If there was ever a scheduled workout that I thought would cause everyone to take a rest day, it was the one that was programmed on Thursday. The WOD called for 30 bar muscle-ups or 30 ring muscle-ups for time. You will often hear Crossfit coaches tell their athletes that only a small percentage of the gym population is expected to do the RX version of a workout. In this case, I was having a hard time envisioning more than a handful of people completing this RX. Even that estimate may have been high. And for those athletes that cherry pick their workouts, this was gonna be the easiest one ever to say "nope, can't do that" and stay home.
To my surprise, the whiteboard in the front of the gym was packed with the names and times of the loads of people who came into class on Thursday. Were there a lot of folks with RX next to their times? No there were not. But I had overestimated the intimidation factor that I thought this WOD carried with it. On second thought, the muscle-up is kinda the pinnacle of Crossfit movements, so maybe it shouldn't have been surprising to see so many people come in and work on the progressions that might one day help them reach that lofty goal.
There was only one class on Thursday that didn't have strong attendance: mine. Perhaps I forgot to throw on deodorant or something, but I was the only one signed up for the 7:30 class. It was looking like I'd have a personal muscle-up training session with Coach Giulz, but LC decided to hop into the 7:30 at the last minute. She's been working really hard on muscle-ups recently, specifically the bar muscle-up. She's done at least one before, but she's been struggling to find the technique again. I've seen her attempting bar muscle-ups with a band with mixed results. It's very similar to how I look when I do jumping bar muscle-ups with a 13" box. I get a few here and there before the bar decides that it is going to violently reject me on every attempt.
Giulz had both me and LC working with a band for bar muscle-up practice. I always feel strange trying to do bar muscle-ups with a band because the band restricts your swing somewhat. I also don't think I kip properly because I'm keeping my feet in the band. My usual kip involves wildly shooting my feet in a somewhat downward direction (although spectators would tell you they're shooting in more of a horizontal direction). Initially, my goal was to get my hips up to the bar and I was able to do that several times. However, when it was time to transition from getting my hips that high to rotating my torso over the bar, I couldn't make that magic happen. I'd raise my hips during the swing, but as I went to kip, my feet rose to an even higher level. Giulz described what she saw as my toes being higher than my nose. From that position, it was going to be impossible to transition into the muscle-up. I needed to be more vertical. That required less hips and more shoulders.
As LC continued to work on bar muscle-ups with a band, my focus became generating height on my swing using my shoulders. It was hard. I've become so dependent on my wild kip that I've neglected incorporating shoulders into my technique. I don't even think the muscles I need to properly kip are developed because my shoulders got tired awfully quickly while I practiced. I got a reprieve when Giulz moved us from the pull-up rig to the rings. She wasn't expecting either of us to perform a ring muscle-up. She just wanted us to get used to swinging on the rings with good form. There was also a focus on a big hip pop. The wild kip I mentioned earlier uses a big hip pop, but mine is super slow. To get a muscle-up, that hip pop needs to be really quick. (It also helps to keep it vertical.) Each time I swung on the rings, I did a tiny hip pop, but worked on making it faster and less horizontal.
It was time for the actual workout and I found myself alone. LC was going to continue working on progressions while I was going to do 30 jumping bar muscle-ups for time. It seemed wise to go with the 13" box plus 25 pound plate combo (15" in total). I've never done 10 jumping bar muscle-ups with only the 13" box, so completing 30 in one workout was unlikely to happen. 15" would be tough, but I thought I could get through it in the 6-7 minute time frame that Giulz recommended for the workout.
I can't really think of a way to make this workout seem anything but bland, so I'll just tell you that I tried to do 3 or 4 reps in each set that I did before needing a breather. I kept doing that until I got to 30 reps. There were some grip issues towards the end because my hands were getting sweaty. I used my shirt to wipe down the bar several times during breaks. I paid little attention to the clock as I made my way to 30 reps and was relatively happy with what I saw when I pressed out that last rep. Final time: 5:49.
The Advent challenge was the only thing remaining and this one played better to the creative types than the strong types. We were doing Turkish Get-Ups for the challenge. I can't properly describe how the Turkish Get-Up works, so I'll simply describe it as laying on the floor while holding an object overhead, standing up with the object still overhead, and returning to the floor with it overhead. As the weight gets heavier, you need to really concentrate because you don't want to drop a heavy barbell (or other object) on your head. Several people at the gym decided to get creative to win raffle tickets rather than go for some obscenely heavy weight. Coach Polpetta allowed Faby to use her for his take on the challenge:
The majesty of the Polpetta Get-Up
I couldn't come up with anything to beat that, so I stuck with dumbbells. I had to watch several other people do the Turkish Get-Up to remember each of the steps (there is a distinct choreography to it). Finally, I attempted it with a 45 pound dumbbell. I was unsteady during it, but I think that had more to do with the fact that I was trying really hard to remember the steps. The weight itself wasn't that bad. I would go on and complete the Get-Up with a 55 pound DB, a 65 pound DB (my best from last year), and a 75 pound DB (Turkish PR?). This isn't my favorite movement in the world, but hey, we do it once a year, so it's not like I need to worry about it showing up in a bunch of future WODs.
Friday preview: Willpower. Not my strong suit.
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