We're Not Racing

Workout date: 2/6/16

If you're hearing the "One of these things is not like the others" jingle in your head, that's because it is time for another Competitors Class recap.  You should know the routine by now: get up way too early, stand in the shower until I feel I am alert enough to drive, arrive at KOP 5-10 minutes late, try my best not to embarrass myself while attempting to keep up with athletes I can't keep up with, watch Flounder shake his head at me at the end of my workout as he gets ready for the 9am class, and finally, if I'm lucky, there is a large breakfast awaiting me at Michael's afterwards.  There you have it. You don't need all the gory details, right?  Fine, fine...

There were 11 of us in total getting ready to put in 2 hours of work at KOP on Saturday morning.  Okay, let's be honest, it ends up being more like an hour and a half, but Mindbody has it booked for 2 hours, so I'm running with that.  Aimee had already begun writing out the list of tasks for the day when I had arrived and it ended up being very partner-focused:

Warm-up (partners):
50 calorie row
200 double unders
*One partner must be holding a handstand against the wall while other partner is working

Strength:
Squat cleans
2-2-2-2-2-1-1-1

WOD (partners):
10 rounds:
10 shoulder-to-overhead (155/105)
10 box jumps (24"/20")
10 toes-to-bar
*Partners alternate rounds

There was also a crazy cash out involving the assault bike and bar muscle-ups written on the board, but that fell by the wayside after the WOD was over.

I partnered up with Queen Pam for the warm-up.  I wasn't entirely sure how long I could hold a handstand against the wall, but it seemed like one of those things where I could zone out even when the pain set in.  Pam got things started on the rower and I held a handstand until she told me that she got to 10 calories.  I thought I might be more useful on the rower, so I did 15 calories while Pam was upside-down.  We repeated this one more time, although Pam must have gotten a really strong last pull in on the rower, as it ticked up to 36 calories and left me only 14 for my final row.  From there it was on to the double unders.  I was worried that I was not going to be able to pull my weight on this part of the warm-up.  I could envision myself messing up over and over again while poor Pam was holding a handstand.  She might have to do a lot of double unders.  The other concern I had was coming off the wall if Pam had a good set of double unders going.  It ended up working out alright.  Pam did something like 36 double unders to start.  I had a couple slip-ups when I started, but then I knocked out a set of 20+ reps to get us to 68.  Don't remember the numbers the rest of the way, but we were each pretty good about getting 20-30 reps before switching spots with our partner.  We were the last group done, but we weren't terribly far behind.

As we got ready for the squat cleans, I noticed how much my shoulders were burning.  That was a lot of time for me to spend holding my body weight while upside-down.  These squat cleans might not go so well.  As I put on my lifting shoes, Shane yelled over to me and asked if I wanted to share a barbell with him.  He was working on the platform and I thought it would be nice to use it as I don't lift on it all that often.  Once again, there was concern about holding up my partner as the nice people of KOP have a bad habit of using the same weights as me even when it is obvious they could go heavier.  I didn't want to hold Shane back.  I asked Shane how heavy he thought he'd go and he responded that he could do 110 and was hoping to do 113.  That wouldn't be so bad if he was talking pounds, but he was talking kilos.  Part of the experience of lifting on the platform is using the fancy kilo plates.  One kilo is equal to 2.2 pounds.  Don't worry, I'll be doing the kilos-to-pounds translation for you in this recap.  So for instance, Shane could do 110 kilos (242 pounds), but was hoping to get 113 (248.6 pounds).  My best squat clean is 225 pounds, so there was going to have to be a point where Shane went off on his own.

We started at 50 kilos (110 pounds) and each easily did 2 reps.  Then we went to 60 kilos (132 pounds) and that wasn't too bad either.  Why not throw another 10 kilos on?  At 70 kilos (154 pounds), the squat cleans became a little trickier.  They weren't unbearable, but they were heavy enough that if you weren't focused on the lift, you could mess it up.  From there, we went up 5 kilos to 75 (165 pounds).  Shane had been asking me how the cleans felt along the way and it was at this point that I said they were starting to get heavy.  His response: "Okay, we'll use that as our first set."  Whaaaaaaaa?

