Final Frantasy XVII

Workout date: 10/23/17

I was in good spirits when I came into the gym for the Monday 6:30 class.  The ponies were finally kind to me.  Some background: 2017 has been my worst year ever as a handicapper.  For the first 7 months of the year, I played in a bunch of handicapping tournaments and had nothing go right.  In 2016, I won 4 tournaments outright, finishing runner-up a few other times.  I qualified for a bunch of live events.  Even when I wasn't cashing in tournaments or qualifying for some live contest, I was always in contention when the last race or two was run.  The calendar turned to 2017 and my results made me feel like I was living in the Upside Down.  (If you haven't watched Stranger Things, you should.  I'm not a sci-fi/horror guy, but both seasons were pretty good.)  Tournament after tournament, I would see my name near the bottom of the scoreboard.  Had I forgotten how to handicap all of a sudden?

My main goal for 2017 was to qualify for the National Handicapping Championship for the 5th year in a row.  There are only two ways to qualify for the National Handicapping Championship.  One is by finishing at the top of the leaderboard in a qualifying tournament.  (Note: You don't have to win necessarily.  Most qualifiers offer NHC spots to the top 2-4 finishers.)  The other is to accumulate enough Tour points over the year to finish in the top 150 in the NHC Tour standings.  That latter route is very difficult to accomplish.  It almost requires a streak of bad luck.  You have to finish just outside of a qualifying spot about 4 or 5 times during the year to rack up that many points.  Of my 4 previous trips to the NHC, only 1 of them came via the Tour points route.

In late August, my results began turning for the better.  They weren't great, but I was at least contending in tournaments every now and then.  By September, I was genuinely worried about not making it to the NHC.  Time was running out and because I had done so poorly early in the year, it was almost impossible for me to score enough points to qualify via that route.  I had to take down a qualifying tournament.  On October 21st, it looked like I was about to break through finally.  I won four of the first 5 races in the contest.  After whiffing on race #6, I had a 6-1 shot break free in the stretch of race #7.  If she won, I would build a lead that would make me very tough to catch.  I thought she was clear, but the favorite in that race came lunging at her at the wire.  The photo showed that I had lost the bob.  I was going to have to sweat out the remaining 5 races.

Two more misses brought the field closer to me, but my lead grew once again when I connected in race #10.  I was two races away from the NHC.  My horse in race #11 was in prime position coming into the stretch, but she could do no better than third.  (Note: You get points for finishing 1st or 2nd in a race in these contests.)  After holding a decent lead most of the day, I was clinging to a small advantage going into the final race.  The contest was giving away two NHC spots, so even if the guy in second caught me, I'd be alright.  I just couldn't have two people leap over me.

The last race had a short field and there were only 3 horses that could mathematically knock me out of the top 2 positions in the contest.  One of those three was my top choice.  By playing him, I had whittled my enemies down to two.  As long as one of those two horses didn't come in, I'd be fine.  My horse went to the lead going into the far turn and was still holding on to it at the top of the stretch, but another horse was emerging to his outside.  It was one of the two horses that could screw me.  Soon that horse was in the lead and pulling away.  I immediately felt nauseous.  The horse I had chosen was no longer of any use to me, but charging down the outside was the favorite.  If he won, I'd be headed to Vegas.  Maybe this would be a replay of race #7 where the favorite got up just in time.  I could only hope.

To my chagrin, the favorite fell a length short of the horse that I needed to lose.  It was time to see who the people behind me on the leaderboard had chosen.  If the players in second and third had both chosen the winner, I was done.  I was relieved to see neither of them had chosen the winner.  Neither had the person in 4th.  The player in 5th had the winner, but 6th and 7th did not.  It wasn't until I reached 8th place that I saw another player with the winner of the last race.  I had to do some math to see whether I hung on or not.  The player in 5th had taken the top spot in the contest with his selection of the final winner, but the player in 8th wound up one dollar behind me.  All of the stress that comes with not being qualified for the NHC late in the year left my shoulders.  I had finally punched my ticket.

The high from qualifying for the NHC really doesn't go away until the NHC is over.  It was certainly still supplying me with endorphins when I came to the gym on Monday night.  It didn't even bother me that one of my least favorite WODs was on the schedule.  Monday would mark our last time doing Fran in 2017.  As was the case every other time we did Fran this year, we'd be starting off with an EMOM (again!) first.  Here's a look at Monday's programming:

Monday's WOD:
4 minute EMOM
4 strict pull-ups

"Fran"
21-15-9
Thrusters (95/65)
Pull-ups

We always run Fran in two heats with one partner working and one partner counting, so we lucked out having an even number of people in class.  There were 10 of us, which was a relatively small number for your typical Monday 6:30 class.  I ended up being partners with Brandon, a guy who I hadn't been formally introduced to until this evening.  Brandon seemed like a good dude who was almost certainly going to beat me on Fran because he was clearly in better shape than I was.  Giulz asked the 10 of us to head over to the pull-up rig to begin our warmup.  On the way over there, Tia remarked how hot it was in the gym.  Yes, it was late October and we were still dealing with this issue.  That didn't bode well for my chances with Fran later on.

Giulz had us go through progressions on the pull-up bar to begin.  The first progression was called a hanging scapular retraction.  I should have known what this was by now, but Giulz had to come over and explain to me that I was doing kip swings, not a hanging scapular retraction.  Oops.  I got the rest of the sequence right though, as we worked our way up to full-on kipping pull-ups at the end.

We dropped off of the pull-up rig and grabbed empty barbells.  As we prepared to go over the thruster, Giulz explained how unimportant Fran was to her.  Fran might have been the trademark Crossfit WOD that everyone loved to talk about, but Giulz described it as a "dumb fucking workout". I laughed because I wholeheartedly agreed with her.  Giulz explained that if this WOD didn't have a name attached to it, we wouldn't get all riled up about it.  If we came in on a Tuesday morning and saw 21-15-9 of thrusters and pull-ups, it wouldn't seem all that different from the other nameless WODs that get programmed.  She didn't care what our Fran times were and neither should we.  All valid points.

We did some front squats.  We did some push presses.  Then we combined the two and did thrusters.  Giulz was pleased with what she saw and asked us to go back to the pull-up rig to do a few more kip swings before we got into the EMOM.  I guess she wanted us to loosen up our shoulders again.  With those out of the way, we were ready for the EMOM.  I lined up near the back of the gym, close to Actuary Mike and Tia.  This was a short one, just four minutes long.  When the clock beeped, we were meant to jump up to our bar and complete 4 strict pull-ups.  Here's how that went for me:

• Round 1: Got all 4 in a row
• Round 2: Got 3, dropped from the high bar, jumped back up, did the final rep
• Round 3: Got 2, followed that up with 2 singles

Before we get to round 4, I should point out that Tia had her back to me and was confused by what I was doing.  She kept hearing multiple thuds behind her as she waited for each minute to conclude.  I explained to her that I didn't have the strength to keep doing 4 consecutive strict pull-ups, so I had to jump up and drop down more than once.  I also let her know that I had the grace of an elephant when I dropped to the floor.

My rounds had gone 4, 3-1, and 2-1-1 so far.  You can see where this was going for round 4.  I went up and did a single strict pull-up before dropping from the bar.  As I shook out my arms, Giulz turned off the clock.  I was apparently the only one breaking my reps up, so no one else needed the clock.  I was about to do my second rep when I began to wonder how I was going to track how much time I had left.  And then I thought "why am I bothering to finish this at all?"  So I shut it down right there.  It wasn't like I wouldn't get my pull-up fill later on anyways.

We came back over to our barbells and Giulz asked us to start building up to the weight we would use  for Fran.  I always use 95 pounds in this WOD, so I added 25 pound plates to my empty barbell.  Giulz watched all of us do a few thrusters.  Then she requested that we all do 7 thrusters and 3 pull-ups.  I'm sure all of this was great for a) the people that don't sweat much and b) the bodyweight ninjas who love to do lots of pull-ups.  It was not great for me.  Upon completing the 7 thrusters and 3 pull-ups, I had now been to the pull-up rig four separate times already and I'd be on the hook for 45 more pull-ups when Fran began.  This was snowballing towards disaster.

Brandon didn't seem too eager to participate in heat one.  I was extremely apathetic, so I agreed to go first.  My shirt was drenched and I was completely disinterested in doing more pull-ups, but I figured it was better to get this WOD out of the way than have to spend any more time thinking about how badly this was going to suck.  Giulz got the clock ready and then told us that the time domain was 7 minutes.  I laughed for the second time in this class, although this chuckle wasn't produced as a result of agreeing with something that Giulz had said.  This time I was humored by the idea that I could complete Fran in 7 minutes.  My best time ever was 8:37 and I hadn't tired myself out in advance of that attempt.  10 minutes would be a job well done on this night.

We got started and I did 12 thrusters in my first set.  Not bad.  I thought I'd get 9 in set #2, but I had to  let go of the barbell after 5 reps.  As I caught my breath, I saw that everyone else in my heat had moved on to pull-ups.  Splendid!  I did my last 4 thrusters and moped my way over to the pull-up rig. I started off doing sets of two on the pull-ups.  I went to begin one of the sets and had my hand slip off the bar as I tried to kip.  That's never a good feeling, especially when you are already frustrated.  At some point I switched to singles, although I can't claim that they were done quickly.  I had a second incident where one of my sweaty paws lost contact with the high bar, forcing me to dismount without completing a pull-up.  There was a lot of eye-rolling as I slowly accumulated 21 pull-ups.

