12/23/2008

Petranek Fitness 5:30pm.

Instead of dragging Becca out to the park to personally train me, I told her I would just rather participate in a class at PF. Good decision!

Warm-up

30 V-Twists (12# ball)
10 Knees-to-Elbows
20 Lateral Bridges

First time with the V-Twists… Andy complemented me on my flawless U-Twists, but said I need to work on getting into a V. I only did two rounds because I was pretty warm already.

Work-out

4 rounds

Fun work-out, first time I’ve done handstands in awhile. Crashed a few times until Andy told me I needed to maintain control rather than hold until failure and fall like a Jenga tower to the floor. Got to watch Andy do this work-out as RX’d and finish 8 rounds! Wow.

Good times!

12/22/2008

Monday at Rancho Park at 6 am. Brought my little brother Armen along as a guest to get a taste of the CrossFit work-out. It was raining softly through the whole work-out!

Warm-up

12 dips
50m skip
10 pull-ups
50m backwards run
12 lunges

This was actually an intense warm-up! So intense that my brother was puking into a trashcan after the third round of walking lunges. I think it was simply a metcon issue and getting a ton of lactic acid dumped into his system because of the leg portions. He sat out the work-out…

Work-out

~15:55

Cardio work-out today! Zach was with us today and if you don’t know him, double-unders are a strong suit of his. He can do them consecutively with ease. Regardless, I have also improved my double-unders and can do quite a few of them with a timing hop in the middle (du-single-du-single). Felt strong on the 400 runs.

Bonus: Tabata push-ups. 4

I enacted my revenge on Zach and his double-unders! Becca and I tried to explain Tabata to Zach, but he just wasn’t getting the picture, so I told him to simply do as many push-ups as he could each round and that he would get the point by the third or fourth round. I think he did 22 each his first two rounds! Suffice it to say my score of 4 ended up beating his score of 3 and Zach learned what a Tabata was! Sorry Zach, it was all in good fun! Armen, participated as well (what a trooper!) and for his efforts got to vacate the remaining contents of his stomach. I think he’s hooked.

12/20/2008

Petranek Fitness at 9:30am

This was a fantastic CrossFit day for me. My first class with Michael and an opportunity to do a partner work-out with Zeb.

Warm-up

5 ring rows
15 walking lunges
5 thrusters (25 lbs)

First time doing thrusters with significant weight and first time doing ring rows. Felt decent during the warm-up. I also informed everyone that if I inadvertently yell, grunt, or “moan like a dying moose” as Michael put it, please tell me to shut-up! You won’t hurt my feelings because I don’t realize I’m doing it. More on this later.

Work-out

28 rounds (14 each)

Zeb is a freaking machine and a fantastic motivator. We had a fast pace going for the first half of the work-out, but as Zeb maintained his pace, I began to slow down, especially on the Thrusters. The worst part was finishing the ring rows and staring at those two dumbbells sitting there mocking me. After recovering from the work-out (nothing like cool pavement after a CrossFit workout!), Zeb very simply and efficiently explained and demonstrated the correct pacing and form for a thruster. Thanks for that Zeb. I’m looking forward to working out with you again, man.

Now the perfect end to my day was Jim introducing himself. Jim was in the class with us and I’ve worked out with him once or twice maybe before. Last week after my weekend with Andy and Jonesy at PF on Saturday and Sunday, Becca approached me and told me that I should use my “inside voice” when I’m in the gym, because it is a small space and quite frankly, I’m either scaring the crap out of people or annoying them to no end. Becca knows full well and I have announced quite a few times that I am completely cool with being told to shush (I started talking at about 10 months and never stopped). After the work-out Jim came up to me and told me very graciously that he was the one that spoke to Becca. I told him I didn’t mind, but I was super-impressed that someone would come up and say what Jim said. There really was no hatchet, but if there were it is buried six feet deep now. Thanks Jim, you’re a stand-up guy and I’ll try to swallow the grunts and screaming when I’m indoors.

