Last days in Vegas

Had a bit of a rough start to the week, with a few late nights and 2 sleep ins. Good news is that I finally got the report done for our client, meaning that my official stint in Brisbane is over. I expect I'll be back for short periods to wrap this job up, but hopefully most of the work is now done! What a relief.

I managed to wake up for a run on Thursday morning and a crossfit sesh today.

Thursday's run was 12.7km in 48minutes (average 3:48min/km) according to the Suunto. I still haven't calibrated the new watch, but I don't think it's far off when compared to MapMyRun. I did the usual route along the river to the rowing club and back, but did it as a random fartlek session. Basically, I started slow, then whenever I saw a logical stretch I went hard for a few hundred meters (up to about 800m I'd say). Kind of like a very random Pain in the Domain, but on my own, at odd points, and along the river. Anyway, I enjoyed it and the average pace was pretty good.

This morning I did yesteday's Crossfit North Manly WOD. It was a 1-11rep ladder of the following:
40kg squat clean
40kg thruster
40kg overhead squat

So, you do 1 rep of each, then 2 reps, then 3 reps, etc. up to 11. Man, it was tough! Working up in reps is mentally hard. Funnily enough, none of the individual exercises were too hard, but it was the cumulative effect that killed me. Even the overhead squats themselves were OK (hopefully I was going deep enough). I did it in 35:02 and wished I was able to throw the weight around, because controlling it at the end of the last OHS set was hard! Anyway, I feel like my Oly lifting is improving, and hopefully with some direction from the coaches next week I'll start getting even better.

300

In a blatant copy of the Crossfit North Manly WOD from Saturday, Dave and I did the 300 workout today. I love this workout - it's one of the first "Crossfit style" workouts I ever did. I also love the hype and misunderstanding around it. Google "300 workout" and you'll find a ream of sites written by uninformed idiots with a baseless opinion. I find these very amusing as these people obviously have no clue what they're talking about. But, don't let me rant, check out the following article from the creator of the workout (click here). Gym Jones, the bunch who were tasked with training the cast of the movie "300", have a very similar fitness philosophy to Crossfit. Their website is very informative as well. Check it out.

We did a slightly modified version this morning, with Dave scaling down the floor wipers and cleans.

25 pullups
50 deadlifts at 60kg
50 tuck jumps
50 pushups
50 floor wipers at 60kg (1 rep is 1 one each side, so a total of 100 raises)
50 cleans (25 each arm) with a 17.5kg dumbell
25 pullups

I did 18:52, Dave was about a minute behind but he had to wait while I did my last few reps of floor wipers. We did abs after. Great workout. The floor wipers were killer. It's the first time I've done them RX'd.

New shoes AND GO THE SEA EAGLES!!!!!

Annabel thinks I have a running shoe problem. My Mizunos were feeling a bit flat and I was concerned that I'd injure myself again (a year ago I hurt my legs by over-using a pair of Newtons), so last weekend I bought a new pair of shoes from Northside Runners. Luke got me to try out a whole bunch of flats, but with similar cushioning to the Ronin Wave 3's I'd been in. I settled on a pair of bright green Saucony's. Today was my first run in them.

I wasn't sure what I wanted to do, but felt good after the first few kilometres, so decided to hit Mt Coot tha. I just did the JC Slaughter falls summit trail and back, but it was still a good 94minutes. The new Suunto Quest said a racked up 23km, but I think it may have overstated that a little. I'm guessing it was more like 21km. I need to calibrate the new watch!

I t was a beautiful day for running and I felt fantastic. I put in a really hard few kilometres at the end and just didn't feel tired. I am keen to work on my negative splitting so today is a positive sign.

Only a few more days to go in Brisbane. I worked til 9pm Saturday night getting a report out, and hopefully Monday/Tuesday will be OK. Annabel arrives Wednesday and we have a big drive back down the coast planned for Sat/Sun/Mon next week.

In the meantime, here a few photos f my new shoes and the whole Brissy shoe collection. Oh, and GO MANLY!!!!!!!! YEWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!

The new Saucony's. Porno, huh?

From the left: North Face Single Tracks (trail shoes), ASICs Kayano (very old runners that gave me shin splints, now my gym shoes), new Saucony's (training shoes), Mizuno Ronin Wave 2's (racing flats)

Games WOD

I've been working late and eating at work all week, so I felt crap and really had to force myself out of bed this morning. I got Dave's text at 6am to confirm he was coming, so I was committed.

We did 2 rounds of a slightly modified Games WOD 10 (final workout) as follows:
- 20 calorie row
- 30 thrusters with a 10kg dumbell
- 20 toes to bar
- 30 tuck jumps
- 20 SDHP with a 25kg dumbell
- 30 burpees
- 20 push press 50kg

We rested a few minutes between the rounds and did abs after.

