wouldn't have been any way to pull myself up. Didn't help that both logs were slick from water and mud. Dropped off onto my feet. Tried again but with a bigger jump trying to land more on my stomach. Ow. Landed on my stomach with my arms over the log. Had to kip a little before I could get on top and then roll over and drop off the other side. Did not feel awesome landing on a log on my midsection twice. Ran a short distance up the hill to get into a big line for a 50m underground tunnel crawl. It was looking like a 30-45min wait, so we opted to bear crawl 50m instead of waiting. Another short run, then we immediately started another tunnel crawl, but in a tunnel big enough to bear crawl through. Much longer though, probably more than 75m long. A little weird being in total darkness but you just keep moving and eventually you crawl out of it. Another short run, then back in line for the monkey bars obstacle. Waited maybe 20min before we got to try it. It was a 15m stretch of monkey bars with a foot or two of water underneath. You had to jump 3-4ft across the water to get to the first bar, so people were having issues with that. Kirt and I made it look easy though. All the way across with no problems, and pretty quickly too.
Short jog around the first water station and then the start of the fourth hill. Maybe 200m up the hill we got into a huge line, long enough where we couldn't really see what the obstacle was. Waited probably 50min before we got to the front. It was two pyramids of logs, each maybe 6ft high, and maybe 15m from each other. There was a thick rope tied around the top of each log. The idea being that you climb up the pyramid, climb onto the rope, pull yourself across the rope to the other pyramid, climb onto the pyramid and jump off. Except that in practice, they were letting 4 or 5 people on the same rope, and there wasn't enough tension in it, so you would get to the middle and literally be crawling on the ground. Kirt got all the way across but when he transitioned off the rope and onto the log, the rope shook and I dropped off 6in onto the ground. So basically a 50min wait to fall off a rope after 30 seconds. Back to tackling the slope. No running up this one, very long and pretty steep. Calves started to feel it. Finally got to the top, quick water station and then an obstacle. Quick line, maybe 1 or 2min. The obstacle was a series of five letter "X's" made of 4x4 beams. You had to get over them by jumping and pulling yourself up. A little awkward but not all that hard. It was at the top of the hill, so we made the turn and jogged down the next slope.
Jogging down a very steep slope is very hard by the way. Very taxing on your quads and because it wasn't designed to be run on bare, there were lots of rocks and holes, so we were constantly bouncing. Really think my trail running background helped here as I didn't have any issues. Made it down the slope, then turned left through a treeline and yay, another gigantic hill to climb. This one nearly as long and just as steep as the previous. Got to the top of it and found another obstacle. This one had the biggest line yet though. The obstacle started with a 15-20ft rope climb, you then had to transition from the rope to the horizontal log that the rope was tied to, from there you had to scoot onto and down another log that was attached perpendicular and running at a slight down angle, from there you then had to climb onto a horizontal metal ladder running at a slight down angle, and then jump down maybe 10 feet onto a padded mat. Couple things. They only had two safety mats, one near the ropes at the beginning, and the other at the end. Neither of which would really help any if you fell from the highest and most dangerous points on the obstacle. I got in line and Kirt walked to the front to check it out up close. When he came back, he said we were looking at a 1.5 to 2 hour wait. The guys just getting to the obstacle had started in the 0830 wave. Nope, not going to wait 2 hours. We heard randomly from someone that it was a 50 burpee penalty to skip it, fine, I'll do 50 burpees for not waiting 2 hours. Also noticed Dad was there, he had taken a couple ski lifts up and saw us. We did the burpees, said hey to Dad then made the turn and headed back down the slope.
We jogged down the slope, and got maybe 3/4 of the way down before we got to another obstacle. This would be awful. Probably 100m of low crawling underneath barbed wire, on gravel/dirt, on a steep downhill. It was agonizing. I was mainly using legs, so my legs were torched. Kirt mainly used arms, so his upper body was smoked. He tore his shirt, I nearly tore my race bib off my shorts. Arms and legs scraped up. We were slowed down when a girl in front of us got her hair caught in the wire. Luckily one of her friends we nearby, crawled over and helped get it untangled. Did not look fun. I had a couple barbs poke into my head and back but otherwise I was fine. Crawled out, jogged maybe 50m down the hill and around the corner to the base of the final slope, which followed underneath a chair lift.
At the base of this last hill, there was an instructor standing there in front of 2 large peg-boards with a bunch of small American flags sticking out. He called a big group of us together and gave us a speech about how this next hill was the "Memorial Climb" and how we were supposed to each carry one of the flags from the bottom to the top and think about the men and women who have been KIA in OEF/OIF. He brought up that only a few weeks before, a Green Beret that several of the GoRuck instructors knew had been killed in Afghanistan. So we all grabbed a flag and headed up. It was the steepest hill of the course. Even though it was maybe only 800m long, it felt much longer. Kirt and I set a good pace, we'd pause for a quick breather every 50m or so. The incline was steep enough that if I stopped moving, I would start to slide back down the hill (this is with new aggressive trail running shoes on, which don't ever slide). We got maybe 3/4 of the way up when we got to a cluster of people. Going around them we noticed they were grouped around a guy who was probably over 60 years old and a good 100lbs overweight, sitting down looking like he was about to have a heart attack. Got to the top of the hill, placed the flags we were carrying into another peg-board, then had another instructor call us together. He said the next "obstacle" was the "Mogadishu Mile." We were supposed to stick together as a team and head down the gravel road. The name comes from the last part of the Battle of Mogadishu in Somalia in Oct 1993. Two Blackhawk helicopters were shot down during an operation to extract several high ranking Somali warlords. A group of Rangers and Delta operators that went to secure one of the crash sites then had to run a mile through Mogadishu carrying their wounded and dead teammates all while being engaged by the thousands of militia in the city. GoRuck's version of this was for us to walk down a gravel road for a mile. Yep. That was it.
Got to the bottom of the gravel road, which wound its way down the mountain, and found another obstacle. This was a balance beam obstacle. It had maybe a 30min line which didn't seem so bad after seeing a close to 2hr line earlier. While waiting in line, one of the GoRuck instructors was walking up and down the line and mentioned to us that obstacles in Nasty were harder than what he had to do in the Nasty Nick course at Ft Bragg. Hm, good to know. So we get up to the front. The obstacle is getting across 3 telephone pole logs. Each log has a slight up-angle, so you get progressively higher off the ground. You start maybe a foot off the ground and finish 6 feet off the ground. Not high, but if you have crappy balance this will screw with you. The logs were not secured in place, so there was a system of people wedging the logs in place so they wouldn't rock while someone walked across them. Kirt and I got across then jogged 200m to the next obstacle.
Next obstacle was a couple of high walls that you had to climb over. These were at an angle coming at you, so it made it tough for some people. But Kirt and I didn't have any issue just doing a muscle up over them. Maybe a 100m jog to the next obstacle.
Next obstacle was The Weaver. This was a series of horizontal 4x4 posts creating a pyramid, starting waist height and going up to probably 20ft off the ground. The object is to go over the first post, then under the next, then over, under, and so on. I got up the pyramid, got to the top, then realized I had no earthly idea how you safely do over/under doing down the slope. I decided I did not want to learn on the fly and possibly drop 20ft onto dirt so I just scooted down the top on my butt and jumped off. Another 100m job to the next obstacle.
This was the Confidence Climb. Probably 30-40 feet straight up a wooden ladder, go over the top, then come back down. Oh by the way, it had been raining for the last hour, so everything was wet. And it had a 15-20min line. Kirt and I decided to skip this one.
Then the last obstacle. This had probably a 45min-1hr line. You started by climbing a 15ft rope. Then transition to a platform. Then walk across horizontal 4x4 beams spaced 2ft apart (with no safety net underneath, just a long drop). After 10m of that, you climb a wooden ladder another 15ft, climb over the top, then climb onto a cargo net and descend to the bottom. Kirt and I skipped this one too. And then you had maybe a 600-800m run to the finish line. The End.
