Workout date: 10/29/16
Completing Wolverine was one of my big goals for 2015. Just as I've become obsessed with double unders in the summer/fall of 2016, my obsession at this time last year was completing workouts that included an insane number of pull-ups. Nothing fits that bill like Wolverine. You have to perform 120 pull-ups during Wolverine and some sickos would tell you that this is the easy part of the workout. The full Wolverine involves the following:
"Wolverine"
6 rounds
10 clean and jerks (135/95)
20 pull-ups
100 sit-ups
1 Lyons loop run (advertised as 600 meters, likely a bit longer than that)
*Cub is 4 rounds of this madness with only 50 sit-ups per round
**The RX version of these workouts requires a costume. Unwritten rule.
During Luke's farewell happy hour (he'd be making a cameo later in the day), a couple people mentioned doing Wolverine. In particular, John McHugh was going to do it and he began persuading me to go for a second round of this torture. Since there is practically zero chance I'll ever say no to John, I started brainstorming what my costume would be for the workout. After all, the costume is the most important part. My personal belief is that the costume should be gym-themed. Sure, I could show up as Deadpool or as a member of the Suicide Squad, but that's your typical Halloween costume. Why not get creative with it and add your own personal touch?
Last year, I went as the Chalk Fairy (aka Aimee Lyons). Working out for over an hour and a half in a curly blonde wig and a rainbow tutu was not ideal, but it wasn't the worst fashion decision I've ever made either. A couple of ideas for this year popped into my head as I sat next to John and Luke, sipping my beer. The most compelling of which was going as Giulz. It would be easy enough to come up with a half-hearted Giulz costume. I could find a plush toy that looked like her dog, Polpetta. I could wear a backwards cap, one of Giulz's go-to fashion accessories. I could probably pull off a fairly decent Giulz rant if the gym was still unclear on who I was supposed to be.
But that's not my style. I'm much more of a "go big or go home" kinda guy. When I play in handicapping tournaments, I'm playing to win, not to finish in the money. When I take on a WOD at the gym, I desperately want the challenge of completing the workout RX, even though it might result in some public humiliation. And if I was going to do the Giulz costume justice, I needed to risk public humiliation yet again.
I have a long-standing rule of never taking my shirt off in the gym (for reasons that will become readily apparent). The folks at the gym who rip off their shirt in the middle of the workout have something to show off. I, on the other hand, have a blindingly white spare tire that I'd prefer to hide. I wouldn't be able to do that if I was going all in on the Giulz costume. She has developed some rock hard abs over the last year and performs quite a few of her workouts in a sports bra. I needed to make that magic happen for the costume. She also has tattoos all over her body. Showing up as Giulz sans ink would look strange. So I made the decision to buy a sports bra (don't ask), to draw abs on my belly (they smeared away after only 1 round of Wolverine), and to recreate as many of Giulz's tattoos as possible (many thanks to my tattoo artist, Jenn, who also crafted my 8-pack). Below are side-by-side shots of a fool and his muses. Pretty sure my chances of ever being an elected official are now gone (not that I'm complaining).
Senator-elect Nichols, could you explain these pictures we found on your Facebook page?
Let's move on to the actual workout, shall we? My first concern of the day was how cold I would be based on how modestly I had dressed. It was in the low 40's at 9am on Saturday and I'd be spending a lot of time outdoors during this workout (3-4 minutes per run, or 18-24 minutes total). A lot of people would be bundled up in such weather, but I had a couple things going for me:
- My body temperature tends to be through the roof (which explains why I'm constantly sweating)
- The gym is almost always much warmer than it needs to be, so the brisk runs would actually balance things out for me
We did a warmup run on the Lyons loop and I felt pretty comfortable during it. And it was only going to get warmer as the morning progressed. No need to worry about how cold I was going to be.
That wasn't my only concern with regards to my outfit. My hat was turned backwards, so I wouldn't have to worry about it on the clean and jerks, but I'd need to turn it around for the sit-ups. My fake boobs likely would be impacted by the clean and jerks, so I'd have to make sure they didn't pop out. Between the hat and heavy wig I was wearing, it wasn't hard to imagine that my head would be sweating like crazy. Last but not least, my dainty outfit would not leave much to the imagination while I was doing sit-ups. (Note: Samson took a bunch of photos for my fake OB/GYN while I did sit-ups. I won't include any on here in case you're eating.)
