In The Nick Of Time

Let’s be honest here. Why do we put ourselves through Crossfit if it’s not to improve our fitness?

For me, it has never been about me against others (ok, maybe a little bit of secret competition between me and others, but they don’t need to know! 😉 ), but mainly, a quest at getting stronger, both mentally and physically.

From the get-go, I have set goals for myself. One of them was to back squat my body weight. In the past few weeks, I have been so close to achieving this goal, but I was still 5lbs short. I knew I wanted to go in for the WOD this morning because our skill was back squats and it would be my last attempt for this goal for the year (my current deadline for this goal). I have set many goals throughout the year and just roll them over to the next year when they are not achieved. I stepped on the scale this morning just because I wanted to know which weight I needed to hit in order to make it happen. The scale read 144.8lbs. Alright! 145# would have to happen somehow today in order for me to make my goal happen.

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Skill: Back Squat 6×2 E90s

Coach Adrianna was coaching us today and I was super happy to get to see her before she leaves us for Seattle. Those Seattle people are so lucky to have her and they don’t even know it. I will miss her terribly and I was gonna take advantage of today to make the most of it. She told me to try to hit 140# on my 5th set and if I missed, I could always lower the weight on my bar for the 6th round. If I succeeded, then I was golden to try at 145# on the 6th round. Ben and the girls also came to cheer me on so that was good too! Marika was there and we were doing stupid shit throughout our warm-up, doing the Hullk pose similar to this:

 

all while grunting and saying stupid things like “Bro sesh!”

We warmed up individually and then we all set off for our sets, just as Mr Lucas Parker walked in. That’s right! He trains at our gym and I get to see him a lot, but I’m still way too intimidated to talk to him, so I go about my business as usual when he’s there.  I started at 120# and made 5# increments with each rounds. When I got to 135#, it started to get heavy. I was nervous about hitting 140# x2 because I had missed my 2nd rep just 17 days ago. I managed to pull through the two reps and got ready to attack 145#. I went down with the bar on my back and started to go up. I got stuck for what felt like an eternity. I was out of the bottom of the squat, but couldn’t straighten my legs anymore. CRAP! I really wanted to hit my goal this year and I didn’t want to let go of the bar! I kept the bar on my back, pulled on it with all my might and, somehow, managed to get out of the squat and get back out.

YYYYYYEEEEEESSSSSS!

I let out a huge victory scream as I had finally achieved the goal I had set for myself 2 weeks after my 1st Crossfit class!

I’ve never been prouder of a yellow star!

I tried to go for a 2nd rep, but I really couldn’t get out of the bottom and bailed out safely. Still though! I was so pumped! I have had this goal for 868 days (2 years, 4 months and 16 days, but who’s counting, really?!?) and I can finally put a check mark next to it, all on the last day of my target date! Nothing was gonna wipe the goofy smile off my face!

Kathleen walked in literally a minute too late to witness my feat, but she was still super pumped for me! As I was getting my stuff ready for the WOD, Lucas commented on my squat and said “That was a good lift!”

Seriously? Could this day get any better? Not only do I reach a massive goal, but Lucas Parker compliments me on it! Hell yeah! I thanked him and got my spot ready for the WOD.

WOD: You Lift Me Up

That was a tough one as you were supposed to go all out at max effort for 2 mins and use the built-in rest after. I was gonna try the FG with my bar at 65# for the thrusters and use the 35# KB. It was my 1st time doing thrusters at 65# outside the Open and I was struggling. I managed 24 reps (2 cycles) on the 1st round and 19 reps on the 2nd cycle. Coach Adrianna came by and switched my KB down for a 26# for the other 2 rounds. On my 3rd round, I managed another 24 reps and I was then able to do the AKBS without breaking them, but I was getting tired. The struggle became real on my last round when I couldn’t push the bar overhead for the thrusters and had to set it down. Most of my thruster reps were muscled overhead and that got exhausting really fast. I only managed 15 reps for that round before I slumped on the floor, tired, giggling with happiness and exhausted!

Sweat angel! I got junk in my trunk, but that butt helped me squat my body weight, so there!

I celebrated a little more with Marika, Adrianna, Kathleen, Ben and the girls before I got cleaned up a bit. I then met “new Adam” (a new coach at our Box) and he seems very friendly! We spoke French a bit as well since he’s from Ottawa! I then had to say goodbye to Coach Adrianna. She asked if she could hug me. I wasn’t even going to offer because I was afraid it would tip both of us into a puddle of tears. It felt like I could have hung on to her hug forever. She has been an amazing coach and supporter and her encouragements and tips haven’t gone into deaf ears. I will make sure to remember her advices and hopefully will go to visit her in Seattle sometime in the next 2 years.

We left the Box and got groceries, ran errands downtown, finished laundry at home and made dinner. My legs are shaking when I get on my tippy toes and for some weird reason, my right heel hurts. My traps are also sore from all those muscled thrusters and I can’t wait to sit with my hot water bottle, my blanket and my knitting in front of the TV. I’m not sure I’ll be up to ring in the new year as I can feel my body slowly shutting down from the adrenaline and excitement from today.