Problems I had with the race:
-The massive lines.
-They made their obstacles harder than the original obstacles they were based on.
-The order of the obstacles was terrible. Lets have 3 of the hardest obstacles all in a row at the very end! Great idea!
-Little to no considerations for safety.
Monday, October 28, 2013
Monday
Woke up feeling pretty decent this morning.
Left the house a little early so that I could swing by a bank and have a notary public sign off on some forms for job applications. Had to wait a little bit but got everything signed. Got to the gym about 1:15.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
CrossFit 130415
15-12-9 reps:
135lbs Thruster
45lbs Weighted Pull Up
First time on this. It was very difficult. Crossfit normally does thrusters with 45-95lbs, so jumping to 135lbs was not a whole lot of fun. Started with 5/4/3/2/1 on the thrusters, did 5/4/4/2 on the pull ups. Second set was a disaster. 4/3/2/2/1 on the thrusters, 4/4/2/2 on the pull ups. Last round was tough but doable. 3/3/2/1 on thrusters, 3/2/2/2 on the pull ups. Finished in 13:16.
Second:
Lots of abs. Turned my interval timer on my phone for 10 rounds of exercising for 20 seconds and resting for 10 seconds. Did each interval rotating through crunches, left crunches, right crunches, reverse crunches, leg levers, scissors, flutter kicks, side bends, seated V-ups, and supermans. Did the whole 10 round interval program twice.
Third:
Incline dumbbell bench press. Haven't done it in a couple weeks. Started with 70bs, felt good, bumped to 80, then 90, then 95lbs, then dropped back down to 70 to burn out.
Fourth:
Wanted to do a hill workout.
Started with 5min on the Stairmaster
Then ran 800m on the Treadmill with 5.0 incline averaging 8:34/mi pace
Then 25 box jumps
Then another 800m run with the same incline and speed
Another 5min on the Stairmaster
Another 800m run
Another 25 box jumps
And finally one last 800m run.
Left the house a little early so that I could swing by a bank and have a notary public sign off on some forms for job applications. Had to wait a little bit but got everything signed. Got to the gym about 1:15.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
CrossFit 130415
15-12-9 reps:
135lbs Thruster
45lbs Weighted Pull Up
First time on this. It was very difficult. Crossfit normally does thrusters with 45-95lbs, so jumping to 135lbs was not a whole lot of fun. Started with 5/4/3/2/1 on the thrusters, did 5/4/4/2 on the pull ups. Second set was a disaster. 4/3/2/2/1 on the thrusters, 4/4/2/2 on the pull ups. Last round was tough but doable. 3/3/2/1 on thrusters, 3/2/2/2 on the pull ups. Finished in 13:16.
Second:
Lots of abs. Turned my interval timer on my phone for 10 rounds of exercising for 20 seconds and resting for 10 seconds. Did each interval rotating through crunches, left crunches, right crunches, reverse crunches, leg levers, scissors, flutter kicks, side bends, seated V-ups, and supermans. Did the whole 10 round interval program twice.
Third:
Incline dumbbell bench press. Haven't done it in a couple weeks. Started with 70bs, felt good, bumped to 80, then 90, then 95lbs, then dropped back down to 70 to burn out.
Fourth:
Wanted to do a hill workout.
Started with 5min on the Stairmaster
Then ran 800m on the Treadmill with 5.0 incline averaging 8:34/mi pace
Then 25 box jumps
Then another 800m run with the same incline and speed
Another 5min on the Stairmaster
Another 800m run
Another 25 box jumps
And finally one last 800m run.
Saturday, October 26, 2013
Saturday
Got up early (0615) for my weekly group trail run. This would probably be my last long run before my 16km mountain trail race next weekend, so I wanted to make it a tough run.
Met out with the guys at 0700. We're starting the normal lap at 0715 to account for it staying dark later every day. The early group was late coming back so we didn't get started until between 0720 and 0725. I don't know for sure when we started, because I was an idiot and forgot my Garmin GPS watch at home. It was really cold, so I was worried about dressing appropriately and completely forgot my watch. Ah well.
Started....sometime...I guess. It was a staggered start. Some guys left, then a couple minutes later, a few more left, then a few minutes later I left with Rick and a woman I didn't know. We chugged along while Rick and the lady chatted, then Rick mentioned he wanted to start reeling people in, so we reeled in the next group. Chatted with them for a bit, then reeled in the next group. Stayed with them up through the halfway point.
I had been debating what to do to make this a more difficult run, and decided that I would run all of the major hills twice. Seemed like a good idea since next week's race is 10 miles of going up a mountain. So at the top of the first hill, I turned around, jogged back down to the bottom, turned back around and ran back up to the top. Along the way I caught up to a lady who normally runs with us but had started late. So we ran and chatted until we got to the top of the second hill, where I turned around, ran back down, then turned around and ran back up. She was long gone by that point, so I ran up the next hill, turned around, back to the bottom, then back up. That was 3 hills, one more to go. Little bit farther away but legs felt good, so I picked up the pace to get to it. Up, turned around, down, turned around, back up, then turned it up again and finished strong. Thinking I finished maybe around 1:30? I have no idea.
Legs felt great. The first hill was probably .2mi, the second and third were maybe .3mi, and the fourth was probably .2mi.
Now that its several hours later, yea, can definitely feel it in my quads and butt.
Met out with the guys at 0700. We're starting the normal lap at 0715 to account for it staying dark later every day. The early group was late coming back so we didn't get started until between 0720 and 0725. I don't know for sure when we started, because I was an idiot and forgot my Garmin GPS watch at home. It was really cold, so I was worried about dressing appropriately and completely forgot my watch. Ah well.
Started....sometime...I guess. It was a staggered start. Some guys left, then a couple minutes later, a few more left, then a few minutes later I left with Rick and a woman I didn't know. We chugged along while Rick and the lady chatted, then Rick mentioned he wanted to start reeling people in, so we reeled in the next group. Chatted with them for a bit, then reeled in the next group. Stayed with them up through the halfway point.
I had been debating what to do to make this a more difficult run, and decided that I would run all of the major hills twice. Seemed like a good idea since next week's race is 10 miles of going up a mountain. So at the top of the first hill, I turned around, jogged back down to the bottom, turned back around and ran back up to the top. Along the way I caught up to a lady who normally runs with us but had started late. So we ran and chatted until we got to the top of the second hill, where I turned around, ran back down, then turned around and ran back up. She was long gone by that point, so I ran up the next hill, turned around, back to the bottom, then back up. That was 3 hills, one more to go. Little bit farther away but legs felt good, so I picked up the pace to get to it. Up, turned around, down, turned around, back up, then turned it up again and finished strong. Thinking I finished maybe around 1:30? I have no idea.
Legs felt great. The first hill was probably .2mi, the second and third were maybe .3mi, and the fourth was probably .2mi.
Now that its several hours later, yea, can definitely feel it in my quads and butt.
Friday
Legs were sore from yesterday but otherwise everything felt alright.
Another screwy schedule. Had to go back to the security company for one last form, then went to the doctor's office so he could sign off on a medical release for me. Which he only did after giving me a 2min sports physical. Ugh dumb. Finally got to the gym around 2:50.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
SealFit 130301
AMRAP in 30min:
50m Bear crawl
5 Burpee pull ups
50m Walking lunge steps
5 Burpee pull ups
First time trying this one. I wanted to do a wod that had bear crawls in it, since I haven't done them in a little while. I used the basketball court that the gym has, since it was empty (thankfully) and its located right next to the pull up bars. I asked the gym staff how long it was and they didn't know, but said it was "3/4" of the size of a normal basketball court. Sounded close enough to me. So I would bear crawl from one end to the other and back, then do the burpee pull ups, back inside the basketball court for the walking lunges across and back, and then finishing up with the last set of burpee pull ups. Bear crawls went very well. Really only the last round or two where I started to struggle, but I still managed every round unbroken. Same with the burpee pull ups and walking lunges. I used my walking lunges as an estimate for distance. On a football field, they are usually about 1 yard per lunge, which puts it close enough to 1m for my needs. Counted the lunges across and it came out to 21-22 pretty consistently. Checking now what 3/4 the length of a full size court is, and its 21m, so I was spot-on. Finished with 6 full rounds, then I finished the 50m bear crawl, the 5 burpee pull ups, and I was 15m into the walking lunges when the timer sounded.
