Not So Funny Bone

Workout date: 5/18/16

The wall ascent is one of those Crossfit items in the gym that doesn't show up as often as it should.  In fact, it is something that you can't even practice in the gym because all the portable racks and the lifting blocks are stored right next to the 8' wall.  You have to wait until it gets programmed and make sure that you don't miss that day.  I would estimate that wall ascents make an appearance about once every 4-6 months in WODs at KOP.  Last month, they were part of a WOD and I had to miss it.  Drats!  Guess I'd have to wait until early fall before I could climb the wall again.

Or would I?  Tuesday night wasn't all bad as I received a gift at 10pm when the KOP blog announced that the next day's WOD would include wall ascents.  Yes!!!  I had actually done this specific workout last April so this would be a chance to see if I had improved since then.  Here was the WOD:

15 minute AMRAP:
1 wall ascent (8'/6')
10 KB swings (70/53)
1 wall ascent
10 burpees

If you wanted a good score in this workout, you had to make sure you were in a class that didn't have a ton of people in it.  Only one person can climb the wall at a time, so if someone else is on the wall (or even worse, if there is a line of people waiting to climb the wall), then you have to wait your turn. The 7:30 class tends to have a low turnout so I felt safe in choosing that class.  There were only 5 of us there, with 3 guys on the 8' wall (me, Brian, and Rahmad) and 2 ladies on the 6' wall (Nicole and Julie Foucher).  Rahmad is new to KOP and he didn't seem so sure about the 8' wall, but he was like we all were when we first started at the gym.  If all the guys were going up the 8' wall, then he was going up the 8' wall as well!  After a few attempts, he realized what we all realized at the beginning: that it's pretty rare that you can just jump into the RX movement right off the bat.  He moved over to the 6' wall, leaving me and Brian on the 8' wall.  Oddly enough, when I had done this workout last April, me and Brian were the only ones on the 8' wall in that workout as well.

Wait!!!  There was a late arrival to class.  Coach Rachel had gone into a phone booth and transformed into athlete Rachel.  There had only been glimpses of this WOD superhero in recent months, but she had been lured to this workout due to the presence of wall ascents, just as I had.  She joined the group going over the 6' wall, although it should be noted that Rachel and Julie Foucher did get their first ever ascents over the 8' wall during the warmup.

My biggest concern about this workout?  My left elbow.  It had begun acting up again earlier in the afternoon and everything in this WOD seemed like something that could aggravate my elbow even more.  Pulling myself up over a wall?  Check.  Swinging a very heavy KB over my head?  Check.  Pushing out of the bottom of a burpee?  Check.  A very solid argument could have been made for skipping this workout to avoid making my elbow worse, but it seemed like sacrilege to miss wall ascents for the second time in a row.  So I made the same deal with myself as I had the night before: if I felt any real pain in my elbow during the workout, I would scale down the movements (or stop).

In order to give a little separation during the initial wall ascent, Coach Jenna sent us off in 10 second intervals after one another to begin.  Brian didn't seem eager to start us off, so I went first.  And I kept a good pace during that first round.  When I had done this workout last April, my score was 5+11 (got through all of the KB swings in round 6).  One round every two and a half minutes meant 6 rounds, so I wanted to try and keep that pace if at all possible.  As I finished my last burpee in round one, I took a peek at the clock and saw I was just over two minutes.  And at the end of two rounds, I was under 4:20.  Six rounds was definitely in play.

Round three was when fatigue began to set in.  I took an extra few seconds each time I got ready to run towards the wall.  I had to talk myself into picking up that heavy KB as I wanted to make sure I got all 10 swings before putting it back down.  And there was definitely some crawling taking place during the burpee portion of the round.  At the end of round three, I saw that getting 6 rounds was going to be tougher than originally thought.  The clock showed 7:10.  There was also a wait at the wall as I had made up a half-round on Brian.  Not that I didn't need that break because I certainly did, but I couldn't proceed on the wall until he had climbed it.  Once Brian disappeared on the other side of the wall, I tried not to waste any time before doing my climb.  My pacing on the KB swings and the burpees didn't feel much different from round 3 and the clock told the same story.  I was beyond 10 minutes at the end of round 4, meaning I needed to pick things up if I was going to get 6 full rounds.

The start of round 5 was similar to the beginning of round 4 as Brian was standing before the wall, trying to catch his breath just like I was.  I knew that I needed to pick it up on the exercises away from the wall if I wanted to avoid being caught behind him, so after he climbed the wall, I did my climb, then got to my KB.  I couldn't stare at it for a few seconds this time, I needed to pick it up, swing it 10 times, and get in front of Brian for the next wall climb.  The burpees took more time than the KB swings anyway, so if I got right on the KB swings, I should have been able to get back to the wall first.  And that is exactly what happened.  I made sure that when I got to the wall that I didn't spend a lot of time there catching my breath there as I didn't want to hold up Brian.  I caught my breath on the next set of burpees as there was a lot of crawling in that fifth round.  Another three minute round left me less than two minutes for round #6.

I had a little bit of a cushion on Brian as I got ready for my next wall ascent, so I once again took a few seconds to prepare myself for the wall ascent.  I got over, came back to my KB, and took some time again.  I was exhausted and the last thing I wanted to do was drop the KB.  When I finished off my 10th KB swing, there was about 35 seconds left to go.  I came over to the wall, took a deep breath, and ran at it.  I got to the top, dropped to the floor, and didn't bother going all the way back to where I had done my KB swings and burpees previously.  I just dropped down and did my burpees over near the kilo plates.  There wasn't much time remaining and I wanted to get in as many reps as I could.  I managed 5 burpees before time was called.  Final score: 5+17.

It was a nice little improvement over last time, but it was also a reminder of how much more my cardio needs to improve.  I'm also beginning to worry more and more about my left elbow, which seems to flare up at the most random times.  (For example, it seems to start aching a lot when I have my left hand resting on the steering wheel while I drive.  Random, right?)  I've been icing it when I'm home, but that doesn't seem to be the cure I need.

Thursday preview: A trip to the noon express class for 15RM overhead squats.  My elbow holds up, but will the rest of my body?