These Are Pretty Light

Workout date: 1/18/16

Monday was MLK Day and with it being a national holiday, KOP hosted a special friends and family WOD on Monday morning.  This workout is known as the Beat the Streets WOD and it is KOP's annual fundraiser for Steve's Club King of Prussia, an athletic program that provides free Crossfit and Olympic lifting classes to disadvantaged youth of all ages.  While the friends and family workout was being held at 9:30 that morning, KOP members could participate in the WOD and donate money at regularly scheduled classes throughout the day.  This worked out particularly well for me, Keithie, Michal, and Rachel, as we had planned to kick off the day by stuffing our faces at Shady Maple.  I'd have the opportunity to work off the pounds I put on during this meal later in the day.

I showed up for the 6:30 class even though I knew the "New Year, New You" program would be going on because I didn't think we would need that much space to do the workout.  And if it wasn't going to be super crowded, I was perfectly fine showing up at my usual time of 6:30 on Monday.  The Beat the Streets WOD is a partner WOD that requires one barbell and nothing else.  Here's what the WOD looks like:

"Beat the Streets"
Partner WOD
AMRAP in 12 Minutes
20 Shoulder-to-Overhead (135/95)
30 Power Cleans (135/95)
40 Burpees

Our class ended up having 5 people in it, so the partner aspect would have to be rearranged a little bit.  There were 2 guys (me and Ryan A) along with 3 ladies ("Megs", Abby, and Danielle), so we divided into groups by gender.  I don't know exactly how the girls handled the workout as a three-person team, but it eventually became a two-person team (spoiler), so they ended up doing it the same way as me and Ryan did it.

Why did they become a two-person team?  Because it was carnage night at KOP!  There were a dozen or so people taking part in the "New Year, New You" class.  Combine that with our group of 5 and you have less than 20 people that were working out at 6:30.  Yet three people did not finish the workout.  Highly unusual.  Before we got started with our partner WOD, there was a commotion down at the other end of the gym.  The other group was doing burpees when one athlete thought she tore an abdominal muscle.  She was in a great deal of pain.  I know we are always concerned about rhabdo at the gym, but this was my first experience with someone possibly tearing a muscle in their mid-section.  Scary stuff.  Departures two and three would come later on.

Ryan and I got ready for the workout and we both had the same idea: I'll do more lifts if you'll do more burpees.  Neither of us is built to do burpees and neither of us enjoys them.  Even if one of us did like burpees though, we couldn't have made the trade we each wanted to make.  The Beat the Streets WOD comes with some fine print.  Each partner must do an equal number of the reps for each movement.  Well damn.  Looks like we were each doing 20 burpees per round whether we liked it or not.

I had some concerns about how fast I could move through shoulder-to-overheads and power cleans using 135 pounds, but Ryan did not.  I suggested that we alternate back and forth doing 5 reps apiece, but Ryan felt he could do more than 5 at a time.  After all, according to Ryan, "these are pretty light". So says one of the strongest guys in the gym.  I told Ryan that was fine and that I would do my best to keep up with him, no matter how many reps he strung together.  Gulp.  Ryan was dealing with an injury issue of his own (his back, I believe), so he was going to do hang cleans rather than continually doing power cleans from the floor.

Coach Aimee led us through our warmups and then it was time to get going.  Ryan was leading things off for us and once we had gotten our "3, 2, 1, go", he proceeded to power through 10 shoulder-to-overheads.  If Ryan moved that quickly the entire workout, I was going to be in big, big trouble.  I grabbed the barbell and was able to get through 10 shoulder-to-overheads, despite wanting to drop after 8 reps.  Ryan took the barbell and did 10 hang power cleans.  Thank God he didn't do all 15!  I kept my hands on the barbell for 10 consecutive power cleans, with my focus on driving my elbows through.  There was also a lot of grunting as it took considerable effort for me to keep up with Ryan on the reps.  Ryan took care of his last 5 cleans and then I followed suit.  On to the burpees.

