If You Could Have One Superpower...

Workout date: 9/20/15

I stupidly posted about my day at Endurance without including the best conversation that was had during the workout.  Perhaps I was too fixated on making sure Flounder's name was all over the blog. Where are my priorities?  Alas, it makes for a nice segue into the Sunday WOD, so let's run with it anyways.

Someone brought up the age-old question of "if you could have any superpower, what would it be?"  Popular answers included the ability to fly, the ability to read people's minds, invisibility, etc.  And while those are all well and good, I believe that I have begun craving another superpower more than any typically chosen by the average person.  The superpower I wish I had?  The ability to stop sweating.  Now to be fair, most people don't choose this as a superpower because it is simply a normal function that their body handles on a daily basis.  For me, well...

Taken during a workout in February

For the majority of my time at KOP, I have laid claim to being the sweatiest person in the gym.  Occasionally someone will come up to me and say they sweat as much as I do.  Then I will point out that they have just finished class while I have simply walked from my car to the lobby.  That typically ends the conversation.

There is a newer member at the gym that I have become friends with who may be able to steal the crown away from me.  (Please, take it already!)  His name is Scott and he has the voice of an angel.  That has nothing to do with how much he sweats.  I was just stating a fact.  Anyways, I did my first workout with Scott sometime during the summer.  The workout was in the annex and there wasn't a whole lot of air circulating in the room.  Between the two of us, I'm surprised we didn't end up drowning one of the other athletes.

Well Scott was there on Sunday and he was joining me and several others in a cardio-heavy workout that was sure to end with buckets of perspiration.  Here's the WOD:

1,000 meter row

(3 minutes rest)

18-16-14-12

Snatches (95/65)

Burpees Over The Bar

The row didn't sound so bad, but rest is always a red flag.  I had done 45 snatches at 95 pounds earlier in the week, but those were hang power snatches (held just above the knee), while these snatches required full range of motion from the floor to overhead.  That might not sound like much more work, but it adds up.  And burpees always suck.  Having to jump over the bar after every burpee made it that much worse.  One last thing: that is a pretty devious rep scheme.  We typically do something along the lines of 21-15-9, where as you move along, the reps decrease and you can motivate yourself internally that there isn't that much more to go.  The decrease here was negligible.  I suspect doing 4 rounds of 15 would not have felt much different.  And the fact that I just wrote all that out shows how much weaker I am mentally during workouts than the average Crossfitter.

My plan:

• Go fast on the row.  1,000 meters is essentially a sprint distance on the rower.  And we were getting 3 minutes rest afterwards.  I needed to push here.
• Do big sets of the snatches.  Remember how you held on to that bar earlier in the week doing snatches with the same weight!
• Keep moving as much as possible during the burpees.  Get back to that barbell!

Joining me and Scott in the class were Sheila, Balmer, Jill A, Danielle, and Ashley.

For the row, I kept a pretty fast pace while trying to make sure that my form was efficient.  I still need some work there.  As is the case with everything in the gym, when I get tired, my form starts to go.  There were definitely moments during the row where I lost focus and didn't keep the form I had hoped to maintain for the entire 1,000 meters.  I finished the row at 3:44.  Considering the fact that I wasn't emptying the tank here, it seemed like a good time to me.  I got off the rower about 10 seconds after Balmer did.

The 3 minute break was all about calming my breathing and shaking out my legs.  My legs were feeling tight after I stood up from the rower.  It was similar to how I felt after the first round of sprints at Endurance on Thursday.  That being said, three minutes was plenty of time to settle down and prepare for the remainder of the workout.  When the clock hit 6:44, I grabbed the barbell and began to do snatches.

It was apparent very quickly that I would not be doing big sets like I had done in the WOD on Wednesday.  I finished up 6 reps then dropped the bar.  Perhaps I had already given in to the desire to break up my sets evenly, telling myself it was okay to do three sets of 6 reps.  Except I didn't even manage that, going 5-4-3 to finish off the first round of 18.  Those who had started their snatches after me had already passed me by.  I began my 18 burpees over the bar and struggled more here than I had on the snatches.  The burpees themselves weren't awful, but jumping over the bar was worse than expected.  Again, the explosiveness I needed from my legs just wasn't there.  I tried to do quick sets of 2-4 reps so that I didn't fall way behind.  Eventually, it was back to the barbell for the round of 16.

The hope was two sets of 8 reps.  Didn't happen.  I believe I ended up doing sets of 4, 3, 4, and 5.  I could see Scott to one side of me and Balmer on the other.  Balmer had moved way ahead of me as he was on his set of 14 snatches when I finished up my set of 16.  Scott was plowing through his snatches more successfully than I was, doing the big sets I had hoped to do.  When we got to the burpees over the bar, I was able to catch up as I did a decent job of continually moving, albeit slowly. From that point on, I used Scott as my motivation to push through the workout.

It took 3 small sets to get through the 14 snatches, but Scott had already started his 14 burpees over the bar by the time I had finished.  Once again, I caught up and we started our final round at about the same time.  I needed 3 sets of 4 to do my 12 snatches, although I took less of a break between the sets than I had earlier.  I'm not sure whether Scott rattled out all 12 in a row, but he was doing burpees when I went to do my last 4 snatches.  When those were done, I told myself that these 12 burpees over the bar were going to be very painful, but that I'd be done when they were over, so suck it up.  I have no doubt I was wincing considerably during those 12 burpees, but I kept things moving.  Final time: 23:48.  Fourteen seconds slower than Scott, who had also picked it up on that last set of burpees.

I wasn't worried about my time for this workout.  I knew during the first round of snatches that this was a workout where I would just need to plug away and finish it.  I did enjoy having the motivation of trying to keep up with Scott, but I wasn't disappointed that he finished before me.  And there was no mistaking where the two of us had worked out if you looked at the floor post-workout.

Afterwards we got talking about that afternoon's Eagles-Cowboys game and I learned that we had more in common than simply being very sweaty.  We were also both Cowboys fans living near Philly.  (Perhaps we sweat so much because we live in an area where the hometown fans hate us.  We're pretty much public enemy #1 here.  Food for thought.)

I finished up my work at the gym by doing my 6x2 set for my back squat program.  Only 5 more sessions left in that program.  Could I be breaking 300 pounds for my 1RM back squat soon?

Monday preview: Sadly have to skip Crossfit Total due to the back squat program, but I make a return trip to Boot Camp instead.