Sunday - October 5, 2008 - ELIZABETH

After Barbara kicked my ass yesterday I woke up to Elizabeth!

Here it the WOD:

21-15-9
Squat Clean - Rx'd 135#
Ring Dips

I have never done Elizabeth before and Jerry wanted us to do Squat Cleans from the floor. I guess they had done Power Cleans or Hang Squat Cleans and previous times. Full squat cleans from the ground are definitely the hardest. I remembered watching Jason Khalipa do the 30 - Squat Clean & Jerk 155# at the Games and he dropped the weight after every rep after locking out. I thought with 135# Squat Cleans I may want to do the same because the energy to lower the bar may be too much, plus may be rough on my body.

We did a quick Med Ball progression to warmup:
Deadlift 10
Deadlift Shrug 10
Front Squat 10
Squat Clean 10
Two Rounds

I was reverse curling the Med Ball on the Squat Cleans and Elise was nice enought to let me know of my poor form. I tried to correct it but was just wanted to start the WOD. So I had my strategy about dropping the weight each time and I was not really worried about the ring dips (almost like active rest for me).

I felt good doing the squat cleans and knew when I had a good rep and knew when I had a bad rep. Only once did I not count a rep because I didn't think I went low enough. I must say I got the bar to move a bit with my Deadlift shrug and on my best rep almost knocked myself out as the bar flew up and got in me in the chin. Jerry gave me some great coaching points:
(1) Keep the bar close and ride it up your shins
(2) Explode your hips and shrug the weight once the bar is above your knees
(3) Once Bar is at your nipples then drop and swing the elbows under the bar
He also told me I round-out on every rep but I do everytime. Still working on that.

I was the first to finish in the 8:30 class and got a 11:04. I was pumped! Only Chriss and Mike M had better times on the Record Board. Jerry actually wiped the board clean and put me on top since they never went from the floor last time and this is the new standard. My stay at the top was very short lived. Chriss came in at 9:30 and blew me away by getting a 8:23. Two and a half minutes faster than me! I and I thought I was flying. Chriss did not drop the weight and actually went touch and go on the floor which was a lot faster. Stacey also did this and I think she got her first 21 reps in 1:46 versus I think I got mine done in 4 minutes. I am curious to see how much quicker I could go if I did touch and go. This is going to bug me and I may do Elizabeth sometime soon just to see what I can do if I touch and go.