Back at my barbell, I began the second round with 6 thrusters.  While I took a break, I saw other members of heat one racing through their final 9 thrusters.  I was not in a hurry.  I had reached the point where I was not concerned about my time.  I was just getting work done.  I went 6 and 3 on my last two sets before heading back to the pull-up rig.  I had basically blocked out the world when I began my second round of pull-ups.  I did 3 quick singles before needing a rest.  As I stood there gasping, I looked at the clock.  It had reached 8 minutes.  Then I looked down the pull-up rig towards the other people who were in my heat.  They were all done.  I felt the same way that I did when we did the fourth minute of the EMOM.  Why was I bothering with this?  I waved over to Giulz and told her I was done.

I've always said I was a better cheerleader than I was an athlete, at least when it comes to Crossfit.  I proved that again as I rooted on Brandon during heat two.  I think he was feeling a bit like I had during heat one because the rest of his heat started to pull away from him.  But Brandon was strong, especially on the pull-up bar.  He was still putting together sets of three even when he was running out of gas.  He kept wanting to look at the clock, but that seemed to be having an adverse effect on his enthusiasm.  So towards the end I blocked his view of the clock, letting him know that he was doing fine.  He kept plugging away and finished in 10:26.

When I wasn't counting for Brandon during his heat, I was busy thinking about how little interest I had in doing this anymore.  Giulz had described Fran as a "dumb fucking workout", but the more I thought about it, the more I realized that almost every WOD had begun to feel like a "dumb fucking workout".  (Just to be clear: EMOMs are the dumbest fucking workouts.  Scientifically proven.  100% fact.)  I leave the gym most nights feeling frustrated for one reason or another.  Sweating as much as I do is a handicap that I'll never be able to rid myself of.  There's no reason for me to believe that the temperature within the gym will ever get much cooler.  November was right around the corner and it was still hot inside the gym.  Even when the temperatures did drop outside, there was a strong chance that the "broilers" would get turned on, ensuring perpetually warm-to-hot conditions.

Those factors were significant in my decision to hang it up at KOP, but my biggest reason for leaving was that the passion I had for Crossfit was gone.  I knew it internally.  I also got constant reminders of how much passion I used to have for this when I ran into other members of the gym.  I would have conversations with injured members of the gym and hear how they were so excited about the prospect of getting completely healthy again so they could do Crossfit.  I'm not injured at all and I have no such enthusiasm.  I used to click on the KOP blog at around 9:55 each night and hit refresh repeatedly, stupidly hoping that the WOD would appear a few minutes early, as if that advanced info would somehow give me a leg up on everyone who didn't check the blog until 10pm.  I hear people talk about how driven they are towards some goal, but I can't think of anything at the gym that I'm psyched about conquering.  I could roll in tomorrow, get my first ring muscle-up, and just have a "meh" reaction to it.

Part of that attitude transformation is a result of how much I've changed over the years.  I know that if I want to get better at certain movements, I need to put in extra time practicing them.  A couple of years ago, you would have seen me putting in those extra hours.  Now I'd rather not.  In the past, I didn't mind shaving the calluses on my hands everyday.  I didn't mind patching up my bloodied shins.  I didn't mind regularly taking epsom baths to recover.  That was simply the price for improving at Crossfit.  Now I'd rather have normal looking hands.  Now I'd rather not rip off my leg hair as I remove band-aids.  Now I'd rather take a bath for the purpose of relaxation, not recovery.

Is there more to it than just the fact that I have changed?  Sure.  The gym is so much different that it was when I wandered in there on a February evening four years ago.  Most of the coaches I started out with are no longer there.  Most of the athletes that I worked out with on a daily basis have come and gone.  Of those that remain, I either rarely see them or they no longer take Crossfit classes.  The days when people would go out and eat or grab a beer after workouts are few and far between.  That's just how life works.  I wish I got to see my non-Crossfit friends more often, but people's lives change and you adapt.  And I know by leaving Crossfit, I won't get to see a lot of folks that I've recently developed relationships with and who happen to be a lot of fun to take classes with.  My hope is that those bonds won't break and that I can maintain contact with them even if they don't see me at late night WODs anymore.

What's up next for me?  Well I definitely want to stay active.  Otherwise I'll go back to looking like this:

Taken during my, ummm, pre-Crossfit days

Running and swimming were among the first things that popped into my head when I thought about coming up with a substitute for Crossfit.  Perhaps I could join some over-40 league next February.  I hope to continue writing in some capacity.  This blog may be coming to an end, but hopefully I'll be inspired to write about something else.  Besides, anyone who knows me knows that I am my own least favorite topic to discuss.  There's gotta be something more enticing on the literary horizon!

When the WOD is announced on the KOP blog each night, it always includes a quote at the bottom.  I thought it would be fitting to wrap up my Crossfit adventure with one of my favorite all-time quotes:

"Don't cry because it's over.  Smile because it happened."

-Dr. Seuss

As I leave Crossfit KOP, there is a smile on my face.  I will always be grateful that Crossfit KOP was part of my life for nearly 5 years.  Thank you for tagging along and reading about my experiences there that I have chronicled since 2015.  It was an honor to provide you with some entertainment, even if you came here hoping to find Russian porn.  Dasvidaniya!

Doesn't Even Count In Crossfit

Workout date: 10/20/17

After Wednesday's WOD, I was experiencing soreness in a variety of locations in my body.  That made Thursday the perfect time to take a rest day.  Coming in on Friday meant I could be present for a class with Coach Keithie, something I hadn't done in quite a while.  Keithie was listed as the coach for the 6:30 class when I signed up, but he must have had other plans because Giulz would be the coach when I arrived at KOP.

There are many times when I'll describe Dudes After Dark as "all dudes except Esra" or "all dudes except The Prodigy".  In this class, the tables were being turned on me.  Giulz had 7 athletes awaiting her instruction and I was the only dude in the bunch.  I'd be taking class with The Prodigy, Caitlyn, Sarah W, Tia, Esra, and Kris.  The seven of us had signed up for the following fun:

Friday's WOD:
10 minute EMOM
2RM power clean

Cash-out:
21 power cleans
50 double unders
15 power cleans
50 double unders
9 power cleans
50 double unders
*Barbell weight should be approximately 80% of the 2RM you found earlier

Seriously?  Another barbell EMOM?  When was this madness going to end?  I thought we had at least smartened up by changing these to ETMOMs so that athletes would get proper rest, but that was apparently a limited time offer.  The cash-out sounded interesting at least.  My goal for the 2RM power clean was 225 pounds, which meant I'd be doing 45 power cleans at 180 pounds along with 150 double unders in the cash-out.  That would definitely be spicy.  I'd probably have to roll that back to the 165 pound range if I was going to finish in a reasonable amount of time.

Giulz began the warmup by having us alternate back and forth between 30 second increments of single unders and a variety of stretches.  Once we had run the gamut of stretches, Giulz had us complete as many double unders as possible in 30 seconds.  I messed up right off the bat, hitting the rack behind me when the 30 seconds began.  I moved forward so that I wouldn't hit the rack again and then got 42 double unders in a row before the 30 seconds were up.

I tried to keep things extremely simple when it came time to come up with a strategy for this EMOM.  At some point I would need to put the big 45 pound plates on my barbell, so why not have them on for round one?  I could start at 135 and get to 225 over 10 rounds by bumping the weight on the barbell by 10 pounds during every transition.  Trying to sneak on the 45 pound plates in the middle of the EMOM was just asking for trouble.  So for better or worse, I was going with 135-145-155-165-175-185-195-205-215-225 for my progression.

The seven of us had all grabbed some space for our barbells and for all of the plates we'd need nearby for the transitions between sets.  I had 45 pound plates on my barbell, with a set of 25 pound plates, 15 pound plates, 10 pound plates, and 5 pound plates at the ready to help me make my way up to 225 pounds.

The sets are supposed to be easy early on and they were in this EMOM.  Giulz emphasized that we could not let go of the barbell during these sets.  They had to be touch and go.  I gladly did one power clean, tapped the floor, and went into my next rep during the first six sets.  The quicker I got them done, the better.  There was a limited amount of time for the lifts, for the transition, and for rest.  If you wanted a breather, you had to be fast and have your plates organized so that the transition would be as simple as possible.  When my transition involved nothing but adding a plate to my barbell, I got about 30 seconds of rest.  If my transition involved changing plates, I got about 15-20 seconds of rest.

It wasn't until I reached the set at 195 that I had to pump the brakes.  The first power clean of the set was no longer so easy.  Even when I got it up to my shoulders, I had to take my time and make sure that I had a strong grip on the barbell before moving forward with the second rep.  The two power cleans I did at 205 pounds were not all that different from the ones I had done at 195.  The set at 215 was a completely different story though.  After getting the initial power clean, I went through my mental checklist before attempting the second rep.  I tapped the floor with the barbell and pulled as hard as I could.  It was not my finest lift.  With my back arched pretty severely, I caught the barbell on the lower part of my ribcage while in a partial squat.  As I stood up, I shoved the barbell up my torso and up to my shoulders.  I saw that Giulz was watching me, so after I dumped the barbell, I gave the "that was iffy" wobbly hand signal.  Before my final set, she came over to talk to me.  I told her that I somehow had violated the extremely lenient "counts in Crossfit" standard, but she assured me that the rep was okay.

