S: 220
P: 125 for 4 reps 3 sets
PC: 142.2

I think i'm pulling with my arms on the PC. I recorded form so will post later.

Syncing back up with my workout partner tomorrow so wanted to do a metacon that wouldn't mess with recovery too much so went for the Russian KB snatch test. Heaviest KB at the gym was 20kg though, got 101. I feel like my CV conditioning is at an all time low but I feel I'll recover it fast, going to aim for the 24kg 100 in 5 mins.

Training has been kinda random and hungover lately.

Went to try and get something done after drinking until 8am and hardly sleeping:

Waited until 8pm to go to the gym. Ran 2miles, loaded up the deadlift with 295 while going dizzy and light headed from the hangover as i loaded the bar, got that fairly easily. The gym was gross at this time, people just putting towels on the benches, nonsense in the squat rack and a Mexican gang member storming around the place aggressively. I just left after the deadlift.

Next work out

S: 225
P: 125 for 4 reps 3 sets, again, meh. Tried to push press the last reps of the last 2 sets but couldn't either.
PC: 145 for 3 reps of 2 then stripped 10lb off back to 135 because my form sucks.

So went yesterday in what should have been a recovery day to practice power clean form. Reread the chapter in SS, i am undoubtedly rowing it up, not internally rotating, not getting elbows high enough and already pulling the lift from the floor too fast rather than learning the movement because i feel i jumped up in weight too fast. Ego aside and going to start this all again rather than learning a wrong movement.

Did the whole SS progression and did a 95lb work set. Then wanted to do a short metcon.

The first ever time i went to a real gym they set this: 16kg KB 50 swings, 50 one arm swings, 50 overhead, 50 one arm swings, 50 swings. It took me 13 minutes 2 years ago and it was the most exhausted i had ever felt in my life. Took 8:45 this time with the KB feeling way too light that i was forcing it down after the swing, obv my grip was done for after doing all the PC progression. CV fitness is still low but strength making up for it.

Today's will be:

S: 230
B: 175
D: 300 (woop)

Also read Eat Stop Eat after Martin of leangains non stop recommending it. Enjoyed it, it's a super fast and short read, will do a 24hr fast at some point this weekend, obviously got to fit that around drinking.

S: 230 (repeat)
P: 115 (reset)
PC: 115 (reset)

PCs felt great today. I was def rowing it up in the past. Squat form felt vastly improved.

Did a 24hr fast on Saturday, it was fairly easy, no mental/physical fatigue. I highly recommend that book.

Did some 400m repeats over the weekend also. Fairly surprised all that didn't mess with recovery to make today's squats tougher than they were.

Doing mobility work daily. It's easy to do so in the Mexican morning sun.

immaback.

not recapping everything since 2p2 going down but cliff notes:

hit a 315 5rm deadlift.
hit 135 for 1 press.
switched over to advanced starting strength because the session that i squatted 235 and deadlifted 315 put my ass in bed for the rest of the day.

front squatted for the first time ever today, only 95lb but that **** is exhausting just stabilizing the bar.

i'm going to continue strength training for another 3 weeks and then i'm switching back to crossfit for last 2 months in playa del carmen. in 3 weeks i'm sure i could pick off intermediate level for all but power clean and squat and but crossfit will help with them and now it's time to go for my conditioning goals. plus i'm also going to start my first ever cut because i obviously want to look like Ryan Reynolds

after a month or so of CF will gently add back in CFE.

couple of thoughts on the power clean improvement of form.

externally rotating my arms is a huge cue for me to stop muscling the bar up.

another strange one is focusing my thoughts only on my feet throughout the lift and then making sure i'm generating force off the floor.

next i'm going to have to learn hook grip and eventually going to take more care to jump backwards less as that has to be less efficient.

but i really love this exercise. and front squats. also reading Dan John's book has me inspired to try some front squat tabatas, so will try some power clean + front squat tabatas soon, it should be brutal fun.

and still ranting, i picked up tickets for the crossfit regionals in Copenhagen expecting to be leaving Mexico that week but plans have changed and i wont get to see it. it would have been good for future inspiration.

Back doing CF now. Found a fairly decent place here in Playa Del Carmen, going to add strength training to their WODs too.

First session back was Eva. 800m run, 30 KB swings, 30 pulls ups 5 rounds. Scaled 16kg KB and jumping pull ups. Took ~50 minutes.

Yesterday was 3 power cleans on the minute every minute for 10 minutes, went with 135lb, was fairly easy.

Today:

1km run then 5 rounds of:

20 push ups.
10 sumo deadlift high pulls w/ 95lb.

finished with another 1km run.

~22 minutes. Push up were the limiting factor, i have small and weak arms from not curling.

