I must admit that I was kinda frustrated with this whole "eating healthy" thing after last week's weigh-in. There were only two weeks left until I could go back to eating whatever I wanted, but the results of this four-month test had begun to feel random. Whenever I thought my weight would go up, it would go down (and vice versa). So when I happened to be near a Five Guys this week as I was searching for dinner options, I said screw it. Went in and ordered a burger and a hot dog. I didn't think the burger and hot dog were going to somehow lower my weight. I just wasn't convinced that they would make me gain weight. Two days later, I had a bowl of ice cream for dessert. Over the weekend, I had some pasta. Have I been going to great lengths to avoid these things? Yeah. Do I miss eating them? More than you know. But they are known as comfort foods for a reason and I needed some comfort after last week's weigh-in. I didn't care about the scale this week. When I did step on the scale, it revealed...
Original weigh-in: 213.2 pounds
Last week's weigh-in: 208.8 pounds
This week's weigh-in: 206.0 pounds
Ummm...I just don't get it. I definitely ate worse this week than I have in quite a while, yet somehow I lost nearly three pounds. For my own sanity, it is probably a good thing that this experiment is ending next week.
There was a special WOD lined up for Monday morning as we were honoring MLK Day with a friends and family workout. It was a partner WOD that had one very specific rule:
MLK Day WOD:
Partner workout:
15 minute AMRAP
10 shoulder-to-overheads (115/75)
25 deadlifts (115/75)
50 box jumps (24"/20")
*Partners must switch after every 5 reps
That line beginning with an asterisk was an important one (hence the bold). Not only did each partner have to do an equal amount of work in this WOD, the amount of work that could be done at a given time was also spelled out. Neither partner was going to get much of a break during this 15 minute workout, so I began thinking about the apology I'd likely have to deliver later on.
This WOD was being run all day long at KOP, but the 9:30am class was the special friends and family version. Participants were encouraged to make a small donation to this month's charity, the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee. (Note: KOP has been raising money for different charities each month. Every time an athlete checks in on Facebook using #checkinforcharity along with that month's "phrase that pays", 10 cents goes to the charity. Many athletes times 30 days or so per month times a dime results in a nice little contribution to these charities.) I arrived at the gym just as Coach Aimee was rounding up the massive group that had shown up for this class. I wasn't sure who I'd be partnering up with. Then I heard Cline swear in front of one of the kids in attendance and it became clear that I had to partner up with him. (The Lord works in mysterious ways. Or something like that.)
Aimee put us through a fun group warmup that was capped off by having everyone run around in a circle as she called out movements. The stars of the warmup were the two ladies shown below:
They may be a bit camera shy, but they killed the warmup
Once that was wrapped up, we were encouraged to grab a barbell and a box (or two). There were going to be 20 teams all doing this workout at the same time, so we weren't going to have much real estate to work with. Cline and I grabbed a small area over by the rings alongside of Becky and Tim P. They needed more space than we did because they would require both a ladies and a men's barbell as well as a ladies and a men's box. Having their own equipment gave them an advantage on the all-male and all-female teams because they would not have to wait on their teammate to give up the barbell or get off of the box. (Yes, I'm making excuses up front because Becky and Tim crushed us on this workout.)
Cline and I tried to set up our box in a space where we could stand on opposite sides of it. That was our small attempt at diminishing the transition time during this workout. This attempt was futile though. Once we got to the first round of box jumps, we discovered that a team working near the far side of our box was doing their jumps from the side, so they were standing where Cline was going to jump from. It wasn't that big of a deal. We would just alternate jumping from in front of the box every 5 reps. As for the barbell, Cline felt comfortable using 115 pounds for the shoulder-to-overheads (the deadlifts were going to be very light), so we were officially taking this workout on using RX standards.
