Neither Of You Scaled Appropriately

Workout date: 9/27/17

Jenn and I decided that we would celebrate two decades of being together by taking two long weekend trips.  The first trip was more her speed.  We headed out to wine country a week after our actual anniversary.  Hey, the girl loves her red wine!  (The second trip, taking place in October, was designed more for me.)  We flew into San Francisco and had a nice dinner the night of our arrival.  We had some excellent dim sum the next morning before heading to Sonoma Valley.  Our first day in wine country would involve hitting up several vineyards there, including our favorite (Imagery) from the trip we took to Sonoma five years ago.  The rest of the trip was in Napa.  Each day we visited 2-3 vineyards.  Along the way, we stopped at Jenn's new favorite vineyard (Quintessa).  I learned a lot about wine during these tours, even discovering that I had a new favorite varietal (Cab Franc).  I also found a varietal that I could identify based on smell alone (Petit Verdot).  It was cool becoming more educated on wines, but by the end of the trip on Tuesday, I knew I had my fill of vino.  I could go weeks before needing another glass.

When I returned to KOP on Wednesday night, I found that the 7:30 class was pretty much the same.  Sure, Giulz was filling in for Jenna and Bryan was there instead of Neil, but once again the big gym felt empty as it was only hosting one coach and two athletes.  The workout was completely different from last Wednesday's though.  Instead of 75 light snatches, we were doing 30 bar muscle-ups with a 10 minute time cap.  After that was done, we had this cash-out awaiting us:

Cash-out:

50 KB swings (53/35)

40 wall balls (20#/14# to 10'/9')

30 box jumps (24"/20")

20 push-ups

*Time cap: 8 minutes

Before we get to the cash-out, let's go back to the 30 bar muscle-ups.  This was one of our 2017 benchmark workouts and I had a chance to do it back in March.  Bryan was in that class with me and I was pretty sure that he was going to destroy me during that WOD.  Early on, things played out that way as he had 8 bar muscle-ups to my 1 with 5 minutes to go.  He hit the wall from there and somehow I found a rhythm with my bar muscle-ups.  Nearly every attempt I made during the last 5 minutes of that WOD was a successful one.  Final score: Dave 9, Bryan 8.

I was not delusional enough to believe that a result like that one would play out again in the future.  9 bar muscle-ups was probably my ceiling, while 8 was likely Bryan's floor.  The stars aligned for me on that night, but it was unreasonable to think it could happen again.  That view was reinforced by Bryan's performance on this workout in June.  I missed that class, but Bryan was a superstar that day, completing all 30 bar muscle-ups in 9:36.  There was no question who would be top dog in our September clash.

I had three things going against me in this workout:

1. I am wildly inconsistent when it comes to bar muscle-ups.
2. I had been away for a week and this isn't the type of WOD you want to do rusty.
3. It was muggy as hell inside the gym.

Given all of that, I was hoping to end up with a score of 3 or 4 when my 10 minutes were up.  Bryan had a much more optimistic view of how I would fare.  He thought I'd put up a score of 20.  There was a better chance of me winning the slam dunk competition at next year's NBA All-Star Game than there was of me doing 20 bar muscle-ups in 10 minutes.  6 felt like "minor miracle" territory for me on this night.

Giulz had Bryan and I do a bunch of drills on the agility ladder while she cleaned up some areas of the gym.  At one point she was over by the pull-up rig, taking down a small bar that was attached where the squat racks would typically be.  Bryan asked her what she was taking down and Giulz explained how this lower bar could be used as a scale by those who were incapable of doing a bar muscle-up.  I immediately requested that Giulz leave the small bar where it was as there was a strong chance that I would be unable to do a bar muscle-up tonight.  She denied my request.  Not only was Giulz stopping me from using that scale, she wasn't allowing me any other scale in this WOD.  She had much more faith than I did (perhaps not Bryan-level faith, but still more than me) that I could complete a decent number of bar muscle-ups in this workout.

Bryan and I had the opportunity to do some warmup attempts and Bryan easily did 2 bar muscle-ups. I had one really bad attempt and then did a second one which needed some work, but was in the realm of what a bar muscle-up should look like.  Giulz asked me if I wanted to do more practice reps, but I really didn't.  Part of me thought I might wear myself out early by doing a bunch of practice reps.  I also thought back to when I did this in March.  I wasn't hitting anything early on, but eventually I figured it out.  Just start the 10 minute clock now and I'll solve the bar muscle-up rubik's cube along the way.

Bryan didn't need to find his way.  As soon as the clock started, he glided through one bar muscle-up after another.  I was not doing so well.  I made one attempt every 30 seconds or so, but most of my attempts looked like the second one I had done during the warmup.  I'd get nearly high enough to rotate over the bar, but my chest kept smacking into the bar instead of my spare tire.  If my rolls weren't enveloping the bar, I had no shot of completing the muscle-up.

While my odometer was frozen at zero, I got to witness Bryan cruise through bar muscle-ups like he was bored.  I had no idea what number he was on, but I thought he might finish before I even got on the scoreboard.  Around the 6 minute mark, my bar muscle-up attempts began to improve.  My chicken wing was getting all the way over the bar.  It was simply a matter of rotating my body the rest of the way.  Maybe I shouldn't use the word "simply" because I had a really hard time fully rotating.  After a few failed tries that were very close, I told myself that I needed to fully commit to rotating by staring at the floor when I got up there.  It still didn't help.  I remained at zero reps.

