Otherwise I was feeling good for a good training session but a little nagging pain in both elbows. Nothing bit but it derives from yesterday's from clean and jerks. Today was another Smolov session, then a tough combination for shoulders in the form of hspu's and du's. It was great to hook up with Jasper for this session.
Jazz doing push-ups, t2b's and jump rope metcon
Smolov.
Back squat 7x5 reps (115kg)
I did some mental work prior to opening the gym door and I saw myself doing light squats. At the end of the day these went as I had imagined them to go. The weight wasn't that bad. It's gonna get heavier, this is the lightest week, getting heavier by the week.
I believe my last set was the best. Don't have that one on the video unfortunately. There was another guy squatting next to me with a beautiful technique and I got inspired by him to put my best effort. The thing was to stay properly on my heels to reach an upright torso. My flutes were squeezed on every single rep and the package was tight. Felt very good to finish strong.
Smolov
Metcon. Time, 15.25
20-16-12-8-4 handstand push-ups
100-80-60-40-20 double unders
Last time I played around with double unders, they felt very natural and we were working as one nit with the jump rope. Today they sucked big time. It was like I was in the verge of learning how to do double unders for the first time. Don't know the reason for that but they definitely took majority of the time on this one.
Breathing was good all the time. It was the du's that failed, and the shoulder burn was real. This combo is putting a lot of stress on shoulders so no wonder they were getting fatigued. Hspu's were pretty okay all the way. I knew this is heavy on shoulders because they have no rest at all in this workout. These were mostly completed in 3 sets (13-4-3, 8-4-4, 6-3-3, 5-3, 4).
Thursday. Clean and jerk emom x 10min (max 80kg). Metcon, 10min amrap of: 10 t2b, 10 box. Result, 184 reps.
Nice, those squats really make a difference. They are not sore but they feel a bit tired. This was not a surprise and this is actually just the beginning. Hoping to get good gains out of this thing. Today's agenda was clean and jerk, every minute on the minute work. In the end bodyweight metcon.
Clean and jerk.
Every minute on the minute x 10 minutes
1-3min: 3 reps @ 70kg
4min: 2 reps @ 80kg
5-10min: 1 rep @ 80kg
Started it off with 3 reps at 70 kilos, then after 3 minutes I put 10 more kilos on the barbell. Thought about completing doubles for a while but the bar felt heavy'ish so I decided to keep it at this weight and not force it. My elbows came a bit sore on these jerks so I didn't push it to 'heavy' jerks.
This is the recovery from the squat position
Pretty good and solid work. First squat cleans were a bit off but towards the end it felt better and better by the rep. When I look at the reps now couple of hours later, they look a lot easier than they felt. I'm kinda happy those look rather solid no matter what happens in my head.
Decided to do something where those elbows would not be stressed that much. The combo of t2b's and boxes were known to be tough on the hip flexors and core but I took the risk. Toes-to-bar's slowed after either round 4 or 5. Until then I went unbroken, then had to break it. First to 6-4, then 6-2-2. And finally something like 4-3-3 and 4-2-2-2. Box jumps were a lot easier.
My core was on a test on the t2b's, that's why I wasn't able to keep the same pace for the entire 10 minutes. At first it looked like it's gonna be almost like emom work. My round times were sub one minute but the last rounds were 70-80 seconds.
Wednesday. Back squat 5x7 (110kg). Metcon, 1.000m row, then 5rds of: 7 jerk (60kg), 15 pull-ups. Time, 13.51.
Another squat day for this week. My hamstring are pretty tight from Monday's session. Not only because of squats but mostly due to Diane. Lots of quick deadlifts and probably with rather straight legs so that created a good tension in the hammies. Feels good =) Anyway, more squats, then jerks and pull-ups for metcon.
First round includes rowing
Smolov.