All of a sudden I was staring at 4 more sets of 2 squat cleans (at heavier weights), along with 3 singles that promised to be even heavier than the doubles.  I thought we were 4 sets into the doubles, not 4 sets away from being done with doubles.  Good thing I didn't burn out my shoulders on the warm-up!  <sigh>  I was going to have to push myself just to make it to the singles.  Our next set was at 80 kilos (176 pounds).  Becoming tougher, but still in that range where I felt I could handle 2 reps.  Add another 5 kilos and we were at 85 kilos (187 pounds).  Now we were venturing into the area where I knew I could do 1 squat clean, but wasn't sure if I could string two in a row.  But after watching Shane do it so easily, the competitive side of me felt like I had to keep up with him.  I got through that set and we headed 5 kilos higher.

90 kilos (198 pounds) was where I had to start to dig deep.  Shane, on the other hand, was just rounding into form.  Shane has this weird tendency to look like he's struggling at the lighter weights, but then his form starts getting better and better as weight is added on to the barbell.  Then when it gets really heavy, his form tapers off again.  I told Shane that it reminded me of watching someone play games while drinking at a bar.  The sober guy is okay at pool, but with a couple of beers in him, he starts making bank shots and calling combos.  Then after a few car bombs, he just starts hitting the balls as hard as he can, hoping something goes in.  And when something does go in, he needs a reminder whether he's solids or stripes.  It was near the end of the doubles that Shane's form resembled a pool shooter with 3-4 beers in him.  (That's a compliment.)

It was probably fitting that we parted ways after successful lifts at 90 kilos.  Shane clearly needed to make bigger jumps if he was going to reach 110-113 kilos.  As for me, my second squat clean required some truly unfortunate grunting in order to stand it up.  I was not going to be able to go too much higher.  I decided to try out 93 kilos (204.6 pounds) for my final double.  I was doing touch-and-go doubles, which means that I never let go of the barbell.  After getting the first rep, I'd tap the barbell against the floor and go right into my second rep.  Shane was doing what I would call "fast singles", dropping the barbell after the first clean and then immediately going into his second rep.  Based on the reaction I was getting doing a touch-and-go, I imagine we were meant to do it the way Shane was doing it, but clearly I don't pick up on such things quickly.

The double at 93 kilos required a small grunt for the first rep and a huge grunt for the second rep, but I did make it successfully through the doubles gauntlet.  The 3 kilo increase seemed reasonable, so I went to 96 kilos (211.2 pounds) for my first single.  More grunting ensued, but I got it.  I could have went from there to 99 kilos, but 100 kilos was close enough, plus it made loading the barbell easier.  At 100 kilos (220 pounds), I got my first taste of failure.  It was an ugly lift, one in which I didn't even come close to whipping my elbows through fast enough so that I could catch the barbell in my front rack.  My second attempt was a little better, but my left elbow was slow coming through, leaving me in an awkward position to catch the barbell.  It stung a little bit when I did that and I knew I was done with cleans for the day.  96 kilos (211.2 pounds) would have to be my score.

Shane made a big jump for his first single, although I don't remember what weight he used.  He eventually did get 110 kilos (242 pounds), but he failed on his two attempts at 113 kilos (248.6 pounds).  He was able to get under the barbell in his second attempt, but he could not stand up with it.