Both rounds hurt, and took just over 10mins I think. I started this first rounf on thrusters, finishing on row, but did the prescribed order for the second round. I think that rowing first was harder. The push presses killed me - I need to work on my shoulder strength.

I wish I'd slept in

I really didn't want to get out of bed this morning. Like, really didn't. BUT, I'd committed to Dave that I'd do gym so I rolled out at 6am. Unfortunately, Dave slept through his alarm, and by the time I found this out, I'd already started the workout! Oh well, it's probably a good thing. I can sleep Friday.

I did the Crossfit North Manly session from today (that Annabel, Mom, Dad & Angus did in Sydney at the same time!). It was in two parts:

21-15-9 reps of supine ring rows and walking lunges with 20kg dumbells

then,
"Annie" which is 50-40-30-20-10 reps of double unders and situps

The first part took me 6:40, so was hard but quick. That is about as heavy as I'd want to go for walking lunges. "Annie" was a bit more challenging as my skipping was completely out of kilter this morning. I felt completely unco-ordinated, mainly because I WAS completely unco-ordinated!!! I did 3 skips per double under and the first set took me ages because I just couldn't get into a rhythm. Fortunately, I worked through it by the thrid set and was fine from there on. I also did GHD situps which are a bit harder than normal situps.

A weird problem I'm having from working late every night is that I never have time to go grocery shopping! Woolies shuts at 9pm so I left work early last night to get there just as it was closing. That meant I could feast this morning on a brekky of smoked salmon, poached eggs and baby spinach with my usual smoothie and coffee. At least that partly makes up for not sleeping in.

AMRAP

Did an AMRAP with Dave this morning and it hurt like hell. I haven't done one in a while but I think I'm going to start doing more as they're such an effective workout. I wish I'd had my heart rate monitor on.

The session was - AMRAP 20minutes of:
10 reps x Pullups
10 reps x Situps
10 reps x 40kg thruster
10 reps x ring pushups

It was great to have Dave there pushing me - we both almost caught each other once or twice (he was a lot closer to my heels than I was to his!!!). His thrusters were solid, whereas I found them a little heavy!

We got 9 full sets and 3 rounds of 10 (i.e. 9 plus 10 pullups, 10 situps, 10 thrusters for me). Afterwards, Dave did 50 box jumps and I did 2 hill "sprints". Not that I could really sprint after! My head went into a spin on the first hill and I battled up the second but called it a day when I saw Dave had done his box jumps.

Full gym this morning - the usual two ladies, the cougar, the little bloke in the hat and a few other dudes I've never seen before. Good start to the morning, although I'm going to need serious amounts of coffee today. I also need to shop - my smoothie was basically only chia, berries and milk this morning as I've run out of everything else!!!

Hurt Locker, rainy run and Monday

I won't have much time to blog this week due to work. A quick summary of the weekend in Sydney:

Saturday
I went to Keith's gym for a workout with Annabel. It was great! The session was a Games WOD:

Pullups, 100 reps
Kettlebell swings 24kg, 100 reps
Double unders, 100 reps (I did 300 skips)
Overhead squat 40kg, 100 reps (I only did 30kg)

My time was a bit of 32mins. I finished 1 second behind a girl who had done the same OHS weight as me (but lower KBS)!! I clearly have work to do. I thought it was a good workout and I learned a lot, including how to properly do a kettlebell swing! Apparently I've been going too far down and not using my hips enough. Keith also showed me some muscle-up progressions, which I'm going to practice.

Sunday
I picked up my new Suunto Quest from Northside on Saturday, so took Bo for a run to test it out. It was pouring with rain but we met Rochey for the 12km Seaforth loop. Had a great run despite the wet - Bo was fantastic and Rochey and I were going at a really good talking pace. The Suunto said 12.5km so I need to calibrate it for that 400m gain. Total of 54minutes (approx. 4:30min/km pace), including warmup and cleaning up after Bo!!

Monday
Back to Brisbane last night for what is set to be a hectic week at work. I did a modified WOD as follows:

21-15-9 reps of
Power clean 60kg (it was meant to be bodyweight, but I'm not up to that yet)
Ring dips
Burpees

I'm very glad that I got the cleans out. They weren't overly pretty, and I need to get under the bar more, but I still got em out! I did 4 sets of 10 toes-to-bar afterwards, as well as some muscle-up progression practice.

I also confirmed that I'm getting better at skipping! I think I'll try to start each session with skipping / DUBs practice and end with MU progressions until I get it right!

Back to work now.