Imaginary Partner

Workout date: 10/31/16

You better believe I needed a day off after 96 minutes of cross-dressing and pain.  I had brief thoughts of going outside on Sunday and doing some double under practice, but I couldn't even bring myself to do that.  Despite the fact that I spent Sunday being lazy, I had done a lot more exercise this weekend than I had done over any weekend since I stopped going to Competitors Class.  That had to count for something when I stepped on the scale Monday morning, right?

Original weigh-in:  213.2 pounds
Last week's weigh-in:  212.4 pounds
This week's weigh-in:  211.0 pounds

I have a confession to make after seeing my weight on the scale this week: this diet just doesn't seem worth it.  I've had ice cream twice in the last two months.  I've had Chick-Fil-A twice in the last two months.  Even worse, I discovered that I haven't gotten the free monthly items on my Chick-Fil-A calendar card in the last four months.  While I've been staying away from my favorite snacks, I've been eating more spinach than Popeye.  I work out 4-5 times per week.  And after 8 weeks, I've lost...2 pounds?  Gee, that totally makes the sacrifice seem worth it.

After angrily consuming lunch at Chick-Fil-A in protest of my diet, I started thinking about what I wanted to do at the gym Monday evening.  The WOD was Chelsea and there was no chance I was doing that.  Chelsea is a 30 minute workout where you are supposed to do 5 pull-ups, 10 push-ups, and 15 air squats every minute on the minute.  If you fail at any point during the EMOM, the workout turns into an AMRAP (complete as many rounds as you can before time elapses).  In theory, you could wind up doing 150 pull-ups in this workout.  I'd probably end up doing 75-80, but even that was crazy talk after having done 120 on Saturday.  I needed something else to do.

You will not be surprised to learn that I tried to top my best set of 78 consecutive double unders.  On my first attempt, I whipped myself in the back of the head before getting a single rep.  I'm not sure why I hit myself in the head with the rope when most others whip their arms or their legs.  It's probably an indication that my form sucks.  On my second attempt, I got 11 reps.  Finally, on my third attempt, a real set got brewing.  I made it through 50 reps.  At about 65 reps, I started tiring out. As I passed 75 reps, I started to believe this would be my first 80+ set.  And then as I was about to set a new PR, I hit myself with the rope.  Ended up with 78 again.  Not a great feeling, but at least it validated my PR from last week.

Maybe practicing the four WODs I'll need to do in less than 2 weeks would be a good idea!  The Brawl in the Fall is just around the corner on November 12th and I hadn't done anything other than come up with a team name (I submitted 5 options to Danielle and she chose "Dudes After Dark: The Co-ed Mid-day Edition").  The WODs had been posted online and I read them quickly, so I had a general idea of what they were.  One involved finding your max clean.  One involved deadlifts, KB swings, and wall balls.  One involved double unders and then a boatload of bodyweight movements.  And the last one was rowing and shoulder-to-overhead reps.  Because I wasn't feeling 100%, I decided that going after my max clean could wait for another day.  I did try out the other three workouts though.  And since Danielle wasn't at the gym, I worked with my imaginary partner.

Practice WOD #1:
15 minute AMRAP
10 deadlifts (185/135)
20 KB swings (55/35)
30 wall balls (14#/10# to 10'/9')

Danielle has informed me that she is the "wall ball queen", so what I wanted to test out was how long I could hold on to the deadlifts and KB swings.  If I could manage it for a while, then I'd do those two segments and rest while she did the wall balls.  I suspected that the 30 wall balls would take Danielle approximately a minute, so I went through two rounds of the deadlifts and the KB swings with a minute rest in between.

The verdict: We might be able to get away with this strategy for a few rounds, but probably not much longer than that.  I was able to string all of my deadlifts and all of my KB swings in both rounds, but by the end of the second round, I was pretty tired.  The deadlift-KB combo took me 1:03 each time I did it.  At that pace, we would complete just over 7 full rounds in the workout.  I highly doubt I could string all of those deadlifts and KB swings for 7 rounds.  3 rounds would be most likely, 4 if I kept it together better than expected.

