Thursday. Emom x 10min, odd min 12 kb swing, even min 15 ghd. OHS singles, build up (up to 80kg). Rowing Nancy, time 14.30 (PR).
Today's workout of the day was great. Nancy is one tough lady! I've had a date with her couple of times before and she's mean every time. Prior to that wod I did some overhead squat singles. Didn't quite go the way I planned but it was cool to do those after a long break.
Warm-up.
Every minute on the minute x 10 minutes
Odd minutes, 12 kettlebell swing, 24kg
Even minutes, 15 ghd sit-ups
After my regular warm-up routines I did a short workout in emom style to activate the entire body. Legs, core and shoulders all got their share and I felt ready after this one. Kettlebell was the heaviest I found from the place, and it was light for sure. Didn't matter, this was only for warm-up purposes. Ghd's felt also light all the way. Still, this was a good way to get pumped up.
There were basically just couple of reps on overhead squats as they were singles and my max lift is at 90kg. That means to say the limit comes pretty quickly. I haven't had heavy stuff over my head in a while and that really felt like it too. I wasn't that confident pressing the barbell up in the sky. However, once I got it there, the descent and ascend from the bottom felt pretty solid up to 80kg.
On the 85kg I somehow didn't find the path down there. Tried it twice in that same lift but it got desperate. Hopefully my elbows stay good now as they are healed so I could do presses and jerks much more. That would create confidence in having the bar overhead.
Uuh, this is a perfect workout. I've done normal Nancy maybe twice before and rowing Nancy once last year. You have a link couple of rows above to that blog post. This was almost a half a minute PR on the benchmark workout. I was definitely not super confident of hitting a new record but I decided to give it a shot. Plan was to row modestly, and then complete the overhead squats unbroken each round. I've been able to do that before so that game me confidence. On the other hand, I also remember they being very nasty so that was not a confidence booster =)
After the first round my legs were burning so that brought some thoughts in my head that maybe this is not going to that easy after all (like I ever even thought of that). I decided to put those thoughts somewhere else and keep grinding. Rowing was something like sub 1:50 for some time, and towards the end it was about 1:50 on average.
Ohs were unbroken every round and I'm very proud of that. Shoulders were great but my legs were in flames for most of the workout. They got so jammed up in the middle of the workout that I had to beat them with my hands to get some blood flowing and to flush them. Don't know if that made any difference but it was great to go unbroken. This time I also had 43kg on the bar. Okay, that's just a tiny addition to the weight but still, it's nice to get this done in shorter time domain with slightly heavier bar =)
Today's star moment was written in my calendar as being benchmark workout Nancy, rowing version of it. Before hitting the actual metcon I had planned to do either clean and jerks or snatches. I felt a little beaten up, especially in my lower body already in the warm-up section. Legs got tired pretty soon so the barbell play time was kind of short and light weight, concentrating in technique and form rather than big loads.
Barbell.
Squat snatch technique at 30-40kg
This is something I've got more and more enthusiastic over lately. I wanna get the bar path nice before trying to force heavier loads. I have readjusted the grip width recently to match better to my body and it has helped me in the "first pull". I can make the contact with bar and body in correct height on the hips. That is great news. The bar tends to still go a little too much forward instead of traveling straight up vertically.
This snatch session included power snatches from ground and from hang position plus squat snatches from both ground and hang. Finally I took some snatch balance work. That seems to be the most natural part of this movement. And what is extremely positive thing is that my mobility is on a level that I don't have to use that as an excuse for not working on this movement. The weights were not playing big role this time, just playing with the bar and getting familiar with the movement.
Nice, Nancy is always a great workout. I've hit this one twice before as described. This ought to be a running workout spiced with overhead squats. Run one lap on a track for 400m, then complete 15 ohs at 42.5kg. Well okay, no need to use a track, distance is the defining factor. Repeat for a total of 5 rounds and you're done. I've done this once together with Toni in Liikuntamylly and then once on my own in the same place. That is one of those rare venues where I can hit this one and it's been an eternity since I've had the chance to train there. Need to have a holiday or a day off to get there. Magnificent place by the way.
I was bitching a bit to Pauliina about having some pain in my right wrist. Probably nothing big but it's feeling very tight without any reason. Haven't injured it anywhere, just realized it maybe yesterday that it's super tight. So I was thinking about just rowing easy and doing some ohs but Pauliina put me back in my place and made me work hard for this benchmark wod. Thanks for that!
Rowing pace was somewhere around 1:45 for the first round, then 1:50 and at some rounds closer to 1:55, there were pace per 500m, that's what the digits show on the Concept2. I knew the difference would be made on the squats rather than rower. I could win just seconds by rowing harder so the bar movement would make a bigger influence on the final time.
Previous time I managed to get all rounds unbroken on the ohs. Today my legs were jello after first round. That was kind of awkward, couldn't figure out why but that made me drop the bar on the second round after 10 reps. On the rounds of 2-4 I did the sets in 2 attempts, either 10-5 or 11-4. On the last round I grit my teeth and pushed it unbroken again. I'd thought my shoulders would have bailed on me before legs but it was the other way around. Sick.
The nature of this rowing version was different than when running. Running got my heart beat higher and more miserable on lungs. Rowing got my muscles more fatigued. Different kind of burn on these two. Both rocked and were pure crossfit workouts, hands down! This workout finished one week of some sort of benchmark workouts. On Saturday I repeated that one crossfit.com workout, then one of the Open workouts, Christine, Cindy-ish, Helen and Nancy. Some sort of version of these benchmarks saw the daylight, maybe a little modified for one reason or the other but I can definitely feel these in my body right now. It's been great to hit these classics!
