2014 MAR 22 : SATURDAY

LK spent the night over his grandmother’s house, so ARK went off in the morning with J for bfast while I slept. ARK was going to workout at 9am, and I was going to go down to the gym as well so we could workout together, but I ended up fixing things on the computer and therefore did not make it in time for class. I walked down to the gym as was surprised it was only a mile. It was also the first time I had ever walked on the section of Rainier Ave between Dawson and Meade.

ARK as a little wasted at the gym, but that was understandable since she hadn’t been in three weeks due to mucking her back up during a deadlift. I did get some squatting in with the 9am class, though.

Afterwards, we retrieved the children and went back home. I went to Olympic Lifting at noon. Afterwards, all of us went to Jefferson Park to let the kiddies run around.

We had a date night later. J spent the night with her grandmother, while LK was watched by S our neighbor. We went to Luc in Madison Valley.

We both got the four course “menu du jour” with wines. My dinner consisted of:

• Lucatini (tasty!)
• baguette topped with some sort of house made cheese and carmelized onions
• smoked salmon and trout, potato salad, salad of pickled veggie things (sparkling rosé)
• pink peppercorn halibut with, um, other stuff (pinot noir)
• apple crisp thing with some sort of creamy stuff infused with basil (port)

Amanda’s dinner:

• same baguette
• arugula + some other green salad with these cool potato “crouton” things
• pasta with mushrooms, squash, plus other stuff
• some chocolaty dessert

I thought the food was good, if not mind-blowing. It was definitely a good deal at $28 for the food. The wines were another $22, which was alright. There was only one set of wines, and since there were a few choices for each course, the wine may not have been ideally matched with the food. My dessert would have been much better with an icewine or a Sauternes or rum, for instance.

Regardless, it was a fun time. We were only gone maybe two-and-a-half hours.

2014 MAR 23 : SUNDAY

The rest of the family went to Geraldine’s while I went off to the gym. Amanda actually dropped LK off at the gym while she and her mother and J went clothes shopping (ARK at least was looking for clothes). After the workout, LK and I had a snack at Tin Umbrella. We then headed off to Lowe’s where I got granite cleaner, a replacement doorbell button for the townhouse, and some hardware to fix the chicken wire around the henhouse. On the way back home we stopped at Safeway because LK really wanted paper clips for his paper airplane kit and I wanted treats.

The afternoon consisted of yard work… cleaning up the backyard… and futzing around with the henhouse. ARK wanted to move the run so that it was flush with the coop which would eliminate 16 square feet of bokbok space. So I did that. I also started tacking down the chicken wire to prevent bokbok escapes. They are casuing too much destruction when they get out and they poo everywhere. I also finally took down the holidays lights we had out front.

We had pizza dinner at AC/MC place. Yummy.

2014 MAR 22 Olympic Lifting

I was feeling kinda weak during Oly Lifting, and my ripped left hand was troublesome. Especially when doing cleans; the rapid rotating of hands on the knurled bar hurt like hell. I did not tape up my hand, but I should have. I noted later they had gobs of athletic tape in the office. I also managed to tweak my right knee. All in all, I should have done the normal workout as it looked fun and exhausting.

2014 MAR 23

EMTOM 15 minutes:
3x overheat squat (85#)
5x box jump 24″

2 minute maxes:
KB swing (91/35#)
slam ball (37/30#)

I wisely stopped by Walgreens to get some tape to tape up my left hand. My tape job worked out better than I thought it would.

I thought I would be able to to 95# on the overhead squats, but I was a little shaky getting them up. That might have been to the lack of real warm up, but I decided to go down since I figured I would start getting really tired after a few rounds. That turned out to be a wise choice. I did manage to get through all 15 minutes on time except for the last minute when I finished the last two box jumps after time ran out.

I tend to go heavy and slow on things, but for the KB swings I decided to go lighter to see how that would go (I was initially inclined to use a 54# or 44# KB). I blasted through the two minutes without dropping the KB and without really slowing down. My total might have been off a bit since my counting tends to fail at high numbers when stressed by exercise. I probably could have also not dropped a heavier KB, but I definitely would not have done as many reps. As for the second max, I’d been using a 40# slam ball during most workouts, but I dropped down because I figured I would be tired (which I was), although now I think that using a 40# ball wouldn’t have affected my final number that much.

A good workout, though. I’m a big fan of EMOTM workouts with a finisher at the end.

CGO 14.4

14 minute AMRAP:
60 cal row
50x toes-to-bar
40x wall ball 20#/14#
30x clean 135#/95#
20 muscle-up

117 reps

I hoped to get to the cleans, but I was only able to start the wall balls. The row took three minutes; I did not know what to expect, but the time required became obvious after 15 seconds or so. Toes-to-bar killed me. I had hoped that I could get through them ok, since I was able to do 50 knees-to-elbows last Monday in basically sets of five, but it took over ten minutes to finish them. Upon reflection, my technique caused me to gas too quickly. I tended to simply pike up by just swinging my legs up when I should have used my back more by “pulling down” on the bar. I also tried to do them in set sets of five, but that caused me to get to muscle failure too fast which made things even slower. I probably did the last 15 reps as singles. As it was, I finished with less than 25 seconds left and managed to crank out 7 wall balls before time was up.

It was a disappointing performance on my part. I think with better technique and strategy I could have gotten to the cleans. On the positive side, eight months ago, I think I could only do one toes-to-bar, so I am obviously much better now. This is the first open workout that I think I could significantly do better if I did it again, but I probably won’t as it is better just to keep doing normal workouts rather than maximize my open placement.

Toes-to-bar were easier than knees-to-elbows before, but evidently that is no longer true for me.

I also managed to rip the skin off my left hand. Oops.

Bear Complex
5 Rounds of 7 Sets of:
1x Power Clean
1x Front Squat
1x Push Press
1x Back Squat
1x Push Press
No dropping of bar between sets
5 minutes rest between sets

I last did the Bear Complex at the Cornucopia Cup, although that was in AMRAP form for the competition at 75 pounds. Today I maxed out at 100 pounds. The first three sets were always very easy no matter what the weight, but then last four were hell. I tended to rest in the back rack postion (S: is that cheating??) and tried to blow through the movements to rest again in the back rack.

During one of the rounds, the barbell bit me on the thumb and index finger and there was much blood, although I did not notice until I stopped. RB said we will never be hand models.

Filthy 50
50x Box jumps 24/20
50x Jumping pull-ups
50x DB swings 35/26
Walking Lunge, 50 steps
50x Knees to elbows
50x Push press 45/33
50x Back extensions
50x Wall ball 20/14
50x Burpees
50x Double-under

35:08 Rx

First time doing this workout, and it went much better than expected. Possibly because I went in at 6am instead of 5am. I swapped the order of a couple of things (pull-ups and DB swings, back extensions and wall balls) because of conflicts with other people. That probably made it easier for me. Most things I broke up into either 10 rep or 5 rep sets, or in the case of the knees-to-elbows 5 reps, then 3 reps + 2 reps, then 1 reps. The knees-to-elbows were the hardest for me, and this workout might have been the first one I did all of them Rx as opposed to just knees-to-somewhere-higher-up. My counting might have been off for a few things too; anything over 10 reps and I can get confused.

At 6am, the time would be enough to get me on the leaderboard at #8. Dunno if it will hold up, though, as there are definitely eight people who should be able to beat me if they come in today. Best time at Rocket is like 21 minutes BTW.