The reason I was thinking of dividing up the workout this way was because the WOD description mentions a tag-in/tag-out station.  When we did a max goblet squat WOD during Brawl in the Burbs, I thought Cline and I had done well, but it turned out we spent too much time tagging in and out.  If the tagging in and out will consume a lot of time, we will need a strategy like this one, but with some tweaks.  If we can just switch back and forth without having to go to a tag-in/tag-out station, then we can simply split up the work and not have to worry too much about strategy.

Just for fun, I got out a 14 pound wall ball and did 30 consecutive reps up to the 10 foot target.  It is very weird using that lighter ball (guys typically have to use a 20 pound ball) and I'm worried that I'll shoot too high (waste of time) or compensate and shoot too low (no rep).  Doing 30 reps with that ball was more tedious than anything.  If I can focus on my breathing and ignore the desire to break up sets, I should be fine.  I finished my 30 wall balls in 1:01.

Practice WOD #2:
Max calories rowed in 5 minutes
Max shoulder-to-overhead (75/55) in 5 minutes

I recently did a partner cash out with Rob where we had to get max calories on the rower in 5 minutes.  We tended to row for 45 seconds each before tiring.  Throw in 5 seconds to transition people on the rower and you get 3 full rounds for both partners.  I imagine that is what we will do for this event, but I haven't discussed it with Danielle yet.  As for the shoulder-to-overheads, I'm a big fan of cycling barbell movements, so that should be a good one for me.  Not exactly sure how we'll divide it up.

Since my imaginary partner needed an imaginary break after the first practice WOD, I did this one myself.  My plan was to go for a full minute on the rower, then a full minute on the shoulder-to-overheads.  I got to 23 calories on the rower and then did 32 shoulder-to-overheads before time was up.  The shoulder-to-overheads weren't bad.  I got tired with about 20 seconds left, but the barbell was light enough where I didn't feel the need to put it down.  If I paused, I held it in my front rack for a couple seconds, then started churning through reps again.  Going for 30 or more in a row might not be ideal during the competition as we'll be doing these for 5 minutes.  I might go for 20 before tagging out instead.

Practice WOD #3:
Max double unders in 2 minutes
Then an 8 minute AMRAP of
25 pull-ups
25 hand release push-ups
25 knee raises
25 air squats

This WOD will easily be the toughest for Danielle and I as neither of us are proficient in pull-ups.  I have chronicled my recent double under work, so hopefully that will pay off here.  I decided to test how I'd feel on the pull-up bar after doing a set of double unders, so I came up with a plan of doing 25 double unders, then trying to string 3 pull-ups.  I started twirling the rope and immediately felt very confident in my form.  When I got to 25, I tossed my rope and jumped up to the high bar.  It was a rare moment where I kinda felt like a badass Crossfit athlete.  (Okay, mildly competent Crossfit athlete might be more accurate.)  I went into my kip for the first rep when I discovered that this bar had recently been used during Chelsea.  I'm not sure what the substance was on the bar (sweat, blood, goopy chalk), but my hands were sliding as I did the first rep.  I managed to barely get in a second rep, but it wasn't safe for me to keep swinging on a bar that I couldn't maintain a grip on.  Instead of continuing with pull-up practice, I took some time to clean the bars at the far end of the gym.

That was it in terms of Brawl in the Fall practice.  Prior to working on those WODs, I spent some time trying to do strict handstand push-ups with only 1 abmat.  It did not go well.  As in, I was successful zero times.  My handstand push-up situation mirrors my bar muscle-up situation: I can't do the actual movement and I am in between scales.  For bar muscle-ups, I find jumping bar muscle-ups with a 17" box too easy and jumping with a 13" box too hard.   Same story with handstand push-ups.  Doing them with 2 abmats feels too easy, while 1 abmat is too hard.  I'm attending a handstand push-up clinic at KOP on November 19th with the hope that I'll learn how to kip and no longer have to worry about how far down I can go on a strict handstand push-up.

That was it for the night.  Jess had come over and asked me if I was doing my own personal Filthy Fifty.  I laughed and told her no, but I did work on a lot of different things while I was at Open Strength.  I feel a little better in terms of figuring out strategy for the competition.  But I think I'll figure more things out when I sub out my imaginary partner for Danielle.

Tuesday preview: Cline and I have a prolonged Chariots of Fire moment.