Two Tough CrossFit Workouts

Last night, I wasn't sure what to expect at CrossFit. It was a de-loading week (a lower weight recovery week) in our Wendler cycle. I didn't know if the workout after the lifting would also be easy, or if we'd get a tough one because the strength work was so easy.

As soon as I saw the board, I knew it would be a tough one for me. But first, the lifting:

3x5 strict press, maxing out at 80 pounds - very easy

5x10 DB Presses with a pair of 35# DBs - This was hard for me due to the number of reps.

3x10 chest to bar pull-ups - This was too easy because I used too much of a resistance band.

Then came the main workout - no equipment required:

100 burpees, as quickly as possible.

Before I ever started CrossFit, I would do burpees at the end of some weight workouts. But, CrossFit burpees are a bit different than the burpees I used to do. If you look at the two different burpee links, you'll see that CrossFit burpees require you to essentially drop your hips to the ground and then do at least a knee push-up that is not required in the other video. This makes them significantly harder. But, I'd done 100 burpees a couple months ago, doing 5 of them, every minute, on the minute. So, I knew I could do the workout in 20 minutes or less. Some of the best times of the day were around 6 minutes, and many of the best times were posted by females. I was moderately happy with my 11:48, and it gives me a time to improve upon in the future.

Immediately after the workout, I had another Graston/ART treatment on my shoulder and things are still progressing. I'm not 100% though, and I remain cautious on certain lifts, mostly anything overhead with a wide grip.

After CF, I rode home, showered, cooked, ate, went to bed, and set my alarm for 4:30 this morning, so I could go to CF before work today. I have a conflict after work, so it was 5:45 a.m. or not at all today. By 5:00 a.m. and first light, I was on my bike, and by 5:30, I was at the gym.

This morning, there was no strength work posted, which guaranteed that the MetCon would be tough. The workout was named Lumberjack 20:

20 Deadlifts (275lbs)

Run 400m
20 KB swings (2pood)
Run 400m
20 Overhead Squats (115lbs)
Run 400m
20 Burpees
Run 400m
20 Pullups (Chest to Bar)
Run 400m
20 Box jumps (24")
Run 400m
20 DB Squat Cleans (45lbs each)
Run 400m

Level 1 was 185 pound deadlifts, 1.5 pood (53 pounds) for the KB swings, 75 for the overhead squats, regular pull-ups, an 18" box for the jumps, and 35# DBs for the squat cleans. I used only 65# for the OH squats, again taking it easy on my shoulder. And, despite my best intentions, I dropped to 25# DBs for the squat cleans.

Despite knowing it would be a long workout, I started out too fast. Maybe it was because deadlifts are a strength of mine and I was fine with the running. But, doing 20 good KB swings at 53# was too much. As I headed outside for my second 400m run, my stomach rebelled because I'd started too hard. I lost two minutes until I could start running and I thought briefly about dropping from the workout. After the first three movements, the toughest work was behind me and I got into a better groove. It wasn't until the DB squat cleans that I had issues again. I had to rest three times during those 20 reps, and I was still on the verge of puking as I headed outside. I started my 400 meters with about a minute of walking and then recovered enough to run the rest.

My time was 35:58 - the slowest in the class. But, six months ago, it would have been a lot higher and I continue to make progress. As long as I'm making progress, I'm not even worried what those 25-year old, 8% body fat percentage guys are doing. It's just me against the workout.

After the workout, I biked to my room, showered and got to work as quickly as possible.

Tonight, I won't get to bed until close to 11:00. I need to decide if that will be enough sleep to let me get up and go to CF at 5:45 again tomorrow. If I don't do that, I'll probably go for a run with my wife after work tomorrow.

Oh yeah, if anyone in the state of Vermont reads this blog, my son became a licensed driver this morning. Be careful out there.

CrossFit Tuesday

Yesterday, with an ominous weather forecast, and some thunderstorms headed our way according to radar, I left work at 4:00 to do the 4:30 CrossFit class instead of my normal 5:45 class. It turned out that the 4:30 class was really crowded.

On my ride to the gym, I heard some thunder in the distance, but the storm didn't catch up to me. I heard later that there were some strong storms to the north and south, but we missed them completely.

As I looked at the workout last night, I wasn't thrilled. We were doing some movements that just aren't kind to my shoulder. It's not that I can't do them, but I still try to keep the weights low, and I am really paranoid about re-injuring the shoulder.