Back squat 5x7 (110kg)
This time the reps came down, sets and weights went up. This weight was very manageable. Definitely felt nasty but I had a good feeling on smashing these sets. My plan was to hit couple of touch'n'go reps, then pause, get more breath, inhale and continue the set. It turned out to be 4 reps in a row, then singles to finish it. Got a good burn on my legs every set.
Another thing I want to focus on these sets is to hit the bottom of my deepest squat in every rep. I still remember how good this Smolov program made to my mobility when I went through it about a year ago. It really opened up my hips. Being under a shitload of weight every other day and letting the body drop naturally to its lowest point really forced the hips to open up. That's what I'm looking as one of the biggest benefits of this program.
Okay, I had a lot of mixed feelings. I've done this one once before and remember it was quite a burner on upper body. Actually I remember that being one bad misery of a workout hehe. I approached this workout with calmness. Because this was gonna hurt I probably took a notch down in vain. Should have attacked it with anger.
My time this time was slower than last time. Okay, my pull-ups are not on the same level as they were previously. Those were the biggest difference for sure. Last time I didn't have the rowing element there. that obviously took couple of minutes.
I went unbroken on the jerks. Those were not the thing. Last 2 reps on the latest sets burned my legs but shoulders stayed fine all the way. On pull-ups I was way too conservative. I had a plan. Usually I go by feeling, on about 98% of the workouts. Today I decided to play it 5-5-5 with short breaks. I followed this one from the very first set (I think), and jumped quite fast back on the pull-up bar. That was the whole idea. There's no point in resting too much and do 5's.
I guess the time was anyway consumed in the transitions and in the latest rounds on the pull-up bar breaks. I felt good after the workout but disappointed when I realized what I had hit last time. My muscles were sore post-wod but breathing was rather well under control. This is a great workout, and I'm sure gonna repeat it some day just to get my revenge. That time I'm gonna give it my all. Plus, I'm gonna have better pull-ups then!
Tuesday. Snatch emom x 10min: snatch + hang snatch (40kg). Metcon, 10 mu's, then 5rds of: 7 hang power clean (60kg), 30 du's, 12 ghd. Time, 13.34.
I was in no rush at all this Tuesday but on the other hand my posterior chain was a bit cranked up from yesterday's session so this was not the toughest one. Metcon was good, snatches were light.
Snatch.
Every minute on the minute x 10 minutes
1 snatch + 1 hang snatch @ 40kg
There was simply no way of building up to heavier sets. I played around with this weight for some time. Even though I warmed up for quite some time it didn't let me go heavy. I had emom work in my mind anyway, had just thought about putting something between 50 and 60 kilos on the bar.
Metcon. Time, 13.34
10 ring muscle-ups, then 5 rounds of:
7 hang power clean, 60kg
30 double under
12 ghd sit-ups
This was a good metcon. Muscle-ups took an eternity because I took them mostly in singles. First was a double, then maybe another double and the rest were definitely singles. No misses, not even close but somehow the pulling power wasn't explosive so I did only singles.
After 10 reps had been completed, it was time to hit the 5-rounder. Went unbroken each round on every element of the workout. Cleans were obviously the strength-element in this one, double unders the cardio and skills piece, and ghd's were putting core to test. There was distances between the stations so once I got to any of the station, I started working right away.
The walk was the recovery in this one. I'm especially happy about the double unders. I've had some issues on couple of sessions because those haven't been visible that much in my sessions in the past months. Today those felt very good all the way.
Monday. Back squat 4x9 (103kg). Diane, time 6.40 (PR).
I started the week with squats, and a benchmark workout Diane. Both went pretty well. This was the beginning of Smolov squats. I'll do them for couple of weeks and concentrate on getting my legs stronger. Diane felt like a perfect ending to this session as I've thought about completing this workout for quite some time.
Smolov.
Back squat 4x9 (103kg)
This first session was a total of 4 sets of 9 repetitions. Mentally this was easier because about 100k is not that bad. On the other hand, these long sets are bad ass. I tried to knock a few off tng style, then catch a breath, and finish the reps. Good start to getting legs stronger.