I'm really enjoying being back at CF. Mentally day to day i feel better too.

that eva workout sounds brutal; so much running; did you think it was worse than murph?

I still haven't done Murph yet. Eva would be better as 20 pull ups IMO. 200 push ups in Murph would be the end of me, my arms are stupidly weak.

Tuesdays was 10 deadlifts, 50 DUs for 3 rounds or sub 50 DU for 200 normal skips. Went with 245lb on the deadlifts and normal skips. Can't remember the time.

Today was 15 front squats, 5 HSPU, 10 front squats 10 HSPU, 5 front squats 15 HSPU. subbed HSPU for push ups and went with 125lb for the front squats. 3:45 time. Should have gone for 145lb on the front squats and i need some HSPU progression.

After that we did tabata sits up for 4 rounds and hollow rocks for 4 rounds. and **** me i hate hollow rocks.

I've been toying around with muscle ups at the end of my session a week ago i could get the transition but couldn't get out of that low ring dip position due to being fatigued after the session. Today i got it . The pull up at the start was a jumping pull up though so i'm not counting it as achieved yet, i'm still fairly weak in the false grip position so i'm going to work on that, i think i'll get a strict one within the next 6 weeks and could probably get a kipping one a lot sooner but i'm not going to aim for that.

Monday:

10 rounds for time
3 thrusters 95lb
6 pull ups
9 Box jumps 24”

Split the pull ups to kipping and jumping. Took 25:10. It was effin' brutal, one of the absolute toughest workouts i've ever done. Had DOMS for the next 3 days on my lats. Also on my neck for being a ****** and chicken necking the pull ups.

Today:

AMRAP 12 min
5 KB swings 32kg
5 push ups (hand release)
10 sit ups

15 rounds. Which was the most in the class at the highest weight, which i'll admit to being lame and say it did feel good. That's more a product of a weak class than strong me though, obviously.

Also training for vanity over strength now so i'm on a cut. Following the general idea from Eat, Stop, Eat book + Paleo still.

Took a week off because of studying and getting back into poker taking up my time.

19 jun 2012
5 rounds
30 sec on 30 sec off
KB swings (1.5/1pood)
Mountain climbers
Wall sit hold

Before hand i thought this was a fairly dumb WOD. It was surprisingly tough and i still thought it was a dumb WOD mostly because of the wall sit holds but i feel like i'm a little more stable in the bottom of my squat now. I didn't really count my reps for this work out because what's the point it's hard to judge what should and shouldn't count for mountain climbers and i'm never going to revisit this workout to beat my reps.

Today was Fran.

21-15-9
Thruster (95/65lb)
Pull ups

My first ever time doing it. Fran is is a good combination of all my weaknesses thrown together, weak squat strength, no explosiveness, weak pull ups, no kipping form oh and fairly bad flexibility to get into a good front squat position.

Went with 65lb and just wanted to focus on keeping good form and trying to get as much hip drive and explosiveness as possible. It took 9:25 w/ jumping pull ups.

WOD 26 jun 2012

TABATA (8 rounds: 20sec on 10 sec each off)
Air squats
Burpees
Push ups
Bar hang (For each time you drop from the bar, you will perform 3 wall climbs at the end of the work out)

This was surprisingly tough, bar hangs at the end just felt dumb and felt like mild torture, it sucked being exhausted and doing that.

218 reps in total. 121 squats, 49 burpees, 48 push ups. People who beat me did so by getting way more squats than me, but lol half squats. We did a timed 400m w/ a turn around at the end, not sure what i got.

Today:

WOD 28 jun 2012
Dead by KB swings (2/1.5 pood)
Perform 1 KB swing the first min
Perform 2 KB swings the second min
Perform 3 KB swings the third min…
Continue until you can not complete the reps on the minute

I think this is a really great WOD. All swings to overhead. I wasn't going to go as my legs are really suffering still from the above but figured i would and just half ass it for once. I went with the 24kg and only got 14 rounds, even with each round getting exponentially harder i think i could do 17 or more rounds in when rested. I'll repeat this WOD in the future.

Blog style rant to clear my thoughts.

I'm not sure what to do next after september with my goals now for health and fitness. A lot more of my time is about to be taken up with travel (Africa then middle east), poker and studying and as much as i love the progression of fitness and strength training it takes a deceptive amount of time with the extra eating, sleeping, resting, reading and thinking about it.

I'd like to at least keep my strength and add to my conditioning. Vanity wise i'd like to cut a bit more and bulk once again then but that's not overly important to me. Mobility and soft tissue work feels like it should be the biggest priority for me as a 27 year old who has spent too long at a computer so has terrible posture, flexibility and less than stellar mobility.

