Wednesday 29.10: Rowing Helen, Gymnastics

Wednesday. Metcon, rowing Helen. 3rds of: 400m row, 21 kb swing (20kg), 12 pull-ups. Time, 8.50. Gymnastics, handstand hold, deficit hspu's for quality.

Another benchmark lady was ahead of me today. I've done Helen once - in the beginning of my cf career - over 2 years ago. Today was a repeat workout but instead of running I went rowing. Afterwards I concentrated in bodyweight stuff, basically hanging upside down, doing static holds and hspu's. Later on Jouni arrived to the gym and we practiced front squats with him for the first time.

Rowing Helen. Time 8.50. Compare to 8.8.2012

• 3 rounds of:
• 400m row
• 21 kettlebell swing, 20kg
• 12 pull-ups

Helen was one of the first benchmark workouts I ever did, back in August 2012, that's also about when I started writing this blog. We did it together with my bro at Kauniainen's sports track. The difference with this and that was running versus rowing. Plus kb swing 2 years back were merely Russian swings, barely even eye level. Bell was same in weight. Originally it should be 24kg but I don't have access to that. I have one 20kg at home which I used 2 years ago. And the heaviest bell at our gym is also 20kg so I used that one today. I've also done a combination of DT and Helen with kettlebells last year, 25.12.2013.

This guy looks a bit different 2 years ago =) I've come a long way

This was by no means rx'd version of the workout because I rowed and the bell was 4kg too light. I understood beforehand this is gonna be rather fast workout so there's no time to start whining but just go and rip it out. On rowing I went something like 1:45 on the first round, around 1:50 on the second and a little slower on the last round. The difference between running and rowing is that you got to set yourself on the rower before you get moving. When running you can drop from the pull-up brand set off right away on that same second.

Kettlebell swings were light, I don't usually do work with anything else than 2-pood bell, that is 32kg. Completed all 3 sets unbroken, and those didn't cause any issues. These were American swings, haven't done Russians probably after the first Helen =) This naturally takes more time as the bell travels higher overhead instead of eye level.

Swings weren't that bad themselves but they consumed some of my energy on upper body so that I couldn't pull off the pull-ups unbroken. First round ub, then  8-4 and last set was 6-3-3. My grip was gone and just couldn't hold on to the bar. I tried to use much more legs in rowing to save my grip and arms for the remaining 2 movements. I was surprised the pull-ups felt that tough but that was the name of the game. Recoveries were short. Transitions were also as short as possible, and round times were 2:46, 2:58 and 2:55, pretty consistent. Great workout! As benchmark workouts tend to be =)

Gymnastics.

• 3 sets of: handstand hold (0:60, 0:45, 0:30sec)
• Deficit handstand push-ups for quality

Today's agenda was solely Helen and I had no other strictly planned workouts. I decided to throw myself in inverted position and took static holds in handstand position. First set was for one minute, second one 45 seconds and the last attempt for 30 seconds. This was useful training.

Secondly, I wanted to play around with handstand push-ups, climbing it to deficit hspu's. I didn't count them that precisely but it was basically triples at different heights. Took off with just one plate under each hand, making the deficit for about 5cm, or whatever the plate's width is. Then plate by plate I went up to 4 pieces making it somewhere between 20-30cm deficit, for a triple. I took 3 sets at this deficit. This was fun play in the end.