The first ever Diane I did was back in 2013, and the time was 17.47. There's been good progression on these skills, and I'm happy to report a new record on this wod at 6.40. This one is definitely all about the hspu's for me.
Diane
At some point during the workout it was a bit frustrating as I thought there's not gonna be a new record. After I went home and checked the previous time, it was a great moment to realize I had remembered the previous PR time incorrectly. This time I was happy about it because it meant that I got through this faster than ever before. Even with breaking the deads into pieces. Okay, the breaks were not long so it was mostly because I was able to move faster on the hspu's.
Sunday. Clean and jerk (max 95kg). Skills, bar mu's. Emom x 5min: 10 thruster (40kg).
Saturday was a pure rest day. It was a tough week with a lot of training so it was welcomed. On the other hand I felt good during the weekend and there was eagerness to hit it but we were spending the weekend at Pauliina's parents and this time I put crossfit aside. Okay, I watched a bit of the Crossfit Games but other than that it was easy weekend. Sunday evening I went to do some work to the gym.
Strength.
Clean and jerk singles (60, 70, 80, 85, 90, 95kg, fail at 100kg)
I just wanted to get couple of heavier reps done on clean and jerk. Haven't done it in a while so it was nice to build up. Felt pretty good up to those successful lifts, then wall hit me at 100 kilos. The previous one - 95kg - felt good so it was a small difference this time. Couldn't quite drop under the bar at 100kg so I wasn't able to lock my elbows.
Jerks
Skills.
Bar muscle-ups
Working on my technique on this movement. Aiming to bring my legs behind the vertical line of the pull-up bar. Feels very tight in my shoulders when I do it like this.
Thruster.
Every minute on the minute x 5 minutes
10 thruster, 40kg
That shoulder tightness also felt in thrusters, and it is kind of normal feeling on thrusters in general. So I want to believe thrusters made good impact on those. This was a good cashout at the end of the session. Easy session in general but a good way to finish the week.
Friday. AM: Run 2k, swim 1k, run 2k. PM: Emom x 10min: Odd min, power clean, front squat, squat clean. Even min, pause at knee, pause at hips, then clean pull. Metcon, bear complex @ 40kg. Time, 11.30.
Different start to the day. Swimming in Italy was great and I got inspired to hit the Helsinki swimming stadium this morning. It's my last day on a holiday so it seemed like a perfect opportunity to go there. In the afternoon Toni invited me to visit his affiliate in Vantaa. It was all about barbell work.
Conditioning.
Run 2.000m
Swim 1.000m
Run 2.000m
The stadium is a bit more than 2k away from our house. I took a back bag, put my stuff inside, and went running. Took 15 minutes to get there. That means it was a jog obviously. Went to study this place. It was a 50m pool with a bunch of lanes. I took the slow one because I'm definitely not a fish when you throw me in water. Never swam that much when I was a little kiddo so there are some lack of skills.
Swam for 500 meters at first, that's 10 pool lengths in total. Then a break, and another 500 meters. It was a good battle for me. Really felt it in my lats. It was all breast strokes through that kilometer. At times my right fingers started to tingle. Go figure. But it was a lot of fun, and it was a good morning workout for me!
Cleans.
Every minute on the minute x 10 minutes
Odd minutes, power clean, front squat (hold 2sec in bottom), squat clean (hold 2sec in bottom)
Even minutes, halt at knee for 4sec, halt at hips for 4sec, then clean pull
Barbell at 80kg
These workouts were 100% programmed by the affiliate itself. Had no word whatsoever in these. Toni invited me to join him, and I've never said no to a workout. This was good accessory style workout for clean. The difference to regular clean training was the obligatory pause in the bottom position. This was supposed to be 75% of 1RM so I figured 80kg would be fine. Toni went with the same weights.