In all honesty, it’s been a very rough end of the year for reasons I won’t get into on the blog (what? I’m allowed some privacy, no?!? Lol!) and I certainly wish 2016 will get better for me. In any case, the only resolution I plan on making for the next year is to put myself and my needs at the top of my list, just below my children’s needs. I have proven to myself that I am strong and that when I have something in mind, nothing will get in the way of my determination. I will now apply that in my personal life as well. If people around me thought I was ruthless before, they ain’t seen nothin’ yet!

I’m currently holding on, but will hopefully soon relax and exhale…

May your celebrations of the end of 2015 be merry and safe. May your 2016 be bold, relentless and strong. I know mine will be because that’s what I want it to be.

Christmas Cold

I haven’t posted in a bit. My last night shift, Rina got sick with a fever and a sore ear and Ben brought her to the ER to get checked out. It turns out she is fine and we have been managing her symptoms with Tylenol and Advil, but I finished my night with a sore throat and when I woke up from my nap, I had a full blown cold. So, to recap, Rina is sick, Béa is sick and I’m now sick as well. To top it all off, Ben has finally caught it as well and we are a couching/sniffling/sneezing mess of a family.

A little head cold didn’t stop me from making my way to the Box on Saturday and this morning as well. I probably could have gone lifting on Thursday morning, but Ben was able to come home early and we spent the evening together, just chatting about life and things. It was nice and by the time he reminded me about lifting in the morning, I had missed my bedtime by about 2 hrs in order to get up at 0500, so I chose not to go.

This morning though, the girls didn’t have school so I took the opportunity to go back to the 0600 class and that meant waking up at 0500. It was nice to see the old crew again! Here’s what we did:

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Skill: Back Squat 5×3 (Tempo 3-2-1) E2M

I had done these 2 weeks ago and had finished at 100#, with a 10# PR. I remembered I was struggling with these and I wanted to try 105# for a new PR. I paired up with Gail and we got working. Here were my sets:

85#-90#-95#-100#-105#

I was pretty pumped about this new PR!

WOD: Thriller

We had tackled this one last June and I had done FG1 @55# on the 20″ box. Today, I was really wanting to try 65#, but with my cold and being back on the 20″ box for the first time since my rehab, I chose to stick to 55#. Good thing I did too because I kept gripping the bar unbalanced and that screwed up some of my reps. I had to re-adjust my grip at the top of the thruster and it made for some lost time.

The first round went well and I was really focusing on trying to be explosive from the hips on the BJ instead of just pulling my feet up onto the box. It was hard since I also had to focus on bracing my inner abs while stepping down from the box in order not to jut my butt to the side (which aggravates my sciatic pain). Sometimes when I think too much about a movement, it’s almost like it’s too much for my little head and then my body is all wonky. That’s what happened today.

My third round was horrible for my grip on the thrusters and I had to put the bar down after 6 reps. I was also really cramping out at the bottom of the squat on the BJ and Coach Caleb came by to remind me to use my hips. I was tired and not sure I could do just that, but I made a mental note to try it on the next round.

My 4th round was better. I didn’t have to put the bar down, I just rested at the top of the thrusters and kept going and was trying to be more explosive on the BJ. I’m not sure I managed, but Coach Caleb told me he could tell I was at least trying. I guess, that’s “A” for effort! Lol! 😉

Here were my reps today vs. back in June:

• 1:29 today  vs. 1:29 in June
• 1:34 today vs. 1:35 in June
• 2:03 today vs. 1:36 in June
• 1:41 today vs 1:48 in June

Had it not been for me dropping the bar on my 3rd set, I think I could have PR’d this WOD, but I didn’t do so bad considering I’m stuffed up and coughing a bit. My time for today was 3:32 vs. 3:17 back in June, which is only 15s slower. I’m not too upset about that one and so far, no sciatic pain from the BJ step down! I’ll take it!

The girls are home with me today and surprisingly enough, I don’t have any cooking, cleaning or laundry to do. I had planned on taking them on a short hike, but it’s raining outside so we are doing collages and playing with Play-Doh. I’m hoping to get to wrap some Christmas presents today and tonight and be done with that before I head back to work tomorrow.

PR During Rehab

*More about women’s health and pelvic floor stuff in this post. Dudes might want to skip this one too*

Let’s be honest here. I’ve been in a funk. I fairly certain that I have SAD (seasonal affective disorder) and the gloomy/rainy weather isn’t helping a ton. I was also having a little pity party regarding my sciatic pain and I was secretly afraid this would mean the end of me squatting, deadlifting, thruster-ing, clean & jerk-ing and snatching. It made me really sad that I was thinking about giving up, but the butt pain was annoying to no end. Ok, maybe I wasn’t really sad about never having to snatch ever again, but that’s a different story. I have a tendency to keep quiet when I feel this way because my Mom always said to keep your mouth shut if you have nothing nice to say…

So yeah, annoying funk. When I get in a funk, I eat. Not always good food choices. My new jeans are feeling snug and so are my scrub tops again. In order to snap myself out of the funk and emotional eating, I reached out to Kathleen and Courtney and we have embarked on a (second for me) Whole30 together. If one of us falls off the wagon, we ALL have to do 15 burpees… per cheat snack. We started last Thursday and so far, everyone has been on plan! Way to go ladies!