We started with our warm-up and then moved into snatch balances - 7 sets of 1 rep each, going as heavy as you can. I have some mobility issues on this lift, on overhead squats, and on squat snatches. So, I kept the weight fairly low and worked on form for the duration of the strength work.

After this, the main workout was as follows:

21-15-9, as quickly as possible:

Squat Snatch (65# for me)

Pull-ups (band-assisted)

Box Jumps (21" for me)

First of all, the squat snatch causes me problems as I mentioned above. All three of the lifts I mentioned above require you to hit the bottom of the overhead squat position. I'm working on it, but progress is slow.

The workout was not 21 snatches, 15 pull-ups, and 9 box jumps. It was 21 of each, then 15 of each, and then 9 of each. If we couldn't do squat snatches, we were supposed to do power snatches instead. In the first round, I did about 10 marginal squat snatches before dropping to power snatches as my shoulder fatigued.

In the second round, I did about six squat snatches and then went to power snatches. The last round was all power snatches.

My total time was 13:04. Because the lifting part hadn't been too heavy, I didn't feel as wiped after this workout as I often feel.

I rode my bike home, went out to run an errand, and then cooked dinner - a grilled porterhouse steak, curried mashed cauliflower, and my "landlady" (it's hard to call her that; she's more like a roommate and we cook dinner together all of the time) made a caprese salad.

My errand last night was to arrange a surprise for my wife for next Tuesday, when we'll celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary. She knows we are going out for dinner, but not much else about that evening.

Tonight, I'll do CrossFit after work, and if I get to bed early enough, and get some good sleep, I'll be up at 4:30 to go again at 5:45 a.m. tomorrow. I'm busy after work tomorrow, so I have to go before work or not at all.

All in all, I do have to say that I'm fully recovered from the marathon and back to a full workout schedule. Of course, it's only 17 days until the 100 on 100 relay, so I'll be beating my legs up in that relay fairly soon. Our team met earlier this week to select legs for the relay and I'll be runner number 4. I've done this race 3 times in the past and I've never done leg 2, 4, or 6. So this year, I'll get #4 out of the way.

Deadlift PR and Some Rest

At CrossFit, we are seven weeks into the 12-week Wendler training cycle we are using to focus on strength, particularly the back squat, strict press and deadlift. Friday was a deadlift day. My prescribed deadlifts were as follows:

5 reps at 285 pounds

3 reps at 320 pounds

1 rep (or more) at 355 pounds

Until earlier this year, my deadlift best had been stuck at 355 pounds for about a year. Then, after a long plateau, I seemed to break through a bit. I did a 365 pound lift earlier this year and then repeated that twice more, the last time coming in a workout called "CrossFit Total", where you do a max squat, press and deadlift for a total weight. I hit 805 pounds the last time we did that workout, an improvement of 50 pounds from late in 2010.

Friday night, I was really surprised how easy 355 pounds felt. Rather than do extra reps at 355, I decided to try one rep at 375. I was shocked at how easily I was able to lift 375. The first time I managed to lift 365, the lift seemed to take forever as the bar moved very slowly to my waist. This time, the lift seemed almost easy and I'm sure I could have done 385 or more.

After the deadlifts were done, I did 5 sets of 10 reps per side of kettlebell deadlifts, and then did a workout named "Jackie"

1000 meter row

50 thrusters @ 45 pounds

30 pull-ups

I used assistance bands for the pull-ups and finished in just under 11 minutes.

On Saturday morning, I got an early start on my bike and rode 35 miles to meet my wife at the farmers market. By waiting until Saturday morning to go home, it gave me the chance to get to CrossFit Friday evening, get in a good bike ride Saturday morning, and save one car trip from our home to Montpelier.

After we got home from the market, I took a nap, the first of a handful of naps over the weekend. After my bike ride, I basically spent the weekend relaxing - some time at the local pool, napping, watching movies, cooking, and mowing the lawn. After three straight days of CrossFit and the bike ride, I was tired and it was nice to just take it easy the rest of the weekend.

Heat Wave

The heat just doesn't seem to want to quit. I've slept with the AC on for days now. The last time I went a night without AC it was because I was awake all night at the Vermont 100. It seemed like today would be cooler, but the last time I checked, it was 96F outside.

I don't even want to leave the air-conditioned building where I work.

But, I will do that about 4:00 and head to CrossFit on my bike. After CrossFit, I'll ride a bit more and then jump right into the swimming pool.