Clean emom
Bear complex. Time, 11.30
Without dropping the bar, complete the following sequence for 7 times. That constitutes 1 rep
Power clean + front squat + push press + back squat + push press (=1 rep)
Once you've completed the sequence for 7 reps, drop the bar. That is 1 round
Repeat for a total of 5 rounds
Time cap 14 minutes
Time, 11.30 @ 40kg
This is a cruel workout. Forearms were killing me. Weight is light but not for long. It's that forearm burn that gets to me. Never has 40 kilos felt this cruel in my life. I just wanted to finish under the time cap. Realized after 3 rounds that there's plenty of time so I kept longer breaks before rounds 4 and 5. Normally this workout is not for time but they had to put a time cap so their daily schedule would stay in the plan.
Bear
Good workout, and got a high heart beat too! As we can see from the video, Toni still has some issues with counting reps hehe. He worked well with the barbell for the entire day for sure though!
Thursday. AM: Metcon, 3rds of: 400m run, 30 wb, 12 pull-ups. Time, 13.29. Skills, handstand. PM: CF Open 11.2. Result, 357 reps. Emom x 10min: 8 reverse lunges (50kg).
In the morning I drove to a place where I have been about two years ago with my bro. Kauniainen sports track. They have a pull-up bar right next to the track so I went there with some action in my mind. Took also some handstand training. In the afternoon it was time for another session. Found a new Open workout which needed to be tested. Good one.
Metcon. Time, 13.29
3 rounds of:
400m run
30 wall ball, 9kg
12 pull-ups
As I just wrote yesterday, running is not in my wheelhouse, don't like the element that much but it's always worth it. During my floorball years I ran a lot, and had good endurance on that one. Never the fastest but a good conditioning on running. Currently it's not as good for sure. Only because I haven't ran that much. It took my breath away today.
Doing wall balls after running for one lap was not the easiest of jobs. Wb's are my thing but they were tough throughout the workout. Didn't warm-up properly so the first round was as tough as the rest. I went 20-10 each round.
Pull-ups were unbroken. It was the easiest element of this one. Mainly due to the number of reps. My fingers were sore from all the work being done this week and it didn't feel good to even touch the pull-up bar. But once I went up there, it was no biggie after all. Good rather short workout after all.
Wall ball station was that white wall on the left
Skills.
Handstand
After getting my breath back I practiced on my handstand skills. The field was as flat as it can be which made it a perfect platform from being inverted. It turned out to be quite a good session on handstand. This was definitely some sort of PR in handstand walk. I got a 10m distance performed on walking on my hands. It felt like 100 meters though. Felt great!
When we were in Italy Toni sent me a message that he'd done this one so it stuck in the back of my head. It looked like a good workout, and I had never seen this one before. Today felt like a perfect timing to hit this one. Took some heavier deadlifts beforehand just to get used to pulling from ground. 70kg barbell turned out to be very light.
The only thing I had in mind was Toni's result when I entered this one. Somehow I knew it's gonna hurt. It's light work so it's basically about engine. No reason to break the sets. For a second I thought push-ups might become an issue but luckily I got them unbroken too. For sure they got heavier but I was determined to finish them with glory.
Box jumps were probably the most challenging element. My hip flexors have been pretty much on fire the entire week because of the training volume so it was no surprise. My plan was to walk slowly from the push-up station to the box, shake my legs during the way, and once I arrived at the box, started jumping right away. I was able to keep a very steady pace throughout those 15 minutes. Didn't gas out at ay moment, peaceful pace from the beginning to the end. It was definitely a perfect metcon in a sense that heart rate and heart beat was high towards the end.
Accessory.
Every minute on the minute x 10 minutes
8 reverse lunges, 50kg
Stole also this one from my man Toni. A little fun accessory action at the end of the session. Mostly this got to hip flexors. Weight wasn't super heavy. The movement itself was a bit awkward in the beginning. Haven't done much reverse lunges but after 2 sets I felt comfortable with these. Got a good sweat on this one too.
