Wednesday 4.11: Snatch, Squat, Longer metcon

Wednesday. Oly, 10 sets of: snatch high pull + snatch @ 55kg. Strength, pause back squat 6x3 @ 120kg. Metcon, 4rds of: 10 power clean (80kg), 15 burpee, 20 ghd, 25 box. Time, 20.33.

It's my birthday so I found a good way to celebrate it after work: crossfit! =) That's a lot of quality time for sure. Olympic lifts, lower body strength and a bad ass metcon. That took my breath away, literally. Loved every second of today's session.

Oly.

• 10 sets of: snatch high pull + snatch @ 55kg
• Both from hang position

This was a new way to work on snatches. And I enjoyed it. Definitely have to take this type of snatch training more often. Big problem for me is the bar is traveling too far away from my body. By doing high pulls it's easy to keep the bar close. And by teaching the body to keep it close, it is also easier to keep it closer on the actual snatch too.

Yes, there were some reps where I caught the bar in front and had to walk a step forward to catch the bar overhead. Still, I consider this practice worth keeping in the repertoire.

Snatch recap

Strength.

• Pause back squat 6x3

Got this idea couple of days ago from somewhere. Since then, it's been tickling me from time to time that I'm gonna hit it someday. I had no idea about the weights I'm able to move but I still decided to go for 120kg for triples. They were actually perfect for weights. First rep was easy, second one needed much more work, and the third one was a good grind!

Squat recap

Metcon. Time, 20.33

• 4 rounds of:
• 10 power clean, 80kg
• 15 burpee
• 20 ghd sit-up
• 25 box jumps

This was originally 20min amrap but I decided to finish the last round which brought it half a minute overtime of the time frame. I wanted it to be long and mental. Power cleans were semi heavy. During the workout they naturally turned a lot heavier. These were singles from the very first rep. I understood this is not where time will be saved if I hurried through the first round.

Next movement burpees. Just pace them through. Keep moving. As I've said before, there is no actual need to stop on the burpees. It is an easy movement. You just throw yourself down on the floor, hit chest on the ground, and come up. Pace yourself and keep the rhythm on. Think about the breathing while your doing it to make it easier.

Ghd's, my core seems to be strong. I've realized it during these 3 years of crossfit. Maybe that's because of my earlier career as a goalkeeper in floorball. Stronger core means faster moves on the goal as you need to move quickly sideways. These were also unbroken. I got a good hint from Lauri to engage my hips more when coming up. Currently I'm doing the work mostly with the core.

On the box jumps I decided to walk back from the ghd's and start jumping. This was also the element where I need to control my breath strongly because otherwise I would have gassed even more. This was a very good conditioning piece to crown the training session.

Below are some parts of the metcon in the form of a video. Cleans, burpees and box jumps.

Metcon

Wednesday 10.10: Pair wod, double Grace!

Wednesday. Pair workout: double Grace (50kg). Time 5.50. Technique for 2-position clean, hang snatch high pull, snatch and overhead squats.

Double Grace .Today’s goal was something very much different compared to traditional training. We took good warm-up with Toni - who was my partner today - in a workout that we completed together as a team. I’ve been thinking and pondering what kind of pair wods we could do and in which kind of workouts we would be in equal level with Toni. Please throw some ideas if you have some in the comments section below. One idea that I have in mind is the other one rowing and the other one holding a plate overhead during the row. At some point change roles on a fly, repeat for 2-3 rounds. This time we did something else anyway. Classic material, Grace was ahead of us.

• On September 7^th, I did individual Grace with 50kg for 5.40.
• Toni’s time on the same day with 40kg was 4.09.
• Today our combined time with 50kg was 5.50.

Now, about 12 hours after the workout, I'm still smiling as I think what happened in the morning. However, I'm wondering about the time we completed the double Grace in. If I think about our performances and times in September and today, some thoughts come to my mind.

First of all, the weights felt so much lighter now. That difference was remarkable. How about the time? First reaction was that damned our time was fast for 60 reps! Then, our "individual times" in this workout were about 5.20. I began at 00.00 and was done with 30 reps at 5.20. Toni had about the same time, he just started about half a minute later.

How about the strategy? The planning ahead was from another planet compared to previous Grace. That time I just started doing the reps as fast as I could. And the result was that I managed quite well up to 15 reps but from then on the workout was a nightmare. This didn't happen this time because of doing 5 reps at a time and then rest while the other guy did his 5 reps. Okay, breathing got heavy today as well but not intolerable. And I was able to keep my technique similar throughout the workout, even as tired. Last time the last third of it was purely struggling, not cool. This time both of us completed all sets unbroken.

So now I'm thinking what happened if we did this individually. Would we have the patience to take it wisely and keep short pauses or would we be too eager and ambitious which would have definitely hit us back at some point. And how long pauses should we keep if the bar didn't feel that heavy? I don't know the answers but my head is full of these thoughts. Would it be a good idea to do for example 6 reps, step back for 20 seconds and repeat for 5 rounds. Could I go like that till the end with the same pace or would fatigue hit me big time? And finally, I should definitely go for heavier weights next time. You'll see the last round of our double Grace below.

As a summary, we both improved our performance clearly. Next time heavier weights. We were both extremely satisfied with this workout and will definitely go for it together and as individuals again. Pair wod was definitely worth trying for and I think we will try to be creative and do other type of metcons together as well. Clean & jerk is one of the favorites for both of us.

I was full of energy after Grace and wanted to do other workouts as well. However, my upper body really felt the burden of it so it was out of question to do anything heavy. I learned some technical issues for 2-position clean, hang snatch high pull as well as normal snatch, some overhead squats too. I haven't really snatched at all so I'm learning it little by little. That hang snatch high pull really made its purpose, I got closer to doing them all the way. I also took some snatches with the bar and mysteriously it didn't feel that difficult. I've had some issues with this movement so I have been avoiding it for some time. Now it's about time to start learning this movement seriously, as well as overhead squats.

Joni was also with us at the gym, he did:

• 5 rounds of
• 20 back squats (50kg)
• 10 burpees

In the evening, I had my floorball training for 2 hours. Our coach was clearly not satisfied with our performance in Monday's game and made us do a bit different type of training this time. Definitely not only floorball, there was actually quite a number of shuttle runs, abdominal movements, push-ups, sit-ups, back extensions etc. I liked it! Tomorrow I will travel to Stockholm to see Pauliina, I'll be back on Monday. We are anyway going to train hard at Pauliina's local gym so I'll keep you informed what's happening in Sweden :)