At last, I was going to get a bit of a break.  Or so I thought.  For someone who hated burpees, Ryan didn't seem interested in only doing 5 at a time.  I prepared to go as he popped up from his 5th rep, but Ryan kept on going.  His pace slowed as he neared 10 reps, but he was determined to do 10 in that first set.  I got a chance to get my breath back, but now I was going to have to do 10 in a row myself.  The set wasn't that bad, but my mind was already wandering ahead.  I was not excited about the possibility of doing 10 more burpees, then getting no rest as Ryan effortlessly did 10 shoulder-to-overheads, at which point I would need to do 10 in a row.  As the wheels turned in my head, I got a reprieve.  Ryan only did 5 burpees this time around.  Yes!  Let's break these awful things up!  I did my next 5, Ryan did 5 more, and I did my final 5 to complete round one.

As we got ready to start round two, I saw that "Megs" and Danielle had stopped.  They had just finished their first round as well, but weren't sure whether to continue.  The Beat the Streets WOD had not agreed with Abby and she had become nauseous.  Aimee was in the lobby while this was happening, so "Megs" and Danielle weren't sure whether they should wait for their partner or not.  I told them they should probably keep going without Abby, so they moved on to round two.  Meanwhile, down at the other end of the gym, one of the ladies had nailed her shin on a box during a box jump and was calling it a night as well.  Perhaps there was a full moon and I didn't know it.

Back to our workout and Ryan led us off on round two.  The burpees had taken some of the starch out of him, enough that he only did 5 reps of the shoulder-to-overhead.  That worked for me, as I felt that I could keep up if we kept the sets at 5 reps each time.  We alternated back and forth until we had done 20 total.  When we got the power cleans, it was the same deal.  Neither of us had any desire to do more than 5 reps at a time.  We made it through 30 reps total and it was time for more of the dreaded burpees.

Ryan got us going with 5 burpees, but he was now doing the crawl burpees that I so often do when I get tired in a workout.  When it was my turn, I managed to do 5 without crawling.  In fact, I felt good enough that an idea popped in my head.  We were running low on time and it seemed unlikely that we would finish this round.  So when Ryan got up from the final rep of his next set of 5 burpees, I let him know that I was going to finish off my final 15 reps.  I might as well get us as high a score as possible if I was moving faster on the burpees.  I think I got 12 done before I really began tightening up, but I pushed through the last 3 and handed the stage back over to Ryan.  He was able to get 4 of his 10 remaining burpees completed before time elapsed.  Final score: 1+84.  (Oddly enough, the girls team got the same exact score in the workout.)

I was really pleased that I could keep up with a stronger partner in this workout.  In particular, I think my form on the power cleans was very good, as I drove my elbows through quickly in nearly every single rep.  I was also glad that I got through all of my burpees without crawling, even though the thought crossed my mind.

My first task at Open Strength was continuing with my shoulder press Wendler program.  I did 5 reps at 100, then 3 reps at 115, before only getting 3 reps at 125.  Pretty sure I was supposed to get more reps than that in my last set, but I didn't want to do extra reps with bad form, and my form was definitely shaky after 3 reps.

Then it was time to practice some skills at Open Strength.  First up was double unders.  I had a few decent sets before getting in a rhythm and hitting a huge set.  As always, I began to feel nervous and somewhat fatigued as I crossed the 40 rep mark.  A mix of panic and excitement kicked in as I hit 50 reps.  As I got to 55 reps, I wondered just how many reps I might be able to get.  Could I somehow get to 100?  Not so much.  I mean, I wasn't even close really.  But I did get all the way up to 62 in a row, a new PR for me.

From there I went to practice toes-to-bar.  The idea was to do three sets of 5 reps using the efficient motion with only a brief rest in between each set.  I was able to do two sets of 5 reps, but on the last set I could only get three.  As had been the case with double unders, I am going to need to practice doing these in an efficient way so that I don't run out of energy while doing a large number of them in a workout.  Finally, I did some push-ups, trying to use my shoulders as much as possible and keeping my elbows glued to my sides.  Again, this was an attempt to do a movement more efficiently so I can get better at WODs that include a large volume of this movement.

Tuesday preview:  Failure.  Plain and simple.