Second:
Another time strapped day. So I combined abs with flat dumbbell bench press. Started with 80lbs, then did a max rep set of flutter kicks. Then moved up to 85lbs and did a max rep set of seated V-ups. Then moved up to 90lbs and did a max rep set of scissors. Then dropped back down to 85lbs for a final set.
Third:
Wanted to get in a sprint workout. Headed up to the treadmill. Ran 4x400m at 5:17/mi pace, then another 2x400m at 5:04/mi pace. And I did 1:30 recovery between each rep. Legs could definitely feel the lunges and burpees.
Another screwy schedule. Had to go back to the security company for one last form, then went to the doctor's office so he could sign off on a medical release for me. Which he only did after giving me a 2min sports physical. Ugh dumb. Finally got to the gym around 2:50.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
SealFit 130301
AMRAP in 30min:
50m Bear crawl
5 Burpee pull ups
50m Walking lunge steps
5 Burpee pull ups
First time trying this one. I wanted to do a wod that had bear crawls in it, since I haven't done them in a little while. I used the basketball court that the gym has, since it was empty (thankfully) and its located right next to the pull up bars. I asked the gym staff how long it was and they didn't know, but said it was "3/4" of the size of a normal basketball court. Sounded close enough to me. So I would bear crawl from one end to the other and back, then do the burpee pull ups, back inside the basketball court for the walking lunges across and back, and then finishing up with the last set of burpee pull ups. Bear crawls went very well. Really only the last round or two where I started to struggle, but I still managed every round unbroken. Same with the burpee pull ups and walking lunges. I used my walking lunges as an estimate for distance. On a football field, they are usually about 1 yard per lunge, which puts it close enough to 1m for my needs. Counted the lunges across and it came out to 21-22 pretty consistently. Checking now what 3/4 the length of a full size court is, and its 21m, so I was spot-on. Finished with 6 full rounds, then I finished the 50m bear crawl, the 5 burpee pull ups, and I was 15m into the walking lunges when the timer sounded.
Second:
Another time strapped day. So I combined abs with flat dumbbell bench press. Started with 80lbs, then did a max rep set of flutter kicks. Then moved up to 85lbs and did a max rep set of seated V-ups. Then moved up to 90lbs and did a max rep set of scissors. Then dropped back down to 85lbs for a final set.
Third:
Wanted to get in a sprint workout. Headed up to the treadmill. Ran 4x400m at 5:17/mi pace, then another 2x400m at 5:04/mi pace. And I did 1:30 recovery between each rep. Legs could definitely feel the lunges and burpees.
Friday, October 25, 2013
Thursday
Woke up feeling pretty decent, which makes sense since I haven't done anything since Tuesday haha.
Little bit of a screwy schedule today. Went to the DMV to get a driving history for a couple applications I'm going to turn in next week. Then swung by the security company that is trying to hire me to sign some more crap. Got to the gym around 2:50.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up and 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
SealFit 130820
3 Rounds, for time:
Run 800m
5 Rounds:
5 Pull ups
10 Push ups
15 Squats
First time on this workout. Felt pretty good. I can bust out quite a lot of these 5-10-15 rounds. Kept a good pace on the runs, somewhere around 6:42/mi pace. And did all 15 rounds of the exercises unbroken. Got a little delayed (maybe 20sec) before starting the exercises in the 2nd round because a guy was finishing up on the pull up bar. Finished in 23:46.
Second:
Knew I was going to be strapped for time so I combined abs in with shoulders. Started with seated dumbbell shoulder press, a recovery set of balance drills, then as many rounds as possible of 5 reverse crunches and 5 leg levers. I think I did 6 or 7. Then did standing shoulder shrugs, another recovery set of balance drills, then as many rounds as possible of 10 side bends and 10 scissors. I did 5 or 6. Then finished up with the lightweight shoulder range of motion wod.
Third:
It was close to when I wanted to leave so I jumped upstairs and did a single 800m run on the treadmill at 5:46/mi pace. Then immediately went downstairs and did a max rep set of strict pull ups (19).
Little bit of a screwy schedule today. Went to the DMV to get a driving history for a couple applications I'm going to turn in next week. Then swung by the security company that is trying to hire me to sign some more crap. Got to the gym around 2:50.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up and 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
SealFit 130820
3 Rounds, for time:
Run 800m
5 Rounds:
5 Pull ups
10 Push ups
15 Squats
First time on this workout. Felt pretty good. I can bust out quite a lot of these 5-10-15 rounds. Kept a good pace on the runs, somewhere around 6:42/mi pace. And did all 15 rounds of the exercises unbroken. Got a little delayed (maybe 20sec) before starting the exercises in the 2nd round because a guy was finishing up on the pull up bar. Finished in 23:46.
Second:
Knew I was going to be strapped for time so I combined abs in with shoulders. Started with seated dumbbell shoulder press, a recovery set of balance drills, then as many rounds as possible of 5 reverse crunches and 5 leg levers. I think I did 6 or 7. Then did standing shoulder shrugs, another recovery set of balance drills, then as many rounds as possible of 10 side bends and 10 scissors. I did 5 or 6. Then finished up with the lightweight shoulder range of motion wod.
Third:
It was close to when I wanted to leave so I jumped upstairs and did a single 800m run on the treadmill at 5:46/mi pace. Then immediately went downstairs and did a max rep set of strict pull ups (19).
Wednesday, October 23, 2013
Army 10Miler
Headed up to Virginia to run the Army 10Miler race with my brother. Its one of the largest 10 mile races in the world with 35k registrants. Of course, it being a race, only ~27k actually showed up, but whatever.
I stayed the night before at my brother's house since he lives closer to downtown than my parents. Worked out pretty well. Got up at 0600, out the door at 0630, drove 10min over to the nearest Metro stop, maybe a 15min Metro ride to the starting area, then about 45min to warm up and stretch.
It was pretty cold, somewhere in the high 40s, and wouldn't be getting above the mid 50s during the race, so I dressed appropriately. Both sets of calf sleeves, Injiniji toe socks, my Puma flats, running shorts, a long sleeve running shirt, a hat, and my hydration belt with one bottle of watered down Powerade Zero. In the other cup holder I carried my brother's phone, my ID, some money, and my bag of Sport Beans.
We got stuck in the last corral so we didn't start until 0820. Kirt wanted to average somewhere around 8:00/mi. Race started and we took off. And for the next 10 miles, we did a fartlek run. We would sprint for 10m to pass people, then slow down and get stuck behind someone, then pass and sprint another 10m, then slow down. On and on, for 10 miles.
Course was pretty easy. Only a few random small hills, which we passed even more people on. I know its supposed to be scenic because it weaves its way around Arlington and DC, but I don't remember anything other than the Watergate Hotel. Had to focus on not running anyone over or tripping anyone up.
The post race was a bit disappointing. There was water bottles everywhere, so that wasn't a big deal. But if you wanted any sort of food (bananas, bagels, whatever), you had to wait in a huge line. No thanks. We walked the mile or so back to the Metro and went home.
All in all a fun race but I wouldn't ever run it and try to PR. That would be dumb. Unless you are literally in the front elite group, you will be stuck behind people the whole way. But overall, a fun way to spend a Sunday morning.
I stayed the night before at my brother's house since he lives closer to downtown than my parents. Worked out pretty well. Got up at 0600, out the door at 0630, drove 10min over to the nearest Metro stop, maybe a 15min Metro ride to the starting area, then about 45min to warm up and stretch.