Good times!

(Edit) P.S. I forgot to apologize to Michael for inadvertently spitting on the wheel of his BMW during the workout. Sorry Michael! Michael walked outside just as I was preparing to do one of my latter round of thrusters and I spit to clear my mouth, but it just passed the pile of ice and hit the bottom of his wheel. Michael exclaimed, “You spit on my car!” and I began to apologize instead of doing my thrusters. It was a good thing Zeb was there… He yelled “It’s just a car, now do your thrusters!” Sorry again Michael and thanks Zeb!

12/19/2008

Rest day

I had a fantastic time at the Petranek Fitness Holiday Party. A great opportunity to meet and socialize with my fellow PF CrossFitters. Thanks for the “I feel a sin coming on” postcards to whomever got those!

12/18/2008

Got an opportunity to meet and work-out with Sasha. Overall good evening, I pushed hard on the sprints and maintained good form on the movements.

Warm-up

19:55

12/16/08

Monday was rained out and as I mentioned before it wouldn’t have mattered anyway, because I was too sore to workout after Nancy followed by Jonesy.

Tuesday was a crisp, cool evening and I had the pleasure of getting some 1-on-1 coaching from Becca as I was the only one at the park in that evening. Form and metabolic conditioning were the focus of the evening.

Warm-up

7 knees-to-elbows
10 wall squats
12 good mornings

My hamstrings have been super-tight the past 24 hours and I’m trying to figure out what blasted them so bad. All three of these exercises really have demonstrated how much I’ve improved. I had issues just hanging for 7 counts when I started CrossFit a couple of months ago, much less doing 7 knees-to-elbows. Throughout the warm-up I worked on form and spent a bit of time chatting with Becca about the joys of growing up in a conservative, ethnic family.

Work-out

21:55

No chatting here. Initially Becca put 12 as the rep count of the day, but at the last second upped it by 33% to 16, which I am glad she did (so glad that I barely stifled a groan). The pull-ups were mostly jumping pull-ups, but I strict formed those and did them all at once to really work on my conditioning. The hardest part were the push-ups. They were also the most rewarding, because Becca made sure that I kept my form through-out. As I mentioned before, at this point I am much more concerned about learning the movements correctly, building up stabilizing muscles, and completing movements without “cheating” (i.e. touching my Armenian schnoz to the ground instead of my chest during a push-up).

I pushed hard through-out and I’m happy Becca was there to watch my form when I got tired.

Good times!

12/14/2008

I followed up my first “Nancy” on Saturday with my first class coached by Jonesy on Sunday. Suffice it to say that even if my Rancho Park class workout wasn’t canceled because of the rain, I would not have made it to class with Becca.

Warm-up

Partner V catch and throw (20#)
10 wheelbarrow push-ups
15 arch rocks

Um, wow. That was quite a warm-up. That’s all I have to say about that.

Work-out

3 rounds + 9 rounds = 12 rounds

A lot of firsts here. The first time in a class with Jonesy, the first time I did kettleball swings, the first time I did ball slams, the first time I’ve done an “Every minute on the minute” workout, and… the first time I’ve felt like my lower back was used as the substitute for a moon bounce at fat camp. In fairness, Jonesy did warn me that if I didn’t keep my chest up during the kettleball swings I would feel it in my back. He wasn’t lying!

That’s what I like about Jonesy’s coaching style: it is a simple statement of how to correct the movement and exactly what will happen if you don’t. If you’re not sure what I’m talking about watch this new Liam Neeson movie trailer (at about the 1:15 mark) -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CvUxdQ4q-Lg

Good times! Sunday was an intense CrossFit workout and I’m looking forward to participating in one of his classes again soon. Thanks Jonesy!

12/13/08

I thought I would come by to cheer on my fellow CrossFitter’s for their Nancy challenge as I had for the Nancy baseline a couple of months back. I had no intention of participating since Becca had said that the day was for those who participated in the Nancy baseline, but Andy was gracious enough to allow me to participate in one of the heats. Since this was my first time doing this many OHSs, I used the PVC pipe.