I have also had my 1st appointment with the pelvic floor physic. It was interesting and mildly uncomfortable at times. I mean, where else do you get little stickers (electrodes) put next to your bum hole and vagina, hooked up to an ultrasound and get to see the strength of your inner abdominal muscles and rectal muscles as well. Add to that the presence of an almost 3-year-old who was peeking under my gown and asked A LOT of questions and you have a pretty good picture of my appointment.

The findings were interesting though:

• I have weak rectus abdominis (front abs)
• My abdominal muscles remain contracted too tight, even at rest.
• I can’t hold a deep abdominal contraction for 10s during kegels
• I get better control of those contractions if I think more about contracting my anus than if I focus on my abdomen.
• My internal obliques and transversus abdominis are working overtime in order to compensate

In terms of regular physic, here’s what’s wrong with me as well:

• I have too much mobility and squat too low, curving my spine at the bottom of the squat, resulting in my obliques taking over and adding a toll onto my lower back
• Too much mobility on the erg as well, resulting in the same outcome as in the squat

What I’m doing to fix this:

• Lots of kegels (we’re talking 60 reps of 10s contractions with holding and 10s rest)
• a weird contraction of the deep abs while lying on the floor and opening my legs sideways, then extending the leg out straight.
• firing the small deep posterior chain before doing any squatting or any heavy lifting
• contracting my pelvic floor muscles when lifting heavy, or even lifting the girls
• one-legged step-ups in the stairs and focusing on not tilting my pelvis
• Squatting down to a med ball to limit my squat depth and ensuring I don’t squat too low (still below parallel, but not ass-to-the-grass

It doesn’t sound like much and when I do my keels and pelvic floor exercises I pretty much look like I’m just standing or lying down and staring into nothing-ness, but it’s a lot of hard work. I also started these on last Thursday.

What I have noticed so far:

• I haven’t had a flare up in my sciatic pain since Thursday.
• The numbing I felt in my lower back has decreased tremendously. So much so that I recently sat down and was amazed to notice what it felt like to sit down and not have that low numbing pain in my back
• I did thrusters today, PR’d my 1RM and there was no leakage
• I sneezed twice today without crossing my legs and also without experiencing any leakage
• I’m not feeling any discomfort in my sciatic or lower back at all after doing the thrusters today
• The pelvic floor PT gave me the green light to start doing my ROMWOD again, now I just have to clear it with the regular PT!

This is huge people! After 5 + years of lower back pain/ butt pain/ sciatic pain, I’m walking almost pain-free and it feels awesome. It has brought back a little of positiveness in my life and it makes the world of a difference in my day-to-day life.

Ok, enough about my lady bits and let’s now focus on the WOD today:

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1RM Thruster: I warmed up to 65# before the timer went off and I planned on doing those E2M with 5# increases on each rep. I was hoping to hit 90# on my last rep, which would have been a 5# PR. Here’s what I ended up doing

65#-70#-75# with the assist of a med ball behind me in order to know when to stop dropping. I almost tripped on it when I did 80#, so I decided to try without any assist on the last 2 reps. 85# went well and Coach AJ told me I had good speed. I failed 90#. I managed to squat it and get up with it, but I couldn’t press it overhead. I was slightly disappointed. I humm-ed and aww-ed for a little bit and then decided to try for a 2#-PR anyway and go for 87#. I went to get the fractional plates and added them onto my bar. I had about 20 seconds left before the 12 minutes were up and i took a deep breath and went for it! I was so happy to get it up and above my head! I didn’t have much expectations that I would PR while rehab-ing my sciatic, but this was a nice welcomed surprise! 🙂

Double Tabata Row: A Tabata is an interval workout. You do 8 rounds of 20s work / 10s rest. Because it was so intense for my sciatic, I chose to go for the Assault bike instead of the erg. I probably could have done a regular Tabata, but not a double one. I set myself up next to Marika (who was on the Airdyne) and off we went. For the 1st Tabata, I managed to keep my intervals at 4 cals for all but the 7th interval! I was disappointed, but kept going and managed to get 4 cals for the 8th round. As soon as we entered the second part of the Tabata, I was just trying my best to keep each interval at 3 cals. I surprised myself by getting 4 cals for a few rounds, but I mostly stayed at 3. I was glad when It was over and my quads were throbbing nicely and seizing up slowly. I got off the Assault bike, got on all fours and then slumped onto my belly on the floor. I caught my breath and went to write my score on the board. I was shocked when I saw that Marika’s lowest score was 6 cals! Holy crap! I thought I’d worked hard for all my rounds, but my score was a measly 3! Coach AJ told us that they don’t count calories the same way and after doing some research online, I found in some forums that people mentioned the Assault bike was scoring about 1/2 the cals and distance when compared to the Airdyne. Good to know I wasn’t so far behind then!