My barbell now weighed 225 pounds and there was just one set left to go.  The second rep from the set at 215 told me I had no chance here, but sometimes you can pull a rabbit out of the hat when the finish line is in sight.  The final minute had started, but I took some extra time to recover from the previous set before confronting 225.  I grabbed the barbell and pulled with everything I had to power clean it up to my shoulders.  Not only did I get it to my shoulders, my form on that lift was greatly improved from the second rep I had done at 215.  I had a real shot at this set, even though the second rep is always trickier because it is touch and go.  I held the barbell on my shoulders for a solid 5-10 seconds.  I re-established my grip.  I took a big breath.  I told myself that I could get this second power clean as it was my last lift of the EMOM.  And then I proceeded to miss very badly.  I completely rushed the entire movement and didn't come close to executing the power clean properly.  Oh well.  Final score: 215.

There was no way that I was using more than 165 pounds in the cash-out.  In fact, I wasn't entirely sure that weight was appropriate for me.  Giulz walked around to all of us and asked us what we planned on using.  When I said I was considering 165, she surprisingly told me that she felt that was a good weight for me.  I thought for sure she would tell me to scale more, but she had faith I could move well with 165.  I would need to keep things moving because Giulz gave us a time domain of 10 minutes for the cash-out.

Early on it appeared as though I was going to reward Giulz's faith.  My first set of power cleans was 6 reps long.  I knew I couldn't take long breaks, so I got right into the next set, but that one only lasted for 3 reps.  Okay, perhaps I could take a slightly longer break than the one I just took.  When I felt ready to go again, I did a set of 4.  Eight reps left in this round.  After my next break, I did two quick sets of 2 reps.  For my last set, I did 4 quick singles.

All those moderately heavy power cleans had knocked the wind out of me.  I staggered over to my jump rope, not really believing that I could get through 50 reps in a timely manner.  Muscle memory took over, however.  I got through a set of 19 double unders before coming to a stop.  The next set was 21 reps long.  I completed the last 10 on my third set.  I was exhausted, but the clock only read 4:30.  There was still a small chance I could keep this under 10 minutes.

My power clean sets in round two all consisted of quick singles.  I did three sets of four reps and one set of three.  My breaks between those sets were much longer than the breaks I had required in round one.  As I came back to the jump rope, I had given up hope of staying under 10 minutes.  Now I was playing for pride.  If I could complete everything in about 11 minutes, I wouldn't feel too bad about my performance.  Once again it took three sets to get through my 50 double unders, with the sets going 14-18-18 this time.

I dragged my body back to my barbell, but I wasn't ready to begin the power cleans.  I couldn't breathe.  I leaned over trying to draw some air into my lungs.  About half of my classmates were now done and they were trying to encourage me to push through this final round.  I did 3 quick singles before resorting to my old standby: the resting squat.  It was so much more comfortable being in that squat and I could breathe better down there.  My classmates were pleading with me to stand back up, but I didn't want to.  Of course, I wasn't going to bail on the WOD with the finish line within reach, so eventually I stood up and did 3 more power cleans.  One more resting squat was needed before I finished off the last of the power cleans.

I stood with my jump rope in my hands for a short time, unable to convince myself to begin the last 50 double unders.  My legs were telling me that they had no desire to jump.  They lied.  Two more resting squats would be thrown in along the way, but I was able to match what I had done in rounds one and two by completing 50 double unders in three sets.  I went 20-16-14 to finish things off.  Final time: 12:52.

That wasn't as close to the time domain as I would have hoped.  I would definitely go lighter on the power cleans if I had it to do over again.  Those destroyed me a whole lot more than I thought they would.  I still haven't recovered the confidence in my double unders that I lost at the Brawl.  I was tremendously tired when I got to the double unders each round, but I was able to complete 50 reps in three sets every time despite being out of juice.  That tells me I need to stop worrying about failing on them when I'm exhausted.  I just need to twirl the rope and believe I can do it.

Monday preview: All good things must come to an end.

Beware Of Falling Objects

Workout date: 10/18/17

I didn't realize that the fall session of the BBC eight-week program had begun on October 11th, but that was because I wasn't in class last Wednesday, a fact that Coach Jenna made sure to tease me about when I arrived for this week's Wednesday 7:30 class.  Per usual, the BBC athletes would be on the right side of the gym near the magic platform while those of us there for the WOD would occupy the left side of the gym.  That was very helpful this evening because we needed the racks on the left side of the gym for this workout.  It was a unique one that would require a lot of planning.

Wednesday's WOD:

Every 2 minutes for 20 minutes

1 front squat + 3 shoulder-to-overheads

(Build towards a max weight, hit that weight somewhere around sets 5-7, use 80-90% of max for remaining sets)

This was basically a barbell EMOM (which I've stated are stupid) that had an extra minute of rest built in between sets (which is brilliant!).  I couldn't imagine these sets taking more than 30 seconds or so to complete.  It would probably take about 30 seconds to change weights, leaving athletes a full minute to recover from their prior set.  No one had to fear that they weren't going to get any rest because they didn't change plates fast enough or because they grabbed a pair of clips that stubbornly refused to come off of the barbell easily.  This was a well-designed EMOM.  Or an ETMOM.  I'm not sure what you call it when work is required every two minutes.

The planning aspect was interesting because there were specific directions included as far as when you should be hitting your max.  The trouble was that most of us didn't know what our "1 front squat + 3 shoulder-to-overhead" max was.  I'm not sure I could even tell you what my max was for 3 push jerks alone.  I also had no idea how much the early sets would take out of us as we progressed along.  Originally I thought that I might be able to get as high as 205 or 215 pounds, but then I looked at the early scores and was frightened off by one in particular.  Rich had ended up with a score of 200 on this WOD and his front squat and shoulder-to-overhead numbers were higher than mine.  His score dampened my enthusiasm a bit.  I would aim for 205 knowing that something in the 185-195 range might be more likely.

Jenna had four people in her 7:30 class.  It was me, Neil, Erika R, and Mark Spak.  She got our quartet warmed up with a series of drills that included a 200 meter run, some squats, some stretches, and some KB swings.  Then she had us each choose a rack and place an empty barbell on it.  Once we made our way to the racks, Jenna covered the various options in this workout.  The front squat was not optional, but she wanted to make sure we all had solid form.  From there it was on to the three shoulder-to-overhead options: the shoulder press, the push press, and the push jerk.  I have no idea why anyone would choose to do the shoulder press, but Jenna had us perform it just in case.  The push press could be quicker than the push jerk in the early sets when the barbell might be light enough that athletes wouldn't need to jerk it, so I understood going over that lift.  Last but not least was the push jerk, the option that was going to be used the majority of the time in this ETMOM.  (I did ask whether a split jerk was allowed and Jenna said that it was, but it was probably going to be difficult to do three split jerks with heavy weight and control it properly.  I also asked whether we were allowed to place the barbell back on the rack during the sequence, as the directions didn't seem clear on whether the work had to be done in one set or whether the work in each set had to be completed within 2 minutes.  Jenna confirmed that all 4 reps had to be done without putting the barbell down.)

My plan was to go 115-135-155-175-185-195-205 for the first seven rounds.  Depending on how those went, I would decide what weight I'd use for sets 8-10.  Before the WOD started, I was leaning towards 175 pounds for those final three sets.  Neil and I discussed what weight we'd be using for the initial set (115), but we didn't go into any details beyond that.  Jenna got the clock ready and reminded us that even though it was going to beep every minute, we had two minutes between sets.  We heard the first beep and got into our first sets.

The sets at 115, 135, and 155 weren't all that difficult.  I looked over between rounds and saw that Neil was using the same weights.  He didn't talk with me until we finished that set at 155.  That was when he asked me if my goal was to get to 205.  Indeed it was.  He then asked me if I planned on going 175-185-195-205 over my next four sets.  Indeed I was!  He had the same plan, but was concerned about reaching that mark because he saw that Rich had only gotten 200 pounds.  It was like we were sharing the same brain!  As we got ready for the set at 175, we made a deal that we were both going to beat Rich's score from earlier in the day.

It didn't take long for me to wonder whether my mouth just wrote a check my ass couldn't cash.  The set at 175 pounds was the first one that felt heavy.  The front squat was still pretty easy, but controlling the barbell for three push jerks was tough.  The barbell would come crashing down on my chest after every rep.  That was no fun.  It was only going to hurt even more as the barbell got heavier.

The sets at 185 and 195 were heavy, but I don't think I experienced any more trouble with those sets than I had with the set at 175.  My chest was taking a beating, but my jerks were still strong.  The front squats were still nothing more than a formality.  It was now put up or shut up time.  Neil and I put 205 on our respective barbells and endeavored to beat Rich.  I didn't grab my barbell immediately when the clock beeped.  I was still gathering my thoughts.  Neil didn't hesitate at all, going right into his set.  A few seconds later, I grabbed my barbell and began my set.  The front squat was still relatively easy.  I came up, gathered myself for a second, then went into the push jerks.  They were rapid fire.  I didn't bother taking time to reset in between reps.  The only pause that I might have taken was to make sure my feet were where I wanted them.  One, two, three...I had beaten Rich's score.

I racked my barbell and then turned to fist bump Neil since I hadn't heard his barbell drop to the floor.  I was surprised to see that he was still holding his barbell.  He was taking his time between reps and had one push jerk remaining.  He got that one overhead and then placed his barbell back on the rack.  I congratulated him, saying "at least we beat Rich!"  Neil was happy about that, but he wanted more.  "215?", he asked.  We were supposed to have reached our max by set 7 or sooner and we had just completed set 7.  Going up was a flagrant violation of the guidelines for this workout.  But I couldn't resist the urge to try 215.  We both added 10 pounds to our barbell.

