Tuesday, August 11, 2008

I caught up with my burpees last night by doing 28 and then 29 after I rolled for 1:15. It was the first time I have sparred in quite awhile because of my injury. I got my but kicked for the most part but one think for sure was that I was not exhausted and felt my endurance and conditioning were there. If I have any advantage over an opponent I feel that endurance and conditioning is it. I owe that to Crossfit and the Zone.

So I have been Zoning pretty strict for about 5 weeks, with last week being a debacle, but one thing that I am noticing is that I am maintaining my weight. I am not expecting to lose weight but am surprised I have not really lost any weight. I don't think I am losing body fat either. I tested my body fat about 5 weeks ago and it was 7.7%, so I am planning on testing it again tomorrow. Even if the results of the zone are not physically apparent I do feel healthy and full of energy.

Needless to say I was a little sore from the WOD yesterday, rolling and catching up on my burpees ( I did 135 burpees yesterday). I was looking forward to a nice heavy skill day. Not so much.

The warm up was 3-5 rounds of:
5 burpees
10 OHS (PVC)
15 Abmat Sit-ups

I was happy that I could use the warm-up to count for 25 of my 30 burpees needed for today but once I did my first one regretted every associating burpees with happy.

The WOD was intimidating. Jerry had told me after his 5pm class yesterday that he had to change the WOD yesterday for the 5pm class because we did a ton of reps (110 Snatches, 110 OHS/Lunges, 110 ring dips). So I was not expecting this WOD:

For Time

Pull-Ups/Kettle Bell Swings (55#)/Box Jumps
36-30-24-18-12-6
Yes complete 36 pullups, then 36 swings, then 36 box jumps, followed by 30 pullups then 30....

I thought as positive as I could because I knew it was going to be tough and jumped on the pull up bar. I knocked out 20 pullups and jumped off the bar, I realized that I shouldn't go for a PR and exhaust myself to wear the remaining pullup were harder. I started pacing myself by breaking reps into little sets. I found myself doing sets equal to 1/3 the total reps, taking 5-10 seconds and then going again. I thnk this is more managable and not as intimidating, plus you give yourself a little reward to reaching your short-term goal. I felt like I was flying through and kept a constant pace other than the 30 seconds or so I asked Jerry for tape on my ripped open callus. Adrienne finished in 20 something but was going ring rows instead of pull ups, still a killer job and I got a sense of time when she yelled "time". Not to say I don't compete with Adrienne because I do, she is one of the toughest girls I know. However, it is hard to compare my time to her when her WOD is modified. Now that I am back (yep shoulder is feeling good) I have a larger amount of people to compete/compare myself with. I was on that last box jump and couldn't wait to yell time, since no one else had and then Steven yelled time at 26:33, I was at 26:34. I know it is just one second but I immediately started thinking through my strategy like what if I didn't get tape, or did I take too many short breaks between my little sets. I think this is good because I know what I can improve on to decrease my time but at the end of the day I was happy with my performance one second behind Steven.

I was reading a affiliate page and saw something that nailed it, you can't go at the same pace everyday or go hard everyday but need to focus on going as hard as you can TODAY. Basically focus on today, and because of different variables (tired, sore) you may not be at the level you were yesterday or tomorrow but go as hard as your body can go today. I do feel like I did because I was beat after this workout and made one hell of a "sweat angel."

One hell of a workout that I can learn from and improve on, but bottom line is I gave it everything I could today.