Bryan was still going a few bars down from me, but he couldn't have been more than a couple reps away from finishing based on what I saw during the first 5 minutes.  As I took a breather from yet another failed attempt, I saw Bryan fail for the first time.  Every attempt I took looked like a struggle, so it made sense that I would fail.  Bryan was still gracefully rising up to the bar, but he looked like he might be out of juice.  His form looked great, but that last little pull at the top was missing.  I watched him miss 3 or 4 attempts in a row and suddenly it wasn't a matter of when he would finish.  It was now a question of if he would finish.

I was on the other end of the spectrum.  The question with me was whether I'd achieve one bar muscle-up before 10 minutes was up.  I still held out hope that I might get 2 in until I got to the final minute.  Then I scaled down my expectations to 1.  I gave it four tries during those last 60 seconds.  A couple more close calls, but no breakthroughs.  Final score: 0.  (Bryan's final score: 24.)

The fact that Bryan fell 6 bar muscle-ups short of the 30 he got back in June should tell you how much the heat had an effect on us.  It would be even more apparent during the cash-out.  My game plan for completing it in 8 minutes went like this:

• Do the 50 KB swings in two sets, 30 and 20 most likely.  That might be on the aggressive side, but this cash-out was a bit of a sprint.
• Break the 40 wall balls up into 4 sets of 10 if possible.  I was going to be tired after the KB swings and the wall balls were probably going to be the toughest part of this cash-out, so I had to push through this station as best as I could.
• If I had 2 minutes remaining when I got to the box jumps, I thought I could finish.  30 box jumps should take somewhere in the 60-90 second range, leaving me 30-60 seconds for 20 push-ups.  That would be cutting it close, but not impossible.

Giulz explained to me and Bryan what her expectations were for this cash-out.  The KB swings should be done in no more than 2 sets.  (Guess my plan wasn't overly aggressive!)  The wall balls should be completed in no more than 3 sets.  (Yikes - that wasn't happening after all those KB swings.)  She didn't give any specific directions on the box jumps or the push-ups.

I thought I could complete 50 swings with a 53 pound KB in two sets, so I didn't scale the weight here.  Once the cash-out began, I did everything I could to hold on to that KB for as long as possible. I made it through 27 swings.  Not bad.  I wish I had less than 23 reps left for the second set, but that's what I'd be facing when I picked the KB back up.  Because this was a sprint, I couldn't take a long break, so I sucked it up and grabbed the KB again.  I was too tired to do 23 in a row.  I didn't even come close to that number, putting the KB back down after 8 reps.  I had broken the "two set" rule.  No point in trying to do the remaining 15 swings all in one set now.  I did a set of 8 and a set of 7 before heading over to the wall.

40 wall balls in three sets was never really under consideration, but it didn't take long to discover that four sets was out the window too.  I did 5 wall balls and then let it hit the floor.  My shoulders were smoked from the KB swings.  While I couldn't do big sets of wall balls, I did manage to keep my breaks brief between sets.  That was good because I took a lot of breaks.  Six, to be exact.  After the initial set of 5, I went 6-6-6-6-7-4 on the remaining wall balls.

I didn't follow Giulz's rule on the KB swings.  Didn't follow her rule on the wall balls.  I must have been completely screwed, right?  Not really, it turned out.  I peeked at the clock as I came to the box jumps and saw that it read 6:15.  I was a little behind schedule, but not by as much as I thought.  I probably wouldn't finish, but I had a chance to be close.  The only way that wouldn't be true is if I couldn't keep up a fast pace on the box jumps.

I did not keep up a fast pace on the box jumps.  I totally underestimated how much the wall balls would factor into my ability to rebound on and off of the box.  After 4 quick reps, I had to stop.  I tried to shake out my legs and get some life back into them, but my next set was also 4 reps.  And now I needed a longer break before I felt confident enough to try rebounding again.  My third set was no different in length from the first two sets.  As I desperately tried to get my legs working again, I saw that there was less than 30 seconds left.  I decided that I was going to push through one more large set, no matter how painful it was, no matter how much it felt like I was going to trip and fall on my face.  I got moving again and was able to get 7 jumps in before time was called.  Final time: 8:31 (8:00 time cap plus 1 second for the 11 box jumps and 20 push-ups that I did not complete.)

I didn't come very close to finishing, but Bryan was even further behind me.  He had to rush to finish off the last of his wall balls before the time cap hit.  He didn't get any of the box jumps or push-ups done.  While the two of us commiserated about how hard that cash-out turned out to be, Giulz came over to scold us.  "Neither of you scaled appropriately", she declared.  I guess she was right, although I'm not sure whether I should have scaled the KB or the wall ball.  All I knew is that with a score of zero on the WOD and a failure to stay under the time cap in the cash-out, I didn't scale anything appropriately on this evening.

Thursday preview: It's too soon for burpee box jump overs again.  I race The Prodigy in the middle of  the WOD, while my mental strength is tested at the start and the finish.