I’m just happy with how today’s session went. I know you can’t always have great workout days, but it sure start the day the right way when you do well on the Skill and WOD!

Putting In The Work, Reaping The Slow Progress

I’ve been at this Crossfit craziness for a little over two years now and to say that I absolutely love it is an understatement. Don’t get me wrong, there are days when I truly don’t enjoy the WODs (ahem, crazy warm-up sesh followed by DT, ahem), but I know and trust my coaches and I know that, in the end, no matter how much I scale back, I am still working towards becoming fitter.

From the beginning of my little journey, I have always wanted to make sure that I understand the mobility behind a lift before I start increasing my weights. It has sometimes been frustrating to see others progress faster, to see them putting heavier plates on the barbells or to see them master a lift or a gymnastic move that still evades me, but, overall, I have managed to stay true to my promise of moving properly before adding weight. Two years into this, I am between Novice and Intermediate (as per this chart) for all my lifts. I’m sure I could probably be a solid intermediate or even higher if I trained more, but I am a wife, a mom and I have a job, therefore, I am pretty happy with where I stand today.

Up until recently, I was using 55# for all my lifts during WODs and I kind of promoted myself to 65# a few weeks ago. It has been challenging for certain WODs, impossible for others and has felt comfortable for some. See? Intermediate! 😉

Here’s what we did today:

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We really warmed-up our hips and ankles and the mood was pretty cheerful throughout the warm-up. Then, it was time to get serious and tackle this WOD.

Triple Treat

I warmed-up with 55# and although the thrusters felt somewhat easy and the deadlifts were truly easy, I knew it would become taxing towards the end. Still, I unloaded my bar, put on 15# plates on each end and was ready to tackle this one at 65#. Coach AJ came by and told me she wanted me to really be explosive from the hips in the BJ and actually move my hips. I have a tendency to keep my hips at the same height and only pull my legs up like  a frog jumps. It makes things easier for this short stuff to get on the box, but it’s not proper form. I did a few reps and it was definitely more challenging, but it gave me something new to work on, form-wise.

I managed to do all 6 rounds with a squat thruster for my 1st rep of every thrusters and keep going from there. The deadlifts were definitely the easiest (for me) in this WOD and I tried my little heart out to really engage my hips in the BJ. That made for some very noisy landings on the box, but I think, overall, I did ok. I could tell on my last round that my form was slowly reverting to my old habits, but I was still determined to work on these! Even though this WOD was a “no score” one, we were able to keep track of our times for each rounds. Here’s how I did:

1. 0:52
2. 0:50
3. 0:46
4. 0:45
5. 0:43
6. 0:42

I was pretty pleased that I was able to shave off 10 secs of my initial time for this!

After the WOD, Coach AJ came by and told me I made her “want to try that ROMWOD thing. You’re moving so well and your squats are so good!” It’s nice to know that what I’ve been working so hard on for the past 2 years is finally paying off and people are noticing.

She asked me if I felt any different in my performance and, funnily enough, today is the first day that my sciatic is truly killing me post WOD since I have started the ROMWOD. Is it because I changed my BJ? Not sure, but it sure is (literally) a giant pain in my butt. I went to the mall with Béatrice after my workout and I couldn’t walk while holding her in my arms, it was hurting too much. Even with her walking by herself, I was limping next to her while we walked really slow. I guess it’s really time I book a chiro appointment for some active release therapy!

As for ROMWOD, I can definitely see an improvement in my flexibility, but I’m not sure how it’S helping me in my performance overall. I really enjoy the increased flexibility I have gained in the past 2 weeks and am looking forward to keeping it up, even if it feels like relaxation most of the time.

Seated Straddle, 2 weeks ago, after 4 minutes into the pose. Head isn’t touching the forearms, shoulders are up.

Seated Straddle, 2 days ago, at the beginning of the 4-minute hold of the pose. Forehead is almost touching the forearms

Seated Straddle, 2 days ago, at the end of the 4-minute hold. My head is past the forearms and almost touching the ground. Definitely an improvement!

Long Day

0400: Snoring and emergency vehicle alarms going on. The snoring I can deal with by nudging the culprit, the alarms go on for an unnatural long time.

0500: Feels like I just fell back asleep. Time to wake up and get ready for the WOD. Looking forward to this one, even though I can barely walk my quads are still so stiff from the squats and GTO from Wednesday. Pre workout fuel-up of cashews and turkey. Out the door at 0530

0600:

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Skill: Trap Bar or Axle Bar DL 4×6 E2M

Last time, I had done the trap bar DL, so today was time to switch it up and use the axle bar one. I wasn’t sure where to start weight-wise on the bar so here’s what I did:

90#-95#-100#-105#

I felt good still at 105# and I think my grip could have taken more. Good to know for next time! ;

 

WOD: Three Fifteen

I teamed up with Telsey and Jenny for this one and it was nice to be able to workout with Telsey again. It was my first time meeting Jenny and she was such  sweet woman! I was really wanting to try this WOD FG at 65#, but I was also very happy to scale it down for my team. I remember too well being the newbie in the class and being terrified of holding people back. I didn’t mind lowering the weight on the bar today, it allows me to really focus on form and being explosive at the hips on the thrusters. I had devised a plan of attack for the WOD and we all agreed on it:

• switch the thrusters every 5 reps
• switch the BJ every 10 reps
• switch the DUs every 30s.

