The morning after the Brawl, I had to get on the road and drive to Albany for a fantasy football draft with my friends from home. I wasn't looking forward to the early morning drive there or the late night drive back, but it was totally worth it. I laughed so hard that I was brought to tears on more than one occasion, something I hadn't done in a long time. I would gladly drive 9 hours for an afternoon with those guys.
I was pretty exhausted on Monday and probably wouldn't have come into the gym even if I had a positive experience at the Brawl. Given that the competition didn't go well, I wasn't eager to get right back into Crossfit. So the question was whether I wanted to pop in for a workout on Tuesday or Wednesday. I was headed out of town again on Thursday and wouldn't be back until the day after Labor Day. Should I get in a couple of WODs while I could or would it be better to just take a long mental break from the gym? I opted for the latter.
My trip on Thursday was to North Carolina. I was reuniting with one of my closest friends from high school, Vic. We ran cross country together back in the day.
Once upon a time, I was a runner. And had goofy hair. That's Vic in front of me.
When I was in college, Vic would come visit me along with my other buddy, Dan. (We both wish we knew where Dan was these days!). Those trips would consist of getting drunk, playing bocce ball in the dorm hallways, and watching Adam Sandler movies. Ah, the good ol days. Vic was ROTC in college and after we graduated, he became an Army Ranger. I remember getting a call from him not long after 9/11 in which he told me he was being deployed to the Middle East. I was worried that I would never see him again, terrified that he'd be killed while on a mission. As the years passed, I would hear every so often that he had returned home. Those returns were extremely brief. Vic seemed to love being a soldier and it didn't take long for him to get deployed back to the Middle East again.
It wasn't until last year that I got word he was back in the US for good. We talked on Facebook and he let me know that he was getting married in September. Over the summer, I received an invite. Jenn had a college roomies trip already planned for Labor Day weekend, so I made the trip to North Carolina on my own. Vic and I did a lot of catching up over that weekend, but as is often the case with longtime friends, some things were just like old times, even though I hadn't seen him in over 15 years. It was like we hadn't missed a beat.
After wishing Vic, his new bride, and his daughter the best, I flew home to Philadelphia. When I got to the airport, I hopped in my car and drove to Saratoga. Labor Day was closing day at the track and my only visit there this year had been on Opening weekend. As was the case with the fantasy football draft, it was a long, tiring trip that I'm glad I made. Saratoga is a special place for me (note my t-shirt in that pic above) whether I'm winning or losing at the track. It's only open for 6 weeks per year, so if I have an opportunity to get there, I'm going.
Driving back on Monday night was asking a bit too much, so I drove home on Tuesday morning. I picked up Griffin from the kennel and came home for a nap. Even after getting some sleep in my own bed, I was still feeling road weary from all of the recent travel, so I decided to pass on Dudes After Dark. My first class back would be on Wednesday night.
I definitely lucked out when I saw that the Wednesday WOD wasn't some 20 minute AMRAP. If I had to run around for any period of time after that extended trip, I would end up sucking wind quickly. What I got instead was the quintessential Crossfit strength workout. It is called Crossfit Total:
"Crossfit Total"
1RM back squat
1RM shoulder press
1RM deadlift
*You may only make 3 attempts at each lift
**You can take as many practice attempts as you want, but you must be clear when you're making a scoring attempt
***Your score is the total of your three 1RMs
Coach Jenna had 5 people in her 7:30 class. Joining me were Joe M, Lucille, Neil, and Brian S. There wasn't a whole lot that Jenna had to go over with us. The shoulder press and the deadlift are the two most basic movements that we do. I'm not sure what #3 would be, but it could very well be the back squat. These were all simple movements that we were very familiar with. It was just a matter of how much weight we could handle when doing them.
