Another weekend, another few days away from the gym. My body probably appreciates the fact that I'm giving it some extra rest on the weekend, even though there is always a part of me that want to go to the gym and take on whatever workout is scheduled that day. I really only know one way to improve: work harder. So whenever I feel like I am lacking in life (which is damn near always), I put in more hours trying to get better at whatever skill is eluding me. I didn't really think that "being less sore" would be something that I needed to work at, but if I don't put effort into my recovery, then my body feels like crap for days. At first I thought rolling out after class and regular epsom salt baths at home would do the trick, but it wasn't enough. It was only after sleeping in a couple of weekends that I realized how much sleep was helping my body recover. So now I'm doing my best to get as much sleep as I can, especially on those nights where I come home wrecked after a tough workout.
(Note: I should have known that recovery takes work because I already knew sleeping takes work. I've had sleeping problems throughout my life. Finally went to see a sleep doctor about 5 years ago and she explained how I needed to train my body to go to sleep. I'm sure most people just lay down and they're good, but I somehow struggle with even the simplest things in life.)
With two idle days to let my shoulders recover, I came in on Monday for a test day. The benchmark we were taking on was Jackie. Jackie is a triplet consisting of a 1,000 meter row, 50 thrusters (45 pounds for everyone), and 30 pull-ups. Not my favorite workout (it has pull-ups, duh), but it is one of those workouts that is good for me to do for a variety of reasons. Most people complete this somewhere around 10 minutes, so the length of this workout should suit me. At the very least, it is pushing the edges of where I start to fall apart on workouts, so I need to get comfortable handling a workout of this length. Another reason it is good for me is because it is a workout that involves some strategy. I made a note when I did this WOD three months ago that pacing out the 50 thrusters did me no good and that I should attack them the next time this workout came up. Time to try out the new strategy.
Monday nights at the gym have become the most popular workout time of the week. It used to be extra busy due to the on-ramp program, but now it is Boot Camp that aids in filling up the parking lot on Monday evenings. With regular classes at 5:30 and 6:30 and Boot Camp at 5:30, you get a ton of people at Crossfit KOP at the same time. Plus, beach season is almost here! (That really means nothing to me, but it seems very important to others.) People want to work out so they look good for the summer, which results in classes like we had on Monday. 18 of us were going to take on Jackie, so that meant we would need to do two heats. And I knew who my partner would be as soon as I walked in the door.
In the past, if I had gotten to the gym and didn't have a partner for a workout that required one, I would just go along with whoever didn't pair up with somebody. Often that would be someone newer to the gym and I was okay with that because I've always enjoyed working out with someone I didn't know that well. It was easier to get to know them if you were spending the class with them. But now I'm becoming more selfish. Maybe 2016 has been too hard on me and I've experienced too much loss. I look around the gym and see that most of the people I began my Crossfit journey with are no longer there. Even the second wave of people that I bonded with at the gym are mostly gone. So when I see someone I used to work out with in my class, I get a little nostalgic and gravitate towards them. And I'll never stop enjoying working out with John McHugh, so I made sure we were partners for Jackie.
Aimee put us through one of her typical rigorous warmups and as we took turns doing each of the movements, John and I had this fantastic exchange:
John: I don't mean to be insensitive, but can I ask you a question?
Me: <amused and curious> Of course John.
John: How much do you weigh?
The reason John asked his "insensitive question" was because we both have struggled with pull-ups. There are three ways to get better at pull-ups: improve your form, get stronger, and lose weight. Neither John nor I have wonderful form. We're both trying to get stronger, but it's a slow process. And we both come in at over two bills on the scale. That's a recipe for struggle on the pull-up bar. Another issue for John was that one of his shoulders was bothering him. I saw him trying to work it out before class began and he was definitely in pain. He's stubborn like me though and insisted he was doing the workout. As he did some practice pull-ups, he looked like he was in pain again, so I suggested we get a box and a band ready for him in case he needed it. He didn't seem excited about that idea, but after a couple more practice reps, he agreed to let me get them. Better to grab them in advance rather than have to do it in the middle of the WOD.
John got ready to go and I stood alongside to offer encouragement and to count his reps for him. He began with the row and he was off to a fast start. John was not only using big pulls, but he was moving back and forth from the flywheel with much more speed than I intended on using. My goal was to not use up too much energy on the row, but to keep it at a respectable 4:00 pace for the 1,000 meters. John was off the row just a smidge beyond 3:30. He was one of the first people over to the empty barbell and began working on his thrusters.