Wednesday. Back squat 7x3 (across 120kg). Metcon, with a running clock for 15min, 5x3min amrap. 300m row, then amrap of squat clean (70kg) for remaining time. Result, total of 44 cleans. PM: Metcon, 5rds of: 15 t2b, 200m sandbag run, 30 air squat. Skills, bar mu's. Metcon, 3k run.
What a great training day! Woke up, and wanted to go swimming but it was raining so I ate breakfast and got ready for a gym session. First time after the vacation my legs were feeling good. Originally I had planned to squat today but I thought my lower body wouldn't agree on that plan. Luckily it was a good day, so I smashed my legs. In the evening I went outdoors with a sandbag.
Warm-up.
4 rounds of:
3 bar muscle-ups
10 overhead squat with a narrower grip
This week I've done different types of warm-ups, changing from the routines. It's been kb's and du's, turkish get-ups, muscle-ups and overhead squats. Something I feel like needs to be worked on. So in this portion I'll do those with quality, and trying to modify technique a bit. Muscle-ups felt great, and it was a positive surprise to be able to do ohs with narrower grip than normally. This might be the thing to better shoulder mobility.
Strength.
Back squat 7x3 (across, 120kg)
I took only light squats last Saturday but those ones murdered my lower body for days. It really felt I haven't done work with weights in about 2 weeks. That was the longest break of training in my crossfit history, probably in my life. It was just light work during the trip.
Now I've had the possibility to sleep and recover well as I'm returning to work only next week. This week is dedicated to training. Today's agenda was triples for a total of seven sets, and I kept the weight at the same load, 120kg each set. Felt a bit stiff for some reason, even though overhead squats felt super good and I was able to sit very comfortable in the bottom. Towards the end hips got better.
Squat recap
Metcon.
With a 15min running clock:
Every 3 minutes complete:
300m row + amrap squat clean (70kg)
This was a nightmare. I was very anxious before putting the clock running. It was obvious it's gonna hurt. This is basically five 3-min amraps with no rest between sets. Every amrap begins with 300m row, and then you have that about 2 min time to work on the cleans. Do them as squat cleans to make it hurt more. I got the inspiration from Ben Bergeron's site competitorswod.com. When I came home I noticed it was supposed to be 200m row instead of 300m but that didn't matter. It was tough.
On the first round I did 10 reps, and realized if I'm gonna keep this pace on the cleans I'm gonna be in big trouble. On the following rounds I completed 8 reps for the next 3 rounds. Last round it was 10 reps again. There was enough time to do 10 reps each round but the feeling was disgusting. I had something like half a minute extra time after those 8 reps but I used the time to give my legs a bit of rest and adjusted the plates / collars back to the barbell. I did singles and the collars were bouncing back and forth. This was one of the worst workouts in a while. It took a while to get back to this planet earth. Afterwards I foam rolled a lot to massage the entire body.
Stage for the metcon, Concept2 and barbell
Metcon.
5 rounds of:
15 toes-to-bar
200m sandbag run, 25kg
30 air squat
In the evening I went to Pirkkola. It was devastating that they had torn the place up. I had wall ball and Sandy with me as I thought about doing a combination of wb's, sandbag run and something with the pull-up bar. My mind was blown as I saw there was no wb station anymore and the place was totally under construction. I gathered my thoughts and came up with this metcon. It was a very good breather!
I've never done any kind of runs with a sandbag. It was a 200m run with a 25kg "Sandy". I tried different styles of carrying it. On some rounds it was on my back, and on some rounds it was on either my left or right shoulder. Don't know which one felt better so I kept changing it. This one really brought the heart rate up better than I expected.
T2b's were ub for the first round, then I broke it into 10-5 for the remaining rounds. It mostly got to my grip. Air squats are always surprisingly burning on the legs when you throw a good bunch of them. They were intentionally right after the sandbag run which definitely had an effect on the squats. Good metcon!
Evening recap
Skills.