That sure was a lot of outfit-related concerns. How did I feel about the actual workout? Not too bad actually. Knowing that this took over an hour and a half last year, I made the decision not to rush through the early rounds. Slow and steady would win the race (assuming that my competition was 2015 Dave). The clean and jerks probably wouldn't be bad, the pull-ups would suck, the sit-ups would eventually suck, and the runs would be active rest. I was hoping to beat my time of 98:15 from last year, but I wasn't going to be broken up if it didn't happen.
Keithie got us started on our long journey and we began doing clean and jerks. Cline was working out directly in front of me. This was his first time taking on Wolverine RX. He has yet to use 135 pounds for Grace (30 clean and jerks), but he sure didn't have any problems with that weight during the first 10 of 60 clean and jerks he'd be doing today. Inspired by how I did on JJ, I was doing quick singles, but they weren't fast enough to keep up with Cline, who got to the pull-up rig before me. When I joined him, I got to work on my plan of doing 10 sets of doubles. I wanted to put off doing singles on the pull-up bar until I absolutely had to. I developed a rhythm where I did 2 reps, dropped from the bar, then jumped up again and did 2 more (quick doubles?), so I was getting 4 reps in before needing a break. Cline was pulling away from me already as he had moved on to the sit-ups. I tried my best to ignore how fast he was going (there was no chance I was going to keep up with him on an ultra-long workout like this one) and stayed focused on getting 2 reps every time I jumped up to the pull-up bar. When I had 20 done, I headed to my abmat.
I started off my first round of sit-ups by doing 50 in a row. From there, I chipped away with smaller sets until I got to 100 reps. I headed out on my first run at the same time as Josh M and Maggie. It didn't seem possible that we were at the same point in the workout, so I assumed they had gone super fast and were in the midst of completing round two. They let me know that was not the case. That was reassuring. Maybe I wasn't going as slow as it seemed. When we finished the loop, the clock inside was at about the 11:30 mark. This would be the last time I spent time with Josh and Maggie until the end of the workout.
In round two, I didn't change my pace on the clean and jerks. I had the same strategy on the pull-ups. There was part of me that wanted to switch to singles, but I challenged myself to keep doing doubles. I wasn't going to get better at stringing pull-ups unless I gave up on defaulting to singles. And this was an opportunity to do 60 sets of doubles in one workout. I knocked out another 10 doubles and moved ahead to the sit-ups. My initial set here was probably in the 20-25 rep range. Soon after, I realized I was in trouble.
I looked back at the blog post I did on Wolverine last year and read that the sit-ups started to become a problem in round 4. I was closing in on the mid-way point of round 2 this year when the mid-way point of my body let me know it wasn't copacetic with doing another 450 sit-ups. I put my mind to doing fast sets of 10 reps with breaks in between. If I got through 10 reps and didn't feel like I was being stabbed, I'd keep going and do 12-15 reps. By the time I got up to do my second Lyons loop, I knew I was going to be losing time on subsequent rounds of sit-ups. I might need to pick up the pace somewhere else. At the end of round two, the clock was nearing 27 minutes.
Because I knew the sit-ups were going to be torture, I tried to pick up my speed on the clean and jerks. I wasn't properly warmed up (my own fault) when I began round 1, so the first few clean and jerks felt worse than I expected. Now that we were into round 3, I was definitely warmed up. I sped through my singles at a faster pace than I had previously. Hopefully this wouldn't screw up my pull-ups! It actually didn't. I stuck with my strategy of two sets of doubles before a break. I kept expecting to fail along the way, but every set of two was a success through three rounds. The sit-ups were brutal yet again. I'd try to do a larger set to begin the round, then settled into sets of 10 (depending on how much pain I could endure). When those were done, I did my third run and returned at around 43 minutes.
Round 4 was more of the same. 10 clean and jerks at a slightly faster pace than I had done them in the first two rounds. 10 more sets of doubles on the pull-up bar, in part due to encouragement from Coach Keithie. 10 sets of 10 sit-ups with much-needed breaks in between as I did everything I could to keep moving through the part of the workout that felt like it was slowly killing me. Run #4 was completed and I returned to see the clock closing in on 61 minutes.
I felt the need to try and go even faster on the clean and jerks since the sit-ups were a nightmare and I expected my pull-ups to give way at some point. If I was going to beat last year's time, I had to make up some time somewhere. I did a clean and jerk, dropped the barbell, then pushed myself to get right into the next rep. When those 10 reps were done, I got right into my first set of doubles. My grips were soaked in sweat, so I needed to take a couple of chalk breaks, but I knew that I needed to keep moving here because my pace was going to come to a grinding halt at the sit-ups. Somehow I managed to keep my doubles streak alive through round 5. 100 pull-ups complete without having to resort to singles! Even though I was generally feeling miserable at this point, I felt good about that accomplishment.