Having not done any form of exercise in 11 days, I wasn't expecting to hit PR's on this evening. That didn't mean I wasn't going to formulate a strategy that would put me into position for a PR if things went well. Below are my personal bests for each lift, followed by the three scoring attempts I was hoping to make, assuming that the practice lifts went without incident:
- Back squat: 335 pounds, attempts of 315-330-345
- Shoulder press: 145 pounds, attempts of 135-145-150
- Deadlift: 385 pounds, attempts of 375-395-405
With the back squat, I wanted to get as close to my best as I possibly could and then give myself one shot at a PR. With the shoulder press, it's really difficult to make big jumps and I've only gotten 145 once that I could remember. So jumping from 140 to 150 seemed like a stretch. I'd rather try to tie my PR, even if it took two attempts. If I somehow did get 145, adding 5 pounds was as much as I could feasibly attempt. With the deadlift, I've been trying to get 405 for three years. I had always felt that was the logical next step from 385, partly because I had a fascination with being able to say that I could deadlift 400. Tonight I was going to give myself a shot at 395. I had only tried 395 pounds one time that I could remember and I was actually pretty close. I almost got it locked out when a couple people ran over and told me to drop the barbell because my back had been so rounded. I reluctantly complied. Instead of having tunnel vision with 405, tonight I would be focused on 395. If I got that, then I would have earned another shot at 405.
All five of us grabbed a rack for the first two segments of this workout. We were starting with the back squat and I began with 185 pounds on the barbell. I did a set of three reps to get loose and followed that with a set of two reps using 225 pounds. Single reps started at 255 pounds. From there I went to 275 and 295 pounds. All of those lifts felt fine to me, so I wasn't too worried about my initial scoring attempt at 315 pounds. I had gotten 3 reps at that weight back at the end of May. Getting one rep shouldn't be that tough.
I couldn't recall ever missing on the 1st attempt of any of my lifts while doing Crossfit Total, but leave it to me to find a new way to fail. I took the barbell off the rack, went into my squat, started to rise, then hit unexpected turbulence. Instead of moving vertically, I began heading in a horizontal direction. I was closing in on my rack and I could tell I was going to hit it before I stood upright with the barbell. I had to abort. I dumped the barbell off of my back and tried to figure out what the heck I did wrong.
The best thing about being under the watchful eye of your coach is that they'll usually tell you what went wrong immediately, saving you from wasting time trying to figure it out on your own. Jenna had been watching all of my lifts even though I didn't know it. She told me that she regretted not saying something to me sooner. Had I been doing something wrong the whole time? Apparently the answer was yes. Jenna noticed that each time I came up from one of my back squats, I was leaning forward slightly. It hadn't affected me during any of the prior lifts, so she let me be, but now she wished she had spoken up. She told me to make sure I came straight up from the bottom of the squat on my next two attempts.
That info helped me out tremendously. My second attempt at 315 was much better. Didn't stagger forward the slightest. Now I had to figure out what to go for on my 3rd attempt. The planned jump to 330 seemed weak as I've squatted more than that before. 340 would give me a new PR, but a 25 pound jump seemed aggressive. I settled on 335. I usually avoid lifts that will tie an old PR, but this felt like the right progression from what I had just done. Did I guess correctly? My honest answer would be no. I focused on staying straight up as I rose from the bottom and once again I bounced out of the squat and stood up without much of a problem. That was the good news. The bad news was that I felt like I could have done more, but I was out of attempts. Final back squat score: 335 (tied PR).
I moved on to the shoulder press next. This was my least favorite lift of the three because my upper body strength is not what it should be for a guy my size. I started off with 95 pounds on the barbell and did a set of three reps. As was the case with my first back squat weight, I did multiple reps just to wake up the muscles I would be using. From there, I did single reps at 115 and 125. That was it for my warmup attempts. The next three were the real deal.
I had set a new 3RM in July of 140 on the shoulder press, so it seemed logical that I could get one rep at 135 pretty easily. Of course, I was thinking the same way when I did that first scoring attempt on the back squat and we know how that turned out. Thankfully history didn't repeat itself on the shoulder press. 135 was definitely heavy for me, but I was able to press it out once. Next up was 145. Ugh...I was breaking the "never tie your PR" rule twice in one night. That is, if I could even get 145, which was far from automatic for me. With the shoulder press, it's all about getting the barbell moving. When I did 3 reps at 140, I got the barbell moving and kept it going after completing the difficult 1st rep. It was very possible that I wouldn't have enough strength to get it moving at 145. I tried not to think about it that way though. If I felt it come off of my shoulders, I was going to get it over my head.
