Monday, April 06, 2009
Warm-up:
800m run
3x:
5 pull-ups
10 wall squats
15 sit-ups

Workout:
“The Chief”
Five 3 minute Rounds
Each round is AMRAP:
3 power cleans (45# - all I had, so yeah, it was light)
6 push ups
9 squats

4,4,4,4,4

Sunday, April 05, 2009
800m run
10 push-ups

Ugh!  I’m waaayyy behind on my posting!  Must…get…caught…up…

Monday, March 30, 2009
Warm-up:
800m run
Bergener warm-up

Workout (45# bar):
10x:
1 power clean
2 front squats
3 shoulder presses
4 back squats

31 rounds

I last did this on 5/21/08 using 35# and completed 19 reps.  This was a nice improvement, particularly considering that it is HOT and HUMID here.  (This is actually the hottest time of the year in Belize.)  Fortunately, I had an audience, which helped motivate me – a large treefrog hopped over and watched me unblinkingly throughout the entire workout, then left once I was finished.  Perhaps he likes heavy metal music?

Thursday, March 26, 2009
Warm-up 3x:
10 walking lunges
10 lateral lunges
10 shoulder press
10 OH squat

Workout:
6 rounds for time:
20 push-ups
25 kb swings (16 kg)
30 air squats

Time:  24:45

Did this one outside, to the great delight and consternation of the neighbors.  I suspect that I have the very first kettlebell in the country.  The idea of “working out” doesn’t exist here – since the men do manual labor most of the day (and are in remarkable shape – the 71 year old man building my fence can outwork me easily!), there’s really no need for it.  The sight of someone lifting iron “for fun” is highly entertaining.  The sight of a woman doing it is even more fun. 

I’m so glad that I can bring some amusement into the world.

Monday, March 23, 2009
Warm-up:
600m run

3x:
6 push-ups with stability roll
9 wall squats
12 walking lunges

Power clean warm-up with dowel rod

Workout 10x:
30 second max work, 30 seconds rest
Power Cleans 45# 8,9,9,9,9,9,10,10,11,11,12
Sit-ups 20,19,19,19,19,19,19,19,19,20

My first workout with an actual weight bar and a sit-up mat!  Since I had a bit more room in the truck, my shipper said that I was able to throw in a few more things when I left LA the last time – I selected a kettlebell, a weight bar and several more boxes of books.  Probably not quite the weight allowance he was anticipating.  It interesting that my interests seem to involve “heavy” items.

I’ve been lifting logs for my new fence - they generally average about 4” in diameter and weigh between 40-60#.  A box of fence staples weighs 50#; a roll of barbed wire slightly more than that.  After carrying around those things, working with a nice diameter, perfectly balanced weight bar seemed *easy*.  I also did my sit-ups on a mat for the first time.  I hadn’t realized how much slower I go when I’m doing them on hard tile – it makes sense, since slamming back into the tile isn’t fun.  The mat let me go much faster, which also meant that I tired much more slowly, since I didn’t get as much negative resistance.  As a result, I breezed through this workout!

Sunday, March 15, 2009
Warm-up:
800m run

3x:
10 ring rows
10 wall squats
10 seconds prone cobra

Workout:
2 rounds, 2 minutes each movement:
Max pushups – 25, 26 (toes)
Max sit-ups – 57, 60
Max flutter kicks (4-count) – 92, 90
Max squats – 95, 88

Worst.  Workout.  Ever.  UGH!  I flopped on the ground and, for the first time since my baseline, honestly thought I was going to need Pukie.  I didn’t, but it took me a while to feel right again, which is also unusual for me, as my recuperative powers are legion.  *grin*

The nutrition discussions were in my mind as I looked in my kitchen and noticed something odd.  In LA, I had an entire pantry devoted to “food”.  Here, I have two small shelves.  That’s it. I don’t keep canned vegetables (why, when the fresh stuff at the market is so much better), or packaged food (doesn’t seem to exist here, as people just cook from scratch) or anything with an expiration date past, say, next week.  I have oats instead of instant oatmeal, limes instead of bottled lime juice, and homemade corn tortillas instead of Pop tarts. (Though I’ll grant you that the tortillas are a rather poor substitute.  There are some guilty pleasures that I miss.  *sigh*)

I will confess that the day that chocolate chips showed up in the stores, though, I bought a bunch of bags…

Thursday, March 12, 2009
Warm-up:
1200m run
3x:
5 Push-ups with stability roll
10 Wall squats
10 Neck rolls

Workout:
HSPU ladder
14 rounds + 10

I am heartily sick of bodyweight workouts.  I am tired of squats in all of their forms.  Doing sit-ups on ceramic tile is no longer fun; the accompanying bruises on my spine are merely an annoyance now.  The fact that whatever I dump into any sized bag (a long bag of jos, a carpetbag of books) always weighs exactly 16 pounds is no longer a vast source of fascination.  I am bored with burpees, push-ups and sit-ups.

