As part of my weight-loss fantasy (let's call it what it is), I was weighing myself on Monday morning every week. Used the same scale. Tried to do it about the same time each week. I wasn't able to do that while I was in Mexico and Alabama, so I missed two consecutive Monday morning weigh-ins. We arrived back home late on a Monday afternoon (the 26th), so I didn't feel right about weighing myself that day. I'd just wait until Tuesday morning and see how things had changed over the last 15 days. Boy, did they change...
Original weigh-in: 213.2 pounds
Last pre-holiday trip weigh-in: 208.8 pounds
This week's weigh-in: 211.8 pounds
In May-hee-co, I believe that is known as "El Gordo". Four pounds gained over the course of my last two weigh-ins. Certainly not the direction I wanted to be heading in. It's frustrating to think that I cut out so many of my favorite delicacies from what I consumed over the last three months, only to gain back most of the weight I had lost while on vacation. Definitely doesn't make the effort seem worthwhile.
I came back to KOP just in time for the final benchmark workout of the year. Only it wouldn't truly be a benchmark workout for me because I either a) missed this workout earlier in the year or b) specifically avoided it when it was programmed. (Spoiler: It's more b than a.) The WOD's name is Nate and it is a hero WOD that involves three difficult movements:
"Nate"
20 minute AMRAP
2 muscle-ups
4 handstand push-ups
8 KB swings (70/53)
Don't have muscle-ups. Don't have handstand push-ups. Barely have 70 pound KB swings. You can see why I might not have been so eager to show up the three times this workout was posted on the blog earlier in the year. And if I hadn't been away from KOP for two weeks, there's a good chance I might have come up with a reason for skipping it a fourth time. Alas, this was the first workout that I could attend once I got home and there was no chance I was missing it.
At least I'd get to do it at Dudes After Dark! The class was small, but 100% dude. I'd be taking class with Actuary Mike and Chris S, who I was meeting for the very first time. LC had us go through a progression of KB swings with a lighter KB before asking us to choose the KB that was appropriate for the workout. (Because it was only 8 swings per round, I went with the 70 pound KB.) Then we covered the scales that we were all going to need if we were going to take on Nate. We started over at the wall where we talked about kicking up on to the wall and potentially doing handstand push-ups with abmats. Chris wasn't going to be able to perform that scale, so he picked out some DBs to use for the seated press instead. Mike had started to become more comfortable kicking up on to the wall, so he was going to use 3 abmats for his handstand push-ups. I wasn't sure what I was doing. I typically go with 2 abmats and do strict handstand push-ups, but there were two problems with that scale:
- It had gotten too easy. It had been a while since my shoulders had grown so tired that I couldn't complete the workout using this scale. I was also finishing the handstand push-up segment of workouts much faster than others in class which gave me the impression that I wasn't really getting the stimulus that I was supposed to be getting from the movement.
- I wasn't getting any closer to doing a handstand push-up with no abmats. I could try and do a workout with strict handstand push-ups and 1 abmat, but since I'd only ever gotten 2 that way in my life, there was a strong chance that I wouldn't finish the workout.
So what was I going to do in this workout that addressed both of those issues? LC told me to continue using 2 abmats, but she also said I had to kip all of my reps. I needed to learn to kip properly if I was ever going to get to the point where I could do handstand push-ups with no abmats. Keeping 2 abmats under my head was going to shorten the range of motion so that I (hopefully) wouldn't get stuck being unable to do reps. It sounded like a reasonable compromise to me.
With our handstand push-up scales figured out, we moved over to the rings. None of us were even close to a muscle-up, so we needed to know what we should be doing instead. Jumping muscle-ups? Transitions? For this workout, LC recommended that we do a 2-for-1 substitution of ring dips and pull-ups for each muscle-up. With only 4 ring dips per round, I toyed with the idea of trying to do those without a band, but it seemed likely that my arms were going to be fatigued from the heavy KB swings and the kipping handstand push-ups. All three of us went for the pull-up and banded dip combo. We were officially ready for Nate.
The first couple of rounds weren't awful. I flew through the banded dips. I did two sets of two pull-ups each time I came over to complete my muscle-up scale. The handstand push-ups were tough because I wasn't used to kipping. Having enough strength to do them strict, I probably used my arms to compensate for my iffy form. Eight swings was about as many as I wanted to do with the 70 pound KB, so I gladly placed it on the floor after my 8th rep was complete. Approximate time for the first two rounds: three minutes.
The banded dips still weren't a problem in round three. I switched to singles for the pull-ups, but they still didn't take all that long. The kipping handstand push-up was where I ran into trouble. I got upside-down, brought my knees into my chest, and kicked my feet towards the sky, but I was getting no oomph into it. I'm sure I looked like a chubby pogo stick as I kept moving slightly up before bouncing back down on my head. LC came over and told me that I really need to fire my feet upward for the kip. Apparently I was not firing my feet up. It was more of a gentle flailing. As a result, I was getting no momentum. While I was off of the wall trying to figure out why I sucked at these so badly, LC let me know that my abmats were too close to the wall. "Your head splotch should be here, not there", she informed me, pointing to the circle of sweat on the top abmat. I moved the abmats a bit away from the wall, ensuring that my head splotch would wind up in the proper location from now on.
That third round took just over two minutes. I continued to struggle with the kipping handstand push-ups, resulting in a fourth round of nearly three minutes. The lack of force when throwing my feet upwards was not my only issue. When doing strict handstand push-ups, you don't have to worry about your core so much. When you kip them, you're using a whole lotta core. All of that scrunching up of your knees into your chest and then shooting them away as hard as you can...it was taking a toll on my mid-section. I began to fail on more attempts. Other than a breather here and there, I was moving through the rest of the workout (even the pull-ups!) pretty quickly. But I kept spending a lot of time at the wall. Both the fifth and sixth rounds took about four minutes each.
With less than four minutes remaining, I knew I needed to pick up the pace if I wanted to complete the seventh round. And by pick up the pace, I mean I slowed down at the wall. When I got upside down, I wasn't worried about trying to do more than one rep. I just wanted to make sure that I didn't waste energy failing on a rep. So I'd complete a good rep, come off the wall, and take my time before going back. I still didn't have a totally clean round of handstand push-ups, but I must have taken less time because I got through the 8 KB swings to end round seven before the clock hit 20 minutes. I even ran over and did 4 banded dips and 4 quick singles right before time was called. Final score: 7+2 (4 banded dips + 4 pull-ups = 2 muscle-ups).
I'm not sure if my exhaustion stemmed from being away from KOP for 2 weeks or if it was because I had never done kipping handstand push-ups throughout a 20 minute workout. Either way, it was clear that my kipping handstand push-ups needed a lot of practice. It would be best to take care of that outside of a WOD.
Wednesday preview: A workout with a unique structure makes me wonder whether I should chase the RX. The pity circle makes its return.
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