The set at 215 began the same way the set at 205 started.  Neil took his barbell from the rack before I did.  I needed a few extra seconds to psyche myself up for this heavy weight, but it wasn't too long before I had my barbell on my shoulders.  The front squat was now getting heavy, but I didn't get stuck at all as I stood up with it.  I made sure my feet were in good position and then I did the first push jerk.  The one thing I was very good about as the barbell got heavy was getting low on the jerk.  It wasn't like I was doing a small dip and rising up a tiny amount with the barbell when I did each push jerk.  I was dropping low enough that I was almost doing half of an overhead squat to complete each rep.  Maybe that was just me going to my safe place since I have a ton of faith in my overhead squatting ability.  All I know is that it worked.  It hurt like hell each time I dropped the barbell on my chest between reps, but I continued to move into the next rep quickly.  I was psyched when I stood upright with the third push jerk at 215.

After racking my barbell, I turned to see if Neil was done.  He was not.  He was actually in a lot of trouble.  I've described how I sometimes cheat on the shoulder press by going into a "vertical bench press" position where my back is arched and I'm using my body to press up the barbell (as opposed to pure shoulder strength).  When I looked at Neil, he was in the vertical bench press position.  He then started walking backwards.  We all went into panic mode thinking that he might fall on his back and have his 215 pound barbell land on top of him.  There was also reason to be concerned for the BBC class, as he was backpedaling his way towards them.  Right as he was closing in on Anne B, he was able to push the barbell forward and away from him.  He fell to the floor without getting injured.  Later, Anne B would remind me that this wasn't the first time that she had to avoid a barbell at a BBC class.  During one of the summer sessions, I dropped a barbell during a WOD and it nearly bounced into her.  Poor Anne was just trying to get better at Olympic lifting and here we were putting her in danger repeatedly.  I told her that in upcoming classes we'd put up warning signs around her that said "beware of falling objects".

I helped Neil put his barbell back on the rack thinking that we were going to drop weight finally, but he told me his 9th set would be 215 again.  I was certainly not doing 215 again.  That was pointless.  I could drop back down to 185 and do two sets at that weight.  I bumped my drop set weight up to 185 from 175 because I had done better than expected in getting 215 as my max.  The other alternative was to go up to 225.  I stood next to my barbell unsure of what I wanted to do until there were 30 seconds left in my rest period.  Finally, I looked over to Neil and said, "screw it, I'm trying 225".  I got 225 on my barbell just before the clock beeped.

Because I was late getting the weight on my barbell, I wasn't ready to go right at the start of the two minute period.  Neil was always ready.  I watched him do the front squat before I went to begin my set.  I took my barbell from the rack and did my front squat.  Just like the rep at 215, it was heavy, but I didn't get stuck at all.  Right as I was about to do my first push jerk, I heard Neil drop his barbell.  He missed at 215 again.  That wasn't inspiring confidence for this set at 225.  I did the first push jerk and barely got my arms extended.  I was a little shaky standing up with it, but I had it.  I let the barbell crash on to my chest in preparation for the 2nd jerk.  I took some time to reset my form, the first time I had done so in this WOD.  This barbell felt extremely heavy and I couldn't speed through my reps and hope to finish the set.  The second push jerk was a replica of the first one I had done, although I had some trouble keeping my balance as I stood upright.  I had to take a couple of steps to my left before I steadied myself.  I wasn't concerned about falling, but I knew Mark was on the rack next to me and I was scared that I might be about to run into him.  I couldn't see him as I got ready for the third push jerk.  I told myself not to step to the left or bail my barbell to the left on this last rep.  I reset everything one last time and went for the jerk.  I was well under the barbell and my arms were extended.  I was a bit in shock as I stood up with the barbell.  I triumphantly slammed my barbell to the floor, giddy with excitement that I had somehow completed the set at 225 pounds.

There was still one set to go, but I wasn't concerned about that too much.  I stripped down my barbell to 135 pounds, cleaned it, put it in the rack, then added 25 pounds to each side so that I could use 185 pounds for my final set.  I expected the barbell to feel light after that set at 225 pounds and that prediction was accurate.  I bounced right out of the bottom of the front squat, made sure my stance was okay, then fired off three fast push jerks.  The ETMOM was over.  Final score: 225.

The cash-out was not for time for the second straight night.  We were given three options to choose from:

Cash-out:

3 rounds

Novice level: 20 ab-mat sit-ups, 20 Russian med ball twists per round

Intermediate level: 20 GHD sit-ups, 20 hip extensions per round

Advanced level: 20 GHD sit-ups, 20 hip back extensions per round

Ab-mat sit-ups are your basic sit-ups with a pad for your back, while GHD sit-ups are the much more difficult version.  You secure your feet in the GHD machine, lean backwards while facing the ceiling, touch the floor, and come back up.  Russian med ball twists involve rotating side-to-side with a med ball in your hands and your feet hovering above the floor.  Hip extensions and hip back extensions also take place on the GHD machine.  You flip your body over from the way you'd have it set up for sit-ups.  For hip extensions, you lower your upper body towards the floor while keeping your shoulders pinned back.  At a certain point, you reverse the motion and return to how you started.  Hip back extensions were slower and more difficult.  The motion is very similar, but you slowly extend one vertebrae at a time.

I was going to go with the intermediate option, but the GHD sit-ups proved to be too much for me.  The soreness I encountered doing 60 GHD sit-ups the week before was still present and additional GHD sit-ups were not the healing salve I needed.  I did 5 reps and then stopped.  I took a decent break before trying again.  I did 5 more sit-ups before having to wave the white flag.  I went to the back of the gym and got an ab-mat.  There was no pain when I performed the ab-mat sit-ups.

Abdominal pain was no longer an issue but quad pain was.  When you do hip extensions, your quads are crushed into the pads of the GHD machine.  It's not the most agonizing pain you'd ever experience, but it's not something you want to endure for very long.  On my first two sets of hip extensions, I had to stop after 12 reps because the pain got to be too much.  The remaining 8 reps of each set were no picnic either.  When I got to the final set of hip extensions, I knew it was the last thing I had to do, so I was going to fight through the pain and do all 20.  I made it to 17 reps before it really hurt, but I hung on for the last three.  Cash-out done.  Count me out when it comes to using the GHD machine any time in the near future.  I've had my fill for a while.

Friday preview: Yet another barbell EMOM.  I do the ugliest power clean ever seen in a Crossfit gym.  The resting squat makes its return during the cash-out.

Girdle Of Pain

Workout date: 10/17/17

Last month, Jenn and I began celebrating 20 years together by taking a long weekend trip to wine country.  That was designed to be a present to her.  My present would come in mid-October.  There are two iconic race tracks in the US when it comes to horse racing.  I grew up next to one of those tracks: Saratoga.  I've been to Saratoga hundreds of times in my life.  The city of Saratoga Springs is my favorite place in the world.  It's not just the race track that puts it at the top of the list (although that is a major contributing factor).  Saratoga also has a national park.  Most of the cross country championships I participated in were held at that park and it became my favorite spot to run.  SPAC (Saratoga Performing Arts Center) was the best place in the area to catch a concert.  There's a lot going on in Saratoga, especially when the weather is nice.

The second iconic race track is called Keeneland and is located in Lexington, Kentucky.  Both Keeneland and Saratoga are only open for six weeks each year.  Saratoga is open for six consecutive weeks in July and August.  Keeneland is open for three weeks in April and three weeks in October.  Jenn surprised me by not only setting up my first ever trip to Keeneland, but by entering me in their fall handicapping contest.  The result?  I bombed out of the handicapping contest, but I did meet a guy at the contest who I've become fast friends with.  As for Keeneland itself, it is a beautiful track with top quality racing.  It's a little on the small side and it is quite a bit fancier than Saratoga, at least the part of Saratoga that I've experienced.  (Note: You can find me by the 1/8 pole on Opening Day at Saratoga, sitting on a bench with my shorts on, drinking a beer.  I'm sure you can find some people at Keeneland doing something similar, but it felt like everyone was dressed to the nines.  And the staff all have very formal green jackets on, making you wonder whether they are on loan from Augusta when the Masters isn't being played.)  Anyways, it was a bucket list item to visit Keeneland and the surrounding area, especially Old Friends farm.  Old Friends is a retirement farm for race horses and my second favorite horse of all-time lives there.  Getting to meet and have my picture taken with Silver Charm was a thrill I'll never forget.

We flew home on Monday, so I wouldn't get back to the gym until Tuesday night.  Dudes After Dark would be focused on one very special lady and her name is Nancy:

"Nancy"

5 rounds

400 meter run

15 overhead squats (95/65)

Completing Nancy in under 15 minutes was one of my goals for 2017.  My best time on this WOD was 15:35 and that came in December of last year.  Given 12 months and at least 4 attempts at it (this was a KOP benchmark WOD this year), I figured it was a slam dunk that I could trim 36 seconds off of my time.  If only it were that easy!  When I did this workout in January, I hurt my back during it, finishing in 20:36.  I had no back problems when I did this in April, but the best I could do was 16:09.    I wasn't at the gym when this came up in July, so Tuesday's attempt would be my last chance unless I decided to do it at an Open Gym later in the year.

LC had a half-dozen of us in class for Dudes After Dark.  It was me, Esra, Brian S, John McHugh, Neil, and Cline.  The six of us started out with a game on the rower.  The rowers have a "fish game" on them where you try to eat minnows and avoid sharks by rowing at different paces.  If you want to move higher on the monitor, row faster.  Trying to drop below an encroaching shark?  Row slower.  Sounds simple, but just about all of us had difficulty getting our speed right.  Towards the end I got the hang of it, but my score wasn't good enough to beat Brian's.  This wouldn't be the only time that Brian would finish as top dog.