I miss having other people around to challenge and support me.  I miss the CFLA coaches alternately encouraging and berating me to push harder, go faster, do better.

Working out truly on your own – not even having a Globo Gym around – is not easy.  If anyone has any good advice on how you keep going, what keeps you motivated, what makes you continue to do this, I’d love to hear it!

Monday, March 09, 2009
Warm-up:
2 hour walk
3x:
10 deadlifts
10 shoulder shrugs
10 shoulder press

Shoulder dislocates, etc.

Workout :AMRAP 20 with 16# carpetbag of books
15 db front squats
12 single hand OHS
10 push-ups (ALL from toes!)

8 rounds + 10 FS

I did not expect to do this many push-ups from my toes; I never have before.  The previous max I’ve done was 30, so going to 80 was a pretty big jump!

Doing the OHS squats with a bag of books was interesting, since they *move*.  The constantly shifting weight made the single-hand OHS much more difficult, so even though the weight was light, it still made for an overall fun workout.

Thursday, March 5, 2009
Warm-up:
800m run
5x:
10 jump rope (singles)
10 jump rope (single foot)

Workout:
Complete as many reps in 2 minutes of each of the following movements, taking 10 seconds transition between each:
Med Ball Squat Cleans (16# carpetbag) - 27
Push Ups - 27
Sit Ups - 54
Squats – 63
=171
- 2 min rest -

Complete as many reps in 1 minute of each of the following movements, taking 10 seconds transition between each:
Med Ball Squat Cleans -  18
Push Ups - 16
Sit Ups - 29
Squats – 37
= 100

Total:  271

Monday, March 02, 2009
Warm-up:
1200m

3x:
8 scorpions
10 windmills
16 lateral lunges

Workout AMRAP 20 minutes:
5 handstand push ups
10 pistols
15 sit-ups

9 rounds + 5 HSPU

Cooking in Belize is always an adventure.  Because nothing has preservatives in it, you buy only what you will use, rather than stocking up.  In addition, things are not always available (including staples, like lettuce, tomatoes, etc.).  As such, cooking is a matter of seeing what is at the market, then figuring out what to do with it. 

After working out, I decided to treat myself with something sweet.  My only “basic” ingredients on hand were chocolate, vanilla and bananas.  Trying to stay fairly healthy, I thought of a warm banana bread pudding recipe that I have.  Unfortunately, I didn’t have any milk (they deliver only on certain days), few eggs (and the chickens were asleep) and no self-rising flour.  The brown sugar is closer to turbinado sugar and sticks of butter don’t appear to exist here.

No problem.  I could make my own self-rising flour, but I had only baking soda, no baking powder.  I could have made my own baking powder, but I didn’t have any cream of tartar.  I also didn’t have a 9x13 pan., but I have an 8x11 (my baking equipment should be arriving this week – I can’t wait!).  I needed to substitute canned cream for the milk and tub margarine for the sticks of butter.  I did, at least, have bananas and oats.  The final mixture, when it was in the pan ready to go into the oven, certainly looked interesting!

It was fantastic.  It came out of the oven all hot and bubbly, golden brown and crisp with the oatmeal mixture on top.

And since I just randomly threw things in (at some point, I even stopped measuring), I’ll never be able to make it again.

Thursday, February 26, 2009
Warm-up:
1200m run
3x:
10 dips
15 second chair sits
20 walking lunges

AMRAP 20 minutes:
10 push-ups
10 sit-ups
15 squats
14 rounds + push-ups + 3 sit-ups
(3 rounds w/push-ups on toes; remaining on knees)

Living in LA, one naturally becomes a weather snob.  I took great enjoyment from speaking with friends who lived in less fortunate climates.  As they regaled me with stories of buying new snow blowers, shoveling out their cars from several inches of snow, dealing with freezing pipes and the like, I gleefully described the lovely, clear, crisp, 70 degree we were having.

