Feels Like Too Much Rest

Workout date: 5/15/17

Another Monday night meant another packed house as we were 19 strong at the 6:30 class.  That's just the way it's gonna be on Monday nights in the near future.  Maybe once the fall rolls around it will settle down some, but I think gym attendance will stay on the high side with beach season on the horizon.  (Note: Being a pale guy who rarely goes to the beach, I don't really know when beach season begins.  I just gauge it by how badly I'm sweating at the gym.  We must be close because I'm starting to get gross.  I'll leave it at that.)

Luckily we were once again being treated to a WOD that didn't require a lot of space.  We didn't have to worry about running into classmates as we scrambled from one station to the next.  All we needed was room for a barbell and some space next to it to perform burpees.  Here's what Monday's WOD looked like:

Monday's WOD:
10 minute AMRAP
1 deadlift (115/75)
1 hang power clean (115/75)
1 front squat (115/75)
1 push press (115/75)
*Must hold on to the barbell for all four lifts for a round to count.  If you drop the barbell mid-round, you have to start with the deadlift when you return to the barbell.
**If you drop the barbell, you must perform 5 burpees before returning to the barbell.
***Score is total rounds completed

If there was ever an incentive to make me hold on to the barbell, being forced to do penalty burpees would be it.  I'd much rather strain through a barbell movement than have to do burpees.  My initial reaction after reading the details of this WOD was "I'm holding on to that barbell for the entirety of the 10 minutes."  That was definitely wishful thinking.

Coach Giulz told us to pair up before we even started going through the progressions for each lift.  You will never believe this, but I chose Matt B to be my partner on a barbell workout.  Startling, I know.  He had the same takeaway from reading this WOD that I did.  He wanted to avoid burpees as much as possible, so he was going to hold on to that barbell as long as he could.  Giulz had done this workout in the 5:30 class and had probably heard way too many people indicate that they had this same burpee-fearing strategy.  She strongly encouraged us to avoid holding on to the barbell until failure.  Burpees might suck, but we would complete more rounds by giving our grip a break and doing the 5 burpee penalty.  Giulz used Laura A from the 4:30 class as an example.  Laura had held on to the barbell for the entire 10 minutes, racking up a large score of 42 rounds completed.  Even though that was a strong score, Giulz contended that she could have gotten 50 or higher had she taken a couple of breaks and did burpees along the way.  (Note: After doing this workout, I can't express how impressed I am that Laura held the barbell for 10 minutes straight.  She must have an iron grip.)

After walking us through each of the four movements and making us do some warmup burpees, Giulz told the members of heat #1 to load their barbells, do some practice reps, and get ready to go.  I was "partner #1" for our group when we were doing the warmup, so I decided that I might as well be consistent and go in the first heat.  Both Matt and I felt comfortable with the RX weight of 115 pounds on the barbell.  I think I did two practice rounds before we began and I could tell instantly that the push press was going to be the most painful aspect of the complex we were doing.  (Matt would later shed some light on why I was having a hard time with the push press.)  Because the practice rounds weren't easy, I knew I wasn't going to be able to hold on for 10 minutes.  I'd be doing burpees during this WOD.  I had my fingers crossed that it wouldn't be too many.

I didn't have much of a plan other than "go until you're tired (but not until failure)" as heat one got underway.  I ended up completing 6 full rounds before I dropped the barbell and did my first set of burpees.  Less than 2 minutes had elapsed on the clock.  (Laura may be Wonder Woman.)  My burpees were slow, but technically this was the rest portion of the workout, so I wasn't all that concerned about my speed.  I was concerned about my breathing though.  It was warm in the gym, so I was already sweating pretty good.  Struggling to breathe and sweating profusely was not a recipe for holding on to the barbell for long periods of time.  My next turn at the barbell resulted in only 3 rounds before I needed to do burpees again.

Matt was not only counting for me, he was watching my form as I did the complex.  During that second round, he started telling me that I needed to use my legs more on the push press.  I think I was a little gun shy about using my legs too much because I didn't want to accidentally do any push jerks. The push press was the last part of each round and messing up that part would mean the entire round would not count.  I couldn't imagine being so tired that I needed to do a push jerk, then somehow finding the strength to hold on to the barbell and fixing my error by doing a push press.  Because I was playing it safe, my push presses were closer to the shoulder press end of the spectrum.  That was going to tire out my arms, meaning my grip would weaken, resulting in more penalty burpees.  That was not the outcome I wanted.  So when I finished up my second round of burpees, I made sure to bend my knees more on the push presses.

My form was better, but my results were not.  After a set of 3 more rounds, I was back on the floor again.  I had hoped to complete 30 rounds before 10 minutes was up, but I wasn't going to get there doing only 3 rounds at a time.  As I wrapped up my burpees, I made the decision to go faster with the barbell.  If I had a limited amount of grip strength when I picked up the barbell, then I might as well go as fast as I could and hope for the best.  It worked (sort of) as I made it through 4 rounds in my next set, bringing my total to 16.  After 5 more burpees, I completed 4 rounds again.  I had reached 20 rounds.  30 probably wasn't happening, but I at least had a shot at it if I could find some extra strength in the final minutes of the WOD.