So that wrapped up a very difficult Saturday...I'm sorry, say that again?  There was still a WOD to do?  Yes, there was still a 10 round partner WOD that we needed to complete.  (I would guess that most of the people in class had written off the cash out at this point, but I could be wrong.)  The class had gotten wiser as the other 10 quickly paired up into 5 new groups.  You did not want to be paired up with the tired guy for the WOD.  Once I figured out that I was the odd man out, I planned on doing the WOD by myself with about 2 minutes rest in between rounds.  But Gordy came over to me and told me I could join him and Giulz for the workout.  Giulz would go first, the Gordy and I would go at the same time.  "We're not racing", Gordy reassured me, which was good because there was zero chance I'd be able to keep up with him.  In fact, I wasn't sure how the rest periods would play out because Giulz would start her next round as soon as Gordy was done, even if I was still completing my round.  That meant less rest for me, which probably would cause me to fall further behind Gordy. Again, I pretended like I was on my own.  If I needed extra rest, I would take it.

The WOD got started and me and Gordy watched Giulz blitz through her first round.  While watching her do toes-to-bar, I started thinking about how unpleasant putting 155 pounds over my head 10 times was going to be.  I had just done 10 shoulder-to-overheads in a partner WOD with Ryan A recently, but that was 135 pounds and even that didn't go all that smoothly at the start.  Giulz finished her second set of 5 toes-to-bar and it was showtime for me and Gordy.  I stood at my barbell with my back to Gordy because I knew he was going to go fast and I didn't want my spirit crushed right off the bat.  The 155 pound barbell was heavy, but I was able to hold on for all 10 reps in my first round, although I had to slow my pace towards the end.  I got to my box and started doing rebounding reps.  Had to split them up, but got them done.  Then I turned to the rig.  Gordy had grabbed the lower bar that was in between the two big bars available.  I had no desire to mess up his workout, so I moved down and used the next available lower bar.  It was kinda fun not having to jump up to the high bar every time and I was able to do 10 fast singles.  Round 1 done and it wasn't too awful.

Round 2 was worse though.  I had to break up the shoulder-to-overheads.  The plan was two sets of five.  The first set was fine, but somehow when I went to do rep #6, my arms wouldn't extend at all.  I had to drop the barbell again.  Part of me was terrified that I wouldn't be able to do any more shoulder-to-overheads, but it turned out to be a temporary setback.  I did the final 5 reps and went to the box jumps.  I started off with some rebounding, but I stopped after 3 reps, then after 6 reps.  If I was going to be stopping and pausing because of the rebounding, I might as well save myself the trouble and do step-downs.  That's what I did for the last four reps.  Back at the bar, I did 6 toes-to-bar, paused, then did the last 4.  Giulz was finishing her third round of box jumps as I finished.  The break was going to be short this time, right when I needed it the most.  My breathing was heavy, but I only had three rounds to go.

I considered giving myself an extra break and not starting at the same time as Gordy, but I calmed my breathing and went for it once Giulz finished her third round.  I got 6 shoulder-to-overheads this time before a break.  Barely got through the last 4, but then I moved over to my box.  Did 10 jumps and step-downs this round, with a slight break between reps 6 and 7.  At the bar, I did 4-3-3 on my toes-to-bar, earning myself a longer break between rounds 3 and 4 than I had between rounds 2 and 3.

Round 4 was a hybrid of rounds 2 and 3.  I broke things up in a similar fashion to round 3, but I moved at the slower pace of round 2.  Giulz began her toes-to-bar right as I finished my next-to-last rep for the round.  It was gonna be a short break again.  But with this being Giulz's last round, and since I didn't count for their team score, this seemed like the perfect time to grant myself a little extra break.  When Gordy started his last round, I began walking towards my barbell.  I gave myself a good 15-20 extra seconds before picking my barbell up.  This time I went 4-4-2 on the shoulder-to-overheads.  The box jumps didn't change at all.  At the bar, I finished up by going 3-3-4.  I think the final time for Giulz and Gordy was in the neighborhood of 17 and change.  No idea what the timer said when I finished.  I was simply looking to get the work done.

Monday preview: After a quick road trip on Sunday, I come back on Monday for a super-sized class with the New Year, New You folks.  Plus, an epic showdown with Matt Bohen.  Okay, perhaps not epic, but we're the last two people to finish the cash out.