Work-out

5 rounds
400 meter run
15 Overhead Squats (PVC pipe)

~13:30

I had a blast today, especially helping others with some old-fashioned yelling and cheering. I do want to make something very clear for all of you CrossFitters: I obviously like to talk and yell and cheer, but if it gets annoying, please feel free to tell me to shut-up, tone it down, go away, etc. You will not hurt my feelings! I sometimes get over-excited and I assure you that I’m not trying to be annoying, I just genuinely like to see people improve and excel (this is why I tutored the SATs for five years… less yelling and screaming there, though).

Thanks to the Burch for pointing out that my jump rope was not heavy enough to properly do double-unders (I knew something felt wrong!) and also giving me a technique to work on doing consecutive double-unders.

Andy is a freaking CrossFit demi-god… Mr. Petranek celebrated his 42nd birthday with a near sub 11:00 Nancy. Then two minutes or so later spoke to the entire group about the merits of the quarterly challenges and how proud he was of the improvements he saw. Andy, please tell me you’re going to compete in the CF Games in 2009!

12/11/08

Good day all around today. (Please, Becca, don’t make me play in the sand again for awhile… Please…)

Warm-up

400 m run
Parking lot shuttle run

10 chest to deck push-ups
20 lateral bridges

Form, form, form. It takes a lot out of me, but I don’t care. After watching elite CrossFitters do their thing dozens of times over the past month online, I’ve learned that what begins to separate them is their form. I only did 2 rounds instead of 3, but as I said earlier, I feel like I was more productive than if I had done 3 rounds half-assed.

Work-out

400 m Farmer’s Walk (2x 25# buckets of sand)
400 m run

14:49

When I saw the buckets, I knew Becca was sending us back to the cursed sandbox to fill those suckers. I was so traumatized from my last work-out that I wandered down staring off into the sand, before Becca called over to me and asked me what was wrong with the 30 feet of sand I had walked by… um yeah. Anyway, this is one of those work-outs where I was in the zone, but I felt that if I had someone there slightly faster than me I would have probably done a bit better. Only two of my fellow Rancho Park CrossFitters beat my time on this workout, so I feel pretty proud of my improvement over the past couple of months.

On a side note: While discussing which title (“the Barbarian” or “the Destroyer”) fit Becca better, Becca and I discovered that David had never seen the classic Conan the Destroyer. Well I guess I was rewarded for my good workout as I came home and discovered that it was playing on Cinemax!

Good times!

12/09/08

I deliberately held off from writing up this work-out log for a several very good reasons:

1. I couldn’t promise that I wouldn’t label Becca with some choice epithets (i.e. Becca the Butcher).
2. I wanted time to think about some of the important lessons I learned on Tuesday (humility being first and foremost amongs these)
3. (Probably the most pertinent reason—->) I couldn’t type yesterday.

Yes, I know you’re all dying to know what we possibly could have done to prevent me from typing or writing legibly, and generally making it an adventure every time I had to twist a doorknob or unbutton my jeans to visit the men’s room (which given the copious amounts of water I am drinking is quite frequently…) Well, you’ll just have to wait!

Warm-up

3 rounds

20 double-unders
10 pull-ups

These are the two exercises that I’m working on at home and I try to get as much work as possible at these. Double-unders I like for two reasons: First, they are a timing exercise and second, they are a less you think about it the better you’ll do exercise. I think these two principles (good timing and the ability to just do it, not think about it) are really important for many of the movements we do in CrossFit. By the end of the warm-up everything from my knees down and my elbows down had already gotten a good work-out…. Oh we weren’t done yet!