After some air-conditioned sleep, I'll ride my bike for a few hours to meet my wife tomorrow, saving some more gas money this week. I'll start at 6:00 a.m. tomorrow to try to beat the heat.

After that ride, I don't know if I want to go outside for the rest of the weekend, unless the heat wave finally breaks.

Next week, it appears that I'll be in my office every day, so I'll do a lot of CrossFit workouts. After a couple easy weeks before and after the marathon, I'll do three CrossFit workouts this week, and hopefully at least four next week.

Double CrossFit - twice in 12 hours

First of all, I have to admit to being lazy on Tuesday. I ended up working late, knowing that it would force me to miss CrossFit. I really could have made it out earlier, but I felt tired and I rationalized that the work was more important than the workout. Kind of a weak excuse.

Yesterday was the first day of really serious heat in the current heat wave. I put my bike on the bus in the morning and rode the bus to work. After work, I rode to CrossFit. The air was thick with heat and humidity.

We started with our Wendler cycle strict press work. I did a 5-3-1 strict press at 100-110-125. The last rep at 125 tied my PR. I then did a few push presses at 125 to work on getting that weight overhead. Then, 5x10 close grip bench press and 3x10 band-assisted chin-ups.

The MetCon was not one of my favorites:

As quickly as possible:

10 Renegade Rows

10 Toes to Bar, Knees to Elbows, or knee-ups (I chose the latter - the easiest option)

9 Renegade Rows

9 Knee-ups

.............

1 Renegade Row

1 Knee-up

I finished in 10:36 and then biked home. Because of a class this evening, my plan was to take a shower, cook dinner quickly, drink a boatload of water, call home to talk to my wife, and get to sleep as early as possible. I didn't get to sleep until about 9:30, an hour later than I'd hoped.

This morning, the alarm went off at 4:15 a.m. I hit the snooze button. I hit it a few more times. And just before 5:00, I decided the world would continue if I missed CrossFit today and just did some bike riding. I reset my alarm clock. And before I could fall asleep, I thought about skipping Tuesday's workout.

I bolted out of bed, put on my cycling clothes and rode to the gym.

Today we started with 5 x 3 of clean and jerks. This is a lift that still bothers my shoulder a bit, so I took it easy. I started at 95 pounds and worked up to 135 pounds by my 5th set.

The MetCon also included C&Js:

4 rounds, as quickly as possible:

5 Clean and Jerks (95# for me)

15 Ring Rows

30 Double Unders (or 30 single rope jumps and 15 tuck jumps)

My total time was 10:59. After that, I rode back to my rented room, took a shower, packed a lunch, and caught the bus to work. I'll get in another 6-8 miles or riding later tonight.

Tomorrow, I'm going to do CF after work rather than going home, like I normally do on Friday. Saturday mornings, my wife and I go to a farmers market in Montpelier, so I'm just going to ride there, about 35 miles or so, and meet her, which eliminates one more car trip for the week.

By the time I get home after three straight days of CF and that bike ride, I'm guessing I'll be a bit tired.

Back at it

I took yesterday as a rest day. After being on my feet for about 18 hours at the race, and then walking for four hours to the finish, my feet and legs were killing me after the end of the 100. I think that I managed to get dehydrated while working the aid stations, which made the four hours of walking a bit more difficult. I was tired enough that I worked from home yesterday, rather than coming into the office.

Today, I'm back in my office and it's time to get back to the workout routine. I'm planning to ride to CrossFit tonight and do the CF workout and then ride back to my room. Hopefully it will be a workout that's kind to my tired legs.

Right now, I've taken off 12 of the last 25 days. Part of that was tapering for the marathon and then recovery from the marathon and then some time volunteering at the race last weekend. But, it's time to get back to a more regular schedule. Before this recent 25 days, I had put in two really solid months of workouts.

I am running in a 100 mile (6 person team) relay race next month, so I've got another event to shoot for right now. After that, I need to decide if I want to run a 50K in September and a 50 miler in October, and a trail marathon in November. My guess is that I'll either do all three or none of them. I'm just not sure which way I'll go.

VT100 - Volunteering and some pacing

My wife and I worked at the Vermont 100 run all weekend. Even in the years I don't run the race or plan to do any significant pacing, it's nice to be there and see many of my ultra friends.

On Friday, we worked the medical part of race check-in. I got to meet some new people, say hi to old friends, but the thing I noticed the most was the number of first timers and new faces who were doing the race.

After the medical check-ins were complete, we headed home to get a good night of sleep, knowing that we'd be awake a long time after we woke up on Saturday.