Bar musle-ups
The pull-up bar that I found there was high enough so it was a good place to hone on the bar mu skills. I took couple of sets so that today's total figure climbed to somewhere about 20 reps. I tried to swing my legs behind the vertical line on the pull-up bar.
Metcon.
Run 3.000 meters
At first this was supposed to be a recovery run but after the first round I paced up and ended up having cramps on both of my quads so it definitely got to a good workout in the end. Normally I really don't like running, especially as a unilateral element. As one part of a metcon it's a great one. But just running, that's a bit boring. Today it felt very good. My body was feeling fresh despite all the work begin done in the past days.
Towards the end it took its toll and brought the cramps. I had trouble to walk to the water station about 200m away from the track. Had to stop 3 times and go to squat as it released the tension in the quads. Once I got my recovery shake, it eased immediately. I drank one liter right away. Recovery back home was a lot of food, sauna and cold treatment for the legs in shower.
Sleeping made a lot of good! Morning workout was already good, and my body felt even better after eating post workout and taking a nap. Felt a little jammed when going to bed but when I woke up a bit later, I felt super! Sleep definitely makes a big difference. Morning was about overhead strength and conditioning. Evening was a lighter session with muscle-ups and emom bodyweight work.
Overhead.
7 sets of the following complex of:
1 power clean
1 push press
1 push jerk
1 split jerk
Sets: 70, 75, 80, 80, 80, 80, 80kg
At first this was supposed to be from rack but then again I decided to take work on my power clean in the process. Because why not. Plus I would have the chance to drop the weights at the lifting platform. Win-win. This was a lot of fun in my opinion. I'm still getting used to barbell work and weights in general so I didn't go super heavy. Well, it got heavier towards the end but there was no doubt of hitting these weights.
I though push presses might be the toughest part of this, at 80 kilos I mean. But that went well, and it was more like the split jerk. Even though it was the easiest way to get the bar overhead but it was also the last rep so there was some more work to be done.
Recap
Metcon. Time, 15.50
6 rounds of:
5 push jerk, 60kg
15 box
300m row
I wrote this as a 15min amrap. At that point I had 55 meters rowed on the last set of 300 meters so I added up the antes and finished the 6th round at 15.50. Concept2 was a bit further down the gym so there was some walking back and forth between rower and jerk / box. This was obviously unbroken on the jerk and box jumps. I was on the verge of putting 70kg on the bar. That would have made a big difference on the jerks for sure. Now as I look at it afterwards, it would have been fun to see if it was unbroken with that weight too.
Box jumps kept the breathing high throughout the workout, and rowing is always nasty in metcons. Pace was somewhere sub 1.50. There was time to pull it madly back and forth. However, the gains were not that great because of the short distance, and I tried to save some of the energy to those two other elements.
The last set I went a lot faster than the first 5 rounds. It was sub 1.40 through those 300 meters. It was a nice finisher to fully gas myself.
Skills.
Ring muscle-ups
I've been missing you guys. Ring muscle-ups. What a sick movement. I was a bit anxious about hitting these because it's such a technical movement. But luckily the level is okay nowadays, and I have certainty of hitting the reps when I attack them. They are not big sets but I'll get them. Today I did a total of about 20 reps in about one minute "intervals". So basically this was some art of emom work.
Workout.
Every minute on the minute x 10min:
Odd min, 10 ring dips
Even min, 15 ball slam
My plan was not to hit a metcon but I wanted to do something. Ring dips a weakness of mine so it's always beneficial to knock a couple of them. Ball slams got my heart rate up which felt good. This was mostly upper body work.