It was pretty cold, somewhere in the high 40s, and wouldn't be getting above the mid 50s during the race, so I dressed appropriately. Both sets of calf sleeves, Injiniji toe socks, my Puma flats, running shorts, a long sleeve running shirt, a hat, and my hydration belt with one bottle of watered down Powerade Zero. In the other cup holder I carried my brother's phone, my ID, some money, and my bag of Sport Beans.
We got stuck in the last corral so we didn't start until 0820. Kirt wanted to average somewhere around 8:00/mi. Race started and we took off. And for the next 10 miles, we did a fartlek run. We would sprint for 10m to pass people, then slow down and get stuck behind someone, then pass and sprint another 10m, then slow down. On and on, for 10 miles.
Course was pretty easy. Only a few random small hills, which we passed even more people on. I know its supposed to be scenic because it weaves its way around Arlington and DC, but I don't remember anything other than the Watergate Hotel. Had to focus on not running anyone over or tripping anyone up.
The post race was a bit disappointing. There was water bottles everywhere, so that wasn't a big deal. But if you wanted any sort of food (bananas, bagels, whatever), you had to wait in a huge line. No thanks. We walked the mile or so back to the Metro and went home.
All in all a fun race but I wouldn't ever run it and try to PR. That would be dumb. Unless you are literally in the front elite group, you will be stuck behind people the whole way. But overall, a fun way to spend a Sunday morning.
Thursday
Wanted to get in a last workout before I flew back home to Virginia.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
SealFit 131010
5 Rounds, for time:
20 Pull ups
30 Dips
40 Sit ups
50 Squats
Run 600m
First time. I knew the dips would be tough, and they were very very tough. Easily the most time spent there. I did all 5 rounds of pull ups and sit ups unbroken, pretty happy about that. The squats were a little tough but not bad. And I kept the run at a good ~6:30/mi pace. Finished in 45:29.
Second:
Abs. Erm, I don't exactly remember what it was though.
Third:
Crossfit Test 3
Tabata Squats
After the last 10sec rest, max reps of muscle up in 4min
Final score is the lowest number of squats performed in one round multiplied by the max number of muscle ups performed.
First time on this one. Squats went very well. Averaged 19 or 20 each round. Muscle ups did not go well. No pop, and had trouble kipping. Only managed 15. Final score comes out to 285 (19x15).
Fourth:
Headed up to the treadmill for a short sprint workout. Ran 4x400m with 1:30 rest in between. Kept it on 5:17/mi pace for all four reps. Then because I wanted an even number of miles for the day, I ran 1x200m at 5:04/mi pace.
Wednesday, October 16, 2013
Tuesday
Legs were sore still. Kinda figured that would happen after yesterday's workouts.
Dropped off my medical records from my broken leg (which happened 23 years ago) at the Army recruiting office. Lord only knows why they would care about that. I decided to be snarky and included a picture of all of my race bibs (34 and counting) to help push the point home that my leg is fine. The recruiter got a kick out of it, and I think she's going to send it along to the doctor's office. While she was on the phone, another recruiter sitting at the next desk turned around and looked me up and down, then said "Hm, looks like you probably want to go Special Forces." I laughed and asked him how he knew that. He said that I "had the build for it." Nice.
Headed to the gym after that, getting there about 1:45. Padawan Josh is on fall break from school so he worked out with me the whole day.
5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
SealFit 121019
Tabata Jump Lunges
Rest 1min
Tabata Dips
Rest 1min
Tabata Bear Crawl
Rest 1min
Tabata Sit ups
First time on this one. Tabata is a type of interval workout where you do 8 rounds of 20 seconds of work followed by 10 seconds of rest. The first few rounds are usually easy, the last several are not. Because there isn't really a goal or anything to shoot for, I think this is more of an effort based workout, than a numbers based. The jump lunges were tough, I went unbroken for them up to the last couple rounds where I had to take a break around 15sec before getting the last few reps. Dips were hard after the first round. Bear crawls were hard after the second round. That's a lot of shoulder, arm and back immediately after doing dips. And then sit ups were easy at the end.
Second:
Runner's core workout. This was the first time Padawan Josh had done this. He complained of the same issues I did the first couple times I did it. I think that just shows that it is a good workout and it challenges the muscles that runners often ignore.
Third:
CrossFit Test 1
Find your 1 rep max (1RM) on flat bench press.
Within 30sec of finding 1RM, do max reps pull ups.
First time trying this. Its from a series of "tests" that CF put out a while ago to judge someone's overall fitness. You score it by multiplying the total weight from your 1RM by the number of pull ups you do. They have a chart for figuring out how you did. Padawan Josh worked up to benching 225 and did 23 pull ups, I worked up to benching 235 and did 30 pull ups. I'm sure both of us could lift more if we were rested. Our shoulders and arms were still pretty burnt from the dips and bear crawls.
Fourth:
Padawan Josh wanted to do some more stuff. So he did sets of 45lbs weighted pull ups while I did my switch grip pull up workout counting from 5-4-3-2-1. Then moved to the dip bars and we both did weighted dips with 45lbs. I did 15, 10, then 8.
Fifth:
Padawan Josh said he wanted to run with me so we changed and headed over to the soccer fields. Ran the usual 4 laps totaling 1.49mi at a decent pace. Then did the back and forth form drills.
Tuesday, October 15, 2013
Monday
Had to get up a little early to take a 4hr training class for a new temporary job I'm getting. Didn't know if I would have time for the gym, but turned out I would. Got to the gym a little later than I normally do, around 2:00.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
CrossFit 130929
21-18-15-12-9-6-3 reps:
Walking Lunge Steps
95lbs Thruster
Pull ups
Knees to Elbows
First time trying this one. It started out rough but thankfully because of the decreasing number of reps per round, it get better, sortof. The second round was awful, 18 reps of 95lbs thruster just wouldn't end. Lunges were easy start to finish. Had the most issues with thrusters straight into pull ups straight into hanging knees to elbows. My grip and shoulders were just torched. Finished in 24:51.
Second:
Abs. Just did some random stuff. Lots of leg levers, lots of these new crunch things that I don't know the name of, then a bunch of flutter kicks, leg levers, and scissors with a 45lbs plate resting on my chest. Nothing makes ab exercises more fun like having restricted breathing.
Third:
Incline dumbbell bench press. Started with 65lbs, felt really good, bumped to 75lbs, felt really good, bumped to 85lbs, ehhh not so good. Then just to see if it was possible, tried 90lbs and got a few reps. Then dropped back down to 60lbs and maxed out.
Fourth:
Hill repeat day. Got onto the treadmill and did 4 rounds of the following:
Run 400m on incline 6.0 (1.0 higher than previous) and speed 7.0
10 Squat jumps
20 Calf raises
10 Squat jumps
Pretty tough. Legs were definitely feeling all of the thrusters and lunges from before. I was thinking its probably good to mix up the length of hill repeats between steep but short 400s and less steep but longer 800s.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
CrossFit 130929
21-18-15-12-9-6-3 reps:
Walking Lunge Steps
95lbs Thruster
Pull ups
Knees to Elbows
First time trying this one. It started out rough but thankfully because of the decreasing number of reps per round, it get better, sortof. The second round was awful, 18 reps of 95lbs thruster just wouldn't end. Lunges were easy start to finish. Had the most issues with thrusters straight into pull ups straight into hanging knees to elbows. My grip and shoulders were just torched. Finished in 24:51.
Second:
Abs. Just did some random stuff. Lots of leg levers, lots of these new crunch things that I don't know the name of, then a bunch of flutter kicks, leg levers, and scissors with a 45lbs plate resting on my chest. Nothing makes ab exercises more fun like having restricted breathing.
Third:
Incline dumbbell bench press. Started with 65lbs, felt really good, bumped to 75lbs, felt really good, bumped to 85lbs, ehhh not so good. Then just to see if it was possible, tried 90lbs and got a few reps. Then dropped back down to 60lbs and maxed out.
