Monday 25.7: DT for 20min

Monday. Pair workout, 20min amrap of DT @ 60kg, You go, I go style. Result, 16 rounds + 3 clean.

Toni asked me to hit a morning's bro session with him on Monday. I'm still on holiday this week so it suited well for my plans. After the session I headed back to Klaukkala where we stayed for couple of days with the family. It was another long day of doing work at the house. They are moving so we got rid of a lot of stuff at the house. We started right after I came back from the training session and I got home after 10pm. Okay we had lunch and coffee during the day but other than that it was action all the way. It wasn't difficult to get sleep for the night =)

Metcon. Result, 16 rounds + 3 clean

• Pair workout
• 20min amrap of:
• DT, You go, I go (12 deadlift, 9 hang power clean, 6 push jerk)
• Barbell @ 60kg

Tough. Very tough. Body felt tired in the morning. The sandbag run had destroyed my legs nicely so luckily this was more focusing on upper body, grip strength and lungs. It was great to have a training partner to share the suffer. This was lighter than the regular DT but we added some stakes by making it a 20min amrap. I started, completed one full round, then Toni did one round. We alternated after every round.

We held on to one minute per round for about 8 minutes. Then we started slowing down. I call this a great session with my main man Toni.

DT, part one

DT, part 2

Saturday 13.12: Cj emom and DT

Saturday. Clean and jerk emom x 5min: 2 reps @ 80kg. Benchmark wod DT, time 11.30.

Tonight we are heading to celebrate one of Pauliina's best friend's graduation. It was also great to sleep for a good 10h last night. For the entire week I got only something like 6-7h of sleep, and that's okay, I'll manage with that but I'd take 1-2h more every night with great pleasure. So it's classic that on Saturday we sleep late and load the batteries. In the early afternoon I hit the gym for a benchmark workout DT, tough stuff.

Clean and jerk.

• Every minute on the minute for 5 minutes:
• 2 reps @ 80kg

I concentrated in my technique prior to this emom workout with lighter weights, in my warm-up section. Focus was on bringing the bar higher on my thighs in the power clean and then speed on the push jerk or split jerk. I don't have that much time to analyze so I'll let you be the judge on the videos below.

Warming up

This emom workout was great. 80kg is rather heavy for me, especially on multiple reps. It starts to get uncomfortable. However, I felt like the reps looked pretty solid and similar which is always a positive sign in my eye.

Emom x 5min

DT. Time, 11.30

• 5 rounds of:
• 12 deadlift, 70kg
• 9 hang power clean, 70kg
• 6 push jerk, 70kg

Uuh… I got 4 rounds on video, then someone came to the gym and battery was about to run dead anyway. Took the deadlifts unbroken, they were the easiest part of this one. Used clean grip / hook grip on them all the way.

Got hang power cleans unbroken for 2 rounds, then divided them into two parts. Those started to get nasty, very nasty. I could have maybe smashed them unbroken too but that would have had huge impact on my push jerks and that was not gonna happen.

4 rounds of DT

Push jerks were the most challenging part of the workout. My only goal in this workout was to get them unbroken so I did some strategic work with cleans in order to save energy for the jerks. And I finally got every round ub on the jerks, good job.

Great workout to say the least. Very challenging for muscles, shoulders especially. Breathing was also heavy most of the times. Grip strength was also a bit of an issue even though I used hook grip. Good one!

Monday 1.9: Front squats and Team DT

Monday. Strength, 5-5-5-5 (max 115kg). Team DT, 5rds of: 12 deads, 9 hang power clean, 6 push jerk, with a 70kg barbell.

It was a great training day for sure. What led to this? My main man Toni came back to our gym where it all started from. My body felt tired yesterday but today it was all fresh. Good move by Toni to start persuading me to hit a partner workout of the hero wod DT. We did it as a team, first time for me to hit this one. Did some front squat as strength to start the session. Toni went after hang power cleans for strength.

Strength.

• Front squat 5-5-5-5 (100, 110, 115, 110kg)

My last back squat session (last Saturday) was not a huge success, and that's been bothering me so I decided to get it out of my system as soon as possible. Changed it to front squats for this Monday, and 5's were in my mind for the entire day. It was a better effort, that 115kg was a tight one but 110kg lifts left a little energy in my tank still. 100kg front squats are too light for strength regularly. There might be days when they seem suitable but at the moment we are at a stage where the bar needs to have more load than 100kg. I'm very happy on the depth of my squat nowadays. Toni said something strange has happened to my mobility. It's been a while since we've trained together and nowadays I drop my butt to the ground every time I squat for strength. That feels like a huge thing for my mobility too.

Team DT.

• 5 rounds of:
• 12 deadlift, 70kg
• 9 hang power clean, 70kg
• 6 push jerk, 70kg
• One athlete completes all of the deads, cleans and push jerks, then passes off to the other athlete who completes all the reps. That is one full round

This was awesome. Tough but awesome! I began this partner workout by doing one round of DT, after which I handed it over to Toni and he nailed one similar round. We both did 5 rounds alternating after each round. The bar was at 70kg which was a little intimidating, especially as I don't know if I've ever done heavier hang power cleans than 70kg. My hang cleans have traditionally been "high hang cleans" or "tall cleans", meaning I don't use the momentum of taking the bar from mid-thigh or lower. It's mostly from a still position by initiating the bar from as high as possible.

