Sunday October 12, 2008 - The Day After

I was having withdrawal of the Blue Room and had to go in. I know I am crazy but I was going to take it easy and was hoping that moving around a little bit would help me losen up a bit and feel better.

The first 30 minutes after a little warm up (a little pullup burpee ladder from 1-5)was skill work on our cleans, which I am glad I did not miss. Jerry broke it down into a few basic steps and exercises to work on these steps.

1) Wider Grip - sometimes I think I may have a narrow grip, which kind of prohibits or makes the rack delivery of opening my hands difficult.
2) Rack Delivery - Something I need to work on because of my flexibility in my wrists as well as finding that good rack position. My deltoids/shoulders tend to get in the way.
A- Frankenstein Squat - Stand upright with arms extended straight out like Frankenstein. Place the bar or PVC pipe in the Rack Position on top of your arms. Squat down and keep the bar in that rack position. This will get you used to keeping upright with a tight core as well as finding the right rack position.
B - Scarecrow - Simply start (while holding a bar or PVC) with arms bend at 90 degrees at the elbows so hands face the ground. This is the position where you need to get the bar or where the shrug will get the bar, some people say the bar is weightless here. The bar sits right below your chest. Quickly swing elbows under and open hands while keeping the bar close and ending in that rack position. The key is to keep the bar close so you don't end up reverse curling the bar up into the racked position.
C - Tall Muscle Clean - While standing straight with the bar or pvc pipe slowly complete the full motion without using your hips or legs. Focus on the violent shrug to start the motion but still go slow motion through the movement.
3) Get Under the Bar - Simple right?
A - Scarecrow Clean- from the scarecrow position dive under the bar or pull yourself under the bar. This pull is referred to as the third pull of the movement.
B- Tall Clean - Faster than the muscle clean but still not using the hips or legs, emphasizing the violent shrug to initiate the movement.
C- Hang Cleans - From a Hang position: knees slightly bent with bar right above knees. Basically where the bar would be if you had just deadlifted it from the ground in a full squat clean.

I really liked class and how this was broken down. I am planning on doing this sequence a little bit on my own to work on my squat cleans. Areas I know are my problem areas are: (1) Keeping the bar close - avoid reverse curling the bar (2) Shrugging the weight up and using my hips to create momentum (3) pulling myself under the bar.

I did not do the WOD which was 75 Hang Squat Clean Thrusters, I watched and coached others.