John might hate pull-ups, but I'm pretty sure he's not a huge fan of thrusters either. He had a pained look on his face early on as he worked his way through 50 reps. But he didn't get the nickname "Mr. Intensity" for nothing, so even though he looked like he was hurting, he growled his way through a medium-sized set before placing the barbell on the floor. With 24 reps to go, I felt confident that John could push through sets of 8 reps, so I let him know he had 3 sets of 8 remaining. Sure enough, John would pick up that barbell and not put it down until he had gotten 8 thrusters. When those 3 sets were done, it was time for the last part of the workout: the dreaded pull-ups.
The man, the myth, the legend. No quit in this guy.
John started working on his pull-ups, but the pain face was even more extreme here than it had been on the thrusters. Before he reached 10 reps, he asked me to grab the box so he could use the band I had tied to one side of the pull-up bar. From that point, he was able to grind his way through the remaining reps 1-2 at a time. John's final time: 11:22.
It was my turn to go and I had my strategy all set: relaxed but efficient row, frantic pace through the thrusters, don't spend all day on the pull-ups. My best time for this workout was 10:55, the time I had gotten three months ago. My goal was to break 10 minutes for the first time. Heat 2 began and I was grateful that Keithie was rowing next to me, because he seemed to have the same idea as me on the row. He was making huge pulls, but his cadence back and forth from the flywheel was slow. For a while, we were almost synchronized with our rowing, although I'm sure he was getting much more out of his pulls than I was. At the 500 meter mark, my time was around 1:50. I knew my pace would be slightly slower on the back half of the row, so I was on track for something near 4:00. When I hit 1,000 meters, I was around 3:50. Not bad. More importantly, I wasn't winded. Yet.
I walked to my barbell, took a deep breath, and told myself that I needed to move with urgency on these thrusters. And I did. My reps were very fast, but that speed was tiring. I tried to breathe as I moved through each rep, but it was difficult to keep it under control. I should have been able to get through 25-30 reps, but after rep 21, I wimped out and put the barbell down. I needed a break to breathe. I'm sure the break was longer than I perceived it to be, but I wanted to be ready to plow through another large set quickly when I picked that barbell back up. Instead I wimped out again. Did 10 reps, put the barbell back down. Same thing on the next set. I guess I should be happy I started off with 21 as that left me only 9 for my final set. The clock showed just over 7 minutes. Doing 30 pull-ups in under 3 minutes was going to be tough, especially since my pulse was racing after trying to do fast thrusters.
I got to the pull-up bar with what I thought was a good plan. I didn't have faith that I could string more than 2 reps, but I told myself that I was doing two sets like this each time before getting a break. So it was string two reps, drop for a sec, hop back up to the high bar, string two reps, take a break. It was almost like doing sets of four. Unfortunately, my breaks were much longer than I would have hoped. I got up to 16 reps with this routine. Then I did three sets of two (not consecutive) to get to 22. I did single reps the rest of the way. I got through 29 reps, tried to hurry to get the last one done, and failed miserably. I shook out my arms, got my breath, and did the last one right. Final time: 11:18.
Not what I was hoping for, although I didn't feel awful about going 23 seconds slower than I had three months earlier. I felt good about the row. The thruster strategy wasn't too bad, I just needed to stop being a wimp about it. And I need to start practicing pull-ups again. Not every so often. I need to practice regularly like I had done last spring/summer. Fatigue did play a role in my struggles on the bar, but my form should be so much better than it currently is.
After some time recovering, I joined Steph C and Fayth who were practicing some handstand drills with Shawna over by the wall. There are a group of girls who have been getting together to do these drills (I think Shawna is the informal leader of the group) and I watched them do this routine the other day. Since I have nothing in the way of handstand push-ups or a handstand walk, I thought it would be worthwhile to join in the fun. The drills I tried consisted of getting into a handstand hold, then removing one foot from the wall for 10 seconds, then switching and bringing the other foot off the wall for 10 seconds. On my first attempt, I only brought my foot about an inch away from the wall. Shawna had shown us a version of this where she took her leg way off the wall and still maintained her balance, so I wanted to do something along those lines for my second attempt. I got up on the wall, took one foot away, then pulled it back further. Spent 10 seconds in that position with each leg. When I came down from the wall, I said to Shawna "that felt like it was much further from the wall than my first try, but it probably wasn't". She smiled and replied "yeah, it wasn't much further away" in the nicest way anyone could. Oh well, just another thing I need to work on.
Tuesday preview: A very bleak Dudes After Dark.
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