I started us off on the thrusters and was a bit slow on the account that I was cleaning EVERY REP! Coach Caleb came by and corrected my mistake! I’m such a keener! The rest of the rounds were uneventful and we moved through the 6 mins quickly.

Onto the BJ, I managed to jump up all my reps and I was super stoked with that. I also managed not to mangle my shins, so bonus there as well! 😉

The DUs is where we slowed down considerably. I was the only one on our team who could get some reps at DUs, but even at that, all my reps were single ones. I couldn’t string them at all today. Oh well, it is what it is! Honestly, I was just happy to be moving today. My body is so freakin’ sore from Wednesday. I know I’ve said it before, but it’s been a while since a skill/WOD combo destroyed my body this much!

We finished with a total of 214 and my personal stats were:

• 25 thrusters
• 50 BJ
• 14 DUs

If you do the math (or if I do it for you), you’ll see that I was responsible for 41.6% of my team’s score. I’m not doing the stats to brag. I remember doing partner WODs over a year ago and wanting to pull my fair share of the work, yet somehow not managing to accomplish that goal. If it was a 3-person team, I would always hover around the 27-29% mark. If it was a 2-person team, I would hover around the 40-43% mark. The fact that I managed to hit almost 42% of our score today lets me know that I am doing something right.

0700: Rush home, say goodbye to Rina before she leaves for school, shower, breakfast and get ready to head out with BeZU to the pumpkin patch at Galey Farms with her pre-school.

0915: Leave 1/2 of untouched coffee behind (still morning this one) to go pick up other preschool mom and son who live 1 street away from us.

0930-1130: Snacks, train ride, hay ride, pumpkin picking in the field and finish it off with a quick trip to The Root Cellar to pick up ingredients I’m missing for my food prep before work tomorrow.

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1200: Getting lunch ready for Béa and making this Paleo fried rice (I subbed the soy sauce for coconut aminos) 

I also wanted to make this, but by the time I was finished the fried rice, it was time to get Béatrice ready and out the door to pick up Rina at the bus stop.

1545: All the family is back home and I now have to figure out dinner. I am done with cooking at this point, so take-out it is for the girls and I have some of the fried rice for myself (needless to say the kids won’t eat it if it’s not orange). Cleaning up the kitchen, unloading the dishwasher, clearing the table, picking up the toys all over the house, another quick shower for myself before I bathe the girls and then a surprise pop-by visit by my sweet SIL who dropped off this little beauty:

She knows me well!

I packed my food for tomorrow’s work day, put the girls in bed, did my ROMWOD (Thank you sweet baby Jezus it was only 9mins-long) and am now cuddling with the hot water bottle. I have been awake for almost 15hrs, have been going non-stop all day and I’m ready for bed. A few technicalities to take care of (finish this post, floss, brush teeth, set alarm, triple check that I’ve set alarm to AM mode, not PM, read 1 line of my book on my iPad) before I finally fall asleep for what I’m hoping will be a restful night.

There were a few times when I wanted to call it quit today, but I applied my tried and true strategy that I use in Crossfit: it’s just one more rep hour, you can do this. Just finish your meal prep, then you can rest. Just unload the dishwasher, then you can rest. Just get the girls to bed, then you can rest.

Now I rest for a bit. I’m out y’all!

 

The Return Of The Klutz!

I saw the WOD last night and I knew it looked harmless, but would be a tough one. I just didn’t know how tough I would really make things on myself! I thought, if the WOD is going to suck, at least, I’ll have fun with my outfit!

Calling on my inner cheetah, not cougar! Lol! I love how they make my quads look big! 

I showed up for the 0930 class and Coach AJ welcomed us. I warmed up my hips, posterior chain and my wrists because I knew we would be working them and those are my weak spots. For once, I felt I warmed-up properly for the skill and WOD. I didn’t know it would be downhill from there.

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Skill: Hang Snatch 6×2 E90s

My plan was to work up to 65# on my last rep. While I was warming up with an empty bar, I lost my balance at the bottom of the squat and because I was wanting to save the empty bar and not let it drop to the floor, I fell on my butt, pulling the bar towards me and ramming it into my shin. Yep! That made me see stars and my foot got numb and tingly. I took off my lifting shoe while Coach AJ brought me an ice pack and I slowly made sure nothing was broken. The pain was real and I was breathing through it. I managed to move my toes, then my ankle. It was sore, but after a few minutes, I took off the ice pack, put my lifting shoe back on and the sensation came back in my foot. I had missed the warm-up and the first 2 sets of the skill, but I picked up the bar and worked my way up.

