Rush, Rush

Workout date: 12/9/15

While Tuesday night might have provided me with my best moment of the year at the gym but no raffle tickets, Wednesday night gave me my best chance at legitimately winning raffle tickets in the daily Advent competition.  There aren't that many things that I would say I do really well at the gym.  In fact, the list is probably overhead squats, pistols, and rope climbs.  If there was an overhead squat challenge, I'm not sure how I could win because that would likely be based on weight and there are several guys in the gym who can handle more weight than me.  Pistols might work, but I think it's really unlikely that they will come up as an Advent challenge for the same reason people have told me they won't come up in the Open: too tough to judge.  That left rope climbs.  I was thinking they might do most 15' rope climbs in three minutes, but the Wednesday challenge ended up being most 15' rope climbs in two minutes.  Even better!  I don't have the stamina to climb the rope for three straight minutes.  (Spoiler: I don't have the stamina to climb the rope for two straight minutes.)

Before we got to that, there was a workout that needed to be completed.  It was a partner WOD that went as follows:

21-15-9
Deadlifts (275/185)
Push Jerks (155/105)
*Athletes 1 does 21 deadlifts, then athlete 2 does 21 deadlifts, then athlete 1 does 21 push jerks, and so on.

There was one big problem.  As of about 7:27, I was the only person at the gym who was taking the 7:30 class.  I'm sure I could have done the workout by myself, but it would have been a little weird.  And it would have been slow, as I wouldn't have gotten the rest built into the workout from watching your partner work.  But just as the 6:30 class was finishing up their rope climbs, Matt E showed up and I had my partner.

I'm not sure I could have picked a better partner for this workout simply from the perspective that Matt and I tend to use a lot of the same weights when we are in class together.  As Coach Jenna walked us through the warmups, she told us we could have two deadlift barbells and two push jerk barbells, but I turned to Matt and said "I think we're using the same weight" to which he nodded affirmatively.  All that was left to do was to decide on what weight to use.  (Spoiler #2: We might have messed this up.)

Jenna had told us that we should aim to complete this workout in about 14 minutes.  I typically struggle when determining what weight I should use for a given time parameter.  But figuring it out for yourself and another person?  That's really tough.  Matt and I began negotiating.  Based on the negotiation, I kinda knew how this workout would play out.  I suggested 225 for the deadlift and Matt's response was along the lines of "sure, if you want."  That told me he could go heavier.  I'm not the greatest when it comes to stringing a large number of deadlift reps, so I wasn't sure how much heavier I should go.  I probably could have done 245 if I wasn't such a wuss.  Matt definitely could have handled 245.  But we stuck with 225.  For the push jerk, I suggested 115 or 125, but I was leaning towards 125.  Matt was leaning towards 115.  Since he had compromised on the deadlift weight for me, I thought it was only right to compromise on the push jerk weight for him.  We threw a couple of 35 pound plates on the push jerk barbell and got ready for the workout.

We had scaled down to 225 and 115, but that still didn't sound like a picnic to me.  I told myself to keep pushing like I had done 24 hours earlier and things would be fine.  We could keep this workout under 14 minutes.  Matt and I talked about who would go first and I ended up leading things off for us.  Jenna got the clock ready and we were off.  Stringing 21 deadlift reps was not going to be a good idea for me.  I'm not even sure I could do it if I tried.  But like I had done with the wall balls during Kelly, I planned on splitting up the reps into two healthy sets.  I got through 12 reps and then dropped the barbell.  Shook out my arms, reset my grip, then got the final 9 reps.  Time to enjoy some rest before the push jerks.  Or not.

Matt immediately proved that he could handle more than 225 pounds for the deadlift portion of the workout.  I thought there was at least a possibility that he would break up the 21 reps like I did, but when he got to his 15th rep and hadn't slowed down, I knew I needed to get ready to do push jerks imminently.  Six reps later, he dropped the barbell and my rest time was over.  If he kept moving that fast, we weren't going to have to worry about 14 minutes.  In fact, Jenna had told us how Giulz and Erika smoked through this workout in an earlier class, finishing in 7:47.  Suddenly it seemed like we might finish closer to that time.

I picked up the 115 pound barbell and got to work on the push jerks.  The competitive side of me took over.  I forget how far along I was in my set (probably around 10 reps or so) when I told myself that I needed to pull my weight in this partnership and string 21 reps myself.  The last 5 or so reps were not pleasant, but I made it through all 21 reps and dropped the barbell so Matt could go.  As Matt got started on his push jerks, I trudged back over to the deadlift barbell.  I had learned my lesson and wasn't counting on a whole lot of rest before needing to get back to work again.  Except Matt broke up his set of 21 push jerks.  I'm pretty sure that if we had been given the option of letting Matt do the 21-15-9 of deadlifts and letting me do the 21-15-9 of push jerks, the both of us would have instantly said "yes please" at the beginning of the workout.  Matt finished off the rest of his push jerks and the round of 21 was done.  And now Matt knew he would get his rest when I did deadlifts, while I would get my rest while he did push jerks.  We learned so much about each other so quickly!  #themoreyouknow