Fourth:
Hill repeat day. Got onto the treadmill and did 4 rounds of the following:
Run 400m on incline 6.0 (1.0 higher than previous) and speed 7.0
10 Squat jumps
20 Calf raises
10 Squat jumps
Pretty tough. Legs were definitely feeling all of the thrusters and lunges from before. I was thinking its probably good to mix up the length of hill repeats between steep but short 400s and less steep but longer 800s.
Sunday, October 13, 2013
Saturday
Legs felt a bit sore from all the burpees and squat jumps yesterday. Should make a long trail run much more enjoyable.
I had a concealed weapons permit class starting at 0900 so I knew I wouldn't be able to start my run at the normal time and have enough time to eat, get cleaned up, and get to the class early. Asked the group and Kyle said he would be willing to meet with me early for a long headlamp lap. That mean getting up at 0430 so I could meet Kyle at 0520. Started our run about 0530. It was dark enough that we had to use our headlamps the entire run. Had a few sketchy moments where we slightly veered off the trail, but otherwise it went fine. I wanted to make it longer than a normal outer loop, which Kyle was good with, so we took two turns onto bike paths which added difficulty and length, and then took a separate trail called the Bluffs to add some more. Totaled around 10mi and we finished it in 1:35.
Because I was in the class the rest of the day, I couldn't do any other exercises. I did dominate the written and shooting tests at the end. 98/100 on the written test and 100/100 on the shooting with a pretty damned good keyhole group in the bulls eye.
I had a concealed weapons permit class starting at 0900 so I knew I wouldn't be able to start my run at the normal time and have enough time to eat, get cleaned up, and get to the class early. Asked the group and Kyle said he would be willing to meet with me early for a long headlamp lap. That mean getting up at 0430 so I could meet Kyle at 0520. Started our run about 0530. It was dark enough that we had to use our headlamps the entire run. Had a few sketchy moments where we slightly veered off the trail, but otherwise it went fine. I wanted to make it longer than a normal outer loop, which Kyle was good with, so we took two turns onto bike paths which added difficulty and length, and then took a separate trail called the Bluffs to add some more. Totaled around 10mi and we finished it in 1:35.
Because I was in the class the rest of the day, I couldn't do any other exercises. I did dominate the written and shooting tests at the end. 98/100 on the written test and 100/100 on the shooting with a pretty damned good keyhole group in the bulls eye.
Saturday, October 12, 2013
Friday
Woke up feeling alright. Nothing overly sore.
Got to the gym a little earlier at 1:30 and met up with Padawan Josh.
5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
SealFit Oreo
AMRAP in 30min:
5 Pull ups
10 Burpees
15 Squat Jumps
First time trying this. Pretty difficult just because of how long it is. And when you consider that every burpee has a squat jump in it, that means you're doing 25 squat jumps per round. Obviously that would be where we had the most issues. Got through 7 or 8 rounds before I started having to break the squat jumps up into 10/5. Took until 10 or 11 rounds before I had to break up the burpees into 6/4. And I did every round of pull ups unbroken. Finished with 16 total rounds. Which totaled 80 pull ups, 160 burpees, and 240 squat jumps.
Second:
Abs. Padawan Josh opted to do Tabata over just sets, so we did Tabata flutterkicks first, recovered for a few minutes, then did Tabata reverse crunches.
Third:
Padawan Josh needed to head to work soon so I rearranged the schedule to have us running next. Headed up to the treadmills. He hadn't run sprint intervals in a long time, so to test we ran 400m on speed 10. It was easy for me, and he probably should have stayed on 10, but said he could bump it up faster. So we ended up running 6 more 400s. He stayed on 11 for the rest. I did 11 for the first two, then 11.5 for the next 2, then 12 for the final 2 reps.
Fourth:
He took off for work. I got the weight belt from the front desk and hung a 45lbs plate from it. Then did 5 rounds of max rep dead hang pull ups followed by max rep dips.
Got to the gym a little earlier at 1:30 and met up with Padawan Josh.
5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
SealFit Oreo
AMRAP in 30min:
5 Pull ups
10 Burpees
15 Squat Jumps
First time trying this. Pretty difficult just because of how long it is. And when you consider that every burpee has a squat jump in it, that means you're doing 25 squat jumps per round. Obviously that would be where we had the most issues. Got through 7 or 8 rounds before I started having to break the squat jumps up into 10/5. Took until 10 or 11 rounds before I had to break up the burpees into 6/4. And I did every round of pull ups unbroken. Finished with 16 total rounds. Which totaled 80 pull ups, 160 burpees, and 240 squat jumps.
Second:
Abs. Padawan Josh opted to do Tabata over just sets, so we did Tabata flutterkicks first, recovered for a few minutes, then did Tabata reverse crunches.
Third:
Padawan Josh needed to head to work soon so I rearranged the schedule to have us running next. Headed up to the treadmills. He hadn't run sprint intervals in a long time, so to test we ran 400m on speed 10. It was easy for me, and he probably should have stayed on 10, but said he could bump it up faster. So we ended up running 6 more 400s. He stayed on 11 for the rest. I did 11 for the first two, then 11.5 for the next 2, then 12 for the final 2 reps.
Fourth:
He took off for work. I got the weight belt from the front desk and hung a 45lbs plate from it. Then did 5 rounds of max rep dead hang pull ups followed by max rep dips.
Friday, October 11, 2013
Thursday
Back and arms were a little sore this morning, otherwise everything felt alright. Left elbow is still improving. Left shin still bothers me from time to time.
Got to the gym around 1:45.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
Another weird day. Wanted this to be the sort of stuff I normally do on Wednesdays. Started with 20:00 of hard effort on the Stairmaster, starting on level 8 and bumping to level 9 at the halfway point.
The plan was to finish and then immediately get on the rower and row 1km. But, naturally, with only a few minutes left to go on the Stairmaster, an older guy gets onto the rower and sits on it for 30min. This meant that after I finished my 20:00, I stood around looking impatient for a while before he finished and I could get on it.
Second:
Rowed 1km on 10/10 resistance. Pretty tough, as my legs were already gassed. First 500m was somewhere around 1:45, but then I slowed down quite a bit. Finished in 3:38, which isn't terrible, but not really near my PR of low 3:30s.
Third:
Back onto the Stairmaster for another 20:00. Again, started on level 8 and bumped to level 9 at the halfway point.
Fourth:
Changed into my VFF and headed over to the soccer fields. Ran 4 laps around the big field, which totaled about 1.48mi. Good pace too, something like 6:04/mi. Recovered for a few minutes, then did my form drills back and forth across a soccer field. In case I haven't mentioned what my form drills are, they are just drills that help reinforce good running form or work muscles that help with good running form. Its stuff that most people have either done when they were kids before soccer/football/basketball games, or seen college or pro athletes do before games. Butt kicks, high knees, jogging backwards, lateral bounding to each side, and forward bounding.
Got to the gym around 1:45.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
Another weird day. Wanted this to be the sort of stuff I normally do on Wednesdays. Started with 20:00 of hard effort on the Stairmaster, starting on level 8 and bumping to level 9 at the halfway point.
The plan was to finish and then immediately get on the rower and row 1km. But, naturally, with only a few minutes left to go on the Stairmaster, an older guy gets onto the rower and sits on it for 30min. This meant that after I finished my 20:00, I stood around looking impatient for a while before he finished and I could get on it.
Second:
Rowed 1km on 10/10 resistance. Pretty tough, as my legs were already gassed. First 500m was somewhere around 1:45, but then I slowed down quite a bit. Finished in 3:38, which isn't terrible, but not really near my PR of low 3:30s.
Third:
Back onto the Stairmaster for another 20:00. Again, started on level 8 and bumped to level 9 at the halfway point.
Fourth:
Changed into my VFF and headed over to the soccer fields. Ran 4 laps around the big field, which totaled about 1.48mi. Good pace too, something like 6:04/mi. Recovered for a few minutes, then did my form drills back and forth across a soccer field. In case I haven't mentioned what my form drills are, they are just drills that help reinforce good running form or work muscles that help with good running form. Its stuff that most people have either done when they were kids before soccer/football/basketball games, or seen college or pro athletes do before games. Butt kicks, high knees, jogging backwards, lateral bounding to each side, and forward bounding.