35#-40#-45#-50#

My first few reps were pretty broken down and I admit I was scared and guarding my shin, but then it got a little bit better. I didn’t quite make it to the weight I had in mind, but it’s ok. It wasn’t my worst set and it wasn’t my best either. Somewhere nice in the middle.

WOD: Thrundle

After I hit my shin with the bar, my super cute leggings were clinging to the part where the skin got ripped off and the friction was not fun, but I was pretty confident about doing the WOD. Plus, I figured, the running would increase the blood flow to the area and help bringing on the healing, oxygenated blood. See? Who knew I could use nursing in Crossfit?!? LOL!

I chose to do FG2 with my thrusters at 65#. I knew it would be challenging, but it is time I start increasing the weights on these during the WODs. There were only 4 of us actually running outside and I was the only girl. The guys took off like little gazelles and I stayed behind. My goal was to break the thrusters into 4s and hopefully finish under 12mins. I came back in from the run dead last and took 4 deep breaths before getting onto the thrusters. I did 2, held on to the bar and regulated my breathing before doing 2 more and putting the bar down. I took 4 more breaths and picked it up again, only to do a wonderful power clean! Space cadet! I finished up the movement by doing a push press and then did proper thrusters.

The second run wasn’t any worst or better than the first one and I repeated my strategy for the second set of thruster, minus the power clean 😉 !

Back out for the 3rd run. Everybody was inside by the time I reached about 100m out and my shin was throbbing a little. I took a walking break for 8 deep breaths and picked it up again. Only a short few minutes left to suffer before I would be done, I could do this.

I came back in, took 5 deep breaths and picked up the bar for 2 thrusters, caught a few more deep breaths and finished off 2 more reps before putting the bar down. I was looking at the timer and it was already 11:28, so I knew I had to pick it back up and finish those last 4 reps if I wanted to reach my goal. I made it just in time, finishing last at 11:58.  I’d say it wasn’t too bad, considering how clumsy I’d been!

I put my bar away and was pretty proud of my time. I came back home to shower and then iced my shin once more. I will repeat that a few more times today and make sure to mobilize my foot a bit to prevent stiffness from setting in.

I will leave you with my very own little fierce Crossfitter. I took Rina to her 2nd Crossfit Kids class yesterday and she had a blast, all while surprising me. I didn’t think she could row to accumulate distance, but she actually managed about 100m/2min!

Love that determined / fierce look in her eye!

Pulling the little sled (empty, obviously)

Mentally Gone

I had a long weird day at work yesterday and I was hoping a good night’s sleep would set my head straight, but it didn’t. Maybe I am still jet lagged or maybe I’m still just on vacation mode. Who knows?

What I do know is that I woke up bracing to face Fran.

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You know you are struggling in the warm-up when you try jumping pull-ups from a 35# plate and Coach AJ come by and adds a 45# plate under your feet. I’m vertically challenged and the struggle for pull-ups is real! #truestory

Skill: Power clean 6×3 E90s

Originally, I was gonna aim for 85# on my 6th set. Even though I was a bit tired, I figured, maybe I could go for 90#? I managed my first 2 reps beautifully with maybe a slight early elbow bend in the pull (according to Coach AJ) and I was getting tired. I didn’t dip low enough to catch the bar in the proper position and I landed it on my boobs, instead of on my collar bone. Needless to say it knocked the wind out of me and I dropped the bar then and there. I was working on catching my breath and stopping the dizziness that had begun when Coach AJ came to check up on me. I didn’t try again and got my stuff ready for Fran. I also realized that 90# used to be my 1RM and I had done 2 successfully before failing my 3rd rep… Food for thought.

WOD: Fran

I was tempted to try my pull-ups with the red band only, but then thought better and added the purple one as well. I also toyed with the idea (for a very brief time) of trying the thrusters at 65#, but then revised that down to 55#. I was already tired and dropped one bar today. No need to try to repeat that a second time around.

I’m not quite sure what happened to me, but I clocked out mentally during the WOD. I don’t go into negative self-talk, I don’t repeat my mantra (“one more rep, just one more rep”), I just zone out. I don’t care about where I’m at and how long I’m taking. I’m just not in the moment. It’s a weird place to be and I’ve felt that way on Wednesday as well. I was talking to Tracey and she said it was because of my vacation and I just need some time to get back into the rhythm of things. I was in the first heat and I was so slow, that people from the second heat were finishing their 21 thrusters before I was done with my round of 9. Oh well! I got to the pull-up bar and finished my 9 reps painfully. My time was 12:21. I had done it back in December 2014 with the same modifications, but using the box to get onto the pull-up bar and finished in 12:03. I was hoping to beat that time today, but it didn’t happen. Still, Bo thought it was pretty good to do Fran so close to my PR time not even a week after coming back from vacation.

I felt just Meh! about it all and made my way home. I showered and could feel a nice little egg on my chest where I landed the bar and it had started to bruise up nicely. Whoops! I’ll have to camouflage those bruises tonight as we are going to a birthday party for a little while before putting the girls to bed.