Sit-ups #401-500 took forever as expected and my fifth trot around the Lyons loop wasn't particularly speedy. I returned to see the clock was just past 78 minutes. If I could finish this last round in under 20 minutes, I'd beat last year's time. Many people were going around cheering on us Wolverine stragglers at this point because they had either done Cub or they had finished Wolverine already. It seemed like the only people still working were me, Luke, and John. And those two had joined the workout after it had officially started. (Wolverine has a rolling start, so you can join in whenever you want, within reason.) The most prominent of my cheerleaders in the final round was Josh, who was determined to get me to pick up my pace. On the clean and jerks, that wasn't a problem. It was more of an issue at the pull-up rig. Josh told me to "just do quick sets of two" as if that was a step down from what I had been doing. I tried to make my breaks between doubles even smaller, but after a couple sets I needed a breather. I walked over to Josh and explained to him that I was trying, but that I was "really fucking tired".
After 5 sets of doubles, I did rep #111, pushed away at the top of the pull-up and then failed on rep #112. I was incredibly pissed. I kicked the wall as hard as I could. I had gotten through 55 sets of doubles, only to fail with a measly 5 left to go. I wasn't even aware at this point that I had ripped skin on both of my hands. I didn't care about the clock. All I could think about was how I had fallen just short again, a common habit of mine. My initial reaction was that I was angry for trying to go faster in the final round in an attempt to please Josh. However, that wasn't the problem. As I tried to do 9 more singles to complete round #6, I ended up failing on another rep along the way. I had told Josh that I was "really fucking tired", but my body was making sure that I grasped how exhausted I truly was. And this was with 100 more sit-ups awaiting me.
I got to my abmat and tried to ignore how much my mid-section hurt. I was able to do sets of 10 reps early on, but I couldn't keep it up for long. I tried to use my recent rage to push me through the pain, but that anger didn't have much of a shelf life. I kept doing a handful of reps before needing another break. I knew I'd be fine once I got to the run, but it seemed like I wasn't making much progress on the sit-ups. 100 seemed so far away, even as I got into the 60-70 rep range. When I got to around 85 reps, I decided that I didn't care what it took to get to 100. I began swinging my arms wildly to help pull my body up from the ground. As I started doing this, my wig and hat came off for the first time. I wasn't putting them back on until I got to 100 sit-ups. Once I did, I swiped them off the floor and started to jog for the door. I put the wig on my head, but it was cockeyed. I didn't care. I jammed the hat on top of my goofy toupee and headed outside. I wasn't alone. An entourage of Josh, Maggie, and Samson pushed me through that final run. Ok, Samson was mainly taking video of the spectacle, but Josh and Maggie kept encouraging me along. Maggie even made sure that my hat wasn't left behind when it fell off my head. I ran solidly during the first half of the run. On the second half, I struggled, but I found enough in reserve to make one last push back to the gym. Final time: 96:24.
That was brutal. I'm not sure why I didn't learn that from last year's experience, but the 2016 edition of Wolverine definitely drove it home for me. If I do this again next year, I am definitely doing Cub. And hopefully dressing like a man.
Monday preview: Halloween brings a workout that is supposed to include 150 pull-ups. Hard pass. I end up using Open Strength to test out a bunch of WODs from the upcoming Brawl in the Fall.
I looked back at the blog post I did on Wolverine last year and read that the sit-ups started to become a problem in round 4. I was closing in on the mid-way point of round 2 this year when the mid-way point of my body let me know it wasn't copacetic with doing another 450 sit-ups. I put my mind to doing fast sets of 10 reps with breaks in between. If I got through 10 reps and didn't feel like I was being stabbed, I'd keep going and do 12-15 reps. By the time I got up to do my second Lyons loop, I knew I was going to be losing time on subsequent rounds of sit-ups. I might need to pick up the pace somewhere else. At the end of round two, the clock was nearing 27 minutes.
Because I knew the sit-ups were going to be torture, I tried to pick up my speed on the clean and jerks. I wasn't properly warmed up (my own fault) when I began round 1, so the first few clean and jerks felt worse than I expected. Now that we were into round 3, I was definitely warmed up. I sped through my singles at a faster pace than I had previously. Hopefully this wouldn't screw up my pull-ups! It actually didn't. I stuck with my strategy of two sets of doubles before a break. I kept expecting to fail along the way, but every set of two was a success through three rounds. The sit-ups were brutal yet again. I'd try to do a larger set to begin the round, then settled into sets of 10 (depending on how much pain I could endure). When those were done, I did my third run and returned at around 43 minutes.