Thursday, October 10, 2013
Wednesday
Normally this is a "do other things kind of day," but since I was busy all day yesterday I decided to switch around the schedule a bit.
Woke up feeling decent. Left elbow felt good. Left shin still bothers me a little.
Got to the gym a little late after talking with my neighbors. Think I got there at 2:30ish.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
Unknown 007 (Running Angie)
4 Rounds, for time:
Run 400m
25 Pull ups
25 Push ups
25 Sit ups
25 Squats
First time trying this one. Its basically just the Crossfit wod "Angie" separated into 4 parts with a 400m run before each. Kept a good quick pace for each of the 400s. I think it was around 6:34/mile pace. Did the first 2 sets of pull ups unbroken, but had to break up the last 2. Did the first 3 sets of push ups unbroken, broke up the fourth. And did all four sets of sit ups and squats unbroken. Decently tough wod. Finished in 22:09.
Second:
The running core WOD. Felt really easy today. I think I may bump it to 1min per exercise for 2 rounds.
Third:
Flat dumbbell bench press. Started a little higher than usual with 85lbs, then 90, then 95, then back down to 80 for a burn out. Felt good.
Fourth:
Did this pull up wod that I thought up. I would do 5 regular grip pull ups, then switch to one hand being regular and the other being reverse for 5 pull ups, then flip flop them for 5 pull ups, then have both of them be reverse for 5 pull ups. Then repeated but doing 4 with each grip, then 3, 2, and 1. Had to hang onto the bar the whole time, so it burns your grip. I followed up each set with 15 hand release push ups and 30 calf raises.
Fifth:
And just because why not, max rep bar muscle ups. Which wasn't very many because my arms and shoulders were dead.
Woke up feeling decent. Left elbow felt good. Left shin still bothers me a little.
Got to the gym a little late after talking with my neighbors. Think I got there at 2:30ish.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
Unknown 007 (Running Angie)
4 Rounds, for time:
Run 400m
25 Pull ups
25 Push ups
25 Sit ups
25 Squats
First time trying this one. Its basically just the Crossfit wod "Angie" separated into 4 parts with a 400m run before each. Kept a good quick pace for each of the 400s. I think it was around 6:34/mile pace. Did the first 2 sets of pull ups unbroken, but had to break up the last 2. Did the first 3 sets of push ups unbroken, broke up the fourth. And did all four sets of sit ups and squats unbroken. Decently tough wod. Finished in 22:09.
Second:
The running core WOD. Felt really easy today. I think I may bump it to 1min per exercise for 2 rounds.
Third:
Flat dumbbell bench press. Started a little higher than usual with 85lbs, then 90, then 95, then back down to 80 for a burn out. Felt good.
Fourth:
Did this pull up wod that I thought up. I would do 5 regular grip pull ups, then switch to one hand being regular and the other being reverse for 5 pull ups, then flip flop them for 5 pull ups, then have both of them be reverse for 5 pull ups. Then repeated but doing 4 with each grip, then 3, 2, and 1. Had to hang onto the bar the whole time, so it burns your grip. I followed up each set with 15 hand release push ups and 30 calf raises.
Fifth:
And just because why not, max rep bar muscle ups. Which wasn't very many because my arms and shoulders were dead.
Wednesday, October 9, 2013
Monday
Little bit of a screwy schedule today. I was running around all morning dropping off paperwork for a job. Ended up getting to the gym a little later than usual, somewhere around 2:00.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
Unknown 003
21-15-9 reps:
Pull ups
Burpees
First time trying this one. It was called "Body Weight Fran," since it sortof resembled a popular Crossfit wod called "Fran." Did all 3 sets of pull ups unbroken, pretty happy about that. Had to break the burpees up a bit. I think it was something like 16/6, 10/5, and then 9. Out of breath, but not a whole lot of muscular soreness afterwards. Finished in 4:10
Second:
Abs. While on my back, I held a 45lbs plate over me, then did 5 rounds of 50 flutter kicks and 5 rounds of 50 scissors.
Third:
Things got a little wonky here. Started with shoulder shrugs (which felt really good again), then a set of balance and agility drills. Just as I was finishing those, Padawan Josh walks in. So we chat for a few minutes, and he asks me to time him on the wod I did earlier, but he needed a few minutes to get ready. So I did a max set of decline sit ups, then a max set of seated V-ups, then the shoulder range of motion wod. He finally comes out, I time him while he does the wod. Give him a few minutes to recover, then he joins me for the rest of my schedule.
Finished up with seated dumbbell shoulder press.
Fourth:
Headed upstairs with Padawan Josh to the treadmills because I wanted to do those hill repeats again. Ended up doing 3 rounds of:
Run 800m, 5.0 incline, speed 7.0
10 squat jumps
20 calf raises
10 squat jumps
Then a 4th round:
Run 800m, 5.0 incline, started with speed 7.5, then bumped to 8.0 at halfway point
10 squat jumps
20 calf raises
10 squat jumps
Felt great again. I think the next time I do these, I'll start with speed 7.5 or 8.0. It still felt decently manageable. May try seeing what higher inclines feel like.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
Unknown 003
21-15-9 reps:
Pull ups
Burpees
First time trying this one. It was called "Body Weight Fran," since it sortof resembled a popular Crossfit wod called "Fran." Did all 3 sets of pull ups unbroken, pretty happy about that. Had to break the burpees up a bit. I think it was something like 16/6, 10/5, and then 9. Out of breath, but not a whole lot of muscular soreness afterwards. Finished in 4:10
Second:
Abs. While on my back, I held a 45lbs plate over me, then did 5 rounds of 50 flutter kicks and 5 rounds of 50 scissors.
Third:
Things got a little wonky here. Started with shoulder shrugs (which felt really good again), then a set of balance and agility drills. Just as I was finishing those, Padawan Josh walks in. So we chat for a few minutes, and he asks me to time him on the wod I did earlier, but he needed a few minutes to get ready. So I did a max set of decline sit ups, then a max set of seated V-ups, then the shoulder range of motion wod. He finally comes out, I time him while he does the wod. Give him a few minutes to recover, then he joins me for the rest of my schedule.
Finished up with seated dumbbell shoulder press.
Fourth:
Headed upstairs with Padawan Josh to the treadmills because I wanted to do those hill repeats again. Ended up doing 3 rounds of:
Run 800m, 5.0 incline, speed 7.0
10 squat jumps
20 calf raises
10 squat jumps
Then a 4th round:
Run 800m, 5.0 incline, started with speed 7.5, then bumped to 8.0 at halfway point
10 squat jumps
20 calf raises
10 squat jumps
Felt great again. I think the next time I do these, I'll start with speed 7.5 or 8.0. It still felt decently manageable. May try seeing what higher inclines feel like.
Sunday, October 6, 2013
Saturday
Arms and shoulders were a bit sore. Legs felt good though.
Got up at 0600 to do my long trail run. Met up with the group at Harbison Forest at 0650 and we started at 0700. Not too many people out this morning, and none of the usual fast guys. Started with two of our lady runners in front, which was different for them. They are normally towards the back of the pack but I think they enjoyed being out front this time. I stayed with them, with 4 or 5 guys behind me, up to the halfway point where the ladies turned off to do a longer section and the guys and I kept going on the regular loop. They were behind me, but I knew I would be adding on some extra stuff and I wanted to try and finish around the same time as them so I picked it up. Took what we call the 2nd bike path to add on a difficult .25mi. Since the other guys took the shorter route, they were in front of me when I got back on the main trail, but only just. So I took off past them again, then turned on another section to add on .5mi. Couldn't catch back up to them, even though I was cooking it. Still only finished behind them by maybe 1min. Finished in 1:25, a little slower than last week on the same route, but I think it was because I was following the slower ladies for the first half this week.