We got to the Camp 10 Bear aid station at about noon on Saturday. Runners hit this station at mile 47 and again at mile 70 or so. So, it's a busy, busy aid station. We immediately jumped into the fray, trying to help as many runners as possible. At first, the focus was on runners hitting the aid station for the first time, as a few returning elite runners showed up on occasion. Eventually, by early evening, the runners were all past mile 47, and we had a break until the masses returned to mile 70. During this lull, some of the volunteers ended their shift, leaving us a bit short for a while. I was re-assigned to be the chef for the station, although it was a pretty easy gig. I handled it just fine, except for occasionally burning a grilled cheese sandwich on the grill.

At this point, I'm going to make some statements that might be controversial, but they might not matter if no one actually reads this blog. The sport of ultrarunning seems to really be changing. The crews of the runners assumed that the aid station food was for them, as well as the pacers and runners. One woman asked my wife if she could take a certain food for herself, as a crew member. My wife replied that the food was intended for runners and pacers. The woman clearly didn't like the answer, and as soon as my wife turned her back, the woman simply took what she wanted. We had people inside the aid station all day, taking food from wherever they wanted. We had a huge number of runners complain that we didn't have what they wanted. One person let us know that not having a vegetarian broth was not acceptable. A few others let us know that not having coffee was not OK. Another person complained that our fruit supply was inadequate for the vegans. We didn't stock the aid station. We were merely volunteering, giving up our weekend to help runners finish a race. But, it sure seemed like we were being blamed for perceived slights.

When I run 100s, I find out what the aid stations will supply, and if I need something else, it goes in a drop bag or my crew brings it for me. It's dangerous to assume that an aid station will supply something critical to your race success.

At one point, so much food had been taken by crew and spectators that my wife drove to a nearby store to re-stock our station.

Demands were common. Thank yous were almost unheard. I got fewer thank yous in 18 hours of aid station work than I hand out while running a 100.

The entire mentality seemed to be one of entitlement; the race was responsible for feeding the masses and satisfying every whim. I found this very disappointing, to be honest. In all the years I've worked at this race, I've never seen this prevailing attitude before.

A week ago, I ran a new marathon here in Vermont. The marathon drew runners from all over the country. The race had 21 aid stations - for a marathon! However, running near the back of the pack, I was shocked at the litter on the course. How could people just throw their trash on the ground when there were so many aid stations.

Is this what running has come to? A sport of high race prices, where runners feel entitled to anything and everything? Litter doesn't matter. Volunteers don't matter; they are servants for the runners. I don't mind being that servant, but I don't accept being treated rudely by runners, pacers or crew persons.

After my wife and I had worked over 10 hours at Camp 10 Bear, we moved to Bill's aid station at mile 89 or so. We were scheduled to work there through the close of that aid station at 6:45 a.m. The runners here were tired and the crews were tired, so the rudeness was reduced. However, runners did seem incapable of using a trash can. They would pick food and drinks off the table, use some or all of what they picked, and then just leave the mess on the table or the floor for others to clean up. They were also very demanding of the medical personnel.

Finally, about 5:30 a.m., I'd had enough and I decided to try to sneak in a nap. Minutes after I laid down, a good friend of mine, with ten prior finishes at the race, came into the aid station. I heard my wife offer him my pacing services and he said he'd love the company. The heat the previous day had taken a toll on him, and he's essentially been walking since mile 57. We had plenty of time to finish if we simply walked the remaining 11.4 miles without wasting too much time. And, that is what we did, getting Joe to the finish line at 29:40 for his 11th finish. I was glad to be part of his race. Joe has incredible longevity in the sport and is someone I respect a lot.

I was amazed when we passed the final aid station - an unmanned station. Not 30 yards from the station, which had a garbage bag, I found a Gu wrapper on the ground. Again, I fail to understand why the littering is OK. It just makes no sense.

After Joe finished, rather than staying for the awards, as we usually do, we headed home. Even though my pacing was at an easy pace, after the marathon the previous weekend and being on my feet for almost 18 hours at aid stations, I was beat. So, my wife and I headed home, and by noon, I was showered and in bed for a well-deserved nap.

I will continue to participate at the VT100 in the future, as an athlete, a pacer or a volunteer. But, if the trends I saw this weekend continue, I'm not sure how many more years I'll participate. I'm glad we helped out and I enjoyed time with friends, but some other parts of the weekend were really disappointing.