Work-out

4 rounds

Walking Lunges
Crab Walk
Bear Walk

20 sit-ups
10 burpees

This was the workout that was put up on the board… there are no distances so I’ll have to provide you with some colorful descriptions. At Rancho Park, a small play ground exists, which is roughly a 50-65 meter circumference circle of sand with a typical play area smack dab in the middle. Becca had placed orange cones at the third-way points of the circle. So beginning with the walking lunges at the starting point, I would lunge my way to the first cone, switch to crab walks, and then bear walk my way home, which then earned me 20 sit-ups and 10 burpees. The twist was that I got to do this in the sand.

I wasn’t worried about this until I got down for my first round of crab walks and found myself unable to gain any purchase in the sand with my hands and feet. Imagine if you will trying to do crab walks on ice, this was only slightly easier than that nearly impossible task. I switched to using my fists to gain purchase in the sand, but while this worked, it put an incredible strain on my already worked (and generally weak wrists). By the time I got done with my first terrible looking bear walks and the situps and burpees, my forearms were burning and my wrists were in genuine pain. When I got to the second round of crabwalks I realized that this wasn’t going to happen. Becca switched up the exercise which consisted of more leg and less arm (including some high knees, butt kickers, and grapevines). It took about 25 minutes to make four 50 meter circuits with some situps and burpees tossed in at the end.

Like many athletes, I learned long ago to picture myself doing a certain movement, exercise, etc. before doing it. The problem I have is that when my body fails to do it the way I envisioned it, I get frustrated with myself and begin to “judge the workout” as Becca calls it. This is going to be my Everest as far as CrossFit is concerned; dealing with failure and instead of allowing it to psyche me out for the rest of the workout, feeding on it to accomplish the parts of the workout I’m good at. I think one can easily overwork their mind as much as their body, and I may be trying to do too much at once in the mental department.

Anyway, Becca and I talked through it after the workout and I feel content that I gave it my best (even if my best was not good enough to finish that particular workout at that time). I need to work on understanding the difference between not trying hard enough and simply not being able to something. I can promise Becca and myself that the former is rarely (if ever) going to be a problem, and the latter will begin to be less of a problem as I progress as a CrossFitter.

Good times!

12/08/08

I love mornings at Rancho Park. It starts out dark when you arrive and about a third of the way into the workout, the sun starts to come out and it becomes light out!

Warm-up

400-m run
Some Jump-roping to get warm

3 rounds

12 dips
10 burpees
15 squats

The warm-up was a fairly standard work on form warm-up. I’ve decided that the working on the form part during warm-up supersedes getting the 3 rounds done (unless I’m told differently!). I figure I’ll get warm whether I do 36 semi-strict dips or 24 strict-form dips.

Work-out

4 rounds

15 wall ball (15 # ball)
30 double-unders
200-m cross country run

12:43

I felt STRONG today and I stuck with Matthew nearly until the end of the workout (he ended up beating me by only 18 seconds!) I really like this work-out because it combines an explosive strength movement, with a coordination movement, and an endurance/speed movement. Matthew is probably faster, stronger, and more cardiovascularly (<—- is that a word?) fit than I am, but I was a bit more consistent with my double-unders and was able to stick with him for most of the workout.

I absolutely love the fire-breathing aspect of CrossFit both on the receiving and delivering end. I perform better when someone is yelling and cheering me on, and I love goading people into drawing down deep by cheering them on. While focus is important during CrossFit, sometimes people can begin to focus in on the wrong things (like “Oh my god, this hurts”), so I also like to get people to laugh or smile once during the tail-end of a long workout, because it is like a quick mental reset (also I strongly believe it is very difficult to focus on pain when one is laughing or smiling).

Good times!

12/06/08

My first workout at CrossFit LA headquarters in Santa Monica!

I got there early and spent some time soaking it all in… From the efficiently organized equipment to the whiteboards which held the records for various exercises and physical feats to the blown-up pictures of people in various stages of CrossFit pain. I loved it! Everyone was very cool and to tell you the truth, I was a bit nervous. The nerves were the kind of ones you get when your family and friends are going to show-up to a sporting event you’re competing in or at a piano recital or whatever. Kind of like, “I want to perform up to the best of my abilities here!”

