Sunday, May 20, 2012

Oxymoronic Weekends

Have you ever watched the Crossfit games?  I was introduced to the sport of Crossfit almost two years ago, and watching Crossfit athletes compete in games during the spring and summer of the last two years has been a favorite weekend past time (ask my wife).  She kind of snickers at the fact that I enjoy watching people basically workout for time.  For some reason though, it is awesome!  Watching what some of these athletes can do is absolutely amazing and extremely inspiring and motivating.

The last few weekends, I've found myself watching the Games live (when they are streaming it) and catching up on the updates throughout the weekend...all the while snacking and eating.  While I'm getting motivated and psyched, I'm eating and snacking...what a moron.

Oh well.  I'll enjoy while I can and hope that my oxymoronic weekends don't take too much of a toll on my weight loss and fitness goals.  Here's a great video from the past few weeks - Rich Froning setting a world record on an absolutely insane workout.


Most will find this boring.  I'm amazed at the stamina, but mostly the mental approach and planning.  The pacing, methodical active rest and guts are just awesome to me.

Monday, May 7, 2012

An Increased Respect for Crossfit Athletes

The Crossfit Regionals are in full swing.  I gained a much greater respect for athletes who compete in the Crossfit games today.

The Crossfit main site WOD today was one of the regional WODs.  If you watch the updates, you'll see that many athletes didn't finish the WOD in the allotted time, and there were some that just killed it.  I realize that I'm not in extremely good shape, but I'm also not in very bad shape.  These guys are just animals.

I did the WOD today, scaled the number of required pull-ups and even scaled the weight on one of the lifts, and my time was not too impressive, 30+ minutes.  There were some athletes that did it in under 20...crazy!


Sunday, May 6, 2012

Week Wrap Up - 5_6_2012

The weeks feel like they go by faster and faster with less and less time to do things.  I guess a combination of work, two kids, spending time with my wife and trying to find time to stay active makes for a busy schedule.  Here's what my week looked like:

Monday:
Morning - 45 minute cardio sesh
Lunch - 
  • handstand push-supersetted with butterfly pull-ups
  • power cleans supersetted with butterfly pull-ups
  • hanging power cleans
  • finished off with a 15 minute walk at high incline
Tuesday:
Morning - 45 minute cardio sesh
Lunch - Chest

Wednesday:
Morning - 40 minute cardio sesh
Afternoon - "The Chief" - 5 cycles of:
  • 3 minute AMRAP of:
    • 3 power cleans at 135#
    • 6 push ups
    • 9 air squats
  • 1 minute rest
I ended up doing 5 rounds, 4, 4, 4, 4 respectively through the cycles.

Thursday:
Morning - 45 minute cardio sesh

Friday:
Morning - 45 minute cardio sesh

Saturday: Rest Day - Happy Anniversary to my awesome wife!

Pretty good week.  Dropped a few lbs and about 1% body fat.  The Crossfit Games Regionals have been going on, so it's been fun to watch those.  Here's of video of Ben Smith, a Crossfit beast.  He works out in his garage and for that, I think it's a great inspiration that the dude can do what does and compete at such a high level.  Enjoy.