We continued on with some stretching.  Some of that stretching involved using bands, some of it involved a PVC pipe.  When that was complete, LC asked us to put the PVC pipes away, grab a barbell, and form one line facing the lobby.  I went around and gathered up the PVC pipes from my classmates and put them away.  Total rookie move.  It meant I was the last one to grab my barbell and the last one to line up.  The only spot left was the area in the back of the gym, furthest away from the side door we'd be running in and out of.  My chances of breaking 15 minutes were already kaput.

That didn't mean I couldn't put up a time I'd be proud of.  After all, the weather was actually to my liking for once.  It was borderline chilly outside, perfect running weather in my estimation.  And this WOD was all about running.  I believed that.  Neil believed that.  Cline believed that.  The only one who didn't seem to be on board with that logic was LC.  We were asking her how she improved her running so much to make it on the gym leaderboard for Nancy.  LC said she didn't make it on the board because her running improved.  The key, according to her, was simply refusing to put the barbell down during the sets of overhead squats.  We called shenanigans.  I had gone unbroken on my overheads for this entire WOD a handful of times and I never came remotely close to LC's board-worthy time of 13 and a half minutes.

The six of us walked over to the barrier, ready for our last tussle with Nancy.  Here's my round-by-round recap:

• Round 1: Cline and Brian were out in front on the run, but I wasn't too far behind them.  I was the third one to my barbell, but after completing 15 consecutive overhead squats, I was the first one back out the door.
• Round 2: Similar story as round one.  Cline and Brian passed me on the run.  I held on for all 15 overhead squats, but I wasn't fast enough to get out the door before Brian.  Based on what LC had said prior to the workout, I was on track for 13 and a half minutes.  Except the clock was telling me a completely different story.  If I wanted to break 15 minutes, I would need to find a way to stay at my current pace.
• Round 3: Cline passed me on the run yet again and Neil and John were starting to close in on me.  I began noticing some back pain during the run.  Nothing as severe as what I felt when I did this in January, but this back pain was being accompanied by some mild abdominal pain.  I was still sore from the 60 GHD sit-ups I had done in the workout on Thursday.  This girdle of pain caused me to move slower on the overhead squats.  I continued to follow LC's directions on refusing to put the barbell down, stringing 15 reps in a row for the 3rd straight round.  Neil was out the door before me, but I was in front of Cline and John.
• Round 4: Neil is supposed to hate running, but he extended his lead on me during the 4th run.  Cline and John would pass me near the end of the 400 meters with Cline telling me to lengthen my stride and John letting me know that I needed to come back to Endurance next year.  They were both trying to provide encouragement, but I was definitely hurting at this stage.  I walked back to my barbell once I got through the door.  Once there, I did 15 consecutive overhead squats for the 4th round in a row.  Cline and John were out the door just in front of me.
• Round 5: Brian was already on his 5th round of overhead squats when I headed out for the final run.  Neil was wrapping up his 400 meters.  Cline and John were in my sights, but I was unable to reel them in during my last quarter-mile.  I tried my best to ignore the pain I was in, moving through 15 overheads quicker than I had in rounds three and four.  It was almost fast enough to catch John at the end, but I would end up finishing right behind him.  Final time: 18:47.

So much for the key to the workout being one's willingness to hold on to the barbell.  I didn't put it down once during the overhead squats and I was more than 5 minutes behind LC's time.  This was a running WOD, without a doubt.

My time wasn't as bad as it might look at first glance.  It probably took 5-10 seconds to get from the side door to my barbell in the back of the gym (and vice versa).  That extra distance was covered 9 times in this WOD, meaning my time was about 45-90 seconds beyond what it would have been had I lined up near the door.  However, even if you were generous enough to cut 90 seconds off of my time, that would still leave me north of 17 minutes on a workout that I'm supposedly good at, performed under ideal conditions.  It was clear that I had regressed.  There was no chance of me completing Nancy in less than 15 minutes this year.  And it was unlikely to ever happen.

The cash-out was a 1,000 meter row that focused on form, not time.  We all switched our monitors from the fish game to an option that showed a graphic representation of our pulls on the rower.  If we pulled properly, a perfect arc would appear on the screen.  If there was a flaw in our form, something other than an arc would show up.  Because we would be rowing for 1,000 meters, we'd get plenty of practice trying to create that perfect arc.

I think this would have been more productive had we done it before Nancy, rather than after.  The only one who seemed capable of getting this elusive arc on their screen was Neil.  The rest of us either had poor rowing form, were too tired, or were dealing with a combination of both of those issues.  I fell into that final category.  There was no arc on my screen.  Each of my pulls resulted in a graph that looked like roadkill more than anything else.  It was a lumpy blob with a flat portion along the top that resembled a tire track.  I don't think I'll be teaching any rowing seminars in the future.  I slowly made my way to 1,000 meters and was happy to head home once that was done.

Wednesday preview: A barbell EMOM with some built-in rest.  What a novel concept!  Neil and I focus on taking down Rich.  A member of the BBC keeps getting accosted by barbells at Wednesday night classes.

You're Here Early

Workout date: 10/12/17

I took Wednesday to cool down.  So did the western suburbs of Philadelphia.  When I was ready to return to KOP on Thursday, it was considerably cooler than it had been on Monday and Tuesday.  That was extra appreciated because I was heading into the gym earlier than usual on Thursday.  A buddy of mine had invited me out to watch Thursday night football and as unappealing as watching an Eagles game at an Eagles bar in Northeast Philly sounded to me, I wanted to go because it had been a while since I've gotten to hang out with my old co-workers.  If I was going to get a workout in, I'd need to stop by the 5:30 class.

I tend to come in for late classes more often than not, but I've never been shy about coming in at other times as well.  I used to hit the noon express every Friday.  You'll catch me at the 6:30 a lot more often than the 5:30, but I've dropped by for the occasional 5:30 class.  In truly desperate situations, I've even come in for morning classes.  Prior to Thursday, I would have thought that I was one of the few athletes at KOP that attended classes at a variety of times.  But based on the reception I got when I showed up for Thursday's 5:30 class, I got the opposite impression.  When I got out of my car, I saw Steph M and she said "you're here early" to me.  We walked in together and encountered Jill A in the lobby, who also greeted me with a "you're here early".  Steph and I passed through the glass doors that lead to the main gym.  The first person I saw in there was Shawna.  What else could I have expected her to say but "you're here early"?  Maybe there was some KOP drinking game going on that I didn't know about.  Noel was sitting on a bench having just completed the WOD, but he got in on the fun by telling me that I was there early when he saw me taking part in warmup drills with the 5:30 class.  The strange part to me about hearing that reaction repeated over and over again was the way in which they all said it.  It was almost like they were asking me if I was lost or if I had forgotten my watch and didn't realize that I had shown up 2 hours early.  Guess I've been neglecting my friends at the 5:30 class!

Coach Giulz had 10 athletes in her 5:30 class ready to take on the following WOD:

Thursday's WOD:
3 rounds
400 meter run
30 GHD sit-ups
20 burpees over the barbell
10 overhead squats (155/105)

With only 5 GHD machines available, we were going to need to run this WOD in two heats.  The first heat would begin 2 minutes ahead of the second heat.  Giulz asked everyone to find a partner who was about the same height so that we could easily share a GHD machine.  Josh P fit that bill for me.  Josh would be our representative in heat one, with his procrastinating partner joining in the fun two minutes later.

Giulz had some guidelines for this WOD:

1. You and your partner could not go in the same heat.  That was the whole point of having partners and running two heats.
2. For the GHD sit-ups, if you had never done a workout with this much volume (90 reps), you should scale the reps or do ab-mat sit-ups.
3. For the overhead squats, you had to be able to snatch the weight you were using.  If you required a clean and jerk to get the barbell overhead, you scaled incorrectly.  Giulz also wanted us to get through our 10 reps in no more than 2 sets.
4. The time domain for this workout would be 20 minutes.  It wasn't a hard time cap, but if you went well over 20 minutes, you scaled this workout incorrectly.

I talked with Josh about the GHD sit-ups because I was concerned about taking too long and holding him up when he got to round 3.  (If I was still working on round 1 of my sit-ups when he returned for round 2 of his sit-ups, then something had gone very, very wrong.)  Josh let me know that he was only going to do 15 GHD sit-ups per round, something I hadn't really considered.  I kept it in mind though in case I started struggling later on.  As for the overhead squats, I was confident that I could snatch 125 pounds even if I was tired out from all the other stuff in this WOD, so I went with that weight on my barbell.

There was one pair of athletes in class that even a complete stranger would know were partners.  Steph and Mariana are good friends and it's easy to notice how close they are.  They also sometimes show up to class in the exact same outfit.  This was one of those times.  Giulz told the first heat to go line up by the barrier to begin the workout and I saw two identical outfits standing side-by-side.  I was in the doorway with Laura A and I told her to watch because Giulz Rule #1 was about to be broken.  Laura seemed certain that they weren't going to both run off together.  Giulz yelled "go" and both Steph and Mariana began running (I win!).  However, Steph ran less than 50 meters before stopping, realizing that they were both going to end up stuck at the same GHD machine if they ran together (I lose!).  We'll call this one a draw between me and Laura.

As the first heat began trickling back into the door, heat two got ready to go.  There was no way we could keep up with Laura, but I did my best Mariana impression by running alongside Steph the entire 400 meters.  Josh was long gone from our GHD machine when I got back from the run.  I did 12 sit-ups before taking a break.  I might have hurried into the next set too quickly because I only got through 8 reps before stopping.  I had to do better than that on the next set or else I'd be stuck with a set of 2-4 at the very end and that would be silly.  I was able to handle the remaining 10 reps in my third set.  I pulled my feet out of the GHD machine and headed to my barbell.  I wish I could say I was about to do overhead squats, but I had a bunch of burpees to do first.

