Doubled Over

Workout date: 3/14/16

You may have gotten the sense from yesterday's post that I probably wasn't in the best mood as I headed to the gym on Monday night.  But in reality, the opposite was true.  After resting for most of last week, I was slowly getting closer to feeling 100%.  I was also desperate to take on a real WOD as it had been nearly a week since I had done a workout that would qualify as such.  Monday's WOD looked like it would be extremely challenging for me, so I was eager to put myself to the test.

Monday WOD:
1 round: 100 double unders, 50 air squats, 25 push press (95/65)
2 rounds: 60 double unders, 30 air squats, 15 push press (95/65)
3 rounds: 40 double unders, 20 air squats, 10 push press (95/65)

For those scoring at home, that is 6 rounds of work in total.  The most ominous aspect of the workout was all of those double unders.  My stamina during workouts with large amounts of double unders was severely lacking.  No time like the present to get some work done on that front.

Our coach for Monday's class was Aimee.  She had done this workout in 11:43.  Most human scores tended to hover around 20 minutes, with some of the better athletes finishing in the teens.  For someone like me, a time in the range of 22-25 minutes would be fantastic.  I saw no reason to scale the workout.  After all, the whole point of me doing the workout was to push myself through all 340 double unders.  The air squats and push presses would not be as much of a problem, although they were certainly not going to be pleasant once the double unders took their toll on me.  Aimee let us know that if we weren't close to finishing the first 100 double unders in 2 minutes, we should move on to the air squats.  But if we were at around 80 or so, we could finish the set.  My concern didn't lie with the first 100 double unders, but with the 240 additional reps that awaited me in rounds two through six.

There were 11 people in the 5:30 class, but we weren't lacking for space.  The wave of people either attempting Open workout 16.3 for the first time or trying to better their score from Friday were coming in at 6:30, so the eleven of us had the whole gym to work with.  And this workout didn't require a lot of space, just enough for a barbell and some room to jump rope and do air squats.  Since Aimee was coaching, the warm-up was intense and I had plenty of sweat dripping off of me before the workout even began.  When we were given a couple of minutes to hit the bathroom before starting, I took it as an opportunity to visit the paper towel rack and dry myself off.

Feeling less moist, I was ready to get going with the WOD.  Aimee got us started and I began with some decent sized sets.  I had slightly more than 50 reps done when the clock hit one minute.  I was glad to be on pace to avoid the two minute cap Aimee had established for the first round.  During the second minute, I was not as smooth with the jump rope and I was getting fatigued.  When two minutes hit, I had 86 reps.  I hadn't done all 100 under the time cap, but I was above the threshold that Aimee had given us in terms of continuing on with the full complement of first round double unders.  The last 14 reps ended up being a struggle though and I was at nearly 2:45 when I finally dropped my rope.

The air squats were supposed to be the rest in this workout (I assumed).  However, I knew that I couldn't lollygag my way through them.  I've come to a point with my workouts where I tell myself to slow down and remain calm during those elements which require skill, but on the flip side, I need to really push through those movements that don't require skill.  There is no movement more basic than the air squat, so it was time to push.  Only that wasn't much of an option.  The 100 double unders had not only left me breathing heavily, they had also done a number on my knees.  The air squats were more painful than I ever remember them being, causing me to break the 50 reps into a handful of sets.  And I wasn't exactly blazing through those sets either.  At last, I was at the barbell.  95 pound push presses couldn't be that bad, right?  They really weren't bad, but due to the fact that I was still gasping for air, I needed to break up the 25 reps into a set of 15 and 10.  When I finished round 1, I looked at the clock and saw nearly 6 minutes had already elapsed.  Not good.  The first round was about 30% of the workout, meaning I was on pace to finish in 20 minutes.  But clearly I was slowing down and the 240 double unders still remaining were going to break me down even more.

The next 60 double unders were the worst part of the workout for me.  My hope was that I could grind my way through the 60 reps, getting about 8-10 reps at a time.  And I did manage a few sets of that length.  But I was losing my ability to breathe.  I needed longer breaks between sets.  Eventually I had to squat during the breaks.  I began to notice that everyone around me was either hitting the latter stages of round two or had moved on to round three already.  I wasn't moving anywhere near the pace I had been during round one.  Forget 20 minutes.  Now I was worried about finishing in 30 minutes.  There was so much more to do, yet I was struggling to get through this part.  And round three would be a repeat of this round.  I was in a world of trouble.