Round 4 was more of the same. 10 clean and jerks at a slightly faster pace than I had done them in the first two rounds. 10 more sets of doubles on the pull-up bar, in part due to encouragement from Coach Keithie. 10 sets of 10 sit-ups with much-needed breaks in between as I did everything I could to keep moving through the part of the workout that felt like it was slowly killing me. Run #4 was completed and I returned to see the clock closing in on 61 minutes.
I felt the need to try and go even faster on the clean and jerks since the sit-ups were a nightmare and I expected my pull-ups to give way at some point. If I was going to beat last year's time, I had to make up some time somewhere. I did a clean and jerk, dropped the barbell, then pushed myself to get right into the next rep. When those 10 reps were done, I got right into my first set of doubles. My grips were soaked in sweat, so I needed to take a couple of chalk breaks, but I knew that I needed to keep moving here because my pace was going to come to a grinding halt at the sit-ups. Somehow I managed to keep my doubles streak alive through round 5. 100 pull-ups complete without having to resort to singles! Even though I was generally feeling miserable at this point, I felt good about that accomplishment.
Sit-ups #401-500 took forever as expected and my fifth trot around the Lyons loop wasn't particularly speedy. I returned to see the clock was just past 78 minutes. If I could finish this last round in under 20 minutes, I'd beat last year's time. Many people were going around cheering on us Wolverine stragglers at this point because they had either done Cub or they had finished Wolverine already. It seemed like the only people still working were me, Luke, and John. And those two had joined the workout after it had officially started. (Wolverine has a rolling start, so you can join in whenever you want, within reason.) The most prominent of my cheerleaders in the final round was Josh, who was determined to get me to pick up my pace. On the clean and jerks, that wasn't a problem. It was more of an issue at the pull-up rig. Josh told me to "just do quick sets of two" as if that was a step down from what I had been doing. I tried to make my breaks between doubles even smaller, but after a couple sets I needed a breather. I walked over to Josh and explained to him that I was trying, but that I was "really fucking tired".
After 5 sets of doubles, I did rep #111, pushed away at the top of the pull-up and then failed on rep #112. I was incredibly pissed. I kicked the wall as hard as I could. I had gotten through 55 sets of doubles, only to fail with a measly 5 left to go. I wasn't even aware at this point that I had ripped skin on both of my hands. I didn't care about the clock. All I could think about was how I had fallen just short again, a common habit of mine. My initial reaction was that I was angry for trying to go faster in the final round in an attempt to please Josh. However, that wasn't the problem. As I tried to do 9 more singles to complete round #6, I ended up failing on another rep along the way. I had told Josh that I was "really fucking tired", but my body was making sure that I grasped how exhausted I truly was. And this was with 100 more sit-ups awaiting me.
I got to my abmat and tried to ignore how much my mid-section hurt. I was able to do sets of 10 reps early on, but I couldn't keep it up for long. I tried to use my recent rage to push me through the pain, but that anger didn't have much of a shelf life. I kept doing a handful of reps before needing another break. I knew I'd be fine once I got to the run, but it seemed like I wasn't making much progress on the sit-ups. 100 seemed so far away, even as I got into the 60-70 rep range. When I got to around 85 reps, I decided that I didn't care what it took to get to 100. I began swinging my arms wildly to help pull my body up from the ground. As I started doing this, my wig and hat came off for the first time. I wasn't putting them back on until I got to 100 sit-ups. Once I did, I swiped them off the floor and started to jog for the door. I put the wig on my head, but it was cockeyed. I didn't care. I jammed the hat on top of my goofy toupee and headed outside. I wasn't alone. An entourage of Josh, Maggie, and Samson pushed me through that final run. Ok, Samson was mainly taking video of the spectacle, but Josh and Maggie kept encouraging me along. Maggie even made sure that my hat wasn't left behind when it fell off my head. I ran solidly during the first half of the run. On the second half, I struggled, but I found enough in reserve to make one last push back to the gym. Final time: 96:24.
That was brutal. I'm not sure why I didn't learn that from last year's experience, but the 2016 edition of Wolverine definitely drove it home for me. If I do this again next year, I am definitely doing Cub. And hopefully dressing like a man.
Monday preview: Halloween brings a workout that is supposed to include 150 pull-ups. Hard pass. I end up using Open Strength to test out a bunch of WODs from the upcoming Brawl in the Fall.
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