Can ou believe the Crossfit Games are here?!? This is an early Christmas to every crossfitter. Masters and Teens begin today, and individuals tomorrow on Wednesday. Here's a sneak peak to ya'll
My prediction of the winners are here:
Men:
1. Matt Fraser
2. Scott Panchik
3. Ben Smith
4. Dan Bailey
5. Noah Olsen
Women:
1. Kara Webb
2. Annie Thorisdottir
3. Emily Bridgers
4. Camille Leblanc-Bazinet
5. Sara Sigmundsdottir
This body really feels beaten up. Huh, but I sure love to drive to the gym, do my thing and smile. For the morning session my intentions concerned snatches. Wanted to do them in a similar way as the clean and jerks yesterday. Emom work as singles. Then I went for a short metcon. In the evening we went for a recovery walk in the woods.
Snatch.
Every minute on the minute x 20 minutes
1 snatch
5x45, 5x50, 5x55, 5x57kg
No misses. And these felt surprisingly good. I did some mental prepping for this snatch session. I saw myself lifting perfect reps in my mind, and figured out the bar paths a lot beforehand. Maybe that helped or not, but this one got me a good mood for sure. Focused on pulling slowly from the ground, and bringing the bar as high as possible before extending my hips and dropping under.
First weights were light at 45kg. My plan was to increase the loading every 5 minutes, same as yesterday. I have once lifted 70kg in my life in the snatch so comparing to that, these were something between 70-82% of 1rm. In real life I would probably lift something like 65kg or a little more if I tried the max lift.
Snatches
Metcon.
5 rounds of:
6 chest-to-bar pull-ups
8 overhead squat, 40kg
10 burpee
I couldn't put all in effort on this one as my legs were not feeling super happy. That reflected on the entire body. Went unbroken on each element. I just worked through, and the thing I put my thoughts on was the depth of the ohs. I went clearly below parallel, forced myself to do that. It was easier after the snatches as hips were loose enough at this point.
Sunday. Emom x 20: clean and jerk (up to 85kg). Metcon, 20min amrap of: 5 power clean (80kg), 10 hspu, 15 ghd. Result, 189 reps.
Even though the easy start back to barbell work yesterday, my legs are still smashed. With a break from weights it doesn't matter what kilos you put on the bar, it's gonna make you hurt. I knew it's gonna be okay when I get warmed up properly but the walking has been quite an effort today, and it probably didn't get any easier towards the evening. But it surely was fun to throw down! In the evening we went for a recovery walk in the woods and picked up some blueberries on our way.
Strength.
Every minute on the minute x 20 minutes
1 clean and jerk
1-5min: 70kg
6-10min: 75kg
11-15min: 80kg
16-20min: 85kg
This was much better than expected. It's some time since doing this technical movement but I believe this went even better than normally. Maybe that break did some good? Go figure but this was great. I wanted to focus on every lift so I took singles, one rep every minute. Okay, in the beginning there might have been a little more action with the 70kg bar but after that it was all singles.
Had no nagging pains that I've sometimes had with the jerks. That made a very positive impact mentally. And it was no big deal to throw 85kg bar overhead. For some reason I thought it would be an issue maybe. My focus in the clean was to bring the bar as high as possible up to the hips before getting explosive. Another point of self cueing was to let my butt drop as low as possible without braking on the way down.
In the jerk part thoughts were on keeping the knees out. I just talked to my bro about this thing on his jerks, and understood that's also something I need to put more effort. If you don't keep 'em out, the dip is gonna be a little bit towards front and the bar might also go front.
Recap
Metcon. Result, 189 reps (6 rounds + 4 hspu)
20min amrap of:
5 power clean, 80kg
10 handstand push-up
15 ghd sit-up
I wanted to have couple of longer metcons right after the holiday to familiar my body in this working rhythm. This was good, really good. I'm very happy I was able to do these elements well. Power cleans were singles from the very first round. I kept a solid pace each round, took a rep, dropped the bar, and grabbed the barbell again for the next rep. Round by round these got more challenging. Or actually the reps were completed in a similar way for the entire 20 minutes but the feeling after the last rep forced me to shake the pain off before getting on the hspu's.