I got through the 60 double unders, then tried to move through the air squats without breaking them up, but it was too painful.  Each squat took a toll on my lungs and my knees.  The only thing I could tell myself as motivation was that the push presses were next and that was the segment of the workout where I was faring best.  I completed the 30 air squats, caught my breath, then strung all 15 push presses.  Still 4 rounds to go and I was already beyond Aimee's time for the entire workout.

The double unders got no better in round three, but my mind had caught on to the fact that it was going to take me a while to get through them.  My form was getting worse as the workout went on.  Even while I was standing, my body began to instinctively double over in an effort to breathe.  Not keeping your chest up is a really easy way to ensure that you're not going to get a big set of double unders.  I knew I was wasting energy trying to do double unders with bad form, so my breaks became even longer.  I was falling further behind everyone who was still working.  I say "those who were still working" because it was around the end of this set of double unders that a handful of people in class finished their workouts.  Yes, 3+ rounds to go and others were done.

I completed my last set of 60 double unders and started to do my air squats.  When I needed a break to breathe, I was going into a squat, which meant I was wasting reps.  I began to fall onto my knees during breaks as sitting in the squat became too much work.  When the 30 air squats were done, I rested on my knees at the barbell before beginning the push presses.  I did 5 in a row, but then lost control of the barbell as I completed the 5th rep, so I dropped it to the floor.  When I was ready to go again, I took care of the final 10 reps.  The clock had long passed the 20 minute mark, but at least the last three rounds were smaller.

During the fourth round I began to consider at what point I should stop.  The 6:30 class was gathering off to the side.  Nearly everyone in my class was done.  Based on the clock on the wall, I determined that we had started this workout at about 6:00, so if I wasn't done in 30 minutes, I'd be spilling over into the next class.  I didn't want to do that, so it seemed like getting through five rounds was best.

The fourth and fifth rounds were a bit of a blur.  Very tired, couldn't breathe, struggled with my double unders.  I had a brief resurgence during the fifth round of air squats, as I got through all 20 reps unbroken.  Then I did all 10 push presses to end my workout right as the clock neared 30 minutes.  Aimee came over and asked if that was my last round.  I told her I had only completed 5 rounds, but that was fine.  She told me to keep going, encouraging all of the people who were waiting for the 6:30 class to begin to come over and help me get through the last round.  It was the pity circle of all pity circles.  And now I was feeling guilty about taking up time from their class.  Don't get me wrong, I am glad that Aimee gave me the opportunity to finish the workout, but it was hard not to be embarrassed at that point.

I remember everything about the final round.  It took me just under three and a half minutes to complete.  The 40 double unders were done in six sets that went 9-9-5-8-5-4.  The air squats had to be broken up into two sets of 8 and 12.  And I felt comfortable enough with the push presses that I wasn't concerned with a silly little detail like being unable to breathe.  I went from the last air squat directly to my barbell and knocked out the final 10 reps.  Final time: 33:45.

Was this an early contender for worst workout of the year?  Definitely.  But I didn't care as much about this performance as some other ones because I went into it knowing it would be brutal and that I would struggle.  I was there to get the work done and I got it done, albeit very slowly.  I need to add a lot more double under volume to my training if I'm ever going to break the cycle of finishing way behind everyone else.  (Note: The entire 6:30 class was done with this workout in 23 minutes.  So yeah, I sucked big time on this one.)  I was exhausted, drenched, and slightly embarrassed, but in the end, I was glad I showed up for this one.

Afterwards, I stuck around to cheer on the folks doing 16.3.  Then I spent a bunch of time talking with Ashley M and providing words of wisdom on all the mistakes I made when trying to get pull-ups.  Ashley is a pretty quick study in general, but by avoiding all of the stupid things I did, her form improved even more.  I have little doubt that both Ashley and her partner in crime "Megs" will soon be crushing me in almost all workouts at the gym as they are constantly there training and improving.

I ended the day doing some squats with Rachel.  I had plans of starting up a new front squat program, but I was so exhausted after the WOD that it took me nearly an hour before I felt recovered enough to do it.  Rachel was working on another back squat program, her third in a row I believe.  The first day is the "light day", so I did 6 sets of 2 reps at 215 pounds, with warm-up sets of 5 reps at 135 and 3 reps at 185.  I'm not sure whether it was the lingering effects of the 5:30 workout, the fact that I've neglected doing a squat program for a while, or a combination of both, but that weight did not feel light.  I wasn't in danger of needing to bail it, but it was a little bit of a struggle getting through those sets.  I'll be trying to do 6 sets of 3 reps at that weight on Wednesday.

Tuesday preview: Something called the Horsepower Complex, which is like the Bear Complex crossed over with snatch movements.  It's new to me too.