Warm-up

800m run
5 dips
10 push-ups
20 double unders

My shoulders are my weak point, so the doing the dips and the push-ups with perfect form tend to take a lot out of me. I got my form corrected on push-ups and I think I’m going to be a form Nazi on myself on those pushups from this point forward, even if it means sacrificing some time on the workouts.

Work-out

AMRAP 20 min

4 db Burpees
8 Windmills
12 db cleans
20 # db’s

4 rounds and the Burpees from round 5

Um, so I didn’t talk much today, because I was too busy “giving birth” as one coach put it. Becca asked me what the hardest part of this workout was, and honestly the most difficult part was the set-up for the clean! Arching my back and pulling my shoulder blades back (chest up and out) was tough! The best piece of advice of the day was probably from Andy (yes, yes, I have to kiss ass), who told me not to start a movement if I didn’t expect to complete it. I waved hello to the Pukie bucket and promised that we would get more intimately acquainted at some point in the near future.

Overall, I had a great day, although I thought I could have probably done a bit better in retrospect. I’m looking forward to next Saturday!

12/04/08

Happy Birthday to my beautiful wife, Yvette!

I don’t quite remember the full warm-up today, although we did start off with a 400 m run and 400 m backwards run.

The work-out was a fun one!

Work-out

Frelen

3 rounds

800 m run
21 Thrusters
12 pull-ups

22:27

The Thrusters were done with a sand-bag. Mine was about 3/4 full, so I’d say it was about 30-35 pounds. The difficult was that the grip was close, which made getting fully extended at the top tougher than if we were doing the exercise with a bar. I’m starting to really improve on my pull-ups and can now actually get some done mid-workout. Fully rested I can do 5-6 dead hang pull-ups, but I was finding myself unable to do any during a workout. I think it was more mental than anything else.

No visits with trashcans today (although Becca did her best by mentioning Wiener Schnitzel during my thrusters in the 3rd round!), which means I probably didn’t go as hard as I could have…

Coming up on Saturday… my first workout at CrossFit LA headquarters!

12/03/2008

I’m baaaack!

First of all, I want to apologize for not being more dedicated to getting my workout logs online. Work and life sometimes get in the way of the little things, which shouldn’t be the case.

I did not take a month hiatus from CrossFit, just from posting elaborate workout logs here online, so I’ve actually improved quite a bit since my last post. I cut my baseline test time by more than half (4:33) and that was just a warm-up for an 8 round workout! I also have been jump roping on my own working on double unders, as well as working on my form for some of the Olympic exercises.

During the past month, I’ve discovered quite a few things about myself: First, the same focus that I am developing to get through CrossFit workouts by being able to partition different exercises and rounds of workouts without thinking about the apparent enormity of the given workout in front of me carries over to work. I’ve been more productive and efficient with my work, and I am able to work longer hours without losing focus! (I’m not sure if that is good or bad thing, but since I own my own business, I guess it is a good thing).

Second, I apparently have a strange obsession with calves. I think it stems from my days as a cross country and marathon runner in high-school. I learned a trick that one can actually stick with a stronger runner by focusing in on their calves and zoning out.

Third, I shouldn’t eat a pound of Wiener Schnitzel the night before an early morning CrossFit workout…

Warm-Up

3 rounds

10 pull-ups
15 sit-ups
20 lateral bridges

I’m improving on my dead hang pull-ups and for the warm-up I was able to do 5 in the first round (with the rest being jumping pull-ups) 4 in the 2nd round and 3 in the 3rd round.

Workout

5 rounds

11 push-ups
11 bench jumps
11 burpees

~ 14:30

I have developed a new rating system for CrossFit workouts: how many different trashcans I throw-up in after the workout is directly proportional to how scared the concurrent Pilates in the Park class is of us Rancho Park CrossFitters! Remember my 3rd discovery? Let’s just say I won’t be eating any Wiener Schnitzel anytime soon again (even if it is Wolfgang Puck’s concotion). I wasn’t tired today cardio wise or muscle endurance wise, but by the end of the 2nd round I was seriously ill. I finished, though, and I gave this workout a solid TWO CANS.

