What is your kryptonite?

Well, what is it? Maybe more importantly: Why is it so?

Mine: Overhead Squats.

Root Cause: Flexibility & mobility limitations

I've pretty much been a "stiff" my whole life. I've never had even above-average flexibility or mobility. Mostly, I think, because I didn't ever work on it.  At least I waited until my late 30's to wakeup to this! The impact of the issue, for me at least, is evident in many areas of my life including Crossfit movements, Krav Maga (nearly everything we do), and even recreational stuff like scuba diving ie(reaching back for my valves).

2011-Jul-29

Mobility WOD
T-spine camp-out

Krav Maga 1
Inside defense & round kick until we all died :)

KO Kickboxing
More round kicks...weee...heh

Keep moving

I've had an up and down week.It's amazing how much sleep interruptions can impact the next day. This week, with a sick dog, I've been woken up multiple times a night for a few nights in a row. I find myself fatigued, headaches, and just kinda blah. I have avoided naps b/c they usually make sleeping at night a struggle.

With Crossfit Central taking a normal week off for the Crossfit Games, I will keep moving by doing Krav Maga, Kickboxing, and some much needed Yoga. I've got that and a bunch of scuba diving this weekend, which will make the weekend go by way too fast!

I have GOT to do even more mobility work!  I'm going to go to Mobility WOD every day and do the day's MWOD to help loosen up my "grody grilled cheese glued together muscles."  :))

2011-Jul-28

Krav Maga 1
Today's class was fantastic! Really worked hard today, punches and hammer fists, then side hammers with power. It's crazy how much harder you can hit when you do it correctly. BOOM! BOOM BOOM! Awesome stuff. Finished the class with a 4 on 1 attack drill, which is pretty crazy - getting hit from all directions and fight them off for 1 min doesn't seem like long...yeah, it's a long f-ing minute!

Yoga For Athletes
Still in flow and zen week. Lots of nice long poses.

2011-Jul-27
Krav Maga 1
Class started off pretty rough: 4 rounds 20 jumping jacks, 20 pushups, 20 crunches, 20 squats.  What do you think of that for a warmup? We worked on straight punches, low and high, kicks, and choke defense.

KO Bag Kickboxing
More of the same...Fun. Pain. Sweat..a lot. Rinse & repeat.

Bonk

Today was one of those days. I thought I felt pretty OK then slowly started feeling kinda blah...then I got to my class and just bonked. I had basically jack shit today. It sucked. I sucked. I fell off the box on box jumps twice. I'd never done that before, ever. I just feel sacked. I'm looking forward to yoga later, though. It'll help me get focused and centered again. No time to worry about a bad workout today, for tomorrow I will wake up and hit it.

2011-Jul-26

Crossfit Central Benchmark WOD
CC Flyers
3 rounds
400m run
21 box jump
12 OHS
DNF ... 1 round & 21 box jumps of round 2 done.

Yoga For Athletes
Flow, yo...  

Playing for keeps!

Sometimes Krav Maga is pretty damn intense. We play these "games" where the instructor puts a kick shield or tombstone shield in random places around the room, makes the class lay face down, then yells "GO!!" and you've got to jump up, find a pad to hold else you have to punch / kick / whatever the drill is for one minute. If you're stuck with no pad and no one to punch (aka last man out) you have to do pushups, crunches, burpees, or whatever...basically being last standing sucks!  People will throw shoulder shivers, elbows, knees, hip checks, and anything else it takes to get to a pad. Today I took an elbow to the head...from a girl! Holy shit, she definitely was playing for keeps!


With a trip nearly half way around the world coming up, I've been reading about the TSA and such - you know, making the time I have left to wait longer. I came across this gem today:  Dude takes loaded gun to check in, and it goes off.... What an idiot.

2011-Jul-25
Krav Maga L1
Worked a lot on front kick, which is really fun (and really taxing). Then some straight punch game I mentioned earlier in this post. Finished off class with front choke defense to counter-attack. Stand with eyes closed waiting to be choked is still kinda freaky!

KO Bag Kickboxing
This class was intense. Lots of v-ups, crunches, leg raises, burpees, and pushups. The punch/kick combos were pretty good, but it was kinda sketchy doing jump kicks on a sweaty, slippery floor!

Almost back to normal

I think I am finally getting over the food poisoning or whatever from Saturday. It's made this week really challenging, to say the least. Staying hydrated has been the hardest b/c it's hard to drink or eat when your guts are all twisted up - not to mention you lose a lot of water. Anyway...

2001-Jul-22

KO Bag Kickboxing
More squat kick squat kick death combos ... awesome. Pretty full class for a Friday.