Hspu's were unbroken for the first 5 rounds. That was freaking awesome. It's been some time since last handstand push-ups so it was a mystery how they would turn out to be like. I kept a "Froning" pace, not rushing at all on them. Just focusing on the next rep, one by one. Short pause on top, then right back up from the bottom. The 6th round was poisonous. I took 6 reps, then two doubles to finish it. That round also was the slowest one because of those breaks in vain.
Ghd's were tougher than traditionally, and my core was cramping in the evening. That's a rarity but it feels kind of nice to feel the abs. Went unbroken on them every round. On the first round I did t2b's but then changed it on the fly to ghd's. I believe that was a good decision. My hands are not used to being in contact with any kind of bars so I wanted to give them some rest, and have only cleans with some sort of grip.
Saturday. Back squat 5x5 (max 115kg). Emom x 21min. 1st: 10 pull-ups, 2nd: 10 lunges (2x20kg db's), 3rd: 15 box.
Damned it was great to make a comeback! We had our 10 day honeymoon trip in Northern Italy right after the wedding. We had a road trip in such places as Milan, Lake Como, Lake Garda, Venice and the eastern coastline. It could not have been better. We enjoyed it to the fullest, and this time training was on the background. The temperature was constantly at least 35 degrees, at max the digits showed a sick 44 degree heat. That's the toughest climate I've ever been even though I have traveled all my life a lot. During the trip I went running for a long one twice, then did couple of metcons, bar muscle-ups, and of course a lot of swimming. Not for once did I touch a bar so it was about time to get my hands on one today!
Strength.
Back squat 5x5 (90, 100, 105, 110, 115kg)
It is still clearly in my memories when we came back from California last year and I went heavy pause squatting, deadlifting and pistol squatting, that my hip flexors got inflamed. That was not cool so I decided to take it easy on the weights. It will definitely hurt in lower body in the following days because there's been almost 2 week break from barbell work. It's always a different thing to work with bodyweight and weights.
These squats felt good in every single set. I believe it was a smart decision to stay light. I'm having a week off of work still next week and I'm planning to hit it seriously on the upcoming week. Didn't wanna kill my legs and make them out of order for days.
Recap of the training day
Metcon.
Every minute on the minute x 21min
1st min: 10 pull-ups
2nd min: 10 walking lunges, 2x20kg dumbbells
3rd min: 15 box jump
This got tough. It really felt like I haven't done metcons in the same severity during the trip. But it sure felt great to get my heart beating big time. Pull-ups were tingling my thoughts beforehand. For the three first rounds those didn't feel good in my palms but I changed the pull-up bar to a thicker one (=normal thickness) and those rocked very well after that.
I was about to do lunges with a barbell but my wife did lunges with dumbbells too and the place is not wide enough so we both worked with dumbbells. That was a good variety. I held the db's in front rack position, one dumbbell in each hand, 20 kilos each. These are probably gonna hurt in my butt tomorrow.
It was great to have the entire body activated. Box jumps are in my wheelhouse. Those took about 30 seconds so during the course of action the recovery started to feel short after box jumps. In the first rounds it's always good in these long emoms but towards the end it's gonna get mental. This was a good start to getting back in to the training routines! Here are couple of pictures from Italy.
It's been quite a journey this far! We are on our honeymoon in Northern Italy on a road trip. First stop was Milan, next one at Lake Como. Nature and the surrounding looming mountains are offering breath taking views. Training is not the first priority here but I've managed to pull off some sessions anyway.
Wednesday.
1. Wod, 5 rounds of:
Swim
20 push-ups
2. Conditioning
Swim 10 min amrap
3. Conditioning
Run 30-40min
Thursday.
1. Handstand
2. Metcon, 5rds of:
22 lunges
Run
10 burpee
Run
3. Handstand
All these have been not for time type of workouts. Healthy nutrition and energy levels for hardcore training are not on the same level as they are back home. It's basically carbs in the form of pasta and pizza so I'm lacking protein and greens to get the best of training. But as I said, this is not the priority and I'm enjoying my time right now and focus on training when we come back home.