Holiday! Beautiful weather, I get to sleep more than normally, take some nap, do multiple workouts a day and plan our trip to California which takes place in May with Pauliina. Pretty awesome if you ask me! I went to Liikuntamylly for snatch and overhead squat purposes in the morning. Happened to nail a new PR in ohs. Then I took on Nancy, a great benchmark workout with running and ohs as a couplet. In the afternoon I went to pick up Pauliina from work which turned out to be a good chance to get in another training session.
Summer is coming!
Strength.
Snatch 5-5-5 (40, 50, 55kg)
Overhead squats (50, 60, 65, 70, 75, PR 80kg)
Liikuntamylly and Eltsu are the two places where I usually go when I have the possibility. These places are made for olympic lifting. I tend to go heavy on these occasions because of the possibility to drop the bar. It's okay to look for PR's at such venues. I believe I have never gone over 60kg in ohs at my "home gym".
70kg
Didn't take any skills practice prior to strength, jumped right on to snatches. Took good mobility session before I touched the bar though. Then some classic warm-up rituals with a barbell plus snatch balance drills. My intention was to do all squat snatches but I found it a little too difficult today, especially on the 55kg snatches I couldn't find the path down properly. That's why they were power snatches instead. Because I wasn't able to find the correct path all the way down, I stayed at 55kg and didn't go heavier on this one.
80kg
Changed some plates and started doing overhead squats. Didn't have any plan, it's been too long since I've done ohs. So I just played with it for a while, added weight on the bar and took more reps. My wrists are a little sensitive for high-rep overhead squats. It's pretty much the only movement where I get some wrist pain if I hold the bar for a long time. At 60kg this came in to play and the weight itself didn't feel that heavy so I started to take doubles and singles from then on.
My previous 1 rep max was 75kg, which we had taken together with Toni the last time we were here together. It was a little shaky at the time when I held the bar overhead. Today it felt much smoother and steady all the way down and up. We took a shot at 80kg with Toni but I remember it was a desperate seek for both of us. It was wobbling back and forth when I had the bar overhead and there was no chance in trying to lower by butt to the ground. This time the press behind the neck was stronger and I got a solid balance right away. There was nothing more to be done but complete the rep.
Recap of strength
One thing that bugs me is that there's a slight doubt in my mind of the squats's depth being shallow. I'll take this for now but this is something to consider in overhead squats in the future. This movement pattern is not that familiar to me compared to back and front squats. I'm used to squat with mirrors in front of me so it's a bit difficult to perceive how deep I'm going without the familiarity of the mirrors (or training partner).
The barbell should be 42.5kg. This place don't have those fractional plates or light weight plates of 1.25kg so I went with 40kg sharp. Not a big difference but still it should have been 2.5kg heavier. On the other hand I ran a little more than 400m. There's a 200m track which I ran twice. I couldn't place the barbell right next to the track so I had to take a side step to my "bar station". On my fourth round one guy was just about to take my barbell 'cause he thought it wasn't in use. That would have been a bummer if I had lost my bar in the middle of a workout =) Luckily I was able to finish this one as planned.
We did Nancy together with Toni in the end of last year, during the winter holidays. Great combination of movements, running and overhead squats, high-rep overhead squats. I remember there was some hassle last time because we only had one barbell but it was a great one anyway. I topped my time with +3min, from 18min to 14.52. Last time it wasn't so precise, today I took it by the second. What I'm most happy about is the round time variation, or actually the absence of them. First round was 2.51, and the last one was 2.58, the rounds in between were 2.53 - 3.01 - 3.06.
I'm very pleased on that one! I was afraid running would get way slower towards the end. I've never been a fast runner and especially in a metcon I feel like I'm wearing down in the run parts. Okay, I was decent runner back in the days considering I was a floorball goalie =) But I wouldn't count that as one of my strengths. The round times hint that the performance was steady all the way.
I got the overhead squats unbroken each round, that's another thing to celebrate. It got tough on the third round but I stuck to the bar and never let go before 15 reps were done. By the way, completing ohs with oly lifting shoes and sneakers are two different things. I'd like to do my squats with oly shoes but naturally it's challenging to run with those flat shoe soles. This workout was awesome and it was pleasing to see the time got better with minutes.
Dip dropsets. Total of 60 reps
In 60sec, amrap weighted dips @ 20kg
60sec rest
In 60sec, amrap weighted dips @ 15kg
60sec rest
In 60sec, amrap weighted dips @ 10kg
60sec rest
In 60sec, amrap weighted dips @ bodyweight
I was open-minded for this second session, and an article came across from "Fit As Fu*k" where Ditte and Sarah were writing about the importance of dips. I realized it's been a while since last time so it seemed to fit in well to this afternoon. This workout was a drop set style, 60 second amrap of dips with dropping weights, one minute break between sets. I liked this much more than traditional style sets of triples or 5's. Managed to nail 15 reps on the first set so I decided to stick to that rep scheme. It got tougher by the round because the rest wasn't enough to get fully recovered.
This is a weakness of mine so I'm happy on the way I was able to perform. Did 15 reps in each set and the feeling was I really had to do work to get them done. Good workout tip by the ladies, appreciate it!
Workout. For quality
5 rounds of:
10 pull-ups
50 double unders
Before the dips I did some pull-ups, strict chest-to-bar versions and couple of belly-to-bar to work on my bar muscle-ups. Also tried to get band-assisted muscle-ups without a swing but that turned out to be too difficult as I've used to do bar mu's with a good kip. This training session was easy in nature, goal was to get body moving, definitely not 100% effort, just get the blood flowing, work on some skills and weaknesses. It was also great to see Joni go after hero workout Small. If you still remember that one: 3 rounds of 1.000m rowing, 50 burpees, 50 box, and 800m running. I did it about a week ago because he talked me into it, now it was his time to suffer =) Good job Joni!