2001-Jul-21

Crossfit Central WOD
Sumo Deadlift 5x2
135, 135, 225, 315, 365X (none at 365)

3 rounds
15 KB clean R (2pood)
15KB clean L (2pood)
35 pullups
DNF (12min cutoff) - 2 rounds + 21 pullups RX


Yoga for Athletes
This is the last week of difficult poses!

2011-Jul-20

Krav Maga class
Straight advancing punches - these are hard to do correctly b/c of the timing and footwork. Roundkicks and roundkicks from the ground.

KO Bag Kickboxing class
Squat, round kick, squat round kick..this gets your HR up real fast!

Down, but not out.

Saturday the 16th I woke up early, the dogs were ready to go out to bark and waste my sleep time. I took them out and while watching them do nothing but walk around I realized I didn't feel right. A few minutes later, it changed from not right to bad. I will spare those of you that may read this the details, leaving just this - it's now Wednesday the 20th and my guts are still all twisted up and things are far from normal. It's hard to just stay hydrated! I didn't workout Saturday, Sunday, or Monday.

The joys of owning my own home were once again realized on Tuesday when the plumber was supposed to show up at 10 for a quick job and didn't arrive until 40min later, thus pushing past my time to leave for class at Crossfit Central - however, he did a great job replacing my spare bath shower/tub fixtures for a lot less than I expected and he didn't have to cut my walls open to do it. I'll take that trade-off.

2011-Jul-19

Krav Maga Class (Level 1)
Worked on advancing punches and elbows and internal defense (straight punches).

Yoga For Athletes
Standing poses, some kinda crazy word I will never remember or spell! A two min headstand to finish up the session

Hay-makers inbound!

This has been a really long week. I've done a lot of work and my fuel has been much better! Also, my laundry work has gone up - that is not a good benefit, is it?  Looking forward to Yoga tomorrow and taking a day to go diving on Sunday.

2011-Jul-15

KO Bag Kickboxing Class 
Man, today's class was hard. The usual combination type stuff then a surprise 1min of max round kicks using both legs if you want from any stance. I got 86. Not the best, far from the worst.

Krav Maga Level 1/2 Class
There was no break between the KO class and this one, so I hurried to hit the restroom and get back. We did a long warmup of shoulder/head/knee touch with partner then added jumping knee to chest 3x on command and three sprawls on command. I was hurting, but trying to keep breath control and not get hit. After some punch work we did the 360 defense. It's pretty damn intense to stand in the room with your eyes closed then wait for someone to tap you from some random direction, then immediately throw a huge hay-maker right at your head, side, or groin! The knife defense class really helped with this. Thankfully they had pads on their arms - I saw someone miss the block and take a pad to the head - no, not me (luckily).

Are you gamed?

I found this link on the Crossfit.com main site - Gamed. Its an interesting read on how companies try hard to get our dollars.

It's been a long week, but a good week! I am looking forward to some rest. Starting to feel like I am burning both ends of the candle.

2011-Jul-14
Crossfit Central WOD
Hang Squat Clean 7x1
135-135-155-185-205x-205  (ran out of time and gas for 7th)

WOD - 12min cutoff
50 Double Unders,
50 Box Jumps
40/40, 30/30, 20/20, 10/10
DNF - was in the 20 round, barely, Rx

Yoga For Athletes
Warrior Pose 2

Hips

It's pretty amazing how much power we can generate with our hips, isn't it? This is true in many things we do. Lift more. Hit harder. Kick like a horse. Fantastic stuff.

2011-Jul-13

Krav Maga class
Hammer fists, hammer side fist, groin kicks, and more choke defense. Good drill with two attackers on us at once.

KO Bag kickboxing class
We did some shadow boxing with dumbbells. Try this with 7lbs per hand for 10 min. Holy shit! Then on to the bag combos and kicks.

Two hrs of great work this evening.

Three -a-days?

Ok I've double dipped a few times lately, meaning more than one workout in a day. I haven't done three yet, and today I've been challenged to go for it. I'm not really nervous or anything, but I don't want to get injured trying to do too much in a day. Mainly I just have to keep hydrated, roll out, and go for it - right?  As one of these is a Yoga class, which can be brutally hard or kinda chill depending on the day, I'm not sure what to expect besides more sweaty clothes. Take that you stupid washer and drier...

I'm very much enjoying Krav Maga, kickboxing, and Yoga along with Crossfit. I think they're the pieces to the puzzle I was missing and will definitely help me reach my goals.