I knew this was going to be the element of the WOD that I would struggle with the most and it lived up to expectations.  I didn't really come to a stop at all as I did my burpees, but it was definitely a crawl throughout.  I figured I was making relatively good time because I didn't stop during the 20 burpees.  Wrong!  I wouldn't find out the truth until after I had completed the overhead squats.  I know for sure that I made good time there.  I snatched the barbell and held on through all 10 reps.  Unfortunately, when I dropped my barbell, I was greeted with the news that my first round had taken about 7:30 to complete.  If I kept that pace, it would take 22:30 to finish.  And just to be clear, that was the best case scenario.  I was almost certainly going to slow down over the next two rounds.

I was bummed to see that round one had taken so long, but I went into a full panic less than 100 meters into my second run.  Laura came flying by me before I got to Frosty Falls.  Was she lapping me?  Was she on round three already?  I mean, she had to be, right?  Laura's one of the best athletes in the gym, so I couldn't come up with a scenario where she would have finished round one behind me.  My rosy outlook on round one had taken a dark turn quickly.

I found more trouble when I got back from the second quarter-mile run.  We each had our own GHD machine that we shared with a partner who was similar in height to us.  It is important to have the GHD machine set up to your height so that you don't hurt yourself during the movement.  As I came in the door, there was a woman on the GHD machine that Josh and I had set up.  I never understand why people agree to do one thing in the warmup and then do the opposite once the workout begins, but it happens frequently.  This woman wasn't nearly as tall as us, so the sit-ups she was doing couldn't have been comfortable.  Neither were the ones I ended up doing on the random GHD machine I ended up on.  Worst of all, I couldn't adjust my new machine because I knew someone else was relying on that machine being set to their height.

I wasn't on that GHD very long though.  With the first round taking me about 7:30, I knew I had to scale down my reps.  I decided to lower the number of GHD sit-ups I'd complete per round to 15 and the number of burpees over the barbell to 10.  I actually felt pretty good on the GHD machine, but those sit-ups have a way of making you sore quickly.  Better to go light there.  I did a set of 8 and a set of 7 before heading to my barbell.  It was an easy decision to scale the burpees.  My goal was to stay close to the time domain that Giulz had given us and the burpees were taking me longer than anything else in this WOD.  I crawled through 10 more burpees and then strung together 10 more overhead squats.  I wasn't going to finish this workout in less than 20 minutes, but I was going to be a whole lot closer now that I had trimmed down my GHD sit-ups and burpees.

As I headed outbound on my third run, I saw Laura returning from her third run.  That meant I had been ahead of her at the end of round one.  There had to be a story behind that.  (The story behind that: Laura attempted to use the RX weight of 105 pounds for her overhead squats.  She was only able to do 2 before having to change the weight on her barbell.  I think that included a run over to the area where our plates are stored to get new plates.  All of that extra time changing the weight on her barbell explained why she fell behind me even though my first round was slow.)  When I got back to the gym, my GHD machine was free.  I went 9 and 6 this time before hustling back to my barbell.  The final 10 burpees weren't fast, but I did try and push the pace more because I had confidence that I could get all 10 overhead squats in one set.  With the burpees done, I snatched my barbell overhead and got to work on my last 10 reps.  There was quite a bit of grunting involved, but I made it through 10 consecutive overhead squats for the third straight round.  Final time: 22:15.

It might not sound like I ended up very close to the time domain that Giulz had given us, but the best time in our class was 19:21.  Eight of the 10 people in class went over 20 minutes with the last finisher coming in at close to 27 and a half minutes.  So I think I did a pretty good job of choosing a rep scheme that was both challenging to me and allowed me to stay relatively close to Giulz's request.

Tuesday preview: After a weekend in Kentucky, I come back to find Nancy waiting for me at Dudes After Dark.  Several of us call shenanigans on LC.  I find multiple ways to fail on the rower.

Don't Toss It Like An A-Hole

Workout date: 10/10/17

The heat index inside the gym on Monday night was high enough to make several athletes feel nauseous.  Things did not cool off much over the next 24 hours.  We were nearing mid-October and it was at least 75 degrees outside, which meant it was north of 85 degrees inside KOP.  I love the huge space that we have to work out in, but it can be brutally hot sometimes.  There is simply no circulation within the gym.  It is badly in need of some air conditioning.  Last year, the heat was too much for me in August and I left for 5 weeks, hoping that the end of summer would bring cooler temps.  This year, we were long past Labor Day and still dealing with this issue.  It would play a big role in my performance at Dudes After Dark.

LC's class was made up of 6 dudes (me, Cline, Bryan, Erik, Actuary Mike, and Brian S) and Esra.  Caitlyn had been in the 6:30 class and I saw the three participants from last evening's "Flight Night With Mike" all chatting when I walked in the door.  Mike was laughing about something.  When he saw me, he came over to tell me that Esra and Caitlyn were experiencing some sore calves as a result of all the double under work they put in after the WOD.  (I'm sure there was probably some cramping due to dehydration as well.)  Mike felt fine.  After all, he only did 18 minutes of work while both of the ladies went the full 25 minutes.  I think he was laughing partly because he knew how they felt having done the Flight Simulator so many times before last night's successful run.

Esra would have to get those calves loosened up in a hurry because she would be leading us out on the warmup run.  LC wanted us to do a 400 meter Indian run with a med ball.  Back during the summer, there would still be daylight available as we did this warmup, so we would toss the med ball up in the air without a care, confident that the person behind us would catch it.  Now that it was dark at 7:30, that seemed a little more dangerous.  The med ball is mostly black to begin with.  Tossing it towards the night sky would camouflage it even more and could result in someone taking a med ball to the face.  LC was aware that this could happen so she gave us clear instructions for the warmup.  "Don't toss it like an asshole", she said to the immature group of students standing by the door.  She demonstrated how we should pass along the ball to one another, twisting to the side and handing it to the mythical person behind her.  She asked if we all understood and each one of us said yes.

Esra had our med ball and we followed her outside.  As we walked past the barrier on the other side of the street, Esra began jogging and we all followed suit.  And then she tossed the ball up in the air like an asshole.  I couldn't have been prouder of her.  None of us wanted to do that lame "turn to the side" alternative.  Every time we've done this warmup, we've thrown the ball in the air and we weren't going to let a little thing like darkness stop us from our routine.  Plus, LC should have known that she was surrounded by assholes.

A glimpse at Dudes After Dark in the future

When we returned from the run, LC had another game awaiting us.  We would stand in a circle with a PVC pipe in front of us.  LC would yell "left" or "right" and we'd have to run in that direction and grab the pipe that was abandoned by the person who had been standing there.  At first the circle was pretty tight and you didn't have to run far to get to the next pipe.  As long as the person who was there didn't intentionally tip it on you, you had a good shot at catching it before it hit the ground.  One by one, players were eliminated and the circle got wider.  In the end, it would come down to me and Bryan.  I made a couple of desperate saves when it was down to heads up, but Bryan would wind up winning when it was all said and done.

Now that we were warmed up (translation: sweaty), it was time to turn our attention to the WOD.  Here's a look at it:

Tuesday's WOD:
20 minute AMRAP
40 wall balls (20#/14# to 10'/9')
30 toes-to-bar
20 power cleans (135/95)
10 bar muscle-ups

A glimpse at the scores from earlier in the day told me that completing 2 rounds would be close to impossible, so I wasn't going to put too much pressure on myself in terms of moving from station to station quickly.  This was probably going to be slow and painful, so I was going to focus on keeping my breaks short rather than focusing on speed.

LC warmed us up at each of the stations beginning with the power cleans (empty barbell) and then the wall balls.  After that, we moved over to the pull-up rig for the toes-to-bar and bar muscle-ups.  My barbell was near the middle of the gym, so I headed over to a bar towards the middle of the pull-up rig.  I was going to use the high bar for the toes-to-bar, so there was plenty of space to do those, but once we went on to the progressions for the bar muscle-up (where I'd be on the low bar), I knew there wasn't going to be enough space for me.  So once we were done with the progressions, I moved down to the far end of the gym by myself.  It probably looked a little weird that I had separated myself from everyone else, but they would be happy to know a sweaty gorilla wasn't going to kick them in the back while they were on the pull-up rig.

The only aspect of this workout that I decided to scale was the bar muscle-ups because I'd never done 10 in a WOD before and I wasn't particularly confident that I could even do one.  LC mentioned chest-to-bar pull-ups as a scale and I knew I could complete 10 of those in a reasonable amount of time.  The toes-to-bar were going to be the most difficult part of the WOD, but I always had the option of coming down from the high bar and doing singles on the low bar if I got too tired to string reps.

After LC watched us do some practice power cleans with the weight we'd be using in the WOD, we were ready to begin.  Well, I was almost ready.  I needed to grab some paper towels and wipe off my head, my arms, and my hands.  My shirt was already completely soaked through.  I hadn't done the workout yet, but it sure looked like I had.  Once I was somewhat dry, I walked down to the far end of the gym and got ready for the wall balls.

