Did You Sweat Today?

I know it has been quite a while since I last contributed, but I feel I have a legitimate excuse.  I was preparing to take the National Strength and Conditioning Associations, Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist (CSCS) examination.  I can honestly say that I studied more for this particular exam than any other I have ever taken.  One week ago today I officially became CSCS certified!  It is a big step for me for reaching my ultimate goal following graduate school.  For the past week I have attempted to rest and also catch up on my school work.  Hopefully by the end of the weekend, I will be at a good spot as for as school goes.  I have been keeping up with CrossFit and have seen some major improvements in my performance.  I have finished several workouts at or near the top over the past couple of weeks, but at the same time there are the occasional workouts that knock me off my pedestal, which I really like.  It lets me know that I still have a long way to go to get into the shape that I would like to.  Today’s workout of the day (WOD) consisted of the following:

1,000 meter row

21 clean squat thrusters

21 plyo-pushups

500 meter row

15 clean squat thrusters

15 plyo-pushups

250 meter row

9 clean squat thrusters

9 plyo-pushups

Here is a link to how the plyo-pushups are done: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDBY-kN7Dxo

I finished the WOD in 23:24

I feel as if each week I have less and less “free” time.  I am taking my NSCA CSCS (National Strength and Conditioning Association: Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist) exam next Friday (Feb. 10), so I have been studying for that for the past several weeks.  In addition, I have my first midterm in on of my classes on Tuesday.  One nice thing is the fact that the material on my school exam is also on the CSCS exam so there is an overlap.

I have been keeping up with Crossfit.  I know I have said this on more than one occasion, but I love it!  It really challenges me and I feel like it does a good job filling the void from not playing competitive sports anymore.  Rather than go through every workout I have done in the past couple weeks, I will just go over today’s WOD.  If you want to look over some of my past workouts, you can go to the Crossfit Firebase website (http://crossfitfirebase.com/).  Today’s WOD was “Cindy”, which was an AMRAP (as many rounds as possible)  consisting of 5 pullups; 10 pushups; and 15 air squats.  I did 13 rounds + 1 pullup.  My goal over the next few weeks is to improve my pullups.  I think I am going to start doing a program which includes doing 5 pullups on the minute for 20 minutes.  One of my friends from Crossfit told me that really helped him improve.

Well I should get back to work!  I only have another hour, then I get to go home to my “study den”!

Blurry Picture after my workout!

Hello everyone….it has been a while.  I am ready for February to get back in to things.  Last time I was out here I was whioning about my varied annoying injuries….well, are they really injuries?  Or are they just the normal aches and pains I am escalating to something more?  I’m not sure, but I am carrying on.
I did a good TRX ab workout the other night…..the burn and sweat felt pretty good.  The weather was pretty nice today, so I rode my bike to work….There is something about starting your day riding that carries through with your mood for the day.  It was 55 degrees when I rode home from work…..I must admit the uphill ride really got my sweat on!  So does relaxing with a cigar after negate everything I did??     Hmmm, a different topic for a different post!

http://crossfitfirebase.com/
Scroll down to Wednesday’s WOD.

Well I know it has been way to long since I last posted, I kept saying I would post then the day would get away from me.  My goal this year is to post at least once a week.

I have been on vacation for the last 3 weeks so this month has not been ideal for starting my new years fitness goals!  I have, however managed to run and do a small circuit of jumping jacks, sit ups, push ups and lunges at least every other day, which is pretty darn good considering I could just be laying on the beach sipping pina coladas!!

I have decided my goal this year (which after reading Alex’s last post and seeing it is quite similar) is to get into the best shape of my life.  I know I put in the work at the gym but I slack when it comes to diet.  I am going to really focus on my food intake and hopefully will see results.  I read the book Choose to Lose, The 7 day Carb Cycle Solution which was a great push.  I am going to take tips from this book and a few other diets I have looked over and put something together that will work with my schedule.  This is not going to come easy and I am going to need some support, so this blog is going to be my support system.

With motivation and willpower anything is possible, so wish me luck and help me along!

Thanks in advance for the support!!

For the past several days I have made a physical note to write a post, but each time have gotten caught up, so today is my day.  Since my last post I “celebrated” my 28^th birthday, finished my second week of classes, studied my buns off for the National Strength and Conditioning Association’s (NSCA) Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist (CSCS) certification exam (I plan to take on Friday), worked for both Sport-Scan and the YMCA, and have kept up with Crossfit (missing only one day due to muscle soreness).