Bruising up nicely!

We went to play mini-golf with the girls this morning before going to look at patio furniture in town, but the sales are crap and we didn’t find the “perfect bench” for our front porch. Next year, maybe.

We came back home after lunch and I cleaned up our entire bedroom (ceilings, walls, mouldings, etc) as well as go through my clothes and got rid of a ton of stuff. I plan on going through every room in the house for the remainder of my vacations. I’ll go slow and hopefully, will have time to get it all done! For now, I’m very much looking forward to a weekend of rest!

When All Else Fails, Just Do One More Rep

I came home yesterday from an absolutely exhausting shift in the NICU. I had been busy all day, missed my dinner break and was very much looking forward to putting my feet up on the couch and devouring my dinner when I got home. The girls were both asleep and I thought I was in the clear for a relaxing evening. I showered and just as I sat with my dinner, BeZU woke up crying, so I delayed (further) my dinner and went to soothe her and give her some water. When she finally calmed back down, I stuffed food in my mouth at light speed. It was 2100 and I had lunch around 1300. Once I was done inhaling my food, I numbed myself with some mindless reality TV until Ben came home. We did our usual 10mins check-in with one another before I went to bed. I slept like a rock, despite the heat wave still in full force (30-32C in our room last night), but just before I went to bed, I looked up the WOD:

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I had vivid dreams of hang power snatches and, in my dream, I could easily do 65#, something I have yet to achieve in real life. In my dream, my reps were fluid and easy and I really nailed it. I woke up and felt like today was gonna be the day I would finally surpass 60#.

Walked in the Box this morning and found beauty in the bare space:

Early morning glory

We did the warm-up and then I had to demo the hang power snatch for everyone. Once that was out of the way, I set up my bar and my weights and got ready to tackle this:

Skill: Hang power snatch + OHS 6×1 E90s

I started with 40# and worked my way up. Once I reached 50#, I could definitely tell that it was getting heavier. I slowly feared my determination to reach 65# wouldn’t be enough for today. I did 60# and although the snatch felt challenging, the OHS felt really good. I loaded my bar with 65# and waited until it was time to go. I picked up the bar, went into the hang position and had a mental blockage. I got back up, reset the bar into the hang position and just lifted it up. I landed it in the power position, but had to do a double jump to stabilize the bar overhead. Once I did, I dipped into the overhead squat and that felt really good. Could it be that after 7 months of being stuck at 60# for any kind of snatch, I had finally broken through that barrier? Just to make sure, I put the bar down, waited a few seconds and re-did one more rep of just the hang power snatch. Surprise, surprise, it wasn’t a fluke because I got the bar back up, landed it in the power position and didn’t have to do a second jump to stabilize it this time around! Woot! Woot! I was one very happy girl!

40#-45#-50#-55#-60#-65# 65#

WOD: Jackita

I teamed up with Tracey and Kelsey for this one and everything that could go wrong pretty much did during this WOD. I set up the red and orange bands for my pull-ups (as well as a box to get myself onto the bar) and was planning on using 55# for the thrusters. Here were my reps:

• Thrusters: 8-6-5
• Pull-ups: 2-11-6

I started on the erg and rowed my 1 minute before going over to the thrusters. they felt good at 55# and I moved over to the rig for the pull-ups. I couldn’t do a strict pull-up with those bands, so I rushed back, switched the orange band for a blue one (the 1st band I could get my hand onto) and managed 2 reps before the minute was up. Not good 😦

I went back on the erg and I was breathing heavily. I went onto the thrusters and although I didn’t get as many reps as I did on my 1st round, it wasn’t too bad either. Back to the pull-up rig where I felt like I was sand-bagging the pull-ups as it was clearly too easy with those two bands. Oh well! That’ll teach me to look up what I did previously on the WOD instead of just winging it!

3rd round on the erg. I was wheezing pretty badly. I don’t know if it was because it was so humid this morning, but I had a sudden onset of asthma and I knew I didn’t have my inhaler with me. My last asthma episode was probably about 2 years ago and, although I have my inhaler in my work purse, it is probably long expired! I was really trying to catch my breath on the thrusters, but it took me a long time, hence the 5 reps. I moved onto the rig and, again, was trying to calm myself down. I know that the more I get into a panic about my asthma, the more I wheeze and the more constricted I get. I was just trying to calm down  and I was happy when it was all done and over with. I regulated my breath as best I could and Tracey helped me with her healing powers. I swear, she’s a unicorn in disguise: magical at Crossfit and in life! 😉 All in all, it was a pretty bad WOD for me and I did poorly compared to the previous time I had done this one, but I kept pushing through no matter what and, really, that’s all I can ask of myself.

I came home and then saw this on Facebook:

Burpee Punishment!