Since I'm a procrastinator and Cline is a go-getter, he led things off for us. I'm honestly not sure how we could have gone faster on the barbell movements (other than having 2 barbells) as we ripped through 10 shoulder-to-overheads and 25 deadlifts. As Cline was taking care of the last 5 deadlifts, I turned towards our box. Becky and Tim were already on their box jumps as were several other teams. The hell? A few seconds later, Cline told me to go and I did our first 5 box jumps, rebounding on and off of the box. Both Cline and I would go through 5 sets like that (naturally I messed up one of my jumps along the way), but we were on to round two at a breakneck speed.
Our transitions on the barbell may have not been as fast for round two, but we continued to have no issues with the lifts. We only had to do 5 shoulder-to-overheads each and that was a small enough number that we could fight through it even if we got tired. The deadlifts were so light that I wasn't even fully gripping the barbell. I leaned down, cradled the barbell with my fingers, then did 5 reps as quick as I could. At the box jumps, I had one missed rep again, but I continued to rebound through all of my jumps. I also noticed something strange towards the end of this round. The dynamic with me and Cline has always been that I could go heavier in workouts and he had the better engine. (To be fair, Cline has closed the strength gap considerably. He'll soon be overtaking me with his 1RM deadlift.) But Cline was starting to slow down on his box jumps. It was not a good sign for our team if I was the "cardio guy" in this workout.
We were close to 6 minutes in when we finished round 2, so finishing 5 rounds was still in play, but probably unlikely. We continued to move fluidly through the barbell movements. It was the box jump that was the difference in this workout. Some teams moved through it with ease. Others needed to step down and take their time from rep to rep. The third round was the only one where I'd do all 25 of my jumps cleanly. I don't think Cline had any bad reps along the way, but his pace continued to slow down. He was also walking away from the box between his sets, so when I completed a set of five, I'd need to call him over to take his turn again. Becky and Tim were motoring through their 4th round of box jumps as we completed our third. We were sneaking up on 10 minutes at the end of round three, so there was no chance that we'd finish five rounds. It was just a matter of how far we'd get into round five.
Round four began in a similar fashion to the other rounds as we quickly got through the barbell stage. I had more trouble than expected on the box jumps as I had three bad reps in my five sets of five. I didn't have to resort to stepping down at any point though. Cline was still walking away from the box in between sets to catch a breather, but he was never too far away when it was his turn to jump again. I was finishing off the last set of our fourth round when Aimee called out that there was 1 minute remaining.
Even though we had 35 reps to do on the barbell, we had moved through those reps so consistently fast in previous rounds that I felt we had a chance to get back to the box jumps one last time. Cline did 5 shoulder-to-overheads, I did 5 shoulder-to-overheads. Cline did 5 deadlifts, I did 5 deadlifts. I was definitely amped up about getting back to the box, repeating to Cline that we could make it back as he went through his reps. Cline did 5 more deadlifts and then I grabbed the barbell. As I did, Cline ran over to our box. "Wait, come back!" I was trying to do my 5 deadlifts and get Cline's attention because he had to do our last 5 deadlifts per the rules of the workout. He hustled back over as I dropped the barbell. I bolted over to the box, as Cline worked on the remaining deadlifts. Aimee let us know there were 10 seconds left. We were certainly getting at least 1 or 2 box jumps in. Cline yelled to me that he was done and I rebounded on and off of the box as fast as I could. My feet landed on the box for a fourth time in round five when Aimee called time. Final score: 4+39.
I thought we kept up a very strong pace throughout the 15 minutes. There were some teams who were just better at box jumps and as a result, they put up much better scores than we did. (Becky and Tim had a score of 6+4!) It was nice feeling like I had an engine for once, although I'm sure Cline will take back that role in future workouts. Probably the best takeaway I had from this workout was that I could confidently rebound during 24" box jumps for a long time. There will definitely be workouts in the months ahead where I am going to be tired and still need to have faith that I can rebound through a bunch of box jumps. This workout was proof that I have that ability.
Here's a pic of everyone who attended the friends and family class:
A packed house for a good cause
Tuesday preview: No Dudes After Dark because I have a hot date with a KOP athlete! (Or maybe I was just invited out for beer and basketball. What can I say? I'm easy to please.)
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