If there was one part of this workout that I had some confidence in, it would be the wall balls.  I wouldn't say I had a breakthrough with these, but I felt like I discovered a way to improve my technique during one of last week's cash-outs.  Because this WOD was likely going to be a long, painful slog, my plan was to break up the wall balls into two sets.  We got underway and I made it through 25 reps before letting the ball hit the ground.  So far, so good.  I tried to keep my rest short.  I picked up the ball and began my second set.  I was only a few reps in when sweat began pouring down my head and into my eyes.  As I tossed the ball up to the wall, I tried to quickly use my shoulder to get the sweat out of my eyes, but it didn't do much good.  If catching a ball falling from the sky outside in the dark was dangerous, then I can't imagine it would be any more safe trying to do it with your vision impaired.  After 8 reps, I got frustrated and let my ball drop again.  I used my shirt to dry off my entire head.  I picked up the ball and completed my remaining 7 reps.

I told myself that my attitude would get better if I could get through the 30 toes-to-bar with some fairly large sets.  Early on, that seemed like a real possibility.  I did two sets of five to kick things off. Four more sets like that and I was on to the power cleans!  On my next set, my grip began to slip on the 3rd rep, but I re-gripped and got a 4th rep in before coming down from the bar.  I chalked up my hands hoping that it would keep my hands dry, but I felt my hands sliding when I got to rep #3 of the next set.  It didn't matter whether I used chalk or dried my hands on one of the small sections of my t-shirt that weren't saturated with sweat.  These solutions were very temporary.  Everyone else had moved on to the power cleans while I struggled to hold on to the bar.  My remaining sets would go 3-3-2-2-1-1-1.  There was a lot of time remaining in the WOD, but I had checked out mentally already.

I came over to the power cleans thinking that I might be able to use some of my anger to cycle the barbell quickly.  But you have to have some real interest in what you're doing to make that happen.  My mind wasn't thinking "hey, put together some big sets here and catch up with your classmates".  It was thinking "great, how is the fact that water pours out of me like a broken fire hydrant going to screw me on this movement?"  I did a set of two power cleans and dropped the barbell.  It wasn't too heavy for me.  I just didn't feel like picking it up.  When I talked myself into going back to the barbell, I only managed two more.  Slowly I began to let go of some of my frustration.  My next three sets would be 3 reps each.  You can do more than 3 reps at a time.  Stop messing around and get back into it.  I took a deep breath and tried to remember what it felt like to want to do this.  I did one power clean, tapped the floor, and went right into the next.  For the first time since I got to the barbell, I developed a rhythm.  I refused to let go of that barbell until I completed all 7 power cleans that I had remaining.

That was the first (spoiler: and only) bright spot of this workout for me.  I came over to a low bar at the far end of the gym ready to do sets of quick chest-to-bar singles.  I had done sets of 6 in other workouts, so I felt like I should be able to do this in two sets.  Not today!  I didn't feel safe on any of my reps.  As I did my kip, I felt my hands slide every time.  I tried to ignore it, but I couldn't help it.   My inability to control how much I sweat was crushing me on this WOD.  I went 2-3-3-2 and moved on to the wall balls.

Somehow things got worse when I got there.  If you told me that I hadn't reached my low point yet, I would never have believed you, but it was still to come.  I began my set of wall balls thinking that I could finish them in 4 sets, maybe 3 if got my head straight.  I tossed the ball up to the wall and when I caught it, I felt it slide in my hand.  It felt like it might come out of my hands, so I had to really throw it hard to get it up to the 10' mark.  It made it there, but just barely.  That wasn't the point though.  I had been doing this workout for over 15 minutes now and it was nothing but one reminder after another about how sweaty I was and how it impaired my performance.  After catching the second rep, I used all of my energy to throw the wall ball as high as I could.  I had no intentions of catching it.  The ball hit the wall up near the flags (between 11' and 12') before crashing back down to the floor.  I walked away from the wall, taking some time to consider whether I wanted to stop now or keep going.

I took my longest break of the WOD.  I didn't need to catch my breath or shake out my arms or anything.  I just needed to make a decision on whether I was going to continue.  If I was going to blow up again during the remaining few minutes, then there was no point.  But if I could convince myself to keep it together for a couple more minutes, then it would be worthwhile.  I dried off my hands and returned to the wall.  I did a set of 12 reps.  On my next set, I did 15.  That left 10 for the final set that I did.

I didn't bother trying to string big sets of toes-to-bar on the high bar as that only had the potential of making me frustrated.  I went to the low bar and did sets of quick singles.  My first set was 5 reps.  Then I got two sets of four completed before time was called.  Final score: 1+53.

Usually at the end of a workout, I'll think about strategy.  I'll think about whether I should have scaled something.  I'll think about whether I need to spend more time practicing a movement.  At the end of this WOD, all I could think about was whether Crossfit was right for me.  Maybe I should be doing something else.  If I took up running again, I wouldn't have to worry about sweating tarnishing my time.  If I joined a swim club, I wouldn't have to worry about perspiration affecting my workout.  There were plenty of other things I could do in terms of exercise where I wouldn't be so harshly penalized as I seem to always be when doing Crossfit.

Then again, maybe it wasn't Crossfit itself that was the problem.  Maybe I just needed to move on from KOP.  I had visited other boxes when traveling.  It's not like there weren't any Crossfit gyms with air conditioning.  They existed.  Maybe I wouldn't end up as frustrated with Crossfit if I found a place where I could do it without sweating so damn much.

I had a lot to think about as I drove home that night.  My gut reaction was to wait it out.  It was bound to cool off at some point, right?  Perhaps I'd re-embrace Crossfit once actual fall weather descended on our region.  That seemed like my best option for now.  I couldn't imagine leaving KOP and doing Crossfit somewhere else, even if they had air conditioning.  I was all-in with the KOP crew.  If I wasn't doing Crossfit there, I wasn't doing it anywhere.

Thursday preview: After a day off to get over Tuesday night's frustration, I come back for an earlier than normal class on Thursday and everyone seems to notice.  For once, it feels like fall.  I make a mid-WOD adjustment in order to stay within the coach's time domain.

Flight Night With Mike

Workout date: 10/9/17

After three days of destroying my legs, I needed a day off on Thursday.  That wound up leading to a long weekend away from the gym.  I knew I couldn't make it in on Friday as I had plans in the city.  And I haven't come in for a weekend workout unless I had a compelling reason to do so.  As a result, I got four days of recovery rather than one, but I can tell you that my legs were grateful for the extended break.

We had some strange weather on Monday.  Hurricane Nate had been making its way up the East Coast and what was left of it reached the western suburbs of Philly on Monday morning.  It looked miserable as I peered out the window, but I discovered that it was weather I liked when I went outside.  It was a nice, gentle rain accompanied by some mildly warm temperatures.  I could get behind that.  I'd be really happy if I could bottle this up and bring it to the gym with me for the workout tonight.

Turns out I wouldn't get that lucky.  The weather changed as the day went on and by the time I came in for the 6:30 class, it was extremely muggy inside the gym.  Giulz told us a story while we got warmed up about how she was in an earlier class and had to deal with similar conditions.  By the end of class, she found herself throwing up in the ladies room.  Moral of the story: this workout was not going to be pleasant.

The weird thing about Giulz's story is that the Monday WOD wasn't some long drawn-out metcon that we had to suffer through.  Instead it was the same format that I had seen in many recent workouts: one part strength, one part short cash-out.  Here's what was on Monday's menu:

Monday's WOD:
3RM shoulder press

Cash-out:
30-20-10
Chest-to-bar pull-ups
DB push press (35/20)
*Time cap: 12 minutes

If that WOD looks familiar to you, then you have been paying really close attention to this blog.  Good for you!  You get a gold star.  The 3RM shoulder press was a 2017 benchmark workout and we did the same cash-out back in July.  (Note: A different cash-out was scheduled after the 3RM shoulder press when we did this in January and April.)  There were 15 of us in class, so we needed to partner up on the shoulder press.  Actuary Mike and I ended up sharing a rack for this one.  Mike would be working towards a new PR at 110 pounds, while I would be chasing a new PR at 145 pounds.

As we made our way through some of the lighter sets, I took a minute to go over and talk to Neil.  The Brawl In The Fall competition was taking place in November.  This event is a bit different from the one held in the summertime.  The summer version includes teams of 4 with two males and two females.  You can sign up for either the scaled or RX divisions.  The fall version recruits teams of 2 with one male and one female.  You can still sign up for either the scaled or RX divisions, but if you have aged like a fine wine, you also have the option to join one of the age group divisions.  The categories available are 35-44, 45-54, and 55+.  Neil and his partner Ashley were not old enough for any of those groups, so they would be taking part in the scaled division.  Kris had contacted me and asked me if I could brainstorm names for her team (she was signed up with Bryan) and for Neil's team.  I came up with lots of ideas, but most of the ones that I came up with for Bryan and Kris weren't that great.  I wasn't having much luck with Neil and Ashley's team name until Sunday afternoon.  I was running around the yard with my dog Griffin when a really good team name popped in my head.  I told Neil that I came up with a name for his team, but he stopped me in my tracks.  He and Ashley had already signed up.  And they had used the name I gave them last week.  Huh?

Remember how I said we all hung out gabbing after last week's Dudes After Dark?  Well one of the things we talked about was how much Mike enjoyed trying to complete the Flight Simulator at Open Strength on Monday nights.  It had become so common that it felt like Open Strength on Monday needed a name, a la Dudes After Dark.  So I came up with "Flight Night With Mike".  The name got positive reviews overall, but it probably amused me more than anyone else.  "Flight Night With Mike" tickled my fancy so much that I suggested one of the teams use it for The Brawl In The Fall.  It wouldn't make sense to anyone outside the gym, but it had a nice ring to it at least.  Little did I know that Neil and Ashley would actually go with it.  I was flattered that they did, but it took the air out of the suggestion I came up with over the weekend.  Neil and Ashley both work at Vanguard, so I thought they would enjoy "Vanguardians Of The Galaxy".  Why did I prematurely push Flight Night With Mike?

