Friday 19.12: 30min amrap

Friday. Metcon, 30min amrap of: 20 hspu, 20 box, 20 power clean (60kg), 20 burpee, 200m run. Result, 3rds + 20 box.

Yesterday was supposed to be an easy day with pure skills training. Right now I feel like it didn't go as planned. My upper body is sore from a lot of muscles. That's great. It's a good reminder of having to keep the rings in programming more often. I think I'll put some focus on them during Christmas. Today's theme was constant variety. Half an hour metcon.

Got this baby for Toni as a b-day present with some colleagues =)

Metcon. Result, 3 rounds + 20 box jumps

• 20 handstand push-up
• 20 box jump
• 20 power clean, 60kg
• 20 burpee
• 200m run

Long metcons like this are not everyday stuff. Should they be? Don't know but at least every now and then it would definitely be wise. Pat Sherwood throws in Monday Monster Mash every week for the community to man up and do the prescribed work. Those have never been easy workouts, and they are always long as hell.

My main man Toni turned 30 years on Thursday, and threw a birthday workout to celebrate it like a real crossfitter. It was only suitable to make it a pain cave for 30 minutes. In honor of this great human being I also wrote half an hour metcon. I liked to do the exact same wod as Toni but it's not possible to throw wall ball at my gym so I made some twists. Ideology was pretty much the same anyway. Lots of reps on one movement before you're able to move on to the next station.

It was 20 reps per element, and running was included as well. I wanted this to be mostly bodyweight stuff but barbell was a must too. Beforehand I thought 20 reps of hspu's and power cleans are no joke in a metcon, and they would be the most bad ass part of the workout. In the end I had the least spark in my eyes when it was time to hit chest to deck on the burpees.

Hspu's were challenging on shoulder strength for sure. Let me think how these went. It was 15-5 on the first round. My PR is maybe 22 reps so I didn't wanna go all out on the first minute of a 30min workout =) Second round was probably 10-5-5, third one was maybe 4 sets and the last one was 5-4, and then doubles. This was tough on shoulders but simultaneously it gave room to get the breathing back to normal.

Box jumps went unbroken each round. First round was easy, then it got to my legs. I stayed on the ball of my feet on the jumps, these were very efficient jumps this time in my opinion. Pace got a little slower on the second and third round but then again on the 4th I stepped up my game because time was running down. There was about 40+ seconds left on the clock, and once I finished the clock stood at 29:58.

Power cleans went down in sets of 5 reps from the very beginning. This strategy stood all the way. With hook grip there was no prob with the forearms. But my breathing got heavy, and that forced me to have a break between every 5 rep set.

The nastiest element of this workout was definitely the burpees. After cleans my breathing was heavy and shoulders were still a bit smashed on push-ups against the wall. First round went okay because it was the first one but from then on those felt like 40 burpees. I'll try to always follow my principle of knocking burpees unbroken because it's such a simple movement and there's no point to stop at any moment. I remember Graham Holmberg say in the past that once you stop on burpees, it's a conscious decision of giving up. It's simple to just go down and back up, no matter the pace, but keep grinding. I followed this agenda and hit them unbroken each round.

I programmed 200m running at the end of each round. There were some people at the gym using those cardio devices so I had to check each round what's available. On the first round I got to row for 200m, on the second round it was crosstrainer that was available, and the third one was finally running.

This was a good workout, tough because of the length, both mentally and physically. However, it's probably worth a shot throwing this kind of stuff every now and then.