It was a mind blowing experience hearing some tips on the bar movement from Toni. After we talked about it for a while, I tried his advice and nailed easy 60 / 70kg hang power cleans. That was strange as hell. But when I think about it, it's not such a mystery. When you clean it from lower position, it's pretty obvious you get more momentum and elevation to the barbell. Thus it feels lighter and you're able to clean / snatch more weight.

Those deadlifts were light naturally. The number of them and the movement pattern itself makes me breath more heavily than normally. So I took 11 deads, dropped the bar, caught my breath and moved on to cleans. There I took the last (12th) deadlift to get to the starting point of hang power cleans. Had no idea how many hang power cleans I might take. Something like 5 was in my mind in the beginning. But once I started pulling, it happened out that I took 8 reps in a row, then dropped the bar. Then another breath taking session and regrip on the bar. Take the last hang power clean and put the bar overhead, 6 times unbroken.

That was the game plan from then on. This was ambitious but I was able to stay with this rep scheme all the way for the entire 5 rounds. Practically unbroken sets of deadlifts, hang power cleans and push jerks. I just dropped the barbell between these movements before moving on to the next move. Because I was able to stick to this system, that also kept the round times steady. It took me about 1:30-1:45 each round. It was the recovery time between movements that got a little longer towards the end because of heavy breathing.

I'm thankful for Toni for giving those valuable tips on hang cleans. This was an awesome workout, especially done with a partner. That's why it was possible to keep a good pace on each round. Doing DT as individual would be totally another ball game because of lack of recovery time. The bar is rather heavy for this kind of movement pattern.

Wednesday 9.7: Ring mu's, 45min workout

Wednesday. Skills, ring muscle-ups. Workout, 3 rds of: 1 round of Hammer, 1k row, 1 round of DT, 1k row. Time 47.28.

Today I left work early to hit a workout on my own. Nobody else at the gym except Pauliina who came there about an hour after I had started. We're heading to Spain for a week in the evening. There was a good time slot to find some real muscle misery in the gym. I went after ring skills and a looooong workout.

Skills.

• Ring muscle-ups

I had no rush at all so I took my time to get properly warmed up, then hit couple of muscle-ups. Just singles this time, aimed to remind my body how it's done. Couple of reps without false grip and then couple in the end with false grip. No biggie, felt good!

Workout. Time 47.28

• 3 rounds of:
• 1 round of Hammer (5 power clean, 10 front squat, 5 push jerk, 20 pull-ups) 60kg
• 1.000m row
• 1 round of DT (12 deadlift, 9 hang power clean, 6 push jerk) 60kg
• 1.000m row

Huh, not a funny one. I needed to have my hands on a barbell because I don't know when the next time will be. Will I find one in Spain or is it gonna be more like gymnastics and bodyweight movement there. I don't know the answer so I played it safe and worked with a bar quite a lot. Mixed in some rowing to make it more grueling.

Hero workout Hammer consists of power cleans, front squats, push jerks and pull-ups. I took one round of that set, and combined it with another her workout called DT. That one is originally completed with 70kg bar but that would have been too much for me to handle. Especially those hang power cleans. So I went with the same barbell all the way. DT is about deads, cleans and jerks. In between these two heroes I had a 1k row.

This is obviously not an all in effort for the entire time. It's more like finding your pace and try to stick with it. I decided to take the row at a steady pace, not going to gas myself out of the game, it was sub 2:00 / 500m pace. In the end that started to feel bad too =) There was a total of 6.000m row during this metcon.

In general I found it awesome to hit this kind of long workout compared to a 5-20min workouts. Constant variety. Anyway, see ya, we're going to enjoy the sun and vacation!

Monday 1.4: Front squat, metcon

Monday. Front squat 5x3 (max 115kg). 1/2 DT.

Feeling better and better every day. Still not fully recovered so taking it a bit easier. Agenda included front squats (not aiming to reach max loads), then a metcon that's about half DT, which is one of the benchmark hero workouts in crossfit.

Strength. Front squat 5x3 (100, 100, 110, 110, 115kg). I felt very good with these weights and it boosted my front squat confidence. The depth of my squat was good and I was able to keep elbows high and thus nice form.

Metcon. 1/2 DT. Originally this wod is 5rds with 70kg.

• 3 rounds of
• 12 deadlift
• 9 hang power clean
• 6 push jerk
• 60kg on the bar

Didn't want to go as fast as possible but still keeping a steady pace and having semi-heavy breathing constantly. Deadlifts with 60kg naturally ain't bad, then continuing to hang power cleans is difficult to do unbroken so I broke it to 5 reps, then 3 and after the last (9th) rep I completed all 6 jerks unbroken. This was the strategy each round and I managed to follow it all the way.

Cashout.

• 3 rds of:
• 10 Toes-to-bar
• 10 Ab wheels
• 10 (5/5) Pistols

Something cool in the end, abs and pistols. Haven't done pistols in a while. They're awesome!