Enough about the Fall Brawl, let's get back to the 3RM shoulder press.  Mike made easy work out of his early sets at 75, 85, and 95.  I didn't have any problems with my sets at 95, 115, and 125.  I thought Mike would keep making 10 pound jumps, but he decided to be more conservative when it came to his 4th set.  He only added 5 pounds, but still looked like he wasn't breaking a sweat as he did three reps at 100.  I was going to be sweating a lot during my set at 135.  In July, I had done a lot of contorting to get through three reps at 140.  I knew I could handle a set at 135, but it wasn't going to be easy.  It really came down to the first rep.  If that went well, the rest of the set would probably be okay.  Surprisingly, the first rep went very well and I didn't have much trouble with the other two.  Could I really get three reps at 145 when the three reps I did at 140 in July were so ugly?

Mike moved on to 105 for his next set.  I try my best to avoid tying my previous best marks, but Mike didn't have a problem with it.  Once again, he made it look easy.  This boy was definitely writing PR next to his name tonight.  I was up next with 145 pounds, my 1RM.  All I kept thinking about was how well the set at 135 had gone.  This might be a struggle, but it's not impossible.  Keep the faith!  I took the barbell from the rack and only got stuck a little bit as I pressed out rep #1.  Don't slow down, keep that barbell moving!  I brought the barbell back down, let it hit my shoulders, then pressed up for rep #2.  This rep was a lot more difficult.  For a second, I thought I might not get it, but somehow it kept heading north.  One rep to go!  PR city!  Make it happen!  I bounced the barbell off my shoulders one more time and pressed up with everything I had.  I was willing to grunt.  I was willing to fight.  But that damn barbell was more stubborn than I was.  Eventually I had to relent and drop it to back to my shoulders and put it back on the rack.  At least I got a new 2RM!  (Hooray?)

I might not have been destined for a new PR, but Mike certainly was.  We put 110 pounds on the barbell for him.  I'm always more psyched to see someone else hit a PR and there was no doubt in my mind that Mike was going to be successful here.  Rep #1: Yawn.  Rep #2: Easy peasy.  Rep #3: Uh oh.  Mike hadn't struggled with a single rep yet, but he was going to have work on rep #3 if he wanted this PR.  He never let the barbell stop moving and although it took a little longer than he probably would have liked, Mike pressed out the third rep and got a PR.

There was no point in trying 145 again because I knew I wasn't going to get three reps, so I decided to add 5 pounds to the barbell.  Say what?  No, I hadn't gone loco.  I wanted 150 pounds on the barbell so that I could try and hit a new 1RM.  I had never shoulder pressed more than 145 pounds.  Having just done 2 reps at that weight told me that a single rep at 150 wasn't out of the question.  It was nothing but positive thoughts and adrenaline as I approached the barbell for my final lift.  I took the barbell from the rack and...it went nowhere.  It was so much worse than my attempt to get the third rep at 145.  I'm not even sure that you could have slid a piece of paper between the barbell and my shoulders.  The set at 145 was the end for me. I just didn't realize it at the time.  Mike would go on to try 115 pounds, but he had the same issues I did at 150.  110 would be his final score.  My final score: 135.

We all got organized for the cash-out and Giulz asked us to grab our DBs.  I was surprised to see that there were so many 50 pound DBs available in a class this big.  Surely other people (Neil came to mind) would be going RX in this cash-out.  Maybe they were warming up with a lighter DB?  I wasn't sure what the deal was, but I couldn't complain about having my choice of the 50 pound DBs.  I chose a pair with rubber ends (always gentler in case you drop them to the floor) and headed down to the far end of the gym where I'd be doing the cash-out.  Giulz asked us to do 5 reps of the push press with our DBs.  I knew these were going to be tough, but I made it through 5 reps.  I had done well recently when facing mental hurdles and I was chalking up the heavy DB push presses as nothing but another one of those.  I put the DBs down and shook out my arms.

We didn't have partners for the cash-out, but Mike was still looking out for me.  He saw my DBs and asked me what the heck I was doing.  I didn't understand his question.  The RX weights were 50/35, weren't they?  Ummm...no, they were not.  Mike pointed to the whiteboard.  It clearly said the RX weights were 35/20.  I nearly made a huge mistake.  I picked up my DBs and hustled back over towards the lobby where I could exchange them.  My illiteracy explained why so many 50 pound DBs were available.  It also explained why all of the 35 pound DBs were gone.  I had no choice but to use 30 pound DBs instead.

Giulz broke us up into two heats to try and dilute the traffic that would be present on the pull-up rig.  I was in heat two, so I would have to wait a couple of minutes before getting started on my chest-to-bar pull-ups.  Once it was my turn to go, I realized that I was going to have to adjust my typical chest-to-bar pull-up technique.  In order to hit my chest against the bar, I have to do a pretty wild kip. That means I take up a lot of space with my feet kicking out in front of me.  Caitlyn was stationed at the next bar up from me and she looked close enough that I might hit her during my reps.  I had no desire to kick the unsuspecting Caitlyn in the back during the cash-out, so whenever I swung forward on the bar, I flared my knees out wide.  Depending on where she was on her rep, I imagined that my knees were probably appearing alongside of her.  Hopefully that wasn't freaking her out too much.  Once we slowed down and both needed breaks, I would simply wait until she took her rest before doing my reps.  When she started again, I took a break.  There was one moment where she pump-faked a break, stepping down on to her box before immediately getting back on to her bar.  I accidentally bumped into her on that rep and apologized.  (Esra was behind me and accidentally bumped into me once as well.)

I wanted to stay under 11 minutes for this cash-out, but the chest-to-bar pull-ups were really difficult to get through.  A muggy gym plus a movement that naturally knocks the wind out of you is a recipe for getting time capped.  Luckily, I had warmed up with 50 pound DBs, so the push presses felt pretty easy when I got to them.  I went 20-10 in round one and 14-6 in round two.  By the time I got to round three of the chest-to-bar pull-ups, I knew I'd stay under the time cap.  It was simply a matter of whether I could beat 11 minutes.

To begin the last 10 chest-to-bar pull-ups, I did three sets of two quick singles.  I was having a lot of difficulty breathing and couldn't convince myself to do more than that.  Giulz's story about throwing up was also resonating at that moment.  The clock can be a powerful motivator though.  I knew these sets of two wouldn't cut it, so I willed myself through the last four in a row to get back to the DBs.  I picked up the DBs and did 10 push presses as fast as I could, but it was too little, too late.  Final time: 11:05.

I definitely needed some time to lie on the floor as I had no desire to heave up my lunch in the men's room.  The conditions were awful in the gym.  We really didn't do much in the way of cardio, yet here I was feeling as nauseous as I had ever felt at the end of a WOD.  We needed cooler temps in the gym ASAP.

Once we had wiped down the pull-up bars and put our DBs away, it was time for Flight Night With Mike.  Oh yes, Mike was feeling much better than I was and wanted another shot at the Flight Simulator.  He got Esra and Caitlyn to join him, but I declined his invite.  Even if I wasn't feeling pukey, I wouldn't have participated.  Finishing the Flight Simulator was a cool goal, but once I had done it, I had no desire to do it again.  I don't read a lot of stories about people coming down from Mount Everest saying "man, I can't wait to do that again next year!"  That's basically how I viewed the Flight Simulator now that I had conquered it.

Mike and Esra were doing the full Flight Simulator while Caitlyn was doing sets from 3 to 30 rather than the normal 5 to 50.  We recommended that for her because this was her first time attempting the Flight Simulator.  How did they do?

Who doesn't love the Flight Simulator?

Mike was a rock star.  The guy never seems to get tired, so fatigue didn't play as large a role in this workout for him as it always did for me.  When I did this, I knew I couldn't mess up very much or I'd be too tired to get through it all.  The only reason Mike hadn't completed the Flight Simulator up to this point is because he had a lot of near misses on big sets in previous attempts.  That wouldn't be the case tonight.  He only messed up twice while making his way through the 19 sets required.  Throw in that he didn't need as much recovery time as I did and this bout was called early.  Mike's final time: 18:24.

Esra had the best form of this trio.  She also had the fastest rope speed.  So it was odd to see her struggling so much during the first 5-10 minutes of this workout.  She would jump back and forth during her sets and it is possible that was what tripped her up.  It was hard to see what else it could be.  She was stuck on the set of 25 for an eternity, but once she finally got past that one, she had a few successful sets in a row.  She made it through the round of 40 before the 25 minute time cap hit.

Caitlyn was feeling good early on in her attempt.  While taking a break after the set of 18, she told us that she wished she had done the regular format (where each set increases by 5 rather than 3).  The Crossfit gods did not like that.  Poor Caitlyn did set after set after set where she got 20 reps when she needed 21.  She must have done 10 sets that ended somewhere in the 15-20 double under range.  By that point, frustration becomes too tough to overcome.  She was still stuck on that set of 21 when the time cap hit.

Esra and Caitlyn were on board with trying this again next week, but I had a hard time believing Mike would want to make a return appearance.  Flight Night With Mike was already defunct.  It needed a new name.  I couldn't come up with something that rhymed with Esra, so I offered up "Flight Date With Cait".  If you see a team with that name at the Brawl In The Fall, you will know where they got it from.

Tuesday preview: Esra breaks the rules.  Bryan outduels me in the warmup.  I begin to seriously question if Crossfit KOP is the right place for me.