I realize now that I was an amateur.

It felt chilly when I was running last night.  I mentioned it to a friend, who said that his wife basically stayed inside this time of year, because she hated the “cold”.  When we talked about the upcoming months, he said that he dreaded May, because it was so “hot”.  The temperature last night was about 70 degrees; May will get to about 90.  The range of “comfortable” here is even narrower than LA – if it gets below 77 or above 84, people complain about the “heat” or the “cold”.

Personally, I’m looking forward to taking my smug weather attitude to a whole new level.  I’m already getting there… last night when I ran, it was COLD – probably about 70 degrees.  Brrrr!

Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Warm-up
1 hour walk
3x:
10 ring rows
10 wall squats

Workout 5x using Wally the Water Bottle:
Max front squats/max push-ups (toes then knees)
1- 15, 15 (5,10)
2- 17, 18 (5,12)
3- 17, 18 (5,12)
4- 16, 19 (5,14)
5- 16, 18 (6,15)

While not a good physical workout (perhaps it was the gibnut lunch that I ate?), it was an excellent mental one.  Partway through, I realized that the difference between my workouts at CFLA and “CF Belize” is greater than I thought.  While at CFLA, I was able to focus on the precision of my movements because I had a perfect environment.  In the case of front squats, I used an evenly weighted bar that would balance correctly over my structure.  This allowed me to work on improving my technique and allowed me to easily measure my progress.  Here, however, I find that is not the case.  Front squats with a water bottle are awkward and work the forearms and lower back much more than using a bar.  It’s also not weighted quite evenly – the neck of the bottle has some water in it, changing the balance just slightly.  At first, I found this frustrating, but this is much more realistic than a bar.  I find myself moving sacks of concrete or bags of grain, lifting and setting a 5 gallon water bottle into the bed of my truck and handling a myriad of other bulky, unwieldy objects that are held slightly in front of me.  While I’m not getting PR’s, and I can’t compare MY workout to those of other CrossFitters, I realized that it doesn’t matter.  CF is supposed to prepare you for real life – and that’s what I’m doing.  I don’t have a clue how much I can truly deadlift anymore, but I *do* know that I was able to move that large log out of the road yesterday… and that’s more important.

Monday, February 23, 2009

The Anti-CrossFit Workout:  Building a road… the EASY way.

Screw the shovel.

Friday, February 20, 2009
Warm-up
1 hour walk
800m run
3x:
10 ring rows
15 walking lunges

Workout:
AMRAP in 20 minutes of:
5 HSPU
10 Jumping Lunges (2 count)
15 Squats
chair sit (30 sec each round)

6 rounds + HSPU + lunges + squats

I assumed that the jumping lunges were two counts – if you should actually count each jump instead, would someone please let me know?  I’d hate to think that I did twice as many as required.

As for the actual workout, who came UP with this one?  I want their name, number and home address.  This was painful.  The chair sits right after the lunges and squats were horrific.  I tried to be very strict (even though I *still* can’t do an L-sit! I don’t think I have hip flexors.  I think they’re just missing entirely) and keep my knees together.  Ah, it brought back fond memories of the old days in finishing school.  Who knew that learning to curtsey, sit up properly and other important social graces would one day come in handy in CrossFit?  If the Queen ever stops by, I’ll know just how to greet her, as well.

These are the sorts of things that help me sleep well at night.

Thursday, February 17, 2009
Handstands – until I started getting small blood spots on my eyelids and underneath my eyes.  I stopped immediately, of course!  My guess is that I wasn’t breathing properly.  I’ll take a couple of days off then try it again, concentrating on my breathing, to see if it goes away.  Weird…

Wednesday, February 18, 2009
15 handstands, then
Max holds – 46 seconds, 32, 42

Saturday, February 14, 2009
Warm-up:
800m run
3x:
10 lateral raises left
10 lateral raises right
10 arch rocks
10 hollow rocks

Workout:
40-30-20-10
Ring rows
Pistols

Time: 12:38

This was much easier to do than I had expected, but hurt much more the day after than I had expected, so overall, I suppose it was a good workout.  The next day I was wandering about my property with the guys who will be putting in the road and it was all I could do to get my legs to climb up the hill!