After getting home and eating and doing my normal morning routine, I did 4 rounds of 25 squats and 25 push ups.
Got up at 0600 to do my long trail run. Met up with the group at Harbison Forest at 0650 and we started at 0700. Not too many people out this morning, and none of the usual fast guys. Started with two of our lady runners in front, which was different for them. They are normally towards the back of the pack but I think they enjoyed being out front this time. I stayed with them, with 4 or 5 guys behind me, up to the halfway point where the ladies turned off to do a longer section and the guys and I kept going on the regular loop. They were behind me, but I knew I would be adding on some extra stuff and I wanted to try and finish around the same time as them so I picked it up. Took what we call the 2nd bike path to add on a difficult .25mi. Since the other guys took the shorter route, they were in front of me when I got back on the main trail, but only just. So I took off past them again, then turned on another section to add on .5mi. Couldn't catch back up to them, even though I was cooking it. Still only finished behind them by maybe 1min. Finished in 1:25, a little slower than last week on the same route, but I think it was because I was following the slower ladies for the first half this week.
After getting home and eating and doing my normal morning routine, I did 4 rounds of 25 squats and 25 push ups.
Friday, October 4, 2013
Friday
Arms and shoulders were a little sore this morning.
Got to the gym at 1:45.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 stretching and foam rolling.
First:
Unknown 053
AMRAP in 20min:
10 Pull ups
10 Ring dips
10 Walking lunge steps
First time trying this one. I couldn't remember if I've explained what AMRAP means, but its "as many rounds as possible." Brought my gymnastic rings to the gym and set them up on the support beam of a Smith Machine. I had maybe a 50ft walk between it and the pull up bar, so there was a delay there each time. Pull ups went great though. Did all rounds unbroken. Ring dips started well, got through 3 rounds unbroken and then in the fourth it started to suck. Walking lunges were easy start to finish. Finished with 11 complete rounds done in 20min.
Second:
Runner's core wod. Went pretty well, although my shoulders were a bit sore still from the previous wod, so the planks weren't fun.
Third:
Incline dumbbell bench press. Started with 65lbs, then 75, then 85, then dropped back down to 60 for a burnout.
Fourth:
I did the Sally Squats wod with just bodyweight. Ugh, got all the way through but it sucked. I can definitely see how doing it with any weight would be awful. Going to have to try that another day.
Fifth:
A little bit of a delay after the Sally Squats wod to talk to a friend driving to Atlanta. But then I did standing barbell military press. Started with 70lbs, then 80, 90, 100, then back down to 60 for a burnout.
Sixth:
Time for a run. Got on the treadmill and ran 6 x 400m with a 1.0 incline. First two repeats were at 5:46/mi pace, next two were at 5:31/mi pace, and the last two were at 5:17/mi pace.
Got to the gym at 1:45.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 stretching and foam rolling.
First:
Unknown 053
AMRAP in 20min:
10 Pull ups
10 Ring dips
10 Walking lunge steps
First time trying this one. I couldn't remember if I've explained what AMRAP means, but its "as many rounds as possible." Brought my gymnastic rings to the gym and set them up on the support beam of a Smith Machine. I had maybe a 50ft walk between it and the pull up bar, so there was a delay there each time. Pull ups went great though. Did all rounds unbroken. Ring dips started well, got through 3 rounds unbroken and then in the fourth it started to suck. Walking lunges were easy start to finish. Finished with 11 complete rounds done in 20min.
Second:
Runner's core wod. Went pretty well, although my shoulders were a bit sore still from the previous wod, so the planks weren't fun.
Third:
Incline dumbbell bench press. Started with 65lbs, then 75, then 85, then dropped back down to 60 for a burnout.
Fourth:
I did the Sally Squats wod with just bodyweight. Ugh, got all the way through but it sucked. I can definitely see how doing it with any weight would be awful. Going to have to try that another day.
Fifth:
A little bit of a delay after the Sally Squats wod to talk to a friend driving to Atlanta. But then I did standing barbell military press. Started with 70lbs, then 80, 90, 100, then back down to 60 for a burnout.
Sixth:
Time for a run. Got on the treadmill and ran 6 x 400m with a 1.0 incline. First two repeats were at 5:46/mi pace, next two were at 5:31/mi pace, and the last two were at 5:17/mi pace.
Thursday, October 3, 2013
Thursday
Legs were a little sore this morning, but not too bad. Everything else feels alright. Still nursing my left elbow and left shin.
Got to the gym at the usual 1:45.
5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
SealFit 130930
21-18-15-12-9-6-3 reps:
24in Box Jumps
Pull ups
Sit ups holding 45lbs
First time trying this one. Always good to have some box jumps now and then. A lot of runners neglect that sort of exercise. Anyways, most of it went well. I had to break the box jumps into groups. I just don't have a ton of stamina in those. I did every set of pull ups and sit ups unbroken though. Happy about that. Finished in 16:45.
Second:
Abs. Did a bunch of scissors, flutter kicks, seated V-ups, and these new crunch things.
Third:
Tried a new wod. There's a song that came out a few years ago from Moby called "Flower." Its not that hard to Youtube search for it, its a pretty recognizable song. You can adapt any exercise to it. The song repeats the phrases "bring sally up" and "bring sally down" over and over again. You just follow the lyrics, when it says up, you go up, when it says down, you go down. I tried it today with push ups. Oh holy crap it sucked. I got halfway through the song before I couldn't hold myself off the ground in the down position. I finished the song doing the up and down at the right times, but I just couldn't hold myself off the deck anymore. May try it again tomorrow with squats.
Fourth:
Weighted pull ups and dips. Definitely haven't done these in a long time, mainly because of my elbow hurting. It was feeling alright today though so I thought I'd try and see what would happen. Did 5 rounds of 5 strict pull ups with a 45lbs weight, maybe 1-2min of recovery inbetween. Then moved over to the dip bars and did 5 rounds of 5 dips with a 45lbs weight, another 1-2min of recovery inbetween. Elbow started to hurt a little during the dips, but overall not bad at all.
Fifth:
Another work out geared towards helping me run up mountains.
4 rounds
Run 800m, 5.0 incline, speed 7.0
10 squat jumps
20 calf raises
10 squat jumps
Haven't ever run on a treadmill with an incline like that. Felt weird at first, like I was going to fall off the back. Just tried to relax and pretend I was running up a hill in the forest. Short steps, good arm swing, head and chest up, blah blah. Sweating pretty good by the end. Felt like a good leg work out.
Got to the gym at the usual 1:45.
5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
SealFit 130930
21-18-15-12-9-6-3 reps:
24in Box Jumps
Pull ups
Sit ups holding 45lbs
First time trying this one. Always good to have some box jumps now and then. A lot of runners neglect that sort of exercise. Anyways, most of it went well. I had to break the box jumps into groups. I just don't have a ton of stamina in those. I did every set of pull ups and sit ups unbroken though. Happy about that. Finished in 16:45.
Second:
Abs. Did a bunch of scissors, flutter kicks, seated V-ups, and these new crunch things.
Third:
Tried a new wod. There's a song that came out a few years ago from Moby called "Flower." Its not that hard to Youtube search for it, its a pretty recognizable song. You can adapt any exercise to it. The song repeats the phrases "bring sally up" and "bring sally down" over and over again. You just follow the lyrics, when it says up, you go up, when it says down, you go down. I tried it today with push ups. Oh holy crap it sucked. I got halfway through the song before I couldn't hold myself off the ground in the down position. I finished the song doing the up and down at the right times, but I just couldn't hold myself off the deck anymore. May try it again tomorrow with squats.
Fourth:
Weighted pull ups and dips. Definitely haven't done these in a long time, mainly because of my elbow hurting. It was feeling alright today though so I thought I'd try and see what would happen. Did 5 rounds of 5 strict pull ups with a 45lbs weight, maybe 1-2min of recovery inbetween. Then moved over to the dip bars and did 5 rounds of 5 dips with a 45lbs weight, another 1-2min of recovery inbetween. Elbow started to hurt a little during the dips, but overall not bad at all.