I forgot to put my bands AND my box away after the WOD. 1st time in 2 years that it happens, but I have been a space cadet over the past 2 days, to be honest. CFVC’s policy is a burpee punishment when you forget to put your equipment away. I videoed my punishment and posted it to FB so Coach Caleb would see that I kept my word, and then realized I had done only 28 burpees on the video so I did 2 more in the kitchen. Apparently, not only am I a space cadet, I also cannot count when doing burpees! 😉

I started my day slow and then got into the cleaning and laundry. My energy was dwindling by the time I finished and was glad to sit down for lunch a bit. Now, I can’t wait to go for nap before heading in to work tonight.

Pushing Through

Thank goodness we have a king-sized bed because we ended up sleeping the 4 of us in it last night. Béatrice is having a hard time with her molars (finally) coming through on her lower gums and Rina was having bad dreams. At 0130, both Ben and I gave up and took the girls to bed with us. It took me a while to fall asleep because, as per her usual, Béatrice kept snuggling me and stroking my face and hair. Just as I was about to storm out of bed to go sleep downstairs on the couch, she finally settled. I was exhausted and I knew I would need to be rested for today’s WOD:

 

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Skill: Deadlifts 5×5 E90s

Last time we did these, I did 115# for all reps. This time around, we were to increase our weight as we went along. I managed the hook grip on all reps and didn’t drop the bar on the last rep. I managed a nice 20# PR on these today. Here were my weights:

95#-100#-105#-115#-135#

WOD: Thriller

The Box was full this morning and I managed to find a spot below the rig.

0600 crew represent!

The only problem was, I couldn’t see the clock so I had to move my box around in order to get a clear view of the clock when I was done. I really wanted to try 75#, but that would have given me no rest at all and that wasn’t the point of this WOD, so I went with 55# for the thrusters. I managed the first round unbroken,  then round 2 and 3 I took some rest at the top of the thruster. Round 4 was a struggle. I had to actually drop the bar after my 9th rep. I picked it back up and finished my last 3 reps before getting to the box jumps. I had to no rep myself on my 5th rep because I almost didn’t make it to the top of the box and had to balance myself with my hands. That was scary and it brought back flashback to that one time I mangled my shins:

Painful Memories!

I settled my nerves (and thanked the little man above I was wearing my shin pads) on top of the box and kept going, but that ate a lot of my time on that round. Here were my times for each rounds:

1. 1:29
2. 1:35
3. 1:36
4. 1:48

For a total combined (fastest and slowest interval) of 3:17. Not stellar, but considering my lack of sleep, I’ll take it. Thank goodness I’ve been gearing up to the Whole30 nutrition-wise, I’m pretty sure that’s what helped me today! Weirdly enough, my scar on my left shin from my fall back in November was throbbing and hurting once I was done. Phantom pain?!? Coincidence? In any case, it took a while for the throbbing to go away. I’m just glad I managed to finish this one without falling! 🙂

 

A Newbie No Longer

Today is a holiday in BC and that meant only 2 classes at Crossfit. We were a large group for the 0930 class, but it was a team WOD and I was pretty pumped about the work to accomplish.

 

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I teamed up with a bunch of strong women with small feet so we wouldn’t fiddle with the erg (Alli, Bridget and Megan) and we got ready to tackle this stuff! I started us off on the thrusters. Man! Do I love working on the bar! Thrusters, especially! It’s a lift that comes easy to me, for some reason. I finished off with a 3RM of 85#. I had never done a 3RM before for the thrusters, but it’s a definite 15# PR from my 5×5 Squat Clean Thrusters. I started off by cleaning them from the floor, but I moved onto the rack at 75#. I felt proud as punch when we were done with these! Bridget killed it with 115#, Alli finished with 85# as well and Megan got 80#

After we were done our 4-mins rest, I started us off on the erg. I was trying to keep track of my calories for each interval, but I gave up after my second round. I know I got 13 and 15 cals for the 1st 2 rounds.

After yet another 4-mins rest, we moved on to the burpees. As much as I used to hate them when I first started Crossfit, they have now become one of my favourite move to do! I challenged myself by making sure I would touch the pull-up bar on every rep and managed 15 of them in my 1-minute. Not bad, considering everybody else on my team did the same, except for Megan who got 16! I felt so good after this WOD. I know I’m not at my peak performance yet, but I think I’m getting there. Tracey and I talked about the WOD when it was all done and she said that: “Someone who gets a 3RM Thrusters of 85# can no longer call themselves a newbie.” I guess I can’t hide behind that excuse anymore!

Coach AJ (who has come back to us recently) even said that I had gotten so much stronger since she had left. It was nice to hear and it made my proud of my hard work!

After I was done beaming, I made my way to the grocery store. I had forgotten to bring a change of clothes and was going around in my short shorts and my tank top. Yeah, let’s just say Crossfit attire outside the Box attracts some pretty marked glares! I passed a guy who gave me a nod and a smile after he stared at my shorts, then my Crossfit shoes. He was wearing a Crossfit shirt as well, so I smiled back! Crossfitters everywhere unite!

I’m so happy that I get the week off and will be able to go to the Box 4 times this week. This truly is my drug! I love Crossfit and I love me some barbell work! Proof is this love gush on Instagram!