I vowed to myself that by the end of my 28^th year I would be in the best overall shape of my life.  I want to be able to tackle any physical activity without and restraints.  I also would like to have my MS in Exercise Physiology completed and hopefully have a career started.  I see too many people in my field who are not all that healthy or just lift and lack the overall fitness.  That is not what I want.  I also read a post from Vern Gambetta where he said he swims a minute for every year on his birthday.  That may be a new tradition next year.

I have begun to see various improvements during my Crossfit workouts.  My form for the Olympic lifts (e.g. power cleans, clean and jerks) have become smoother and my ability to work through my mental pain is also improving.  I have almost completed one straight month and am looking forward to how my body reacts as I move forward.  I have a few professors who feel Crossfit is too much and does not give the body enough time to recover.  As I mentioned earlier, I took off Thursday to rest my sore muscles, and I believe that is the key to Crossfit.  As in any form of physical exercise, one must listen to their body and cannot be afraid to take a day or several days off to let it heal and rest.

When I got to the gym on Friday, everybody was talking about “Fran” the WOD, which had not been prescribed for about a year.  The white board read as follows:

21-15-9

Thrusters

Pullups

I have learned over the past month that when WOD’s consist of two exercises, no matter how simple they may appear, they usually kick your butt.  I have yet to figure out the “kipping” pullup so I had to complete my pullups from a dead-hang and eventually completed jumping pullups (the bar is just out of reach over my head so even the jumping pullups are a challenge).  I finished Fran in 9:53 which I was happy with but am eager to learn to kip so I can improve WOD’s that include pullups.  Yesterday’s WOD was the following:

As a 4 person team complete the following:

FireBase Loop (1000m)

300 Kettlebell Swings (50#M/30#F)
400 Pushups

500 Situps

600 Air Squats

5 Rope Climbs per team member

For Time.  *Only 2 team members may work at a time.

I do not have my notebook in front of me, but my team finished first with a time around 33:00 minutes.  We split the group up and alternated the exercises; pretty much doing sets of ten until we completed that exercise, and then moved on to the next.  I cannot remember the last time I did rope climbs.  My technique was pretty bad to I did not have good footwork which led to me usually predominantly my upper body.  My arms were on fire following the 5 climbs.

I was going to talk about my classes, but I really need to get back to studying.  I will attempt to take a break and post again later today, but don’t hold me to that.  Enjoy your Sunday!

Saturday was a lazy day, we really couldn’t get motivated to do much of anything.  Plan some meals for the week, go grocery shopping, prepare a nice stir fry. But beyond that, it was mostly just reading and relaxing by the fire.
After supper I got on the bike and did 20 minutes or so.  I had the heart rate monitor on so I could make sure I was in the Primal fat burning range.  I kept it in the 102- 107 range which I calculate (by any number of methods!) should be in my 60 -70% MHR range.  It felt pretty good, and I wasn’t exhausted.

Still a little bored, I decided to do kettle bell swings…the thing is I don’t have a kettle bell!  So I improvised with a 20 lb dumbbell.  I couldn’t swing it back as far, and it wasn’t as easy to go the American way, but I must say that 4 sets of 15 later, I could tell I did something!  and this morning my hamstrings are a bit sore, but it’s a good sore, just enough to let me know I did something, and got a little sweat on!

My busy week is finally beginning to wind down.  I started class this week and also worked a long schedule at the YMCA. I have worked out every day this week and yesterday my team finished a workout of the day (WOD) first.  It was the first time that I had finished at the top.  The workout was as follows, as a 2 person team, complete 50 Sit Ups each, then while Partner 1 Runs 400m, Partner 2 Rows for Meters for 5 Rounds. Then complete 50 Sit Ups each. For Time.

Although we completed the workout in the fastest time we did not row as far as we had hoped.

I have found that the WODs help me burn off my stress, which is really nice especially now that I am taking classes and working.  Today we worked on double-unders and handstand walking, which is extremely hard.  After the technical work we completed the WOD which consisted of 21-15-9 reps of ring pullups, ring dips and roll to candle sticks.

I read a quote the other day that I really liked:

“It takes 4 weeks for you to notice your body changing, 8 weeks for your friends to notice, and 12 weeks for the rest of the world to notice. Give it 12 weeks. Don’t QUIT!”

Stick with it!! 4 weeks is nothing!