For some odd reason, Mr. Roger’s “Would you be my neighbor” was stuck in my head after the workout, but instead changing my shoes while talking into a camera, I was puking into the trashcan next to Pilates folks. Hello neighbor!

Until next time…

10/30/2008

I was expecting to be crushed after two workouts the two days prior less than 11 hours apart. Sadly, I didn’t really feel sore on Thursday. I take this to mean that I’m not working out enough and my level of fitness has reached the point where I should be CrossFitting 5 days a week at least.

So in an effort to force myself to workout this weekend, I’m banking my Burpees.

10/31/2008

Happy Halloween! Being a resident of Glendale, I have to wake up at 5am to get to the 6am class in the park. Mostly, I’m just in cruise control until I get to the park (i.e. brain mostly shut-off). So when I stopped to grab a bottle of water from the gas station down the street from my house, I was perplexed/shocked to see a slutty version of Snow White hop out of the Volkswagon Beetle in front of me. After staring at her for a few seconds, my brain turned back on (imagine your computer waking up from Sleep mode) and I realized it was Halloween. Niiice.

Warm-up

Some jump-roping to get us awake and warm.
Partner carry about 50m, twice. (Sorry Matthew!)

3 rounds
10 squats
10 windmills
15 dips

This was the first day in awhile that Becca had not included Burpees in the Warm-up. This, of course, meant one of two things:

A) The actual work-out would incorporate Burpees.
B) She had read my last workout log, but the local pet store was all sold-out of white Siberian tigers.

It ended up being a bit of both.

Workout

“High and Dry”

3 rounds
400 m run (two 200 m circuits)
40 walking lunges

Wait one second… that is far too easy. So how about we incorporate buckets filled with 20 pounds of sand! And, you have to keep said buckets above your head the entire workout! Nice. So where do the Burpees work themselves into the equation? Well, if you happen to bring the bucket below the top of your head, you have to do Burpees… first offense: 5 Burpees, second offense: 10 Burpees, third offense: 15 Burpees… you get the picture.

17:49

I liked this workout, because it was a “scenario” workout. You have something cumbersome, yet valuable and there is an imaginary flood up to your chin. Keep your valuables above the top of your head and dry. I’m not quite sure how the lunging and Burpees work themselves into the scenario, but anyway it was fun.

So, I started by attempting to lock my elbows and keep the bucket over my head with extended arms. That lasted about 100 m. I then placed the bucket on top of my head, channeling my inner Swahili. This method showed promise except for the poorly designed bucket which had a sharp piece of plastic at the bottom digging into my head. So on my second circuit of my first 200 m, I grabbed my towel and placed it on my head, under the bucket. Jackpot!

About midway through the workout, I also realized that keeping both of my hands on the bucket was painful and, more importantly, unnecessary, so I stabilized with one hand and alternated every couple of minutes or so. I’m not sure Becca was thrilled about the towel trick (she later said that she would probably prohibit the towel the next time), but I honestly believe that I would have been a couple of minutes slower at least if I had to deal with that sharp plastic nub digging into my head.

I think I should have moved a bit faster during the run/walk phase to make up for being a bit slower in the lunge phase. Anyway, I realized as I was chasing Jen on the last round that if I didn’t step it up on the 400 m portion, she was going to torch me on the final lunges. So as I jogged by her, I mentioned this little tidbit to her. I got to my lunges first and about eight lunges in I saw Jen popping up and down while she blew by me. Nice! Jen finished about 30 seconds or so in front of me, but I was still very happy with my overall performance.

I’ll get you one of these days, Jen! Good job everyone (especially Greg and Matthew who eschewed the wimpy towels and took their pain like the true CrossFitters that they are).