2011-July-12

Crossfit Central WOD
5 rounds
15 push-jerk, 115lb
500m row
18:39 Rx

Ok, for real, this WOD was way harder than I expected. I actually think push-press would have been faster, but I am often wrong. Who knows. I came real close to puking.

Krav Maga Class
We worked palm-heel strikes, groin kicks, & choke defense.

Yoga For Athletes 
Started yoga directly after KM. It was actually maybe a bit easier b/c I was already warm (way past warm, really). We did the superman pose and Warrior 1. For some this was harder than the triangle poses from last week, but for me it wasn't as hard to hold.

>> I filled my 40oz water container 8 times! That's 40 glasses of water <<



Who has two thumbs and will sleep well tonight? THIS GUY!

Double Down

I think that signing up for Krav Maga and all their classes at Fit & Fearless has been a great thing for me. Over the last month I've gained a TON of confidence and I feel like my metcon is definitely improving. Also, it's made me focus a lot more on what I fuel my fire with. Let the benefits roll!

I haven't really ever doubled down on workouts, but lately I have been doing that a bit more. On the 11th doing those classes back to back was pretty freakin' awesome and I felt strong and focused the whole two hours. Good stuff.

Do you double down?

2011-Jul-11

Krav Maga Class
Worked palm-heel strike, front kicks, elbow 1, and choke defense. Great class today.

KO Bag -Kickboxing Class
Another fun, yet crazy challenging class. Lots of kick, jab, squat jump, sprawl, punch combos. It's almost like doing burpees then punching again haha

2011-Jul-10

Went diving. One technical/decompression dive and two fun dives. A fantastic day!

2011-Jul-9

Yoga For Athletes
Triangle poses. The AC was off. By the end, I was doing yoga in a sweat pool the size of Lake Travis

2011-Jul-8

KO Bag - Kickboxing Class
Crazy combo sets, and a killer workout. Fantastic stuff.

A long short week

For a holiday week, this sure has been a long one! Lots and lots to do at work and some great workouts.

My stupid pulled muscle still smarts a bit, but it's getting better.

2011-July-7

Crossfit Central WOD
30 wall ball, 20lb
30 burpees
30 power clean, 95lb
30 toe to bar
150' walking lunge, 45lb overhead
11:49RX

Yoga For Athletes
Standing triangle poses of death (my words). Left sweating like I did another crossfit class! haha

2011-July-6

Krav Maga Class
Straight punches, groin kicks, blind attacks where you have to stand with eyes closed and wait for someone to hit you. Takes a bit to get used to that! Good stuff!

Rest.

Friday I pulled/strained/whatever something in my left side while kickboxing...just another hurdle, right? It pretty much made me take a few days off to rest. When sneezing makes you buckle over in pain, it's time to put away the ego. So, Saturday through Monday I didn't really do jack shit. I didn't even break a sweat. Showers not earned, by any means. I did roll out, do some triggerpoint, and ate clean. Today it hurts still (a little) to sneeze and/or cough, but I figured it's time to get back to work.
 
Griff - In honor of USAF SSgt Travis L. Griffin, 28, who was killed April 3, 2008 in the Rasheed district of Baghdad by an IED strike to his vehicle. Travis is survived by his son Elijah.

2011-Jul-5

Crossfit Central WOD
"Griff"
Run 800
Run 400 backwards
Run 800
Run 400 backwards
17:36

This hurt the arches of my feet more than anything else. I felt like the 400s were agonizing and slow. I hated it, to be honest. My feet still hurt an hour and a half later. W T F.

Finally the weekend, but...

It was a crazy week! New job, training, brutal workouts, etc! It was going so well, until Friday KO Bag class.  Oh well.

 Happy 4th everyone.

2011-July-2

I think today is going to be a rest day. I have that muscle pull still giving me a great deal of trouble. Even sneezing is quite painful. Feels like I broke a rib! WTF!?!

2011-July-1

KO Bag - Kickboxing Class

Tons of crazy combinations of punches and kicks that pretty much no one could follow. Something weird happened. I went to do a kick w/my left leg and I pulled a muscle or something right at the bottom of my rib cage on my left side. It SUCKS!! 

2011-June-30

Crossfit Central WOD
5x3 front squat
135, 135, 165, 185, 225

WOD (95lb bar)
21 SDHP, Run 400
15 SDHP, Run 400
9 SDHP, Run 400
9:36 RX

2011-June-29

Krav Maga Class
Worked straight punches, elbow variations (all 7), groin kicks w/lead leg and trailing leg. Fun game of face down find a pad before someone else.

2011-June-28

Crossfit Central WOD
Cindy
13rounds + 4 squats RX