After adding 10 pounds from the attempt at 135, I walked up and took the barbell off the rack for my shot at 145. I felt it come off of my shoulders. I'm gonna get this! Suddenly I realized that my right arm stopped moving. I'm not gonna get this! My left arm was still slowly extending even though its counterpart was taking a coffee break. The barbell was rising, albeit diagonally. Before this attempt, my arms must have had some sort of disagreement and decided that they were not going to work together because my right arm wouldn't budge until my left arm was locked out. Once my left arm could extend no further, my right arm kicked into gear. I'm gonna get this! Sure enough, I managed to lock out my right arm. It was ugly, but it counted. I'd get a PR attempt at 150.
I'm guessing there are very few Crossfitters who have done this WOD that wanted to stop after two attempts at one of these lifts, but I've never witnessed it at our gym. I didn't do it here, but I certainly gave it some thought. 145 was a miracle, so I already knew that I had no chance at 150. Why even bother with the 3rd attempt? For formality's sake, I added 5 pounds to my barbell and tried to press it out, but it went absolutely nowhere. It took the last of my shoulder strength to get through that lift at 145. Final shoulder press score: 145 (tied PR).
In boxing, if two of the three judges score a match a draw, it goes down as a majority draw, even if the third judge scored the match in one boxer's favor. I still had the deadlift to go, but my Crossfit Total was officially a majority draw already. I had tied two PR's and, based on my planned progression for the deadlifts, the third judge was either scoring this match in my favor (new PR) or scoring it against me (less than my PR). 385 was not going to appear on my barbell during this final set of lifts.
I loaded the barbell to 225 pounds for my first warmup attempt. Usually I'd start with lifts at 135 and 185, but that felt like a waste of time and energy to me. Let's get to the heavy lifts and see whether I was getting a thumbs up or a thumbs down! I cruised through single reps at 225, 275, 315, and 345. I've done so many deadlifting sessions where I've moved on from 345 to 365-385-405, with that lift at 365 being the one where shit gets real. I wasn't stopping along the way for that one tonight. Straight to 375 and then on to PR attempts hopefully.
The deadlift at 375 was everything I could have hoped for, oddly enough. It was a successful lift, first and foremost. It was also a flawed lift. As I slowly raised the barbell from my knee towards my waist, I felt my fingers start to lose their grip. I managed to hang on until it reached my waist, but I learned that I was going to have to really focus more on my grip during the setup if I wanted to be successful at 395.
I took a few minutes before making my PR attempt. I really thought I had a good chance at 395 as long as I didn't forget anything on my checklist. Ensure you have a strong grip. Push the ground away hard with your legs. Don't give up on it early. I walked up and gripped that sucker as hard as I could. My form felt right and I pushed against the ground as hard as I could. The barbell came off of the ground. This is the part where I'm supposed to tell you it was really slow and I had to fight inch by inch for it. Except that wasn't the case. It was incredibly heavy, but it moved from the floor to my waist at a constant speed. After three years of being stuck at 385, I finally had a new PR. (Why was I so stubborn about going after 405 all the time?)
The deadlift at 395 went so well that I began thinking that maybe I've had a mental block when it came to the lift at 405. Perhaps that lift at 395 was just what I needed to eliminate that mental block. Of the dozens of attempts I've made at 405, there were only a few times where I can truly say I felt confident about my chances. Most of the time I was just hoping I finally got it. As I prepared for my last attempt, I was as confident as I've ever been. This was going to be the moment where I scratched "400 pound deadlift" from my list of goals.
I went through the same routine as I had when I got ready for the lift at 395. When I felt locked in, I began to pull. It came off of the ground, but I had done that at least a handful of times when trying to get 405. I had only gotten it to my knees once and it didn't get much beyond that point. I slowly got it up to my knees here before my form began to waver. If I wanted to get this barbell to my waist, I was going to have to forget about style points. This was going to be ugly. The barbell nearly came to a stop as it reached mid-thigh, but I was too close to give up now. I started to tug it little by little the rest of the way. I got it to my waist. I made sure my shoulders were pinned back. And as I held it there, I asked Jenna if that counted. She gave me the white paddle (figuratively) and I dropped the barbell. I had finally conquered 405! Four of my 2017 goals were now complete. Six more to go.
This workout ended up being much more successful than I would have imagined after an 11 day hiatus. The deadlift plateau had been one of the bigger monkeys on my back at the gym, but now I could put it out of my mind. Bye bye monkey! Glad that I could now focus on some of the other goals remaining on my list.
Thursday preview: 11 days of rest seemed to improve my deadlift. Could it have the same effect on my bar muscle-ups?
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