I'm also going to be on the move so wont have a regular gym or be able to carry equipment. IDK where i'm going with this it's something i need to think about more, maybe yoga and body weight metcons are the answer?

Had 2 weeks off while i was in Cuba. Did some runs and there were workouts i did before that that i didn't post. Back in England for 2 months. So i'm back at my favourite gym of Crossfit Leeds. Going to take health and fitness seriously over these 2 months before i go away again, Africa next.

Session #1:

Mobility Warm Up

Not for time, 4 rounds of

3 Turkish Get Ups.
1 minute of DU practice.

then

For time:

7 rounds of

2 wall climbs
7 box jumps at 30".

Foam Rolling

Strict Pull ups.

Did the Turkish get ups with 16kg and then 24kg on the last round. Wall climbs were the first ever time i've done them. Did the WOD in 5:27. First time ever doing 30" box jumps.

I added the pull ups. Did 5, 4, 3. Too much rum and coke in Mexico has made me skinny fat weak.

Session #2

Thursday is off day so I played around.

8 x 15m out 15m back prowler pushes with 30s rest between each, 30kg on the prowler. 7:50. Brutal.

50kg 3 x 5 push press. Felt weak.

Session #3



Did 50kg on the push press. It's impossible for me to get into a good rack position for the push press. I'm more in a front squat rack position with only 2 finger tips underneath so i have to hip thrust without any pressing strength and then dance my hands around to catch it and then press the weight. The coach said it's because of lack of external rotation on my shoulder and showed me a couple of the classic mobility drills to fix it. More problems with being a computer guy.

6r + 6. 43 wall balls. I had to do 4 planks.

Session #4:



70kg and 11:24 first round was with 24kg for swings and squats then 20kg for push press but i was beat so the next 4 rounds were with 20kg and 16kg.

No rest day in between sessions, front squats first, being fasted and being on a calorie deficit made it tough.

Rest day of rolling and mobility today.

Moved around a lot over the last 4 months. Went to Kenya and Tanzania then to Vancouver and now i'm settled in Playa Del Carmen, Mexico again.

In Africa did bodyweight metcons (taken from you are your own gym) before summitting Kilimanjaro. Will trip report that later. It was tougher than i imagined it would be. More as a mental stress test than a physical endurance test.

Then did CF 1x a week in Vancouver w/ bodybuilding dumbbell stuff 2x week and mobility 1x a week. Bodybuilding for abz for the beach in Mexico.

Going to do some mixture of 2x strength training, 1x mobility, 1x conditioning, 1x yoga here in Mexico. Going to cut for the next 4 - 8 weeks, limiting alcohol is tough here. Mostly concerned with cutting atm so this may become a Mexican food log. IF + 24hr fast/week.

Light day while getting back into it.

Mobility Warm Up

S: 165
PC: 115
B: 145

Ring Pull ups 5 5 4.

Corrective work for posture.

Rest day yesterday did a slow 2.5 mile jog along the beach.

Today:

FS: 135.
Press: 115 for 3. 105 for 4. 95 for 4. a mess obv.
DL: 255 singles for 5.

Trying to cut down on alcohol. I'm more concerned about these aspects of my health ATM than strength and conditioning so may include them in the log.

Drank 4 bottles, 2 mojitos, 1 cuba libre last night.

Mobility Warm Up

S: 165. Didn't want to push this because of weak form last time, tight back, cutting and all the alcohol recently.*
PC: *125. Focusing and keeping my shoulders externally rotated for as long as possible and a slow pull.*
Dips. 10bw 5 x 8kg 5 x 12kg x 5 x 16kg
Ring Pull ups 3 x 5

last 3 work outs have been:

S: 170
P: 115
D: 275

S: 175
PC: 5 x 3 x 135lb
Dips 3 x 5 x 16kg

S: 180
P: 115
D: 280 5 singles.

my lifestyle has been stupid lately due to all the music festivals in Mexico. not sleeping or eating enough. inconsistent sleeping times and eating. too much partying etc. so i'm just not recovering enough and as such i feel like ****. those habits will get better in the up coming months but i'm young and single in a party town so there are always going to be there and trying to do SS along side of them and while trying to cut isn't wise. i'm going to switch to 5/3/1 now with the plan of doing it for all of 2013.

Jay,

Impressive work sticking to regular workout routines with this traveling lifestyle. Sounds like you're having a blast and staying in great shape too!

Not sure if serious! I've done 4 different routines in the past 3 months which looks like programming ADHD but have constantly worked out 3x/week.

I have 9 months in the same place now so i can happily focus on progressing on one program so switched to 5/3/1 and a new log here: http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/85...-3-1-a-1286258