Fifth:
Another work out geared towards helping me run up mountains.
4 rounds
Run 800m, 5.0 incline, speed 7.0
10 squat jumps
20 calf raises
10 squat jumps
Haven't ever run on a treadmill with an incline like that. Felt weird at first, like I was going to fall off the back. Just tried to relax and pretend I was running up a hill in the forest. Short steps, good arm swing, head and chest up, blah blah. Sweating pretty good by the end. Felt like a good leg work out.
Wednesday, October 2, 2013
Wednesday
Josh called me a couple days ago asking if I'd run an outer loop with him at the forest Wednesday morning. He's trying to build his endurance back up. I agreed because why not haha.
Got up at 0615 and met Josh at the front parking lot at 0715. Beautiful weather, I think it was 60* with the sun just barely coming up. Unfortunately I think we were the first people on the trail, because for the first 40 minutes, we were just constantly eating spiderwebs. A little over halfway, a couple cyclists passed us going in the opposite direction, and they seemed to have taken down most of the webs for that side. Tried to let Josh set the pace for the majority of it. Once we got to maybe 1.5mi remaining, I turned it up a little to make Josh work for it. He kept up and we finished in 1:19:53.
Went home, ate breakfast, did my usual morning routine. Then because I'm dumb I decided it would be a good idea to go to the gym for more suffering. Got the gym around the usual 1:45.
5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
Wanted to try something different, so I did 5 rounds of 2min on a Stairmaster at a hard pace followed by 1min on the rower with 10/10 resistance and going max effort. My max effort on the rower was not great haha. The first round was maybe 1:39/500m pace, then it dropped to 1:41/500m, then stayed around 1:43/500m for the remainder. Really tough on my legs. I was sweating buckets and out of breath by the end.
Second:
Changed into my swimsuit. Jumped into the pool and did 5:00 of stretching. Then into the hot tub for 5:00. Then back into the pool and treaded water for 30:00. It was going well until an older man started to swim laps in the same lane as me, so every 30 seconds I would have to hold my breath as his splashing and wake washed over me. After that, back in the hot tub for 5:00, then changed and headed home. Can already tell my legs will be sore tomorrow.
Got up at 0615 and met Josh at the front parking lot at 0715. Beautiful weather, I think it was 60* with the sun just barely coming up. Unfortunately I think we were the first people on the trail, because for the first 40 minutes, we were just constantly eating spiderwebs. A little over halfway, a couple cyclists passed us going in the opposite direction, and they seemed to have taken down most of the webs for that side. Tried to let Josh set the pace for the majority of it. Once we got to maybe 1.5mi remaining, I turned it up a little to make Josh work for it. He kept up and we finished in 1:19:53.
Went home, ate breakfast, did my usual morning routine. Then because I'm dumb I decided it would be a good idea to go to the gym for more suffering. Got the gym around the usual 1:45.
5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
Wanted to try something different, so I did 5 rounds of 2min on a Stairmaster at a hard pace followed by 1min on the rower with 10/10 resistance and going max effort. My max effort on the rower was not great haha. The first round was maybe 1:39/500m pace, then it dropped to 1:41/500m, then stayed around 1:43/500m for the remainder. Really tough on my legs. I was sweating buckets and out of breath by the end.
Second:
Changed into my swimsuit. Jumped into the pool and did 5:00 of stretching. Then into the hot tub for 5:00. Then back into the pool and treaded water for 30:00. It was going well until an older man started to swim laps in the same lane as me, so every 30 seconds I would have to hold my breath as his splashing and wake washed over me. After that, back in the hot tub for 5:00, then changed and headed home. Can already tell my legs will be sore tomorrow.
Monday
Shoulders and upper back were a little sore this morning. More than likely from the shoulder work out yesterday. Legs felt good though. Got to the gym around the usual time, something like 1:45.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance followed by 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
Unknown 025
4 Rounds, for time:
50 Squats
5 Muscle ups
First time trying this one. Figured I could do the muscle ups unbroken, but I knew I'd have to break up the squats. Started with 40/10, then 30/20, then 25/13/12, then the last one was crap, something like 20/10/8/6/6. Elbow felt good the whole way through the muscle ups though. Finished in 6:43.
Second:
Did the runner's core wod. Planks are getting easier I think.
Third:
Flat dumbbell benchpress. Started with 80lbs DBs, then bumped to 90, then 100. Tried with 105 and got stuck halfway. Then dropped back down to 80 for a burn out set.
Fourth:
Changed into my VFF and headed over to the soccer fields for a barefoot work out. Ran on the grass about 1.5mi then did a series of barefoot running form drills.
Tuesday, October 1, 2013
Monday
Woke up feeling pretty decent. Still nursing my left elbow and left shin though.
Had to move my gym time back a few minutes so I could walk my friend's new puppy. Ended up getting to the gym around 2:00.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance, with 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
SealFit 130909
2 Rounds:
Run 400m
Max Push ups in 2:00
Run 400m
Max Sit ups in 2:00
Run 400m
Max Strict pull ups
First time trying this one. Went pretty well I though. Kept a good quick pace on the treadmill, which was nice since I have done sprints in a long time. I think my runs were all at 6:22/mi pace. The exercises were tough to do after running hard for a 400. For push ups, I did 83 the first round and 66 the second. For sit ups, I did 93 and 80. And for pull ups I did 21 and 19. Tough to go straight from max push ups into hard running. Arms don't really want to work correctly.
Second:
Abs. Did 100 reverse crunches, 100 side bends, 100 scissors, and a max set of seated V-ups (40).
Third:
Shoulders. Haven't done shoulders in a couple weeks, and it felt like it, ugh. Started with seated dumbbell shoulder press. Just no energy in my arms. Had to stick with the starting weight and even then could barely finish. Did a recovery set of balance drills, then did shoulder shrugs with plates. Thought it would go as bad as shoulder press but it surprisingly felt great. Probably the best its felt in a long time. Not really sure how or why. Did another set of balance drills, and then did the lightweight shoulder range of motion wod.
Fourth:
And just because I wanted to burn out, I did one round of the leg blaster wod (20 squats, 20 lunges, 20 jump lunges, and 10 jump squats). Then headed to the pull up bar and did 10 strict pull ups with a knees-to-chest after each pull up.
Had to move my gym time back a few minutes so I could walk my friend's new puppy. Ended up getting to the gym around 2:00.
Usual 5:00 rowing warm up on 10/10 resistance, with 10:00 of stretching and foam rolling.
First:
SealFit 130909
2 Rounds:
Run 400m
Max Push ups in 2:00
Run 400m
Max Sit ups in 2:00
Run 400m
Max Strict pull ups
First time trying this one. Went pretty well I though. Kept a good quick pace on the treadmill, which was nice since I have done sprints in a long time. I think my runs were all at 6:22/mi pace. The exercises were tough to do after running hard for a 400. For push ups, I did 83 the first round and 66 the second. For sit ups, I did 93 and 80. And for pull ups I did 21 and 19. Tough to go straight from max push ups into hard running. Arms don't really want to work correctly.
Second:
Abs. Did 100 reverse crunches, 100 side bends, 100 scissors, and a max set of seated V-ups (40).
Third:
Shoulders. Haven't done shoulders in a couple weeks, and it felt like it, ugh. Started with seated dumbbell shoulder press. Just no energy in my arms. Had to stick with the starting weight and even then could barely finish. Did a recovery set of balance drills, then did shoulder shrugs with plates. Thought it would go as bad as shoulder press but it surprisingly felt great. Probably the best its felt in a long time. Not really sure how or why. Did another set of balance drills, and then did the lightweight shoulder range of motion wod.
Fourth:
And just because I wanted to burn out, I did one round of the leg blaster wod (20 squats, 20 lunges, 20 jump lunges, and 10 jump squats). Then headed to the pull up bar and did 10 strict pull ups with a knees-to-chest after each pull up.
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