I had completed 25 burpees more than I wanted to when I got to my barbell for the 6th time.  If I was quick, I might be able to do 2 more sets before time was up.  That meant I needed 5 rounds per set.  Unlikely, but not impossible.  I did 2 fast rounds, then started round 3 with a deadlift.  As I hinged forward for the hang power clean, the barbell began to slip out of my hands.  It was like one of those immunity challenges on Survivor where someone loses focus for a second and all of the sudden they stumble off the stump they were standing on.  Once the barbell hit the floor, I was mentally checked out of this workout.  I crawled through my burpees, knowing there was less than a minute left and that I had no chance of reaching 30 rounds.  I came back to my barbell with about 30 seconds remaining.  I did 3 quick rounds.  There was about 5 seconds left when I completed the third round.  That wasn't enough time to do another full round, so I dropped the barbell and finished a few seconds early.  Final score: 25 rounds.

Matt went in heat two and his approach was much saner than mine.  He had watched me and everyone else go in heat one and decided that he was doing 5 rounds at a time, then moving to burpees.  Didn't matter whether he could hold on longer.  That was his plan.  He looked a lot better than I did as he moved through his 10 minutes.  For the first half of the workout, he appeared to have no problems with doing 5 rounds at a time.  His burpees were on the slower side, but I think that was intentional.  Moving quickly through the burpees didn't allow you to recover for the barbell.  Matt's first 4 sets were all 5 rounds long.  On his 5th set, he completed four rounds and I yelled "just one more" to him as he finished his 4th push press.  He shook his head at me and let me know that was all he could do at this stage.  He didn't look thrilled about doing more burpees, but I let him know these would be the last 5 he would have to do.  He was going to have less than a minute left when he came back to his barbell and there was no point doing extra burpees once he dropped the barbell a final time.  Like me, Matt got through 3 rounds in his last set and finished up a little before the clock hit 10 minutes.  Matt's final score: 27 rounds.

The large class was busy rolling out after the WOD when Giulz came over and said she wanted to talk to the group.  Prior to our workout, she told us that she wanted us to be accountable and hold ourselves to the standards of the WOD.  If we didn't meet the standard, we shouldn't take credit for completing the round properly.  Specifically, there was going to be a tendency for people to do push jerks rather than push presses at the end of each round.  If she saw us do a push jerk, she was going to call us out on it.  I think hearing her tell us that at the beginning of the workout also contributed to me not using my legs a lot on the push press.  Giulz was upset that the class seemed to ignore the speech she had given.  She let the class know that if people continued to not meet the standards, she would call them out.  And if they didn't like that, they should sign up for classes she wasn't coaching.  She apologized for being a "bitch" about it, but she wasn't going to stand for it any more.

Giulz isn't known as "The Hammer" for pussyfooting around topics like this one, but I don't think there was anything wrong with her enforcing the standards of the workout.  I only got to watch heat two, but I did see a lot of push jerks being done at the end of each round.  I don't feel like it is my place to call people on it during the workout, except in the case of the person I'm judging.  (I let Matt know in the warmup that he wasn't hitting depth on his front squat and he made a concerted effort to do so once the workout began.)  I know I've taken pride in the fact that KOP goes above and beyond to meet the standards at competitions while members of other gyms can end up getting away with murder.  I'd hate to see us get lax on that, so I'm glad Giulz spoke up about this issue.

I tend to stick around for Open Strength on Monday nights, but I wasn't sure what else I wanted to do after that workout.  I wasn't jazzed up about doing anything with a barbell.  I could have done some gymnastics work, but that wasn't calling me either.  As I walked over to my bag, Danielle asked me if I wanted to do some "Endurance" work with her and Donna.  They were going to do a cash-out on the assault bike.  Danielle is a big fan of finding workouts online that top Crossfit Games athletes do and taking them on after the regular WOD is over.  Today's mission was to do 10 rounds on the assault bike, 15 seconds on and 45 seconds off.  It sounded painful, but some extra cardio would probably do me good.

I went all out on the first sprint because it was only 15 seconds long and I was getting 3x as much rest.  When I heard Danielle's clock beep to signify the rest period had begun, I had sweat dripping off of me and I was panting.  Danielle and Donna were smiling and having a pleasant conversation.  Then Danielle wondered aloud if the 45 second break "feels like too much rest".  Not to the guy gasping for air next to them!  Adding to my misery was a malfunctioning monitor.  I wanted to track how many calories I accumulated in this cash-out, but when I started my first sprint, my screen started blinking.  I didn't get it fixed until after the second sprint.

It was after that second sprint that Caitlyn joined us on the bikes.  The four of us went hard on every sprint and the perception that we were receiving too much rest slowly went away.  I had 67 calories on my bike at the conclusion of the 10th round, so I probably would have been in the 80-85 calorie range had my monitor worked from the start.  I did some slow pedaling during a couple of my recovery periods, so I should also probably subtract some calories from my total if I'm being fair.  Let's call it 80 calories in the end.  My body was sufficiently tired once the assault bike cash-out was done, so I decided to leave Open Strength on the early side this Monday night.

Tuesday preview: Heavy overheads!  You know I have to show up for that!  Plus the cash-out tests how well I perform some movements while fatigued.