Knowing that the deadlifts were going to be much worse the second time around, I told myself that I was nearly halfway done with the workout.  Suck it up, buttercup!  I got through 9 reps before dropping the barbell.  It was important for me to get to 9 reps because I did not want to split up the reps in the final round and this was a way to remind my body that it could handle that many reps when I was tired.  Because I was definitely tired already.  I struggle with sprint-type workouts at the gym and somehow this 14 minute partner WOD had become a sprint.  I did the final 6 reps and sat down next to the push jerk barbell expecting very little rest.  And little rest is exactly what I got as Matt knocked out 15 straight deadlifts.

The lack of rest may have affected my ability to recall this next part of the workout, but I feel like I strung all 15 push jerks when I came back to that lift.  Let's just pretend that I did even if I didn't.  Just as I was mirroring Matt's deadlift sets with my push jerk sets, Matt would break up his push jerk sets in much the same way I was breaking up my deadlift sets.  We really were ideal partners for this workout.  I got slightly more rest as I prepared to do my final 9 deadlifts.  Both Matt and I were exhausted, but the finish line was in sight.

When Matt finished his 15 push jerks, I got right into my 9 deadlifts.  Don't put the barbell down, stupid.  You can hang on for 9 reps.  I'm sure this was another one of those moments involving horrible grunts and amazing facial contortions, but I did hold on for all 9 reps.  Matt was tiring, but tired Matt is still a better deadlifter than I am.  He got through all 9 reps.  I was relieved to be finishing with the push jerks as I had no doubt I could get the last set fairly quickly.  I'm sure I was doing something wrong as I began bunny-hopping forward on each push jerk, but I did nine of them and then brought the barbell back to where it had started.  Matt just needed to do 9 reps and we were done.  He took care of those 9 reps and we both dropped to the floor.  Final time: 8:36.

Did we choose our weights poorly?  Maybe.  It certainly wasn't intentional.  If you had said to us prior to the workout that there was a 9 minute time cap, I don't think either of us would have thought we could complete the WOD with 225 for the deadlift and 115 for the push jerks.  If I had the opportunity to guess again on what weights would have left us in the ballpark of 14 minutes for a final time, I would probably go with 255 and 125.  But after seeing how tired we were after only eight and a half minutes of that workout, I think we were both glad that we didn't choose a weight that would have had us working for five and a half minutes longer.

Matt decided that he didn't want to do the rope climb challenge and headed off on a road trip to Scranton for work.  That left me to take on the challenge by myself.  I needed a solid 10 minutes to recover from the WOD and only then did I start throwing on my shin guards for the rope climb.  Before seeing any of the scores, I thought 8 would most likely be the top score, with 9 climbs being a possibility if someone was really moving.  Turns out Jonathan P was really moving.  He got 9 climbs, while Samson was holding down second place with 7 climbs.  I didn't see a way I could get 9 climbs. If I could keep it together like I had during Kelly, there was a chance I could get 8 climbs, so that was my goal.

I don't know when I became such a spaz when trying to do things quickly, but that seems to be the norm these days whenever I rush.  My first two climbs were quick and under control, but my breathing was starting to become an issue.  So when I came down from the second climb, I caught my breath for a second while holding on to the lower part of the rope with my right hand.  Then I proceeded to try and jump high on the rope without remembering to let go of the rope.  The left part of my body went high while the right part of my body was anchored low.  That does not work in rope climbs.  Rather than spend a lot of energy trying to re-adjust on the rope, I bailed.  Bye-bye 8 rope climbs!

I did a third and a fourth rope climb before my next big mistake.  Again, it occurred when jumping on to the rope.  While trying to hurry, I got a very good jump, but somehow swung my legs to the wrong side of the rope and had nothing to clamp on to.  I was wasting precious arm strength while I tried to swing my legs back to the proper side of the rope.  I had my feet clamped on to the rope for a second, but then my grip strength started to go.  I dropped off the rope a second time.  Way to make a bunch of mistakes in a two-minute challenge, Dave!

I made it back up the rope a fifth time and when I got back down to the floor, I was informed that I had 20 seconds left.  I needed to tap that 15' mark one last time.  Twenty seconds sounded like plenty of time, but my grip strength was fading.  I needed a couple extra pulls to get up to the mark, but I made it with a few seconds to spare.  Final score: 6.  Not what I wanted, but after a very fast Kelly time on Tuesday and a very fast partner WOD on Wednesday, I couldn't complain about how my week had gone.

With Festivus on Thursday and why-the-heck-would-you-workout-after-Festivus Friday on deck the next two days, I'd be off until Saturday.

Saturday preview: A workout from home which will include the WOD held at the gym on Thursday.  Mucho cardio.